Murder Mansion Read online

  “Pink work boots and an attitude.” His demeanor remained serious while the corner of his eyes crinkled a tiny bit.

  Damn. She’d hoped for something a little more elaborate or even flattering. “I can see how you thought it might be me.”

  He nodded. “The yakking about a possible murder was a tip-off too. Do the two of you even know what discreet means?”

  Daniel looked down at his hands, acting properly chastised. Donna wasn’t having any of it. Wasn’t everything happening to her? Wasn’t she getting the sharp end of the stick? No one had it worse, well, except for the victim. “We weren’t talking all that loud. I know one diner had a recent hernia operation. Another one is checking her husband’s texts to see if he’s cheating on her. The family next to us had no control over their children and the husband was no real help, either. The only difference between them and us was our conversation was more interesting. Besides Daniel told her I was a mystery writer.”

  “Oh, what an inventive excuse.” He exaggerated his eye roll. “That one has never been done before. How many police dramas do the two of you watch?”

  Daniel looked up, recognizing an opening. “I need to go home. My wife needs me.” He held up his blinking cell phone as evidence.

  Taber nodded, which was all Daniel needed to escape from the car, jump into his truck and take off.

  Thanks a lot, brother. “Coward.” She muttered the word as she watched her brother drive away, careful not to speed out of the parking lot, but probably wanting to all the same. The diner owner watched the car leave but switched back to stare at Donna.

  Taber’s hand passed through the open window and nudged her shoulder. “Don’t be so hard on your brother.” He glanced back at the diner. “What did you do to get the owner so riled?

  “Who knows? I think this time it was actually Daniel. She called him a pretty boy. I guess that made me his floozy. I’d say she’s a bitter divorcee who caught her handsome husband cheating. Now, she’s suspicious of all handsome men. The break is rather recent, which explains her attitude, or she keeps the pain alive by reliving his betrayal.”

  A long whistle punctuated the air. “You’re good at this. None of the new detectives would have summed up the woman so concisely, with her only uttering a few sentences. I’m betting you’re right, a regular Sherlock Holmes.”

  An unaccustomed sense of pride swelled up in her chest. Most everything she did was right, professional and to the letter, but people seldom praised her for it. Instead, they expected it rather like the sun coming up every morning. They’d be upset when it didn’t happen. “I have a knack for observation that serves me in my work.”

  His hand moved over his face, lingering on his beard stubble. “I can see that. Apparently, you’ve been talking the case to death. Remember anything else?”

  “I did.” She volunteered quickly, sounding a bit like the girl detective from the Saturday morning children’s show that honed her observational skills. “Smells actually.”

  “Smells?” His lips pursed, then relaxed. “Like what?”

  “Not any obvious poisons.”

  He held up a hand, stopping her. “How do you know so much about poison and should you be confessing it to me.”

  “Seriously.” She wrinkled her nose and caught herself smiling. “I’m a nurse. It’s my job. I did two years in the trauma unit and we had our share of poisonings, accidental and intentional. I realize some don’t leave a scent. I didn’t notice any of the obvious ones or skin mottling. A high-end cologne aroma hit me went I bent to check his airway. Still robust, it hadn’t faded yet. The scent of mouthwash or just brushed teeth, the smell of a fastidious man or one whose plans centered on more than conversation. Knife-sharp crease lines remained in his khakis. He looked more like a man expecting a romantic assignation. He may have just showered too. I was freaking out a little and could have missed some details.”

  Taber had pulled out his pad. His pen poised over the tablet, he asked, “Could you name the cologne?”

  “Not off hand. I could go to a department store and sniff what they have and maybe come up with a name. If you know who he is, then it’s a moot point.”

  “You’re right. Still call me impressed. Well, you’re free to go. Remember to call me if you think of anything else. Your observations are gold. I need to go talk to the owner. Lucky for me, I’m no handsome face.” He flipped his tablet shut and shoved it back into his inner jacket pocket.

  The desire to correct his statement stalled before it could take shape in her mouth. Good thing because he’d know it to be false and would consider it fictionalized flattery. She didn’t want that.

  The engine turned over with a slight cough. Didn’t need car problems when every dime she had in the bank had gone into purchasing the inn. A loan for rehabbing the property would be easy to obtain, but not as long as it was a crime scene. Supposedly, people’s memories for sensationalized stories were short. This factoid she needed to be true.

  Chapter Five

  The strident alarm announced 5 a.m., vibrating with vicious vigor on the bedside table. Its annoying shriek would pierce the heaviest stupor sleep could produce. Her eyes blinked slowly, focusing on the red numerals. It continued its wail until she slapped it into silence. Daniel gifted her with the clock on her last birthday, joking it could wake the dead.

  The murdered man took shape in the predawn darkness. He was standing beside her bed, looking just as lifeless, but standing. His bowed head straightened, his eyes opened, and he stretched out his open hands toward her. His lips moved. A whispery voice choked out the words, “Find my killer.”

  Fear strapped her to the bed, keeping her in place better than a dozen bungee cords. The specter’s pale blue eyes held hers, imploring her, although she felt there was some imperiousness about his attitude. Definitely had to be a doctor in his previous life or some other profession where he ordered people around and they all scurried to do his bidding.

  An honest-to-goodness ghost, a real live spirit—she paused to consider if spirits merited the adjective live or whatever—stood by her bed issuing commands. Her fingers gripped the covers, slowly pulling them up her chest, then over her head, cutting off her view of the glowing ghost. He had to be glowing. How else would she see him in the dark or the color of his eyes? Of course, it could all be the tail end of a dream brought on by a very stressful day. There might have never been a murdered man in her inn either. Her lips pursed as she considered the possibilities. What if she never had purchased the old Victorian? Of course, there’d be no Detective Taber and she’d still be welcome at The Good Egg restaurant.

  The alarm grumbled again, starting weak and growing in irritating intensity. Work remained a constant. It also demanded she lower the covers. It had taken years to rate the primo first shift rotation. Unfortunately, it started early in the morning. Technically, it started at seven, but she had to be there at six-thirty to get the shift change information along with enough time for a cup of coffee.

  Her mattress depressed somewhere near her leg, freezing her heart in mid-beat. A gentle snuffling sound started it again. Jasper, her dog, often took it upon himself to be the second alarm system. With closed eyes, she dropped the covers, afraid if she opened them, her unwelcome visitor would still be there. Jasper’s tongue bathed her face while encasing her in a cloud of smelly dog breath. Ack, he really needed breath mints. Her eyelids flickered open, taking in the shape of her dog illuminated only by the glowing clock and the power lights from various chargers. Her hand reached blindly behind her, finding the clock and turning it off.

  No ghost anywhere in the dark room, but just to be sure, she announced, “I’ll find your killer. Not for you, mind you, but for me. I don’t want that kind of thing attached to my inn.” No reason to have some dead man bossing her around. She had enough of that in real life.

  Jasper stopped licking her face and cocked his head. Unable to see his eyes, she still had no doubt he’d have that expression he often donned, the
one with a slight angle of his head that somehow managed to question her sanity. Sure, she gave the poodle mix human qualities, but hey, that’s what happened when you live alone. You ended up talking to yourself, being analyzed by your dog and apparently smart mouthing off to ghosts. Could have been a dream, she reminded herself as she half sleepwalked to the bathroom with a canine escort.

  Jasper would literally dog her steps until he received his morning can of dog food. The bathroom’s astonishing bright light served as another assault on her waking body. Most of the stores no longer stocked 100-watt fluorescent bulbs since they’d all switched over to those curly energy types. Energy saving was all good, but she didn’t want to take a shower in a dim cave. Lucky for her, she’d stocked up on the high-wattage bulbs. The bulb’s unforgiving glare served as a plus, she reminded herself, as she winced in the sudden burst of illumination.

  She managed all her business in the bathroom without looking in the mirror once. Her early morning appearance would be enough to frighten small children with her hair mussed and often raccoon eyes from not removing her makeup completely from the night before. Good chance she’d see a little something else in the mirror, too. She saw enough horror movies as a kid where ghosts ended up in mirrors often talking to the main character. Didn’t need that. She smoothed on her foundation by touch alone and decided to forego eye makeup, which would require a mirror.

  Her coffee maker gurgled as she unwrapped her breakfast, a granola bar. Already dressed in her uniform, but still wearing slippers, she shuffled outside for the morning paper. She tucked it under her arm and turned as Jasper barked his demand for service. No one liked a barking dog at five-thirty in the morning.

  Dog back inside, coffee made, she opened the paper. A full-color photo of her house graced the front page. The inn didn’t really look her best against the strong morning light that never flattered an aging lady, even if she wasn’t flesh and blood.

  The peeling paint created texture, but also shouted ramshackle. Even the slight sway in the front porch showed in the paper. As much as Donna hated to admit it, the photographer had talent, even if most people wouldn’t look at the photo as intently as she did. Her guests would be people who wanted to visit the quaint town, not people who already lived here.

  The bold headline caught her eye when she finally looked up from the photo. UNKNOWN MAN MURDERED IN ABANDONED BUILDING. Abandoned sounded awful. They might as well have called it a crack house. The subtitle underneath spiked her blood pressure. IS THIS THE WORK OF A SERIAL KILLER? Whatever happened to truth in reporting? She shoved the paper away from her. It might as well be a grocery tabloid. No more of that for her. Besides, work awaited her.

  The radio came on as the car engine turned over. Daniel warned her about the drain on her battery having everything left on, but she did it anyhow. Just call her a wild woman. The local news came on at the top of the hour. “Police have been handed a real-life mystery. A dead stranger showed up in a vacant home yesterday.”

  Vacant? That didn’t sound much better. It implied neglect. Didn’t they have anything else to report on? She knew better, considering the usual news involved the barbecue at the VFW and the Community Chorus Car Wash. George Pippin’s steer escaping the stockyard pens monopolized the news for a week as sightings of the freedom-loving bovine came from various witnesses. In the end, the steer had to be retired to the farm after earning the nickname Liberty.

  No one at work even realized she had innkeeper aspirations. All she had to do was keep mum about the entire situation until it blew over and her inn opened.

  Her car nosed into her parking place. No name denoted it was hers or even for the staff, but most knew it was her place. She parked there every day. It suited her because it was close to the back entrance and she’d maintained the same spot for the last ten years. A phlebotomist, who she jokingly nicknamed The Vampire because of her blood-gathering techniques, started hijacking her place a couple of years ago when the technician first started. Someone, okay that someone was she, mentioned that it was the unofficial parking space of the first shift post-op surgery head nurse. You didn’t get many perks as head nurse, more headaches than anything else, but her parking place was sacred, even if she enforced its sacredness with what a few might label bullying. The new hire apologized and never parked there again. Close, but never in Donna’s unofficial spot.

  The guard nodded at her as she swung into the building. She made a quick stop in the lounge for coffee and stowed her purse in her locker. Her cell phone slipped into her smock pocket. Phones were the only sure communication when seconds counted. Her speed dial contained a series of medical personnel as opposed to family. Nan, the shift leader, bent over a newspaper. Not too surprising at this time in the morning since most of the post-op patients still snored away in a drug-induced slumber. Once all her aides and nurses clocked in, the waking-up process would begin by checking vitals, restrooming and then breakfast.

  The counter gate clicked as she pushed into the station, bringing Nan’s head up. “Lookee, it’s our local celebrity. I bet you had an eventful weekend.” The nurse Donna often considered her work friend glanced back at the paper, then up at her with a smile.

  Great. Was her name in the newspaper as the owner of the house? If so, the newspaper staff showed more journalistic diligence than the sensational headlines hinted at. She peered over Nan’s shoulder. On the second page the article continued. Not too surprising, considering it was front-page news and probably the only thing that happened yesterday unless Liberty had made another escape.

  A small photo showed her and Detective Taber in the car. Their heads turned toward each other indicated an intimacy she hadn’t felt at the time. The words underneath the photo were even worse than abandon and vacant. Police question suspect. C’mon, they never even asked her name. She could sue for slander.

  “I’m not a suspect!”

  Nan patted her arm. “Of course you aren’t. If you were, you wouldn’t be here.” Gwendolyn, another evening shift nurse, circled the counter, smiling at Donna before she sat and typed patient info using a keyboard. Having everything typed into computers was a lifesaver, except when the system went down. There was a backup system of handwritten notes, but most new nurses never learned the art of deciphering gibberish.

  Whether the smile was because of the ending shift or that Gwendolyn had heard about the train wreck Donna’s life had become was difficult to say. It shouldn’t have happened in her house. Murdered folks ended up in the river or in someone’s trunk in long-term parking at the airport, a grisly welcome-back present.

  A red light buzzed on the patient board. Nan glanced at it. “Mrs. McDermott is up.”

  Gwendolyn stood without her asking. “I’ll handle it. She likes me. I remind her of her beloved granddaughter back in Scotland.”

  Donna watched the woman leave without complaint. “Did that quarrelsome McDermott actually say that?”

  “Nope.” Nan winked. “I said she said that, but the end result is Gwen happily deals with the woman. It all works out.”

  Nan had some techniques Donna might borrow. The night shift was the crap shift. No one really wanted it if married or even in a relationship. They existed in different time zones than their loved ones and seldom saw them. Most nurses dreamed of escaping night shift, except for Nan, who enjoyed working nights because it was time spent away from her spouse. Donna didn’t understand why they stayed married if neither one of them particularly enjoyed the other’s company, but Nan explained it was too much work to do otherwise.

  Her friend folded the paper in half so the photo of her and Taber was on top and handed it to her. “The man isn’t bad looking. He has a careworn look. I’m sure the right woman could smooth out his rough edges.”

  “Yeah, right. Not exactly, a romantic rendezvous, Nan. He’s asking me about the dead man I found in my inn.” She shook her head, always surprised at a woman, too lazy to divorce her own lackluster spouse, yet found romance in the smallest things.
Nan believed it into existence.

  The other nurse looked thoughtful for a minute before reaching for the paper. She held it out at arm’s length and brought it in slowly. “People have to meet somehow. I guess discussing why a guy up and died in your—” She stopped and looked at Donna with a shocked expression. “Did you say inn?”

  Her friend’s baffled expression almost made her laugh. Finding a dead man or even meeting an eligible male didn’t merit as much surprise, but the idea of her doing something other than nursing stopped everything. “It’s not an inn yet, but my goal is to turn the Victorian into a B and B.” It wasn’t how she wanted to announce her project, but it was better than being a suspect.

  The rest of the day went pretty much the same. The hospital administrator called her in for a chat to make sure he didn’t have a homicidal nurse on staff. Charlie, relieved it was a newspaper issue, muttered about it being bad for business otherwise. Never mind that she might go on a killing spree helping patients out of this world sooner than expected. Forget the immorality of murder. It was all about the bottom line. Charlie readily accepted the paper made crap up because they often did. The hospital had their own run-in with the newspaper when it claimed a retired teaching surgeon was a terrorist as opposed to emeritus.

  By lunchtime, her minor celebrity status as possible murderer and finder of dead bodies had gotten old. It grew tiresome five seconds after she found the victim. All she needed now was for the police to name the corpse and find the killer—with a strong emphasis on finding the killer. She and Daniel had a lot to do to get the house ready in time for the tourist season.

  Several festivals in neighboring towns brought visitors looking for a quaint place to stay with added local color. The community’s reenactment of Columbus wrecking on their shore on a foggy Christmas night brought crowds too. Usually, the people broke into two camps as far as believers went. A few saw Columbus as a noble figure who did step foot on the North Carolina banks. Another group devoutly asserted he never ever set foot in America and it was inaccurate to say he did. In general, most people didn’t care. They used the festival as a time to dress up in loosely based historical costumes from striped pirate pants to tightly laced corsets that had the girls on prominent display. The costumed revelers drank heavily and punctuated every other word with argh. Not an expression Columbus ever employed, she’d willingly bet.