Ghost Gone Wild (A Bailey Ruth Ghost Novel) (9 page)

A huff of impatience. “Any fool studies the course before riding.”

I did not take that as a compliment. Who was she to be so high and mighty? “Nick told me about you.” My whisper was high and hot. “You sound like a mess.”

“We can have this discussion another time.” Possibly, the implication was clear, when the next ice age arrived. “Right now you’re here, and you’re supposed to be keeping Nick safe. You have to get to City Hall before he does.”

I folded my arms. “You go to City Hall. You can pop right there. I can’t.”

“Of course you can.” Dee was impatient. “Go poof.”

“Easy for you to say. I’ve been stuck here since last night. I appeared to reassure Nick, and now I can’t disappear.”

“Oh. That’s a problem.” She sounded personally vexed.

We were in heartfelt agreement, though she might have addressed my situation with a little more sympathy.

Those cool, strong fingers seized my elbow. “Then I’ll have to make do with what’s available.” Disdain was evident in her brusque tone. “No wonder Wiggins considers you a third-tier choice.”

I was wounded to the core. Dear Wiggins would never denigrate an emissary. I was furious. “He didn’t say so.”

“Possibly not in so many words.” The admission was careless. “But you aren’t on his auto dial.”

I felt triumphant. “He sends telegrams.”

“You haven’t received one recently.” The observation was smug.

“You are odious.”

“
You
are wasting time. You have to get to City Hall before Nick does.” The fingers yanked, and I found myself propelled down the aisle and across the library lobby by a hard push in the center of my back.

• • •

Aunt Dee’s left arm clutched my waist.

The scooter seat scarcely afforded room for two. I felt crowded by the handlebars.

“Faster.” The command was accompanied by a sharp pinch to my right thigh.

The scooter swerved to the right. I corrected and we veered left.

Behind us a car honked.

I gave a bit too much gas, and the scooter jumped like a gigged catfish.

A siren squalled.

“Look what you’ve done.” I flung the words over my shoulder as I eased to a stop.

The retort was sharp. “Quick. Gas it. He’s out of the car and you can make it around the corner.”

“Are you out of your—” I broke off and looked up into the startled face of one of Adelaide’s handsomest police officers, Johnny Cain—curly dark hair, mesmerizing blue eyes, chiseled features.

“I beg your pardon, miss?” He stared at me with an uneasy, not to say haunted, expression. This was not our first encounter. On an earlier assignment to Adelaide, he had seen me in the passenger seat of a dead woman’s car, though he was unaware of her demise at the time. Later, he’d had a partial glimpse of me as I fled the counter at Lulu’s. It would be fair to say neither episode had brought him joy.

I smiled brightly, though I was trying to jut out my chin in hopes of altering my appearance.

“You look like you have lockjaw.” The hiss behind me was snakelike.

I whipped my head around, started to speak. My mouth opened, closed. Calmly, I faced Johnny again. “I thought I heard someone behind me. It sounded like a goose.”

The pinch was sharp. I managed not to exclaim.

“Lockjaw?” he asked.

“Logjam. That’s the predicament I find myself in. Just one of those logjams that we find ourselves in. But that’s neither here nor there, Officer. What can I do for you?” It was an effort to keep my chin out as I talked, and it added an odd cadence to my words.

He stared at me, possibly wondering if I was being impudent or, worse, was slightly unhinged. “You were driving erratically. May I see your license?”

“License.” I nodded in agreement. “I would be happy to display my license.” I spread a hand expressively. “If only,” I sighed, “I had my license. I know you will understand. Actually, I was on my way to the police station—”

Dee gripped my arm tight as a vise.

“—at City Hall”—the pressure relaxed—“to report that my purse had been stolen.” Fortunately, I’d not brought the new purse with me. It reposed in my room at the B and B. I’d tucked the remainder of the money from Nick into a pocket of my slacks. “I know”—I realized I was talking normally and poked my chin out again—“I shouldn’t be driving, but what else could I do? Certainly the loss of a purse isn’t a crime that requires the dispatch of officers. I felt I was doing my civic duty—saving time for Adelaide’s finest—by making my report in person.” My jaws ached.

“You’re on your way to the department?”

“As fast as I can go.”

His broad mouth twitched. “Maybe you might go a little slower.” He pulled a small notebook from his pocket. “Name?”

“Hilda Whitby. I live in Dallas, 1427 Carleton Way. I’m visiting Adelaide to make impressions of gravestones of long-deceased relatives. At the cemetery, I dropped into that wonderful old mausoleum with the stone dog and cat.” Johnny well knew the Pritchard mausoleum, because he recently had wed a family connection. “I left my purse dangling from a handlebar and, when I returned, my purse was gone. So”—my gaze was pleading—“I’ll report the theft now if I may, and I promise to drive more carefully.” I poked an elbow backward and took satisfaction in a muffled
ouch
.

As I pulled away from the curb, I noted in the rearview mirror that the patrol car kept pace behind us until we turned into the lot behind City Hall.

• • •

At City Hall, we took the elevator to the third floor, bypassing the police department. As the elevator door clanged behind us, Nick slammed out of an office midway down the hall.

I hurried toward him. “Nick!”

He was moving fast, fists balled, feet stomping, a furious scowl turning his bony face into a good imitation of an enraged hawk.

“Nick!” The cry from Aunt Dee brought him to a startled stop.

His eyes widened. They darted back and forth across the hall. He looked behind him, then he swung toward me. “Knock it off. You had to know Aunt Dee to sound that much like her. Lady, I don’t know what kind of nut you are, but I want you out of my life. I got enough problems without some death-obsessed redhead on my case. Take the cash and go. If you show up at the B and B, I’ll call the cops, get you arrested for fraud.”

Before I could respond, he plunged around me and broke into a run.

Now I was cast out on my own without even the prospect of a place to stay. Obviously, he discounted my claim to be an emissary, but he knew I could not possibly bear scrutiny by the police. I had no papers. I stamped my foot, my patience at an end. “You’re a rat,” I shouted after him. “It will serve you right if your ship goes down and you with it.”

“Did he scare you, too?” A reed-thin blonde peered out anxiously from Cole’s office. “I think he’s dangerous. I’m going to call the police if he comes back.”

“He isn’t dangerous. Or a rat.” The pronouncement was vigorous, though there might have been an uneven breathiness to Dee’s deep voice.

The young woman clutched at the doorjamb. She was trembling. “Mama told me I shouldn’t work at City Hall. She said people go bonkers all the time. First you say he’s a rat, then you speak in a different voice and say he isn’t. I don’t know if he’s a rat, but he’s a wild man.” Her voice was shrill. “I’ve never seen anybody madder.” Her china-blue eyes stared fearfully down the now empty hall. “He came crashing in here, yelling for Mr. Clanton. I told him Mr. Clanton wasn’t here but he banged past me and slammed into Mr. Clanton’s office and then he came out and rushed at me and I got behind my desk. He was so mad his voice was shaking and he wanted to know where Mr. Clanton was. I said I didn’t know and he pounded on the edge of my desk and told me to tell him that Nick Magruder was looking for him and they used to hang people like him and when he got his hands on him—”

I had no difficulty sorting out the pronouns.

“—he was going to wish he was dead.”

• • •

I tried to slide back an inch on the scooter seat. “You’re crowding me.”

“If you had smaller hips, I’d have more room.”

“My hips are perfect.” I spoke with confidence. At twenty-seven, I was slender but curvaceous. Bobby Mac always whistled when I walked past.

“Your hips are irrelevant.”

Did I hear a distant whistle?

Only in my heart.

Dee poked me in the back. “Hurry. We have to find Nick.”

I clamped my hands on the handlebars. “Why?”

A hand gripped my right shoulder. “He’s still getting himself in trouble. It will be all over town that he’s threatened Cole Clanton.”

“I don’t care if he challenges Cole to a duel. Nick’s popularity in Adelaide is of no concern to me. Unlike me, you are quite free to pop”—my voice was bitter—“after him. As far as I’m concerned, my job is done. I saved his life last night. I’ve warned the suspects that the police will be informed if anything happens to him. And now, I want to go home.”

Even as I spoke, I knew she was no longer there.

No pressure on my shoulder. I had plenty of room on the seat.

“Wiggins?” Possibly he’d become aware of my marooned state.

No answer.

He always sent a telegram to summon me. But I couldn’t send him a telegram. I tried ESP.

It’s a long way from earth to Heaven.

I’d wanted to be free of Dee. She was overbearing, exasperating, imperious. She’d pushed me here, yanked me there, and now she’d abandoned me.

Where had she gone?

No doubt she was popping around Adelaide, a spirit on the loose, trying to help her adored nephew.

She could at least have had lunch with me. I was hugely hungry. Dee likely wasn’t thinking about food, since she hadn’t appeared. It was being in the world that created appetite.

I brightened. As long as I was
in
the world . . .

• • •

Lulu’s was just as I remembered, the plate-glass window, the counter on one side, four booths on the other, and every seat taken at the lunch hour. I waited a few minutes and slid onto a vacated stool at the counter. I felt better when I’d ordered a hamburger with a thick slice of cheddar, onions, tomatoes, dill pickles, mayo, fries, and iced tea. In Adelaide, everyone drinks iced tea year-round.

I was midway through my burger when I glanced in the mirror. I wasn’t surprised to spot Johnny Cain and several other patrolmen in a booth. Lulu’s was on Main Street and convenient to City Hall. I noted that he carefully did not look my way. Obviously, he was cutting me slack about my lack of a driver’s license and would be sure not to see the yellow scooter parked outside. I scanned the other booths behind me. My feeling of comfort vanished.

Cole Clanton’s secretary hunched in the third booth. Face pale, eyes huge, hands gesturing, her mouth moved in rapid speech. Three women listened, their food ignored.

I didn’t have to overhear to understand. She was regaling her lunch companions with a blow-by-blow account of Nick Magruder’s fiery appearance at Cole Clanton’s office. Her expressive face told a tale I should have read when Dee and I were there. Cole’s secretary was genuinely frightened.

I took a last bite, but the savor was gone. I’d been so consumed with irritation at Dee and aggravation at Nick, I’d not considered the implications of Nick’s search for Cole Clanton. An obviously agitated and upset Nick was tearing around Adelaide looking for Cole. It was a reversal of fortune. Cole had been furious with Nick on two counts, the lost opportunity to buy the Arnold property and Nick’s revelations about Lisa to Arlene. Now Nick was livid with anger.

What had prompted Nick’s fury?

As Cole Clanton slammed out of the B and B, he’d tossed a taunt at Nick: “I got some business to see to, but I’ll be in touch, Phidippus.”

I’d told Nick to stay with Jan at the B and B.

I placed a bill by the check and slid from the booth, once again ruing my inability to disappear and arrive immediately at the desired destination.

Because, suddenly, I was frightened.

• • •

As soon as I was out of sight of Main Street, I boosted the throttle on the little yellow scooter. I made it in four minutes flat to the B and B, ran the scooter right up to the back porch, braked, killed the engine. In a flash, I pounded up the back steps and hurried inside.

Jan sat at the kitchen table, her hands clasped tightly together. She saw me and jumped to her feet, her round face apprehensive. “Where’s Nick? You have to tell me what’s going on.”

“He’s hunting for Cole.”

She was impatient. “I know that. Nick raced out of here after he talked to Cole.” She gestured at the kitchen table and two mugs of coffee. “We were sitting there, talking. Everything was fun, the way it used to be when we were kids. I felt safe. And happy.” Her voice shook. “When his cell rang, he glanced at it and almost didn’t answer. Oh, I wish he hadn’t. Then he said, and he was cocky, ‘It’s Cole. The little man left in a bad mood. Too damn bad. He said he’d call. I’d blow him off, but he’d tell everybody I was running scared. I’m not afraid of him. Now or ever,’ and he clicked on the phone.”

Jan’s expression was suddenly stricken. “Nick’s face changed as he listened. It was awful. It was like he’d been slammed hard and couldn’t get his breath. I could tell he was looking at a picture. He jumped up and his chair crashed to the floor. He was yelling into the phone, his words coming so fast I could barely understand. He told Cole he was a repulsive, slimy, sick son of a bitch and when he got his hands on him he’d regret ever being born. And then he stood there”—she pointed at the center of the kitchen—“his face red, and yelled, ‘You’d better not. I’m coming for you.’ He clicked off the phone and started for the door. I ran and grabbed his arm and it was rigid as steel. I asked him what was wrong. He looked down at me and shook his head. ‘I don’t know what I can do. I’ll stop him. Somehow.’ He charged out the door and drove away.”

I had been right to be frightened. Something had set Nick off, and if he found Cole there might be serious trouble.

Jan flung out a beseeching hand. “I’ve been crazy ever since he left. And then Rod Holt called and asked for Nick, and when I said he was gone and could I take a message, Rod acted really odd. He said I should tell Nick that Cole Clanton was in an ugly mood and he’d tried to talk Cole out of doing something he might regret, but he hadn’t had any luck. I asked Rod what he was talking about and he said well, it was just a word to the wise, but he didn’t want to get involved and maybe Cole would have second thoughts. He hung up real quick. I called back and he didn’t answer.”