Spark of Attraction

CHAPTER ONE

ELLIE

With a groan and a muttered curse, I rolled out of bed. Had I slept at all? I synced my watch to the app on my phone. Not even four hours of sleep, and even that wasn’t in one block. No wonder my eyes scratched and burned.

I’ll love living back in Port Paxford, I’d assured everyone when I inherited the house and announced I’d be moving into it. I’ll sleep better there. There are no horns honking at three AM, no footsteps stomping on the floor above.

As I’d predicted, I’d slept well the first night I’d moved in. Probably because I’d been so exhausted from carrying boxes out of the storage unit and into the moving truck I’d rented, then out of the moving truck and onto the porch, and up the stairs to the various bedrooms. I’d set a personal best for steps and I’d even earned a daily stair-climbing award.

The second night, I’d slept well, too, thanks to a day spent vacuuming and dusting all the rooms, steam cleaning the carpets, as well as setting up the front bedroom to temporarily use as my office before doing more unpacking. By nine o’clock I’d fallen in to bed exhausted, something totally unheard of for this night owl.

Until around midnight when I’d awoken to a scritch-scratch sound.

Old houses, I discovered, make noises. Weird noises. Creaks and groans. They have trees whose branches brush against the outside walls, the roof, the windows, like a witch’s nails scratching to get in. Then the sound changed locations. The wind had shifted and a different branch brushed up against the side of the house, that’s all, I told myself.

I’d turned on my side, but sleep eluded me. Turned onto the other side. Was that a pitter-patter of tiny feet running across the roof? Or in the attic?

That’s when I’d gotten up and tugged on the first set of clothes I could find. After turning on all the lights so I could trace the sound, I returned with no answers. Deciding not to undress in case I had to get up again in a hurry, I flopped down on the mattress, intent on falling back asleep. But I couldn’t stop listening for the next creak, groan, or scratch. I would rather have been listening to clog dancers in an apartment above than thinking I had mice.

First thing I needed to do was get a cat. Or hire an exterminator. Probably both.

No. The first I needed to make a big-ass mug of coffee. It was still dark when I stumbled down to the kitchen, filled the kettle from the tap. After I plugged it in to the outlet beside the microwave, I opened up my laptop and pulled up the House Repairs spreadsheet I’d created. Top of my Needs to Be Done Right the Hell Now list was having the roof reshingled. I added a hire an exterminator entry above that. Which also moved get the floors finished and paint the bedroom, living room and hallways to third and fourth places, above another dozen tasks that I needed to tackle aside from remodeling the kitchen.

As a cardinal sang from the mountain ash past my back door, and chickadees and nuthatches flitted about the birdfeeder I’d hung yesterday, I frowned at my growing list of contractors I needed to contact. Then the list of contractors I’d contacted already, most of whom hadn’t responded to my inquiries. Would I have as many problems finding a chimney sweep, or a painter to paint all the rooms, including the stairwell? Would the contractor I’d need to hire to take out the wall between my kitchen and dining room also be able to repair the porch? Or did that require a different tradesperson? And what order did each task need to be done? Should I get the rooms painted before I had the floors refinished or after?

Was Joshua right? Was I taking on too much?

No, this was my dream. And I’d figure it out.

I’m smart. I’m capable. I can do this.

Once I had my morning caffeine fix.

After setting my French press beside the almost-boiling kettle, I grabbed the leftover slices of pizza out of the fridge, put them on a plate and slid them into the microwave. I tapped the settings I wanted and pressed the Start button.

Sparks shot out of the outlet and smoke curled around the plugs, while an awful burning scent filled the air. I jumped back with a shriek so high-pitched, I’m surprised it didn’t break all the glasses on the counter.

The first call I made that morning was not to an exterminator. Or a roofer. I called Malcolm, my brother’s best friend, and the only electrician I knew.

CHAPTER TWO

MALCOLM

Ipoked at the scorched outlet, the plastic covering slightly puckered and blackened. You say the kettle was running when you turned on the microwave?

That’s right, Ellie agreed. Then there was this really loud pop and sparks shot out. Was it the microwave what caused it? Or the kettle? Do I need to contact a manufacturer or see if there’s a recall or something?

I don’t think it’s the kettle or microwave’s fault. Given the age of the kitchen, I had my suspicions of what I would find once I opened up the outlet.

When my best friend Josh mentioned Ellie was moving back to Port Paxton, he’d told me he thought his sister had rose-colored glasses about Hauser House and the amount of work it would require.

I’d learned from years of experience, both apprenticing and in my own business, that hundred-year-old houses could come with a shit-ton of problems hidden behind their fancy wainscotting and crown moulding. Sometimes you had to admit it was a lost cause, and stick a For Sale sign on the lawn.

I didn’t see any issues screaming for immediate attention. The air was stale, like old people and cleaning fluids, but nothing a couple of nice spring days with the front and rear windows left wide open wouldn’t fix. The faded hallway paint had rectangular spots that hinted at pictures that had been removed, which was a cosmetic issue easily remedied with a can of paint. Soot stains above the marble fireplace in the front room could mean there had been a chimney fire that might have cracked flue tiles that needed replacing, or it might mean a badly designed flue fireplace that didn’t properly direct the smoke. Either could be a pricey fix. Or maybe the soot was simply an accumulation of over 130 years of wood fires and, like the hallway, the mantel and wall simply needed to be repainted.

The scuffed wooden floors in both the hallway and main room, probably oak, which I suspected had once shone, needed a complete refinishing. It wouldn’t scare me off, but maybe Josh, who had grown up in a more modern house, saw such things as problems?

Unlike her brother, I understood why Ellie loved this old Victorian house. It was warm, solid, and inviting. Few modern houses had eleven-foot ceilings, transoms over the internal doors or decorative plasterwork, including rosettes around the art deco chandeliers like the one in the hallway. Fewer still had stained glass around the original oak doors, or their original crown moulding. And only Hauser House had nearly a full acre that sat on a hill with a lush lawn that sloped down to Hawkeshead Lake and was bordered by ancient lilacs, maples and cedars.

Although I’d avoided facing Ellie, I finally turned, forcing myself not to react to her outfit.

Her hair, which had been visible-from-the-space-station orange in high school, had darkened to a reddish brown. She’d pulled it into something my sister called a messy bun. I wasn’t sure if it was messy because she’d deliberately styled it that way or if she’d slept in it and hadn’t brushed her hair yet. The manufacturer’s tag that should be at the back of her neck sat at the notch of her collarbone, the seams visible along the shoulders and down the sleeves. Her multicolored pants were also inside out. I considered the plausible reasons for her outfit.

Have you been having any other electrical issues? Do I need to check out the lights in your bedroom?

She narrowed her eyes at me and scowled. My bedroom is just fine, thank you.

Shit. I’m not planning to… I swallowed the first word that jumped onto my tongue and substituted, get into your bed. I waved my hand at her outfit. I figured you couldn’t see when you were getting dressed. If your lights aren’t working upstairs, I can look at them, too.

Ellie glanced down and shrieked the word I’d self-censored, then raced out of the kitchen, papering her path with more f-bombs and a few s-bombs too. Her rapid thump-thump-thump up the stairs and along the hallway traced her path. The dishes in the cabinet behind me rattled as she slammed shut the door directly above the kitchen.

Before I’d stuck my size-ten steel-toed boot in my mouth, I’d intended to ask her where I’d find the fuse