by Ann Charles
“There’s more,” I interrupted, glancing back toward the stairs to make sure neither of my kids were eavesdropping. “He’s found a place to live.”
“It better not be across the street.”
“No, but this might be worse. He’s living in the apartment over Dominick Masterson’s garage.”
Doc stilled. “That’s an odd coincidence.”
“That’s what I figured.”
“What’s Masterson up to now?”
I’d been scratching my head about that all afternoon. “I’m thinking he’s trying to stack the deck in his favor.”
“Does he know the dynamics between you and Rex?”
“No. Maybe. I don’t know.”
He sighed. “We need to neutralize Rex.”
“I agree. Let’s start with castration. I’ve got plenty of rubber bands. We can borrow scrotum clamps from Harvey. I think I saw some in his barn last time I was in there.”
Doc chuckled low in his chest. “I said ‘neutralize,’ not ‘sterilize.’ ”
“Oh well, can’t blame a girl for studying castration techniques while daydreaming about her piece of shit ex.”
I touched my bruised cheek, wincing under the pressure. I needed to undergo some more frozen-pea therapy.
“Listen, Doc, before we head upstairs there’s something else I need to shed some light on.”
“Is it going to make me want to borrow Harvey’s favorite shotgun?”
Unfortunately, Bessie wouldn’t be any help against Prudence’s wrath. “Actually, I was speaking literally. Can you turn the lights back on?”
“Sure. Shine the flashlight on the breaker box, will you?”
I lit it up. He hit the breaker switch. The fluorescent bulbs buzzed to life, not a single flicker at the moment.
Doc was still dressed in khaki pants and a blue dress shirt, but his tie was missing. His dark hair looked finger-mussed. That might be my fault for the cryptic texts I’d sent earlier.
“Now, what is it you—” He looked back at me and he stopped, his brow lining.
I pointed at my cheek. “I thought it would be better for you to see this before we headed topside.”
“Hell’s bells, Killer.” He cupped my face and turned my head. “It looks like Prudence won round one.”
“She throws one hell of an elbow, that’s for sure.”
“She didn’t make Cornelius clock you, did she?”
“No, this is my fault. I was pulling Zelda off of Cornelius and she fell on me elbow-first.”
“Oh, my poor girl.” He gently kissed my temple next to my bruised cheek. “We need to get some ice on that.”
“Come on, you two,” Aunt Zoe called down the steps. “Don’t make me send Harvey down there.”
“Okay, okay. We’re on our way.” I took Doc’s hand, leading him to the stairs.
The light flickered twice and then dimmed.
Doc hesitated, frowning up at the light. “I need to fix that before somebody ends up stuck down here in the dark.”
I tugged on him and started up the steps. “We still have Elvis’s nightlight if it stops working.”
“Did Addy tell you she’s taught her chicken how to turn the nightlight on and off?”
“No, but I’m not surprised. If Addy put her mind to it, she could probably teach that dang chicken to play chess.”
Upstairs, the circular table in the kitchen was set with the pot of chili in the center next to Aunt Zoe’s big cast iron pan full of golden cornbread. Harvey had finished setting the table after I left, including glasses of water along with a bucket full of ice and chilled bottles of beer.
Doc excused himself to go wash his hands.
I watched him go and then faced the peanut gallery sitting around the table, which consisted of Natalie, Reid, Aunt Zoe, and Harvey in that order from left to right. Bowls of chili steamed in front of each of them while squares of cornbread sat on small plates nearby.
“Did the kids already get their food?”
Natalie nodded, popping the top off a bottle of beer. “They’re eating and watching The Andy Griffith Show.”
“Dear Lord, baby girl,” Aunt Zoe said, a pained expression on her face as she looked up at me. “Did you go and spit in a wildcat’s eye again?” She held out her hand. “Come here and let me take a closer look at that shiner.”
I did as ordered, bending over my aunt, who was still dressed in the old denim work shirt and holey jeans she often wore out in her glass shop. Her silver-streaked hair was secured back in a braid tonight, but several tendrils had come loose. As she tipped my head toward the light, I smelled her glass furnace and a dose of the cinnamon air freshener she used out in her workshop.
Aunt Zoe whistled through her teeth. “Prudence had her tail up today, I take it.”
Somebody must have already told her about my visit to the Carhart house.
“Prudence doesn’t fight fair,” I grumbled.
“Ah, come on,” Harvey said with a smirk. “Prudence is as playful as a kitten most days.”
Natalie guffawed and then took a swallow of her beer. She was wearing a pink thermal shirt and stonewashed bib overalls that made her look closer to twenty than forty. I wasn’t sure if she’d gone home and changed clothes after our stakeout because she’d had her coat on the whole time in her pickup. Her face was scrubbed clean of makeup now and her hair pulled back in a ponytail. If she was trying to make herself look less attractive for Cooper’s sake when she told him they were going to have to hit the brakes on any more fun beneath the sheets, she was going about it all wrong. Curlers, an old ragged robe, and a mud mask would have been a better choice.
“What did you bring for dessert?” I asked Natalie, taking the empty seat on the other side of her.
“I swung by Chuckwagon Charlie’s and ordered some apple pie bars to go.”
I rubbed my hands together. Their apple pie bars were covered with a brown sugar and butter crumb crust that made me drool at the mere thought of them. “I didn’t know they did takeout.”
She set her bottle of beer down. “They don’t, but I went to school with the owner’s son, who manages the kitchen these days.”
“Of course you did.”
“You need to keep icing that bruise, Sparky,” Reid said. I was surprised he was sitting next to Aunt Zoe tonight. My aunt usually liked to keep a solid body or two as a buffer between her and her old heartthrob. “Or it’s going to look even worse come morning.”
“I don’t know,” Harvey said with a snicker. “She looks bucksnortin’ mean with that shiner. Maybe Detective Hawke will quit pesterin’ her if he thinks she’ll kick his butt until his teeth fall out.”
“I doubt my face will discourage the bonehead,” I said, sharing a knowing look with Natalie.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Aunt Zoe asked. When I turned to her looking as innocent as possible, her eyes narrowed. “Violet Lynn, I saw that face you made at Natalie. What’s going on?”
“Nothing.” At least nothing that Natalie and I knew about so far. I made a show of spreading my napkin on my lap and picked up my small plate, eyeing the cornbread. “Everything smells delicious, Reid.”
I dished up a piece of cornbread as Doc returned to the kitchen. He snagged the bag of frozen peas from the counter at Reid’s request and settled in next to me, placing the makeshift ice pack next to my bowl of chili.
“Coop just pulled up,” he announced and grabbed a beer from the bucket before ladling some chili into my bowl and then his.
I pretended to be surprised. “Hmm. I wondered if he’d make it tonight.”
I could feel Natalie’s gaze swing my way, but I stayed focused on slathering some butter on my cornbread.
“When he heard Reid was making firehouse chili,” Harvey said, “he said he would make an extra effort to wrap up work in time.”
Right, the chili made him rush over. I’d bet Harvey’s left nut that the girl next to me had more to do with Cooper’s decision to join u
s than the food. Or was Harvey’s right nut the lousy one that he liked to bet on?
Stop thinking about Harvey’s nuts!
Grimacing, I hit the brakes on that train of thought and returned to Natalie and Cooper playing k-i-s-s-i-n-g down in Arizona. Wait, that wasn’t much better.
I glanced at Natalie, expecting to see her face scrunched in a scowl or hear her grumble about Cooper’s work ethic like usual. Instead, she was busy staring into her chili bowl as though Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster, might poke its head up at any moment.
I fidgeted with my spoon, feeling anxious for her about how this post-Arizona-sex meeting was going to go.
Natalie and I both jumped at the sound of the doorbell.
Doc gave me a questioning look before eating a spoonful of chili.
Aunt Zoe called out, “Layne, get the door for Coop.”
A minute later, the detective joined us. “Sorry, I’m late,” he said, taking the empty seat between Harvey and Doc, across from Natalie. He wore the same clothes he’d had on earlier, only now they were twice as wrinkled. His hair was still a mess of spiky glass shards, too. “We had a vandalism call come in about an hour ago up in Lead that I needed to check out before I could head this way.”
As he scooted closer to the table, he snuck a glance at Natalie, who was stirring a sprinkling of cheese into her chili with such white-knuckled intensity I expected her to bend the spoon in half at any minute.
“Done for the evenin’ then?” Harvey asked, taking Cooper’s bowl and ladling chili into it.
“I hope so.” Cooper reached for a piece of cornbread and set it on his plate. “But with Parker on the—” he glanced up at me and froze mid-sentence. His glance turned into a full-on gawk.
I waved my spoon at him. “Hi, Cooper.”
His upper lip twitched. “Is that a …” he started and then laughed out loud.
The sound was so foreign that everybody stopped eating to stare at him. His laughter increased until he was almost howling.
“He’s cracking up again,” Aunt Zoe said during Cooper’s laugh-fest, her spoon hovering in midair. “He’s done this before in front of Violet and me, remember, kiddo?”
“Yep.” I scowled at Cooper, who was trying to stop but couldn’t. “But this time I think he’s just straight up laughing at me, no stress needed. Isn’t that right, Coop?”
“That’s Cooper …” he laughed behind his hand for a few more seconds before finishing with, “ … to you, Parker.” He wiped at the corner of one of his eyes. “Whew.” Another chuckle hiccupped out. “Sorry about that, everyone. Parker’s face caught me off-guard.”
“Hardy-har-har, Cooper.” I shot him a wrinkled lip before taking a bite of chili. The hearty mix of ground beef, kidney beans, and stewed tomatoes took the edge off me being the butt of his joke.
Still grinning, he sprinkled some cheese into his chili. “So, who did you piss off this time?”
“Prudence,” Harvey said, answering for me since my mouth was full.
That sobered up the detective lickety-split. The last time Cooper had joined me at Prudence’s, I’d suffered extensive bruises as well. Only it wasn’t Zelda who’d hurt me that day, it was Cooper, and he hadn’t been able to do anything to stop himself from doing it. Prudence had been at the helm again, and that time she’d marked me on purpose.
“Shit.” He frowned. “What happened?”
While Cooper and everyone else ate their chili and cornbread, I told them the story of my visit with Prudence this afternoon, including the reason I’d been summoned there in the first place.
When I finished, Aunt Zoe set down her spoon and watched me with a furrowed brow. “You’re sure she said it was a Duzarx?”
“Positive.” I drizzled honey on the square of butter-soaked cornbread on my plate. “Have you ever come across anything like one in our family history volumes?”
“I may have read something about a Duzarx.” Aunt Zoe forked off a small bite of cornbread. “Only I believe it was called a different name in that story. I’ll have to research the creature as soon as I can take a break.”
I hated to add to her workload. “If you don’t have time for this right now, just point me in the general direction and I’ll start digging.”
“I can help,” Doc offered, rubbing my thigh under the table.
“Anything that crawls out of the Open Cut and disappears into the trees can’t be good for anyone’s long-term health, can it?” Natalie asked, fiddling with her fork.
“Well, I should smile,” Harvey said with a hard nod.
I stared across at him. “What are you smiling about?”
Cooper groaned. “Don’t ask.”
“That means Harvey agrees with me,” Natalie explained. “He picked up the phrase from a Louis L’Amour book he read on the drive down to Arizona.”
“It was Zane Grey,” Harvey corrected.
I caught Natalie casting a glance in Cooper’s direction.
So did Cooper, which made her cheeks darken.
“Anyway.” I stabbed a piece of my cornbread. “Judging from Prudence’s level of agitation, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t have rainbows or sunshine coming out of its ass.”
Harvey grunted. “I’m still scratchin’ my noggin’ about Corny givin’ the ol’ gal a run for her money when she tried to crawl inside his melon. What was it she said she found rattlin’ around in there?”
I swallowed a drink of water. “A small door leading to a room full of terrors. Then she theorized that he kept something from each of the ghosts he came across, which is why they follow him around.”
“That would explain several things,” Doc said, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed. His bowl and plate were empty. Apparently, my story hadn’t dampened his appetite. He must be getting used to taking my blunders in stride.
“Such as?” Cooper asked.
“For starters, Cornelius’s ability to hear the ghosts talk sometimes. Collecting these talismans establishes a deeper connection to the spirits, like a life line.”
“Or death line, in his case,” Reid said.
Doc nodded.
I stabbed another bite of cornbread. “You think there might be a lot of chatter going on as these trapped ghosts try to figure out how to get Cornelius to release them?”
“Could be.”
“Is there any chance that Cornelius is doing this on purpose?” Aunt Zoe asked. “Maybe not consciously, but on some subconscious level?”
“To what end?” Natalie asked.
“I don’t know. Violet talked about how much energy he had at the end of their visit. Maybe it’s like some kind of temporary mental high for him.”
“You mean like ghost cocaine?” Natalie threw out, and Aunt Zoe nodded.
“No,” I replied.
“You sound sure,” Reid said.
“Listen, Cornelius talked about his grandmother helping him quiet the voices, but he didn’t realize he was actually storing away any talismans from the ghosts until Prudence pointed it out.”
“Maybe he’s very good at lying,” Aunt Zoe said. When I gave her a hard look, she held up her hands. “I’m just playing devil’s advocate here.”
“Cornelius has no malicious intent when it comes to the ghosts,” I said.
“How can you know that for certain?” she pressed.
“Because I’m the only one here who’s gone into the dark with him, and when we’re in there you don’t see each other with your eyes, you see with your mind. If there was something sinister within Cornelius, I believe I would have felt it by now.” At least I was ninety-nine percent sure I would have.
I finished off my cornbread and pushed my plate away, catching Natalie aiming another sneak peek at Cooper.
Doc rested his elbows on the table. “This snaring ability also explains how I can see Cornelius so well when he goes into the dark with you.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I suspect it’s the beacon that I see in the da
rk when I’m looking for you two. He’s drawing me in like he does with other spirits—consciously or not.”
Doc’s abilities in the paranormal realm went beyond being a mere mental medium. While he couldn’t travel the darkness by my side like Cornelius, he was able to guide us and open doors through which we needed to go, in addition to several other abilities, like switching places with ghosts to experience their final breaths.
“You’re going to have to go back and talk to Prudence some more,” Aunt Zoe said, rising to take her bowl and plate over to the sink. “You need to start working with her instead of butting heads.”
“But Parker excels at head butting,” Cooper said with a rare grin in my direction. The smartass was enjoying my black eye a little too much.
“Maybe I should head butt you in the nose again, Cooper, just to keep in practice.”
“If you say so, Rocky,” he said, still grinning as he raised his beer to his lips.
I cringed at the nickname I’d been saddled with down at the police station after giving Cooper a broken nose. “When you smile at me like that it makes me want to wallop you with my purse again.”
“What do you mean ‘again’?” Reid asked.
Before I could explain, Harvey spilled the news about our afternoon adventure in the Sugarloaf Building. He ended with me batting the darn critter out the window and us finding no traces of it below.
Aunt Zoe aimed yet another furrowed brow at me. “This isn’t good, Violet.”
I’d had a feeling she wasn’t going to like the outcome of that faux pas. “But it was just a little guy.” I’d have called him “cute” if it weren’t for his raisin-like skin, bulging eyes, and razor-sharp claws.
“Do you have any idea of the trouble that imps can reap when they are free?”
I grimaced. “Are we sure it’s not a gremlin?”
“It’s an imp, Violet.”
She would know.
“You need to find it soon.”
“Yeah, well, it will have to get in line after the lidérc. Dominick is upping the pressure to catch that smoky devil. He’s sending me cryptic messages through Rex.”
Natalie set her beer down with a thunk. “Rex the ex?”
I nodded and leaned forward, telling them about Rex’s visit this afternoon in a low voice so the kids wouldn’t hear.