Licensed for Trouble (7 page)

“How about ghosts?”

“If you think Joy Kellogg is roaming the grounds, hunting for her killer—”

“No, I was thinking of Agatha,” Boone said.

PJ followed him as he shone his light up the back stairs, but he put an arm out to block her before she could climb them. “What?”

“She died here. Upstairs. In her bedroom.”

PJ peered up into the darkness. “Not the one at the end of the hall,” she said softly.

“Yep. And quite a while went by before anyone found her. Maybe even a week.”

“Okay, that I didn't need to know.” PJ backed away from the stairs. No wonder the door to the bedroom was locked. “How'd she die?”

“She got Meals On Wheels delivered once a week. The delivery guy found her. They think it might have been a stroke, but she was so old, she could have died in her sleep. No one ordered an autopsy, if I recall.”

PJ said nothing, even when Boone flicked his light on her.

“See, I told you. Run. Put it on the market as is, and get out before you get sucked in. The Kellogg history is rife with trouble and heartache. And that's the last thing you need.”

There it was again—the perfect opportunity for him to add
since you already have enough of it.
But no. He just moved toward her, then pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped her cheek. “A little remnant there from your fall.”

His touch was too gentle, too familiar. And he smelled good, like a summer night, all husky and sweet. For a terrible second, with everything inside her, she wanted to lean into him, to wrap her arms around him. It hadn't escaped her that he'd come to her rescue.

Again.

“Who knows why she left you this place, PJ. But it's a mess. The electricity is out, the plumbing is probably shot, and the roof could cave in on you at any moment. It should be condemned, not resurrected.”

Her thoughts went to the hole in the stairs. “But it's mine.”

“Just because you think you want something doesn't mean it's the best thing for you.” He put the handkerchief away. Caught her hand. “I just don't want to see you get hurt.”

“By the ghosts of Kellogg Manor.” She finger quoted her words. “Sounds like a Nancy Drew mystery.”

His expression suggested he wasn't amused. “You so want to buy into the fairy tale, don't you?”

“What's wrong with that? Every girl, at some point, dreams that she's a lost princess, forgotten in a faraway land. Can't I want it to be true?”

His blue eyes had turned so soft, sweet, she had to look away.

“PJ?” The voice echoed through the long hallway, bearing an edge of worry. “Are you here?”

Another light, this time wiping across the paned windows, across the dust and cobwebs of the main room. And then footsteps. “PJ?”

Boone's touch dropped away as Jeremy appeared and spotlighted the couple in the kitchen. PJ slipped away from what probably looked like Boone's embrace and saw that scenario flash in Jeremy's eyes.

“Are you okay?” he asked, his gaze going to Boone. “I called Connie, and she told me you . . . were here.” A muscle pulled in his jaw. “Am I interrupting something?”

Next to her, Boone stiffened.

“Of course not, Jeremy.” She paused there, hoping Boone might fill in the gap, but he brushed past her and began checking the gas fittings over the stove. So much for another rescue. “I fell down a hole outside, and Boone found me.”

Alarm crossed Jeremy's face and ignited a curl of sweet emotion inside. “Are you okay?”

“Yes.” She rubbed her arms and glanced at Boone. He shot her a quick look, then moved out into the main room, toward the fireplace.

It seemed that Jeremy had the PI instincts not to ask questions, at least not with the way Boone was stalking the room as though he were in the middle of a crime scene. PJ wasn't sure who he considered the criminal here.

Or rather, the dead body?

Jeremy scanned his light over the beams crossing the ceiling, the huddled forms of clothed furniture in the massive room. “So this is it? your new digs?”

“Apparently. Only it has a few glitches—electricity is out; plumbing could be burst.” She went to stand in front of the window, staring through it to the lake. “Boone thinks it's too big of a project. Maybe I should just put it on the market.”

“Oh, PJ, are you serious? Look at the architecture. And the view. It's incredible.” Jeremy came up behind her, not unlike he had this morning, and put a hand on her shoulder, turning her. “Imagine this place cleaned up. The tile scrubbed, the windows washed, the grounds landscaped or even just mowed.” In his eyes, alive with something she'd never seen before, yes, she could see the house scrubbed up, free of grime, Vera frying something in the new kitchen, Sergei and Davy playing in the backyard.

Jeremy and PJ sitting on the veranda, drinking lemonade.

Her gaze shot to Boone, now watching them with a stony expression on his face.

Especially when Jeremy hooked her chin with his finger, made her meet his eyes, apparently not caring that Boone hovered a few feet away. “Can't you see the potential in this place?”

“Maybe,” she said, her voice a whisper.

“Princess,” he said, his voice dipping, “you can't sell this place. You belong here.”

“Of course you'd say that,” Boone snapped. Then he turned and stalked out of the house.

Chapter Five

“You smell like a dog left out in the rain.”

“I know you mean that in the nicest way.” PJ held up a flashlight as Jeremy stood in the darkness of the utility closet under the stairs. She tilted her light up for a second and located the spot where her foot had punched through. At least she wouldn't have ended up in the basement.

Or perhaps she should refer to it as the swamp, since Boone had been correct in his call about the pipes bursting. The odor that engulfed the house came from a layer of sump water, putrid and containing the fetid remains of a family of rodents, muddying the dirt basement floor. Thankfully only half the house hiccuped brown sludge. The back room, the one that seemed like a maid's quarters, had a small, working bathroom in which the water ran clear.

Even if the electricity didn't seem to work.

“Over here, Princess. Let's get some light on the subject.” Jeremy chuckled at his own joke, even flashing her a smile over his shoulder. He'd been in an oddly jovial mood since Boone marched off the premises, despite the fact that, under the scrutiny of the flashlight, Jeremy sported the makings of a shiner under his eye.

“Are you going to tell me how you got punched?”

His smile faded. “I haven't seen this kind of fuse since my grandmother's house in South Minneapolis.” He grabbed PJ's wrist, angling the light over what looked like porcelain drawer tabs, one after another in a giant panel of knobs. Each one contained a glass center, many of them black. After Jeremy unscrewed one, he peered at the metal knob. “I don't even know where we can get a new supply, unless . . .” He reached up, above the metal box attached to the wall, and dragged down a small cardboard box. “I like practical people,” he said, sifting through the box to find a fresh—or perhaps fresh from the previous century—fuse.

“Jeremy, really. How did you get hurt?”

“Let's see if we can get any power here.” He screwed in the fuse, then scooted past her out into the hall. Looked around. “We should see a light on somewhere. Maybe it's on upstairs.”

“I have a feeling it's more than just a fuse,” PJ said. “Otherwise, the ones that aren't black would be working.”

“See? Natural detective skills.” Jeremy brushed by her again.

“But not-so-great interrogation techniques. What do I have to do to get you to come clean?”

“Just a little altercation at work.” The smile had vanished from his voice.

“Work? What am I, the answering service? Your work is my work, partner. Should I be worried here?”

Jeremy was reaching above the fuse box again. “Nope. And we're not partners.”

PJ flicked off the light.

“What?” He rounded on her, and even in the darkness, she could feel the heat of his expression. “I can't see what I'm doing.”

“Neither can I, bub. I'm totally in the dark here.
We're not partners?
” She hated how her voice hitched on the last word. Because this morning, as he'd wrapped his arms around her, tugged her close, it had felt very partnerish. She let her voice find its footing. “When I left you today, you were glued to your computer. How did you go from tracking down the last known addresses on our list of fugitives to getting a shiner?”

He said nothing for a moment. She resisted the urge to reach out to him, touch his chest, maybe just for balance. Or to assure herself that she wasn't dreaming. That something palpable had happened between them.

Still, sometimes being around Jeremy gave her the sense that she might be perched in the open doorway of an airplane, staring down, daring to fling herself into space.

Sure, she'd jumped from heights during her brief career as a stunt girl, but skydiving seemed like a whole different brand of crazy.

“I tracked down Bruno Dirkman. Now turn the light on.”

“Alone? He could have killed you.”

She heard him sigh, then felt his hand on her wrist, moving up to the flashlight. He pushed the button to turn it on. His expression, however, remained dark. “Give me some credit, will you.”

There it went again, that dark tone, the hooded expression that reminded her how little she really knew about Jeremy Kane, former SEAL, current boss, and undercover electrician.

“No, I won't.” The words slipped out of her mouth, and she backed them fast with her own steely expression. “Beyond the fact you were a SEAL, well, I barely know you.”

“You
barely know
me? Don't you think that's a bit overstated?”

“Fine. I know you have a thing for old movies and popcorn, too.” She expected a smile, but she only got the smoldering, intense gaze that brought her back to this morning, in his arms. Yes, okay, she knew a bit more.

“What else do you want to know?”

She swallowed. “Uh . . . well, uh . . .” What did she want to know? What were the important parts? His childhood? His favorite color? Oh, wait, one look at his black leather jacket, dark T-shirt—she could probably answer that one. How about . . . what did he want out of life?

Maybe that was too big a question, too soon, and especially in a caught-in-time electrical closet. “I don't know.”

To her surprise, his hand moved to her face, brushing it with his fingertips, a tickle of a caress. His eyes gentled, something that took her breath away, especially from a guy who looked like he'd run face-first into a barroom brawl. “In time, Princess. In time. You'll have everything you need.”

For what?
she wanted to yell but just stood there, stilled by his touch, her heart tattooing in her chest.

He turned and gathered up the fuses. “I think you're right—your electrical problems may be more than a few blown fuses.” He dumped them into their container and placed them on top of the fuse box. “I'll see if I can track down the problem.”

“So now you're an electrician?”

He gave her a cryptic smile. Another question to add to her list . . . in time, of course.

Moving past her, he caught her hand. “Are you hungry? I'm starved. I think it's time for a pizza.”

See, even if she didn't know his favorite baseball team, his favorite band, or anything significant about his life before the day she met him, they had a deeper bond.

“Pepperoni and mushrooms?”

He gave her hand a warm squeeze in the dark.

An hour later, she emerged from the bathroom of Hal's Pizzeria, not necessarily clean, but smelling like the strawberry-scented liquid soap from the dispenser. They'd hit the fringes of dinner hour, the place still populated by families, a small assembly of grade-schoolers jockeying for space on the stoop outside the kitchen. The victors had their noses pressed up to the glass, watching dough being tossed into the air.

Located in the middle of Kellogg's Main Street, with a dormant volleyball sandpit out back, Hal's appeared to be transitioning from beachside playground to Halloween haunted house with spider netting hanging from the door, a papier-mâché witch dangling from the ceiling, and crepe paper pumpkins taped to the walls. PJ dearly hoped Hal's still hosted their annual Halloween all-you-can-eat pizza buffet.

Jeremy lounged in an orange vinyl booth, perusing the menu, a tall red glass of soda in front of him.

“I thought we were going to get a pizza?”

“We are. But I thought we'd order an appetizer, too. Maybe mozzarella sticks?”

PJ unwrapped her straw. “What's the occasion? Don't tell me you already collected the cash from your FTA collar.”

“Nope. Buffalo wings or sticks?”

“Uh . . . wings.”

“Attagirl.” Jeremy closed the menu, lifted a finger to signal for the waitress. PJ had a mind to ask her if Hal's was hiring. Jeremy might be able to bring in his man, but PJ hadn't the faintest clue where to track down Bix.

“So why the big spender?”

Jeremy placed the order, then shot her a smile. “Oh, you're buyin'.”

PJ nearly lunged for the waitress. “What? I barely have enough money for a Happy Meal. I can't buy dinner.”

He pulled a folded paper from his inner coat pocket and opened it on the table. “Sure you can. You're an heiress.” He said it without blinking.

“Listen, Pizza Man, all I have is a run-down, rather smelly old mansion that may or may not have working electricity and is definitely without adequate plumbing. That hardly qualifies me as an
heiress
. An heiress is someone with a pet Chihuahua, a butler, and a closet full of designer shoes.” She lifted her grimy pant leg, exhibiting her Converse tennis shoes. “Unless I'm mistaken, these aren't Jimmy Choos.”