“You’re not. I was right here the other night when you got the message that he was canceling his trip because of a bad car accident.”
“Right. I guess that’ll teach me to follow up on things like this myself. Particularly when a message to cancel a room comes in.” She sighed. “At least he went away somewhat mollified.”
But as I drove home, I wondered why Andrew Braxton had been so adamant about staying at Hennessey House in the first place. How could he have heard so many great things about it when it had only opened two days ago and hadn’t even been rated by any of the travel associations yet?
Had he heard about the necklace? Was that why he was so anxious to stay here? Did he think Jane had it? Who else did he know in town? Maybe I was being paranoid, but I wanted to know who in the world Andrew Braxton was. I intended to find out before Friday when he’d be moving back into Hennessey House.
I mentally added his name to my suspect list because why not? His odd, mistaken cancellation and untimely arrival were weird. I couldn’t wait to get home to my Google machine.
And I couldn’t forget about Stephen Darby, who was already staying at Hennessey House, thanks to a fraudulent telephone message about Andrew Braxton being in a car accident. Did Stephen have sinister plans to find the necklace as well? According to Lizzie, Stephen’s own father had admitted that Stephen had been desperate to get a good look at Jesse’s house that time he and Ned stopped by. Were Stephen and Ned in cahoots? Were they responsible for Jesse’s death?
I thought about Stephen’s credit card being rejected when he had checked in Saturday night. I knew things like that happened all the time, but it made me wonder about his competence as a financial adviser. Working as a part-time chef wasn’t exactly a big moneymaking occupation. Did Stephen need money? Did he think he could find the necklace and sell it for ready cash?
And who could forget that he’d already asked Jane out on two dates? Of course, what guy wouldn’t want to ask her out? But did he have an ulterior motive for getting close to her?
And if Stephen wasn’t responsible for Jesse’s death, who was?
And who was Andrew Braxton?
Stephen and Andrew were only two of the names on my newly revised suspect list. Which reminded me that I still needed to visit some of the pawnshops around the area to see if Jesse had shown the necklace to anyone else. Beginning tomorrow, I would start looking. Because people and things were closing in on Jane and I had a feeling we were running out of time.
Chapter Eleven
Early Tuesday morning after gulping down two cups of coffee to steel my nerves, I drove over to the Rawley Mansion to meet Wade and Emily. I was concerned about my crew working there while an errant ghost haunted the premises. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes. And I still couldn’t explain what had happened to Gus. Luckily he hadn’t been hurt, but his possession—what else could we call it?—was about the weirdest thing I’d ever witnessed.
I parked my truck on the street and walked up to the front door. It was open, so I walked inside. And felt the grief hit me like the heat of a blasting furnace.
“Wade?” I called.
“In here, Shannon.”
I heard pounding and ran into the dining room, where three of my guys stood with Emily near the wall of green paint. Sean was using an ax to tear into one of the wall panels—directly at the spot where the arrow was pointed.
“What’re you doing?” I shouted over the sound of the ax slamming and tearing the wood.
“There’s something in here,” Sean said. “I’m sure of it.”
“How do you know?”
Wade glanced at me. “He saw it in a dream.”
I smiled, then instantly sobered when Wade gave me a warning look. “No, really. He saw it in a dream.”
“I felt something here, too,” Emily said. “Remember the other day when the wall felt warm?”
“I remember.” It had been vibrating, too. So maybe that meant something.
“Couldn’t hurt,” Wade reasoned. “If nothing’s there, we can always patch up the wall and call it a day. Weirder things have happened, right?”
No, not really, I thought. All in all, the ghost of Mrs. Rawley was about the weirdest thing I’d ever experienced.
Sean pulled the last of the wood shards away and we all stared into the wall. Wedged inside was a small book. Sean grabbed it and held it up for us to see. He handed it to me.
“It’s a journal of some kind,” I said, staring at the faded red leather cover. I opened it to the first page and read the delicate handwriting. “The Diary of Winifred Rawley.”
I glanced at Sean. “Was this part of your dream?”
“No.” He leaned the ax against the wall. “I dreamed I was being shoved into this room and the ax floated up and into my hands. And I started tearing into this wall. Then I woke up.”
I held the book out to Emily. “Do you want to read it?”