Haunted
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Synopsis
In this spine-tingling tale the New York Times bestselling author melds love story with historical mystery as past meets present in Jerome, Arizona.
1898: Robbery, prostitution, and violence are commonplace in the fabulously rich copper mining city of Jerome. But a brutal murder sets the stage for a series of strange events that will echo far into the future.
2024: Jenny Spencer’s Copper Star Saloon and Hotel is one of the best-loved attractions in the popular tourist destination, but eerie occurrences in the newly renovated wing are souring business.
Cain Barrett, the wealthy owner of the nearby Grandview Hotel, has his eye on Jenny. He’ll help her any way he can, but Cain has problems of his own . . .
A brutal murder at the Copper Star, entries in a dusty journal, and ghostly sightings at both hotels . . . is the connection a figment of Jenny’s imagination, or a threat to her life? And who is causing trouble for Cain?
As they work together to solve the mystery, Cain vows not to let anything, or anyone—living or dead—stand between him and the woman he has come to love.
Release date: September 24, 2024
Publisher: Kensington Books
Print pages: 400
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Haunted
Kat Martin
A LOT OF BAD THINGS HAPPENED IN THE WICKEDEST TOWN IN THE West. Men died. Women were murdered. Some of their deaths left a haunting imprint in the very walls of the buildings. The Copper Star Saloon was one of them.
It was the year 1898. The plinkity-plink of an old piano rose up from downstairs. Rough men’s voices and women’s high-pitched laughter seeped through the wooden floors of the rooms above the saloon. A woman sprawled naked on the bed, the big hairy body of Boris Koblinsky, one of the local miners, pressing her down in the mattress.
“You’re hurting me, Boris.”
“Ya know the way I like it,” Boris said. “Tell me ya want it.”
What Sadie wanted was to push the big bastard off her, tell him to find someone else, but Boris paid three times what the other miners did. He’d taken a fancy to her nearly a year ago, and it was worth a few bruises for the extra pay.
Boris panted and made the iron headboard slam against the wall. Lacey, the owner, would want a few coins for the damages, but it would all be over soon, and Sadie could tuck the extra money into her savings. In a year or two, she’d have enough to leave this hellhole, move to Tombstone or Bisbee, maybe even find herself a husband.
The bed kept hammering against the wall. Boris squeezed her breasts, pinching so hard pain shot through her body.
“Stop it, Boris!” She sucked in a breath and tried to roll away from his big, calloused hand. He should have been done by now, but Boris was drunker than usual, numb enough to last longer. Sadie couldn’t take much more. She cried out, but the music and laugher muffled the sound.
Her anger surfaced, replacing the lure of money. She began to fight, trying desperately to dislodge him.
“That’s enough, Boris. Get off me.” Boris just kept grunting, ramming painfully inside her. “Stop it, Boris—you pig!”
“Pig, am I?” Fury distorted his features. Boris reared back and slapped her so hard her ears rang. “Well, I might be a pig, Sadie Murphy, but yer nothin’ but a two-bit whore.”
Sadie felt Boris’s big hands settle around her throat, and her fury slowly faded, turning instead to fear. “Let . . . go . . . of . . . me!”
She thrashed beneath him and clawed at the thick, blunt fingers squeezing off her air supply.
“You’re mine, Sadie! Ya belong to me!” Boris rammed into her again, his big hands gripping her tighter and tighter as he rode her toward release. His lust was building, his excitement reaching its peak.
Sadie’s vision began to blur. Her nails dug into Boris’s calloused hands, but she couldn’t pry his fingers loose. Darkness hovered behind her eyes.
Boris . . . The silent word remained locked in her throat. Her vision narrowed and finally went black. Beneath Boris’s heavy weight, her body went slack. Boris finally finished and pulled out of her.
Dragging on his denim pants, he jammed his big feet into his heavy leather work boots, and pulled his undershirt back on. Sliding his suspenders over his thick shoulders, Boris glanced over at the bed. Sadie lay on her back, pale legs splayed, eyes open and staring lifelessly up at the ceiling.
Got what she deserved, he thought.
Still, the sheriff might not see it that way. Boris grabbed his floppy brown felt hat, tugged it low on his forehead, strode along the hall and down the back stairs. Plenty of jobs around. Time he found himself a new one.
Plenty of whores around, too.
Boris smiled to think of the pleasure in store for him when he found himself a new woman.
THE COPPER STAR SALOON AND HOTEL ON MAIN STREET BUZZED with activity. Tourists came from all over the country to visit the remnants of the old mining boomtown the New York Sun had once described as the Wickedest Town in the West.
The town, a city of fifteen thousand at its peak, was now an infamous ghost town with a population of less than five hundred. It had been falling in ruins until the sixties, when artists and shopkeepers began moving in, keeping the town alive.
Built in the 1890s, the Copper Star had been ravaged by fire four times, but had always managed to survive. The molded tin ceilings, batwing doors, long wooden bar, and ornately carved back bar looked the same as they had more than a hundred years ago.
The owner, Jenny Spencer, worked behind the bar, comfortable in a business that had been family-owned for as long as she could recall. After her father had died, her uncle Charlie had run the business, then six months ago, Uncle Charlie had also passed away. Though Charlie had a son, the sad truth was, Eddie Spencer wasn’t capable of running the place. He’d been into booze and drugs since his teens.
Instead, Jenny had inherited the saloon and hotel she had been running ever since her divorce.
Behind the bar, Jenny drew beers and made drinks for the tourists, smiled, and made conversation. The place was usually peaceful in the daytime, but when the town was full of summer visitors, the bars and saloons could get rowdy. Fortunately, she was well known in the small town, where everyone seemed to watch out for each other. So far, she had managed to take care of herself.
Setting two beers on the counter and retrieving the patron’s money, Jenny looked up to see her tall, lanky brother shoving through the batwing doors. Breathing a sigh of relief, she rounded the bar and hurried toward him.
“I didn’t know you were coming, but I’m really glad you’re here.”
“You look a little harried. Everything okay?”
“Unfortunately, no. The hotel’s full. It’s time to clean the rooms. I’m down to one girl, and the bartender didn’t show up.” She glanced at the customers seated at the wooden tables scattered around the saloon. “Could you possibly take over till I get things worked out?”
Dylan just shrugged. “Sure, no problem.”
“Thanks. You’re a lifesaver.” Jenny went up on her toes and kissed his cheek, knocking aside his dark blue baseball cap where the words PRESCOTT FIRE gleamed in white letters on the front. She was far shorter than her brother’s six-foot-one-inch frame, her long, curly hair a lighter shade of brown.
“Sorry.” She tugged the cap back down over his forehead. “I promise I won’t be long.”
Jenny headed for a door on the other side of the saloon that led to the hotel lobby. Halfway there, she spotted the regular bartender coming in.
“Sorry I’m late.” Troy Layton was sandy-haired and good-looking, a real ladies’ man, good for business in the saloon. “Had car trouble this morning. Carburetor problem. I figured you could handle things till I got here.”
“A phone call would have been a good idea,” Jenny said. “At least you finally made it. I’ve got work to do upstairs.”
“Like I said, I had car trouble. I’ll call next time.”
Jenny didn’t bother to reply. Troy was a pain in the neck, but he was a good bartender. In a town as small as Jerome, not an easy guy to replace.
As Jenny walked through a door to the original hotel lobby, one of the guests was on her way down the stairs.
“I want my money back!” the woman demanded. Short and round-faced, pretty much round all over, she was Mrs. Friedman, Jenny recalled.
“What’s the problem?”
Angry spots of color pinkened the woman’s cheeks. “The problem is I paid good money for a room and didn’t get a wink of sleep. People arguing in the room next door, footsteps in the hallway at ungodly hours. I’ll never spend another night in this hotel! Either you give me my money back, or I go on the internet and give you a one-star review, warn people what they’re in for if they book a room at this hotel!”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Friedman, there shouldn’t have been a problem. All the rooms in that section were recently remodeled. We had them soundproofed. It shouldn’t have been noisy in there.”
Mrs. Friedman ignored her, just dug through her purse, pulled out her wallet, and slid out her American Express card. “I paid for the room online. Please refund the amount on my card.”
Dylan walked through the door just then, and Jenny cast him a beseeching glance.
“Refund the lady’s money,” he said. “You don’t need a bad review.”
“Fine.” But Jenny wasn’t happy about it. As soon as the woman grabbed the handle of her carry-on and marched out through the etched, half-glass front door, ringing the bell above, she turned to her brother.
“There is nothing wrong with the rooms in the new section. That woman just wanted a free place to stay.”
“You just opened that section, right?”
Jenny nodded. “It’s only been available for a couple of weeks. Tourism is growing in town. Jerome has plenty of business. The hotel needed the income, and you and I both thought the increased earnings would pay off the loan fairly quickly.”
“And it will,” Dylan said. “Just because some old bat of a woman . . .” He paused at the look on her face. “What? What aren’t you telling me?”
Jenny sighed. “This isn’t the first time. I didn’t want to tell you. This is my business, and you have a job and a life of your own to worry about.”
“You’re my sister. You know I’ll help anyway I can.”
“I know.”
Their dad had raised them after their mother had died of cancer; then he was killed a few years later in a car accident. She and Dylan were both used to being on their own.
“So tell me what’s going on with the new section,” Dylan said.
“That’s just it. I have no idea what’s going on. Guests complain about hearing things.”
“What kind of things?”
“Footsteps when no one is there. Chains rattling. People whispering in the hallway.”
“Chains rattling? Seriously?”
Jenny glanced away. “That’s what they say.”
“Come on, sis. You should be used to this stuff by now. Jerome is a ghost town, one of the most famous in Arizona, maybe the whole country. During its heyday, hundreds of people died working the copper mines. People come here specifically hoping to see a ghost. Hell, you can buy a ticket online for a ghost tour.”
“I know, but this is different.”
“Different how? The hotel is on the damned tour. There are stories of at least four dead people supposedly seen walking the halls upstairs.”
“Those are friendly ghosts.”
“Friendly ghosts?”
“I mean, if they’re actually real.”
He cocked a dark eyebrow, which Jenny could barely see beneath the bill of his ball cap.
“Uncle Charlie always kept those rooms blocked off,” Jenny said. “Back when he remodeled the hotel, he left that section untouched. When we opened it, the rooms still had the original furniture. I had some of it refinished and put back when we were done.”
“Yes, and the rooms look damned good up there.”
“Yes, they do. They’re as pretty as they were back when the hotel was first built, but . . .”
“But what?”
“Charlie never talked about it, but he told me once that odd things happened in the rooms in that section. Dangerous things. That’s what he said.”
The skeptical look on her brother’s face reminded her that he didn’t believe in ghosts, except the ones the kids dressed up as on Halloween.
“I always figured Charlie just didn’t want to expand the place,” Dylan said. “Be more work he didn’t need. Until the manager quit and you took over, he seemed to be enjoying his retirement.”
Jenny bit her lip. “Maybe you’re right. It’s probably just a result of the new construction. That part of the building is settling or something.”
“That would be my guess. And don’t forget how susceptible people are to suggestion. They come to Jerome looking for spirits. They find what they expect to find.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
Dylan grinned. “You didn’t bring it up. Mrs. Friedman did.”
Jenny smiled. As the bell above the door rang again, her gaze shifted away from her brother to her best friend, Summer Hayes. Her family owned the Butterfly Boutique, where Summer worked. She was taller than Jenny, pretty, with a willowy figure, long straight platinum-blond hair, and a shy disposition.
“Hi, Jenny.” Her face lit up. “Dylan, nice to see you.” The blush in Summer’s cheeks betrayed the crush she had on Jenny’s brother. So far, he hadn’t seemed to notice.
“I thought you might have time for lunch,” Summer said to Jenny.
“I’m starving, but I’m swamped.” Jenny checked the ship’s clock on the wall behind the old-fashioned, slotted key holder on the wall. “I’ve got some paperwork I have to finish. Give me thirty minutes, and we can get something here.”
Summer nodded. “Okay, that sounds good. I’ll be back then.” She flashed a timid smile at Dylan. “Take care, Dylan.”
“Will do. You, too.”
The bell rang as Summer walked out. Dylan’s gaze followed, lingered a moment, before he glanced away. Jenny wondered if he had any interest in her friend, or if Summer’s attraction was completely one-sided.
Jenny turned to her brother. “So, what are you doing in town?”
“My shift starts tomorrow. Eight days on before I’m off again. I thought I’d check on you before I went to work.” Dylan was a firefighter in Prescott, a larger town less than an hour’s drive away. Jenny worried about him. Fighting fires was a dangerous occupation. She took comfort in knowing he was very good at his job.
“You didn’t have to do that, but I’m always glad to see you.”
They talked for a while, but Jenny had work to do, and Dylan had begun to glance at his watch. “I better get going.”
“Yeah, me, too.”
Her brother walked out the door, ringing the bell once more. He was such a stand-up guy, so different from Richard, her abusive, cheating, rat bastard ex-husband.
Looking forward to a short lunch with Summer, Jenny headed to her small office in the rear of the lobby.
JENNY SAT WITH SUMMER AT A TABLE IN THE SALOON, EATING A Miner’s Burger and Fire-in-the-Hole Fries, the specialty of the house, along with a cup of Smelter Soup.
The bar menu was limited—just burgers, sandwiches, salads, and pizza, which came frozen, but, with a few extras, actually tasted very good. There were miscellaneous appetizers, like fried mozzarella, onion rings, and chicken wings. Just enough to keep the customers happy.
It was the bar that made most of the money.
“So how’s everything going?” Summer asked. She’d been living in Jerome since her mother bought the Butterfly Boutique ten years ago, and the two had moved into an apartment upstairs.
“This business is never easy,” Jenny said. “But I’m dealing. It’s harder now that Uncle Charlie’s gone and I’m on my own.”
Summer picked up a fry, dabbed it in a blob of ketchup, and popped it into her mouth. “At least you have your brother.” She ate another fry. “He looks great, by the way. What’s he doing these days?”
Jenny smiled. “Dylan always looks good, and if that’s a subtle way of asking if he’s seeing anyone, the answer is no one serious. Not that I know of, at any rate.”
“Think there’s any chance he would ever ask me out?”
“I don’t know. I think he’d like you if he got to know you, but he’s stubborn. He’d be pissed if I tried to interfere in his love life.”
Summer sighed, and both of them dug into their burgers. Jenny was sipping a Diet Coke when she spotted someone pushing through the old batwing doors at the entrance.
“Speaking of good-looking,” Summer said, “check out the guy who just walked in.”
Jenny’s attention fixed on the door. The man was at least six-three, with a pair of biceps bulging from the sleeves of a black T-shirt snug enough to reveal a set of shoulders any linebacker would envy and a heavily muscled chest.
“That’s Cain Barrett,” Jenny said. “He’s the new owner of the Grandview Hotel.”
“I’ve heard about him, but I’ve never seen him. Wow.” She sighed. “Just wow.”
Jenny smiled. “Can’t argue with that.”
“I heard he’s doing a major remodel over there.”
Jenny nodded and sipped her Coke. “Dylan said he went to Mingus High School, same as I did, but he was older. He dropped out for a couple of years, came back and graduated, then left town. I guess he was just too far ahead for me to remember him.”
Dylan had also told her the men in the Barrett family had been miners since the early nineteen hundreds. Rumor was, they were ruffians, outlaws, and criminals. Dylan said Cain had been extremely poor as a kid, but apparently that had changed. Cain Barrett was now the owner of Barrett Enterprises, a company worth millions.
The Grandview remodel was well underway when Cain had begun showing up in the bar. Occasionally, he would come in with the job foreman or one of the guys on the construction crew. Once in a while, he came alone and sat at the bar. One of the locals told her he had dated an army of glamorous women, but he had never married.
“Oh, my God,” Summer hissed. “He’s coming over here.”
Jenny sat up a little straighter, wishing she weren’t wearing the red bandana that tied up her hair in a ponytail. Not that she was interested. After her cheating husband and her ugly divorce, men were off-limits.
“Ms. Spencer,” Cain said in a deep, masculine voice as he stopped next to their table. “It’s good to see you.”
“You as well, Mr. Barrett.”
“It’s just Cain. I thought we’d settled that the last time I was in here.”
Her cheeks warmed. She didn’t really know him that well, but he was a good customer, and if that was the way he wanted it . . .
“All right . . . Cain. This is my friend, Summer Hayes. She and her mother own the Butterfly Boutique just down the street.”
Cain smiled. “Nice to meet you, Summer.” He had a solid jaw, dark brown hair, and gold-rimmed dark eyes.
“I’d like to speak to you for a moment when you’re finished,” he said. “I have a business proposition for you.”
Summer surged to her feet. “I was just getting ready to leave.” Though half her burger and fries remained on her plate, she nearly knocked her chair over trying to escape.
“I’ll buy next time,” Summer added. “Nice to meet you—”
“Cain,” he reminded her, and Summer’s face flamed.
“Cain,” she repeated.
“You as well, Summer.”
With a last glance at Jenny, Summer turned and hurried out of the bar. Jenny forced herself to relax as Cain pulled out a chair and sat down at the table.
“Would you like something to eat or drink?” she asked.
“I’m fine, thanks.”
“So what can I do for you . . . Cain?”
“I need to hire a consultant to help me finish the hotel. I’m interested in hearing suggestions that could make the place run better. I figure you’ve been managing this place for a while—”
“Actually, I own the Copper Star. I’ve been working here off and on since I was a kid. Now I own the property.”
He looked chagrined. “My mistake. I should have done a little more research. I thought Charles Spencer was the owner.”
“Uncle Charlie recently passed. He left the Star to me.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you. I miss him every day.”
Cain just nodded. “Being the owner/operator, you clearly know how to run the business, which gives me an even better reason to hire you.”
Jenny frowned. “Surely you can find someone a lot more qualified than I am to give you advice on how to run your hotel.”
“Maybe. But I’d have to bring them in from Phoenix, find a place to put them up until we open, and take the risk they know what they’re doing. Add to that, Jerome is a specialized clientele, a mix of locals and tourists. A tiny community that’s extremely self-sufficient. You’re accepted here, and you understand the mix.”
Jenny considered the offer. She knew how to run the Star, but this was different. The old Grandview Hotel had dozens of rooms, plus a bar and a restaurant. She wasn’t sure she could handle the job.
On the other hand, she could certainly use the money. Uncle Charlie had run up a debt on the business she was still paying off, and there was a second loan to cover the construction on the newly opened wing.
“I’d have to hire someone to fill in for me while I’m over at the Grandview,” she said. “How long would you need me?”
“Until the hotel is finished—at least a few weeks, maybe longer. But it would only be part-time, which should allow you to handle things here as well.”
At least the place was close by. She would still be driving the eight miles to and from her small house in Cottonwood, but she was used to that. “What sort of money are we talking about?”
Cain named a sum that made her head swim. Maybe she had misunderstood. “Are you . . . are you sure?”
“If it isn’t enough—”
“No! That . . . that isn’t what I meant. I meant are you certain you want to take that kind of risk on an unknown commodity like me?”
He smiled, and a soft flutter rose in her stomach. “I like the way this place operates,” he said. “I like that the locals come here as well as the tourists. That means you’re doing a good job. It also means you’re an accepted part of the community. That’s what I want for the Grandview.”
“You were raised in Jerome. You’ll be accepted as a local.”
Cain shook his head. “I’ve never been accepted. But that’s a story for another time. Do you want the job or not?”
She had offended him. She hadn’t meant to do that. “Would it be all right if I took a look at the hotel before I give you an answer? It’s been closed for three years. I’d like to see what I’m getting into.”
Cain relaxed. “Good idea. I should have thought of it myself. I’m liking this idea better and better. Do you have time to go now, or should I come back for you later?”
“I’m afraid I can’t go today. Tomorrow would work.”
“All right. What time shall I pick you up?”
“We’ve got a shift change at five. I usually take a break about then.”
Cain nodded. “Fine. I’ll be here tomorrow at five.”
“It’s only up the hill,” Jenny said. “I’ll just walk.”
Something that might have been irritation—or maybe it was amusement—touched his lips. Clearly Cain Barrett wasn’t used to someone else calling the shots. Jenny wondered if taking the job would be a mistake.
Cain shoved his big frame up from the chair, and Jenny stood up, too. She hadn’t realized how much he would tower over her. She thought of Richard, but his abuse was mental, not physical.
“I look forward to seeing you tomorrow at five.” Cain turned and strode across the room. Liking the view, Jenny watched until he disappeared out the door.
The afternoon was coming to an end. Cain pulled his silver Dodge Ram 2500 diesel out of the parking lot of the Grandview Hotel, his most recent acquisition.
His grandmother was ailing. Nell Barrett had been in an assisted-living facility in Prescott for the last five years. Cain had always taken care of her needs, but her fondest wish was to return to Jerome, the place she had been born, the place she had lived with her late husband for forty-five years.
But Nell needed twenty-four-hour care. Which was the reason Cain had purchased the Grandview. For the last eight months, he’d had a construction crew remodeling the old hotel, turning it into what he hoped would be a profitable business and, more important, a place for his grandmother to spend the last years of her life.
As far as Cain was concerned, he owed Nell Barrett everything. He’d been four years old when his father had abandoned the family. A year later, his mother had dumped him with his grandmother and disappeared, too. It was Nell who had raised him, fed and clothed him, done her best to turn him into a decent human being.
He owed her for making him the man he had become and for everything he had accomplished. She wanted to spend her last years in Jerome.
By God, Cain would see that she got her wish.
He slowed the pickup to take the steep curve in front of him. There were thousand-foot drops off the edge of the narrow road. The drive wasn’t for the faint of heart.
Jerome sat at a 5,600-feet elevation. There were two ways in and out: one off Highway 17 or the shorter route back to his ranch, along a formidable switchback through the national forest.
The remnants of Jerome perched on the steep side of a mountain, its precarious location alone making the place a tourist attraction.
Added to that was its violent, yet interesting history as a Wild West town—the murders, the shoot-outs, the gruesome fires that had burned the place down again and again and taken countless lives. Shifting soils, a result of the eighty-eight miles of mine tunnels, had killed thousands of miners and collapsed whole portions of the city.
His grandmother loved Jerome, with its colorful residents and western history, but the place held few good memories for Cain. Too much bad had happened. Too many gruesome deaths. Too many ghosts.
He smiled at that. He’d been around the town since he was a kid, but he’d never seen a spirit. Maybe you had to be a believer.
Whatever the truth, the Grandview was famously known as one of the town’s most haunted places. The Copper Star was another.
The thought reminded him of the woman who ran the saloon, Jenny Spencer. Cain remembered Jenny from high school. Petite and always smiling, she was popular with the kids in school. He’d noticed her one day when one of the football jocks had been picking on a boy named Felipe, a Latino kid about half the guy’s size.
Jenny had gotten right in the jock’s face and warned him he’d better back off or else. The jock and his buddies had laughed their asses off, but they’d left Jenny and the kid alone.
She’d only been a freshman, way too young for him. He’d been a real bad boy in those days, hung out with an ugly crowd, but he never would have hurt an innocent young girl.
Jenny was no longer a kid. With her curly brown hair and big green eyes, she was even prettier than she had been in school. Her figure had matured from girl to woman, which made him think about her in a way he hadn’t back then. She still had that girl-next-door appearance, and she still intrigued him.
Cain was now a respectable citizen, and after her divorce, Jenny was available. He wanted to find out more about her than the gossip he h. . .
It was the year 1898. The plinkity-plink of an old piano rose up from downstairs. Rough men’s voices and women’s high-pitched laughter seeped through the wooden floors of the rooms above the saloon. A woman sprawled naked on the bed, the big hairy body of Boris Koblinsky, one of the local miners, pressing her down in the mattress.
“You’re hurting me, Boris.”
“Ya know the way I like it,” Boris said. “Tell me ya want it.”
What Sadie wanted was to push the big bastard off her, tell him to find someone else, but Boris paid three times what the other miners did. He’d taken a fancy to her nearly a year ago, and it was worth a few bruises for the extra pay.
Boris panted and made the iron headboard slam against the wall. Lacey, the owner, would want a few coins for the damages, but it would all be over soon, and Sadie could tuck the extra money into her savings. In a year or two, she’d have enough to leave this hellhole, move to Tombstone or Bisbee, maybe even find herself a husband.
The bed kept hammering against the wall. Boris squeezed her breasts, pinching so hard pain shot through her body.
“Stop it, Boris!” She sucked in a breath and tried to roll away from his big, calloused hand. He should have been done by now, but Boris was drunker than usual, numb enough to last longer. Sadie couldn’t take much more. She cried out, but the music and laugher muffled the sound.
Her anger surfaced, replacing the lure of money. She began to fight, trying desperately to dislodge him.
“That’s enough, Boris. Get off me.” Boris just kept grunting, ramming painfully inside her. “Stop it, Boris—you pig!”
“Pig, am I?” Fury distorted his features. Boris reared back and slapped her so hard her ears rang. “Well, I might be a pig, Sadie Murphy, but yer nothin’ but a two-bit whore.”
Sadie felt Boris’s big hands settle around her throat, and her fury slowly faded, turning instead to fear. “Let . . . go . . . of . . . me!”
She thrashed beneath him and clawed at the thick, blunt fingers squeezing off her air supply.
“You’re mine, Sadie! Ya belong to me!” Boris rammed into her again, his big hands gripping her tighter and tighter as he rode her toward release. His lust was building, his excitement reaching its peak.
Sadie’s vision began to blur. Her nails dug into Boris’s calloused hands, but she couldn’t pry his fingers loose. Darkness hovered behind her eyes.
Boris . . . The silent word remained locked in her throat. Her vision narrowed and finally went black. Beneath Boris’s heavy weight, her body went slack. Boris finally finished and pulled out of her.
Dragging on his denim pants, he jammed his big feet into his heavy leather work boots, and pulled his undershirt back on. Sliding his suspenders over his thick shoulders, Boris glanced over at the bed. Sadie lay on her back, pale legs splayed, eyes open and staring lifelessly up at the ceiling.
Got what she deserved, he thought.
Still, the sheriff might not see it that way. Boris grabbed his floppy brown felt hat, tugged it low on his forehead, strode along the hall and down the back stairs. Plenty of jobs around. Time he found himself a new one.
Plenty of whores around, too.
Boris smiled to think of the pleasure in store for him when he found himself a new woman.
THE COPPER STAR SALOON AND HOTEL ON MAIN STREET BUZZED with activity. Tourists came from all over the country to visit the remnants of the old mining boomtown the New York Sun had once described as the Wickedest Town in the West.
The town, a city of fifteen thousand at its peak, was now an infamous ghost town with a population of less than five hundred. It had been falling in ruins until the sixties, when artists and shopkeepers began moving in, keeping the town alive.
Built in the 1890s, the Copper Star had been ravaged by fire four times, but had always managed to survive. The molded tin ceilings, batwing doors, long wooden bar, and ornately carved back bar looked the same as they had more than a hundred years ago.
The owner, Jenny Spencer, worked behind the bar, comfortable in a business that had been family-owned for as long as she could recall. After her father had died, her uncle Charlie had run the business, then six months ago, Uncle Charlie had also passed away. Though Charlie had a son, the sad truth was, Eddie Spencer wasn’t capable of running the place. He’d been into booze and drugs since his teens.
Instead, Jenny had inherited the saloon and hotel she had been running ever since her divorce.
Behind the bar, Jenny drew beers and made drinks for the tourists, smiled, and made conversation. The place was usually peaceful in the daytime, but when the town was full of summer visitors, the bars and saloons could get rowdy. Fortunately, she was well known in the small town, where everyone seemed to watch out for each other. So far, she had managed to take care of herself.
Setting two beers on the counter and retrieving the patron’s money, Jenny looked up to see her tall, lanky brother shoving through the batwing doors. Breathing a sigh of relief, she rounded the bar and hurried toward him.
“I didn’t know you were coming, but I’m really glad you’re here.”
“You look a little harried. Everything okay?”
“Unfortunately, no. The hotel’s full. It’s time to clean the rooms. I’m down to one girl, and the bartender didn’t show up.” She glanced at the customers seated at the wooden tables scattered around the saloon. “Could you possibly take over till I get things worked out?”
Dylan just shrugged. “Sure, no problem.”
“Thanks. You’re a lifesaver.” Jenny went up on her toes and kissed his cheek, knocking aside his dark blue baseball cap where the words PRESCOTT FIRE gleamed in white letters on the front. She was far shorter than her brother’s six-foot-one-inch frame, her long, curly hair a lighter shade of brown.
“Sorry.” She tugged the cap back down over his forehead. “I promise I won’t be long.”
Jenny headed for a door on the other side of the saloon that led to the hotel lobby. Halfway there, she spotted the regular bartender coming in.
“Sorry I’m late.” Troy Layton was sandy-haired and good-looking, a real ladies’ man, good for business in the saloon. “Had car trouble this morning. Carburetor problem. I figured you could handle things till I got here.”
“A phone call would have been a good idea,” Jenny said. “At least you finally made it. I’ve got work to do upstairs.”
“Like I said, I had car trouble. I’ll call next time.”
Jenny didn’t bother to reply. Troy was a pain in the neck, but he was a good bartender. In a town as small as Jerome, not an easy guy to replace.
As Jenny walked through a door to the original hotel lobby, one of the guests was on her way down the stairs.
“I want my money back!” the woman demanded. Short and round-faced, pretty much round all over, she was Mrs. Friedman, Jenny recalled.
“What’s the problem?”
Angry spots of color pinkened the woman’s cheeks. “The problem is I paid good money for a room and didn’t get a wink of sleep. People arguing in the room next door, footsteps in the hallway at ungodly hours. I’ll never spend another night in this hotel! Either you give me my money back, or I go on the internet and give you a one-star review, warn people what they’re in for if they book a room at this hotel!”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Friedman, there shouldn’t have been a problem. All the rooms in that section were recently remodeled. We had them soundproofed. It shouldn’t have been noisy in there.”
Mrs. Friedman ignored her, just dug through her purse, pulled out her wallet, and slid out her American Express card. “I paid for the room online. Please refund the amount on my card.”
Dylan walked through the door just then, and Jenny cast him a beseeching glance.
“Refund the lady’s money,” he said. “You don’t need a bad review.”
“Fine.” But Jenny wasn’t happy about it. As soon as the woman grabbed the handle of her carry-on and marched out through the etched, half-glass front door, ringing the bell above, she turned to her brother.
“There is nothing wrong with the rooms in the new section. That woman just wanted a free place to stay.”
“You just opened that section, right?”
Jenny nodded. “It’s only been available for a couple of weeks. Tourism is growing in town. Jerome has plenty of business. The hotel needed the income, and you and I both thought the increased earnings would pay off the loan fairly quickly.”
“And it will,” Dylan said. “Just because some old bat of a woman . . .” He paused at the look on her face. “What? What aren’t you telling me?”
Jenny sighed. “This isn’t the first time. I didn’t want to tell you. This is my business, and you have a job and a life of your own to worry about.”
“You’re my sister. You know I’ll help anyway I can.”
“I know.”
Their dad had raised them after their mother had died of cancer; then he was killed a few years later in a car accident. She and Dylan were both used to being on their own.
“So tell me what’s going on with the new section,” Dylan said.
“That’s just it. I have no idea what’s going on. Guests complain about hearing things.”
“What kind of things?”
“Footsteps when no one is there. Chains rattling. People whispering in the hallway.”
“Chains rattling? Seriously?”
Jenny glanced away. “That’s what they say.”
“Come on, sis. You should be used to this stuff by now. Jerome is a ghost town, one of the most famous in Arizona, maybe the whole country. During its heyday, hundreds of people died working the copper mines. People come here specifically hoping to see a ghost. Hell, you can buy a ticket online for a ghost tour.”
“I know, but this is different.”
“Different how? The hotel is on the damned tour. There are stories of at least four dead people supposedly seen walking the halls upstairs.”
“Those are friendly ghosts.”
“Friendly ghosts?”
“I mean, if they’re actually real.”
He cocked a dark eyebrow, which Jenny could barely see beneath the bill of his ball cap.
“Uncle Charlie always kept those rooms blocked off,” Jenny said. “Back when he remodeled the hotel, he left that section untouched. When we opened it, the rooms still had the original furniture. I had some of it refinished and put back when we were done.”
“Yes, and the rooms look damned good up there.”
“Yes, they do. They’re as pretty as they were back when the hotel was first built, but . . .”
“But what?”
“Charlie never talked about it, but he told me once that odd things happened in the rooms in that section. Dangerous things. That’s what he said.”
The skeptical look on her brother’s face reminded her that he didn’t believe in ghosts, except the ones the kids dressed up as on Halloween.
“I always figured Charlie just didn’t want to expand the place,” Dylan said. “Be more work he didn’t need. Until the manager quit and you took over, he seemed to be enjoying his retirement.”
Jenny bit her lip. “Maybe you’re right. It’s probably just a result of the new construction. That part of the building is settling or something.”
“That would be my guess. And don’t forget how susceptible people are to suggestion. They come to Jerome looking for spirits. They find what they expect to find.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
Dylan grinned. “You didn’t bring it up. Mrs. Friedman did.”
Jenny smiled. As the bell above the door rang again, her gaze shifted away from her brother to her best friend, Summer Hayes. Her family owned the Butterfly Boutique, where Summer worked. She was taller than Jenny, pretty, with a willowy figure, long straight platinum-blond hair, and a shy disposition.
“Hi, Jenny.” Her face lit up. “Dylan, nice to see you.” The blush in Summer’s cheeks betrayed the crush she had on Jenny’s brother. So far, he hadn’t seemed to notice.
“I thought you might have time for lunch,” Summer said to Jenny.
“I’m starving, but I’m swamped.” Jenny checked the ship’s clock on the wall behind the old-fashioned, slotted key holder on the wall. “I’ve got some paperwork I have to finish. Give me thirty minutes, and we can get something here.”
Summer nodded. “Okay, that sounds good. I’ll be back then.” She flashed a timid smile at Dylan. “Take care, Dylan.”
“Will do. You, too.”
The bell rang as Summer walked out. Dylan’s gaze followed, lingered a moment, before he glanced away. Jenny wondered if he had any interest in her friend, or if Summer’s attraction was completely one-sided.
Jenny turned to her brother. “So, what are you doing in town?”
“My shift starts tomorrow. Eight days on before I’m off again. I thought I’d check on you before I went to work.” Dylan was a firefighter in Prescott, a larger town less than an hour’s drive away. Jenny worried about him. Fighting fires was a dangerous occupation. She took comfort in knowing he was very good at his job.
“You didn’t have to do that, but I’m always glad to see you.”
They talked for a while, but Jenny had work to do, and Dylan had begun to glance at his watch. “I better get going.”
“Yeah, me, too.”
Her brother walked out the door, ringing the bell once more. He was such a stand-up guy, so different from Richard, her abusive, cheating, rat bastard ex-husband.
Looking forward to a short lunch with Summer, Jenny headed to her small office in the rear of the lobby.
JENNY SAT WITH SUMMER AT A TABLE IN THE SALOON, EATING A Miner’s Burger and Fire-in-the-Hole Fries, the specialty of the house, along with a cup of Smelter Soup.
The bar menu was limited—just burgers, sandwiches, salads, and pizza, which came frozen, but, with a few extras, actually tasted very good. There were miscellaneous appetizers, like fried mozzarella, onion rings, and chicken wings. Just enough to keep the customers happy.
It was the bar that made most of the money.
“So how’s everything going?” Summer asked. She’d been living in Jerome since her mother bought the Butterfly Boutique ten years ago, and the two had moved into an apartment upstairs.
“This business is never easy,” Jenny said. “But I’m dealing. It’s harder now that Uncle Charlie’s gone and I’m on my own.”
Summer picked up a fry, dabbed it in a blob of ketchup, and popped it into her mouth. “At least you have your brother.” She ate another fry. “He looks great, by the way. What’s he doing these days?”
Jenny smiled. “Dylan always looks good, and if that’s a subtle way of asking if he’s seeing anyone, the answer is no one serious. Not that I know of, at any rate.”
“Think there’s any chance he would ever ask me out?”
“I don’t know. I think he’d like you if he got to know you, but he’s stubborn. He’d be pissed if I tried to interfere in his love life.”
Summer sighed, and both of them dug into their burgers. Jenny was sipping a Diet Coke when she spotted someone pushing through the old batwing doors at the entrance.
“Speaking of good-looking,” Summer said, “check out the guy who just walked in.”
Jenny’s attention fixed on the door. The man was at least six-three, with a pair of biceps bulging from the sleeves of a black T-shirt snug enough to reveal a set of shoulders any linebacker would envy and a heavily muscled chest.
“That’s Cain Barrett,” Jenny said. “He’s the new owner of the Grandview Hotel.”
“I’ve heard about him, but I’ve never seen him. Wow.” She sighed. “Just wow.”
Jenny smiled. “Can’t argue with that.”
“I heard he’s doing a major remodel over there.”
Jenny nodded and sipped her Coke. “Dylan said he went to Mingus High School, same as I did, but he was older. He dropped out for a couple of years, came back and graduated, then left town. I guess he was just too far ahead for me to remember him.”
Dylan had also told her the men in the Barrett family had been miners since the early nineteen hundreds. Rumor was, they were ruffians, outlaws, and criminals. Dylan said Cain had been extremely poor as a kid, but apparently that had changed. Cain Barrett was now the owner of Barrett Enterprises, a company worth millions.
The Grandview remodel was well underway when Cain had begun showing up in the bar. Occasionally, he would come in with the job foreman or one of the guys on the construction crew. Once in a while, he came alone and sat at the bar. One of the locals told her he had dated an army of glamorous women, but he had never married.
“Oh, my God,” Summer hissed. “He’s coming over here.”
Jenny sat up a little straighter, wishing she weren’t wearing the red bandana that tied up her hair in a ponytail. Not that she was interested. After her cheating husband and her ugly divorce, men were off-limits.
“Ms. Spencer,” Cain said in a deep, masculine voice as he stopped next to their table. “It’s good to see you.”
“You as well, Mr. Barrett.”
“It’s just Cain. I thought we’d settled that the last time I was in here.”
Her cheeks warmed. She didn’t really know him that well, but he was a good customer, and if that was the way he wanted it . . .
“All right . . . Cain. This is my friend, Summer Hayes. She and her mother own the Butterfly Boutique just down the street.”
Cain smiled. “Nice to meet you, Summer.” He had a solid jaw, dark brown hair, and gold-rimmed dark eyes.
“I’d like to speak to you for a moment when you’re finished,” he said. “I have a business proposition for you.”
Summer surged to her feet. “I was just getting ready to leave.” Though half her burger and fries remained on her plate, she nearly knocked her chair over trying to escape.
“I’ll buy next time,” Summer added. “Nice to meet you—”
“Cain,” he reminded her, and Summer’s face flamed.
“Cain,” she repeated.
“You as well, Summer.”
With a last glance at Jenny, Summer turned and hurried out of the bar. Jenny forced herself to relax as Cain pulled out a chair and sat down at the table.
“Would you like something to eat or drink?” she asked.
“I’m fine, thanks.”
“So what can I do for you . . . Cain?”
“I need to hire a consultant to help me finish the hotel. I’m interested in hearing suggestions that could make the place run better. I figure you’ve been managing this place for a while—”
“Actually, I own the Copper Star. I’ve been working here off and on since I was a kid. Now I own the property.”
He looked chagrined. “My mistake. I should have done a little more research. I thought Charles Spencer was the owner.”
“Uncle Charlie recently passed. He left the Star to me.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you. I miss him every day.”
Cain just nodded. “Being the owner/operator, you clearly know how to run the business, which gives me an even better reason to hire you.”
Jenny frowned. “Surely you can find someone a lot more qualified than I am to give you advice on how to run your hotel.”
“Maybe. But I’d have to bring them in from Phoenix, find a place to put them up until we open, and take the risk they know what they’re doing. Add to that, Jerome is a specialized clientele, a mix of locals and tourists. A tiny community that’s extremely self-sufficient. You’re accepted here, and you understand the mix.”
Jenny considered the offer. She knew how to run the Star, but this was different. The old Grandview Hotel had dozens of rooms, plus a bar and a restaurant. She wasn’t sure she could handle the job.
On the other hand, she could certainly use the money. Uncle Charlie had run up a debt on the business she was still paying off, and there was a second loan to cover the construction on the newly opened wing.
“I’d have to hire someone to fill in for me while I’m over at the Grandview,” she said. “How long would you need me?”
“Until the hotel is finished—at least a few weeks, maybe longer. But it would only be part-time, which should allow you to handle things here as well.”
At least the place was close by. She would still be driving the eight miles to and from her small house in Cottonwood, but she was used to that. “What sort of money are we talking about?”
Cain named a sum that made her head swim. Maybe she had misunderstood. “Are you . . . are you sure?”
“If it isn’t enough—”
“No! That . . . that isn’t what I meant. I meant are you certain you want to take that kind of risk on an unknown commodity like me?”
He smiled, and a soft flutter rose in her stomach. “I like the way this place operates,” he said. “I like that the locals come here as well as the tourists. That means you’re doing a good job. It also means you’re an accepted part of the community. That’s what I want for the Grandview.”
“You were raised in Jerome. You’ll be accepted as a local.”
Cain shook his head. “I’ve never been accepted. But that’s a story for another time. Do you want the job or not?”
She had offended him. She hadn’t meant to do that. “Would it be all right if I took a look at the hotel before I give you an answer? It’s been closed for three years. I’d like to see what I’m getting into.”
Cain relaxed. “Good idea. I should have thought of it myself. I’m liking this idea better and better. Do you have time to go now, or should I come back for you later?”
“I’m afraid I can’t go today. Tomorrow would work.”
“All right. What time shall I pick you up?”
“We’ve got a shift change at five. I usually take a break about then.”
Cain nodded. “Fine. I’ll be here tomorrow at five.”
“It’s only up the hill,” Jenny said. “I’ll just walk.”
Something that might have been irritation—or maybe it was amusement—touched his lips. Clearly Cain Barrett wasn’t used to someone else calling the shots. Jenny wondered if taking the job would be a mistake.
Cain shoved his big frame up from the chair, and Jenny stood up, too. She hadn’t realized how much he would tower over her. She thought of Richard, but his abuse was mental, not physical.
“I look forward to seeing you tomorrow at five.” Cain turned and strode across the room. Liking the view, Jenny watched until he disappeared out the door.
The afternoon was coming to an end. Cain pulled his silver Dodge Ram 2500 diesel out of the parking lot of the Grandview Hotel, his most recent acquisition.
His grandmother was ailing. Nell Barrett had been in an assisted-living facility in Prescott for the last five years. Cain had always taken care of her needs, but her fondest wish was to return to Jerome, the place she had been born, the place she had lived with her late husband for forty-five years.
But Nell needed twenty-four-hour care. Which was the reason Cain had purchased the Grandview. For the last eight months, he’d had a construction crew remodeling the old hotel, turning it into what he hoped would be a profitable business and, more important, a place for his grandmother to spend the last years of her life.
As far as Cain was concerned, he owed Nell Barrett everything. He’d been four years old when his father had abandoned the family. A year later, his mother had dumped him with his grandmother and disappeared, too. It was Nell who had raised him, fed and clothed him, done her best to turn him into a decent human being.
He owed her for making him the man he had become and for everything he had accomplished. She wanted to spend her last years in Jerome.
By God, Cain would see that she got her wish.
He slowed the pickup to take the steep curve in front of him. There were thousand-foot drops off the edge of the narrow road. The drive wasn’t for the faint of heart.
Jerome sat at a 5,600-feet elevation. There were two ways in and out: one off Highway 17 or the shorter route back to his ranch, along a formidable switchback through the national forest.
The remnants of Jerome perched on the steep side of a mountain, its precarious location alone making the place a tourist attraction.
Added to that was its violent, yet interesting history as a Wild West town—the murders, the shoot-outs, the gruesome fires that had burned the place down again and again and taken countless lives. Shifting soils, a result of the eighty-eight miles of mine tunnels, had killed thousands of miners and collapsed whole portions of the city.
His grandmother loved Jerome, with its colorful residents and western history, but the place held few good memories for Cain. Too much bad had happened. Too many gruesome deaths. Too many ghosts.
He smiled at that. He’d been around the town since he was a kid, but he’d never seen a spirit. Maybe you had to be a believer.
Whatever the truth, the Grandview was famously known as one of the town’s most haunted places. The Copper Star was another.
The thought reminded him of the woman who ran the saloon, Jenny Spencer. Cain remembered Jenny from high school. Petite and always smiling, she was popular with the kids in school. He’d noticed her one day when one of the football jocks had been picking on a boy named Felipe, a Latino kid about half the guy’s size.
Jenny had gotten right in the jock’s face and warned him he’d better back off or else. The jock and his buddies had laughed their asses off, but they’d left Jenny and the kid alone.
She’d only been a freshman, way too young for him. He’d been a real bad boy in those days, hung out with an ugly crowd, but he never would have hurt an innocent young girl.
Jenny was no longer a kid. With her curly brown hair and big green eyes, she was even prettier than she had been in school. Her figure had matured from girl to woman, which made him think about her in a way he hadn’t back then. She still had that girl-next-door appearance, and she still intrigued him.
Cain was now a respectable citizen, and after her divorce, Jenny was available. He wanted to find out more about her than the gossip he h. . .
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