Death in D Minor
Page 23
“I visited Sweeney’s many times while I lived.” Gethsemane raised an eyebrow. “The restaurant on the ground floor. The chef did a brilliant shepherd’s pie. And shame on ya for what you’re thinking. Anyway, it’s about time I paid Sweeney’s a return visit.”
Gethsemane pressed her ear against the door to room twelve. “I don’t hear anything.”
“Try knocking,” Eamon said.
They’d come straight from the cottage to Sweeney’s Inn, Dunmullach’s only lodging except for two rooms above the Mad Rabbit the barman sometimes rented out. The two-hundred-fifty-year-old hotel had hosted its share of famous and infamous guests over the centuries—statesmen and highway men, runaway lovers and incognito celebrities. On their way in, Gethsemane and Eamon passed a small crowd in the lobby gathered around someone Gethsemane assumed was moderately famous. She ignored them. Hank Wayne and Billy McCarthy were the only guests who interested her at the moment. Green, purple, and gold Epiphany decorations festooned the lobby and reminded her of how little time remained to save the cottage she now considered her home. A star struck desk clerk left the registration desk unguarded. Gethsemane peeked at the registration book and found Hank’s room. They’d gone up unannounced.
Gethsemane knocked.
“Who is it?” Billy McCarthy called through the door.
“Oh, good, they’re together,” she said to Eamon. She answered Billy, “Gethsemane Brown. Something’s happened at the cottage. I need to talk to you about it.”
Billy opened the door a crack. “This isn’t the best time. Actually, this isn’t even my room. I’m in fourteen. Perhaps you could come see me later.”
She peered around him. “Is that Mr. Wayne? Hi, Hank. Hey, thanks for outing Ray Delaney about being in New York. You helped tie him to the murders. Not that he lived to face charges.” She hoped she sounded flip enough to hide her true reaction to the memory of seeing Ray’s destroyed corpse lying on the floor of the baggage car. “But you did help.”
Her elbow tingled at Eamon’s touch. “Steady, darlin’.”
She turned her attention back to Billy. “May we come in?”
“We?” Billy, one of the majority of people who couldn’t see Eamon, stuck his head into the hall and looked both ways. “You’re alone.”
“Not quite.”
Eamon pointed at the door and it flung inward, knocking Billy to the floor. Hank’s eyes widened. His mouth opened into a silent “oh.” He jumped from his chair, sending stacks of paper floating to the floor, and jumped onto the bed, where he flattened himself against the headboard.
“I take it you see me, Mr. Wayne,” Eamon said.
Hank quivered. Unlike Eamon’s nephew, he had the gift of being able to see ghosts. Or the curse.
Billy stared back and forth between Gethsemane and the developer.
She explained, “Your uncle’s here and he’s pissed about you selling out to Hank. He feels betrayed by his closest living relative and heir.”
“This is business.” Billy’s eyes watered as he fought to keep the tears from his voice. “And I’ll remind you that it’s none of yours.”
A blue orb appeared in the middle of the room and whizzed toward Billy. “Shite!” He dove and curled into a ball. The orb missed him by a few inches and fizzled out in a corner. It singed the carpet. “What the feck was that?”
“Uncle Eamon’s calling card. You’ll probably have to pay damages for that,” Gethsemane said.
“You don’t understand.” Billy’s sobs broke free.
“I understand, Billy, I do. Hank offered you more money than you ever dreamed of having. He offered you so much money that if he’d offered it to the devil, the devil would have sold his soul to Hank. But this is family. And family is more important than money.”
“He’s not your family.”
“But he is my friend. And friends are more important than money, too.”
Hank had dropped to his knees on the bed and recited a prayer over and over.
“Hank,” Eamon said.
The hotel man prayed louder.
“Hank.” Eamon levitated the bed and let it drop, jostling Hank to the floor.
Hank blubbered. “Please don’t hurt me, please don’t hurt me,” he said between sobs.
“I don’t want to hurt you. I want you to go away. Forget about buying my home, leave this village, and leave Ireland. And don’t come back. If I find you within ten kilometers of Dunmullach limits, I’ll haunt you. The party tricks are for Billy’s sake. I won’t need those with you. I’ll just be wherever you are. I won’t give you a moment’s peace. Do you understand me, Hank?”
Hank nodded at Eamon. He pulled himself up with the bedclothes and stumbled to the table. He picked up the scattered papers and tore them into pieces. He stumbled to the door and collided with a bellhop.
“’Scuse me, sir,” the young man said. “We had a report of crying and some thuds. Is everything all right?” He looked at Billy on the floor and both men’s tear-stained faces. “Did you fall? Does anyone need a doctor?”
Hank squeezed past the bellhop, careful to keep space between himself and Eamon.
“I’m checking out. Now. I’ll send for my things later.” He ran for the stairs.
Billy pushed himself to his feet. “No need for a doctor. Business deal went sour, that’s all.” He stepped into the hall. “I’m going back to my own room. Maybe you can see to Mr. Wayne’s things.” He handed the bellhop a folded bill.
Gethsemane called after him, “Billy, wait.”
“Wait for what? For you to bring the roof crashing in on my head? Haven’t you done enough? By the way, I want you out of Carraigfaire. Tonight.”
He slammed his door.
“That didn’t go exactly as planned.”
Eamon glowed a happy green. “You saved the cottage, got rid of Hank Wayne.”
“Yeah, but—”
“That eviction nonsense?” Eamon waved a hand. “Don’t worry about it. It’s my house, and I say you can stay. Besides, Billy’ll come ’round once he stops being mad.”
“If he stops being mad. We did just cost him a fortune.”
“Like you said, family and friends are worth more than any fortune.”
“We three kings of Orient are, bearing gifts we traverse afar, field and fountain, moor and mountain, following yonder star,” Gethsemane sang as she chalked the year and “C + M + B” over the cottage’s doorway.
“What’re you doing?” Eamon materialized beside her.
“You are such a heathen. This is the traditional Epiphany house blessing. C, M, and B are the magi’s initials. They also stand for Christus Mansionem Benedicat. I figure we can use all the blessings we can get.”
“Will you stop worrying about Billy? I told you he was talking mad. He hasn’t sent the gardaí ’round to put your things on the drive.”
“Yet.”
“Did you see him at church tonight?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Was he civil?”
She conceded he had been.
“He didn’t mention you leaving and he minded his manners. He’s over his tantrum.”
“His good behavior didn’t reassure me. It’s hard to evict someone when the parish priest is preaching about charity and giving and half the village is in the pews watching you.”
“Worrywart.” Eamon dematerialized.
She found him in the kitchen, oven door open.
“Since when do you cook?” he asked. “I wasn’t gone that long, was I?”
“I can cook. One or two things. King Cake being one of the two.” She slammed the oven door. “Don’t open that. It’s not done yet.”
“Explain king cakes to me. Why would anyone want to cook a plastic baby in a cake?”
“It’s an Epiphany tradition. You serve the cake at your T
welfth Night party and whoever gets the slice with the baby has to buy next year’s cake. It’s also a choking hazard, so these days the cake’s usually served with the baby on the side. It’s also more fun when more than one person eats the cake. It being just me kind of kills the suspense of who gets the baby.”
“So am I invisible all of a sudden?” Eamon solidified until he appeared as dense as Gethsemane.
“You have to have, you know, teeth and a mouth and internal organs to eat cake.”
“I have a nose.” He sniffed. “Are you sure it’s not done?”
She grabbed a potholder and pulled the purple, green, and gold ring from the oven. She waved away smoke. The cake had a fourth color on the bottom—dark, dark charcoal brown. “Oh, well. I’m not in a party mood anyway.” She let the cake slide into the trash, plastic baby and all.
“Is throwing the baby out with the king cake anything like throwing the baby out with the bath water?” Eamon laughed his full throaty laugh. A green aura surrounded him.
“It’s not funny.”
Someone pounded on the door. They both fell silent. The pounding repeated.
“What if it’s Billy?” Gethsemane whispered.
“One way to find out.” Eamon dematerialized.
She rushed to the front door and inserted herself between him and it. “Let me. Maybe it’s just magi bringing me gifts. But in case it’s not…” She grabbed her shillelagh and turned the lock.
The woman on the porch handed Gethsemane a business card and pushed her way into the entrance hall. “I’m Venus James, true crime author.” She spoke with an American accent. “I’d like to talk to you about the Eamon McCarthy case.”
“Oh, God, it’s you.” Gethsemane crumpled the card. “You wrote that book.”
Before the woman could respond, three men came into view behind her on the porch. Gethsemane stared at the one in the lead. Mid-thirty-ish, slim, hipster glasses, dressed in black. She’d seen him somewhere. The crowd at Sweeney’s Inn. He’d been in the middle of it. No, wait. She knew him from someplace else.
“You’re—”
He finished her sentence, “Kent Danger.” He introduced his companions. “We’re the Ghost Hunting Adventures boys.”
“Paranormal investigators,” Eamon said over her shoulder. “Bloody hell.”
About the Author
A writer since childhood, Alexia Gordon won her first writing prize in the 6th grade. She continued writing through college but put literary endeavors on hold to finish medical school and Family Medicine residency training. She established her medical career then returned to writing fiction.
Raised in the southeast, schooled in the northeast, she relocated to the west where she completed Southern Methodist University’s Writer’s Path program. She admits Texas brisket is as good as Carolina pulled pork. She practices medicine in North Chicago, IL. She enjoys the symphony, art collecting, embroidery, and ghost stories.
The Gethsemane Brown Mystery Series
by Alexia Gordon
MURDER IN G MAJOR (#1)
DEATH IN D MINOR (#2)
Sign up for Henery Press updates
and we’ll deliver the latest on new books, sale books, and pre-order books, plus all the happenings in the Hen House!
CLICK TO SIGN UP
(Note: we won’t share your email address and you can unsubscribe any time.)
We’d love to hear what you thought about this book. No matter how brief or how long, reader reviews make a difference. Thank you!
Henery Press Mystery Books
And finally, before you go...
Here are a few other mysteries
you might enjoy:
A MUDDIED MURDER
Wendy Tyson
A Greenhouse Mystery (#1)
When Megan Sawyer gives up her big-city law career to care for her grandmother and run the family’s organic farm and café, she expects to find peace and tranquility in her scenic hometown of Winsome, Pennsylvania. Instead, her goat goes missing, rain muddies her fields, the town denies her business permits, and her family’s Colonial-era farm sucks up the remains of her savings.
Just when she thinks she’s reached the bottom of the rain barrel, Megan and the town’s hunky veterinarian discover the local zoning commissioner’s battered body in her barn. Now Megan is thrust into the middle of a murder investigation—and she’s the chief suspect. Can Megan dig through small-town secrets, local politics, and old grievances in time to find a killer before that killer strikes again?
Read all about it at www.henerypress.com.
THE DEEP END
Julie Mulhern
The Country Club Murders (#1)
Swimming into the lifeless body of her husband’s mistress tends to ruin a woman’s day, but becoming a murder suspect can ruin her whole life.
It’s 1974 and Ellison Russell’s life revolves around her daughter and her art. She’s long since stopped caring about her cheating husband, Henry, and the women with whom he entertains himself. That is, until she becomes a suspect in Madeline Harper’s death. The murder forces Ellison to confront her husband’s proclivities and his crimes—kinky sex, petty cruelties and blackmail.
As the body count approaches par on the seventh hole, Ellison knows she has to catch a killer. But with an interfering mother, an adoring father, a teenage daughter, and a cadre of well-meaning friends demanding her attention, can Ellison find the killer before he finds her?
Read all about it at www.henerypress.com.
FIXIN’ TO DIE
Tonya Kappes
A Kenni Lowry Mystery (#1)
Kenni Lowry likes to think the zero crime rate in Cottonwood, Kentucky is due to her being sheriff, but she quickly discovers the ghost of her grandfather, the town’s previous sheriff, has been scaring off any would-be criminals since she was elected. When the town’s most beloved doctor is found murdered on the very same day as a jewelry store robbery, and a mysterious symbol ties the crime scenes together, Kenni must satisfy her hankerin’ for justice by nabbing the culprits.
With the help of her Poppa, a lone deputy, and an annoyingly cute, too-big-for-his-britches State Reserve officer, Kenni must solve both cases and prove to the whole town, and herself, that she’s worth her salt before time runs out.
Read all about it at www.henerypress.com.