Ghosts of Rosewood Asylum (35 page)

Ray nodded, held open the door and waved
them in. Shelly passed through first, pausing at the ticket window just inside
the doorway. She pulled a bill from her purse. Ray leaned in, peered at the
heavyset girl in the booth and held the side of his index finger in front of
his lips. “Shhh, Gigi, we’re forgetting to collect a cover from these guys.”

She flashed an okay hand gesture and went
back to reading a magazine.

The group received the news with an
approving woot. As Wendy passed by, she ran her fingers across Ray’s chest.
“Thank you, Rayyy.”

To which Angel, behind her muttered, “Free
shit rocks!” He slapped Ray on the arm. “Thanks, man.”

After Turk passed through the entrance, Ray
turned to Zach. “Let’s get these clowns settled in and then I want to hear
everything.”

Feeling somewhat weak and out of sorts, Zach
leaned in and gave Ray a man-hug—a one-armed lean with a couple slaps to the
back. “Let’s go,” he said.

Ray quickly caught up to the group and
guided them through the glitzy chaos to an elevated table off to the side of
the club. Zach had only been inside
Wine, Women & Thong
one other
time and it had been his very first adventure in a strip club. The week after
Zach completed his undergrad degree, Ray took him out to celebrate. The strip
club was Zach’s second-to-last stop on his graduation “celebration tour.” The
final stop having been a glamorous close-up view inside his toilet. It had been
an experience Zach was eager never to repeat and certainly not one, as a good
Catholic boy, he wanted to become habitual.

The club teemed with young, thin girls
scantily dressed. Most wore miniscule underwear bottoms and skimpy halter-tops.
During his previous visit, Ray laughed when Zach had expressed his expectation
that the girls would wear more clothes before going on stage in order to
prolong the experience of getting naked. He’d laughed even harder when Zach had
asked if
Wine, Women & Thong
only served wine.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone drink a
glass of wine in here,” Ray had said.

Of course the girls did not get completely
nude on stage or anywhere in the club. They stripped to merely topless in a
skimpy thong. It had been more than enough excitement. The admission of his
activities had resulted in a good chuckle, and then a half-hearted lecture from
Monsignor Macginty during Zach’s next confession.

“What’s behind there?” Wendy pointed to a
purple velvet drape that covered a door near the back of the club. Above and
below the curtain, only mirrors and black lighting could be seen.

“That’s
restricted
area back there,”
Angel said, with a wave of his hand. “And it’s
heaven
!”

Wendy didn’t seem to know what he was
talking about, but laughed anyway before sipping her margarita. Apparently
Angel’s machismo had made him, temporarily anyway, her favorite. Turk didn’t
seem to mind. He guffawed at Angel’s quip and held out his fist for him to
knock. Angel obliged and followed up with a sarcastic and mocking version of
the
Demon Hunter
cheer.

“Yeah, what assholes they turned out to be,”
Turk muttered.

Considering Bryce’s part in falsifying
evidence, the Demon Hunters had not been invited along for drinks, and it had
been an odd parting. Rico and Pierre shook hands and said goodbye as though
nothing unusual had happened. Bryce got into the van without saying a word.
Patrizia was solemn and cast Zach one longing goodbye glace. She hadn’t said
anything.

“Okay, kids. You all behave. No touching the
performers. If they—”

“Performers!” Shelly chuckled and then snort
laughed. “Sorry, Ray...”

“Anyway, if they touch you it’s okay, but no
touching them.” He grabbed the nearest cocktail waitress. She probably wore
less clothing than ninety-nine percent of women in ninety-five percent of all
bars. Yet at
Wine, Women & Thong,
she seemed overdressed. “Maria,
first round of shots and drinks is on me. The rest, these lowlifes can buy on
their own.”

The group cheered. Angel instigated the mock
Demon Hunters
cheer and the others immediately chimed in with gusto.

Zach’s thoughts turned back to Patrizia and
the kiss. It had come from nowhere. Seemingly nowhere, yet looking back the
tension had been building between them since they’d first locked eyes. And now,
considering how
XPI
and the Demon Hunters had left things, she might be
out of his life forever.

“Hey, buddy-boy.” Ray grabbed Zach by the
neck with both hands and pretended to strangle him. “Come help me out up front
a few minutes.”

“Oh sure,” Zach said. “You’re just trying to
get out of buying me a shot and drink.”

“Tell ya what,” Ray said. “You down a shot’a
tequila and guzzle a margarita, and I’ll get up there and dance.” Ray thumbed
the stage.

“Alright. Alright,” Zach said. “I’ll help
you out up front!”

“Hooooo!” Angel shouted out.

Again they pounded fists
Demon Hunter
style. Zach pitied their waitress.

“Then let’s go, son,” Ray said, grabbing
Zach by the collar as though he were going to toss him out on his ear.

They backtracked through the club. It was
crowded for just past eleven on a weeknight. Ray navigated them towards the
front door, and they arrived unscathed having survived flirtation attempts from
several strippers.

“How do you deal with this every night?”
Zach asked.

“Oh, I manage.” Ray carded a group of
college aged guys who were patiently waiting outside. They entered, and he
turned to Zach. “Okay, buddy. C’mon, spill it. Tell me everything.”

By the time Zach updated Ray on the night’s
events—most of them at least, and returned to the table, it was clear that the
foursome had imbibed far more than just one round of shots and drinks. Empty
glasses cluttered the table. Zach looked at his watch. 11:25. He’d been away
for a little less than half an hour, but it appeared as though he’d missed at
least three rounds of shots. Apparently Rosewood’s tension wasn’t cut with a
knife; it was drowned with a bottle of tequila.

Wendy was pressed up against Angel
and—practically sitting on his lap. Even though she wasn’t wearing a slave
outfit, Zach couldn’t suppress thinking there was a faint similarity to Jabba
the Hutt and Princess Leia.

If Wendy had intended on making Turk
jealous, it didn’t appear to be working. He sat talking to Shelly; his opposite
arm was casually draped around a “performer” who had nestled up to him. She’d
rested her dyed blonde head on the front of his shoulder and was indifferently
stroking his chest. As Zach walked up, he could have sworn he heard Turk
talking about some girl he’d been dating less than a month whom he knew he was
destined to marry.

“Zachman!” Turk lifted a nearly empty glass
of something on the rocks. Upon realizing Zach didn’t have a drink, he returned
it to the table. “I got the last round. Whose is its turn?”

“Whose is its turn?”
Wendy repeated.

They all laughed.

“I insist,” Shelly shouted. “My’s is its
turn!”

They all laughed even harder.

The dancer who was sidled up to Turk must
have seen this as her opportunity to escape. She slipped past Zach with a mere,
“Excuse me...”

Turk didn’t even seem to notice her absence.
“Zach, whatcha havin’?” He put his arm over Shelly’s shoulders. “My confidant
and advisor’s is its turn to buy.”

Even though their third round of laughter
was little more than a chuckle, Zach knew he would scream if someone made the
same joke a fourth time.

“How much have you all had?” Zach asked.
When there was no response, he added, “Did any of you eat dinner?”

“I did,” Angel admitted, raising his meaty
arm.

Shelly and Wendy exchanged glances that
suggested they were colluding to not answer the question.

“Dinner’s fer pussies,” Turk said.

Considering Zach hadn’t eaten anything
except that protein bar around 4 PM, he wasn’t one to lecture. Besides, unlike
him, none of them had lost several pints of blood.

The waitress came and collected empties from
the table while the group went through extensive machinations to essentially
order another round of the same. Clink. Clink. Clink. She stacked shot glass
upon shot glass. Mesmerized, Zach stared. She clunked the group of them into
Angel’s empty pint glass. Just like John Paramour, Zach thought,
collecting
souls.
The more the waitress stacked, the easier the group of glasses was
to manage. And if she dropped them? Imagine the impact.

Zach now knew that Evelyn was a spirit.
However, was she the infamous female ghost of Rosewood that scared people away?
And if she was, why? Zach gazed across the club at the strippers putting on
false faces to attract customers, and the answer came.

Evelyn keeps putting on false faces to repel
people.

 
XPI
had been banned from
Rosewood, but this case was far from over. John Paramour needed to be stopped;
otherwise he and Evelyn would continue their haunting indefinitely.

“Zach, it’s time...”

“Huh?”

“Time to order?” Wendy said.

“Oh yeah.”

“Boy oh boy,” Angel said, “if dat’s what
sobriety does to ya’, git me an’udder round!”

Zach ordered his beer as the others laughed.
“A bottle,” he told the waitress. “Anything domestic.”

He wasn’t even sure why he’d bothered to ask
for it. He didn’t need his godfather’s voice to confirm what his intuition had
already told him. Zach would never get the chance to sip from that beer.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

“Did
who
call me?” Zach shouted into
the phone as he darted towards the exit. “Rebecca, calm down. Hold on a sec.”

He trotted past the girl in the ticket
booth. She barely glanced up from her magazine. Zach burst through the door and
outside to the cool night air and quietude.

“What’s up?” Ray asked.

Zach held up a finger and whispered, “It’s
Rebecca.”

Ray’s brow furrowed. Like Zach, he knew she
wouldn’t have called at this hour except in an emergency.

“Ginny.” Rebecca’s tinny voice could finally
be heard. “Foster. Joey’s missing!”

“Missing? How? When?”

“She said he woke up screaming. Blabbering
nonsense about his dad. And Boy.”

“What?” Zach must have shouted it louder
than he’d intended. Ray peered over and mouthed the words, “What’s up?”

“Yeah, right? She said she calmed him, but
he was both clammy and feverish. She went and got him a drink of water and he
was gone. Like ‘poof disappeared’ gone. Ginny didn’t know we’d gotten kicked
out of Rosewood. She thought we were still in the neighborhood, so she called
me.” Rebecca was out of breath. “I’m getting in my car now but I’m forty-five
minutes away. Can you go?”

“Rebecca, wait.”

He’s inside Rosewood.

Over the phone, Zach heard noise in the
background—a car door slammed, keys jingled and dummy dings notified a driver
to buckle the seatbelt.

“Wait, what?” Rebecca asked.

Zach reconsidered his instinct to try and
convince her to stay home. It would be futile, wasted time. Precious wasted
moments. Zach looked at his watch—11:33.

“Rebecca, call Ginny back. Tell her...tell
her, I’m on my way. I’ll be there in twenty minutes and to meet me at
Muses
.
You meet me there, too.”

“
Muses
? Why?”

“Rebecca, listen. They’re open for another
half hour. So is
GrocersMart
. Maybe someone down there saw Joey.”

“Okay. Okay,” she said, sounding a bit
relieved. “I’ll call her. I’ll meet you there.” She hung up.

He’s inside Rosewood.

Zach knew Joey was inside the asylum. He
knew no one near
Muses
or
GrocersMart
had seen him. It was
nothing more than a fool’s errand, and it wouldn’t be the last Zach would need
to conceive.

He’s inside Rosewood.
His godfather’s voice said again. Despite
the cool autumn night, Zach was sweating. His heart rate was dropping. And of
course, there was the
Sailor Black
thick as coastal haze at dawn. Then,
Uncle Henry’s voice spoke again.

Zachary, you must go in there alone.

Ray had taken up residence within a foot of
where Zach was standing. “Whatever it is, I’m going with you.”

“But work?”

“Screw work.”

“But R—”

A Ray “the Railroad” Ross hand waved in
Zach’s face. It would be no use arguing. Precious wasted moments. Ray opened
the door, leaned close to the ticket booth and mumbled something to the girl.
All Zach heard were the first and last words. “Tell” and “emergency.”