Sweet Tea and Spirits

by Angie Fox

  I stood with a sigh. Maybe I was being silly. Frankie had been on his own for decades before he met me and seemed to do just fine, even if he had gotten shot in the head.

  The silence inside the house hung heavy over me.

  Now that I was alone, I slipped Julia’s payment out of my pocket, the envelope full of cash that made me nervous to simply hold.

  Frankie had been so proud of me for being paid.

  Stop it.

  He was fine. I’d find him before tonight.

  In the meantime, I’d take a lesson from his book and hide my windfall, not under the porch as I’d pretended this morning, but somewhere safe.

  I made my way to the front staircase. I supposed I could have deposited the money in the bank, seeing as I had $215.09 currently in checking and nothing in savings, but this was a small town and I wasn’t quite sure how to explain a cash deposit of several thousand dollars, without me actually holding down a job or selling anything.

  Make no mistake, this was Sugarland. If the bank teller didn’t mention it to her sister, who would mention it to her knitting group, then the person in line behind me would handle the honors.

  News of my envelope of cash would be all over town before sunset. Then I’d have to explain my sudden wealth paired with my outlandish urge to join the Sugarland Heritage Society.

  Julia would deny everything, take her money back, and I’d be out of luck.

  No, I’d stash Julia’s payment in a nice, safe place that only I knew about. Then I’d see about solving her problem.

  I padded up the staircase and made a left into the empty bedroom that had once belonged to my grandmother.

  The well-worn oak planks creaked under my sandals and I stopped for a moment to admire the white wallpaper with pale pink roses. I pictured her dresser against the wall and the old pinewood bed Grandma had inherited from her mother.

  I knew it well. This had been my bedroom after I’d inherited the house.

  Of course, I’d had to sell everything when Virginia Wydell had gone after me. She might have taken my things, but I’d kept hold of the house. Even without those family heirlooms, this was still a wonderful room filled with memories.

  I made my way to the built-in wardrobe my grandfather had made, across from the windows overlooking the backyard.

  He’d constructed a false bottom for tough times. I said a quick prayer of gratitude for his foresight and for the fact that Grandma had shown me how to use it. I gently drew open the wardrobe door and let out a small cry at what I found inside.

  “Frankie!”

  He’d mashed himself in the back right corner, behind several empty hangers and the multi-striped, hideously ugly winter coat I’d bought from the resale shop.

  “Close the door!” he ordered, eyes wide, his hands braced against the sanded wood interior.

  “I will not,” I said, pushing the hangers and the coat to the side with a metallic screech. “What are you doing in there?”

  “Hiding,” he hissed, batting me away as if I were a moth or an errant fly. “Now shoo. Go away.” He drew his hat down and tried to make himself smaller. “Go back downstairs and keep looking for me.”

  Of all the silly notions. I glanced behind me, making sure I was alone with this lunatic. “Why?”

  “So Mick ‘The Angel Maker’ doesn’t come up here and shoot me in the head,” he gritted out.

  For the love of Pete. “It’s not like you haven’t been shot in the head before.” And, oh great, his left leg was missing. “You need to stop this nonsense and save your energy for tonight.”

  “You don’t get it,” he said, breathing hard, as if he’d been running. “Mick and I had a misunderstanding. I can hear him out there…looking for me.”

  “Can’t you just disappear into the ether?” It was the in-between place where spirits could rest and relax.

  “Like he wouldn’t follow me there.”

  Goodness. Well, no ‘Angel Maker’ was allowed to wear out my mobster. That was my job. “Fine. I’ll talk to this Nick guy.”

  “Mick,” Frankie barked. “And don’t go near him. He’s insane.”

  And this wasn’t? “Mark my words, I’m going to have a talk with this bully. In the meantime, I insist you calm down and save your strength.”

  He nodded, cringing as I closed the wardrobe door.

  Of all the nonsense. Frankie needed to find new friends and something positive to occupy his time.

  Belatedly, I realized I still had the envelope of cash.

  “This will make you feel better,” I said, opening the door and pressing the small lever near the front of the wardrobe. A compartment roughly the size of a shoebox lifted from the bottom.

  I slipped the envelope inside the wood-lined box at the bottom and closed the lid on top.

  “That is nice,” Frankie said, of the cash or of the compartment, I had no idea. “Watch out for Mick. He’ll eat your liver for breakfast.”

  “Leave it to me,” I said, closing the door on him once more. I’d dealt with my fair share of bullies in life. “Besides,” I told him, “in a match between a Southern girl and the mob, you should always bet on the girl.”

  “This isn’t a joke,” he growled.

  “I realize that.” I’d be smart. Because once I had Frankie’s powers tonight, once I was on the ghostly plane, Mick ‘The Angel Maker’ could go after me as well.

  I smoothed my hair and put on my best smile as I descended the staircase. Lucy raised her head as I walked straight back out onto my porch.

  “Oh, Suds,” I called to Frankie’s right-hand man. The daisy pot near the stairs wobbled and I hoped that meant he was close. Either way, it didn’t matter. “I just remembered. Frankie said he’s gone into hiding. Can you take a message to him for me? He said he’d be at the Piggly Wiggly in Jackson City. Either there or Monkey Joe’s clear over in Nashville. If he’s not there, check the twelve blocks around the Nashville Library on Church Street…” Suds would know it was a lie, that Frankie needed his urn to travel. He was the only one who knew Frankie’s secret. “Anyhow, tell him I’m leaving tonight without him and he’d better not bother me when he gets home.”

  The wind chimes at the end of the porch tinkled.

  “Thanks, Suds,” I said, taking a seat on the white-painted swing, folding my legs under me as it swayed gently in the breeze.

  And in a few moments time, I saw a bunny rabbit hop out from my neighbor’s property to mine. Soon after, a squirrel scampered up the side of the apple tree. I smiled as the bees returned to my hydrangea bushes near the porch and birds began to chirp.

  If I knew one thing about gangster ghosts, it was that they couldn’t resist a chase. I’d gotten my house and my property back once more.

  I went upstairs and knocked twice on the wardrobe. “You can come out now. I sent Mick away.”

  “Where?” Frankie asked, poking his head through the door next to me.

  “The Piggly Wiggly. Among other places,” I assured him as he glanced around the room.

  He glided out of the wardrobe and slunk toward the back window. He stood, back to the wall, and ventured a glance outside. “They’re all gone,” he said, studying the grounds, “even the horses.”

  The tragedy. “You’re safe now,” I told him. “I gave them lots of places to look for you.”

  He nodded, not bothering to thank me. “My gang must have followed the chase. The rest of ’em probably went home. A lot of times, the old soldiers don’t like the shooting. Kind of crazy, huh?”

  “Not really.” I imagined many of them had seen enough conflict to last more than one lifetime. “What did you do to Mick anyway?”

  “Nothin’.” He notched his chin up. “He said I had no business running a track,” Frankie said, as if it were a great insult, as if I hadn’t told him the same thing. “I told him he had no business carrying such a sissy gun.”

  “He pulled his gun on you?” I gasped. I’d known that gambling operation would cause problems. />
  “He insulted me,” Frankie said, holding his hands out. “I didn’t know I was talking to Mick ‘The Angel Maker,’” he drew a hand over the back of his neck, “or I wouldn’t have pulled out my own gun, shot him in the foot, and shoved him into the pond.”

  “Maybe you should try to apologize,” I suggested.

  “What?” He tossed me a strained look. “No. Being a gangster means never having to say you’re sorry.”

  Well, it certainly couldn’t hurt.

  Perhaps after Mick dried off for a bit longer, he’d relax about his encounter with Frankie. We could hope.

  “Get some rest,” I told him. “I need you fresh for tonight.”

  “I suppose we have a deal,” he said, fading back into the wardrobe. “In the meantime, think I’ll hang out with the money.”

  “Good idea,” I said, not sure how I felt about Frankie haunting the old wardrobe.

  At least I knew where he was.

  I went downstairs and noodled with a few menu designs for Ellis’s new restaurant, then curled up for a short nap with Lucy. Before I knew it, the afternoon had faded and it was time to investigate the heritage society ghosts.

  “Pull the car out front,” Frankie said, hovering above the envelope of money. “Take it to the edge of your property and I’ll jump in.”

  I did, and true to his word, he shimmered into view on the passenger floor next to me as we drove down the lane toward the highway.

  “You can’t keep living like this,” I said. “You’ve got to talk to Mick and work it out.”

  “Never,” he vowed.

  We’d see about that. At least I had him tonight.

  We arrived at the heritage society a few minutes later. Security lights cast shadows over the crushed flower bed out front. It appeared as if Kelli’s handyman hadn’t quite gotten to fixing it yet.

  I pulled in next to a classic red Corvette convertible with whitewall tires and sixties space-age brake lights.

  “I hope that’s Julia’s.” I didn’t see any other cars in the lot save for the white van.

  Frankie hung close as I locked up the car. “You think we were tailed?”

  “Stop it. You’re fine.” Even if he took a fatal bullet wound, it would just knock him out for a few hours. You couldn’t kill a ghost. They were already dead. Although putting him out of commission would mean I was on my own.

  He gave me a doubtful look. “You don’t get it. Mick makes spirits go away. For good.”

  “I don’t believe it.” I’d seen spirits “killed” and come back. That was how it worked.

  Frankie gave me a long look. “Word on the street is that he dispatched ‘Nickles’ Scarteri. Permanently. Ain’t nobody seen him around since.”

  “Just stick close,” I told him, glancing behind us at the darkening parking lot as we made our way to the front door. “I could also use your powers right about now.”

  Frankie was gentler this time, and I paused only briefly as the prickling energy descended on me, wound its way through me, opening me up to the ghostly side in a way that surprised even me, especially when I nearly walked straight through an otherworldly half-barrel of geraniums on the porch.

  “That came up out of nowhere,” I gasped.

  “If you say so,” Frankie said, waiting for me near the door. “Keep an eye out for that cute widow,” he added, glancing up toward the second-story windows.

  “We’re here to do a job,” I reminded him, hoping he didn’t disappear on me.

  “Julia?” I called, pushing in the door. “It’s me, Verity.”

  I stepped into the foyer and gasped.

  Julia sprawled on the floor at the bottom of the main staircase, her neck twisted at an impossible angle.

  “Not again,” Frankie muttered behind me.

  “It could have been an accident,” I stammered, trying to make sense of the woman in red, her eyes wide and staring lifelessly at the ceiling.

  I should have turned away. I should have gone outside and called the police, or locked myself in my car for safety. But what I saw, or rather didn’t see, had me rooted to the spot.

  She was obviously dead. Yet when that happened, I saw soul traces. Those wispy white streaks of light around a body told me that a soul had recently passed. Whether or not that person came back was another matter, but every death I’d experienced left its mark at the scene.

  Julia lay as if she’d been placed there, with no soul traces around her.

  “She didn’t just trip and fall. She died somewhere else and was moved here,” I told Frankie. “This wasn’t an accident. “This is murder.”

  Just like the caller had warned.

  Chapter 7

  At least I had the Sugarland PD on speed dial. Susie Barnes, my sister’s friend who worked in dispatch, instructed me to turn around and walk outside, without moving anything, touching anything, or breathing on anything. To say it plain, I was a little insulted. It wasn’t like I’d interfered with a murder investigation, ever.

  Unfortunately, I’d had plenty of opportunities.

  My knees felt weak as the weight of what had just happened crashed down on me.

  I stepped out onto the front porch, not even touching the front door to close it.

  They should know by now that I wasn’t some overzealous troublemaker, some amateur sleuth who thought it was cute or funny to fumble around and complicate police matters. I never gave the police reason to doubt me or made their job harder—quite the contrary. Still, when Detective Pete Marshall arrived on the scene, he appeared less than thrilled to see me.

  He parked his police cruiser next to the red Corvette and got out of the car with more vigor than you’d expect for a sixty-something detective in a small town like Sugarland.

  “Verity Long,” he said, taking the steps two at a time, drawing out my name as if I’d been at fault every time he found me on the scene. To cut to the chase, I hadn’t. “You draw trouble like a skunk at a Sunday social.”

  He obviously hadn’t met my skunk.

  Marshall paused in front of me, his mouth stern. The jagged furrows in his weather-beaten forehead deepened. “Where is she?”

  “I found her at the bottom of the stairs,” I said. Ambulance sirens sounded in the distance. It was far too late for them to do any good. “I didn’t touch her. It’s clear her neck is broken.”

  “Stay outside,” he instructed, brushing past me and into the house.

  A young officer with a military haircut launched up the steps after Marshall. I stepped aside to give him room. “Hello, Officer Duranja.”

  “Evening,” he said, almost as an accusation, passing me with barely a glance. He was one of Lauralee’s regulars at the diner, and he’d been nice enough on the other occasions when I’d found a body.

  “Don’t look so glum,” Frankie said, hovering next to me. “You wanted to get this job done in one night and you succeeded.”

  “Hardly,” I said, stepping off the porch. I didn’t need anyone looking out the window and seeing me talking to thin air. “There’s a dead woman in the foyer.”

  “You had nothing to do with it,” he said, with a bit too much relish for my taste. “If the client is dead, that means your job is over. And you got paid in cash!”

  I stared at him. “I can’t believe you just said that.”

  He grinned. “Me neither.” He threw his arms out to the side as we headed for the shadows under a copse of trees. “Verity Long got paid in cash!” He turned a circle. “Boy, that feels good to say.” He dropped his arms. “You should try it.”

  “Franklin Rudolph Winkelmann,” I scolded under my breath.

  Frankie’s jaw dropped open. “How did you know my name?”

  “Wikipedia.” That wasn’t the point. “I made a promise to that dead woman in there. I told her I’d get to the bottom of the haunting on this property and we haven’t even begun to look into it.”

  “And now you got the fuzz in the house,” Frankie muttered.

  That
wasn’t our biggest problem. “I also owe it to Julia to learn exactly who killed her and left her body at the bottom of the stairs.”

  “Ah, no,” he said, pointing a warning finger at me, “that was never part of the gig.”

  “It is now.” If I could help bring a killer to justice, I would. “Like it or not, this power comes with responsibility.” I had no idea what was happening here, but I couldn’t ignore the fact that we had a dead woman on site the night after I’d received a call about murder. “I’m thinking that call last night was a warning.”

  “Like some ghost knew it was going to happen?” Frankie considered the question. “And then she called you?”

  Of course. “It’s not like there’s anyone else in town who sees ghosts.”

  “She could have watched a killer setting up a mark,” he said, working it out in his head, “although I don’t know why anyone would stick their nose in like that.”

  “Because there are good people in this world, and the next.” Heck, I was still holding out hope for Frankie.

  He rolled his eyes and urged me farther into the darkness under a large oak tree. “Look, hon, you ever wonder why the nice lady handed you an envelope full of C-notes?”

  “She said she had it handy because she was hiring a private detective.” It seemed all was not well in Julia’s world.

  Frankie glanced over my shoulder at the paramedics heading into the house. “People kill because they are covering something up.”

  “Oh my. I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

  “Then you’d better start,” Frankie shot back. “This stinks of dirty money. You know what happens when you mess with that?” He pointed to the bullet hole in his forehead. “Ka-bam!”

  “Aren’t you being a little dramatic?” I hoped. I crossed my arms over my chest and backed deeper into the darkness.

  Frankie’s eyes bugged out. “Take my advice,” he said, advancing on me. “Consider the job done and walk away. Give it a rest. You think I don’t take things seriously? Well here’s me being serious: you’re in over your head. You’re dealing with a killer, same as me. Let’s take the money and forget we ever heard about Julia Whatshername.”