Asking for Trouble

by Leslie Kelly

  Call the psych ward. He tensed in anticipation of the words. When they didn’t come, he gruffly asked, “What, exactly, do you think is going on?”

  She took his hands in hers, staring him in the face, her expression entirely earnest. Finally, with a bit of fire flashing in those brown eyes, she said something he’d never expected to hear.

  “Simon, honey? Someone is fucking with you.”

  13

  Lottie

  I’VE SAID IT BEFORE, I’m not a violent person. Sure, I have my moments of Italian temper, particularly where my brothers are concerned. Or when somebody cuts me off in traffic or talks loud on a cell phone in a public place. Yes, those tee me off. But I’ve certainly never wanted to do serious physical harm to another person.

  Anything’s possible, right? Because oh, man, when I figured out what had been happening to Simon, I was ready to crush someone. Rip them apart with my bare hands.

  He, God love him, didn’t believe it at first. The man has been carrying so much guilt and regret around that it almost seemed easier for him to accept he was being meted out some psychological punishment for his perceived crime rather than thinking someone had been playing vicious, ruthless mind games with him.

  I could certainly see his skepticism. It sounded pretty bizarre, I know. Still, it was the only thing that made sense when looking at the big picture. And gradually, by hitting every single point, going over every odd moment he and I had both experienced, I’d brought him round.

  Did I say I was mad?

  “I don’t think I have ever been more furious in my life,” he snarled as he paced back and forth in front of the fireplace, practically wearing a hole in the carpet. “I can’t believe this. Someone here, sneaking in and out of this place, spying on my every move?”

  Oh, God, I hoped not his every move. The thought that someone might have seen us during an intimate moment made my flesh crawl. Simon obviously had the same concern because he whirled around, then crouched down in front of me. “The doors were closed.”

  “The bastard’s getting around somehow. Who knows what secret peepholes he has in here?”

  Thrusting a frustrated hand through his hair, he straightened up and resumed his pacing. “You really, genuinely believe this is what’s been happening?” he asked, not for the first time.

  “It makes sense,” I said, hearing my own disgust. “The open windows, the beds, things being moved around, noises…how easy is that? I mean, you’re down here locked in your office all by yourself most days, you wouldn’t hear a herd of donkeys running around on the third floor. Before I came, I bet there were days when you never even left your room.”

  He nodded slightly in acknowledgment.

  “Someone could have gotten inside through one of these lousy old locks—hell, someone who once worked in the hotel might have a key! Then they just went and did their mischief, made some noise so you’d come investigate and find some weird, inexplicable situation. Voilà, you’re obviously psycho.”

  He threw himself down in the chair beside the fireplace, his long legs kicked out in front of him. His fingers were clenched into tight fists on the armrests and fury was crashing over the man in near visible waves. “The woman?”

  “The guy has an accomplice. Somebody did a little research into you, got a hold of some pictures—which is incredibly easy on the Internet now. And then he recreated a few moments to freak you out….” Rolling my eyes, I added, “If it weren’t so late I’d suggest going out and looking around along the cliffs. I bet we’d find very real footprints.”

  “The rest…the smells? The pictures?”

  “I’m no expert,” I said, voicing what I’d begun to suspect about some of the other weird goings-on. “But I know my great-aunt Cecelia has suffered migraines all her life. They are quite often triggered by cloying, sweet smells. Odors piped in through the air vents might very well have been intended to cause your migraines.”

  He muttered a string of curses that even my foul-mouthed older brothers would have been impressed with.

  “How could they know I have migraines?” he finally asked when he’d gotten just about every cuss word known to man out of his system.

  “If they’ve been prowling around your house, they could have seen you dealing with one. Those curtains are never closed. How easy would it be for someone to peek in here and see you lying down with a cloth on your head?”

  A muscle in his cheek kept flexing. “Yes. Possible.”

  “As for the thing with the computer, jeez, Simon, I told you when I first got here that your network was way too easy to get into. No firewall whatsoever.”

  “You can’t just make an attachment show up on someone else’s computer by sending an e-mail,” he said, immediately shaking his head. “There’s no way somebody crept in here and opened up a file while I was lying right beside the damn laptop.”

  I thought about it for a minute, trying to remember some of the details from the computer classes I’d taken in college. “Look, sometimes in class when I was working on a program or presentation and ended up totally screwing it up, my professor would be able to take control over my system from his own computer. I’d sit back in my chair and watch the cursor moving around the screen like the stylus on a Ouija board and he’d fix whatever the heck I’d done wrong.”

  Simon didn’t appear convinced.

  “I’m not entirely sure how, but it can be done. I’ve seen it. And someone with a little computer knowledge probably wouldn’t have much trouble, especially if they got their hands on your laptop one day when you were in the shower or something.”

  Simon stopped arguing, obviously seeing the plausibility of the scenario I’d described. It was plausible. Outrageous and vicious and vindictive…but plausible.

  “It makes sense,” I said softly, completely certain I was right. “We have three choices. Either you’re crazy, there is a ghost at work in this house, or some sick person is getting kicks out of trying to get under your skin. I vote for option three.”

  He glanced up, meeting my eyes from a few feet away, and slowly nodded. “Yeah. I hate to think I’ve had some filth in and out of my house, spying on my private life for three months, but it absolutely makes the most sense.” His mouth pulling tight and his thick lashes lowering halfway over his eyes, he added, “Someone’s ‘gaslighting’ me, like in that old movie. But who? And why?”

  His anger had eased, and had probably been replaced by embarrassment…even pain. Which made perfect sense. Who would want to think someone could be so twisted and hateful? I was feeling violated after being here a short time—I couldn’t imagine how he had to feel.

  “I don’t know who, but I might have an idea why. It seems to me that somebody’s trying to get you—and now me, judging by the thing with the attic, and the carriage—out of this house. Anyone feel they have a claim on it?”

  “Uncle Roger had no other living relatives.”

  Scratch that. “Okay, how about potential buyers? Has anyone been after you to sell it?”

  “The day the will was read, my uncle’s attorney told me there were interested parties who’d approached Uncle Roger before he died. I told him to forget it, just as Uncle Roger apparently had, several times.”

  That sent a chill up my spine, though at first I wasn’t sure why. “Did they persist?”

  Rubbing a weary hand on his forehead, he nodded. “Yeah. The lawyer’s called a couple of times, asking if I’ve changed my mind.”

  I almost said aha in triumph. We were on to something. I knew it. Hey, I did this for a living. “So we contact the attorney and get the name of the buyer.”

  Simon reached for the phone, which startled me into a laugh. “Uh, babe, you do realize it’s three a.m., right?”

  “Oh. Right.”

  Suddenly feeling that late hour in every bit of my body, I rose to my feet and stretched. “I think I’ve had about as much as I can take for the night.”

  Simon nodded and stood beside me. “You think you�
�ll be okay sleeping here tonight?”

  I knew what he meant, of course. It was possible—unlikely, given the late hour—but still possible that someone was lurking somewhere in Seaton House. The very thought of it made me sick. “Well, if they are, they know we’re on to them now.” I raised my voice. “And that they better get the hell out before we find them and have them thrown in jail for a few decades.”

  An exaggeration, I was sure. But worth a shot.

  Simon laughed softly, the tension seeming to ease from his shoulders for the first time in hours. “The bedroom has one door and it locks.”

  “And you have a big dresser we can shove in front of it, right?”

  Laughing, he dropped his arm across my shoulders and led me into his room. Once we were inside, with the door locked, I glanced at the dresser and cocked an eyebrow.

  “You were kidding, right?”

  I shook my head.

  “You want me to break my back and be no good to you at all?”

  “I’ll be on top.”

  He grabbed me around the waist and pulled me tight. “That sounds fantastic. But how about we use the chair instead?”

  I eyed the chair, piled high with his clothes from the costume party, and grunted. “That won’t keep anyone out.”

  “Oh, I’m not worried about keeping someone out. If someone gets in, you can bet I’ll be waiting for him. The chair will, however, make some noise, guaranteeing nobody can sneak in on us.”

  I didn’t want to think about Simon being put in the position of having to defend himself against anyone ever again. Hopefully though, it wouldn’t come to that. Whoever had been tormenting him was a damned coward as far as I was concerned, lurking in the shadows, playing vicious tricks. A scavenger—a hyena—picking him off piece by piece then scurrying away like a rodent. He wouldn’t face Simon head-on.

  So, nodding, I said, “Okay. You can save your back, we’ll use the chair.” And as he picked it up to place it beneath the chair, I added, “But I still get to be on top.”

  WE SLEPT LATE the next morning, which obviously wasn’t any big surprise. Making love and then sleeping wrapped in each other’s arms seemed the best way to thrust the ugliness of our discovery out of both our minds. But judging by the look on Simon’s face late the next morning when we finally ventured from the bedroom, his thoughts had gone right back to our previous night’s conversation. “Do lawyers keep Sunday hours?” he asked.

  “I doubt it,” I said as I finished flipping some pancakes onto a heavily laden platter.

  “Tough,” he said, “I’m calling.”

  “Yeah. I figured you would. But eat first, okay?”

  “You calling me skinny again?”

  “Oh, no, you are in perfect shape. But after all the late-night exercise, I think you need to regain your strength.”

  Appearing mollified, he helped himself to a heap of pancakes and proceeded to devour them. Oh, I loved a man with an appetite.

  Picking at my own food, I thought about my conversation with my brother the other day. I didn’t think what was going on at Seaton House had anything to do with Simon’s incident in Charleston. However, despite my assurances to Simon that anyone could have gotten those pictures of his attacker, I was a little curious about it. Deciding to call Mark while Simon went after the attorney, I mentally went over a list of points I wanted to cover.

  I didn’t worry about bothering my brother on a Sunday because I knew, by one, he and Noelle would be at the folks’ house. This was the Sunday before Halloween, a good excuse for a gathering. The men would be watching football, the women would be hanging out in the kitchen. Mama would supervise, making homemade pasta, meatballs and brachiole. Gloria would be chasing after my nephews, two little boys who were Tony’s pride and joy. Meg would probably be holding baby Maria’s fingers and encouraging her to take her first steps with Joe watching over her shoulder. Lucas would arrive with his bride, Rachel, who would undoubtedly have a delicious, fattening southern dish in hand.

  My family. I missed them. The whole loud, boisterous bunch of them. And I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to walk into the house with Simon on my arm. Seeing him shake my father’s hand, sample Mama’s cooking. Talk sports with my brothers and tantalize my sisters-in-law with his dark sexy looks and that mysterious scar.

  He’d win them over, of course. They’d love him. Just like I do. I do.

  I really needed to stop thinking about it. Especially because I was still supposed to be going home soon and the thought that Simon might actually come with me to meet my family seemed utterly impossible. And, right now, the idea of leaving him filled me with more anguish than anything I’d ever experienced.

  Then again, I suddenly realized, there was absolutely nothing that would compel me to walk out of here without making sure whoever had been tormenting him was caught, that Simon would be okay and be able to get on with his life.

  So, no, I might not be leaving here on Tuesday at all. Maybe I’d have to take the rest of the semester off. Get my brothers to go over to my apartment, pack it up and put my stuff in storage. Maybe I’d stay.

  If he wanted me to.

  Once we’d finished breakfast, Simon said, “Look, while I make this call, why don’t you get in your car and go into town and do some shopping or something.”

  I frowned. “On a Sunday? That town doesn’t look like it has stores that are even open on Saturdays.”

  “So go to church.”

  “I’m staying.”

  He shook his head, taking my arm. “I want to search this house, top to bottom, and I really don’t want you here in case I bump into our ghost.”

  Oh, sure, right, like I was going to leave him alone for that. “Searching will go much faster if there are two of us.”

  “Lottie…”

  “Simon! I am not leaving,” I said, poking him in the chest with my index finger, my eyes narrowed. “There is absolutely nothing you can do or say that will make me, so you might as well shut up, go make your phone call and meet me in the foyer in a half hour so we can begin searching.”

  Staring at one another, we engaged in a silent battle of wills. But he obviously had a lot more sense than any of my brothers, because he realized right away he wasn’t going to be able to change my mind. “All right. Half an hour.”

  I rose on tiptoes and kissed his mouth. “Deal.”

  Once he’d gone into his office to try to track down the attorney, I went outside in search of a cell phone signal. By some weird twist of fate, as soon as I saw a couple of bars on the phone’s screen, it began to ring.

  Spying the number on the caller ID, I started to laugh. “Hey, how’d you know I was picking up the phone to call you?”

  Mark probably didn’t hear me, since he immediately snapped, “I’ve been trying to reach you all morning, why the hell haven’t you had your cell phone on?”

  “I did. There just isn’t any decent reception unless I stand on my head with three plates on my nose.”

  Chuckling, he said, “Look, the whole family’s in the house.”

  “I figured.”

  “So I’ll be quick before somebody realizes I have you on the line and grabs the phone away.”

  I’d been missing my family, but I didn’t want to get involved in a marathon Santori phone-fest. Mark would understand. Every one of us had been on the receiving end of the never ending pass-the-phone parties at some time or another.

  I did not want to waste an hour having the same conversation with every person in the family. Including, most likely, the little ones. “Look,” I said, “I’ll call back to talk to the folks later, but I need to talk to you. I have a question you might be able to answer.”

  I asked him about the accessibility of the crime-scene photos. And whether someone could possibly have gotten their hands on an evidence list that might name the kind of perfume in the dead woman’s purse.

  His answer didn’t surprise me. “That’s a tough one. I mean, sure, the pictures
could have gotten out. Or maybe some sicko took his own shots of the scene before the first responders secured it.”

  Hard to imagine someone yanking out a camera and taking pictures of a woman lying in her own blood, especially if they weren’t sure whether she was dead or not. Then I thought about Princess Diana and realized it was entirely too possible.

  “But the evidence list? I don’t know, that’s a little more tricky,” he admitted. “Which doesn’t mean someone sitting in the bar that night couldn’t have smelled the woman’s perfume and recognized it. And, of course, anyone who knew her might have known what she wore.” Then, obviously really thinking about my questions, he asked, “Why, Lottie? Why do you want to know this stuff?”

  I thought about telling him everything, but knew he would just freak out. Being hundreds of miles away, he’d feel helpless and would order me to leave, abandoning Simon to whoever had been stalking him. And if I refused, I wouldn’t put it past him to walk into the house, tap Joe, Lucas and Tony on the shoulders and march them all out to his car for a little ride. To Pennsylvania.

  That definitely nixed any idea of telling him the truth. Having four of my five brothers here would prove very beneficial in helping us search this house from top to bottom, which I intended to do as soon as I was finished my call. But they’d also be assholes to Simon the minute they realized I was sleeping with him. So I didn’t tell him.

  “Just something that came up,” I said. Wanting to stop him from asking more questions, I continued. “Now, why were you trying to call me?”

  “Uh, didn’t you ask me to look into this case for you?”

  Well, duh. I’d gotten so worked up over what was happening to Simon now—on who was using his tragedy against him—that I’d almost forgotten wanting to know more about the details of that tragedy. “Of course. Sorry. What did you find out?”

  He quickly went over the stuff I already knew, but then surprised me by saying, “The lead investigator did tell me they’ve learned a little more about the suspects. A family member came to claim the woman’s cremated remains several weeks after she died. I guess her brother was thought to be the only next of kin, but someone else stepped forward.”