Everett stares at her, unblinking, long enough that it starts to creep her out. “It’s a good idea,” he says at last.
His feelings are hurt.“I’m not saying it’sbad,” she reassures. “And it’s certainly better than some other ideas you’ve had that I won’t name. But we’re gonna have to go back to the drawing board and find another way in. Now, I know you probably don’t remember what this is like, since I presume you don’t need to sleep anymore, but I’m tired. So I’m going to head up to bed.”
“Will you at least put something else on TV for me first? Something that won’t question my endurance.” He scowls at the screen’sAre you still watching?prompt.
“Fine,” Gretchen says, switching over to regular live television to ensure it’ll continue playing all night. It’s mostly infomercials this late on basic cable, but eventually, Everett brings a stop to their channel-hopping with a shrieked, “Oh, oh! That’s what I want!The Golden Girls! I loveThe Golden Girls!”
“Okay, I’ll put it on, but then you’re not going to disturb me again for the rest of the night. Deal?”
“Yes, sure, deal.”
She confirms the channel is showing back-to-back-to-back episodes, then heads to the laundry room to check on her jacket (not looking good) and collect her dry things before trudging to the second floor. Upstairs, she examines the doors lining the hallway—Charlie’s room to the left, the bathroom straight ahead, her room and the office to the right. Now would be a good time to sneak around up here and learn what she can about Charlie to help her better convince him of her honesty. She hoped Everett would be a valuable source of info, but so far he hasn’t proven himself particularly reliable, especially when put on the spot (not that Charlie has been at all receptive to the info she has managed to get out of him anyway). Plus, there’s gotta be stuff up here Everett hasn’t seen because he can’t open drawers or comb through piles of papers...
Except...
Well, Charlie is already so suspicious of her. What if he left a booby trap somewhere? Not like anIndiana Jones–style boulder one, but something that will give him the evidence he needs to prove that Gretchen went into his bedroom or office, the door towhich is cracked open just enough to see that the small space is mostly taken up by a large antique desk. As much as her fingers itch with the desire to get her hands on the mountains of paperwork in there, and as much as she would love to check out his bedroom and meet Teddy the teddy bear, the thought of losing even more of Charlie’s already limited esteem by doing exactly what he expects of her—and the way her toes are starting to go numb as the old farmhouse gets chillier—has Gretchen heading straight to bed.
But she doesn’t sleep right away. Her brain won’t let her. It’s too busy continuing to scheme, plot,think. Not that Gretchen minds too much; this is, after all, her default state of being, and it’s actually nice to return to something familiar after the bizarre day she’s had. Not to mention the fact that she’s in a strange bed, in a strange room, in a strange place—which used to be par for the course for her, but hasn’t been something she’s had to acclimate to recently. So she embraces her instinct to work on the problem at hand: Charlie Waybill.
He’s going to be a tough nut to crack, that much is certain. Maybe she’s become too used to the grief-stricken old rich ladies who come to her already halfway (or fully, in the case of True Believer clients like Janice Easterly) convinced of her abilities. But Charlie’s so resistant to her spirit medium persona that it almost seems like more of a burden than a boon. Everett was right that honesty would no doubt get her farthest in this situation, but there’s a limit to just how honest Gretchen is willing and able to be. Strategically and maybe even biologically.
So what are her other options?Make Charlie fall in love with you. Gretchen scoffs at the memory of Everett’s voice, so matter-of-fact, as if he was proposing wearing a sweater on a chilly dayinstead of manipulating a person’s strongest emotion. What would it be like to have someone like Charlie love her? She allows herself to imagine it. Safe. Warm. Right. “Yeah,” she says to herself, mentally crumpling the picture her brain starts to paint. “Great plan. A-plus-plus. Nothing could go wrong there.”
And yet the idea echoes in her brain, getting quieter with each reverberation but not fully disappearing until sleep finally overtakes her. She wakes briefly sometime later at the sound of the front door closing, and Everett’s subsequent, “Gretchen! Help! Charlie turned off the TV! And in the middle of a St. Olaf story. Help!” But it’s been a long, long day, and tomorrow is bound to be even longer, so she clutches her pillow over her head to drown out the shouting and drifts off again.
10
A sound—someone knocking at her door?—pulls Gretchen from the deepest sleep she’s had in years. As her eyes flutter open, she takes in her surroundings.Right. She isn’t in her apartment in DC, she’s in the farmhouse’s guest bedroom, with its startlingly bright afghan and wrought iron headboard and a pair of bright blue eyes staring at her from the other side of the bed and—
“Jesus, Everett!” she says, springing up to escape from the chill emanating off him. No wonder she dreamed about living in an igloo last night.
“And a good morning to you too,” he says grumpily.
Morning seems like an exaggeration, considering it’s still dark outside. Gretchen slides out of bed, wrapping herself in the afghan for extra warmth. “What are you doing here?” she demands.
“Um, okay, I thought we already went over this, but... I’m the victim of a family curse that has me stuck at Gilded Creek—”
“Not what I meant. Why are you sleeping with me?” She speaksin her angriest whisper, aware that Charlie is probably able to hear anything louder through the door. And while she does want him to believe her about Everett in general, she doesn’t need him knowing that she apparently shared a bed with a freaking visitant last night.
“I told you this was my room,” Everett counters. “So really, when you think about it,youwere sleeping withme.”
The knock comes louder and more urgently, along with a deep-voiced, annoyed, “Acorn, get up,” that makes Gretchen’s skin tingle in a way that she can’t tell if she likes or not.
“This conversation isn’t over,” she warns Everett, and reaches for the doorknob.
Charlie stands there, already dressed in worn jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt with the sleeves pushed to under his elbows. He’s wearing socks but no shoes, and he has a pile of clothes thrown over his shoulder. He dumps it into her arms. “Lori brought you a few things. Will they work?”
A quick glance through the stack reveals two pairs of overalls—one olive-green twill and the other light-blue-and-white-striped like a train engineer costume—and a dark tan duck canvas jacket. “Thanks. They should. So... should I wear these with just a bra underneath or...?”
A blush sweeps over Charlie’s cheeks. He grits his teeth, as if annoyed with himself for not resisting that mental image. “Hold on,” he says.
He disappears into his own bedroom and comes back with a plain white cotton T-shirt like the one Gretchen spotted under his sweater yesterday. “Here,” he says, holding it out, the scent of laundry detergent wafting toward her. His other hand busies itself with scratching at his beard while he avoids direct eyecontact. “That should work for now. We couldn’t figure out footwear, though. Lori’s daughter has real big feet, so we doubted her shoes would work for you.”
“I can wear the ones I came here in,” Gretchen says. “They’re already ruined anyway.”
Charlie quirks an eyebrow. “Didn’t those have heels?”
“Just a three-inch block. It’s fine.”
