Some Like it Haunted (A Sophie Rhodes Ghostly Romane Book 2) (11 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

A
t least I dreamed about Cal that night. He’d be glad when I told him. After I apologized. In my mind, he had overreacted to my fool remark, but we’d both been under a lot of pressure lately. His parents weren’t making his life any easier, and neither was Rachel as she pushed her way back into his family’s affairs like an invasive weed.

Having slept well, I awoke early, completely rested and ready to tackle a day full of tasks. Apologizing to Cal was first on my list. Second was finding out if Myrtle’s cold case was still open and if Detective Sigmund was open to receiving the new information Mr. Haviland had uncovered.

Myrtle had stayed behind at Spencer House, vowing not to leave until her body was exhumed.

The sun was just spilling light into the dark sky when I motored into the shopping center parking lot near Cal’s house. My plan was to get eggs and bacon at the grocery store and a tall, steaming cup of hot coffee from the diner. I’d show up at his door, hand him his coffee, fix him a hearty breakfast, and make everything right.

I slipped into a spot, turned off the engine, and reached down for my purse that had fallen onto the floor of the passenger side. My head popped back up in time to see Cal pulling the door of the diner open for a dark-haired woman.

“It’s Cal,” I said to Marmi. I laid my hand on the horn ready to honk lightly when I recognized the woman. My stomach lurched and my hand fell into my lap.

“Isn’t that the devil’s spawn, Rachel, with him?” Marmi sneered.

“It is.”

I spent ten minutes sitting in my car battling two Sophies: the Sophie who wanted to waltz right into the diner and confront the situation. After all, maybe there was a reasonable explanation for why Cal was having breakfast with his ex-wife. Didn’t feel likely, but that Sophie wanted to remain positive. The other Sophie, the one who had a slew of creepy, cheating boyfriends in her past, wanted to cut and run.

Finally, a third Sophie surfaced. She pointed out the time and reasoned that there were still a couple of hours before she had to be at work. She also knew that Detective Sigmund at the Stephens City PD used to arrive at the station by dawn.

I decided the third Sophie was a wise woman. Spending the morning tracking down Myrtle’s killer would distract me from wanting to kill Cal.

I arrived at work later than usual. In fact, I flew in just five minutes before our first patient was due to arrive. Cal sat at the front desk when I opened the door.

The furrow between his brows vanished when he saw me. “I was worried. You’re usually here earlier.”

“Yeah, sorry.” I was relieved that his patient hadn’t shown up yet. “I took a detour to the police department. Had a chat with a detective there.” I pulled my jacket off and hung it on the hook in the kitchenette. I returned, standing at his side and looked him in the eye. “How was your morning?”

He shrugged. “Fine.”

“Did you have a good breakfast?”

He hesitated noticeably as he rose from the chair. “The usual,” he said finally. “Why?”

So this was the road he was taking. Okay. Fine. “No reason. Just, you were so tired last night. I was hoping you had a good breakfast to get you through the day. Did you sleep well?”

He nodded. “You?”

“Like a baby.” I sat in my chair and wheeled closer to the phone. “I’d better listen to the voicemails.”

Cal started down the hall toward his exam room. His movement was hesitant.

“Cal,” I said sharply.

He stopped with the posture of someone caught in the act.

“You didn’t ask me why I went to the police department.”

“I, uh...”

The door opened and a mother with a young boy stepped in.

“I’ll ask you about that later,” he said, not meeting my eyes. He ushered the mother and son back to his exam room.

“The cat who ate the canary,” Marmaduke said, appearing at my side.

“Thank you for staying out of that,” I said.

“Anything for you, dear Sophie. You know that. If you would like me to put some fear into that wretched wench, however, just say the word. Just say the word.”

Amy called me at noon. She’d had a long, personal talk with her mother about adoption. “She’s always been ambivalent about looking for her birth mother,” Amy said. “But after our talk, I think she’s considering the possibility.”

I had a lot to tell Amy. “Can you meet for lunch?”

“Sure.”

“Are you okay?” she asked. “You don’t sound very happy.”

“Man troubles,” I said. “I’ll tell you about it at lunch.”

“Shane was acting strangely the last few days, but he came over last night and boy, he’s back to his old self again,” she said.

“That’s great. See you soon,” I said.

I popped my head into Cal’s exam room just before one o’clock. “I’m having lunch with Amy.”

“Okay,” he said.

I’ll admit, I was looking for more than an “okay.” My mood deteriorated further. “See you.” I started to close his door behind me.

“Wait,” he said.

I pushed the door back open. “Yes?”

“I lied,” he said.

My heart sank. “Lied?”

“Breakfast. It wasn’t usual. I met Rachel at Morton’s Diner this morning.”

“I know. I saw you.”

“You did?”

“I stopped at the grocery store. I was going to make you an I’m-Sorry-Breakfast.”

I expected him to apologize in return, but he didn’t. “I don’t like keeping secrets, so I thought I should tell you.”

“Why in the world would you have breakfast with her?”

“It wasn’t intentional. I went there for breakfast and so did she. We just ran into each other.”

“You really believe that?”

“I didn’t go there to meet her, I swear.”

“That I believe. I don’t believe it was unintentional on her part. Or the massive foreign object in her eye that miraculously washed away on its own only after she managed to get you alone in your exam room. What were you two laughing about back there anyway?”

He waved that off. “Oh, just a story she had to tell about a couple of friends of ours.”

“How chummy of her. A couple of days ago you detested this woman and now you’re chuckling over the old days.”

“It’s not like that. And this morning we just talked about my parents. She thinks my mom really is sad without my dad. Of course, I didn’t need her to tell me that, but she wants to help.”

“Help with what?”

“Getting them back together.”

Rachel the weed was taking over. How couldn’t he see that? “You don’t need her for that.”

“Let’s talk tonight after work,” he said.

“That’s a good idea,” I said, perking up a bit. The office was a bad place for this personal business. We could go to my place after work and talk things out, kick Rachel out of the picture. “I never got my good morning kiss today,” I said. “Can I give you mine now?”

He smiled. “Yeah.”

I left, not happy with the smile or the kiss. He was trying, but something was wrong. The entire drive to lunch with Amy, I talked myself into thinking Cal and I were just experiencing a little hiccup in our new and budding relationship. A little hiccup by the name of Rachel. But truthfully, I knew I was working too hard to convince myself. Deep down, I was afraid there was a bigger problem that might not have anything to do with Rachel at all.

It was nice unloading on Amy. She listened and understood. “Ex-wives are the reason for half the ulcer cases we see in the ER,” she said, patting my hand. “I’m sure he isn’t going anywhere. I’ve seen how he looks at you. He has a severe case of the love bug.”

“Yeah, that’s what Marmaduke says.”

She laughed, nearly snorting iced tea out of her nose. “We don’t have enough hours in this lunch for you to tell me all about your Marmaduke, so you owe me a long story sometime. But on the subject of ghosts, I have an idea for how Myrtle can meet my mother. I was inspired when I turned on an episode of Milwaukee Medium on TV yesterday.”

“Oh, well,” I said, “about Myrtle. There has been a development.”

I gave Amy the account of my visit to Spencer House.

She listened, hanging on my every word. “So she’s still at the rose garden?”

I nodded. “And I made a stop by Detective Sigmund’s office this morning. He reopened Myrtle’s missing person case a few years ago at her mother’s behest. The original detective on the case in 1958 spent about two minutes looking for Myrtle. Sigmund figures the department didn’t want to put a lot of manpower and money into looking for an unwed mother from out of town. So basically, when he reopened the case, he didn’t have much to go on. He was very excited to have Victoria’s full name. He’s running it now.”

As I sipped on my soda, I noticed that many of the surrounding diners’ eyes were glued to the television set behind the bar.

“Turn it up,” one man said to the bartender.

Amy swiveled to see what had caught my attention. We both stared, mouths agape, as the reporter from a local news channel stood in front of Spencer House while a banner under her said
Breaking News
.

“Is Spencer House really haunted?” the reporter asked viewers. “Some speculate that the disturbance here is merely an elaborate Halloween-inspired gimmick designed to attract more visitors for their haunted house tours.” The camera zoomed in. The shutters on the windows flapped. Halloween decorations on the front lawn danced, unaided by strings or electronics. A mournful wail echoed across the lawn, and a skeleton danced a circle around the reporter, cackling, before zooming off to scare a curious onlooker.

The poor reporter tried to keep it together, but she failed miserably. “It might be a gimmick, but I for one don’t plan to stick around and find out! This is Danella Davies reporting dead—I mean live—from Old Town, Stephens City.”