Liz Jasper - Underdead 02

by Underdead in Denial

Marty stood before the front door, talking to the paunchy unibrowed LBPD detective in charge of Tom’s case. I use “talking” loosely. Marty’s voice was just shy of a shout and his arms were flapping in anger.

  “How much longer is this going to go on, Detective? I have a business to run.”

  The detective made a show of looking down at the haunted house, snaking through the parking lot. “Looks to me like you guys are doing a fine job.” His voice was so calm he almost sounded bored.

  Marty’s arms flapped faster. “This is ridiculous! You can’t shut me down indefinitely. I demand to have access to my own theater. I will take this higher, don’t think I won’t!”

  Without warning, he turned and stalked away from the detective. If I didn’t move quickly, he was going to bump into me. I jogged a dozen feet back the way I’d come, then turned around and pretended I was just coming up the path.

  “There you are,” I said, flattening myself against the side of the building as Marty nearly mowed me down. “Hey, is everything okay?

  “Fools!” Marty took a breath so deep I drew back, fearing he’d pop like a balloon.

  On the exhale, his whole body relaxed and he flashed me his “benevolent uncle” smile. “Everything’s fine,” he assured me absently.

  Then his gaze grew sharp and his smile faltered. “What are you doing up here?”

  “Looking for you. The parents sent me to fetch you. They wanted to clear up a few minor things before the haunted house opened.”

  He relaxed again. “Of course, of course. Never underestimate the value of a good pep talk before an event. Now.” He clapped his hands together. “Let’s go scare some teens!”

  He started back down the path, stopping again as I moved to follow.

  “Where do you think you’re going? Back to the front. You’re our ticket-taker. I’m counting on you to hold down the fort until I get there. Take the stairs. It’s faster.”

  He turned away and hustled down the path. Marty really moved quite fast for a man shaped like a barrel.

  “Hey, get in position!” he bellowed to a mummy as it ambled out of the rehearsal room, zipping up its costume. “We’ll be letting the crowds in any minute.”

  I turned and began to make my own way back to the front end of the parking lot. I was at the top of the stairs about to head down when I felt a pinch on my shins and the ground suddenly tilted up to meet me. My feet wouldn’t move properly. I barely registered a shadowy human form where a tree should have been as gloved hands whipped a dark plastic bag over my head and shoulders. A little shove between my shoulder blades sent me plummeting down the staircase in darkness.

  Chapter Eleven

  Falling blindly, I swung out instinctively with both arms. My left hand connected with the railing in a bone-jarring move, but I held on, nearly twisting my arm out of its socket as it bore my weight. My head didn’t hit the stairs, but every other part of me seemed to. The collision knocked the wind out of me. Sharp pains shot through my thighs, hips and back.

  The plastic bag tightened over my mouth and nose as I gasped desperately for air. Letting go the railing, I frantically ripped a hole in the bag near my mouth, but it wasn’t enough. Not for my panicked breath, my oxygen-starved lungs. I needed it off me. The bag seemed enormous, endless. I tore futilely at it for precious moments before I realized it was pinned under my hip. Twisting, ignoring the sharp protests of my abused limbs, I struggled to my feet and cool fresh air billowed under the bag. Bliss.

  I was so caught up in unwrapping myself that I didn’t consider that whoever had done this might still be around.

  Until I heard a shoe scratch on a stair behind me.

  The hairs on the back of my neck went up. Through the holes I’d made in the bag, I smelled a familiar sweet, musky perfume. It was faint, barely there. But I noticed it. I knew what it meant.

  Natasha.

  The panic that had consumed me only moments ago was nothing compared to the terror that filled me now, pouring through my every cell like a sick poison. The bag was still over my head. I couldn’t see. I grabbed at the plastic in earnest, trying to desperately to get it off me. I refused to die like a blind, trussed rat.

  Hands grabbed me from behind, pulling at the bag, fighting my efforts. I tried to suck in a breath but the bag had shifted and my air holes had disappeared. The plastic tightened over my mouth, cutting off my cries like a gag.

  The hands tugged harder at the plastic, pulling me off balance. I stumbled backward and cracked the back of my head against what felt like a rock.

  “Ow!” The curse that followed was short, heartfelt and male. I was released.

  I grasped handfuls of plastic bag and pulled myself free of it as my assailant disappeared around the corner. I had the impression of light colored hair, but little else, and I wasn’t even sure about the hair.

  And Natasha? Had I imagined she was there? Confused, I forced my aching, trembling legs to take me back up to the top of the staircase for a better look around. Natasha was nowhere to be seen. I was as alone as someone could be in a parking lot full of people. Marty, who hadn’t noticed that I’d nearly met my death on the stairs, was twenty yards away, chatting with the volunteers at the gate.

  Just then, something made me look to my left. Way at the other end of the parking lot, nearly invisible in the shadow of the tree he leaned against, was Will. He was looking straight at me. The moment our gazes crossed, I felt a rush of fire and ice slide through my body. My legs seemed to move on their own accord, and I took a step toward him.

  And nearly tripped again. I glanced down. A thin gleam of plastic flashed in the faint red glow of the parking lot lights and disappeared. I bent down. Fishing line. I tugged my laces free. The line was looped around a tree trunk on one side of the path and tied off the other. Quick but effective.

  All my demise had nearly required was fishing line, a trash bag and opportunity. If I’d been moving at my usual brisk pace, the fall might have broken my neck.

  Fury filled me. Driven by pure anger, I stood back up and started toward Will. I was done playing Natasha’s little game of cat and mouse. If Will wanted to finish me off, fine. Let him try it. But I was damned if I was going to let his taffy-haired sybarite do me in.

  What I’d taken to be a second slender tree trunk by Will’s side swayed and Natasha appeared in a patch of moonlight.

  I stopped in surprise.

  Even a vampire can’t be in two places at once.

  Natasha hadn’t done it.

  It didn’t make sense. If Natasha wasn’t behind these “accidents”, who was?

  Maybe Dan was the real target, after all. But then why would someone trip me? Was it a mistake? A diversion to put Dan off his guard?

  The sound of someone bellowing my name caught my attention. Marty was waving me to the front gate. Limping with pain, I headed over to join him in the parking lot. I could feel Will watching me.

  A small group of new volunteers awaited me at the front of the snake. Four people taking tickets was really three too many but I couldn’t have been happier to have them there. They were charming and chatty and couldn’t possibly have had anything to do with Tom’s death.

  Nonetheless, after an hour, I’d had enough. I was tired and anything that didn’t sting ached deep in my bones. But I would have gladly suffered twice the pain if I could stop the chaotic thoughts running laps in my head.

  I knew I had to face the elephant in the room. I had to decide once and for all whether Dan was a target, an innocent bystander or a murderer.

  What I decided was that it could wait until tomorrow. It was still early and I was going to go home and do something I wanted to do on a Friday night. Eat as much as I could hold, take a long bubble bath and crawl into bed with a good book.

  I said goodnight to the other volunteers and headed wearily over to the rehearsal room to get my purse. As I dug it out from under the crinoline pile, Dan came out of the bathroom and headed for the door. Before I knew what I was doing
, I called out to him. He stopped, as I knew he would.

  “The haunted house turned out pretty good, huh? You get a gold star for helping me round up all our new Bayshore volunteers.”

  He was grinning, happy. I felt like an idiot. Did I really think Dan was a murderer? No. And yet…

  “May I ask you something?” I said.

  “Sure.”

  “Where did you put the gingersnaps after Becky gave them to you?”

  From the expression on his face, I’d clearly overstepped myself.

  I put a hand on his arm. “Sorry, that didn’t quite come out right. It’s just that I’m worried about Becky. Whoever doctored the cookies must have either seen her give them to you or watched you stow them away.”

  His face smoothed out, only to fall back into a frown of a different sort. “I know. But I didn’t see anyone.”

  “Are you sure? I bet people pass back and forth by your dressing area all the time. Maybe you’re just so used to it, it didn’t register. I thought that if you walked through it again, maybe it would jog your memory.”

  He shook his head. “Really, I’ve tried. Believe me. But I don’t remember anyone.” Frustration limned his voice.

  “I mean, walk through it literally. Act it out.”

  The hunted look left his face and his sky blue eyes lit with interest. “Actually, that’s not a bad idea. It might just work. Let’s see. So you’re Becky.” He put his hands on my shoulders and shifted me so I stood facing him, a couple of feet away. “We’re talking…I’m putting on my lab coat…Becky takes the cookie tin out of her bag and hands it to me…”

  He looked expectantly at me and I pantomimed Becky’s actions.

  “I was going to open the tin and have one but…” His voice suddenly grew excited. “I heard someone in the hall. Jo, that’s amazing, I—”

  “Did you see anyone?”

  His eyes fixed on the ceiling as he thought. He returned his gaze to me and his shoulders sagged. “No.”

  “What next?”

  “I said something about not wanting to share. They really are my favorite cookies. Or were…” His look grew distant and sad. He shook his head as if to forcibly change the direction of his thoughts and the actor replaced the person again. “I wrapped the tin in my sweatshirt and put it on the bench. And then I thanked her…” Dan turned back toward Becky-me and moved in closer. He had his eyes open and he looked thoughtful, as if trying to remember if he’d seen someone pass by in the hallway as he’d put the move on Becky. And then his gaze shifted to me and he leaned in.

  “There you are, Jo! I’ve been looking for you.” Gavin barked the words like a disapproving parent who’d caught his only daughter necking on the front porch. I winced and Dan jumped back as if stung.

  Gavin came to a stop between us, arms crossed, face hard and judging. I resisted the urge to insist that it wasn’t what it looked like.

  I glanced at Dan. He blinked a few times, looked at his watch and blew out an expletive.

  “I gotta go. Becky’s alone in the haunted house and what’s Frankenstein’s monster without Frankenstein?” He grinned at me, a happy guy who couldn’t quite believe his luck at having captured the interest of Becky. He didn’t seem to feel any of my awkwardness. In fact, he didn’t seem to think anything strange had happened at all.

  Of course he didn’t. Because he hadn’t been hitting on me. He’d been acting a part. It was just Gavin’s timing that had made it seem so sordid.

  I turned on my heel and followed Dan out the door. Dan ducked back into the haunted house from one of the hidden side doors and I continued out of the parking lot through the main gate. The line for the haunted house still wrapped around the block. I was glad of a crowd, raucous as it was, as I strode to my car. I wasn’t particularly worried about vampires, not with Gavin ten steps behind me. It was Gavin’s safety I was afraid for. Right now, I wanted to kill him.

  Gavin’s Jetta was in my rearview mirror the whole way home. At the first stoplight, I called a local restaurant that delivered and ordered a very rare steak. I hoped Gavin was hungry as well, for I hadn’t ordered him a thing.

  Parking was abysmal, as it always was on Friday night. I finally got a spot two streets over, where the McMansions had so much closet space, owners actually used their garages for parking. I didn’t think there was anywhere left for Gavin to park, but when I got out of the Volvo, he was waiting for me. I ignored him on the walk to my apartment. I ignored him as I got my mail. I ignored him hovering over my shoulder as I unlocked the dead bolt. I tried to shut the door before he could follow but he stuck his foot in the doorway.

  “Ow!”

  “You should know better than to stick your foot in a closing door,” I said.

  He ruthlessly shoved the door open, stepped inside and locked it behind him. Almost immediately, there was a knock on the door.

  “Excuse me,” I told Gavin. “That’s for me.”

  “Do you know who it is?”

  “I doubt it.”

  Gavin blocked my way. “You open your door to strangers, at night?”

  “Not normally, no. But if it’s a delivery guy bringing me dinner, you bet I do.” I pushed past him and opened the door.

  A small, wiry guy in a red polyester shirt with a spatula stitched on the breast regarded us curiously from behind plastic-rimmed glasses. I gathered my door wasn’t sound proof. He looked from me to Gavin, who was breathing over my left shoulder like a baleful dragon, and held up the bag. “Delivery?”

  “That was fast.” I took the bag and gave him my most brilliant smile and a wad of cash. “Thank you so much.”

  He didn’t look at the money. He was too busy looking at me. Up at me, to be precise. I had a good five inches on him. And about twenty pounds. And at least a year or two.

  Gavin said pointedly, “Don’t you have another delivery to make?”

  “Yeah.” The delivery guy remained on my doorstep as if his feet were glued to the cracked cement. His eyes were glued on my face. His mouth opened and words poured out. “I’m Davy Peter Smith. You’re really hot. You-wanna-go-out-sometime?”

  I gaped at him.

  “No, she doesn’t,” Gavin answered for me. He flipped open his wallet to display his police badge. “If you don’t leave right now, I’m going to ticket you for double parking.”

  “Hey!” I barked at Gavin, pushing the badge away. “I can handle this myself, thanks.”

  The delivery guy took this as an invitation and stepped eagerly toward the door.

  Gavin moved in front of me to block the way. He was twice the width and had four times the muscle of my would-be swain. “Leave,” Gavin told him. “Now.”

  The delivery guy watched me as he walked away, head affixed to his left shoulder. As he rounded the corner, he stumbled and nearly took the stairs face first.

  “That is the last time I’m wearing this costume in public,” I muttered. “He probably thought I was a hooker.”

  Gavin locked the door behind him and plucked the delivery bag out of my hands.

  “Hey!”

  He put it on the side table. “You can eat whatever disgusting thing you have in there later.” Planting his feet shoulder-width apart, he demanded, “Back there in the rehearsal theater… What the hell did you think you were doing?”

  I was too annoyed to bother prevaricating. “I was helping investigate.”

  “Helping? How? By hitting on your best friend’s boyfriend?”

  “How dare you! I was not hitting on Dan! I—”

  “Maybe you didn’t realize it, but you were.”

  “That’s total—”

  “Jesus, Jo. Ever hear of vampire magnetism? You have it and it’s getting worse. You get this smoldering look in your eyes and then you smile. Don’t you realize the effect it can have on men? That delivery boy almost broke his neck on the stairs getting a look at you.”

  “Maybe he thinks I’m cute!”

  “I’m sure he thinks that. He’d think yo
u’re the hottest female on this planet if you were eighty-five, bald as a bat and had lost all your teeth.”

  “That’s a terrible thing to say. You act as if this is my fault.”

  “Isn’t it? That’s two men you’ve lured in tonight. You’re a damn vampire. Have some sense of responsibility.”

  He couldn’t have been crueler if he’d tried. I felt the hot sting of tears pressing against the back of my throat. I closed my eyes tightly, refusing to let them fall.

  “There! Is that better, Detective? Maybe I can fashion some sort of blindfold to wear around so I don’t insult any more men with false attraction.”

  “Dammit, Jo!” Gavin grabbed me by the shoulders. His strong fingers dug into my flesh.

  Then he pulled me to him and his lips came down on mine in a bruising kiss. For a long, dizzying moment I didn’t know where he ended and I began. His hands gentled and slid down my back to wrap around my waist, pulling me closer. My own hands crept up to touch his hair. The short hairs were soft under my fingers, like rough velvet.

  It ended as suddenly as it had begun. He shoved me away.

  I stumbled back against the wall to catch my balance. My eyes opened and his gaze poured into me like liquid silver. Broad chest heaving as if he’d sprinted a dozen miles, he reached out a hand as if to steady me but snatched it back before he made contact. As if I were poison.

  “Damn it all to hell,” he said. And left.

  Chapter Twelve

  I stood there a long time, staring at my front door. I heard the soft scuff of a shoe on the other side. Gavin hadn’t left.

  “Bolt the door,” he said wearily.

  In two brisk strides, I reached the deadbolt and gave it a savage turn. Grabbing the bag with my steak dinner off the little entrance table where Gavin had stowed it, I marched into the kitchen.

  My steak was lukewarm and very, very rare. Perfect, I thought, sticking a finger into the juice puddling around the meat. It was right about body temperature, I’d guess. Just the way I was going to learn to love it.

  Ignoring the ick factor that instantly tightened my throat, I grabbed a fork and a steak knife, shutting the silverware drawer with my hip as I reached for a plate. I was starving and there was no one to see. I could have eaten with my fingers out of the Styrofoam packaging if I’d wanted to, but I didn’t. I told myself it had nothing to do with Gavin’s cruel accusation that I was becoming more like a vampire.