Amanda sank onto the bed beside him. “We’re going to find him. You’re going to get your brother back. And you do have a friend, me. When this is over, you’re going to make lots more friends. As far as family, I’ll be happy to share mine with you. What with birth family, adoptive family, and in-laws, I’ve got more than enough to share. Off the top, you can have my sister and my mother.”
Dawson gave a small hiccup of a laugh. It was better than nothing. “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass on both of them. Right now having Brendan here makes me feel more secure. He knows a lot about computers. We talk the same language. And he saw the people who took Grant.”
“What the heck,” Amanda said, giving in. “If it makes you feel better, I suppose one more crazy person around here won’t matter.”
To her surprise, Dawson leaned over and gave her a quick hug. “I appreciate all you’re doing to help, Amanda. You are my friend.” He stood and left the room.
A warm spot settled in the middle of Amanda’s chest, a warm spot that had nothing to do with the broiling temperatures outside. If having the goofy little man there made Dawson feel better, she’d do her best to keep him there and see that he didn’t cause any problems.
She followed her young friend back to the living room.
“He did something with Dawson’s computer!” Charley said. “I tried to stop him, but I couldn’t! My hands just went right through him! Don’t ever die, Amanda. It’s not as much fun as you might think.”
Chapter Thirteen
So much for Brendan being harmless. Amanda charged over to where he sat. “What did you do to his computer?”
Dawson gaped at her in surprise. Brendan blinked rapidly behind his thick glasses. He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “I was just looking.”
“Looking at what?”
“I—I wanted to be sure he has enough RAM for my program to run.”
Dawson glanced down at his laptop then back up to Amanda. “How did you know he was on my computer? He wasn’t when I came back to the room, and you were behind me.”
Both men stared at her, waiting for an answer. She looked from one to the other.
Charley laughed. “Time to acknowledge your husband’s help!”
Amanda hovered a hand about an inch above the keyboard of Dawson’s computer, moving it back and forth. “I can feel the energy from his fingertips.”
Dawson put his hand beside hers. “Really? That’s amazing. I can’t feel anything.”
“It’s a talent. Inherited from Grandmother Phoebe.”
Dawson frowned. “That’s your mother’s mother and she isn’t related to you by DNA.”
“Yep. That’s why the talent’s so strange. Look at the time. Why don’t I go pick up some lunch? You boys carry on with whatever you’re doing.”
She grabbed her helmet, jacket and purse and dashed out the door.
Of course Charley followed. “Don’t leave him alone with that nut! I don’t trust him. He was doing a lot more than checking for RAM on Dawson’s computer.”
Amanda laughed. “How would you know what he was doing on the computer? You think RAM is a male sheep!”
“I know about computers. I can go inside them and make the pictures do wonky things. You can’t do that.”
Amanda rolled her eyes. Arguing with Charley was a waste of time and energy.
Her cell phone rang. “Oh, not my mother again!” But this time it was Sunny. Amanda answered as she walked down the stairs.
“Your mother’s on a rampage,” Sunny said.
“Which mother?”
Sunny laughed. “The one who goes on frequent rampages. Seriously, Amanda, she’s worried about you. You haven’t been answering her calls, and your shop’s closed.”
“She went by my shop?”
“She’s worried. She called Irene and me to see if we’d heard from you.”
Amanda pushed through the outside door into the midday heat. “Damn! I hope you told Irene there’s nothing to worry about.” She’d already given her mother-in-law plenty of reason to worry a couple of months ago when she’d stayed with her while trying to prove Roland Kimball was a murderer. The first woman who’d ever baked cookies for her—other than her mother’s various cooks, of course—deserved some peace of mind.
“I told Irene and your mother that I saw you yesterday and we had an uneventful motorcycle ride.”
“Thank you for not telling them about the kidnapping. I don’t want to upset Irene or give Mom so many gray hairs she has to run to her hairdresser. Remember those strange people in the van who were following us? They may have been Grant’s kidnappers.” As she walked around the building and over to her motorcycle in the parking lot, Amanda updated Sunny on the latest developments.
Sunny was silent for a long moment. “You followed a guy who just got out of prison? Do you think it was a good idea to follow a known criminal and spy on him?”
Amanda hesitated. She considered telling Sunny that Charley had actually done most of the following and spying, but after the disaster yesterday of trying to tell her about Charley, she decided not to revisit the topic right then. “I was never in any danger. Well, I need to run. I’m going to pick up lunch for Dawson. Can’t ride and talk on the cell phone at the same time.”
“Amanda, one more thing. About Charley.”
Amanda looked at the ghost in question who was entertaining himself by teasing a small black dog. He darted toward the dog who barked and backed away then, wagging his tail, trotted toward Charley and rolled over to have his tummy rubbed. Her ex could never get a role in a scary ghost movie.
“What about Charley?”
He turned at the sound of his name. “Dogs and cats can see me. Maybe I’m getting more real.” The dog stood up and extended a paw toward his hand.
“You said some things that concerned me.” Sunny’s voice was quiet. Worried.
“Can we talk about this another time? It’s okay. I’m perfectly sane. Well, as sane as I’ve ever been.”
Sunny laughed softly. “Okay, we’ll talk later. Just be careful and remember I’m here when you need me. And please call your mother before she drives us all crazy.”
Amanda disconnected, shoved the phone in her jacket pocket then sighed and took it out again. She dialed her mother’s number and breathed a sigh of relief when the call went straight to voice-mail. “You’ve reached Beverly Caulfield’s phone,” her mother’s slow, precise voice informed her.
Amanda drummed her fingers on the seat of her bike as she waited for the message to finish and get to the beep. Too bad there wasn’t a way to fast forward through messages longer than ten words. Amanda’s own was, This is Amanda. Leave a message, and she was thinking about taking out the This is Amanda part.
“I’m not available at the moment,” her mother’s voice continued, “but if you’ll leave a message, I promise I’ll call you back at my first opportunity. In the meantime, I hope you have a wonderful day.”
“Hi, Mom. It’s Amanda Caulfield. Dad probably told you that’s my official name these days. You can put it on the invitations or leave it off. Just don’t put Amanda Randolph on them. Do whatever else you think needs to be done. You have proxy for my vote. My shop’s closed because I’m taking a few days off. Hanging out with friends. Learning new uses for aluminum foil. Bye.” That should keep her mother happy for a while, thinking Amanda was doing something that involved making cute little decorations using aluminum foil. Anything was more acceptable in her eyes than motorcycle repair.
*~*~*
Almost an hour later Amanda made it back to Dawson’s apartment with a couple of boxes of chicken and French fries strapped to the sissy bar on her bike. She swept the kick stand down with a savage motion, climbed from the bike and yanked off her helmet. “What did you think you were doing? Why did you make all the chicken go stone cold so they had to fry up another batch?”
“I didn’t do it on purpose. It looked and smelled so good, I just wanted to see if I could taste
it, and you know what, Amanda? I could! It was almost like eating. Surely you don’t begrudge me a little taste of fried chicken after all these months of having nothing to eat or drink.”
“If we go to a winery, are you going to dive into one of the barrels and stop the fermentation process with your cold just so you can have a taste of wine?”
“Would that be red wine or white wine?”
“Amanda, who are you talking to?”
She gasped and whirled around to see Jake and Ross watching her from a few feet away. “How did you get here?”
Ross arched a dark brow and indicated the faded blue sedan parked at one end of the lot. “We drove in that. Just like yesterday.”
Jake studied her, his forehead creasing as he squinted against the overhead sun. “We were getting out of the car when we saw you pull up. Everything okay? You sounded a little upset just now.”
“Everything’s fine.” Yeah, everything was just fine if you didn’t consider the fact that she couldn’t go anywhere without her psycho ex-husband’s psycho ghost. “I bought chicken.” She turned and began removing the straps that held the food to her sissy bar. Perhaps fried chicken could distract them from trying to figure out what she meant when she’d asked the apparently empty air about stopping the fermentation of wine.
“Smells great,” Jake said.
“It really does,” Ross agreed. “I just ate, but I think I could still manage a piece of chicken.”
“See?” Charley darted past her. “Either of them would have done the same thing I did. The smell of fried chicken is irresistible.”
“Let me carry that for you.” Jake took the sack from her as she struggled with balancing the food and her helmet.
“And I’ll take your helmet,” Ross offered.
“You two are such gentlemen.” And, fortunately, easily distracted from the subject of her conversation with a ghost.
Charley snorted.
“So how’s Dawson doing?” Jake asked as they headed toward the front of the building.
“Oh, yeah, I probably should warn you. Brendan came over while I was following Nick, and by the time I got back, he and Dawson had bonded and put aluminum foil on all the windows.”
Jake and Ross both came to an abrupt halt.
“Aluminum foil on the windows?” Ross repeated.
“You were following Nick?” Jake asked.
“You’re in trouble,” Charley taunted.
“I’ll explain on the way upstairs.” Amanda continued to the front door of the building.
As they climbed the steps, she told them about following Nick to work and about Brendan.
“He shouldn’t be looking at Dawson’s computer,” Jake said. “We don’t want him possibly messing up whatever’s on there. I wish you hadn’t left them alone.”
“See how it feels when you make one little mistake and get chewed out about it?” Charley’s words were a cold breeze in her right ear.
“At least I didn’t freeze the chicken.”
“What?” Jake asked.
“I said, I had to go get the chicken.” She stepped onto the third landing and over to Dawson’s door then knocked loudly.
Dawson opened the door. His eyes were still bloodshot, and he was still twitching from the Red Bull. However, he looked marginally better than she’d seen him look over the past two days. Maybe Brendan was having a positive effect on him. “I’m glad you’re back. Brendan’s helping me search for the program.”
Amanda cringed. “You told him?”
“I didn’t know what else to do. We need all the help we can get.” Dawson bit his lip. “We’re running out of time. Brendan’s brilliant with a computer.” He stepped back to allow them to enter. “Brendan, this is Amanda’s cousin Jake and his friend Ross.”
At least he hadn’t told Brendan that Jake and Ross were cops.
“Hi, Brendan,” Amanda said. “What’s up?”
From his seat at the table in front of one of the laptops, Brendan regarded her solemnly. “Dawson’s in grave danger. The aliens murdered his parents and stole his brother. Dawson’s the only surviving heir to the throne of the entire Alpha Centauri star system.”
Dawson shrugged and looked a little abashed, but the corners of his mouth tilted upward in a small, tentative smile. That smile cinched it for Amanda. If the tin man could help Dawson get through this, then she was all for him.
“I brought some fried chicken. Would you like to join us for lunch?”
“Are you crazy, Amanda?” Charley demanded. “I can’t believe you invited that nut to eat with us! We need to get him out of here, not feed him!”
Jake said nothing, but as he plopped the boxes of food in the middle of the table, he gave her a look that echoed Charley’s words.
Amanda found paper plates in the kitchen and passed them around while Dawson returned his attention to one of the computers on the table. She put a drumstick and fries on the plate beside his laptop. “Eat.”
“I’m not hungry.” He picked up his Red Bull can and tilted it to his lips, tipped it all the way, then frowned and slid his chair back.
“If you want another Red Bull, you have to eat.”
Again it worked. Without protest Dawson picked up the drumstick.
While everyone except Charley ate, Brendan talked, telling a convoluted, rambling tale of evil aliens who forced Dawson’s parents to flee to earth where they killed them and now had kidnapped Dawson’s brother. Amanda made no effort to pay attention to the bad science fiction story. Apparently psychoses did not make for coherent plot lines.
In the silence that followed, only crunching could be heard. Even Charley had no response to the incredible tale.
“You and your brother are the last of the line, aren’t you, Dawson?” Brendan asked. “You don’t have any descendants, do you?”
Dawson gulped and set down his empty plate. “Descendants? No, no descendants. Grant was my only family.” The color drained from his face as he seemed to realize what he’d said. “I mean, is. Grant is my family.”
“Of course he is.” Amanda stood and picked up her plate then Dawson’s. “Grant’s your family, and he’s going to be home with you soon.” She tried to make her tone firm, ordering him to believe just as she’d successfully ordered him to eat.
Jake rose also and picked up his and Ross’ plates. Amanda added Brendan’s to her stack and started for the kitchen. Jake followed.
He opened the pantry door, lifted the lid of the trash can and dumped his plates inside then held it for Amanda. As she approached, he moved closer, so close she could feel the heat from his body. Was her heart beating faster? Of course not!
He moved his lips so close to her ear she could feel his warm breath. She was pretty sure then that her heart was beating faster. “If you don’t get rid of that nut job, I will, and I won’t be nice about it,” he whispered then turned away and went back to the living room.
“You thought he was going to whisper sweet nothings in your ear, didn’t you?” Charley taunted.
She glared at him, making a mental note to say something mean to him later.
“All right, folks,” she said, walking into the living room and bringing her hands together with a loud clap, “time for a little after-lunch nap.”
“Nap?” Dawson repeated. “We don’t have time for a nap.”
Amanda walked over to him and took away his latest can of Red Bull. “Yes, the prince of Alpha Centauri is going to lie down and rest for a while. He’s been up all night. I don’t care if you sleep or not, Dawson, but you need to rest.” How many times during her youth had she heard that speech from her mother? “Brendan, you can come back over after the prince has his nap.”
Brendan rose uncertainly. Amanda put her hand on Dawson’s shoulder to keep him from rising too.
“Thanks for the chicken, Mrs., uh, Amanda.”
Yeah, she was obviously sounding like a bossy mother.
Brendan looked at Jake and Ross who made no effort to stand
or to explain why they were staying when he had to go.
“My cousin and his friend are going to watch over Dawson while he takes a nap so the bad men from Alpha Centauri can’t hurt him.”
Brendan shrugged and looked at Dawson. “I’ll come over later and bring some shielding material for your walls. Hang tight, buddy.”
Dawson gave him a thumbs-up. “Thanks.”
Jake opened the door for Brendan to leave, closed the door behind him then held a finger to his lips until they heard the soft sound of Brendan’s door closing.
“Why did you do that?” Dawson demanded. “Why did you make him leave? He was helping!”
“We have some things to talk about that he doesn’t need to hear.” Jake turned one of the deadbolts on the door and moved over to sit in a chair at the table.
Amanda took the chair next to Dawson and laid her hand over his. “You do realize that guy’s talking crazy.”
Dawson scowled. “Of course I know that. But he’s very knowledgeable about computers. He knows as much as I do. That means we can search twice as fast.”
Jake ran a hand through his hair and shook his head. “You’ve been running and hiding from people for two years, and suddenly you trust a nut job?”
Dawson looked at Amanda. “I trusted her and that worked out. Then she forced me to trust you and Ross.”
Amanda grinned. “So what’s one more nut job, huh?”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
Amanda patted his hand. “It’s okay. I get it. You need all the help you can get right now.”
“Yes, I do. I think Brendan’s okay. I mean, he can’t be involved with the kidnappers because he’s too, um, unstable.”
Jake nodded. “I guess that’s one way to look at it, but I’m not sure you want to let someone so unstable have access to your computer right now.”
Dawson bit his bottom lip and drew in a deep breath. “Noted. But we only have five hours until they start—” he swallowed— “until they start taking off Grant’s fingers.”
“We’re working some leads,” Jake said. “I’m going to Dallas Regional State Prison to meet with Steven Lowell, the real grandson, at two o’clock and see what I can find out about Nick Farner.”
The Ex Who Glowed in the Dark (Charley's Ghost) Page 11