The Uninvited
Page 15

But as they walked, her smile faded. She moved more slowly as they left the restaurant behind.
He was surprised. She was trying to draw out their evening together.
Fine. He slowed his pace, as well, curious about her reasons.
They walked back along Market Street and the quiet of night made the experience of looking at the facade of Independence Hall seem even more hallowed. He tried to imagine how the hotheaded politicians of the time had managed to work together well enough to “make thirteen colonies chime as one.”
“A penny for your thoughts,” Allison said.
“A penny? With inflation? My thoughts are worth at least two cents.”
She laughed. “I’m not sure I could afford them these days.”
“I was thinking that it’s a miracle we exist as a nation. Could you picture our Congress today cooperating to make that kind of decision?”
“Good point,” she said. “Patrick Henry and Sam Adams were fierce and fiery orators, and they didn’t always agree with each other. They made it work somehow.”
“They had the same goal.”
She laughed. “And they put aside their differences to achieve that goal. We can keep hoping! They realized that society would change over time. When you think about the past two-hundred-plus years, they didn’t do so badly. Most of them knew the slavery question would arise, but they felt they had to create a country before dealing with such a serious issue. We’ve made mistakes as a nation and we’ll continue to make mistakes. That’s human nature. The American dream is one thing, while men and women are flesh and blood and real. All we can do is try to avoid those mistakes in the future. You know the famous quote about learning from history or else being doomed to repeat it.”
He nodded. She was interesting, reasonable…and, yes, charming. Fun to be with.
He realized it wasn’t a sudden desire for his company that had her stalling, dragging her feet, walking slowly. She seemed loath to go in the direction of her house.
“Is something wrong?” he asked her.
“No, no, nothing. I was thinking maybe I’d go to the Tarleton-Dandridge House with you now.”
He arched a brow. “You’re afraid the intriguing Cherry Addison will step in—and give me incorrect information. Or that she’ll convince me the ghosts of her ancestors are running around and our investigation would make a great TV show.”
She sent him a stern glare. “You wanted me to talk. You wanted my opinion on people there. You want to know about the history of the house. I’m too keyed up to sleep, so I’ll come back with you, if you don’t mind.”
“Not at all. I’m a big believer in plunging right in.”
He kept a smile in place.
He wondered what was going on with her. The last thing she really wanted to do, he thought, was to go to the Tarleton-Dandridge House with him.
She just didn’t want to go home. Why?
* * *
She was surprised that he hadn’t come right out and demanded to know what she was lying about.
But he hadn’t.
She sounded like a liar to herself, and she was seriously worried about her sanity.
What a choice!
Home—where Julian Mitchell might suddenly appear to be sitting in the chair by her sofa. Or the Tarleton-Dandridge House with Tyler Montague.
Montague was alive. That meant he won.
The question was, how long could she pretend to be helping him at the house?
She’d already been through the crime scene. The idea of walking through it again just made her feel numb.
They went into the mudroom and then the foyer. The entry was large, which was convenient when they were doing tours. People could disperse and look into the different rooms so they weren’t all trying to crowd into one area at the same time.
“Here we are,” Tyler said.
“Where are you sleeping?” she asked him.
“The master bedroom. I’m the first one here, so I get first choice.”
“That’s a rope bed. The quilt on it is from the 1800s.”
“The quilt is safely in a closet. I brought sheets and a blanket.”
“What about the rest of your people?”
“They’ll come with bedding, as well.”
“As well,” Allison repeated. “As well as cameras and all their ghost-hunting equipment,” she said scornfully.
He stopped and turned to her. “I’m sorry you find us laughable. My unit has an extraordinary record of solving every case we’ve been brought in on.”
“There really isn’t a case here—I mean, not worthy of your effort. I can’t see how there could be.” She thought she must have sounded desperate and tried to calm her voice. “There is nothing in that attic. Nothing worth taking. I keep thinking that Julian had to be playing a prank and it got the best of him. Who knows, maybe he thought he’d create a mystery for us, and that I’d find him in the study playing Beast Bradley and he’d scare me.”
“That may be the case,” Tyler said mildly. “If so, we won’t be here long. Look, Allison, there’ve been a lot of deaths in this house.”
She unfastened the red velvet cord that sectioned off the period sofa and sank into it. “It’s an old house,” she said stubbornly. “People die.”
“I’m not talking about the natural deaths, and you know it.”
“The unnatural ones, like the poor kid who electrocuted himself?” Allison asked. “Sam Daily. That was eight years ago. I never met him. I was a college student back then, working occasionally on my breaks. There is no real protection against human stupidity. He started ripping out wires and got an electric shock. That’s what happens.” She winced, remembering. They’d shut down the house then, too. But only for a few days.
“You were here?”
“Like I said, I never saw the student—or the police or anyone. It was horrible, tragic. As tragic as when a spring-breaker gets drunk and goes over a balcony at a Florida hotel. Everyone felt terrible, especially for the parents. When we came back to work…it was uncomfortable. And still, there was nothing any of us could have done, and certainly nothing that any form of law enforcement could have done. He thought he could trip the alarm and play games in the house. A live wire killed him. That’s all I know.”
“I didn’t say you should know more.”
She lifted a hand. “The thing is, that kind of tragedy could have happened anywhere. There’s no reason to assume that ghosts are running around this house. People can do crazy things, and sometimes they pay horrible consequences.”
“Sadly, that’s true.” Tyler took a seat next to her. “What about the other incidents?” he asked.
She cast him a wry glance. “I wasn’t alive when Bill Hall fell down the stairs.”
“Angela Wilson?”
She felt a little pang squeeze her heart. “I loved Angie. She was so knowledgeable and she was the grand matriarch here. I knew her from when I was really young. She encouraged me to love history and books and…she was a role model for me. She had a wonderful career, wrote several fantastic historical novels, married a great guy and had kids. She was seventy-two—not old at all these days, and in great shape. But she had a heart attack.”
“I’m sorry,” he said softly.
“Thank you,” she murmured just as softly.
He rose. “I’m going to take a walk around the house and make sure all the doors are closed and the windows are secure and ready for the alarm, so I can go right to sleep when I get back. Then I’ll stroll on over to your house with you and pick up my car. I’m exhausted. You must be, too.”
She nodded.
He stood up and started for the stairs.
Allison was dismayed to realize that she wanted to call him back. She wanted to leap to her feet and go with him.
She was terrified of being alone.
Somehow, she managed to stay seated.
As his footsteps disappeared up the stairs, she got up, too. She couldn’t sit still—and she didn’t want to go home.
Check into a hotel? That was ridiculous!
But it was better than going home. Thankfully, she knew some good therapists and she’d go see one first thing in the morning.
All she had to do was get through the night.
“Allison!”
She heard the whisper of her name, but denied it to herself.
The sound came again, more urgent.
“Allison, please!”
She turned and there he was, Julian Mitchell, still in period costume, in the doorway that led to Angus Tarleton’s study.
She backed away from him. She backed up so far that she couldn’t move any farther; she could feel the sofa against her legs.
Julian Mitchell came toward her.
Once again, it was too much.
This time, she didn’t hurt herself. She passed out onto the period sofa that sat just inside the entry of the Tarleton-Dandridge House.
* * *
Tyler didn’t think he’d taken that long to walk around and assure himself that the house was secure.
He must have been longer than he’d thought.
When he returned to the foyer, Allison was stretched out on the sofa, sound asleep. He gazed down at her for a moment. Maybe she’d awaken soon. He hated to rouse her when she’d been through so much and was so exhausted.
There was more work he could do in the study; he decided he’d get to it and wait for her to wake up.
He ran upstairs and got a pillow—one he’d brought himself, with a twenty-first-century pillowcase bought at Target—and slipped it beneath her head. On second thought, he went back up and returned with a blanket. When he’d covered her, he went into Angus Tarleton’s study.
While he continued to read about the people involved with the house throughout its history, he found that he was continually distracted. Looking up at the painting of Beast Bradley, he knew why.
The portrait didn’t bother him. It was the work of an excellent artist, someone capable of imbuing a painting with character. He’d shown a handsome man steeped in cruelty, a portrayal that was so different from the painting in Lucy Tarleton’s room.