Nothing to Ghost About
Read Nothing to Ghost About Online
Authors: Morgana Best
Tags: #ghosts, #occult, #paranormal, #supernatural, #ghost, #cozy mystery, #ghostly, #witches and wizards, #mystery supernatural, #cozy animals
Nothing to Ghost About (Witch Woods
Funeral Home Book 2)
Copyright © 2015 by Morgana
Best
All Rights Reserved
Smashwords Edition
Smashwords License Notes
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for respecting the author’s hard work.
* * *
This is a work of fiction. Any
resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
The personal names have been invented by the author, and any
likeness to the name of any person, living or dead, is purely
coincidental.
This book may contain references to
specific commercial products, process or service by trade name,
trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, specific brand-name products
and/or trade names of products, which are trademarks or registered
trademarks and/or trade names, and these are property of their
respective owners. Morgana Best or her associates, have no
association with any specific commercial products, process, or
service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise,
specific brand-name products and / or trade names of
products.
By this act
And words of
rhyme
Trouble not
These books of
mine
With these words I now thee
render
Candle burn and bad
return
3 times stronger to its
sender.
(Ancient Celtic)
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
The funeral singer had vanished. It
was just after six in the evening, and it was uncharacteristically
hot for this time of the year. The guests were milling about in a
grumpy fashion. Everyone looked depressed, but that was not
surprising, given that they were at a funeral, after
all.
The deceased, Alec Mason, was a
middle-aged man, a well-known crime figure who had served time for
organized crime of the jewelry theft variety. His untimely demise
had been caused by a hit-and-run. At the time of the accident, he
was unmarried, but had been married three times—in fact, all three
of his ex-wives were in attendance. Thankfully, they were so far
giving each other a wide berth.
I was standing at the doorway to the
viewing room, keeping an eye on my mother. She was ‘mingling’ as
she put it, despite the fact that I had told her no less than seven
million times that she shouldn’t be ‘mingling’ at a funeral. It was
our job to run the event and to do our best to ease one of the many
hardships on those who had recently lost someone close to them. If
I did my job well, the family of the deceased should not give me a
second thought, at least until the bill arrived.
Yet my mother did not share my views.
She said a good host should not stay on the sideline. Never mind
that there was a funeral going on, and not a dinner party, and
never mind that my father had left the business to me.
I watched as Mom approached ex-wife
Number Two. She spoke to her for a few moments, before taking her
by the arm and leading her over to ex-wife Number One. That woman
was standing close to me, so I could hear my mother
plainly.
“
Death should bring us
together,” she said, “not drive us further apart.”
I sighed and hurried forward, stepping
between the two ex-wives, who looked as if they were about to come
to blows. I touched my mom on the shoulder lightly to get her
attention. “Mom, I need your help in the kitchen,” I
said.
She turned and glared at me. “Excuse
me,” she said to the two women who were still staring daggers at
one another. She followed me out of the viewing room, across the
entrance hall, and then through the dining room and into the
kitchen.
“
Every time you ask for
help in the kitchen, you really want to yell at me,” my mother
said.
I nodded. “Well, very astute. Stop
trying to get the ex-wives to speak to each other. You do realize
this is a crime family? What if they pull out knives or guns or
something? This funeral home has had enough bad publicity
already.”
Mom glared at me. “With Pastor Green
being on vacation, I need to help his replacement, Pastor Morrison.
I can never find that man anywhere! Anyway, Ian said he overheard
one of the ex-wives express regrets. I wanted to help them overcome
their regrets.”
I grimaced when I heard Ian’s name.
Ian was my mother’s younger and equally religious best friend, or
more of a pet really. He followed her around, and the whole thing
creeped me out. “I didn’t even know Ian was here.”
“
He’s been avoiding you,”
my mother said pointedly. “He thinks you would make him
leave.”
“
I
would
make him leave!” I said, trying
my best not to shout. “He doesn’t work here. Speaking of people who
actually
do
work
here, at least for the night, I need to find the singer I ordered
from the internet. I saw him setting up earlier, but now he’s
nowhere to be found.”
“
You know, Ian has a lovely
singing voice,” my mother started.
I lifted my hand and cut her off.
“Don’t.” I made my escape and went to find the singer.
I didn’t see the man anywhere among
the guests, and no one answered when I called out his name outside
the restrooms. The only place I hadn’t looked was upstairs. No one
had been upstairs for a long time. Up there was an apartment in a
state of disrepair. As soon as I had some free time, I was going to
renovate it so I could move in. Living with my mother was
difficult, to say the least.
I went upstairs to check. “Preston?
Are you here?” I called out.
A man walked around the corner. “Yes,”
he said. “Preston was here.”
That was a strange thing to say, but I
ignored it. “Excuse me. No one is supposed to come up here. We need
you downstairs. We’re about to begin.”
“
Right, right.” He nodded
gravely. “I don’t think I can.”
“
You don’t think you can?”
I asked. I supposed the man had stage fright. I really had little
sympathy. He shouldn’t advertise himself as a funeral singer if he
was prone to stage fright. People were counting on him. Some days
everything just worked together to raise my blood pressure—I could
almost feel my blood boiling in my veins.
“
I don’t think I can,” he
repeated sadly. “No one would enjoy me. Well, you could, I guess. I
must say, I’m a little surprised that you’re talking to me. I am
new to all of this, though.”
“
You’re new to this?” I
asked, my eyes going wide. “The website said all you guys were
professionals, with experience!”
Preston did not respond, but instead
stared at his hands, turning them over and then back
again.
I was worried that he was unwell, and
stepped forward. “Preston, what’s going on?”
“
I can’t go on. I’m sorry;
I simply can’t. I would if I could—believe me!”
He continued to look at his hands, and
then swept one hand through the corner of the wall.
I stared at his hand moving through
the wall. “Preston?” I said softly.
“
I would much rather go
on,” he said. “I love to perform.” Slowly he reached down for my
hands, and as I watched, his hands went right through
mine.
Somewhere downstairs, a woman
screamed.
“
You’re a ghost?” I asked
breathlessly. The fact that he was a ghost meant something was
wrong. The scream meant something was wrong. It meant I needed to
be rushing down the stairs, but I was frozen to the
spot.
Preston nodded. “I’m afraid
so.”
I gasped. “But you weren’t when you
got here, were you?”
Preston shook his head.
“
Oh no,” I said. There was
a break in the screaming downstairs, and then it started again. I
turned and hurried away from the ghost.
Downstairs was a scene of panic.
People didn’t know what to do. Most people were crowded into the
hall, facing the restroom. I shoved my way through the crowd, and
found my mother by the bathroom door.
She clutched at me. “It’s
horrible!”
I stepped into the bathroom. There
stood Ian, shrieking. I had been so sure it was a woman, but he was
simply hitting a note that not many men could reach. He stopped
screaming when he saw me.
“
There’s a body,” he said.
“A dead one.”
And then he fainted. I stepped forward
to catch him, letting him fall onto my arms before I bent and
deposited him on the floor. I turned and looked. Preston Kerr, or
at least his body, was on the floor. I crouched to get a closer
look at the man. It looked as though there were deep bruises around
his neck. Someone had strangled him, or at least it appeared that
way.
Two men in suits appeared by my side.
“We need to get everyone out of here,” one of them said.
“
Get everyone out?” I
parroted. I was in shock.
He nodded. “Yes. The police are on
their way, and will need to speak to everyone.” He turned to
address the crowd. “Leave this area, but no one is to leave the
premises!” he said in a booming voice.
I said the first thing that came to
mind. “The deceased man’s family will be upset.”
He somewhat pompously crossed his
arms. “The fact of the matter is that he is no longer the only
deceased man here.”
“
Everyone, please, we’re
going to have to ask you to leave,” the other man said.
It was obvious to me that they were
detectives. As the deceased—the official deceased, that is, the man
in the coffin—had been a crime figure, and a murdered one at that,
I had expected undercover police to come to his funeral. Now they
were no longer undercover, but had taken charge. I wondered where
they had been when Ian started screaming, given that I’d beaten
them to the funeral singer’s body.
It took a few minutes to get everyone
moving in the right direction, but soon the corridor outside the
restroom was empty, and everyone was gathered in the reception
room. No one was trying to make a break for it, for which I was
thankful.
“
This place has been crazy
since you came along,” a disembodied voice said.
I turned to see Ernie leaning against
the wall. I always wondered how ghosts could sit or lean, given
that they could pass through solid objects. I supposed I’d find out
some day—I hoped not too soon. I nodded at him, careful to make
sure I didn’t look like I was communicating with thin
air.