Home For the Haunting: A Haunted Home Renovation Mystery (11 page)

He shook his head. “Just take her around with you; show her the ropes. She was saying last night she might like to get involved, go into the family business.”

I froze.

“You have
got
to be kidding me.”

“It might not be such a bad idea. You’re always talking about moving to Paris. Think about it. If your sister stepped in to take over for a while, you’d be off the hook.”

Cookie in charge of project schedules, client relations, and construction workers? The mind reeled. The dust level alone on the typical jobsite would give the woman palpitations.

“Dad, I really don’t think—”

“Sometimes you don’t give your sister enough credit. She’s a good girl, and she’s smarter than people think.”

This battle was not worth fighting. I didn’t want to disparage my own sister, and Dad was defensive of her. Whether he really couldn’t see it or was simply living in a state of denial didn’t much matter. The results were the same.

I had one more possible out today, though.

“I’m not just working construction today, though, remember? I’ve got ghost class tonight. I won’t be home for dinner.”

He rolled his eyes. “For cryin’ out loud, when are you going to stop with that ghost stuff?”

“You told me yourself I needed to take ghost busting seriously if I was going to keep doing it. So this is me taking it seriously. There’s a lot to learn, not the least of which is how to run things like an actual business and get paid for my services. There are forms and licenses to consider.”

He snorted and started chopping onions.

“Making omelets?” I asked, trying to change the subject. Dad wasn’t buying.

“Just do what I tell you and take your sister.”

I saluted. “Yes
sir
, Commander, sir.”

I had lost this round, but at least I made him smile.

•   •   •

The morning air was crisp and cold. I started up the car and put on the defrost, then climbed out to wipe the dew from the windows and mirrors. Dog immediately jumped into the passenger’s seat, happy and ready to go. No matter that he got carsick, he always leapt into the car, excited to be going somewhere, apparently failing to connect the sick feeling to the vehicle. As much as I loved him, I had to admit that Dog was a profoundly dim bulb.

Cookie came out of the house wearing fashionable boots and a pink wool pea coat, looking like a perky Lands’ End model, even at this early hour. She stomped her feet and wrapped her arms around herself.

“
Brrrr
. It’s so coooold.”

“Tell that to people in Montana. This would be downright temperate for them.”

“In LA, the weather’s always perfect: not too hot, not too cold. Every day’s the same.”

I managed not to express my next snide thought:
Sounds boring.

“Does the doggy have to come?”

“We’re trying to help him get over his carsickness,” I explained. My father and Stan had taken Dog to a holistic veterinarian in Berkeley. None of us could get behind the suggestion that the poor canine go vegan, but we were giving the suggested exposure therapy a shot. “He’s supposed to ride around with me at least three or four times a week.”

“Why can’t he go tomorrow?”

“He’s already in and ready. Let’s just go.”

“He’s in my seat.”

Dog’s big brown head lolled over in our direction, tongue hanging out the side of his muzzle, chocolate eyes huge and patient and benign.

“He likes to ride shotgun,” I said. “Would you mind riding in back?”

Cookie made an outraged gasp, her mouth hung open, and she gaped at me.

“Just kidding.” I chuckled at her reaction. Okay, it wasn’t much for humor this early in the morning, but it made me smile. “In the back, Dog,” I said with an exaggerated gesture, pointing toward the rear seat.

Why I did this was anyone’s guess; Dog had never once responded to my verbal command. Finally, I put a hand under his butt and urged him on until he finally jumped awkwardly into the back.

“There you are,” I said to Cookie. “Let’s go. I’m already running late.”

“There’s hair all over the seat! It’ll get on my coat.”

I blew out a breath and tried to draw upon my shallow reserve of patience.

“We’re
working
today, Cookie. That involves dusty, muddy jobsites. If you were wearing something appropriate to construction, you wouldn’t be worrying about a little dog hair.”

“Look who’s talking. How come you get to wear party dresses to jobsites?”

She had me there. I tossed her a clean towel from a supply I kept in the back. She arranged it over the seat, tucking the ends in carefully, and finally climbed in.

“Now, isn’t this nice?” said Cookie as I headed for the freeway. “The Turner sisters, out for a day on the town!”

“We’re working,” I reminded her.

“Oh, I
know
. Two career girls, out for a day on the town! Where should we go to lunch?”

C
affe Trieste is on a corner just off the famous strip of the Italian part of town. At this hour on a Tuesday, the hordes of tourists that crowd the streets looking for really great lasagna and music and strip shows were still sleeping off last night’s fun, so I found a parking spot within a couple of blocks.

“Mel!” said Stephen, and we hugged over the counter. “How are you? What a surprise! You hardly ever come in, you—” His eyes flicked over to where Inspector Crawford sat at a small table toward the back, already nursing a latte and making notes in her ever-present notebook. “Oh. Are you here for . . . ?” He gave an exaggerated gesture with his head in the inspector’s direction, in a move that was much less subtle than if he had merely said her name aloud.

I nodded. “Stephen, this is my sister, Cookie. Cookie, Stephen.”

“I’m sorry; you want a cookie?” asked Stephen as he shook her hand.

“No,
I’m
the Cookie!” she said with a delighted laugh. “I get that all the time.”

“Oh . . . nice to meet you. I like your outfit.”

“Thank you! How sweet of you to say,” she said, casting a significant glance my way.

“How about me?” I demanded. “You designed this dress.”

“Yes, but . . . to tell you the truth, it’s looking a little out-of-date at this point. It still looks great on you, of course, but—I don’t know—maybe the spangles are a little early two thousands, if you know what I mean.”

He stood back, cocked his head, and assessed me. Cookie followed suit.

“I think she might benefit from a slightly different style given her . . . curves,” suggested Cookie. “I’m not so sure the bugle beads are doing her any favors.”

Stephen nodded and stroked his whiskerless chin. “Yes, I see what you mean. I think a plainer fabric might be just the ticket.”

“Could I get a double cappuccino, please? Full fat.” I’d be damned if I ordered my usual skim milk after a comment like that. “Come on, Cookie, I’ll set you up over here.”

I chose a table for Cookie near the entrance, out of hearing range of Inspector Crawford. I set up my laptop, on which I’d bookmarked several home renovation sites, as well as an industry glossary and a builders’ chat room.

“Study these sites so you have a sense of what’s going on with the business. I’m going to chat with someone for a few minutes. You stay here and be good,” I told her, as though she were a child.

As I approached Inspector Crawford at long last, she looked over at Stephen and Cookie, then raised her eyebrow at me.

“What? You felt a need for backup? This isn’t an official inquiry. I merely asked you to coffee.”

“Well, you know me. I like to travel with an entourage. And there’s no way you ‘merely asked me to coffee.’”

An imperious lift of an eyebrow was her only response.

I shrugged. “Plus, I get a little nervous around cops.”

“I’ve noticed. Why is that? You don’t have a police record.”

“You investigated me?”

“In the course of two murder investigations, yes, I have had occasion to type your name into the computer. I’m a cop; I like to do that sort of thing. Check into suspects’ backgrounds.”

“Are you saying I’m suspect?”

“Not this time.”

“Mmm,” I mumbled. I guess it made sense the authorities would look into the backgrounds of all the key players. And I had, after all, been at more murder scenes than the average innocent person. But it still felt unsettling to think that someone was snooping around my life.

“Don’t worry; the background check didn’t turn up anything interesting.”

“Oh, good. Or should I be insulted?”

She shrugged. “Why so nervous around cops?”

“My father tells me I have an inborn problem with authority figures.”

“You and a million others in this city.”

“So. To what do I owe this pleasure?” I asked, as though having coffee with a homicide inspector were an everyday occurrence. Whether or not this was an “official inquiry,” I was braced for some sort of grilling as well as the suggestion—implied, never stated—that I knew more than I was admitting. It was our usual MO. Still, the café smelled of dark-roasted coffee, an intense aroma that I loved, and my body was having a Pavlovian response to the promise of caffeine. I glanced around to see how soon Stephen would deliver my cappuccino.

“I can’t believe I’m asking you this,” the inspector said as her eyes scanned the room, as though to make sure that the caffeine-deprived ranks at the café this early in the morning on a Tuesday weren’t going to blow her cover. “But . . . I’d like your help.”

“
My
help? What kind of help?”

She cleared her throat and brushed an invisible something from the mosaic tabletop.

Finally, still not meeting my eyes, she spoke quickly, as though afraid to allow the words to linger on her lips: “Ghost help.”

Well, knock me over with a feather.

“Beg pardon?”

“You heard me.”

True, I had heard her. But Inspector Annette Crawford of the San Francisco Police Department—doubting, cynical, imperious Inspector Crawford—was looking chagrined, and I found myself enjoying it. It was the flip side of my discomfort with authority.

“Ghosts, you say?” I queried in an oh-so-innocent voice. “Surely not. An esteemed policewoman of my acquaintance informed me on more than one occasion that there’s no such thing as ghosts.”

More clearing of the throat, more obsession with invisible dust motes. Finally she blew out a long breath and met my eyes.

“Hubert Lawrence says there are ghosts in his house.”

“The Murder House?”

“I wish everyone would stop calling it that. But yes. That house.”

Newsflash, Inspector,
I thought; there
were
ghosts in that house. But before I could say anything, Stephen brought my coffee, and after taking a sip, I decided that, discretion being the better half of valor, I should concentrate on my drink.

My eyes wandered over to Cookie, who appeared to have encountered some technical difficulties that required the assistance of three men. They hovered over her table and the computer, discussing their options, chuckling at Cookie’s comments. I couldn’t make out the words, but I got the gist.

I turned my attention back to the homicide inspector.

“I feel as though we’re switching roles here,” I said, “so I guess it’s my turn to ask: What do ghosts in the house next door have to do with your crime scene?”

“The victim’s name was Linda Lawrence. She was Hubert’s older sister.”

“‘Victim’? It’s not a suicide? Hugh said she had tried to kill herself before.”

“Mmm,” the inspector said. Or maybe she was just enjoying the latte. “Linda Lawrence appears to have been troubled for some time. Problems with substance abuse, mostly pills and alcohol.”

“But you don’t think she purposefully killed herself? Could it have been an accidental overdose?”

“I don’t know what to think. But the whole thing seems . . . fishy to me.”

“Enough to make you believe in ghosts?” That must be quite a fish.

“I didn’t say I believed in ghosts,” she replied, a touch defensively. “I’m checking out possibilities, that’s all,” she said.

“Like a good cop should,” I said solemnly.

“Like a good cop should,” she agreed, and relaxed a bit. “Here’s the thing: Hubert Lawrence really believes what he’s saying. He and Linda had visited the house last Friday, and Linda thought she saw something.”

“Something being a ghost?”

She nodded.

“Hugh mentioned that she thought she saw the ghost of her father at the bottom of the stairs. Turned out it was Hugh. He looks a lot like his father.”

“When did you speak to Hubert Lawrence?” she asked me.

“Yesterday. He called and asked to meet with me about renovating the house for him. And . . . I think he wants me to communicate with the ghosts as well.”

“Really?” We were back to the relationship I was more familiar with: the one where she thought I was snooping around in her homicide investigation.

“
He
called
me
,” I said. “Not the other way around. There’s no law against meeting with a potential client, is there?”

“Huh,” she grunted. “Anyway, after the walk-through of the house, Linda never made it back to the halfway house. The medical examiner puts her time of death as later that night.”

“Okay . . . ,” I said, wondering where this was heading. If Linda had seen ghosts at her old home, had she turned to pills for solace, misjudged the amount she was taking, and overdosed? Why did it seem Annette thought there was something more to it?

“The thing is, there are indications that the body was moved, postmortem.”

I sipped my drink. “Moving corpses around would be unusual behavior in a ghost.”

Annette gave me a scathing, don’t-even-
think
-of-messing-with-me look, and I shut up.

“I’m not suggesting a ghost moved the body, Ms. Turner. But if Hugh Lawrence believes there are ghosts in that house, and Linda did as well . . . I want to know how he reacts if we go in there and—I don’t know—talk to them. To the ghosts.”

Something in the inspector’s manner struck me as odd, and I decided to go for it. “There’s more to it than that, isn’t there?”

“I may have . . . that is, I thought . . . Well, there are some strange things going on at that house.”

“Strange how?”

“I’m not sure how to characterize it,” the inspector said, dodging my question. “Tell me: Have you seen anything?”

“Enough that I’d like to take a closer look. Listen, Hugh Lawrence asked me to walk through the house with him and his wife. He wants to hire Turner Construction to redo the place, but here’s the interesting thing: He doesn’t want to renovate the house. He wants it restored, exactly as it was when the murders occurred.”

“As if to recapture a moment in time?”

“Exactly.”

The inspector frowned. “So Hugh Lawrence learns his sister is dead and her body was found in the shed behind their family home—and the first thing he does is hire a construction crew to make the house look exactly as it did on the worst night of his life?”

“I know it sounds odd, and you would know better than I if Hugh has something to hide. But I have to say, I didn’t take it that way. You’ve met him. He’s a bit . . . I don’t know. A little . . . off.”

She widened her eyes as if to say,
You can say that again
.

“Also, he seems to believe that the house is the key to helping him overcome the trauma of the crime.”

“Yes, that’s what he says about Linda. That’s what they were doing on Friday—just walking around and helping her re-create that night in her head. Poor woman. I don’t think anyone meant any harm, and I’m not a psychotherapist, but it seems to me that sort of thing should be done under the direction of a mental health professional.”

She looked out through the front window of the café, shaking her head, and when she spoke, her sadness and frustration were palpable.

“I’ll never understand this sort of thing. Beautiful family, lovely home, the whole enchilada . . . and then, the kind of craziness that makes someone destroy it all. What is it with some people? You want to kill yourself? Fine—slink off into the woods and shoot yourself. Have done with it. Why take your family with you?”

This was easily the most personal thing I’d ever heard Inspector Crawford say. The last thing I expected was to be this hardened cop’s confidante. Then I reminded myself: She was dealing with the possibility of ghosts. That pushed people out of their comfort zone and often resulted in saying and doing things you thought you’d never do. I should know.

A peal of girlish laughter indicated that Cookie found something hilarious. No doubt in response to one of the males in her orbit.

“Friend of yours?” asked Annette, checking out Cookie.

“My sister.”

“No kidding? You don’t look much alike.”

“Yes, I’m aware of that.”

“She’s a piece of work, huh?”

I blew out a sigh. Happily, Crawford wasn’t expecting a response to her query.

“You said there is something strange at the house,” I said. “Have you . . . seen something?”

The pause was too long not to be eloquent.

“You have, haven’t you?”

“I’ve been a homicide inspector for a long time, Ms. Turner. And before that, I was a beat cop. Suffice it to say, in all those years I’ve seen a lot that I couldn’t make sense of. I’ve learned not to jump to conclusions and not to make assumptions. And when I see evidence of something . . . no matter how crazy it might seem, I follow it up.”

“That’s very commendable,” I said, meaning it. Those whose jobs decide the fate of others should be especially conscientious.

“I know—but I’m telling you all this for a reason. I want you to go into that house with me.” I hadn’t expected
that
. My feelings must have registered on my face because the inspector smiled. “Surprised?”