“Maybe not, Penny. We don’t know that.”
Darcy felt her breath catch. That was it, of course. She’d assumed, they’d all assumed, that the ghost had to have been there for years. She had never really thought that Matt might have killed his ex-wife, and yet…
The suspicion had been there.
She stared at Adam. He stared back at her, and she knew that they were both hoping that they hadn’t found Lavinia Harper Stone.
Matt was still staring at Darcy. She felt his eyes and looked back at him.
“We don’t know anything about this skeleton—yet,” he said. “But we will.”
With that, he walked on by.
And all eyes turned on Darcy.
Chapter 17
17
I t was approximately one in the morning when they first dug out the bones.
It was four by the time Matt’s team had carefully dug out the surrounding dirt along with the skeleton and sealed off the smokehouse for further excavation. The box containing the remains was locked into the morgue at the Mahoney Funeral Home by four-thirty, and Matt was back at the house by five and finally showered and in bed at five-thirty.
He was exhausted, and should have slept easily, but he lay awake staring up at the ceiling. How the hell had she done it?
He was tempted to go to her. Knock on her door, the hell with whoever might hear the sound. He felt a greater need than ever to be with her. He tried to tell himself that he was an idiot—she had suggested that he might be capable of murder, for God’s sake! And there was still that thing…tonight, once again, seeing the look in her eyes, the set of her jaw. It was creepy, and if he was failing to realize it, it was all because he was blinded by emotion, he was letting his dick, rather than his mind, rule his thinking.
Didn’t matter, he realized. He felt the same way about her, no matter what. Except…he was damned indignant. He looked at his watch. Six. He groaned, then rose, went out to his desk, and began shuffling through his papers. Somewhere, he had the cell number he wanted. Not in his phone, it was too new.
At last, in the bottom drawer, with a stash of old pictures, he found the number. He punched it in, expecting an answering machine.
She didn’t answer with a simple hello. After all these years, she must have recognized the house number on her caller ID.
“Darling!” Lavinia cooed over the wires. “Darling, do you know what time it is?”
“Six-o-five, I believe,” Matt said dryly. “Sorry, I thought your machine would pick up, and you’d give me a call back.”
“That’s quite all right, although really, you should know better than to call me at this hour, unless, of course, you have some kind of incredibly hot proposal to make?” she teased.
“No. Actually, I just called to see how you were doing.”
“At six in the morning?”
“Like I said, I didn’t expect you to answer.”
He heard Lavinia’s low, husky, rumbling laugh. Once, the sound of it had been sheer aphrodisiac. Now…
“Things are going wickedly down there, so I hear,” she told him. “Believe it or not, I was going to call to see if you were all right.”
“Oh?”
“An article made it into the New York papers by that local walking-stick you’ve got down there. All about the occult. You’ll just have to see it, darling. All about the world’s most beautiful ghost hunter finding a skull, then being cast into a grave.”
“That just happened yesterday!” Matt said.
“Darling, it’s only ‘news’ because they get it out quickly.”
“Good point, Lavinia.”
“Is she that beautiful?” Lavinia inquired.
Matt wondered if there was a touch of jealousy in her voice, and even, a touch of pathos.
The past was long gone. And Lavinia was alive and well and in New York. He was suddenly feeling very generous.
“Lavinia, she looks a great deal like you. A tall redhead with all the elegance in the world.”
“Should I come down and meet her?” Lavinia asked. Matt wasn’t sure if she did so with mischief, or the best of intentions. “I mean, it sounds as if you could use a little help. You know…actually, I wasn’t all that fond of the Lee Room myself, but…the article this fellow wrote tells about all these weird events at the house, how a ghost has pulled hair and slapped people, and all that kind of stuff. If you need help…?”
“That’s sweet, Lavinia. I think we’re fine.” He hesitated. “Miss Tremayne led us to a skeleton last night. Once the remains are identified, I think we’ll be fine.”
She was silent for a minute, intuitive, then she said, “Oh, Matt! I am so sorry. I haven’t been there in years, of course, and I had said that I was coming back. I had an offer in Paris I couldn’t refuse, and there was no point in pursuing that lovely affair between the two of us….”
“A marriage isn’t the same as an affair, Lavinia,” he said.
“But someone there thinks the bones are me!” she exclaimed.
“Lavinia, look at that! If you tire of the social whirl, you’ll be perfect for Harrison Investigations. What intuition.”
“Don’t tease, Matt. I’m between events right now. Summer can be so droll. If you need to prove that I’m alive, I’ll be happy to come down.”
“Lavinia, I know you’re alive and well, and I’m grateful. That’s all I need.”
“Ah, well. You do have my number.” The last was filled with sexual innuendo. It didn’t mean anything. Lavinia was incapable of anything else.
“Thanks, Lavinia. And hey, if you need me, I’m here.”
“Oh, darling, on nights when I’m alone, I do need you.”
“Good thing there aren’t many nights like that, eh, Lavinia?” he said, his tone light. “Sorry to have awakened you. Take care.”
“You, too. I’ll love you a little, Matt.”
“Yeah? Thanks. Take care.”
He hung up, feeling remarkably smug. Maybe he should have asked her to come down. Make sure everyone saw her.
He nearly jumped when the phone started to ring again. Thayer.
“Thayer, what’s up? Didn’t you get anyone to spell you yet?”
“Matt, you’re not going to believe this.”
The pleasure he’d felt at hearing Lavinia’s voice evaporated in a flash. “Try me.”
“The bones are gone.”
“What?”
“The bones are gone. There was a break-in at Mahoney’s place. And the box with the dirt and the bones has been stolen.”
“Anything else missing?” he asked Thayer.
“The office drawers were trashed, some petty cash was taken,” Thayer said. Then he plunged in with, “But if you ask me, they broke in for the bones. Someone has chalked a few of the walls with Greek letters as if it were a fraternity prank, but…who knows? College kids have been known to do more than steal bones on a lark.”
“You’ve got the area sealed?” Matt asked, a little too harshly. But he’d be damned if he’d lose fingerprints or any other important evidence on this one.
“Matt, you know that we’re capable of protecting the integrity of a scene,” Thayer said.
“Sorry, I do know that,” he said. “I’ll be right there.”
Darcy woke to the sound of an ear-shattering scream. She’d had to shower again last night, after her bout in the smokehouse, and she was wearing a knee-length sleep T-shirt. She didn’t bother with a robe or slippers, or care in the least about her appearance, not at the sound of a scream like that one.
She tore out of her room and to the railing, looking downward.
Penny was standing in the foyer, her hand to her throat.
“Penny!” Darcy cried, and came racing down the stairway.
She came up abruptly against Penny’s back, and stared past her.
There was a soldier at the front door. He was wearing worn butternut and gray, his sash tied perfectly around his hips, his sword swinging at his side. His hat was low slung over white hair, and he wore a regal silver beard. He was ready to march to battle.
“Harry Smith!” Penny chastised, her finger falling from her throat.
Harry Smith. Darcy smiled, recognizing the medical technician who had come to her aid when she’d crashed through the floor at the library.
“You scared me to death!” Penny told him.
“Penny Sawyer, why I’d suddenly scare you after all these years, I can’t begin to imagine!” he said gruffly, shaking his head. “But I sure am sorry.” A smile was tugging at his lips, and only barely hidden by his growth of beard.
Darcy started to laugh herself, and then Penny eased completely and laughed as well. It was easy to see how Penny might have thought that she had indeed come across a ghost from the past. Harry Smith was the perfect image of a long-ago soldier.
“Harry, you look great!” Darcy said.
He inclined his head toward her. “Thank you, ma’am. The uniform belonged to my great-great-grandfather, who was captain of one of the units that fought here. The sword is authentic, too.”
“Harry, this is all well and good, but did you forget the concept of knocking?” Penny asked. “If you’d knocked at the door, I might not have come so close to having a heart attack!”
“Penny, now, you’re the one who’s claimed to have seen ghosts in the past, anyway,” Harry told her. “I did knock. No one answered, and the door was open.”
“That’s odd—we’ve been careful about locking it lately,” she murmured, then challenged Harry again, her eyes sparkling. “And we had a rough night. Darcy led us to a stash of bones in the smokehouse, so you see, Harry Smith, there is a ghost!”
Harry looked at Darcy. “I heard,” he said. “Good work, young lady. Except, it seems that you ladies haven’t heard the latest.”
“What happened?” Darcy asked.
