Deadly Forecast

by Victoria Laurie

“Work the case, Abby,” he said bluntly. “If someone connected to this mess is really out to hurt Rivers, you’re the only one that’ll see it coming in time to stop it.”

  My crew weighed in immediately and my mind was flooded with a feeling that under no circumstances should I get involved, but then I turned to look at Dutch again and I made up my own mind. “Okay.”

  Brice seemed surprised. “Yeah?”

  I nodded. “You’re right. It’s the only thing I can do to try to keep him safe.”

  Brice clinked his coffee cup with mine. “Welcome aboard,” he said, but then he sobered a little and added, “Dutch is gonna go ballistic when he hears that I talked you into working the case.”

  “He will,” I agreed.

  Then Brice seemed to think of something, because he reached for his cell, and the door handle. “Listen,” he said before departing, “sit tight for a few while I figure this out, okay?”

  I eyed him quizzically but agreed to stay put, and about a half hour later I knew what Brice had been up to, and I silently thanked the gods for his resourcefulness when a bright yellow Porsche pulled up next to me—my best friend behind the wheel.

  Abby & Dutch’s Wedding Day—T-Minus 02:00:00

  “That is one sweet car,” Gilley Gillespie said, whistling appreciatively, as he and M. J. Holliday walked past a shiny yellow Porsche parked in the lot of the manor home where Abby and Dutch were about to get hitched.

  “I think that belongs to Abby’s best friend, Candice,” M.J. said, digging in her purse to retrieve the wedding invitation in case the doorman asked for it. She remembered meeting Candice the last time she got to hang out with Abby, which was a few years earlier when Abby had needed M.J.’s help ridding an investment property she’d purchased of its spectral squatters. M.J. was a spirit medium and professional ghostbuster. Gilley was her best friend and her partner in their ghostbusting business, and the computer tech on their cable TV show, Ghoul Getters.

  “How can you tell it’s Candice’s?” Gilley asked.

  “My first clue was the vanity plate,” M.J. replied. The tag on the yellow Porsche read CANDYPI.

  “Oh,” Gil said, craning his neck to take a look. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

  M.J. shivered in the cold breeze blowing across the huge lawn of the manor home. It was a pretty awful day for a wedding, she thought moodily, pulling at the wrap around her shoulders. The sky was dark and overcast, and the local weather forecast threatened rain for late afternoon.

  Still, there was something else bothering M.J. as they neared the entrance and waited for three people ahead of them to show the doorman their invitations. Something had shifted in the energy around her that morning, and as the time of Abby and Dutch’s wedding drew closer, she found herself anxious to get to the manor house and check in with the bride.

  “Why are we here two hours before the actual ceremony again?” Gilley asked as they made their way to the interior.

  “Because the invite said that guests were welcome to arrive anytime between twelve and two and because I want to see if I can have a private word with Abby,” M.J. told him, tucking the invitation back into her purse and looking around at the small crowd already in attendance. “She said she needed my input on a case she’s been working, but she never called me to give me the details, and I have the most pressing feeling that she still needs my help with it.”

  “Ugh,” Gil said, pouting next to her. “Only you would take a job during a wedding.” M.J. couldn’t really blame Gil for being grouchy. After all, she’d dragged him to Austin to be her plus one because her boyfriend, Heath, couldn’t make it—he was busy moving his mother into her new condo in Santa Fe. “Hey,” M.J. said, nudging her best friend. “Stop pouting, would you?”

  Gil leveled his eyes at her. “Girl, you know I love a good wedding, but what I love even more is a good nap, and the fact that you dragged me away from a comfortable—oh look! Food!”

  Gil immediately headed in the direction of a small buffet table with artfully arranged hors d’oeuvres, and M.J. breathed a sigh of relief. That’d keep Gil’s bouche amused for a little while at least. Hopefully long enough for her to find Abby and make sure she was okay.

  After scanning the crowd, M.J. found a face she recognized—Abby’s fiancé, Dutch Rivers. He was a great-looking guy whom she’d met only once but it was enough to leave a very favorable impression. He seemed perfectly suited to Abby, as he was even-keeled and cool under pressure, with a keen insight and a sharp mind. Not much got by him. Also, he clearly adored Abby; that much had been evident when M.J. had seen the two together two and a half years ago, and it was even more evident now, because although Dutch seemed to be engaged in conversation with a few other people around him, M.J. noticed that he kept bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet, and casting quick glances toward the back of the house where the bride was obviously getting ready. He looked as excited and impatient to get things under way as any love-struck groom could.

  “Well, hello, handsome,” said a voice right next to M.J. She turned her head and saw that Gil had come up beside her again holding a small plate piled high with hors d’oeuvres while he drank in the sight of Dutch across the room. More than weddings and a nap, Gil loved free food and good-looking men. “I thought you were taken?” M.J. kidded, referring to Gilley’s new beau.

  “I’m taken, not dead, M.J.,” Gil replied. “I can look and flirt all I want. I’m just not allowed to touch.”

  “We can all breathe a little easier now,” M.J. said with a laugh. Then she pointed across the room to the object of Gilley’s current affection. “That’s the groom. Dutch. Remember? We went to dinner with him and Abby before when we helped her with her investment house.”

  “Sugar, I could never forget a man that gorgeous,” Gil replied, popping a small quiche into his mouth.

  That anxious, nervous feeling that’d been bothering M.J. all morning cropped up again. “I need to find Abby,” she whispered.

  “Before the wedding?” Gil said.

  “Yeah. I keep feeling like everything’s not okay with her.”

  Gil made a face. “How could things be anything other than perfect for a girl about to marry that tall drink of water?”

  M.J. ignored him and moved away in the direction that Dutch seemed to be perpetually focusing on, the back of the manor home. Winding her way through the crowd, she finally came to a corridor that looked promising. “I don’t think you’re supposed to go back there,” Gil said from right behind her, and M.J. jumped. She hadn’t realized he’d been following her so closely.

  “Do me a favor,” she told him. “Stay here and keep a lookout. I just want a quick word with the bride.”

  Gilley’s frown returned. “Are you about to meddle?”

  “No, Gil, that’s your territory. Just keep a lookout. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  M.J. then hurried into the corridor and followed it to a room with the sounds of excited voices. Knocking first, she poked her head in, but found two women wearing jeans and impatient looks. “Oh, sorry!” M.J. said. “I thought the bride might be in here.”

  “She’s not,” said one woman, and M.J. noticed she was wrapping up the cord to a curling iron. “And neither is the maid of honor.”

  “Uh,” M.J. said, not quite knowing what they were subtly hinting at. “Are they farther down the hall?”

  The other girl, who was shuffling makeup around on the vanity, said, “Nope. The bride’s missing and now so is the maid of honor.”

  A jolt of alarm went through M.J. “Missing?” she repeated. “The bride is missing?”

  Both women nodded. “We see this thing all the time. The bride gets nervous and tries to bolt right before the ceremony. I just did a wedding three weeks ago where the bride fled to the Bahamas with the best man.”

  M.J.’s mouth fell open. She couldn’t imagine Abby skipping out on Dutch. Those two were as meant to be as any two people she’d ever met. “Does the groom know?” she whispered.r />
  Both women shrugged. “I think only Mrs. Cooper-Masters knows,” said the woman with the curling iron. And she and the makeup artist exchanged another knowing look. “Which is why we’re hiding in here. No way do I want to be around that bundle of crazy right now.”

  M.J. nodded and closed the door. She hadn’t met Abby’s sister, but she’d heard she could be a handful. Still, that feeling of unease heightened up another several notches. Something bad was happening. Really, really bad, and it involved Abby. Something far more terrible than just Abby skipping out on the wedding was taking place, M.J. could feel it in her bones.

  Moving back down the corridor, she found Gilley still popping those hors d’oeuvres and staring at the gathering crowd. “Did you find her?” he asked when she came up next to him.

  M.J. wrung her hands. “No. And now I’m worried.”

  “Maybe she’s in one of the other rooms?” Gil suggested. “A house this big has to have a whole wing devoted to dressing rooms.”

  But M.J. ignored him. She believed the hairstylist and the makeup artist. Abby was missing, and M.J. didn’t think she was even on the property. The question was, Should she say something to Dutch? Because it was obvious he didn’t yet know that his bride was MIA.

  Another wave of unease washed over her, as if in answer to her internal struggle, and M.J. was moving toward Dutch without giving it any more thought.

  He was still engaged in conversation with several other guys, one also dressed in a tux and almost as handsome as Dutch, and three others dressed in suits who bore a striking resemblance to the groom.

  As she came up next to the small crowd, she knew she’d have to work to get his attention. “Dutch!” she called softly, but he was in the middle of telling a joke and not aware of her presence. “Dutch!” M.J. tried again, a little louder.

  This time the man in a tux standing next to Dutch gave him a nudge and motioned toward her. At last Dutch turned to her. “M.J.!” he said, his face lighting up with a happy smile as he leaned in to give her a brief hug. “Abby told me you were coming. Did you need something?”

  M.J. opened her mouth to speak, but hesitated. Dutch continued to stare expectantly at her and finally she said, “Do you know where Abby is?”

  His expression turned humorously quizzical before he motioned with his chin toward the corridor she’d just come from. “She’s getting ready back there. Did you want to poke your head in? I don’t think she’d mind if you went back to say hi.”

  M.J. bit her lip. “I’ve been back there,” she said, moving closer to him to keep her voice low enough that only he and the people around him could hear. “She’s not there.”

  Dutch’s face lost all of its humor. “What do you mean, she’s not there?”

  “I spoke with the hairstylist and the makeup artist. They said that Abby’s missing. And so is Candice.”

  The man next to Dutch leaned forward, his own face suddenly alarmed. “Hold on,” he said. “What do you mean they’re missing?”

  Given the man’s reaction, M.J. realized that he must be Candice’s fiancé, Brice. “That’s all I know, but, Dutch, I have this feeling, this really bad feeling….” M.J.’s voice trailed off. She didn’t quite know how to explain what she felt. This awful feeling swirling around her was so oppressive it was hard to think.

  He was staring at her intensely now. “You’re psychic too, right?”

  M.J. nodded. “I’m more a medium than a psychic, but every once in a while I get a really strong feeling that something bad is about to happen.”

  Dutch’s posture stiffened even more. “Like now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Dammit,” he muttered. Feeling along his pockets and coming up empty, he nudged Brice. “My phone’s at the guesthouse. Brice, give me your cell.”

  Brice pulled out his phone and handed it to Dutch. “Abby’s in the contacts list,” he said.

  Dutch tapped at the screen and placed the phone to his ear. M.J. waited anxiously, but that mounting feeling of something terrible occurring continued to fill her mind with dread. “What’s going on?” a voice beside her demanded.

  M.J. turned to find Gilley next to her again, his plate now empty of food. “Nothing. Go get some more hors d’oeuvres. I’ll be there in a sec.”

  But Gilley wasn’t having it. “Obviously something’s up,” he insisted. “Seriously, tell me what it is!”

  “Voice mail,” Dutch said, calling M.J.’s attention back to him. He then tapped at the screen again. “Where’s Candice’s number, Brice?” he asked impatiently.

  His friend took the phone and tapped at it himself. After a minute he spoke into the phone. “Sweetheart, it’s me. Call me back as soon as you get this message.” He then hung up and began texting, but M.J. couldn’t see what he was typing.

  Meanwhile Dutch was scanning the crowd. “Has anyone seen Milo?” he asked. “He told me he was going to check on Abby an hour ago and I haven’t seen him since.”

  “The hairstylist said that Cat might know where Abby and Candice are,” M.J. confessed. She didn’t like ratting on Abby’s sister, but this was serious. She just knew something bad had happened.

  At that moment a petite woman with short blond hair emerged from the kitchen area and began to weave her way through the crowd. She wore a Bluetooth headset, and gripped a large clipboard in both hands as she moved swiftly through the crowd, making a beeline for Dutch.

  “Speak of the devil,” Dutch muttered. “What’s happened?” he asked the moment Cat came close.

  “It’s probably nothing,” Cat replied in that way that told you it clearly wasn’t.

  “Where’s your sister?” Dutch said next, his voice sharp. “Cat, tell me, has something happened to Abby?”

  “No!” Cat said a bit too hastily. “I’m sure she’s fine. It’s just…”

  Dutch’s eyes flickered to M.J.’s and that horrible foreboding feeling surged within her with renewed energy. M.J. shook her head to let him know that she knew better. Abby was in trouble.

  Dutch then stepped forward and took Cat by the shoulders. “Please tell me,” he whispered.

  “She’s missing.”

  “She’s missing?” he repeated. M.J.’s heart began to pound.

  “Well, maybe not missing so much as she’s left the building and no one seems to know where she is,” Cat explained.

  “And Candice went with her, right?” Brice asked, his own face a mask of worry.

  Cat gulped. “No. Candice went to look for her, along with Milo. I didn’t want to worry you, Dutch, but they’re not back yet and I don’t know what could be keeping them.”

  Dutch focused again on Cat. “Talk to me,” he demanded quietly. “Tell me everything you know and don’t leave anything out.”

  Cat wiped her brow, which was creased with perspiration even though it was chilly out. “Abby ducked out on us somewhere between hair and makeup. The makeup artist was too afraid to tell me until an hour ago. I sent Candice to go find Abby. She took Milo, and now I can’t get either of them on the phone.”

  Dutch lifted Brice’s phone out of his hand and dialed. A moment later he said, “Milo, it’s me. Call me back on this number as soon as you get this message.”

  Dutch then hung up and dialed again—and a second later one of the two phones Cat held on top of her clipboard began to vibrate. Dutch reached out and took it from her. When he looked at the display, his face immediately darkened. “You took her phone, Cat?”

  Cat gulped again. “I had to, Dutch! You know my sister! She’s been so crazy over this case your people have been working that she wasn’t letting go of it even though this is her wedding day! I needed her to focus on getting ready, not make phone calls all day long!”

  Dutch squeezed the phone in his hand so hard his knuckles whitened, but he kept his tone even as he said, “Explain to me what the hell you’re talking about, please.”

  Cat sighed, and wiped again at her brow with trembling fingers. “Abby was trying to call h
er boss—”

  “Me?” Brice interrupted.

  Cat nodded. “Yes. Well, at first she was trying to call Mr. Gaston, but I wouldn’t let her, because she was sounding like she was going to have all you bureau boys leave the ceremony and go chase down some new lead she’d discovered. I told her it could wait until after she said her vows. I was only thinking of how much she’d regret it if her wedding day was ruined over something that could keep a few hours!”

  “So she left,” Dutch snapped, his eyes narrowed and angry.

  “Yes.”

  “Did she take the limo?” Brice asked next.

  “No. She took her own car.”

  “Why was she driving her own car?” Dutch’s voice was starting to rise above the hushed whispers they’d all been speaking in.

  “According to Candice, Abby got up early and left her a note that she wanted some alone time, and she took her own car here. Candice was worried about Abby, because she’s been acting weird all week, so she took her own car too. Nobody thinks about the effort and money it took me to get the limo to pick the girls up, oh, nooo! They’re all off driving their own cars all over town while I—”

  “Cat!” Dutch barked, putting his hands on her shoulders again. “Focus! About what time did Abby leave here?”

  “I don’t know!” she cried, and several people nearby turned to stare at their little group. M.J. could feel a sort of ripple of alarm spread through the room.

  Dutch’s jaw bunched, and M.J. could see he was trying to think through the possible places his bride could be.

  Abby’s sister put a hand on his arm, attempting to console him. “I know that Abby would never leave you at the altar, Dutch. I’m sure she just needs a little time to get her head together, and she’ll come back. You wait—Candice and Milo will talk some sense into her.”

  It was then that M.J. realized Cat still didn’t understand that Abby was in trouble. She was thinking that her sister had turned into a runaway bride.

  “She isn’t missing because she doesn’t want to be here, Cat!” Dutch nearly yelled, and the rest of the room fell silent. “She’s missing because something’s happened to her! Don’t you get it?”