“Erielle.”
Her name in his low voice sent a shiver racing through her.
He stepped toward her, closing the gap, one hand half-lifted like he meant to touch her arm, then stopped himself. The pause was worse than if he had. Her back pressed against the counter, heart thrumming. Not because she was afraid of him. Because she wanted him too much.
“I know your grandfather believed this place—this whole town—was haunted, and you grew up hearing stories, but I’m pretty sure this place isn’t haunted.”
“I thought you believed. When we were talking to Pete in the bar the other day, you acted like you believed?”
“I mean. I don’t believe. But I think he believes.”
Her shoulders slumped. She thought maybe he would know something she didn’t. But he was just placating a drunk that night. And now she didn’t know who was going to believe her.
Well, Marie, maybe, but other than knowing the other woman worked at a grocery store in Maillard, she didn’t know how to track her down.
She trusted Samson, though. She just didn’t know how to convince him she wasn’t losing her mind.
He took a step toward her, and she would have retreated, but she had nowhere to go with the counter at her back. So she shrunk in on herself, not because she was afraid of him, but because she had lost her trust.
He eased back, clearly seeing her reaction. “Are you sure you didn’t just rearrange these? Maybe you forgot that you hung up the painting?”
“And the whispers? The light in my room?”
“Just a dream that lingers.”
She wanted to believe it but, “I don’t dream it when I’m sleeping in the car. Whatever it is, it only happens in the house.”
“Okay, well, only one way to know for sure. Tonight, I’ll stay over.”
Her mouth fell open. “You absolutely cannot do that.”
“I’ll follow you over after you close up, and I’ll sleep on the couch.”
She grimaced. “I don’t think you’ll fit on the couch.”
“Then I’ll bring a sleeping bag. It will do two things. It will help you feel safer, so you don’t have to sleep in your car. And we can find out for sure if the house is haunted.”
She stared at him for a long moment. “But you don’t believe the house is haunted. You’ll sleep in a sleeping bag in an unair-conditioned house to prove that?”
“I’ll sleep in a sleeping bag in an unair-conditioned house to make you feel safer.”
She grunted, considering. It would be nice to know that she wasn’t crazy, right? So she should accept. But she felt like she needed to make more of a protest. “You don’t worry about the people in town talking?”
“I don’t if you don’t.”
She waved a hand. “They’ve been talking about me since I got here, will probably keep talking about me after I leave. But your dad has a reputation, and shouldn’t you be helping him, anyway?”
“I haven’t slept there in a while. It’s not a big deal.”
She held his gaze a little longer, those sincere brown eyes. “You’d really do that?”
“I’d really do that.” His voice left no room for doubt, and the look he gave her wasn’t just protective—it burned, low and steady, with something more.
“I’ll clean up the living room so it’s ready, unless you want one of the bedrooms upstairs.”
“No, I want to be downstairs, because we’re going to leave the painting in the room with me.”
Sixteen
