The Chick and the Dead

by Casey Daniels

  Pale gray light seeped in at the windows, and for the first time, I was able to take a look around and assess the damage. Instantly, I saw why I couldn't move. My legs were pinned by the metal storage cabinet. I twisted out from under it and sat up, my back to the wall, pushing my hair out of my eyes and realizing how lucky I'd been. When the cabinet fell, it didn't hit me in the head. Instead, whatever had been stacked on top of it had come down on me. The fur coat had kept me warm all night. The wooden box that lay next to me (open and empty) was what must have conked me into unconsciousness.

  Nothing was broken. I knew that for a fact because I flexed my arms and legs and everything was working, even if it all was a little stiff. Still, a night on the attic floor hadn't done much for my looks or my mood. The taste of dust filled my mouth, and when I swiped one hand over my face, I felt grit dig into my skin. A deep pore cleansing was in order. ASAP.

  So was a change of clothes. The left knee of my jeans was ripped. The right strap of my tank top was torn. There was a smudge of dirt across my pink cardigan.

  And none of that was as disturbing as the questions that bounced through my head.

  When the cabinet came down, it made one hell of a noise. Hadn't anyone heard it? And if so, why hadn't they come to see what was up?

  There was only one way to find out. I dragged myself to my feet.

  As anxious as I was to get out of there, I couldn't avoid the whole private investigator thing. On my way across the attic, I stopped to check out the spot where the cabinet had previously stood. In my dazed and confused state, I had yet to question what caused it to fall or if the sound I heard (or at least I thought I heard) right before it tumbled had anything to do with the mishap. Now, in the anemic morning light, I saw that the floor nearby was scuffed, the dust kicked into little mounds.

  As if someone had stood there and pushed.

  My blood went cold, and another barrage of questions assaulted me.

  If someone tipped the cabinet over on me on purpose, was it to scare me?

  Or kill me?

  I glanced around, but there was no sign of anyone there now. Still, I wasn't taking any chances. I bolted across the attic, heading downstairs in search of answers, coffee, and a long, hot shower.

  Not necessarily in that order.

  I might have opted for the shower first, but the moment the attic door closed behind me, the aroma of coffee enveloped me like a wonderful, caffeine-laden cloud.

  Dirty face and torn clothing be damned. I hurried to the kitchen to find a good, hot cup of Java.

  What I found instead…

  Well, how can I possibly express the mix of horror and embarrassment I felt when I walked into the kitchen and found Quinn Harrison in there pouring himself a cup of coffee?

  At five eleven, with a 38C bust and hair the color of fireplace embers, I'm not exactly easy to forget.

  Still, I swear that when Quinn heard me out in the hallway and looked over his shoulder just as I saw him and froze in the doorway, it took him a second to register that he knew me. But a second isn't very long, and I could tell exactly when the truth dawned.

  That would have been when his jaw tensed and his shoulders went rigid.

  "Well, look what the cat dragged in." He took a sip of his coffee, examining me over the rim of a mug that was decorated with pink roses and the letters ISFTDS in flowing script. "Don't tell me, let me guess. You missed me so much, you tracked me down all the way here."

  "I didn't miss you." I lied, but hey, like I should feel guilty? I was dirty, disheveled, and feeling like shit. Better I should lie to the man who topped my would-like-to-jump-his-bones list than look like a complete loser. I tried not to limp when I crossed the room.

  Keeping my distance—from Quinn and from the uncontrollable urges (see the above reference to jumping his bones) that swept over me whenever he was around—I reached for a mug and filled it with coffee.

  "And I didn't have to track you down anywhere," I told him almost as an afterthought. "I work here. In fact, I'm living here for the summer."

  "You're kidding me."

  I was in the process of rummaging through the cupboards in search of sweetener, and I made a face at him. "Do I look like I'm kidding?"

  He glanced from the tips of my sneakers to my ripped jeans, and from there to the top of my head. Big points for him, he didn't ask why I looked as if I'd spent the night on the floor of the attic. He was more the cut-to-the-chase type. "You look like hell."

  "Thank you very much." I finished with the cupboards and tried the drawers of the baker's rack that stood next to the stove. "Which explains why I'm getting a cup of coffee." I ransacked one drawer and started on another. "Want to tell me why you're here?"

  Don't ask me where he got it, but he held up one of those tiny bags of sugar. "This what you're looking for?"

  Okay, so it wasn't sweetener and the calories were empty. I wasn't in a position to argue. I plucked the sugar out of his hands, ripped the bag open with my teeth, and dumped the contents into my cup. "Were you going to make me beg?" I asked him.

  I had meant it as one of those—what do you call them?—rhetorical questions. But Quinn took it at face value. He set down his coffee, cocked his head, and leaned back against the countertop, his arms crossed over his chest. "I'll tell you what," he said. "I'm kind of liking the sound of that. You begging, that is. Does this scenario have anything to do with you being down on your knees?"

  Have I mentioned that Quinn is gorgeous?

  Of course I have. I can't possibly talk about Quinn and leave out the gorgeous part. Gorgeous is as much Quinn as his take-no-prisoners attitude and the wardrobe that came from a place where cops shouldn't be able to afford to shop.

  Today was no exception. Navy suit. Crisp white shirt. Red tie. All of it expensive. All of it designed and tailored to make the most of the chipped-from-granite chest, the lean and stubborn chin, and the dark hair that was so thick and wavy, I had spent more than one night dreaming about running my fingers through it.

  None of which meant I was going to crumble.

  At least not this early in the game.

  I pretended I had no idea what he was talking about. Just like I tried to convince myself that what he was talking about didn't make me tingly all the way down to the tips of my toes. Instead, I reached for a spoon and stirred my coffee. "You haven't explained why you're here."

  "What can you tell me about Merilee?"

  I shrugged. So what if the broken strap of my top slid down my arm and made the front of the tank dip just a bit? For all he'd put me through, Quinn deserved a little torment. I saw him glance at my chest. He was tormented, all right. It cheered me right up.

  "Merilee is my boss," I said.

  "What about the cemetery?"

  "I'll be working at the cemetery again. As soon as Merilee leaves town."

  "And how did you get the job here?"

  "What, you don't think I'm qualified?" I had to give myself credit. Even I knew I wasn't qualified, but still, I made it sound like I was offended.

  "Oh, I'll bet you're plenty qualified." Quinn reached for his coffee and took another sip. "But you're talking about being qualified to work here at the museum, and I'm talking about…" His grin was hot enough to smoke the angels out of heaven. "Well, never mind."

  The smile I shot back at him was tight around the edges. Maybe because I was tired. Or maybe there was just so much grit on my face, I couldn't manage anything more sincere. "Only if we're talking about me working as Merilee's secretary for the summer," I told him.

  Though he tried to corral it, Quinn couldn't control the fleeting expression that crossed his face. It looked like worry to me. But then, I'd had a rough night. And finding him there in the kitchen had been something of a shock. Maybe I was just imagining it.

  "So…" His expression blank again, he took another sip of coffee. "You haven't told me what you know about Merilee."

  "You haven't told me what you're doing here."

&nb
sp; "And what about that Bob guy? Not exactly the kind of person I ever pictured you working with side-by-side."

  "My sides and Bob's sides have never been side-by-side," I told him. "And never will be." I shivered. "He gives me the willies."

  "That's the first thing we've agreed on since—"

  Since the night we almost ended up in bed together.

  I knew that's what Quinn was thinking.

  Quinn knew that I knew that's what he was thinking.

  Which is why I decided it was time to change the subject.

  "Merilee is a royal pain in the ass," I said. "Why do you care?"

  He shrugged. "Maybe I don't. Maybe I'm just thinking that it may not be just dumb luck that you're here."

  "Nobody said it was dumb."

  "I didn't mean you."

  It was as close to an apology as I'd ever get from him, and I knew it. I finished my cup of coffee. If Quinn had made the coffee—and I hadn't seen anybody else around, so I had to assume he had—it was another thing to add to the list of things he did (or probably did) better than any other man alive.

  "Call me crazy…" No one ever would. Quinn was a lot of things, but crazy wasn't one of them. "But I'm thinking you're not just here because Merilee needs a secretary. I know you too well for that, Pepper. You have a way of sticking your nose where it doesn't belong."

  "You don't know me well at all," I reminded him. "And why do you care if I'm here, anyway?"

  He looked me up and down. "Maybe because you obviously ran into some problems. And from the looks of things, I'd say it was just recently."

  "It's nothing." I waved away his concern, mostly because I knew it was professional and not personal. "I was up in the attic and I got attacked by a Wookiee."

  He raised his dark brows.

  I sighed and confessed. What choice did I have when he was giving me that penetrating tell-me-everything-you-know look? "I was up in the attic and a storage cabinet fell over on me. There was a fur coat on top of it."

  "The Wookiee."

  I nodded, confirming his theory.

  "Storage cabinets don't fall over by themselves."

  "I didn't get hurt." Just to prove it, I dance-stepped across the kitchen. "Everything's in good working order."

  He gave me another quick once-over. "I have no doubt of that. What were you doing in the attic?"

  "Looking around."

  "Minding your own business?"

  "Don't I always?"

  "Not if hanging around with the local mob means anything."

  "It doesn't." That much was true. My investigation of Gus's murder was done with. My hanging-around-with-the-mob days were over. "I'm here as a favor to Ella, my boss, who just happens to be the ringleader of the crazy SFTD fans," I told Quinn. "That's it. Honest."

  "Is there a reason I don't believe you?"

  "I don't know what you believe and what you don't believe. And honestly, I don't really care." I poured another cup of coffee. "If you want to stay here and drink coffee all day, be my guest. Right now, the most important things to me are a shower and a change of clothes." I headed for the door.

  "You haven't put it together yet, have you?"

  I didn't know what he was talking about, and honestly, I doubted that it had anything to do with Didi and the missing manuscript that may not have been missing because maybe it never existed in the first place.

  But I couldn't take the chance.

  I stopped and turned to him. "What?"

  "You don't think I stopped by just to see you, do you?"

  "Is it that impossible?"

  "It is, because I didn't know you were here."

  "Which means—"

  The chunk I heard inside my head was the pieces falling into place. Slowly, I admit. Then again, I had a good excuse for the fact that my brain was moving at a snail's pace. I had recently been knocked out. I had spent the night on a hard wooden floor. I'd been ambushed by a man I wasn't expecting to see and a whole lot of wants/needs/ desires that I had hoped to never have to grapple with again.

  At least not with this man.

  "Trish died," I said. "Here. Just a couple of days ago. And you're with—"

  "Bingo!" Quinn grinned. It was not a happy expression.

  "That means—"

  "You got it." When Quinn's cell phone rang, he set down his coffee cup and reached for it. "You're working here as Merilee's secretary. And apparently, no one told the new secretary what really happened to the old secretary. She didn't just die, Pepper. She was murdered."

  Chapter 12

  A sour taste filled my mouth. It had nothing to do with Quinn's coffee.

  When he walked out of the kitchen to take his phone call, I was left there trying to absorb everything I'd just heard.

  The news of Trish's murder put a whole new spin on what happened in the attic the night before. Not to mention the little detail of me staying in Trish's room.

  The room where she died.

  "Chocolate chip? Or peanut butter?"

  My grim thoughts were interrupted by Didi's pleasant chirp.

  I turned to find her standing at the stove in a pencil-slim dress, heels, pearls, and an apron. She had a quilted oven mitt on each hand, and she held out a cookie sheet toward me. "Chocolate chip?" She glanced toward the left half of the tray and two rows of steaming hot cookies dotted with gooey chocolate morsels. She looked at the right half. "Or peanut butter?"

  "How about the truth for a change."

  The tone of my voice told her I wasn't kidding around. She set the cookie sheet down on the stove and just as had happened when Elizabeth discarded her cigarette holder, the cookie sheet instantly disappeared. So did the oven mitts when she yanked them off. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

  I barely contained my sigh of frustration, but there was nothing I could do to control the wave of exasperation that churned through my stomach along with a healthy dose of anger. "Well, we could start with your movie career. Or should I say your lack of a movie career?"

  Can ghosts blush? I guess so, because a pink flush raced across Didi's cheeks. She wrinkled her nose. "There was no harm in telling you I'd been in the movies," she said. "I was just… I dunno… Just fooling around. It's fun to pretend, don't you think?"

  "Not when you pretend you were murdered."

  "Oh, no!" She went on the defensive, stepping back and shaking her head. "I never told you I was murdered."

  "You never told me you weren't."

  "You never asked how I died."

  "I never thought—" My words came out too loud. I looked toward the hallway, and when I still heard Quinn's baritone hum on the phone, I lowered my voice. Decibels notwithstanding, I was plenty pissed. "Don't pull that on me. I shouldn't be expected to know how this stupid Gift thing works. Gus was murdered, and I was able to see him. When I saw you, I figured you must have been murdered, too. I thought you showed up so that I could investigate. I even told you I'd look into your murder. More than once. You never said I was wrong."

  "No, but I did tell you I didn't want you to do anything but find out the truth about my book."

  "And you never mentioned that you killed yourself."

  "What difference does it make?" Didi's shoulders slumped. Her voice wavered. She untied her apron and slipped it over her head. It, too, vanished the moment she set it down. "Dead is dead."

  I couldn't argue with that.

  I couldn't afford to get sucked in by the pathetic trembling in her voice, either. Rather than think about what awful thing could have brought her life to the brink of despair, I stuck to the matter at hand.

  "And then there's that original handwritten manuscript," I said.

  Didi's face brightened. "You found it?"

  I didn't need to answer. My expression said it all.

  "You didn't find it." Her smile disappeared like magic. Just like the cookie sheet and the oven mitts had. "You don't believe it was ever there."

  Too irritated to keep still, I threw my hands in t
he air and did a turn around the room. "What am I supposed to believe? You've been telling me stories, Didi. And sucker that I am, I've been more than willing to believe them. Then the truth comes out and smacks me in the face. Your movie career, the way you died, the manuscript. Sorry if I'm jumping the gun here, but I'm thinking that pretty soon, I'm going to need hip boots to wade through your lies. Maybe if I could find something in So Far the Dawn that sounded like you—"

  "You're reading it?" Didi's smile was radiant. "Do you like it? I mean, really, tell me. Is it the best book ever? Have you gotten to the part where—"

  "I've gotten to the part where Opal is leaving for Baltimore," I confessed. "And what difference does it make what I think of the book? I'm not reading it to be entertained." Not exactly a lie since I never dreamed I'd actually like the book. "I'm reading it in the hopes of finding the truth. I don't see you in those pages anywhere."

  "You don't see Merilee, either."

  I couldn't deny it. "You're right. It's just that I thought maybe there would be some hint of your voice. I was thinking that maybe the way you describe things in the book would sound like the way you talk. That one of your characters would sound just like you."

  "That's not what writing is all about." Didi waved away my theory. "It's not like writers take their own lives and just plunk them down on paper. It's fiction, silly. I made it all up."

  "But if your voice was there—"

  "What about what's not there?"

  I wasn't sure what she was getting at, and it was Didi's turn to be frustrated. She gave me a penetrating look. "How far have you read?" she asked.

  "I told you. Opal is leaving for Baltimore."

  "That would be…" Didi narrowed her eyes, thinking. "About page 147."

  As far as I remembered, she was just about right. I nodded.

  "So tell me, in the 147 pages you've read, have you seen one mention of the unemployment rate in Cleveland in 1857?"

  "No, but—"

  "Have you read anything about the petroleum industry here? Or the way steel is manufactured? Or"—she shuddered—"economics?"

  I knew where she was headed with this. "No," I said again. "And you're saying—"