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Sophie pushed her chair away from Toots. “You don’t have to get in my face. For Pete’s sake, there is nothing wrong with me! You’re the one who’s seeing ghosts floating around in your bedroom. And I will never understand in a million years why you bought this dump. It’s beyond ugly. Hell, it was ugly when it was new. I pity the poor jerk who has to make this place livable.”

“I would be ‘that poor jerk,’ I’ll have you know. You don’t have to live here, smart-ass. Last time I heard, you had a few million tucked away. Go buy your own damned house.” Toots smiled wickedly when she saw that Sophie was about to bust a gut at her outburst.

“You’re a real bitch, Toots, you know it?”

“You’d best remember it, too,” Toots added affectionately. “And for your information, this dump cost me three-point-eight million dollars, and that was a bargain-basement price.”

“Then I say someone got screwed.”

Toots eyed the pink-and-purple kitchen, the white Formica kitchen furniture, and knew she and whatever contractor she hired were facing an uphill battle. If she’d been really smart, she would have consulted with the HGTV crew. It was going to take time and more money than she’d originally planned, but when she looked out at the view, she decided that it would be worth every penny.

Today the beach was empty of the usual crowds, the view of the Pacific endless, the sky a clear robin’s-egg blue, and the smog a distant memory. This view and being close to Abby was worth every single penny of the $3.8 million and a lot more, which it was obviously going to take to make the house inhabitable by ordinary humans, not pop tarts.

“So what’s your suggestion?”

“Sell it and buy a condo?” Sophie replied in the blink of an eye.

“You know I won’t do that. I don’t mind the remodeling, it’s the other that I’m…not so comfortable with.”

Sophie took a deep breath, crushed out her cigarette, and lit another. “Yeah, okay. We’ll start by switching rooms. Tell Ida and Mavis the mattress hurts your back if they ask, though I doubt they’ll even question it. They’re too involved in their own lives right now to notice either of us.”

Toots considered this. “I agree. Ida and our good Dr. Sameer can’t seem to get enough of each other’s company. When she’s not on the phone with him, she has an appointment at his office. Something is going on between the two of them, I’m sure. He sent another prayer rug yesterday, too. And Mavis is either jogging with Coco or designing her next outfit. It’s hard to believe how much the two of them have grown in the past six months.”

“Mavis has shrunk, remember? Okay, okay, I know what you mean. It’s Ida who worries me, though. She and that doctor spend too much time together, if you ask me. I know they’re more than just friends. Ida keeps telling me that, but I don’t believe it for one minute.” Lowering her voice and looking around, Sophie continued, “She simply cannot be without a man.”

Since the fire at The Informer, Toots had been so involved in its cleanup and rebuilding, getting the paper ready for production without revealing to Abby that it was she who’d purchased the failing rag—not to mention the time she’d spent searching for the perfect home—that she’d hardly given much thought to Mavis’s and Ida’s activities. “I think we all need to have a sit-down to catch up with one another before something happens.”

“What do you suppose will happen, Toots? Think one of us might get laid? I’d bet my last dollar Ida and the good doctor are doing the dirty.” Sophie laughed when she saw the look of disgust on Toots’s face.

“Your mind is always in the gutter, Sophie. I swear, you haven’t changed since seventh grade. I can’t recall a single conversation in which sex didn’t pop up at some point.”

“Pop up? Is that a Freudian slip, Toots? Or sheer coincidence?” Sophie teased.

Toots huffed. “See? You find a sex connection in everything I say. Seriously, what are we going to do about my…visitors? I want them, it, whatever, out of here. Or I’m going to commit myself to the nearest nuthouse. Tell me what one does, Sophie. How do you go about ridding your home of a ghostly presence?”

Toots poured the rest of the brown sludge in her cup, then added a large splash of milk and more sugar. “Want more? I’ll make another pot real quick.”

Sophie shook her head. “Let’s go sit out on the deck, in case the girls come downstairs and creep up on us. I just don’t trust Ida, although I don’t quite know why.” She fretted. “She’s always been such a damn sneak. I wouldn’t put it past her to try and sell your ghost story to The Enquirer or The Globe.”

Grabbing her cup, Toots laughed and followed Sophie onto the deck. Even though it was summer in Southern California, the early-morning air held a chill. Sophie motioned her over to a pair of weathered deck chairs. Toots saw an old iron table with a glass top jammed in the corner of the deck, dragged it over by the two chairs, and placed it between them. Sophie snatched the shell they’d been using as an ashtray and set it on the small table before removing her cigarettes and lighter from the pocket of her sweats. As was becoming the norm, she lit up for the both of them.

“Okay, you want to know about ghosts,” Sophie said matter-of-factly, as though they were discussing what they would have for breakfast. “I’ve been interested in the paranormal for as far back as I can remember.”

Toots cast her an odd look.

“It wasn’t something I talked about. Back in our day we would’ve been tarred and feathered for even thinking about this stuff, let alone believing it. I used to visit a lady in Queens, she called herself Madam Butterfly, if you can believe that. Everything was butterflies with her. Jewelry, clothes, even her damned wallpaper was butterflies all over. She read tarot cards for me once a week after I married Walter. She warned me about him, too. Said he was bad for me, but I was young and in lust and wouldn’t listen to her.” Sophie paused. “I wonder how my life would’ve turned out had I taken her advice? Oh well, too late for that.”

Toots interrupted. “Get to the point, Soph.”

“I’m explaining how I became interested in this stuff. I started reading astrology charts and doing my own little tarot readings on the side. Oh, nothing for the public, just for myself and a couple of girls at the hospital. Never made much of a big deal out of it. It was all in fun anyway. Sure helped me get through some rough times with that son of a bitch I married. I just want you to know that this isn’t a new hobby, in case you’re wondering.”

Toots couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “I think we’ve discussed your interest enough. Just tell me what I need to do, Soph. You can’t imagine just how weird I feel in that room. When I put my robe on this morning, I kept looking around to see if anyone was watching me.”

“Once I’m settled in the room, I’ll know more. For starters, I’ll have to make sure there really is a presence there.”

With a trace of impatience Toots asked, “And how will you do that?”

“It’s just something I’ll know. I’ll set up my voice recorder and video for backup, but if there’s truly a ghost hanging around this dump, I’ll know. Once I determine if it’s—shit, this sounds dumb even to me—once I determine if it’s a friendly ghost, then I can do a number of things. For starters, there’s the shoes remedy, and it’s pretty safe.”

“Shoes? You’re going to rid this place of its ghosts or whatever the hell it is with a pair of shoes? Puh-leeze, Sophie. Even I’m not that gullible.”

Sophie stubbed out her cigarette. “I know it sounds like a crock, but just hear me out.”

Toots gazed out at the beach, where the white foamy waves were gently reaching the shoreline. In and out, constant, always predictable. She liked knowing what was happening around her, liked knowing, or at least being able to make a pretty good guess, what each day would bring. After last night’s scare, Toots was sure of one thing—she really did not like the unknown or the unpredictable. No, she liked and needed good, hard facts. But something told her that there would be very few of those available in what she was about to hear.

Resigning herself to listening to Sophie’s shoe theory, she motioned with her hand. “Go on, tell me about the shoe stuff.”

Sophie lit another cigarette; Toots was sure she’d smoked at least half a pack already. Then she, too, reached for one and lit up alongside her.

With the surf as background noise, the occasional seagull cawing with bursts of laughter from an unseen group on the stretch of beach below them, Sophie sat on the edge of her deck chair and explained herself. “I’m not sure of its origins, but somewhere I recall reading about the shoe theory. It’s said when you go to bed at night, the person seeing or feeling the presence of a ghost—and in this case that would be you—is supposed to place the shoes you’ll be wearing the next day at the foot of your bed. You then point one shoe in one direction and its mate in the opposite direction. This is said to confuse the ghosts. After a few nights of discombobulation, the ghosts leave.”

Toots glared at her in disbelief. “That’s it? Please tell me you’re joking.”

Sophie instantly appeared deflated at Toots’s reaction, collapsing in on herself like a balloon that had lost its air. “What do you mean, joking? You asked me to tell you about the shoe theory, and that’s what I did. It’s not rocket science, Toots. It’s not something you major in physics at Harvard, Yale, or Caltech to learn. Don’t look so damned disappointed.”

“Guess I was expecting something more…I don’t know, concrete. I haven’t dealt with this type of…bullshit before.”

“Most people haven’t and never will, Toots. This isn’t the everyday normal stuff that we’re used to. Why do you think it’s so difficult for the average person to believe?”

Toots agreed that she had a point. Still, in broad daylight, with the ocean stretched out before her and a warm breeze blowing tendrils of hair loose from her topknot, it was hard to adjust to the fact that they were discussing ghosts and ways to get rid of them.

“Sophie, if word of this gets out, I could be in real trouble. What if someone at The Informer learns my identity, then discovers I’m seeing ghosts? This would not help Abby or the paper. In fact, it’s this kind of story that could sink us.”

“What in the hell would make you think the paper could even find anything out about this? It’s not like I’m going to start running off at the mouth. Ida does enough of that for all of us.”

“Sophie, you should be ashamed of yourself. She doesn’t wag her tongue that much, but don’t you see, that’s just it? We can’t afford to let anyone, and I mean absolutely anyone, find this out. Whatever you do, we have to keep this between us.”

Sophie held up her hand to stop further conversation. “Remember, Toots, I can keep a secret.”

Toots nodded. How could she ever doubt Sophie? She’d kept Walter’s abuse hidden from her for years. Toots trusted Sophie as much as she trusted herself. This craziness would stay between the two of them.

“I know you can, Soph. Now that that’s settled, you want to share another ghostbusting theory with me? I am not spending another night in that god-awful purple room. I’ll go back to the Beverly Hills Hotel first.”

Sophie laughed, her brown eyes sparkling with mischief. “Of course you will. Now, tell me. What do you know about electronic voice phenomena?”

************************************************************************************************

Abby Simpson gazed around her newly remodeled office, which had once belonged to Rodwell Archibald Godfrey III, her former boss and editor in chief of The Informer. Known as Rag to most of his employees, he’d made headlines himself when he’d disappeared several months ago. Days after he’d gone missing, she’d searched his house, called a few old girlfriends, and come up empty-handed. Rag was famous for pulling weekenders in Vegas and not showing up on Mondays, but Abby knew this was more than just your average recovery from a weekend binge. Concerned because it was unlike her boss just to up and vanish—he usually had the decency to at least call or send an e-mail—Abby reported him missing to the authorities, after which all hell had broken loose. The Informer, a third-rate tabloid with its offices housed in the former building of The Examiner, the building in which William Randolph Hearst had printed his first paper, had been set afire by Michael Constantine, a local lowlife with mob connections who’d been searching for Rag since he’d skipped town. Apparently her former boss had ripped Constantine off for fifty grand. Constantine was spotted leaving the scene of the fire and was caught and arrested within hours. The paper had to close for a few weeks in order to undergo cleanup and remodeling. Abby, along with a skeleton staff, had used her garage as a temporary office. Rag was still on the loose, with the authorities on his trail. It was thought he’d embezzled $10 million from the new owners of The Informer, who wished to remain anonymous. Abby had used every source she had, and still she hadn’t been able to learn the new owners’ identity. She told herself it didn’t matter. Whoever they were, they had not only doubled her salary but also appointed her temporary editor in chief. Though not out pounding the pavement for celebrity news, she still made a point to remain in touch with all of her sources. She wasn’t giving up tabloid reporting completely. If a story jumped out at her, something exclusive, she would write it, no matter what her position at the paper. Maybe when the new owners decided to come out of hiding, she would jump back into the swing of things full-time, but for now she had a third-rate tabloid to run, and she was a person who took her responsibilities very seriously.

Rag’s old office had consisted of a metal desk with an equally tacky lump-filled chair and an outdated computer. Several portable black-and-white television sets had been shelved on the wall opposite his desk. Most were always tuned to E!, Fox News, or CNN. With the fire damage, everything in his office had been destroyed. Apparently the new owners had deep pockets. Abby learned that during the remodeling she was to update all of the offices with nothing but the best. Abby had done her best, and with the help of a professional office decorator, Rag’s office—her office now—was sleek and efficient, equipped with every high-tech gizmo on the market.