by Morgana Best
“I didn’t want to get too fancy,” Cressida said by way of greeting. “I figured someone from television has enough fancy food.”
“I’m sure he does.”
“Full disclosure—I’m missing one of my nails,” Cressida said as she held her right hand out to me so I could see that one of the garish pink acrylic nails had come off her index finger. “I think it’s in here, so keep an eye out, all right?”
I grimaced and nodded.
“And can you start making sandwiches? Everything is there.”
There wasn’t a lot of time to speak with all the work to be done, so the two of us hunkered down and got lunch ready. By noon there was a nice spread on the dining room table: various sandwiches, the potato salad, a macaroni salad, a large pitcher of ice tea, another of lemonade, along with a few bags of potato chips, and a platter of cupcakes for dessert. For an added plus, the fake nail had been found, indeed in the potato salad.
Cressida opened the door from the dining room to the main hall to find it filled with people. Mr. Buttons was there, as was James, Ken, Michael, and Alex. There was a good looking man of about fifty years of age wearing an expensive suit. His hair was black and slicked back, and he wore sunglasses which he pulled off and slid into his breast pocket before shaking Cressida’s hand.
“My name is Victor Fredricks, and I think you all might have known I was coming.”
This drew a laugh from the ghost hunters. I would have laughed too, if I had been expecting a rich contract.
“We have lunch ready for everyone,” Cressida said.
“Thank you,” Victor said, before turning to James. “Let’s eat, and then you and I can discuss what I came here to discuss.”
“Sounds great, Mr. Fredericks,” James said. James’ face was flushed with excitement.
“Please, call me Victor.”
“Okay, Victor.”
And with that we all went into the dining room and ate lunch. I sat a few seats down from Victor, who was enthralling us all with stories of Hollywood, and personal details about celebrities he knew. I hung on every word. It was simply cool. I didn’t know a better word to describe it.
When lunch was finally over, two and a half hours later, Victor turned to Cressida.
“Would you please excuse us? James and I have a few things we need to go over.”
“Of course,” Cressida said with a smile.
Everyone filed out of the dining room, and Cressida and I cleared the table.
I was stacking the dishwasher when Cressida said, “I’ll go and see if I can hear anything.”
I just nodded and kept shoving as much as I could in the dishwasher.
I had just dumped the dishes that didn’t fit into the dishwasher into the sink and was filling it with hot sudsy water, when Cressida returned. “What are they talking about?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve heard the words contract, prime time, and that’s about all I can make out. Oh, and I’m sure I heard the words million dollars.”
My mouth fell open. “A million dollars?”
Cressida nodded.
“So that was why he killed Sue,” a voice said, and I turned to see Dorothy standing by the sink.
“You think James killed Sue?” Cressida asked. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I didn’t want him to kill me,” Dorothy said.
“Why do you think your James killed Sue?” I asked, keeping an eye on the knife drawer, just in case.
Dorothy took a step closer to me. “I heard them arguing, the night before Sue died.”
“About what?” I asked as I moved further away from Dorothy.
“Sue was mad at James. She said he was faking everything, and she didn’t want to be a part of it. Sue had said she wouldn’t let him do that. She said she would tell everyone. And the next day she was dead.”
At that moment, the door swung open, and Victor walked into the room.
“I didn’t mean to scare you, although when you’re in a house this haunted, I’m not surprised you’re all on edge!” the man said with a smile. His teeth were so white they were almost blinding. I supposed that everyone in Hollywood had teeth like that. “I just want to thank you for a lovely lunch, and it was great to meet you all, and I have a plane to catch.”
“You’re all done?” Cressida asked. “That was fast.”
“Well you know what they say in Hollywood,” Victor said. “Hurry up and wait.” He winked and then left.
“Well, we had better call Blake,” Cressida said, when the door shut. “And we had better call him fast.”
Chapter 21
Mr. Buttons kept an eye on the window while I searched James’ bedroom, looking for evidence to indicate that James was faking the ghostly phenomena.
“Hurry, Sibyl! James will probably be heading back soon.”
“I know, but we have to find something first.” I rummaged through suitcases and duffel bags, when my eyes fell upon some furniture in the corner. I walked over and lifted up a round, wooden table. It looked heavy and old, but I was able to flip it right-side up with one hand. “Mr. Buttons, come here! I think I’ve found something.”
He walked over and looked at the table without even a hint of optimism on his face. “A table?”
“Not just a table. Look at this.” I handed the table to Mr. Buttons and tilted it so he could see a metallic device that was fastened to the bottom of the table. “I think it’s for a signal or something. Look, there’s even a remote.”
Mr. Buttons reached over and slid the remote from its holster. He pressed a few buttons on the tiny remote, and the table shook.
“Wow, so this is how he did it,” I said. “One press of a button and it looks like a ghost is randomly shaking the table.”
Mr. Buttons pointed to a strange-looking contraption poking from a black, duffel bag. “See what that is.”
I leaned over, and seized the device. It was square in shape, with large antennae, several LED lights decorating the top, and a gauge with a floating needle resting in the center. I pressed one of the buttons, and a ghostly voice emanated from the other side of the room.
I jumped and clutched at my throat. “That scared me,” I said, somewhat unnecessarily.
“He’s set it up so that if you press that button, the ghostly voice comes out of that camera,” Mr. Buttons said. He crossed the room and fetched the camera. “Press the button again, Sibyl.”
I did, and the ghostly voice said, “Leave!”
“That was the voice we heard the other night,” I said.
Mr. Buttons nodded. “Yes, and with the cameras being in the other rooms, no one would know the voices were actually coming from the cameras. Sibyl, we have enough. Let’s take the camera and the EMF meter and get out of here.”
I looked around the room which was in disarray. “No, we’d better cover our tracks first. Mr. Buttons, could you hurry and call Blake, and tell him to get here fast, and I’ll quickly put everything back, so that James won’t know anyone’s been through his things.”
Mr. Buttons nodded in agreement and headed toward the door. “All right, but make it fast! He could be back at any minute.”
I set the table back down in its original location and tidied up as best I could. I heard the door open, and I swung around.
“What do you think you’re doing up here?” James’s tone was filled with fury.
“I’m sorry. I came up here to look for you, and the door was open. I just thought it would be cool to see some of your ghost hunting gadgets.”
James turned around and locked the door behind him. “You do realize I’m not stupid, right?”
“Err, umm,” I stammered.
“So you thought you’d come up here and look through my gear for what? To find a motive for Sue’s murder? Did you find one?”
“A motive?” I parroted.
He looked at me in disgust. “I see you’re standing right near my table, and I’m sure you’ve already found out that it’s
rigged to make it look like paranormal activity is affecting it. Also, I supposed you’ve discovered that the EMF detectors are rigged to go off whenever I want them to.”
No, I hadn’t known that. “So what if your show’s a bit staged?” I said. “I watch a lot of TV. I’m sure it’s all staged.”
James walked toward me and I backed against the wall. “Sue was going to blow the whistle and come out with the truth. Sue and I dated on and off for a long time. We pretty much started this thing together. Sue objected when I faked stuff for the pilot. So, I told her we needed to part ways and that I’d make sure she was compensated for being in the pilot. That was not something she was willing to accept though. She told me she had emails, photographs, video, and everything else she needed to prove I was a fraud. She even threatened to go to the network with the information and demand she stay on the show.”
“So she was going to use extortion as a way of staying in the TV series?” I said, hoping to keep him talking until help arrived. “Surely the network would have dealt with it themselves.”
James let out a snort of derision. “No. They would have canceled the entire thing. It was worth over a million bucks to me—did you hear that? A million bucks!”
“So you killed her?”
James shrugged. “I didn’t have a choice. I injected nicotine into her hair dye—quite clever of me, I thought.”
“Well, you nearly killed Cressida, too.”
“I didn’t mean for anyone else to get hurt. Well, until now.” Without a warning, he lunged toward me and seized me by my arm. With his fingers digging painfully into my arm, he dragged me toward the open window.
I threw myself backward, and I collapsed to the ground, pulling James down with me. James scrambled back to his feet, and grabbed me with both hands. “Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be.”
James dragged me to the window, and when I caught sight of the ground below, I struggled even harder. It was a long drop to the ground, with James’s room being two stories up, and I knew I wouldn’t survive the fall. I screamed, but James clamped his hand over my mouth. I smashed the window next to the opening to dry to draw attention to my plight, but all that did was cut my hand.
At that moment, the door flew open with a loud thud. As James looked up in surprise, I took the opportunity to knee him hard in the unmentionables. I ran forward, and staggered into Blake’s arms. “He killed Sue,” I said.
“I’ll take care of him. Keep her safe and get her outside,” Blake said to Mr. Buttons, who was right behind him. He turned back toward the room and shut the door.
I crumpled into Mr. Buttons’ arms as we both fell against the wall and slid to a sitting position.
There were a few loud noises and banging sounds from within the room, and then Blake opened the door, pushing a handcuffed and sullen-faced James in front of him.
Chapter 22
Learn How to Kill in Just Three Swift Techniques. I sighed and dropped the brochure—that one might be a bit too much. On Efficient and Tactical Threat Neutralization. That one was clearly out of my league. How to Rip a Man in Half. Hmm.
I leaned back in my chair and threw my hands into the air in defeat. I’d been leafing through self-defense brochures all day, but hadn’t had any luck. It didn’t seem like many people wanted—or were able—to teach martial arts in such a small town, and the few that did seemed, quite frankly, terrifying.
After James had attacked me, learning how to defend myself seemed like the natural next step. I knew it wasn’t something that was likely to ever happen again (or in the first place, I supposed), but learning a martial art would be a good way to set myself at ease.
Then again, I considered that I was already quite at ease. Life was back to normal, and I’d finally found the chance to relax. I was halfway through my coffee when my thoughts were interrupted.
“Shut up, you &^%$$ idiot!” Max yelled, much to my surprise. Through quick thinking, I narrowly avoided spilling my coffee all over myself by nimbly spilling it all over the table. I sighed, setting the cup down and grabbing a cleaning cloth. Just as I finished cleaning it up, I was interrupted again, this time by a knock on the door. I threw the sponge in the sink and quickly finished rinsing my cup out before answering it.
As the door opened, the first thing I noticed was that someone was holding a bunch of flowers. The second thing I noticed was Blake. Finally, I noticed that he was wondering why I was still looking at the flowers and hadn’t said anything.
“Uh, hello, Sibyl,” he said, leaning down and giving me a little wave. I felt my face turning red and quickly composed myself.
“Hello, Blake, sorry! I was just lost in thought.” I smiled.
He chuckled and handed the flowers to me. “These are for you. I thought I should check up on you after everything that’s happened.”
I took the flowers, admiring them. I had no idea what kinds they were, but they were a vibrant myriad of colors and shapes. Some of the flowers were completely foreign to me, but it was a beautiful arrangement.
“Thanks so much!” I said. I hugged him on impulse and he hugged me back. We both lingered a little longer than was normal before releasing, and I felt my face turning red again. I looked up at him, as we were still holding each other. He looked back, his face inches from mine. I leaned in, thinking that we might be about to kiss.
“#$^& off! You stink!” Max yelled furiously from inside. We released each other and both took a step back, embarrassed.
“Um, come in; come in,” I said, ushering him through the door and looking at the floor. My face was red again, and Blake was the last person I wanted noticing.
“Do you have company?” he asked, looking for the source of the yell. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”
“No!” I exclaimed before composing myself. “That’s Max, as usual. He still hasn’t given up his bad language.” I laughed nervously. “Would you like some coffee?” I started the machine and, hopefully, a new topic of conversation.
“Sure, thanks.” He smiled and took a seat. “I can’t talk about specifics just yet, but I wanted to let you know that you don’t have to worry about James. That’s all in the past.” He smiled again.
I turned around from the coffee machine to face him. “I’d figured as much, but it’s still good to hear,” I said, turning back and finishing the first coffee. “The evidence against him wasn’t exactly circumstantial.” I handed Blake his drink and went back to making my own.
Blake laughed a little, nodding. “Not exactly, no. How are you holding up?” he asked, a look of genuine concern in his eyes. It wasn’t until that moment that I realized it wasn’t normal for police to follow up on this sort of thing personally, even in a small town like this.
“I’m fine, but I appreciate you asking.” I poured my coffee and sat down opposite Blake. “It was scary, of course, but I know it’s not something that can affect me again.”
“Are you, uh, planning anything?” Blake picked up one of the self-defense brochures: How Enemies Become Dead. Blake raised an eyebrow and looked at me with concern.
“Just leafing through a few of them, but I don’t think they’re for me, if I’m honest. I’m not at all a fan of violence, even if it’s in self-defense.” I drank my coffee slowly, trying to savor it. I was enjoying just sitting here with Blake, even if the air was a little heavy and I didn’t know what to talk about.
“Do you think…” I was interrupted again by yet another knock on the door. “Oh, excuse me,” I said, standing up. I opened the door to see Cressida and Mr. Buttons, both smiling broadly and handing me a bouquet of flowers. For the briefest moment I worried that Cressida was going to try and kiss me.
“Hi, Sibyl!” Cressida said, still smiling broadly. “We thought we should check on you. How are you holding up?” Mr. Buttons stood behind her, wearing a look of concern.
“I’m fine, thank you! And thanks for the flowers.” I smiled back. “I’m just here with Blake,” I said, hoping in vain that t
hey would get the hint.
“Oh, I’d like to say thank you to him,” Cressida said, completely oblivious and walking straight past me into the house. Mr. Buttons gave me a quick hug and followed her inside.
I looked down at the flowers they had given me. I put them in a vase and added some water, setting it on a high side table where Sandy wouldn’t knock it over. Blake, Cressida, and Mr. Buttons were chatting in the next room and I went back to join them.
“Anyone for a drink?” I was asking in order to be polite, but was hoping they’d leave me alone with Blake for a moment. It seemed as though whenever I was with Blake it was either somewhere very public or somebody was trying to kill somebody else. This was one of the precious few times we were having a moment together, so I should have known from the outset that something would interrupt it.
Not that I minded too much. It was a little frustrating, but it was good to have my friends in one place now that there wasn’t anything to worry about.
“Oh, yes, please!” Cressida said, much too excited.
“Yes, thank you, Sibyl,” Mr. Buttons said politely. “Would you like a hand?”
“That’s fine, thanks. It won’t take a moment.” I smiled and exchanged glances with Blake, who apparently felt the same way that I did. It wasn’t a bad thing to have them here, though, and Blake and I would always have time later.
“What exactly are you doing?” Blake asked. I spun around to see Mr. Buttons on his knees, polishing Blake’s shoes furiously.
“Just a spot of dirt. It won’t be a moment,” Mr. Buttons explained nonchalantly. “Oh, it’s a stubborn one, though.” He continued scrubbing furiously. Blake sat patiently, unsure of how to react.
“Mr. Buttons, please leave Blake alone. He’s a police officer, so his shoes are going to get dirty from time to time. They’ll get dirty again as soon as you leave, there’s no point in cleaning them now.” I noticed Mr. Buttons wasn’t really paying attention to me as I spoke, continuing to try and rub the dirt from Blake’s shoes.