HOUSE OF SECRETS
To clear his imprisoned fatherâs name, Shane Gillum must find evidence hidden in a Marthaâs Vineyard cottage. But he arrives to find the âvacantâ property being prepped for sale by real estate agent Janice Swenson. Is she tied to the notorious owners? Or is she in over her head as the âaccidentsâ on the property grow increasingly dangerous? And who is the saboteur targetingâShane with his search, or Janice with her dark, hidden past? With so much at stake, trusting Janice is a huge risk...but keeping silent about the cottageâs mysteries could mire them both in a deadly scheme.
âLook out!â Janice shouted.
At a highway intersection, a midnight-blue SUV ignored a red light and roared toward her side of the lightweight car. Shaneâs plunge on the accelerator plastered Janice to her seat.
His face shrouded under the bill of a wide-brimmed hat, the driver of the other vehicle laid on his horn. The blast rang in Janiceâs ears as the little Ford whizzed beyond the SUVâs massive bumper.
Sucking a quavering breath into her lungs, Janice stared at Shaneâs sober profile. His Adamâs apple bobbed as he kept his gaze locked on the road.
âDid you notice a license plate number?â he asked.
âI was too scared, and it happened so fast.â
She stared warily out the window at passing traffic. This was too weird. Was the whole island warning her away?
Sheâd left the family name and all such associations behind long ago, but did someone with a vendetta against the Morans know who she was? Unfortunately, the number of people with reason to hate the Moransâany Moranâwas legion.
Did that include Shane Gillum?
JILL ELIZABETH NELSON
writes what she likes to readâfaith-based tales of adventure seasoned with romance. By day she operates as housing manager for a seniorsâ apartment complex. By night she turns into a wild and crazy writer who can hardly wait to jot down all the exciting things her characters are telling her, so she can share them with her readers. More about Jill and her books can be found at www.jillelizabethnelson.com. She and her husband live in rural Minnesota, surrounded by the woods and prairie and their four grown children, who have settled nearby.
ONE
Janice Swenson squatted on her haunches, frowning down into the ink-black hole beneath a hatch in the floor. Dank air wafted into her face and she shivered. It was too easy to imagine this whole property rotting beneath the weight of fetid family secrets.
Disposing of this cottage sheâd inherited from a distant relative might prove to be more troublesome than Janice would have anticipated. At any other time in her life, sheâd have sold the property, sight-unseen, and called it good riddance. But she had her reasons for coming to Marthaâs Vineyard to handle the transaction personally.
If her superstitious days werenât well behind her, Janice might be tempted to think Moran Cottage was bent on doing her in. At her first step onto the front porch, she had nearly plunged her foot through an eroded board. Then as sheâd explored the walk-in kitchen pantry, a shelf let loose, tumbling expired canned goods onto her shoulders. A few aches across her back betrayed bruises forming. Now sheâd wrestled open a trap door in the floor of the hallway outside the miniscule bathroom and found the cellar.
At least her decade of experience as a Realtor had prepared her to deal with little issues such as lack of power in a run-down property. Janice swiped a flashlight from her belt-loop clip, clicked it on and pointed the beam into the pit. A set of treacherously steep stairs ended in a packed-earth floor.
She frowned. If she wanted to sell this unexpectedâand unwantedâinheritance, besides adding onto the bathroom and completely renovating the kitchen, she might have to invest in pouring cement down here. Those projects would eat up a lot of her budget, making it doubly important that she do as much as she could of the simpler tasks herselfâbasic cleaning, wall-painting, buffing and refinishing the vintage wood floors and brightening up trim and moldings.
The plank steps appeared thick and sturdy, though the pitch of the descent was almost like a ladderâs. Surely there was another entrance from outside the cottage, probably a set of those nearly flat-to-the-ground cellar doors, but why traipse through the overgrown weeds outside when access lay before her?
Janice hauled in a cleansing breath and squared her shoulders. If snakes or spiders lurked below, she might be startled for a split second, but she could thank God neither arachnophobia nor ophidiophobia numbered among her issues.