Inheritance (The Lost Bride Trilogy, #1)(31)

“That sounds like a lot. Is it a lot?”

“Maine winters are long. If you need more, you tell me or John Dee. You’ve got a log splitter, but you’re going to do me a favor and not mess with it.”

She swiped a hand over her heart. “I can give you my solemn oath on that one.”

“Anything I didn’t cover you want to know? Anything I did you have questions about?”

“I’m hoping I don’t forget half the things you went over, but I think I’m good. Or good enough. But I do have one question. Your father didn’t tell me how Collin died.”

“He fell down the stairs. The same stairs Johanna fell down nearly thirty years ago. He’d taken a sleeping pill. Just one according to the coroner, but enough to make him woozy. And some over-the-counter cold meds. He’d caught a cold, and it lingered. For whatever reason, he got up in the night, and fell. My mother had made him some chicken soup, and I stopped by to bring it and check on him.”

“You found him.”

“I did.”

For a moment she thought she caught the scent, just a hint of the aftershave her father had worn. Then it faded.

“That was hard for you.”

“He was family. So the way it comes down, Sonya, makes you family.”

“I understand he was family to you, and you to him. I don’t understand why he left all this to me instead of to you and your family.”

“He wanted you here,” Trey said simply. “Now you are. Personally, I think you’ll stay.”

“Why?”

“The manor weaves a spell. I’ve been watching it weave one on you. I’m going to leave you to settle in.” He got to his feet. “You need anything or have any more questions, you know how to reach me.”

“Take half the cookies. You more than earned them.” She took a handful out, gave him the tin.

“That’s more than half.”

“So share.”

She walked with him to the front door. “It’s snowing pretty good now. I hope you don’t have far to go.”

“I’ve got the third floor over the law offices. It’s not very far.”

“Handy. No commute to work. I’ve gotten used to that myself.”

“You’re going to hear John Dee and the plow before long. He might wait to blow off your walks until morning.”

“Either way, I’ll have coffee. Thank you for everything, and tell your father I hope he feels better soon.”

“You’re welcome, and I will.” In his parka, still hatless, he took her hand. “You’ll be fine.”

“You sound sure.”

“Because I am. Welcome home.”

“Trey,” she said as he opened the door to the wind and blowing snow. “Just one question. Have you ever actually seen a ghost?”

He gave her a long look and that quiet smile. “Yes.”

“In the manor?”

“That’s two questions. Same answer. She was on the widow’s walk dressed in white.”

He left her shivering in the doorway. She waited until he’d started the truck, backed out of the drive.

She closed the door, leaned back against it. And looking at Astrid Grandville Poole’s portrait, said, “Well, shit.”

The best thing to do—the smart thing to do—was go up, unpack, give that champagne time to chill.

She’d FaceTime with Cleo, call her mother.

She’d make something to eat—God knew, from the look of the fridge, the Doyles had supplied her with enough for a month.

She walked up the stairs, trying not to think two people had died on them, and down the long hallway into what was now her bedroom.

She walked to the window. And the view simply entranced her.

The blowing curtain of snow with the steel-gray sea behind it. That curtain hid the bay and the village. It closed her in.

But the fire offered warmth and light; the room smelled of fresh flowers.

She would be fine, she told herself. And she could be happy here if she gave herself a chance to be.

Opening a suitcase, she began the task of making the room hers. Clothes tucked in drawers, hung in closets. Cosmetics and creams in the vanity drawers, to be organized later. Her tablet sitting on a nightstand, charging. Her great-grandmother’s old silver-backed brush and mirror on the dresser along with three pretty little bottles she’d found antiquing with Cleo. And a fourth holding the perfume she’d indulged in post-Brandon.

More hers now, she decided.

In the morning, she’d set up her office in that fabulous library. She’d hang her father’s paintings there.

He already had one hanging in the manor, she thought. How had Collin come by it? That’s a question she wanted answered.

Halfway down the stairs she felt a wave of cold air and turned, half expecting to see someone behind her.

“Old house,” she muttered. “Drafts expected.”

She went into the kitchen, slapped a sandwich together with the provided bread and cold cuts. She ate it over the sink, watching the snow.

And felt a ridiculous lift when she heard what had to be John Dee and his plow.

A quick hunt scored her a lidded mug and she filled it with coffee. She’d watched and learned.

Gearing up, she took it outside to meet another neighbor.