No one answered, even after she repeated her question in a louder voice. Surely the staff wouldn’t have left the office unlocked. Maybe, since she was the last appointment of the day, Dr. Paine had let the receptionist leave and Skye was supposed to go straight in. You would think, though, that someone would have left a note to that effect.
Annoyed, Skye eased through the door. The moment she was inside the hallway, anxiety spurted through her. It wasn’t the pain that made her hate to go to the dentist; it was the noise and the smell. Today the office was as silent as a tomb; unfortunately, the odor of antiseptic and fear remained.
The first two alcoves on her right were empty, as was the small office to her left, but now that she had moved farther down the short corridor, she could hear groans coming from the treatment room at the end of the hall—the only one with a door.
Skye hesitated. It sounded as if Dr. Paine was working on a patient. Should she go back and sit in the waiting area? But with the receptionist gone, how would he know she was there? Maybe she should leave. No. She had come this far. She’d let the dentist know she had arrived.
“Dr. Paine.” She knocked on the door, opened it a fraction, and said, “It’s Skye Denison. I have a four-o’clock appointment.”
No answer. She raised her voice, “Uh, Dr. Paine.” She inched the door a little wider, stuck her head around the edge, and whispered, “Holy crap!”
Blond hair flowed over the headrest of the dental chair, and long pink nails clawed at a white butt going up and down like an oil derrick. The dentist wasn’t filling a tooth; he was filling a much lower cavity.
Skye eased the door shut. Obviously Dylan Paine wouldn’t be very cooperative if she interrupted him in the middle of his crowning achievement. But this, along with the incident at the grocery store, confirmed that Dr. Paine was indeed the Romeo of the rinse sink, and thus had a motive for doing away with his wife.
During her short ride home, Skye figured out who the dentist had been drilling that afternoon. The hair and nails had looked familiar, and she connected the dots. Dr. Paine’s little afternoon delight was none other than Evie Harrison. Hmm. That gave Evie an even stronger motive for killing Annette.
Skye smirked. Clearly Evie had found some spare time in her busy schedule as Promfest chair. A talk with the blonde was way overdue, and now that Skye knew about Evie and Dr. Paine, no way could the woman get Skye fired or complain to Quirk about Skye harassing her.
Bingo met Skye as she stepped into the foyer, rubbing against her ankles and purring. She scooped him up and nuzzled his soft fur. “Were you a good boy today?” He bumped her hand with his head, demanding that she scratch under his chin. “Of course you were. Unlike some males in this town, you’ve been fixed.”
Skye continued petting the cat until he tired of the attention, wiggled out of her arms, and herded her into the kitchen, where he stood looking meaningfully at his empty food bowl. She fetched the open can of Fancy Feast and gave him another third of the contents—he’d gotten the first third that morning.
She found herself smiling. Was she in a good mood because she was finally making some progress on the murder, or because she seemed to be over whatever bug had been causing her to feel sick the past few days? Or maybe her illness wasn’t a virus. Come to think of it, because of her dentist appointment, she hadn’t eaten her usual ration of cookies that afternoon.
Could she be allergic to Oreos? She shook her head, refusing to believe those delicious chocolate wafers with their luscious cream filling could be the culprit. It had been the flu, and that was that.
Grinning at her own silliness, she went to check her answering machine. The flashing light indicated four messages. The first was another one from her mother, which Skye erased. She felt a little guilty, but she knew Vince had talked to May that morning and assured her that Skye was fine, so there was no need for her to spend an hour—or more—reiterating the news.
The second was from Loretta again, short and to the point: “We need to talk about Vince. Call me.”
Shoot. Skye’s mood darkened. She should have known it wouldn’t be possible to stay out of that mess. She only hoped she wouldn’t lose Loretta’s friendship over it.
The third call was from Hope Kennedy, saying she’d run into Quirk at the gas station and he’d threatened her again. Skye tried to call the teacher back, but no one answered.
The final message was from Wally. “Hi. I’ve got some bad news. Dad fired the original nurse I lined up—said he wanted a male RN. I’ve found one, but he can’t start before Saturday, which means I can’t come home until then. My new flight arrives at four thirty, so I should be in Scumble River by six thirty or seven, depending on traffic. I’ll call you when I get in.” Skye thought he had hung up, but as she started to press DELETE, he said, “Why don’t you have your cell phone on? I keep leaving messages on your voice mail, but you never call me back.”
Crap. She wasn’t allowed to have her cell activated in the school building, and she kept forgetting to turn it on once she left. And she really needed to figure out how to access her voice mail.
As she quickly dialed Wally’s number, she wondered were she had put the instruction booklet that came with her cell. Of course, now Wally wasn’t answering his phone, so she left him a message about Quirk’s latest threat to Hope and hung up. Maybe tomorrow would be better.
Fridays were supposed to be good days, but Skye’s sure wasn’t going that way. When she walked into the high school, Homer dragged her into his office and began screaming at her about some stupid traffic cones. “Do you have any idea what a mess you caused this morning? Buses were stacked up like the Tupperware bowls in my wife’s cupboard. We had to close off the whole damn parking lot!”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. I wasn’t even here this morning. I stopped at the grade school to speak to a teacher.” Skye had assured Hope Kennedy that Wally would be back the next evening and would take care of the Quirk situation. “I didn’t get here until a few minutes ago.”
“Fern didn’t see you, and you didn’t sign the attendance log. I checked.”
“I forgot to sign it because I didn’t go into the office. After I talked to the teacher, I spent an hour setting things up for an evaluation this afternoon, then came over here,” Skye explained. “What happened?”
“You know darn well what happened.” Homer loomed over Skye, who was seated on a visitor’s chair in his office. “You put traffic cones funneling the buses away from the entrance and into the bus parking area in the back of the school, which is a fricking dead end.”
“I did not,” Skye protested, her heart pounding. No one messed with the buses and got away with it. “Why would I do that?”
“How should I know? But you were seen.” Homer crossed his arms and glared at her. “Mrs. Boswell, the old lady who lives across the street in the white house, was out walking her dog and saw you putting the cones out. She came to my office and told me all about it when she saw the traffic jam.”
“That’s impossible. I didn’t do it.” Skye ran her fingers through her hair. “What time was this?”
“Seven thirty-five. She remembers exactly because she waits until seven thirty to take Snowflake out. She said she knows all the teachers have to be here by that time, but the buses don’t start to arrive until seven forty.”
“But, but . . .” Skye trailed off.
“But nothing,” Homer roared. “In my thirty-five years of experience, nothing like this has ever happened before.”
Skye stopped herself from blurting out that in reality, Homer had had one year of experience thirty-five times, since he did the same thing over and over again.
Homer stared at Skye, and when she remained silent he demanded, “Why did you do it?”
“I keep telling you I didn’t.” Skye was getting frantic. “Did Mrs. Boswell identify me by name?”
“No,” Homer admitted. “But she said she saw a female of your general build, with curly reddish
brown hair.”
“What do you mean, my ‘general build’?”
Homer’s eyes dropped. “Not thin.”
“Fat?”
“That wasn’t what Mrs. Boswell said.” Homer didn’t look up. “Not exactly.”
Hmm. Homer was less of a jerk when he was embarrassed. Skye tucked that fact into her memory for future use, but quickly pressed on, not wanting to lose her slight advantage. “What exactly did she say?”
“She said she saw a big girl putting the traffic cones out.”
“She used the word girl?”
“Now don’t go all feminazi on me.” Homer was already over his embarrassment. “Mrs. Boswell is in her nineties—anyone under sixty is a girl to her.”
“I see. And she said curly hair?”
Homer nodded.
“My hair’s straight today.” Skye lifted a strand. “See? I had some extra time this morning, so I used my flatiron. It’s only curly when I let it dry naturally.”
“Do I look as if I care what you do with your freaking hair?” Homer’s voice rose in anger. “Try to wiggle out of this any way you can—the description fits you.” He jabbed her in the shoulder with his index finger.
Skye searched her mind. Had anyone at the grade school seen her at seven thirty? She’d talked to Hope quite a bit earlier than that. Yes. Thank goodness for Belle’s talkativeness.
“I can prove it wasn’t me. The speech pathologist stopped by my office at the grade school around that time to ask if I had been able to set up a testing appointment with the parents of the new student.” Skye pushed Homer away from her, got up, and grabbed the phone. “Call and ask her if you don’t believe me.”
Once Homer verified her alibi, Skye fled the high school. Her schedule called for her to be there all morning, but she knew that if she stuck around, she’d end up telling the principal what she thought of him, which would result in tears—either on her part or on his, maybe both.
If she hadn’t had the whole team set up to evaluate the little Russian boy, she would have given up and gone home. Instead, she spent the rest of the time until his appointment brooding in her office at the grade school.
Later she decided she should have taken the sick day. Nothing Skye said to the boy in English, or Jackie said to him in Russian, seemed to make any impression. Instead, Vassily spent the time tearing around the room and destroying anything that was not nailed down.
His parents said his behavior was similar at home, and they were at their wits’ end. Skye assured Mr. and Mrs. Warner that she would include a behavior plan when she wrote her report. Developmentally, he appeared to be less than two years old.
Vassily had cut a wide swath of destruction through Skye’s office, and as she cleaned it up, she thought about the last few days. Chemical bombs at the high school, wannabe mommies at the junior high, and now a wild child at the elementary school—not to mention Annette’s death and Hope’s revelation about Quirk. What was next? An invasion by spacemen?
Why was she doing this? Yes, she wanted to talk to Evie about her affair with Dylan Paine, and also find out why the new Promfest chair had run away screaming the night of Annette’s death. Yes, she was still afraid that she would look bad in comparison to Jackie. And yes, she had given her word, but in her heart, Skye knew it was a mistake to return to the haunted house.
She hadn’t been in the bathroom for ten minutes when her instincts were proven right. As she took off her street clothes and prepared to slip her costume over her leotard, she heard a siren. Was that the police? What had happened now?
Before Skye could decide whether to put her regular clothes back on or go ahead with the witch’s outfit, the building’s fire alarms started to blare. Instantly the other women, who were also changing into their costumes in the bathroom, made a mad dash for the exit, each trying to be the first one out.
Skye stood undecided—there had been so many false alarms at school that she distrusted the system—but a nanosecond later common sense prevailed. Even the possibility of being charbroiled was enough to make her skedaddle.
Snatching her tote bag, which contained her jeans and sweater, and wiggling into the long black witch’s dress as she ran, Skye followed the others. Regrettably, the women had halted only a few steps from the bathroom door, and Skye, unable to stop her forward momentum, plowed into them, mowing them down like a broom hitting a nest of dust bunnies.
It took her a few minutes to free herself from the tangle of arms and legs, and when she did she wished she could crawl back under the pile. Standing in the hallway, dressed like a cross between a cartoon astronaut and the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz, was Earl Doozier. In his hand he held a toilet plunger. On his head was a portable siren duct-taped to a baseball cap, a stringy ponytail dangling out the opening in back. At his feet sat an industrial-size Shop-Vac. Glued to its canister was a hand-lettered sign that read GHOSTFLUSHERS.
Skye closed her eyes and prayed for a twister to transport her to the Emerald City. An instant later someone screamed.
CHAPTER 20
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, aka A Midautumn’s Nightmare
Skye watched in appalled fascination as Earl shouted something about evil spooks and bloodthirsty bogeymen while thrusting his plunger into the growing crowd. Drawn by his hollering and the women’s screams, people from all over the haunted house poured into the hallway. Most of the group wore bemused expressions, but a few actually seemed frightened, and at least two folks were enraged.
Frankenstein, aka Dr. Paine, appeared furious enough to start busting heads, as did the woman next to him, Zinnia Idell. Skye shuddered. She knew from personal experience that Mrs. Idell could turn violent faster than a Weedwacker could decapitate a flower not perfectly aligned with its peers, and for as little reason.
Skye had forgotten that Mrs. Idell was involved in A Ghoul’s Night Out. Her presence tonight meant she had been at the hall last Friday as well. Maybe she was angry enough with Skye to have strung up the rope that killed Annette. Come to think of it, Zinnia had been at Mass last Sunday, too. Skye wondered what kind of car she drove.
Mrs. Idell was fingering something in her jacket pocket, and Skye winced when Earl whirled on her and yelled, “Y’all stand aside now. I’m here to save you from the spooks,” and shoved his plunger in Zinnia’s face.
When the woman whipped out a pistol and aimed it at Earl’s heart, Skye took an involuntary step backward and shrieked, “Don’t shoot!”
Despite the fact that Earl had traded his customary fall ensemble of sweatpants and flannel shirt for a Michelin Man jacket with the lid of a garbage can duct-taped to its front, Skye was pretty sure he was still in trouble. The new outfit might be the latest thing in fighting ghosts, but it wasn’t bulletproof.
Skye’s fellow haunted-house workers surged forward to get a better view of the show, crowding Mrs. Idell, Dr. Paine, and Earl closer together. The proximity caused Earl’s thrusts with the plunger to become jerkier, and Mrs. Idell’s hand to move back and forth. Dr. Paine stood absolutely still, staring at the gun as it swung from side to side.
Someone had turned off the alarm, but that shouldn’t stop the firefighters from arriving to check things out. Where were they? Maybe, unlike the schools, this building’s system wasn’t directly connected to the fire station.
Whatever the reason, help didn’t seem to be arriving. Now what? Skye briefly considered battling her way to the edge of the crowd and hightailing it out of there, but curiosity and her instinctive desire to help won out. She needed a plan.
Spotting Evie hovering near the exit with a cell phone pressed to her ear, Skye elbowed her way toward her, shouting above the noise, “Any thoughts on what to do about this?”
“As soon as I get a signal,” Evie continued, pressing buttons, “I’m calling the cops to come arrest the freak.”
Skye flinched. “You do know that arresting a Doozier usually takes the National Guard, and I have a feeling it might require the Special Forces to bri
ng in Zinnia Idell.”
“Don’t be silly.” Evie edged around Skye. “Situations like this are why we pay taxes.” Pushing open the exit, she stepped outside and closed the door emphatically in Skye’s face.
Skye raised an eyebrow. If the chairwoman had that kind of confidence in the government, she must be a lot happier writing her check to the Internal Revenue Service on April fifteenth than most people were.
Cell phone reception on the sidewalk didn’t seem to be any better than it was inside the building. As Skye watched, Evie furiously pirouetted in different directions like a ballerina dancing Swan Lake, all the while thrusting her cell phone in the air.
After a few moments of enjoying the performance, Skye realized this was her opportunity to get things under control before Quirk arrived and made a bad situation worse. Her adrenaline pumping, she zigzagged back toward the front of the crowd.
Following her belief that effective communication could solve most problems, Skye pushed through the crowd until she was only a couple of feet from Zinnia, and called in a loud voice, “Mrs. Idell. Mrs. Idell.”
“You!” Zinnia kept the gun leveled at Earl, but turned her head toward Skye. “Why are you always around when there’s a problem? What does it take to make you mind your own business, a grenade up your butt?”
“Uh . . . I’m just trying to help.” Skye realized that putting herself within bullet range of an armed parent who hated her guts had not been a wise move, and she scrambled for something calming to say. “I know everyone’s a little nervous, with the murder and all, but Earl, here, is completely harmless.”
“No, I’m not.” Earl grabbed the hose of the Shop-Vac and shook it. “I’m the Ghostflusher. I’m the only one here who can tell the fake ghouls and goblins from the real ones. Without me, you’re all in danger.” Earl made a loud woo-wooing sound.
Skye hissed at Earl, “Shut up.” Then she turned to Zinnia and said, “You know Earl, Mrs. Idell. His reality check bounced long ago.”
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