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And it all stopped, it all vanished.

Trey pulled open the front door to cool, clear air.

“She’s not there.”

“She finished.” Sonya stared out at the seawall as the animals raced outside. “She ended with the first and last bride. She killed them, showed us, and she finished.”

“Trey’s right about the whenever. Let them run around awhile,” Owen added as he closed the door. “The guy in my room was smoking Camels and there was one of those phones—candlestick deals. And when I first came out, there was a girl wearing bell-bottoms. It wasn’t Clover. She’s blond and this one had dark hair.”

“Not just people who died here. Whenever,” Sonya repeated. “All the music and voices from the ballroom. Servants and the rest. Not all of them died here.”

“Illusions.” Trey kissed the top of her head. “Most of it illusions, or memories.”

“The manor’s memories.”

“Yes!” Sonya turned to Cleo. “Yes, that’s it.”

Cleo rubbed her chilled arms. “Barely a peep out of her for twoweeks so she could do this. Then we pissed her off, Son, taking another room on the third floor.”

“Good. Good! Let her waste her energy on bullshit like this. She can keep right at it because it doesn’t change what fucking is. This ismyhouse!”

“Okay then,” Owen began, and she rounded on him.

“A Poole built this house. Pooles made this house! It’s our house. A house for the living.”

From the tablet in the library came Simple Minds and “Don’t You (Forget About Me).”

“Not now, not ever. This house is ours,” Sonya repeated, fury under every word. “And anyone who lived here and loved it. I don’t care if a thousand ghosts make their home here now, then, or goddamn whenever. There’s only one who’s not welcome.

“Reclaiming another room pisses her off? Just wait until we’re finished, and she can piss herself back to hell.”

Shoving at her hair, Sonya let out a long breath. “Now I’m going back to bed.”

As she strode toward the stairs, Trey grinned after her.

“I get why you’re gone over her,” Owen commented.

“Way gone. I’d better catch up. Call the dogs and Pye in, will you?”

“Sure. Go on up,” he told Cleo. “I’ll bring them in.”

“I will, but I want a good shot of whiskey first. Want a whiskey?”

“Now that you mention it. Look, the offer to bunk in your sitting room sofa still stands.”

“And is appreciated, very sincerely. But I’m fine—or will be after about a couple of fingers of Jameson’s. I can’t say I would be if I’d seen someone murdered in my bed. But sex? It’s healthy.”

“Let me know when you want to get healthy.”

Cleo got a bottle from the butler’s pantry and smiled. “You’ll probably be the first.”

After a late start all around in the morning, Sonya kissed Trey goodbye, waved both men off. She gathered what she needed and wentto the third floor. After shooting up a middle finger in the direction of the Gold Room, she went into the new gift room to do as Owen instructed and clean and oil the furniture.

And found everything already gleaming.

“You beat me to it, Molly. A very big thank-you.”

Hands on hips, she turned a circle.