by Kathi Daley
Hezekiah was already an old man when I was a child. A crazy old man, I’d like to add. Although he’d seemed to have adequate financial resources, he’d chosen to live as a recluse who rarely, if ever, left his creepy old house. When I was seven, one of my classmates told me that in his youth, Hezekiah had murdered and then dismembered over a hundred people. It was rumored he’d buried the body parts under the floorboards in the basement and then settled into a life of seclusion to maintain the spell he’d used to trap the souls of his victims in limbo for all time. Of course, I didn’t necessarily believe the story to be true, but, like I said, the house had seen more than its share of death. Hezekiah died when I was nine, and for years after that, no one dared enter the creepy place, though as time went by the rumors ceased, and vagrants began to use the building to ward off cold winter nights. The legend of Hezekiah Henderson and the haunted basement faded.
Then, seventeen years ago, a bunch of counselors from a nearby summer camp decided to have a party in the old house. Before the night was over, four counselors were dead. Which brings us to five years ago, when I found Coach Griswold’s body in the basement. That murder had had a very human explanation, but that didn’t stop a ghost hunter from coming to town four years ago to research paranormal activity in the house. He seemed to be on to some sort of a revelation until his body was found at the bottom of the stairs a few days later.
When I returned to my car my best little pal and constant sidekick, Charlie, was waiting impatiently with the very pregnant cocker spaniel I’d rescued from the house. “I’m sorry it took so long.” I grabbed a towel from the back seat and dried my face and hair. “I knew you’d be worried, but having you both wait in the car seemed the best course of action.” I looked at the spaniel. “So, what are we going to do with you?” The dog cowered on the back seat, which I guess I understood. The poor thing had probably been dognapped, then tied up in the basement of Henderson House for who knew how long. “I guess I’ll take you home until we can find your humans. It looks like those pups could come at any time, and it will be much more comforting to be around people than to be locked up in a pen at the Zoo.”
Fortunately, the Zimmerman clan was between fosters. In addition to Charlie, we had two full-time dogs and three full-time cats. More often than not, we also had a dog, a cat, or both, we were fostering. Currently, however, the spare room was free of any temporary furry guests. I called the house and spoke to Alex, the fourteen-year-old girl who lived with Zak and me. I told her what had happened and that I was on my way, and she agreed to start dinner. Scooter, the fourteen-year-old boy who lived with us too, had soccer practice after school, which had been moved to the gymnasium due to the rain. That was where Zak would be picking him up. I was fairly certain both would be home shortly. I’d left my almost-ten-month-old daughter with my best friend, Ellie Denton, so I’d need to stop at the boathouse where she lived with her husband Levi and toddler Eli, before heading home for the evening.
Charlie settled in the front seat and the mama spaniel curled up with the blanket I’d found in my trunk in the back, and I started the car and drove slowly down the rutted dirt road. The pouring rain had created large puddles that I navigated carefully so as not to jostle my pregnant passenger any more than I had to. While the rain was still coming down, it seemed the thunder and lightning had moved on, at least for now. The sky was still heavy with dark clouds, so I had no doubt another round of thunderstorms could be in our future.
The rain had caused minor flooding in low-lying areas, so I took it slow once I reached pavement as well. I turned on the radio to the easy listening station in an effort to provide a distraction from my thoughts, and to introduce a calming element to the overall atmosphere of the vehicle. I felt tense, and if I was tense, Charlie would be too, and the poor mama spaniel looked scared to death.
A few minutes later, I glanced in the rearview mirror to the seat behind me. It appeared the spaniel had gone to sleep. I didn’t blame her a bit. The whole ordeal must have been very trying for a mama so far along in her pregnancy. I’d need to put Catherine in the back seat once I picked her up, so I decided to run by the house, drop off the dogs with Alex, then head over to the boathouse to pick up my baby.
******
“You found another body in Henderson House?” Ellie asked after I’d greeted Catherine, who was sitting on the floor playing with Eli. Or at least playing near him. It didn’t seem as if she necessarily cared whether he joined in or not. “Doesn’t that make three bodies you’ve found in that house?”
“I didn’t technically find the parapsychologist who died four years ago, so in terms of bodies I’ve found in the house, this only makes two. This is the third murder that’s taken place in that house in the past five years, however.”
“Someone should just tear that place down. The number of people who have died in that house over the years is ridiculous. I’m not one to be superstitious, but I’d almost be willing to bet the place is cursed. Do you know who this victim is?”
I shook my head, raising my lips on one side in a sort of half grin. “I didn’t recognize him, but I can tell you that the killer was a vampire.”
Ellie lifted both brows. “A vampire?”
“The guy had these two little holes in his neck that looked exactly like a vampire bite.”
“You know vampires aren’t real.”
I lifted one shoulder, enjoying the look of disbelief on Ellie’s face. “Maybe.”
She began to catch onto my game and rolled her eyes. “Why would someone make a murder look like a vampire attack? It feels weird and intentional.”
“It was weird and intentional.” I went on to explain my theory that the killer had specifically intended for me to be the one who found the body. I shared my thoughts about the dog being tied up in the basement and the call to the Zoo when I would be the only one there.
“So you think you were lured there?” Ellie gasped. “That terrifies me.”
I bit my lower lip, a more serious mood overtaking me. “Yeah. The fact that the scene seemed to have been set for my benefit is bothering me as well.”
“You don’t think it was Claudia…?” Ellie asked.
Claudia Lotherman was a woman I suppose could be classified as my archnemesis. Not only had she tried to kill me twice in the last several years but she’d kidnapped Zak the previous spring and made me pass a bunch of tests to get him back. The last I heard, she was still in the wind and no one knew exactly where she’d holed up, but I had a hard time believing she’d come back to Ashton Falls when so many people were looking for her. Still, she had concocted an elaborate scheme when she kidnapped Zak.
“I suppose it’s possible Claudia is behind this,” I agreed. “The vampire thing seems like something she’d do, and she’s a master of disguise, so she might be able to slip into town unnoticed. But it seems like a huge risk for her to come back here so soon after her last visit, so I’m thinking it isn’t her, even if she is a total loon. So, maybe. I’ll mention it to Salinger when he calls later and see what he thinks.”
“If the person who killed that man and left him for you to find wasn’t Claudia, then who?” Ellie asked. “With everything you’ve told me it really does sound like you’re being targeted. Someone really seems to want to mess with you. We know Claudia will go to great lengths just to yank your chain, but other than her, I can’t think of a single person who would go to so much trouble. I mean really, a vampire? Who would do such a thing?”
I wished I knew. The idea that someone had set up the murder for my benefit bothered me quite a lot. I had to wonder if the body I’d found in the basement was the beginning and the end to whatever was going to happen, or if there were other people at risk of being killed just so someone could get at me. I’d been struggling with that idea ever since I’d found the body, that perhaps I was the reason a man had died on this blustery day in late October. I just couldn’t figure out how anyone could possibly know the details of that first death all th
ose years ago.
“Do you need me to watch Catherine tomorrow?” Ellie asked when I didn’t speak for a couple of minutes.
“No,” I answered, pulling myself out of my thoughts and into the present. “I plan to be home. Do you want to come over? We can work on a menu for the Halloween Spooktacular. I’d like to do theme foods, the way we have in the past, and of course we’ll need chicken wings for Levi. But I thought we could add some new things as well. Maybe we can throw in a few more desserts. I bought a Halloween recipe book when I went to the market last week. I bet we can find some ideas in it that haven’t occurred to us before.”
“I’d love to come by your place for a visit, and I do want to go over the menu, but I have a doctor’s appointment in the morning, so it’ll have to be in the afternoon.”
“Is everything okay?” I asked. Ellie was pregnant with child number two.
“Everything is perfect, although I’m a little nervous. Tomorrow is the day I finally find out the sex of the baby.”
I smiled. “That’s great. I’ve been dying to know. I don’t know why you waited so long to have the ultrasound.”
Ellie let out a breath. “I guess I was scared, so I procrastinated.”
I narrowed my gaze. “Scared? Why? Because you’re hoping for a girl and will be disappointed if it’s a boy, or do you want another boy and will be let down if it’s a girl?”
“Exactly.”
“To which one?” I asked.
“Both.”
Chapter 2
Later that evening, I sat at the dinner table with Zak, Zak’s honorary grandmother, Nona, Alex, Scooter, and, of course, baby Catherine. The pregnant mama dog had taken to Alex, who I knew was an excellent foster mother, so we set her up in her room. Charlie was lounging nearby with the other Zimmerman canines, Bella and Digger, while the family cats were all curled up on the sofa in the living room.
“I think I’ve figured out what I want to dress up as for the Halloween dance Zimmerman Academy is having on Saturday,” Alex said.
“Oh, and what’s that?” I asked.
“Marie Curie. Diego is going to go as Pierre Curie. We thought it would be fun to do a couple’s costume, and we wanted to do someone from history. We’re going to wear lab coats, and I’m going to wear my hair up the way she has it in a lot of photos. We figured we’d wear name badges because the costumes won’t be totally obvious, the way a ghost or witch costume would be.”
I glanced at Zak, waiting for him to blow a gasket, but instead he just smiled and said he couldn’t wait to see how the outfits came out. Okay, this was good. I guess that meant he was getting used to Alex and Diego as a couple. He hadn’t been thrilled at first, but personally, I really liked Diego, and if Alex was going to date, I wanted her to date a responsible and caring person like him. Besides, he’d helped me save Zak’s life when Claudia had kidnapped him, so as far as I was concerned, he’d passed any sort of concerned-mama test I could throw at him.
“I’m going to be a ninja,” Scooter said after a beat.
“Weren’t you a ninja last year?” I asked as I forked up a piece of potato.
“No. Last year I was a samurai. It’s totally different.”
I wasn’t an expert, but they seemed pretty much the same to me. Still, if Scooter wanted to be a ninja for Halloween that was fine, as long as he was happy with his choice. I knew he would be attending his first boy/girl dance at the public school he attended and I wanted him to have a wonderful time despite the fact that he planned to attend with his best friend Tucker instead of taking a date.
“What’s Catherine going to be?” Scooter asked.
“I’m not sure yet,” I answered. “I guess I should head into town and choose something before everything is picked over. Did you ask Tucker about the Halloween party here at the house?”
“He’s coming,” Scooter said.
“Diego too,” Alex seconded.
When I first began having my now-famous Halloween parties they were strictly an adult affair, but now that most of our friends had children, we’d changed things up a bit to make it a family event. My parents planned to attend with my four-year-old sister Harper, Jeremy was bringing his three daughters, and Levi and Ellie would be bringing Eli. My mom’s friend Ava said she’d stop by with her two children, so I imagined we’d have eleven or twelve kids ten and under, in addition to the ten or twelve teens I knew were planning to show. Of course, I’d also invited everyone from my senior book group, so the over-sixty crowd would be represented as well.
“Are you planning to dress up?” I asked Nona.
“I thought I’d come as a biker chick. I can’t ride my bike much, but I still have the jacket, leather pants, and boots. I’m not sure yet what I’m going to do about a date. I’ll let you know if I decide to bring someone.”
Before her brain tumor and surgery, Nona had ridden a pink Harley, but since recovering, she seemed to have tamed the wild woman she had once been. In her place was a very nice and mostly responsible grandmotherly type. I missed Nona the hell-raiser, who seemed to have lived without filters of any kind, but I knew the life she lived now was not only better for her health but a lot more compatible with living in a family unit. Still, I wondered if crazy Nona would suddenly appear again one day.
I turned and looked at Zak. “I noticed you finished decorating the entry. The garland on the staircase looks really nice. Are we done with the interior of the house?”
“Almost,” Zak, who tended to go just a bit crazy with the decorations every holiday season, answered. “I want to do a display in the entry, and I’m still thinking of adding something to the garden window in the kitchen. I do, however, plan to commit most of my time and effort to finishing the outside decorations. I’m behind this year.”
“When are you going to put up Mr. and Mrs. Frankenstein?” Scooter asked Zak. “They’re my favorites.”
“I guess I can do them tomorrow. You don’t have soccer and I don’t have any meetings or anything after school. Do you want to help?”
Scooter grinned and nodded. “Maybe we should add a baby Frankenstein this year because we have baby Catherine.”
“And two teenage Frankensteins, because you have us,” Alex added.
“If I can find two teens and a baby we’ll make them be part of the display,” Zak promised. “Do you want to help Scooter and me?” Zak asked Alex.
“I would, but I’m going to the library to work on my history project with Hazel. Grandpa said he’d come by to help out too.” Hazel Hampton, now Hazel Donovan since marrying my grandpa, was the town librarian.
“What are you researching?” I wondered.
“The Norlander mine. It’s pretty interesting so far. Did you know that the Norlander brothers pulled tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of gold out of that mine before they were both murdered? Some people say it was even more than that. And that was a century ago, so just think about how much money that would be now.”
“I wasn’t aware it was that much,” I said, “although I do remember hearing it was a very profitable mine, unlike some in the area.”
Alex set her fork on her plate. “Hazel said it was the most prosperous mine around when the brothers were murdered.”
“Murdered?” Nona asked.
Alex nodded. “It’s assumed they were killed by another miner, set on taking over their claim, but the killer was never caught and the mining operations sort of fizzled out shortly after the brothers died, so no one ever did take over. Hazel said by the time the brothers were killed, the mine was about done producing, so the really sad thing is, if the brothers were murdered for their claim, they died for nothing. Of course, the motive was never verified because the killer was never found, so I guess it’s possible they were murdered for another reason altogether. Grandpa said there was probably a woman involved.”
“Why would he say that?” I wondered.
“I asked him that, and he said there’s always a woman involved.”
“Th
at’s Grandpa for you.” I laughed. “Always ready with a joke.”
“Are you talking about that haunted mine up on the mountain?” Scooter asked when there was a pause in the conversation. “The one with all the fencing around it?”
Alex turned to Scooter. “Maybe. I haven’t been up there and I’m not sure which mine you’re talking about. There are a lot of them. But I do know it’s up on the mountain, so it could be.”
“I’m talking about the one with the big sign telling everyone to stay out.”
I looked at Scooter and nodded. “I think the mine you’re talking about is the one Alex is studying.”
“You know that mine is haunted,” Scooter warned her.
“There’s a legend that the brothers stayed behind to protect their claim even after they both died, so I suppose it could be haunted. How do you know about the mine?” I asked.
“Some of the kids at school were talking about it. If it’s the one I’m thinking of, the brothers were killed on Halloween night. Their bodies were ripped apart, like some animal got to them. A few of the guys said it was a werewolf that killed them. Others said it was just a bear. No one knows for sure, but most of the guys were pretty sure something supernatural was going on up there on the mountain.”
Alex laughed. “While it’s true the brothers’ bodies were mutilated, the real story is that they were killed with a pickax. At least that’s what I read in the old history book Hazel lent me.”