“I bet you say that to all the girls.” Lily winked at Tessa. She grabbed her purse and waved as she left.
Tessa picked up her notebook from the coffee table and flipped to the most recent list. Number three asked,Sell my home?Beside it, she wrote,Mama: Yes.Lily: Yes.
Tessa dug through the containers of food Harry and Cecilia had given her. She pulled out black beans, homemade salsa, diced peppers, and two eggs. Scrambled eggs were one of the only dishes Tessa could cook without burning something or making herself or someone else sick. She cooked the eggs and peppers together and plopped them onto a plate along with the beans and salsa. Then she grabbed an open bag of tortilla chips she’d found in one of the cabinets in her condo. She popped one into her mouth and chewed. Definitely stale, but they were edible, and she dropped a few handfuls onto the plate. Then she sat down at the kitchen table, eating her deconstructed breakfast burrito and drinking mint tea, trying to feel a shred of enthusiasm about the prospect of looking for a new home.
Chapter 6
Hopeful Hash Browns
Afterfinishingherearlylunch, Tessa walked to her office. She flipped through the mail, stopping when she held a large mailer sent from Trudy Steele. Tessa ripped open the end of the envelope and tilted it upside down. A set of miscellaneous keys, including a tarnished skeleton key, fell onto her desk.Honeysuckle Hollow. A prickle of excitement skittered over her skin. She tabled her curiosity and finished sorting the mail and making phone calls. By midafternoon, she was caught up with her office work, and she’d even printed out house listings to look at for herself. When she left the office, she first met with a client across town, and then afterward, she made the short drive to Honeysuckle Hollow.
Dogwood Lane was at a higher elevation than the rest of Mystic Water, so the flood waters had streamed down the streets toward the lower sections of town, leaving the historic neighborhood with nothing more than soggy grass and patches of muddy yards.
Tessa parked in front of the neglected brick Victorian house. Weeds choked the front lawn. A sea of dandelions bobbed in the breeze, scattering their feathery seeds into the air like spring snowflakes. Irises knifed through the weeds, pushing purple and white buds above the wildness. Snaking vines had taken over the wraparound front porch. Tessa wove her way through the tall grass and weeds, and a cloud of grasshoppers leaped ahead of her like personal escorts leading her toward the door.
She gripped a peeling wooden handrail framing the front stairs, and it snapped outward beneath her weight, breaking away from its mountings. She lost her balance and nearly tumbled sideways off the stairs, but she fell against a column, giving it an awkward bear hug while smashing her face against the wood. When she pushed away from the column, it groaned. She warily glanced up at the roof sheltering the porch. Was there a chance it would collapse on her head? She brushed dingy white paint flecks from her cheek.
The porch boards creaked as she scurried for the front door. The windows lining the front of the house were soiled with two years’ worth of inattention. A rotted porch plank had fallen halfway into the dirt crawl space beneath the porch. Tiny animal prints traveled up and down the collapsed board like mud paw stamps. A critter was obviously using the board like a bridge from its lair to the top world.
She pulled the keys from her pocket and realized the skeleton key was the one that would open the antique lock on the front door. She’d never used a real skeleton key before, and for a moment she felt like a heroine in one of her romance novels, about to unearth long-lost secrets.
Electricity tingled through her fingers and up her arm as she turned the key in the lock, causing her breath to catch. Maybe the house was just as excited as she was. Tessa pushed open the door, finding herself in the two-story foyer. Filtered light streamed through the windows, which allowed her to see her way around well enough since the electricity wasn’t on. Off to one side of the foyer was a stunning, skillfully crafted wooden staircase. Tessa touched the finial at the base of the railing. No one constructed staircases like this anymore. Even though it was covered in a thick layer of dust and spiders had weaved gossamer tapestries through the spindles, its unmistakable beauty remained apparent. A strong breeze swirled through the house, raced past Tessa, and went out the open front door as though the house was exhaling, thankful for a visitor.
To her right was a dining room with a tray ceiling and a bay window. A long table had been covered with a motley assortment of sheets. To the left was a living room with another bay window and a large cast-iron fireplace. Like the dining room, the furniture had been covered, but Tessa doubted the sheets served as much protection from two years of disuse. The house smelled musty and forgotten, like cardboard boxes in storage.
Tessa marveled at the details and the tile work on the cast-iron fireplace. She crouched in front of it and realized it was a pass-through. She could see a large room on the other side. The hearth was coated with ash, soot, and an unknown substance in a goopy black pile. Remains of a half-burned log sat crumbling on the grate.
“Wow,” she said. “This fireplace is a great feature.”
She pulled a work notepad and pen out of her purse to make notes but stopped writing when she heard a strange sound, like Styrofoam cups rubbing together. The racket grew steadily louder. Tessa backed away from the fireplace. A whooshing noise barreled down the chimney, and a colony of bats exited through the pass-through fireplace. Tessa screamed and flapped her arms and hands around her head as though her hair were on fire. The bats darted by her face. Rapid wings brushed against her skin, which caused the pitch of her scream to jump to another octave.
Tessa’s flailing caused a hefty, rectangular book to fall from the mantel. It slapped the floor, sounding like a gunshot, and dust mushroomed around it. The bats flew straight out the open front door. Tessa screamed for another five seconds. She pressed her hands against her pounding heart and dropped onto the nearest sheet-covered chair. A cloud of dust erupted around her, clinging to her hair and clothes.
When she could breathe normally, she texted Lily,I was attacked by killer bats. I almost died. Tessa gathered up her notepad and pen, which she’d flung across the room. Then she picked up the fallen book. She brushed her fingertips across the front cover, revealing the wordsGuests of Honeysuckle Hollowembossed in shiny silver letters against navy-blue leather. Tessa returned to the chair and flipped through the pages. Handwritten entries filled the entire book. The first few dated back more than ten years ago.
The first entry read:Honeysuckle Hollow was the answer to a desperate prayer. After my husband was laid off from the bubble gum factory in Willow Grove, our savings dwindled quickly, and we couldn’t afford our rent. Before long, we had nowhere to go. A chance visit to Dr. Hamilton saved us. We’ve called Honeysuckle Hollow our home (and what a fairy-tale home) for the past month, free of charge, and now with Philip back on his feet again with a great job in Mystic Water, we found a place to rent. This house was a godsend.
The second guest’s handwriting looped across the page in delicate, tightly knit letters:While traveling south, our youngest son became extremely ill. We were forced to stop in Mystic Water and seek help. Dr. Hamilton was on call at the hospital, and we saw him just in the nick of time. Timmy was so ill that he required hospitalization for two weeks. Rather than letting us pay for a hotel in the nearest town, Dr. Hamilton offered Honeysuckle Hollow to us for no cost. We couldn’t believe the generosity. Once Timmy was well enough to leave the hospital, we stayed one more week in Honeysuckle Hollow before returning home. This magic house was such a blessing during our time of need.
Tessa glanced around the room. She had known that Dr. Hamilton rented the place for parties and special events, but she hadn’t known that Honeysuckle Hollow had been a haven for those who were down on their luck and out of options. She inhaled a breath deep enough to expand her chest.
“You deserve to be beautiful again,” Tessa said to the house. She closed the book and put it with her purse.
She hesitated before exploring the house any further. What if there were bigger creatures making Honeysuckle Hollow their home? Maybe she should call the exterminator first. But her curiosity had her rising from the chair.
Tessa tiptoed out of the living room and up a short hallway beside the staircase. She walked into the expansive room she had seen through the fireplace opening. The family room opened into a breakfast nook and a spacious kitchen with an island. The island had been added years after the kitchen was created because its cabinetry was a much newer style, probably intended to match the original house. To a trained eye like Tessa’s, it was obvious the island wasn’t antique.
But the worst addition to the kitchen was the graffiti. The thieves, or perhaps rogue teenage artists, had spray-painted extra-large words in florescent paint. She tilted her head to try and decipher a drawing that stretched from one kitchen wall to the high ceiling. Tessa categorized graffiti as a foreign language. No matter how long she stared at it, the meaning never came to her.
It didn’t take long to piece together how the vandals had made it into the house. French doors leading from the breakfast nook opened into the backyard, but one door had busted off its hinges, and every pane of glass in the other door had shattered. Glass littered the floor and crunched beneath Tessa’s flats. The appliances were missing, and from the looks of the deep grooves in the hardwood floors, they had been dragged out of the kitchen and through the French doors.
“Such a shame,” she said as she passed through the kitchen.
Clusters of mold spotted the window casings, and one window was partially open, allowing wild honeysuckle vines with creamy-yellow and bright-pink blooms to reach inside and tangle around a chair at the kitchen table. Their fragrant blooms waved to Tessa as she passed by.
There was a full downstairs bathroom with a claw-foot tub covered by a filthy shower curtain draped over a circular ring hanging from the ceiling. Tessa grabbed the shower curtain in one hand and stood back as she yanked it open. A mangy calico cat cowered near the tub’s drain. Its eyes widened, its back arched, and it hissed at Tessa. She raced out of the bathroom, straight through the kitchen and into the backyard.
The half-acre backyard was wilder than the front. Tessa stopped almost as suddenly as her feet hit the brick patio, skidding to a halt and pitching forward. She glanced over her shoulder to see if the cat had chased her. Nothing stirred in the house. Her cell phone dinged, and she yelped.
