Dead Corse (5 page)

The door knob turned a few times. Someone was messing with the
padlock. I moved back and watched as the door opened. Rhonda stepped through
and her face looked a little messed up. She’d been crying and the right side of
her face was red and swollen. This bastard had hit her!

Another figure came through the door just behind her. One of the
workers. Only this one had a gun pressed to Rhonda’s head. Rhonda held up her
hands.

“Where’s your partner? I don’t see her”

“They’re not in here. I told you I was alone.”

He hit her with the gun and she stumbled forward. He stopped her
from falling by grabbing the back of her hair and pulled her to him. The gun
was dangerously close to her face. “Liar. Now you tell your partner to come out
of hiding. I heard you talking to her and I heard her answer you. Do it now or
I shoot
 
you
.”

Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck.

What was I going to do? I couldn’t let this jackass hurt Rhonda—I
didn’t even know what it was he was here for. Was he a burglar? Thinking with
the Haunted House going on here the security would be less tight? And if so,
what did he think was here to steal? The only idea that came to mind was a pretty
stupid one but I needed to take his attention off of Rhonda. I moved to the
desk and through it—and looked at the painting again.

The leaves were nearly gone now, the sky cloudy, and the figure
was next to the house. The hairs all over my body stood on end as I ducked down
behind the desk and crawled under it. I made myself as corporeal as I could and
hoped this guy could see me. This didn’t always work because sometime they just
never saw spooks.

“Hey…don’t shoot. I’m here. Don’t hurt her!” I called out.

“See? I knew she was in here. Stop hiding so I can see you.”

Moment of truth. Either he’d see me or he’d just get pissed off
even more and start shooting the desk. I moved back as if coming out from under
it, even though I could move through it, and then stood. I could tell the way
his gaze tracked me he could see me.

“Wow…you’re a tall one.” He moved the gun. “Get from behind there
so I can see you.”

I moved from behind the desk, careful not to walk through
something. Not that I thought he’d notice in this dim light or given the fact
he was holding a gun. “What is it you want? I doubt all these other workers in
here are part of what you’re doing.”

“Shut up.” He looked around the room. “Well, is it in here?”

“Is what in here?”

“The book, you bitch!”

Rude! I put my hands on my hips. “What book?”

“The Durgan Book of Shadows. I know it’s here!”

Wait a second. Of all the people who would know about this book,
what were the chances of all three of them being in the same house as opposed
to this guy being the one person who brought the book to my attention? I
narrowed my eyes at him. “Jack Grayson?”

Nailed it.

His face went blank in surprise. Rhonda shoved him back ran to me.
Well, she ran behind me. “How…how did you know? How could you possibly know who
I am?”

“Because you wanted me to find that damn book you asshole,” I felt
my bravado returning now that he wasn’t pointing a gun at Rhonda. “Why the fuck
are you here?”

“You’re the girl on Craig’s List?”

“Yeah,” I glanced at the painting. FUCK! The trees were bare and
the little figure was in the doorway of the house. I looked behind Jack Grayson
and the open door of this study. “So why didn’t you let me finish the job?”

“I thought you’d steal the book when you found it. Something told
me I needed to come here and get it myself.”

“So you knew it was in this room?”

“No, I just came in here and saw that crazy chick talking to a
door.”

Oh. Made sense.

He lifted the gun and pointed it at us. “Now, where is the book?”

“I couldn’t find it.” I moved in front of Rhonda, though I was
pretty sure if he shot me the bullet would go through and then it would just be
pointless. “I looked all over this room.”

“Liar. You want that book for yourself. It’s magic, did you know
that? It’s got the secrets of the universe in it. And I plan on using it to
play the lottery.”

…

I have heard some stupid ass things in my life, but this guy
wanted to play the lottery with a magic book?

I looked at the painting again. The figure was gone.

Did that mean it was here? In the house?

“Why do you keep looking at the picture?” He looked from me to the
painting. “What? Do you think it’s behind the painting?”

Behind it? Huh. I never thought to look there.

Rhonda gasped. I looked at him and then past him and caught sight
of something shadowy in the doorway just behind him. I could see through it as
it slowly came closer.

“Well it’s not there. You know why I know that? Because I put that
wall there. I know what’s behind that wall and the book isn’t there!” He did a
double take of the picture. “What’s wrong with my painting? Why is it winter?
And why isn’t she there?” He pointed at the painting. “Why isn’t she in the
painting?”

I looked at the painting again. That’s when I spotted the gold
initials in the right lower corner. JKG. “Did you paint it?”

“Yes. I did it for her. I wanted to give her something so she’d
give me that book.” His face sobered and the gun wavered. “But did you know she
told me no? Yeah, my own grandmother. She told me I wasn’t gifted enough to
understand it. That I didn’t
 
deserve
it.”

Rhonda stepped to my left. “Jack—what happened to your
grandmother?”

“That’s my secret, and that’s not one I’m going to tell either of
you.” He aimed the gun at us.

The shadow in the doorway was clearer now. A woman, dressed in a
long house-coat. Sort of like the one mom wore in the winter. She disappeared
and then reappeared in front of Rhonda and me.

Jack hesitated and started firing, but we’d ducked down hit the
floor.

Then he fired at the painting over and over until it was little
more than shreds of cloth. The wall behind it was damaged and the sheet rock
cracked.

Thunder proceeded a crowd of workers charging into the room.
They’d heard the gunfire and came running. Several of them grabbed Jack and
wrestled him to the ground as another one helped Rhonda to her feet and led her
out of the room.

I stayed incorporeal and remained in the background. Once they
were gone and I heard the police sirens I pulled out my watch and gasped when I
saw a full two hours gone. That wasn’t right—I hadn’t been in this house that
long.

Unless—was it possible my going corporeal ate into that time?

I hadn’t thought about that.

“You’re not dead.”

The voice made me squeak and I nearly dropped the watch.

I wasn’t alone in the room. The woman I’d seen coming closer to
the house now occupied the room’s center. “No, I’m not.”

“What are you?”

“I call myself a Traveler.”

“Sad,” she said and looked that way. “I had hoped you were an
angel sent to rid me of my bond to this place.”

“You’re bound here? By what?”

“I hoped it was my body, but now that it will be found I feel no
release. So I have to assume it is because of my folly.”

Rhonda came bounding back into the study at that moment, a blanket
over her shoulders. “They want me to give my statement to the police on how he
threatened—” she stopped when she saw the ghost. “Oh…hell…”

The woman looked at Rhonda. “Use it wisely. And never for harm. It
possesses the same strength of will as that of an athame. If you accept it,
then it will be your bane as much as it is mine.”

I had no idea what she was talking about. But Rhonda seemed to.
She nodded to the spectre. “I promise.”

Something clicked in the room and I turned to see one of the
larger plaques pop out from the wall. It swung open on a hinge.

Rhonda went to it and opened it wider. Behind the plaque was a
small vertical hole in the wall cut in the exact shape as the book she pulled
out. It was a big book, thick and bound in something brown and leathery.

“Is that it?” I pointed to it.

“Yes,” the ghost answered. “Do you accept it?”

“Yes, yes I do,” Rhonda said.

“Think carefully, little one. And remember there is nothing evil
in this world, but thinking—”

Rhonda opened the book.

The ghost vanished.

I stood there for a few minutes before I felt the first tremor under
my feet and an overwhelming dread press down on my shoulder. “We need to go…
now
.”

• • •

The house fell.

I mean it literally fell on its foundation. No one living was
hurt. The gross part was it revealed three bodies buried inside the house walls.
None of them was the lady we’d seen. Her body was found in the woods, buried
under a now collapsed gazebo by a long dried-up lake. Mariana Durgan, the
matriarch and I assumed the woman who spoke to us. She’d been killed by a blow
to the head. Her grandson Jack Grayson confessed to the crime and buried her
ten years ago. He’d had the gazebo added six months later to cover the grave.

Jack was arrested and sentenced a year later on drug related
charges and recently been released from prison before contacting me.

The other two sets of remains were sent to the crime lab.

No idea who they were.

Mom and Rhonda were glued to that book for days afterward. I filed
Jack Grayson’s case as closed and kept his retainer for services rendered. I
was in the botanica, curled up on my old papasan chair with my laptop on my
knees. I’d been trying to compose my report to Maharba for over an hour. I
wanted that other 50K. But I didn’t know what to tell them. And I discovered
that mom hadn’t told Rhonda about this person’s or people’s interest in her.

Mom came in with a cup of hot chocolate and sat on the couch
beside me. “Still trying to figure out what to say?”

“Yeah. You done with the Big Book of Everything in there?”

She nodded. “It’s Rhonda’s responsibility now.”

I scratched at my cheek. I didn’t care for the thing and was happy
enough to core dump it for now. “I’m a little weirded out that someone’s that
interested in her. Why?”

“Oh who knows. I would give you a suggestion though.” Mom leaned
in. “Tell them she’s not a witch.”

“But that’s lying.”

Tim appeared next to mom then and sat on top of the coffee table.
“I don’t like her.”

“That was kind of random,” I frowned at him.

“Tim’s just mad because I’ve offered Rhonda a job to help me here.
That way I can train her properly and get a bit of help. Maybe take her on as
my apprentice.”

“Bad idea,” Tim said but didn’t utter another word.

I didn’t care one way or the other. Rhonda and I got along pretty
well, and it was nice having someone I could talk to about all this. And I loved
my watch. “So, you think I should just say she’s not that gifted?”

“Tell Maharba that Rhonda Orly is not a witch. You won’t be
lying.”

“Mom, I saw her light that candle without even touching it. And
what about what she did with my new watch?”

“That doesn’t make her a witch.”

“Then what is she?”

Mom looked dubious. “I don’t know. But do what I said. Get the
money. And have no more to do with them.”

I typed up a to-the-point report and hit send. After I set the laptop
aside I picked up my own hot chocolate even though it was more like warm cocoa
now. “Mom, that ghost started to tell Rhonda something before she left. But she
didn’t finish it.”

“What was it?”

I repeated what I heard.

“That’s Shakespeare, Zoë. Hamlet. The full quote is,” she shifted
and took a deep breath. “Why then ’tis none to you; for there is nothing either
good or bad, but thinking makes it so. To me it is a prison.”

I stared at her. “What the hell does that mean? And why would she
want to tell Rhonda that?”

“I’m assuming she wanted Rhonda to understand that the information
in the book—and it is more of a dictionary than a spell book—should be used in
the most noble of fashion.”

“And if she uses it in an
 
not
-noble
fashion?”

My email pinged so I grabbed at the laptop again and looked. A
reply from Maharba.

Dear Miss Martinique,

We do appreciate your insight into this matter and your
information is invaluable. We also concur on your assessment and have made
recommendations concerning issues that have made themselves known within the
last twenty-four hours.