The Ghost Had an Early Check-Out

by The Ghost Had an Early Check-Out (retail) (epub)

  “Look, look!” Juri hastily unwrapped the small white parcel that turned out to contain glistening red chunks of liver and other offal. The wrapper floated to the marble floor as he waved a fistful of meat frantically. “Wally! Wally! Look here, boy! Come here!”

  At the sound of Juri’s voice, the alligator raised its long, ugly head and appeared to sniff the air. Its massive tail swept back and forth as it began to reverse. Nick and everyone else in the hall jumped out of range.

  “There. You see?” Juri exclaimed. “He’s leaving. He just got confused. He didn’t mean any harm. It’s my fault for leaving the gate open.”

  “Then maybe he should shoot you,” Long Hair retorted. “My ass, he’s harmless! If he’d got through that door—”

  The door in question opened cautiously. A young woman with curly brown hair and wide green eyes craned her head around the edge. “You promised, Enzo,” she said. “You said it would never happen again.”

  “I know, I know. I could have sworn I shut the gate.” Juri was walking backward, still waving the meat. “I don’t know what went wrong.”

  “I’ll tell you what went wrong,” Long Hair said. “You forgot to lock the goddamned gate.”

  Juri had reached one of the tall, arched glass doors. He fumbled with the latch, shoved it open, and stepped outside, still making clucking sounds and calling to the alligator, who slowly followed him.

  “Jesus fucking Christ.” The guy with the long hair looked at the girl. “Are you okay, Ami?”

  She nodded, looked at Nick, looked at the pistol. “Thank you. I thought he was really coming through the door that time.”

  “It’s happened before?” Nick asked. He holstered his weapon.

  “Last month. He’s a pet, but still.”

  The young man said, “And two months before that, he got out. You can’t domesticate wild animals. Imagine if one of us stepped out of our room at night and that thing was running loose in the dark. It belongs in a zoo.”

  “I know.” The girl shuddered. “But he’s had him for forty years.”

  “Hell, put Juri in the zoo with him.”

  “What’s going on here? What’s happened?” The voice was somehow familiar, although it had probably been twenty years since the last time Nick had seen a Horace Daly movie.

  They all turned to face the newcomer.

  Yep, Horace Daly, in the flesh. He was tall, slender, and unexpectedly elegant despite the scuffed tennis shoes, worn jeans, and wrinkled white denim shirt. His hair was long and silver, and even from all the way down the hall Nick could see how blue his eyes were.

  Long Hair and the girl both started talking at once.

  “Wally tried to get into my apartment again,” Ami said. “He nearly took the door down this time.”

  “That thing’s a menace. Something’s got to be done,” the man—presumably Ned Duke—insisted.

  “Have you spoken to Enzo?” Horace’s crystal gaze fell on Perry. “My dear boy! You came! You kept your promise!”

  “Yes, I—”

  “I knew you were a man of principle. The moment I laid eyes on you.”

  “Oh. Thank you, but—”

  “But where are your bags?”

  “In the car,” Perry said. “We had to park down by the road.”

  Horace was beaming at Perry, but then the “we” registered, and he belatedly noticed Nick. His expression seemed to change to one of wariness before smoothing out to a courteous blank. He offered his hand. “I’m sorry. I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  Nick shook hands. Horace’s skin was cold and dry, but there was plenty of strength in his grip.

  Duke, meanwhile, wasn’t giving up. “What happens if that monster gets through the door next time, Horace?”

  Horace ignored him. Pointedly.

  Perry said, “This is Nick Reno. I told you about him yesterday.”

  Horace smiled, but his eyes did not warm. “Ah, yes. The PI. But I thought you were out of town?”

  “Nick got back last night.”

  “It’s illegal to keep an alligator as a pet in Los Angeles county,” Duke persisted. “I looked it up. Maybe somebody needs to call Animal Control.”

  Horace stopped smiling and turned back to Duke. “Not if that somebody intends to keep living at Angel’s Rest.”

  The girl murmured in dismay.

  Duke’s face tightened. “I’m not sure low rent is worth the risk of being eaten by an alligator.”

  “Eaten by an alligator?” Horace made a dismissive noise. “No one has been eaten in four decades. I think you’re safe enough. Ami, lovey, were you harmed in any way?”

  “Well, no. But…”

  “It would break Enzo’s heart if something happened to Wally. Do you want to break Enzo’s heart?”

  Ami glanced at Duke and sighed. “No. But I also d—”

  “Excellent,” Horace said with finality. “Then we’re all in agreement.” He turned to Perry and switched the smile back on. “I’m ecstatic you came. Let’s go where we can speak in private.”

  Perry offered Nick a look that was half apology and half now-the-adventure-begins! and followed Horace, who strode swiftly down the long, gloomy corridor. Nick walked behind them, observing and assessing. Through the grimy arched windows, he could see Enzo still coaxing the alligator across the patchy lawn toward an opening in the hedge. That was one very big lizard, and Nick’s sympathies were all with Ami and Duke.

  “Arrogant little shit. I don’t appreciate being threatened,” Horace was muttering as he opened the ornate bronze gate to a small elevator at the end of the hall. “It’s hard to find good tenants, though, and the Duke boy has never missed a rent check yet.”

  The three of them crowded into the ornamental-looking elevator, Horace slid the gate shut with a clang, pressed a button, and the small cage lifted slowly and, it seemed to Nick, none-too-steadily from the hall. The pulleys squeaked ominously as the floors inched past. Horace talked all the while—and, in Nick’s opinion, to no purpose. Just filling the silence? There was a lot to fill in a place this big.

  The lift lurched to a stop on the third level, and Horace shoved back the gate and gestured for them to disembark. “I’m the only one on this floor. The rest of them are downstairs. I like my privacy.”

  He led the way down another much darker hallway, past a mannequin in a monk’s robe and hood. Most of the lighting provided by the retrofitted wall sconces was flickering or nonexistent. Still, from what he could tell, the scarlet and gold carpet was in better shape up here and the watered silk wallpaper mostly intact. A skull with a knife through the eye sat on a tall, narrow library table, but what caught Nick’s attention—and that was likely due to nearly a year of living with Perry—was the artwork. A gallery of large, framed paintings in a variety of mostly disturbing styles stretched all the way from the elevator to as far down the hall as he could see.

  Nick spent a lot of time in motels and hotels, and it was safe to say this art was very different from the generic photographs of lighthouses and floral watercolors that graced most of his lodgings.

  “Pretty cool, right?” Perry said, watching his reaction. “These are all paintings from Mr. Daly’s films.”

  “Is that so?” Nick had guessed as much. He couldn’t imagine there was a big demand for landscapes featuring gallows trees and graveyards outside of the movie industry.

  “I always made sure to make friends with my film set decorators,” Horace put in. “Of course, none of this is worth anything to anyone but me.”

  “There’s some good stuff here.” Perry assured Nick, as though reading his mind.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. Well, I don’t mean valuable necessarily, but that’s a great try at cubism, and it’s an actual painting, not a print.” Perry nodded at what looked like a portrait of a woman hacked to pieces. Eye of the beholder stuff, for sure.

  Perry and Horace chattered on about the prop paintings until they reached Horace’s room. Horace unlocke
d the door and ushered them inside rooms that smelled of must, mothballs, and marijuana.

  Wow, in Perry’s words.

  Horace’s quarters were actually a couple of presidential-sized suites with the dividing wall knocked down in order to create one large and luxurious apartment. Or at least at one time it would have been luxurious. Now… The first thing Nick noticed was the enormous picture window overlooking the dead garden. The window let in a lot of daylight which, after the disturbing hallway art gallery, was welcome. The second thing he noticed was that the place looked more like a film set than a place where anyone actually lived.

  A huge gold and black mummy case stood propped against one wall. At the dining table across the room, a skeleton in a cape and top hat was seated opposite a second skeleton wearing a tuxedo and a horse skull for a head.

  “Homey, isn’t it?” Nick said, and Perry grinned at him.

  “I like to have my toys about me,” Horace said. He was preening. Did he imagine most people would be anything but creeped out by this collection of macabre memorabilia? Or maybe he liked the idea of creeping people out?

  “I see that.”

  There were toys in the room, as a matter of fact. A heavy bookcase was crowded with old-fashioned tops and jack-in-the-boxes and tin soldiers—probably worth a pretty penny on eBay—and on the top shelf, a row of creepy, antique dolls in frilly dresses slumped against each other.

  Having visited this personal museum the day before, Perry’s attention was focused on Horace. He was saying, “I told Nick all about your situation. I think he can help you.”

  Horace doubtfully surveyed Nick. “Let’s talk in the kitchen where we can’t be overheard,” he said.

  Overheard by what? The skeletons? The dolls with their bright, empty eyes? Whatever was residing in that mummy case?

  But Nick said nothing, following Horace and Perry through the open doorway into the adjoining room. Here at least the smells were more ordinary: burned bacon and a drain that could have used a box or two of baking soda. A bottle of sage-and-lavender-scented cleaning solution sat on the metal-edged linoleum counter.

  Horace went straight to the kitchen sink and turned the taps on full. He beckoned to Nick and Perry to join him.

  As they edged close, he put his finger to his lips. Nick gave Perry a side look, but Perry was watching Horace attentively.

  When Horace decided the rush of water had reached the right decibel, he spoke in a low but carrying voice. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you kept your word.”

  “Of course,” Perry said. Serious and solemn. Concerned for Horace. Indifferent to the weirdness of the situation. Nick shook his head inwardly and let his impatience go. Perry had committed to this plan of action, therefore Nick was committed. That was how it was.

  “All I need is someone to stay here until Monday morning. Once Halloween is past, the danger will be over.”

  Nick said, “I’m not following.”

  “Just having someone here during the…the critical period will act as a deterrent. I truly don’t believe he—they will try anything now.”

  Horace gazed at them with blazing-eyed earnestness that did nothing to reassure Nick.

  “You don’t believe who will try what?” Nick asked. He hadn’t missed the he being belatedly switched out for they.

  Horace pointed silently, meaningfully at the floor.

  Meaning friends, family, or tenants? All of the above? None of the above?

  Nick could not say what he was thinking—not with Perry gazing at him with that mix of hope and confidence. Hope that this would make sense to Nick. Confidence that once it did, Nick would have a ready solution.

  “Why would the danger pass with Halloween?”

  “Because,” Horace said quickly. “Because.”

  “Yeah, that really doesn’t expl—”

  “I was thinking about this after we spoke last night.” Horace was talking to Perry again, and Perry was nodding encouragingly. “I started remembering. The last time this happened, it was around Halloween as well. I’m almost positive that every time it starts up again, it’s around Halloween. Which makes sense.”

  No. Not really. Not even to Perry, who was now shooting Nick uneasy little glances.

  “When what starts up again?” Nick persisted.

  “The attempts on my life!”

  “I see. You’re saying you believe every Halloween someone attempts to kill you?”

  “Yes. I don’t believe it. I know it. That’s when the letters arrive.” Horace frowned. “Well, not every Halloween. And this time is different. This is the first time assassins were sent after me.”

  Assassins.

  Horace was the original drama queen, but maybe it came with the territory.

  “Mr. Daly, is it at all possible that yesterday’s attackers were pranking you?”

  “Pranking me?” Horace’s brows rose in offended inquiry.

  “Playing a practical joke on you. Maybe someone with a peculiar sense of humor?”

  Horace frowned over this idea for a moment or two before admitting grudgingly, “Perhaps. I might accept that explanation if there hadn’t been three of them.”

  “I don’t see the significance of three attackers.”

  Perry said, “How realistic is it someone could persuade three people to take part in a potentially fatal practical joke?”

  “For the right amount of money? Very. Dumb people do dumb things for money.”

  “But why would someone pay for that? Besides, those guys weren’t professionals, but they also weren’t kidding around yesterday.”

  Fair enough. And Perry was in a position to know how serious Horace’s assailants had been, having nearly fallen victim to them as well.

  “Okay,” Nick said. “Not a bad joke, then. You believe that someone in this house wants you out of the way?”

  Despite his earlier hints, Horace hesitated. “It’s possible. Or it could be someone obsessed with my films.” Horace nodded at Perry, as though that was Perry’s theory.

  A limitless cast of suspects. Great.

  “Perry said you’ve received threatening letters. Did you keep any of the letters? Did you keep the envelopes?”

  “No.”

  Nick wasn’t sure if he was lying or not. The problem with Horace’s films had never been Horace’s acting.

  Nick said, “Do you remember if the letters came in the mail?”

  “Yes.” Horace frowned, considering. Or pretending to consider? “I think so. I think they came in the mail.”

  “Do you remember if the stamps on the envelopes were cancelled?”

  “I…don’t remember. It isn’t something I looked for.”

  That was hard to believe. Who wouldn’t at least glance at the envelope after receiving a death threat? Then again, Horace did seem to live in his own little world.

  “If these threats aren’t coming from a crazed fan, who do you think might wish you harm?”

  Once again, Horace hesitated. He said without conviction, “I can’t think of anyone.”

  “Who gains from your death?”

  Horace gave a weird laugh. “As of this morning?” He nodded at Perry. “Perry does.”

  Chapter Five

  “Huh?” Perry looked from Nick to Horace, then back to Nick. “Wait. What?”

  He’d read about people’s faces looking like thunderclouds, but this was the first time he’d actually witnessed it. He could practically see lightning bolts glinting in Nick’s eyes.

  “What does that mean?” Nick said with ominous restraint.

  Horace’s smile was a little unsettling. “Last night I phoned my lawyer, he drew up a new will, and I signed it first thing this morning.”

  “Why would you do that?” Nick asked. It was Perry’s question too.

  Maybe Nick’s displeasure was finally starting to register because Horace seemed a little flustered. “I-I realized yesterday that Perry is a man of extraordinary tal—”

  Nick broke in
. “I repeat. Why would you do that?”

  “After Perry explained his situation last night—”

  This was more and more confusing. Never mind the fact that Horace was living like a refugee from the Hollywood Horror Museum. Nick was liable to think…what? That Perry had been complaining about money—or, more exactly, the fact that they didn’t have any? He hadn’t. Wouldn’t. Besides, compared to his previous precarious financial situation, they were living like kings. Well, princes. Princes on a fixed income. It didn’t matter. He’d be happy to live in a cardboard box so long as it was with Nick.

  “You think someone in this house might have a motive to kill you, and knowing that, you changed your will in favor of Perry?”

  Perry put his hand on Nick’s arm, feeling the rigidity of tendons, the bulge of muscles. Nick was mad enough to punch something. Or someone. “It’s okay—”

  “No, it’s not okay.”

  Horace was stammering, “Well, yes. If anyone here imagined they had a reason to want me out of the way, that reason is gone. I signed it away at 9:15 this morning.”

  “And turned Perry into a potential target.”

  Okay. Now he got it. Now he understood the underlying cause of Nick’s tension. Nick had a tendency to be a little…overprotective. Sometimes. But really, wasn’t the most likely explanation of Horace’s troubles a crazed fan who couldn’t tell the difference between reality and special effects?

  Although… If the unpleasant Nevins were hoping to inherit whatever remained of Horace’s fortune, this decision of Horace’s would not go over well.

  “No, no,” Horace was saying quickly. “There would be no reason. The will is signed. It’s over and done. Now my estate goes to whoever Perry designates.”

  “What are you—? Are you—? You’re not dead,” Nick snapped. “Perry wouldn’t inherit until you’re out of the way. If something happens to Perry before you die, it means you’d either have to choose another heir or the estate goes to your next of kin.”

  Accurate and absolute. Like a well-aimed bullet. That was Nick.