The First Ghost Read online

  “Cut it out. You’ll wake the dead.” This made me giggle. “Okay, maybe not, but you’ll piss off Mother. If you keep barking at ghosts, you can’t go to work with me anymore.”

  I set the coffeepot to brewing and went for my own shower.

  * * * *

  Biddle’s place was barricaded off with yellow crime-scene tape. True to Fierro’s prediction, neighbors had already gathered. Two news vans were ensconced across the street. The cameramen looked bored, stuffing their faces with breakfast sandwiches and checking watches.

  “Isn’t this exciting?” said Mrs. Peeples. She hadn’t bothered to take the pink sponge rollers out of her hair, but she had powdered her face. “I always knew Old Man Biddle was a dangerous criminal.”

  The CSSU folks stood around in black Windbreakers and sensible shoes. Tessler ducked under the yellow line to meet me by the street. “Fierro says you talked the niece into signing the consent for us. We appreciate that.” He steered me away from the crowd by my elbow.

  “Glad I could help. I hope you find all the women.”

  He shifted his gum to the other side of his mouth. “You mean both women, right? The two wives?”

  “There were rumors about something more, girlfriends. I thought there might be more bodies. Like...um...five of them.”

  “Really.” He stared hard at me. “Interesting. We’ll see what we see, I guess. Fierro’s in the house.”

  “Could you guys use some coffee? I don’t mind making a run.”

  “That would be great. Fierro was out late last night. Must have been with his lady friend.” He nudged me with his elbow.

  “Lady friend?”

  Tessler shifted feet. “Thought you maybe knew her or something.”

  I shook my head. “No, but...but I’m glad for him.” I felt a little sick.

  “Yeah, he met someone recently. They’ve been going out. It’s about damn time, too. It’s the first time he’s paid attention to a woman since Gracie died.”

  Of course Fierro had a girlfriend. Fierro and I were more like brother and sister anyway.

  Like family.

  Totally platonic.

  Kissing him would have felt wrong.

  This was good.

  I made excuses and left to get coffee. I wasn’t disappointed. Not at all. Why hadn’t he mentioned it to me?

  Stupid men.

  I found things to do before I headed back to Biddle’s place. Finally, I pulled up with Styrofoam cups in a cardboard cup holder.

  Fierro was standing out front. I held up the coffee and his face brightened. He waved me under the tape. “Man, am I glad to see you,” he said, taking one of the cups. “Tessler said you were going for coffee, but that was like an hour ago.”

  “Yeah, I was busy. Any luck yet?”

  “Nada. We haven’t found squat. Tessler is arguing with the lieutenant about getting geo equipment to check the grounds, but that’s pretty expensive. I don’t think we’ll get a lot more time.” He took a sip of the coffee. “Hey, cream but no sugar. Good call.”

  I smiled weakly. Of course I knew how he liked his coffee.

  “Man, that place is nasty.” Tessler came across the yard, hitching up his belt. “Coffee! My angel. Lou says it’s a no-go with getting any equipment out here. We’ve got two hours tops. Then he wants CSSU outta here.”

  Fierro nodded. “Better let them know the clock is ticking.”

  Tessler hesitated for a moment. “Sure.” He glanced from me to Fierro. “Sure. I’ll do that.” He raised a questioning eyebrow, but left us.

  Fierro pulled me over to the side and lowered his voice. “Can you give me anything more to go on here? Anything at all?”

  I closed my eyes, trying to recall my conversations with Biddle. “He admitted to five women and he said they were here. That’s all I know. There aren’t any spirits here for me to ask. I’m pretty limited. No Hephzibah, either.”

  “That’s Death, right?”

  “Yeah, but she’s not here. I never thought to ask her for help in this.”

  “So maybe Biddle was lying.”

  “He could be, but I thought he was serious. I’m sorry. This looks bad on you, but it’s all my fault.”

  “Naw, we’ve been trying to get in to search this place for ages. Lou isn’t pissed at me. He just doesn’t want it to cost a lot. But I’ve got one more card to play. I’m not ready to pack it in yet.” He took a long drink of the coffee. “That’s good stuff.”

  “So--” I kept my voice casual. “Tell me about your girlfriend.”

  “My who?” His face was puzzled. I told him what Tessler had said.

  “Oh.” He looked away. “Vic misunderstood.”

  “He seemed pretty sure.”

  Fierro sighed. “Look, I told him that ’cause he kept wanting to know where I had been. I couldn’t very well say I was my checking on my psychic friend, so I tried to give him something vague. He’s built this up in his head.”

  “So no girlfriend?”

  He drained the last of his coffee and crumpled up the cup. “No girlfriend.” He tossed it at the trash can, but the wind blew it to the side. He sighed and picked it up. “There’s my ace up the sleeve right now.”

  Ellie’s Suburban pulled in behind my car. Two more black SUVs pulled in behind her with heavily tinted windows and PIU logos on the doors. Four people bailed out of the darkened vehicles, all in matching black.

  Tessler started over, but Fierro flagged him down. “It’s okay,” Fierro called. “I asked them to be here.”

  Ellie waved cheerily. Tessler whirled back to us. “You invited her?”

  “And her whole team. Yes, I did. If there is ever a place for the Psychic Investigators Unit, this is it. I’ve promised them access. Lou knows about it.”

  Tessler’s mouth hung open. “You called in psychics? You?”

  Ellie ducked under the tape, followed by a woman with some sort of handheld device taking readings of God knows what. Two cameras tracked their every move.

  “You agreed to this?” I recoiled from the camera trained on me. Ellie put a hand on the cameraman’s shoulder.

  “Give it a rest for a minute. How about some establishing shots before we go in? Set the mood a bit while I talk to them.” He wandered away. She shook hands all around and introduced herself like everyone didn’t know her.

  “Do you know how Mother is going to react if she sees me in any of these shots? Is this for your show?”

  “A special,” Ellie confirmed. “I can try to keep you out of it. Or you can go.”

  “I was hoping you would stick around,” Fierro said to me.

  “Is she psychic too?” Tessler glared.

  Ack ! “Of course not, but I can help her.” I rubbed my forehead. “I’ll stay.” Mother would flip, and there would be hell to pay when Aunt Bella got back from Europe. Mother would blame her for giving birth to Eleanor. “Don’t worry about the filming. I’ll deal with it, Ellie.”

  “Good. You’re coming inside with me? In case I need help?”

  I glanced over at Tessler, who was studying me carefully, his eyes narrowed.

  “Sure,” I said. “I’ll do what I can.”

  We had the full attention of the CSSU folks. They congregated around the edges, muttering and laughing to themselves.

  Ellie barked something and her cameraman scampered back. We proceeded inside. Ellie picked her way through the trash, wrinkling her nose as she stepped over the debris of Biddle’s existence. Her hands stayed in her pockets so that she didn’t touch things accidentally.

  Tessler rolled his eyes, but got an elbow in the ribs from Fierro and a hard look. He sulked and hung back.

  “Not much personal stuff here in the kitchen,” Ellie commented. The room reeked of stale burgers and fries with an underlying funk of urine and sweat that permeated the entire house. I was anxious to be out of that room myself.

  I pointed toward the stairs. “His bedroom is upstairs.” Tessler raised an eyebrow. “I had to
get a suit for him to be buried in.”

  Ellie looked at me. “Anything else I should know?” I shook my head. “Right, then. Upstairs.”

  Ellie was followed by her cameraman, then the two detectives, then me. It made the cluttered bedroom very crowded.

  “That’s his closet.” I pointed across the room.

  “What’s in there?” Ellie gestured to another closet next to the one I had found his clothes in.

  “I didn’t tour the place. I got his clothes and left.”

  “Would somebody open it?”

  Fierro snapped on gloves and opened it. It was stuffed to overflowing with crap. Just opening the door shifted things. A box started to slide. Fierro caught it and hefted it back into place.

  “Open both closets, if you please.”

  Fierro did. Ellie studied them both, arms crossed. “That hat. He wore that a lot.” She gestured to a worn Cubs ball cap.

  Tessler removed the hat and held it out. Ellie circled it slowly. “Set it on the bed.”

  Tessler sighed and tossed it onto the frayed bedcovers, earning him a glare from Fierro.

  She stared at it for a moment as if it might bite before cautiously making her way closer. She closed her eyes, taking deep, cleansing breaths in a great show of readiness, and then picked up the hat. For a moment, there was nothing.

  Then her eyes rolled back and her head lolled. She grunted a few times, rhythmically. “Stupid bitch.” Her head snapped back and forth. “Nobody leaves ... stupid ... make you sorry...” Her voice was vicious and low. A shiver ran down the base of my spine. I recognized the intonation. She sounded just like him. “Beg! Beg for it! Maybe I’ll let you live! Beg me!” Her face mottled red with rage. “Stupid, fucking cunt! Should’ve done it a long time ago... What the...burns... Oh, shit.” Ellie fell to the floor with a soft moan and was still.

  “Cripes, she’s passed out.” Tessler knelt beside her.

  “Just give her some air,” the cameraman pleaded.

  “Ellie? Ellie?” I cradled her head.

  Her eyes fluttered. “He killed her in here. On the bed. Oh,” she moaned. “He raped her and killed her. A woman with long dark hair. He strangled her. He made her beg for her life and loosened his grip like he was going to let her live. Then he tightened again.” Her eyes searched wildly. “He was playing with her. Oh my God. The hatred.”

  “It’s okay,” I said uneasily.

  “Something else happened to him,” she insisted. “I saw him die.”

  “He had a heart attack.” Fierro squatted on his heels next to me.

  “No, something ate him,” Ellie said. “It was big and smelly. It pierced him with its claws and sucked. It burned him from the inside out.”

  I felt faint myself. “That part doesn’t matter,” I whispered. “Old Man Biddle is gone. Really and completely gone.” We locked eyes.

  Tessler cleared his throat. “Are we done now?”

  Ellie struggled to sit up. “No, I saw women’s things crammed into that closet. Maybe I can get something that will help us figure out where they are.”

  “You sure?” Fierro helped her to her feet. “That was pretty intense.”

  “I got all of it,” the cameraman said with satisfaction. “It was fantastic. Really good stuff, Ellie.”

  Ellie smiled faintly. “I’m fine. It’s upsetting, but it doesn’t hurt.”

  Tessler peered in the closet. “I see some women’s clothes and a purse and...”

  “I’ll take the purse,” Ellie said. “The more personal the object, the better the reading. Purses are great. Women hold them close to their bodies and take them everywhere. Does it look worn?”

  “Yeah.” Tessler drew out a battered black leather bag. “I’d say it got a lot of use.”

  “Bed,” Ellie said.

  This time he laid it carefully on the bed. Ellie went through her prep routine. Finally, she kneeled by the bed and took the purse in both hands. She was instantly in the slack-jawed thrall of her gift. “I don’ wanna,” she said thickly, her words slurring. “Wanna sleep. Go ’way. No.” A soft sob. “Not again. Unh. Unh.” She shook her head back and forth, gagging as if choking. Her eyes bugged open. Her mouth worked soundlessly. When she drew air in, it was loud and harsh. “Oh my.” She spoke in her own voice. “Oh. My.”

  “Did you get something?” Fierro leaned in.

  “That woman was drugged. She didn’t know him. Biddle was a stranger to her. She was pretty confused, didn’t know what was happening. I think he kept her for a while.”

  We were silent, absorbing the implications. They had expected wives and I had expected girlfriends, but no one had been prepared for the notion that Biddle might have held unknown women prisoner in his home. I’d thought the story about the hooker was just another boast. I was suddenly very, very cold. I wanted out of there.

  I turned to go, but Ellie stilled me with a look. “Stay?” Her eyes pleaded her case. Finding out that the bogeyman of your childhood really was the bogeyman is deeply upsetting on a primal level. Just your friendly, neighborhood serial killer. How many times had we dared one another to ring his bell and run?

  I turned back.

  As the morning wore on, we had learned a great deal about Biddle and his house and the women who had lived and died there, but we were no closer to finding any physical evidence. Ellie would have one hell of a TV special, but that was about it.

  Defeated, we trouped down the stairs. The CSSU had run out of time and begun to pack things up. I paused at the bottom of the steps, and then it struck me.

  “I can’t believe I forgot that.” I smacked myself on the forehead. I could picture Biddle trying to lead me into the back room. “That room back there. We need to go there.” Four sets of expectant eyes stared, waiting for me to explain. “I just remembered that he spent a lot of time back there. In that room and the back porch. We need to go there, as well.”

  Fierro sighed. “You heard the lady.”

  Ellie shook her head, worn from the emotions. How many deaths had she lived that day? “Let’s start with the back porch. Now that you mention it, he spent a lot of time gardening.”

  “We’ve dug the back yard all to pieces,” Tessler said. “It looks like the moon with all them craters.”

  “What about the porch?” I asked.

  “Pulled up some boards. Nothing down there.”

  Ellie looked hard at me. “Can’t hurt. Let’s go out.” She strode resolutely to the back door and grasped the knob. It doesn’t matter how often I saw her do it. It always squicked me.

  Ellie’s eyes fluttered and rolled back until only the whites showed. “Heavy. The fucking bitch is so heavy... Too many of them under the tree...maybe I need to make the patio bigger...fucking cunt...ought to just burn it...I wonder...” Her eyes snapped open and gradually focused. “That’s it. He put them under that stand of pine trees when the trees were little. Then he put them around the edges of the pavement and poured more concrete. They’re under the slabs. He added those.”

  “Holy shit,” Tessler breathed. “You sure?”

  “’Course she’s sure.” Fierro rubbed his hands together. “She saw it. Hell, she lived it.”

  Tessler looked at the stand of trees in the back yard. “We’re gonna need to get the equipment back here to yank those out. That ain’t gonna be easy.”

  “What about the concrete slabs?” Fierro eyed them. They were about three feet by four feet slabs of concrete that lined the patio slab. They didn’t look any deeper than an inch. He was already out the back door and pulling at the edge. It came loose and lifted. He dropped it back down. “Get CSSU back out here. Let’s give it one more try.”

  I was sitting in the passenger seat of my car when my cell vibrated.

  “Where are you?” Mother demanded. “I need you here. The viewing has turned into a vigil, and it’s a little more complicated. I have to get over to First Baptist for the funeral.”

  I checked the time with a guilty start. “Sorry. I
got caught up in something. I’ll head in.” I slid across to the front of the hearse regretfully. I could call and check on things later.

  Chapter 21

  “There you are. It’s about time. Where have you been?” Mother had taken Billy to work with her. He trotted on her heels.

  I shrugged vaguely. She would know soon enough, but her pissed-off face made me hesitate to mention it now. Her hair looked like she’d been running her hands through it.

  She turned on her heel and stalked back into the sanctuary. Billy planted himself at my feet and watched her go. Boris only got four bars into My Blue Heaven.

  “Give it a rest!” Mother snapped.

  Harry brushed past me. “Lie low if you can. She’s wicked hung over. Got a pickup.” He vanished. Coward.

  I followed Mother into the chapel. The coffin was in front. I could see it was top-of-the-line mahogany with platinum handles, no expense spared. Enormous flower arrangements clogged every available space. The smell of lilies was cloying.

  “You knew we had a viewing today. You knew I needed help. I have a graveside in just two hours, and I can’t be two places at once.”

  “Chill, Mother. There’s plenty of time to get everything ready. Why are you so frantic?”

  She fussed over the cushions, rearranging them, stepping back and then doing it again. “No reason.”

  “Do I look all right?” A matronly, olive-skinned woman of indeterminate age hovered over her casket, peering down. I looked at her corpse. She seemed in danger of bursting out of the plunging neckline of her couture gown.

  “You look fine, Mrs. Jimenez. Doesn’t she, Portia? The sisters did a good job.”

  “You don’t think the necklace is too much? I can’t believe Leo is going to bury me with it.” She sniffed. “He always spoils me so.”

  “It’s lovely,” I said. “You look very nice.” The sapphire on the necklace would have choked a horse. I could have retired on the amount of bling the woman was being buried in—assuming that the grieving Leo didn’t have it removed before the casket was closed and lowered. It wouldn’t be the first time.

  “Oh, look at the little doggy. Aren’t you a cutie?” Billy wagged his tail and flopped over to give Mrs. Jimenez a view of his belly.