“What’s that?” Nonie asked, anxious for them to leave before Guy pulled another stunt.
“What we supposed to wear?” Shaundelle asked. She stuck her head into the van and asked the question again. Probably this time to Jack.
When Shaundelle turned and looked back at Nonie she had her lips pursed. “The man say wear whatever you want. Wear black, girl. It’s slimmin’, not that you need any slimmin’ with your skinny self, but it makes me look like I’ve been dietin’ for a week. I don’t want to be the only one wearin’ black, so wear black, okay?”
Working in funeral service, the one color Nonie had plenty of was black. “No problem. Black it is. See y’all tomorrow.”
Nonie waited on her porch until the van pulled out of view, then she turned and stormed back into the duplex. Guy Skinard had better have gone to meet the Lord because if he hadn’t after what he pulled tonight, she planned on showing him how to get there—the hard way.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Suspecting what was coming from Nonie, Guy made himself scarce. For him, scarce meant leaving the house because no matter where he’d try to hide in Nonie’s duplex, she’d see him and give him what for.
It wasn’t like he could’ve helped it. That bastard, Nagan, had been sitting too close to his girl. Was getting too friendly. He couldn’t just stand there and watch that happen without doing something about it.
Nonie might be going ghost scouting with that good-looking pain in the ass, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t follow along to make sure Mr. Jack, whatever his name was, kept his hands to himself.
Dead or alive, Nonie belonged to him, and Guy planned to make sure it stayed that way.
There’d been an occasion or two when Nonie had gone out on a date with Kyle, Lyle’s twin brother, but that hadn’t bothered him. On the first double date with Buggy and Lyle, Guy saw immediately that Nonie really had no interest in Kyle. Not sexually anyway. She enjoyed the company and the chance to get out and have a little fun, but he knew her well enough to know that sex wasn’t ever going to happen between the two of them. The only time Guy’s hackles rose was after their first double date when Kyle kissed her goodnight. Fortunately, and confirming what he figured Nonie thought about the guy, there’d been no tongue or groping involved. She’d given Kyle more of a peck on the lips, like she’d have been kissing her brother good night.
Two men concerned him. First was Nate Lopez, the new deputy in town, who definitely had the hots for Nonie. The guy stood about six feet tall, was muscular and had blue eyes and collar-length black hair. He seemed to be a nice guy, as far as Guy had witnessed, and more Nonie’s type, which made him a hazard Guy knew he’d have to keep an eye on.
The second man that concerned him was this new guy Jack. Not that Jack or Nate had done anything inappropriate. . . yet. And tonight, when he found Jack sitting way too close to Nonie, he’d done something about it. Chances were Mr. Ghost Hunter wouldn’t return to Nonie’s duplex anytime soon.
The only other man who’d shown serious interest in Nonie was Edward Roy, the grocery store owner’s son. The man was about thirty-five with short brown hair and lips that held a perpetual pout. Definitely not Nonie’s type.
To keep himself out of Nonie’s wrath path, Guy walked around Clay Point, checking out what was going on that evening. So many times, when he’d see old friends hanging out at places he used to frequent, it made him feel homesick. Worse than homesick because being dead meant he’d never be able to enjoy those friends or hangouts again. All he had to hang onto while stuck in Clay Point was Nonie, and she was worth sticking around for.
Now, because he’d made her so angry after he messed with Jack, Guy would have to wait until she fell asleep before going back into her apartment. That made him feel the loneliest of all. He hated being away from Nonie even for a moment. Of course, there were times when she’d all but tell him to get lost, like when she went into the bathroom, was at work and had to concentrate, or had important company.
And, for the most part, when she asked him to leave, he complied. Except for this whole Boo Krewe gig. It made him nervous. Nonie, much less Tatman, Buggy, and Shaundelle didn’t know what the hell they were getting themselves into. Big man Jack might have done paranormal investigations for years, but they never included Guy’s Nonie. He feared for her. He knew what spirits were out there. Some benign, kind of like himself, stuck here because they refused to leave a loved one, some mischievous, causing just enough chaos to scare the hell out of anyone who entered their space. Then there were the evil ones. The ones who’d never been human in the first place. He’d heard some investigators call them demons. Guy called them assholes. They hurt people. Made them fall down ladders, flights of stairs, made them sick until they’d become little more than a blubbering, drooling mess. Since his death, Guy had run into one or two of them, and it hadn’t taken him long to see the evilness that drove their game. Each time he came across one, he veered off in a different direction. He wasn’t about to confront something he couldn’t fight.
Guy had already made up his mind to follow Nonie on every scouting trip. He knew she often saw and heard the dead, but to his knowledge, she’d never run into a demonic asshole. He might not be able to defeat it, but he could deflect its attention to something other than his girl.
The biggest challenge Guy thought of was how he’d get to the scouting site without Nonie knowing he was around. It wasn’t like he could hitch a ride in the van. She’d see him in a nanosecond and pitch one of her notorious fits. The vehicle was a van, which meant it had no trunk. The only way Guy figured he’d be able to hop a ride was to place himself on top of the van. Nonie was too short to see him up there from ground level. If she stood on the bumper, however, he’d be busted. Logic insisted that she’d have no reason to stand on the bumper. If anything was placed up there for safekeeping until they reached the location, they had Tatman the muscle man to handle the job. And Tatman couldn’t see him.
Although Guy knew why Nonie had decided to take this gig, and his warning to her about it seemed to fall on deaf ears, he thought up a plan. He knew she needed the money to make ends meet and to scrap working at the funeral home. So, if he worked hard enough at it, Guy was certain he could make that happen.
He wondered . . .What if, no matter the location they went to, he showed up and start moving things around? Rang doorbells, threw pots around, made will-o’-the-wisp smoke appear out of nowhere?
He bet he could even make those gadgets Jack had brought to show everyone tonight light up and ding or do whatever they were supposed to do to validate a “ghostly presence.”
He’d have to do it in such a way that Nonie wouldn’t get freaked out, of course, but if he worked that plan at each location, Nonie would get five hundred bucks per scout, and the numbers would start adding up fast.
And if they found a location that held a legitimate spirit in it, all the better. Guy would make sure to rile that spirit up until the walls shook.
He chuckled, seeing it in his mind’s eye. Mr. Jack, the investigator, getting so freaked out he’d run out of the place, leaving his crew behind. That would show Nonie the man he really was. Hopefully. For all Guy knew, Jack might actually be good at this investigation thing. Instead of scaring him, it might excite him to the point that he’d be shooting film until dawn.
After strolling around Clay Point for what seemed like hours, Guy decided to sneak back into Nonie’s, hoping she’d gone to bed and was asleep by now.
Instead of walking straight into her bedroom, he just poked his head inside the wooden door. She was lying in bed on her stomach as usual with an arm curled under her pillow. Her breathing sounded slow and easy, like she’d already drifted off to dreamland.
Feeling safe enough to give it a try, Guy pulled his head out of the door and did a full body walk in. He kept his footsteps light to make sure no air caused the floor boards to creak, and he didn’t stir any additional breeze around her.
Guy stood at the foot of
her bed, loving the sight before him. Nonie’s long, curly brown hair with bangs that reached the top of her eyebrows, her smooth complexion, her small nose and perfect lips. He could have stared at her all night and probably would have if she hadn’t suddenly sat up in bed.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” Nonie asked.
Guy frowned. Nonie had been faking sleep to lure him inside. He hated being tricked.
“What are you talking about?” Guy asked.
“Give me a frigging break, Casper,” Nonie said. “I’m talking about you poking Jack in the cheek then slapping the top of his head. What the hell were you trying to prove?”
Guy felt anger roil in his gut. “He was sitting too close to you, and I didn’t like it. Just showing him who was boss.”
“Boss over who? Me? Since when? The guy couldn’t even see you for heaven’s sake.” She lay back down and pulled her pillow closer to her face. “And for the dumb move you made tonight, I don’t want to see you right now either. Go poke somebody else. Go ride the moon. Just go.”
“But I always stay with you during the night.”
Nonie turned her head slightly and glared at him. “Until you learn how to behave yourself, you can sleep in a barn filled with cow shit for all I care. You’re not staying here tonight, and that’s a frigging order!”
With that, Nonie turned her face back into her pillow. Guy stood there for a moment, regretting what he’d done to Jack, even though he’d felt justified doing it at the time. He hated making Nonie mad, but sometimes he found himself pissing her off without even trying.
Taking her at her word, Guy exited Nonie’s bedroom the same way he’d entered. He left the house, and for the first time he walked for two miles to visit a place he’d avoided since his death. The cemetery. And the grave with his name and dates etched in marble.
CHAPTER EIGHT
By seven the next morning, having only one cup of coffee under her belt, Nonie dragged herself into the funeral home, wearing a black blouse and blazer, along with a knee-length black skirt and pumps. She’d been warned by her mother, Rita, more than once to dress appropriately for the funeral and to get there early in case they needed help prepping before the mayor’s family arrived at nine. The only prepping she did when arriving, though, was head for the coffee room and add sugar and cream to a large mug of coffee. Her sleep last night had been sporadic. She’d dreamed of Jack. Intimate dreams. Sex dreams. And each time a dream came close to driving her over the edge of panting, Guy appeared in her dreams, screwing it up.
“Good morning, mon petite,” Fezzo said to Nonie, when he limped into the room and went straight for the coffee urn. Evidently he needed the same caffeine buzz she did.
Nonie gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Morning. Where is everybody? I didn’t see Margaret or Mom at the reception desk.”
Fezzo groaned and pulled out one of the chairs near a table and sat.
“Your leg hurting you this morning?” Nonie asked, worried.
“Aw, the leg, the back, the head. When you get to be my age, even you butt hurts sometimes just ‘cause it’s part of you body.”
Nonie grinned. “You’re not old. You’ll wind up outliving us all.”
Fezzo swallowed a sip of coffee and said, “Poo yi, bébé don’t say dat. Outlivin’ you means I’d be over a hund’erd years old. Who wants to live dat long when parts are already starting to sag, fall off, or disappear when you in you seventies?”
Nonie laughed. “Just make sure you stick around for the important stuff in my life, you hear? Like if I ever get married and have babies. I want you around when that happens.”
“Mah den you bes’ get somethin’ movin’,” Fezzo said. “I don’t see no boys hangin around ‘cept the twin of that boy Buggy dates all de time.”
“Kyle’s not so bad,” Nonie said.
“No, not bad. But if I was fishin’ and caught dat on my line, I’d throw it back to the water. Find me a bigger, better fish.”
Nonie sat beside her uncle. Being alone with him was very rare. She wanted so much to tell him about Guy. To ask his opinion about what she should do with him. Fezzo had been right, she rarely dated but it was all because of Guy. Not that she felt she’d be cheating on him, but because she knew he’d pull some kind of stupid stunt like he had with Jack and chase the guy away. She knew in her heart that her Uncle Fezzo wouldn’t think she was crazy or make fun of her. His advice would be as real as he could make it.
“Uncle Fezzo?”
“What mon petite?”
“Remember when Buggy came over yesterday?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, she came over to tell me that I could be part of a paranormal investigation scouting group. I’d get paid decent money if we got any evidence. It’s for a show called Something’s Out There.”
“What’s dat a paranormal what you called it?”
“It means we’d go to different places and look for ghosts.” ‘
Fezzo studied her face carefully. “What you think about dat?” he finally asked.
Nonie shrugged. “I’m thinking about doing it. I mean, the money’s good.”
“You know why dey want you to be part of dat group?”
Nonie looked down at the table, unable to keep her eyes on her uncle. “I . . . yeah,” she said simply.
“’Cause you can see de dead, huh?”
She looked up at him, startled. “How did you know?”
Fezzo reached over and patted her arm. “I know from why back when you tried to tell you mama and daddy dat you saw you grandpa the night after his funeral.”
“And you believed what I said was true?”
“Mah, you said it, so I had no other reason to believe it wasn’t de trut’”
“Why didn’t you say something to me then? It would have been nice to know that someone believed me.”
“I know, mon bébé. I didn’t want to cause no fight wit’ you mama and daddy. So nonc just left well enough alone. I figured sooner or later we’d have de chance to talk about it. Now is not dat time though. We gonna have a full house today. We’ll talk about it later, okay?”
All Nonie could do was nod. She still couldn’t believe that after all these years Fezzo had known she saw the dead. Well, her grandfather anyway. She wanted to talk to him about Guy, about her concerns with doing the scouting gig. But he was right, now wasn’t the time for that talk. Soon the funeral home would be packed with people, and with a subject that serious, she wanted, needed more time with her uncle.
“Where’re Dad and Butchy?” Nonie asked, getting her mind off of Guy and the real discussion she wanted to have with Fezzo.
“Well, let’s see—Margaret, her, is in the embalming room with Butchy seeing about Mrs. Trahan. Remember the one we had to pick up last night from the nursing home?”
“Sure, but aren’t we showing her today?”
“No, you daddy talked the family into waiting until tomorrow because he was afraid there’d be too many people with the mayor being here. The Trahans didn’t mind. Dey a small family anyway, so it made them no never mind. Dey gonna have de viewing for Mrs. Trahan in the morning, early ’cause they wanted to get her through the church by eleven. That only gives ‘em a two-hour viewing, but hey,” Fezzo shrugged. “each person got their own way to send off de dead.”
“And what about Dad? Where’s he?”
“Back at his house wit’ you mama. He wanted to wear his black pinstriped suit for the funeral, but you mama say no. De suit would crash wit’ what she wanted to wear.”
“Crash?” Nonie squinted for a second. “Oh, you mean clash.”
“Yeah, dat’s what I said, crash.” And you know how hardheaded you mama can be. If she don’t want him to wear de suit he wants to wear, he’s gonna put on de one she wants him to wear.”
Nonie sighed, wondering if there were other families in Clay Point this dysfunctional.
“Did the Fontenots decide if they were going to run the mayor through church or go fo
r cremation?” Nonie asked.
“Dey gonna do de visiting hours until four dis afternoon, den he’s goin’ to the crematorium. I already called Claude over dere to warn him. You know how de mayor’s wife and kids can be a little coo-coo in the head sometimes. I wanted to warn Claude in case they all decided to show up to watch de burnin.’”
Nonie shivered. “Who on earth would want to watch that?”
“You’d be surprised, mon petite. Some people gotta see so dey know it’s real. Some gotta see just to say dey saw. And others go and just take a peek, like when you pass a wreck on the road. You look and see how bad de cars is messed up but you don’t wanna see no dead bodies.”
“Nonie Marie!” There was no mistaking that heavy-smokers southern drawl. Margaret must have finished in the embalming room. Nonie heard her footsteps hard and heavy on the carpeted floor of the hallway.
“Mah, it looks like our coffee breaks over,” Fezzo said. “De bulldog from Atlanta’s lookin’ for you, and I don’t need her to find me.”
Nonie grinned. “I know you’re not scared of Ms. Margaret.”
“Scared, no. But dat mout’ on her can drive a man to de bottle until it’s empty.” He chuckled. “I’m gonna go check the hearse, make sure it’s all shiny. No fingerprints. Don’t need your mama having another hissy fit over fingerprints on the car.”
As Fezzo left and before Margaret made it into the coffee room, Nonie heard her confront him. “What were you doing in there? It’s not time for coffee or breaks of any kind. The mayor’s family is going to be here in about an hour and a half. Everything needs to look top-notch, shipshape.”
“I’m goin’ shape de ship right now,” Fezzo answered, and it took all Nonie had not to burst out in laughter.
In that moment, Margaret stuck her head in the lounge. “I should have figured you’d be sipping on coffee like you were company. You need to get busy, young lady, before people start arriving.”
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