Nun After the Other

by Alice Loweecey

  She raised her phone to take a picture.

  “You’re new at this, aren’t you?”

  Without replying, Giulia snapped a burst in natural light and a handful of single shots with her night vision app.

  “You were a Gibson Girl.”

  “And a Suffragette. And I designed this house. Sit down before you fall down. Women these days have no stamina.” She raised a cigarette to her lips, inhaled, and blew a smoke ring.

  At least Giulia would’ve sworn the ghost inhaled and exhaled.

  “Would you mind not blowing smoke in my face?”

  “I despise croakers.” She vanished.

  Giulia backed to the laundry folding table. When it was supporting her butt, she gave herself permission to react. Her knees gave out. Her hands shook so hard she lost her grip on her phone and had to dive for it before it hit the floor.

  One minute and forty-four seconds later by her phone clock her fingers stopped trembling enough to open the Contacts folder.

  Frank answered on the first ring. “Hey, babe. I was just about to call you. We’re bringing in a snitch and we have to deal with him tonight. I’ll be way late. What’s for supper?”

  “I don’t know.” Her voice must have sounded even stranger to him than to her because she heard his desk chair screech against the floor in the detectives’ office.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “There’s a ghost.”

  “A what?”

  “A ghost. In the convent. It smokes. I mean, she smokes.”

  “Back up. The convent where Eagle got torched?”

  His voice was helping her calm down. “Yes. I tried to take pictures, but I don’t know if any of them came out.”

  “Babe, wait. I remember you telling me about that thing you saw with your camera at the Dahlia house. You weren’t sure if it really happened, though.”

  Every raging pregnancy hormone and missed cup of coffee arose in Giulia. “Francis Xavier Driscoll, I’ll thank you to remember you are not the only professional in the family.”

  “Honey, I’m only saying—”

  “I understand quite well what you’re saying. I’ll see you when I get home.” She stabbed the End button hard enough to make her finger joints ache. Her instant outrage subsided.

  “A real woman in this house at last.”

  Used to not showing surprise when a client or suspect tried to startle her, Giulia did not jump. She looked up from the phone. The dead Gibson Girl stood—appeared to stand—in front of her.

  “I am sick to death of withered virgins.” A fresh cigarette in her hand lit itself. “Ghosts with jokes. Too bad a comedy club didn’t buy my house.”

  Giulia pressed Record on the voice memo function in case her call with Rowan hadn’t filled it up. “What’s your name?”

  “Florence Gosnall. Go ahead, type it in. You’ll find me.”

  Her thumbs refused to obey her. Google took her best guess at the jumble of letters she gave it. Giulia made a show of comparing the “Florence” thumbnails on the Image tab with her personal apparition.

  “Yes, I died young. Why do you think I look this good now?”

  “I didn’t know there were rules. Is there a—”

  “If you say ‘Handbook for the Recently Deceased,’ I’ll haunt that bedridden crone upstairs until she remembers how to scream like she means it.” Several puffs on the new cigarette.

  Giulia bit her lips. “I like Beetlejuice.”

  “You won’t after you kick off.”

  “Ms. Gosnall—”

  “Oh, please. I’m haunting you. We’re allowed to call each other by our first names.”

  Giulia hadn’t watched horror movies for years without assimilating their key points. She’d already violated one: Don’t go in the basement. As for the one where true names have power, she was out of luck. Most of the nuns spoke to her as “Ms. Driscoll,” but Bart called her “Giulia.”

  She’d have to have an emergency session with Rowan and Jasper. For now, she smiled at the ghost and said, “Thank you, Florence. I do have a question. Were you down here during the break-in and the fire?”

  Ticktackticktack-bump on the stairs did make Giulia jump. The ghost snickered. Steve came into view. Giulia kicked herself. The dog trotted up to the ghost, who bent over and scratched its ears.

  “I was allergic to dogs and cats when I was alive.” Florence raised her eyes to Giulia. “You want to know more about that butterball who got stuck in the window?” She gave the dog a pat on the rear. “Scoot. I’m in the middle of a haunting.” Steve scooted behind the furnace. Florence stood upright. “Wouldn’t you rather know how I can do this?” A new cigarette appeared between her fingers.

  “I would, but I’m working on a case.”

  “A female detective. I suppose a man is your boss?”

  “No. I own the business.”

  “You make me happy. I knew women would move beyond working for Pinkerton’s.”

  “If you’re tied to the house,” Giulia did not bring up plot points from Beetlejuice, “you should know I’m here to negotiate a deal between the nuns and the developer. Every house on the street will be demolished.”

  A string of incongruous profanity spewed from the translucent mouth. Upstairs, the front door opened and Steve scrambled upstairs, barking and panting. The Gibson Girl vanished.

  Giulia followed Steve. A haggard Sister Kathryn stopped an argument with Sister Olive when she saw Giulia.

  “Now what?”

  An irritated human pleased Giulia to an unexpected degree. “I was double-checking certain things. Do you have a few minutes?”

  She recapped her meeting with Barbara Beech as all the ambulatory nuns crowded together in the hallway. Cautious hope replaced Kathryn’s irritation.

  “Do you think they’ll go for it?” Dorothy said.

  “I gave her a higher figure than necessary on purpose. Even my second offer was more than I expect my final one will be.” While Giulia spoke, she surreptitiously sniffed for cigarette smoke. The only smells her nose identified were old wood and ripe dog.

  “Steve!” Olive picked the Chihuahua up by the scruff of the neck. “What did you roll in?”

  Fifty

  A midnight blue Honda CRV drove down the street below the speed limit as Giulia walked to the Nunmobile. She palmed her phone and walked faster. The SUV followed her. Half a block. A quarter. Ten steps and she would reach her passenger door. Key in hand, she ran for it.

  The CRV honked and a hand waved out its window.

  “Giulia, it’s me.”

  She recognized Pit Bull’s voice and stopped with the key in the lock. The CRV’s detailing of a tattooed pit bull dog holding a TV camera should’ve clued her in. If she hadn’t been a wee bit off-kilter from her conversation with the convent ghost.

  “Do you have time to talk?”

  “Yes. Follow me to my office.” She led the way, passing two food trucks and her favorite hot dog place. She’d have to remember to keep granola bars in the glove compartment with the Glock. All the fashion-forward pregnant PIs were doing it.

  She giggled, heard its keyed-up sound, and forced herself to stop. Her hands started to shake again and she gripped the steering wheel tighter. Talk to Pit Bull now. React later.

  Ten miles from the office they got stuck behind a four-car pileup. The side streets were too far away to try to back up and police had stopped traffic in both directions to give access to fire engines, ambulances, and tow trucks. The wait added half an hour to what should’ve been a fifteen-minute drive at this time of night.

  Accidents, Giulia thought. Rowan said to watch out for accidents.

  They parked in the building’s empty lot at quarter after eight.

  Giulia opened the back door. “No one is in the building at this hour.”


  As they climbed the stairs something skinny and dark ran down and shoved them into the wall on either side. Pit Bull reached out one long arm and grabbed the something by its hoodie.

  The kid inside the black hoodie and jeans choked and struggled. Pit Bull cuffed the back of the kid’s head. Giulia continued upstairs and Pit Bull followed, dragging the still-squirming kid, who emitted a jangling sound at each tread.

  Fresh scratches marred the doorknob plate on DI’s door. She should’ve been furious, but a human thief was familiar territory. She doubted the kid could make cigarettes materialize at will. She took pictures before she unlocked the door and relocked them all inside. Pit Bull turned one of the window chairs around and dropped the kid into it. Giulia approached and Pit Bull clamped the kid’s arms to the arms of the chair. The kid was two-thirds Pit Bull’s size and half his weight, and Giulia estimated Pit Bull at six foot two and one eighty or ninety. She reached into the kid’s hoodie pocket and pulled out three professional lock picks.

  “Who hired you?”

  The kid said nothing.

  She repeated the question.

  Pit Bull loomed over the kid. The kid side-eyed the cameraman’s impressive muscles. Pit Bull flexed. A whimper escaped the kid before he cut it off.

  Giulia took out her phone. “Being married to a police detective has its privileges.” She angled the screen toward the kid and pressed ‘9’. The kid bleated. She pressed ‘1’.

  “Don’t!” The kid looked up at Pit Bull and shrank into the seat.

  She hovered her finger over the ‘1’ button. The kid tried and failed to turn his butt cheeks into feet and walk himself out of the chair.

  “I just got out of juvie. I can’t go back inside.” He started to tremble.

  Pit Bull released one arm and picked up a lock pick. “We caught you breaking in with professional tools.” He held the pick an inch from the kid’s face.

  “I got no job. I gotta get food for ma.”

  “What are you, twelve?”

  “Twelve and a half, and don’t talk to me about school and shit.”

  Giulia pinched the bridge of her nose, glad she was no longer teaching. “Why us? We aren’t retail.”

  The kid muttered, paused, and shrugged.

  Giulia’s first thought was Eagle, except Eagle was not directing minor criminals from beyond the grave.

  She hoped.

  She said to Pit Bull, “Kanning?”

  The cameraman considered.

  Non-violent Giulia Driscoll, advocate of peace, said, “I’ll break his microphone over his hair-sprayed head the next time we meet.”

  A crafty expression replaced the fear on the kid’s face. “Will you cut me a deal if I spill?”

  Giulia fired up Sidney’s computer and logged in as herself. “Give me your name.”

  “James…Driscoll.”

  She didn’t dignify the lie with an answer. Her fingers poised over the keys, she waited. Pit Bull worked magic and made himself appear larger. The kid swallowed and said, “Jimmy Haynes with a ‘Y.’”

  Giulia emailed Frank: Will explain later. Please look up record of James Haynes. Email here ASAP.

  Pit Bull said, “No. He wouldn’t shoot himself in the foot.”

  “All right.” She knew he meant Ken Kanning, but since he depended on Kanning for his job, the assertion carried less weight than he might have thought. If not Kanning, what about Beech? Closing Eagle’s last deal would cement her position as leader.

  Frank’s reply pinged. Giulia read it out loud. “Probation at age eleven for shoplifting. Three months at age twelve for breaking and entering.” She looked over the monitor at James Haynes with a “Y.” “Did you steal the lock picks?”

  “Who’d steal something that small? They were part of the deal.”

  Giulia pounced. “Deal with who?”

  The kid shuddered hard enough to rattle the chair. “I’m screwed. I’m so screwed.”

  “Language,” Giulia said.

  Pit Bull picked up the kid by his scrawny biceps. “Kid, if you shit yourself on her floor, she’ll make you clean it with your tongue.”

  The kid’s hands clamped over his butt cheeks.

  Pit Bull raised him so they looked eye to eye. “Tell her who hired you or I’ll make sure you spit shine her floor.”

  The kid turned large, deep, soulful eyes on Giulia. Giulia crossed her arms and waited. The kid’s feet twitched. Pit Bull affected a bored expression, as though he could hold this position for days.

  The kid licked cracked lips. “Keep me out of juvie and I’ll tell you who’s paying me.”

  Giulia nodded to Pit Bull, who plopped the kid into the chair again. When Giulia had a Word doc open, she said, “Go.”

  The kid talked fast, always keeping an eye on Pit Bull. “This guy I knew in juvie met me at this place I hang out. He said I could earn a hundred bucks easy. Told me to be at a certain place at a certain time to meet a guy.”

  Pit Bull clenched his fists, flexed his biceps, and made his neck veins stand out as the kid talked. Every time the kid saw muscle movement, he spoke faster.

  “I ain’t stupid. I need the money. I met the guy, he gave me the picks and paid me half up front. Told me to grab anything that looked like it’d have private info. Laptops, papers, stuff like that.”

  Giulia typed. “When are you meeting your contact?”

  “Tonight, duh. He wants the stuff.”

  “When?”

  “Nine.”

  Giulia thought. The kid’s legs wouldn’t stay still. Pit Bull inspected his fingernails. The kid couldn’t seem to take his eyes away from Pit Bull’s hands. Giulia wondered if he expected Wolverine’s claws to spring from the knuckles.

  Giulia called Frank.

  “Babe, what the hell’s going on?”

  “I caught the kid with the record trying to break into the office.”

  “What? I’ll send a car to bring the little shit in.”

  “No. Wait. I won’t press charges if he leads us to the guy who paid him.”

  The kid started to get out of the chair. Pit Bull convinced him it would be wise to stay put.

  Giulia interrupted Frank’s argument. “Bigger fish.”

  Frank started to argue again and stopped. “What’s the rest of it?”

  “Pit Bull says Kanning isn’t behind this. I think I know who is. I have to be sure. If you meet us at the rendezvous, you land the fish.”

  “If the fish turns out to be Kanning, I’ll shove his microphone down his throat and take him on a tour of the state before bringing him in to get it removed.”

  “You’re so sweet when you’re Neanderthal. We’re leaving now.”

  “Nash and I will wrap up in five more minutes and meet you there.”

  Fifty-One

  Pit Bull kept a hand on the kid’s shoulder all the way downstairs into the parking lot.

  “You wanted to talk to me,” Giulia said to Pit Bull. “I’ll call you when this mess is finished and we’ll meet. An hour, tops. Okay?”

  “Yeah, fine. Thanks.” He pushed the kid into the Nunmobile’s passenger seat and stuck his head in after. “Remember: You touch her, you touch anything in the car, you do anything to screw up, and I promise you will clean her floor with your tongue. Capisce?”

  The kid tried to disappear into the upholstery. “Got it.” His voice cracked.

  “Buckle in.”

  It took the kid three tries.

  “Sit on your hands.”

  He obeyed.

  Pit Bull stood and said to Giulia across the top of the car, “Got me on speed dial?” He winked.

  “Right here.” She opened her phone to his entry in Contacts, moving it across her window so the kid would see it.

  She buckled herself in, not glancing at her passenger si
tting on his hands lest she giggle. Even though no part of tonight’s adventure was funny.

  The kid regained his voice at the second stop sign. “Look, lady, I’m not shooting up or anything. I’m clean, you get it? I’m doing this for my mom.”

  “Your mother might appreciate a son who finishes school so he can get a legitimate job.”

  “Jesus Chr—”

  “Stop. You will not curse in my car.”

  Giulia’s tone of voice stopped him but the command appeared to baffle him. He opened his mouth half a block later. “My dad got my mom hooked. He beat the sh—uh, he beat me and Mom whenever he got a skinful and then he OD’d, but Mom’s got shi—dammit—sorry, uh, Mom can’t pick guys who ain’t bad for her. Her next two hookups used and beat us too. Fun life, huh? Mom tries to stick with methadone but she doesn’t always do good at it and the only places she can get work are dollar stores and stuff.”

  “Am I now supposed to open my heart and wallet to you?” Giulia learned long ago to distrust sob stories.

  “F—” The kid coughed, muttered, and cleared his throat. “I’m marking time ’til I hit puberty. Then I’ll bulk up like your bodyguard and I’ll beat Mom’s latest hookup like he beats us and I’ll kick him out and I’ll take care of Mom. But I gotta get money somehow.” His body jerked with the effort to keep his hands under his butt. “It’s your fault I got caught anyway. You weren’t supposed to be there.”

  “Take responsibility for your own actions.” Giulia turned left onto the public library’s street and parked in front of the first house on the street.

  Frank and Nash exited their car when she opened her door. Giulia came around and opened the passenger door.

  “Out.”

  He slunk out. Giulia handed him a manila folder she’d stuffed with printouts not needing to be shredded.

  “Okay, Haynes,” Frank said, “get over there. You won’t see us, but we’ll be breathing down your neck.”