The House on Foster Hill

by Jaime Jo Wright

“There have been rumors for years that piano music has been heard coming from inside of Foster Hill House. The fact the piano was untouched by time suggests occupancy. I remember Andrew Thorpe telling me when we were kids that he heard the music himself.”

  Dunst heaved a sigh and shifted in his chair. “There have been ghost stories circulating about that place for decades, Joel. Piano music. Strange lights in the middle of the night. Some even say they’ve spied a ghost. Certainly you’re not telling me that’s all evidence for this case?”

  Joel sank back down onto the chair, taking up his coffee again. “It’s possible evidence to support the idea that the house hasn’t been as deserted as we thought. Perhaps our victim stumbled there for sanctuary and disturbed whoever has been staying there.”

  Ivy peeked back in the window. Joel’s back was to her.

  “I find it difficult to believe someone has been living there for over a decade and passing themselves off as a ghost. They would need food, supplies. Someone would have seen them coming and going.” Sheriff Dunst gulped the last of his coffee, then slammed the cup down on the desktop.

  “I understand it’s farfetched.” Joel gave the sheriff a nod of affirmation. “Who were the last people to live at Foster Hill House?”

  “From what I’m aware, the Fosters themselves were the last people to live there. They were run out over forty years ago as Confederate sympathizers. I was just a toddler then. Ever since I can remember, it’s been abandoned. The Fosters had two children, but they’ve never returned to Oakwood.”

  “The fact is,” Joel said, “there are signs someone has been inhabiting the house for far longer than the last two weeks. If Gabriella had stumbled on someone who believed the place to be theirs, she paid with her life—and very possibly her child’s too. And now that someone seems to be focusing his attention on Ivy. I don’t like it. She needs to be protected.”

  “I agree. She never should have involved herself—even though her intentions were noble.” Dunst rubbed his hands over his eyes.

  “It’s her good intentions that make me admire her, in spite of her idiosyncrasies. She has an empathetic heart and that’s a rare gift.” Joel rose to his feet and this time he reached for his hat. “Someone is hiding something—more than Gabriella’s murder. If they weren’t, they would have fled, not gone after Ivy over by the orphanage. Foster Hill House is holding secrets, and I’m going to find out what they are before they claim Ivy’s life.”

  The pen dripped ink on the page of her journal, like the drop of blood that had dried at the corner of Gabriella’s lip. It was a morbid memory. Ivy pulled her quilt closer around her shoulders, treasuring the feel of the cotton squares cut and sewn together from remnants of Andrew’s clothes. It was all she had left of him. She dabbed the drip with an ink blotter and tried to redirect her thoughts to imagining what Gabriella had been like alive. She set the cloth aside and lifted her pen once again. The recent pages she had written in her memory book had evolved into a diary of sorts.

  Ivy looped her L as she penned more thoughts. She could only imagine that Gabriella had felt abandoned by everyone, even God, in the end. Sometimes she grieved her own loss of faith almost as much as she did Andrew’s death or Joel’s abandonment. Maybe that was one reason why she could not release Gabriella to the grave. They shared the commonality that God was indifferent to their pain.

  She spun on the organ stool that served as her chair when a stone plunked against her window. Joel. Not again. She padded over to the window and moved the curtain aside just a bit to peek out. His frame was recognizable and distinct. Ivy let the curtain fall back into place and leaned her temple against the wall. Tonight she was vulnerable, and seeing Joel would only revive that longing for oneness of soul with another person . . . and with God. For the past twelve solitary years, her own mind had been her solace, and she had been content.

  Joel had created the wound she bore the day he left her alone at Andrew’s grave. He had reopened the wound the day he returned to Oakwood.

  Ivy shoved her feet into slippers and shrugged on a coat over her nightgown. She tied the emerald green ribbon at the collar as another stone pinged against the glass. Opening her bedroom door, she glanced at her father’s. It was closed. The darkness between the bottom of the door and the floor told her he’d retired for the night. She hurried down the familiar narrow stairway and crossed the braided rug that lay in the foyer. Ivy summoned her conviction. It was time to put an end to Joel’s intrusion into her life.

  The night air met her face with a gust of cool March air. Ivy buried her hands in her dressing coat pockets. The moon was hidden by the earth’s rotation, yet an early sign of spring chirruped from the bushes as crickets awoke to the night. Ivy stalked around the corner of the house. Joel would be below her window with another pebble in his palm. She could easily imagine his chiseled face. The unwelcome yearning for the friendship they’d once shared was persistent.

  A hand touched her arm. Regardless of the fact she’d expected to see Joel, the touch in the darkness startled her and Ivy screamed. Her scream was muffled as a hand clapped over her mouth to stifle it. She bit down as hard as she could into the soft part of the man’s palm. The muffled cry of pain was followed by Joel’s irritated hiss.

  “Ivy! Have you lost control of your senses?” Joel shook the hand she’d bitten as an instinctive reaction. As he stepped closer to her, the light from her bedroom lamp filtered down onto his face.

  “I panicked,” Ivy countered, knowing how ridiculously she’d overreacted.

  “I saw your curtain move. You knew it was me.” Joel held his palm in front of him. “I think I need stitches.”

  “Balderdash,” she muttered.

  Joel shot her a surprised look mixed with irritation.

  Ivy yanked his hand toward her and leaned over it. His skin was warm against hers. She fought against the desire to stroke his palm in apology. “I can’t see it well enough. Come into the house.” She knew she hadn’t bit him hard enough to need stitches, but for some reason she wanted an excuse to be near him even though her original intent had been to send him away.

  Once inside, Ivy led him to the left, through the door that connected to her father’s office. She struck a match and lifted the mantle on a lamp near the examination table. The wick took and light burst into the room.

  “Sit.” She motioned to the examination table.

  Joel was holding his hand to his chest, fingers curled.

  Ivy lit another lamp on her father’s desk, wishing absently that one day they would be wealthy enough to install gas lamps. She blew out the match and retrieved gauze and alcohol to cleanse the wound.

  “Let me see your hand.”

  “Give me the gauze. I’ll take care of it myself.”

  “And stitch it on your own too?” Ivy narrowed her eyes. “Don’t be a child.” She heard the sharpness in her voice and saw a flicker of hurt in Joel’s face.

  Ivy didn’t apologize but took his hand gently this time. It was bleeding just a little where her teeth had broken the surface, but it was nowhere near needing a needle and thread. Shaking her head, she released Joel’s hand and prepared the gauze to clean the wound.

  Her murmured apology came two seconds before the first press of the alcohol-soaked gauze onto the bite.

  Joel scrambled backward on the table. “Ouch, woman!”

  “Oh, stop.” Ivy tried to hide a smile as she yanked his arm down and continued dabbing the wound. He was quite whiny for such a strong, self-assured detective.

  “At least apologize,” Joel said through clenched teeth.

  “I did.”

  “Words. Your harsh touch says otherwise.”

  “I’m being quite gentle. You, on the other hand, have a remarkably low tolerance for pain.”

  “You bit me!” Joel grimaced again as she gave the wound one final and unnecessarily firm blot.

  “You startled me. What was I to do after being attacked at Foster Hill House and followed to the
orphanage? I’ve no intentions of joining Gabriella in eternity. At least not this evening.” Ivy couldn’t help but chuckle. Relief, perhaps. Or maybe nervousness at the way his head bent so close to hers as she cleaned the bite mark she’d left on his hand.

  “I was throwing pebbles at your window. You’re supposed to open the window, not come outside.” His pointed look made Ivy avert her eyes.

  “So you attack me when I do?” Ivy bit the inside of her cheek. She had the choice to be furious or find the humor in the situation. There had been far too much darkness the past week.

  Joel tilted his head, his expression one of exasperation. “I wouldn’t exactly call touching your arm an ‘attack.’ Besides, aren’t you a bit concerned about me? What if you were a nefarious murderer?”

  She struggled to hide her grin. “A nefarious murderer in a nightdress? That should have been your first clue, Detective.”

  Ivy immediately regretted calling attention to her state of dress. Joel’s eyes skimmed her body, from the green cotton dressing coat to the lacy hemline of her nightgown that peeked out beneath.

  When he met her eyes, his were stormy. “Perhaps we should begin this conversation again.”

  “Perhaps you should cease throwing stones at my window as if I were fourteen.”

  “Perhaps you should open your window rather than wander through the night.”

  They were at an impasse. Mostly because Ivy was finishing the bandage on Joel’s hand, but also because he had the audacity to slide his free hand up her arm to rest on her shoulder. His thumb stroked the base of her neck.

  She stilled.

  Joel leaned toward her.

  Ivy stepped back, breaking the connection.

  “Well then.” She cleared her throat. “I believe your hand is cared for. You may be on your way, and I must beg of you to refrain from future visits in the night.”

  “My, so proper,” Joel goaded, a teasing smile on his lips.

  Ivy’s insides turned to butter at his smile. The banter was almost like old times. Goading, teasing, flirtatious. She busied herself putting away the bandages. “Why did you come here, anyway?”

  “Would you believe me if I said I missed you?”

  Ivy froze as she returned clean gauze to its jar. She bit her bottom lip and closed her eyes. “I would believe you if you hadn’t disappeared for twelve years.”

  Her mumbled words met with silence. She returned the lid to the jar.

  “You’re never going to forgive me, are you?”

  She searched for words, but none came.

  “It took me a long time to get over my own guilt of not being able to save Andrew.” Joel’s admission touched places in Ivy’s heart she wished they wouldn’t. “Once I left here, coming back felt like going before a judge and a jury all rolled into one. I knew you’d never forgive me.”

  “How would you have known that?” Ivy whispered, corking the bottle of alcohol.

  “Because I know you.”

  Ivy turned. She searched his face, but it was shielded as he massaged his wrist below the wounded palm. He took a deep breath and then let it out, as if attempting to find the right words but instead, like her, he came up short. He slid off the examination table and leaned against it. They stared at each other, only a few feet between them, but with a history of broken trust separating them.

  Joel’s brows furrowed. An unspoken plea for her to give him understanding reflected in his eyes. “I was wrong to wait so long to come home,” he said, then paused. “I knew you’d be furious. Then I got myself into my own spot of trouble. All that to say, I had some growing up to do. After I did, the years—they melded into each other as I learned my trade in Chicago. But I never forgot, I couldn’t forget, and as time went on, I knew I needed to come back to Oakwood. To try to reconcile.”

  “Reconcile.” It was a lot to ask. Perhaps Joel had reasons for being away so long. Immaturity, a penchant for trouble, his career. But with each passing year, the pain had only dulled into a tarnished memory for Ivy, fully awakened now with his presence.

  “I need you—your help, Ivy.” His tone seemed to release her from anything too personal. Yet Ivy’s face warmed and she looked away.

  He continued. “We know Gabriella’s baby may still be out there, and you’re the only one who’s seen her killer.”

  “I hardly saw him—I could never identify him.”

  “I know. But I still need you to come with me—to Foster Hill House. Tomorrow morning.”

  My, my. Ivy drew in a shaky breath and blew it out through her lips. What a shift in conversation. From his painful absence to solving a murder. The man gave her conversational and emotional whiplash.

  “What would returning to that house even accomplish?” she asked.

  She caught a whiff of Joel’s cologne as he closed the distance between them. It bothered Ivy that she hadn’t the courage to look him in the eye when he took her hands. Their fingertips touched and formed peaks, like mountaintops. Mountains they had yet to climb since they had just found their balance on the tenuous ground of renewed friendship.

  “I don’t want you hurt, Ivy. I want to keep you safe, whether you believe it or not.” Joel’s voice lowered, resonating in her ears. “But, if there’s a chance taking you back there just once more helps you remember something from the night you were attacked, that you couldn’t recall the first time, then I need you.”

  He needed her. She needed him. She had for years. Ivy lifted her face, and their gazes met.

  “Why didn’t you at least write to me?” she whispered. Her fingertips tingled but she didn’t pull away.

  Joel closed the gap between their palms, his bandaged hand scratching against her skin. “I did. I wrote to you not long after I arrived in Chicago.”

  She shook her head. “I never received a letter.”

  Joel squeezed her hands. “I explained everything in the letter. Why I left, and why I had to stay away. To forgive myself before I could expect you to forgive me.”

  “Then the letter was lost. Somehow.” Ivy stared at their fingers. “Or you’re just saying that you wrote to convince me to help you now.” There was instant regret as the words escaped her mouth. Joel’s hands stiffened, but this time she sensed the frustration flowing through his grip.

  Ivy searched his eyes. There was challenge in them.

  “Do you really think I never loved Andrew, or you? That I would just leave here and only return to use you? You never returned correspondence, your father never came to look for me. It was as if, when Andrew died, the Thorpes severed ties with me. As if I were to blame. Coming back here to Oakwood has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I came back to say I’m sorry without knowing if you or your father would even listen to me. But I had to come back. To bring closure for myself, if not for you.”

  She dropped her hands. “How dare you,” she whispered.

  “I dare,” Joel said, and tipped his head to the side, “because when it concerns me, you ignore the need to examine the evidence. Not what you think happened, but what really happened.” He reached for his coat and stuffed his arms into the sleeves. “But then you’ve had twelve years to concoct a fictionalized version of the truth.”

  His words stung, like alcohol on an open wound. Joel stalked across the room, then turned on his heel, his face set. Ivy wrapped her arms around herself, bracing against the chill in his gaze.

  “I’ll be by in the morning. At least I know you care to find the actual truth for Gabriella and her baby. Which is more than I can ever hope for myself.”

  The door closed behind him, and Ivy was left alone once again. Only this time she knew it was all very much her own fault.

  Chapter 26

  Kaine

  Here she was again in Grant Jesse’s house. Olive lazed on the floor at the feet of the barstool Kaine was perched on. The night sky was black and moonless, yet Kaine fixated on it for a long moment, the kitchen window opened wide over the sink.

  “I just c
an’t believe it.” She was still stunned over her discovery beneath the floorboards.

  “I never expected to see that myself.” Grant lifted dishes from the drying rack beside the sink and stacked them before putting them in the cupboard.

  Kaine leaned on the granite top of the kitchen island. She stretched out her bare foot to scratch Sophie’s broad pit-bull neck with her toes. Olive, unaffected by the other dog, only groaned in her relaxation. She liked it here. So did Kaine.

  The image of the find was burned on Kaine’s mind. “Great Expectations pages. Like the one I found in the library downstairs. The scribblings in the margins. Lines so telling it’s hard to breathe, as if a woman sat in that room day after day and wrote her thoughts on the only paper she could find. From a book! I just—I just can’t get over it.”

  Grant shut the cupboard door with a smack and turned his back to the counter, bracing his hands against the sink. “Why hide them under the floor?”

  Kaine waved her hands. “How would I know? Most women hide their journals, though. I hid my diary under my mattress.”

  Grant smiled. “That’s original,” he said wryly.

  Kaine gave a sheepish grin in response. “I was only seven.”

  “Okay. Hold on.” Grant pushed off the sink and slid his elbows onto the island, crossing his arms and leaning forward. “So Ivy’s locket was upstairs in the attic. You have her quilt that was stolen from the museum back in the sixties. Now some buried treasure of Great Expectations turns into an antique, Facebook-style status bar? Could it be from Ivy?”

  “I think it was the girl who was murdered at Foster Hill House.”

  The kitchen clock ticked. Olive’s tail thudded on the floor once, then stopped. Sophie rounded the island to lick Grant’s foot.

  Grant frowned. “But how did they survive all this time?”

  Kaine had already thought that through. “They were hidden in the floor, which blocked out sunlight and moist air.”

  “Crazy that no one has discovered them until now.”

  Kaine nodded, again prepared with another answer. Her brain had been spinning since she’d pulled the pages from beneath the floor. “I know. But those are the original floorboards, which means no one has ever seen the pages except for whoever put them there to begin with.”