Cold Cases and Haunted Places

by Trixie Silvertale

  Anna wasn’t sure she was.

  Thump.

  Still…

  The refractive illumination from hundreds of crystals in the entryway chandelier lent brightness to the attached living room but didn’t do much to illuminate the shadowed area behind the stairs. Mitchel had started a fire in the stone fireplace. It crackled cheerfully, its smoky warmth pulling some of the mildew stench from the air. Anna realized she should just stand right there and wait for Pratt to come back inside, so she had backup when she went exploring.

  Behind the stairs, a shadow slightly darker than the rest flashed through the space, momentarily obscuring the silvery rectangle of glass on the outside wall.

  The soft creaking of wood against wood sped her pulse.

  It could be the killer! Anna thought. He might be getting away.

  That realization spurred her into motion.

  And, before she even knew what she was doing, she was moving toward the shadows.

  4

  Anna called out to Joss as she ran, her gaze locked on the moonlit rectangle of the window ahead. Nothing obscured the glass and, though it was filthy, soft moonlight filtered through to paint the dusty runner in silver light.

  The window was in a door and there wasn’t much else back there, though Anna couldn’t see much in the dim lighting. She tested the knob and found the door locked.

  Anna reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone, using its light to check out the nook. The back wall held a built-in storage bench with hooks along the high top and several small cubbies along the floor. An old pair of muddy galoshes left mud-prints in one of the cubbies, and a tattered knit scarf still hung from the center hook.

  She slid the light to a spot beyond the bench and saw the faint gleam of metal. Anna moved closer, forgetting everything in the excitement of the hunt.

  The light of her cell phone illuminated an ancient round doorknob, set low in a door that had been crafted from rough wood, with heavy boards crisscrossed over its front. The door held an aged patina, giving off the sour stench of really old wood.

  Thump.

  Anna jumped, realizing the sound had come from inside the room.

  Thump!

  She quickly texted Pratt, telling him where she was. And then she took a deep breath and turned the knob.

  The door opened stiffly, the hinges giving off a soft squeak that had her heart pounding in her chest. Anna shoved the door into the room and stood to the side, waiting. A burst of cold air wafted out, filled with the choking stench of rotting things and dust. When nothing flew out at her, she peered around the doorframe.

  It was starkly, unnaturally quiet.

  The room was pitch dark.

  The icy air was like a hand reaching from the ether. Something ghostly was either in the room or recently had been.

  A sharp squeak sounded down by her feet and she yelped, leaping into the air as a tiny gray body flew out of the darkness and skittered down the hall, squeaking with indignation.

  Anna released the breath she’d been holding and laughed softly.

  She stepped in front of the door and realized she’d dropped her phone. She crouched down and felt around on the floor, grimacing at the grimy feel of the old floorboards.

  Footsteps pounded toward her from the room and, before Anna could react, a big body barreled into her. There was a blood-curdling scream as the man who’d slammed into her toppled over and smacked hard against the back of the stairwell, collapsing on top of Anna.

  A second body flew past, blonde hair flying around a shrieking form, and disappeared toward the front of the house on silent feet.

  The front door slammed as Anna tried to pry the heavy body off her, and a woman’s high-pitched voice peppered the silence in shrill shrieks.

  Finally finding her phone, Anna hit the button and light flooded the niche.

  A pair of scarred cowboy boots appeared in front of her as she struggled to get out from under the man’s dead weight.

  She scanned a look up, and up, and up, frowning at the ghost leaning against the wall with an unhappy look on his handsome face.

  “I know, I know,” she said. “You told me to stay put. Are you gonna help me or not?”

  Joss continued to scowl at her. “Darlin’, I’m presently disinclined. ‘Pears you need ta learn a lesson.”

  Anna expelled a breath. “Stop acting all snooty and get this man off me. He’s crushing me.”

  Her obvious discomfort was enough to overcome Joss’s pique, and he waved an angry hand, flinging the body against the nearby wall without touching it.

  He reached down and offered Anna his hand. Anna ignored it. She could be annoyed too.

  “Anna?” Pratt’s heavy footsteps hurried down the hall in her direction. He rounded the stairwell wall and stopped, looking down at the unconscious man on the floor. “Did he attack you?” Pratt crouched beside the man and flipped him over, shining the light of a small flashlight over his face and down his body, no doubt looking for wounds.

  “He kind of fell over me and crashed into the wall with his head,” she admitted, giving Pratt an “Oops,” look.

  Pratt shook his head. “Bill’s here. He has the girl.”

  Anna looked down at the young face illuminated by the flashlight. “That’s just a kid.”

  “Probably sixteen or seventeen.” Pratt punched numbers on his phone and, a beat later, spoke into it, giving the 9-1-1 operator the address and requesting an ambulance.

  When he was off the phone, Anna asked, “Let me guess, they were going to spend the night in a haunted house?”

  Pratt shined the flashlight over a rumpled pile of blankets and pillows on the dusty floor inside the room. He slid it along the walls, illuminating a boarded up window with one board hanging half off and an open closet door across the room. A single item of clothing hung in the closet. From where Anna stood, it appeared to be a party dress. A pretty thing with lace on the skirt and spaghetti straps.

  “Come on,” Pratt said. “Bill’s interviewing the girl.”

  “What about the curly wolf there,” Joss asked.

  Pratt jumped and turned a glare on Joss. Apparently, he hadn’t seen Joss skulking against the wall.

  The ghost chuckled meanly. “Don’t be so skeery, Puke. Ain’t ya never seen a ghost before?”

  “Har,” Pratt said, glowering at him. “You shouldn’t sneak up on me like that. I might shoot you.”

  Joss’s eyes sparked with humor. “If’n ya hadn’t noticed, I’m already dead.”

  “Not dead enough,” Pratt muttered.

  Anna smacked his arm, fighting a grin.

  “Why were you and the boy in this house?” Bill Dresden asked the pretty blonde teen. She’d settled down quite a bit since Anna had stumbled across them in that room and didn’t seem all that intimidated by the soft-spoken cop.

  “I’d think that was pretty obvious,” she told him in a petulant voice. “Mack can’t resist a good dare.” She folded skinny arms over her not-skinny chest and extended her bottom lip.

  Bill managed to remain calm, his pleasant, though slightly pugnacious features neutral. Though Anna did see a flash of irritation run through his wide hazel eyes. “Someone dared you to spend the night here?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Duh.”

  Joss popped up next to Anna, his dark blue eyes flashing. “That little g’hal needs a good switchin’. She’s in a right pucker and don’t seem able ta find her way out of it.”

  Anna shivered at the chill accompanying Joss’s appearance. “She’s scared,” she told the ghost. “Some people get mouthy when they’re scared.”

  “Would you rather continue this conversation down at the police station?” Bill asked her a little less gently. “You did break and enter this house. I’m sure the owner will be just as irritated as you seem to be. But with much greater cause.”

  Unfortunately not, Anna thought. Since he was dead. She frowned.

  The girl sighed expansively, inserting a much-abu
sed fingernail between her teeth. “Mack’s cousin dared him to spend the night here. Everybody knows there’s an angry ghost in this house. I tried to talk him out of it.”

  The girl’s eyes widened hopefully at this bit of information─as if her feeble resistance might get her out of trouble.

  “I’ll need the cousin’s full name,” Bill told her.

  She was eager to give him that piece of information, no doubt hoping the fierce gaze of the law would refocus in the cousin’s direction. “George Thackery. He’s a second or third cousin or something.” She shrugged as if the information wasn’t important. “But he’s lots older than Mack, so Mack’s always trying to impress him.” A worried light filled her eyes. “Is he okay? Mack?”

  Bill acted like he hadn’t heard the question. “Tell me what happened tonight.”

  Some of the girl’s cockiness abandoned her. “We thought the house would be empty. It’s been empty for like, forever. But we’d only been here for a few minutes before he…” Her gaze slid reluctantly toward the bloody spot on the floor.

  Thankfully, the body was gone. Bill had called an ambulance even before he’d arrived at the house and they’d gotten there fast.

  “Was anybody else here tonight?”

  “Um. Let’s see.” Amazingly, she seemed to be counting something off on her fingers.

  Anna and Pratt exchanged a look, and Pratt smiled.

  Joss shoved his hat back on his head, scratching his thick blond hair.

  “Nobody except Jessie and Rob. They got here just after us…”

  Bill held up a hand. “Hold on. Who are Jessie and Rob?”

  The girl harrumphed her disgust. “Jeez! Try to keep up.”

  Bill gave her the “we can finish this at the station” look again, and she managed to reign in her disgust. Barely. “They’re our friends. They came to rattle stuff and try to scare us. But we didn’t fall for it.” She shrugged, the ever-abused fingernail returning to her mouth. “Mostly.”

  “How long were they here?”

  “I think they left right after that guy came.” She jerked her head toward the bloody spot again.

  “You think?”

  “We were hiding in that room. You didn’t think we were just gonna stand out here and wave at the guy when he came into the house, did you?”

  Anna was pretty sure Bill wasn’t thinking any such thing. But he very possibly was thinking the girl could benefit from some time in the Crocker jail.

  Anna was thinking the very same thing.

  “Then how do you know they left?” he asked very reasonably.

  “Because I’m sure they wouldn’t hang around when the screaming started.”

  “Screaming?”

  “This g’hal’s got more humbugs than the worst kind of hoister,” Joss announced.

  The girl frowned, jerking her gaze to their small group, almost as if she’d heard him.

  Interesting, Anna thought. Little Miss Debbie had some spectral sensitivity.

  “Did you say something?” she asked Pratt.

  To Anna’s surprise, Pratt nodded. “Yes. I asked who was screaming.”

  Bill sent Pratt a grateful look. Pulling information out of the flighty teen was proving to be a two-man job.

  “I don’t know. But it sounded like a man.”

  Alrighty then.

  “Do you have any idea why someone would be screaming?” Bill asked with exaggerated patience.

  She shrugged again. “Maybe that old guy saw a mouse or something.”

  Bill went very still. His expression turned deceptively neutral.

  Pratt sighed.

  Finally, Bill said, “Old guy?”

  “Yeah, the one who showed up right after the dead guy.”

  “Can you describe him?” Judging from the tone of Bill’s voice, Anna was pretty sure his teeth were clamped together.

  The girl started to shrug again, stopping mid-motion when Bill’s eyes took on a murderous glint.

  “Um…he looked like lots of other old guys, I guess. Brown hair that had a lot of gray. I couldn’t see the color of his eyes because he was too far away. I was peeking around the stairs until they started yelling at each other.”

  “What were they yelling about?” Anna asked. She figured she might as well join the attempt to drag information from the girl.

  Debbie glared her way. “One of them said it was too dangerous to be here. The other one said it had to be done. Then somebody, I think it might have been the old guy, told the other guy he was gonna die…”

  Bill held up a hand. “Wait. He threatened the other man?”

  She shrugged. “Sounded like that to me.”

  Bill sighed. “Anything else?”

  She tapped the finger with the abused nail against her chin, apparently to show that she was being thoughtful. “No. Nothing. There was the screaming…and then we heard a big thump.”

  Anna was pretty sure some of Bill’s teeth were being ground down to nubs. “Okay, thank…”

  “Except for that white collar thing the older guy was wearing.”

  “White collar?” Pratt asked, stepping closer.

  She nodded. “Yeah, you know the kind those church guys wear?”

  5

  Pastor Frederick wasn’t at the church when they arrived. The front doors were locked. Pratt and Anna headed toward the little house at the rear of the church. Light glowed behind one of the windows, and they could hear the low rumble of the television inside.

  Pratt knocked.

  The Pastor opened the door a moment later, his smile tight. If Pastor Frederick had been at the Mistren home, he’d clearly changed when he got home. He was dressed for comfort in a stained pair of khaki pants with tattered cuffs and an oversized Indiana University tee shirt. “Pratt. Anna. Have you talked to Mitchel?”

  Something in the way Frederick asked the question made Pratt wonder if the man knew Mistren was dead. “Can we come in?”

  Deep worry lines appeared between the older man’s eyes and he nodded, stepping back. He grabbed a remote from a small table beside a well-used recliner and turned off what looked like one of those Crime Scene Investigation shows.

  Replacing the remote, he smiled. “Can I get you something to drink?”

  Pratt shook his head no.

  “Yes, thank you,” Anna interrupted. “Maybe some tea?”

  The pastor looked relieved to have something to do. Pratt realized that Anna had made the request to put the man at ease. They’d get more out of him if he were relaxed. Smart move.

  He slid his fingers through hers and squeezed them as they followed Frederick to a small kitchen with white paint on the walls and oversized, gray tile on the floor. Frederick motioned toward a table in front of a bowed window. “Please, sit.” He filled a teapot and put it on the stove. “So, did you see Mitchel?” he asked without turning around.

  Anna winced slightly. “I’m sorry, Pastor. When we got to the house, he was…”

  Frederick spun around, his eyes tight. “That ghost killed him, didn’t it?”

  “Why do you say that?” Pratt asked, watching the other man carefully.

  “I warned him.” Pastor Frederick wrung his hands, leaning against the counter. “I tried to talk him out of being there.”

  “Pastor, we have a witness who puts you at the Mistren home tonight. Before Mitchel was killed.”

  If the reverend recognized the insinuation in Pratt’s words, he gave no indication of it. He nodded. “I was. I tried to convince him to stay out of the house until you had a chance to…” He scrubbed a shaking hand over his face. “I failed him. I let that creature kill him.” He shook his head, looking decades older than he had the last time they’d spoken to him. “Mitchel came to me for help. And I was too late. I should have helped him five years ago, instead of encouraging him to run away from the problem.”

  “Pastor,” Anna said gently. “Tell us about this ghost.”

  He shook his head. “I wish I could, Anna. Mitchel was
too upset to give me many details when he first came to me. All he said was that it was angry and wanted him to find its killer.”

  Pratt’s phone rang. He looked at the ID and answered. “Bill?”

  “Mack Quill is awake. I thought you might want to be here when I spoke to him.”

  “The trespassing teen?”

  “The very one.”

  “We’ll be there in ten minutes.” Pratt disconnected and fixed the reverend with a hard stare. “I’m afraid we’ll have to take a raincheck on that tea.”

  Frederick nodded. “I understand.”

  “I just have one more question for you, Pastor Frederick,” Pratt said.

  The man seemed to deflate. He answered Pratt’s question before it was asked. “Did I kill young Mitchel tonight?” He stared at his stockinged feet for long enough that Pratt started to wonder if he was going to confess.

  But then the reverend shook his head. “I almost wish I had. Then, at least this would be over. But this isn’t over, son. It’s definitely not over. Whatever lives in that house will kill again. If we don’t figure out what’s got it so riled up and stop it.”

  “I told you I didn’t see anybody.” The boy was openly belligerent. “I was in that room the whole time.”

  “Debbie said you were standing by the stairs, peeking at the two men at the front of the house,” Bill said.

  Mack started to shake his head and stopped, wincing. Probably from the headache Anna could see shadowing his gaze. “I wasn’t spying on those men. Debbie was. I couldn’t get her to come into the room until the men started yelling at each other.”

  Anna thought of the shadow she’d seen pass through the back hall. “Neither you nor Debbie came out of that room after we arrived?”

  “Not a chance,” Mack said. “We didn’t know that guy was dead. We figured we’d get caught if we came out.”

  Ice crawled up Anna’s spine. If that hadn’t been them she’d seen sliding through the shadows, then who…or what…had it been?

  “Did you hear what they were yelling about?” Bill asked.

  “No. I was too worried about the ghost.”