In the Air Tonight (3 page)

“I’m starting to think you want to get someone killed so you won’t be lonely.”

Confusion flickered across his deceptively sweet face. “I’m not lonely. I have you.”

“What about your mother?”

Wariness replaced the confusion. “What about her?”

“Is she still alive?”

It wasn’t very nice of me to sic Stafford on his mother, but seriously, why me?

“If she is,” I continued, “you could visit.”

I doubted this would work—Stafford seemed attached to the school and therefore he probably couldn’t leave to haunt—I mean “visit”—his mother. But I was desperate.

“If she isn’t, you could still visit.”

Once he was on the other side, I didn’t think he could come back. At least none of the other ghosts I’d convinced to go into the light ever had.

“Stafford?” His eyes met mine. “Your mother?”

He looked away and didn’t answer.

“How about your father?”

One of the fluorescent bulbs flickered.

“Stop that,” I said.

“You stop that,” he returned.

I had to bite my lip to keep myself from continuing the childish exchange. “I just want you to—”

The ghost child disappeared.

“Come back here!”

All the lights in the room went out. I didn’t bother to check the fuse or the switch. Been there, done that. The only way they would go back on was if Stafford wanted them to. Which was usually after I’d called Mr. Jorgenson, head of maintenance—i.e., the janitor. He would arrive to investigate thirty seconds after all the lights went back on. Then he would point out that every bulb was fully functioning and shake his head at the foolish female who’d probably neglected to flip the switch in the first place. As he was unable to hear Stafford’s laughter, I could hardly blame him.

I gathered my things and left. On the street, I glanced back. Every light in my room blazed, throwing Stafford’s shape into stark relief beyond the window. Another one of his tricks. I could count on a note in my mailbox tomorrow from the principal admonishing me about wasting energy.

Stafford waved. I gave up and waved back.

I could have avoided the crime scene on the way home. New Bergin was small but not so small there wasn’t an alternate route. However, I felt drawn there. Though I didn’t want to see the dead woman again, I probably would. Ghosts revealed themselves to me for a reason, and until I knew that reason, she might turn up anywhere. There was no avoiding it, or her.

Yellow tape cordoned off the alleyway where she had died. The body was gone, but the asphalt still sported bloodstains and burn marks. I wasn’t sure how they’d make those disappear beyond repaving the street. Until the murder was solved that was probably off the table.

I was surprised there weren’t a few stragglers ogling the crime scene. Horrific as the murder was, it was the most excitement we’d seen in New Bergin since a deer had jumped through the front window of the Norseman Caf
é
during rut. He’d trashed the place pretty good before he’d rammed his rack into the drywall.

The sun was falling fast; the Indian summer warmth would disappear as quickly as Stafford had. The idea of standing on a dinnertime deserted street in the approaching twilight and coming face-to-face again with that ink-eyed specter had me hurrying in the direction of my apartment at the same pace I’d left it that morning.

Inside I slipped into my favorite yoga pants and a ratty tank top then studied the finger-shaped bruises on my arm. I was rarely without a bruise of some kind—shin, hip, thigh, chin—kids were rough.

I opened the medicine cabinet and took out the arnica cream. People could label the concoction hippy-dippy all they wanted, but it was the only thing I’d ever found that helped the bruises fade more quickly.

After squirting some onto my arm, I rubbed until the ointment disappeared. The marks still tingled like frozen toes immersed in warm water.

I watched television for a few hours. A day spent with children turned my brain to oatmeal and until I had some distance, I’d be no good for anything. Eventually I popped the cork on a new bottle of cabernet and took both it and the glass to my kitchen table where I proceeded to correct papers.

“You must run.”

In the act of reaching for my wine, the voice nearly made me knock it over. My Puritan hugged the shadows of the living room. He had an accent—Irish? Scottish?—something with a brogue.

“I … uh … What?”

Not only had he never spoken, but he’d never come so close. At this range I could see he was nearer to my age than I’d thought—mid-twenties perhaps—and handsome despite the prudish, black clothes.

“Now, dear girl.”

I glanced at my cell phone, which had been sitting on the table next to my papers, and it flew onto the floor then skidded toward the front door.

I stood. “Was that really necess—”

My Puritan disappeared.

Something moved within my darkened bedroom, and I took a step in that direction.

“Hey,” I began.

The figure started toward me. Though I couldn’t see a face, or even get a sense of male or female amid the swirling shadows, the meat cleaver was unmistakable. I threw open the door and tore down the stairs. “Help!”

Unfortunately it was ten
P.M.
In New Bergin. Everyone was safe at home, probably already asleep.

I was so dead.

I sprinted into the street, ignoring the chill of the pavement against my bare feet. Where I was going, I had no idea. The police department lay on the other side of town. Not that the town was that big, but it was dark. No streetlights. No need. No one drove around at this time of night, and if they did there was a lovely invention called headlights.

For an instant I believed my thoughts—or my wishes, hopes, and prayers—had conjured some. Then the car that was moving too fast for First Street hit the brakes and screeched to a halt about a foot from my knees. A man jumped out.

Talk about wishes, hopes, and prayers. He was the answer to all three.

Fury brightened his blue gaze. “Are you crazy?”

Despite the color of his eyes, he wasn’t from around here. The Southern accent would have given him away even if I’d been too blind to register the deeper than sun-kissed shade of his skin.

“I … No.”

Maybe,
my brain corrected.

I pointed where I’d been, cringing when I realized the knife-wielding maniac could have caught up to me by now, but we were alone.

“There was someone in my apartment. With a meat clever.”

I expected him to laugh and ask if I was high instead of crazy. Instead, those brilliant eyes hardened. “Get in the car.” He reached inside and came out with a gun. “Lock the doors.”

While I stood there gaping, he hurried toward my apartment. I glanced back and forth, torn between following him and doing as he’d ordered. Then the wind picked up, making the autumn leaves rattle like bones. The headlights blared down the street, creating shadows at the end that might be a dog, a cat, a murderer, or just shadows.

I got in the car.

*   *   *

Bobby climbed the steps to the second-story apartment. The door loomed open. No meat-cleaver-wielding maniac burst out. But there was still time.

On the landing he leaned right and left, able to see nearly the entire living area and kitchen through the open door. Both were empty.

“Police,” he announced, and stepped inside. “Show yourself.”

Nothing moved but the papers on the table, which ruffled in the breeze through the door. A few had drifted onto the floor next to a cell phone, which the woman must have dropped when she ran. A cell phone would have been a good item to take along, but people did strange things when they were frightened.

The papers appeared to be homework for the very young and proved an intriguing contrast to the nearly full glass of wine glistening like rubies in the lamplight.

On one side of the sheet were three fish, four cats, two bicycles, and so on. The other side listed the numbers. Wavy crayon lines connected the numbers to the pictures.

Bobby tilted his head, narrowed his eyes. Looked like Jacob needed some special help as he’d connected the cats to the three and the fish had been counted as two.

“Focus.” The meat-cleaver maniac might still be through door number one or door number two.

The first loomed open on a shadowy bedroom. He flicked on the light, peeked behind the door, under the bed, in the closet. Nothing but brightly colored, casual clothes and more dust than she probably wanted anyone to see.

He backed out, flicked the next doorknob, and sent the closed door flying open.

Bathroom. Empty.

He lowered his weapon, stepped to the room’s single window—painted shut—and glanced out. A dense forest began not more than fifty yards from the back of the building.

Bobby considered holstering the gun and didn’t. Forests gave him the twitchies. Pretty much anything could be in there.

New Orleans had swamps—thick ones, with dripping Spanish moss and lots of alligators. Creepy in their own way, but also familiar. Bobby knew how to search a swamp. But a forest?

Not a clue.

He returned to the street. His car still sat in the center, the shadow of the woman shifted inside. Oddly no one had come out to see what was going on—as if shrieking women and cars idling in the middle of the road were commonplace. Then again, had she shrieked? Maybe not.

He crossed to the car, flicked his finger, indicating she should get out. Instead, she lowered the window a few inches. “Did you see anything?”

“No.”

She frowned. “Nothing?”

“Was it a he? She?”

“Yes,” she answered. “Definitely a he. Or a she.”

Bobby’s lips twitched. He shouldn’t be amused, but he was. “They didn’t trash the place, unless you call knocking your phone on the floor along with a few of the ‘One fish, blue fish’ papers a mess.”

She lifted dark brows toward hair as black as his own. The contrast of that ebony hair and milky skin made him think of Snow White. Too bad he wasn’t any kind of prince.

Foolish thoughts. What was wrong with him? Probably nothing more than his having had no dates in the last year combined with the enticing sway of her ample breasts loose beneath that ancient tank top. Any man would want to be her prince the instant he saw breasts like that.

“Who are you?” she asked, her gaze on the gun in his hand.

He slid his weapon into the shoulder holster. “Bobby Doucet. I’m a detective with the New Orleans PD.”

“You’re a long way from New Orleans.”

His gaze touched the trees again. “Don’t I know it?”

“Why?”

As now was not the time for that explanation, he ignored the question. “I didn’t find anyone in the apartment, Miss…”

“Larsen,” she said. “Raye Larsen.”

“The intruder could have come down the stairs on your heels, then hoofed it into the woods at the sight of my car.”

“Maybe.”

“The other option is that no one was there in the first place. Take your pick.”

A police cruiser, lights flashing, slid to a stop behind Bobby’s car. Apparently someone had noticed its presence after all and called 911. Or maybe the night watch had finally gotten back to this street. It wasn’t as if there were that many streets to keep track of.

A sinewy fellow with tufts of white hair above his ears and none anywhere else stepped out. “What’s goin’ on here?”

“Chief!” Miss Larsen hit the locks and nearly smacked Bobby in the chest as she opened the car door. She was taller than he’d first thought, at least five seven in bare feet.

“Raye, what are you doin’ out here?” He turned his scowl on Bobby. “Who are you?”

“Detective Bobby Doucet. Chief Johnson?”

The man nodded.

“I think you’re expecting me.”

“Not in the middle of the night,” Johnson grumbled.

Bobby cast a glance at the numbers displayed on his dashboard. Since when was ten o’clock the middle of anything? In New Orleans ten was barely the beginning.

“Miss Larsen requested my assistance.”

The chief’s scowl deepened. “What kind of assistance?”

“I saw someone lurking around the crime scene,” she blurted.

Bobby opened his mouth, then shut it again. What the—

Johnson’s eyes moved to Raye’s face, studiously avoiding parts lower than her chin. “Who?”

She shrugged.

“And then?”

“The detective arrived, and I flagged him down to tell him.”

“You saw a strange man in a strange car and thought he could help you with the stranger?”

She nodded.

Bobby wasn’t sure what to do. She was lying. Then again, he’d found no meat-cleaver-wielding maniac in her apartment, nor any sign of one. Perhaps she’d decided she’d had a vivid dream while drunk paper correcting and just wanted it all to go away. He could relate.

“Was there anyone there?” the chief asked.

“No,” she answered. “Must have been a shadow.”

Johnson grunted. He wasn’t convinced. But what could he do beyond calling the woman a liar, and why would she lie about something so pointless? Bobby couldn’t wait to find out.

“You have a place to stay, Detective?”

“Just point me to the nearest hotel.”

“Forty miles that way.” Raye’s finger indicated the direction he’d just arrived from. Come to think of it, the only hotel he’d seen between here and the Dane County Regional Airport had given him
Psycho
flashbacks.

“There’s no hotel in town?”

“We don’t need one,” she said. “Visitors stay with the relatives they came to visit.”

“That’s…” He wasn’t sure what it was. Obviously not impossible.

“There’s a bed-and-breakfast,” the chief said. “You want to run him over to your dad’s place, Raye?” Johnson lifted his eyebrows. “After you put on some clothes. If he sees you walking around like that he’ll have a stroke.”

If her attire was stroke inducing she better hope her father never came to New Orleans. Bobby didn’t think he’d seen a bra—unless it was worn without a shirt—on Bourbon Street in years.

The chief paused with one foot inside his cruiser. “Let’s meet at my office in the morning, Detective, and I’ll bring you up to speed. Say seven?” The chief didn’t wait for an answer, just climbed into his car, pulled around Bobby’s and away.