Drowning in Amber (A Marie Jenner Mystery Book 2) (2 page)

I put the phone away and picked up my pace. I had to get to the Holy Trinity Church, find the dead guy—who I now knew was called Brown Eddie—and convince him to tell me, clearly and without a doubt, who had killed him, so I’d have good news to take back to James.

Technically, things like “who killed you” didn’t matter when it came to moving a ghost to the next plane of existence, but it would help Honoria, and that would help the Jimmy Lavall Detective Agency, which would in turn help me.

All right, so I wasn’t going to see the ghost for any altruistic reason. I was doing it for a paycheque. My mom would have never done anything like that. She saw our gift as a calling, not a career. But I wanted a career.

Forget career—I wanted a life. And not the same as my mother’s, that’s for sure. All that gift gave her was a broken marriage, screwed-up kids, and cancer.

Okay, so maybe it didn’t give her cancer, but it sure gave her the rest. Why would I want that? Why would I ever willingly accept that as a viable life choice? It never paid. It’s not like I could invoice ghosts. Could I?

No. Trust me. I couldn’t.

Now, I didn’t feel particularly good about trying to get information from this Brown Eddie guy without offering to help move him on to the next plane of existence, but I’d decided I wasn’t going to volunteer. I was still exhausted—and dehydrated—from the last ghost I’d moved on. If Eddie didn’t ask for help, he’d just have to find his own way.

Usually, they move on without help
, I told myself as I trudged down the street toward the church where the dead guy had been killed. Usually.

But not always. Sometimes they needed help from people like my mother. Like me. So if Eddie asked, I’d probably feel compelled to help, which was just about the last thing I wanted to do.

It wasn’t just because I didn’t want to interact with ghosts anymore, though that was a big part of it. It was because I’d have to lie to James Lavall about any and all information Eddie gave me. You see, he didn’t know a thing about my ghost-seeing abilities, and that’s the way it had to stay.

For about a second, I wished I could just come clean to James about being able to interact with ghosts. It would have made it all so much easier. But I knew I wasn’t going to do that. Normal people like James don’t want to know about this kind of stuff. They live on the surface of the world. And they always—always—think that people who live any deeper are crazy.

Just ask my dad.

Thinking about the way he’d treated my mother girded my loins, so to speak. Nope. James didn’t need to know about the ghost. James just had to be massively impressed when I walked in with all the answers, solved the case, and brought in a quick—and real—paycheque for both of us.

I hoped.

I HAD TO
push through a large crowd to get to the big tree in the dusty front yard of the Holy Trinity Church. Nothing draws the crowds like death, I guess. I couldn’t really see anything until I got to the yellow police tape draped around the tree. Then I saw the blood.

The front of the tree looked as though it had been drenched in it. Two branches, reaching out from the trunk about four feet up, looked as though they had been attacked with an axe. I felt sick and turned away, nearly stepping on a frighteningly skinny woman about my age, squatting in the grass by the yellow tape. She was trying to light a candle that she’d set by a grocery store bouquet of white daisies.

“Watch it,” she said, without looking up. She sounded exhausted, as the lighter in her hand spewed hugely ineffectual sparks all around the candle and the daisies. She rubbed her eyes distractedly, smearing her mascara. “I can’t make the stupid thing light.”

“Want me to try?”

She stared at me for a second, then handed me the lighter. It took a couple of tries, then the candle was lit, and I handed it back to her. “Thanks,” she said.

“You knew Brown Eddie?” I asked. “The guy who died?”

“He didn’t like being called that.” Her eyes narrowed, and she clutched her purse. “You a reporter or something?”

“No. I work for a detective agency,” I said. “And I want to help. What was his name?”

I will never know why she told me, but she did. Her bottom lip quivered, and she turned back to the tree. “His name is—was—Hansen. Eddie Hansen.”

“Thank you.” I turned, but her voice brought me up short.

“I wish I could be the one to tell his mother what happened to him,” she whispered. “She needs to know.”

“The police will do that,” I said.

“Yeah,” she said, and shook her head. “But I’d like to be the one to look her in the eye and say, ‘You did this to Eddie, you bitch.’”

Her mouth pulled into a thin, tight line in her pocked face. I didn’t know what to say, but for once did the smart thing and kept my mouth shut.

“If she’d only let him back home, maybe none of this would have happened.” Her lips quivered. “I mean, she lived in the city and everything. And he was only a kid.”

She turned toward me as though she was going to say more, then her eyes iced, and she shook her head. “I shouldn’t be talking to you. I don’t even know who you are.”

Before I could speak, she turned on her heel and walked away, letting me know without a shadow of a doubt that our interview was over.

So I looked around the rest of the church yard for a dead guy named Eddie Hansen. What I found was nothing. Absolutely nothing.

I kept looking at the tree as I searched in vain for the ghost. He should have been here. The violence to that tree told me he’d have questions—a boatload of them was my guess—before he made his decision and moved on. So, where was he?

Nowhere I could see.

I left the churchyard and headed back to the office, not completely depressed, but close. I had Eddie’s last name and knew that his mother lived in the city. Somewhere.

I hoped I could turn those bits of information into something concrete before James and I had our meeting with Honoria Lowe, our almost client, since I had no idea where Dead Eddie Hansen was, and my hour was up.

Darn it anyhow.

I WASN’T FEELING
fantastic as I walked back to Dead Uncle Jimmy’s office, where James Lavall was waiting for me. I was supposed to be bringing back all sorts of information that would help us quickly wind up the case I’d taken.

However, Dead Eddie hadn’t been where he should have been, which was close to his place of death.

Typical. Never a ghost around when you really need one.

I briefly wondered if he’d moved on to the next plane of existence all on his own. It was unusual, but not out of the question. The big problem was, if he’d moved on, I’d have to actually do some detective work if I wanted to figure out who killed him. Since I had no idea how to do that, Honoria Lowe would probably have to find someone else to save her from the police. Which meant no paycheque for us.

James was sitting at his dead uncle’s desk, reading a book, with a pizza box and two cans of soda sitting in front of him. He looked up and smiled as I walked in, gesturing at the pizza box, which I could see had been opened.

“Want some?”

“Thanks,” I said. I was starving, and the cooling cheese and pepperoni smelled divine.

He handed me the unopened can of soda, then leaned back, watching me as I mashed the slice into my mouth. I realized I was not being very ladylike and tried to slow down, but my starving stomach said no-go to that idea, and I swallowed and rammed more in, grinning at him.

“Just a teeny bit hungry,” I said. I was going to get embarrassed, which would have made me say something mean, I’m sure, but he shrugged.

“I was starving, too. When was the last time we had a decent meal?”

“I don’t remember,” I mumbled.

“Neither do I,” he said. “Things got a little exciting. Couldn’t seem to work it in.”

“Yeah.” I sipped the soda and took another big bite of the pizza, sighing deeply. It felt like a little bit of heaven, and James was good enough to let me finish eating before he grilled me.

“So, tell me about this meeting we are supposed to have,” he said, as I swallowed my last bite.

“Yes,” I said. “The meeting.”

“Yes,” he replied, and smiled at me encouragingly. He sounded nothing like the angry man I’d spoken to an hour before. “Tell me all about it.”

“Did you take a painkiller?” I asked.

“Yep.” He grinned even more broadly. “Those are good pills.”

Ah. Drugged. Explained just about everything.

“Okay, the meeting. Honoria Lowe is the cousin of one of your Dead Uncle Jimmy’s old clients.”

“Don’t call him that,” James said.

“Sorry.” I shrugged, and continued, “She wants us to help her cousin Honoria prove she had nothing to do with the death of Eddie. I thought I’d gather some intel while you were asleep—”

“Intel?” He snickered.

“Yeah,” I said, bristling. “I can gather intel as well as anyone else. Can’t I?”

“Yes,” he said, and luckily for him, the snickering subsided. “You’re actually quite good at it. Were you successful?”

I thought about not finding Eddie and shook my head. “Not really. I figured out the dead guy’s name. Eddie Hansen—”

“I knew that, too. It was announced on TV just before you got back.”

Of course it was. Which meant Eddie’s next of kin had been informed. “All right, fine,” I sighed. “I met one of his friends, but she didn’t give me much more than his name. Not yet.”

“In other words, we have nothing.”

“Not right now.”

“So we should probably tell this Honoria person we can’t take the case,” he said.

“It’s a job, James.” The words rushed out of me before I could stop them. “I don’t know about you, but I could use some extra cash, even if it is only for a couple of days’ work. At the very least, let’s talk to her. If she can give us some clues, maybe we can figure out who killed Eddie and get her off the hook.”

“Clues. Intel.” He grinned again and walked slowly over to the door. “You’re starting to sound like a detective, or something.”

I tried to grin back. “I’m just the secretary,” I said.

“Like fun you are,” he replied. Then he leaned heavily against the door jamb and thought.

“All right,” he finally said. “We’ll talk to her. Maybe there’s a way we can help her prove to the police she wasn’t involved.”

“Thanks,” I whispered.

“But if she doesn’t give us any good ‘clues’”—and he grinned again—“then we’ll send her on her way. Right?”

“Right,” I said.

I wondered why the cops saw her as a potential suspect. Then I shuddered, remembering all the blood around that tree. What if she actually was the one who killed Eddie Hansen? And what if we figured it out?

“Would she still pay us?” I muttered.

“What did you say?” James asked.

“Nothing,” I said. “I didn’t say anything.”

HONORIA LOWE CAME
to the office at two o’clock on the dot.

I was sitting behind my desk in the reception area, trying to look busy. James was back in his dead uncle’s office, doing whatever.

Honoria walked into the room so quietly I did a double take. She could have been one of the dead. Even her footsteps were silent. She stood, staring at the top of my desk.

“My name is Honoria,” she finally said. “Honoria Lowe.”

Then she smiled and literally lit up the room. I could have worked up a big case of “I hate you” right there, if she hadn’t also looked like she’d been psychically beaten to a bloody pulp. I’ve never seen anyone who looked so haunted in my whole life.

And I see ghosts, for heaven’s sake.

“You mentioned on the phone that you’re having trouble with the police. What’s going on?” I asked.

Honoria frowned. “I thought I was supposed to have a meeting with the owner. James Lavall.”

She was making it much easier for me to hate her.

“Yes, you’re absolutely right. My apologies.”

She didn’t acknowledge my existence after that. Nice. She didn’t want to talk to the hired help, obviously. I pushed myself out of my chair and walked to the closed door of the inner office. James could deal with her.

I knocked twice, then stuck my head into the office. “She’s here.”

James looked up from the book he was reading and closed it softly. I didn’t understand his fascination with books. They just made my head hurt. “I’m ready,” he said. “Send her in.”

Honoria smoothly walked past me and up to James’s desk. “Honoria Lowe,” she said, and held her hand out to him. “My cousin says good things about this agency.”

Her cousin knew James’s Uncle Jimmy. James’s very recently dead Uncle Jimmy. The actual private investigator. I hoped Honoria didn’t know about that. No need to worry her with our lack of expertise.

She sat in the chair opposite James’s, then stared at the top of his desk as though she’d been struck mute.