“Go ahead.”

“She was found this morning by a jogger. The street is Willow Lane. Nearest address is 147. It’s in a subdivision called Meadowgate.”

“You said no ID?” she asked, jotting down the information.

“Nothing.”

“Any idea when it happened?”

“No, but Lewis is on his way there. Eddie, too, to take some photos.”

Lewis Moore was one of the crime scene techs. Eddie Sheldon was a photographer. Meredith knew them both.

“Great. Anything else you can tell me?” she asked.

“That’s all I got.”

“Okay. Thanks, Jackson.”

“My pleasure, detective. Until next time.”

Meredith hung up the phone and ripped the paper containing her scribbled notes from the pad. Her chair squeaked and groaned as she stood and walked to Sergeant Wheaton’s door.

“What have you got?” he asked, not looking away from the screen.

“Young girl. No ID. Found on a street in a nice neighborhood.”

He stopped typing. “Please tell me it’s not a sex thing.”

“Won’t know until I get out there but I don’t think so. Jackson would have said something.”

Sergeant Wheaton went back to tapping on the keyboard. “Okay. See ya.”

“You want to text Foles? Tell him to meet me there?”

“Nope. I want to welcome him to his first day of homicide and let him know that he is off to a spectacular start. Then, I’ll send him to you.”

“Gotcha,” Meredith said, knocking on the doorframe before turning and walking out.

She did not envy the ass-chewing Sergeant Wheaton had in store for Tyler Foles when he arrived.

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Acknowledgments

As a kid, I was obsessed with ghosts. I devoured stories about ‘The Brown Lady of Raynham Hall’, ‘No.50 Berkeley Square’, ‘The Tulip Staircase’, ‘The Winchester House’, ‘The Bell Witch’, etc. My favorite ride? The Haunted Mansion in Disney World, of course. So, I’ve always wanted to write a haunted house story, but I had a lot of help.

Thank you, Abigail Fenton over at Harper Collins/HQ for your guidance and patience on getting Nightingale House out into the world. There’s no one I trust more with these stories.

Thank you, Sandy Comstock. I wanted to make Daniel’s grief a form of haunting, because I feel that’s what grief is, and you helped me put Nicole in the Nightingale House.

Thank you, Deborah Griffieth for Rebecca’s voice. I can’t imagine what this book would be like without your contributions.

And finally, thank you, Stephanie Frech, for reading me all those ghost stories when we were kids.

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