The reptilian creature had Bertie in a headlock. The old man’s toupee was gone, a casualty of the melee.
“Dear lord, what is that?” I asked.
“An iguana,” Stanley whispered, a stunned look on his face.
I looked up at him. Stanley’s eyes grew wide. A proud grin popped onto his face. “My spirit animal. It came!”
Earl came hobbling over for a look.
“Lord-a-mercy!” he said, getting an eyeful of Bertie and the beast. “Them’s the worst dang hair plugs I ever seen!”
HAVING BESTED BERTIE, the iguana slithered off into the night. As for Bertie, after his heavyweight match with Iguanodon Jr., he was so worn out he couldn’t even sit up.
“I guess there’s no need to restrain him,” Stanley said as he untied me.
“Nope. That feller’s spent his last dime,” Earl said.
I glanced around. “Where’s Grayson?”
“So now you ask about me,” Grayson said, stepping out of the darkness. By his side was Nina, the skinny black nurse from Banner Hill.
I shot him an angry look. “Why didn’t you help us escape from Bertie?”
“That’s my fault,” Stanley said. “In order to summon my spirit animal, Nina said someone had to play the bongos.” Stanley shrugged. “I don’t know how.”
Grayson grinned and banged on the bongos strapped to his waist. “See? I told you I was multi-talented.”
I gave Grayson a begrudging smile. “Where’d you get the spirit animal idea, Stanley?”
“From Nina.” He nodded toward her. She’s not just a nurse. She’s also a voodoo priestess.”
Nina folded her hands and bowed her turbaned head. The clatter from the bone necklaces around her neck made me shiver with awe.
“Wow,” I said.
“And a powerful priestess she is,” Stanley said. “She helped me summon the great spirit of the iguana.”
“Actually, that was a zombiguana,” Grayson said.
“You put a dead iguana in a trance?” I asked Nina. “That’s amazing!”
“No,” Grayson said. “Zombiguana is the term I invented to describe iguanas trapped in a metabolic stupor.”
My nose crinkled. “What?”
“Iguanas aren’t native to Florida,” Grayson droned on, ruining the magic of the moment with his dry, boring facts. “Therefore, their bodies aren’t adapted to cold temperatures. Anything approaching the forties causes iguanas to half-freeze. With a strong enough wind, they drop from their tree perches like overripe mangos.”
“You’re making that up,” I said, shooting Stanley and Nina an apologetic smile.
Grayson shook his head. “When are you ever going to trust me, Drex? Zombiguanas are a real phenomenon. In fact, last year, the National Weather Service started issuing warnings about falling iguanas.”
Bertie let out a moan. “Need ozzie ....”
We all turned and stared at our forgotten nemesis. The poor old geezer was lying face up in the dirt, weakly waving a hand at us.
“What are we going to do about him?” Stanley asked me. “You want to press charges? He did hold you at gunpoint.”
“His mama didn’t love him, and he can’t wear a watch.” Earl said. “Ain’t that punishment enough?”
“It all depends on his involvement with the missing vets,” Grayson said. “At this point, we’ve still got no proof he’s guilty of anything but poor taste in head rugs. The only card we’ve got left is to wrangle a confession out of him.”
A sadistic grin crept slowly onto my lips. “I think I’ve got an idea on how we can do just that.”
Chapter Fifty-Four
THE DOOR TO BERTIE’S semi-trailer clicked closed behind me, trapping him inside.
The sadistic grin on my lips grew a little wider. “Give Bertie half an hour in there with Earl and that parrot, and he’ll spill the beans, guaranteed.”
AS IT TURNED OUT, BERTIE broke in under three minutes. Frantic banging from inside prompted Grayson to open the door.
“Please,” Bertie groaned. “Can’t ... can’t—”
“Fine,” Grayson said.
He walked over and knelt beside the old man. Bertie was leaning against the wall by the hyperbaric chamber, holding a pillow over his head like giant earmuffs.
“Ready to answer some questions?” Grayson asked as I walked up beside him.
Old Bertie must’ve been in bad shape. He didn’t even react to the fact that I could walk. Instead, he stared at Grayson, wide-eyed as a strangled chicken.
“Please,” Bertie panted. “Must ... chamber ....”
“Chamber?” Grayson asked. “You need a chamber pot, old man?”
I gasped. “I think he means he needs his hyperbaric chamber!”
Bertie nodded, his face turning the color of a blue Tootsie Pop. “In by nine ... or die,” he gurgled, then slumped sideways. His torso collapsed to the floor.
I glanced at my cellphone. It was 8:56.
“Hurry!” I yelled. “Stanley, you get his feet. Grayson, you get his arms. We’ve got to get him into that hyperbaric chamber!”
“Dirty Birtie,” the parrot squawked as we lifted Bertie into the chamber. Freed from its cage, Polly was promenading around like a penguin that’d barely survived Mardi Gras.
“I don’t understand,” I said to Earl. “Why didn’t Bertie just climb into the chamber himself?”
“He tried to, but Polly wouldn’t let him. She kept chasing him around, worryin’ that old feller half to death.”
“Why didn’t you help him?”
Earl balked at the idea. “I thought he’d get all rejuvenated up in there then suck my vital juices!”
I turned and stared at Bertie. Inside the chamber, he looked like a long-distance space traveler whose cryonic capsule had sprung a leak.
“Anybody know how to operate this thing?” I asked.
“I think I can figure it out.” Stanley studied the buttons for a minute. “Okay. I think I got it. Seal the lid.”
“It may be too late,” I said, and nodded at Bertie. His coloring had gone from blue-raspberry to grape.
Stanley grabbed Bertie’s wrist. “Aw, man. No pulse. He’s already gone.”
My heart pinged with sadness for Bertie. Sure, he’d been a jerk. But I knew all too well what it was like to feel like a freak.
“Let’s get him out of this thing and back to wherever he usually spends the night,” I said. “I know he wouldn’t want to be found here like this.”
“First, let’s say a prayer for his soul,” Nina said.
“Say a prayer for yourselves!” a man’s voice rang out.
We all whipped around to face the door—and found ourselves staring down the barrel of a sawed-off shotgun.
Chapter Fifty-Five
“YOU KILLED HIM!” ROCKO yelled.
He aimed his shotgun at us as we stood around the hyperbaric chamber, staring at Bertie’s blue face.
A collective gasp echoed through the semi-trailer. We all simultaneously raised our hands and took a step back from Bertie—all except Grayson, that is.
“No, Rocko. Bertie killed himself,” Grayson said, taking a step toward him.
“What?” Rocko’s angry face softened a notch. “Bertie committed Suicide?”
Grayson pursed his lips. “Well, in a way, yes.”
“I don’t believe it,” Rocko said, shaking his head.
Neither did I.
I shot Grayson a what the hell look. He opened his palms and took another step toward Rocko.
I blanched. Either Grayson was being heroic and trying to save us, or he was sealing our doom.
“Hear me out,” Grayson said. “Brother Bertie believed he would die if he didn’t get into that hyperbaric chamber by nine p.m. He didn’t make it because he didn’t make it.”
“What?”
Rocko’s face crinkled in confusion. The rest of us followed suit and stared at Grayson.
“His belief is what killed him,” Grayson said
. “Faith is a powerful, mystical thing that can’t be quantified.”
“Actually, he died at 8:59,” Nina said.
All eyes shifted to the woman dressed in African voodoo garb.
“What? I’m a nurse,” Nina said. “I noted his vitals on my watch. It’s a habit of mine.”
“Your watch could be wrong,” Grayson said.
I tugged on Grayson’s sleeve. “That’s hardly the point to be arguing right now,” I whispered, nodding toward Rocko.
The leather-clad ex-biker was standing in the doorway looking utterly shattered. He was blocking our only exit from the semi-truck trailer. He still held the shotgun, but at the moment, it hung limp in his hand, pointed at the ground.
“Lettuce pray,” Earl said, breaking the silence. “Come on over, Rocko. Let’s join hands in a circle.”
I stared at Rocko, wondering who he would shoot first. Then, just like that, I got the miracle I’d prayed for. Rocko laid the sawed-off shotgun on the floor and ambled over to us.
Stunned, I joined the circle holding hands around Bertie’s dirty body as it lay in state in his hyperbolic chamber.
We all stood as one, in silent reverence for the man who could’ve been a psychic vampire, a scam artist, a healer, or merely suffering from dementia.
I glanced around. Our group included one voodoo priestess, one dreadlocked warrior, one fake paraplegic, one tattooed biker, one fedora-topped physicist, and one bear-sized redneck. As different as we all were, we were united in one thing—paying our final respects to the hundred-year-old faith healer who, sadly, never figured out how to resurrect his own hair.
The irony that our circle looked like some kind of bizarre cult ritual wasn’t lost on me. Earl’s words only added to the surreal nature of the moment.
“Dear God, whoever and wherever you are, take our brother Bertie with you,” Earl prayed, his eyes shut tight, his face pinched with sincerity. “Ol’ Bertie tried hard to do what he thought was best. He couldn’t heal old Sally, but Grandma Selma swore he got rid of her warts. Amen.”
“Amen,” we all echoed.
“Oh, and P.S., God?” Earl said, squeezing his eyes shut once more. “Is it all right with you if I keep Polly?”
Chapter Fifty-Six
BERTIE LOOKED AT PEACE tucked into his bed inside his cozy travel caravan. The guys had washed and dressed him in a fresh, white suit. Nina and I’d done our best to resurrect his mangled toupee.
I made the final adjustments, tugging the fake, silver-white cap of hair over the doll-like row of hair plugs dotting his pale forehead.
“There,” I said. “He’s ready.”
Rocko came over and gazed sadly at Bertie. “I mean, the guy could be a tool sometimes. But why did he have to die?”
“Some things just are beyond our understanding,” Grayson said.
“Like two-headed turtles?” Earl asked.
“Yes.” I slipped an arm around my cousin’s waist. “Like two-headed turtles.”
“I guess we’ll never know what happened to those missing vets now,” Earl said.
I turned to Rocko. “Do you think Bertie could’ve been involved? Could he have used his semi-trailer to haul them away?”
“If he did, I never saw anything,” Rocko said.
“I hear you,” Stanley said, nodding his head. “Pleading the Schultz.”
“No.” Rocko let out a sigh. “The old guy had his secrets, but I really don’t think he was a murderer.”
“Dirty Bertie!” Polly screeched as Earl brought her in to pay her last respects.
“His untimely death was certainly inconvenient,” Grayson said. “We may never know now if Bertie was a psychic vampire or not. However, we may still be able to clear his name about the missing veterans.”
“How?” Rocko asked.
“By proving you did it,” Grayson said. He reached for his Glock, but didn’t pull it out.
“Me?” Rocko said.
“You had ample opportunity when you picked up the men in Bertie’s van. Maybe you transported them to the revival, or maybe you took them for your own ulterior motives.”
“Like what?” I asked.
Grayson studied Rocko’s face. “Selling their body parts. Exacting revenge for their ex-wives over unpaid alimony. I can think of a dozen viable money-making reasons.”
Rocko rolled his eyes. “If I had any money, you think I’d be living in the back of a van with Bertie’s face on it?”
Grayson’s brow furrowed. “Good point.” He turned to Stanley. “There’s still the possibility Old Mildred’s ghost got the men. If she’s responsible, Bertie would be innocent of any wrongdoing.”
“Bertie!” Polly screeched. “Dirty Bertie!”
Rocko winced and twisted an index finger in his ear. He shot a sour face at Earl. “You sure you want that bird?”
“Me and Polly are friends now,” Earl said. “We understand each other, don’t we girl?”
Polly sidled up to Earl’s leg and squawked, “Two-headed turtle.”
Earl beamed like a proud papa. “Yep. I’m sure.”
“Then she’s yours.” Rocko clapped a hand on Grayson’s shoulder and nodded toward the caravan door. “Brother, I want you to go clear Bertie’s name, if you can.”
I glanced over at Bertie’s corpse. “What about—”
“I’ll notify Bertie’s family,” Rocko said. “You guys take off. If you hang around, it’ll just stir up questions about vampires and stuff we don’t need to get stuck having to answer.”
Grayson nodded and shook Rocko’s hand. “Thanks, brother. You can count on us. If Bertie’s innocent, we’ll prove it.”
Rocko knelt beside Bertie. A tear slid down his cheek. “To think, he was so close to turning a hundred.”
“He made it,” Grayson said.
Bertie looked up at Grayson. “What do you mean?”
“Some Asian cultures mark the start of someone’s life as the date of conception, not birth. In those terms, Bertie lived well past the century mark.”
Rocko nodded and wiped his eyes. “Thanks for the reminder, brother.”
Grayson smiled. “That life isn’t the number of years you live, but the life you put into those years?”
“Well, sure,” Rocko said. “That, and that Asian chicks are hot. After all this blows over, I’m moving to Thailand.”
BESSIE’S ENGINE ROARED and the revival tent faded into the darkness. Relief washed over me.
It was extremely short-lived.
“We need to talk about our stakeout plan for Banner Hill tonight,” Grayson said.
My gut flopped for the fourteenth time that day. “What?”
Wedged between Grayson and Earl in the front seat of his monster truck, there was no physical escape from the madness. I was going to have to talk my way out of it.
“It’s too late,” I argued, scrambling for excuses. “It’s already past nine-thirty. That’s midnight at Banner Hill. The doors are already locked!”
“I can get us in,” Stanley said. He’d called shotgun and had a window seat to our human sardine act.
“Won’t they suspect something?” I asked hopefully.
Stanley shook his head. “No. I told the other guys working tonight that I was taking you to see your brother. Said we might be back late tonight. They’re expecting us.”
“Well done,” Grayson said.
“No way am I going back there tonight,” I said, digging in my heels. “Haven’t we had enough crazy for one night?”
Grayson took my hand, put his lips to my ear, and whispered the magical words I’d been longing to hear. “If we solve this case tonight, you don’t have to spend another night in Banner Hill.”
I blew out a sigh. “Fine. I’m in. What’s the plan?”
Chapter Fifty-Seven
“WHERE YOU GUYS BEEN all evenin’?” Melvin asked after poking his head out of his room across the hall from mine.
“Sorry if we disturbed you,” Stanley whispered, pausing my wh
eelchair in the hallway in front of my room. He leaned over and patted me on the shoulder. “I really need to grease the wheel on your chair, Georgie.”
Stanley straightened his back and wagged a finger at Melvin. “And you, young man. You should be in bed. It’s after ten o’clock.”
“I was worried,” Melvin said, giving his rumpled comb-over a swipe with his gnarled hand. “I thought maybe they’d come and got Georgie, too.”
“Who?” Stanley asked.
Melvin glanced both ways down the hall. “The vampires,” he whispered. “I heard y’all talking about ’em this morning. You want a clove?” He held up a head of garlic.
“There’s no such thing as vampires,” Stanley said. “Now get back in bed.”
Melvin scowled. “Have it your way. But I ain’t taking no chances.” He popped a garlic clove in his mouth, then disappeared behind his door.
Stanley rolled me into my room. “See? I told you that old coot was crazy. Get ready for bed. I’ll be back in a few minutes to set things up.”
I WAS IN BED IN MY hospital gown, dunking my vampire teeth into the glass of blue water beside my bed, when I heard a light tap at my door. The door squeaked open. Stanley entered, pushing a laundry cart.
Operation “Get Old Mildred” was about to begin.
Stanley closed the door behind him, then laid his hands on a bag stuffed with dirty laundry. It began to squirm like an oversized larva. Stanley untied the drawstring. Grayson’s head popped out like some tragic, not-meant-to-be-funny scene in a low-budget horror movie.
“Seen any toe-sucking parasites?” Grayson asked, inching the laundry bag down to his waist. He reached into it and pulled out his black fedora. He popped it atop his shaved head.
“No,” I managed, stifling a laugh. “But Melvin across the hall asked about vampires again.” I shook my head. “I just don’t get it. What’s up with everybody’s infatuation with vampires?”
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