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Chapter One
Paige
CanIliveina haunted house?
I mean, there are some variables at play here. Nice ghost or mean? Is it mostly active at night? I’m a single mom—Ineedmy sleep. Is it trying to avenge anything? That’s a hard no. Creepy little kid? Also no. Tragic widow? Maaaaaybe. I could also deal with a grumpy but harmless ghost. Like an old man ghost or something.
Which kind of ghost lives in 341 Orchard Street? From the sidewalk, I eye the small house’s peeling yellow paint on its faded exterior. Half the windows are missing shutters, and several of the remaining ones hang askew. While someone has kept the shrubbery trimmed, brown leaves blanket the yard and the sagging front porch.
There’s no way its only residents are spiders and mice.
It’s possible the Halloween decorations on the stately porches and well-groomed yards of the rest of Orchard Street are contributing to the vibes, but I have a feeling this derelict cottage would look haunted no matter what.
The thing is, this house has one irresistible quality: a For Sale sign, the only house that’s ever come up in Creekville in my price range. I can see its potential, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind in the three days since it was listed.
I called my mortgage broker’s office this morning and applied for loan preapproval; it was waiting for me by lunchtime,andhe’d found a grant program that would allow me to do a smaller down payment. That would give me a cushion for some initial renovations.
I glance up and down the street; it’s empty of people. I’m on my lunch break, and I can’t resist the urge to get a closer look. Three concrete steps take me up to the warped wood porch, and when I peer through the cloudy glass of the cheap front door, I spot some old furniture and dust motes floating in the muted light.
“Can I help you?” a male voice asks.
I whirl to find a pale middle-aged man standing on the walkway of the leaf-covered yard. He’s wearing khakis and a brown sweater. With his dark hair and brown-rimmed glasses, he’s crayon-like in his head-to-toe brownness.
“Just looking inside to get a sense of the place,” I say. “Do you live here?”
His eyebrow goes up. “Does it look likeanyonelives here?”
Ew. He’s—what does Cary Grant call the sheriff inHis Girl Friday? Oh, an insignificant, square-toed, pimple-headed spy. I summon my inner customer service patience fairy and offer him a pleasant smile. “I meant on Orchard.”
He nods toward the house next door, the largest and most elegant house on the street, but says nothing else.
“Well, I’m thinking of making an offer, so if things go well, we’ll be neighbors.” It’s a test for me to see how I feel about saying it. I don’t feel pukey. That’s a good sign. In the past, I’ve felt pukey when I was on the verge of making decisions that would burn my life down.
“You don’t want that place.” He says it so surely. So flatly. So infuriatingly.
“But I do.” I’m not sure about that yet, but Iamsure I don’t wanthimtelling me whether I do or not.
“Too small.”
“Three bedrooms,” I counter. I’ve pored over that listing. “That’s perfect.”
“Are you single?” he asks. This is not a creepy come-on ask. This is a judgy ask. Any answer I give here will be wrong. I can feel it.
“Why does that matter?”
“There’s not much to offer here for single people.”
I stare at him. “In a college town?”
“On Orchard Street.”
It’s clear he thinks I belong anywhere but next door to him. I am so tired of dudes talking down to me. They did it when I waited tables until Evie was five. They do it now in the hardware store I manage, which makes it extra fun when I point out that they actually need to use a pocket screw, not a corner brace. I don’t know what it is about me that screams DUMB, but I’m over it.
I walk down from the porch and stop a few feet from him. Now that I’m closer, he’s much younger than I thought at first, probably in his mid-thirties. Still very brown up close, all except for his sun-starved skin. Even his eyes are dark brown.
“Well, neighbor,” I say, emphasizing the word slightly, “I have a kid. Seems like Orchard Street will be perfect for us.”
“So you’re married.”
