Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
The next evening, the meeting room at the shop was filled once again, this time with those who had become Harper’s ad hoc legal defense team.
Natalie, with a few interruptions for corrections from Liam, had just relayed the story Margaret had told them at the hospital.
Harper, Agnes and Dee sat in stunned silence. Natalie couldn’t blame them. It was a hell of a tale.
While they wrapped their head around the recent disclosure, Natalie turned to Liam. “Is it physically possible that Margaret, Doug too actually, were both… scared to death?”
Liam nodded. “Very possible. Medically, an extreme surge of adrenaline can actually trigger a fatal heart arrhythmia.”
“Will that hold up in court?” Agnes asked.
Dee, seated on the sofa next to Agnes, wobbled her head. “Possibly. It would help if I had an expert medical witness.”
“The prosecution would definitely make sure the jury knew my girlfriend is one of the defendant’s closest friends,” Liam pointed out.
Natalie cringed at that and glanced at Harper. “Sorry.”
Harper reached out and squeezed her hand. “Never be sorry for being my friend.”
“Aww.” Natalie’s eyes misted.
“All right, you two. I’m sorry I said anything. We don’t know it will even get to a jury trial,” Liam said.
“But if it does, we’ll have Margaret’s testimony that she saw something on that sidewalk,” Agnes said.
“Something she can’t describe, can’t identify, but that she is somehow convinced wanted to kill her.” Leave it to Liam to introduce reality into the conversation and bring down the mood.
“But not Harper,” Natalie reminded.
“Not Harper,” Liam conceded with a patient nod.
The front bell jangled and they all sat, waiting as the sound of quick footsteps grew closer.
Finally, Alice rushed through the door between the shop and the meeting room. She took in the group gathered with one quick sweep then announced, “Margaret’s home.”
“Really? That’s fast. No?” Natalie pivoted to Liam for an answer.
He lifted one shoulder. “Not if she takes it easy and follow’s up with her doctor.”
“So that means she can give a statement to the sheriff and tell them something, not Harper, terrified her on the sidewalk and then her heart stopped,” Natalie suggested.
“Where’d you hear that?” Alice frowned.
“Margaret told us at the hospital.”
“Nope.” Alice’s insistent swing of her head and that single word stopped Natalie’s hope in its tracks. “I wouldn’t count on it.”
“What? Why? And how do you know?” Harper demanded of Alice.
“Buck was in the hardware store. He heard from Chris behind the counter that Margaret’s husband had come in to buy a grab bar for the toilet.”
“And?” Natalie prompted what would no doubt be a long, roundabout Mudville-style answer to a simple question.
“Well, Mary saw Buck at the diner and he told her Margaret was home. So Mary called the Trout’s house and talked to Margaret directly, who told her there was nothing to talk about. It was just a heart attack.”
“What? That lying, sneaky, b—”
Liam’s hand on Natalie’s arm stopped the rest of the rampage.
“That’s not what she told us in the hospital,” Natalie said in defense of her outburst.
Alice shrugged. “I don’t know. Wasn’t there. But it’s what she’s saying now.”
“Why is she lying?” Harper was back to looking miserable and more than a little panicked.
“I’m guessing she’s worried she’ll look crazy,” Liam answered.
“But without another explanation for that heart attack that happened directly after Harper’s heated interaction with Margaret at the bakery, Margaret’s heart attack becomes evidence in court for Doug’s widow’s lawsuit,” Agnes said.
“No. I will not let this happen.” Natalie glanced around the room. “We’re going to get Margaret to talk. Doug’s ghost too. We will badger, coerce, threaten, bribe, and sweet talk them into talking. Whatever it takes. If it’s the last thing I do. Who’s with me?”
Everyone in the room raised their hands, except for Liam.
She frowned at him. “You’re not with me?”
He forced a fake looking smile. “I’m always with you, darling. But I have one suggestion. More of a concern really.”
“Which is?” Natalie asked.
“Shouldn’t we try to find Margaret’s scary something? Especially if it’s the same thing that terrified Doug.”
Natalie grasped what he was saying and more, what he wasn’t saying…
”Before it strikes again?” she finished for him.
“Before it kills again,” Liam corrected.
The word hit Natalie like a gut punch. She swallowed hard. “How do we do that?”
Liam leveled a gaze on her. “You’re the ghost whisperer. You tell me.”
Natalie glanced around the room and realized every eye was on her. Every hope rested on her. And any failure… that would be all hers too.
After a promise that Operation Get the Victims to Talk would be a go, starting tonight for the ghost patrol after Harper passed the word on to Gabe and Millie, and tomorrow for the livings, the group dispersed.
That left Natalie and Liam alone in the shop as she switched off lights and locked the front door.
Done closing up, she turned to Liam, thinking it was time for some mindless television and snuggling and then bed.
When it became obvious to her from his expression, his posture, his whole damn demeanor, that Liam had something to say, she asked pointedly, “Yes?”
He raised his gaze to hers, but it looked less like confusion over her question and more like he was contrite. “I know it’s late, but I was hoping to get some time in at the lab tonight.”
Pressing her lips together, Natalie mumbled a closed mouthed, “Mmm, hmm.”
“You’re mad,” he said.
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You’re really not mad?”
“Of course not. I love you, even in research mode. Now go on. See you…whenever.”
He rolled his eyes. “I won’t be long. I promise. There’s just a couple of things I want to finish.”
“Mmm-hmm,” she mumbled.
Grabbing both her arms, he hauled her close until her body was pressed up tightly against his big hard one. After a kiss that had her rethinking letting him leave for the lab right now, he said, “I reserve the right to wake you up if you’re asleep on the sofa when I get home.”
Home.
She loved when he referred to her little two room apartment carved out of the back of the shop building home. With the way that single word from his lips made her feel, all warm and liquid inside, he could do pretty much anything he wanted, including leaving her to go work more tonight.
Keeping that to herself, no need to grow his ego any larger, she smiled again. “See you later.”
His small smile revealed his sexy as hell dimple as he stopped by the door and glanced back to say, “See you later.”
Apparently, he was serious about not being long. It wasn’t more than ten minutes later, Natalie barely had time to brush her teeth and change into PJs, when the back door flung open wide and Liam barreled inside.
He slammed the door closed and locked it. Both locks.
With wide crazy-looking eyes he swept the room with a glance. When his gaze landed on her, seated on the sofa with the remote in her hand, he said, “Hey.”
“Hey,” she repeated, but hers sounded more like the question it was. “What’s up? I didn’t expect to see you so soon.”
“Uh, nothing. I just decided the work can wait until the morning.” After a glance behind him at the locked door, he moved to the sofa and sat down close to Natalie. “What are we watching?” he asked, in a tone of voice that sounded nothing like his usual.
“I haven’t decided yet,” she answered turning to stare at her man.
This was not normal. Something was wrong and she was going to get to the bottom of it.
Liam hadn’t acted like this when they’d been tied up by Gabe’s murderer. Not even when he’d been accused of being her accessory to murder.
Although now that she thought about it, about their history together, there was one other time Liam had looked completely spooked and thrown off kilter. That had been the first time she’d revealed, and had proven with Gabe’s help, that ghosts were real and that she could really see them.
This freak out was about a ghost. And after all they’d been through together in this area, it had to be bad to have him acting like this.
She sat sideways on the sofa to face him, taking both of his trembling hands in hers.
Trembling.
Liam didn’t tremble. Not unless it was from a super long, exceptionally good marathon session of sex. But not from fear.
This was bad.
“Liam. Tell me. What happened at the lab that has you so spooked?”
He drew in a shaky breath through his nose then said, “There’s something evil in the lab and it feels like it wants to kill me.”
Natalie absorbed the meaning behind the flood of words that had tumbled out of Liam on a single burst of breath.
She had to admit what he’d just said and how he’d said it was definitely not what she’d been expecting. Worse, it mirrored what Margaret had described a bit too closely because what Margaret had felt had almost killed her.
There was something in Mudville. In that lab. And she feared she was the one who was going to have to find it.
Picking up her phone, she typed in a quick text with fingers that refused to hit the correct letters.
“What are you doing?” Liam asked, watching her from under furrowed brows where he sat looking traumatized on the sofa.
This was the man who’d threatened to kick in every door of the Hotel Utica to get to her when he thought she was in danger inside.
Yet here he was with his forearms braced on his thighs, slumped forward in a position just a few degrees short of putting his head between his knees as if he were about to pass out.
Whatever was over there was bad. Very bad.
“I’m calling in reinforcements,” she answered.
“What’s that mean?” he asked.
“I’m asking Harper to send Gabe over… just to get his take on this,” she lied.
She’d face this thing in Liam’s lab, whatever it was, but she wasn’t going to do it without Gabe. But she also knew Liam would never let her go over there without him. And he was in no shape to be of any help.
Liam reacted as she expected and looked annoyed at the mention of Gabe’s visit. She could use that.
“Why don’t you go jump in the shower? I’ll be quick. I promise. By the time you’re done and changed into comfy clothes, I’ll make sure Gabe is gone. Then we’ll watch that World War II show you wanted to see. Deal?”
He drew in a breath then nodded. “Deal.”