And I was back in the back seat of Ashara’s car.
“What the hell?” I said.
Ashara jumped and the car swerved.
“Don’t do that,” she said as she moved back into her lane.
“I didn’t do anything,” I said. “One minute I was watching the killer guy, the next minute I was back in the car.”
“Hmm,” said Maw-Maw thoughtfully.
“What?” I demanded.
“We just passed back into Abramsville when you showed up. Looks like maybe you can only leave the city limits when you’re with us.”
“Oh, God,” I groaned.
“Don’t you take the Lord’s name in vain, young lady,” Maw-Maw said.
“Does this mean I’m tied to you?” I asked, ignoring her admonishment.
“Maybe so,” she replied, leaning back into the seat. “Or maybe to Ashara. Maybe both of us.” She sounded all too complacent for my taste.
“Okay,” I said, “not to be rude or anything, but if you and I are tied together, what happens when you die?”
“Well, I ain’t planning on dying anytime soon,” Maw-Maw said. Then she looked over her shoulder and smiled slyly. “But just maybe I’ll drag your bony white ass up to heaven with me.”
“Maw-Maw!” Ashara sounded shocked.
I spun in my seat and looked at my butt. “My ass is not bony!”
Maw-Maw just cackled and leaned back in her seat again.
Chapter Ten
“So are we going to try to follow him tomorrow?” I asked as we pulled into Maw-Maw’s driveway. Her house looked positively grand in comparison to the ones out on the old Howard place road.
“I have to work,” Ashara said firmly. “I can’t just quit going to work, even to catch a killer.” Her voice shook slightly. “Anyway, he scares me. He has dead eyes. I think we ought to just go to the police and tell them what we know.” She stepped out of the car and moved around to the passenger side to help Maw-Maw heave herself out of the car.
“They won’t believe you,” I said. “If you go in saying anything about this guy, they’re going to want to know how you know he did it. And we don’t have any proof at all.”
Maw-Maw nodded as she hobbled up her front steps. “Callie’s right, Ashara. You can’t go talking to the police yet. And you can’t let that Howard boy know what you know, so you gotta keep quiet for now.”
Ashara sighed. “I still can’t skip work. So you’re just going to have to try to follow him yourself, Callie.”
“How?” I almost wailed in frustration. “I can’t even leave the city limits without one of you with me.”
“I don’t got to work,” Maw-Maw said.
“No,” said Ashara. “Absolutely not. Anyway, you can’t drive anymore. You don’t have a license.”
Maw-Maw waved her hand in the air as if shooing that fact away. “Those people at the DMV don’t have a lick of sense. I can see just fine to drive.”
“You can not,” Ashara said, opening the door. We all moved into the living room and Maw-Maw dropped into her seat with a huff.
“Furthermore,” Ashara said, “you don’t have a car, and I’m not letting you borrow mine.” She crossed her arms and stood staring down at Maw-Maw implacably. Maw-Maw glared back at her granddaughter through her thick glasses. Their expressions were remarkably similar.
The silence stretched out.
“I have an idea,” I finally said.
* * * *
I left Ashara at her house with the last four digits of the number that Howard had dialed. “I guess we just have to assume it’s local,” I said. “You ought to be able to find a reverse directory on the internet.”
Ashara nodded as she wrote down the number, and then looked up at me doubtfully. “You sure you want to do this?” she asked.
I shrugged. “It’s the only thing I can think of. You got any better ideas?”
She shook her head.
“Okay, then,” I said. “I’ll go see what I can find out. You do the same here. I’ll be back in an hour or two.”
I started at Rick McClatchey’s musical instrument repair shop, back in the workroom. The store was closed and the lights were off, but I could see by the glint of moonlight coming in from the front window. Again I wondered briefly about the fact that I seemed to need some light to see.
Like I said, the living don’t know jack about the dead.
Hell, I don’t know jack about the dead, and I’m one of them.
I hovered over each of the workbenches, peering intently at the contents of each person’s station as I tried to find something that would give me the information I needed.
Nothing.
I tried to pull open a file cabinet in the back, hoping to be able to riffle through some files. No luck. Apparently I could pop open money drawers at banks but not open plain old file cabinets.
I finally found what I was looking for under the counter at the back of the showroom. In a basket on a shelf, I discovered a pile of dusty name tags. And right on the top was the one I was looking for. Stephen Davenport.
Smiling triumphantly, I headed toward the front of the store. I was almost at the entrance when I heard a key slide into the back door.
I hate to admit it, but I froze in fear.
Yeah, yeah. I know. I’m dead. Nothing can really hurt me. I’m about as hurt as I can get. But apparently those old human instincts are slow to die.
So there I was, standing in the middle of the store staring at the back door like a rabbit caught in the middle of the road when Stephen Davenport walked in. He, too, froze.
My shoulders slumped as I heaved a sigh of relief.
“You scared the hell out of me,” I said. I moved back to the doorway between the display room and the workshop.
Davenport didn’t move, but his eyes grew rounder. “Back at you,” he said warily, his hand gripping the still-open door.
“I was looking for you,” I said.
“Yeah?” He eased the door shut behind him. “Why?”
“I need your help,” I said.
He leaned back against the door, his eyes still wary. “What are you?”
Not who. What.
“So you really did see that bit with the cars?”
“Yeah.”
I sighed. “I’m dead.”
He tilted his head and looked me up and down. “You don’t look dead.”
“Good,” I said. “I think dead is probably a bad look on most people. Glad it’s working out for me.”
“You’re awfully sarcastic for a dead person.”
“I was a pretty sarcastic live person, too.”
“I’m not sure that helps any,” he said.
“Maybe it would be easier to think of me as a ghost.”
“No, not really,” he said, shaking his head. He clasped his hands in front of him and stayed plastered against the door.
“A helpful spirit?” I suggested.
“That might be a little better.”
“At least you haven’t peed yourself,” I said, trying to sound encouraging.
He looked down at his crotch as if affirming the fact for himself. “At least,” he finally agreed, looking back up at me.
“So see? It could be much worse.”
He didn’t answer.
I sighed. “Look. I’m not going to hurt you. I meant it the other day when I told you that I didn’t believe Rick killed Molly. In fact, I know he didn’t, because I was there. I just want to find evidence to prove Rick’s innocence.”
“You were there?”
“Yeah.”
“When Molly died?”
“Yeah.” My voice grew quiet.
“So why didn’t you stop it?”
I looked at him for a moment, and then waved my hand up and down and back and forth, through the wall. “Not much power to move stuff,” I said.
All the blood drained from his face and he slumped a little against the door.
“Oh, hell,” I said. “Don’t
faint on me, dammit. I told you I was a ghost.”
“I don’t think I really believed it,” he whispered hoarsely.
“Why don’t you have a seat and let’s talk about this, okay?”
He nodded weakly and sank down onto the nearest bench.
“I tried to stop it,” I said. “I really did. But they couldn’t see me, so the killer just . . . killed her.” I shook my head, trying to clear the images of Molly dead in the bathtub. “So now all I can do is get the right guy arrested.”
“And you think I can help?” Stephen asked.
“You’re one of the few people who can actually see me. And you care about what happens to Rick. So yes, I’m hoping that you’ll help me.”
He stared down at his hands for a moment.
“Why isn’t Molly’s ghost here?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen any other ghosts since the day I died. But it hasn’t been all that long, so maybe they’re just not speaking to me yet.”
“Why can I see you when other people can’t?”
“I don’t know. There’s a lot I don’t know. But if you’ll help, I promise I’ll tell you if I figure any of it out.” I stood completely still, waiting for his answer, hoping I wouldn’t have to go search for yet another person who could see me.
He looked back down, and then finally nodded. “Okay. I’ll help.”
* * * *
We went back to Ashara’s in Stephen’s car.
“Can’t you just pop over there or something?” he asked.
“Why does everyone keep expecting me to voluntarily teleport myself around?” I threw my hands up in the air and stared up at the sky as if waiting for an answer from heaven. As if heaven has any part in my afterlife, I thought, shaking my head and slipping into Stephen’s little Honda through the closed door.
“You know,” he said as he opened the driver’s side door and climbed in, “that’s a little creepy.”
“Can’t very well open the door,” I said. “Come on, let’s go. I want to get started on all of this.”
Ashara was sitting at her computer when I moved into her house, calling out “I’m here! It’s Callie!” to keep from startling her.
“Hey,” she said without getting up from the computer. “I think I’ve got something.”
“Me, too,” I said. “I need you to unlock the front door to let him in.”
She looked up at that. “You got him to come over here already?”
“Yep, already. He’s waiting on the porch.”
When Ashara opened the door, she and Stephen just stared at each other for a long, silent moment.
“Um. Hi,” he finally said.
“Oh. Yeah. Hi,” she replied, almost stumbling over her own feet to move out of the way. “Come in, please.”
I stood behind her. “Stephen Davenport, this is Ashara Jones. Ashara, Stephen.”
Stephen stepped inside and stood awkwardly in the living room as Ashara shut the door. By the time she turned around, though, she had regained some of her usual composure. “Could I get you something to drink?”
“Water would be nice,” he said.
Ashara nodded and headed for the kitchen.
“Have a seat,” I offered, gesturing around at the couch. Stephen nodded and sat down at one end, hand tapping restlessly at the armrest.
“So,” Ashara said as she came back into the room and handed him a glass of ice water. “I take it Callie told you what’s going on?”
“Sort of,” Stephen said.
I nodded. “I caught him up on everything on the way over here.”
“I’m still a little fuzzy on some of the details,” Stephen said. “Like how you two got involved in all this, for one thing. And why you,” he nodded toward me, “can’t go anywhere without Ashara’s grandmother.”
“Yeah, well,” I said. “I’m a little fuzzy on that one myself.”
“But,” Stephen added, “I’m ready to help if it means getting Rick out of trouble.”
“Good,” said Ashara. She nodded approvingly. When did she get so gung-ho about this? I wondered. “I’ve got some questions for you, then.”
Stephen nodded.
“The night that Callie and I went into the shop, the guy who came in after us had a key. So who all has keys to the shop?” she asked.
I stared at her with my mouth hanging open. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t even bothered to think of that question.
“Well,” said Stephen, “everybody who works there, for a start.”
“Does a Clifford Howard work there?”
Stephen shook his head.
“How do you know that’s the guy’s first name?” I asked Ashara.
“Maw-Maw got it out of him when she started asking him about his family the other day.”
Of course she had.
“And this Clifford Howard guy is the one who killed Molly?” Stephen asked.
I nodded.
“So why don’t you just go to the police about it now that you know his name?” Stephen asked.
Ashara and I stared at each other in exasperation. “Because,” she said slowly, “the only reason we know he did it is that Callie saw him do it. And the cops probably aren’t going to take a ghost’s word for it.”
Stephen stared at me. “Oh. Yeah. I guess I forgot that part for a minute.”
“Good,” I said briskly. “The more you think of me as a real person, the happier we’ll all be.”
“So this guy had a key to the shop,” Stephen said musingly.
“Yeah. He walked right in, stood over Jeffrey McClatchey’s desk, and picked something up. Something small. He put it into his pocket and left.”
“So that’s why you came back the other day?” Stephen asked me.
“Yeah. I wanted to see what I could figure out. Have you heard anything else about the piano wire the police picked up out of the trash?”
“No. Not that they’d tell me. But I do know that Rick’s been charged and there’s some sort of preliminary hearing next Monday. For bail or something.”
“Does Rick have enough money to bail himself out?” Ashara asked.
Stephen shrugged. “I don’t even know if he’s got enough money for a good lawyer. It seemed like everything he made went back into that business. Molly’s job was the one that paid for the house and stuff. At least, that was the sense I got of it.”
I nodded. I hadn’t spent all those evenings at the McClatchey’s house without learning a little bit about them.
“So have you talked to Rick since he got arrested?”
Stephen shook his head. “No. I keep thinking I ought to go visit him, but I can’t figure out what I’d say to him. ‘Dude. Sorry your wife’s dead and you’re in jail.’ Doesn’t seem very comforting, really.”
“Okay,” I said. “I think we should write down everything we know. And by ‘we,’ I mean one of y’all, since I can’t hold a pen very well anymore.”
Ashara nodded, stood up, and came back with writing supplies.
“Okay,” I said. “You said you had something, Ashara?”
“Yeah. I found a couple of possibilities for that phone number you gave me. Both local numbers, but I didn’t recognize the names.”
“Write them down anyway.”
She used the number as a sort of heading and under the number, she wrote “David Evans and Allison Brown,” along with the full telephone number connected to them.
“Recognize either of those people?” I asked Stephen. He shook his head.
The next heading was “Key,” and under that, Ashara wrote the day and time of Clifford Howard’s meeting with the person he’d talked to on the phone.
“What else?” she asked.
“Evidence,” I said.
She wrote down the heading. “What do we have?”
“Well,” I said, “the police have a drop of Howard’s blood, but they clearly haven’t figured out its significance yet. They’ve got the piano wire that killed Molly and the pian
o wire that was in Jeffrey’s trash can, but we don’t know if those things will even match up.”
“The rumor at the shop is that part of the problem is Rick’s alibi. He headed home from his conference early enough that it shouldn’t have taken him that long to get home. He says he stopped to get something to eat, but Molly was apparently in the middle of cooking dinner when she was attacked. So the police don’t believe him when he says he wasn’t there.”
“But we know for sure that he wasn’t. So he probably really did stop to eat,” Ashara said.
I nodded. “Molly might have been planning to surprise him. It’s the sort of thing she would have been likely to do.”
“Is that everything?” Ashara asked.
“I think we ought to have a special category listing everything else we know about Howard,” I said.
“Okay.” She wrote it down, then listed what we knew: killer, has key to shop, has small key, took something from Jeffrey’s desk, has meeting tomorrow, called phone number to set up meeting.
“Didn’t you say that there was another number on a sheet of paper?” Ashara asked.
“Oh. Yeah.” I struggled for a moment to remember the number, and then gave it to her. “203. Why? Do you have some idea what it might be?”
She shook her head. “I keep thinking that I ought to know what it is, but I can’t remember.” She shook her head again. “I think I need to get some sleep. Maybe it’ll come to me by morning.”
I stood up. “Okay, then. We’ll get Maw-Maw tomorrow and see if we can follow this guy.”
Ashara nodded. “You be damned careful with my grandmother, though. If you get her hurt, I’ll kill you.”
“Too late,” I said cheerfully. “Seriously. We’ll stay far enough back that he won’t even know we’re following him. Right, Stephen?”
“Right.” He nodded, but he didn’t seem as delighted with the plan as I was. But at least he was on board.
“Okay, then. I’ll see y’all tomorrow.” I wafted out through the door, and then waited for Stephen to follow me. It took a long moment, but finally the door opened and he stepped out.
“What took so long?” I asked.
“Ashara had to explain to me what she would do to me if her grandmother got into any sort of trouble.” His voice sounded subdued.
Waking Up Dead Page 7
