P.J. Alderman - Ghost Ship

“It was too dark,” Hattie pointed out.

“Do you mean to tell me you can’t see in the dark ?” Jordan asked.

“Of course not. Why would you think we could?”

“Oh, maybe because you’re ghosts?” Jordan replied sarcastically, and Darcy snickered behind her. From the corner of her eye, she saw Jase crack a smile for the first time since he’d arrived.

“As ghosts, we aren’t all-powerful,” Frank retorted. “Mostly, we have the same powers of deduction and senses that a human has, plus a few extras.”

“Oh, well, that explains it.”

“At least you’re sarcastic with everyone,” Darcy said. “I’d hate to think you reserve it just for us.”

Jordan ignored that. “So what did you see?” she asked the ghosts.

“He had some small kind of light he was holding, like a directed candle, but the flame didn’t flicker,” Frank said.

“A flashlight,” Jordan explained. “Probably a small penlight.” At Frank’s perplexed look, she added, “Too complicated.”

He shrugged, accepting her answer. “I caught a glimpse of a mask, as well. Not just over the eyes and nose—bigger, as if he’d pulled it over his head.”

“Like a ski mask,” Jordan concluded.

“I have no idea what that is,” Frank replied.

“His clothing was dark, and he wore a hood over his head,” Charlotte contributed.

“Sounds like the same person who attacked me at Holt’s house,” Jordan deduced as she propped a fallen portrait against a bookcase, then set a toppled plant upright. Again.

“Wait, don’t tell me: dark hoodie and jeans, right?” Darcy asked.

“Close enough,” Jordan replied, inspecting the plant more closely. The poor thing—it had almost no soil left in the pot.

“You were also attacked at Holt’s house?” Jase asked grimly.

“I’ll explain—”

“—later,” Jase finished for her. “Got it.” He shook his head and started picking up books, replacing them on their shelves.

“Aren’t you going to dust for prints or something?” she asked Darcy.

“I’ll send someone around to dust the door and the desk in the morning,” Darcy replied. “But it’s not like you want fingerprint powder all over those rare books. And it would take forever to try to locate a fingerprint on them.”

“So that’s it?” Jordan asked.

“Yeah.” Darcy yawned. “I’m going back to bed. Your intruder is gone, whoever he was. I doubt he’ll be back tonight, but you seem to have a good warning system in place. If anything happens, call me.”

Jordan followed her outside. “Well, thanks for coming over.”

“That’s the job.” She nodded her head toward the house. “Get some sleep, and we’ll talk again in the morning. If I were you, I’d make it a top priority to see if that cash is still around, and if it is, get it into a safe-deposit box at the bank. We can let the story float around town that you’ve found it and removed it from the house. That should discourage any more nighttime visitors.”

“ If that’s what he was after,” Jordan said.

“It’s a safe bet. Those papers Clive Walters claims were stolen are worth only a fraction of the forty thousand Hattie says is in that wall safe.”

“Yeah, but Charlotte and Frank described the intruder as looking like the person I saw at Holt’s this afternoon.”

“Yesterday afternoon,” Darcy corrected mildly. “It’s way past midnight.” She stretched, then stood for a moment, checking out the neighborhood. “Seems quiet enough. I’m out of here.”

Jordan watched her drive away, then came back inside. Jase, who had followed them out and listened quietly to their exchange, stayed where he was. “I’ll bunk down here tonight. Just in case.”

“Bunk down on what?” she asked, grabbing the first excuse that came to mind. She wasn’t sure she was ready to deal with a sleepover. “My furniture is piled in the second-floor parlor. There’s only the wing-back chair in the library, or the desk chair, and you can’t sleep sitting up all night. Besides, the ghosts will alert me if anyone tries to break in again.”

“Yes, you can count on us to remain vigilant,” Hattie assured her.

“ Hattie! ” Charlotte hissed. “If he stays here, they might end up making passionate love! We should leave, so that he feels compelled to protect her!”

“Whoa,” Jordan protested. “I don’t need ghosts playing ma—” She glanced at Jase, who had his arms folded across his chest and one eyebrow raised, listening with amusement to her side of the conversation. Swallowing the word “matchmaker,” she sent Charlotte a scorching glance.

“I’ll be fine,” she told Jase.

He studied her for a moment in silence, then gripped her shoulders with warm hands and leaned in to place a light kiss on her forehead. She felt tingles all the way down to her toes. In the background, Frank snorted.

“I’ll get out of your hair, then,” Jase told her. “Pleasant dreams.” Jogging down the front steps, he disappeared into the night.

“Huh.” Jordan stared after him. “He didn’t even put up a fight.”

“You know nothing about attracting men.” Charlotte hovered in the entry. “If you had acted as if you were indisposed with a fit of the vapors, he would have remained by your side throughout the night.”

“Indeed,” Hattie agreed, “he seemed to be looking for any excuse to do so.”

“This is a conversation I wish to avoid,” Frank said.

Jordan shook her head. Then she shooed all of them back inside, closing the door. “Go back to your portals, or wherever you go at night to sleep.”

“Well!” Charlotte sniffed. “You are singularly ungrateful for our assistance this evening.”

“Thank you,” Jordan told them belatedly. “Really.” She made another shooing motion. “Now go away.”

She turned her back on them and stood in the doorway of the library, staring glumly at the mess. There was no way she was alphabetizing those books a third time. And since Tom would be tearing out the bookcase within a few hours, she could deal with the rest of the damage in the morning.

Before turning out the lights, however, she walked over to the desk and rummaged for a piece of paper and a felt pen. In large, thick block letters, she wrote: I DON’T HAVE THE PAPERS. She found some masking tape and attached the note to the front door. Then she took the small hall table and wedged it under the doorknob.

Satisfied, she and Malachi traipsed back upstairs to get whatever sleep they could before the sun rose.

Chapter 12

JORDAN woke up to a deafening, rumbling roar resembling a jet engine on bad fuel. Shooting straight up before she had fully comprehended the noise, she stared at her room from wide-open, unfocused eyes. The bed vibrated beneath her as the noise continued. Rising and lowering in volume and pitch, it was sometimes a whine, sometimes a deep, grinding sound.

Grabbing her sweats, she ran out into the hall and in the direction of the noise, which seemed to be coming from inside the second-floor parlor. That room was packed to the ceiling, but between boxes and pieces of stacked furniture, she thought she glimpsed sunlight. Where there was no window .

Hopping about on one foot, she tugged on her sweats, slapping a palm against the wall when her balance became precarious. She then headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time. Where the hell were the ghosts? How could they let something like this happen?

Yanking open the front door, she ran out, trying to pinpoint the location of the noise, tripped over something solid, and was airborne. Strong arms grabbed her before her face pancaked against the porch decking.