by Cate Lawley
“We live in a supernatural hot spot?” My left eye started to twitch.
“Why do you think you were drawn here? And me, and Hector—have you introduced yourself to Hector yet?”
I shook my head. Because no, I hadn’t introduced myself to the mysterious Hector, what with the complete absence of any free time since I’d learned of his existence. And no, I didn’t think I’d moved here because it was a supernatural hot spot. Just the opposite. I’d moved here because I thought it was a nice, quiet street.
“I’m sure there are others, but they haven’t been as neighborly as Hector,” Tamara said.
“Hector . . .” Sylvie pursed her lips as she thought. “I know, I met him on Monday! Right after the explosion. He was the large black man with the unusual hazel eyes. He was lovely, so kind. He offered to build a new shed for me if I bought the supplies. But he was just there for a moment and then gone again.”
“He took one look at me and retreated.” Or so it had appeared to me at the time.
“It’s the daylight,” Tamara said. “It puts him in a terrible mood. He’s not usually out and about until later. Hector’s more of a night owl.” Tamara pulled out a scrap of paper and printed a number on it. She pushed the little scrap closer to Sylvie. “Call him when you’re ready. He wouldn’t offer if he didn’t mean it, and he’ll create a beautiful building for you. One that will be much harder to blow up.”
And now my curiosity concerning the mysterious Hector had trebled.
“And we’re sure this Hector, whoever he is”—whatever he was—“isn’t involved?” I didn’t think it appropriate to bring up the bombing again, but if Tamara was capable of blowing up a shed, what were all these other supernaturals who were hanging around in my “quiet” neighborhood capable of?
“No. Impossible.” Tamara’s implacable tone had me half convinced, but there was clearly something supernatural going on with the man. If he was a man. “Although if we don’t come up with a reasonable solution soon, we might want to stop by and see if he has something to help us through the upcoming meeting.”
I glanced at the clock.
“Two hours left,” Sylvie said. “What now? Ginny?”
“I can try, but I’m not sure how to get in touch with her.” I asked Tamara if she had any thoughts.
With a brisk nod, Tamara said, “Now we consult some toads.”
24
“Ah . . .” But I didn’t have a ready reply to ghostly communication via toad consult.
Clarence might have been right when he said Tamara was crazy. Intermittently, she'd put on a good show of sanity, but it looked like the cat was out of the bag. Or perhaps the toad?
“Oh, fun!” Lilac clapped her hands. Immediately her enthusiasm died. “I’m so sorry. That was insensitive. Of course I’m worried about Clarence, but”—her eyes lit up again—“toads!”
And now everyone was insane. Or I was the slow kid in the class, the one with spitballs stuck in his hair. “I guess I missed that seminar. How does one consult with toads?”
“Oh, no.” Sylvie looked faintly queasy. “This doesn’t have anything to do with entrails, does it? I don’t think I could kill a toad.” Her color fled, followed by a warm flush.
“Why would we kill a toad?” Tamara looked confused and a little concerned. “We’re going to talk to one.”
Because that made so much more sense. Maybe I was overreacting. In the grander scheme of things, talking toads weren’t all that shocking a concept. After all, my housemate was a talking bobcat.
Tamara stopped rummaging in her bag, looked up, and said, “If I can find a sociable one at this time of day. It wouldn’t be a problem at all if it were dusk or later.” Then she returned to her bag.
“And what exactly will this toad tell us? Assuming we can find one.” I blinked at the marble Tamara pulled triumphantly from her bag.
“I thought I had one in here, though I did pack this bag some time ago.” She rolled the large marble in her fingers. “One should never be without a bit of gold, or in this case, a small golden ball.”
Lilac grinned and held out her hand. “May I?”
Tamara handed her the marble. “The toad won’t tell us anything. If we’re lucky, he’ll get the word out to your helpful ghost, Ginny.”
“Helpful” wasn’t the way I’d describe Ginny, but now seemed a poor time to mention her faults.
Sylvie watched Lilac roll the ball in her hand with a hypnotic fascination. But then she shook her head and turned to me. “You seem certain Ginny must have seen something, but if she has such a watchful eye on the neighborhood, then wouldn’t she know we’re looking for her?”
“Ah, about that . . . she might be specifically avoiding me. It’s possible you could get her attention if I were gone, but she’s also shy. Sort of.” I wasn’t about to explain my role as Ginny’s unwilling evening peep show. And I couldn’t in good conscience mention her tragic past and how that might have influenced her ghostly interactions with people.
Tamara finished mixing together several powders from the vials in her bag, then dipped her pinky in the mixture and tasted it.
Once I’d recovered from my choking fit, Tamara, who was still alive and showing no signs of poisoning, said, “Now, who has some tall grass and a little shade?”
After some discussion, we determined Sylvie’s backyard the best option, since she’d been overdue a mow back before the explosion and had postponed it due to debris. The wildlife that had been driven away by the blast were proving surprisingly resilient and were already returning to her little back garden, so she thought we might have some luck.
Tamara stuffed the rock in her satchel with Sylvie’s approval. With her traveling magic bag in hand, she led the way across the road to Sylvie’s.
She pulled the prepared mixture from one of her deep pockets and retrieved the small gold marble from Lilac. Then she found a nice shady spot, rolled the golden ball, and murmured a few words.
Then we waited.
After what seemed an awkwardly long moment of silence and no action, Tamara picked up the ball and handed it to Lilac. “Give it a try. Just a gentle roll in the grass. I’ll do the rest.”
With a shrug, Lilac bent down and rolled the ball as instructed. Tamara whispered a few words that I couldn’t make out—perhaps in German?—then we waited.
Not five seconds later, a sleepy, slightly peeved-looking toad hopped our way. Sylvie, Lilac, and I all stared. Then Sylvie nudged me in the ribs. “It’s a toad. I can’t believe that worked.”
Her whisper barely reached my ears, so I hadn’t a clue how Tamara, several feet away, heard her, but she said, “I’m concentrating over here.”
So we all watched, waiting for the toad to say or do something. At least, I was.
Tamara took the powdered mixture and, after tapping small amounts out, made a circle around the toad. She looked at me and shook her head. “He’s a conduit, Geoff. He’s not actually going to speak. He doesn’t have vocal cords. And could you think a little quieter?”
Could I think quieter? What did that even mean? And since when could witches read thoughts? But I tried as best I could to turn down the volume of my thoughts without actually knowing what that meant, and watched as the toad jumped out of the powder ring and then back in, and then again twice more.
And that was it.
Nothing else happened, but Tamara looked quite satisfied with herself. Turning to me, she said, “It’s not all bright lights and explosions.”
Lilac nudged me. “She’s here—I think. Someone’s here.”
Ginny flickered into sight. “The toad said you wanted to see me. This better be good, because you’re not my favorite person right now.”
Tamara might have made the toad-enabled call, but Ginny only had eyes for me. I, on the other hand, was having a hard time pulling my attention away from the mysterious toad. I didn’t think I could ever look at the odd creatures the same way again. But then he hopped away, leaving me to face Gin
ny.
Ginny scanned the group. “There are a lot of people here.”
Unlike Bobby, Ginny was powerful enough to make herself seen by non-mediums. And she was clearly making that effort now, because Sylvie looked right at her. “Thank you. Oh, thank you so much, Ginny, for coming.”
Ginny flickered, a sign that her emotions were already running high. “Do I know you? I don’t think so.” She pointed a finger that encompassed all three women. “No talking.” Her eyes narrowed and her finger returned to Sylvie. “But especially you.”
Like a ghost with a crush wasn’t bad enough, now I had a ghost with a crush who was jealous. I motioned for Lilac, Tamara, and Sylvie to step back a few feet, and they quickly complied.
“Ginny?” I said, with an effort at a charming smile. It was about as difficult as taking my shirt off was when I’d known someone was watching. As a soul collector, my job had been difficult, yes, but it had also been straightforward. I’d been honest, because to do anything less was to undermine the trust between oneself and the soul to be collected.
Deception was a skill, and it appeared I was woefully out of practice.
She stopped glaring at the women and turned her attention to me, but she didn’t look much happier.
“Thank you for coming,” I said, trying to be casual and charming and nonthreatening all at once.
I suspected I just looked out of sorts, because Ginny crossed her arms with a grim look. “You sent a toad after me. Hard not to hear the message.”
“Yes.” I glanced at Tamara. “I’m new to, ah . . . toad messages.”
Ginny snorted. “Of course it was the witch. I should have known.” Ginny used two fingers to point at her own eyes, then Tamara’s, then her own.
The message was clear enough: like everyone else on the block, Ginny was keeping a close eye on Tamara.
Tamara didn’t look terribly concerned, so I pushed forward with our agenda. “I have a few questions for you about what’s happened in the neighborhood.”
Ginny’s upper torso leaned toward me. “I’m not sure if I want to answer them. I’m still not sure how I feel about our last meeting.” But then her outline stabilized and her features cleared, and she looked like the pretty young woman I knew she’d been in life. “Was the list helpful?”
“Yes, it was. And thank you for that. I really hope that you can help again, because someone’s taken Clarence.”
Ginny nodded, unsurprised. “You know, you’re not very nice to Clarence.”
My spine straightened. Sure, Clarence and I had our disagreements, our never-ending negotiations, our vastly differing opinions on topics like porn, theft, and where one should relieve oneself, but generally, I thought we managed to get along moderately well. “We make do. It’s a difficult situation, but it’s not like either of us has much choice.”
Ginny shook her head. “That’s not right. Clarence chose you.”
“He was assigned to me,” I corrected her gently, but still the flicker increased.
“He chose his caretaker. He chose you.”
That was news to me. I thought that he’d landed with me because of my ability to communicate with ghosts. Since it was hardly a normal trait for an ex-soul collector to have, and Clarence had been assigned to me shortly after discovering that particular paranormal hiccup in my make-up, I’d assumed the two were connected—but my bosses had never actually said they were.
“Regardless of how he ended up with me, he’s not in a good place, and we need to get him back.”
“I like Clarence. Mostly.” She bit her lip. “He should stay with someone who takes care of him and doesn’t make him eat kitty kibble. With someone who rubs his belly. How do you know this place isn’t better? That he doesn’t get to eat whatever he wants there?”
I tamped down the urge to roll my eyes. This was about dry food and massages? The dry food kept him from completely gassing us out of the house. If he only ate his craving of the moment, which invariably included organ meat, bacon, cheese, beer, Cheetos, and vodka, I wouldn’t survive the ensuing noxious fumes. And belly rubs? No. Just . . . no.
The little warning bells in my head started to clang. Those comments were very specific. “Do you know where Clarence is?”
Ginny gave me a mulish look.
She knew. She had to. Where else would she be getting the idea that his captors had given him free dietary rein? I was about sixty percent sure, maybe seventy, that Ginny knew where Clarence was being kept—or at least who had taken him.
“Bobby’s pretty sure his kidnappers mean to kill Clarence—and I think Bobby’s right this time,” I said.
“Bobby.” She huffed and flicked several ghostly strands of hair over her shoulder. “Bobby’s about as clever as a cow.”
It was hard to argue in favor of Bobby’s vast intelligence. I bobbed and weaved that one. “Ginny, listen to me. I think maybe whoever took Clarence might have killed Bobby.” I heard a gasp from the peanut gallery, but I kept my attention focused on the ghost in front of me. “If I’m right, they’ve killed before and won’t hesitate to kill again.”
I had no proof, beyond the Swiss cheese memory of a death-fugued ghost. Bobby might have been killed by random violence or someone associated with the stolen car ring he’d been involved in. Maybe he was confused, except suddenly I knew that he wasn’t. I knew that what I’d said was true: the kidnappers had killed Bobby.
“No. You can’t know that. Bobby had death fugue.” She started to flicker. “You can’t know they killed Bobby, because you don’t even know who they are!” She was flickering so fast that she looked like an old, poorly preserved film. “You’re lying! I hate liars.”
Clive the gnome floated up in the air, just like the condiments she’d smashed in my kitchen. Only Clive wasn’t glass—he was cast iron. And it wasn’t just me in the line of fire. There were three innocent people present. I glanced at my peanut gallery and revised that to two innocent women and a somewhat shady neighborhood witch. Keeping my eyes on Ginny, I moved slowly to my left. “I’m not lying. I don’t know how, but I know I’m right.”
The flickering slowed just a bit. “Like a vision?”
“No.” As the flickering picked up, I quickly said, “But sort of. A vision without the visuals.” Sure, why not? That sounded close enough to the truth. I stepped again to my left, hoping that if I moved far enough, the ladies—witch inclusive, because even shady witches could be ladies—wouldn’t be in the line of fire.
The flickering stopped, and Ginny giggled. “A vision without the visuals. You’re funny, Geoff.”
I took one more step to my left, relatively confident that I’d changed the angles enough to now be the singular target. So long as she kept her attention on me. “Do you think you can help me find Clarence? I truly believe he’s in danger.” When she still hesitated, I added, “But you’re right about the food. I’ll try to find something tastier for him.”
Preferably something that wouldn’t give him noxious gas on par with the chemical warfare of my generation. But she didn’t need the details.
“Okay,” she said in a cheerful tone. And I immediately felt like I’d been out-negotiated by a master. “He’s with Nicky.”
Not knowing what Ginny gained from this deal made me itchy. But there were bigger, more immediate problems than Ginny’s unpredictable mood swings. For instance . . . “Who’s Nicky?” And had he been on our suspect list? But Ginny would hardly know that answer.
“The Gonzalez house,” Sylvie called. “Mrs. Gonzalez’s nephew.”
“Mrs. G? Are you sure, Ginny?” But I regretted my questions immediately.
Clive came tumbling at me with remarkable speed.
25
I flinched. I yelled—probably profanity, but I was uncertain of the exact words. Generally, I looked like a bumbling idiot.
What I didn’t do was duck.
Wild-eyed, I stared as Clive tumbled ass over teakettle directly toward my head. The world had slowed, and each rotat
ion was distinct: round rump, then grinning face, then pointy hat, then round rump . . . Slow enough to see in great detail, but still speeding faster than I could dodge.
Beaned by a gnome—of all the undignified ways to die. And me having just retired back to mortality only a few weeks ago.
And then, no more than a hand’s width from my eyes, he smacked into a wall. An invisible wall. A wall that couldn’t be there. But a wall solid enough to produce a resounding thud when Clive made contact.
Clive looked up at me from the ground with his cheerful expression and his pipe clenched firmly between his teeth. And I said the most inane thing, the first thing that popped into my head: “Thank you, Clive.”
Maybe he did bash me in the head after all, because I’d swear Clive winked at me.
“I’ll take that thanks.” Tamara leaned down to retrieve Clive. She lifted the statue like it weighed nothing and handed him to Sylvie. “You might like to put him back where he belongs. He’s fond of his spot.”
The subtext to her comments was too much for my almost-bashed-in head to process, so I ignored it. “Wait, Ginny?” I looked around the garden and found no signs of her.
“Gone,” Lilac said. “Too bad they don’t make mood stabilizers for ghosts. Or maybe she needs therapy? There seems to be a lot of anger going on there. Girl also has some highly conflicted emotions rolling around inside her. Toward you.” She raised her eyebrows. “Toward Sylvie.”
“Yes.” I winced. Talking about Ginny with Clarence was one thing; this was different. Lilac didn’t know her, and Ginny didn’t trust strangers. Striving for vagueness but not wanting to leave Lilac with a bad impression, I said, “I’m sure she has very good reasons for the way she feels.”
“I’m sure you’re right. Also, I’m sorry.” She gave me sheepish look. “I get why you were looking for a ghost repellant before. I’m sorry about what I said, you know, judging you for wanting them to go away. I only ever have the sense they’re around. I’ve never seen or spoken to one before. And none of them have tried to bean me. Not yet.”