Another Saturday Night and I Ain't Got No Body (A Page Turners Novel) (12 page)

10

Bzzt! Bzzt!

The vibrating of his cell phone jerked him awake. Jake had been dreaming that he was being crushed by a heavy weight.

In reality, he was being crushed by an eighty-pound furry Golden Retriever. Beau had crawled up onto the sofa and sprawled across Jake’s prone body while he dozed. Beau now lifted his head from where it had been tucked into the space between Jake’s neck and shoulder.

Jake reached for the phone that bounced along the edge of the coffee table as it continued to buzz.

He flipped open the phone while trying to push Beau off his chest. “Hello,” he croaked. The dog reluctantly stepped to the floor, circled the coffee table, and came back to rest his head in Jake’s lap. One of Beau’s ears flipped back, as if the dog were actually listening to the one-sided conversation.

“No, I’m fine. Just doing some research. What’s up?”

“Yeah, I found the will. It definitely mentions me in it, but I can’t find any place where it mentions her.”

“I’ve tried to talk to some of the neighbors about Walter and his actions the last several months, but I haven’t gotten very far. I’m not sure they really trust me. Yet.”

“I know that, but some of the neighbors act suspicious of me already. I can’t push too hard or I will blow the connections that I am making.”

Jake absentmindedly patted Beau’s head as he continued his side of the phone call. The dog whined as Jake’s voice rose in frustration. “I
realize
this is a dangerous situation. I’m worried we may be running out of time.”

“I’m still working on his computer and searching the house, but I haven’t found much we can use. The man saved everything from old tin foil to eight track tapes.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll let you know as soon as I find anything.”

“You don’t have to remind me how dangerous she is. I remember.”

“All right. I’ll be in touch.”

“Bye.”

Jake stood and stretched, his muscles sore from sleeping on the ancient sofa and bearing the weight of the dog. Said dog seemed to have wandered off, and Jake picked up his empty paper plate and soda can to carry into the kitchen. As he went in search of his canine house guest, thoughts of the conversation with his boss replayed in his head.

He had been surprised to see he and his mom mentioned in Walter’s will
. I didn’t think the old man even acknowledged that I was alive.
The old bitterness surfaced, no matter how hard he tried to forget.

He knew he needed to put his personal feelings aside and focus on figuring out what happened to his grandfather and the woman Jake was afraid he was involved with. As angry as Jake was, he wasn’t sure he wished her kind of vengeance on anyone, even Walter
.

Jake tossed the trash into the wastebasket under the sink and whistled for the dog.

“Here, Beau. C’mere, boy,” he called as he wandered from room to room.

Beau made his entrance from the hallway leading to the bedrooms. He proudly held a new found treasure aloft in his mouth.

“Whatcha got there, boy?” Jake asked, as he reached for what looked like either a very old flannel shirt or a rag used to clean the bathroom.

Beau recognized this game and raced around the room, pausing only to look back to make sure Jake still chased him. And he did.

He chased that dog all over the house, trying in vain to retrieve the cloth treasure. At one point, he had it, but then lost the game of tug of war, and Beau took off again. Jake did have it long enough to recognize it as a flannel shirt and to wonder if the hardened brown splotches that ran down the sleeve were dried blood.

Seeing the possible blood stains ramped up his heart rate and created more questions in Jake’s mind. What had Walter gotten himself into? Had the woman Jake searched for hurt Walter, then staged the explosion of the garage to cover her tracks?

Jake hadn’t taken the time to fully explore the garage before the explosion, and he pushed back the guilt of wondering if he could have found his grandfather inside, possibly hurt or already dead
.
He picked up his efforts to capture the shirt, but that only increased Beau’s commitment to keeping it.

“You win,” Jake cried as he collapsed on the floor, the green shag carpet rough against his outstretched arms. He closed his eyes and was catching his breath when the offensive, crusted- and now wet with slobber- material dropped onto his chest. Jake’s eyes fluttered opened to see Beau’s giant head leaning toward him, a drop of slobber clinging to his lolling tongue as warm breath panted into his face.

Jake grabbed the shirt and rolled just as the slobbery drop left Beau’s mouth and descended to the carpet below.

He held the shirt gingerly in one hand as he carried it into the kitchen and got a trash bag from the box under the sink. Jake had hoped this was just an old work shirt and the brown stains were paint, but upon closer examination, Jake was fairly certain the sleeve was covered in dried blood. His worry and frustration deepened as he chastised himself for not getting here sooner.

He dropped the shirt into the bag, tied it closed, and then grabbed his car keys before he opened the back door for himself and Beau.

The dog raced outside and ran around the yard, sniffing bushes and spots of grass as Jake carried the trash bag to his car and locked it into his trunk.

Heading back into the house, the dog at his heels, Jake looked up to see the curtains in Edna’s kitchen drop quickly back into place.

“That nosy old woman sees everything,” he whispered to Beau. “Now, if I can only get her to trust me…”

11

Following Jeremy into the basement, Sunny prepared herself for a lot of things. What she wasn’t prepared for was walking into a room filled with six people and eight computer stations. The room was decked out in so much technology, it looked like NASA.

As they walked in, a few of the men looked up and gave Sunny appraising glances, but the others were too intent on whatever action was happening on their screen to notice her.

The basement was a large room with one side a typical living room complete with couch, coffee table, and television. The other side of the room was a wall of shelves with a counter that ran the length of the room at about desk height. Four cubbies were spaced along the wall and laptops or PCs were set into each one.

In the center of the room, four cheap, particle board desks sat back to back to make a large workstation. Each desk also had a computer on it. Rows of cords and wiring snaked across the floor connecting computers to power strips and wall sockets. Some of the cords were duct-taped to the floor while others ran pell-mell across the room as if they were the tentacles of a giant computer beast.

Three men and one woman sat at the desks in the center of the room. Two other men sat at the far cubbies against the wall.

“Hey, everybody. This is Sunny, my date for the evening.” Jeremy nodded at her as he placed the overweight pooch on the floor beside the first man who sat at the desks against the wall. “Sunny, this is John, the owner of this fine establishment, and the proud papa of our beautiful Priscilla here.”

John reached out to shake Sunny’s hand, and she passed the plates of pizza to Jeremy. John wore an open, friendly grin and had a warm handshake. “Nice to meet you. Thanks for filling in tonight,” he said, as he slipped one foot from his flip-flop and absentmindedly began massaging the dog’s back with his bare foot.

“You’re welcome,” she said. “But Jeremy hasn’t filled me in yet on what we’re doing here this evening.”

“We’re playing an MMORPG,” said one of the men at the desks, “and we need to get started.”

“A what?” Sunny asked.

“A Massive Multi-player Online Role-Playing Game,” said the woman, with a roll of her eyes. “They like to use technical jargon.”

“I’m Rachel,” she continued, “and this is my husband, Mike, and his brother, Bill.”  She pointed first to the dark-haired man who sat next to her, then across to a younger version of the dark-haired Mike.

“Bill and Nick work with me at the office.” Jeremy gestured to the two men at the desks. “Bill brought Mike and Rachel into the game.”

“This is our bi-monthly date night,” Rachel said. “We’ve all played this game every other week for over a year now. It’s something fun to do together and a date night away from the kids for Mike and I.”

“The guy sitting behind John over there is Tim.” Jeremy waved to a short, heavyset man with thinning blond hair.

“Nice to meet you, Sunny,” Tim addressed her with a nod. “Have you ever played World of Warcraft before?”

“No, I’ve never even heard of it.” Sunny heard Mike let out a groan behind her. “But I like games, and I’m a quick learner.”

“Well, you better be, because we’re all waiting for you two so we can start our raid,” Mike said.

Sunny looked blankly at Jeremy who had set the pizza and beer on the counter and was setting up the two laptops closest to them.

“It’s easy, Sunny,” Jeremy assured her. “You’ll catch on really quick. Here, have a seat.”  He pulled out the chair between himself and John and gestured for her to sit. He moved the two laptops closer together.

Sunny was intrigued by this game idea and everyone in the room seemed to think it was fun. Feeling a little intimidated by the closeness and experience of the group, she listened intently to Jeremy’s instructions.

“World of Warcraft is a game played on many different realms. Everyone in this room has built a character and has played long enough to build up to be level eighty players,” he said.

“Is that good?” she asked.

“Yes, that’s very good. That means they’ve done countless quests and fought a ton of battles. We meet here every other Saturday night and play the game as a team with a bunch of other players online. We’ll do a ten-person raid tonight so we’ll battle together until we reach a Boss, or a really big dragon, then we’ll fight him and take him down together.”

Sunny was fascinated by the images on the screen. The colors of the computer-generated world were vibrant blues, greens and purples, and the details of the castles and the trees and the animals were wonderful. Jeremy brought up a character on her screen of a dwarf with long reddish-blond hair wearing a purple shirt covered with gold stars, holding a shield and a mace. A black panther paced in the background behind the dwarf.

“I’m going to let you play one of my characters tonight,” Jeremy said. “This is Hesiod. He’s a hunter, which means he specializes in ranged attack, which is bows and arrows and things you throw.”

“Cool. He looks kind of like Gimley from Lord of the Rings.”

“Yes, he does. That’s because Gimley was also a dwarf. Now, this beautiful beast behind him is his pet. Her name is Cocoa Puff.”  This elicited a few snickers from the men around her, but Jeremy ignored them and continued his instructions. “I’ve set her so she will attack anyone who comes near you.”

“Go, Cocoa Puff!” Sunny cheered. “But what if I get near one of you
?
Will she attack you?”

“Good question, but no. We are all in an alliance together, and you or your pets can’t hurt any of your friends or your alliances you’re doing the raid with. You won’t fight us; you can walk right through us if you want.”

He clicked on a box labeled
Enter World
, and Sunny’s dwarf suddenly stood in a village looking at a water fountain.

“Wow. This looks just like Belle’s village from
Beauty and t
he Beast
,” she said, only to elicit another groan from one of the dark haired brothers.

“My character is Stroszec, who is also a dwarf, but I’m a Paladin, which means I’m a Defender of the Light. I specialize in…”

“Killing puppies and punching kittens,” John filled in.

Sunny looked up at him horrified as the men in the room broke into laughter.

“Be prepared for plenty of Junior High humor with this crowd,” Rachel told her, good-naturedly.

“He’s teasing you,” Jeremy said. “Really, I’m speced for Retribution, so I carry a two-handed weapon, and I hit people
really
hard.” 

He used both his mouse and Sunny’s, and she watched as their characters ran through the woods to a copse of trees where a group of assorted characters stood in a large huddle around a doorway that glowed with a bluish light.

Jeremy pointed out each character as he introduced them to her.

“So, this enchanting creature is Rachel.” He pointed to a tall, svelte woman dressed in blue and gold with long, flaming red hair. Quite the opposite of the cute, chunky five-foot two blonde who sat across the room.

“My character’s name is Aliya and I’m a Mage, so I stand in the background and cast spells while my brave husband goes in and fights.” Rachel smiled over at her husband, who was currently wearing a scowl
.
“This is Mike’s character, Zeus.” She pointed to a tall, dark haired man whose outfit was adorned with spikes and skulls. “He’s a Death Knight, so he uses diseases to fight with. His brother is Prometheus, he’s the one next to him in blue, and he’s a healer. John’s character is a healer, too. John and Bill will help heal us when we get hurt in battle and restore our health levels.”