My Inherited House Might be Haunted

Nine

Calix

I’d offered to pick Rhett up at his house because I was old fashioned that way. I knew Rhett had moved into his inherited house this week, but I hadn’t gotten details.

I did not expect a glorious, Goth-style Victorian.

I absolutely, positively did not expect to pull into Ruth Fairchild’s driveway. Or her former driveway.

Oh boy, did I not expect that.

Holy fuck. I hadn’t put the pieces together, not until this moment, but now it all made sense. Of course Rhett had an aura. He was Ruth Fairchild’s nephew! She was one of the more famous witches of this area. Of course he had two familiars. My question was, why did he own a tech shop? Why was he asking for help on clearing out some ghosts? He acted like he didn’t know magic at all, which was really, truly strange.

I was also really jealous he got this house. I’d love to live here. Victorians were my absolute favorite style of architecture. It was lovingly maintained, too. The flower beds were perfect, with their red roses and trimmed hedges. A black wrought iron fence surrounded the yard, but there was a section of driveway open to the road before the gate cut off access. Likely for delivery purposes.

I pulled in there, parked, and spotted part of a carriage house behind the main house. Wow, even that looked in perfect shape.

Faintly, I heard the sound of barking from inside. Ah, Myst must have heard me. Still couldn’t believe he was a puppy at that size and with that kind of deep bark.

I tugged my vest into place as I headed toward the front door. I’d opted for a midnight blue dress shirt, tan vest, and black jeans for tonight’s date. I looked good—I knew I did.I just hoped Rhett appreciated the view. Butterflies flitted about in my stomach as I walked up, and I paused at the door, composing myself before pushing the very ancient looking doorbell.

An impressive sounding goooooooong rang out.

The door opened promptly and I about swallowed my tongue. Rhett looked good enough to eat, and here I was, a very, very hungry boy. I needed someone to say bon appetite so I could get my mouth on him.

“Hi, Calix. You’re right on time.”

“I do try.”

He smiled as he greeted me but there was something off. Something about his body language, which looked stiff, and the smile looked strained around the edges. Hmm? What was this?

Then I realized Lucy was standing in between his legs, facing backward, like a guard dog on alert with her master. Myst was also on guard, one eye behind Rhett, even though he was turned so he could greet me. What was this?

I gave Myst a scratch on the head, but I attuned to my surroundings better. Oh.

Figured a building of this age would be hella haunted.

Now, I wasn’t the strongest when it came to sensing ghosts, that was more my mother’s gift, but I could sense them. And if I wasn’t mistaken, my date had not one, not two, but a whole house of ghosts all gathered in the foyer watching curiously. I could vaguely see the outlines of their spirits gathered in close—just the transparent silhouettes of them. To be honest, I sensed them better than I saw them.

Had Ruth Fairchild also been a medium? I’d never heard, but I couldn’t explain why there were so many ghosts here otherwise. Seriously, you’d think this place was a waystation for Ghost Express with the amount of them in this foyer. Typically I didn’t advertise I was a practicing witch. Not everyone was welcoming of that sort of thing. Right this second, though, I felt like Rhett would be open to me telling him something. I was fairly certain Rhett was magical. Besides, if we were going to date, better to get this out in the open right now.

“Uh, Rhett? You realize you’ve got a lot of ghosts playing peanut gallery right now?”

It was like all of the tension in his body just whooshed out. “Oh, thank fucking Christ, you can see them?”

“Half see, half sense. As a witch, I’m very sensitive to the energies around me, see.”

“Oh.” He blinked, absorbed that, then nodded. “That makes perfect sense. Truth told, I can’t see them. But they’ve been picking things up, or moving shit, or making stomping noises so I know they’re there. Aunt Ruth said they’re all friendly. They haven’t done anything bad yet? Just kinda spooking me out of my skin.”

“Well, yeah, of course. You can’t see them, can barely sense them, so makes sense it’s unnerving. Tell you what, let’s go get dinner. You can tell me more about this whole situation, and I can help you come up with a game plan so you’re more comfortable living in the house.”

Rhett stepped forward abruptly and hugged me. Just full-on bear-hugged me.

I liked having a cute male hugging me very much, so I hugged back with a smile. “You like my plan, I take it.”

“I fucking love your plan. Yes, please.”

“Then let’s do it.”

I kind of reluctantly let go and turned my attention to the two animals patiently waiting on standby. “You two watch the house. Be back in a few hours. And the rest of you, behave. I don’t want to evict you either.”

Lucy flicked an ear, indicating she had heard me, but she didn’t turn her head. Her attention was on keeping the ghosts off her human. Myst gave a tail wag and nudged Rhett against the thigh with his nose to get more love. Then again, he was a puppy, so it made sense he didn’t really get the full gravity of the situation.

Rhett quickly locked up, then followed me down to the car. We hopped in, and all the while, I had two thoughts bouncing around in my head and getting tangled up. I was super glad that he’d taken the news of me as a witch with aplomb. I really, really wanted to give us a chance at building a relationship. Second thought was, how to deal with the ghosts? They did seem friendly at first glance, but I think boundaries needed to be established so Rhett didn’t keel over from a heart attack.

Feeding the man was definitely the first step.

The drive was short, so we didn’t get much into the conversation. I let that be for a minute and let him breathe out some of his nervous tension.

Rhett was noticeably calmer once we were seated in the restaurant. My sister had given good advice, as the food was excellent and the place had a calm, quiet sort of atmosphere, making it easy for conversation. With the pleasant evening temps, we requested seating outside. No one else was on the patio, so we had an excellent view of well-maintained flower beds and each other. Just how I liked it for a date.

Once we had our orders placed, I zeroed in on Rhett. “I have so, so many questions for you.”

“I bet.” He flashed me the smile that made butterflies flit about in my stomach. “Where to start?”

“The house?”

“Sure, might as well. So my Great-Aunt Ruth and I were really close. My mom and I were basically the only blood relatives she had. My mom married my stepdad about, uh, ten years ago? So I have stepsiblings she was also fond of, but blood relations, it was just the three of us. I spent summers traveling the world with her, and once I was finished with college, I moved out here with the intention of helping her. Her health had rapidly declined the last three years of her life, see. But the timing sucked. By the time I got out here, she was in hospice and I only got three weeks with her. I spent most of my free hours in the hospital visiting.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” I could tell it grieved him that he hadn’t had more time with her. I wasn’t sure whether or not to mention I had known her. It might seem too weird? “She must have been an awesome lady.”

“She was cool as hell. The house, as you might have guessed, was hers. She left it to me upon her passing.”

That did explain how he managed to own a house like that .

“It took a few months after she died to get all the estate things settled, and then I moved into the house this week.” Rhett made a face and sipped his water. “Which was when I discovered it was haunted as hell.”

“She didn’t say anything to you about it?”

“Oh, she said something. She left behind a book of instructions for me about the house, and she wrote exactly three paragraphs about the ghosts. Starting line was ‘don’t worry about the ghosts, they’re friendly.’”

I choked on a laugh. “Wow.”

“Wow indeed. She clearly had developed some kind of rapport with them, but I have no such rapport.” Rhett scratched a cheek. “I had a friend in high school who was a witch, and she could see ghosts, so I’m not too surprised that you can. Anything you can do about them?”

“Lots. Although honestly, my mother’s sense of them is much stronger. I think it’s best to have her over before we make any plans. I will go back with you tonight, though, and communicate with them. At least set some boundaries so you’re not coming out of your skin.”

“Much appreciated.” Open relief flooded his face.

So he’d known someone who was a witch as a teenager, eh. That explained why he was so easygoing with me. But I was really getting the sense that he didn’t know about himself, which was confusing. I’d have to work my way around the question and see if my assumption was right. At the moment, I was very thankful he was so open-minded. Not everyone was.

“My turn for a question.” Rhett sipped more water before speaking. “Why the store?”

“Hmm, really, I’ve always thought a store a good idea. Sourcing stuff for spells is an absolute pain sometimes. And we practitioners didn’t have a place to really gather in this city, which is also a pain if we’re trying to do any group workings. Your Aunt Ruth was someone I knew, actually, as she was the most famous witch of this area.”

Rhett’s eyes bugged right out of his head. “She was a witch?” he asked, voice raising.

That confirmed things for me right there. Rhett had no idea what he was. Why had Ruth hidden it? “A very good one. She was generous to the whole community, always willing to help. I didn’t know her as well personally, having only been around her maybe a dozen times? But she hosted a lot of events and stuff at her house until about four or so years ago. Health issues prevented her, I guess. Part of the reason I opened the store was to give the community a communal event space again. I decided at eighteen I wanted to open a store and crowdsourced it so I could open one. My dad did force me to take some accounting and business classes so I didn’t do anything stupid, which in hindsight was wise of him, but what surprised me was the rest of the city latching on to me. See, I do sell infused products—Moon drops, for example, that help with a woman’s cycle. Some of what I make is really popular and word spreads like wildfire. I make more money off those products than I do the stuff I thought I’d sell.”

“Now isn’t that how it always works? Nothing goes according to plan.”

“Preach.”

“Are you a kitchen witch, then?”

I did a double take. Damn, he really did know something of my world if he was asking that.

Rhett laughed, eyes sparkling. “I just shocked you. I told you, I had a good friend. We lost contact when I went to college, but it’s not like we had a falling out. She told me a lot.”

“She must have told you a ton. And yes, I do consider myself a kitchen witch, mostly because I’m constantly making up something. I’m also a fire witch, though, as fire is my best affinity.”

“Dude, that’s metal as hell.”

I preened. “I do try. My turn. When you first came into the shop four months ago, I was under the impression you were an employee only. Then Robbie just disappeared. What’s the full story there?”

“He did.” Rhett rolled his eyes heavenward. “Robbie’s one of those guys who’s all for a get rich quick scheme. He didn’t really have any technical background, which was why he was hiring guys like me to do the job. He had no idea how to fix more than basic tech issues. After he hired me, he popped in and out of the store, but he wasn’t really running it. I saw him less and less and then he just…disappeared. I didn’t see him again. Couldn’t reach him by phone. I think he just washed his hands of the place and walked out.”

My eyes crossed at that. “My god, that’s so irresponsible.”

“Tell me about it. Once I realized what he’d done, I sat on it for a hot second, then called my stepdad. Asked him for advice. He instead asked me a question—was the shop making decent money? And it was. Honestly, it makes a pretty good living. So he said, why not take over? And I couldn’t think of a single downside to doing so.”

I blinked at him. “So you just…did?”

“Basically. I contacted the landlord for our building, explained the situation, asked if I could take over the lease. Macy didn’t really care who paid the bills as long as someone was.”

I could totally see that. Macy was in her sixties and preferred playing with her grandchildren over everything else.

“With her blessing, I then went down to the county clerk office and filed a business license. Thirty-five dollars later, I was a businessman.” Rhett shrugged like this was no big deal.

The sheer moxie of him was amazing. I wasn’t sure I would have done the same in his shoes. Also, Robbie, what the hell? How stupid can you be to walk away from a business that was doing well?

“So how long have you owned it?”

“About two weeks.”

“Do you think Robbie was out of his depth and that’s why he walked out?”

“Man was totally out of his depth. But here’s the thing. Eighty percent of the clientele who walk through my doors don’t actually have a complicated problem. If I take the computer or phone apart, clean it, and put it back together? It works fine.”

“Wait, dirt is that destructive with machines?”

“A-yup,” he confirmed, popping the P.

Robbie, seriously, you stupid. I’m glad he was stupid, though, don’t misunderstand me. I wouldn’t have gotten this close to Rhett otherwise.

“Well, I’m glad you did step up.”

“Easiest thing in the world, honestly.” Rhett’s expression turned soft and sweet. “Also some of the best luck I’ve ever had. I’d never have met you if not for that. And I’m really, really happy to know you.”

If this man got any sweeter, my heart wouldn’t be able to take it. My voice came out husky. “Me too, Rhett. Trust me, me too.”