Free Haunting Ellie by Patti Berg Page B

braid and encircled her face like a halo. But she was no angel. Hell, no! He’d dated angels, even been in love with an angel once—and he’d been bored to tears.
    There was nothing the least bit dull about Elizabeth Fitzgerald.
    “Before I shove my head under the sink, why don’t you give me a tour of this place?” he said. “Haven’t been in here since I was a kid.”
    “I doubt it’s changed.”
    “A little boy’s memories aren’t always the same as a man’s. Things seemed immense back then... of course, I’ve grown a bit since I was a kid.”
    Slowly her eyes traced the length of his six-foot-six frame from head to toe, and he just stood there and let her peruse him. A hint of a smile touched her face, tinting her cheeks a pale shade of pink against her porcelain skin. He thought she might comment on his size. Instead, she returned to talk of the hotel. “I guess there’s time to show you around. The upstairs, at least. Once you finish the plumbing down here, maybe you can figure out how to add a few bathrooms.”
    “You have high hopes for my plumbing skills, don’t you?”
    “I would imagine a man like you thinks he can do anything,” she fired back, and he liked the pretty grin that accompanied the words.
    “I imagine I could, with the right incentive.”
    She laughed, and he sensed some of her animosity draining away. “Come on,” she said, opening a narrow kitchen door that led to a small landing with steps going up and another flight leading to the basement. “The furnace is downstairs. Maybe you can check it out in the next few days. The fire’s nice, but it doesn’t warm the entire place.”
    She led the way to the rooms above and Jon followed closely behind. ‘There are two floors above us and the attic, with four bedrooms on each floor,” she said, “far more than I’ll need. What I’d like to do is put in four suites, two on each floor. One for me, the others for guests.”
    Jon listened to her talk as he followed her up the stairs, so similar to the spiral stairway leading from his kitchen to his studio. It was close, quiet, and dark. He could smell dust mixed with the light scent of Elizabeth’s perfume. And then an odd sensation he remembered from his childhood caught hold of him: he felt as though they were being followed, that each step he took was matched by another step— that wasn’t Elizabeth’s.
    He turned around suddenly, but saw nothing except darkness.
    He placed a boot on the next stair and a strange light breeze blew against the hair that waved slightly over his collar. He gripped the iron railing. He didn’t like what he felt. He didn’t like feeling that something was mimicking his moves and breathing down his neck. He’d spent years in and out of a psychiatrist’s office being convinced that ghosts didn’t exist—except in his mind.
    But, dammit, it had seemed real back then.
    It felt real now.
    The door at the top of the stairs creaked when Elizabeth opened it, and they stepped into the dimly lit hallway. “I turned all the lights on this morning to brighten up the place. Didn’t do much good, though,” she said. “When you have a chance, maybe you could put new bulbs in.”
    He quit thinking about ghosts and things he hadn’t worried about in over twenty years and took a good look at his surroundings. Yard after yard of wainscoting needed to be stripped and re-finished. Creaking floors needed the same thing. Yellowed wallpaper hung in strips, their edges curled and turning brown. There were water spots on the ceilings, and the light fixtures were so dingy that putting in new bulbs wouldn’t brighten the hall. “From the looks of this place, I think you’d be better off just tearing it down and starting over again.”
    The smile he’d seen on her face when they’d stepped into the hall faded away. “My last house fell down—with me under it—and this is the first permanent home I’ve had since then,” she said. “If you think the