A Ghostly Grave (15 page)

“Beg him not to use Lady!” Chicken was desperate. “Tell him I won't hold up my end of the deal.”

“If you use Lady, you won't be holding up your end of the deal,” I blurted out.

“He's dead, thanks to me.” He laughed.

“What?” Marla Maria darted toward him with her claws in the air going straight for his eyes. The bartender aimed at her over my shoulder and clicked the trigger, sending Marla Maria to the ground. Another shot rang out and he fell forward into me, sending me to the ground and landing on top of me.

“Get up! Get up!” I screamed, trying to push him off me. I looked at my hand and there was blood all over it. The chickens were going crazy with fear.

Sugar bent down next to me. I noticed in the dirt that his footprint was the same footprint I had found in Granny's kitchen, not to mention the feathers on the cock were exactly the same as the feather I had found there too.

“Don't you move!” Jack Henry shouted. I couldn't see him because the big burly guy was on top of me, but I could hear him and his heavy footsteps along with other footsteps.

“Stand up and slowly back away,” Jack Henry ordered. Sugar did what Jack Henry told him to do.

 

Chapter 22

G
o over it again.” Chicken asked me to ask Jack Henry one more time how Sugar Wayne had killed him.

The lights in the Sleepy Hollow Police Station interrogation room flickered as we sat there waiting for Marla Maria to hobble in to hear how Sugar Wayne was involved. The bartender's shot had grazed her in the knee. “Be careful. I have to strut my stuff on the pageant runway when I get my school built, so save my knee!” She had screamed the entire time she was being put into the ambulance. Chicken had me grab Lady to get her as far away from the crime scene as possible, only Jack Henry had other plans for me.

He was not happy to have found me there after he shot the bartender and pulled me from underneath him. He then hauled me off to the station to interrogate me to find out what I knew.

After telling him all the clues I had found, he told me how they all fit together.

“Tell him to listen carefully.” He referred to Chicken Teater before he opened the door and helped Marla Maria to a chair next to me. “I knew something was fishy when Emma Lee told me Chicken had a secret video camera with which he was taping his house to make sure no one was tampering with Lady Cluckington.” Jack Henry swallowed hard. He knew what was about to come.

“You mean to tell me . . .” Marla Maria was starting to get angry at Chicken all over again.

“Let me finish.” Jack Henry put his hands out to shush her. “I sent my officers back to the double-­wide. I knew you weren't home because Emma Lee told me you were going to the Lexington fairgrounds”—­he pointed at me—­“which I told you not to do. You obviously didn't listen.” He reached over and plucked a feather from my dress.

He blew it in the air. We sat there in silence as he continued to tell how he figured out Sugar Wayne had killed Chicken.

“Emma kept telling me about some agreement.”

“Oh that!” Marla Maria's hand plunged down her shirt and pulled out a napkin. She flattened it out on the interrogation table. For a second, I thought she was using a napkin to blot her boob sweat. “Here it is.”

My mouth dropped. “An agreement on a napkin? Are you kidding me?” I glared at Chicken.

“What? We did make the agreement while we were pretty loaded at the Watering Hole.”

“Who are you talking to?” Marla Maria asked.

“She has the Funeral Trauma.” Jack Henry came to my defense. “Anyway, my guys found the secret recorder and there was a tape in there. Chicken's last tape. It clearly showed Marla Maria pouring Chicken some sweet tea and handing him a glass. That was when Sugar came to visit and made his agreement with him about taking care of Lady if something happened to him. Chicken got up . . .”

Jack Henry and Chicken were talking at the same time.

“I got up and walked over to see if Marla Maria was out of earshot,” Chicken recalled.

“When Chicken got up, you can clearly see Sugar Wayne put something in the tea pitcher and refilling Chicken's glass. He was going to kill Marla Maria too, but then . . .”

“I told him he could date and marry Marla Maria if I was dead so he could keep an eye on Lady since I knew he had always had a little thing for Marla,” Chicken said.

“That is when you see Chicken gulp down the glass of tea, and Sugar refilling it yet again. When Marla Maria comes in to pour herself some more tea, Sugar accidentally knocks over the poisoned pitcher of tea, because he was seriously considering the fact he might get to marry you.” Jack Henry pointed to Marla Maria.

“We looked into Sugar Wayne and that is when we connected how he sold the property to Chicken. When we went to check out the property, we found remains of the cockfighting going on there and put a couple of undercover guys on him. That's how we knew he was going to do something to Marla Maria and Lady, because Marla Maria wouldn't date him and the agreement was going to be completed after Lady's big competition today.” Jack Henry ran his hands through his hair. Even in the dark interrogation room, he looked hot and hunky, making me want to jump up and kiss him, but I refrained when he continued. “We also went to Sugar's real-­estate office.” Jack Henry took out a document and pushed it in front of me. “Chicken and Sugar had a signed document from a lawyer and a witness. The witness was the bartender from the Watering Hole.”

Jack Henry had shot the bartender in the back of the thigh, making him fall on me and pass out. Currently, he was undergoing surgery at the hospital to remove the bullet before they shipped him off to prison alongside Sugar Wayne.

“But it clearly states that if you”—­he nodded toward Marla Maria—­“didn't hold up your end of the deal, he got the land. Your end of the deal was the competition.”

“But Lady didn't compete because he grabbed both of us from the beauty pageant.” Marla Maria looked over at me and said, “By the way, you won't be my first student. You clearly aren't beauty-­queen material.”

“Good! I only did it for the investigation anyway,” I blurted out and then covered my mouth.

“You are a cop now?” She crossed her hands over her chest and cocked one of her penciled-­on eyebrows high.

“No, but I didn't want you to get your claws into him.” I pointed to Jack Henry.

“Ladies, can we please get through this. I'm tired and I have a table waiting at Bella Vino.” He looked at me and winked. Immediately, I straightened in my chair and zipped my lip.

“Luckily, the lawyer on the signature was at the cockfight so I'm pretty sure we can get him disbarred and you will get the property regardless.” Jack Henry delivered the news like Marla Maria had won the competition anyway.

“That's wonderful news!” Marla Maria clasped her hands together. “I can get Duckie to start right away.”

“O'Dell Burns was at the wrong place at the wrong time.” Jack Henry reminded me about O'Dell's attack and I recalled seeing Sugar Wayne that very night, right before I had gone to Granny's. “Sugar Wayne heard you arguing with him. He knew you were snooping about Chicken and how you had gone to the Watering Hole. You were in his way. Everyone was around to hear you threaten O'Dell, and he used it against you and attacked O'Dell, making you look like a suspect.”

Everything he was telling me made my head swirl. I had to take several deep breaths.

“Duckie isn't involved anyway?” I asked.

“No. He is just a good neighbor looking out for Marla Maria.” Jack Henry shut the file. “I got the lab results from Vernon Baxter. Chicken's tea was laced with arsenic. Large doses.

Chicken stood behind Jack Henry shaking his head.

“Please tell my Marla Maria I'm sorry I thought she killed me.” Chicken appeared next to Marla and tried to stroke her hair.

She must have felt him because she looked up with tears in her eyes.

“No matter what you think, I loved Chicken. I really did.” A tear dropped. I reached over, took a Kleenex from the tissue box and handed it to her. “I was tired of being the second love of his life. But I couldn't be without him.”

Lady clucked happily in the cage by the door. The cock was next to her in his cage. He was just a baby. Never fought a day in his life. Marla Maria wanted to keep him too. She must have loved Chicken because she was willing to care for them both.

My bag from the pageant was also on the floor. I had no idea how Jack Henry had gotten it but I assumed one of the undercover officers who was trailing Sugar Wayne had picked it up.

“I'm sure he loved you too.” I stroked her arm to give her some comfort.

“I'm going to take you ladies back to Marla Maria's so you can get on with your lives and Emma Lee can grab her hearse.” Jack Henry helped us out of the station to his cruiser. I got to sit up front.

None of us said anything the entire way back to the trailer park. Marla Maria was exhausted, so she grabbed both cages and got out of the cruiser.

“I'll pick you up after you change?” Jack Henry plucked another feather. He reached through Chicken, who was sitting right next to me, and tickled my nose with it.

“I'll be ready.” I looked around Chicken to see him. “I'm starving.”

I got out of the car, retrieved my bag from the trunk and waved him off.

“Well, let's go.” I exhaled, thinking I should say something profound to Chicken. I got in the hearse and started it up. “Let's go,” I said again, ready for Chicken to sit next to me with his arm draped around my shoulder.

I waited a ­couple of minutes. Nothing. I glanced over at the empty spot where I had gotten used to seeing Colonel Chicken Teater. My heart sank. He was gone. He had crossed over.

 

Chapter 23

I
nhale. Exhale.” Hettie Bell raised her hands over her head and lowered them.

Granny, Mable Claire and Beulah Paige all did what Hettie Bell told them to do.

“Look at all y'all this early in the morning.” I had stopped for a big cup of coffee from Higher Grounds and decided to go see how Granny had taken the news about O'Dell Burns.

“You should be doing this too. I'm sure your stress level is out of this world.” Hettie Bell stood up and put her hands on her hips before she went over to help Mable Claire into some position.

“I'm fine,” I assured her.

Mable Claire jingled her way around until she fell on her butt. Change scattered all over the front porch. She rushed around picking it up.

“You should probably clean out your pockets before you come to yoga.” Granny bent down and picked up some items for her. “My key!” Granny held up the small moped key she had left in Charlotte's office. Her eyelids lowered. The wrath of Granny was upon Mable Claire. “Did you steal my moped?”

Mable Claire fumbled around, twirling her fingers. “I . . . I . . .” She took a deep breath and put her shoulders back before dropping her hands to her sides. “Yes I did. You are going to kill someone on that thing.”

“Granny, calm down,” I tried to talk some sense into Granny, though I knew she didn't hear a word of it. “Maybe she did it to save you from doing harm to yourself or worse . . . others.”

“Yes.” Mable Claire took a few steps backward as Granny took a few steps toward her. “Exactly what Emma Lee said. You are my dearest friend and I want to keep it that way.”

Before Granny did any harm to poor Mable Claire, she inhaled deeply and said, “I have customers to cook breakfast for.” She turned to Hettie Bell. “This is not a yoga studio. I suggest you get that building open and start doing your classes there.”

Granny was the true Southern woman. She held her red head high and marched into the Inn. But not before turning around to get in the last word.

“Emma Lee, I need you to go retrieve my moped.” She disappeared inside the Inn.

“It's behind Artie's Deli and Meats,” Mable Claire whispered, looking a little guilty. “Behind the Dumpster. If you hurry I'm sure you can make it before the trash ser­vice gets there today.”

“Thanks,” I said before I darted down the stairs and across the square, which was filled with visitors coming for the last day of the Kentucky Cave Festival.

Artie's had a big handwritten sign in the window about free doughnuts. Who was I to give up a free doughnut? The moped could wait a few more minutes.

I stood in the cashier line, where they were handing out the delicious pastry. The magazine rep was restocking the magazine section in the front. I snickered when I saw
Cock and Feathers
but stopped when I saw the headline and picture.

Special Edition: Chicken Teater (owner of Lady Cluckington) is more famous in death than in life.

There was a split picture on the cover. One was of me onstage in the terrible dress, singing “Old McDonald,” and the other was of Marla Maria ripping out the VHS tape player. There was a small circular photo of Chicken Teater strategically placed between the two photos.

“OhmyGod.” I picked up the magazine and reread the headlines. I laughed. “I guess he made it onto the cover of
Cock and Feathers
after all.”

“Hey.” The husky voice behind me chuckled. “That's the guy that sent me to you.” A chubby, hairy finger reached over my shoulder and pointed to Chicken's picture. “He said you can help me.”

 

Read on for a sneak peek at the next

Ghostly Southern Mystery!

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GHOSTLY

DEMISE

Available Fall 2015 from Witness!

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A

GHOSTLY

UNDERTAKING

is available now!

 

C
ephus Hardy?”

Stunned. My jaw dropped when I saw Cephus Hardy walk up to me in the magazine aisle of Artie's Meat and Deli admiring the cover of
Cock and Feathers,
where my last client at Eternal Slumber Funeral Home, Chicken Teater, graced the cover with his prize Orloff Hen, Lady Cluckington.

“I declare.” A Mac truck could've hit me and I wouldn't have felt it. I grinned from ear to ear.

Cephus Hardy looked the exact same as he did five years ago. Well, from what I could remember from his social visits with my momma and daddy and the few times I had seen him around our small town of Sleepy Hollow, Kentucky.

His tight, light brown curls resembled a baseball helmet. When I was younger, it amazed me how thick and dense his hair was. He always wore polyester taupe pants with the perfectly straight crease down the front, along with a brown belt. The hem of his pants ended right above the shoelaces in his white patent leather shoes. He tucked in his short-­sleeved plaid shirt, making it so taut you could see his belly button.

“Momma and Daddy live in Florida now, but they are going to be so happy when I tell them you are back in town. Everyone has been so worried about you.” I smiled and took in his sharp pointy nose and rosy red cheeks. I didn't take my eyes off him as I put the copy of
Cock and Feathers
back in the rack. I leaned on my cart full of groceries and noticed he hadn't even aged a bit. No wrinkles. Nothing. “Where the hell have you been?”

He shrugged. He rubbed the back of his neck.

“Who cares?” I really couldn't believe it. Mary Anna was going to be so happy since he had just up and left five years ago, telling no one—­nor had he contacted anyone since. “You won't believe what Granny is doing.”

I pointed over his shoulder at the election poster taped up on the front of Artie's Meat and Deli's storefront window.

“Granny is running against O'Dell Burns for mayor.” I cackled, looking in the distance at the poster of Zula Fae Raines Payne all laid back in the rocking chair on the front porch of the Sleepy Hollow Inn with a glass of her famous iced tea in her hand.

It took us ten times to get a picture she said was good enough and agreed to use it on all her promotional items for the campaign. Since she was all of five foot four, her feet dangled and she didn't want people to vote on her size, therefore, the photo was from the lap up. I told Granny that I didn't know whom she thought she was fooling. Everyone who was eligible to vote knew her and how tall she was. She insisted. I didn't argue anymore. No one, and I mean no one, wins an argument against Zula Fae Raines Payne. Including me.

“She looks good.” Cephus raised his brows, lips turned down.

“She sure does.” I noted.

For a seventy-­seven-­year-­old and twice widow, Granny acted like she was in her fifties. I wasn't sure if her red hair was still hers or if Mary Anna kept it up on the down-­low, but Granny would never be seen going to Girl's Best Friend unless there was some sort of gossip that needed to be heard. Otherwise, she wanted everyone to see her as the good Southern belle she was.

“Against O'Dell Burns?” Cephus asked. Slowly he nodded in approval.

It was no secret that Granny and O'Dell had butted heads a time or two. The outcome of the election was going to be interesting to say the least.

“Yep. She retired three years ago, leaving me and Charlotte Rae in charge of Eternal Slumber.”

It was true. I was the undertaker of Eternal Slumber Funeral Home. It might make some folks skin crawl to think about being around dead people all the time, but it was job security at its finest. O'Dell Burns owned Burns Funeral, the other funeral home in Sleepy Hollow, which made him and Granny enemies from the get-go.

O'Dell didn't bother me though. Granny didn't see it that way. We needed a new mayor and O'Dell stepped up to the plate at the council meeting, but Granny wouldn't hear of it. So the competition didn't stop with dead people; now Granny wants all the living people too. As mayor.

“Long story short,” I rambled on and on, “Granny married Earl Way Payne. He died and left Granny the Sleepy Hollow Inn. I don't know what she is thinking running for mayor because she's so busy taking care of all of the tourists at the Inn. Which reminds me.” I planted my hands on my hips. “You never answered my question. Have you seen Mary Anna yet?”

“Not yet.” His lips curved in a smile.” I came to see you first. Cephus Hardy sent me.”

“She's done real good for herself. She opened Girl's Best Friend Spa and has all the business since she's the only one in town. And—­” I wiggled my brows, rambling on without letting him get a word in. “She is working for me at Eternal Slumber.”

A shiver crawled up my spine and I did a little shimmy shake thinking about her fixing the corpses' hair and makeup. Somebody had to do it and Mary Anna didn't seem to mind a bit.

I ran my hand down my brown hair that Mary Anna had recently dyed since my little stint as a blond. I couldn't do my own hair, much less someone else's. Same for the makeup department.

I never spent much time in front of the mirror. I worked with the dead and they weren't judging me.

“Emma Lee?” Doc Clyde stood at the end of the magazine aisle with a small shopping basket in the crook of his arm. His lips set in a tight line. “Are you feeling all right?”

“Better than ever,” my voice escalated when I pointed to Cephus. “Especially now that Cephus is back in town.”

“Have you been taking your meds for the Funeral Trauma?” He ran his free hand in his thin hair, placing the few remaining strands to the side. His chin was pointy and jutted out even more as he shuffled his thick-­soled doctor shoes down the old tiled floor. “You know it's only been nine months since your accident. And it could take years for the symptoms to go away.”

“Funeral Trauma,” I muttered and rolled my eyes.

Cephus just grinned.

The Funeral Trauma
.

A few months back I had a perilous incident with a plastic Santa Claus right here at Artie's Meat and Deli. I had walked down from the funeral home to grab some lunch. Artie thought it was a good idea to put a life-­sized plastic Santa on the roof. It was a good idea until the snow started melting and the damn thing slid right off the roof just as I was walking by, knocking me square out. Flat.

I woke up in the hospital seeing ghosts of the corpses I had buried six feet deep. I thought I had gone to the great beyond. But I could see my family and all the living.

I told Doc Clyde I was having some sort of hallucinations and seeing dead people. He said I had been in the funeral business a little too long and seeing corpses all of my life had been traumatizing. Granny had been in the business for over forty years. I had only been in the business for three. Something didn't add up.

Turned out, a psychic confirmed I am what was called a Betweener.

I could see ghosts of the dead who were stuck between the here and after. Of course no one but me and Jack Henry, my boyfriend and Sleepy Hollow sheriff, knew. And he was still a little apprehensive about the whole thing.

“I'm fine,” I assured Doc Clyde and looked at Cephus. “Wait.” I stopped and tried to swallow what felt like a mound of sand in my mouth. My mind hit rewind and took me back to the beginning of my conversation with Cephus. “Did you say Chicken sent you?”