Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 135696 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135696 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
The minute she arrives, she knows it’s perfect.
The very night of her arrival, however, someone—or something—is scratching at her window.
The next morning, she meets her one and only neighbor, Doc Riggs. He’s a rough, good-time guy who rubs Nadia wrong immediately. They clash, and neither of them are happy to be sharing their lake.
But soon, Nadia learns the lore around her cabin, and how the townsfolk are certain it’s haunted by the ghost of the man who was murdered there fifteen years before.
Riggs and Nadia are suddenly thrown into a tangled web of history, betrayal, grief, secrets, with only one thing certain.
Someone—or something—wants them off that lake.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
ONE
Weaver Cabin
Nadia
The mailbox I was told to look out for, as suspected from the description, was hard to miss.
There were four huge planters surrounding it frothing with peach, pink and orange impatiens. The mailbox itself was a shiny stainless steel with the words Weaver Cabin painted on the side. It was held aloft by a twisted branch, which, only when I turned in and got close, could I see was actually burnished steel with fake, metal leaves on it.
Last, it was unique and incredibly pretty.
And seeing it made some of the anxiety I had about the decision I’d made start to ebb away.
The lane to the cabin meandered with gentle curves and was edged in small boulders, many of which had bright-green moss growing on them.
The lane was also longer than I expected.
It’d be quite a hike to get my mail in the morning.
And it meant my home for the next year was seriously secluded.
Finally, the cabin came into view, and the instant I saw it, the reservations that had recently sprung up about the seclusion of Weaver Cabin vanished.
One story, smallish, with a carport attached that would protect my SUV from the elements on all sides but the front. The roof of the timber house was blue tin, and a porch ran the length of the face of the structure.
On the porch was an arrangement of two rocking chairs—one yellow, one red, both with cute pillows on them—sharing what appeared to be an old whisky barrel as a table, which was topped with an arrangement of fresh wildflowers in a mason jar. At the other side of the veranda, there was a porch swing with a fluffy pad and more sweet pillows.
Yes, a porch swing.
There were lanterns scattered about, along with a plethora of different sized pots and hanging baskets, these filled with more impatiens, plus petunias, begonias, pansies and fuchsias.
It was colorful and charming. A hundred times better than the pictures I saw of it when I was deciding where to go, and those pictures had captivated me, so that seemed impossible.
But there it was, right before me.
Colorful and charming also pertained to the man standing on the porch, not to mention his beat-up, old, faded-white Ford pickup parked off to the side.
He had white hair pulled back, probably in a ponytail, a farmer’s cap on his head. Scruffy white beard. Weathered skin. Plaid shirt.
And faded denim overalls.
Overalls!
Yes, that anxiety was fading fast.
I swung around the front, switched off the ignition and exited my vehicle with a small smile on my face.
“You Miz Williams?” he called.
I didn’t wince at the name I’d never changed and tried not to use, but it was the name on all legal documents.
Including rental contracts.
“Yes. But I’m Nadia. Are you Dave Weaver?” I called back, moving across the gravel path to the wooden front steps (all lined with pots of flowers, including parts of the gravel).
He held up a hand, palm out, to stop my progress.
I halted.
“I get how it is, gel.”
The “g” in “gel” was hard, and I had a feeling he meant the word as “girl.”
He kept talking.
“These days, heck, all through history, you gotta be careful. My Brenda was supposed to meet you so you’d feel comfortable during the walk-through. She got to feelin’ bad, so, my apologies, but it has to be me.”
Before I could fully process what he said, he unexpectedly tossed a set of keys toward me, and fortunately, I moved fast enough and caught them.
He continued speaking.
“I’ll keep my distance as I show you around.”
Ah.
He meant me being in the middle of nowhere with a strange man.
It was lovely he thought of that, because, considering his Green Acres Santa look, I hadn’t.
He swept a hand around to indicate the entirety of the space.
“Brenda told me to put the pillows out so you’ll get the full effect. And you can do it if you want, but she said she’d come and water the plants, but she won’t come unless you know she’s comin’.”
Considering I had little else to do, taking care of all these flowers sounded like a good meditative task to have.
A responsibility.
Something that counted on me.
Yes, that seemed a good thing to do.
“If she tells me how much water they need and how frequently they need it, I can take care of it,” I told him and shot him another smile. “I’m not known for my gardening chops, but I can learn.”
He nodded. “I’ll give her that heads up.” He hooked his thumbs in the straps of his overalls and carried on, “As a welcome home, we got the essentials in there for you, so you don’t have to head back out and grab yourself some groceries. Not like the market is close.”
That was nice, though my trunk was filled with about fifteen bags of groceries because I’d had that same thought.