Haunting Jordan (2 page)

Jordan frowned. Even with the aid of fuzzy focus, the house wasn’t yet close to a “beauty.” But, hey, maybe he was an architect who recognized potential.

The aroma of fresh-roasted coffee and steamed milk wafted over her, and her eyes crossed.

“Can I ask what your interest is in her?” he asked.

“What? Oh.” Jordan cleared her throat. “I bought her.”

“Ah.” He looked squarely at Jordan, not concealing his curiosity. Up close, his face was rugged and lived-in … and appealing. “You must be the psychologist from Los Angeles.”

Her surprise must have shown on her face.

“Sorry.” He shrugged, smiling sheepishly. “Small towns and all that.” He extended a hand. “Jase Cunningham.”

“Jordan Marsh.” His grip was warm and firm.

“So you’ll be setting up shop here in town?”

“No, at least, not right away.” Perhaps not ever, though she wasn’t admitting that yet, even to herself. “I’m taking a year off to work on the house.”

“You’re planning to fix her up?”

She nodded.

“Good.”

“I need to buy a hammer,” she blurted out.

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “The purchase of a hammer is a symbolic act. It is not to be taken lightly.”

She narrowed her gaze. Okay, scratch
architect
. Maybe he was one of those artisans who worked on historic homes. Maybe he had a lot of hammers. Maybe he named them.

He came to some kind of conclusion with a nod. “Talk to Ed at Port Chatham Hardware out on the highway, and tell him I sent you. He’ll get you set up properly.”

“Um, thanks.”

He pried one of the cups from its holder and handed it to her. She clutched it with both hands, giving him a look of such profound gratitude that he grinned. “You seem a little shell-shocked—it’s the least I can do. Welcome to the neighborhood.”

“Thanks again.”

He waved a hand as he started down the street.

“Hey,” she yelled, and he turned back, raising an eyebrow. “Do you know who owns the dog?”

“Nope. Never seen him before.”

* * *

J
ORDAN
watched for a moment longer, then shook her head.
Four-Point Plan for Personal Renewal
. Time to review the salient points.

As she walked over to her Toyota Prius, she took a sip of the coffee, which she discovered was an excellent latte. The man obviously knew his java. Shifting the cup to her left hand, she opened the trunk and hauled out her bag.

The hairs on the back of her neck suddenly rose, and she glanced around. The neighborhood of turn-of-the-twentieth-century homes seemed unusually deserted, the street empty and desolate with its cracked pavement and faded markings. Why weren’t more people outside, taking advantage of the fine summer day?

She studied the vacant windows of the surrounding houses, keeping her expression nonchalant. No doubt a neighbor was watching her from inside one of them. After all, this was a small town—people were bound to be curious about the recently widowed psychologist moving to their neighborhood.

From the foliage of the maple tree, a songbird trilled enthusiastically, mocking her uneasiness. Shrugging, she gripped the handle of her bag and rolled it across the uneven lawn, banging it up the front steps.

The dog scrambled to its feet, ears perked. It had the black and tan coloring of a German shepherd, but its blocky build and thick, shaggy hair reminded her of a much larger breed. Definitely a classic mutt. A very
large male
mutt. She held out her hand for him to sniff.

Setting her bag down, she hunted through her pockets for the key the real estate agent had given her. After several tries, the lock gave with a screech and the beveled-glass door swung inward.

She looked down at the dog. “Excuse me.”

He cocked his head.

“Shoo?” She wiggled her fingers, and when that had no effect, she managed to look stern. “Go home!”

He didn’t budge.

She sighed. “I absolutely
cannot
get attached to you—someone owns you, I’m sure of it. I’m not letting you inside.”

He barked, and she jumped a foot. Then he trotted into the foyer.

“Right,” she muttered.

She set her bag inside the door, then slowly turned in a semicircle. The carved mahogany staircase that had made her hyperventilate when she’d first laid eyes on it rose in a graceful curve to the second floor, its risers covered by a faded, robin’s-egg-blue runner worn through at the front edges. To her right stood the parlor with its bay window looking onto the front porch; to her left, the library that had been the second reason she’d lost her mind and written an obscenely large check.

“God.” She sagged against the arched doorway to the library, staring at the cream-colored area rug. “That may be an Aubusson. Did I even notice that when I was here before?”

Nails clicking on the oak parquet flooring, the dog came to stand next to her, sniffing the stale air. She rubbed his head. “If you pee on that rug,” she warned, “we’ll have words. No marking your territory, even if it is the male imperative.”

He looked insulted and returned to lie down by the front door.

The house had the empty silence of disuse, as if it had been waiting far too long for her arrival. She climbed the stairs, brushing cobwebs off the dusty railing. High up in the stairwell, sun shone through a small dormer window,
turning the tracks her fingers made a burnished gold. Dust motes spiraled upward, floating on air currents warmed by shafts of sunlight.

She walked into the front bedroom, a giant, dimly lit cavern, the formality of its frescoed ceiling relieved by the cozy window seat in the turret. The room stood empty, its wide-planked floor scratched and bare, and the air was even staler than it had been downstairs.

After three tries, she found a window that wasn’t painted shut. Fresh air blew in on a cool breeze, banishing the odors of must and mildew. She’d start cleaning in here first so that she wouldn’t have to put her sleeping bag down in the dust. She’d packed only the essentials for the trip—casual clothes, an espresso maker, books. The movers wouldn’t be here for another day or two, so she’d be roughing it until then.

Bracing her knee on the worn velvet seat cushion, she gazed down at the street through the leafy boughs of the maple tree. The neighborhood was quiet, filled with quaint, carefully tended houses and mature trees, reminiscent of small-town America from a bygone era. Ryland would have hated this place, she mused, as much as she was drawn to it.

The dog trotted up the stairs but stopped short of coming into the room, watching her hopefully with soft, liquid brown eyes. She straightened, sighing. “You really
do
need to go home.”

Walking over to him, she rubbed his head some more, then ran a hand down his back. She could feel every joint of his spine, she realized in horror. Whoever owned him
certainly didn’t deserve him. “Come on, fella. Let’s find you something to eat.”

She bounded down the stairs. Glancing into the library as she walked past, she noted what she estimated to be a few thousand books stacked in random piles and jammed into glass-fronted bookcases. A wingback chair sat in the center of the room, flanked by a rickety pedestal table and a floor lamp with a leaded-glass shade. Across the room, a huge oak desk sat stacked with more books and yellowed newspapers. But it was the French doors on the opposite wall that beckoned.

She held up a hand to the dog. “I’ll only be a moment …”

The doors swung open onto a stone patio tangled with weeds. An intoxicatingly sweet scent blew in, and she ventured out a few steps and looked up, trying to locate its source. She gasped. Wisteria covered the entire side of the house. Its cascading lilac flowers drowned her in fragrance.

“Oh …
oh
!” She knelt and wrapped her arms around the dog’s neck.

In her mind’s eye, she could see the garden as it would be when she cleaned it up—overflowing with flowers, bounded by bentwood fencing lush with climbing roses blooming in a riot of pink and white. What she’d felt the first time she’d seen the house had been a serious crush, but this … this was
love
.

“I’ll be okay,” she sniffed, burying her face in the dog’s fur and pushing back the ever-present grief. “We’ll be just fine.”

“Hello?” The call came from the front hall.

“Coming!” She stood, swiping at tears, and crossed the library. Through the window, she spied a police cruiser parked at the front curb.
Damn
.

A woman stood inside the door, her gaze as sharp as the razor cut of her chin-length ash-blond hair. She spied Jordan. “Oh, good. I was afraid Sandy—the real estate agent—had left the door open. You must be the psychologist.”

Though dressed casually in pressed jeans and a tailored jacket, she reminded Jordan of a Scandinavian Valkyrie—around six feet tall, she estimated, athletic and imposing as hell. Jordan had had her fill of cops in the last few months, asking questions for which she had no answers, treating her as if she were a criminal.

The Valkyrie thrust out a hand nearly twice the size of her own. “Darcy Moran. Port Chatham chief of police.”

Chief of police. Even worse
. Jordan reluctantly introduced herself. “What can I do for you, Chief Moran?”

“Make it Darcy. Stopped by to welcome you to the neighborhood.”

Jordan relaxed marginally. “Thanks.”

Darcy jerked her head toward the front door. “Looks like you could use some help carrying boxes.”

“That’s okay. You don’t—” She was talking to empty space. The woman was already at the curb, pulling boxes from the trunk of Jordan’s Prius.

Jordan followed at a more leisurely pace. “Slow day?” she asked wryly.

“Waiting for the tourists to wake up and hit the
streets.” Darcy shoved a box into her arms, then picked up two more. “Where do you want these?”

“Um, the kitchen?”

They carried the boxes down the hall to the roomy country kitchen at the back of the house.

“When did you hit town?” Darcy asked over her shoulder as she deposited her boxes on the warped linoleum counter and headed back outside.

Jordan had to trot to keep up. “This morning. I’m a bit overwhelmed.”

“Buyer’s remorse.” Darcy handed her another box. “You’ll get over it.”

“The wisteria’s helping.”

“Yeah, it’s cool. Bit of a pain to keep in check, though.”

It took only two more trips to empty the car. “See?” Darcy dusted off her hands. “Much easier when someone helps.”

Jordan eyed her, trying to catch her breath. “Anyone ever compare you to a human cyclone?”

“I may have heard similar comments a time or two. Got anything to drink?”

Jordan rummaged in the ice chest they’d brought in, coming up with a soda. Then she found a bowl and headed for the sink. Nothing but a hiss of air came out when she turned the faucet handle, so she uncapped a bottle of Evian and poured it into the bowl for the dog. Unwrapping the all-natural chicken breast she’d been saving for a sandwich, she held it out to him. He scarfed it down in one gulp, then looked at her expectantly.

“I’ve been trying to catch up with that dog all week.”
Darcy flipped open her cellphone. “Let me put in a call to Animal Control—”

He lowered his head and whined.

“No!”

Darcy paused, her finger poised over the keypad, brows raised.

“He’s mine,” Jordan improvised.

“Uh-huh. Didn’t you say you just drove in this morning?”

“Minor technicality,” she replied brightly. “Why don’t we take our drinks and go sit out front? I’ve always wanted a front stoop to sit on.” Without waiting for an answer, she grabbed Darcy’s soda can, leaving her to follow.

“So what made you decide on Port Chatham?” Darcy asked once they were settled on the porch steps.

“An acquaintance of mine gave me tickets to last year’s jazz concert. A few days in town was all it took to hook me on the idea of moving up here. Are you familiar with the Ted Rawlins Trio?”

Darcy nodded. “Rawlins is the friend? I’ve heard him play—he’s very good. I think he purchased a summer home south of town on the golf course, didn’t he?”

“He comes up every summer, as far as I know.”

“How long are you planning to stay in town? Will Longren House be your vacation home, or your primary residence?”

The police chief was grilling her—and not all that subtly, either. Jordan kept her answers friendly. “I’ll be here at least a year, maybe more, depending on how the
remodel goes. And no, I don’t plan to split my time—I’m gone from L.A. for good, I think.” She shrugged. “We’ll see. I want to research the house’s history, plan the remodel right. Got any suggestions on where to start?”

“County. They might even have a copy of the original plans.” Darcy propped an elbow on the top step. “If memory serves, a Captain Charles Longren built the place for his bride, Hattie, in the late 1800s. Hattie didn’t live here all that long, though. There’ve been a number of owners over the years—”

Her cellphone wailed, startling Jordan.

After a brief conversation, Darcy hung up, sighing. “I’ve got to head back to the station.”

“Your phone is programmed for Miles Davis?”

“Of course. We take our jazz seriously around here.” Darcy drained her soda and stood, then studied Jordan for a moment. “So I’m betting you weren’t the one who cut the brake lines on your husband’s Beemer.”

“No, I wasn’t.” Jordan managed to keep her tone matter-of-fact.

Darcy nodded. “Needed to ask.”

“I can give you the name of the detective in L.A. who is handling the case. I’m sure he’ll be glad to fill you in.”

“Not necessary. The LAPD has already been in contact to say you’re part of an ongoing investigation. It got me curious, so I asked a few questions.”

Jordan didn’t respond—over the past few months she’d learned not to volunteer information.

They walked to the curb, Darcy in the lead. “Listen,
why don’t you drop by the pub tonight? I’ll introduce you around.”

“Pub?”

“The neighborhood hangout, over on the main drag. Come to think of it, your buddy Rawlins is slated to perform there tomorrow night. It’s a laid-back place—the food is great and Jase doesn’t water the drinks.”