by Cate Lawley
A delicately cleared throat was the first sign that I wasn’t alone in my living room. I pivoted toward the sound.
“Your front door was wide open, and when I tapped on the storm door, you didn’t respond. I brought a housewarming gift.” Sylvie lifted a plate of cookies and watched me with intent interest. “Ah, are you talking to my ex-husband’s ghost?”
6
Red peppers and scalding water never made my face burn so bright.
The poor woman, her ex-husband dead no more than a few weeks, and she walked in on me not only appearing to talk to him, but also declaring my intention of not having sex with her. It was mortifying—for both of us.
Two public declarations regarding my sexual intentions in one day. In my world, that was two too many. Contrary to the evidence, I wasn’t sex-obsessed. I spent too much time with a talking bobcat who had the hormonal urges of a teenager, but he was the sex-obsessed one.
And since when could a cat, regardless of how clever, work a childproofed door? I was going to have a nice chat with that saleslady about how childproofed my front door was. I distinctly remembered shutting it firmly and the latch catching.
When I emerged from my haze of horrific embarrassment, I found her grinning. “Bobby did tend to have that effect on people.”
“What effect?” And what a stupid question. Get it together, man.
“Excited, inappropriate utterances.” Her brown eyes twinkled back at me, demonstrating an amusement I was sure I wouldn’t share in her place.
I blinked dumbly back at her.
“You were saying, before I broke into your house . . . something about it not being necessary for you to have sex with me?” That fetching little dimple that I’d noticed before peeked out and then disappeared.
A throbbing behind my left eye distracted me briefly. “Ah, yes, apologies for—”
Her chuckle interrupted me, and like that, the pain was gone. She waved a hand dismissively. “I blame Bobby.”
“No, please accept my apology.” But before I could complete a coherent expression of regret, I realized it might be best to address the other topic, the not-sex-related one. “You asked if I was talking to Bobby, your ex-husband. The one who’s dead.”
She nodded solemnly. “I did. Something to do with you staring at a blank space on the wall and calling it Bobby, then talking about his ex-wife, who I assume to be . . . me. Cookie?”
She pulled back the cellophane covering the pile of cookies. And that was when I got my second whiff of cookies that day.
“You like to bake?” I limited myself to one, thought better of it, and then took two more. The first bite was answer enough to my question. Cookies had the appearance of simplicity, but it was a lie. Creating the perfect cookie was an art, and Ms. Baker had mastered the perfect cookie.
“I do.” Again the dimple peeked out. “These are all for you.”
“Ah.” But that was all I could manage with a mouth full of cookie, so I nodded with what I hoped was sufficient enthusiasm to express my gratitude.
Her eyes crinkled attractively at the corners as she tucked the cellophane back around the cookies. “I’ll just set these over here.” She pointed at the kitchen table.
Still savoring the large bite I’d taken, I nodded again. Ms. Baker found me amusing, and I wasn’t certain how I felt about that.
A plaintive meow chased away my uncertainty. About that particular creature, I had no reservations. “Ignore him. He likes to complain.” I shot Clarence a warning look, which he completely ignored, emitting another meow. “About your ex, or, rather, your ex’s ghost . . . What are your feelings about ghosts?”
Disregarding my directive to ignore him, Sylvie leaned down and scratched Clarence under his chin. “Aren’t you just the handsomest cat ever. Such a big kitty.” A thunderous purr startled a chuckle out of her. “And loud.” She scratched under his chin and ran her hand down his back. Finally, she said, “I’m not sure what my feelings about ghosts are, but if you’re asking whether I believe they exist, then yes, I do.”
“You do.”
She stood and brushed her hands together. Little tufts of cat hair fell and drifted to the ground. Her firm, clear gaze met mine. “I do, and it seems you do as well. Sink?”
I gestured to the kitchen sink and considered her words.
Bobby wasn’t fully himself. He’d either gone wrong when he’d become a ghost or he’d not been the brightest bulb to begin with. Having twice now met Sylvie Baker, I suspected the former.
Then again, he was her ex-husband.
But whatever the origin of his decreased mental capacity, was he confused enough to fantasize a threat that didn’t exist?
Was Sylvie truly in some kind of danger? I’d been concentrating on ridding my life of a pest. Since cleansing my house seemed unlikely at this point, I was turning to alternatives to addressing his concerns in hopes that a happy ghost would have no need to pester me and might even move on. Immersed in my own headache-inducing, ghostly troubles, I hadn’t considered the implication that my pretty neighbor might truly be in harm’s way.
The idea that someone intended her harm, even if the idea came from a half-demented ghost, made me uncomfortable.
“While you try to decide whether I’m gullible, silly, or naive, I’ll just go ahead and tell you: my grandmother saw ghosts. Actually, she mostly heard ghosts, but every once in a great while, she could see them.” She replaced the tea towel she’d used to dry her hands on the hook next to the kitchen window and turned to look at me. Without any sign of her previous levity, she said, “My grandmother was not a silly woman. And that’s why I believe in ghosts.”
Fair enough. Not that I’d considered her silly or gullible or naive. She possessed the kind of happiness that escaped like bubbles into the air for others to admire and enjoy. But she wasn’t the least bit silly.
Before I could think twice, I said, “Bobby’s been haunting your home and popping in to see us at regular intervals.”
A frown creased her forehead. “I was afraid of that.”
“You were?” That didn’t seem like something that would occur to most people after their ex passed away. Not even a top-twenty concern, if I had to guess.
“If ever a man was going to haunt a woman from beyond the grave, Bobby was a good candidate. He tended toward obsession.” Again the wrinkle in her forehead appeared. “Not that he was possessive, nothing like that. He was generally a good man—one who made terrible decisions—but a good man.”
“Not always.” When she looked at me with a question in her eyes, I tried to clarify, “He didn’t always make terrible decisions, because…” The words “you’re amazing” didn’t exactly trip off my tongue, but I think she got the picture.
The wrinkle disappeared, replaced by the crinkle at the corners of her eyes. “Aren’t you sweet, Geoff.”
My neck warmed.
A hacking hairball cough reminded me we had an observer. That I could forget Clarence, even for a moment, meant that Sylvie Baker had me tied up in knots.
But there was business to be handled, a threat to be assessed. “Sylvie, about your husband—”
“Ex-husband.”
I scanned the room for some sign of Bobby, but he must have run out of juice while we’d been speaking. He’d be recharging now and would be back later to drive me out of my mind.
“Right, your ex-husband. He seems to think that you might be in danger.” I shrugged and gave her a sympathetic look. It sounded more than a little crazy voiced aloud. Not that I wasn’t worried, but I felt silly saying it.
Even if Bobby had been in some trouble before his death, they weren’t married anymore. And she was a hairdresser. Who could possibly want to hurt her? And yet, the thought had me twitching with unease. One moment, my rational mind was convincing me this was ridiculous and the next my gut was telling me it wasn’t. This was what happened to my orderly life when the chaos of humanity was invited into it.
Shaking her head, she sa
id, “I can’t imagine—”
An eardrum-thumping clap trailed by an ominous vibrating rumble had us both ducking in surprise.
“What in the world?” Sylvie’s gaze darted around the room looking for the origin, but she wouldn’t find it here.
I knew that sound. Something nearby had exploded.
It looked like my gut might be more clever than my head. I’d bet those fantastic cookies on my kitchen table that the target of the explosion was the house kitty-corner to my own.
7
The good news: it wasn’t the house kitty-corner to mine. The bad news: it was the shed in the backyard of the house kitty-corner to mine.
Sylvie was understandably upset. Her shed had been blown to pieces about the same time that I’d been suggesting there just might be a small possibility that someone wished her harm . . . according to her dead ex-husband.
But beyond “upset,” I hadn’t a clue how she was handling the explosion or the news of her haunting. She’d emerged from my home to the sight of smoke in her backyard and several helpful neighbors already on the phone with 911. The crowd included a few neighbors I’d met: Mrs. Gonzalez, Mr. and Mrs. Patterson, and Vela George. But there were quite a few new-to-me faces: a tall black man with dark shades who took one look at me and spun on his heel to leave, a group of teenage kids who looked intermittently shocked and fascinated, and a young man who spoke to Mrs. Gonzalez before leaving, possibly her nephew.
Mrs. Gonzalez had embraced Sylvie as she stood in the middle of the street and watched the rising smoke. With one suspicious glance in my direction, Mrs. Gonzalez hustled Sylvie away from me. They quickly disappeared into Mrs. Gonzalez’s home, four houses down from my own. From what little I knew of Mrs. G, Sylvie was either being plied with sweet tea or she was drowning her loss in tequila.
I stayed long enough to watch the authorities arrive, both firemen and police, then retreated indoors.
Clarence followed on my heels, watching as I poured whiskey into a coffee mug and started a pot of coffee. In my experience, Irish coffee was the only reasonable way to drink booze before noon.
“No way you could have known her house was going to get exploded,” Clarence said while I waited for the coffee to brew.
His words bordered on considerate, sympathetic even. I eyed him with suspicion.
“What? A cat can’t have a little empathy? I mean, I know you want some of that—who wouldn’t?—and now it’s gonna be hard, what with her crying over her house. Although you could comfort her—”
“Stop while you’re still ahead.”
“Right.” He flicked the back of his ear with his hind foot. “So how about we go for gold here, and I also mention that I’m sorry for leaving the front door open. I was bird-watching earlier and then got distracted.”
“The childproofing is on there for a reason.” Clarence, out in the world, wreaking whatever havoc popped into his feline brain, was not a scenario I liked to dwell on. But he hadn’t left the house, just created another bird-squirrel-neighbor viewing spot, so I relented. “It wasn’t your fault I got caught spouting—what did Sylvie say?”
Clarence chuckled. “Excited, inappropriate utterances. She’s cute. And just about your speed, except, you know, with really nice ta-t—”
My throat-clearing efforts produced the desired effect, and Clarence firmly sealed his lips. For about three seconds.
“I’m just saying, I think you’re a nice”—he spat, like something nasty had crawled into his mouth—“couple. There. I said it. That’s my requisite nice for the day.”
“Appreciated. Now, any thoughts about this explosion?”
“Ha!” If Clarence still had a knee, he’d be slapping it. As it was, he bounced in a very un-catlike way. “I knew you couldn’t ignore a damsel in distress.” He pogoed a few more times. “We’re gonna do right by Bobby and his old lady. That’s my upstanding, do-gooder boss man.”
Apparently, Clarence truly had been lonely if he’d developed such an affinity for our ghostly visitor in such a short time. I felt a twinge of guilt for the limited contact he had with the outside world, but he wasn’t trustworthy and he was my responsibility.
In a moment of weakness, I reached down and patted him. “We’re going to do our best to sort this mess out, I promise.”
Clarence purred, and I snatched my hand away.
He blinked his big green eyes at me. “Is this one of those ‘never to be spoken of’ moments, boss?”
Not answering seemed the best method to discourage him, so I changed the subject. “I’ll get you a good scratching post, and you can rub your chin to your heart’s content.”
Clarence had only called me “boss” when we’d discussed Bobby’s situation. Maybe it was an indication of just how important it was to Clarence to help his new friend. Yet another reason to involve myself. Not only was it the right thing to do, but my feline ward was showing some signs of emotional growth. I wanted to encourage any improvement . . . and it was also likely he would make my life miserable if I didn’t take the case. So it looked like I was diving in, even if it would drop me into the deep end of humanity much sooner than I’d anticipated.
“Or you could invite that tight piece of—”
I cleared my throat. So much for Clarence’s big heart and good intentions. “Don’t start.”
He ignored my warning. “As I was saying, you could invite the lovely Sylvie over, and she can scratch that itch for me.”
“Clarence, get your mind out of the gutter. Besides, I’m not sure Sylvie will have much time for us, what with our recent disclosure and her shed blowing up. Most people don’t look favorably on the supernatural or those who believe in it.”
“I don’t know. She seemed pretty open-minded to me. You heard what she said about her grandmother.”
“We surprised her. We’ll see how she feels after she’s had a moment to consider it.”
Clarence grinned, showing a little fang. “You know, it’s always possible that there’s no bad guy here. Maybe she was cooking meth in her shed.”
His gleeful tone made me roll my eyes. “Really? You think so?” I sat down at the kitchen table after pulling a chair out for him.
Clarence hopped up and eyed me intently before sitting. “I guess not. Your neighborhood doesn’t have a Breaking Bad flavor. It’s more Leave It to Beaver meets The Brady Bunch.”
“With you living here? Try I Love Lucy.” I rolled my shoulders, working out the kinks. Getting used to a physical body again was proving eventful. “Enough with the sitcoms. We need some intel, and since neither of us has an inside man with the fire department or the police, we need some more local sources.” I leveled him with a stare. “Sylvie’s off the table for now.”
“Sure, sure,” he agreed—much too readily. “What are you thinking, boss?”
“I’m thinking the recently dead. Maybe there was a witness.” I tilted my head. “Anyone besides Bobby still hanging around?”
Clarence would know, since ghosts appeared to him whether they actively wanted to be seen or not.
“Word of your disinterest in engaging with the spirit world has gotten ’round.” Clarence flattened his ears and poked out his nose. “And by word, I mean not nice words.”
“Who, me?” I asked. My former rep had been as a polite, escort-your-soul-with-kindness sort of death. But I was retired. Couldn’t a man get some peace in his golden years?
“You’ve developed a post-retirement reputation.” Clarence sniffed.
I pointed a finger at him. “Don’t sneeze on the table.”
His ears flattened again. “I wasn’t going to. I’m trying to be nice, but since you’re being such a cat hater, I’ll just say it. You’ve got the rep of an ornery, mean old fart. There, I said it. A cat-hating, unhelpful meanie.”
The unhelpful part certainly hit home, primarily because I wanted all of those pesky ghosts to leave me alone. If my life was a lawn, I was that guy hollering for the kids to get off it.
; Leaning back in my chair, I crossed my arms. “Not the reputation I had as a soul collector, but I’ll take it now.”
Clarence waggled his kitty eyebrows. It was unsettling to see, even more so than a talking cat whose mouth never moved. “You sure you were so beloved before?”
“Yes, actually. Okay, Clarence. I’ll try to be more helpful. Not because I want to clean up my reputation, but because solving Bobby’s murder is the right thing to do.”
“What about the cat-hating bit? You gonna fix that? Give a clever kitty some extra fish for dinner, maybe?”
His request got exactly the attention it deserved. “So, again, any souls in the area? Besides Bobby. Preferably one who’s more intact than Bobby.”
Clarence looked as shifty as a cat could look. His gaze darted to the corner of the kitchen ceiling. With a sigh, I couldn’t help imagining how bad a poker player he must have been in his human days.
“Are you developing other friendships? Or perhaps hiding some especially persistent spirits? Spirits, like Bobby, to whom you’ve made certain promises.”
He whistled. A whistling bobcat in my kitchen, and he didn’t think I’d find that suspicious. “Spill it. And no negotiating.” When he hesitated, I reminded him that he’d requested my involvement. “Time to do your bit for this investigation.”
Apparently, the moral dilemma hadn’t occurred to him, because he looked baffled.
“It’s called a conflict of interest, Clarence. Look it up.”
“What am I? An attorney?” A little grousing and grumbling and he finally said, “Ginny. She might have been hanging around and seen something. She’s grounded at the end of the street.”
“Uh-huh. And where exactly did you meet Ginny?”
“Hmmm.” His whiskers twitched, and he tripped my finely tuned trouble alarm. Or rather he increased the trouble quotient. With Clarence there was always a baseline of mischief.
Resigned, I asked, “In the house?”
