Who Killed the Ghost in the Library: A Ghost writer Mystery

by Teresa Watson

  Before he could take a good look at what I handed him, I heard something shatter and a zipping sound fly over my head. Mike shoved me to the floor, sending the papers flying. “Stay down!” he said, grabbing his Colt and crawling toward the window.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Someone’s shooting at us!”

  Chapter 32

  “What is going on around here?” I said. “Is this ‘all the nutcases in town gang up on Cam’ day? I’ve got enough bumps, bruises and cuts already, people!”

  “What did you expect him to do, Cam? Did you think he was going to call first and say ‘Excuse me, I’m planning on shooting up your house tonight. Do you feel alright?’ It doesn’t work that way.”

  Another shot hit a piece of plywood on one of the broken windows. “Do you have a gun?”

  “In my bedroom in the safe.” My father would kill me if he knew that.

  “Do you know how to use it?”

  I nodded. “An ex-boyfriend taught me how to shoot. He stopped giving me lessons when I started outshooting him.”

  “Go get it; I may need it,” he said as another shot came through one of the windows. I heard it hit something in the living room. “Stay low to the ground.”

  I nodded, and crawled to the bedroom. Dragging the safe out of the closet, I unlocked it, took the gun and the extra ammunition out. I crawled back to the living room and handed it to him. “A Sig Sauer, I’m impressed,” he said.

  “Can you tell where the shots are coming from?”

  He shook his head. “Where’s your cell phone?”

  “My bag.”

  Taking his phone out of his pocket, he handed it to me. “Call 911. Tell them officer needs assistance, that someone is shooting at us. Unknown number of suspects. Tell them I’m in plainclothes, and tell them not to shoot me.”

  I did as he instructed. A fourth shot came through a side window and took out my brand new flat screen. “Damn it!” I said.

  “TVs can be replaced, you can’t.”

  The shooting seemed to stop as suddenly as it started. “How the heck is he able to shoot at us from outside?”

  “Night vision rifle scope,” Mike said, “or thermal night vision.” He crawled to one side of the window and stood up. Glancing out the window, he looked around. “I don’t see anything.” I heard a noise coming from the back door. “Stay there.” He moved slowly toward the kitchen. The shot came through the kitchen window and hit him in the right arm.

  “Mike!” I said as he hid behind the wall.

  “I’m fine, stay there! Don’t go anywhere near the kitchen doorway.”

  I heard sirens coming up the street. I took a chance and peeked out the window as three patrol cars screeched to a halt in front of my house. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Open the window a little and tell them to check out back,” he said, sliding down into a sitting position.

  I did what he told me to. One of the officers stayed in the front yard, holding a shotgun. The other two officers split up: one went left, one went right. I duck waddled down to the hallway bathroom. “What are you doing?”

  Grabbing a couple of light blue towels and the first aid kit, I waddled down the hall and over to him. “What does it look like I’m doing?”

  “It looks like you’re trying to get shot.”

  “I’ll pass, thank you very much. I’ve had enough excitement for one week,” I replied, opening the first aid kit. It was one that I had put together myself, and I silently gave thanks that I had the foresight to put in a small pair of scissors. Putting on a pair of latex gloves, I took the scissors out and cut the sleeve of his shirt. I winced as I got a look at the wound. Taking out some antibiotic wipes, I gently cleaned around the area. It didn’t do much good because it was bleeding too much. I folded one of the towels in half, and pressed it against his arm. Mike winced. “Sorry. Here, hold this. Is the safety on?”

  “No, can you do it?”

  I took the gun out of his hand and slid the safety on. Someone knocked on the front door. “Ma’am? It’s okay; you can open the door. It’s all clear out here.”

  Standing up, I walked over, unlocked and opened the door. The officer with the shotgun came inside. “Chief, you alright?”

  “I’m fine. Did you find anyone?”

  The officer shook his head. “One of the guys said they heard a car peeling out in the alley, but by the time they got over there, they didn’t find anything. Danny checked the ground near the back door and found a shell casing. Maybe we can get a print from it.”

  I noticed my light blue towel was turning very red. I knelt down next to him, folded the other towel and switched it with the first one. “You better call an ambulance. This won’t stop bleeding,” I told the officer. “And here, take Mike’s gun.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He pulled out his radio, requested an ambulance, and took the Colt from me, double checking to make sure the safety was on. “You missed the other two safeties, ma’am,” he said as he secured the gun.

  “Sorry,” I said, “I didn’t know.” I picked up the Sig Sauer and the extra ammunition, and locked it back in the bedroom safe. Returning to the living room, I used Mike’s phone to call Randy. “I need you to get over here. Someone took some shots at us, and Mike’s been hit. I’m going to go with him to the hospital when the ambulance gets here.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Just stay here while the police do whatever it is they’re going to do. I’ve got more busted windows and a blown out TV.”

  “He shot the TV?!”

  “Not Mike, whoever was shooting at us.”

  “Gotcha. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

  The ambulance finally showed up, and Kim Thurston and her partner walked through the front door. “You two again?” she said, kneeling next to Mike.

  “Don’t blame me,” I told her. “Things like this didn’t happen to me until I started hanging around with him.”

  “Excuse me?” Mike said. “Everything that’s happened has been your fault. Sticking your nose into my investigation.”

  “You injured my arm!”

  “When I shoved you to the ground to save your life!”

  “Well, if I hadn’t been there, you would have blown up in the house, remember? So I saved your life, too! And it wasn’t my car someone blew up in front of my house, it was yours!”

  “And they’re taking potshots at your house, not mine,” he replied.

  “Hey, hey!” Kim said, interrupting us. “You two are bickering like an old married couple. Put a ring on it, make it official. Then you can kiss and make up.”

  “Very funny,” we both said.

  She moved the towel and looked at the wound. She checked the back of his arm. “Looks like the bullet just grazed you. Not a big deal, but they do bleed a lot. We’ll take you to the hospital and let the doctors look at it.” She turned to me. “You did a good job here, getting it cleaned up and putting pressure on it.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Come on, we’ll give you a ride to the hospital.”

  “Thanks,” Mike said.

  Kim wrapped some thick gauze around his arm and taped it. We helped him up. “I’m going to grab my bag,” I told her. “I’ll be right there.”

  “You don’t have to go with me,” he said. “You should really stay here.”

  “This isn’t open for debate,” I told him. Going over to the coffee table, I straightened up the papers as best I could, shoved them into my messenger bag, picked up Mike’s black bag, and followed them out the door.

  Randy pulled up as Mike was getting into the ambulance. “How’s he doing?” he asked, giving me a hug.

  “He’ll be alright. Kim said he needs to get checked out at the hospital. I’m going to follow them in my car.”

  He looked at my car, which was blocked by a patrol car. “Here, take my car. If I need to leave, I know where your spare keys are.”

  “It’s kind of a mess in there.”


  “I’ll take care of it, don’t worry.”

  “Thanks,” I said, giving him a hug. “I’ll call you later.”

  I followed the ambulance to the hospital, and parked as close to the emergency room door as I could. They were taking Mike out on the stretcher, and I walked in with him. The doctor on duty was the same one who had been on call when I had been there. “I thought I told you to go home and get some rest.”

  “I was trying to.”

  “And you shot him because he wouldn’t let you?”

  “No, someone else shot him. I’m innocent.”

  “Uh huh,” the doctor said as he cut away the gauze on Mike’s arm. “Does this hurt?”

  Mike winced. “Not much.”

  “It doesn’t feel like anything is broken. It looks like it’s just a flesh wound. You’ll probably need some stitches. We’ll take some X-rays, just to be sure.” He turned to me. “As for you, I want you to sit down and do nothing. You look a bit too pale for my liking. I know that chair isn’t very comfortable, but I want you to sit down and get some rest while we take care of your boyfriend.”

  “He’s not my boy…” I started to say, but the doctor was out the door before I could finish. “I’ve been here so much this week, I feel they should just reserve a room for me on a permanent basis.” Mike opened his mouth to say something, but I held up my hand to stop him. “Let it go.”

  “You do look tired.”

  “So do you. Does it hurt much?”

  “Not really. I’ve had worse injuries than this before.”

  “Sorry about that.”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “Maybe not, but you’re right. It was my house they were shooting at, so they were obviously trying to shoot me, not you.”

  Mike looked at my splint. “You’ve got some blood on that.”

  I looked down. “No big deal.”

  “If your mother sees that, she is going to freak out.”

  “She’ll get over it.”

  An orderly came to take Mike to X-ray. While they were gone, I pulled out the papers I had stuffed into my bag. Sitting in the very uncomfortable chair, I put the papers on my lap and started thumbing through them. Stanley III’s will was the first thing I found, and I pulled it out. Amelia was named as the executor of his estate, and she inherited the bulk of it, with a few provisions, namely the trust funds for his son and daughter. The figure I had estimated for the trust funds was way off: he had put twenty million in each account, to be administered by Amelia until they reached the age of twenty-five, at which time, they were to be given full access to the funds. However, if their mother felt they weren’t ready to be given total control of the money, then she had the right to continue to administer the accounts until they reached the age of thirty. Should one of them die, then the money would be divided equally between the surviving sibling and their mother, if she didn’t predecease them.

  I set the will aside, and continued going through the papers. I pulled out financial statements for Amelia, Cecilia and Stanley IV. My eyes bugged out at all the enormous numbers in their accounts. Wait a minute, if Cecilia’s trust fund had twenty million in the account, and if Amelia had put the money into a savings account, then there was seventeen million dollars missing. Could she have used it to hire someone to kill Cliff and Aggie?

  Laying my head on the edge of the bed, I closed my eyes and fell asleep. I had a wild dream about running around the Ashton estate while some faceless person chased me in a pick-up truck. The driver drove me toward a corner of the estate, where I tripped and fell down a deep, dark well. I was clawing at the walls, trying to climb my way out, when a skeletal arm reached out and pulled me deeper into the well. I screamed as the darkness swallowed me whole.

  “Hey Cam, wake up,” someone said, shaking my arm. “Come on, wake up.”

  I woke up, blinking in the bright light. Squinting, I noticed Mike looking at me. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to go to sleep.”

  “You were screaming,” he said. “Bad dream?”

  I rubbed my eyes and put my glasses on. “Yeah. I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up. What time is it?”

  He looked at the clock on the wall. “Almost eleven.”

  “Has the doctor been back in yet?”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t notice,” he chuckled. “He came in about an hour ago. You were out of it. Nothing’s broken. They’ve patched me up, and told me I could go home when you were ready.”

  “You should have told me,” I said, standing up. The papers fell out of my lap and onto the floor. Bending down, I gathered them up and put them in my messenger bag. “I brought your black bag with me. It’s in Randy’s car. Do you want me to go get it?”

  Mike shook his head. “Nah, I can change shirts when we get back to your house.”

  “Did they give you something for the pain?”

  He held up a tiny envelope. “Two pain pills for tonight, and a prescription that I can fill tomorrow.”

  “Do you want to check on your grandfather before we go?”

  “He’s probably asleep.”

  “I thought I would come out and see him tomorrow,” I said, slinging my bag strap over my head. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

  “Those X-ray technicians are masochists,” he groused. “They kept twisting my arm in different positions. Who do they think I am, Gumby?”

  “No, you’re Pokey.”

  “I see you went through some of those papers. I thought the doctor told you to rest.”

  “I like to read when I rest.”

  Mike shook his head. “And I can tell by the look on your face, you’ve found something.”

  “Maybe.” I told him about Stanley III’s will. “Do you think Amelia used some of Cecilia’s trust fund money to hire Jake?”

  “She’s my best suspect right now.”

  I had my doubts. I just couldn’t see her doing something like that. I pulled out the statement for Stanley IV’s trust fund. “This is what I wanted you to see before all the shooting happened,” I said, handing him the bank statement. “Over the last forty years, money has been withdrawn and deposited into the account, like someone was investing in the stock market or something. And look here: a month ago, five hundred thousand dollars was withdrawn, but nothing has been put back in to replace it.”

  “Maybe I’m a little slow here, but I’m not following you.”

  “Amelia told me that she hadn’t seen her son since at least 1969, 1970 at the latest. She said she had no idea where he was at or if he was still alive. If he was dead, the money in his trust fund would have reverted to her. The account has been active all these years.”

  “Which means Stanley IV is alive and kicking.”

  Chapter 33

  I drove us back to my house. New plywood covered the windows that had been shot out, and all the police cars were gone. I parked Randy’s car in front of the house near the scorch marks. Randy opened the door as we came up the sidewalk. “What’s the word? Are you going to live?”

  “Hate to disappoint you, Cross, but yeah, I’ll live to argue with you another day.”

  Randy had been busy while we were gone. Besides putting the plywood up, he had cleaned up all the broken glass, removed the shot up TV, and moved the TV from my bedroom into the living room. “Sorry about the new TV,” I told him.

  “No big deal. I’ll take care of it tomorrow. I noticed you took some of the files with you. Did you find anything interesting?”

  Mike and I sat on the couch, while Randy sat down in the recliner. I told him about the will and the bank accounts. “There’s one thing that bothers me,” I said, “something that dawned on me on the way home.”

  “What’s that?” Mike said.

  “All of the accounts were set up at the Ashton bank here in town. We know Amelia’s on the board of trustees, so she would have been able to monitor the accounts, right?”

  “More than likely, or she could have someone do it for her,”
Mike replied. “So?”

  “I think she was lying when she said she didn’t know if her son was alive or not. She would have seen the same thing on the bank statements that we did.”

  “And she would have realized he was still alive,” Mike said.

  “Exactly.”

  “Then why did she lie about it?” Randy asked.

  “Maybe she thinks he’s the one who hired Jake Yarborough,” I replied. “And I’ll bet money once that board meeting is over, she’ll be on the first plane out of here.”

  “Not if I have something to say about it,” Mike said. “Hand me my phone.” I dug it out of my bag and gave it to him. He dialed a number and waited. “Danny, it’s Mike. Yeah, I’m fine. Listen, I want you to drive over to the Marriott near the airport at 7 a.m. Tell the hotel concierge that you need to see Mrs. Amelia Ashton on official police business. If she wants specifics, tell her it’s about her son. When she comes down, escort her to our police station. Let her call her lawyer if she wants to. I’ll be in by 9 a.m. at the latest.”

  “She’s going to be seriously upset with you when you get there,” I warned him as he hung up.

  “I really don’t care,” he said. “She’s impeding my investigation.”

  “This still doesn’t answer the question we started out with in the first place,” Randy pointed out. “Who killed Stanley III?”

  I dug a notepad out of my bag, made a few notes, tore the page off and handed it to Randy. “Could you get this to Jo?”

  He read it over, his eyes getting bigger the more he read. “Are you serious?” I nodded. He shook his head and whistled. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” he said as he stood up.

  “So do I.”

  “What is she doing?” Mike said. He looked at me. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing, I’m just sitting here,” I replied, giving him my best ‘I’m totally innocent’ look.

  Mike tried to snatch the paper from Randy, but he stepped back and put it in his pocket. “Well, you two kids have fun. I’ll let you know when I get some answers, Cam. Good night.”