Christmas Blackout

“Yeah. The Downs is theirs and I run it for them. They’ve had to temporarily move in to a retirement building in town because of health problems.” She sighed and sat back on her heels. “Found my phone. Parts of it, anyway.”

He looked down at the pieces in her hand. It looked as if someone had stomped on it. Glancing behind her, he spotted her glasses. He carefully bent them back into shape and cleaned them on the corner of his shirt before handing them to her. “Here you go. Now, what kind of security do you have if he comes back?”

“Just the usual locks on the doors and windows.” She slid her glasses on. Then she grabbed a box of Christmas things from the floor and carried it across the barn, scooping stray decorations off the floor as she went. “I have three guests at The Downs right now, so I won’t be alone. But there’s absolutely no reason for anyone to come back here looking for Charlotte. If she was in trouble I’m the last person she’d go to for help. We weren’t even friends.”

She set the box down beside a pile of other ones. “Charlotte was just my arrogant, former roommate. Six years ago, she talked me into letting her come stay at The Downs by telling me she could prove it had some hidden, rum-running past and had been used as a speakeasy during Prohibition. But she was probably just using me to get a break from her abusive, controlling ex-boyfriend. He was some nasty piece of work.”

“Nasty enough to threaten to kill you in order to find her six years later?” he asked.

“I don’t know.” Piper shrugged. “I never met him. She called him Alpha—like the head of an animal pack. He called her constantly, expected her to drop everything and run to him, and sometimes sent really creepy presents like dead flowers. But he was also really financially generous when he wanted to be. Rich and twisted. Even if this Kodiak guy isn’t Alpha, he could be a sign her taste in men hasn’t changed.” She crossed the barn toward him. “But either way, any sympathy I had for her disappeared the moment she repaid our kindness by robbing The Downs, smashing years’ worth of handmade Christmas decorations into tiny pieces and knocking our tree through the front window—”

The door slammed shut so hard the whole barn shook.

The lights went out.

* * *

Her heart was beating so hard she was almost afraid Benjamin could hear it. He’d thrown his arms around her and now the warmth of his chest was pressed up against hers, the strength of his arms wrapped around her shoulders. Right then she needed it. She could barely keep her knees from buckling.

“Hey, it’s okay.” She forced herself to step back out of his arms. “It’s probably just the wind coupled with some ice on the power lines.”

“Maybe it’s nothing. But maybe it’s something.” Benjamin’s hand slid down her arm and squeezed hers. “Either way, get behind me and stay close.”

Tempting. But no. She’d spent way too long trying to rid herself of the dizzying butterflies that soared through her veins whenever Benjamin was near. She wasn’t about to lose her head now. Sure, back on the island last summer she’d thought their relationship was heading somewhere romantic. Right up until he’d taken her out to dinner her last night on the island only to blindside her with the news that he was determined to remain a commitment-free bachelor for the rest of his life.

“Power goes out around here all the time in the winter.” She pulled her fingers out of his grip. “It usually comes right back within minutes. But even if it is someone dangerous, I’m going to meet it head-on.”

Benjamin didn’t step back. “Look, Piper. I know you’re plenty strong—”

“Yes, I am. Just because one thug managed to get the jump on me doesn’t suddenly mean I’m helpless.” She sounded more defensive than she meant to. But the fact that Benjamin was probably pretty used to taking charge in bad situations didn’t mean she was some damsel in distress, counting on a handsome man to save her. Especially not the kind of a man who was in a hurry to leave. “Don’t forget, I was a pretty fierce hockey player and not half-bad at mixed martial arts, too. Both times I took out guys every bit as big as Kodiak.”

The only reason she didn’t compete nationally was the cost of the training and the time she’d be away from The Downs, where she was needed to help run the place.

“I remember.” His voice dropped. “But I nearly lost my sister, Meg, to the Raincoat Killer last year. I’d never forgive myself if anything happened to you. Not when there was a chance that I could’ve stepped up and done something to protect you.”

The lights flickered on again. There was the furious yip of barking and the scramble of paws. Piper flung the barn door open, then dropped to one knee as Harry bolted through. She buried her face in the husky’s soft fur. “Hey there, guard dog. Welcome to The Downs.”

Benjamin looked out. “Well, if there was anyone there, Harry frightened them off.”

“Thanks for bringing him down. I think he’s exactly what I need around this place.” She gripped the dog’s collar and stood. Time for her to call the police and for Benjamin to get back on the road.

“I’m going to miss him like crazy.” Benjamin followed her out of the barn. “But sadly, once I’m on my boat, I’ve got no room for Harry.”

Or a relationship. Or a family. Or emotional complications of any kind.

He’d told her so that last night on the island. It didn’t matter what kind of fireworks that man set off inside her chest, Benjamin couldn’t even commit to a dog.

They rounded the corner and Piper gasped—his truck was a mess of scrunched metal and broken glass. “I thought you said everything was okay.”

The chimney had a huge chunk missing from one side. Bricks dented the hood of his large black pickup. Yes, she’d heard the sound of a collision. But he’d been so reassuring she’d just trusted him when he told her everything was okay.

“The truck will be fine,” he said. “A new side panel and a fresh windshield and it’ll be good to go. I’m really sorry about the chimney. Hopefully it’s nothing a good masonry job won’t fix. I’d offer to do it myself if it wasn’t knee-deep in snow and I didn’t have places to be. I just hope it won’t be a problem for your Christmas Eve shindig.”

“It’s more than a shindig.” She took a deep breath and reminded herself that none of this was Benjamin’s fault, and that he was even more inconvenienced than she was. “It’s called Christmas Eve at The Downs. The purpose is to provide a really awesome potluck dinner and carol singing for people in the community who have nowhere else to go. Aunt Cass started it twenty-five years ago. This is the first year I’m managing it on my own. The barn’s really old and I really should have gotten a new roof put on it this year. But the priority has been saving up to renovate the bed-and-breakfast.”

The sooner she could get Uncle Des and Aunt Cass out of that awful seniors’ residence the better.

“Torchlight News did a big article on your renovation plans, right?” Benjamin asked. “Because your house was declared a heritage site of historical value, you needed to apply to get special permission?” He brushed the glass off the driver’s seat and climbed in.

“Yup. The Downs is over a hundred years old. We’re pretty isolated, so there are rumors that during American Prohibition, people used to sneak across the lake and fill their boats up with bottles of illegal rum out of this very barn. Some even say there was a full-fledged speakeasy lounge with drinks and music running in The Downs. All these people would supposedly boat across the lake and sneak up through our woods in their finest evening wear. But no one’s ever found any evidence. Not even so much as an empty rum bottle or lost earring in the trees. Trust me, I looked.”

As a little girl she’d combed The Downs for some hidden stash of jewelry or money. As an adult, she’d be happy to just see The Downs increase in value enough they could get a loan to cover renovations.

Benjamin pulled the truck back. The corner of the hood was crumpled and the whole right side was dented. But still the engine ran smoothly and the air bag hadn’t deployed.

“We’ve got a really good mechanic here in town,” she said. “He’ll be able to get you fixed up in no time.”

He ran one hand through his dark mop of hair. “There’s a wedding rehearsal tomorrow afternoon and I’m also supposed to be fitted for a tuxedo. But I can’t exactly drive without a windshield.”

Before she could respond, she saw a shadow move through the distant trees. A shiver ran down her spine. Was someone watching them? But when she looked again, it was gone. Which probably meant her imagination was now playing tricks on her.

“Well, looks like I’m not going anywhere fast.” Benjamin yanked a vintage red hockey bag out of the backseat. “You got room at The Downs for one more?”

THREE

To his surprise, Piper blinked. Her hand rose to her lips as if his question had somehow caught her off guard. “Oh. Sure. Of course. I’ve only got three guests staying right now. I can definitely house one more.”

Okay, and what was he missing now? It had seemed like a pretty straightforward thing to ask. After all, she ran a bed-and-breakfast, and it was unlikely a mechanic would get him back on the road before morning. He turned off the truck and climbed out. “Well, as long as it’s no problem and won’t cause you any extra trouble.”

“No, no trouble at all.” She wasn’t meeting his eye. “It’s the least I can do, considering you probably saved my life.”

Alrighty, then. Benjamin yanked a tarp out of the backseat and began tying it down over the missing windshield to keep the worst of the snow out. Truth be told, he’d feel a whole lot better staying close by in case Kodiak was still lurking around. Something told him that memory of Piper down in the snow with a bag over her head would haunt his nightmares for a long time. There was a tug on the tarp. He looked up. Piper had grabbed the other side and was tying it down on the passenger side.

Her eyes cut to the National Hockey League team logo on his bag. A smile curved on her lips. “You’re just lucky you saved my life before I remembered you supported our hockey rivals in Montreal.”

He chuckled. Yeah, he hadn’t forgotten just how passionate she was about cheering on Toronto. “Well, as long as you don’t high stick me, I promise to leave all conversations about Stanley Cup history at the door.”

She rolled her eyes. They started up the steep, narrow path through the trees. Harry ran beside them for a while then disappeared on ahead. Benjamin tried to hitch his duffel bag higher on his shoulder and just barely managed to keep from knocking into her.

“That’s a pretty big bag for visiting a few friends,” she said. “I thought you believed in traveling light.”

“I do.” He swung it around to the other shoulder. “Actually, this is everything I’m taking with me to Australia. Passport, airline ticket, travel money—if it’s crossing the world with me, it’s in here.”

The sun had set behind the snow. Motion sensor lights wound through the trees ahead of them, flickering on as they neared. He reached the top of the hill and looked out. Snow-covered trees flowed down the slope behind them, spreading all the way out over the lake. It was breathtaking.

“On a clearer day, you can see the American shoreline,” Piper said. “Uncle Des and Aunt Cass married in the south of England. He had what he thought was a temporary job at a company in Niagara and they moved out here. Aunt Cass named The Downs after the South Downs, this range of hills near the village she’s from. They got the property in a foreclosure sale actually. Took them years to sort through all the junk the previous owners left behind.”

“But sadly no illegal rum in the cellar or stacks of secret cash in the wardrobe?”

She shook her head. “Nope.”

He turned toward the house. The Downs was three stories tall, with lead piping on the windows, peaked roofs and shuttered doors opening onto small balconies. Christmas lights wrapped around the windows and balconies, and looped around the fire escape that ran all the way from the ground floor to a round window high in the roof peak. “So this would be your fairy-tale castle?”

She stopped walking. “What did you just say?”

“I seem to remember you telling me that you were born in England, too, but that you and your mom moved here to live when you were really little. So, you used to pretend you were secretly an English princess and The Downs was your castle.”

She paused for a moment then shook her head. “I can’t believe I told you that.”

If anything, she sounded disappointed with herself. But why? They’d talked for hours during those four days last summer. She’d told him all sorts of things about herself. He in turn had confessed stuff about himself that nobody else knew. Like how he’d decided he was never going to have a wife or family.

“I was one when I moved in here actually,” she said. “We were pretty broke. My father left us a couple of weeks before Christmas and my mom had no way to pay the rent without him. The British expression is ‘he did a runner,’ so for the longest time I thought he’d literally leaped out a window and ran. Our flight landed Christmas Eve. We were the first two wanderers to be welcomed at Christmas Eve at The Downs.”

He followed Piper past a towering woodpile, through a small back door and into the garage. His eyes ran over racks of ice-hockey equipment. A kayak, canoe and two surfboards lay on beams above their heads, and there was camping equipment on wall shelves. Steel-toed hiking boots hung on a peg by the door, next to two pairs of boxing gloves, some climbing gear and what looked like a heavy wool cloak. All of the gear looked high quality, well loved and as if it hadn’t been touched in ages.

“So, if you keep the bed-and-breakfast open over Christmas, when do you take your own holidays?”

“I don’t really.” She pulled off her coat, then pushed her foggy glasses up onto the top of her head. “The Downs is open and running 365 days a year.”

Okay, he heard what she was saying, but there was something wrong with this picture. They were standing in a garage surrounded by incredible sports equipment. Sure, living in the Niagara region meant she could probably get in a bit of skating or cross-country skiing. But there were only so many times a person could hit the same patch of earth before wanting to try something new. And she could hardly surf or camp without taking a day off.

“Yes, but the whole reason we met is because you were on holiday on Manitoulin Island this past summer—”

“No, I was on the island for four days while my uncle was here helping movers pack up their things so they could move into the seniors’ home. My aunt’s health is poor, and a friend of hers who lived on the island invited her to stay for a few days. She wasn’t able to make the trip alone so I went with her.” She shrugged. “I’m going to need to run this place nonstop at capacity if I have any hope of starting the renovations by this summer. Even once they’re done, my uncle and aunt are going to need me around on a daily basis. Like I said, they have health problems.”

“Okay, but what kind of health problems?”

“My uncle has arthritis in his hands and arms. Not too bad, but he’s also seventy-two. My aunt’s a lot younger but she has mobility problems. She needs help doing things and getting places.” She wiped her glasses on her shirt and then slid them back on. But she still wasn’t looking at him. “If it’s okay with you, I’d rather not go into it right now.”

He ran his hand through his hair. Why did it feel as if this conversation was one wrong sentence away from turning into an argument? His sister’s anxiety disorder had kept him from pursuing his own dreams for way too long, so he should be the last person to judge anyone else’s commitment to family. It was definitely time for a subject change. He looked around the garage and spotted a small tractor by the wall with a snowplow on the front. “Nice piece of machinery. I’m guessing you clear your own snow?”

“Always. I also rake my own leaves in the fall and mow my own lawn in the summer.”

“Well, how about I plow the driveway and hill, while you call the police?”

She opened the kitchen door, pulled a key chain off the wall and tossed it to him. “Thanks. I’m also going to call my uncle and aunt, and the mechanic about your truck.”

“Great. Tell him I have insurance but I’m happy to pay out of pocket if that speeds things up. Anything I can do to get out of here faster.”

“Will do.” She walked into the kitchen.

Benjamin opened the garage door and stared out at the dark, snowy night. What was it with Piper? There was this weird tension between them that he couldn’t get his head around.

He’d told himself that when the time came to leave Canada, he’d do his best to make peace with everyone he left behind. But how could he make peace with Piper if he didn’t even know what he’d done wrong?

* * *

The steady clacking sound of fingers on a typewriter echoed through The Downs, like some kind of robust combination of music and water torture. Tobias Kasper wrote books on tactical warfare and was the kind of guest who treated the entirety of The Downs as an extension of his suite. Right now, the short, rotund middle-aged man sat in the middle of the living room, sporting a paisley bow tie and the kind of vest that some people called a waistcoat. He was pounding the keys of a machine that had to be at least sixty years old.

Piper nodded to him politely and closed the kitchen door. The Downs’s galley kitchen was much smaller than she would’ve liked, while the living room was huge, with an old brick fireplace and a huge wooden staircase leading to a sweeping second-floor balcony. When it came time to renovate, they’d be knocking down the wall between the two rooms. But right now, she was thankful for something to muffle the noise.

Her nerves were frayed enough as it was. She’d thought her heart was going to leap into her throat when Benjamin asked if he could take a suite for the night, and it finally hit her that he’d be staying around a little while longer. Benjamin had absolutely no idea the effect he had on her. And he was never going to know.

The phone began to ring. Piper was about to let it ring through to the answering machine, when her gaze caught the name on the display: Silver Halls Retirement Home. She grabbed the phone. “Hello?”

“Piper, honey?” It was Aunt Cass.

Piper smiled. “Hi, Aunt Cass. I see you finally managed to get a turn on the landline phone.”

Laughter trickled down the line. “I was about to use my cell phone. But your uncle started going on about saving minutes and I didn’t know if you’d gotten my text.”

Piper’s sparkling, vibrant, sixty-three year old aunt was nine years younger than Piper’s uncle, and so very young at heart. Aunt Cass hadn’t wanted to do anything even close to retire when persistent, unexplained numbness in her legs and then her arms forced her and Uncle Des to move out of The Downs into the only available rental place in town where everything was accessible on the ground floor.

“I’ve got an appointment for more tests at the hospital in Niagara Falls on January 12,” her aunt informed her.

Piper grabbed a pen and wrote it on the calendar. “No problem. I’ll be able to drive you.”

What kind of health problems? Benjamin had asked the question so casually, as if the answer was as simple as a sprained ankle or chicken pox. It had taken everything inside her not to groan, “We don’t know! That’s the problem!” She wasn’t even sure when her aunt’s limbs first stopped cooperating with her brain, like a frustrated marionette with intermittent strings. But after sudden numbness in her legs sent Aunt Cass tumbling down the stairs into the living room last summer, a broken arm and nasty bruises had woken them all up to the reality that their lives were going to change. Since then it had been a string of doctors, tests and possible diagnoses like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease. And prayers. Lots of prayers.

Piper ran her hand along her neck. It was tender. Now she was about to tell them something that would make life even more complicated than it already was. “Now, Aunt Cass, please don’t worry, but I was just...accosted by a trespasser down by the barn.”

“Desmond! Get your coat!”

“No, wait! It’s okay.” Piper waved her aunt down, even though she couldn’t see her through the phone. “He’s gone and I’m fine! I am going to call the police and file a report, but he was just looking for Charlotte Finn.”

“The sad, blonde girl who liked puzzle books?”

Trust her aunt to remember Charlotte as the girl who was sad and liked puzzles, as opposed to the one who’d smashed every single one of Aunt Cass’s cherished handmade nativity figures on the fireplace mantel. “Yes, her. I haven’t seen her or heard from her in years, and I told him so.”

“Was it her young man?” Suddenly Uncle Des was on the line and Piper realized her aunt must be holding the phone up between them.

“I don’t know,” Piper said. “I never met him.”

“Tall. Big shoulders. Young lad.”

“You met Alpha?” Piper blinked. “Six years since she robbed us and you never told me that!”

“Didn’t know who the guy was. Just saw her smooching someone in the woods out my window one night when I was locking up. Told her to knock it off and come inside. He ran off and I never saw his face. I didn’t think it was anybody’s business. But I gave the police a description then and I’m happy to do so again now.”

“You come by tomorrow and fill us in,” Aunt Cass said. “In the meantime, you might want to see if Dominic Bravo wants to rent a suite. You remember him? From youth group?”

“Yeah, of course I do.” Dominic was a great guy. Sure, the former high school athlete was pretty quiet and shy, and floundered in school. But when Charlotte’s robbery rampage had included knocking Piper unconscious, Dominic had been the one who’d realized Piper was in trouble and had come to find her. “Didn’t even realize he was back in town.”

“He’s back in town for a few weeks studying for the police academy. His grandmother says he’s staying with his sister and all her little ones right now, sleeping on their pullout couch.”

“Good for him! My friend Benjamin is taking the final suite for tonight, but I’ll keep Dominic in mind. Speaking of which, I really must call the police now. I’ll come by and see you tomorrow.”

She said her goodbyes and hung up the phone. When she heard a floorboard creak behind her, she turned. Tobias was standing in the doorway, leaning on his cane. As far as she could tell the cane was simply part of his eccentric style and fashion sense, as opposed to something he actually needed to walk.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “I couldn’t help but overhear. You have a problem with intruders?”

Piper stepped back. She hadn’t even thought through how she was going to tell Tobias and her other two guests about what had happened with Kodiak. “Yes, I was just about to call the police. Then I thought I’d call you, Gavin and Trisha together in the living room to update you all.”

He ran one hand through his salt-and-pepper hair. “You know, rumor has it that back in World War II, the enemy used the most inventive booby traps against the Allies, including exploding soap, oil paintings and chocolate. It’s all about thinking like a predator, Piper.”

“How interesting.” She smiled politely. “But I’m sure if we do beef up security we’ll find something a little less dramatic.” A building as old as The Downs tended to attract a lot of quirky folk, but exploding chocolate was definitely a new one. “Speaking of history, have you ever heard the rumor that The Downs used to be used in alcohol smuggling?”

“Oh, my expertise is in warfare, not local history.” Tobias shook his head. “But, I’d have thought most of the action took place closer to either Michigan or New York. This stretch of Lake Erie was supposed to be fairly uninteresting.”