Unhallowed Ground by Heather Graham Read Free Book Online Page A

that the excavation of the bones should be supervised by Professor Manning, an expert from the college who had one doctorate inhistory and another in anthropology. She was far too close to the situation here, too involved.
    She just wanted those skeletons out of her walls and respectfully interred—somewhere far away.
    It was definitely going to be one hell of a story. So far the police had agreed to her request that no press be let into the house until the researchers and police had carried out the necessary investigations. The bones wouldn’t be going to a mortuary any time soon. While the circumstances leading to their presence in her walls were being determined, the bones themselves would be going to various institutes for study.
    Study that would take time.
    She let out a groan of frustration, stood up, grabbed her things and stuffed them into a small rolling suitcase, and then paused, looking around the room and catching sight of herself in the standing mirror. She looked too thin and too pale, she decided. Why? She wasn’t afraid of the bones, wasn’t afraid of being haunted by ghosts crying out for help. She firmly believed that the soul did not remain in the body after death.
    Still, this discovery had somehow changed everything.
    Her house had now become a small part of history, a part of local lore and legend, in a way she had never anticipated or wished for.
    There was nothing genuinely tragic about the discovery—an undertaker of long ago had done all the right things in public, then made money by selling the same coffins over and over again. The souls of the people in the walls were long gone, and anyone who had loved them was long gone, too.
    But for some reason it felt as if her life was going to be different from now on, and that made her uneasy.
    At least I’m not a blonde, she found herself thinking, then winced. Where had that thought come from? A young woman, a blonde, was missing, and that was sad, but it had nothing to do with her house. It was odd, though, that there had been two disappearances in two years—two young women, both with blond hair. Maybe it wasn’t the most admirable way to be thinking, but it was reassuring to know that at least she didn’t seem to fit the profile of those recent victims.
    She sighed and turned to leave. For tonight, she wanted out of here. Rolling her bag behind her, she hurried downstairs.
    There was no one in the entry or hallway, but she could hear voices coming from the library.
    The room where the grisly discovery had been made.
    As she stood there, wondering whether she should let someone in charge know she was leaving, Caroline reappeared.
    “Come on, at least come get a drink with us,” Caroline suggested.
    “All right, but let me run over to Bertie’s and get a room first.”
    “I still say you could stay with me,” Caroline told her, then gave in when she saw that Sarah’s mind was made up. “Never mind. Go on and get your stuff over to Bertie’s, then meet us at Hunky Harry’s.”
    “It’s a plan,” Sarah agreed.
    “You’ll really show?”
    “Yes, I’ll really show,” Sarah said. “I promise.” Shequickly gave Caroline a kiss on the cheek and headed out. From the corner of her eye she’d seen Will, Travis and Renee heading toward them from the hallway, and she wanted to get away from everyone. She desperately needed a little respite from the day’s excitement.
    She made it down to the sidewalk, where there was still a throng of tourists and a few locals. Friends. She found herself caught up in conversation, whether she wanted to be or not.
    Luckily, the cops were there, too, clearing the area. As soon as she could manage it without being hated by every friend and acquaintance in the area, she escaped.
     
    There was something about the house, definitely. It had drawn him from the first, and Caleb didn’t think it was because he had somehow sensed that a long-ago funeral director had been playing fast and loose with the corpses