Page 7 of Destined Chaos
That job, coupled with my flying charter service, paid the bills, but neither field was where my twenty-year plan was taking me. No, my lifelong dream would be a reality and hopefully finalized in four months if everything went as planned.
“I’m meeting the contractor at the house. Mr. Gambit said he’d give me the heads-up before Palmer Realty puts it on the market. I’m hoping to make an offer the owner can’t refuse.”
“Contractors have come and gone for various reasons. Most importantly, they never stayed around long enough to get it to pass inspection.”
“It’s got good bones; it just needs some TLC.” I dropped my feet to the ground and hit the computer mouse again, bringing the aerial picture of Slaughter House back to life. Slaughter House was large enough. It had amenities we’d need. Turning it into a lodge would be easy enough.
“You think good bones is going to be enough to draw tourists into town?” our sister, Clara, asked from across the room.
She’d been quiet the entire time during my proposal until this point. Her quietness was never a good thing, not when she could already predict the outcome.
“A better question, you think we need to be drawing tourists into town after our family has spent decades running any newcomers out in an effort to hide our secret?”
“This town needs new blood. It’s been asleep for way too long. We can make it great again.”
“You sound like you should be running for office,” Emmett said, staring out the window into the hangar.
“We’re all grown now. We can handle our abilities without any hiccups. It’s time.”
“It’s not what we’re hiding that concerns me. It’s who you’d be inviting in.” Clara slid off the table and headed for the door. She pulled it open and glanced back once more. “We aren’t the only family that grew up drinking the funky Kool-Aid. Others like us are going to be attracted to this town like a baker testing his own sweets. Once you open the gates, there won’t be any kicking them out.”
Clara left her words of warning linger behind.
“You should reconsider,” Emmett said quietly from the window. “If Clara thinks it’s a bad idea, then it’s a bad idea.”
“She didn’t say that.” I stood, shoving the chair with my legs. “She said other people have abilities. So what? It doesn’t mean they’re bad. They could be just as innocent as us.”
I patted my brother on the shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’ll go take another look at the place, and if I do get to buy the property, then I’ll make sure to screen everyone that makes reservations. I’ve got this. When have you ever known me to fail?”
Emmett sighed and nodded toward the local couple headed into the hangar. “Never.” He glanced at me. “And that’s what scares me. You’re overdue.”
“Have a little faith.”
Emmett stepped around me. “I’m taking the couple two towns over. They want to go shopping, and well, we don’t have much of that here.”
“We need growth, but until then, I’m going up to Slaughter to take one more look around.”
I grabbed my truck keys and smiled at the couple in passing as I walked out onto the tarmac. Climbing into my truck, I let the warnings simmer in the back of my mind.
It was a twenty-minute drive up the mountain to Slaughter House. I’d only stopped long enough for gas and a box of donuts to bring Mr. Gambit and his crew.
An SUV was parked out front. The door was partially open, and not a single soul was in the yard.
I grabbed the donuts and shoved one into my mouth while jogging up onto the porch. Slaughter House wasn’t huge, and it wasn’t tiny. It was perfect for what I had in mind. The large wrap-around porch had the potential for guests to rest and relax while enjoying a cup of coffee or warm hot chocolate, hunkered under blankets, looking up at the stars.
All of the shutters needed a fresh coat of paint, and one hung askew. Nothing that couldn’t be fixed. Scaffolding was constructed on the side of the house for workers to reach the third-floor chimney. They’d made little progress.
I opened the door farther. “Mr. Gambit.”
My voice echoed through the empty corridor, bouncing off walls still in need of fresh paint.
No answer. I headed for the kitchen and had to do a double take as I passed the sitting room. A sleeping bag was in in the center of the room on the floor. A line of salt surrounded it. Each corner had a candle that was partially burned.
“Okay, then.”
Who was I to judge? Ghosts were real. Just ask my family. It was the only acceptable explanation if we didn’t count that my family was in need of straitjackets. I headed toward the kitchen.
“Mr. Gambit, if you need a bed or someplace to stay, why didn’t you just say?” I called out as I stepped into an empty kitchen where a blender with a green smoothie-like substance now sat in place of the coffee pot.
