“I still really don’t know,” he said with a laugh. “But I’m not sorry. And Devlin and his investors are never going to get it.”
Casey smiled at that, their gazes locking across the table. Finn felt his heart expand as if filled with helium. Her cheeks seemed to heat before she glanced down at her ice cream again. “This is good. Thank you.”
“Glad you were up for it. It wouldn’t be half as much fun eating it alone down here.” He glanced around the kitchen. “I can’t say this place has grown on me, although I do have a greater respect for haunted hotels.”
She cocked her head at him, seemingly glad for a change in subject that wasn’t quite so personal. “You aren’t going to start that again, are you?”
He shook his head. “Guess you’ll have to experience the ghosts yourself. Or not. Depends on how long you end up staying.”
“Not long enough for the ghosts to know I’m here, I hope,” she joked.
He watched her finish her ice cream. A lot of it had melted since she was eating it so slowly. Stalling? Because she liked his company as much as he liked hers?
“Did something happen while I was gone?” he asked, eyeing her. He’d heard something in her tone. “What was it? The noises?” He shook his head. “You are probably used to them since it wasn’t that long ago that you stayed here summers. This place was an antique even then. No, I’m guessing it was the footsteps.” There was the slightest flicker in her eyes. He nodded, chuckling as he got up to rinse out his bowl.
“It wasn’t a ghost,” she said to his back. She finished her ice cream and brought her bowl over. He took it from her, washed it, and as he dried his hands, he leaned against the counter, facing her.
“I just know there were nights when I wanted to be anywhere but in this hotel,” he said. “The good news is that whoever, whatever, is walking the hallways, it doesn’t seem to be dangerous.”
“And if you’re wrong about that?” He realized that she was more upset than he’d originally thought.
She started to turn away. He grabbed her arm, turning her to face him. The fear he saw on her face made him catch his breath. “I’m sorry I joked about it. So tell me exactly what happened.”
She looked defiant for a moment but sighed and told him a story that matched his own experience. “Someone is trying awfully hard to convince me Megan’s ghost is in the hotel. Most everyone was down by the fire. So the footsteps I heard outside my door? It had to be Claude or Devlin.”
“IT HAD TO be one of them,” Casey said again. She could see that Finn didn’t believe it, making her more determined. “Who else knew about the perfume except one of the staff?”
“You think Claude and Devlin knew the kind of perfume Megan wore?”
“Maybe not, but Jason did. Also, Megan had the general store here order more of her so-called signature perfume when her bottle got broken. It’s really expensive, so someone at the store would have remembered, if either of them had asked.”
He looked at her as if he wanted to argue the point, which only irritated her. She needed him to agree. She needed it to be Claude or Devlin. “Isn’t it possible Claude only pretended to leave? Or Devlin is still around somewhere, hiding?”
“That has crossed my mind.”
At the sound of agitated voices, they both turned toward the kitchen doorway. They could hear everyone come rushing into the hotel and quickly moved to the doorway to see what was going on.
“We just saw Megan’s ghost!” Jason announced, sounding winded. The others joined in, all of their voices too high, too animated. She stared at them, seeing both flushed faces and pale ones.
“She ran through the woods, but not before we’d all seen her,” Jen said, hugging herself. She appeared to be shaking. Next to her, all the color had drained from Shirley’s face.
“Show me where you saw her,” Finn said as he approached the group.
“I’ll take you to the exact spot,” Jason said and turned to push through everyone toward the door. “Ben and I ran into the woods, but she was gone.”
“I’ll go with you,” Benjamin said. No one else moved.
Casey found herself looking at each of them, trying to tell if this was some joke they’d cooked up. They looked scared. Jen was kind of jumping on the balls of her feet as if not sure what to do with the sudden energy spike. Shirley just looked numb. Even Patience appeared worried, her back against the hallway wall, her arms crossed over her chest. She cut her eyes to Casey as if sensing that she was being watched. “I think we should all get out of here.”
The hallway felt alive with fear as Casey stepped past them and headed for the back door. She didn’t believe in ghosts. She kept telling herself that as she pushed open the door and spilled out onto the walkway.
There was no one around the campfire as she crossed the large parking lot. Flames rose, and sparks hovered in the air before blinking out. In the dark of the trees, nothing moved. She stood there for a moment before she began to walk toward the woods. The trees behind the hotel and outbuildings were dense. As dark as the night was, it would be black in there. Unless they’d taken a flashlight...
She’d passed the firepit and started into the woods, wondering how she would ever find the men, when she saw a light bobbing along the ground in
