Just pals.
And making him chew over it was exactly what his brothers intended when they’d started poking at him.
He told himself to put it away, forget it, but was grateful for the knock on the door of Reception for distracting him.
He went out, passed the kitchen area, saw Clare and the boys through the door—which he opened with a flourish.
“Welcome to Inn BoonsBoro. Do you have a reservation?”
“We have a personal invitation from the owner.”
“In that case—” He stepped back, gave a sweeping gesture that made the boys laugh.
“You said to come to this door, right? I’m so used to—Oh, the tiles are just great! It’s all right to walk on them?”
“Here, and through the kitchen and down the hall. Lobby’s off-limits. They’ll grout that tomorrow.”
“It looks so big. Don’t touch anything,” she added quickly. “Remember? And stay with me. We can only go where Beckett says we can go.”
“Do you really own this whole place?” Liam asked him.
“My family does.” There was that word again. “This is where people will come in, check in. Hope’s going to sit right there.”
“There’s no place to sit.”
“There will be,” he told Harry. “Chairs for people to sit, too, in front of the fireplace.”
“Mom wishes she had a fireplace.” Murphy looked up at him. “You build stuff, so you could make her one.”
“How come you got all those old bricks?” Harry poked at them. “Where’s the wall for the inside?”
“That is the wall for the inside. They’ve been there a really long time, so we wanted people to see them. It shows respect for the building. Down here’s the kitchen.” He glanced at Clare. “They’re going to start installing the cabinets soon. That’ll be another big corner turned.”
“I’ll say. See, guys? This is where Hope’s going to fix breakfast.”
“Don’t walk past the tape, Harry.” Beckett started down to where Harry stood at the edge of the completed tile.
“I’m not. What’re all those little things sticking up?”
“Spacers. See how straight all the lines are between the tiles?” He started explaining grout, then wondered if he was too technical.
“Why are there smaller pieces?”
“At that edge there? They have to cut the tiles to fit.” So the kid was interested. “They have a special tool for that.”
“Where?”
“I’ll show you before we go.”
“The tile rug.” Clare kept a firm hand on Murphy, just in case. “It’s fabulous.”
“What rug?”
So Beckett explained about tile rugs before taking them around to the dining room.
“You’ve started on the ceiling!”
“We wanted to see if the plan worked,” Beckett told her. “And with it done, there’ll be less chance of messing up the hardwood when that’s installed.”
Harry pointed at the arch of stone in the wall. “Is that stone for respect?”
“That’s right. This was the first stone building in town. It’s important.”
“My mom’s bookstore place is old. The stairs creak.”
“That’ll happen.”
“If it’s old, how come you got a new porch?”
“Someone took the one that used to be here away a long time ago. We put one back.” Beckett went out, opened the door. “It’s not exactly the way it used to be, but I think the building likes it. I have copies of old pictures Mr. Bast gave us. I’ll show you sometime.”
“He has a furniture store and a museum.” Liam danced out on the porch. “He has all
“Maybe he can work on that.”
“It’s beautiful from this angle, too.” Clare stepped out, looked over to Vesta, down to her own shop. “Everyone who came in the bookstore today talked about it. I must’ve walked out on my own porch a half dozen times to look over and—Murphy!”
She whipped back inside in time to see him halfway up the stairs. “Come down here. I told you not to go upstairs alone.”
“I was just going to talk to the lady.” He looked up, smiled that angel’s smile. “Okay, ’bye.”
“What lady? Who are you talking to?” Clare rushed in, scooped him right off the steps and into her arms.
“The lady upstairs. She said hi, and she guessed my name.”
“Beckett, if there’s someone upstairs—”
“I’ll go up.” But he already knew.
For Clare’s peace of mind, he did a quick walk-through.
“Nobody here,” he said when he came back down.
“I guess she had to go to the party. Is she gonna live here with Hope?” Murphy wondered.
“Maybe.” Speculating, Beckett glanced back up. “She was going to a party?”
“I guess. She had a long dress. Ladies wear long dresses to parties sometimes. Can we see upstairs now?”
“Sure. Okay?” Beckett said to Clare.
“Fine, but . . . we’ll talk about things later. Murphy, you stay with me.”
Since she wouldn’t let the boys out of her sight, he had to wait until they went for pizza. Getting her alone, more or less, at that point came easy. All it took was a pocketful of quarters.
“Okay, I get you don’t want to talk about it in front of them, but we could be talking about a plague of two- headed frogs and they wouldn’t cop to it now. That was something else.”
“I don’t know what happened, or what this is. All I know is whatever it is had my little boy going upstairs, by himself, to... whatever it is.”
“She’s not dangerous.”
“There is no
“We’re all over that place every day.”
“Grown men.”
“I’ve been in there countless times on my own. Just today she and I had this little negotiation about leaving the porch door open.”
“Maybe because she wanted to push you over the rail.”
He would’ve laughed, but clearly this wasn’t a joke to her. “Why would she?”
“How do I know why?” Irritation bubbled in her voice. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. We’re sitting here talking about a ghost. For God’s sake, Beckett.” She grabbed the glass of soda the minute the waitress set it down.
“Everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine, Heather.” Beckett sent her an easy smile. “Thanks.”
He waited until Heather moved off again. “We’re having the conversation because you’re upset about it. Murphy wasn’t scared.”
“He’s a child.”
“Yeah, and I figure that’s why he actually saw her. They say, don’t they, kids are more open to stuff like this.”
“How do I know? I don’t—didn’t—
Gauging her mood, he tried to lighten it. “You can be Scully and I can be Mulder. Maybe I do want to believe,
