by Amy Boyles
“No, I was just looking around.” I made eye contact with the spirit.
The shopgirl cocked her head at me. “You’re the woman from the other day at Soul Food and Spirits.” She snapped her fingers. “And from last night at the funeral home.” She placed the back of her hand to her mouth like we were swapping secrets. “Folks say you can talk to ghosts.”
“Folks say a lot of things,” I said. “Not all of them are true.”
She hitched a shoulder. “Anyway, I’m Faith. Let me know if I can help you.”
“Thanks.” But there wasn’t anything she could help me with. What I needed could only be gained from the spirit.
I met gazes with the ghost.
“Get out,” she said.
Never one to be intimidated, I took a step forward.
“I’ll just be in back if you need anything,” Faith said.
As soon as she was gone, I turned to the spirit. “Listen, all I need to know is if you’ve ever heard of a guy named Lucky Strike.”
“Who wants to know?” she said, eyeing me curiously.
“That would be me,” I whispered. “You know him?”
She smirked. It was sort of an evil look, if I have to be honest. Not too much warmth in it. Not any, actually.
“Everyone knows Lucky. But not him as you say.”
“Great. Riddles. Just what I don’t need.”
Figuring the spirit wasn’t anything more than a dead end, I turned and left the shop. I didn’t have time for nonsense. Maybe next visit to the candle store, she’d be more willing to help and not as willing to throw riddles at me.
When I reached Ghost Catchers, I was shocked. A line wound out the door. It looked like a Saturday morning at the Apple store. You know Saturday morning is always the worst to go to that place. If you need anything, always hit Apple on Wednesdays. Saturday and Sunday, you’re asking to be spending all day waiting in a horrendously long line.
Yeah, I realize I’ve got major issues when a line at the Apple store bothers the bejesus out of me.
As soon as I stepped up, the crowd broke into murmurs. They turned to me en masse and started clapping. I shrank back. Anita had been right to call and bless me out. I didn’t need to be some sort of local celebrity.
I dodged and darted until I finally squeezed into the store.
Alice and Ruth sat behind a table. They had thick black markers in their hands and were signing the local newspaper. I peered closer and realized they were signing their pictures! Oh, and the ghost had been caught as well. Susan was no more than a blur, but it was still quite the news fodder.
Someone shoved a paper and marker under my nose. “Will you sign?”
A geeky kid with bucked teeth smiled widely. I really, really wanted to say buzz off, but I would’ve felt guilty for crushing his little nerdy dreams.
So I shrugged and signed. For the next half an hour that’s all I did. Finally the crowd died and I made a break for it, locking the doors.
“What happened?” I said.
Alice shrugged. “It was like a tidal wave of people. Been like that all morning. Soon as we walked in, half the town followed, wanting us to sign their papers.”
“You’re local celebrities,” I said.
“Not only that,” Ruth said, pointing to the phone. “We had seven messages waiting for us. Folks want us to come catch their ghosts.”
“Oh, well,” I said, unsure of how to respond. You didn’t really catch a ghost last night didn’t seem very nice. So I zipped my lips.
“What about you?” Alice said. “You need our help investigating Slick?”
My jaw dropped. “What’s this ‘we’ business?”
Ruth shook out her signing hand. “After our conversation last night I figured that’s what you stopped by for, especially since you found the whole image rights paperwork.”
I drummed my fingers on the counter. “Yeah, I need to see if he has the computer, but I haven’t figured out how.”
Alice cleaned her glasses on her floral dress. “Guess we can’t do the same trick with the ghost twice, can we? Have it appear at the funeral?”
I shook my head. “No, I don’t think so. I mean, it was pretty tasteless doing that at the viewing. Having a spirit scream and throw things at a funeral is pushing it.”
Ruth and Alice sat. Ruth whipped a tin of cookies out of nowhere and passed them around.
“No thanks, I just had a pie from Soul Food and Spirits. Fried peach. Delicious.”
“Hmm, those are good,” Ruth said. She munched on a cookie for a few minutes. Finally she spoke. “We need a way to get into his house that doesn’t involve breaking and entering.” She snapped at Alice. “Where’s everyone going after the funeral?”
Alice shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Ruth grabbed the phone and started dialing. “I’ll call Lindsay May Pope at the church. She owes me a favor.”
“What are you going to have her do?” I said.
With a twinkle in her eyes, Ruth smiled widely. “Why, I’m going to make sure that boy Slick has all the food he can get his hands on after the service. I’m going to send all the Baptist ladies to his house. We’ll go, too. That’ll be our excuse for being there. He’ll be in mourning and won’t have a clue what to do.”
Alice beamed. “Smart thinking.”
Ruth dialed up Lindsay May Somebody and got it all straightened out. Great. At six p.m., right after Xavier’s graveside service, the Baptist Women’s League would converge on Slick’s house with their best casseroles in tow. It would be perfect, exactly the distraction we needed to get inside.
I was about to leave when something occurred to me. “Is there supposed to be a spirit at the bed-and-breakfast?”
Ruth and Alice exchanged glances.
“What is it?”
Ruth closed the cookie tin. “There isn’t supposed to be, but it was well-known around town that the grandfather of the young man who owns it now—what’s his name?” she said to Alice.
“Roan,” I chimed.
“Roan, yes. It was well-known his grandfather dabbled in things.”
Ew. I didn’t like the sound of that. “What sort of things did he dabble in?”
“Magic mirrors, people rumored,” Alice said. “They said he could see the future.”
“Okay,” I said slowly. “But I’m asking if a spirit haunts it.”
The women exchanged another look.
“Will you two stop shooting looks.”
Alice grimaced. “Sorry. Old habit. Ruth and I have known each other so long we don’t have to ask the other what we’re thinking. We know.”
Must be nice to have friends like that.
Ruth smoothed her hands down her skirt. “Some folks say one night they heard horrible screaming. Terrible, like people were dying. But when the cops investigated, no one was home. They even searched the place. But the next day—”
“Old Man Storm’s hair was completely white,” Alice finished.
“White?”
“He’d had the most beautiful auburn hair before that. But it was white as if all the color had been pulled right out of his head.”
My gaze darted from one to the other. “You’re kidding?”
“Nope. And ever since, the family’s been real hush-hush. All the rumors about Mr. Storm stopped, but the family has never sold. They keep the place to themselves.”
I zipped up my jacket. The story creeped me out, set a chill in my bones. “Okay, the whole white-hair thing is a little weird if it’s true, but the fact that they’ve never sold isn’t a big deal to me. I mean, lots of folks keep businesses in the family. I don’t see a real smoking gun there.”
They exchanged another look.
“Darn it, if you two are going to keep doing that, I’ll just do the whole Slick thing by myself.”
“No,” Alice said. “We need you. How else are we going to catch ghosts?”
My stomach clenched. “We didn’t catch a ghost. It was all show.”
I smacked my forehead. “I’m here to catch one ghost—one.”
“We can help you.”
I opened my mouth. Shut it. “I’ll think about it. Anyway, what is it you’re keeping from me about the bed-and-breakfast?”
“Well,” Alice said, lowering her voice. I didn’t know why. It was only the three of us in the room. “Rumor has it they keep the place in the family because there’s a terrible monster locked up in the basement.”
“Hmpf.”
Ruth stared at me. “You already know this.”
“Okay, a little birdie might’ve said something about it,” I admitted. “But I didn’t believe it. It sounds stupid. A spirit trapped in the basement? A family has to guard the spirit. If it gets out, it’ll scare people and turn their hair white. Sounds like a bunch of phooey.”
Alice slapped her thigh. “Believe what you want, that’s how the story goes. Anyway, we’ve never been called in to investigate, so I wouldn’t know.”
I rose. “Okay, since that’s as clear as mud, I’m going to get going. What time are we supposed to meet? Five?”
“Yes. Be here around then. Wear something black.”
“Crap. I don’t have anything black.”
“I might have something for you,” Alice said.
Alice was at least four sizes wider than me. I paused, unsure how to politely say no thanks, when Ruth stepped in.
“I’ll find you something. I’ve got a niece about your size. She doesn’t have purple hair, though.”
“Violet,” I corrected.
“Violet,” she said, smiling.
I left and walked straight into Blustery Books. As soon I hooked my fingers around the door handle and pulled, I shouted loud enough for young Ricky to hear me.
“Ricky, I’m back for my wallet. And this time I’m not leaving without it.”
TWENTY
Mr. Hodges was nowhere to be seen. Thank goodness, because I looked like an idiot. I pulled a wrapped leftover fried pie from my pocket and waved it back and forth.
“Come on, Ricky. Let’s call a truce. I’ll be nice and you can have this pie.”
A couple of seconds ticked past.
“Come on. I’m about to be homeless, kid.” I peered behind a bookcase. No Ricky. The floorboards creaked and moaned as I perused the store.
When I reached the far corner of the shop, where the sun streaking through the large leaded windows didn’t touch the richly stained oak flooring, I settled the pie on the floor and took a few steps back.
It took a moment, but Ricky finally appeared. He eyed the pie greedily and set about mimicking eating it.
I bent down and smiled. “I got it from the restaurant where that nasty spirit keeps you from. I figured you might like one of her pies. Show her she can’t bully you.”
Ricky raked his hair from his face and smiled. A second later my wallet fell from the sky and landed on the floor in front of me.
I scooped it up. “Thanks. But you’re not going to steal it from me again, are you?”
He shook his head. I was tempted to reach out and muss his hair, but then I remembered that he was a spirit and I was not.
I’d learned my lesson with this kid—don’t drop the wallet in my pocket. With it clutched in my hand, I headed to the front door.
Mr. Hodges appeared from the back. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you come in. Is there something I can help you with?”
The tenuous relationship between the spirit world and the human wasn’t nearly as strict in this town as it was in so many others. I’d lived my life knowing that spirits were meant to move on. They weren’t supposed to live with us, and we weren’t supposed to live with them.
But for the first time in my life I didn’t feel like those boundaries needed to be so fiercely kept in line. For the first time I liked my gift. Yes, darn it, I could see spirits and talk to them and help them cross to the other side.
And it didn’t bother me one bit.
I smiled at Mr. Hodges as I tossed my wallet in the air and caught it one-handed. “No, sir, I don’t need any help. I’ve got everything I need.”
Which was exactly what I thought until I received an urgent call from Ruth a couple of hours later.
“The Baptist Women’s League won’t be able to do the food at Slick’s. Apparently they’d already planned on camping out at Truck’s house.”
I groaned. “But we need to get into Slick’s place. We need a reason to search it.”
“He’ll be at the funeral,” Ruth said. “The place will be empty then.”
“We can’t break and enter. That’s illegal. No. I need him to welcome us with open arms.”
I clicked my tongue. Without an onslaught of old women shoving green bean casserole under his nose, Slick would have no reason to see me. Thoughts raced through my head—should I tell him I was thinking about buying the restaurant? Tell him I left some stuff in the van?
Problem was, Slick didn’t have the van.
As much as I hated to do it, it looked like I was going to have to use scare tactics to get inside the place.
“I’ll call you back,” I said. “Let you know if I’ve got a plan.”
I hung up and pressed my phone against my forehead. The one thing I knew was that I couldn’t drag Alice and Ruth into criminal activity with me. There was simply no way. It was one thing for me to go about breaking and entering, another thing completely to coerce two little old ladies to do it, too. Even if those little old ladies wanted to be world-class ghost catchers.
Hmmm…unless there was another way.
I glanced at my watch. It was four. The funeral started at five and it would be beginning to darken then. Figures Xavier would want to be buried at night. I didn’t even know the cemetery allowed such things.
Well, I guess you pay enough money and you could do just about anything you wanted.
I pulled on a sweater to stop chills from setting in.
“You got a hot date?”
I turned to see Susan lying on my bed. Her legs were stretched out and her arms tucked neatly behind her head.
“No dates. Well, maybe a date. Do you think your friends will be hanging out tonight?”
She blew a huge Bubblicious-sized bubble and pinched it with her fingers. “Probably. They never leave.”
“Great. Thanks. And I owe you one for the other night.”
Susan winked at me. “No problem.”
I grabbed my keys and wallet and headed downstairs. It only took a second to find Roan. He was in a small office off the front entrance. I leaned on the doorjamb and opened my wallet, yanking out several large bills.
“I have to owe you close to this.”
He smiled. His dark eyes twinkled. For the first time I noticed a dimple in his cheek. “And here I thought you were going to stay and dash.”
“Stay and dash? Is that a thing?”
He shrugged. “Could be.”
“Anyway, if I owe you more, let me know.” I started to walk away.
“Blissful.”
I paused, turned. “Yes?”
“You have plans later tonight?”
My heart seized. He wasn’t supposed to ask me that. “Um. Yeah.”
“All right.”
“Why?” Because you wanted to ask me out so you could take off your shirt? Let me watch you run around shirtless for a while?
You know, I could really get into that.
He opened his mouth and shut it. When he opened it again, he said, “We’ve got meat pies for supper.”
I quirked a brow. “Is that really what you were going to say?”
“Your hair is very violet today.”
Like how could he make a compliment sound sarcastic and sexy at the same time? I think drool dripped from my mouth. “Meat pies aren’t very Southern.”
“But very fill
ing,” he said it slowly, like he was savoring every word.
Great. So all he wanted was to invite me to gorge myself on fattening food with a half dozen other guests.
I flipped a lock of hair over my shoulder. “I’ll try to make it back in time.” But I doubted I would.
“I’ll save you one.”
My heart clenched. The niceness of his words hit me. I closed my eyes, inhaled deeply and got ready to rumble.
I left the house and hopped in the cruiser. It only took a few minutes to make it to the cemetery. I could see where Xavier’s funeral would be—on the other side of the hill. Far from where I needed to make some magic happen.
Let’s face it, I wouldn’t be making any magic, but a few spirits might if they decided to show up.
I waited as the sun burned down the horizon. “Come on. Come on and sit already.”
As soon as twilight sparkled in the distance, I opened the door. I could see a winding showcase of vehicles down on the other side of the hill.
Not wanting to be seen by any of the funeral attendees, I hunched down in front of a gravestone.
“Boo!”
I glanced up to see Captain Blount standing on top of his headstone. He bent over and gave me a solid stare that could’ve made even the bravest of men wither.
“And what, my dear, do you think you’re doing scampering about out here? Not grave robbing, I hope.”
“I need a favor.” The funeral procession was now out of sight. I rose and brushed off my knees.
Other spirits materialized. “What favor do you need?” Granny Mildred stared at me with dark eyes.
“I need a whole bunch of you to create a ruckus in town. Not one or two—all of you. I need a distraction.”
“And how will this further the cause?” Captain Blount said.
“The cause?” I said, confused.
“He means,” snipped Farmer Kency, “how will it further the goal of equality with the living?”
Oh that. “Well,” I hesitated, “it might not. It might hurt your cause.”
Captain Blount wagged a finger at me. “Listen here, little lady. We will do nothing to hinder the cause. We want equality.”
These spirits were seriously out of their gourds. “What are you doing to help yourselves?” I snapped. “All I see is a bunch of spirits hanging out in a graveyard. You’re not down there,” I pointed to town, “picketing for rights. Oh no, you’re sitting right here complaining and whining about your lack of them.”
