Krewe of Hunters 8 The Uninvited Read Online Free PDF Page A

graveyards. She noted that Todd
didn’t want to be in the cemetery; she was shocked to realize that she was
anxious to end the tour herself.
    It was finally time to usher her people out, but Allison was
still disturbed by the way Todd looked at her as he left with his family. They
were the last ones out the back gate, and he lingered. “A ghost can’t follow you
home, can it?” he asked in a whisper.
    “I don’t think so. I mean, if we do have ghosts, I imagine
they’d just hang around here. Have fun tonight! Pinch a tavern wench somewhere,
okay?”
    He grinned at her. “You don’t mean that.”
    “No. She’d slap you. But go forth and have fun and be a
kid!”
    When they were gone at last, she hurried into the house through
the back door. She found Jason Lawrence in their small employee quarters behind
the main pantry.
    He had removed his Colonial garb and was wearing jeans and a
T-shirt that promoted his favorite band.
    “Hey, you holding up okay?” he asked her.
    “Yes, but it’s nice when four people actually work on the busy
days,” Allison said. “We could’ve used Julian. I understand why Annette had to
go—poor thing. She looked like she was in so much pain.”
    Jason was an attractive young man, about three years her junior
at the ripe old age of twenty-four. They’d been friends since they’d met, and
although they had great chemistry together, it wasn’t sexual. They were friends.
He raised his brows and let out a sigh. “We may all love him for being a clown
and a prankster, but Julian can also be a total pain in the ass,” he said. “He
thinks he’s going to get rich and famous—and that we’re all going to be grateful
just to have known him. But you have to speak to him or to Sarah or someone else
on the board, because this isn’t fair.”
    “I’ll try talking to him first,” Allison said. “And then, if he
doesn’t start acting more responsible, I will talk to Sarah.”
    Jason nodded. “Mind if I scoot?”
    “Hot date?”
    “I hope so.”
    “Go.”
    “I hate to leave you alone…”
    “I’ll make a run-through and set the alarm as I head out.”
    “I’ll lock the back door. The back gate’s locked, right?”
    “Yep. I can just hit the alarm and dash out the front.”
    He gave her a kiss on the cheek and she heard his footsteps on
the hardwood floor as he went to lock up. She heard him as he moved through the
house, and she heard the front door close as he left.
    To her annoyance, she was suddenly frightened in the house. She
silently chastised herself. Todd was at the age when he wanted to be a sexual
lothario one minute, and a kid spooked by a campfire tale the next. She wanted
to rip off her dress and stomacher and change into her comfortable jeans;
instead, she decided to hurry up and check the house, then get out of there.
    She glanced over the room and went out, locking the door. She
walked past the dining room and the grand salon and returned to the foyer.
Looking up the stairs, she knew she wasn’t going up to make sure she’d left no
scared toddler or would-be ghost hunter in the house. She knew that every man,
woman and child on her tour had departed through the back gate.
    A sense of something dark and evil seemed to have drifted over
her, and she wished she could call Jason back. As she crossed the foyer, she
stopped.
    She’d heard a sound. A ticking or a…scrape or…
    It was coming from Angus Tarleton’s study.
    She didn’t want to look. She wanted to rush to the front door,
hit the alarm and run home, run out of the house screaming....
    How ridiculous!
    It might have been an air-conditioning vent or…wood settling.
There were probably dozens of technical or architectural things it could be.
    She closed her eyes, shaking her head, annoyed again that Todd
had managed to unnerve her like this. She was a sensible and responsible human
being, a historian.
    She walked to the room and looked in.
    And a scream, shrill and horrified, tore from her