The Carriage House

The Carriage House
Carla Neggers

Fun and a little hard work.That’s all Tess Haviland had in mind when Ike Grantham paid her for her graphic design work with the run-down, nineteenth-century carriage house on Boston’s North Shore. Then Ike disappeared, and now Tess finds herself with much more than a simple weekend project to get her out of the city. It’s not just the rumors that the carriage house is haunted–it’s the neighbors: six-year-old Dolly Thorne, her reclusive baby-sitter, Harley Beckett…and especially Dolly’s father, Andrew Thorne, who has his own ideas about why Tess has turned up next door.But when Tess discovers a human skeleton in her dirt cellar, she begins to ask questions about the history of the carriage house, the untimely death of Andrew’s wife…and Ike’s disappearance. Questions a desperate killer wants to silence before the truth reveals that someone got away with murder.

Praise for the novels of

CARLA NEGGERS

“No one does romantic suspense better!”

—New York Times bestselling author Janet Evanovich

“Neggers’s brisk pacing and colorful characterizations sweep the reader toward a dramatic and ultimately satisfying denouement.”

—Publishers Weekly on The Cabin

“These pages don’t just turn; they spin with the best of them.”

—BookPage on The Waterfall

“Suspense, romance and the rocky Maine coast—what more can a reader ask for? The Harbor has it all. Carla Neggers writes a story so vivid you can smell the salt air and feel the mist on your skin.”

—New York Times bestselling author Tess Gerritsen

“Tension-filled story line that grips the audience from start to finish.”

—Midwest Book Review on The Waterfall

“Carla Neggers is one of the most distinctive, talented writers of our genre.”

—New York Times bestselling author Debbie Macomber

“A well-defined, well-told story combines with well-written characters to make this an exciting read. Readers will enjoy it from beginning to end.”

—Romantic Times BOOKclub on The Waterfall

CARLA NEGGERS

The Carriage House

To Robyn Carr

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

One

On the day Ike Grantham disappeared, he missed an appointment with Tess Haviland, a Boston graphic designer and one of the few women who didn’t find him irresistible. She liked him, but over a year later, she still couldn’t explain why. He was blond, handsome, a risk-taker, outgoing to a fault, egalitarian and very determined not to fit the stereo-type of the serious, philanthropic-minded heir to a New England industrial fortune. He was without guilt or ambition, and there were days Tess thought he was without morals, too. Especially where women were concerned.