Chapter 3

Chapter Three

As the ghost world and the world of the living—the two realms Natalie had attempted to navigate separately for the past year—collided, the last thing Natalie needed was to host book club at the shop.

But there was no way to get out of it. Her one and only employee, Jules, was taking a night class and couldn't cover the evening so it fell to Natalie.

If it was a nice normal book club who sat in a circle and talked about the latest read, she could just hide in the shop and wait for them to leave. But there was nothing normal about Mudville, or its residents. Which is why it was no surprise when Alice Mudd, octogenarian and direct descendent of the town's founding family, popped her head in the front door and said, "I need help."

Resigned, Natalie drew in a breath and braced herself for anything. "Coming."

Outside, she saw why Alice, five feet tall maybe on a good day, needed help. She was trying to wrestle her giant beverage dispenser out of the back seat.

Natalie eyed the dispenser suspiciously. "Alice, I thought we agreed you weren't going to serve magic mushroom lemonade at book club anymore."

"I'm not."

Phew. "Good. Thank you," Natalie said as she took the two gallon-sized containers of tea from Alice's hands.

"This is cannabis iced tea," Alice said as she pushed the car door closed with one foot while balancing the empty dispenser on her hip.

"What?" Natalie choked.

"Don't look so scandalized. It's legal here now and I have a bumper crop of weed growing behind the barn to share with my friends."

The question was, knowing Alice, how many friends had she shared her weed with but had forgotten to tell them they were being drugged.

Frowning, Natalie remembered the brownies Alice had brought to the last meeting. She'd had only half of one but remembered feeling completely relaxed and mellow. And she'd slept like a baby that night.

Dammit. She'd been drugged by Alice. Again!

"Alice—"

"Agnes needs this tonight. And that's your fault," Alice said, waiting by the door for Natalie to open it for her.

"Why my fault?" she asked, while juggling the two gallons of pot tea and opening the door.

"You told her the house is haunted. Poor Agnes hasn't slept in two days."

Crap. The lie that had been meant to keep this whole ghost thing under wraps had done the opposite. Blown up and spread all over town.

She should have known. This was Mudville. Small town at its best—and worst. Gossip spread like wildfire and so did lies—and truths.

The last thing she'd wanted to do was freak out Harper's great aunt Agnes over the ghost living in her house. The worst part was, Millie had actually moved out. The house was now ghost free for the first time in a hundred years. Agnes really did have nothing to worry about—not that she'd believe that.

Maybe it was a good thing Alice came prepared to dose the book club. At least Agnes might sleep tonight.

The regular book club crowd filtered in and every one of them stopped at the refreshment table for a cup of Alice's iced tea.

One day they were going to get in trouble for this. As she smiled and greeted each attendee, Natalie imagined DEA and SWAT descending upon the old train depot turned book and wine shop and cuffing her. Cuffing them all—Alice included.

She'd have a record. And a mug shot!

Liam would have to bail her out. He'd never let her hear the end of it.

As she imagined the worst, the meeting had begun in the next room. Steering clear of the beverage area, Natalie hovered near the back to make sure the club didn't need anything from her before she went back to the shop to try and get some cardboard boxes broken down for recycling.

"Before we get started on the book discussion, I wanted to run an idea past everyone," Alice began, apparently running tonight's meeting instead of Agnes, who truly didn't look well. Guilt weighed on Natalie's shoulders.

Meanwhile Alice shushed two attendees who weren't completely silent.

She was in rare form today, standing in front of the group, but barely tall enough for Natalie to see her over the heads of those seated in the room.

"The recent situation that Agnes has found herself in," there was a murmur in the room that Alice quickly silenced with one sharp glance, "has given me an idea."

Natalie noticed that Alice hadn't elaborated as to what Agnes's situation was exactly but everyone seemed to know anyway. Small town. Zero secrets.

"We're going to use this as an opportunity to put Mudville on the map."

What?

"You know we've all been writing to Hallmark to get them to film one of those Christmas movies here, to no avail. But Hallmark's loss is the Paranormal Channel's gain. Now I don't approve of how it seems they've gone all in on crappy reality television, but I can forgive that if they choose Mudville as the location for their new show."

The low murmur of chatter began again as Natalie wondered what the hell Alice was talking about.

"They're holding a contest. The winner gets to be the location for their new show. Harper, if you would be so kind." Alice glanced up and found where Harper was seated.

Harper stood, a stack of cards in one hand and a fist of pens in the other. "As Alice said, PNC is accepting nominations for the town for their next location. So all we have to do is fill out these postcards. I've already printed all the information for the town and stamped and addressed them to the channel. All you have to do is sign your name and add your information in the return address field."

"Do you think we really have a chance to be chosen?" Mary Brimley asked.

"Of course, we do. They'd be foolish not to choose us," Margaret Trout sniped.

"Hallmark hasn't," Dee Flanders reminded them. "And we've been emailing them for a year."

"Right. Because they're foolish." Margaret nodded.

Agnes had stayed conspicuously quiet until now. Alice moved to stand behind her chair. The diminutive woman squeezed her friend's shoulder and said, "I think we have an excellent chance of being chosen. Right, Agnes?"

Agnes let out a breath but bobbed her head in agreement as Natalie wondered what any of this Paranormal Channel stuff had to do with poor Agnes.

"What's the show they'd be filming?" Mary, the town's ad hoc information officer and chief keeper of all Mudville knowledge, asked.

"That's the reason we're a shoo-in. Between Agnes's house and Harper's evidence they'll have no choice but to choose Mudville, because the name of the show is…" Flashing yellowing teeth in what took on the vestiges of an evil grin, Alice revealed after a lengthy dramatic pause, " Ghost House ."

Ghost House . At that the air left Natalie's lungs.

Her nightmare was coming true.

She'd lied to prevent exactly this. Prevent strangers and looky-loos from invading Mudville on their amateur ghost hunts. And now it was going to happen anyway.