Read Online For the Sake of Warwick Mountain (Harlequin Heartwarming) by Charlotte Douglas - Free Book Online Page B

Becca.”
    Maybe he’d allowed his affection for her to show in his voice, because a flush started at the base of her throat and worked its way to her cheeks. “Good night, Matt.”
    She almost ran up the stairs and disappeared around the landing without a backward glance.
    Matt, feeling suddenly lonely, entered the guest room and stripped off his clothes. Although the room was snug and attractively furnished with antiques and country quilts, and the bed comfortable with sheets fragrant with fresh air and sunshine, he feared he’d toss and turn for hours. Surprisingly, he drifted almost instantly into a deep sleep.
    Until an icy hand caressed his cheek and jerked him wide awake.

CHAPTER FIVE
    S TARTLED , DISORIENTED , and remembering Becca’s warnings of Granny Warwick’s ghost, Matt bolted upright and gazed around the room, seeing no one in the pale moonlight that streamed through the windows and dimly lit the space. The fluorescent dial on the bedside clock read twenty minutes past midnight.
    “Dr. Matt,” a shaking voice whispered beside the bed. “It’s me, Emily.”
    Matt spotted the girl, whose head barely reached the top of the high bed. “What are you doing up in the middle of the night?”
    He reached for the lamp on the bedside table.
    “No!” She grabbed his hand. “No lights! You’ll scare them.”
    Her hand was freezing, and he could feel her shivering. In the faint light, he could barely make out her thin cotton Scooby Doo pajamas. He grabbed the extra blanket at the foot of his bed and flung it around her.
    “Is something wrong?” He wondered why the child hadn’t gone to her mother. “Is your mother all right?”
    “She’s asleep,” Emily said.
    Matt thought longingly of the deep, peaceful sleep she’d disturbed. “Then why did you wake me?”
    “So you can see the ghosts. Lizzie won’t believe me. But she will if you see them.”
    Matt shook his head in an attempt to clear the dregs of sleep. The entire Warwick family was obsessed with ghosts. “Ghosts don’t exist except in stories.”
    “They’re in the woods behind the house. I saw them. Come see.”
    Taking a look and proving nothing was there would be the only way to dissuade her and send her back to bed. “Wait for me in the hall. I’ll be there in a minute.”
    Once Emily had left, he jumped from the bed, shivered in the frigid air and quickly pulled on his pants and shirt. Barefoot, he joined Emily in the hall. “Now, where are these so-called ghosts?”
    Clasping the blanket around her with one hand, she grabbed his hand with her other and headed for the kitchen. When she tripped over the blanket, he caught her before she fell, then scooped her in his arms and carried her.
    “We can see from the back porch.” She twined her tiny arms around his neck and laid her head on his shoulder with a trust that touched him. He’d never held a child before, hadn’t realized how sweet one smelled, how fragile one felt. For the first time, he wondered what holding a child of his own might be like.
    Matt carried her through the kitchen, stepped out the back door and stopped short. Deep in the woods far behind the house, two lights bobbed up and down through the trees, then stopped, hanging as if suspended in space.
    “See,” Emily whispered in his ear. “I told you.”
    “I see,” Matt whispered back, “but they’re just lights. Somebody’s carrying them, but that doesn’t mean they’re ghosts.”
    “Somebody want to tell me what’s going on?” Becca’s voice demanded behind them, shattering the stillness and echoing across the yard.
    In the woods, the lights went out.
    “Emily and I were looking at the strange lights,” Matt said.
    “What lights?” Suspicion put an edge to Becca’s voice.
    “Ghosts were in the woods, Mommy, but you scared them away.”
    “Come inside before you freeze to death,” Becca said. “Both of you.”
    Following Becca, Matt carried Emily into the kitchen. Becca closed the door