Gabby’s Haunted House
Culinary Cozy Mystery
(Book 5)
LORRIE BANNETT
Copyright 2015
All Right Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
…Synopsis…
At that point, she didn’t know what the heck she was going to do. As a matter of fact, things seemed to be getting out of hand. Every shred of evidence was pointing in one direction, but her gut was telling her to follow the exact opposite. She held up the gun and pointed at her face. Gabby was shaking all over the place. She had never used a gun for a very long time and not on an elderly person.
“If you are going to shoot me, then I suggest you got over and done with.”
“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be used against you in a court of law.”
“Come on Gabby. I have been silent all these years. What makes you think I will say a damn thing? Yes, I think you are right. I have the right to remain silent. Everything I say will most definitely be used against me ha-ha. You have nothing on me.”
Gabby smiled. She had Martha Reese where she wanted to have her, and now, there was nothing she could do to get off this hook. She unfolded her clenched fist and revealed a radio. The sight of the recorder wiped the evil smile that Martha had on her face.
“I think I have all I need to put you behind bars away for several years.”
Table of Contents
Chapter 1:
Chapter 2:
Chapter 3:
Chapter 4:
Chapter 5:
Chapter 6:
Chapter 7:
Chapter 8:
Note from Author
Chapter 1:
-Studying the crime scene-
The police got to Gabby’s place in record time. And this time round, they brought in more police officers just to make sure that if anything popped up, they would have all the necessary muscle to handle the situation. After the discovery of strange areas of that house, many of the police officers had taken an interest in the house as well as the queer history that it had.
And for that matter, they thought it would be a great idea if they just kicked back and made sure that they were in a position to understand whatever the heck they were dealing with at the moment. And this made sure that they were doing lots of research on the house and all of the queerness around it.
Getting to learn all about the strange disappearances only made things worse since at that moment, nobody wanted to be involved with the house. The circumstances surrounding the disappearances was just too darn strange and scary at the same time.
The commander was also present in the wee hours of the morning and didn’t want to get in the middle of any damn thing. Yes, he was pissed at the fact that Gabby was always finding all of these queer stuff in the middle of the night, having to spoil everyone’s sleep in the name of investigations. And Gabby knew all about it since it was written all over his long face.
“Come on partner, cheer up a little. You know as much as I do that you will get the credit for combining a task force that was able to put to rest a case that had been a puzzle for so many years. And we also both know just how much you love the attention.”
“I know, and that is why I am here. But at the end of the day, I still don’t like whatever history this house has. I know you already have done all the research, and you know what I am talking about, right? For all I know we might be playing house with ghosts. Oh, that is you. You might be playing house with ghosts. My bad.”
That was a joke alright. But Gabby didn’t find it funny at all. If anything, she thought that the commander was just mean, and that didn’t go down well with her. She hated the fact that the commander always found ways to kill her enthusiasm. And that was one thing that she wanted him to be well aware.
“You are such a killjoy. You know too damn well that we are on the right track. And even if the ghosts are a part of this, we will find them and read them their Miranda rights without a moments’ hesitation.”
“You know I am a superstitious man. You keep affirming the ghost rumors, and I will round up my equally superstitious staff and abandon you like the disciple did Jesus. Oh snap, what was his name again?”
“Judas?”
“Yes, Iscariot!”
“Iscariot didn’t abandon Jesus. He betrayed him.”
“Same difference.”
The funny part about the argument was that these two didn’t even know what they were talking about since they were the least religious people in the police force. It was a good thing that they were making jokes despite the gravity of the situation. It was a good thing because Gabby managed to keep her head from the very stressful situation.
At the moment, she didn’t know what the heck she was going to do. She had spent a fortune in that mansion that nobody would want now that the media was starting to get whiff of this developing story.
“On a lighter note, how on earth do you think the media got a hold of this story?”
“I think one of the neighbors might have tipped them. And with all the hustle and bustle that your little haunted house has been having, it's very difficult for it to evade the interest of the media as well as the general public. It has a yellow tape outside for crying out loud.”
“Can you please stop referring to my house as haunted? You are starting to scare me.”
“I am sorry. Oh, here comes the forensics guy, let us ask some questions.”
But from the look of things, the forensics guy was headed towards them. And so they didn’t need to call after him. his face was long, and her had tiny droplets of sweat were seen on his forehead, some of which was forming little rivers that trailed down to his bushy eyebrows right before spilling over his brows. But that didn’t seem to bother him as much as it bothered Gabby and the commander. His lab coat also had patches of mud.
“What is going on Sanders? You don’t look good son.”
“You are right commander. I don’t look good. I think this place is haunted.”
Gabby almost died. She was fed up with people refereeing to her house as haunted though to some extent, she too was starting to suspect that maybe they were right. Some things weren’t just normal to begin with, and the fact that her cat was behaving in a very strange way just topped it all up. But she decided to swallow her anger and choke on the harsh reply that she had for Sanders.
“What makes you think the house is haunted?” the commander asked, right before giving Gabby that naughty look of victory. The look that Gabby efficiently ignored.
“The aura down there is just too spooky. Anyway, we have examined the body and what is strange is that when we dug it out of the concrete, we found it intact, only that the different parts belonged to different people. Of instance, the head, the frame, the arms, and legs all belonged to different people.”
“I am afraid am not following. What on earth are you talking about?” the commander asked with a cocked eyebrow.”
Sanders was clearly having a very difficult time trying his level best to stay calm. And this made both Gabby and the commander to feel a little bit concerned. Sanders had been working on so many crime scenes including some that were fresher and much ghastlier than this but never seemed to be this anxious.
“What I am trying to say is that this house must have been some temple in the late thirties. These kinds of rituals were very salient during such times, and that is why I am very uncomfortable working down there, who knew what kind of curses exist down there. It's just too darn freakish.”<
br />
Now Sanders was starting to sound like a teenage girl. And if he wasn’t smart enough to leave at that very instance, she was going to get blasted by Gabby, who had had enough of his cry baby antics.
“Why won't your forensics people get it together? I don’t think I will ever be kind enough to serve you with cookies when you come back here. And that is a promise.”
“Who said we want your haunted cookies?” the commander said right before taking a huge bite from the cookie he had on his hand.
Gabby clenched her teeth and waved her fist as the commander so cleverly moved away from where they had been standing for almost twenty minutes. He was doing such a fine job taking Gabby’s head out of the current situation with his flimsy jokes and for that, Gabby was thankful. But from the look of things, her mind just couldn’t escape that current situation.
She was scared to the core and needed this nightmare gone from her forever.
Chapter 2:
-Back to the drawing board-
A fortnight after the remains had been unearthed; the entire team gathered in the conference room in the NYPD base to discuss the findings. It was also a very good thing for them to carry out investigations on the disappearances that had been reported, but nobody was interested in making a follow-up.
And in just two weeks, the kind of information that they got was way too much. The information ranged from a bunch of people not wanting to give full details to the police who had the balls to investigate for fear that the ghosts would haunt them to those who came up with exaggerated tales just to make it to the papers.
But the commander took it all up. They didn’t want to leave any stone unturned or else they weren’t going to put this baby to sleep. The cases seemed to have been ranging from between the thirties and the most recent one happening only a decade ago.
But from the look of things, it seemed as though the police didn’t want to pursue the cases after way too many people started coming up with fake stories, even to the point that the real ones started sounding like fiction especially when someone threw in a ghost or anything to do with the supernatural world.
And once the commander had made sure that everyone was in the room, he took to the podium and got to kick start his speech. One thing about the commander that made him fit for that position was the fact that he had an amazing speech. Many a times Gabby would be heard making fun of him telling the commander that he had landed in the wrong career path, that he should have become a pastor or something within those lines.
“I know this work is way too much and irrelevant, as I had heard some of you gossip. But this is what we do people – get justice for each and everyone and ensuring that the rest of the population is safe. And that said, I will need all of us to get a little bit more serious with the way we are getting to handle this case. Our very own is in the middle of this and, therefore, it makes this case personal to me. And you all know the drill – if I take a case personally, then all of you should at the end of the day.
“Those remains belong to six different people, and we need to find out their killer. I know as much as the rest of you do that the killer couldn’t be the same one. And this means that this ritual was inherited. And if the latter is the case, then we should be having some young killers having a really good time killing people out there. And those are the ones we need to catch.
“Also, this is the reason I told all of you to get the files of the cold cases. Get to study them and once you are done, get to pick one that will get you all sorted out without a doubt. Are we clear on that?”
Everyone was very attentive as the commander gave his speech. Some of the agents could be seen jotting down little notes in chicken scratch right before they reconnected with the orator. The commander did like the way things were coming up and, needless to say, wound up by asking them if there was anyone who had any queries or concerns.
“I have one question, sir. Why is it that we aren’t asking the neighbors any questions at the moment?”
“That’s a very good question Agent Howard. The only reason we are not asking the neighbors any questions yet is because we are back on the drawing board. We just can’t go out there and start asking people questions we don’t even know. We need to study this case first before we can embark on the questioning. That way, we will be in a position to just kick back and know the right questions to ask. Are we clear on that? Good. Any other question?”
But from the look of things, the agents hard fully understood what they were supposed to do. And for that matter, the commander didn’t want to hold them back. As a matter of fact, he needed them out in the field trying to get some answers at the end of the day.
Gabby was sitting there following the proceedings as usual. She had ordered the copies of all the files that the police task force had found with the intention of having her very own research. She also had made a formal request for the results since she wanted to countercheck the results with those that she would have found about missing persons.
That way, it was going to be much easier for her to identify the missing people who might have been the victims at the end of the day.
The police, as well as the forensics team, could have done so in a matter of days, but Gabby didn’t want to wait for a couple of days to pass. She wanted to have this nightmare gone from her life. She couldn’t help but think about the words that Martha Reese had told her earlier on and needless to say, she wanted to hear so much more about what she had to say about the bodies.
“What are you thinking about?” the commander asked her, bringing her back from cloud cuckoo land.
“Well, I have this neighbor. She is very old and seems to have lots of information about this house. I think if we have her brought over and asked a couple of questions, we will have a lot of answers that we would have otherwise hustled very hard to get. Don’t you think?”
The commander was a little bit hesitant. It looked as though he didn’t think this was a great idea. Gabby had known him for a very long time to know whatever the heck he was thinking. And this time round, it didn’t seem as though this was the most brilliant idea. And Gabby wanted to know why because she thought hers was the best idea.
“I think we need to get to the bottom of this right before we start asking the wrong questions to the wrong people. Let our people do the research. And once they are done, we will have a meeting, and we will pick out the people we need to question first.
“That is how we handle cold cases. You are good at going to missions and stuff like that, I am a specialist when it comes to solving cases and finding motives. That is why we made such an incredible team back in the day. So, can you trust me with this one?”
“Ok fine, I will trust you with this one, but if my instinct is going to kick off, you know there is nothing I can do to try and stop myself.”
“And nobody is going to try and stop you, girl. Do your thing. Just make sure that you aren’t breaking any laws. And that means you call me when you are thinking about bending them. Is that clear?”
“Crystal.”
“Good. Now fetch me some cookies.”
Gabby smiled. It was clear that the commander fell in love with her cookies years back, and that was his way to remind her. Nobody could blame him, though. The only other thing that Gabby was great at doing apart from being a kickass police officer was baking cookies. That explained why Henry was such a big cat.
Chapter 3:
-Henry’s behavior-
Henry had been awfully relaxed ever since the bodies had been retrieved. And for a moment, Gabby had thought everything was back to normal. Each and every time she got home from work, the cat was always there to greet her. It was how Gabby had imagined her couple months to retirement. And now that she was getting that kind of life, she didn’t want to let it go.
To some point, even Gabby herself had forgotten all about the incidents to the point where she started to believe that her cat was demon possessed.
As a way of showing gratitude for h
er cats amazing reformation, Gabby made sure that she was making some sweetened cookies for Henry and let him enjoy them with some skimmed milk. At some point, even Gabby started to think that her cat was becoming way too cool for his normal demeanor. But she wasn’t complaining at all.
But all this while, it seemed as though Henry was taking a break from all the supernatural stuff simply because he couldn’t get the scent of dead bodies at all and that made sure that he was calm. And needless to say, Gabby was glad to have finally had her cat back with her.
What Gabby didn’t know was that her beloved cat was making rounds back to the basement when she wasn’t home and trying to sniff out any bodies but only came back up right before she came from work. And since Henry wasn’t doing some digging, he managed to keep his paws clean.
But there was something that was bothering Henry and for that matter, he always made a point of going down there just to check out on whatever the heck was going on. From the look of things, he suspected that there was something that was still happening down there, and he needed to know all about it. And that explained his secretive behavior.
The forensics team had turned the place upside down but couldn’t find anything else apart from the bodies. And that was the reason Gabby decided to let the sleeping dogs lie and focus on solving the cold cases. Besides, she could sleep much better because there were not any more bodies sharing the same roof with her and her pet.
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