by Dawn Brown
“Damn,” she muttered, tearing her mouth from his and grabbing hold of the waist before they dropped any lower.
Declan lifted his head and smirked. “That’s the fastest I ever got a woman out of her pants.”
“Ha, ha,” she said, pretending the whole ordeal hadn’t set her face on fire. She ducked her head and made another try for her boots. “I should go. Andy’s waiting.”
She bent and scooped up her soaking footwear, not sure whether to wear them back to the inn or just go barefoot.
“Come back tomorrow,” he told her, still grinning.
“To drop off your clothes?”
“And to finish what we started.”
She frowned, not sure which he meant. The investigation or the kiss she’d enjoyed entirely too much.
“Whatever’s in this house, I want to get rid of it.”
Disappointment flickered in her chest, which made no sense at all. She wanted his participation in the investigation, and she should never have kissed him. “I can’t promise you that.”
“But if we know what’s here, what it wants, it would be a start.”
“The shadow man seems to show itself more readily in the dark. We’ll come tomorrow evening, around six.”
Carly slipped out of Declan’s room and hurried downstairs, carrying her boots in one hand and holding up her pants with the other.
Outside, Andy waited behind the wheel of his van, a deep frown etched into his features.
Chapter Eight
Declan woke early after another lousy night’s sleep. Every time he closed his eyes he saw Carly flying off the end of the dock, sinking beneath the slick water as if The Devil’s Eye had absorbed her, and he woke in a cold sweat. He gave up around six-thirty. At least he’d managed an hour longer than the day before.
He showered and dressed, then as he did every morning, opened his computer to see about getting some work done. Outside, the sky brightened to a chilly blue above the tangled treetops, a pleasant change from yesterday’s rain.
Rather than viewing his emails as he normally would, he opened a search window and typed in Jonas Worthing’s name. A list of websites popped up, most tied to haunted locations in the British Isles.
He opened the first and scanned the article. It was similar to the story Carly had told him. Jonas Worthing’s oldest daughter Alaina had lost her grip on reality, and fearing for his family’s safety, he locked the young woman in the attic. At some point she freed herself. Where this story differed from Carly’s was that Alaina’s mother and infant brother survived. Only father and daughter perished in the fire.
Great, another terrible story linked to the estate—although there was at least no mention of Stonecliff in the segment.
He checked the other websites, but they all basically told the same story. The only differing point, whether Worthing’s wife and son survived. Some claimed they did, others insisted everyone died in the fire.
The haunted aspect of the story claimed that if one visited the site where the house had been at the same time the fire started—somewhere between 2:00 a.m. and 4:00 a.m. depending on which article he believed—you would hear screaming and the crackle of flames.
Curious to see which version of the tale was true, he searched for Worthing’s death certificate, and found a record of his death in 1936. None of the sites he visited mentioned his wife or son by name. He toyed with searching for the man’s marriage certificate, but the registers office didn’t have their records available online. He’d have to email a request. He had other sources he could use to track down more details about the man, but he hesitated.
What difference did it make? It wasn’t Jonas Worthing’s ghost he’d seen in his bathroom, after all. Did that mean he accepted that he had seen ghosts in this house?
He rubbed his tired eyes with his fingers. Images of Carly shooting off the end of the dock filled his head. She hadn’t simply lost her balance and tumbled in. Something had to have shoved her from behind to have her hit the water a good four feet from the dock.
Icy panic had washed over him, draining the blood from his face. He’d run for the water’s edge, tearing away his jacket and toeing off his shoes. He plunged into the icy bog, eyes open, searching for any sign of her in the silt and froth. He’d spotted her not far from him, flailing in the water, but instead of pulling herself up to the surface, she was sinking as if her shoes were made of lead.
He’d grasped her hand and yanked her to the surface—half-surprised she’d come so easily, that he hadn’t had to fight some invisible force to pull her free.
“There’s something in here. It was pulling me down,” she’d said through gasping breaths. And he’d believed her.
Did he still? Did he buy into her idea that The Devil’s Eye was a mecca of evil, drawing evil to it?
He wasn’t sure. All he did know was there was something very wrong with this place.
Not your problem, a voice in his head said. He was leaving soon, in just four days now. He would eventually sell this dump—he hoped—and never think of it again. But what if Carly was right? What would that mean for anyone willing to buy this place?
Buyer beware.
He had four days until he left. He’d let Carly run her investigation. If she could tell him what the hell was happening here, he might be able to figure out how to get rid of it—maybe get Stonecliff blessed or something, maybe an exorcism.
Of course, getting a handle on the strange things happening at Stonecliff wasn’t the only reason he was letting her come back. He liked her. He liked all that cool methodology while she worked, liked watching her crumble when he kissed her, liked the way she tasted. It was a stupid game to play. Pursuing her had nowhere to go—he was leaving in less than a week—but his reasoning did little to squash the anticipation inside him.
Too much to think about before his first cup of coffee.
He pushed back from the desk, left his room and went downstairs. As he approached the kitchen, Hugh Warlow emerged from the doorway.
Anger ran through Declan. The man had lied to him and on more than one occasion. Yet even beneath the anger, there was a flicker of unease. Why had he lied? What could he possibly have been hoping to achieve?
Why wouldn’t he have mentioned the original house? Sure, it had burned down, and apparently had garnered attention and a haunted legend had been born, but that had been almost eighty years ago, and the tale was pretty mild compared to three village locals murdering men at the bog.
As for Brynn and Eleri, the only reason Declan could think Warlow would lie about his sisters’ character would be to keep him from feeling a connection with them.
The man couldn’t have guessed his efforts had been unnecessary, that he had enough responsibility with the siblings he already had and was in no hurry to add to their numbers.
But why didn’t Warlow want Declan to know his sisters? Carly’s cryptic warning from Eleri about the man the first day they met came back to him. Maybe he should speak to her, after all.
“Good morning, Mr. Meyers,” Warlow said, warmly. “When you have a moment, I’d like a word. I’ve an opportunity to hire a groundskeeper, but would of course like to discuss the matter with you first.”
Declan nodded, frowning. “What happened to the last one?”
“He didn’t work out.” Warlow’s expression darkened briefly before he waved his hand carelessly. “Hiring people to work at the estate has never been an easy task. Not everyone appreciates the isolation.”
Or appreciated living in a place where so many people had turned up dead, no doubt. “Fine.” He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. “I’m just going to get a coffee and I’ll meet you in the study. There’s a matter I’d like to discuss with you, too.”
The man’s smile faltered, but he didn’t comment.
Mrs. Voyle was at the counter when he entered the kitchen, just starting to get breakfast under way.
“Good morning,” Declan said, crossing to the coffee mak
er.
The housekeeper jerked and let out a small squeak. The spoon in her hand clattered to the floor.
“Oh, Mr. Meyers,” she said, pressing a hand to her chest. “You gave me a fright.”
“Sorry,” he said, bending and scooping up the spoon before handing it to her.
“No need to apologize,” she muttered, setting the spoon in the sink and grabbing another from the drawer. “I’m just being foolish.”
“Can I ask you something?” Though why he thought he might get a different answer from his housekeeper than the butler he didn’t know. From everything he’d seen since he arrived Mrs. Voyle was loyal to the man.
She looked up from the egg mixture she was stirring in the bowl. “Of course.”
“What happened to the last groundskeeper? Did he quit?”
She frowned, thoughtfully. “I suppose he did. Reece Conway only took the job to report Eleri’s actions to the detective investigating her. Once everything was out in the open, he had no reason to play the part anymore.”
Reece, his sister’s fiancé and Carly’s friend who apparently saw ghosts. The more he learned about this guy, the more he didn’t like him. Carly had said he’d worked on the estate, but she never mentioned his involvement with a detective.
“Why was he working with police? Did he have law enforcement experience?” Maybe because of his so called abilities he’d helped on investigations before.
Mrs. Voyle leaned closer to him, eyes bright, as if delighting in having someone to share her gossip with at last. “Oh no, nothing like that. From what I heard, Reece had got himself in some trouble, and the detective agreed to see go away if Reece took the job here. It was all very underhanded.”
Oh yeah, this guy engaged to his sister sounded like a prince. “He only had the job a few months, right? What about the groundskeeper before him?”
“He was murdered. Ruth, Mr. James’s nurse, killed him.”
Right, he’d heard about the people she’d killed. Ruth had been the one to kill the girl who used to clean Stonecliff. “And before him?”
“Daniel Forbes. He was one of the men found in The Devil’s Eye.”
Before Conway, the last two groundskeepers had been murdered. No wonder Warlow had a tough time hiring people.
Isolation, my ass. “How many of Stonecliff’s groundskeepers have wound up dead?” “Including the men we were just speaking of, three. Of course, there may have been others.” She dropped her gaze to her bowl. “They weren’t able to identify all the remains, were they? And there were men we thought had just moved on when Eleri had been too young to be blamed.”
Right, because Eleri had been the primary suspect in this mess.
“The things Hugh Warlow said about Eleri and Brynn, are they true?”
Mrs. Voyle looked up. The gleam had vanished from gaze. She hesitated a moment, as if searching for the right phrasing. “I had suspicions about your sisters, but I was wrong. Stonecliff is a funny place. It can be difficult to see who the real villains are.”
She turned back to the bowl.
“Who are the real villains?” he asked.
“Well, they’ve been arrested, haven’t they? I’m sorry Mr. Meyers, but I really need to be about my work. I’m a little behind today.”
He left the housekeeper to her cooking, not sure what to make of her words. He’d known Eleri had been under suspicion for the murdered men and that with the arrest of the pub owner and his wife and the doctor, she’d been cleared of any wrongdoing, but that didn’t tell him if Brynn had been here to get her hands on their father’s interests—such as they were.
In the study, Warlow stood by the French doors, gazing out at the sea. He turned when he heard Declan enter. Declan sat behind the desk and Warlow opposite him.
“As I said, I have an opportunity to hire a groundskeeper. Sean Leonard, whose mother owns the inn, has put me in touch with a man in need of work. Admittedly, I don’t know very much about him, nor does Mr. Leonard, at least not enough to vouch for his character, but we will need someone to manage the grounds, especially once you’re gone.”
Warlow brought up a good point. The property had run riot over the summer months, the gardens filled with weeds, lawns overgrown, and now, in the fall, dead leaves covered the courtyard like a carpet. Declan had done some of the work himself, but unless he were able to commit eight hours a day, seven days a week there was no way to stay on top of everything that had to be done.
But there was still the small matter of payment, especially with Stella arranging for someone to come in and help with the cleaning.
“I think it’s a good idea, but I can’t afford to pay him just yet. Stella is arranging to sever the property from the lodge. She believes that will sell fairly quickly.” He thought of the boarded-up shops in the village, and a sinking feeling settled over him. “I should be able to take him on then.”
Warlow nodded, considering Declan’s words. “Perhaps he’d be willing to work for his room and board.”
That sounded a little too much like slave wages to him. “I’m not comfortable with that.”
“Perhaps, then, you’ll need to stay on longer than you planned. Stonecliff is your duty, now—your family’s legacy.”
Declan stiffened beneath the weight of the man’s recriminating tone. “And I have a duty to the family who actually means anything to me.”
“Of course.” Warlow began to stand.
“I’m not finished,” Declan said.
Warlow’s gaze narrowed and a flash of the man Declan had seen in front of his building a few months ago appeared only to vanish so quickly Declan wasn’t sure he saw it at all. The butler settled in his chair once more.
“You haven’t been entirely honest with me since I arrived,” Declan said, leaning back in his chair.
Warlow’s white brows shot up. “How so?”
“You told me that past The Devil’s Eye was more forest, but you neglected to mention the ruins of the original house.”
“Was it the ghost lady who told you? Does she believe you can hear screams and burning in the wee hours of the morning?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Warlow leaned forward, rested his elbows on the desk and pressed his hands together as if in prayer. “Ruins is a rather lofty description for what remains of that house, a little of the foundation nearly hidden by the forest. I rarely think about it, the house has been gone so long, and knowing is of little importance to you.”
“I don’t know, I think I would have liked to have known about the second driveway that was used to bring in murder victims to The Devil’s Eye.”
“I apologize then for not informing you better.” The butler’s clipped tone lacked sincerity.
“There’s also the matter of…” He hesitated, not sure which word to use. Sister seemed too personal for a woman he’d never met. He settled on, “Brynn.”
Warlow’s brows rose once more, but he said nothing, waiting for Declan to continue.
“You told me she showed up here after having nothing do with Arthur for most of her life, because he was on his deathbed and she wanted a piece of Stonecliff, but that wasn’t entirely true, was it?” Warlow didn’t answer, but Declan hadn’t expected him to. “She hadn’t had anything to do with him because she thought he was dead. She came here to meet him before he died. What I can’t understand is why you would make something up.”
Warlow’s eyes glinted like blue ice, his face turning hard as granite. “I did not make anything up. I know the story that woman claims to be true, but I find her timing suspect.”
Declan’s gaze narrowed. “You don’t want me to speak to them, do you?”
“I assure you, it makes no difference to me one way or the other. But I promise you, once you do contact them, they’ll be here sniffing for their share.”
Maybe, maybe not. He’d been here a week and a half already, their father dead nearly two months. If they wanted their part of the estate, where were they?
/> A shrill scream tore through the quiet. For a moment, he blinked, trying to process what he’d heard, where it had come from. Mrs. Voyle. He jumped to his feet and tore down the hall to the kitchen, Warlow right behind him.
When he entered the room, Mrs. Voyle stood up against the cabinets on the other side of the stove with her hand pressed to her mouth as if to physically hold back a scream. Smoke billowed from the eggs burning in the pan.
“Iola,” Warlow said sharply and the housekeeper jumped. “What’s happened?”
She faced them slowly, her face white as a sheet and a thin sheen of sweat turning her skin shiny.
“Are you all right?” Declan asked. He switched off the stove, then pushed the pan off the hot burner.
“I thought I saw…” Her voice trailed away, her gazed fixed on something over Declan’s shoulder. “I couldn’t have, though. It must have been a trick of the light.”
“What did you see?” he asked, taking the woman’s hand and leading her to one of the chairs at the kitchen table.
She lowered herself slowly into the seat. “Nothing.” Her voice was high and thready. “I don’t feel well, I’m afraid.”
Declan poured her a glass of water and pressed it into her hand. She took a small sip before setting it on the table.
“I’m sorry for my behavior,” she said. “I must be coming down with something. Perhaps I should go home.”
“Whatever you need. Hugh or I can drive you.” She still looked pale and shaken, and in no condition to drive.
She shook her head and stood. “I’ll be fine. No need trouble to yourselves. I am sorry for any inconvenience, Mr. Meyers.”
“It’s fine, as long as you’re all right.”
She assured them she was, took her coat from the hook in the utility room and hurried out the back door.
“That was strange,” Declan said, as her blue hatchback pulled away from the courtyard.
“Indeed,” Warlow agreed. “In all the years she’s worked here, I don’t believe Iola Voyle has ever taken a sick day.”
Chapter Nine
Declan and Hugh Warlow managed to avoid each other for most of the day. While Declan had spent most of it catching up on work he was missing, he had no idea what the butler had been doing until the man knocked at his bedroom door to tell him Carly had arrived and he’d left her in the parlor.