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saw bundles of papers . . .
    Love letters,
Enzo said sadly.
Before I was with her.
Enzo had been Great-Aunt Sandra’s dog when Clare had been a tween. She’d gotten the
     impression that he’d stayed with Sandra as a companion, but hadn’t been her mentor
     or spirit guide. Apparently that had been John Dillinger, since, according to Sandra’s
     journals, she had specialized in ghosts from 1905–1939.
    Clare looked at the letters tied with a ribbon, set them aside. Older, dark brown
     leather colored books made her breath catch. “Journals?” she asked. “From Great-Great-Uncle
     Amos?” With a smile she turned to Enzo, and found the Other.
    They might help. We have encouraged those of your blood to record what must be,
the Other said,
but not many are in English, mostly Hungarian.
    “Oh.”
    The thin red one is of the weeks that the gift descended upon Orun, your great-great
     uncle Amos’s older brother. Orun refused to BELIEVE and died from the cold.
The Other’s smile twitched Enzo’s muzzle in a not-doglike scary way.
You remember that.
    “Since it was three weeks ago, yes, I recall that part of this inheritance.”
    The Other snorted.
Time grows short before people come. You must get the knife.
    “Is the knife supernatural?”
    The Other’s back rippled as if in a shrug.
You will see. But you cannot kill an evil ghost of your time period without it. There
     is a price for using it.
He paused and actually clarified,
You may ask me when that time comes.
    When, not if. Clare’s mouth dried.
    And it must always be kept safe and hidden and with you, or Our agreement with you
     is broken. You would not like what happens if the bond is broken through your carelessness.
    “Oh. Oh!” Rules, good. More pressure, terrible.
    She was
cold
, more from the icy touch of fear she got when looking into his eerie eyes than the
     freezing waves emanating from him. A loud click sounded, the top of the chest opened,
     and an ivory silk bag about fifteen inches in length fell. Clare shot out her hands
     and caught it and the hidden panel of the chest sprang back shut. Probably the Other’s
     doing.
    She could feel a metal sheath in her hands and the hilt of the knife looked lumpy
     through the cloth. Even as she reached for the faded red tassels that tied the top
     of the silk cover, her doorbell rang.
    Hide it, Clare!
Enzo was back, staring at her with worried eyes. She ran to her bedroom walk-in closet,
     grabbed the piece of luggage she used for a week’s trip, and shoved the knife in the
     main pocket. Good thing they’d fly by private plane. Looked like she’d have to book
     chartered flights in the future to dispatch evil ghosts.
    Her door knocker pounded. Hurrying to the door of the small ghost seer office, she
     closed the room off, went to the hall intercom, fumbled, and then pressed “front door.”
    “Who’s there?” she asked.
    “It’s me,” said a woman’s voice with an accent she’d never been able to place. “Desiree
     Rickman.”
    Tony Rickman’s wife. What was she doing here?
    “I consider you a friend, Clare.”
    Clare wasn’t sure she felt the same way.
    “I’d like to talk to you before you leave. I’m worried about you, Clare.”
    She wasn’t the only one.

FOUR

    CLARE WENT DOWN the stairs, grumbling. She hadn’t changed clothes, hadn’t taken a shower, and now
     she’d meet the most stunning woman she knew all disheveled and with the feel of dried
     sweat on her skin.
    She arranged her face in an acceptable curious expression, looked through the peephole,
     saw the smaller woman and no one else, and opened the door.
    Desiree Rickman gave her a smile loaded with charm. “What a fabulous house.”
    “I just moved in two weeks ago.” It seemed like yesterday . . . or a year ago, so
     much had happened. Her gorgeous Tudor-style brick house built in the 1920s cost her
     more than she’d ever thought she’d pay for a place. She absolutely loved it. Stepping
     back, she