Cloudy with a Chance of Ghosts (Destiny Bay Cozy Mysteries Book 4) (10 page)

It made my heart ache for her. I was seriously afraid that she wouldn’t be able to handle it—like I could. I’d grown up hardened by disappointment and regrets. I hated to see her have to go through all that without the tough upbringing that I’d had.
 

“It’s so late,” she said, as though looking for excuses not to do this. “Don’t you think we ought to call her first?”

“No.” I hated to get stern with her, but right now I was afraid she needed it. If we were going to have any chance at all of helping Jagger beat this rap, we were going to have to do things we didn’t really want to do. “Then she’ll know we’re coming and we’ll lose the element of surprise.”

She looked at me and I could see the strength creeping back, the real Jill coming through. Her eyes filled with humor. “The element of surprise. I see. So you think we’ve got that, do you?”

I had to laugh. “Well, I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever tried to get it, so this is a first for me. We’ll see if it works.”

“Right.”

“Oh, now
you’re
starting to sound skeptical,” I teased. “Keep the faith, baby. I need your support.”

“Don’t worry. I’m a pillar of strength when it comes to giving support. Help, maybe not so much. But moral support—I’m with you all the way.”

I grinned at her. “Good enough for me.”

It took about ten minutes and we found our way through the complex easily, pulling into a small parking lot across a green belt from the building.
 

“You are going to do the talking,” Jill told me as we climbed the steps to the front door. “Because I’m not sure what we’re here for. Is this a confrontation?”

“No!”

“Good. I’m not good at those.”

“We’re here for information,” I whispered, reaching out for the door bell.
 

We could hear the bells sounding inside, but no one came to the door. We tried again, then I tried the door. It wasn’t locked. We looked at each other, squeamish to walk into a house that way.
 

“Faint heart never wins fair lady,” Jill muttered. I think she was talking more to herself than to me. We both took a deep breath and went on into the house.
 

“Hello!” I called as we made our way through the living room.
 

No answer.
 

The lights were on and the place was nice, furnished with elegant upholstery and rich woods. Whatever else Marilee was, she was evidently a woman of taste.
 

There was a stairway to the second floor. Lights were on up there as well, and something seemed to draw us there. From the looks of the layout, I assumed we would find two bedrooms and a bath at the top of the stairs.

 
We looked at each other, shrugged, and turned to begin the climb up.
 

“Hello,” I called again. “Marilee?”

A door slammed. The lights flickered. I gasped and grabbed Jill. She was breathing as though she’d just run a mile and she held onto me as though I was her last hope of salvation.
 

Her eyes were huge and shadowed. “M…m…maybe we ought to go,” she whispered breathlessly.
 

It seemed like a very good idea—but I stopped myself from running for the door. We had to do this thing and we had to follow through. I took a deep breath and started for the stairs again.
 

My mood had changed very quickly. It had seemed risky but normal enough to go into Marilee’s house, but now, for some reason, it was beginning to feel foolhardy. It was as though a chill wind had swept through, full of evil possibilities. Was this my magic again? Or something more sinister? Whatever it was, my heart was racing.
 

We reached the second floor landing and turned toward the hall. I heard something weird, something that sounded like a groan. I stopped, frozen in my tracks, heart thumping-- and at that very moment, the lights went out.
 

All of them.
 

The whole house.
 

It was pitch black and we couldn’t see a thing.

Chapter Eight

We screamed and clung to each other and something came barreling past us, knocking us both to the floor. We screamed again and began to flail, until we realized we were hitting each other, not whoever had turned off the lights and come crashing into us.
 

“Flashlights,” I managed to gasp out between panting breaths as we struggled to our feet. “Never again will we go anywhere without flashlights.”

“Hush,” she whispered harshly, grabbing my arm. “He’ll hear you.”

“Who?”

“The man who knocked us down.”

“How do we know it was a man?”

“Who do you think it was? Marilee?”

“No. I think you’re right. But he’s gone. Didn’t you hear the front door slam?”

“Oh. No, are you sure?”

“Yes.”
 

I was feeling my way along the wall. “We’ve got to find some light.”

“Wait,” she said, grabbing my arm again. “Look at that.”

It was an eerie, wavering light coming from under one of the doors.
 

“What is that?” I was whispering now too.
 

“Candles,” Jill said. “I think it’s candles. I’ll bet that’s the bathroom.”

We made our way to the door and stopped.
 

“I’m going to knock,” I said.
 

“Are you crazy?”

“No. We can’t just barge into a bathroom without knocking.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know. It’s just not right.”

“Oh, alright. Marilee’s privacy concerns are important, I guess. Go ahead. Knock away.”

I did.
 

“Marilee?” I whispered loudly, just in case the man who had bowled us over really was back downstairs and would hear me.
 

But there was no response.
 

“Okay. I’m going to open this door.”

“Go ahead. I’ll just close my eyes and wait for the murderer to come barging out again.”

“He’s gone.”

“So you say. I don’t believe it.”

With a sigh of exasperation, I opened the door. Sure enough, it was a bathroom, and a very nice one, too. Small candles filled the room with a warm, romantic atmosphere. But all that was ruined by the body in the tub.

“Oh no!”
 

Reaching out, I tried the switch and was surprised when it came on, flooding the room with light. “Grab her!”

It was Marilee, lying just under the water as though she was looking up at us. We both pulled her out, but it was obviously too late to do anything about her. She’d been thoroughly drowned.
 

The water was still warm, so it hadn’t been long since she’d died. I have to admit I dreaded seeing the police with another murder to my credit. I actually had a moment of panic, thinking we could run for it and phone it in anonymously. But I knew right away that was impossible. I tried to calm myself and make the call.
 

I struggled to find my cell phone. My hands were shaking and my throat was dry. This was horrible.
 

We moved in a dream until the police arrived, bringing in the paramedics who checked her over and declared her officially dead. Captain Stone arrived and barely gave me a look, but I was grateful to avoid another conversation. We answered questions and then more questions and I was in the living room when one of the detectives played back the recording on the answering machine. The only call that was in any way relevant was from Jagger, and he was furious.
 

He’d obviously found out that she’d fingered him for the murder, and he called her some ugly names.
 

“I’m coming over there,” he warned. “You’re not going to get away with this. I’ll make you pay.”

Jill and I looked at each other, eyes wide. Then Jill was murmuring something I couldn’t quite make out. It looked to me like she was reciting the rosary without using beads. For just a second or two I wished I was Catholic so I could have that comfort for myself.
 

We watched numbly as the police took away piles and piles of papers and other possible evidence. When Captain Stone finally let us go, he looked me right in the face and acted like he’d never met me before. It was actually getting downright annoying.
 

As we walked out to my car, I noticed a piece of paper stuck in a bush as though someone had dropped it and it had caught there. Jill was talking and I didn’t say a word as I pulled down the paper and stuck it in my pocket. I had no idea what it was, but something told me it might be important. It looked fresh, like it hadn’t been stuck in that bush for long, and it wasn’t on the path the police were taking their loot through. It might be nothing. But it might also be something.
 

Who could have dropped it? Almost anybody—but likely the person who pulled the plug on the lights so he could crash his way past us without being seen. Had he been carrying away papers? Was this one of them? I didn’t know, but I wasn’t going to leave it behind when there was a chance…just a bare chance…that it was something that could shed some light on the case. I certainly wasn’t going to leave all the investigating to Mr. Nose-in-the-Air….uh, Captain Stone.
 

Another thing I wasn’t going to leave was Jill on her own after what we’d been through.
 

“You can stay at our house,” I told her. “We’ve got an extra bed. Don’t think twice. It’s a done deal.”

She gave in quickly, so I could tell she’d been hoping we’d take her in all along. She didn’t want to go home and listen to the emptiness and notice the phone that didn’t ring. She needed to be with people who cared about her. So she stayed.
 

We got into jammies and talked until midnight and then I went to my own room. Finally I had a chance to pull out the piece of paper and check it out.
 

It was a sheet of personalized stationery. The name Keri Shorter was printed at the top, surrounded by a simple wreath of wild flowers. The note was typed and addressed to a magazine publisher in the East, requesting permission to change the focus of a story she was working on for the magazine.
 

“I’ve stumbled upon some interesting background to the Carlton Hart story which is going to take me off along a different road, involving possible criminal activity and corruption. I’d like to discuss this before going further. Please give me a call….”

A couple of words were misspelled and crossed out and a large x covered the body of the letter. Obviously, it was a first attempt that Keri had used for practice before sending the real letter.
 

So it seemed to be true that Carlton Hart had a shady past and Keri was digging into it. Muckraking journalism—I suppose there is a place for it and sometimes it can be important and illuminating. But I wasn’t sure this was one of those instances. My first impulse was to say—leave Carlton alone!

“But that’s not the way the world works,” Jill reminded me when I went back to where she was about to go to sleep to show her the letter and revealed my instinctual response. “Your foibles are bound to come out eventually. We all have to pay for our shortcomings.”

“Do we?” I wasn’t sure if that was really a necessity. Still, it was what it was.
 

I went back to my bed and fell asleep quickly, only to find Sami trying to head butt me awake at three in the morning.
 

“Go away!” I grumbled at him, but for some reason, he kept attacking me. It was a benign attack, a fairly affectionate one. Sami was the best head butter around. But it was impossible to sleep while he was doing it.

“What? Do you want something to eat?” I got up and headed for the kitchen. If he was this hungry, I knew feeding him was the only way I was going to get any sleep. But he sailed right past me and went to the back door, meowing frantically, as if he wouldn’t live until dawn if he didn’t get outside.
 

“Okay, okay.” I opened the door to let him out, and then I saw something moving in the back yard. My heart started to thump until I realized it was Roy. I quickly went out to where he was standing, near his patrol car.
 

“What are you doing here?” I whispered as I met him beyond the morning glory vine.
 

“Checking on you.” He grinned at me, his hands in his pockets. “I was down in Santa Barbara for most of the day and I heard you had some excitement, so I thought I’d come by and see if you were up.”

“I wasn’t,” I noted dryly.
 

He shrugged. “You are now.” He looked me up and down. “Cute pajamas,” he said, trying to hold back another grin.
 

I looked down at the fabric. “Little Scotty dogs,” I told him. “My favorites.”

“Uh huh.”

“Jill’s here,” I added. “She’s sleeping in the guest room.” I frowned at him, hoping he wouldn’t notice how happy I was to see him. “So what did you do, send the cat in to wake me up?”

He nodded, humor in his eyes. “Cats love me,” he said. “I’m like—king of the cats sometimes. They’ll do anything for me.”

“Liar.” But I smiled at him

He raised one dark eyebrow. “You going to tell me what you were doing at the latest murder scene?”

I stared at him. He was beginning to sound like the Captain. “Why?” I asked him. “Am I a suspect?”

“Hey.” He laughed softly, shaking his head. “No, you’re not a suspect.” Reaching out, he pulled me close. “I’m just worried about you, that’s all. You seem to have a knack for hanging out where death shows up. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

I raised my face to his and he kissed me—sweet and warm, sending quivery little shivers into mad confusion all over my susceptible places. I drew back, reluctant but firm. I wasn’t going to give in to those delightfully human urges. Been there, done that, and lost a round or two. I wasn’t going there again.
 

But I did like this man, and I wanted him to know it. So I told him everything—all about our suspicions, about Celinda’s visit, about our trip to see Marilee that ended in tragedy.