"Even if I still have a key for the house and so, technically, we wouldn"t be breaking in," Rosemary added.
Sadie thought about how she had broken into May Lathrop"s bas.e.m.e.nt suite to honor the ghost"s final request.
"I guess it wouldn"t be the first time," Sadie grumbled.
They all piled into Rosemary"s Mini Cooper, since Sadie"s Corolla was once again being dusted for fingerprints and tested for trace evidence. They parked a couple blocks away and walked casually down the street like three women out for a stroll. Sadie loaned Rosemary a dark hoody so that the woman"s piercings, tattoos, and baldness were less noticeable. But it was asking a lot of a hood to hide everything, and a young man eyed them warily when they walked by.
At Sadie"s suggestion they went around the back of the house so that neighbors wouldn"t see them entering.
"Don"t touch anything," Sadie warned once they were inside. "Petrovich already has enough work cut out for him here."
"It"s not like our fingerprints aren"t already here," Maeva said. "But we"ll be careful. Don"t worry."
As they walked through the house they paused briefly to carefully tiptoe around the substantial blood left by Gayla"s murder. Although blood didn"t usually bother Sadie, knowing it could"ve been her own pooled there caused her to catch her breath.
As they headed up the stairs Maeva mused, "I wonder why all the action happened in the master bedroom instead of Iris"s room."
"That"s a good question." Sadie opened the door to the master bedroom where they"d gathered the few times before. "Maybe we should be in Iris"s room, if she was poisoned in her own bed like the papers said."
"The ghost visited you at hotels and she had no trouble making a pretty big impression in this room," Rosemary pointed out. "If she wants another room, I"m sure she"ll find a way to make that known."
Sadie shuddered as she looked around the room where she"d been held by Gayla Woods.
"Maybe this wasn"t such a good idea," Maeva said, worriedly watching Sadie. "Are you sure you"re okay?"
"She needs to finish it," Rosemary stated firmly. "She"ll feel better once she does."
"Let"s just get it over with." Sadie didn"t feel good at all. She took a deep breath and let it out gradually, then called out, "Iris, it"s time."
They watched as the closet door slowly opened. Inside the s.p.a.ce was the spirit of Iris, who looked worriedly over her shoulder as she stepped forward.
"Gayla"s dead and your dad"s in jail," Sadie said. Then she added sympathetically, "I am so sorry that you never had a chance to be the actress you wanted to be."
"Mom wasn"t crazy at the start . . . he made her that way." Iris"s voice still held that faraway sound as if talking from the bottom of a well, but she also sounded weary. Tired of fighting the demon of a dad she hardly knew.
"You did good," Rosemary put in. "You should be proud."
"Who knows how many women he would"ve killed if you hadn"t helped."
"I want to be with my mommy," Iris whimpered, sounding more child than teen.
"You don"t need to stick around any longer. Close your eyes," Sadie instructed. "Remember good times with your mother. Think about all those times when she was there for you. Imagine her waiting for you with her arms wide open and-"
Sadie stopped and watched as long arms reached out from the swirling darkness of the closet and wrapped around the spirit of Iris. Her mother"s arms. Bit by bit Iris"s shape began to fade. A churning cloud of white enveloped the ghostly opaque shapes of both Iris and Della Prior. Then as quickly as the mist appeared, it dissipated and the two shapes shimmered around the edges before disappearing forever.
"Much better." Maeva smiled and walked forward to shut the closet door.
"Wait." Sadie strode forward and peered inside. "I never noticed before but the back paneling in the closet looks loose."
"With all the slamming, banging, and spiritual upheaval in there I"m surprised it hasn"t totally fallen apart," Rosemary remarked.
Sadie stepped inside, wrapped her fingers around a loose corner of wood paneling, and yanked. The board groaned, splintered, and finally gave way. Out tumbled a bundle of faded white envelopes. She picked up the stack, untied the string that bound them together, and opened the top letter. She scanned the notepaper inside and anger flooded through her. She handed off the paper and opened the next letter, and the next.
"a.s.shole," Rosemary muttered.
Sadie agreed.
"Eddie was writing his wife all along and telling her that Iris was possessed by the devil."
Maeva added, "Look at this." She waved a letter in the air. "He even told her the phrases to use and the actions to take for an exorcism, and told her to get off her meds so that she could see Iris more clearly."
Sadie skipped to the last letter.
"There"s instructions telling her where to get the a.r.s.enic to put in Iris"s drink. He swore it would kill the demon inside her but not harm Iris."
"He knew Della was mentally unwell," Sadie said furiously. "He knew that and used it." Sadie looked around in disgust. "Let"s get out of here."
"We need to make sure all entry points from botched exorcisms and open pathways are closed," Rosemary stated emphatically. "Or this house will never be safe for another family."
"Can I leave you two to do that?" Sadie put a hand to her head. "I just want out of here."
She left the house by the back door and sat on the stoop in the dusky light, waiting for her friends.
"I leave town for a single night and you almost let my partner kill you, huh?"
Sadie looked up and smiled wanly at Owen Sorkin.
"What are you doing hanging around here?" she asked.
"Driving by and saw some lights upstairs. I thought maybe it was a ghost," he said, chuckling. "Question is, what are you doing here?"
Sadie didn"t comment. She didn"t think Owen was ready for the whole truth and nothing but the truth on the supernatural.
He joined her on the steps and held her hand.
"I am so sorry for all you went through," he said seriously. "I had no idea Gayla was a crazy loony and I"d never heard of that Herbert guy."
"Eddie Prior was his real name," Sadie corrected. "The real Halladay Horror and Seattle Slasher."
Owen gave Sadie"s hand a squeeze.
"I"m sorry for siccing the cops after you," she said.
"That"s okay. Perfectly understandable. I was checking out a cottage I bought," he whispered in her ear. "Feel like getting away from it all and resting for a few days? There"s a hot tub, fireplace, and a well-stocked liquor cabinet."
She released his hand and got to her feet.
"Thanks, but I need to get my own house in order." She offered him a quick smile. "And that includes trying to work things out with Zack."
He stood up next to her.
"Maybe you"ll change your mind."
Sadie shrugged, because one thing she knew, there weren"t any guarantees in life. Or death.
Read on for a sneak peek at the next Ghost Dusters Mystery
DROP DEAD BEAUTY.
Available from InterMix in May 2013 Sadie bolted upright in bed and squinted into the dark. Someone was in her room. She could hear them breathe and felt the shift in the air as a shadowy figure came closer. Weighing her options, she decided on the most logical choice. Emitting a shrill, piercing scream, she launched herself to the furthest side of the bed and scrambled in the drawer of end table for her pepper spray.
"Shut up already!" yelled a male voice in reply.
Sadie flicked on her lamp and blinked rapidly as her eyes adjusted.
"Detective Petrovich?" Sadie"s jaw dropped. "Dean?"
He nodded sharply.
She put a hand on her pounding chest.
"You scared me half to death!"
"Sorry to barge in on you like this, but I needed a place to stay."
"It"s five in the morning!" Sadie groaned and shook her head. "Why me? What about your fiance? Wouldn"t she be the more logical choice?"
"They"ll look for me there. I"ve got to lay low until this case blows over." He paced the floor and rung his hands nervously. "Staying with Jenny would put her in danger."
"But you"re okay putting me in danger?"
He didn"t reply.
Sadie sighed, swung her legs out of bed and walked to the kitchen. She had raging heart burn. Dean followed her and watched as she dug out a roll of antacids from the drawer and popped two in her mouth before heading for the coffee maker.
The detective had the good sense to wait until Sadie was seated at her kitchen table with a mug of coffee in front of her before continuing the conversation.
"I"m in trouble," he began. He scrubbed his hand across the stubble of his regulation short hair. "They think I killed her."
Sadie hesitated and nodded. It was all over the news. Petrovich"s ex-wife, Jane, had been murdered and most reports had pegged Dean as the shooter. Seattle Detective shoots his ex wife. The papers hadn"t had this much fun since a certain senator was caught stepping out on his wife with a transvest.i.te.
"I have to ask," Sadie said. "Did you do it?"
"No!" Dean roared.
"Okay." Sadie held her hands up. "But I don"t know how I can help you."
"You can start by finding out who did it."
"Whoa. I do trauma cleaning. I"m not a police officer and I don"t even pretend to be one."
She got up and brought her mug to the sink, pouring out half the coffee. Her stomach felt unsettled. She decided on juice and toast.
"Move aside," Sadie told Dean when he followed her. She nodded with her chin. "I need to access my toaster."
Instead, Petrovich stepped closer until there were only a couple inches separating them.
"I need you to do that thing you do." His voice was quiet and pleading.
"If you"re talking crime scene cleanup, I turned down the chance to clean up that scene." Her bottom lip quivered as she talked and she took a deep breath. "I couldn"t do it. It"s one thing to clean up the blood of strangers. It"s another when you have a personal connection."
"I"m talking about that other thing you do. Talking to dead people. I want you to ask Jane who killed her. She won"t even be surprised that you"re talking to her on account of I told her all about what you do one time when we were on better terms."
"You told her?" Sadie was annoyed. She"d a.s.sumed that information was just between the two of them.
"Yeah, well, she was fascinated with that kind of s.h.i.t. Psychics and stuff."
Sadie ignored the fact that he"d just called her way of life "s.h.i.t" and walked around the detective to shove a piece of bread in the toaster.
"First of all, it"s not a given that somebody"s spirit remains behind if they"ve been killed," Sadie told him.
"Really?" Petrovich frowned. "Sure as h.e.l.l feels like it happens all the time with you."
It feels like that to me too.
"Well, it doesn"t happen all the time. You only think that because you happened to be involved in a lot of those cases." Sadie retrieved peanut b.u.t.ter and jelly from the fridge. "Couple weeks ago I had an unattended death. Guy had a ma.s.sive heart attack and died alone at home. By the time his neighbors complained about the smell, he"d been gone about a week. You can imagine the state of his apartment." The toast popped and she systematically slathered on peanut b.u.t.ter and jelly and then took a big bite. "I had to sweep up so many maggots that-"
"How do you do that?" Petrovich shook his head.
"Do what?" Sadie asked around a second mouthful of toast.
"How do you talk about decomposing bodies and maggots while eating?"
Sadie shrugged.
"See!" He waggled a finger near her face. "You should"ve been a cop. You"ve got a stronger stomach than most rookies by far."
"My point is that there was no spirit lingering behind at that scene. It was nice and peaceful," she told him.
"Only you would describe an unattended death scene as peaceful."