A casual date for wedding planner Kimberly Jennings goes horribly awry when a stranger whispers that her new beau is a killer. Kim’s conscience won’t let her turn a blind eye, but how does she go about explaining that her informant was the ghost of a previous victim?
Private investigator Reed Cullen needs money to fund the search for his missing sister. What doesn’t he need? A neurotic party organiser on a personal crusade for revenge against a slimeball who spiked her drink, or the secrets that come with her. But like it or not, he’s stuck with Kim and he’s stuck with the case, for better or for worse.
Spooked is a paranormal romantic suspense novel in the Electi series. No cliffhanger!
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The beginning…
My date was going well until the dead girl in the back seat started talking to me.
At least, I thought it was going well. And I thought it was a date. The guy sitting beside me at the wheel had taken on an ethereal quality, hazy, floating in and out of my field of vision like smoke on the breeze.
How much time had passed since dinner? We had eaten dinner, hadn’t we? I recalled a bowl of pretzels, wine, candles… But I’d gone beyond feeling full and straight to sick. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars, do not puke in the nice man’s car.
He smiled at me, white teeth shining eerily in the darkness, and I tried to smile back but my face had stopped working. None of my limbs felt as if they were attached to my body either. What was wrong with me?
“Are you okay, Kimberly?”
His voice echoed around the car, words coming at me in stereo. How did he know my name? Had I told him my name? What was his name? Was he a cab driver?
“Who are you?”
“We’re friends, remember?”
No, I didn’t remember, not really.
“Where…” The words stuck in my throat. “Where are we going?”
“Home, Kimberly. I’m taking you home.”
Ah, home. Home would be good. I could put on my new pyjamas, the ones with the cats on them that Annie gave me for my birthday. My birthday… Candles, lots of candles… Cake… How old was I?
“You need to get out.”
Boy, the man’s voice had gotten really high pitched. Feminine.
“You need to get out now.”
Wait a second. Or a minute. Who knew how time worked anymore? The voice was coming from behind, not beside me, and I tried to twist around. A glimpse of pale white skin, a flash of shiny brown hair, that weird, translucent shimmer people got after they died.
Shoot. There was a ghost in the back seat. A ghost! The bane of my freaking existence.
“Just get out of the damn car!”
Was she crazy as well as dead?
“The car’s moving,” I mumbled.
The man rested a hand on my thigh. “Of course it’s moving. I’m taking you home, remember?”
Don’t talk to ghosts in front of people, Kimmy. My mom’s words echoed in my head, and I cursed myself silently. Don’t swear out loud—that had been another of her rules.
“Hey, hey!” the girl shouted. “Don’t fall asleep on me. My name’s Georgette, and I died in this car—don’t let it happen to you too.”
Georgette. My mom used to have a friend called Georgette, but that was before Mom got taken away. Locked up for being crazy, although nobody ever said those exact words. Don’t let it happen to you too.
Was I crazy? I sure felt as if I’d lost my mind. Fuzziness clouded my thoughts, and darkness nibbled at the edges.
“He killed me,” Georgette said. “The man you’re with killed me. He drugged me just like he’s drugged you.”
Drugs? I didn’t take drugs. Except for that funny cigarette I smoked in high school with… What was her name? Blonde… Always carried a Twinkie in her purse… No, it was gone. But hold on, Georgette said the man drugged me. Could he have done that?
“What…should…I…do?” I slurred, every word an effort.
His hand squeezed my leg. “Just sit back and relax. I’ll put you to bed.”
“Did he even ask your address?” Georgette asked. “Did he?”
Did he, did he, did he? Everything before the car was a blur. What was my address? I had a nice house, ranch-style, painted cream on a good-sized lot. No pets unless you counted the orioles that hung out at my bird feeder in spring.
“My name is Georgette Riley, and I was twenty-four years old when I died. Remember that, because you need to solve my murder.”
Introducing Reed…
“Hello?”
One word from the woman’s mouth and I swallowed back a groan. Words that sprang to mind from her tone? Entitled. Confident. Bitch.
“Yes?”
“Reed Cullen?”
“That’s me.”
Three guesses: cheating spouse, one of the household staff was stealing shit, or she’d lost a pet. Probably a cat. Women like that always had cats.
“Good. A mutual acquaintance suggested you might be able to help with a problem.”
“Which mutual acquaintance?”
“Officer Leopold with the Montgomery County PD.”
Jerry Leopold? I hadn’t seen him for over a year now, but I liked the old guy. He’d been as disillusioned with the department as me, although he’d decided to stick it out until retirement.
“Go on.”
“My friend needs to find a man.”
“This friend have a name?”
“Kimberly Jennings.”
Nope, never heard of her. “And who are you?”
“Maria Fitzgerald.”
“Conrad Fitzgerald’s wife?”
“Ex-wife.” An uncustomary pause. “You know who I am?”
“Lady, the whole of Bethesda knows who you are. You make the gossip pages every week.”
Not to mention the fact that Congressman Fitzgerald had engaged me in an attempt to prove his wife was doing the dirty after getting caught with his own pants down. I was ninety percent sure she’d been faithful, although I’d long suspected the devious ex-Mrs. Fitzgerald had hired the call girl her husband was found with.
Tread carefully, Cullen.
On the plus side, the bitch—I’d been right in my initial assessment—had money, and I sure needed some of that.
Maria laughed, loud enough that I held the phone away from my ear. “I suppose I do get photographed a lot.”
“Who’s this man your friend needs to find?”
An ex? An AWOL employee? Or just a date for the evening? I choked back my own laugh at the thought of the last prospect since I hadn’t had a shower in three days or a haircut in six months. Life was all about priorities, and living in my car, I didn’t have a roommate around to complain about the smell.
“Someone drugged her in a bar on Sunday evening, and the police haven’t made the progress we hoped for.”
“Let me guess—cutbacks?”
“Can you help?”
“Did he assault her?”
“No, she thinks he tried to kidnap her. She remembers being in a car, but she jumped out. And because the toxicology report didn’t show anything and the camera system in the bar was broken, the police have given up.”
“If the tox screen was clear, how does she know she was drugged? What if she only drank too much?”
“She just knows, okay? Besides, she’s practically teetotal. She was the only person at my last wedding who didn’t get drunk.”
I heard a quiet but indignant voice in the background. “Because I was your wedding planner, Maria.”
Maria was with a wedding planner? “Are you getting hitched again?”
“In two and a half months. Do you want the job or not?”
“What’s your goal with this? If I find the guy, what then?”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you want to build a case and pass the evidence to the police? Go to the man’s employer? Have a quiet word?”
“We were thinking of a full-page ad in the Washington Post. Unless you can arrange for him to have an accident. Do you do that sort of thing?”
“I run a legitimate business here, lady.”
At least, I did when there was a possibility of entrapment.
“Fine, so we’ll stick with the naming and shaming. When can you start?”
“I haven’t said I’ll take the job yet.” But I knew I would. I didn’t have any choice. Since a recent client bad-mouthed me all over the internet in a hysterical reaction to finding out that her husband’s mistress was in fact her sister, the phone had been worryingly quiet. And my wallet was almost empty. If I didn’t work, I didn’t eat—simple as that. “How about I drive over and meet with you tomorrow? We can discuss things further.”
Such as my fees. A case like that—finding a stranger from a bar—could be a straightforward, half-day job or a never-ending, money-sucking nightmare. And the pauper inside me secretly wished for the latter.
“I’m not available tomorrow.” Frantic whispers sounded through the phone. “But Kim is. You can come to her office. I’ll text you the details.”
“Ten o’clock?”
More whispers. “Don’t be late.”
