All the Lovely Bad Ones: A Ghost Story

Travis and his sister, Corey, can't resist a good trick-so when they learn that their grandmother's sleepy Vermont inn has a history of ghost sightings, they decide to do a little "haunting" of their own. Scaring the guests proves to be great fun, and before long, the inn is filled with tourists and ghost hunters eager for a glimpse of the supernatural.But Travis and Corey soon find out that they aren't the onlyghosts at Fox Hill Inn. Their thoughtless games have awakenedsomething dangerous, something that should have stayed asleep.Restless, spiteful spirits swarm the inn, while a dark and terrifying presence stalks the halls and the old oak grove on the inn's grounds. To lay the ghosts to rest, Travis and Corey must first discover the dark history of Fox Hill and the horrors visited on its inhabitants years earlier.

7 The Jennings gang followed Miss Duvall and Chester, twittering about the grove and what they might see. Mrs. Jennings paused and smiled at me. "I know you're a skeptic, Travis, but I hope you and Corey will join us tonight. Eleanor is convinced we'll have a better chance of seeing the ghost if your sister's with us." "Don't count on it," I told her. Mrs. Jennings sighed. "Chester was very tactless at dinner, but then I suppose that's how it is when you're a genius. The ordinary rules don't apply." With another smile and a pat on my shoulder, she hastened after the others, leaving a trail of sickeningly sweet perfume behind her. Across the room, Tracy cleared tables. The setting sun shone through the windows and backlit her hair, making it shine like fine threads of gold. She turned and caught me staring at her. "What do you think of Chester and Eleanor?" she asked. "Bona fide nut cases, both of them." With a serious face, she set her heavy tray on my table. "If you'd been in the grove last night, you wouldn't sound so smug." More embarrassed than smug, I scraped the last bit of chocolate icing from my plate and licked it off my fork, tine by tine. "It's all fake," I said. "Corey and I wanted to make people think the inn was haunted so Grandmother would get more guests. She dressed up like a ghost and-" Tracy shoved her face so close to mine we were almost nose to nose. Which would have been a thrill if she hadn't been so mad. "There was something in the grove last night-and it wasn't Corey!" She snatched up my plate and fork, dumped them on her tray with a clatter, and huffed out of the dining room. There I was, all by myself, surrounded by empty tables covered with dirty linen and crumpled napkins. It was obvious Tracy was never going to be my girl friend. Not only was I tactless and offensive, but I was shorter and younger than she was. "It was your imagination," I called after her, but the only answer I got was the whop, whop, whop of the kitchen door swinging back and forth. "But what if it wasn't?" the little voice asked, a little louder this time. "What if . . . What if . . . ?" Exasperated, I tossed my napkin on the table and went to find Corey. I wished we'd never thought of the ghost game. As it turned out, Corey agreed with me. I finally found her sitting on the patio in the dark all by herself. At first she refused to look at me or answer any questions. "Why are you mad at me?" I asked her. "What did I do?" She turned to face me. "I told you I wanted to read, but you made funny noises outside my door, threw apples at my window, and thumped on my wall. You even unplugged my light and my radio and changed the time on my clock." I stared at her. "Are you crazy? I knocked on your door once and you told me to go away and I did. I never made funny noises or threw apples or thumped on your wall or anything." "Then who did? Mr. Brewster?" "Corey, I swear to you I did not do that stuff." "Oh," she said sarcastically, "then it must have been the ghost." We looked at each other in the moonlight, electrified by the same thought. "No joke," I whispered. "No." Corey folded her arms across her chest and shivered. "No joke." Delicate shadows from the wisteria vine patterned the table and Corey's face, shifting as the breeze blew. From somewhere in the darkness, an owl hooted and anoth