Birthday Cake Waffle: Book 8 in the Diner of the Dead Series

by Carolyn Q. Hunter

  After a little trial and error, she seemed to have the hang of it overall, although not perfectly.

  “Okay, down to that house,” she whispered.

  Floating over the edge of the balcony, she lowered herself down to the main floor and toward the front door. To her surprise, she ended up just going straight through the door as if nothing were there.

  Heading down the hill she approached the dimly lit cabin. If her new ghost body had a heart, she would feel it pounding in her chest from the anxiety of what she was about to do. Despite the fact that she was no longer technically breaking and entering (not unless you could convict a ghost in court) she felt a little guilty.

  Approaching the front door, she paused just outside. Going through the motions of taking a deep breath, she floated through the door and into the house.

  This cabin had a much different set-up. The small entry hall led to a stairwell directly across from the front door. To the right was a door to a garage. Sonja noticed it was sitting ajar and peered inside to see a small silver car inside. “Must be Harriet’s,” she whispered to herself.

  To the left of the entry hall was the kitchen which wrapped around one side of the house. On the other end of the kitchen, facing the river at the back of the house, was the living area.

  That was where she needed to go.

  Floating into the kitchen, Sonja instantly had flashbacks to the scene she had assumed she witnessed earlier that very evening.

  Glancing toward the counter where the knife had been, she shivered, seeing the space on the counter empty. Her eyes were drawn to the floor where something dark lay in splotches along the tile.

  “Oh no,” she whispered. Following the trail of thick liquid, the pattern slowly turned from puddles to streaks. The streaks created a path that turned the corner into the living room at the back of the house.

  Floating just above the dark residue she came into the living area. Sonja felt a scream catch in her throat. The single dim lamp illuminated the gory scene before her.

  Just as they had seen from the outside, Harriet had indeed been sitting on the couch with her head slightly tilted down, but it wasn’t because she was reading. It was because she had been posed that way. Her sweater was pock marked with holes and the fabric soaked through with deep red, the same liquid which had created the trail through the house.

  A paper sign, stained on the corners, was taped to Harriet’s chest. On it, haphazard letters were scrawled: If I Can’t Have You, No One Will.

  The scream finally escaped Sonja’s body.

  CHAPTER 12

  * * *

  Accompanying her scream was a strange groan Sonja hadn’t expected. Stifling her own voice, Sonja glanced down at the body. Was that a breath escaping Harriet’s body?

  “Oh my gosh, are you still alive?” she urged.

  Crouching close to the body, Sonja tried to look into its dead open eyes.

  “C-c-cheaaaateeeer,” the voice croaked.

  Sonja suddenly felt deathly cold when she realized the voice was coming from behind. Turning to look, her jaw dropped open.

  Harriet floated there just a few inches off the ground, dressed in the same sweater, and staring.

  “H-Harriet?” Sonja gasped, glancing from the dead body, back to the woman hovering just above the stained carpet. Her feet hung there, the occasional red drop of liquid falling away from her toes.

  The woman’s hair fell in ragged locks all around her face. Her eyes were wide open, completely bloodshot and sunken deep within her skull creating dark rings around them. Her mouth was stained red and her lips were chapped. In her right hand, she held a kitchen knife.

  “D-D-Doooon,” she groaned. “Chhheeaaateeer.”

  “Don cheated?” Sonja whispered her question.

  “Chheeaaateeer,” Harriet’s voice grew from a low croak to a horrific roar. “Cheater,” she screamed.

  Raising the kitchen knife high above her head, she zoomed forward at Sonja.

  Screaming, Sonja tried to dart out of the way, but the knife came down and clipped her in the shoulder. To her surprise, it hurt.

  “Oh, no,” Sonja screamed, attempting to will her ghostly body to move away from the attacking specter.

  Harriet’s eyes grew wild with frenzy, blood flowing from them like tears, as she brought the knife up and down, again and again, attempting to hit the fellow ghostly figure.

  “No, no.” Sonja tried to move her body away as fast as possible, but she just wasn’t well trained enough in this new experience yet. Her movements were slow, choppy, and lethargic.

  By some stroke of pure luck, the blade continued to miss her as she scrambled back and forth, floating along the air. Within moments Harriet was on top of her. With one gigantic sweep of her arm, the ghost’s blade came down.

  Sonja screamed at the top of her lungs.

  * * *

  She was in a dark tunnel, moving violently, quickly backward. Strange noises echoed like voices of tormented spirits off the tunnel walls. The world wrapped all around Sonja in rivers of muted color. Her vision blurred.

  For a second, she thought she could hear her name on the voices.

  “Soooonja, Soooonja.”

  It sounded familiar and comforting.

  The tunnel turned completely black for a moment, plunging her into its darkness. Then, a moment later a pinprick of light appeared in the distance.

  “Sonja. Sonja, wake up,” a voice echoed.

  Rushing toward the light, Sonja opened her eyes.

  “Sonja, Sonja wake up,” Frank cried.

  He was beside her, shaking her back and forth, both hands on her shoulders.

  “F-Frank?” she muttered.

  A sigh of relief came from the handsome face above her. “Thank goodness. Are you okay? You were screaming bloody murder in your sleep.”

  “I think so,” she said. “I just have the worst headache, now.”

  A quiet meow drew her attention. The little ghost cat sat nearby, pawing at her gently and clearly worried.

  “You scared me half to death,” he sighed, pulling his hands away from her shoulders. As he did, both of their eyes widened. There was blood on his hand. “You’re hurt?”

  Looking over at her shoulder she realized there was a tear in her night shirt and a small cut underneath.

  “Just hold on. I’ll get the first-aid kit,” Frank offered, darting off. “I can’t imagine how you did that in your sleep.”

  Somehow, Sonja could.

  CHAPTER 13

  * * *

  “I’m telling you,” Sonja pleaded. “There is a dead body down there in that cabin.”

  Sitting at the kitchen table, Sonja was in her sports bra she usually wore when she was doing yoga so that Frank could easily dress the wound.

  “You just had a nightmare, that’s all,” he soothed, using a gauze pad and some rubbing alcohol to clean the wound.

  “It wasn’t a nightmare,” Sonja insisted. “I know she’s down there. I know she’s dead.”

  “And you know Don killed her,” he finished the thought for her as he threw the used gauze in the trash. “I think this might need a little more than just a band-aid.”

  “I’m serious,” Sonja exclaimed.

  Sighing, Frank dug into his first aid kit and pulled out a little bottle. “I’m so sorry, Sonja,” he whispered. “This is all my fault. If I hadn’t yelled at you, if I’d just listened to you a little more, you’d probably have never had that night terror.”

  “Frank,” she demanded firmly, “I didn’t have a night terror. There is a dead woman down there.”

  Frank unscrewed the cap on the bottle. “Just relax,” he ordered.

  “What is that?”

  “Medical glue. As a police officer, you never know what might come in handy.” He carefully applied it to the wound on her arm and pinched the skin to help seal it shut. After a few seconds, he released his hold on the wound. “Now, I’m not going to argue with you about this anymore.” Pulling o
ut a butterfly bandage, he applied it to Sonja’s arm. “Besides, whether or not that woman is actually dead, we still have to wait for the local police to arrive. Nothing has changed about that.”

  “Then I’m going down to the gas station to wait for them,” she insisted.

  “Going to the gas station,” Frank exclaimed. “I’ve just finished bandaging you up. You need to take it easy.”

  “I don’t care,” Sonja fought, picking up a clean T-shirt with the words I Love to Breakfast on the front and slipping it over her head.

  “Please, Sonja. Don’t do this. You’ve had a night terror, you thought you saw a murder outside our window, and you passed out this morning. I think you’re completely overworked and overstressed and it’s all just catching up to you now.”

  His sincere worry truly touched Sonja, but his words still stung. How could he tell her she “thought she saw a murder” like she had imagined it? She didn’t ask to see it, and she didn’t ask to see the bloody dead body either, but a lot of the time she didn’t have another choice. During a lot of these murder cases, it had fallen to her to take action when no one else would.

  At the same time, how could she blame her boyfriend for worrying? From his perspective, there hadn’t been any murder.

  His eyes pleaded for her to stay, pleaded for her to just try and enjoy the weekend trip, even just a little. For a moment, she honestly felt as if she could say the words “I love you.” With all her craziness about murders and ghosts, what other boyfriend would stick through all of this?

  Unfortunately, her knowledge of the dead body at the lower cabin wouldn’t allow her to stay.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I can’t just sit around here all night. I have to do something, even if it means just waiting at the gas station on the main road.”

  Leaning down, she kissed him goodbye passionately, a reaction of her growing affection for him. As she pulled away a combination of confusion and excitement crossed his face at once.

  * * *

  Pulling out of the driveway, Sonja noticed she had missed a second call from Belinda. There was a voice message. Putting the phone on speaker mode, she hit the play button.

  “Sonja, I’ve learned a few more things you should know. As I mentioned before, because you are projecting yourself into the spirit realm, that means you’re still connected to your living body. This means that events which happen in the spirit realm can have an impact on you in real life. If you get scared or excited, your body’s heartbeat will speed up. This also means that if you encounter a malicious spirit, they can actually hurt you. Whatever happens to your projected self may also happen to your real body, so keep that in mind and be careful whenever you're projecting. But it also works two ways. Since you’re not actually a ghost, your presence, and power in the spirit realm may impact other ghosts. Oh, and expect some disorientation whenever you go in and out of projection. Anyway, let me know what it’s like if you try it out.”

  The line clicked off and Sonja hit the button to delete the message.

  “Good to know,” she whispered, glancing down at her wounded shoulder.

  CHAPTER 14

  * * *

  Watching her leave, Frank felt his heart sink. He just couldn’t understand her sometimes. She had to be one of the most stubborn, forward, and hard headed women he had ever met, and yet he loved her all the more for it.

  The only problem now was the fact that he wasn’t sure what to do. Should he follow her out? Should he attempt to walk down to the gas station and be with her?

  He wasn’t sure she wanted him there. Frank had lost it earlier, flew off the handle unnecessarily, and he was kicking himself now for it.

  However, there was the rub. What else could he have done to help out? Even if there had been an attack or a murder, without seeing it with his own eyes he couldn’t very well do anything without incurring potentially serious consequences. Heck, he could lose his badge if he acted outside of his jurisdiction, breaking into someone’s home when nothing had actually happened.

  Had something happened?

  That was the part that ate away at him the most. Sonja was one of the most intuitive people he’d ever met. If she wasn’t so invested in her job as a diner owner, he would almost encourage her to go into law enforcement or private detective work. She was literally that good at problem solving, investigation, and deduction. She had been one of the main reasons he had apprehended so many criminals—particularly murderers—this past year.

  On the other hand, she had quite the varied emotional spectrum in her personality, and he wasn’t sure how that would affect her work if she did choose to go into law enforcement. Somehow, deep inside, he felt it might only add to her efficient nature.

  The point was, he was normally inclined to believe her when she claimed she saw something—but this time he was having difficulty. The only issue was that he didn’t have any evidence at all that proved a crime had happened, and the other side of it was they couldn’t do anything about it if it had.

  Standing up, Frank sighed, deciding he needed to take a walk and clear his mind. If Sonja wanted to go wait down at the gas station, he had no control over it. The only control he had was over himself.

  Throwing on his bomber jacket, a scarf, and a knit cap, he headed out the back door and down to the river path.

  He walked along in the snow, listening to the water run under the ice, his breath catching in the air and freezing there in a cloud. He kept his head down.

  Had bringing her here been a mistake? Had it only added to her stress?

  He thought of his confession of love earlier and, while not regretting having said it, he regretted his timing. He only wished that she would be able to say those words back to him.

  Frank had spent his life being confident in everything he did. He knew since he was a little boy that he wanted to be a policeman. After going to police academy, he knew he wanted to eventually become the sheriff of his hometown. He simply never imagined he’d accomplish that goal at such a young age.

  Once he was elected, he had made each decision as sheriff with surety and confidence. Even during the strange string of murder cases, he never once hesitated to move forward in one way or another.

  So why was having a serious girlfriend such a difficulty?

  Pausing, Frank saw the glint of something sitting in the snow. Even in the dark night, the moon seemed to illuminate its circular shape.

  Bending down, he realized it was a gold wedding ring.

  CHAPTER 15

  * * *

  Pulling up to the front of the gas station, Sonja parked and got out. It was beginning to snow again, and Sonja drew her coat more tightly around herself. She just hoped the gas station had good heating.

  Before she got to the door, she heard a quiet meow and instantly knew the little ghost cat had followed her. Turning, she saw it standing there on the pavement, the snowflakes drifting through its little body.

  It meowed again at her as if pleading for her to turn around and head back to the cabin.

  Squatting down, she held her hand out to it. “Come here, sweetie.”

  The cat didn’t come, it simply continued meowing.

  “What do you need, huh?” she asked. “Do you just have to constantly follow me around? Do you have to remind me about this whole ghost thing?” Standing up, she glared down at the little beast. “I’ve had it, you know. I didn’t ask for all these powers. I didn’t ask to have ghosts and murderers follow me everywhere I go. Honestly, I’m getting pretty sick of it.”

  The cat tilted its head to one side and gave a sad look, its eyes wide and glassy.

  “I’ve had it with you, too. You, these ghosts, these murders, they’re all ruining my normal life. I can’t even have a normal weekend vacation with my boyfriend.”

  Sniffling, Sonja felt the heat of tears come to her eyes. The snow came down harder around her, the single street lamp shining down on her like a spotlight.

  “I ruined this weekend. All
he wanted was to do something nice for me, and I ruined it.”

  The cat stepped closer and meowed, eagerly pleading with its master.

  “Get lost,” she muttered. “I don’t want to see you anymore. I don’t want to be reminded that my father left, that I have the ability to see ghosts, and that I ruin everyone’s lives around me.” She lowered her head. “Get.” Turning, she headed for the gas station.

  The cat meowed eagerly at her to come back, but she ignored it.

  * * *

  Stepping into the station, Sonja could hear the two voices arguing from behind the curtain. Almost as soon as she’d heard them, the voices stopped—almost as if mid-sentence. Raising one eyebrow, she curiously walked up to the counter to see if she could hear anything from behind the curtain.

  As she stood there, however, the curtain parted and Balton stepped out. “Oh, hello, ma’am. How can I help you?”

  “It’s Sonja,” she replied, trying to force a smile and hoping the red cold of her cheeks and nose would hide the fact that she’d just been crying outside.

  “Ah, yes. Sonja. You and your husband are up here for the weekend.”

  “Boyfriend,” she corrected.

  The clerk turned a little red. “Oh, sorry. Boyfriend.”

  “Did . . . Did I just hear someone arguing in the back room?” she asked.

  Balton raised one eyebrow. “Arguing?”

  “I’m sorry,” Sonja stuttered, realizing how rude it was of her to ask. If Balton was having a personal conversation, she had no right to listen in or ask questions. “It’s none of my business, I’m sure.”

  The clerk’s eyes widened with realization. “Oh, you mean the voices?”

  “Yeah, I just heard something when I came in. Don’t worry about it.”