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over long legs, and boots she'd bought years before for a hiking trip through the Blue Ridge Mountains. The same mountains that rolled up against the sky now.

Years ago, she thought. The last time she'd come east, come here. And when, she supposed, the seeds for what she would do now had been planted.

Didn't that make the last four-or was it five-years of neglect at least partially her doing? She could've pushed sooner, could have demanded. She could have done something.

"Doing it now," she reminded herself. She wouldn't regret the delay any more than she would regret the manipulation and bitter arguments she'd used to force her mother to sign over the property.

"Yours now, Cilla," she told herself. "Don't screw it up."

She turned, braced herself, then made her way through the high grass and brambles to the old farmhouse where Janet Hardy had hosted sparkling parties, or had escaped to between roles. And where, in 1973, on another steamy summer night, she took her own life.

So claimed the legend.

THERE WERE GHOSTS. Sensing them was nearly as exhausting as evaluating the ramshackle three stories, facing the grime, the dust, the disheartening disrepair. Ghosts, Cilla supposed, had kept the vandalism and squatting to a minimum. Legends, she thought, had their uses.

She'd had the electricity turned back on, and had brought plenty of lightbulbs along with what she hoped would be enough cleaning supplies to get her started. She'd applied for her permits and researched local contractors.

Now, it was time to start something.

Lining up her priorities, she tackled the first of the four bathrooms that hadn't seen a scrub brush in the last six years.

And she suspected the last tenants hadn't bothered overmuch with such niceties during their stint.

"Could be more disgusting," she muttered as she scraped and scrubbed. "Could be snakes and rats. And God, shut up. You're asking for them."

After two sweaty hours and emptying countless buckets of filthy water, she thought she could risk using the facilities without being inoculated first. Chugging bottled water, she headed down the back stairs to have a whack at the big farmhouse kitchen next. And eyeing the baby-blue-on-white laminate on the stubby counters, she wondered whose idea that update had been, and why they'd assumed it would suit the marvelous old O'Keefe amp; Merritt range and Coldspot refrigerator.

Aesthetically, the room was over the line of hideous, but sanitary had to take precedence.

She braced the back door open for ventilation, tugged rubber gloves back on and very gingerly opened the oven door.

"Oh, crap."

While the best part of a can of oven cleaner went to work, she tackled the oven racks, the burners, the stove top and hood. A photograph flitted through her memory. Janet, a frilly apron over a wasp-waisted dress, sunlight hair pulled back in a sassy tail, stirring something in a big pot on the stove. Smiling at the camera while her two children looked on adoringly.

Publicity shoot, Cilla remembered. For one of the women's magazines. Redbook or McCall's. The old farmhouse stove, with its center grill, had sparkled like new hope. It would again, she vowed. One day, she'd stir a pot on that same stove with probably as much faked competence as her grandmother.

She started to squat down to check the oven cleaner, then yipped in surprise when she heard her name.

He stood in the open doorway, with sunlight haloing his silvered blond hair. His smile deepened the creases in his face, still so handsome, and warmed those quiet hazel eyes.

Her heart took a bound from surprise to pleasure, and another into embarrassment.

"Dad."

When he stepped forward, arms opening for a hug, she tossed up her hands, wheeled back. "No, don't. I'm absolutely disgusting. Covered with... I don't even want to know." She swiped the back of her wrist over her forehead, then fumbled off the protective gloves. "Dad," she repeated.

"I see a clean spot." He lifted her chin with his hand, kissed her cheek. "Look at you."

"I wish you wouldn't." But she laughed as most of the initial awkwardness passed. "What are you doing here?"

"Somebody recognized you in town when you stopped for supplies and said something to Patty. And Patty," he continued, referring to his wife, "called me. Why didn't you tell me you were coming?"

"I was going to. I mean I was going to call you."At some point. Eventually. When I figured out what to say. "I just wanted to get here first, then I..." She glanced back at the oven. "I got caught up."

"So I see. When did