Hexes and X's (Z&C Mysteries, #3) (3 page)

“Is the sketch in here?” asked Claire.

“Yes.” Matilda approached four of the wall’s especially old and chipped bricks. “There are bricks in this house, and lap and plaster, which you saw coming up the winding staircase.”

“I knew we were walking within the skeleton of this house,” Zo said.

“The key I’m using was just rattling around in a desk drawer. No one threw it away, I think because it is really kind of pretty, and now quite old. I suppose somebody in my family knew at one time it went to an attic door. Everyone knows that now, but what they don’t know is that the other end is a spring key to this further attic of the captain’s walk.”

Matilda removed two of the bricks, leaving a red-orange dust on her fingers, then explained, “It looked to me as if the slat wall out there wasn’t well-seamed, and I was thinking about a little termite problem when I took my key to dig out a little of the dust. The normal key part was too thick so I turned it over and pushed in this ornate end and the wall popped out a couple of inches. I thought I had broken the damaged wall, but I saw hinges on the inside. I was delighted to make a discovery of the door, and, thus, this room.”

Zo was already in adventure mode. She inquired, “I think just finding this room is a treasure. Do you suppose that there are many attics in this house because of all the varying roof tops?”

“Could be. Sounds reasonable, I would guess.” Matilda reached in and pulled out a rolled paper, two-by-two feet. A black-looking finger bone held by a cord flopped around it.

“Okay, that is really disgusting.” Claire grimaced.

“You two can look the sketch over at your leisure.” She handed it to Zo since Claire was repulsed. After she closed and locked the secret door and then the attic door, she handed the key to Claire. “Be very careful with this. We don’t want anyone else to have it.” After a little more visiting, Matilda said goodbye, saying she had to go over some books in her office downstairs.

Claire pushed the key down deep into her pants’ pocket. “What say we go get something to take to our room to eat as we look over the sketch?”

“Let’s
,” Zo agreed, food often being on their minds. “I saw hot chocolate mix and cinnamon rolls.”

“I saw cold chicken, corn on the cob and potato chips.”

“Let’s have it all. Then tomorrow it is strictly salad and turkey sandwiches.”

“Right! Grab the napkins,” Claire added.

When they got up to their room, they unrolled the sketch and anchored it down to a table with perfume bottles, a tube of toothpaste and a hairbrush. Similar to a builder’s blue print, it showed different levels of the old building. They snacked while walking around the table, not touching anything except to take bites or sips. X’s were inked over four areas—areas hidden in the bowels of the monstrous house. Then there was the lone X in their very bedroom.

“What do you make of it, Claire dear? Five X’s—one being here?”

“That is puzzling.” They took a quick scan of their lovely room from their posted positions. “The X’s indicate something all these places have in common, right? Something to find, maybe? Like treasure?”

“Or clues,” Zo said. “What else does the map show us?”

“Well, look. There is the picture of the key… and the room under the captain’s walk.”

“That attic Matilda took us through?”

“Yes, yes.”

Zo took a drink of her
hot chocolate. “I’ve got that much. This key and the finger have to be serious clues. We need to ask ourselves why somebody was going around with nine fingers so the missing digit could be attached to this map.”

“You said map.”

“Did I? Okay.” Zo cocked a brow in interest. “That must be what my subconscious is telling me. This is a map. Perhaps we need to follow the X’s in some order.”

After walking a circle around the sketch again, Claire noted, “So there is an X in the attic. It looks like it’s the only entryway to get to the other, hidden areas. I think we need to go back up there in the morning and check out what that X could mean.”

Zo nodded, then felt the soft edge at the top of the map. “It looks torn here. I hope that doesn’t mean we’re missing some important information!”

A sudden loud clacking vibrated through the high-ceilinged foyer, reverberating up through their bedroom walls. “What on earth?” Zo pressed a hand to her chest. “Is the building falling down?”

“I think it’s a door knocker, Mom.”

FOUR

They both headed for the front door, wondering who would be on the other side.

It was Slobber.

“So you are here, my beloved,” he said to Claire. “I can’t come in for any kisses.” He tipped his soiled baseball cap at Zo with a “Hello, ma’am,” and continued, “I’m jus’ here to warn you the little round woman is after you. She bein’ my unbetrothed, ’cause I never did say I would marry up with her.”

Claire quirked her brows at him. “Okay, and what can I expect from that? A yelling at, in public? She’s going to try and slap me? …Slash my tires?”

“Nothing so sweet as that, my darlin’. That there is Patricia Bule, close friend to Cindy—the scariest psycho-witch in this state.”

“Are you referring to Cynthia, the ‘evil hag
’?” asked Zo.

“Ha heh ha,” snorted Slobber. “You called her a hag. Oh, dang! Good one.” His shoulders moved up and down on his thin frame and he lifted a leg as he choked out his laughter. “Wait till she hears that one.” But then, with another thought, he raised an oil-dirty hand and said seriously, “I won’t tell. I won’t tell. I gotta go. I’ll probably get killed, my beloved,” he said, turning to Claire again, and then he ran toward a rusty pickup.

“You are so brave, Slobber!” Claire extended a hand in his direction, dramatically calling after him.

“Oh, good! We’ve made friends with a Malevolent Society, daughter.”

“I like that Slobber,” Claire emphasized.

“A good man is hard to find in a haystack.”

“True words, Mother. Too bad I don’t want to live in a haystack.”

“And, what are the chances I could rent the one next to you?”

“Yeah. It won’t work.”

Zo put a sympathetic arm around Claire’s shoulders as they began their climb up the stairs. “It is better to find these things out early.”

*

They unpacked their bags, took showers, said a prayer together for the preacher’s wife and for protection from Pat and Cynthia, then climbed into their beds for much-needed sleep.

“Mom.” Claire’s voice seemed solitary in the dark. “Which is the most scary—our Hillgate mansion or this place?”

“I think our place was.” Then there was a shatter, something was grunting and an “Owww” came drifting up
. “…Until now!”

A light went on at Claire’s nightstand. Zo had feet on the floor and was struggling to get her arm in her robe’s other sleeve. “Grab your cell phone!”

“Got it!”

Zo looked around to find something for a weapon, while an “oof oof” and a “thud, thud” could be heard. She thought about picking up an iron from a cute little wood-burning fireplace, but instead chose a long-handled flashlight out of Matilda’s box of “things that may be useful.” “Maybe you should hide under the bed, Claire, til
l Mommy gets back.”

“Ha!” Claire refused. “Besides, it is I who protect you…,” she said but reconsidered. “Er… you protect me.” She remembered back on all those times her mom came to her rescue.

They both determined, once in the hallway, the sounds must have been coming from outside. They got to the front door and opened it carefully, ready to slam it if anything was on the porch; but, they saw nothing, so they inched out step by step. The sounds became louder. There were two silhouettes growling and struggling against each other on the lawn. Finally, there was a voice: “I’m going to kill you, you idiot!”

“Not if I get offen my back and kill you first!”

“What are you doing leaping out from the dark? Are you a lunatic?” the first voice snarled.

“I’m protecting my ladylove, almost betrothed!”

“And is your ladylove a lawn gnome? A wood nymph?!”

“No! It is Claire, who is the heat source of our magnetic love.”

“Oh, don’t tell me you are using Claire Kane’s name in vain?!”

“I don’t know what her last name is, and I don’t care much on accounta she is going to be the new Mrs. Cornswallow!”

“What?! Why, I ought to let you up just so I can throw you down again.”

“I tripped!”

A big bright light beamed in on the trespassers, causing both to blink and squint. It came from Zo’s flashlight.

“Jack, is that you?” Claire was flabbergasted.

“Yes. This crazy man attacked me.”

Claire giggled.

Jack wiped some mussed blond hair off his forehead. “He said you are engaged to him. Is that right?”

“I did not! I said ‘almost.’ We haven’t had time to come to an understandin’ yet,” Slobber defended. “These things has got to be done with finesse. Don’t they, darlin’?!” He looked up at Claire with a big smile, showcasing a couple missing teeth.

“What Slobber says.” Claire’s eyes drilled into Jack’s.

“Well, I don’t believe it,” Jack volleyed. “Come on now, Claire. We have a couple things to talk over. You have misjudged me. We need to talk a little… Just a little.”

“You can talk all you want. It don’t do ya any good,” said Slobber, who everyone forgot was still pinned by Jack.

A few raindrops began to fall. Big ones. The type that smack the head in threat of a torrential downpour. Zo told Jack to get off Slobber, so he could go home. Slobber refused to leave until Zo and Claire convinced him he didn’t need to sit in front of their bedroom door with a shotgun he kept in his pickup. When wet hair was sticking to their faces and rain was pouring off the ends of everyone’s nose, Slobber relented and jogged toward his truck.

In consideration of the storm, Jack was invited to spend the night. Jack grabbed a couple suitcases out of his Audi, and they headed into the house, the wind blowing rain after them. Zo threw a towel to her daughter and her daughter’s ex, so they could dry their hair.

Before hitting the hay, Jack asked Claire to sit with him at the kitchen table.

“Claire, what is it that you really want? Your heart’s desire? Go ahead, whisper it in my ear. Do it. It’s okay.”

Claire thought, Oh my gosh! Is he referring to marriage? I hope not.

He continued, “I’m changing jobs. The last one didn’t work out the way I expected; and, well, I have got to move on. I’m also going to need a place to stay.”

“I don’t want any renters
.” Claire played dumb.

“No, that is not what I’m talking about.”

“Are you by any chance talking about marriage? Because that is a big discussion.” She was thinking about giving him all the reasons she would never go back to him.

“There is nothing to discuss. I have already moved on with you.” He pulled out a paper from his back pocket. “I just made a little list for us to agree on.”

“Just for the heck of it, Jack—what guarantee would I have that you wouldn’t find fault and leave me like last time?”

“That is why I made this list, so I won’t want to leave.” He handed her the paper.

1. Wean yourself from your mother. You have me.

2. No prenup.

3. No Quit Claim for me to sign.

4. Have respect for my decisions.

“There are a couple more to talk about, but we can work that out later. Uh, what would you want on your list?”

“Love, nurturing, equality. I tell you what… I will think this over and answer you tomorrow.” Claire was too tired to deal with Jack and his list tonight.

Claire watched Jack slip into his bedroom down the hall, before entering her own. A soft light was left on. If her mother was awake, she didn’t stir, so that left Claire trying to figure out how she was going to handle her predicament.

The wind sounded like a train passing a cheap hotel at seventy miles per hour, until she fell asleep. Still, wheels continued to clack over rails throughout the night, like
a locomotive barreling around corners; but it was a screech and whistle that finally jarred Claire awake.

Claire turned over on the mattress for her fiftieth time, but saw something at the edge of her bed that startled her. It was like a bizarre scene from a scary movie—her mom sitting up, unmoving like a statue, eyes focused on the door.

The train whistle sounded again. As Claire’s sleep-fog lifted from her mind, she realized it was actually the long screech of a high-pitched scream.

“Well?” Claire was waiting to find out what her mother thought about it. “Are we going to take a flashlight to a slash fight?”

“Honey, you have turned into a rather talented poet.” Zo got up and reached under a pillow. “No, I think we should take this cute little .22 automatic with hollow point long rifle bullets, ’cause you still don’t believe in ghosts, right?”

“I didn’t say that…”