Shallow Grave (The Lazarus Codex Book 3)

by E. A. Copen

  An electronic chime sang as I pushed open the door. Inside, the air smelled musty, dusty and faintly of orange wood polish. Glass cases lined the walls, giving the place an even more crowded feel. Every inch of space on the wall was also covered in everything from old guitars to chainsaws and electronics.

  The fellow at the cash register was an older man with a white mustache and silver hair. He kept both his hands on top of the glass case in front of him, beady eyes focused hard on me. “Can I help you, sir?”

  “Yeah, a friend of mine came in here and sold a few things. I’d like to buy them back on his behalf if you still have them.”

  The man grunted. “Depends on how long ago this friend of yours was in. Ain’t had much business this week. Bought more than I sold.”

  “Squirrely guy,” I said, closing on the register. “Frizzy redhead. Thin as a rail. Glasses. Said he gave you a ukulele and some golf clubs?”

  “And an opal ring.” He nodded. “Yeah, I remember him. Wait just a sec while I pull up his receipt. Why don’t you have a look around? You a gun fella? Got some real nice pieces in.”

  I frowned. Louisiana was gun country, and every time gun legislation comes up, voters nixed any chance of restricting ownership except to one class of people: felons. Since my conviction also included assault on a police officer, I’d already been deemed a violent felon when I was put away, which meant no guns for me ever. Not that I wanted one. Guns were for killing, and I wasn’t fond of doing that, even when necessary.

  While the shop owner went about fighting with his computer to pull up the record of Nate’s transaction, I wandered away from the guns and went to look at the jewelry. The shop had a whole case of gold, silver, and diamonds in every cut for dirt cheap. A guy could get everything from engagement rings to earrings there, but I wasn’t looking for anything like that. It was way too soon to even look at the rings, and I wasn’t even sure Beth had her ears pierced. I had seen her wearing necklaces before though, so I walked down the glass case until I found a small display of those. Most were gold and out of my price range, but one caught my eye.

  The necklace was a deep shade of amber with teardrop-shaped beads. In the very center, an extra bead hung from the first, drawing the eye down to a single point. The warm color suited Beth’s skin tone more than any of the silver or gold on display, but the price was just a little more than I wanted to spend. Maybe I could haggle.

  The shop owner returned, carrying a wooden ukulele, a ring box, and a golf bag full of clubs. He slid a paper over the counter toward me and recited the total, which would wipe out just about everything I had until Mrs. Lawrence paid me. I’d have enough left to pay for dinner and drinks, and that was it.

  I looked up from eyeing the total. “This much for golf clubs, a ring, and a ukulele?”

  His bottom lip stuck out, and he leaned one arm against the glass case. “That’s how much I loaned him plus taxes and fees. If you can’t afford it, I’ll just keep it.”

  “No, it’s just…” I eyed the necklace. It really was the perfect gift, and I was going to meet Mrs. Lawrence right after my stop at the pawn shop. As long as she paid me what she owed me, I wouldn’t even notice. “I want the necklace too. The red one.”

  His eyes got big, and he looked down at the string of amber beads. “That necklace? Are you sure?”

  “Why? Is something wrong with it?”

  “No,” he said a little too quickly and then covered with a smile. “I mean, no, it’s just been here for quite a while, is all. One could say it adds a little character to the place. But then, perhaps a little character is what you need, friend.”

  The way he was acting put me on edge and made me think twice about purchasing the necklace, but I wouldn’t have time to stop anywhere else, and nothing else in the store was such a good fit. Maybe there’s a flaw in one of the stones. Or maybe he’s just a little crazy, I thought. Or maybe he’s picked up on who and what I am. That’d explain the sudden nervousness.

  Just in case, I thought I’d turn on the Soul Vision I’d acquired when I became the Pale Horseman. Aside from the low body temp, the ability to interact with souls was the one perk of the job. Human, fae, or god, it didn’t matter who you were, as long as you had a soul I could see and touch it. Though I normally didn’t try to touch souls. The one time I had, I’d put a guy into a coma I was pretty sure he was still in. Removing the soul didn’t do good things to a living person either. Or, at least it didn’t to a god. I’d never tried to take a person’s soul. The very idea that I could creeped me out and I had no reason to make the attempt. Any living person was still using their soul as far as I was concerned, and I had no right to it.

  Under my Vision, the pawn shop owner’s soul glowed a bright, pulsating white. Human. I blinked and turned off the Vision. Maybe I was just paranoid. After everything that had happened lately, I couldn’t blame myself. Any sane person has a healthy dose of paranoia, and if they don’t, they don’t stay sane long. Or alive.

  “You okay?”

  I blinked and refocused on the shopkeeper. “Yeah, why?”

  “It’s just…” He pointed to his eyes. “Your eyes. They sorta went out of focus for a minute and… Never mind. Here, let me get this wrapped up for you.”

  The pawn shop owner put the necklace in a nice case and wrapped it up for me before putting it in a plastic bag along with the ring. The ukulele wound up shoved in a much larger bag, and I carried the clubs out on my shoulder in their bag.

  In the parking lot, I struggled to get the golf clubs into the back seat of my new-to-me car. It wasn’t as big as my Accord, which was saying something as part of the Accord’s appeal was its small size meant low gas consumption. I hadn’t been able to find anything else that compared at an attractive price, so I settled for one of those new Smart Cars. Two seats, limited storage, but cheap. I’d gotten mine used for next to nothing. Best of all, unlike lots of modern cars, the Smart Car had a big steel cage frame that flying alligators would have a tougher time pulling apart. At least, that’s the theory. Fitting golf clubs in the tiny space behind the seats, however, was impossible.

  As I stood, wiggling the golf bag in between the front seat and the dash, a cold chill settled over me. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, and I got the distinct feeling I was being watched. I stopped wrestling with the golf bag and turned around, searching the empty parking lot. It was a small lot in a popular area, but there weren’t many cars immediately within view. Of the ones I could see, all looked empty. A quick scan of the windows nearby showed the same. I was alone in the parking lot, despite what my senses were telling me.

  I saw him when I turned back to my car, just sort of floating there over the bag I’d tossed behind the seats. He was squished between the rear of the vehicle and the front seat, or rather should’ve been. His shoulder protruded out the other side and nearly into the steering wheel. For a ghost, he looked remarkably solid. Whereas most ghosts appeared in muted grays and faded colors, this one wore a navy blue jacket with wide, pointed lapels and brass buttons, a blood red shirt underneath. A matching crimson feather stuck out of his dark, wide-brimmed hat with its one corner turned up.

  He crossed his arms and turned toward me, dark, well-trimmed mustache twitching. “Wanker.”

  I blinked, not knowing which was more impressive, that the ghost had spoken to me, or that he’d done it in French. My French isn’t so great, but it’s one of those things you just pick up living in New Orleans, especially when you want to impress girls. And like any other language learned in grade school, the areas I was most confident in were swears and slurs.

  “Um, hi.”

  His eyes went wide, and his jaw dropped. “You can see me?”

  “Hear you too. Comes with being a necromancer. Now, if you’ll kindly get out of my car…”

  The ghost launched into a frantic spattering of French. I might know a few words here and there, but only if I really think hard, and if the other guy is speaking slowly, which he d
idn’t seem inclined to do. “Hold on there,” I said shifting the clubs so they’d lean out the window. “Je ne parle pas Français.”

  “Obviously,” said the ghost, rolling his eyes. “You don’t need the ne in there, imbécile, not when speaking aloud. You only write that. And you need to enunciate.” He made a flamboyant gesture to his throat alongside the word enunciate. Just like my sixth-grade French teacher.

  “Well, do you mind if this imbécile drives and we chat at the same time? I don’t want to be late meeting my client.” I wasn’t too keen on driving around town with a ghost in the back of my car, but I didn’t really have much of a choice, not if I wanted to get to my meeting with Mrs. Lawrence in time.

  The ghost looked around, a single skeptical eyebrow raised. “Drive? This? But where are your horses?”

  Great. Just my luck that I’d get stuck with an old ghost who didn’t understand modernity when I didn’t have time to explain it to him. I made sure the passenger door was secure, then walked around to get into the driver’s side. When I reached for the button to turn the engine over, an icy chill shot through my shoulder. I turned and eyed the half of the ghost that was sticking through the seat and into my back. “You mind?”

  He shifted so his shoulders weren’t in my personal space.

  With a satisfied grunt, I pressed the button, and the car started up. We eased out onto the road, me trying to ignore the surprised sounds the ghost was making behind me. Had there been anyone else in the car, they probably wouldn’t have heard or seen him, but just my luck, seeing ghosts came with the necromancer gig sometimes. It didn’t happen often, mostly because it took an immense amount of willpower for a ghost to materialize enough that I could see them without trying, but when it did, I found the best thing to do was ignore the annoying ones. Case in point, the old French ghost cursing right behind my head.

  It was dusk when I pulled out onto the main street in the Quarter. There’s nothing more beautiful than driving into the city as the natural lights fade and the artificial ones come on. Under the light, soft edges blur. Things normally separated by light and shadow swirl together, becoming one. Even the unyielding concrete and steel of day softens under the glow.

  But where there was light, there was also shadow. My last run-in with the fae had made me wary of shadows, fearful in the same way a child might be of the monster in their closet. Dark things moved in the shadows, the only weapon against them pure light, which was why I’d begun carrying a flashlight everywhere I went. My hand slid to my waist thoughtlessly and found only my belt. Dammit, I’d forgotten to grab it on my way out.

  An icy ball settled in my chest, cold enough that my lungs seized and my muscles stiffened. I gasped, tightened my grip on the steering wheel, and looked down to see the ghost’s head sticking through my ribcage, examining the steering column. “No wind, no wheels, no clip-clop of hooves. How does one make it go?”

  “Personal space,” I wheezed.

  The ghost’s head spun around, so he was looking up at me. “Oh please. Don’t be so dramatic.”

  I slammed my foot onto the brake, drawing blaring horns from behind me. With the heavy traffic, I was lucky I didn’t get rear-ended straight away, but at least the sudden stop sent the ghost out of me and into the windshield in a blast of cold. He hit the glass and rolled off to sprawl over the other half of the car, shifting the clubs aside.

  Wait, that wasn’t right. Ghosts could pass straight through most solid objects. Usually not anything with a high iron composition like the frame of the car, but the glass shouldn’t have been a problem. Another car horn blared, reminding me that I should wait until later to sort out ghost physics. I jerked the steering wheel to the right and slid into a narrow parallel parking spot.

  “Okay,” I demanded of the ghost, “let’s get this over with. Who are you and what do you want?”

  He sat up, adjusted his hat and dusted off his shirt before muscling into the seat beside the golf clubs. “Je m'appelle Capitaine Jean Laffite.” He gestured to himself with a smug grin.

  “You’re Jean Laffite? As in the notorious pirate who saved New Orleans Jean Laffite?”

  “Oui.”

  “Never heard of you.”

  His mustache twitched as he curled his upper lip into a scowl. “Impossible. You just said you knew me.”

  “Yeah, well, history wasn’t exactly my favorite subject. If you are Jean Laffite—and I’m not saying you are, because I know ghosts can lie—then that’s pretty much all I know about you other than the tourist crap they peddle. Most of that’s false anyway.” I hit the turn signal and eased out in traffic.

  “You don’t believe me?”

  “Ok, let’s think about this logically.” I was more talking to myself than my ghostly passenger, but it helped to organize my thoughts out loud. “Everyone knows Jean Laffite died off the coast of Mexico. Ghosts tend to haunt the places they died. New Orleans is not off the coast of Mexico. Ergo, you cannot be the ghost of Jean Laffite.”

  “I may have been dead two hundred years, but I’m still relatively certain ghosts themselves aren’t logical.” He crossed his arms.

  “Good point. Okay, let’s say you are him. What do you want with me?”

  Like everyone living in and around New Orleans, I’d heard the stories. Everyone said Jean Laffite buried some treasure near the city, though no one could agree on where. Treasure hunters from all over the globe had combed the city, occasionally turning up Spanish doubloons or something of value, but no true treasure had ever been found. That didn’t stop the legend from circulating, and it didn’t stop more treasure hunters from showing up year after year in search of something that didn’t exist.

  I figured this ghost was just confused, maybe the ghost of one of those treasure hunters or maybe just one that had gone crazy. That happened sometimes. Usually, that meant the ghost became violent and dangerous, but I figured it was equally possible that they could suffer from a sort of senility that left them with no real idea of who they were.

  The ghost frowned. “My story is a long but exciting one. It begins—”

  I cut him off by holding up a finger. “On second thought, could you hold off on that just a bit? We’re almost to Mrs. Lawrence’s house, and I don’t want to have to interrupt you once you get going. This sounds like it’s going to be quite the tale.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me.

  I ignored him and pulled into the driveway of a quaint little two-bedroom bungalow on the edge of a nice gentrified neighborhood. The sun was officially down now with only the faintest hint of orange glow in the sky and long, dark shadows everywhere. Without my flashlight, the short walk between my car and the front door to ring the bell was going to feel like miles.

  “What’s the matter? I thought you were in a hurry,” said the ghost.

  “I am.” I can do this. It’s only a little dark. Besides, you killed the monsters who could move through shadows. Then again, you also discovered any member of the Shadow Court could move the same way… Not exactly the comforting pep talk I’d meant to give myself.

  I sat there, talking myself into getting out of the car for another few minutes before I finally convinced myself it was only going to get darker the longer I waited and opened my door. As I took my next step, I realized my shoe was untied and dropped to the pavement to remedy the problem.

  That’s when the window exploded behind me.

  In a panic, I threw myself to the ground face first and covered my head. Whatever had blown the windows out of my car had already happened, and the move wouldn’t protect me, but certain protective gestures are just ingrained in the human body. After a moment, I realized I should do something other than sit there and wait for whatever had happened to my car to happen to me and pushed myself up.

  A high-pitched yipping cut through the night air, the sound belonging to some small dog that didn’t know it wasn’t a Doberman. A black shadow dropped from the rooftop and into the bushes beside Mrs. Lawrence’s house. I darted af
ter it, rounding the side of the house just as the porch light came on. Garbage cans tumbled and something billowy and black disappeared around the corner to the backyard. I tried to sprint around the garbage but stepped on my untied shoelace and wound up tripping instead. Arms flailing, I only barely managed to keep my face from hitting the sidewalk. The trip cost me valuable time. When I came around the corner, I found the backyard empty.

  I checked the bushes and around the other side of the house, but there was nothing.

  Whoever had been running from me was gone.

  Chapter Four

  I went back to the car to check the damage. The driver’s side window was shattered with only remnants of glass left in place. Whatever had crashed through it had also bored through the passenger window on the other side. I found a neat perfectly round hole there. A bullet hole.

  Jean floated up next to me. “You’re a lucky fellow. Half a second earlier and that would’ve caught your head.”

  I sighed and looked around for the bullet. It would’ve gone into the ground somewhere, but in the dark, I couldn’t tell where. I hadn’t even heard the shot. Dammit, who had I pissed off this time?

  The dog yapping intensified, and Mrs. Lawrence’s screen door opened. A brown terrier sprinted out the door, down the steps, and to the edge of the pavement where it stood, barking furiously at Jean.

  “Mr. Kerrigan? Is that you?” Mrs. Lawrence was a little old lady with bad eyesight in the day. She was practically blind at night, for which I was thankful. At least I wouldn’t have to explain what’d happened to my car.

  “Yes, Mrs. Lawrence. I’ll be right there.” Even though she couldn’t see, I waved to her. Never hurts to be polite.

  She smiled and bobbed her head, adjusting the bifocals on a chain that rested on her hunched over shoulders.

  I moved aside the golf clubs and grabbed her husband’s urn from the floor of my car while she yelled for her dog, Tinkles. The dog growled at me as I approached, but stopped to sniff my shoe. Tinkles let out a frightened whine and ran straight back to Mrs. Lawrence.