by Lucy Score
“Seriously, Griffin?” Riley said, exasperated.
Nick had had enough.
“Listen, shorty, you think she’s got anger issues, you ain’t seen nothing yet,” he threatened, putting himself between them. “Now, get out of our way, or I’ll pick you up and find a Dumpster.”
“I’m a journalist,” Griffin whined, his voice a full octave higher.
“Why don’t you go shower off that cologne? It’s making my eyes burn. Then you can explain to your viewers how exactly you know Ms. Thorn. And that she divorced you after you failed to keep your tiny dick in your—”
“Okay! I think we got enough here,” Griffin squealed, covering the camera lens with a hand.
“Come on, Nick,” Riley said, tugging on his arm. They left him at the entrance to the parking garage and headed for Nick’s vehicle.
They almost made it.
“Riley! Wait up!” Griffin called, jogging after them. This time without a microphone or a camera.
They didn’t stop, but with her pained gait, it didn’t take long for Gentry’s stumpy legs to catch them.
“Who is this guy? Your bodyguard?” He snorted at his own joke.
“I’m her fiancé, genius. And if you don’t get out of her face right now, I’m going to knock you down and mess up that snazzy suit,” Nick told him.
The guy took a self-preserving step back. “Fiancé?” Griffin looked him up and down. “What? Did you decide to get engaged just because I did?”
“Go away, Griffin,” Riley said through gritted teeth.
“You owe me, Riley,” he wheedled.
She wheeled on him, then winced. But when she opened her pretty brown eyes, there was bloody murder in them. “Exactly what do I owe you? You cheated on me. You sued me. And you cash my check every month,” she snapped.
Now Nick really didn’t like this guy.
“Come on, Ry. I’m trying to make the move to the evening desk. Help a guy out.” He cocked his head to the side and flashed her those white teeth.
“Does he think he’s being charming right now?” Nick asked Riley.
“He thinks he’s charming all the time,” she told him.
Gentry pouted. “Look. Just give me an exclusive on this. I get you on camera. You can tell your side of why you shot that guy. I’ve got a one-on-one with the mayor for the six o’clock news tonight. Between the two, I’m basically guaranteed a spot on the desk.”
“I didn’t shoot anyone,” she argued wearily. “Why don’t you just have your dad fire someone again?”
“Riley, Riley, Riley.” Gentry reached out like he was going to do the old “push the hair behind the girl’s ear” move. She recoiled like a turtle going back in its shell.
Nick moved between them again and grabbed the guy’s wrist. “Gentry, man. I swear to God. If you don’t remove your finger from her vicinity right now, I’m going to break it. And then I’m going to sue you for assaulting my nose with that god-awful cologne.”
Gentry sniffed at his shoulder and frowned. “You don’t like it? It’s pheromone-based.”
“It smells like cat piss. Now, get the fuck out of my way, and don’t come near my woman again.”
Nick gave the guy a helpful shove so he could put Riley in the passenger seat. When she was situated, he shut her door and took a menacing step toward Griffin that had the guy scurrying back toward the news van.
“You’ll be sorry,” Gentry squealed over his shoulder as he jogged back up the ramp.
Nick got behind the wheel and looked at Riley. She had her eyes squeezed shut.
“That guy?” he said finally.
She opened one eye. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
16
8:25 a.m., Sunday, June 21
“I say we install cameras and motion sensors around the perimeter.” Mrs. Penny gave the living room floor a thunk with her cane as she paced.
Nick had delivered Riley to her front door after the hospital with a “take care” and what felt like a smoldering look. But there had been no offers to call or visit her later.
She couldn’t blame him. The whole “psychic” thing and run-in with her ex-husband would have scared anyone off. She’d pout about it after the “neighborhood watch” meeting called to address the “dead neighbor thing.”
“I still think this could be a paranormal phenomenon,” Lily insisted as she swiveled around and around on the stool in front of the organ someone had stuffed into a corner a few decades ago. “I think we need to have the place exorcised.”
Mrs. Penny snorted. “A spirit doesn’t shoot deadbeats in the head with a Smith and Wesson. It was a human, and now we need a security system with laser beams.”
“We don’t have that kind of budget,” Fred said from the pink meditation cushion in the window seat. “We could take turns patrolling.”
“And do what if you catch someone breaking in?” Riley asked. She was wedged onto a green velvet divan between a stack of pillows Lily had thoughtfully arranged for her and Mr. Willicott, who seemed to think she was one of the pillows.
Realistically, she was the only one in this house who had a chance at being able to outrun a wannabe murderer or at least surviving the heart attack if she found one hiding in the basement.
“We could hire a self-defense expert!” Lily suggested. “There’s this handsome martial arts man at my gym.”
“When did you start going to the gym?” Fred asked his sister.
“Let’s all get guns,” Mr. Willicott said, perking up. This was the first time Riley could remember him contributing something conversation-related since they’d met.
“You’d find a way to shoot yourself in the ass,” Mrs. Penny argued.
The doorbell rang, and they all froze.
“Is it another murderer?” Mr. Willicott shouted.
“I bet it’s the ghost,” Lily said, sounding a little too enthusiastic about that possibility.
“Only one way to find out.” Mrs. Penny yanked open the door, and in walked Riley’s mother.
“Oh, no,” Riley groaned, girding herself for the guilt trip.
Blossom dumped her hemp shopping totes in the foyer and hurried to her daughter’s side. “You poor thing,” she crooned, fussing over Riley’s bandage and sling.
“I was going to call you, Mom,” she fibbed.
“Don’t be silly,” Blossom said, pulling a dusty afghan off the back of the divan and tucking it around Riley’s legs. “You’ve been through so much. Why would you even think to call me? Besides, Lily called me and told me your fiancé took you to the hospital.”
Uh-oh. Danger zone.
Riley recognized that diabolical sparkle in her mother’s otherwise guileless eyes. This was Forced Fasting-level Blossom Basil-Thorn.
“Now, you just cozy up in here. I’ll warm up my boneless bone broth. While that simmers, I’ll do a top to bottom smudging,” Blossom said cheerfully.
“Thank you, Blossom,” Lily called after Riley’s mother.
Blossom waved a clump of sage and disappeared into the back of the house.
“Back to the meeting,” Mrs. Penny announced.
“We need a code word,” Fred said with a lot of confidence for a man who had put his toupee on backward that day.
“A code word?” Riley, more concerned that her mother was about to exact her revenge through soup, couldn’t follow the conversation.
“In case one of us is being held hostage or abducted. If the bad guy has one of us, we’ll use the code word to alert the others.” Mrs. Penny obviously had no trouble following the unraveling thread.
Riley wasn’t sure how a code word would prevent a gun-toting bad guy from breaking into the house and shooting someone else. “Maybe we should just start locking the house?” she suggested.
“Then how will we lure the bad guys in?” Lily wanted to know.
“Wait. Why are we luring them in?” Riley asked. She really needed to go to sleep. For two days.
“So we can use the code word. Keep
up, girlie,” Mr. Willicott bellowed.
“Harbinger.” That was Mrs. Penny’s suggestion. Or she was calling someone in the room a harbinger. Riley’s body was one low throb of pain. It made paying attention more difficult.
“Swiss cheese,” Fred tried.
“But what happens if I need you to pick up some Swiss cheese at the market?” Lily pointed out. “You’d think I’ve been abducted.”
“Good point. What’s a food none of us like?” Mrs. Penny wondered.
“Pizza,” Mr. Willicott said.
“Pizza?” everyone echoed in horror.
“What kind of monster are you?” Mrs. Penny hissed.
“I don’t like the hard shell,” Mr. Willicott grumbled.
“Shell? You mean crust,” Fred said.
“No! The yellow crispy shell that holds all the meat and lettuce.”
“I think you’re thinking about a taco,” Riley said.
“That’s what I said. Tacos,” Mr. Willicott said grumpily.
“Have you seen the neurologist lately?” Lily asked sweetly.
“Let’s focus, people,” Mrs. Penny said, clapping her hands. “We need a code word that we’ll all remember.”
“Ciabatta,” Fred suggested.
“Cha-what now?” his sister asked.
“French toast?” Mrs. Penny tried.
Blossom wandered past the doorway barefoot and waving a bouquet of smoking sage.
“How about cabbage casserole?” Riley suggested.
“Code word: cabbage casserole,” Mrs. Penny mused. “I like it.”
“Great. Can I go to bed now?” Riley asked.
There was a knock at the front door. Everyone over the age of seventy scrambled out of their seats.
“What do we do?”
“Is it the killer?”
“We should have got those guns!”
“Anyone have something we could hit him over the head with?”
“I got a lamp!”
“Put that down, Fred. I paid ten dollars for that at a garage sale!”
“Harrisburg Police,” a weary voice called from the other side of the door.
“You got a warrant, copper?” Mrs. Penny demanded through the door.
Even from the divan, Riley could hear the man sigh. “I’d like to talk to Riley Thorn.”
Mr. Willicott opened the door, and Detective Weber walked in. He’d lost the tie and jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his button-down. He looked almost as tired as Riley felt.
“Have a few minutes?” he asked her.
Great. Now she had to give up her nap for an interrogation. Well, she’d have plenty of time to sleep in prison.
“Yeah. Sure.” She didn’t think she could make it up the stairs on her own, so she limped back to the kitchen and closed the pocket door behind them. “Do you want some water or something?” she asked, dropping onto one of the vinyl chairs around the table.
“No. Thanks.” The detective took the chair across from her and sat. Wordlessly he reached into his pocket and dropped something on the table between them.
It was a tie clip.
She sighed.
“I have a lot of questions,” he said.
“Join the club,” she said.
“Why don’t you start by telling me how it works?” he suggested.
“If I knew that, I’d be able to control it. And if I could control it, I’d block out these ridiculous visions and stop having conversations with dead people.” She scrubbed a hand over her face to hide the fact that her nose was twitching. “Your dad wants you to know he doesn’t blame you.”
The detective sat there stone-faced for so long, Riley wondered if he’d fallen asleep with his eyes open.
“Tell me about how you knew Frick was going to be murdered,” he said finally.
She gave him points for not shifting gears and demanding to know all about the message his dead father just sent.
“I didn’t know that it was going to happen. I’m not exactly a practicing psychic. I didn’t even know until recently that these things were visions and not cabbage-induced hallucinations.”
He wisely let the cabbage thing go.
“You had a feeling something was going to happen to Dickie. How did that come about?” he tried again.
Riley yawned mightily. When Weber didn’t turn into a human and suggest she go to bed and talk to him later, she told him about the vision in the hallway, the visit to the police department, the note.
“Why didn’t you go to him personally?”
She leaned in. “Detective Weber, I have something to tell you. There’s someone out there who wants you dead, and they’re going to knock on your door and shoot you in the head. I don’t know who or when, but it’s probably going to happen. So how about that rain in the forecast for Tuesday?”
“Point taken.”
“Am I still a suspect?”
“Right now, you’re the only person of interest we’ve got since your boyfriend exonerated himself with dash cam footage.”
“Haven’t you heard? He’s my fiancé now,” she joked.
“You could do better,” he said.
A low moan came from the hall.
The door slid open, and her mother stood there with a phony smile pasted on her face, smoking sage clutched in her hand.
Riley sighed. “This is my mother, Blossom Basil-Thorn,” she said, making the introductions. “Mom, this is Detective Weber.”
“I’m so happy to meet you on such an auspicious day, Detective,” Blossom said. “After all, how often does your own daughter get engaged and accused of murder on the same day without telling you anything?”
“Oh, boy,” Riley whispered.
Detective Weber looked a little nervous.
“Mom, we’ll talk about that later,” Riley said, nodding toward the door.
“Don’t mind me. I’ll just stir this boneless bone broth with the knife in my back,” Blossom insisted, stomping to the stove.
“You can’t make those jokes around a homicide detective,” Riley pointed out.
“I’ve heard worse,” Weber admitted.
Since her mother wasn’t leaving the room anytime soon, Riley slumped back in her chair. “So, what now? Am I under arrest?”
“Should you be?”
“Do you really think I killed Dickie?”
“I’m more concerned with the facts. You had prior knowledge of the situation. You were here when the crime was committed.”
“Lots of people were here,” Blossom announced to the broth she was whipping into a vortex. That was the thing about her mom: Even if Blossom was mad, she still had her family’s back.
“What’s my motive?” Riley asked, too tired, too sore to care at this point.
“Sometimes people don’t need much of a motive,” he said. “Did I mention your fingerprints were found on his door?”
She rolled her eyes. “I bet you found everyone’s fingerprints. We’re a nosy, close-knit group.”
“Not close enough to introduce your mother to your fiancé,” Blossom grumbled.
“Mom!”
“There you are!” Jasmine Patel, in all her beautiful glory, stormed into the kitchen. Her dark hair flowed out behind her like the cape of a tough yet benevolent superhero. The detective looked the way all men did when Riley’s best friend entered a room: dumbstruck.
“Hey, Jas,” Riley said weakly.
“What the hell happened to you? Why didn’t you call me?”
“Join the club,” Blossom said, whirling around, clutching a ladle.
“Hey, Blossom.” Jasmine waved.
“Who did call you?” Riley asked.
“Lily. She said something about an evil spirit committing a murder, you falling down the stairs, and getting engaged.”
“Jasmine, this is Detective Weber, who is considering whether or not to arrest me. Detective Weber, this is Jasmine.”
Jasmine went on the beautiful, angry woman attack. “If you think that Riley ha
s anything to do with whatever the hell happened, you’re an idiot. What did happen by the way?” she asked, turning back to Riley.
“Your friend’s great-uncle was shot and killed in his room last night,” the detective answered.
“Regular uncle,” Riley corrected him. “He was only fifty-seven.”
“Really?” Blossom asked in surprise. “I thought he had to be at least ninety.”
Jasmine leaned in to examine the diameter of Riley’s pupils. “Did you hit your head?”
“Repeatedly.”
“Jimmy’s been dead for two years,” Jasmine said, shooting a look at Blossom, who was violently drying a bowl with a dish towel.
“Not Jimmy. Dickie.”
“Wave-the-cannoli, leave-the-underwear Dickie?” Jasmine asked, confused.
“Yes. That Uncle Dickie,” Riley said.
“Oh. Right. Oh. Ohhh!” Jasmine recovered nicely. “Listen, Detective… what was your name again?”
“Weber,” he answered.
“Detective Weber, if you want to question my client, you’ll need to go through me first.”
“You’re a lawyer?” he asked.
Jasmine was an estate and elder law attorney. Her client meetings took place in dated living rooms crammed with knickknacks, not interrogation rooms.
“You’re damn right I am,” she said, poking him in the chest with a very red fingernail. Riley felt like that probably wasn’t allowed. Poking a cop was probably like touching the Liberty Bell or hugging one of the guards at Buckingham Palace. It just wasn’t done.
“Hey, Jas, do you mind getting me a glass of water?” Riley asked, adding a dry croak for effect. There was no reason for them both to go to jail.
“Of course, babe. Anything you want. You better watch yourself, mister,” she threatened Weber with that same pointed finger.
“Detective,” he reminded her.
“Mister detective,” Riley said, then started to laugh. Not the normal laughter of a regular person who found something entertaining. No. This was the unhinged, deranged, hiccupping gasp of a lunatic who desperately needed sleep.
This was the delayed hysterical reaction of a woman who had been pushed too far. A woman who had tried to save a dumbass’s life. A woman who had cushioned the fall of the very fine, very dense body of Nick Santiago, who was never, ever going to see her again. A woman who was hanging on by her fingernails while her cheating ex-husband booked first-class tickets for his second honeymoon.