Murder Ghost Foul: The Complete Mystic Springs Paranormal Cozy Mystery Series

by Mona Marple

  Another reason I know all is not well.

  “What’s going on?” Patton asks, appearing at my side. I shush him and go back to spying. The man’s a total dish, but he needs to give me some space. He skulks off towards the attic, and then I feel bad, so I grab his arm and pull him back to me, a little too forcefully.

  “Is that you, Sage?” Connie calls, her tone a little jumpy.

  “The one and only.” I say, making my grand appearance in the kitchen, Patton at my heels.

  “Oh, hi Patton.” Connie says.

  “What’s going on?” I ask, glancing at the journal in her hand. She follows my gaze and drops the journal on the counter as if it’s burnt her.

  “Nothing!” She says with a laugh. “Just so tired!”

  “Cut it out.” I say with an eye roll. “What’s happened? What did Lovey say?”

  She tells us everything, and I nod at her words. Of course he’s innocent. I’ve been telling people that for ages. Of course, nobody likes to hear that, but reminding people that I’m right is one of my favourite hobbies.

  “I told you so.” I say.

  Connie takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. “I’ve had a text message, I don’t know who from. They want me to leave the journal at Emelza’s waggon.”

  “What are you going to do?” I ask. “Patton, what should she do?”

  Patton looks at me anxiously and then offers an apologetic smile. “I don’t know. I never dealt with anything like that. Sorry.”

  “Seriously?” I ask, screwing my eyes up towards him.

  He shrugs. “I’d say ring the cops but that’s not much of an option. Ignore it?”

  “That’d only bring the trouble into my home.” Connie says with a sad smile. “I’m not ignoring it, I’ve already decided that.”

  “It’s too dangerous to do anything else.” I object, although I know that I’m wasting my breath. When Connie decides to do something, there’s no changing her mind. Like when she decided to move to America and leave me behind.

  Connie looks at me and I see in her eyes the same fierce determination she had as a fourteen year old when she told our mother she was getting a part-time job, and the same look she gave her each week after then when she forced a tiny wad of paper bills into the decoy biscuit barrel (that never held biscuits) towards the housekeeping.

  “Okay.” I say. “What can we do?”

  Connie bursts into a grin. A nervous grin, I can tell, but still a grin.

  “Gather everyone you can. This needs to be a group confrontation. Meet me at the waggon.”

  Wilson takes no convincing, of course.

  I hope Patton is as persuasive as I don’t need to be.

  “Let’s go.” I say, and he holds out his hand, which I bat away. “Nice try. Come on, walk with me, just not too close.”

  The field surrounding Emelza Shabley’s waggon is deserted, the only noise the distant hum of cars on the freeway and the occasional chirrup of a bird.

  We all see her approach, teetering across the field in her heels, too darn arrogant to check whether she’s being followed.

  The group of us huddled inside the waggon do a collective intake of breath. This is the moment we have waited for, sitting far too close together, the proximity that’s fine for an intimate relationship but awkward with everyone else. I sit wedged between Patton, who keeps his hands folded on his lap, and Wilson Bruiser, who doesn’t manage to keep his own hands so still. Next to Patton sits Adele, then Connie, then Atticus, and even Finian Archbold has turned up for the fun.

  Lovey Lovegoode stands hidden at the side of the waggon’s door, perspiring through a mix of the clammy air and nerves.

  The woman’s eyes spot the journal, lying abandoned on the back of the waggon, and she breaks out into a smile, revealing a dab of red lipstick on one of her front teeth. As she reaches for it, Connie pulls the string she’s wrapped around it, tugging the journal into the waggon’s slightly ajar door.

  The woman gazes up, locks eyes with Connie and lets out a laugh.

  “Oh, how entertaining!” She calls.

  “Come in. We need to talk.” Connie says, and the woman obeys, her arms crossed over her chest. As she enters the waggon, Lovey slams the door behind her and bolts it, slipping the key into his waistcoat pocket.

  “You?” The woman asks, glaring up at him. “What is this? What’s happening?”

  “We know you killed her.” Connie says, her voice firm. “Your own relative. How could you?”

  “She was no relative of mine!” Lavinia roars, her voice ice and fire, as she sneers towards Lovey. “Are you spreading this ridiculous rumour?”

  “It’s no rumour, Lavinia. She was your blood, and you know it.” Lovey says. He pushes his glasses up his nose as he speaks.

  “You killed her over a journal that says nothing more than how infuriating your great-grandmother was.” Wilson says with a snigger. “You could have just asked me and I’d have told you.”

  “Why would she pretend it said you were Mayor?” Lavinia asks, her face ashen.

  Wilson shrugs. “Maybe just to annoy you, dear girl. I can see why she might be tempted.”

  “How dare you! Finian, have you heard this?” Lavinia exclaims, looking to her strange friend for support. Finian is, as we expected, more about a good show than any loyalty, and he purses his lips towards her in a mock pout.

  “Oh, darling, you can be frightfully annoying.” Finian admits with a shrug.

  “Are we going to be much longer?” Adele whispers. “I need to get back to the twins.”

  Connie glances at her and shakes her head. “We’re just wrapping things up. Lavinia, do you want to confess? It would make things a lot quicker.”

  “I have no idea what you mean!”

  “You demanded the journal be left here.”

  “That doesn’t make me a murderer!” Lavinia argues. “I want the journal, because it should never have gone to… to her. Sure, my message could be read as if it was from the murderer, I guess. Maybe I did want to scare you a little, Connie. But I couldn’t ever kill someone.”

  “Where were you when she was killed, then?” Connie asks. “Because you weren’t discussing fundraising with Sheriff Morton.”

  “I know I wasn’t.” Lavinia says. “I was…”

  “Well?”

  Lavinia’s cheeks flush and she glances towards Finian. “I believe I was entertaining my friend in his castle that night.”

  Finian winks across the waggon towards her.

  “Is that true?” Patton asks.

  “It is indeed.” Finian says as he consults a small paper day planner. He holds it up on the week of Emelza’s murder - on four of the days, a small L is written and enclosed with a love heart.

  “Cryptic code you’ve got there.” Patton says with a smirk.

  “I’ve nothing to hide.” Finian says. “My discretion is only to protect the lady.”

  “Hold on?” I say, completely confused. “I thought this was it, we’d cracked the case. I was sure it was you, Lavinia.”

  Lavinia scowls at me. “I don’t have to stay and put up with this. I’m a beacon of respectability in this town. How dare you all!”

  “Why is Sheriff Morton pretending he was with you that night?” I ask, remembering the writing on his calendar.

  “He isn’t.” Connie says. “He wrote it in the wrong date. You’ve seen the man’s office. He’s a good Sheriff, but he’s terribly disorganised. In fact, I checked some of the other meetings he’d put on there, and two others had been written on the wrong date, too. He was in the hospital the night Emelza was killed. Apart from a short period where he got some fresh air. He left the hospital for a while, didn’t he, Adele?”

  Adele looks up at Connie. “I -”

  “You don’t know, do you?” Connie says, her tone sharp. “Because you weren’t there.”

  “I -”

  “You told me you were asleep, but that’s a lie. You killed Emelza Shabley, didn’t you?�
�� Connie says, a glint of fight in her eyes. “Thank you for being a good sport, Lavinia. I knew it wasn’t you. You are many, many things, Lavinia, but you’re not a killer. You on the other hand, Adele. Why did you do it?”

  “I - this is crazy. I’m leaving.” She says and rises to her feet, where she takes a step forward. “Please move.”

  “No.” Lovey says. “You used my dagger. You framed me!”

  “It wasn’t like that.” Adele says.

  “What was it like, then?” Connie asks. “I thought we were friends.”

  Adele cracks a smile then, a mean smile that betrays the poison in her heart. “I’d never be friends with someone like you. Any of you!”

  “How to win friends…” Wilson mutters with a snicker.

  “Oh, shut up.” Adele spits. “You’re such a group of small-town morons. Well done! You’ve finally figured it out, hey? I can’t wait to get out of this awful place.”

  “That’s why you did it.” I say. “You did it so Taylor would agree to leave.”

  “Oh, God. You shot him so he’d really see how dangerous it is here?” Connie says with a gasp.

  Adele lets out a shrill laugh. “Oh, goodness no. I shot him because he’s a lying snake. And he hasn’t even had the decency to die.”

  A chill runs through me. “Are you seriously saying you killed Emelza because you don’t like Mystic Springs?”

  She shrugs. “It was too easy, when the stupid girl announced the journal. Everyone wanted it. I mean, can you imagine how pathetic you all sound, going mad over an old diary of a mad man?!”

  “Eh, enough of your cheek, lassie.” Wilson sings in a Scottish accent, and if I didn’t know that spirits can’t eat or drink, I’d swear he’s drunk.

  “You just made it so easy.” She says with a lazy roll of her shoulder. “I gave the whole mommy thing a try. Ugh. My life in New York would have been so different. Nannies, a PA, back to work after a fortnight. But this? It’s a neverending hell! Feeding and changing diapers and feeding again, it’s torture. Waking up - every single night? It’s not the life for me.”

  “So, why leave? Why come here?”

  “Ugh.” She says. “We had no choice. It was move here, where nobody else in the world wanted to come clearly, or no more Sheriff.”

  “What?” I ask. “Was Taylor in trouble?”

  “You could say that.” Adele says with a grimace. “Caught with his pants down one time too many.”

  “Then how could you go back? Even if you’d convinced Taylor to?”

  “I don’t need his money.” Adele says with a roll of her eyes. “But I did need him with me. I take my marriage vows seriously.”

  “Clearly.” Wilson quips.

  “You can’t take the babies away from him, can you?” Connie asks.

  Adele shakes her head. “We signed a parenting pre-nup.”

  “A what?” I ask.

  Adele glares at me and rolls her eyes, my lack of sophistication frustrating her even further. “It was meant to protect me. I knew he was playing away. I didn’t want him to leave me for a younger model and try to take the babies.”

  “What changed?” Connie asks.

  “I wasn’t going to leave without him. And then I heard about him carrying on with that trollop -”

  “Me?” Lavinia asks with a gasp.

  “Her?” Finian asks at the same time.

  “Secret meetings. Visits to the police station. You know what they say about small towns and everyone knowing each other’s business? Oh, this place is just the gift that keeps on giving!”

  “I can assure you, nothing untoward ever happened between me and the Sheriff.” Lavinia says, and she opens her purse and pulls a flyer out of it.

  MYSTIC SPRINGS HALLOWE’EN EXTRAVAGANZA!

  The flyer declares, above a picture of a haunted house.

  “We’ve been working on this.” She announces, holding the flyer up for all to see. It’s a rough drawing that a child could have created, so the crowd are somewhat underwhelmed. “Main Street’s going to be closed for a grand parade! It took some planning, I can tell you!”

  “And you’re old enough to be his mom.” Wilson sneers.

  “It hasn’t stopped him before.” Patton murmurs.

  Adele is red-faced, her eyes flitting from Wilson to Patton, before she dives across the waggon and picks up a box of matches from the side of the kitchen sink. She slides open the box and pulls out a single match, holding it at face height.

  “You let me go, now.” She commands, and I hear the lawyer in her. The way she can craft an argument. The authority in her tone. Her words are her weapon. How desperate she must have felt to choose real weapons instead. I try to imagine the closing speeches she must have given to Taylor, pleading with him to leave Mystic Springs.

  “Adele, don’t do anything silly.” I coax. “Let’s talk about this.”

  She laughs, and drags the match across the side of the box, so that a tiny flame illuminates the room.

  “Adele.” I urge.

  “Well, I’m out of here.” Wilson says with a snicker, and vanishes.

  “Just let me go.” She says, steely determination. Lovey unlocks the waggon door and the chill of the night air rushes into the tiny space.

  “We can’t do that.” Connie says.

  I move quickly, grabbing the journal and holding it in my hands, just as Adele tosses the match into the bedroom where she had killed Emelza.

  “Everyone out!” Connie screams as the room glows amber and the flames take hold.

  Lovey dashes out of the waggon, already dialling for the fire brigade. He’s followed out by Finian and Lavinia, then Connie, and then Patton and Atticus.

  I look across the waggon towards Adele, drop the journal, and glide, out of the waggon and into the field, the night silent apart from the crackles of the fire and the distant sirens approaching.

  “Adele, just get out.” Connie shouts, and I turn just in time to see Adele lurch forward, trip over the string that is wrapped around the journal, and fall flat on her front inside the waggon with a groan. She looks up as the smoke grows thick and black, and Connie moves forward, towards her.

  I grab her arm and pull her to me as she begins to sob.

  “We have to help her.” She manages, as a terrible mix of screams, smoke and the smell of death fill the air.

  20

  Connie

  They say that a best friend is like a four-leaf clover; hard to find and lucky to have. I’ve been searching for a best friend for most of my life. Back when I was the geeky teenager, already carrying an extra twenty pounds and able to name every bone in the human body, you know for sure I wasn’t being invited to gain entry to the cool club. I was as desperate for friendship as I was to ace my exams and reach adulthood, where I was told constantly by well-meaning teachers that I would find a place to fit in.

  Where I’d be able to tell people that smoking was bad for their bones, but fizzy drinks weren’t, without being called a party-pooper.

  Where I’d finally find a friendship group.

  Except I didn’t.

  I was never quite one of the group, instead always stuck out on the sidelines laughing at jokes a moment too late, playing catch up to try and work out the in-jokes. It seemed like everyone had already made their friendship groups, and I was trying to gain entry to a club that had already formed.

  I was the nice, but a little too needy, woman. The one people eyed with suspicion when I tried to woo someone into falling into platonic love with me, just a little too hard. You know what desperation smells like? A so-great-to-meet-you-let’s-do-this-again-sometime text message, responded to with silence, and followed up with an oh-so-natural how’s-Tuesday-for-you?

  Maybe that’s why I was so eager to befriend Adele; new in town, friendless, overwhelmed by life, Adele. So eager to befriend her that I ignored the sharpness of her tongue, and the fact that it was me making the effort every time.

  Something happened to me, when Sa
ge restrained me and stopped me running back into that burning waggon. It was as if, suddenly, I realised I’m okay. I’m okay as I am. I don’t have to beg anyone to be my friend.

  And I have a best friend. Her name is Sage, and she drives me insane. But I’m also well and truly in her circle. The in jokes are our in jokes, and I probably haven’t made enough effort to help other people catch up with them. She was there all along, while I was searching for someone else.

  Sure, she had to die for me to appreciate the importance of a shared history, and then it was the most amazing second chance because I had her - mainly - all to myself. Just me and however many millions of spirits for her to spend her time with, and usually, she chose me.

  But Sage is like one of those beautiful, rare birds. She’s not meant to be locked away in a cage. She’s so incredible, of course you want to clip her feathers and keep her close, but if you do, her beauty will start to fade. She’ll start pecking you when you stroke her. She’ll refuse to sing for you.

  And one day, when you least expect it, she’ll manage to escape.

  Never to return.

  The lunch is an array of colour, the table piled high with foods I’ve not bought from the supermarket in a long time. Like, years.

  Four separate salads, all featuring a base of gem lettuce, are the centrepiece, and in front of them is a long plate with a selection of meats and cheese. No bread in sight. I repeat, no bread in sight. May day, may day, this is not a drill!

  Yes, this is my home, and this is my food.

  And today is Sage’s birthday.

  I know, throwing a birthday party with food for a spirit who can’t eat might seem a little mean, but trust me, when she sees all of the guests I’ve invited, she won’t care that they’re eating and she isn’t. She’ll be far too busy being the centre of attention.

  I’ve printed every photo of the two of us I could find and created a collage on the kitchen wall, and I stand back now and admire my handiwork. It had me up at 5am. I glance at the rows of photo after photo, and it strikes me how beautiful and carefree Sage looks in them all.