Always in My Dreams by Jo Goodman Read Free Book Online

recommendation."
    "And all of it done today. Imagine that. You were very certain of me."
    He shook his head. "I was hopeful."
    "This means I'll be missing the spring term at school."
    "Is that a sacrifice?" he asked. "I didn't think you were enjoying yourself."
    Skye couldn't remember that her father had ever thought she should attend college to enjoy herself. His lecture had invariably included the fact that she should study harder. "It's not a sacrifice. I wasn't doing very well."
    "That's not because you're not smart enough," he said.
    Suspecting that he was warming up to a speech, Skye leaned forward, dropped a kiss on her father's cheek, and bade him goodnight. In the hallway she called the same to her mother before tripping lightly up the stairs.
    Skye's bedroom was in a separate wing from that of her parents. At one time she had her sisters on every side of her. Now she was alone. Some nights she missed the sharing and confiding, the laughter and tears, but this evening she didn't mind them being gone. One of them might have tried to talk her out of going to the valley. Someone, probably Rennie, would have brought up the Granville ghost and tried to frighten her out of her plan.
    Skye caught her reflection in the mirror above her vanity. Her mouth was lifted at one corner in a half smile. She shook her head, laughing at herself. That ghost. From the moment she realized her destination was the Granville house she'd felt a thrill of fear that made her instantly feel all of five again. And not only fear. There was curiosity that was almost like a hunger. Excitement squeezed her stomach and heart. It was the kind of anxiety that skirted the edge of panic and gave her restless energy instead.
    She'd felt that same way in the park tonight, not when she was surrounded by Daniel and his friends, but when she was hiding in the pines, watching the stranger face his enemies.
    Skye sat at her vanity, dropped the newspaper among her perfumes and creams and rouge, and took the pins from her hair. As she threaded it with her fingers, her hair was like fiery silk against her skin. She massaged her temples, easing the tension that had begun to form there.
    The stranger. She had managed to put the incident behind her, but not the feelings. She wanted her life to be that exciting. It hadn't seemed earlier that being a housekeeper for Jonathan Parnell quite fit the bill. Now, thinking of confronting that childhood ghost, for all that it was only a story meant to scare her, it seemed that a door had been opened to her. There was no sense in not stepping through it.
    Skye unbuttoned the throat of her velvet bodice. Flipping open the paper again, she reread Parnell's ad.
    Housekeeper desired for year-round employment. Small staff. Must be able to do both heavy and light work. Room and board. $50 per month. Please reply to 224 Brooke Place, Baileyboro, New York.
    Heavy work... she wondered if he expected his housekeeper to move the furniture as well as dust it. The wages were less than her father gave her for an allowance, but she would survive quite nicely in Baileyboro. There was no place in the hamlet to spend her money. Small staff. She remembered the Granville home as being every bit as big as anything ever built on Fifth Avenue. It was curious that he didn't require a full staff.
    Skye got up from the vanity and turned down her bed. She lighted a lamp on her small writing desk, then went to the armoire and withdrew a nightgown and robe. The nightdress had a border of eyelet lace on the neck, sleeves, and hem, and pearl buttons on the bodice. The material was so voluminous that Skye always felt she was being wrapped in a cloud. The very feminine cut of the nightgown disappeared as Skye slipped into her comfortable old robe. The plain cotton wrapper, shiny at the elbows, worn at the hem, and frayed along the sash, had certainly seen better days, but Skye couldn't part with it.
    After belting the sash, Skye sat down to compose her response