Chasing Shadows Read online

  “Ow, can you stop hitting me?”

  Mildred gave one more whack with the book for good measure before moving to stand beside Jane. Avery saw Mildred say something to Jane, who nodded and then tittered across the room.

  “Um, Avery, you can get off me now,” Cam said as the overhead light turned on.

  Avery loosened her hold on Cam’s wrist and began to rock back on her knees to pivot up, but then just as quickly froze as her eyes met Cam’s and something clicked. She leaned back in and whispered, “What’s the rush?”

  Cam answered with a blush.

  Avery gave a sly smile, but before she could speak again, a sharp pain struck her shoulder. Frowning, she jerked around to see Mildred still wielding the book. “What the hell, Grandma?”

  Mildred sniffed and cocked her head. “You know,” she said in a low, accusatory voice. Jane, who had just returned to stand by Mildred’s side after having turned on the bedroom light, shook her head disapprovingly.

  A little embarrassed that her grandmother had apparently caught the exchange, Avery rose to her feet and dusted off the knees to her pants. She held out a hand to Cam, who hesitated for a fraction of a second before she allowed herself to be pulled up.

  Avery squared off in front of Cam, her grandmother, and Jane. Folding her arms, she said, “Now, does someone want to tell me what the hell is going on here?” Cam looked to Mildred, who in turn began to study her nails. Jane smiled sweetly but remained silent. Avery took a step forward, her foot striking the taser she’d knocked from Cam’s hand earlier. She reached down and swiped it from the ground. “And this?” she continued. “Anyone want to explain this?”

  “How about you explain why you tried to scare the shit out of us, barging in here like that. Why, you nearly gave Jane a coronary.”

  Seemingly emboldened by Mildred’s words, Cam narrowed her eyes and nodded. “Yeah, and you grabbed me and threw me down like I was some common criminal. What was that about, Avery?”

  Avery threw the lot of them an incredulous look. “Are you serious right now?” she said. “You’re going to crawl through a window and then ask me about entering my own crime scene?” She turned on Cam next. “And you—you tried to tase me.” She frowned. “And where the hell did you get a taser?”

  Cam gave a half-shrug before nodding her head in Mildred’s direction. “Ask your grandmother.”

  Avery sputtered for a moment and then shook her head. “I think I’ve heard all I need to.” She took a step toward the door but stopped, turning on her heel to face the trio again. “And what were you thinking? Do you want to go to jail? Never mind that whoever killed your friend is still out there, Cam. Did you think about that? What if he’d shown up?” Another guilty exchange of looks followed. “Oh, wait,” she sneered, “the taser, right?”

  “Well…”

  “Damn it, Cam.” She shook her head. “I expect it out of these two, but you? I thought you had better sense than that.”

  “Don’t pick on Cam,” Mildred said, suddenly springing to her defense. “For your information, she…we…were just trying to help you out.”

  “Help me out? What are you talking about?”

  “With the investigation,” Mildred said matter-of-factly.

  “How would you…” Avery trailed off as realization hit her. “Are you fucking kidding me? Don’t tell me you were planning on having some sort of half-assed séance here?”

  Mildred crossed her arms and sniffed indignantly. “I don’t do anything half-assed, thank you.”

  “I don’t believe this.” Avery drew in a long breath before turning back on Cam. “And you were going to what? Pick up some item that belonged to Jennifer Morris, wave it around, and ask her to appear?”

  Cam, who had been standing quietly beside Jane, swallowed and shook her head. Her face had taken on an ashen tone. “No,” she said quietly.

  “No?”

  “No.” Cam licked her lips nervously and took a deep breath before continuing, “I don’t need to wave anything around. Jennifer is standing right next to you.”

  The other three women simultaneously looked to the empty space to Avery’s left.

  Avery blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”

  In response, Cam pointed. “She’s standing right there.” Cam’s eyes shifted and she continued in a low voice, “Yes, I know that.”

  Avery arched an eyebrow. “You know what?”

  “Oh,” Cam gave a slight smile, “sorry. That last wasn’t directed at you.”

  “Then who was it directed to? Your ghost?”

  “She’s not my ghost,” Cam answered a second before Mildred and Jane rushed forward, nearly bowling Avery over as they did.

  “Quick, Jane, give me the thingy-bob,” Mildred ordered, her hand outstretched. “This is what we came for.”

  Nodding, Jane fished furiously through her purse before pulling out a small black object that looked vaguely like a TV remote control. Rows of colors lined one side of it, with tiny light bulbs at the end of each row. Mildred took it from Jane, all but snatching it out of her hand, and began to wave it through the empty space Cam had identified as being occupied by Jennifer Morris’s ghost.

  “Grandma, what the hell is that thing?”

  “It’s an EMF meter,” Cam answered instead. At Avery’s blank look, she continued, “We use them on the show. They measure the electromagnetic fields that manifest when a ghost is present.” She narrowed her eyes as if to get a better look at the object as Mildred continued to wave it around the room. “That’s a nice one. Where did you get it?”

  “Amazon,” Mildred said, stopping to hold the EMF meter up proudly in one hand. “And it was Prime Shipping.”

  Avery shook her head. This is ridiculous. “Okay, fine. So you think you see Jennifer Morris’s ghost standing beside me?”

  Cam nodded. “Yes.”

  “So, where is she? Right here?” She swiped a hand in the empty air, telling herself that the cold spot she suddenly felt had to be a coincidence. She looked up, expecting—hoping—to find an air conditioning register. There was none. “And what words of wisdom on the murder investigation—her own murder investigation—can Jennifer impart?” Avery smirked. “Maybe she can give us the name of her killer so we can all go home and get a good night’s sleep.” Lord knows that I can use one.

  Cam’s eyes darted to Avery’s left, looking just to the side of where Mildred and Jane were waving the EMF meter around and whispering to each other as the lights on the end flashed off and on. She nodded her head before turning her attention back to Avery. “Jennifer says she doesn’t know who it was that killed her, but to tell you that it wasn’t her ex-husband. And, that you don’t have to be such an ass about the whole thing.”

  Avery felt a chill sweep over her. “She said what?” she said quietly, hating herself for the tremble she heard in her voice.

  “She said you don’t have to be such an ass about the ghost hunting thing, it’s—”

  “No,” Avery shook her head, a slight buzz in her ears, “the other.”

  “Oh. She said that her ex-husband—Simon’s his name, right?—Simon didn’t kill her. She said that you needed to know that.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “I really like her hair. I think it’s one of those razor cuts I was reading about in Cosmo. I wonder where she gets it done?”

  “Seriously?”

  “What? Just because I’m dead doesn’t mean I can’t keep up with the latest fashions.”

  Jennifer shook back her own blonde, frizzy hair as she walked around Avery, her eyes traveling up and down the other woman as she moved. Jennifer reached out as if to feel Avery’s hair, but her incorporeal hand passed though Avery’s head instead.

  “Actually, I think it does,” Cam drawled, flashing a quick smile at Avery, who seemed oblivious to what had just happened, and simply continued to stand in the same spot she’d been for the past several minutes. The expression on her face fell somewhere between vaguely irritated and
pissed off.

  Jane and Mildred tittered about beside Avery and Jennifer, still brandishing the EMF meter. Every so often Mildred would wave it through Jennifer and the LED lights on the device would flicker, causing the pair to whisper furiously amongst each other. Cam was surprised to see that the meter actually worked. She’d always thought it was just like all the other “ghost hunting devices” used on her show—just a flashy prop.

  “I guess you’re right,” Jennifer lamented. “I’m sure the afterlife is not filled with outlet malls and hair salons.” She smiled and twirled around Avery once more. “Although, a girl could always hope.” She came to a sudden stop and pursed her lips. Looking thoughtful, she looked back and forth between Avery and Cam. “Wait a minute…are you two a thing?”

  “What do you mean a thing?”

  “Oh, you are!” Jennifer squared up in front of Avery and looked up at her as if studying an exotic animal at a zoo. “Hm. She is cute in a lesbian sort of way.”

  Cam frowned. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Calm your tits.” Jennifer glanced back at Cam. “I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I’ve always been into men, is all. But, if I did decide to stray to the other team,” Jennifer said with a leer, “Officer Hottie here could certainly play catcher.” She reached out as if to cup the swell of Avery’s breasts, just visible beneath the loose-fitting shirt she wore.

  Feeling a surge of jealous anger wash through her, Cam took a step forward. “Are you for real right now?”

  Avery arched an eyebrow and cocked her head to one side. “Is what real?” she drawled. “Your insanity? I’d have to say yes on that one.”

  “I wasn’t talking to you,” Cam said, ignoring Jennifer. What had gotten into her? Other than being dead… “I was talking to—”

  “To Jennifer Morris,” Avery interrupted, “yes, you said that already.” She frowned. “What is it you think she’s saying, then?”

  Jennifer flashed Cam a devilish smile. “Is she good in bed?”

  Cam sighed and put a hand over her eyes. “Nothing worth repeating,” she murmured. In response, Avery raised a skeptical eyebrow.

  Jennifer pressed on, “So is that a yes?”

  “What?” Cam looked back at Jennifer and shook her head. “No, that’s not a yes.”

  “Really? How disappointing.”

  “As much as I’d love to stand here and watch this—” Avery waved a hand through the air. “—show of yours all night, we need to get out of here before one of the neighbors calls the police.”

  “She’s right,” Jennifer nodded, “most of them in this town are not as nice as your Officer Hottie.”

  “Now wait a minute,” Mildred said, using the EMF meter to point at Avery. “We’ve gone to all this trouble, we need to try to get the answers we came for.”

  “Answers?” Avery shook her head. “What answers?”

  Mildred pointed at Cam this time. “From her ghost.”

  Cam closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “For the love of God, will you stop calling her my ghost? She’s just a ghost, not my ghost damn it.”

  “Cam, if you don’t mind. I’m not quite sure what or who is in charge of the afterlife just yet,” Jennifer said, grinning as she crossed her arms, “so maybe you can hold off taking the big guy’s—or who knows, maybe gal’s—name in vain and all that.”

  “Maybe I am going crazy,” Cam murmured, shaking her head. “This is insane.”

  Avery looked disapprovingly back at Mildred. “Grandma…”

  “No, don’t ‘Grandma’ me.” Mildred shook her head defiantly. “I know you don’t believe all this—you think it’s all an act—but I’ve been around this woman long enough to know that she’s not that good of an actor.”

  “Um, thanks,” Cam muttered. I think?

  Mildred nodded. “So go ahead, ask her a question that only the dead woman would know. That’s how they do it on TV.” Jane bobbed her head vigorously in agreement.

  Avery blew out a breath. “Fine.” Crossing her arms, she squared off on Cam. “All right…ask her where we found her body.”

  Cam looked to Jennifer, who shrugged in response. “Well, I was kinda dead at that point in time. Maybe she can ask something I would have a chance of actually being able to answer?”

  “She doesn’t know,” Cam replied to Avery.

  Muttering something under her breath, Avery shook her head. “Look…it’s been a long, shitty day, and all these games aren’t making it any easier.”

  “Games?” Cam frowned. “I’m not playing any games, Avery.”

  “Cops in this town, I tell you,” Jennifer said. “They’ve already got their mind made up in advance, no matter what you tell them.”

  “Call it what you want to, then,” Avery scowled. “Either way, I’m over all this ghost hunting nonsense.”

  Cam bristled at her words. “It’s not nonsense.” Avery snorted, sending another wave of anger through Cam. “Believe it or don’t, your opinion is just that. I know what I saw. I saw something at the Johnston house—who or what I have no idea. I saw—and am seeing—Jennifer. I saw Bill—”

  “Stop right fucking there,” Avery snarled, her hands balling in fists at her side. “How dare you say his name.” Taking an aggressive step forward, she lowered her tone, “Even after I told you how much he meant to me, you’re going to stand there and keep up with this bullshit.”

  “It’s the truth,” Cam said, straightening her back as she stood her ground. “I just don’t know how to make you believe it.” She took a deep breath before continuing, “And Bill may have been your partner, but Jennifer was my friend and somebody killed her. What’s the point of all of this if I can’t help find out who that somebody is?”

  “Aww,” Jennifer smiled, “you’re so sweet.”

  “That’s my job,” Avery said, expression unchanged, “not yours.”

  Ignoring Jennifer, Cam kept her gaze fixed on Avery, the anger and the irritation of the past several days spilling over. “Yeah, well, not anymore. They kicked you off your job, didn’t they?”

  Avery’s eyes widened and then just as quickly narrowed. “Bitch,” she muttered before pivoting on one heel and storming off toward the door, walking through Jennifer as she moved. “Let’s go, Grandma,” she called, “it’s time to go home.”

  Standing by the bed, Mildred and Jane looked at each other as if, for once, unsure what to do.

  Avery stopped at the doorway and glared back into the room. “Grandma, I said let’s go.”

  Cam blinked and suddenly Jennifer stood face to face with her. “Officer Hottie is right about one thing,” she said, “we don’t have all night. Sorry, but I don’t think there’s any other way to do this.”

  Before Cam could ask Jennifer what she was talking about, the other woman took a quick step forward. Cam shivered as she felt Jennifer’s icy grip on her shoulder and then nothing.

  ****

  “Now Avery, I think you need to calm down and wait just a minute.”

  Irritated—No. She’d left irritated behind half an hour ago. Now, she was downright pissed—Avery stood in the doorway of the bedroom and cut her eyes to Mildred, who, with Jane in tow, was rushing after Avery. “No, Grandma, I’ve had it up to here—” she threw a hand over her head. “—with her, you, and for that matter, this whole damned town. I’m going home. Stay here with Cam, come with me, whatever. I don’t care anymore.” Not waiting for a response, Avery turned and continued on into the hallway.

  “Don’t rush off on my account, Officer Hottie.”

  Avery froze in mid-step at the unfamiliar voice. Who the hell? She turned back around, noting that Mildred and Jane looked equally confused. Avery peered back into the bedroom. “What did you say?”

  Cam stood in the middle of the bedroom looking down at herself. Avery watched, intrigued, as she ran a hand down the length of her arm and then touched it to her head, ruffling her own hair. Cam glanced up, as if suddenly aware of Avery’s presence, and winked b
ack at her. “You heard me.”

  It was Cam’s face, Cam’s body. The lips moving were Cam’s, but the voice… It was Cam, but it wasn’t. The timbre was different, deeper, and it held a Southern twang that Cam lacked.

  “Nice trick,” Avery said with a confidence that she did not feel.

  Mildred took a step toward Cam, holding the EMF meter in front of her like one would a sword. She waved the device around while slowly back-tracking. Mildred turned back to face Avery, holding up the meter, its lights flashing. “I don’t think that’s Cam anymore,” she whispered. Jane, peering over Mildred’s shoulder, nodded in agreement.

  Avery cast an exasperated glance at her grandmother before moving back into the bedroom.

  Cam was busy studying her nails. At Avery’s approach, she looked up and smiled. “Now look, Officer Hottie, I don’t have a lot of time left, and what little I do, I’d rather not spend piddling around, listening to all this back and forth between you and Cam.”

  “Between me and Cam?” Avery echoed. “Who would that make you, then?”

  “Really?” Cam drawled. “And here I thought you were a detective.” She tilted her head to stare up at Avery, seeming to study her face. “Is it that much of a mystery?” She reached out to trace her fingers down the length of Avery’s arm. The touch was icy cold, leaving goosebumps in its wake. Avery shivered and retreated a step. “Who knows,” Cam said, “I could be someone’s daughter.” She smiled back up at Avery. “Maybe someone’s sister or wife or mother…”

  Why does that sound familiar? Avery’s breath caught in her throat. “Jennifer?” The name was a whisper on her lips. It couldn’t be…

  “Very nice, detective.” Cam—Jennifer—began walking around Avery, raking her eyes over Avery as if sizing her up, talking as she moved. Avery found the movement unnerving but remained frozen in place. “Smart and good looking. Now I see why Cam is so sweet on you.”

  This is crazy. Avery shook her head. Or maybe I’m going crazy.

  “So anyway, like I was saying to Cam a little bit ago,” she continued, her Southern accent becoming more pronounced. “Simon may be an ass, but he didn’t kill me. I don’t want to see him go down for something he didn’t do.”