Free Parker And The Gypsy by Susan Carroll Page A

of the car. Then he said briskly, “C’mon, we’d better not keep Miss Mamie waiting. After all, you’re paying me by the day. Don’t want this spook of yours to end up costing you a fortune.”
    Giving her no chance to reply, he seized her hand and tugged her along after him around the side of the inn. Sara stumbled in her efforts to keep up with his longer stride, her head still full of the letter he seemed to have dismissed.
    But the disturbing vibes she’d picked up from the envelope continued to ripple through her like a handful of pebbles tossed into the serene lake waters of her mind. For a few brief seconds there, she felt as though she’d drawn once more too close to the edge of Mike Parker’s world. It was a world where a man could get a knife thrust through his shoulder and be grateful it wasn’t his heart. A place where Mike clearly didn’t want her probing around and she didn’t want to go, fearing what she might find.
    It was almost a relief to give herself up to the inn’s chilling, but far more familiar aura instead.
    As she trailed Mike up the veranda steps, Sara sensed a slight drop in temperature that was a sure sign of a supernatural presence. She marveled that Mike didn’t feel it, too, but he tramped heedlessly along the porch, peering in windows. “So which one of these do we have to force open to get inside?” he called out to her.
    â€œNone of them. We can go through the front door. It’s not locked.”
    â€œYou people are trusting little souls around here, aren’t you?” he drawled.
    â€œNo. The Jorgensens have tried to install locks on the doors, but Mamie keeps removing them. She has her own way of dealing with unwanted intruders.”
    â€œNo kidding? Well, if she ever gets tired of this gig, I could get her a job at Boom Boom’s. They’re looking for a good bouncer.”
    Although Sara wasn’t proof against his teasing grin, it irritated her that he could be cheerfully oblivious to the inn’s brooding presence that was already beginning to weigh so heavy upon her own spirit
    Well, just wait until she got him inside.
    Ducking past Mike, she approached the front door, the once-elegant tracery of the oval glass insert now begrimed and cracked. Turning the ornate handle, she thrust the door open. It pushed inward with a loud and eerie creak.
    â€œGreat special effects,” Mike said.
    â€œYou haven’t seen anything yet,” Sara muttered.
    â€œAfter you.” He waved her inside with a mock gallant bow.
    â€œNervous, Mr. Parker?” she asked.
    â€œShaking in my shoes, Miss Holyfield,” he replied.
    Sara thought she would have dressed up in a bed sheet and yelled “Boo” herself if it would have driven that confident smirk off Mike’s face. But she was going to have to leave it up to Mamie to do that.
    Preceding Mike across the threshold, Sara stepped into the chamber that in its heyday had been the inn’s bustling front lobby. The room stood still and silent, from the great chandelier with its dusty glass globes to the front desk with its pigeonholes filled with rusting keys.
    Sara picked her way carefully past a drop cloth, overturned ladder and some paint cans abruptly abandoned by the last work crew Mamie had sent fleeing in terror. The temperature seemed to have dropped several more degrees and Sara could feel the full force of the inn’s aura beating down upon her.
    The oak-paneled walls seemed steeped with voices long since silenced. Given the inn’s troubled history, Sara marveled that Mamie was the only ghost to walk these halls. From the first time she’d set eyes on the place, Sara had sensed that the Pine Top Inn had always been a refuge for lost and tormented souls.
    Glancing back at Mike, she saw that he had closed the door and was picking his way carefully past the painters’ debris, peering curiously about him. Was it her