Little Ghost Lost (Destiny Bay Cozy Mysteries Book 5) (7 page)

I managed a smile and shook my head. “No, it was nothing,” I lied.
 

She didn’t buy it but she wasn’t going to push me, not yet anyway.
 

“Are we going upstairs?”

I hesitated. I had an impulse to call it a day and get out of there, but that would be silly. I would just have to come back again later. I might as well get this inspection finished while I had a chance of doing it with Jill by my side.
 

“Sure,” I said. “Let’s go.”

We went. From the look of things, most of the bedrooms had been emptied out long ago—all except for a couple just off the landing, including the one that looked as though someone had slept there lately. We wandered down the hall and into one empty room after another, not talking much.
 

Finally, she turned and looked at me. “Is this the floor you fell from?”

I nodded.

“Which room?”

I took her into it and gestured toward the still-open door to the balcony. You could see where the railing had bent and crumbled. My heart beat faster just looking at it.
 

“Don’t go out there. In fact, we should board the doorway up so no one else goes out there.”

“Good plan.”

We stared at the balcony for awhile, each thinking her own thoughts. I was wondering if I’d imagined what had happened.
 

I don’t mean the fall. That was real. But had some force, some resenting spiritual entity, really pushed me out? Or had my emotions gotten tangled up with my fears and made me think it had happened that way?
 

Finally, Jill turned and looked at me, her head to the side and her mouth curved into a tiny smile.
 

“No ghosts,” she noted. “I haven’t seen the evidence of even one.”

I shook my head. “No ghosts,” I agreed, ignoring the hints I’d had.
 

She sighed. “But you’re strung too tightly to enjoy the release that gives you, aren’t you?”

“What do you mean?” I protested.
 

She shrugged. “The dog that didn’t bark. The shoe that didn’t drop. The ghost that didn’t show up. You’re disappointed and relieved at the same time. But you’re jumpy too, expecting something to leap out at you from some dark corner at any moment. Right?”

I laughed softly, then said with pure affection, “Oh Jill, you know me so well.”

She nodded. “You better believe it, sweetie. Sometimes I think I know what you’re going to say before you say it.”

I pretended to be offended. “I guess I’ll have to try to think deeper and make my conversation a little more interesting for you.”

“Forget it.” She laughed at me. “But I am pretty bummed to be cheated out of a little haunting action.” She stood in the middle of the floor. “Tell you what. Let’s give them a chance to make good on their scariness.”
 

She threw back her head and said in a loud voice, “Okay, ghosts. Here’s your chance. You’ve been messing with my BFF and that is not allowed. So come on out and try your tricks on me, okay?” She spread her arms out as though issuing a welcome. “Right now! I’m ready for you.”

She was so earnest, she made me grin, but I held it back. Back to back, we both turned slowly, Jill surveying one side of the house, and I the other, looking for any sign of action, listening for any sound. The silence was thick and eerie, even though I knew very well there were beings nearby. I could feel them.
 

Suddenly, I had goosebumps. Something was very close. But what?
 

We turned back, facing each other again. Jill looked triumphant.
 

“There! They don’t want to mess with us. Right? I think we showed them.”

That would have been all well and good, except that her voice was shaking a little bit and I could tell that the whole concept of what she was doing was beginning to get to her. I wanted to tell her to leave off the taunting stuff. You never did know how a ghost would take your words and it didn’t pay to get too cocky.
 

But before I got a proper statement clarified in my mind, she grabbed my hand.
 

“What was that?” she whispered, eyes huge and dark.
 

I was going to laugh at her, but instead I listened. She was right. Something was moving downstairs. Just a small noise at first, then louder, like something scraping across the floor. I grabbed her hand back.
 

“I don’t know,” I whispered urgently.
 

In less than a second we were clinging to each other again.
 

“Did you hear it too?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Like someone dragging a ball and chain,” she said, her melodramatic nature in full sway. “Or…or a body.”

Going hysterical wasn’t going to get us anywhere. I stiffened my spine and said, “Let’s go look down the staircase and see what we can see.”

“No!” she said, clutching me. “Let’s hide in a closet.”

There was a new sound.
 

“It’s coming up the stairs!”

It was!
 
Clump, clump, clump…

I didn’t know what it was, but there was no denying it was something. And fear is contagious.

Chapter Six

“Okay,” I said breathlessly. “The closet it is.”

Before we got more than two steps, a voice rang out.
 

“Mele? Are you up there?”

We stopped and stared at each other.
 

“It’s only Roy,” I cried, relief beginning to drain the adrenalin away. “Up here, Roy,” I called out, and Jill and I backed away from each other and pulled ourselves together.
 

“Hi,” I said as his head appeared on the stairway. I was hoping to get away with a complete cover-up on how skittish we’d just been. “We were just exploring and…”

“And you scared us to death!” Jill cried accusingly, totally destroying any pretenses. “Why were you making those scraping noises?”

“What?” He grinned at us knowingly. “Spooky, huh? I was just trying to get a clear place to the wall so I could get a look at some of the woodwork downstairs. There’s so much junk piled everywhere.”

“It sounded like….like…”

“Bodies being dragged across the floor,” Jill told him sternly. “But now we know it was only you.”

“Yeah, I heard that as I was coming up,” he said, giving me a sidelong glance. “
It’s only Roy
. Thanks a lot, ladies.”

I wasn’t going to dignify that with a response.
 

“Do you want to see where Mele fell from?” Jill asked him in her bright-eyed way.

“Fell from?” He turned and looked at me, alarmed. “What are you talking about? Are you okay?”

I flashed Jill a “thanks a lot” look and shook my head. “I’m fine. I just fell out of….”

Jill blatantly ignored my sign that I didn’t want to talk about it with Roy and grabbed his arm, pulling him toward the bedroom. “Right in here. Look at that railing. She thinks a ghost might have pushed her.”

“Jill!”

“He has to know, Mele. We’re your friends and we are the only ones who can protect you.”

“You’re into that ghost stuff again, huh?” He looked mystified. “Tell me about it, Mele. What’s going on?”

I gave him a quick explanation of what had happened, trying to downplay the spooky angle as much as I could, and he was happy to take ghost talk with a grain of skeptical salt.
 

“Okay, bottom line, you shouldn’t be messing around in old wrecks like this. They’re dangerous.”
 

I rolled my eyes his way. “It’s my job. Just like yours is to accost bad guys who are set to try to hurt you. We each have to deal with what we have to deal with. The way of the world.”

He grunted and went into the bedroom to secure the door so that no one would be tempted to go out there again. Jill went downstairs, so we had a quick moment alone when he came out onto the landing again, and he took advantage of it, pulling me into a hug and dropping a kiss on my lips.
 

“Are you sure you’re okay?” he said, real concern in his eyes.
 

I nodded, warmed by evidence that he really cared. He stroked my cheek lightly with his bent forefinger.
 

“Hey, I’m sorry about the laughing thing,” he told me quickly. “That was just crazy. I really couldn’t stop.”

Jill looked up the stairway at us and heard that last remark.

“You know what that means, don’t you?” she told him from below. “Subconsciously, you can’t face your deepest emotions. You feel things for Mele you don’t dare express aloud and so it comes out in hysterical laughter.”

“Right.” He gave me a sideways grin. “Dr. Jill with the latest in psychotherapy.”

“I’m just sayin’!”

He and I grinned at each other and we started down the stairs. He held my hand, our fingers linked.

“Want to go for Italian tonight?” he asked as we reached the first floor.
 

I wanted to say yes, but I remembered little Mandy and reluctantly shook my head. “I’ve got some things I have to do tonight,” I told him.

He looked like he was about to say something, but in the end he shrugged and turned to smile at Jill. “This is some creepy old house, isn’t it?” he said, looking around.
 

“It was beautiful once,” I said defensively. “Look at this.” I dug into my shoulder bag and pulled out some old file photos I’d found from fifty years ago.

“Wow. I guess the old lady did look pretty good in her youth.”

“Hah,” Jill scoffed. “Don’t we all?”

We started walking toward the library where he was going to take our statements.
 

“Did Celinda get back yet?” I asked him.

“Yeah. She showed up. She’s pretty broken up about her husband being murdered, of course.”

“Well, yeah. That’s only natural.” I sighed, feeling sorry for her again. “I guess we’d better go over and give our condolences before we head home.”

“There’s a doctor with her right now. They’re calming her down. You might want to wait a bit.”
 

I hesitated, but then decided to go ahead. It would all come out eventually anyway.

“Did anyone tell you that her husband thought he was the legal heir to this house? From what Celinda told me, I guess that’s why they originally moved in next door.”

Roy turned to look at me harder. He squinted a bit. “No. I hadn’t heard that.” He grimaced, looking wary. “You’re not going to get involved….”

“Absolutely not,” I said before he could even get all the words out. “I am going to have nothing to do with this situation. It’s none of my business.”

He looked relieved. “Exactly. Stay away.”

I nodded. That was just what I intended to do. His cell phone buzzed and he took it out and glanced at the screen.
 

“Uh oh. I’ve got to go back over.” He looked up. “Can you two come in to the station this afternoon to give your statements?”

“Sure. What time?”

“How about three o’clock?”

We looked at each other and both nodded. “Okay.”

With a casual wink, he was gone. I looked at Jill. She looked at me. I sighed.
 

“Does it occur to you that he is awfully casual about how things might be between the two of us?” I asked her. “Or am I beginning to obsess too much?”

She took in a long breath before answering. “I think he’s not ready for a serious commitment. At least, that’s the way it looks on the outside.” She raised one eyebrow. “The question is, are you ready? And do you really care if he’s not anxious to make things more permanent? I mean, I don’t get the vibe from you that says, ‘Hey guy, marry me or lose me forever’.”

I shrugged. She had a point there, but I wasn’t sure I liked it. “Maybe you’re right,” I said.
 

We went out to the car. “What did you think of the place?” I asked, looking back at the big old beautiful house.
 

“It would make a great historical museum,” she said. “Can you imagine what this place would look like fixed up 1890’s style?
The Gilded Age
returns. I think you should recommend the city restore it
.
”

“You do?” That boosted my spirits a bit. I started to get into the car, then realized I was missing something.
 

“Oops, I left my journal in the house,” I said, throwing my shoulder bag behind my seat and turning back to run up the steps. “Be right back.”

“Do you remember where you left it?” she called after me.
 

“Yes, it’s in the kitchen. Don’t worry, I’ll be back in a jiffy.”

The minute I stepped through the front doorway, I knew this was a mistake. The atmosphere had changed completely.
 

I should have expected that, but I didn’t think it would take more than a few seconds to run into the kitchen and get my journal and get out of there. I hadn’t counted on just how calculated ghosts could be.
 

I tried to hurry through the entryway and into the living room, but cold air was swirling through those rooms like an arctic storm—and then the whispering began. There was such a sense of angry presence. I felt very much alone.
 

Who were these creatures?
 

What were they waiting for?
 

What were they doing here?
 

I had the impression there was something unsettled about their deaths, but that might just have been because I’d always heard ghosts stayed around to take care of unfinished business from their lives. But was that really true? I supposed I could try asking Aunty Jane at some point, But I didn’t trust that what I got from her would be true—or even have anything to do with what I asked her!

The whispering quickly got louder, more intense. At first I couldn’t make out what the voices were saying. There was more moaning than talking, more spine-chilling than informational, more mood altering than anything else. I gritted my teeth and fought my way to the kitchen like Captain Peary slogging toward the North Pole. My teeth were chattering—not sure if that was from the cold or from fear that was now running through my system like a malignant shot of adrenalin.