A Hard Day's Fright Read online

  I backed away from the service, holding up a finger to signal that I’d return in a moment. It seemed simpler than telling her that her youngest daughter—who most definitely should have been at school at that time of the afternoon—wasn’t as unobtrusive as I bet she thought she was. But then, she was standing on the roof of a mausoleum about fifty yards away and watching the proceedings through a pair of binoculars.

  I skirted the cluster of mourners, circled around to the other side of the grave, ducked behind a couple head-tall tombstones, and sidled between a gray granite monument with an angel at the top of it and a pink marble bench.

  Here’s the thing about sneaking up on someone using binoculars—they’re so busy looking into the distance, they don’t know what’s going on right in from of them. When I cleared my throat, I thought Ariel was going to tumble off that roof.

  “The cemetery’s insurance company would have a fit if they knew you were up there,” I told her while she was still trying to catch her breath. “And your mother would have a coronary. And not just because she’d be worried about you. That mausoleum is over a hundred years old. I bet it’s a national treasure or something. Come on down.” I held out one hand to help. “And do it carefully. If you fall and break something, your mom will kill me.”

  “Only if you tell her.”

  “What, that you fell and broke something?” I watched Ariel crab-step to the edge of the mausoleum roof and skitter down the side, just waiting for her to fall and break that unnamed something. When she landed on her feet, none the worse for wear, I let go the breath I was holding. “What the hell—”

  “Is that any way to talk at a funeral?” Ariel grinned. She was dressed in jeans and a dark T-shirt. Her red locks were wound into a braid, and those binoculars hung around her neck. She’d stashed a canvas bag near the mausoleum door and she went and got it, pulled out a legal pad, and scribbled some notes.

  “What are you doing?” I had to fight to keep my voice down. Sounds carry in a quiet cemetery, and I didn’t want to interrupt the funeral. “And why aren’t you in school? And what are you doing here?”

  She finished what she was writing. “I’m investigating, of course. You heard Janice was murdered, right?”

  I nodded.

  “And I can’t believe you don’t think that has something to do with our other case.”

  “We don’t have another case.”

  She was not one for subtleties. “That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” she asked. “To investigate?”

  “I’m here because your mother shouldn’t be at the funeral of a friend all by herself. And now she is all by herself, because I didn’t want to be standing over there”—I pointed—“and watch you over here”—I swung my outstretched arm in the other direction—“taking a tumble off that mausoleum and breaking your neck. And what do you mean, anyway? What do you mean you’re investigating?”

  “I’m starting my own private investigation firm. You know, like the one you have.”

  “Except I don’t have a private investigation firm.”

  “But you investigate. Privately.”

  “Sometimes, yes. But not because I want to.”

  She folded her arms over her chest. It was the first time I noticed that she must have made a trip to Victoria’s Secret for one of those push-up bras with the gel cup inserts. Ariel had curves! “You want to keep all the business for yourself.”

  “I don’t. I don’t even want the business I have. Not most of the time, anyway. But this time I do, because this time is different. I want to help your mom find out what happened to her friends. But investigating…” I glanced back toward the gravesite. While I’d been busy keeping Ariel from doing a header off the mausoleum, the funeral service had already broken up. Some of the mourners were standing in knots and talking softly. Others were headed to their cars. “Investigating is exactly what I’m not doing.”

  “Then what are you waiting for, girlfriend?” So much for the power of a lecture from me. Laughing, Ariel took off toward Janice’s gravesite. “I’ll bet one of those people over there is the murderer, but we’re not going to know until we grill every one of them.”

  She could move pretty quick. But then, she was a dozen years younger than me and she was wearing sneakers. By the time I got back over to the funeral, Ariel had managed to buttonhole a white-haired granny.

  Not the murderer type, I was sure of it. But Ariel didn’t need to know that. While she was busy chasing red herrings, I might actually be able to get down to business.

  Ella was speaking to the minister, and I fully intended to join them and see what he could tell me about the people in attendance when I saw a familiar face watching the goings-on from behind a shaggy rhododendron.

  As funerals went, this looked like the one the uninvited wanted to crash.

  This time, there was no mausoleum roof involved so at least I didn’t have to worry about broken bones. I did have to worry that Will Margolis would catch sight of me closing in on him and take off running before I had a chance to corner him. I quickened my pace, coming around at him from the side and stopping by a headstone taller than me when I got within five feet of him. Before he noticed me, I took a moment to gather my thoughts, and watched him watch the crowd.

  For a moment, Will’s gaze rested on where the casket glinted in the afternoon sun. Then it traveled over to the left, to the spot where I’d seen Ella and the minister only a minute before. The minister was walking back to his car, and Ella stood there all alone. She bowed her head, took a pink rose from the spray of flowers that had been left next to the grave, and set the flower on Janice’s casket. When she stepped back, the sun glistened against the tears on her cheeks.

  Rather than deal with the sudden lump in my throat, I looked back at Will. Since the last time I saw him, the left sleeve of his black cardigan had been ripped, and there was a smear of something muddy looking—like dried blood—across the front of it. The color matched the scrape on his right cheek and accented the dark circles under his eyes. The hair that hung out from the back of his stocking cap was limp and greasy. My guess? It hadn’t seen a drop of shampoo since that day I’d gone to see him at the rehab center.

  Ready to run after him if he bolted, I stepped closer. “You look like hell, Will,” I said.

  “Feel like hell, too,” he said. He didn’t look surprised to see me. In fact, he didn’t look anything but lost and miserable. He swiped the cuff of his sweater under his nose before he turned to face me.

  “I went over to the center to look for you. Where have you been?”

  There was a couple days’ growth of beard on his face and he scraped a hand over it. “Thought I was really going to make it this time.”

  “That doesn’t mean you can’t try again.”

  “I dunno.” He shifted from foot to foot. “Can’t remember where I’ve been. Or what I’ve been doing. Can’t remember much of anything. I woke up this morning behind some downtown bank and my face hurt like the devil.” He touched a finger to the raw, swollen skin of his right cheek. “Don’t even remember who I was fighting with, but I guess I lost, huh? And then I walked by one of those buildings with the newsstand on the first floor. And I saw this morning’s paper. And the picture of Janice.” His cheeks went ashen, and I knew I had to keep him focused or I’d lose him.

  I dared to step closer. “Do you remember when you left the rehab center on Saturday? Where did you go, Will? And why did you leave?”

  His shoulders trembled. He shook his head.

  “I’ll bet if you try hard, you can remember. Maybe someone came and got you? Asked you to do something?”

  Will twitched. “You mean something like kill Janice?”

  I guess Will and I had something in common after all. He wasn’t one to beat around the bush, either. “It wouldn’t be your fault,” I said, and hoped what I was trying to make sound like quiet reassurance would work its magic. “Not if that person made you do it. Not if he took advantage of you.”
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  His head moved faster, back and forth. “I didn’t kill her. No. Not me. Not this time.”

  My breath caught behind the ball of anticipation that made it hard to breathe. I forced out the words, nice and slow. “Are you telling me—”

  “Not telling you anything.” Will’s face twisted. His cheeks flushed as muddy red as that wound on his face. He paced over to a marble headstone with a lamb carved on top of it, and his voice was choked and angry. I swear, he wasn’t talking to me. I don’t think he even remembered I was there. Will was talking to himself. To his demons. And his voice rose and echoed against the gravestones all around us.

  “I’m not telling anybody anything,” he yelled. “I never have. I never have, that’s what I said. And still, Janice is dead. And Bobby’s dead. And Lucy…” His eyes cleared and he froze, and aimed a laser look in my direction. “You know Lucy’s dead, too, don’t you?”

  “I do know that.” I took another step in his direction, but as soon as I did, he started up again. He stomped out the distance between the lamb gravestone and the bush he’d been hiding behind to watch the funeral service, and I scrambled for a way to calm him down and keep him talking. No easy thing considering he was sobbing now. He swallowed gulps of air and moaned.

  “How do you know Lucy is dead, Will?” I asked him. “Did someone tell you? Or did you—”

  He stopped, as still as the statue that watched us from a nearby monument. He didn’t look my way. Will looked down at the grass at his feet, then up to the dome of blue sky over our heads. He balled his hands into fists and flexed his fingers, and balled them up again, and he pounded them against his own chest. “I know, I know, I know,” he wailed. “But I’m not telling. I’m not going to tell. I’m not ever going to tell.”

  I was so busy wondering what on earth I could do to calm him down, I didn’t realize we weren’t alone until Ella stepped up beside me.

  “Hello, Will,” she said.

  With the cuff of his sweater, Will wiped away the tears on his cheeks. He gasped for breath, choked, coughed.

  Ella’s expression didn’t give away a thing, and even as I watched her take a step closer to him, I wondered. Was she disappointed to see what the years had done to Will? Repulsed by him? Had she already called cemetery security and asked them to hightail it over there and toss the guy out onto the street?

  “I’m glad you came,” she said, and since glad was something I hadn’t even considered, I could only watch and go on wondering. “Janice would have liked that.”

  “She’s dead.” His voice, so blistering just moments before, was no more than a whisper. His shoulders were stooped. He hung his head. “She doesn’t know nothing. Janice is dead.”

  “I like to think that the dead still watch us.”

  That sure wasn’t me who spoke. I knew the dead did watch us, and thinking about it was enough to give me a major case of the willies.

  “Do you believe that, Will?” Ella tipped her head, watching him, and when he didn’t move and he didn’t say a thing, she smiled. “We’ve got a lot of catching up to do, don’t we? It’s late.” It wasn’t, and since she looked at her watch, she should have known this. “I’ve got work to do at home this evening and I know I won’t have time to make dinner. I was just going to head over to the Academy Tavern for a burger. You want to come along?”

  He didn’t say yes, but he didn’t say no, either, not even when Ella wrapped her arm through Will’s. Side by side, they walked over to where her car was parked.

  “Where’s my mom going with that weird guy?” I glanced to my left to see that Ariel had been watching, too. She made a face. “You’re not going to let her get into the car with him, are you? Are you nuts, Pepper? He’s dirty and crummy. He’s disgusting.” She darted forward, eager to follow Ella and stop her.

  I clamped a hand on her shoulder to keep her in place. “He’s not disgusting,” I said. “He’s an old friend.”

  14

  Remind me next time one of the not-so-dearly departed needs my help…it’s not a good idea to get involved with a ghost stuck in a place that requires an admission charge.

  With Ella gone, I knew nobody would miss me, so I dug the last of my dollar bills out of my purse, cut out of work early, and hopped on the rapid.

  The Indians had an evening game scheduled, the rapid was heading downtown, and I found one of the last empty seats, but lucky for me, the guy sitting next to me got off at the next stop. Just as soon as he did, Lucy materialized in the seat next to me out of the nowhere ghosts go when they aren’t hanging around complicating my life.

  “We’ve got a lot to talk about.” Yes, I had my cell out and up to my ear. Better that than having people stare at me the way the mourners leaving the funeral gaped at Ella and Will when they walked to her car together. “I had a talk with Darren.”

  She didn’t look surprised. But then, I imagine once you’ve been kidnapped and murdered, everything else is pretty small potatoes in the taken-by-surprise department.

  “Does he miss me?” Lucy asked.

  I was not in the mood for teenaged drama. “Why did you break up with him?”

  Lucy pressed her golden lips together.

  “Fine.” I slapped my hand down on my lap. “If that’s the way you want to be, let’s see how successful you are at finding your own body. Especially since you’re stuck on this train.”

  When the woman in the seat in front of me looked over her shoulder, her eyes wide and her mouth open, I realized the hand I’d slapped onto my lap was the one holding the phone. I quickly lifted it back up to my ear.

  “Yeah, that’s what I said,” I growled into the phone. “Find your own body of evidence. Let’s see you do that when you’re stuck here on the train in rush hour.”

  Apparently, this satisfied her, because the woman spun back around. I lowered my voice and turned in my seat so I was facing Lucy.

  “Why did you break up with him?” I asked her again, this time right into the phone, and in barely more than a whisper.

  She tossed her head. “What difference does that make? It can’t possibly have anything to do with my death. I was—”

  “Murdered. Yeah. I know.” I beat her to the drama punch and Lucy didn’t like it. No one pouts as well as a teenaged girl. “He’s sleazy.”

  I expected an eye roll. What I got instead was a sidelong look that told me Lucy wasn’t all that surprised to hear this news.

  “What?” I inched closer. We weren’t touching, but I could feel the icy aura that enveloped her. The chill hit me in little waves that sent goose bumps up my arms. “You’re not surprised to hear me say that Darren is a scumbag. Is that what you’re telling me? Does that mean him being sleazy, does that have something to do with why you broke up with him?”

  She clicked her tongue. “What difference does it make? Darren didn’t kill me.”

  “How do you know?”

  “He got off the rapid before me with the rest of them.”

  “But he was mad at you. Because you broke up with him.”

  She shook her head. “Darren? He wasn’t mad. In fact, I think he was relieved. See, I was the one who was mad. Darren…Well…” She drew in a breath. Or at least she would have if she were alive and breathing. “Darren was stealing tests,” she said. “Don’t ask me for details, I never did figure out how he was doing it or how he got away with it for so long. But he did. See, Darren wanted a bigger allowance, and Mr. Andrews wouldn’t give it to him. He said Darren had to learn the value of hard work, that he had to realize that most people didn’t get everything just handed to them. So Darren got ahold of those tests and started his own little business. History tests. Math tests. English tests. He’d sell the questions, he’d sell the answers. It was how he got enough money to buy that fancy car of his.”

  I remembered the Mustang. “And so…”

  “So…that’s it. That’s all there is to it.”

  I didn’t think so. There had to be more to any answer that came out
that fast—and that definitive. “That still doesn’t explain why you broke up with him.”

  Lucy’s big blue eyes filled with tears. Her lower lip trembled. When she looked me over, she said, “You just don’t get it, do you? I guess a girl who looks like you never would. In your whole life, you’ve probably never had trouble getting a boyfriend.”

  Getting them? No. It was keeping them that seemed to be my problem.

  Rather than explain and risk getting into the whole thing—Joel, my ex-fiancé, and Dan, the paranormal researcher who’d left the country after we worked together to solve a case, and Quinn, of course—I glommed on to what I saw as the subtext of her comment. I studied Lucy’s gorgeous, golden hair, those long, shapely legs shown to perfection by her miniskirt, that cute figure. “You had trouble getting boyfriends? No way!”

  “Looks aren’t everything. But then, you probably know that, too. I might have been cute, but I never knew when to keep my mouth shut. I had opinions. And I didn’t keep them to myself. Back when I was growing up…well, that wasn’t the way a girl was supposed to act, and when guys realized there was more to me than just my looks…” She shrugged like it was no big deal, but I knew it was.

  I have a hard-and-fast rule about dealing with the dead: I never let them know what I’m thinking. At least when it comes to my love life. It keeps things simpler and it keeps them from butting their ectoplasmic noses in places they don’t belong. I violated the rule and lowered my guard—just this one time. But then, I figured I owed it to the girl who’d never had a chance to get as old—or as wise—as me. “I had a guy walk out on me,” I confessed. “Because I told him I talk to the dead.”

  “And he didn’t believe you.” Lucy shook her head in disgust. “I get it. I mean, I don’t get how he could be so horrible, but I’ve seen it a thousand times. A girl speaks her mind, a boy can’t handle it. Gosh, that’s too bad, Pepper. I mean it.” She sighed a sigh that didn’t ripple the air between us. “I thought things would be different by now. I thought that’s what the sixties were all about—all of us, men and women, young and old—finding our ways and our own true voices. That summer I died, I could feel the first quiverings of it in the air. Free love. Free speech. Free thought. Finally, I felt like I was going to fit in. Like I could speak up and guys wouldn’t look at me like I had two heads. But I never had the chance to enjoy the freedom. I wasn’t alive to be part of it. That’s what the poem was all about, you know? Girl, crimson and golden, awake to the dawn. Alive to the pulse. The vibration. The beat.”