Sweet Dreams Boxed Set (82 page)

Impossible.

It had moved.

Kathy let out a shriek, stood, clutching the massive cat to her.

And yes, it moved…one of the giant hands reached out, reached out across the desk, reached for her….

She screamed and came around the desk, staring at it in horror, wondering in the back or her mind which was closer, the front door or the back door.

She raced toward the front door.

And then she felt it touch her.

Skeletal fingers wound into her hair, pulling her back. It spun her around and all she could think was that the thing was evil. She could hear the thunder of her heart; she could barely breathe. The noise of her pulse was deafening….

She screamed again, wrenched free, bolted for the front door and threw it open, letting Waldorf slip to the ground and run on his own, her only thought—escape!

She raced into the night….

On to Elizabeth Street.

And into the headlights of a coming car. 

Chapter 1

“I feel like an absolute idiot, calling you down here for this. I mean…well, I think that Kathy just…freaked herself out,” Colby Kennedy told Michael Quinn. “But, she’s my sister. I love her. And she’s terrified. The doctors told me they were so worried about her sanity that they were afraid she was going to hurt herself more than she was already hurt if she was left alone. Of course, Traci and I made it back here in a couple of hours, but….”

Colby’s voice trailed as Michael Quinn studied his old friend. He could see that Colby was twisted, torn and lost. He loved his only sister.

At Quinn’s side, Danni Cafferty spoke up, her voice filled with empathy. “Colby—it’s all right. Please, believe me, we’re happy to be here, and we truly hope, with all our hearts, that we can help you.”

Quinn set an arm around her shoulders. Danni’s true sense of humanity was part of what he loved so much about her. Strange to think that they hadn’t known one another until her father had died—and that they’d started out almost as sworn enemies. But that had been because he’d worked with Angus when Danni hadn’t really known what her father had done—other than owning and operating a curios and local art shop on Royal Street in New Orleans.

But now they had been together for almost three years, in a relationship that was closer than any he might have imagined—and yet one that they seldom talked about. Danni still felt oddly about what they did and what they shared—dealing with the deadly and often very strange. Of course, he’d come into it all willingly. Danni had inherited the shop—and her father’s secret “business.” Still, she came at it all wholeheartedly and they depended upon one another and a small circle of friends.

This was a different occasion—and part of why he loved Danni so much. When he’d told her about the out-of-the-blue and desperate call from an old friend who lived in the Florida Keys, she had been willing to pack up within minutes, hop a plane to Miami and then a “puddle jumper” that brought them here, to meet with Colby Kennedy, at the hospital. Colby’s house was in Old Town Key West but right now they were in Marathon—a city comprised of a number of the small islands in the Keys—just about fifty miles west-northwest of Key West. There were no better facilities closer to Colby’s home for Kathy.

They sat at a table in the cafeteria drinking bad coffee. Colby’s wife, Tracy, was sitting with Kathy while Colby spoke with them.  

“Thank you,” Colby said, his voice almost a whisper. It seemed he was near tears. “Really, thank you for coming. The cops thought that Kathy was on something—drunk or high on drugs. Then, when tests came back, they all thought that she was having some kind of an episode. A mental episode! She’s twenty-eight—and they tested her for early Alzheimer’s because of my mom. I know my sister—she’s a hardworking doll who has spent her entire life living in Key West—working mostly on short horror and sci-fi films. She doesn’t freak out easily. No—she doesn’t freak out at all. When I first saw her, she was under pretty heavy sedation and still convinced that she’d been touched by pure evil. She was really, truly terrified. By a life-sized horror doll. Oh, my God! She’s worked with so much more.  Gory, horrible films that I can barely watch. I mean….” His voice trailed as he looked down at his Styrofoam coffee cup.

Colby Kennedy was a big man, fit, bronzed—in perfect condition. He’d played football with Quinn for Loyola years ago. They’d been friends—and then, when Quinn had gone off the deep end himself into drugs and alcohol—they’d drifted apart. Colby had always been a standup guy.

Quinn had actually been pronounced dead on an emergency room operating table before he’d become one himself.

Colby looked up at them again.

“Thing is, the mannequin should have been in the attic. That’s where I left it. I don’t know how it got down to the parlor. Or if my sister did go crazy, head up to the attic and drag it down. I just know that…well, I may be bothering you for nothing. Maybe that’s what she did. Maybe it’s all finally been too much and my sister is going crazy. But, I—I heard that this…this kind of situation is what you do. Like…weird things happening. Kathy could have died! I mean, you’re a P.I., Quinn, but you were a cop, and I read up on you and…you’ve solved crimes that centered around…weird things. You, uh, own a collectibles shop, right?”

“Danni does,” Quinn said, smiling at her.

Yes, they ran a shop. And they were involved with weird things, found out about them, destroyed them, or added them to the strange collection Angus had started in the basement—built up first floor, really—of the shop on Royal.

“I’d read about some strange crimes in NOLA and saw that you’d been instrumental in solving them,” Colby said. “So I called you,” he whispered. “Thing is, too, Kathy got me the work that made us think we should take out little vacation and now…this, whatever, happens to her.” He swallowed and looked over at Danni. “Weird. But, then you’ve probably seen a few weird things in your day, right?” Colby asked Danni.

“A few,” she murmured dryly.

“But, evil things? Kathy is insisting that the thing is evil—and that it was out to get her. She’s absolutely terrified of being alone. I think she believes that it’s going to drive itself up here and attack her in her hospital room. Things can’t be evil—they’re just things!” Colby said.

Quinn thought that Colby was waiting for vindication of his words. “People can be very evil,” Quinn told him quietly.

“And people can—perhaps, in a way--imbue things they—that they use with that evil,” Danni said carefully. “What do you know about the doll or figure or—exactly what is it? And where is it now?”

“It’s a—a moveable mannequin, something like a puppet,” Colby told them. “There were five of them—they were used in a movie called ‘Zombie Nuns of the Apocalypse.’ The movie is, naturally, bizarre, but something of a cult classic now. Oh, I guess it’s really an animatronic—it’s battery operated and can jerk—the arms lift, that kind of thing. The moviemakers put them up at an auction—they were coveted by collectors! I was really lucky to have snagged one—or, at least, I thought I’d been incredibly lucky.”

“So it was a prop in a move,” Danni murmured.

“More than a prop,” Colby said. “Scream Queen Arianna Palacio played a nun as well—the zombie nuns were created to look just like her. With the actress and the five mannequin/puppets, the filmmakers were able to make it look as if an army of the things was swarming. Each was a little…well, eaten away a little differently. Missing flesh, bone sticking out, scabby—in different places. Okay, so the move was no ‘Casablanca’—or even a ‘Friday the 13
th
,’ but like I said, it wound up with a huge following. It was shot for less than fifty-thousand dollars—a modern miracle in the film world. It grossed millions around the world. And I’m yapping on about a movie when my sister….” he stopped speaking, his voice choked off, and his eyes becoming moist with tears.

Danni reached across the table, setting her long slender fingers over Colby’s hand. “Kathy’s going to be all right; you told us she’s going to be all right.”

Colby nodded. He straightened and shook his head slightly, as if by doing so he could regain his composure. “Broken leg, two broken ribs…serious concussion. But we’re lucky—really lucky. She’s alive. And the driver who hit her wasn’t a drunk or an ass. He stopped and got the cops and an ambulance and the cops called Tracy and me so that we were able to hit the first little plane out of the Bahamas and get back here. It’s less than an hour…still felt like I was so far from her. She’s all I have, you know. My dad died three years ago and my mom…she’s been in a home for the last six months.” He paused again, wincing. “Alzheimer’s and other complications,” he said quietly. “I’ve told the nurses at the home not to even think about trying to tell her about Kathy.”

“Of course not,” Danni murmured.

“So, you want us to go to your place and check out this mannequin puppet, crazy nun thing?” Quinn asked. He was somewhat surprised. Over the years, he’d seen plenty of people freaked out over “scary” creations. Some had real phobias about clowns. Some—dolls in general. With others, it was only puppets.

Quinn was surprised that Colby had called him for several reasons—first, Quinn had visited Colby at home a decade ago before Colby had lost his father and when Colby’s mom had been great and fun and beautiful and completely in her right mind. Their house--the one Colby and Kathy had grown up in--had been filled with incredible things—wild collectibles, reproduction death masks and all kinds of film creatures and other odds and ends of art and whatnot.

Kathy could not have been easily frightened.

And that Colby actually wanted the zombie-nun checked out seemed odd. Did he believe himself that the movie prop or figure was evil?

And was it?

“I want you to get rid of it for me,” Colby said. “Maybe get it back up on the market. People were bidding high for them. Unless….”

“Unless?” Danni asked.

“Unless there is something…bad about it. Then….” Colby spoke quickly, and then his voice trailed just as quickly, as if he were afraid that what he was about to say would sound crazy.

“Then?” Danni asked.

“Burn it. Burn the damned thing. Cut it to pieces. Do whatever you have to do,” Colby said. “You can—you can try to do that, right?”

He seemed to really wonder if the zombie-nun could be burned.

“We can do what you want,” Quinn told him. He hesitated. “We need to see your sister,” he told Colby.

Colby stiffened at that and ran his fingers through his short cut, coal black hair. “I’m trying to get her to forget what happened, to let it become a bad dream.”

“Colby,” Danni said, still gently touching his hand, “we’ll listen to her. Without suggesting that she’s crazy in any way, which, I doubt, anyone has done yet. It’s not a bad dream—she’s in the hospital. We need to understand what she thinks happened—from her. We won’t upset her. I promise.”

Quinn glanced at Danni. She had a way with people—one he was sometimes lacking.

“All right, all right,” Colby said. “But, please….”

“We won’t upset her, and if she’s agitated at all, we’ll leave,” she promised.

That settled it for Colby. “Well, come on up,” he said.

He was polite and anxious as they waited for the elevator. He asked Danni and Quinn how things were in New Orleans and thanked them again for coming so quickly. Quinn told him it wasn’t a problem; they had two co-workers who lived in an apartment above the main house at the shop—they were happy to take care of Wolf—Quinn’s big hybrid dog. The elevator came and once to their floor, they went down the hall. Tracy—Colby’s wife—had been sitting by the side of the bed and she stood quickly as they entered, smoothing her hair back and looking at her husband with relief. Quinn had never met his friend’s wife before—they hadn’t been married more than a year or so. Tracy was tiny, especially next to Colby’s six-foot-three frame and Quinn’s own six-four—even Danni’s five-nine. She was a pretty little woman with a delicate face that easily betrayed emotion and she looked as if she’d been cast in a horror movie herself—and didn’t know her lines.

Ironic, of course, Quinn thought, since Tracy Kennedy was an actress. She and Colby had met, Colby had told Quinn, when they’d filmed
Treasure of the Elizabeta Maria,
a decent kids’ movie filmed in the keys that had made use of Colby’s company for the dive scenes.

“Oh. People,” Tracy murmured, but Quinn’s attention was then on Kathy Kennedy.

Colby’s younger sister lay on the bed in pathetic condition; her head was bandaged, her leg was in an apparatus that held it up and straight and she was bruised and blue about the eyes and nose. She looked at Quinn, though, as they entered, and he believed that it was a glimmer of hope he saw in her eyes. She’d been a young teenager the last time he’d seen her—pretty, bright—eager and hardworking even then. She loved movies and scripts. She was quick—as they watched a movie that turned out to be pretty darned bad—to point out when the actors weren’t at fault. “What could they do with that horrible script?” she would say.

Tracy cleared her throat and moved out of the way murmuring, “Kathy has been drifting in and out…she’s awake now, I believe.” With her back to Kathy she mouthed to them, “On a morphine drip! Poor girl could say anything, I think!”

Quinn nodded politely as he shook her hand and introduced her to Danni. Then he moved around to smile at Kathy and take the seat next to her.

“Hey, kid, can you talk?”

Kathy nodded. “Quinn. Cool to see you. I had such a crush on you,” she told him.

He was surprised to actually flush. Kathy was looking at Danni. “Hey,” she said. “I hear you own a shop that takes…evil things.”

Danni nodded. “Yes. It was my dad’s. He was great. Now, it’s mine. Quinn and I…work on that kind of thing together. With help from our friends,” she added.

“What we need to know, Kathy, is exactly what happened,” Quinn told the girl in the hospital bed.

Kathy didn’t break into hysterics. She looked at them gravely. “I swear to you,” she said. “It came to life. It had been in the hall. I didn’t like it—but I wasn’t even paying any attention to it. The cat! Even the cat knew…I felt his claws and heard him hiss and I looked up…and it was right there, right in front of the desk.”