Even if I can’t say it out loud, there’s no denying that I feel it.
It’s palpable, flowing between us like an electric current. Every time we so much as pass each other in the corridors, it pulses between us.
His hand drifts lazily over my bare skin. “Penny for your thoughts.”
“I’m just lying here, wondering how often you bring girls down here.”
“I’ve never had a woman in here.”
“Then why do you have your own private sex dungeon?”
He chuckles. “Do you see any rope or whips lying around?”
“They could be hidden too,” I quip.
“My grandfather had this room added when the hotel was built. I sleep here sometimes when I work late or when there’s a party or event where I’ve had too many drinks, and I don’t want to drive all the way back to Moose.”
Hmm.
“So, no secret liaisons?”
“Before tonight? No.”
I roll to my side and look down at him.
“Anything else you want to know?”
“Anything?”
He twirls one of my curls around his finger. “Just ask.”
“How did you know we were investigating upstairs tonight?”
“I didn’t. Diana told me about the guest requesting to move rooms, and I was coming to investigate myself.”
“Looking for the ghost?”
He gives me an exasperated look. “No. Looking to see if something was wrong with the room’s lighting or electricity. Ghosts aren’t real.”
“How do you know?”
He exhales a deep breath. “There was a woman who died here ninety years ago. Her name was Belle. She was a young lady who was a special friend to a guest. And she jumped from the balcony of the main inn the night of the Christmas gala.”
“So, it’s all true.”
“That part is. Mostly.”
“Who was the guest? Why did she jump? Why did the Belicourt help cover it up?”
The questions roll off my tongue in rapid succession.
“Because the guest was Theodore Garrison. My great-grandfather’s younger brother and my great-uncle. He was a gubernatorial candidate, and my great-great-grandfather really wanted him elected that year.”
“Oh wow.”
“Apparently, he would stay at the hotel while campaigning, and his family—he had a wife and two daughters—would stay at their home in Jackson.”
He pauses.
