The tooth fairy left. I stuck the Tootsie Pop back in my mouth and crawled into bed. “I saw Melvin came back this afternoon. Is everything all right with him?”
Stanley’s face softened with relief. “Yes. The little man caused us quite a stir this morning. But turns out, he just went a little AWOL. He left this morning without signing out.”
“How’s that possible?” I asked as Stanley tucked me in with his rippling biceps.
Yeah, I could get used to this, all right.
“This isn’t exactly a lockdown unit,” Stanley said. “People are free to go in and out from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Otherwise, the old chimney smokers around here would stage a mutiny on the Banner.”
I smiled. “Oh. Right.”
A knock sounded at the door. To be on the safe side, I performed an encore of my gummy smile. “Come in!”
A doctor in scrubs and a surgical mask strolled into my room. Stanley’s eyes widened. “Is there another flu epidemic going on, doctor?”
“No,” the doctor mumbled through his mask. “I just came in to give Georgie the results of the test we conducted earlier.”
“What test?” I asked.
The doctor pulled down his mask, revealing the worst moustache in the Western Hemisphere.
“Grayson,” Stanley said. “What are you doing here?”
He nodded toward me. “I needed to let our patient know her toe swabs tested negative for saliva.”
Stanley’s face puckered. “Huh?”
“Never mind, Stanley,” I said. “Long story.”
“I also want to talk to Melvin across the hall,” Grayson said. “Okay if I pop over there?”
“No can do,” Stanley said, shaking his head. “Little man came home this afternoon totally whipped. He went to bed without even eating dinner. And potpie is his favorite.”
“Whipped, you say?” Grayson’s eyebrows met in the middle of his forehead.
Another knock sounded on the door.
“That would be my associate,” Grayson said, and yanked open the door. Earl bumbled into the room looking like Sasquatch in beige scrubs.
“Howdy, y’all.”
“What do you need an associate for?” Stanley asked.
Grayson shrugged. “With lights out at 7:15, I figured he and I’d have plenty of time to check out the records of the missing men. I know you don’t want to get involved, so I brought Earl to be my lookout. You can count on us to be discreet. Just get us into the file room. We’ll blend in like staff. No one will even notice.”
Stanley chewed his lip as he thought it over.
“Hey, what’s this button do?” Earl asked, and mashed a shiny red button on my bedside.
The wail of an alarm nearly blasted me out of bed.
“Shit!” Stanley hollered. He scrambled to my bed and whacked a button, silencing the alarm.
“Oops,” Earl said. “My bad.”
Stanley jogged back to the door, glanced up and down the hallway, and then came back in and closed it behind him.
“Look, man,” he said, his eyes trained on the door like he was expecting a SWAT team to burst in any second. “Wait here. I’ll go get the records. Don’t touch anything, okay?”
He took a step toward the door, then eyed Earl suspiciously. “On second thought, Earl, you come with me.”
Earl glanced at Grayson. He gave him the nod.
“Be right back,” Stanley said. “Larry Meeks, Harry Donovan and Charlie Perkins, right?”
Grayson nodded. “Correct.”
Stanley turned to go, then whipped back around on his heels again. “Please, don’t touch anything while I’m gone!”
“You have our word,” Grayson said.
Stanley’s mouth pursed with regret. He grabbed Earl by the bicep and led him into the hallway. As the door closed behind them, Grayson turned to me.
“Okay, quick. We need to concoct a plan for exposing Bertie at the revival tomorrow.”
I sat up in bed. “Shouldn’t we wait until Earl comes back?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Basic strategy 101, Drex. When you don’t know who the patsy in a card game is, it’s you.”
Chapter Forty
GRAYSON WAS EATING the sweaty little tub of tapioca by my bedside when the door cracked open. Rasta Stanley and his skunk ape sidekick snuck back inside.
Stanley handed over three files. “Here you go, man. What you hopin’ to find in them, anyway?”
“Some kind of connection,” Grayson said.
Stanley’s brow furrowed. “Connection? You mean to Old Mildred?”
“As far as you know, yes,” Grayson said. “We need to figure out why these three men in particular were targeted. Was it their blood type, toothpaste brand, electromagnetic energy, or whatnot.”
“What was that last one?” Stanley asked.
“Whatnot?” Grayson asked.
“No. The thing before that.”
“Ah. Electromagnetic energy.” Grayson nodded. “It’s quite possible that Larry, Harry and Charlie could’ve been emitting energy fields that were particularly tasty to psychic vampires.”
Stanley’s face dropped two inches. “Psychic vampires?”
“Yes.”
Stanley stared, dumbfounded, at the man impersonating a doctor, licking tapioca from his overgrown moustache. Then his eyes shifted to the hairy, itchy-eyed man ogling the controls on my bed like a Ritalin-deprived toddler.
Finally, Stanley turned to me, his eyes pleading for an anchor in the vortex of insanity swirling around him. But given the fact I was posing as an old tranny vet with vampire teeth for dentures, I wasn’t exactly the most reliable port in the storm.
Stanley let out a big sigh. “I know nothing, I see nothing,” he said, and slowly backed his way out the door.
AFTER STANLEY DID HIS Schultz routine and fled, Grayson and I sat Earl down in the recliner by my bed and hooked him up with headphones and a TV remote set on Pimp My Ride.
With Earl floating around in redneck heaven, Grayson and I were free to peruse the files of the three missing veterans without his annoying interference. Even so, we had to be quick. Visiting hours were over in eight minutes.
“Did Larry have hemorrhoids?” Grayson asked, flipping through Harry’s file.
“Uh ... yeah,” I said.
“So that makes three things so far,” he said, scribbling in a notebook.
“Three?”
“Yes,” Grayson said, counting on his fingers. “All three men served in Vietnam, they all showed signs of borderline anemia, and they all used Preparation H.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“Either we’ve got a Vietnamese khakua with a penchant for cabooses, or we need to do more research.”
I grimaced at the unwanted imagery flashing across my mind. “What happened to your psychic vampire theory?”
Grayson looked up from the file. “Who says it can’t be both?”
I closed my eyes and sighed.
Awesome. Here we are, Larry, Moe and Curly, searching for Larry, Harry and Charlie. Maybe, if I pray hard enough, the evil twin inside my brain will do a voodoo dance and I’ll lapse blissfully into a coma overnight.
Chapter Forty-One
“RISE AND SHINE,” A demonic voice whispered in my ear.
I shot up in bed so fast I knocked heads with my human alarm clock.
“Oww!” I yelled. “Grayson, how did you get in here?”
“It’s quarter after six, sleepy head. Banner Hill’s been open for business for fifteen minutes.”
“Well, I’m not.” I scowled and pulled the covers up to my neck.
“Nice knot on your noggin,” Grayson said, rubbing his own forehead. “How’d you get it?”
I touched the lump above my right eye. My gut went slack. “I ... I don’t know. I dreamed I got whacked on the head by Old Mildred last night. I mean ... I thought it was a dream ....”
“Interesting,” Grayson said, leani
ng in for a better look. “Do you bruise easily?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
“What do you remember about last night?”
“Aw, geez,” I moaned. “Could I at least have some coffee before the interrogation?”
“It’s on the nightstand.”
I spied the steaming cup. Relief washed over me. I grabbed it and took a big gulp while Grayson studied me like a lab experiment.
“Anything else you remember?” he asked.
I took another slurp and felt the caffeine kick in like heroin. “I remember that after you and Earl left last night, I was reading over the files and—” I shot up in bed. “Where is Earl?”
“Don’t worry. I sent him to pick up donuts.”
I sighed again and took another slurp of coffee.
“So, you were reading the files,” Grayson prompted.
“Yes. And ... that’s all I remember. I guess I fell asleep.”
“Can’t blame you there. Those case files weren’t the most riveting reading material I’ve ever run across.” Grayson took a sip of coffee, then locked his green eyes on mine. “So, you said you dreamed of Old Mildred again?”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes and tried to recall the dream, but it flitted out of my grasp, like my last boyfriend. I opened my eyes.
“All I remember is that Mildred had a huge hunchback. Then you woke me up.” I shivered. “And I feel sweaty, too. All the way to my toes.”
Grayson’s left eyebrow ticked up. “Interesting. Let’s swab ’em.”
He pulled out something that looked like a small medicine vial, then screwed off the top. The lid had some kind of applicator thing on it, like a jar of rubber cement.
“Show me the tootsies,” he said.
I didn’t bother to put up a fight. I stuck my foot out from under the covers. “Go ahead. Knock yourself out.”
I’D JUST FINISHED DRESSING and jonesing for a crème-filled donut when Grayson returned with Earl in tow.
“Where’d you get that knot on your noggin?” Earl asked, tossing the bag of donuts to me. “Wrestlin’ with your inner demons again?”
“Or outer ones,” Grayson said. “This could be the work of Old Mildred.”
“That hunchbacked old soul sucker?” Earl asked.
Grayson stared at him for a moment, then glanced down at my feet. “Of course,” he said, shaking his head softly. “It’s been staring me in the face the whole time.”
“What has?” I asked.
“Incubus and succubus.”
“Inky and sucky who?” Earl asked.
“Incubus and succubus,” Grayson repeated. “Sex demons.”
Earl crinkled his nose. “After Bobbie? I ain’t buyin’ that.”
I closed my eyes and blew out a sigh.
“Incubus appears to sleeping women at night,” Grayson explained. “He lies on top of them, trapping them into sex.”
“But Bobbie ain’t no woman,” Earl argued.
“No, but she’s pretending—” Grayson shook his head as if to clear it. He gave me a sheepish smile. “Yes, she is. A woman, that is.”
I supposed I should’ve been grateful for the acknowledgement, but I just wasn’t feeling it. “Grayson, what’s this got to do with the men who’ve gone missing?”
“The succubus is the female version,” Grayson said. “She comes to men at night and lures them into salacious behavior. Repeated sexual activity with either kind of demon is thought to result in deterioration of the victim’s health, both mental and physical. It can even lead to death.”
Earl’s eyes grew wide. “You sayin’ Old Mildred could be one of these succubus critters?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
“But why would she suck my toes?” I asked.
Earl laughed. “’Cause, Bobbie. You ain’t got what she’s really lookin’ for.”
Gross.
“Give me your spy pen,” Grayson said. “Maybe we caught the succubus in action.”
“Okay.”
As I scrounged around in my bedclothes for the pen, someone knocked on my door.
“Come in,” I said.
Stanley side-stepped into the room. His face looked grave. “Good. You’re all here,” he said.
“The pen’s missing,” I said, glancing over at the nightstand. My gut flopped. “So are the files!”
Stanley shook his head slowly. “And so are two more resident vets.”
Chapter Forty-Two
“TWO MORE VETS DISAPPEARED?” I gasped. I grabbed a paper napkin and wiped the vanilla crème donut from my lips. “How did it happen?”
“Nobody knows,” Stanley said. “They just vanished, like the others.”
“Dang!” Earl handed Stanley the bag of donuts. “Sounds like that succubus critter sure had her a busy night last night. Donut?”
“Succubus?” Stanley asked, turning to me. His eyes widened in surprise. “How’d you get that bump on your head?”
“I hit it on the bed railing,” I blurted, before Earl could say anything.
“Actually, I think it could be the work of Old Mildred,” Grayson said, popping the rest of a powdered donut into his mouth. “The old gal may have attacked Drex in her sleep last night.”
Stanley’s eyes grew wide. “You were attacked by Old Mildred?”
I cringed. “Maybe. Things are kind of blurry. I dreamed about her, then woke up with this knot on my forehead.”
“I was afraid this would happen,” Stanley said, staring absently at the chocolate glazed donut in his hand. “I told you Old Mildred doesn’t care for other women hangin’ around.”
I wiped my hands on a napkin and reached in my purse for a Tootsie Pop to calm my nerves. “I know this sounds weird, but I think Old Mildred took my spy pen—and the files on the other missing guys you brought us last night.”
Stanley shook his head. “But why? What would an old ghost want with those things?”
“Good question,” Grayson said, pulling out the little testing vial he’d swabbed my toes with earlier. He held it up to the light. “But one thing’s for sure, Drex. You weren’t dreaming. There’s definitely saliva on your toes.”
A shiver of disgust ran down my spine. On the one hand, at least I wasn’t crazy. On the other hand, someone sucked my toes last night!
“Hmm,” Grayson said, studying the vial. “I wasn’t expecting that.”
“What?” I asked.
“According to the test results, Old Mildred is a pothead.”
“LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT,” Stanley said after I told him my recurring dream and Grayson showed him the test vial results. “Someone’s actually been sucking your toes while you’re asleep?”
“Yep. A succubus,” Earl said. “Wait a minute, y’all. Wouldn’t a succubus suck a bus?”
I winced to stop an eye roll. “Ignore him, Stanley. Those two vets who went missing last night—was Melvin one of them?”
“No.” Stanley helped me into the wheelchair. “Why? You don’t think he’s the one sucking your toes, do you?”
The thought of the pasty, Brooklyn comb-over champ gumming my big toe made me nearly dry heave. “Ugh! I hope not!”
“There’s no way to tell who the culprit is from this,” Grayson said, pocketing the test vial. “I only used a six-panel preliminary saliva test. I’ll need another sample in order to conduct a DNA match.”
I winced. “Another sample?”
“Listen, man,” Stanley said, “I get what you’re trying to do here. But I can’t be part of it.”
“Too late for that,” Grayson said. He opened the door to my room, stuck his head out, and glanced up and down the hallway. “I really need to talk to Melvin,” he said, turning back to face us. “I need to find out what he knows about the BERPS, and if he saw or heard anything last night.”
“You can’t man,” Stanley said, pushing me out into the hall. “Melvin got up early and left with some tattooed guy.”
“Don’t
touch that!” I hollered.
Stanley and Grayson’s heads swung my way. Earl jerked his hand away from my bedside as if he’d been shocked with 10,000 volts.
“Sheez,” I growled at my cousin. “Keep your mitts off the buttons!”
I returned my attention to Stanley. “Why was Melvin in such a hurry to leave this morning? Did you see what kind of vehicle the guy was driving?”
“No. But I think we should make an appearance before anyone comes looking for us, too.”
Stanley took the reins on my wheelchair ushered me into the main hall toward the breakfast room. There wasn’t another person in sight.
“Where is everybody?” Grayson asked.
“It’s Sunday morning,” Stanley said. “Around here, that means you either get in a van to go to church, or you head to the rec room there for an exercise class.”
Earl peeked into the rec room and laughed. “Anybody wanna work up a sweat to old Regis & Cathy Lee DVDs?”
“In leotards or not?” Grayson asked.
“Ugh!” I grumbled. Someone needed to take charge of this lame operation. From the looks of it, it was going to have to be me.
“Stanley, you go grab the files on the other two missing men and meet us at the RV,” I demanded. “Grayson, you take the helm on my wheelchair. And Earl? For the millionth time, stop touching that!”
Chapter Forty-Three
“WHAT’S THE PLAN, MR. G?” Earl asked as Grayson rolled me down the sidewalk in front of Banner Hill, toward the RV parked on the street.
“Nothing’s set in stone, as far as you know,” Grayson said. “But with two more vets missing this morning, we need to act fast.”
“Agreed,” I said in my best commanding tone. “We need to put our heads together on this.”
Earl picked up a fallen oak branch, stuck an end in his armpit and shot it like it was an Uzi. “You can count on me!”
My eyes had just completed their orbit in my sockets when we reached the RV. Stanley came trotting up, holding his duffle bag.
“You got the files?” I asked.
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