Third Grave Dead Ahead

  I started across the balcony that looked down into the bar. My office was just past the elaborate iron elevator, but the little girl with the knife stood blocking the way. I stepped around her and inside my office.

  “Oh, I’ll get you some coffee,” Cookie said really loudly. She rushed into my office where the coffeepot was and waved at me, her eyes wide.

  I smiled and waved back.

  She rolled her eyes, hurried to the coffeepot, and gestured toward her office with a nod. “Do either of you U.S. Marshals take cream?”

  Oh. Close call. I backed out the way I came in and inched the door closed. Whew. The little slasher girl was gone. Our encounters were fleeting yet meaningful. I was certain of it.

  Not really in the mood to talk to Dad either, I snuck past his office and out the back door. Uncle Bob called my cell phone as I booked it to Misery.

  “You ratted me out,” I said, skipping the pleasantries.

  “I did no such thing.” He seemed really offended, then said, “Well, okay, I probably did. To whom did I rat you out?”

  “Dad. Duh.”

  “What? The Reyes thing?”

  “Did you know he wants me to quit?” I dug my keys out of my bag because Misery lacked the technology to sense my DNA and open the door when I approached.

  “Quit what? Your gym membership?” He laughed out loud.

  I slid the key into the lock. “That was so amazingly offensive.”

  “What?” He sobered. “Don’t tell me you actually have a gym membership.”

  “Of course I don’t have a gym membership. He wants me to quit work. My job. The investigations business.”

  “Get outta here.”

  “No, I’m telling you.” I threw my bag in the passenger’s side floorboard and climbed in one-handed. “He’s lost it. He really wants me to quit. So I’m thinking either professional wrestling or belly dancing.” Nor did Misery say things like, Hello, Charley. Shall I arm the missiles for you?

  “I’ll talk to him. In the meantime, I got a flag on the doctor.”

  “Like, an American flag?”

  “In the database. Nothing ever came of it, but his name was mentioned in some kind of a forgery investigation. I can give you the detective’s name who was in charge. He retired last year. I know him. Plays a lot of golf now.”

  “Cool. He probably deserves it. I’ve got two U.S. Marshals in my office,” I said as Misery purred to life. No voice recognition software or retinal scanning required.

  “What do they want?”

  “No idea. I already talked to a marshal last night, so I snuck out the back way.”

  “In true Davidson style.”

  “Hey, can you check on Dr. Yost’s financial situation? I’ve already got Cookie on it, but I need official stuff that I can’t get without a warrant.” I steered Misery onto Central. Steered her. Like with my two hands.

  “Don’t have to. He’s rich. Have you seen his house? His monthly water bill would feed a small country for a month.”

  “Well, how do you know he’s rich if you haven’t checked his bank accounts?”

  “You really want me to check into his finances?”

  “Is the pope Catholic?”

  “Did I mention how behind I am on my paperwork?”

  “Did I mention how much you owe me?”

  “Finances, it is.”

  12

  Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you’re wrong.

  —T-SHIRT

  I’d parked Misery on a side street half a block away from the abandoned mental asylum and did a crouch run to the nearest Dumpster, where I dived for cover behind a group of evergreen bushes. Then I waved my arms about wildly and spit a few times when I realized the bushes were covered in spiderwebs. After a shiver of revulsion, I gathered myself, summoned my Mission: Impossible chi, and scaled a chain-link fence to the top of a dilapidated shed. Once there, I curled into an embryonic ball and whimpered. Chi or no chi, scaling fences sucked, mostly ’cause it hurt.

  I pried open my throbbing fingers and scanned the area. Nary a Rottweiler in sight, so I jumped down and booked it to the basement window I used to sneak into the place. I turned the latch I’d rigged to unlock the window and pulled. Normally, the window opened out and I could do a drop-and-roll kind of thing into the basement, which was kind of like a duck-and-cover thing with less concern over radiation poisoning resulting in permanent hair loss, but the window was stuck. I pulled harder and it gave. For about half a second before it slammed shut again. What in the name of Zeus’s testicles?

  Before I could try again, Rocket appeared, his nose pressed against the glass like a giant kid in a nightmare version of peekaboo. He grinned. “Miss Charlotte!” he yelled, as though I were a thousand miles away.

  “Rocket,” I whispered, jamming an index finger over my mouth, “shhhhh.” I glanced around, waiting for the pitter-pat of Rottweiler paws. I had no idea if canines could hear the departed but figured this was not an ideal situation to find out. “Rocket, let me in.”

  He giggled again. “Miss Charlotte, I can see you through the glass!” he yelled louder, pointing to it over and over in case I missed it. “Can you hear me?”

  Oh, for the love of Godsmack. I crawled onto my stomach and inched the window open. “Rocket,” I said through the open slit, “you have to let me in.”

  “You can’t come in. I have company.”

  “Company? Seriously?” Rocket had died sometime in the fifties. How many people could he know? “There are huge dogs out here, and I have to give you some names.”

  He brightened. Like literally. It was weird. He pushed open the window another inch and poked his nose and mouth out. “Names?” he whispered.

  “Yes, names of people. I need to know if they’ve passed or not.” I could lose him any second. Keeping Rocket’s attention for more than several seconds was similar to winning the lottery, minus the monetary gain.

  He pushed the window frame against his face to scrunch it and was making fish faces at me. “Hellllllloooooo, Miss Charlotte.”

  I drew in a deep, calming breath. “Rocket, where are Strawberry and Blue?” Blue Bell was his sister who died in the thirties from dust pneumonia. I’d never met her. Apparently, she didn’t want to be introduced to the grim reaper. Strawberry was the departed little sister of a local police officer who worked with my uncle. She was a pain in the ass.

  With his face still scrunched, he smiled. “They’re hiding from you.”

  “Oh, great, now they’re both going to avoid me?” At first I got a little irked under the collar; then I remembered I disliked children, so this was actually quite nice. I had no choice. I had to give him the names. He would probably bolt through the asylum and I’d lose him entirely, but that was better than having a leg gnawed off. “Teresa Dean Yost.”

  He stepped back and froze, his lids fluttering as he flipped through his mental registry. Then, as quick as that, he refocused on me. “No. Not her time.”

  His answer stunned me. Really? She was still alive? What the hell? I was positive Doc Holliday killed her. Two million smackeroos was a lot of smackeroos. But she was alive. I still had time. “Rocket, I love you.”

  He laughed, then slammed the window shut again.

  “Rocket, wait.” I pulled and jerked to no avail. The guy was like a boulder. Rocks were digging into my ribs and elbows, and I’d have to go home and change before I could do anything else. After a herculean yank, it budged, but only a little. “One more name, sweetheart,” I whispered into the slit.

  “Can you say the magic word?”

  “Please?” I said, after exhaling loudly.

  “Please is the magic word? I thought it was abracadabra.”

  “Oh, right, sorry. Okay, are you ready?”

  He nodded, his eyes glistening in anticipation.

  This was going to be trickier. Earl Walker had several aliases, and who’s to say what his real name was, but it was worth a shot. “
Earl James Walker.”

  “Dead,” he said, matter-of-fact.

  I blinked in surprise again. “Wait, are you sure?”

  Rocket closed the window and latched it with an evil laugh.

  “Rocket, damn it.” I pulled and fought, unlatching it over and over only to have him latch it back. “Rocket!” I rasped.

  He finally stopped laughing long enough to look at me.

  Hoping he could hear me through the window, I said, “Earl James Walker. You’re sure he’s dead?”

  He opened the window again, just enough to talk through it, refusing to give up the game, then shrugged. “Most of them are.”

  “Most of what? Earl James Walkers?”

  “Yessiree.” He counted on his fingers. “Seven dead since the black storms. Who knows how many before that?”

  I had no idea what the black storms were, but Rocket had grown up during the Dust Bowl era. Maybe that’s what he meant. “But, are there any alive?”

  He counted again. “Two.”

  Wow, that meant maybe Reyes wasn’t crazy. Clearly these Walkers weren’t the most creative lot, naming all their kids Earl James. “Can you tell me where they are?” I asked, knowing the answer.

  “Not where, only if. Alive or dead. That’s what I know.”

  Well, crap, this was not helping. Maybe if I explained some things about this particular Earl Walker, we could narrow it down. “Rocket, let me in.”

  “Why?” he asked, as if thoroughly confused.

  “Because I need to talk to you, and I don’t want to be eaten by a freaking Rottweiler.”

  A huge grin spread across his face. “Like that one?”

  He pointed over my head as a massive dollop of saliva dripped onto my jacket sleeve. Then it breathed, its hot breath fanning across my cheek, and I tried not to wet my pants.

  A rush of adrenaline flooded my body, making it difficult to lie still, but lie still I did. Running only made them happy. As though defusing a bomb, I eased a hand into my jacket pocket and took out a rawhide strip in the shape of a bone. I had barely pulled my hand out of my pocket when a huge set of jaws clamped down on it and rolled over on top of me with a bark, likely breaking several ribs in the process.

  I grunted and looked to my side as the Rottweiler spread out beside me and started gnawing, thankfully on the bone. He nudged me as if begging me to try to take it. And my heart was lost.

  “Aren’t you a sweetheart?” I asked, and he—correction, she—rolled onto her stomach, bone locked between jaws, stubby tail wagging hard enough to cause a hurricane in China. I rubbed her stomach. “You’re just a doll. Yes, you are.” She nudged my hands with her nose, and I looked at her collar. “Artemis? Your name is Artemis?”

  Figuring it would be good practice for my new career, we wrestled for a while. “Are you a goddess? You look like a goddess. What a pretty name for a pretty pupp—” I stopped talking baby talk and froze when a large set of boots stepped into my line of sight.

  My gaze wandered up chap-covered legs, a skull-shaped belt buckle, and a T-shirt framed within a leather vest that said KILL THEM ALL, LET GOD SORT THEM OUT. I continued my journey up to a scruffy jaw, a pair of black wraparound sunglasses, and hair so dark, it didn’t reflect, but absorbed the sunlight.

  “You’re lucky your jugular is still intact,” he said, the tenor of his voice deep and soothing despite its message. “Artemis doesn’t like people much.”

  Completely covered in dirt, I rose into a sitting position with my arms braced behind me and gazed up. “She’s a sweet dog.”

  Two more men walked up, looking just as scruffy as the first. One was young and looked like a Greek prince. The other looked more Italian Mafia than biker gang.

  The first man turned to them. “She said Artemis is sweet.”

  The prince shrugged. “She is sweet.” After receiving a jolting punch to the shoulder, he rubbed it and said, “She is. It’s not my fault.”

  “It’s entirely your fault, bitch.” He seemed angry enough, but I found it difficult to pinpoint his exact emotion. “This chick should be missing half her face.”

  Tony Soprano nodded in agreement. I shook my head, disagreeing wholeheartedly.

  “She’s not even a good guard dog anymore. What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”

  Artemis jumped on his chest, as if to show him her new toy.

  “Yeah, yeah. I know. You got a present.” He rubbed her ears playfully and pretended he was going to eat it as he led her back to the ground and had her sit. She tried to jump again, but he kept a hand on her until she gave up and placed her full attention on the bone.

  “Me, huh?” the prince said. “You old softy.”

  After another loud thud echoed against the building, one that had my own arm aching in response, I looked up at the guy who was apparently the leader of this here motorcycle club. “You’re probably wondering what I’m doing here.”

  They glanced at one another and chuckled. “Are you kidding?” Mafioso asked.

  “You can see them, can’t you?”

  I refocused on the leader. “Them?” I was still on the ground and started to get up when he placed a boot on my stomach. Not hard, just enough to keep me down. Apparently, that’s how he liked his women. Despite the fact that I was already dirty, I glared up at him. “Do you mind?”

  “You’re trespassing, remember? I can do whatever I want to you.”

  And just when I was starting to like him.

  “Who are they?” he asked.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The prince kneeled beside me, leaned in until his mouth was almost on mine, then reached into my back pocket and pulled out my PI license. He stayed there a full ten seconds longer than need be, then glanced at my ID. “She’s a private investigator.”

  He stood and handed it to the leader.

  “Charlotte Davidson, PI,” Fearless Leader said, taking his boot off my stomach. “You any good?”

  “You’d have to define good. Where are the other dogs? You guys usually have three.”

  A silence fell over them. “Gone,” he said quietly. “Poisoned. Artemis barely made it.”

  I gasped and climbed to my feet. “Who did it?” I couldn’t help but be outraged.

  Mafioso shrugged. “We’re looking into it.” Then he eyed me suspiciously.

  I chose to ignore the accusation. As if.

  “So who are they?”

  Turning back to the leader, I lifted my brows in question while swiping at my clothes. Artemis took my movement as a sign and darned near tackled me through the wall of the asylum. “Who are who?” I asked, falling back and hugging her to me.

  “The ghosts in the asylum.”

  I paused in surprise as the leader took Artemis’s collar and sat her down again. I realized how gentle he was being with her. Perhaps she was still sick. “You don’t look like the kind of guy who believes in ghosts.”

  “Didn’t. Do now.”

  “’Kay. What makes you think I know who they are?”

  The prince spoke up. “Because you’re the only one who visits regularly to talk to them. Everyone else who breaks in here just wants to party, or take video of the haunted asylum.” He wiggled his fingers for effect. “Freaking ghost hunters. Of course, sometimes guys bring girls here just to scare them. It’s fun when they jump in your arms.” He smiled. “I’ve used that a couple of times myself.”

  I couldn’t help but grin. “And what makes you think this place is really haunted?”

  “We see the walls,” Mafioso said, “names there one day, new names the next. The ghosts scratch name after name, over and over into those walls.” He glanced up at the dilapidated building. “This thing’s going to fall down someday.”

  I was worried about that, too. “Actually, it’s a he. Well, a Rocket, to be more exact. He’s the one who carves the names into the walls. His sister’s here, too, but I’ve never met her.”

  Their belief stilled them. Th
e underlings looked back at the leader to see what he would say. He wanted to ask me questions, but I really didn’t have time to go into it. I decided to shoot for the Reader’s Digest version.

  “Look,” I said, drawing a deep breath, “Rocket died sometime in the fifties. He has this … I don’t know, ability. He knows the names of every person ever born and knows if they’ve died or not. I use that to my advantage when investigating rather often. He’s a savant. He’s—” The thought of Rocket’s personality made me smile. “—he’s like a kid. Like a big, burly kid with a really bad case of ADD.”

  They glanced at one another.

  “Can I go?” I asked, hitching a thumb over my shoulder and inching that way. “I kind of have a missing woman to find.”

  “Can you talk to him for us?” Fearless Leader asked.

  “Sure can, any day but today.”

  The prince’s head tilted as he watched my lower half appreciatively.

  “You can go out the front,” the leader said, taking hold of Artemis’s collar. She was panting with her tongue hanging out, clearly wanting to play.

  “Really? The front?” This was great. Scaling fences was not my forte.

  “When you coming back?” one of them asked.

  I was busy hightailing it to the front gate. “Soon!” I promised. I’d really wanted to talk to Rocket more, but now was not the time to get chummy with a biker gang. They always wanted lap dances, for some reason. As I rushed to Misery, I stopped dead in the middle of the street and looked back behind me. A large black truck sat about half a block away. The window slid down, and Garrett leaned out with a huge smile before saluting.

  My jaw clamped shut. It was apparently his shift. My uncle had put him on my tail again. Reyes had escaped, and I was the obvious path of least resistance to find him.

  I offered Garrett the best death stare I could conjure, hopefully blinding him for all eternity.

  He chuckled and yelled, “Three! I’m dying to try that!”

  Oh, my god, with the list already. I turned and stalked away, refusing to look back when he laughed out loud. Damn him. He could tell Uncle Bob no once in a while.

  I hopped in Misery and started to dial Cookie’s number on my cell when Rocket popped in beside me. Just popped in and sat in the passenger’s seat. I’d never seen Rocket out of his element, so it took me a moment to adjust. And, well, to recognize him. He obviously needed a moment as well. He blinked, glanced around like he didn’t know where he was, then turned his childlike face toward me.