Ghost Layer (The Ghost Seer Series Book 2) Page 3

  The miner’s wraith shuddered. They ARE my bones.

  Enzo, can you tell me anything about this gentleman? Clare asked.

  The ghost dog sniffed all around the phantom. I like his smell, Clare, Enzo, not the Other, said. Enzo’s tongue lolled. He is the one we need to help now.

  What’s your name? she asked the specter mentally, now flushing and very aware that everyone stared at her.

  A dark bowler hat appeared on the apparition’s head, just in time for him to doff it with a bow to Clare. J. Dawson Hidgepath, at your service, miss.

  His name meant nothing to her.

  Enzo, can you show Mr. Hidgepath to the carriage house I use for consulting?

  You’re going to open that space for consulting? Hooray! Enzo hopped around. I told you that you needed to do that, and that it would be a very good space.

  I’m using it to consult with . . . She glanced at Hidgepath. Those who’ve passed on. I prefer to see them there.

  Again the apparition winked. I prefer ladies’ bedrooms.

  That sounded just great. Clare sincerely hoped to see no bones in her bed, no phantom, again, at the foot of her bed. She let herself relax as the wraith followed Enzo through the door. The cold dissipated.

  She stood with her back to the others for only an instant then turned around and, keeping her expression bland, met Laurentine’s gaze and said, “Tell me about J. Dawson Hidgepath.”

  The bodyguard, who’d stationed himself behind the millionaire, seemed to shake himself, rather like her ghost dog.

  She remained the focus of all eyes. Zach took her arm and began to lead her back to her seat.

  By the time she sank into the plush gray leather of the barrel chair, and Zach took his own chair, Enzo galloped back into the room, tongue lolling.

  Hi, Zach! Enzo sent to her mind as his muzzle opened and he barked. He trotted around the room, sniffing the living men, then came back and licked Zach’s hand. Zach stiffened. Her lover had admitted he could see ghosts when he touched her, and believed it was due to her psychic gift and talent. She thought otherwise but hadn’t said anything about it yet.

  She angled to look at Mr. Laurentine, two seats over to her right. Enzo leapt into the chair between her and the multimillionaire.

  Mr. Laurentine glowered at her, tapping an index finder on the arm of his chair. “So now you suddenly know about J. Dawson Hidgepath.”

  “I know the name. He was a prospector?”

  “His bones have been legendary for over a century, though they seemed to have stopped appearing near the turn of the twentieth century,” Mr. Laurentine said, then waved a hand. “But, of course, I didn’t move the cemetery of Curly Wolf when I bought the rest of the town. I only moved the buildings. I would not disturb the dead.”

  “I see,” Clare said. Unfortunately she saw way too much . . . like ghosts.

  “But the bones have begun to appear again,” Zach put in.

  “How are you involved in this?” Mr. Laurentine asked.

  “He’s one of my operatives,” Rickman said.

  “He’s a friend of mine,” Clare said.

  “He doesn’t look ex-military,” Mr. Laurentine said.

  “I’m not,” Zach said, and his body and his eyes changed in that way he had.

  “Cop,” Mr. Laurentine said, glanced at Zach’s cane. “Ex-cop.”

  Zach shrugged.

  The multimillionaire shifted more toward Clare. “And you’re Clare Cermak.”

  “That’s right.”

  “And you can lay ghosts.”

  Yes, she can! Enzo shouted, though his confirmation didn’t seem to have been heard by anyone else.

  “You vouch for her?” Mr. Laurentine asked Rickman.

  “Yes, enough that I’m willing to negotiate a fee for her as a consultant.”

  Clare shrugged, not interested in that right now, but figured like most executives he’d take it for assent. “Mr. Hidgepath told me that his death wasn’t accidental. He said he was murdered.”

  The word electrified the men.

  Zach sat up straight, reached for his cane, and ran his hand over the curve. She noted it was a new cane with a hooked handle and looked more old-fashioned than his other one.

  Rickman scowled. The bodyguard . . . shifted or something, and looked about ten times more dangerous.

  Mr. Laurentine’s eyes popped a little. He blinked, then answered her with suppressed excitement. “I’m an expert on Curly Wolf and its history and I’ve never heard this. His death was ruled an accidental fall from a trail to his mine near Mount Bross.”

  “Sounds suspicious to me,” Zach said—and he sounded as if he were just being contrary. “And I think I’m the only one here who’s ever investigated a murder.”

  Everyone shifted their attention to him and she was glad. For a minute she’d felt like a pinned butterfly.

  “Tcha!” Laurentine made a disgusted noise. “As if you could find out what happened nearly a hundred and fifty years ago about a man whose whole life doesn’t amount to more than a few paragraphs on the Internet.”

  Rossi, the bodyguard, gave a little cough. “That’s true enough. Most of what we know about him concerns his bones.”

  Mr. Laurentine scowled. “His bones. Those damned bones. I wish they’d remained legendary.” He ran a hand through his shoulder-length hair. Clare studied him. His hairstyle didn’t look quite modern, more like something she’d seen in the many antique photographs in her books on the Old West.

  “J. Dawson Hidgepath?” she prompted.

  “If he was murdered, maybe Clare can’t send him into the great beyond until we find out the truth,” Zach added.

  “J. Dawson was a ladies’ man, and considered himself a poet.” The multimillionaire leaned back in his chair, like a storyteller. Clare didn’t think he’d be a good one.

  “Just the facts,” Zach said.

  “As I said, there seems to be a dearth of facts. But if you wish a quick and dirty summary, the prospector ‘courted’ several ladies, a saloon girl, a teacher—any new woman showing up in Curly Wolf would get a bouquet and a poem. When he fell off the mountain, he was no sooner buried than his decomposing body appeared in the saloon girl’s bed.”

  “Eeewww,” Clare said.

  “They reburied him in the Curly Wolf Cemetery and a few nights later he showed up in the schoolmarm’s bed, even more disgusting, along with a poem. Again they buried him, this time at an unknown location with the ministers from all the churches from all the towns around taking part in the service . . . and yet he continued to rise throughout the end of the century. When we buried him, we went back to his first grave.”

  “It was a localized haunting, then?” Clare asked. Of the three ghosts she’d actually sent on, two had seemed to be local, staying in the same place as their death.

  Enzo said, Ghosts stay where they feel they need to be, but they can move around lots if they think they have to. He yipped cheerfully. It all depends.

  How wonderful, still no darn solid rules. Clare’s fingers went to tug at her hair—a new bad habit that she hadn’t had as an accountant—but she stopped the gesture and turned it into a roll of her hand for Mr. Laurentine to go on. The man shrugged. “That’s all I know.”

  “Until now,” Zach said. “He’s back.”

  Another frown from the multimillionaire. “So we believe. My last two house parties were spoilt; the two ladies whose beds he showed up in were extremely unhappy and left in the middle of the night. They won’t return despite my persuasions.” He scowled, flushing with anger. “I lost other guests, too. Worse, I’ve lost some of my housekeeping staff and a couple of caretakers, carpenters, of Curly Wolf itself. I don’t want a ghost that will cause me problems or a haunted house.” His jaw set and he appeared once more a formidable man, accustomed to wheeling and dealing in millions of dollars.

  Then his pointed stare fixed on Clare. “If I hire you, I’ll expect you to produce results.”

  She met his
gaze calmly. “If I accept the consultation, I will do so to help Mr. Hidgepath.”

  Mr. Laurentine stood, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a gold card case, took the top card, and held it out to her. “This is the address of my ranch in South Park. I’m heading straight up after this meeting. I’ll tell my people to expect you in no later than forty-eight hours.”

  Only the image of J. Dawson kept Clare from saying something snippy. She stood and Zach and Rickman followed. She stared at Mr. Laurentine’s card. She really didn’t want to do this.

  This is your next ghost to help move on! Enzo ran around her in a circle, seeming happy as usual. He is waiting for you at your carriage house.

  As long as it wasn’t her bedroom.

  Come ON, Clare! Enzo shouted.

  She looked down at the doggy spirit, slid her gaze toward the arrogant Mr. Dennis Laurentine with all his expectations and no belief in ghosts or her. Perhaps she could show him something.

  With a gesture, she asked Enzo to sit and shake. He sat and offered his paw and she took his icy paw in hers, gave it a good squeeze. When she initiated contact with ghosts, and she always had to do that to help them, she experienced their frigid selves with cold sleeting through nerves and muscles to settle in her bones. The experience was always worse than if the ghost touched her.

  She let go of Enzo’s paw and saw Mr. Laurentine and Zach watching her, the other two men, Rickman and Rossi, ostentatiously looking elsewhere.

  Chin high, she strode over to Mr. Laurentine, and began to take the card, making sure her cold, cold fingers brushed his. His hand jerked and the card fell.

  And Enzo lifted it to her fingers.

  “I didn’t see that,” Rickman muttered.

  “I didn’t either,” Rossi said.

  “What are you talking about?” asked Mr. Laurentine.

  Zach laughed.

  “I’ll be in touch, Mr. Laurentine,” she said, and strolled toward the door, putting a little extra sway in her hips for Zach. He’d been gone six days.

  The electronic door lock released with a click, probably from Rickman’s desk, and she opened it and sauntered out, hearing Rickman say, “Let’s talk provisional terms, Laurentine. Zach, please stay on Clare’s behalf.”

  “Oh, very well,” Mr. Laurentine said. “And I suppose you want me to hire the ex-cop to look into a more than century-old death by accident.”

  “We’ll negotiate,” Rickman said smoothly. “But first, Ms. Cermak’s services . . .” The rest of his words were cut off by the door shutting, and the sass in Clare leaked out of her like air from a deflating balloon.

  Whatever Rickman charged Mr. Laurentine would be both too much and too little. Too much because she had to help ghosts pass on to whatever awaited them, or go crazy. Too little because money, no matter how much, didn’t make up for her life being totally screwed up now.

  THREE

  A HALF HOUR later, after a ride home during which she hadn’t wasted any time checking out Curly Wolf and J. Dawson Hidgepath and the cemetery on her tablet, Clare went through the iron gate next to her large new-to-her home into the backyard. She walked down the red flagstone path set in thyme to her carriage house or, since her house had been built in the twenties, an early garage. She hadn’t visited the smaller building since the day she’d toured the property with her realtor, eleven days ago, and hadn’t paid much attention to the one-story-and-a-loft building.

  During the last week she’d been occupied in the main house, arranging her portion of Great-Aunt Sandra’s furniture, setting up a home office for accounting and perhaps tax preparation services, and a tinier office for her “ghost layer” psychic gift.

  Learning the rules for helping apparitions move on had not been going well. Enzo would sit next to her as she read books written by mediums and other psychics and shake his big head mournfully, saying, It is not like that with us. He’d been her great-aunt Sandra’s dog and was now Clare’s, to help her.

  She thought she’d rather have a cat.

  Great-Aunt Sandra’s jumbled journals didn’t help much either, assuming Clare knew items or procedures that she didn’t, talking about ghost laying in Sandra’s own personal terms, which made Clare’s brain hurt.

  But Great-Aunt Sandra had made another fortune for the family . . . as had Sandra’s predecessor, Great-Great-Uncle Amos. Sandra had compiled money both as a psychic consultant and, as she had told Clare in a video, because “the universe supports our efforts.”

  Clare had found that out from experience. At the end of her first case, she and Zach had found a gold coin that was so rare it was currently sitting in a New York City auction house valued at four million dollars. That still staggered her. Four. Million. Dollars. For one “case,” as Zach would call it. She still didn’t know how that worked.

  Unlike her great-aunt, Clare hadn’t intended to make the psychic thing a business, and yet here she’d been dragged into a paying job. Rickman had probably already negotiated her fee from Mr. Laurentine.

  Come ON, Clare! Enzo popped out of the oak wood door of the small brick building.

  The Labrador was always cheerleading and she was always dragging her feet. That wouldn’t happen with any cat, real or ghost.

  She used key and keypad to open the door and walked in, and the sunny cream-yellow walls made her smile. Pretty light from high horizontal windows and the huge skylight in the roof of the nonloft part of the room illuminated the space. The shabby floral pastel furniture from her great-aunt Sandra’s secondary sunroom had been temporarily placed here by the movers. Clare recalled now that this team was also the one that had done the kitchen, and had been led by a woman. She’d done a good job, setting up a cozy conversational area near the small kitchen area, revealed by an angled lacquered floral screen of a pale blue. And that’s where Great-Aunt Sandra’s copper teapot had gone, along with a new coffeemaker. Clare approved.

  Miss. The ghost of J. Dawson Hidgepath bowed before her, his bowler in his hand. He wore a new and elegant suit.

  Clare offered her hand. He took it and kissed her knuckles. She felt nothing but chill, no icy drops of spit or anything.

  “So, J. Dawson, what is your first name?”

  He smiled slyly. It could be John. Or James. Perhaps Joseph or even Jedidiah. He winked.

  Great, he wasn’t going to be forthcoming. Clare let loose a sigh, perched on the seat of a wing chair. “What do you need from me, J. Dawson?”

  He scowled, hovering close, but appearing distracted as he looked around the room. This place is only as big as a cabin, and too fussy. I’m better outdoors. That’s why I left my family back East.

  “I’m not consorting with ghosts in my backyard,” Clare stated. The brick walls around her place were twelve feet high, but her neighbors’ homes were also two to three stories, with balconies in the back.

  Struggling for more courtesy so she could get this done fast, she said, “Ah, J. Dawson, tell me why you began leaving your bones around again, and at Mr. Laurentine’s.”

  Another sly smile. He has pretty ladies at his house.

  “I’m sure he does.”

  Now the apparition looked serious. And in the grayness of my existence, I . . . felt . . . the movement of Curly Wolf, how it bloomed again. He placed a hand over his heart. It stirred me.

  Mr. Laurentine would not want to hear that, and it was time to get to the bottom line. “You were murdered, J. Dawson?”

  He stopped floating around, clenched his fists. Yes, someone pushed me off the trail!

  “I’m so sorry,” Clare said. And she was.

  Enzo whined and rubbed against J. Dawson, and that reminded her that if she wasn’t helping J. Dawson, she’d be struggling with some other ghost. She’d just hoped that the next big test of her very puny skills and limited understanding would have come later . . . maybe even a month later rather than a week.

  Gently, Clare said, Your murderer must also be . . . gone by now.

  I want the truth! His nex
t words came with a fierceness that had ghostly spittle flying from his mouth. I am a phantom, stuck in gray space, stuck in NOWHERE, mind being nibbled away by time until I am only shreds on the wind UNTIL YOU FIND ME THE TRUTH.

  Clare felt herself paling. “I am sorry, J. Dawson. I will do my best to help you, uh, pass on.”

  If she’d gone whiter, his aspect had gained a darker shade—embarrassment, she thought. His bowler appeared and he pulled it low over his head rather than tilting it at a jaunty angle. My deepest apologies. I should not have raised my voice to you. I am ill-mannered and have behaved like a cad. He made a jerky gesture of distress, then vanished.

  Clare tugged a strand of her hair. “That didn’t go well.” She wasn’t pleased with herself either. She stood. “I have so much to learn.”

  Enzo licked her hand, a cold swipe along her skin. You did okay, Clare. I will help you!

  “Thank you, Enzo.”

  And this is a very nice space.

  “Yes.” She smiled. “But I can’t see Mr. Laurentine here, and I’m not inviting that man into my home. Home is for sanctuary.” She sensed she’d need every smidgeon of peace she could find while dealing with her gift for the rest of her life.

  • • •

  Clare let out a huge breath as she entered her wonderful and huge home by the modern kitchen . . . and went straight to the bar. She assembled a pitcher of margaritas, poured herself one, and wandered to the living room and the multipaned bay window, which curved out over the front yard.

  She was hoping Zach would drop by. It was evident that he wasn’t quite sure of their relationship, of bonds forged between them in danger and weirdness. Well, neither was she.

  Then his large, dusty black truck pulled into her wide driveway, and she set her drink aside and sighed in relief.

  Zach’s here! Enzo said, running to the old-fashioned boxed radiators built in around the bottom of the window and sticking his head through the glass. A pause. He’s just sitting there. Why isn’t he coming in?