“That’s my girl.” He hoisted her up, gave her a toss. The mutinous little face went sugar sweet and bright with smiles. Pretending to pout, Hayley finished pouring her beer.
“Shows where I am in her pecking order.”
“You got the beer, I got the kid.”
Lily wrapped an arm around Harper’s neck, dipped her head to rest it on his cheek. Hayley nodded, lifted her glass. “Looks like.”
IT WAS WONDERFUL to have everyone around the table again, the whole Harper House family, as Hayley thought of them, sitting together, diving into David’s honey-glazed ham.
She’d missed having a big family. Growing up, it had been just Hayley and her father. Not that she’d felt deprived, she thought, not in any way. She and her father had been a team, a unit, and he was—had been—the kindest, funniest, warmest man she’d ever known.
But she’d missed having meals like this, a full table, lots of voices—even the arguments and drama that went hand-in-hand in her mind with big families.
Lily would grow up with that, because Roz had welcomed them. So Lily would have a lifetime of meals like this one, full of aunts and uncles and cousins. Grandparents, she thought, stealing a glance toward Roz and Mitch. And when Roz’s other sons, or Mitch’s son, came to visit, it would just add to the rich family stew.
One day, Roz’s sons, and Mitch’s Josh, would get married. Probably have a herd of kids between them.
She shifted her gaze toward Harper and ordered herself to ignore the little ache that came from thinking of him married, making babies with some woman whose face she couldn’t see.
Of course, she’d be beautiful, that was a given. Probably blonde and built and blue-blooded. The bitch.
Whoever she turned out to be, whatever she looked like or
“Something wrong with the potatoes?” David murmured beside her.
“Hmm. No. They’re awesome.”
“Just wondered why you looked like you were forcing down some bad-tasting medicine, sugar.”
“Oh, just thought about something I’m going to have to do, and won’t like. Life’s full of them. But that doesn’t include eating these potatoes. In fact, I was wondering if you could show me how to cook some things. I can cook pretty good. Daddy and I split that chore, and we were both okay with the basics—I could even get a little fancy now and then. But Lily’s growing up on your cooking, so I ought to be able to fix it for her myself when need be.”
“Hmm, a kitchen apprentice. One I can mold into my own likeness. Love to.”
When Lily began to drop the bits of food still on her tray delicately to the floor, Hayley popped up. “Guess who’s done.”
“Gavin, why don’t you and Luke take Lily outside and play awhile?”
“Oh.” Hayley shook her head at Stella’s suggestion. “I don’t want them to have to mind her.”
“We can do it,” Gavin piped up. “She likes to chase the ball and the Frisbee.”
“Well . . .” At nearly ten, Gavin was tall for his age. And at just-turned-eight, Luke was right behind him. They could—and had—handled Lily at play on the backyard grass. “I don’t mind if you don’t, and she’d love it. But when you’re tired of her, you just bring her back.”
“And as a reward, ice cream sundaes later.”
David’s announcement got a couple of cheers.
When playtime was over, the sundaes devoured, Hayley carried Lily up to get her ready for bed, and Stella brought the boys up to the sitting room they’d once shared to watch television.
“Roz and Mitch want an Amelia talk,” Stella told her. “I didn’t know if you’d gotten the word.”
“No, but that’s fine. I’ll be down as soon as she is.”
“Need any help?”
“Not this time, but thanks. Her eyes are already drooping.”
It was nice, she thought, to hear the muted crash and boom of some sort of space war on the sitting room television and the bright chatter of the boys’ commentary on the action. She’d missed those noises since Stella had gotten married.
She settled Lily in for the night—hopefully—checked the monitor and the night-light. Then left the door ajar as she returned downstairs.
She found the adults in the library, the most usual meeting spot for ghost talk. The sun had yet to set, so the room was washed with light that was just hinting of pink. Through the glass, the summer gardens were ripe, sumptuous, spears of lavender foxglove dancing over pools of white impatiens, brightened with elegant drips of hot-pink fuschia.
She spotted the soft, fuzzy green of betony, the waxy charm of begonias, the inverted cups of purple coneflowers with their prickly brown heads.
She’d missed her evening walk with Lily, she remembered, and promised herself she’d take her daughter out for a stroll through the gardens the next day.
Out of habit, she crossed to the table where a baby monitor stood beside a vase of poppy-red lilies.
Once she was assured it was on, she tuned in to the rest of the room.
“Now that we’re all here,” Mitch began, “I thought I should bring you up-to-date.”
“You’re not going to break my heart and tell us you researched during your honeymoon,” David put in.
“Your heart’s safe, but we did manage to find some time to discuss various theories here and there. The thing is, I had a couple of e-mails from our contact in Boston. The descendant of the Harper housekeeper during Reginald and Beatrice’s reign here.”
“She find something?” Harper had chosen the floor rather than one of the seats, and now folded himself from prone to sitting.
“I’ve been feeding her what we know, and told her what we found in Beatrice Harper’s journal, regarding your great-grandfather, Harper. The fact that he wasn’t her son, but in fact Reginald’s son with his mistress—whom we have to assume was Amelia. She hasn’t had any luck, yet, digging up any letters or diaries from Mary Havers—the housekeeper. She has found photographs, and is getting us copies.”
Hayley looked toward the second level of the library, to the table loaded with books, Mitch’s laptop. And the board beside it that was full of photos and copies of letters and journal entries. “What will that do for us?”
“The more visuals, the better,” he said. “She’s also been talking to her grandmother, who’s not doing very well, although she does have some lucid moments. The grandmother claims to recall her mother and a cousin who also worked here at the time talk about their days at Harper House. Lots of talk about the parties and the work. She also recalls her cousin talking about the young master, that’s how she referred to Reginald Jr. And saying the stork got rich delivering that one. That her mother told her to hush, that blood money and curses aside, the child was innocent. When she asked what she meant, her mother wouldn’t speak of it, except to say she’d done her duty by the Harper family, and would have to live with it. But the happiest day of her life had been when she’d walked out the door of this house for the last time.”
“She knew my grandfather had been taken from his mother.” Roz reached down, touched a hand to Harper’s shoulder. “And if this woman is remembering correctly, it sounds as though Amelia wasn’t willing to give him up.”
“Blood money and curses,” Stella repeated. “Who was paid, and what was cursed?”
“There would have been a doctor or a midwife, perhaps both, attending Amelia during the birth.” Mitch spread his hands. “Almost certainly they’d have been paid off. Some of the servants here might have been bribed.”
“I know that’s awful,” Hayley said. “But you wouldn’t call that blood money, would you? Hush money more like.”
“Bull’s-eye,” Mitch told her. “If there was blood money, where was the blood?”
“Amelia’s death.” Logan shifted, leaned forward. “She haunts here, so she died here. You haven’t been able to find any record of that, so we have to assume it was covered up. Easiest way to cover something up is money.”
“I agree.” Stella nodded. “But how did she get here? There’s no mention of Amelia in any of Beatrice’s journals. No mention of Reginald’s mistress by name, or of her coming to Harper House. She wrote about the baby, and how she felt about Reginald bringing him here, expecting her to pretend she’d given birth to him. Wouldn’t she have been just as outraged, and written of that, if he’d established Amelia in the house?”
