Ropes and Revenge (4 page)

She pushed through the swinging doors to the saloon, pausing to soak in the Old West feel of the place. The long, polished bar was a heavy, ornamented thing from another century and across the room a small wooden stage shrouded with thick red curtains practically begged for an old time burlesque performance. Aside from the jukebox and the modern clothing on the patrons scattered throughout the tables and cozied up to the bar, she could have been transported back to another age.

Immediately, her foul mood grew a few degrees fairer. Her passion for servicing the spiritually distressed was rivaled only by her passion for historical treasures. She’d been a history junkie since the day her father had taken her to the Metropolitan Museum’s Egyptian exhibit for her fifth birthday.

She couldn’t resist trailing her fingers along the polished wood of the bar, tracing the hand carved vines that swirled along the edge. She was so drawn in she didn’t realize she had company until a bright voice sounded beside her.

“Isn’t it gorgeous? I could fondle this baby all day long.”

Percy turned to find the clerk who had checked her in early this morning sliding onto the stool beside her. The petite Asian woman had changed from her hotel uniform into a purple and green scarf dress with a matching purple nose ring that glinted from the center of her heart-shaped face.

“It’s beautiful,” Percy said. “Is it original to the hotel?”

“Not this one.” The woman rearranged her skirt and hung her small purse on one of the hooks beneath the bar. “It was salvaged from the Union Hotel over in Peyote after it burned, but the Blue Saloon’s original owner did all the restoration work himself.” She patted the stool beside her. “Take a load off and tell me how your first day of touring Lonesome Point’s most haunted went. I’ve been thinking about you.”

“Pretty good,” Percy lied before sliding onto her own stool. “But I’m hoping to have a chance to go back to the Lawson ranch and do another sitting.”

“So cool.” The clerk’s brown and gold eyes flashed with excitement as she held out a ring-bedecked hand. “I’m Yasmin, by the way.”

“Percy.” Persephone shook Yasmin’s hand, pleasantly surprised to have company. She usually wasn’t good at meeting people. On her shorter trips, she tended to drift in and out of towns without speaking to anyone aside from her pre-arranged contacts. “Have you worked at the hotel long?”

“Only a few months, but I love it. It’s so fun to meet new and interesting people all the time. Like you.” Yasmin grinned. “But I’m off for the next two days. Want to help me get my weekend started? I’ll buy the first round.”

“Oh, no,” Percy demurred. “Let me buy.”

“Seriously, let me get it.” Yasmin glanced over her shoulder to where the bartender was busy at the opposite end of the bar before turning back to Percy and adding in a confidential whisper, “Clint, the bartender, is my new sex slave so I get a killer discount on well liquor and house wine.”

Percy blinked. “Oh, well then… I, um... I guess a glass of the house white would be great.” She watched as Yasmin crooked her finger and Clint—a handsome older man with a hint of gray in his neatly trimmed facial hair—started their way.

Percy tried to keep her eyes on the bar as Clint and Yasmin kissed hello, but she couldn’t help sneaking a peek and wondering what it would be like to be so at ease with a lover that she felt comfortable swirling her tongue through his mouth in public. Considering she hadn’t kissed a man—even in private—in nearly a year, she doubted she would be getting the answer to her question anytime soon.

“Clint, this is Percy, the ghost whisperer I was telling you about,” Yasmin said, when she finally came up for air, fluttering her ring-covered fingers Percy’s way. “Percy, this is Clint, my stud muffin.”

The bartender’s cheeks flushed beneath his goatee. “Nice to meet you Percy. I see you’ve met the most outrageous woman in Lonesome Point.”

Yasmin huffed indignantly even as a pleased smile spread across her face. “I’m not outrageous! I’m lively.”

“You’re great fun,” Clint said affectionately. “Now what can I get you ladies?”

“Whiskey and Coke for me and a white wine for Percy.” Yasmin shifted on her stool as Clint turned to fetch glasses from the mirrored shelves behind the bar. “Now, tell me everything, P. My friend Georgie says the Lawson property is cursed because an entire tribe of Apache women and children were massacred there in the 1800s. Did you make contact with the people who were murdered? And was it totally scary, or normal for you because that’s your job?” She broke off with a wrinkle of her nose. “I’m sorry if I’m not supposed to ask stuff like that, but I’m so curious. I’ve never met a ghost whisperer before.”

“No, it’s fine.” Percy cleared her throat. She usually didn’t discuss her work with strangers, but Yasmin seemed nice and so genuinely interested she didn’t want to seem rude. “The massacre is why I arranged to tour the Lawson property, but I didn’t make solid contact with anyone today.”

Yasmin’s lips pushed into a pout. “Bummer. So no ghosts at all?”

“I did sense something,” Percy said. “But it felt like a more recently deceased spirit. It was timid and reluctant to make contact. The spirits who’ve been searching for someone to listen to them for a hundred years or more tend to be more aggressive.”

“Oh my God.” Yasmin’s gaze cut meaningfully in Clint’s direction as he set their drinks on the bar. “Did you hear that, babe? Do you think it could be…”

Clint shook his head. “I don’t know. I guess it could be though I’m not sure I believe in ghosts.” He glanced at Percy, lifting his newly free hands in the air. “No offense to you, ma’am, I just don’t have any experience with that sort of thing.”

“No offense taken,” Percy assured him, brow furrowing as she turned back to Yasmin. “Would you mind telling me who you think it could have been? Has there been a death on the property recently?”

Yasmin sighed as she swirled her straw through her drink. “Lily Lawson, John’s wife, passed away in an accident last spring. I don’t know the family well, but my boss and bestie is engaged to Cole Lawson, the middle brother. She says poor John is still a hot mess about it.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that.” A pang shot through Percy’s chest.

The poor man, to have lost someone he obviously loved so much.

Immediately, she forgave him for being unpleasant. She’d never been married—or even deeply in love—but she could imagine how torturous it would be to try to move past that kind of grief. She’d lost her parents and big brother when she was not quite seven and even now, twenty-three years later, she mourned them. Their death had set the course for her entire odd and often isolated life.

She knew how grief could change a person, molding them into something different than they had been before. Still, she couldn’t help wishing that John had let her try to help him—and his wife if hers was the spirit Percy had felt lingering by the spring.

“It’s totally sad,” Yasmin agreed, leaning closer to add in a softer voice, “Especially since John thinks Lily was murdered. He hasn’t been able to find any evidence, but he’s dead set on proving her death wasn’t an accident.”

“Don’t gossip about stuff like that, babe,” Clint said, looking uncomfortable as he set a bowl with peanuts still in the shell on the bar.

“It’s not gossip if it’s true,” Yasmin said, a guilty expression flickering across her features. “But Layla wouldn’t want me spreading her future family’s dirty laundry all over town. Forget I said anything, okay Percy?”

“Forgotten,” Percy lied.

But it was far from forgotten and John was never far from her thoughts as she finished her glass of wine, chatted about the must-see tourist attractions in Lonesome Point with Yasmin, and ordered a sandwich to take up to her room for dinner.

She couldn’t stop thinking about the pain in John’s deep blue eyes, or that moment when he’d practically begged her to leave. She had felt how close he was to breaking and reaching out for help and had been so disappointed to be sent away. Her first attempt to comfort a living person in need had ended badly, but that didn’t mean she had to give up. Now that she knew where John was coming from, maybe she’d be able to communicate with him more effectively.

Or maybe she could avoid communicating with him at all and sneak around behind his back.

Percy wasn’t usually sneaky, either, but so far John Lawson was making her behave in all kinds of unexpected ways. Besides, she would be sneaking around for his own good. If she could find a way to get on and off the property without him knowing about it, and if the spirit she’d felt today proved not to be his wife, she wouldn’t have to needlessly upset him. The spirit would be released into the afterlife, she would leave Lonesome Point knowing she’d done what she came here to do, and John would be none the wiser.

And if the spirit was his wife…

Well, she’d cross that bridge when she came to it, once she’d discovered why Lily Lawson’s spirit was lingering and whether there was any validity to John’s insistence that her death hadn’t been an accident.

Now she just needed a way onto the property.

As she passed by the hotel’s front desk with her to-go dinner in her hands, she paused to pick up a ghost town map from the pile beside the golden ring-for-service bell, letting her eyes slide to the current clerk’s nametag. When she read “Layla” on the silver plate, she decided to take it as a sign.

“Hello,” Percy said, smiling shyly as the clerk turned her way. “Are you Layla? Yasmin’s friend? The one with connections to the Lawson family?”

“I am.” Layla smiled, her ice blue eyes crinkling lightly at the edges. “I hope Yasmin hasn’t been driving you crazy. She was so excited about having a ghost hunter in the hotel she couldn’t talk about anything else all day.”

“Not at all,” Percy said, deciding to let the ghost hunter thing go this time. “She was very nice. And she mentioned that you’re close with the Lawsons, so I was hoping maybe I could get your help with something.”

Layla’s brow knitted, but she nodded pleasantly. “If I can.”

Percy explained the situation in as much detail as she could, making it clear Laura Mae had given her permission to remain on the property. “I felt something while I was there, but I didn’t have a chance to make a connection before John arrived and asked me to leave. He was clearly upset, and after talking to Yasmin, I think I know why.”

She took a breath, forcing herself to keep going even though Layla’s gaze was growing progressively more guarded the longer she spoke. “I certainly don’t want to upset him again,” she assured the other woman, “but on the off chance that I might be able to help give him some kind of closure, I’d love to take one more drive around the property. Maybe with you? Sometime when John isn’t around?”

Layla studied her critically for a moment, but Percy stood tall. She was used to encountering skepticism. It came with the job, along with all the other perks, like spending hours alone waiting for something to happen and being rewarded with a sneer almost every time she told a stranger about her life’s work.

“Can I be completely frank with you, Percy?” Layla finally asked.

“Please,” Percy said. “Anything else is a waste of time.”

Layla nodded and some of the tension in her shoulders eased away. “I normally wouldn’t even consider what you’re asking, but John has been suffering for a long time and if there’s even a snowball’s chance in hell you can help him, I’m up for it. But I have to call my fiancé first. If he’s on board, then maybe we can figure something out.” She reached for the hotel phone. “If he is, would tomorrow morning work for you? I’m off until four.”

“Yes, it would, thank you so much,” Percy said, backing away from the desk. “I’ll wait in the bar and give you some privacy.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Layla was already dialing and putting the phone to her ear. “I don’t mind if you stay.” A deep voice sounded on the other end of the line, and Layla smiled the smile of a woman in love. “Hey you, you got a second? I have kind of a weird proposition.”

The masculine voice murmured something Percy couldn’t hear, but which she could guess was suggestive judging by Layla’s response.

“No, not that kind of weird proposition. Get your mind out of the gutter, Lawson.” Her smile grew even wider. “I’m with the woman who came to visit the ghost town and the pool on your property.”

Percy shifted her supper from one hand to the other and gazed up at the tin ceiling while Layla filled her fiancé in on the plan. While she waited, she casually sent out a wave of probing energy, searching the old hotel for any lingering spectral activity.

Instead, she was rewarded with a ping from Layla’s side of the desk. The flutter of new life wasn’t what she’d been expecting, but it made her smile, even before she heard Layla make plans for them to meet her fiancé at the ranch mid-morning tomorrow.

“He’s game.” Layla settled the phone back in its cradle. “So I’ll swing by and pick you up around ten tomorrow. That way you won’t have to have your car on the property. John takes his boys to karate on Saturday mornings so he won’t be back until after lunch.”

“Thank you so much,” Percy said. “I really appreciate your help. And congratulations on the baby. You and your fiancé must be so excited.”

Layla’s smile faltered. “Excuse me?”

“The um…the…” Percy silently cursed herself for opening her big mouth. She should have learned by now not to say anything unless the mother had a clearly visible baby bump. “I’m sorry. I just… I can sometimes tell when someone is expecting. It’s part of being aware of different energy frequencies.”