Minerva's Ghost (15 page)
Authors: Danielle Elise Girard
“You bet,” Heidi said, confident as always. “What’s your ETA?”
“Fifteen minutes, max,” Gabe replied.
“See you in a few,” Heidi said and hung up.
Everyone was converging on the hospital. Gena skidded into the parking lot, just as Gabe and Amanda arrived in Minnie’s Cadillac and parked in regular parking. Michael’s truck was parked nearby. Martha came just after them. An ambulance carrying Tom parked at the emergency drive blocked by Gena’s car. Scooby, Reese and Heidi all came in following their various assignments.
Gabe and Amanda stopped at an examining room when they spotted Allison hovering over the limp body of Michael awkwardly hanging off both ends of a gurney. Allison held his head and patted him lovingly.
Gabe said, “I thought you were the one who was hurt. What happened to Michael?”
“He fainted when the doctor told him I’m pregnant.” Allison told them. “We’re married and she just assumed he knew.”
“Most people would,” Amanda said mildly, but her voice was full of warmth. “Congratulations, cousin.” She had a new bit of family she actually liked. She was really thrilled.
“Thanks,” Allison said with a mischievous smile. “Michael will be fine. He just hates rubbers. I don’t know what he thought would happen, but we’re going to be parents whether he’s ready or not.”
Down the hall a resounding screech made them all cover their ears.
Gena was staging the scene to end all scenes in the ER while hospital orderlies tried to restrain her.
“My babies, my babies,” she screamed. “A doctor tried to slip by to one side of her and she grabbed him by his doctor coat and screamed in his face, “You have to help them! I have work for them to do still.”
Orderlies got on either side of her and wrestled her in to an examining room. She still dragged the doctor and he agilely twisted out of his coat and left it in her grasp. A hospital security officer trailed the three and told Gena, “Either you restrain yourself or I’ll have you in a strait jacket and jailed before you know what happened.”
Gena believed him and stopped screaming. “What about my boys? You have to tell me.”
“We don’t have any kids here at the moment,” he told her.
“My boys…Rory and Pete Godwin. My other son said they were in a car wreck.” She panted in an agony of worry and anxiety, like an old dog that had run too far in the heat.
“They’re the car wreck?” the guard asked. Now he knew what she was asking about. “Wait here. I’ll get the doctor.”
Forced to wait, Gena buried her face in her hands and sobbed.
Martha found her there and offered to wait with her.
The orderlies were pleased to leave the women alone.
When Martha closed the door, she walked to Gena and whispered, “You can’t tell them anything. It would implicate both of us.”
Before Gena had a chance to reply there was a perfunctory knock on the door and an ER doctor, a woman entered the room. “Which one of you is the mother?” she asked.
“I am,” Gena gasped.
“The heavier one…” she started,
“Rory, “ Gena said.
“Rory broke his right arm. Both of them have second degree burns and bruises. The other one, Pete I believe, has been shot in the knee and has second degree burns on his face. The police are talking to him. He says he saw a ghost…someone named Minnie. The police want to talk with you, too. They’re waiting in the hall. ”
Gena stared toward the doctor, but was seeing Minnie hovering in the air behind the doctor against the hospital green wall.
“Minnie says we have to tell what we’ve done,” she said. “How can she be here? Rory and Pete killed her just like we told them to do.”
Martha couldn’t believe it. Not only had the silly twit implicated her children and her self, she had implicated Martha, too.
Martha picked up her big purse off the floor and stood up. “Since the boys are OK, I really must leave you, Gena.” She edged toward the door as the doctor watched in what looked like beady-eyed glee. She opened the purse as she reached for the doorknob. “If you’ll excuse me…”
She slipped into the hallway into chaos. Gabe and Amanda were there along with several tough looking individuals who were armed. Heather stood to one side, but ran to her as soon as she spotted her. “Oh, Darling, your father has been brought in with a stroke. The police want to question both of us.”
Martha was fed up with hearing it. “I know nothing about that old fart and care less. He was never a father to me. He owes me and he’s going to do what I tell him for his own reasons. I won’t give up this close to what I’ve spent years working for.” She looked at Heather and said, “We need to leave…NOW. “ and pulled a big six shooter out of her voluminous purse and aimed it at the group surrounding her and Heather.
Heather watched in appalled fascination. She, ever the realist, knew it was over. If she was going to lose everything there was just one thing she wanted to do before she was arrested. She reached for her little purse and pulled out a small automatic. She pointed it at Rory and fired before anyone could stop her. She got him right between the eyes and he was dead and gone before he fell back on the gurney.
The police and hospital personnel had seen it before, but most of the rest of the observers were shocked. No on expected anyone to commit murder in front of 20 witnesses.
“Oh, Heather, are you mad? We can never be together, now. I’m not confessing to anything. Your parents must have been first cousins to give birth to such a weak headed bunch,” Martha said in a coarse whisper.
Everyone heard her. Gabe and Amanda looked at each other in shock. It was wild and getting wilder by the minute. The police were listening. Pete watched from his gurney. Michael was back on his feet and he and Allison clung to each other. Gabe’s people were there. Hospital personnel tried to go about their duties without missing anything, spectators at a sporting event.
“Minnie’s going to have her way in this, “ Pete shouted. “She told us she would. This is all your fault, Martha!”
“Minnie isn’t here!” Martha screamed, irritated past caution. “She’s dead. She died in a car accident. There’s no such thing as GHOSTS, damn it.”
“Well then, who’s holding your gun?” Pete asked.
Martha stared in shock, only just realizing that somehow the big revolver she thought she held was floating in the air and pointed directly at her. Floating directly behind it was the golden image of her nemesis and former employer, Minnie Godwin.
Minnie said, and they ALL heard her, “I expected more of you after I hired you as a favor to Tom. You need to learn to seek harmony in your life, my dear girl.”
Martha’s eyes rolled back in her head and she fainted. It took days for the police to finish questioning everyone. By the time they were done they were glad to stop taking confessions.
Amanda and Michael pressed charges against everyone except Tom and Justin, both of whom were dupes chasing false hopes. The wheels of justice turned with their usual inefficiency, but Minnie had sewed up the whole bunch in a gift package for the police. Not even the Miranda warning could keep them quiet. A couple of their lawyers tried insanity pleas but they didn’t fly either. Heather was found guilty of conspiracy and accessory to Minnie’s murder, but innocent for Rory. She said he had sexually abused her as a child, and Pete supported her story in a delayed attack of character. Jail doors slammed shut on the whole bunch eventually and the whole county seemed safer.
After word
Doris could plan beautiful weddings. Amanda and Gabe’s was outside at Minnie’s house. Michael gave her away, Allison was the bride’s attendant, Scooby was best man and everyone partied. Amanda actually felt she had a family. After years of feeling she and Minnie were alone in the world, she had finally found people who would come through for her. It gave her a feeling of security she had never had before.
The police found the missing money in a joint bank account belonging to Martha and Heather. Ben Foster found paint from Pete’s car on Minnie’s truck, implicating the boys even further than Pete’s confession. Within a year Moon Godwin went sober. Michael and Allison had a girl they named Minerva. Amanda and Gabe had a son they named Gabe, Jr. In the next ten years or so they produced three more children, two girls and another boy. Aaron married his young girlfriend after he had a heart attack and realized he needed someone to take care of him. The jailed crowd got old and tired and gave up plotting, conceding sadly that they were not good at it. Who knew how many good witches there were out there to haunt the wrong doers?
The business never replaced either Justin or Martha. Amanda gave Doris the additional task of making sure they met federal hiring guidelines, Gabe watched after accounting controls and everyone lived happily ever after.
Ben Foster offered to drive the Caddy to the airport in Atlanta for the newlywed’s honeymoon trip. On the drive to the airport Ben showed Gabe and Amanda what the nitrous oxide fuel injection system (Minnie’s secret weapon) on the Caddy could do. The speeding ticket cost them $3,000 and Ben’s driver’s license. Minnie laughed delightedly and Ben said it was worth it, even if he did have to leave the caddy parked at the airport and take a bus back to Alabama.
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Minerva’s Ghost
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