LITMIR.BIZ

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down. “Hasn’t the hotel been in your family for generations? “

      “Yeah.”

      “And you don’t mind?”

      “I’m not very sentimental.”

      “I imagine not.”

      “You’re appalled.”

      “No. Not at all. You need to do what you need to do. I’m not a sentimental person, either. Not really. There are only a few things in my life I couldn’t live without. One of them, sadly, is my best friend.” She looked over at Erin, sitting among her fan boys. “I’m better with her around.”

      “How so?”

      “I live most of my life on the Internet. It’s pathetic. Erin helps me participate in life, as she calls it. Without her I’d go out even less frequently than I do now.” Carrie shrugged, took a step away from him. “We should get back to watching the monitors. There could be ghosts.”

      “Right. Ghosts.” He wasn’t sure if it was the talk of sentiment or the talk of Erin that had changed the tenor of the conversation. Her body language had changed, even her whisper was different.

      Would it be smarter to leave things be for the night and hope for a better tomorrow? Or should he wade back in and try for a recovery?

      She took his plate and hers to one of the washing bins, then came back and refilled her coffee. All without meeting his gaze.

      “I think it’s time for me to say good-night,” he said, as much as it pained him.

      She looked up then. “Giving up the ghost so early?”

      He grimaced at the pun, then smiled. “Big day tomorrow. I can’t sleep till noon.”

      “It was nice running in to you again. I enjoyed it.”

      “Me, too. Maybe we’ll meet again tomorrow.”

      Her dark eyes were wide and beautiful, and they studied him closely. “Yeah. That would be good. I’d like that.”

      He believed her. All was not lost. At least, he didn’t think so.

       6

      CARRIE CLOSED HER EYES. Again. For the billionth time. It was four-thirty in the morning, and a half an hour ago, she’d been so dead on her feet that she’d strongly considered paying Erin to put the comforter back on her bed.

      She’d managed alone, and to brush her own teeth and get into her pj’s, but the moment she’d actually put her head down on the pillow, she’d been alert, awake and, no matter how sternly she’d spoken to her inner monologue, it would … not … stop … yammering.

      “Shut up,” she said, hoping the aloud version would be more effective than the silent one.

      Evidently not, because the next millisecond she was thinking about him. Again. The fact that she’d told him she had to work while she was here wasn’t so bad. It was nothing, in fact. They were going to be here for nearly a week. Of course people had to work.

      No. What had been bad was that she’d said one hell of a lot more. She’d told him flat out that she was a complete loser who had exactly one real friend, and that the rest of her life was spent playing World of Warcraft and trolling Web sites. Awesome.

      Reciprocity. That son of a bitch.

      He’d told her his secret about selling the place, which was whoa. Major. So then she’d felt the need to reciprocate with a secret of her own.

      If she hadn’t wanted to sleep with him, it wouldn’t be an issue. But, she’d realized the moment he’d taken the comforter and pillows that she did want to sleep with him. She liked him. Nothing earth-shattering, but she was ostensibly on vacation, and Vacation Rules stated that one could sleep with a very attractive hotel owner if one wanted to on the basis of like, which was quite different from Regular Life Rules. She was also allowed to eat at least one dessert a day, she didn’t have to work out and she could speak with a British accent if the mood struck.

      But Sam had a life. He made important films about important issues. He lived in New York and traveled the country, not at comic book conventions, but living with the real people. He was friends with a world-class chef. She was friends with [email protected]. It was the first damn night and she’d already blown it. Hence, staring at the ceiling in the wee hours of the morning.

      The true tragedy was that she hadn’t even told him the worst of it. That she was there undercover, her sole intent to embarrass and malign people just like him. Oh, he’d love that. Who wouldn’t? She could just see how well that conversation would go. He’d probably kick her right out of the hotel, and who could blame him?

      It was a miracle she even had Erin.

      Anyway, Sam was going to find out about her. All it would take was a little Google action, and he’d discover her secret identity. She wrote under the name Carrie Price, but Price was her mom’s maiden name, and it wasn’t exactly a state secret.

      She turned over and socked her pillow a few times, then tried to get comfortable. Fat chance.

      Hell, maybe he’d understand. He was a New Yorker, for god’s sake. Just because he believed that ghosts were real didn’t mean he had no sense of humor. He was probably used to people making fun of him. Film people were notoriously cynical, right?

      Crap. Even if he did get made fun of, he wouldn’t want to sleep with someone who openly disparaged his beliefs. That would be like her sleeping with someone who thought graphic novels weren’t real books.

      Worse. Because a lot of people didn’t know squat about graphic novels. As far as the supernatural went, she was in the minority. A huge percentage of the world believed not only in life after death, but also ghosts and reincarnation and angels and demons. Most folks didn’t go a day without relying on something that couldn’t be scientifically proven. It was the norm, and she was the weirdo.

      Nothing new there. She was used to being the odd woman out. She just wished she’d kept her mouth shut.

      The only thing she had going for her was that he thought she was hot. It was right there all over his face. The way he looked at her? Oh, yeah. He wanted some vacation action.

      Her smile fell. It was the first night in far too many nights that she hadn’t fallen asleep thinking about Armand. Was her attraction to Sam nothing but rebound lust?

      After giving that a moment’s ponder, she turned over one more time. So what if it was? In fact, rebound lust was the whole damn point.

      AT TEN TO FOUR IT WAS almost time for the first official event of the day. It, like all their indoor meetings, would be held in the ballroom. Sam had spent the morning with the buyers who continued to make nice noises without saying anything definitive, and left them in Beverly’s capable hands for a tour of the stables, the barn and the back fields. Sam had come to supervise the pumpkin-carving contest, which would be loud and messy, but fun. At least, that was the plan.

      He wished he’d slept better. Thoughts of his conversation with Carrie had kept him up long after he’d hit the sheets. He’d dissected every word and come up with fifty different interpretations of what had gone down. He’d concluded he hadn’t completely blown his chances.

      Naturally, he’d looked for her everywhere. At breakfast, although she’d be nuts to come down at eight after her night, in the ballroom, even in the kitchen. He’d been hopeful when they’d gone to the bar to grab lunch, but no go.

      After that, Sam had taken Heartly and Mori into Crider City. The trip couldn’t have been timed more perfectly, as there were four buses parked at the IHOP and tons of tourists wandering through the decorated town. In Crider, Halloween was as big a deal as Christmas. The local legends about hauntings weren’t restricted to the hotel property, but had propagated all through the town. Most probably made up over a beer or two and carefully seeded across Colorado and beyond.

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