“All right.” I rose on tiptoe and kissed my favorite smattering of freckles, the daisy-shaped cluster beneath his left eye. “But let me know if you change your mind.”
“There’s the added benefit of allowing Mrs. Oliphant to stay home.”
She must be the cook to her husband’s concierge, neither of which would be needed this week.
“Ah.” I should have put it together sooner. “You’re kicking the Oliphants out too.”
Two less bodies in the house doubled our odds of getting attacked.
Yay?
“I have to admit, I’m surprised you chose this.” I made a small hop, and Linus caught my legs around his waist. “You’re usually opposed to me getting even the least bit maimed.”
“You can take care of yourself.” He carried me to the bed. “I can’t imagine whatever is haunting this place is more dangerous than anything we’ve faced together so far.”
Otherwise, it went without saying, he never would have brought me here.
I squealed when he tossed me onto the mattress then laughed when he landed on top of me in a press of now-familiar weight.
“You can tell me if you’re disappointed.” He brushed his fingers across my cheek, my nose, my lips. “I always thought I would take you to a remote island where I could have you all to myself.” He softened his voice. “You used to love the beach.”
More to the point, I had loved a woman who lived on the beach. Odette Lecomte, the next best thing I’d had to an aunt growing up, and the person who had betrayed my parents, Maud, and me.
Sand, surf, and sun no longer held any appeal. I hadn’t visited Tybee Island in years. It held too many memories. I wasn’t in a rush to walk any other beaches either. The roar of the waves, the tang in the air, the grains between my toes, would remind me of the good times and that they were all a lie.
“I always pictured a beachy honeymoon.” There was no point in lying about it. He knew me too well for that. “But I can’t see it anymore. That’s why I was relieved when you offered to take over the planning. I had no idea what I wanted to do or where I wanted to go, and you’ve been everywhere at least once.”
“I have traveled a lot.” His work, both as a professor at Strophalos University and his private necromancy practice, plus his former position as Scion Lawson, had carried him all over the world. “That doesn’t mean I explored those cities or did more than show up for lectures or perform resuscitations before retreating to my hotel room to read.”
“How could you visit Rome or Greece or Ireland and not go out for gelato or spanakopita or colcannon?”
“I didn’t eat then,” he reminded me, “and the world had long since lost its flavor.”
From what I gathered, Linus hadn’t lived much during my imprisonment in Atramentous. He wouldn’t call it a self-imposed punishment, but that’s how I saw it. He had worked hard, made solid friends, and performed his duties as the Potentate of Atlanta to the best of his considerable abilities, but even the art he created during that period tended more toward black and gray.
“Lucky for you, you’ve got me.” I linked my feet at his spine. “I’m willing to eat my way through Europe and anywhere else.”
“I am lucky,” he said, earnestness and puzzlement and happiness all rolled into his tone.
Three loud knocks on the door spared him from the sound pinching he deserved for finding himself even a teensy-tiny bit unworthy. It must be Kylie with our luggage.
Fiddlesticks.
I knew I should have searched for a do not disturb sign.
Two
The disgruntled teen at the door looked about as thrilled to be standing there as I was to have to put on pants again. I noticed her noticing Linus’s shirt wasn’t buttoned up to his throat, and the few that had been fastened in his haste fit the wrong holes.
“Sorry to interrupt.” She trudged into the room with our luggage rolling behind her. “You guys can get back to it in just a second.” She left the bags and opened the closet. “I get docked if I don’t do the whole shebang.” She came out holding two mismatched wooden stands, flicked her wrists, and set up the luggage racks. “Do you want any of your stuff hung up, or is this good?”
With a grunt, she heaved each of our big suitcases onto their respective racks.
“That’s good,” I rushed to assure her. “We can handle it from here.”
Our bags contained items hard to explain to humans, plus Neely had stuffed mine with lingerie I was too embarrassed to look at, let alone model for Linus. There were swimsuits in there too, which I wouldn’t need, and a few fancy dresses with even fancier shoes that also wouldn’t come in handy while sleuthing.
Linus opened his wallet, let her notice its fullness. “How long have you worked at the inn?”
“Officially?” Kylie tongued her piercing, flicking it back and forth. “About two years.”
“Have you experienced anything strange during your time here?”
A knowing smile sharpened her eyes. “You’re ghost hunters.”
“Something like that,” he agreed, pulling out a fifty-dollar bill, which he dispensed the way most of us handed out fives. “Well?” He passed it over. “Any paranormal phenomenon to report?”
Weighing her words against the heft of his wallet, she appeared to debate what we wanted to hear.
“Tell us the truth,” I urged gently. “Trust me, he tips better when you’re honest.”
That gave her pause, but she came to a decision and closed the door behind her.
“There’s a smell in the kitchen,” she whispered as if her grandfather were standing in the hall. “I thought it was eggs gone bad, but Grams claims she doesn’t notice it.” She shrugged. “She’s old, so maybe her nose doesn’t work like it used to, but come on. It seriously reeks in there.”
Haunted kitchen.
Check.
All those sharp knives were practically begging to stab someone. What violent ghost wouldn’t set up camp in there?
“That’s all?” Linus prompted, already selecting the next bill in his stack.
“I got shoved down the stairs once, but that was back when I was a kid.” Kylie glowered. “Gramps didn’t believe me.” She held up her arm, flashing a deep scar across her elbow. “He blamed me, said I must have left a toy on the stairs.”
Well, okay, so calling it a ghost had been polite. Obviously, we were dealing with a poltergeist…or worse.
Hand on Linus’s sleeve, I kept him from forking over quite yet. “Can you think of any other incidents?”
“Guests report weird stuff all the time, but other than the stink and the shove, no.”
Pungent and violent. The telltale thrill that always preceded the hunt kindled along my nerves. “When did the smell start?”
“Two days ago? Something like that?”
“Thank you.” Linus passed her the bill once I released him. “We appreciate your candor.”
“No problem.” She crammed the money into her pocket. “Dial two if you need anything. It goes direct to my cell, so I’ll get the call even from home.” A tighter shrug twitched her shoulders. “We live in the cottage behind the property. It’s not a long walk, and I’m up late most nights.”
“We’ll do that.” Linus escorted her out then appraised me with a thoughtful tilt of his chin. “What do you think?”
“That you don’t understand the value of a dollar, or that you have some bizarre affliction that makes you unable to read zeroes. Either of those would explain why you grease palms with such large bills when half that amount would do.”
“People who are hesitant to cooperate often find themselves more willing to do so when the sum of money they stand to earn far exceeds their expectations.”
Given he was the one who taught me the art of cultivating informants through bribery, I couldn’t knock his system. Though, granted, I was still more likely to offer a twenty and reserve my fifties for the hard cases. Linus just preferred to go big and save time.
“You’re lucky you were born filthy rich is all I’m saying.”
“You’re both richer and cheaper than I am.”
“I can’t decide if that last part is an insult, but I’ll own it.”
There was a time after Atramentous when I struggled to keep the lights on. Money was tight, food was a luxury item, and I spent a lot of time sitting in dark rooms to save on the power bill. Ketchup on crackers was not gourmet, let me tell you. Neither was dry ramen dusted with a flavor packet. After eating that a few times, I never forgot the cutoff date for the water again.
“How about frugal?” He crossed to me, resting his hands on my waist. “Better?”
“I can live with frugal.” I decided not to tell him he could call me anything he wanted if his hands kept doing what they were doing. “It has a higher-end ring to it.”
About to resume our newlywed activities, I growled in frustration when a dark figure wearing a tattered cloak with a shadowed cowl coalesced behind Linus.
“Cletus.” I exhaled through my teeth. “We talked about this.”
The wraith was never more than a summons away, but he groaned yet another throaty complaint about us gallivanting off alone. We had left him with Oscar and Keet at Lethe’s house with strict orders not to follow, but he must have decided he knew best. A very Maud-like trait, if you asked me.
“Grier and I would appreciate some privacy.” Linus tried his hand negotiating with him. “We’ll call if anything happens.”
If.
Often, it was a matter of when, but maybe this time the odds would be in our favor. A wedding gift from the universe. Wouldn’t that be nice?
Sometimes being Grier Woolworth, Dame Woolworth, and the Potentate of Savannah all rolled into one made me tired. And then there was the mother-in-law factor. The Grande Dame wasn’t the call me Mom kind. More like the bow before me type. Let’s just say, despite being on decent terms with her, she and I weren’t in danger of coordinating mother/daughter ensembles anytime soon.