On the Cutting Room Floor (A Ghosts of Landover Mystery Book 8)

by Etta Faire

  Mandy took a two-inch stack.

  “You’re home early,” she said to Ruth as she crunched on Pringles.

  “Fridays are my easy day. I’m heading back out. To the gym. You should come with me. I’m allowed a guest.”

  Mandy sucked potato chips from her teeth. “I would, but you know me. I’ve got a few scenes to finish up. And they’re having dinner catered tonight. I don’t want to miss that.”

  “Of course not,” Ruth replied, her eyes avoiding Mandy’s midsection.

  I read Mandy’s thoughts from the time. Ruth was judging her again. Nothing had changed since college, not even Ruth, darn it. Twenty years later and she still looked good, the only difference being her hair was a lot shorter now, more practical.

  “My kids are coming soon. I don’t want to miss them,” Mandy said, her voice shaking for no reason. I could tell Ruth made her nervous. She was too perfect. Her house. Her hair. Her outfit.

  “Olivia’s got her first big scene coming up,” Mandy added.

  “That reminds me,” Ruth said, snapping. “I redid the killer’s blue notes like you asked me to.”

  “I really only suggested you look them over,” Mandy replied.

  Ruth nodded. “And you were right. It’s always a good idea to consult a psychologist when it comes to psychological terror. You guys are known for your psychological twists in your movies, huh?”

  Mandy blinked at her friend. She had no idea Ruth watched their movies. “I guess the psych classes you talked me into taking twenty years ago paid off.”

  Ruth smiled. Her teeth were long and white. “The theater classes you talked me into taking come in handy too, when I’m with my clients, acting like I know how to solve their problems.”

  They laughed a little. It felt strained and uneasy, like two friends who weren’t quite sure how to be friends anymore, but neither wanted to admit it.

  Ruth picked up one of the bags of sheep’s blood, curled her lip, and set it back down again. “You’re really finishing up this weekend, right? And you’re paying for cleaning?”

  Mandy talked to me in our head. “Ruth and Barry were both in the theater club with us in college. But they were far from it now. At first they said they were going to stay at Ruth’s parents’ house while we filmed, but then, last minute, they decided to stay here while their kids stayed with Ruth’s parents. They said it was so we could catch up. But we could tell they really wanted to keep an eye on things. They didn’t trust any of us. They seemed very controlling over their house and the production.”

  “We’ll be out of your hair soon, and we’re getting a cleaning crew. A good one,” Mandy said, like she actually knew who had been hired for that. She pulled out one of the heavy wooden dining chairs and sat down. “So, let’s look at those notes.”

  Ruth hustled over to an attaché case leaning against a back wall next to a gym bag and pulled out a thick black leather planner. She plopped it on the dining table, then pulled out one of the chairs to sit next to Mandy. It squeaked along the tile.

  “Let me see. Where did I put those?” she said, opening the planner. It was stuffed with loose papers and neon colored sticky tabs throughout.

  Mandy tried not to peek over at her friend’s busy calendar, but it represented such a different life than her own, and one she would never know. Shoulder pads, important meetings, a need for a pager. Fancy power suits with the kind of thin heels that made you look like you could kick some serious butt. Even her workout gear was trendy and cute.

  Mandy was a jeans-and-t-shirt kind of gal, and most days it was really stained sweatpants because jeans didn’t have that stretchy give she liked.

  She guessed Ruth had a walk-in closet with designer shoes in every color and purses just for nights out at the theater that she’d store in cubbies with tissue paper to keep them perfect. Mandy could almost feel the wooden hangers, smell the cedar.

  Ruth clicked her tongue and got up, leaving the calendar open, and went back to her briefcase. “I guess they must be in my bag.”

  Mandy peeked over at the calendar. September was color-coded in four different highlighter pens. The three weeks Toppletree was renting the house were obviously a bright green. She could see that. A little heart on Monday’s date, probably because it was the end of production.

  Rude.

  It looked like Ruth’s appointments were in pink. Barry’s schedule was in blue. Her client appointments in yellow…

  She had already finished four client appointments today, even though it was only 3:30. Mandy thought back to her day. She’d spent way too much time sulking over Ned’s changes this morning then spent the rest of the time typing up her own changes, only to have them ripped up…

  She checked Barry’s schedule. It was just as full. Work until 5:00. Gym until 7:00. The twins had an orthodontist’s appointment after school. Ruth’s mother was taking them.

  Everyone was busy. Everything had a purpose. Forward, onward, upward.

  Mandy pushed her lips together, trying not to let Ned’s words hurt her about being too old. She wasn’t going to feel like she’d wasted her life, like she didn’t have much to show for things. She had a whole career full of low-budget movies to be proud of.

  It didn’t matter that she didn’t make money off of them.

  Mandy heard her friend’s tennis shoes squeak closer, and she quickly looked back up before Ruth could see her studying the planner. Ruth didn’t seem to notice. She placed five blue pieces of paper on the table in front of Mandy and clicked her manicured nails together.

  “I took my task very seriously, I’ll have you know,” Ruth said.

  That was something Mandy did not doubt.

  Ruth tapped her forehead. “You gave me the job of digging into the mind of the killer. Of course, I deal in child psychology, but many serial killers become serial killers because they had unusually terrible childhoods.”

  Mandy reached for the Pringles can and grabbed another small stack. Her mind wandered to changing careers. It wasn’t too late to build some sort of a retirement yet.

  She knew Barry and Ruth had been saving since college. Barry once remarked to Graham that he and Ruth couldn’t possibly be doing a better job when it came to their portfolio.

  Mandy didn’t even know what a portfolio was.

  Ruth was still talking. “So, I took your idea, and I ran with it. And I think I may have even figured out a better twist.” She smiled at the ceiling.

  “I only asked you to look over the notes,” Mandy said.

  Ruth talked over her. “I think you need to change who the killer is. The killer should be someone resentful about everything and everyone. They’ve made some pretty bad life choices. And they hate it that their youth is gone and these kids represent a time they can’t get back. They’re broke, middle-aged, and a little frumpy. So, they peg the young counselors off one by one.”

  She leaned forward and touched Mandy’s arm. Her eyes beamed with confidence. “I think the killer should be you. Don’t you think?”

  Mandy sucked potato chips into her lungs, suddenly unable to breathe.

  Chapter 11

  Tick Tock Goes the Clock

  We stood back up and leaned over the table, coughing. “Thanks for your help on the notes,” we somehow managed to say through fits of breath, still trying to cough the potato chips up.

  “Are you okay?” Ruth asked. She stood up and kicked her chair back. “Can you breathe? Don’t panic. I know the Heimlich.”

  Of course you do, Mandy thought, forcing herself to take a breath. Her lungs hurt. I bet you’re a black belt in karate and you make soufflés like Julia Child…

  “I’m fine. Fine. That just came as a huge surprise.” We barely got the words out through our coughing fit.

  Ruth patted our back. “Do you need water?”

  “No, I’m good.”

  Ruth nodded, watching us with concern. She put a hand to her heart. “Of course, I didn’t mean the real you when I said all of that about the
killer resenting life and being frumpy. I meant your character. The woman in the story.”

  Mandy coughed into her balled fist. “And I one hundred percent knew that.” She stumbled over to the fridge, still coughing, and pulled out a Diet Coke.

  We poured it down our throat, letting the bubbles take over our senses, help us forget about the potato chips, the lack of oxygen, and the lack of a portfolio, whatever that was. “That is a very good psychological twist,” we said, pointing at our friend.

  Ruth smiled.

  Mandy talked to me again in our head. “It was Graham’s idea. He could tell we were wearing out our welcome here at the Lockes’. So he suggested we ask Ruth to look over the blue notes that come up in the movie, to get her expert opinion as a psychologist. But, she was just supposed to look over the notes. Not take over the movie.”

  “I will definitely run that by Graham,” Mandy said to her friend. “But I think it might be a little too Friday the 13th. The first one when the mom does it.”

  “I never saw that movie. I have other ideas…”

  We coughed more, guzzled more Diet Coke, and coughed some more. We stared at the blue folded notes on the table.

  Every part of us wanted to know what Ruth thought we would write to the youth of Camp Red Lake if we were about to pick them off one by one.

  We sat back down and stretched our fingers toward the first note.

  Ruth stood behind us. I could see out of the corner of our eye that she almost looked like she didn’t want us to read them now.

  Her head was tilted, her eyebrows darting. She seemed worried about our psychology. “You’ll see they’re all in uneven block letters, just like you asked.”

  She stressed the “just like you asked” part, talking in a slow therapist’s voice.

  Mandy looked at the note. “So perfect,” she said, nodding at her friend.

  It read, “PRETTY YOUNG GIRLS MUST DIE”

  Mandy put it to the side. “Because that would be exactly the thing… my character would say if she were frumpy and resentful about youth.”

  Our hands fumbled to open the next note:

  “TICK TOCK GOES THE CLOCK”

  “WASTED TIME, WASTED LIVES”

  “YOU CAN’T STAY YOUNG FOREVER”

  “CHOICES HAVE CONSEQUENCES”

  Mandy tossed the notes to the side. “I understand most of the notes, but why do choices have consequences?”

  Ruth flipped to the back of her planner where the notes section was. She pointed to a spot where she’d explained her thought process. “Your character is killing kids off in order to teach them a lesson. You think the kids aren’t making good choices by partying at the camp and not paying attention to their responsibilities.”

  Mandy cut her off. “I see. So, she lectures them before she kills them.”

  “Look, I tried. You don’t have to use any of those notes,” her friend snapped.

  Mandy took a sip of her Diet Coke. She knew the notes were a dig. Ruth saw her and Graham as that sad couple from college that never amounted to anything, and she was resentful about letting them use the house.

  “No, they were great. And, I guess my character would be pretty resentful about making all of those bad choices in her life,” Mandy said. “Spending time and money on silly movies for twenty years, and none of them ever making much return on investment…”

  Ruth snapped her leather planner closed. “I knew you’d take this the wrong way.”

  “No, no. I get it. I’m just wondering if maybe we should make a few changes. Maybe my character should be a snobby, middle-aged yuppie instead. Who drinks kale smoothies and turns her nose up at Pringles. Maybe that’s why she resents her life. Maybe that’s why she color coordinates every minute of her calendar so she has no time to notice that she’s a lonely sellout to corporate America who barely sees her husband or her kids, and treats old friends like major inconveniences.”

  Ruth stood up. “I’ve gotta go to the gym.”

  Mandy watched her friend rush across the room in her workout outfit, a blur of neon perfection. Mandy instantly kicked herself for saying what she’d just said. Ruth was one of her oldest friends. And Ruth probably hadn’t meant anything by her notes.

  She stood up. “Look, Ruth, I’m sorry. I think I might be going through menopause or a midlife crisis or something. I’ve been under a terrible amount of stress lately. Empty nest syndrome. Ask Graham. Look, it’s just, I know we’re different now. But…”

  Ruth tossed her planner in her gym bag and zipped it up. “When Barry told me you and Graham needed a favor, I told him what you really needed was a job. An actual job with a steady income, benefits, and a pension. Do you even know what a pension is?”

  Mandy tried not to look offended. She pulled her tight pink t-shirt down because it was riding up again. She dug her Converse into the plush carpet.

  Ruth went on. “Apparently, Graham told him that you guys are really in the hole here. You’re in a ton of debt.” She slung the gym bag over her shoulder. “What are you going to do if this movie tanks like the rest of them? You have no favors left to call in and you’re almost fifty.”

  “Fifty?” Mandy shouted. “In six years.”

  “Six years goes by fast.” Ruth looked at the ceiling. She set the bag down again. “Oh, how I wanted to say no. But Barry reminded me we made a pact. You and Graham were calling in your one favor. So, here we are.”

  The one favor… Graham had called in the one favor.

  Mandy felt like she’d been punched in the face. She hadn’t heard those words in twenty-something years. Her mind raced with the possibilities. She now knew Graham had likely called in their one favor from Ned too. It was the only reason the big-name director was here. The only reason they were renting right on the lake in a fancy house, eating their friends’ Pringles, having money for catering.

  That must mean they really were broke.

  Sure, she knew they were in debt. They opened up credit card after credit card, one to pay off the other, but then they’d make a movie or license out some rights and they’d make the money up, or so she thought.

  She wanted to call the bank right now. She never checked on their finances. She just trusted her husband.

  But she knew she didn’t need to pick up the phone. Things must have been bad for Graham to call in their one, can’t-say-no favor, something she never thought she and Graham would ever actually use.

  “I had no idea,” Mandy said to Ruth.

  Ruth scrunched her face up. “Sure. I couldn’t help but notice your original notes seemed a little bit… telling.”

  “What?”

  Mandy thought through the notes they had asked Ruth to look over for them.

  I know what you’re hiding

  You’re supposed to protect the kids

  You must pay for your secrets

  The doorbell rang in a mechanical chime that sounded like Big Ben, and Mandy almost didn’t recognize it as a doorbell. She hadn’t heard it in the three weeks they’d been there. The crew just ran in and out of the Lockes’ house, too busy for formalities. All part of the one favor, apparently.

  Ruth hustled off to answer the door. The faint smell of perfume still lingered after she left.

  I paused the memory. “Okay, tell me about this onetime favor,” I said to my ghost client. I knew we were both getting tired. The memory wouldn’t last much longer.

  “It was awful, actually. Something that happened our first year at Landover University. Ruth got a great babysitting gig on the lake for a couple of days for Barry’s boss. Really easy, just watching a baby. She was a natural at it, and we all went to hang out with her because the house was amazing, even bigger than Ruth’s house right now.

  “I remember Graham showed up with a movie camera he’d checked out from the university, and Ned brought a girl no one knew. Gorgeous blonde. The kind that steals the show. Dark eyeliner, tight sweater, hair piled high on her head. I remember Ruth and I just kept wondering why
on earth she was going out with Ned.”

  I thought about the squatty man with the wild dark hair and bushy mustache.

  Mandy continued. “Ned talks a good game, always has. People love him. Or they’re afraid of him, and there’s not much difference. Anyway, we started making a quick horror movie using stuff we found around Barry’s boss’s house. We were all into it, except Ned’s girlfriend, who really only wanted to raid the liquor cabinet and snoop around. The girl could have been the star of the show, and she really only wanted to party. Ned did a lot of partying too.”

  “No wonder Ruth seemed a little freaked out about people staying here,” I said. “She knew how there’d been a lot of partying in the past.”

  “Probably, but it gets worse,” Mandy replied. “The horror movie was going well. We used whatever we could find. The family’s knives. There was even a scene with a blender. But then Barry and Ned tried to use this technique where you light someone on fire like a stuntman. Ned swore he knew how to do it, but the house quickly went up in flames. Everyone ran out… but Ruth forgot the baby.”

  I heard my physical body gasp outside of the channeling.

  Mandy went on. “I was just about to run out of the house too when I heard the baby crying, so I ran upstairs and grabbed him. He was fine. The house burned down. But, Ned’s friend was still in the house. He’d forgotten she had passed out in one of the bedrooms.” Mandy paused. “She didn’t make it.”

  Pretty young girls must die, I said in my mind, forgetting that Mandy could read my thoughts.

  “Yes,” Mandy said. “Maybe that’s why Ruth wrote that note because she was mad we had called in our one favor. I told her once that we would never do that.”

  “So what happened next? Did you get in trouble for the fire?”

  “No. Ned and Barry decided it would look better if none of the boys had been there, so they all took off before the fire department arrived. The house belonged to Barry’s boss, and this was the 60s. It would’ve looked awful for Ruth to have boys over while babysitting, especially with people drinking, and doing God knows what else.”