Better Homes and Hauntings Read online

  “Somebody’s got a friend already,” Jake singsonged, wriggling his eyebrows at her.

  “She just feels bad for me.”

  Jake shook his head. “Nope, I have a sense for this sort of thing, Nina Linden, and you are a lady who draws people to her, like moths to a sassy but vulnerable flame. I’ll bet Deacon will fall all over himself when he sees you. I should warn you. He makes random Star Wars references when he’s nervous. So expect a lot of Lando Calrissian jokes.”

  “Yes, who could resist the pasty-green girl who looks like she’s on the verge of puking?” Nina pushed her windblown mess of thick auburn hair out of her face.

  “Some guys are into the Exorcist look,” he said, shrugging.

  She let out an indignant grunt—half laugh, half gasp—and slapped at his shoulder.

  “See? You’re feeling better already,” Jake said. “Hitting me with the force of a toddler must have required some energy—Ow!” He yelped as she whacked him again, with significantly more strength. He chuckled as a bit of color crept back into her cheeks. “You’ll be all right.” He nodded to the horizon line again. “And here is your first introduction to the lady herself.”

  Once the playground where the indecently rich escaped the heat and “vapors” of the big cities each summer, Newport was now a respectable tourist destination. The upper class still retreated to their private clubs and the middle class toured monuments to excess built by families such as the Vanderbilts and the Astors. During the so-called Gilded Age, mansions like the Breakers and Miramar set new standards in architectural extravagance, while the ever-so-riche matrons fought for dominance of the social scene. At the tail end of this era, Gerald Whitney had chosen to separate himself even further by building his home on his own private island.

  Long before the Whitneys were a wealthy family, Gerald Whitney’s great-great-great-grandfather Loudon was a simple sailor who ferried people around the bays surrounding Rhode Island. Eventually, those little bays and inlets became very important to the Revolutionary War effort. Loudon volunteered his services and his growing fleet of boats to get the Colonial troops where they were most needed, all along the seaboard. His assistance was instrumental in winning some of those first early skirmishes. Loudon invested more and more into the boats as time went by and continued to allow the Colonials to use them. He was rewarded handsomely and made friends among the earliest politicians. He made a particular friend of the governor of Rhode Island when he managed to get the governor’s son to a doctor after he was wounded in battle. The governor showed his appreciation by rewarding him in the way of the old country, with land grants. Of course, at the time, the island was virtually useless. Who would want to live on a tiny spit of land twenty miles off the mainland? But old Mr. Whitney thanked the governor profusely and held on to it. Gerald Whitney was the first to make any use of it.

  As for the house itself, the Crane’s Nest rose out of the water like a drowned debutante, her fine lines eroded and obscured, tangling into the overgrown green expanse of Whitney Island. Nina could see evidence of what had once been an exacting geometric landscaping plan leading up to a rounded porte cochere, hiding the massive front doors in its dark, cavernous maw. The gardens were long past feral, with dry, withered grass strangling the remains of statuary and rosebushes. The façade consisted of three levels, a loggia flanked by two-story wings leading into the main structure. Rows of windows stared back at her with the blank sheen of dolls’ eyes. A ring of tall chimneys crowned a flat slate roof, echoing the pattern of blunt cornices extending from the porte cochere.

  Despite the warm, sunny afternoon, there was an air of melancholy to the house, and not just in the overall state of disrepair and decay. The patina of age and grime over the battered gray limestone seemed like a black mark on the house’s soul, a warning to passersby to move along. Contentment and happiness were not to be found in the Crane’s Nest.

  The photos that had been provided for Nina’s bid hadn’t prepared her for the sheer size of the building. It felt as if the house could tumble down the sloping yard and swallow their little boat at any moment. All the more reason for Nina to want to disembark as quickly as possible.

  As they drew near shore, Jake ducked behind the helm and started making adjustments to the boat’s trajectory, calling out an occasional request to Cindy to pull a line or tighten a sail. With Nina out of commission and no other sailors aboard, Cindy’s reluctant, untrained help was the best Jake could get. The boat jolted with a splash and made a slow turn, causing Nina to groan.

  She couldn’t help but feel as if they were intruding, their arrival disrupting the house’s slumber. The Crane’s Nest had stood for nearly one hundred years, untouched and uninhabited. And now Nina felt as if she’d wandered into a church full of people to ask directions, only to realize she’d interrupted a wake.

  Nina felt Cindy approach from her right, staring up at the decrepit mansion.

  “Just a little cottage built for two,” Cindy mused, sliding her cat’s-eye sunglasses up through her thick mane of curls. “Complete with twelve bedrooms, a formal dining room, and an evil spirit in the basement that wants to eat your soul, if the urban-legend Web sites I read are to be believed. I mean, who wouldn’t want this gem for their weekend place?”

  “I don’t think the Whitneys were known for their subtlety,” Nina said, trying to focus on anything but the quivering tumble of her stomach.

  “You realize that as the blonde, I’m probably going to be picked off first,” Cindy muttered.

  “Picked off?” Nina asked.

  “Did you not hear me mention the soul-eating ghoul in the basement?” Cindy teased. “In the movies, the blonde always gets killed first, to establish the rules on Certain Death Island, such as ‘Don’t wander off on your own to go to the bathroom’ and ‘It’s not a great idea to wear a negligee to investigate spooky noises armed only with a flickering candle.’ ”

  “But you could be a postmodern blonde,” Nina suggested. “You could be Buffy or Naomi Watts in The Ring. They were always the last girls standing.”

  “Oh, we’re going to get along just fine, hon,” Cindy told her, patting her shoulder. “You get extra cool points for any Jossverse reference.”

  “Well, that’s a relief.” Squinting in the glaring afternoon light, Nina traced the line of the roof with her eyes, admiring the wrought-iron railing that enclosed the widow’s walk. There was potential for a terrace garden there, from what she’d seen in the pictures. She was trying to estimate the roof’s square footage when a dark feminine figure stepped up to the wrought-iron boundary. Nina gasped. A cold wave of nausea washed through her as the dark shape seemed to stare down at the approaching boat. For a moment, Nina thought she could make out the lines of an old-fashioned gown, a slim waist, dark twists of long hair blowing in the wind. But there was no detail to the face or form, only shadow. Nina shivered and braced herself against the bow, taking deep breaths. When she looked up at the roof again, the figure was gone.

  “Is it always this quiet?” Cindy asked, surveying the island with a worried expression.

  “Yes,” Jake called from behind the wheel. “The Crane’s Nest is the only home on the island. So, no crazy neighbors or barking dogs to keep you up at night. Don’t worry, though. We’ll make some noise soon enough,” he told her. Cindy’s delft-blue eyes narrowed at the suggestion, and Jake’s cheeks flushed. “I meant with construction equipment and workers! Hammering, nailing . . . oh, good God, there is no recovery from this, is there?”

  He looked to Nina for help, but the sudden deceleration of the boat plus the possible hallucinations of shadowy figures had finally tipped the scales in her battle with nausea. She was currently bent over the rail, saying good-bye to her breakfast.

  Cindy rushed over to Nina, whipped a blue bandanna from her pocket, soaked it with Nina’s water bottle, and held it to the back of the ailing redhead’s neck. She looked to Jake, who surveyed the scene with a horrified expression. “What did yo
u do?” she hissed at him.

  “I didn’t do that to her. Poor inner ear dynamics did that to her.”

  “Well, you must have done something! I know I’ve wanted to throw up since boarding this boat with you.”

  “Me? What did I do?”

  Cindy exclaimed, “You’re you. That’s all it takes!”

  Oddly hurt, Jake turned on his heel and devoted his attention to running the boat. “Well, it can only get better from here.”

  Orientation for Residents of Spooky Island

  EACH OF THEM handled the stress of officially landing on Whitney Island in a different way. Cindy was organizing the pile of luggage and boxes stacked near the defunct fountain just short of the sparsely graveled drive. Nina sat on a stone bench with her head between her knees. Jake was wandering around the lawn, trying to find cell-phone reception, although Nina suspected he was just trying to distract himself from staring up at the house. Every time he looked up at the huge structure, a What have I gotten myself into/I want my mommy expression fell across his boyishly handsome face.

  Nina had no desire to look at the house, either. Had she imagined the dark figure on the roof? Had the atmosphere, combined with the house’s reputation, created some sort of surreal illusion? She wasn’t one for flights of fancy . . . but it had seemed so real. Mr. Whitney said that they would be the only people present on the island full-time, but maybe he’d hired cooking staff or had his own administrative staff from his office there to make way for the renovators. Did administrative personnel wear old-fashioned gowns with tiny wasp waists?

  Every local knew the story of the Crane’s Nest and the tragic death of its mistress. Nina had grown up on the outskirts of Newport, and it was an urban legend among the local kids. Townies like Nina, who spent summers on the less picturesque stretches of beach trying to avoid summer people, grew up hearing tales of the wailing ghost of Catherine Whitney wandering the halls of the Crane’s Nest, searching for her killer, her lost treasure, a hidden illegitimate baby . . . the details tended to change depending on who was telling the story. It was a common dare among the high school set to sail to Whitney Island and spend the night at the house. Very few kids managed to make it as far as the island’s dock without getting spooked and speeding back to the mainland. This led to a rumor that the island was cursed, that no boat would moor on it. Nina had lived in Newport for most of her life, and this was the first time she’d ever laid eyes on the place.

  So it was only natural that her fertile imagination, after she’d grown up on these stories, would bring the tortured ghost of Catherine Whitney to life. Right?

  Nina rubbed her hands over her face. She had to get a grip. The Crane’s Nest job would be the crown jewel of her portfolio. Impressing Deacon Whitney would help her gain entrée into the eastern seaboard’s most exclusive circles and the rich potential clients therein. She would build her business. She would rebuild her life and her credit rating from the ground up. She would stop imagining scary shadow people on the roof.

  “Feeling better now that you’re on solid ground?” Jake asked, pressing a cold soda can into her hand.

  She accepted it gratefully and guzzled the better part of the bubbly elixir before answering. “Much, thanks,” she said, glancing over shoulder again toward the still-uninhabited roof. “I swear, I’m not this high-maintenance on dry land.”

  “Hey, you’re the first girl to throw up on that boat for reasons unrelated to alcohol. That sets you in a class all your own,” Jake assured her.

  “That’s not particularly flattering,” she mused. “Jake, you said we were the only people on the island. Surely, Mr. Whitney sent a prep team ahead of us to clean the staff quarters or stock the kitchen.”

  Jake shrugged. “Cindy’s crew came out to clean up the dorms for us. And the catering staff from Whit’s office stocked the kitchen. But they haven’t been here since yesterday. Why do you ask?”

  Nina chuckled weakly, sorry now that she’d said anything. “It’s just silly. I thought I saw someone on the roof, right before I got sick.”

  Jake smiled at her, but there was a hitch to the expression, a hesitation that made Nina curious. “We’re the only ones here, I promise. There’s nobody else. What you saw? It was probably just a trick of light.”

  Nina observed that tricks of light rarely wore hoopskirts, but she thought better of saying that out loud. Before she could come up with a more suitable response, a chopping noise in the distance caught their attention. A tiny black dot in the sky grew closer and closer, the sound of propeller blades beating a regular rhythm against the wind. The unmarked helicopter landed about forty yards to their left, flattening a patch of perfectly nice purple gypsy flowers into the dirt. Nina winced at the sight. She doubted the delicate stems would recover from that.

  Oblivious to Nina’s botanical distress, Jake helped her to her feet. “That’s Whit!” he shouted over the noise, that happy grin brightening his face again.

  The helicopter landed nimbly on the shaggy, but level, patch of grass. A slim, long-legged man in jeans and a blue Oxford shirt emerged from the helicopter. He slapped the helicopter door twice, prompting the pilot to take off. As the wind whipped his Oxford aside, Nina caught a glimpse of Captain America’s shield underneath.

  Deacon Whitney ran a billion-dollar company, and he still wore comic-book-hero T-shirts. That was sort of adorable.

  As the helicopter and its hair-wrecking winds disappeared into the horizon, she did her best to straighten her mussed clothes and look presentable. She took one last breath-freshening sip of her soda and stepped forward to greet the man who would save her financial future.

  Deacon Whitney was all long, lean limbs and angular lines, with high, sharp cheekbones and a jawline most matinee idols would sell their mothers for. But his hair was a shaggy, curling mess of light brown and combined with his rumpled business-casual clothes to complete the disgraced-aristocrat look. Much as he had when they’d first met at his corporate offices, Deacon gave Nina the immediate impression of being uncomfortable with his surroundings. He’d covered it quickly enough, with no-nonsense eye contact and firm handshakes all around, but Nina recognized the look of someone who was stressed and burdened. She’d seen it in the mirror every morning for months.

  Despite the kindred twinge she felt for another neurotic, she was determined to stay as far away as possible from Deacon Whitney. She’d had more than her fair share of men whose money made the world go ’round. Nina had no interest in falling prey to that brand of man again, even if it came wrapped up in a yummy geek-chic package.

  Jake stepped close and whispered something in Deacon’s ear. Deacon frowned and glanced at Nina. Suddenly self-conscious, she combed her fingers through her hair. “Excuse me for just a second,” Deacon said.

  Leaving the ladies to their own devices, Deacon and Jake wandered down the lawn a bit, deep in discussion. Deacon seemed unhappy, glancing over at Nina and then at the house, shaking his head. Jake shrugged and, judging from the smirk on his face, had just made some completely inappropriate comment. Deacon rolled his eyes skyward, as if asking heaven why he’d been saddled with this man as his friend. Deacon’s expression of exasperation was too well-practiced. And Jake was too good at blithely ignoring it.

  Jake poked Deacon’s shoulder, making Deacon roll his eyes again. So Jake nudged a second time, shoving him toward Cindy and Nina. Deacon reluctantly joined the group.

  “Jake just reminded me that ‘nice, nondouchebag employers’ greet people by name and make some effort to be sociable,” Deacon said, blushing slightly. “So hello, I’m Deacon Whitney, owner of this very large pile of bricks. Please excuse the dramatic entrance, but I’ve never been fond of boats.”

  Nina would have liked to have known about the nonboat option. But perhaps there was no nonboat option for nonbillionaires.

  “I chose each of you, not because you’re the biggest names in your fields but because you presented the most original ideas, and I was excited to see wh
at you would do with the place.”

  “Not me,” Jake interjected cheerfully. “I was chosen because of nepotism.”

  Deacon sighed and continued on as if Jake hadn’t spoken. “So, thank you for joining me here this summer and giving me your full time and attention during what I’m sure is your busy season. I promise the project will be worth your while. If you have any questions or concerns, don’t be afraid to come to me or Jake, here. And if you will follow me, we can get settled into the staff quarters.”

  Nina had expected Whitney to take them toward the main house, where they would bunk in abandoned guest rooms. But he led the group down an overgrown pebbled path around the main house to a series of low-slung bungalow structures flanking the coach house and the stables.

  “The original mistress of the house, Catherine Whitney, ordered the architect to build separate staff residences,” Cindy whispered as they trudged past the jagged remains of the greenhouses. “Even though the other cutthroat—but ever so elegant—Gilded Age ladies kept their servants close in case they had some urgent need for warm milk at midnight.”

  “So why did Catherine have them built so far away?” Nina whispered back.

  “Catherine wanted the servants to feel that they had a home with privacy and peace, to foster a neighborly camaraderie among the staff. She figured happier servants made for a happier household. She came from a family with just one servant, and in that kind of household, the servant was just like part of the family. I guess she was a bit more sympathetic to the plight of people living ‘belowstairs.’ ” Cindy lowered her voice even further. “Also, a less savory suggestion has been made that Mr. Whitney hadn’t wanted the servants to hear what he did to his wife at night.”

  “I grew up around here, and this is the first time I’m hearing any of this,” Nina said quietly. She looked over her shoulder to see Deacon watching her while Jake chattered about imported tile. Just as her brain managed to communicate the Smile like a normal person! message to her face, he looked away, to the tablet Jake was shoving in his face.