The Last Warrior (Shifters Unbound #13) - Jennifer Ashley Page 0,60

was built far from the house so the smoke and smells wouldn’t bother the family within. We’ll visit those after we see the rest of the interior.”

She stood aside while her flock, mostly older women clutching phones they used as cameras, oohed over the view and the many roses that covered the railings. Wind chimes rang like laughter.

The tour guide, after pausing fifteen seconds to let her brood snap photos, zipped back into the house, skirts bouncing off the doorframe. Her followers trotted after her.

A small, white-haired woman, handbag over her arm, paused to take one more photo.

Rhianne, crouched with her nose almost into the crawl space beneath the house, stifled a cough at the musty air. The woman above paused and peered over the railing.

Whether she saw the two of them huddled there or not, she said nothing, and retreated indoors, her feet pattering as she hurried to catch up with the others.

Rhianne let out a breath. “Goddess.”

Ben stifled his laughter as he slid on his pants. “Get dressed, and I’ll sneak us inside.”

“How?” Rhianne shoved her feet into her jeans then reached up to the veranda and whipped down her T-shirt, pulling it on over the camisole.

“I have a secret way in. We can take ourselves upstairs. Or …” His mischievous side emerged. “We can hide there and make them think the house is haunted.”

Rhianne settled the straps of her shoes. “This is a sentient house. Won’t they already think it’s haunted?”

“The house behaves itself and doesn’t scare off the tourists.” Ben found and dragged on his T-shirt. “Jasmine needs the income, and she’s made the house promise to leave visitors alone. But the punters like to be a little bit frightened.”

“Punters?”

“Paying tourists. Ready?”

He grasped Rhianne’s hand and led her in a low crouch around the back to a half-door set into the foundation. The entrance was hidden by vines, but Ben had loosened them to create a swinging curtain that disguised it.

Ben pulled aside the vines, unlocked the door with the keys he always kept in his pocket, and opened it, going first to make sure the way was clear.

The space under the house was too shallow to be a cellar, more a crawl space than anything else. The ley line was strong here, Ben’s skin tingling with it.

He led Rhianne on hands and knees to the place he knew lay under the large drawing room. With a smooth stick he’d left here for the purpose, he tapped the underside of the floor.

Ben always tapped in a pattern so those above wouldn’t think they heard only random noises by a settling, old house. Ben paused, then repeated the thumps. Rhianne watched him, hands over her mouth, eyes glimmering in the darkness.

Ben next scratched the stick over the boards. The creaking sounded like the rusty hinges of an invisible door opening to nowhere.

Voices came to them through the floorboards. “What was that?”

“What was what?”

“Did you hear? A tapping? Like someone, or something, trying to get out.”

“The house is indeed haunted.” The tour guide eagerly took up the cue. She began the completely fabricated story of a girl child of the house trapped beneath the floor. She’d died there, the tour guide said, and now walked the house, searching for her way out.

The event had never happened. Ben had researched the entire history of the house and hadn’t found evidence of anyone dying under the floorboards, and besides, the house wouldn’t have let that happen. But a tragic story booked tours.

Ben laid aside the stick—overdoing it would only bring people down here to search—and ushered Rhianne onward.

In one corner was a trap door, which Ben had reinforced, that led to a hidden room behind the staircase. He opened the door and reached for the short ladder he’d positioned in the room above.

Ben hadn’t known about this room until a Shifter guest—more a fugitive really—had revealed it. He found it handy now for hiding from the tour groups or as a space to be alone. He kept records of the house there and other things he didn’t want found.

He climbed the ladder then assisted Rhianne up into the hideaway.

The room was lit by a tiny window, and Ben had made it cozy, adding a bookcase to the antique desk and chair that had already been there. He’d filled the desk drawer with snacks for the days he had to stash himself in here, like this one.

Rhianne studied the bag of potato chips Ben opened for her, then reached in for