The Ghost Detective Books 1-3 Special Boxed Edition: Three Fun Cozy Mysteries With Bonus Holiday Story (The Ghost Detective Collection)

by Jane Hinchey

  “Everything okay?” Anita Finley reappeared with an attractive redhead in tow. I blinked through watering eyes, opened my mouth to speak, but all that came out was a croak. Oh my lord, I think I’d burned my vocal cords, and I hadn’t even swallowed any of the Hellspawn sandwich.

  “Ah.” The redhead nodded knowingly. “You had one of Eleanor’s sandwiches, huh?”

  “Mftsh?” I tentatively touched my lips to make sure they were still attached to my face.

  “Anita, grab our guest some milk, would you?” The redhead ordered. Anita hurried off to obey. The redhead stood in front of me, blocking me from view of the rest of the room. “Just relax. And breathe. Most of us know to give Eleanor’s sandwiches a wide berth. She just can’t seem to grasp the concept of a hint of chili. I don’t know exactly how much she puts in her mix, but suffice it to say it’s enough to strip the enamel clean off your teeth.” Anita came back and shoved a Dixie cup of milk into my hand. I bolted it down, the fire easing somewhat. “What else is in those things?” I gasped. “I thought it was chicken.”

  “That’s her seafood surprise,” the redhead replied. “A mixture of crab, shrimp, tomatoes, and cheese.”

  “And chili,” Anita added almost as an apology. “Oh, my gosh!” She suddenly exclaimed. “You’re not allergic, are you? I have an EpiPen if you need it. I don’t know how many times I’ve asked Eleanor not to bring seafood dishes—I’m allergic myself—but she continues to ignore me and bring her seafood surprise. We’re all so used to it now, and know to avoid it, that it completely slipped my mind to warn you. I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I’m fine,” I said, my mouth now blessedly numb.

  “This wouldn’t happen if we had the budget for catering,” Anita grumbled. “But the books aren’t looking so hot this year. We’ve had to self-cater. Otherwise, I’d get Lacey here to provide the food for all of our events. Oh, how rude. Audrey, this is my best friend, Lacey Stevens. Lacey, this is Audrey Fitzgerald. Lacey is a chef!”

  “Is that right?” They had a chef on the committee, and they let things like Eleanor’s seafood surprise slip through? But I guess if you didn’t have the budget, well, you had to be thankful for potluck dinners.

  “Pleased to meet you, Audrey.” Lacey Stevens smiled, her auburn curls dancing around her shoulders. I eyeballed her critically. Anita’s best friend, huh? She looked to be younger than Anita, in her late forties maybe, with immaculate makeup, rocking a red lip and winged eyeliner not dissimilar to mine, and a chic yellow pantsuit with heels.

  “Here, try one of these.” Lacey moved with graceful strides to the buffet table and returned, holding a noodle cup on a napkin. “One of my specialties, and something I know Anita can eat.” She smiled warmly at her friend. “These are chicken, and the only spices are ginger, garlic, and soy sauce. Oh, and peanut oil. You’re not allergic to peanuts, are you?”

  “No, thankfully, I’m allergy-free.” I cautiously took a bite of the noodle cup, my eyes widening. It was delicious, even my fried taste buds thought so.

  “Right?” Anita grinned. “She’s the bomb.”

  “Okay,” I said, taking another bite. “I think this just became my favorite dish.”

  Lacey laughed. “Everyone says that. So, how do you two know each other?”

  Anita’s face flushed bright red, and panic flitted across her features. Oh boy, I had a sinking feeling she was about to blow my cover. The whole idea of tonight was that I got to meet and question the societies’ committee members without them being any the wiser. And definitely not letting them in on the fact that Anita’s diamond necklace had been stolen. But all of that had fled Anita’s mind, and I knew she was about to spill the beans.

  2

  “I hired Audrey to—” Anita began, but I cut her off.

  “Anita hired me to help with the Kelsh estate.” I smiled while reaching out to grab Anita’s wrist and giving it a hard squeeze. We talked about this, remember? I conveyed with my eyes.

  “I’m a temp,” I explained. “Bit of an expert with spreadsheets and I had a gap in my schedule, so when Anita called to see if I’d be interested in a day or two’s work cataloging the estate, well how could I refuse?”

  The basis for my cover story was true. I had been an office temp before I was a PI, and Dudley Kelsh had no living heirs, so he’d bequeathed his entire estate to various charities. The contents of his family home went to the historical society. Anita had told me there wasn’t anything of value in those contents, just some old furniture and a ton of bric-à-brac, but never-the-less she wanted to see his donation given the proper amount of respect it deserved.

  “The Kelsh estate?” Lacey arched one perfectly manicured brow. “I hardly think that requires cataloging. I thought the committee agreed we’d hold a yard sale?”

  Anita stiffened. “We did. But we are legally obliged to keep a record of what we’re selling or giving away.” I had no idea if that were true or not, but I wasn’t about to argue the point. Seems Lacey had no such qualms.

  “Really, Anita? You’re wasting our precious resources on hiring a temp to catalog a lonely old man’s junk?” She sniffed. “We’d be better off hiring a skip and cutting our losses.”

  “Harsh.” The word slipped out before I could stop it, and both women looked at me in surprise. I smiled weakly, casting my mind around frantically to cover my outburst when inspiration hit. A good PI needed to think on their feet, and I was starting to believe I had what it took to make a decent career out of this private investigator gig. “When Anita explained the assignment, and that it’s on behalf of the society, I immediately waived my fee. So you see, no money wasted. And it’s all for a good cause. I’m sure, as a member of the historical society, you’d appreciate that, Lacey?”

  Lacey cocked her head and looked me up and down as if re-evaluating her initial opinion of me. With a slight inclination of her head, she smiled ever so sweetly. “Of course. Would you excuse me for a moment?”

  Anita and I watched her walk away. “She’s your best friend?” I asked.

  “She is,” Anita sighed. “I know, I know, everyone thinks we’re the odd couple. I mean, look at us. She’s beautiful, graceful, stylish. I’m fat, frumpy, and boring.” She gave a self-deprecating laugh. “But we just clicked. I’ve never had a friend like Lacey before. She only moved to Firefly Bay a few months ago to take up the chef position at the hotel. She joined the historical society to make friends, and yeah, here we are. Chalk and cheese.”

  I gave Anita a reassuring pat on the back. “Friendships come in all shapes and sizes.” I looked around the room at the potential suspects. Who here had stolen Anita’s necklace? “Right, while we’re alone, tell me again what you believe happened to your necklace. And then introduce me to the suspects.”

  “Right.” She nodded. “The committee met last week to discuss this evening’s event. Who would open up, who was bringing what dish? I so wish Eleanor had listened and not brought the seafood surprise sandwiches. Again, I’m so sorry.”

  I waved away her apology. “Who was at the meeting? Everyone? And you mentioned when we spoke before that you’d told them you were planning on wearing your diamond necklace?”

  “Yes! Yes, that’s why I hired you because I remember specifically telling them I would wear it tonight. I usually keep it tucked away at home, I don’t wear it often because I’m so scared of losing it. It was a gift from my parents for my twenty-first birthday. After the meeting, I went home and got it out, I left it sitting on the dresser in my bedroom, in its box. And then yesterday I noticed it was missing. I searched high and low for it, wondering if I’d knocked it to the floor or something, but it was nowhere to be found. That’s when I called you.”

  “And you said some of the committee members were in your house between the night of the meeting and yesterday?”

  “Yes.” She nodded vigorously. “Not the entire committee mind you. But three of them. And I thought it suspicious, when I looked back on it, that all thr
ee had been at the meeting when I mentioned the necklace, and all three had been in my house, and then it goes missing.”

  “Point out the three.” I invited.

  “Keagan Dunn popped in.” She nodded toward the good-looking art dealer. “He wanted to talk about an old painting we discovered in the attic of the Kelsh estate. Worthless, but pretty enough, and the committee agreed that Keagan could oversee the cleaning and restoration of the piece at his gallery, and then it would be donated to the museum.”

  Keagan didn’t strike me as the type who would swipe a diamond necklace, but I filed away what she’d told me. He was in her house and had the opportunity.

  “Who else?”

  “Noreen Bellamy.” I followed Anita’s gaze towards a woman wearing black slacks, a green blouse, with a black waistcoat, the buttons stretching tight across her plump belly. She had shoulder-length reddish-brown hair that lacked any sense of style, and heavy rimmed black glasses. “Noreen is our treasurer,” Anita explained. “And she’s also my husband Logan’s bookkeeper.”

  “Right.” She looked like the bookkeeper type. Either that or librarian. “So she stopped in to talk to you about the society’s accounts?”

  “No, no. She was there to see Logan. She’s been looking after the accounts for his construction business for years. He doesn’t share any of that with me. I tried to get involved when he first started the business, but I was a school teacher back then and busy with my own career, and we had Tyler, so I was super busy. Finley Constructions took off, Logan already had an excellent reputation as a builder when he struck out on his own, so it was easier for everyone if he just hired a bookkeeper to take care of things.”

  “And has that bookkeeper always been Noreen?”

  “Good grief, no. Logan started the business twenty-two years ago, he’s been through four or five bookkeepers since then. Noreen has been with him for about five years give or take.”

  Interesting. Would a family friend, one who’d been involved in the financials of Anita’s husband’s business, be brazen enough to steal from her employer? Or, more precisely, her employer’s wife?

  “Okay. And who was your third visitor?”

  “Mary Wilson, the historical society’s secretary. She was dropping off some flyers for the movie night. Each committee member has a commitment to pass around the flyers. Mary designs them, prints them out, and then delivers them to the committee members.”

  “She delivers them to you?” I was surprised. Mary was not only overweight, but I would have thought her arthritic knees would have been problematic.

  Anita grinned. “On her mobility scooter. And a word to the wise, if you see her coming toward you on the sidewalk, get out of her way. She’s been known to run over a foot or two.”

  “Duly noted.”

  “You know, come to think of it, it couldn’t have been Mary,” Anita said.

  “Oh? Why’s that?”

  “Well, logistically, I don’t think Mary could get up the stairs in my house. Our bedrooms and second bath are upstairs. Living areas downstairs. And the necklace was last seen in my bedroom. Plus, I remember now… she didn’t even come inside. She beeped the horn on her scooter, and I came out to collect the flyers from her.”

  “Right, so we scratch Mary. That leaves Keagan and Noreen.”

  Anita frowned, and I recognized the look on her face. Remorse. Guilt. She was regretting having me investigate her colleagues, I was sure of it.

  “Look.” I placed a hand on her shoulder. “You said your son, Tyler, suggested you may have simply lost it? That he remembers saying last time you wore it that the catch was faulty?”

  “Finally!” Ben, who’d been spending his time at the buffet table had now rejoined us, threw his hands up in the air. “This has been a wild goose chase not worth your time, Fitz.”

  “Hush,” I scolded him. I was in the middle of soothing Anita, I did not need my ghostly side-kick butting in.

  “What was that, dear?” Anita asked, looking at me with a suspicious look on her face, the one that said you did not just tell me to hush, did you?

  “I said that maybe the necklace is simply lost. Not stolen.” I ignored my slip and hoped she would too. I was the only person who could see, hear, and talk to Ben’s ghost. And sometimes that was a pain in my butt.

  She chewed her lip. “I’d like to think that.” Her sigh was long and heartfelt. “But the problem is, I don’t remember taking it out of its box. Or putting it on. So how could I have possibly lost it?”

  “It’s certainly a conundrum,” I agreed. “One that I will get to the bottom of. Let me chat with Keagan and Noreen, and you can get on with enjoying your evening and not worrying about any of this.”

  “You are such a softie.” Ben accused me as we watched Anita Finley join in an animated conversation about highland terriers.

  “What do you think happened to the necklace?” I whispered, trying not to move my lips as I spoke.

  “Best guess? She knocked it off the dresser. It was still in its box, so I’m guessing she didn’t notice it on the floor and has given it a kick and soccered it into some obscure, hard to reach hiding spot. Under the dresser or something.”

  “She said she searched her room. Thoroughly.”

  “Have you? Searched for it, I mean. Her idea of a thorough search and your idea of a thorough search are possibly two very different things. Did she move the furniture about?”

  “All good points,” I sighed. “I’ll stop by her house in the morning on my way back from the range and search for it myself.”

  3

  Watching Galloway check the clips on the two pistols laid out in front of us had my heart skipping a beat and sweat beading my brow. I’d come into this with a brash confidence that was rapidly retreating the closer I got to holding one of those deadly objects in my hands.

  “You need to know how to use this,” Galloway said, placing the black pistol he’d been holding back onto the overturned forty-four-gallon drum serving as a counter. “But I hope you never have to.”

  “So do I…” I couldn’t contain the nervous giggle that slipped out. “I’m sorry, it’s just… I don’t even kill spiders.”

  “Nor do I. Not with a gun.” His joke broke the tension, and I snorted out a laugh. He nodded his head toward the gun. “It’s all yours.”

  When he’d told me we were going to the shooting range, I’d thought he meant the one in town, the one with lanes and barriers and safety equipment. The one where I felt reasonably confident I wouldn’t accidentally shoot myself or him. Instead, we were in an abandoned tunnel, part of the old mill that had closed down decades ago, and there were no safety precautions to be seen. Just the tunnel, caved in at the far end, illuminated with two big construction lights, a string with three targets pegged to it, the drum, and us. It had disaster written all over it.

  “You come here often?” I asked, wiping my sweaty palms on my jeans.

  “Sometimes.” He shrugged. “When I need to blow off steam.”

  “You blow off steam by shooting things?”

  “Sometimes. I know you’re stalling, Fitz.” He shook his head and approached, moving in close behind me. “Safety first,” he said, lips close to my ear. I shivered, reached with a trembling hand to pick up the safety glasses and earmuffs. Galloway donned his own gear, then reached over me to pick up the handgun, handing it to me.

  “Three things to always remember. One, keep the gun pointed in a safe direction.” He gave a nod toward the targets. “Two, keep your finger off the trigger until you’re ready to shoot. And keep the gun unloaded until you’re ready to use it.”

  A wave of nausea washed over me. “Got it.” Convinced I would puke, I turned to face him, desperate for this to be over with. Guns made me nervous. I really didn’t think I had what it took to be a responsible gun owner.

  “You’ve got this, Fitz.” Ben, who’d been exploring the old mill, had returned. Startled, I swung toward him, gun raised.

  “Who
a!” Galloway grabbed my wrist and swung my arm toward the targets. “That way.”

  “Right.” I nodded, clasped the gun with both hands, screwed my eyes shut and prepared to fire.

  “Eyes open,” Ben instructed, while Galloway moved in closer, so close I could feel the heat of him along my back and thoughts filtered through my mind, thoughts that had nothing to do with shooting a gun. I was trembling and pretty sure I would pass out or vomit, possibly both.

  “Easy.” Galloway eased the earmuff away from my ear. “Hold it like this.” He positioned my hands correctly, one hand cradling the other. “We’ll do two hands to start.”

  “To start?” I squeaked.

  “Mmmm. It may not be possible to always use two hands. You need to be comfortable with a one-hand grip.”

  I nodded jerkily, my head bumping his. “Take a breath, raise your arms, level up your target, gently squeeze the trigger.”

  He released my earmuff, and I did as instructed, swinging my arms up I eyeballed the target, aimed as best I could, and squeezed. The gunshot echoed throughout the tunnel, and the target didn’t so much as flutter.

  “Not too terrible,” Galloway lied, voice raised to be heard through the protective ear wear. “Remember to squeeze the trigger gently, don’t jerk it. Try again.”

  Breathe and squeeze, breathe, and squeeze. Round after round completely missed the target.

  “Is this faulty?” I peered at the gun in my hand, twisting it this way and that. How can I not have hit the target yet? Galloway hastily placed his hand over mine and directed the gun back at the target. “Do not shoot yourself. Or me.”

  “So far, I’m doing a bang-up job of shooting that pile of dirt,” I grumbled, my frustration growing. I hadn’t expected to be good at this, but I had hoped to at least nick the edge of the target. So far, I had a one hundred percent success rate at missing it altogether.