The Carriage House by Carla Neggers Read Free Book Online Page A

you?”
    Tess hoisted her satchel higher onto her shoulder. “I don’t believe in ghosts.”
    â€œTess.”
    â€œNo, I didn’t tell him, okay? For God’s sake, I’m a grown woman. I don’t have to tell you or my father that a few highly imaginative people believe my carriage house is haunted.”
    â€œNot a few people. It’s in the goddamn guidebooks.”
    She gripped her satchel with one hand. “How do you know these things?”
    He grinned at her from behind his oversize mustache. “I know everything.”
    â€œIf I decide to turn the place into a bed-and-breakfast, a ghost could be good for business.”
    â€œNot that ghost.”
    Tess didn’t respond.
    Davey grunted. “No wonder you still keep your old man up nights. He wants to go to his grandkids’ Little League games, and he’s got a daughter wanting to renovate a barn haunted by a murderer.”
    â€œI’m not answering you, Davey. Answering would only encourage you.”
    They turned onto the main road, traffic streaming past them, the last of the daylight finally fading. She thought of Beacon-by-the-Sea, how quiet it would be.
    Davey eased back. “Go on. Go home, Tess. If you screw up, you screw up. You’re smart. You’ll figure it out.”
    She smiled at him. “And you and Pop will be there. Don’t think I don’t know that, Davey.”
    â€œHell, no. I’m not cleaning up after this mess. You’re on your own.”
    She laughed, not believing him. “Look, I’ll invite you up for scones and tea one Sunday. Okay?”
    â€œI’ll wear garlic.”
    â€œThat’s for vampires.”
    He shrugged. “Close enough.”

Five
    S usanna denied all knowledge of how Davey Ahearn had learned about the carriage house. “He and your father have extrasensory perception where you’re concerned.” She plopped down at her computer with a tall mug of coffee she’d brewed herself. She’d once done a chart on how much she and Tess were saving over a lifetime by staying out of coffee shops. “It’s creepy. I don’t think I want to know that much about my kids.”
    Tess emptied her satchel onto her desk. She hadn’t done any work last night when she’d gotten home from the pub. “Pop and Davey don’t know anything about me.”
    â€œThey don’t understand anything about you. They know everything.”
    Susanna wanted to know all the details of Tess’s trip to see her carriage house, from the avocado appliances to the trapdoor and possible bloodstains. “Sounds like a nice little shop of horrors,” Susanna said.
    â€œIt’s got great potential.”
    â€œThat’s what we say in Texas when we’re about to tear a place down and put up a new one.”
    Tess never knew when Susanna was being serious about her Texas observations. Some days, it was like she was living in exile in Boston. Other days, she seemed very content not to be in San Antonio.
    â€œMy neighbor’s a Thorne,” Tess added.
    â€œAs in Jedidiah and the bloodstains by the front door?”
    â€œSo he says.”
    â€œWhat’s he look like?”
    Tess thought of Andrew Thorne’s piercing blue eyes and lean good looks. “A nineteenth-century duelist.”
    â€œYour basic rock-ribbed Yankee?”
    â€œIf that’s the way you want to put it.”
    â€œOkay.” She tilted back her chair and sipped her coffee, which she drank black and strong. “It’s going to be tough, paying rent on your apartment and office and keeping up this carriage house. At least there’s no mortgage. Damn, you must have a good accountant—”
    â€œI do.” Tess crossed their small office to the coffeepot, filled her own mug. She added more milk than she normally would since Susanna had done the brewing. “I don’t know, Susanna, but I think somehow I was