Free 'Tis the Season by Judith Arnold Page B

Poplar Ridge Road. “You’ll have to tell me which house.”
    â€œIt’s up a way. You can’t see it from the street.”
    They drove in silence. His apology couldn’t erase the low-level tension that hummed in the car. He wasn’t sure why he felt so contrite—it wasn’t just because of his kids or because he’d inquired about her marital status. He suspected it had something to do with the fact that as soon as he’d calmed down enough to look at her when she’d first appeared in his backyard, he’d practically stripped her naked in his imagination.
    In and of itself, that wouldn’t be a crime. He was a man, single and unattached. He was allowed to appreciate an attractive woman, allowed even to fantasize about her. But Filomena Albright wasn’t simply an attractive woman. She had an aura about her. Maybe it was her elaborate earrings, or her long, flowing hair. Maybe it was the sight of her with Gracie in her arms—like a powerful savior who’d rescued his fragile pajama-clad daughter from the evil shadows of the forest.
    There was nothing fragile about Gracie, of course. But he’d been taken by the way Filomena had looked holding her: strong yet protective. More than a savior—an Amazon goddess, a magical spirit, a warrior endowed with mythical powers.
    Evan was not given to flights of fancy. He couldn’t begin to guess why Filomena inspired him to imagine such things.
    â€œThere,” she said, pointing toward a barely visible driveway, its entrance flanked by two short stone columns. He turned onto the gravel driveway, pebbles crunching beneath his tires. His headlights guided him up the curving drive until suddenly the house loomed before him.
    It was huge. He wouldn’t call it a palace—there was nothing elegant about it—but the house had a ruggedgrandeur. Its walls were constructed of randomly shaped stones, its double door arched, its windows filled with light. The cast-iron lamps hanging on either side of the door illuminated not just the porch but the shaggy front lawn and untrimmed shrubs. The driveway ended in a circle near an overgrown path of slate leading to the broad front steps. Astonished, Evan shut off the engine and gawked. “This is your house?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œWow.” He craned his neck to admire the roof, whose patterned tiles sloped sharply above the third story. “I never knew there was a house hiding back here. How old is it?”
    â€œAround a hundred years, I think.”
    â€œWow.” No one would have built a house like this today. It would have required too much labor, and the land it sat on—a huge parcel, given the length of the driveway—would have been zoned into smaller lots. “I guess I can understand why my kids were curious about the place.”
    â€œDo you think it looks haunted?”
    He eyed her. Her smile had returned, warm and tantalizing. “It looks like the sort of house that would be haunted by a woman named Filomena.”
    Her eyebrows flicked upward. “Oh?”
    â€œUnusual name. Unusual house.” Unusual woman , he wanted to add, but he had no way of knowing whether she was unusual. He only sensed it. “And my house is really just through the woods?” he asked, scrutinizing the expanse of forest behind the house.
    â€œThere’s a path. It wasn’t too clear to me, but Billy had no trouble following it even in the dark.”
    He turned his gaze back to the house. He couldn’timagine Filomena rattling around in it by herself. She’d said it was her childhood home. Had she endured an odd childhood? Or an average one in an odd house?
    He tried to picture her the way she’d been before Sunday, in Manhattan. He envisioned her as an artist, living a bohemian life in SoHo or TriBeCa, or whatever Manhattan neighborhood was funky-chic these days. He envisioned her in long skirts and flamboyant