Dawn Brown - The Ghosts Of Cragera Bay

He glanced at the table where he and Carly had been sitting. Empty now, their cups cleared away, there was no evidence they’d been there at all.

Unease settled over him. “The woman I was with, did she say where she was going?”

“Not to me. If I see her again, should I tell her you were looking for her?”

He shook his head. “It’s fine. Was she limping when she left?”

The woman’s thin brows knitted together. “I didn’t notice.”

Maybe Carly’s ankle was better. If she’d hobbled out of the café, surely the woman would have noticed. Though, maybe not, depending on how engrossed she was in her book.

“Thanks, anyway,” he muttered, and stepped back outside. The sun had dipped behind the buildings, casting long shadows over the narrow road. He glanced up and down the empty sidewalk. No sign of Carly.

Again that tickle of apprehension.

For God’s sake, she was a grown woman. She’d survived so far without any help from him. No doubt she would continue to—twisted ankle or not. Still, that she’d just vanished in the past fifteen minutes gnawed at him.

He might not have given it another thought anywhere else, but here, in Cragera Bay, someone disappearing was reason to worry.

Chapter Two

“Stella Bahl called while you were out.”

Declan stiffened at the mention of his real estate agent, especially by Hugh Warlow. A flicker of guilt lit inside him.

“Did she leave a message?” Declan asked, shrugging off his jacket and draping it over the newel post at the bottom of the stairs in Stonecliff’s front hall.

Warlow plucked up the coat and folded it over his arm. “Just for you to ring her when you get in.”

“You don’t have to do that.” Declan slid his hands into his jeans’ pockets. He didn’t think he’d ever get used to people waiting on him the way the butler and housekeeper had since he’d arrived. “I can take it up to my room when I go.”

“Of course,” Warlow said, smiling, but he didn’t relinquish Declan’s jacket. “I’ve gathered all the records of updates and renovations to Stonecliff and left them for you on the desk.”

“Thanks. I guess I’ll call Stella back, then.” Maybe she already had someone interested in buying this dump. Declan crossed the hall to the study.

“I’d assumed you’d gone to see Ms. Bahl just now,” Warlow said, following him into the room.

The butler was fishing for information, not that Declan blamed him. Warlow had worked in this house for more years than Declan had been alive, and when Declan sold the estate there was a good chance that Hugh Warlow would be out of a job and a place to live.

Declan would pay him a severance, of course. He’d even put in a good word with whoever bought this heap for Warlow and Mrs. Voyle both. But it did little to ease the feeling that he was somehow letting the butler down.

He thought back to when he’d first met the man in front of his building in Seattle two months ago, that weird exchange that had left him creeped out for days later. The Hugh Warlow he’d dealt with since the man had met him at the airport in Manchester was a completely different person than the one he’d met back in August.

Declan chalked up the strange encounter to exhaustion and overall discomfort at having anything to do with his father on his end, and to the stress of Warlow’s employer passing while, according to the butler, Declan’s grasping sisters tried to get their hands on anything that hadn’t been nailed down on his.

Since coming to the Isle of Anglesey in northern Wales, Declan didn’t know what he would have done without the other man’s help. He’d had no idea what went into managing an estate this size, or dealing with the investment properties his father had owned and left to him. Warlow had been a patient teacher. He’d taken Declan around the estate, showing him the grounds and filling him in on its dark history—or at least most of it.

When Declan returned to Seattle at the end of the week, Warlow would continue to manage the property until he found a buyer.

“I went to the village to meet with Carly Evans.”

The butler lifted his straight brows. “The ghost lady?”

Declan’s jaw tensed. Was there anyone in Cragera Bay who hadn’t heard of this woman? “I thought if I made it clear that there was no way in hell I would let her onto the estate or anywhere near The Devil’s Eye, she might go away.”

Images of empty cobblestone streets, no sign of Carly Evans anywhere popped into his head. He wished he’d chosen his words differently.

Warlow chuckled. “Are you sure that was for the best? What’s that old saying? There’s no such thing as bad publicity?”

“I don’t think that applies when trying to unload a property where fifteen people were murdered.”

The humor vanished from Warlow’s face, and again Declan wished he’d stopped to think before opening his mouth.

“Your father had hoped you would take his place at Stonecliff. He wouldn’t want you to sell it like this.”

The words then he should have left it to someone else danced on the tip of his tongue, but he bit back on them. He didn’t know why his father had left him Stonecliff. He’d never met the man. His mother had left Arthur James when she was pregnant, moved a continent away and spent the first nine years of Declan’s life moving from state to state and changing her name. That had stopped when she’d met and married Allen, his stepfather, though Declan still wasn’t sure why. All he knew was his mother married Allen and Meyers had been Declan’s last name ever since.

When he’d received a call last month informing him of his inheritance, he’d been secretly thrilled. Not by his father’s death, of course. He still wasn’t certain how he felt that he’d never met him, and now he never would. But inheriting an estate in Wales—he’d seen dollar signs and the chance to finally dig his way out of the hole his brother had landed him in.

That, of course, was before he’d seen the crumbling stone house that looked like something from a horror movie. Before he’d learned of the murders, the bodies and the cloud of bad luck that hovered over the entire village.

Before he’d spotted glowing red eyes watching him from the shadows.

A chill washed over him, but he did his best to ignore it.

“My life is back in Seattle,” Declan said. He had his family, his business, and he wouldn’t have stayed at Stonecliff if someone paid him to.

Warlow nodded. “I understand, but I think your father hoped you’d feel a sense of duty and accept your legacy to this land, to the village.”

From what he’d seen of the boarded-up shops and restaurants, there wasn’t much of the village left. Another strike against the house when he tried to sell it.

A faint smothering wrapped around him. Warlow meant well, but all his talk of duty and legacy left Declan ready to bolt.

“I’m sorry. I can’t stay.”

“Of course.” A wide smile lifted the man’s mouth, but never reached his chilly blue eyes. “I’ll leave you to make your call.”

Once the butler had gone, Declan sank into the large leather chair behind the desk and let out a sigh. He shouldn’t feel guilty about not wanting Stonecliff. He really hadn’t needed to come here at all. He could have had the lawyer arrange the sale, but he’d been curious about this house that had sent his mother running and also about his father, despite his every effort not to be. A part of him couldn’t shake the sensation that he was somehow betraying his mother’s memory by coming here.

What did it matter? In less than a week he would be home.

Declan lifted the phone and returned Stella’s call, agreeing to see her the following day. When he hung up, he leaned back in the chair and glanced at the dark screen of his father’s computer. He toyed again with packing the ancient beast away and setting up his own laptop in its place. Declan had tried to keep up with his PI firm’s clients over the past weeks while he was here. He specialized in background checks and tracking down missing people. He had a knack for finding people who didn’t want to be found—maybe a result of spending his formative years trying to stay hidden. Working at the large, ornately carved desk would certainly be more comfortable than the small writing table in his room, but the idea made his chest tighten.