Chapter 32
CHAPTER 32
K imball Spicer pinches his eyes shut right here in the parlor of a very formidable haunted house. “Merritt asked me to do whatever I could to seduce one of her friends.”
“What?” I squint over at him. “Which friend?” I ask, a touch too leery, but hey, I didn’t think she had any.
“Visalia Jones.” Kimball ticks his head to the side. “Don’t get me wrong, she’s a beautiful woman, but I’m not the type to bed ’em and leave ’em.”
I inadvertently clear my throat as I cast a quick glance at Ransom.
“Why would she ask you to do that?” Ransom is focused.
“Beats me.” Kimball gives a long blink. “She said that Visalia was in need of some attention. She even tried to give me cash for the effort. And when I refused, she said—” He glares out the window a moment. “She said if I didn’t do it, then she’d tank my restaurants.”
“How?” I ask a touch too loud before giving the perpetrator in this crime a dirty look.
Merritt rolls her eyes and turns up a shoulder at us.
“She said she’d leave enough bad reviews at all four of my establishments and make sure no one ever ate at any of my restaurants ever again. I don’t know what got into her, but she was insistent.” He shakes his head. “And that was what we were arguing about before we boarded the ship.”
Why in the world would Merritt pursue this so hotly?
“Kimball, one more question.” Ransom nods his way. “Do you know if she had a trust?”
“Merritt? A trust? Please , she lived like a teenager. I’m positive she thought she was never going to die.”
“Technically, I’m still here,” she pipes up once again. “So, I guess I was right.”
“And what about her books?” Ransom asks. “Who gets the literary portion of her estate? Her royalties, her contracts?”
He shrugs. “I tried to convince her to put her work in a literary trust. I thought it would protect her legacy. But she never saw the point. She rented her apartment and leased her car. She never wanted to own anything. Success may have come easily to her, but she never truly seemed to want it. It was like she was running from something—or maybe everything.” He sniffs hard. “Look, I don’t know who killed her. But she did this to herself, in a way. Whoever strangled her… they were driven to it with a kind of passion that’s impossible to fake. Merritt had a way of pushing people—of cornering them until they felt like they had no other option. I’m not saying it was right. I’m just saying she made it easy for someone to hate her that much.”
Merritt scoffs my way. “The man wouldn’t know a strong woman if she punched him in the face. And how I wish I could punch him in the face.”
A thick silence falls over us as the weight of his words hangs between us like a shroud. The air feels colder, and it feels as if the walls are closing in.
“She was complex,” I say finally. “But no one deserves?—”
“No, they don’t.” Kimball cuts me off with a weary expression. “But sometimes people think they do. And that’s all it takes.” His phone bleats and he checks it. “I’m sorry, I have to take this. I’ve been having trouble with the plumbing at one of my eateries, and I can tell this bill is going to be a doozy.”
He steps out of the room just as a giant crash emits from deeper in the house, followed by screams.
Ransom and I exchange a quick look, then dash toward the source of the chaos. The hallway seems to twist and stretch as we run, and those eerie portraits on the walls seem to shift their gazes in order to watch us.
The echoes of more shouts lead us to a room that looks like it was once a grand dining hall—but now it’s more of a grand disaster.
Nettie is in the center of the room, standing on the table, of all things, with her arms flailing as if she’s trying to catch someone in a hug. Chairs are scattered everywhere and knocked over, and a massive antique chandelier sways precariously above her.
“Nettie,” I shout, rushing her way. “What in the world are you doing?”
“It’s not me,” Nettie says, pointing to the corner of the room. “It’s him! The ghost! He’s fallen in love with me, and he’s going to whisk me away for a ghoulish good time.”
“That’s not true,” a female voice pipes up from behind the credenza and Bess steps out wearily, as does Wes. “In fact, the opposite is true. She’s been chasing that poltergeist around this place, trying to trap him in a loveless marriage.”
“I never asked him to marry me,” Nettie grouses as Ransom helps her off the table.
“I heard a proposal.” Wes holds up his arms.
“I was simply asking for a good time.” Nettie wrinkles her nose at the captain. “It’s called a proposition, not a proposal.”
“It was a proposal and one that you said would last forever,” Bess points out. “You really know how to spook a man, dead or alive.”
“It’s true,” a ghostly howl comes from our left.
“Who said that?” Ransom says, looking in that direction, but with that chandelier still swinging wildly, it’s murky in here at best.
“Who said what?” Bess asks.
I glance that way and squeeze the life out of Ransom’s hand.
“It’s a ghooost ,” I scream at the top of my lungs as a gaunt face twisted into an expression of fury glares our way. Sure, he’s classically handsome with jet-black hair and comely features, but his eyes are hollow and dark. And he just so happens to look as if he wants to drag us all to the afterlife with him .
“Is it Merritt?” Ransom squints as he does a quick supernatural threat analysis.
“No, it’s a man,” I trill with fear. “And he looks very, very angry.”
“ That’s my Jackie ,” Nettie shouts, leaping around in that general area, trying to trap him with her arms.
“Get this woman off my property,” he bellows. “She ransacked the bedrooms, toppled my bookshelves, and tore up the curtains looking for me. Doesn’t she know the dead shouldn’t mingle with the living? Especially not the living who happen to be certifiable.”
“Jack and Bess would get along really well,” I mutter to Ransom.
But Ransom wastes no time in ushering Bess, Nettie, and me right out of the dining room, and right out of the mansion.
He ponies up at the entrance and gives the manager his credit card to cover the damages and we’re back on the shuttle on the way to the ship.
We met up with two ornery ghosts this afternoon and one very determined Nettie.
“I think I need a nice hot cup of apple cider,” I say as we drive by a fire line of orange and crimson trees that wave in the wind as if they were seeing us off.
“I think I need a bottle of whiskey,” Bess says.
Wes sighs. “I might need one too.”
“I need a man,” Nettie announces. “Dead or alive, I’m going to get my hands on one.”
“I need to catch a killer before we hit New York,” Ransom says to no one in particular.
I nod up at him.
And I need to help him do just that.