Holly and Marla, both giggling behind me, assisted in getting Mom into her jammies and comfortable in bed with a bottle of water, the small box of chocolates Mace had placed in each of the rooms, and the TV remote.When we left, she was happily chomping on the chockies while texting pictures from the hen party to my grandmother.
I closed her door, leaning against it while I looked at Holly and Marla.
“It’s been a hell of a day,” I said, my limbs a bit rubbery after all the pampering at the spa.“Did you notice—”
I stopped when a man emerged from around a corner that led to the back stairs.He jumped in surprise at seeing us, swallowed hard a couple of times, then dug through a pocket of his jacket and pulled out a small black box bearing a couple of electronic screens.
“Oh!Erm ...hello.I’m with Spirited Lives.We’re ghost seekers.”He held up the box.“This is my thermal imager.It shows me spirits that you can’t see with the naked eye.”
“Thermal imaging?”I asked, straightening up to get a look at it.“I don’t understand how that can see a spirit unless it has a mass that allows it to conduct energy.Namely, a heat signature.May I see it?”
“Erm ...”The man swallowed again, and backed up a spot.“I shouldn’t.It’s very valuable, and Leon wouldn’t like it.”
“It’s OK.Emily’s a physicist,” Holly said, giving him a supportive smile.“She is dead keen on things like thermal imaging.”
“It’s a little hobby,” I admitted, and scooted closer so I could see just what readouts the device had.
The man made a garbled sound, then spun around and dashed off without another word.Loud footsteps thundered up the wooden back stairs.We waited until the faint thud of a door closing on the upper level drifted down, then looked at each other.
“Odd,” Holly said, her expression thoughtful.
“Downright weird,” I agreed.“Well, I suppose I should pick up Herbert, and go to—ack!”
Behind where Holly and Marla stood with arms entwined around waists, the face of a woman loomed up out of the darkness, making me start.
They spun around as the woman’s lips stretched into a smile.“Oh, hello.I thought you had all gone to bed.”
“We are,” I answered slowly.It was one of the waitresses that Mace had brought on to help with the wedding-related meals.While she seemed innocuous enough, I wondered why she was wandering around the guest rooms.“Is there something we can help you with?”
“No, nothing, thank you.I’m just picking up the tray that was ordered in one of the rooms.”
“Ah.Room service,” I said, watching when she sidled past us and headed to the corridor that led to Devon’s room.“Good night!”
“And a very pleasant evening to you ladies,” she said with another lip-stretched smile that for some bizarre reason made me think of the Slender Man creepypasta.
Holly, Marla, and I faced one another.“I’m getting Herbert,” I said, a profound sense of unreality claiming me.
“I think that’s a good idea.Does Fang have a key to your room?”Marla asked as we proceeded down the hall to their room.I’d left Herbert there just in case any cop arrived possessed with the knowledge that Bess was my sister, thus leaving me the likely—if unknowing—recipient of her hot birds.
“Yes.I’ll lock the door.”Ten minutes later, Herbert had been let out of his carrier, protesting mildly when I offered him fresh water.He graciously accepted a couple of chopped grapes, ruffled his feathers and pecked at a few that didn’t fall back into place tidily, then blinked at me until I put him back into the carrier, and made a little towel nest for him.
I checked my phone, but Fang hadn’t texted, and I didn’t want to interrupt his guy time.“Lord knows he gets little enough free time, and then it’s usually spent with me,” I told Herbert.“It’s good for him to let his hair down a bit and be wild and crazy.”
Herbert made sleepy cooing noises before burrowing into the towel cave.
“I agree.Wild and crazy within limits.”I rolled over, made a face, then swapped Fang’s pillow with mine so I could bury my face into his delicious scent, and went to sleep.
“Holly, have you seen Brother?”The voice drifting into the dining room from reception was my mother’s.I was pleased to hear she didn’t sound hungover.
“Not this morning.I can ask—there she is.Marla, have you seen Dr.Williams?”
I set down my coffee cup, and gave exactly one quarter of a smile to the fact that although Holly had no problem calling my mom Chris, she could not get over an initial impression that Brother was a highly regarded medieval scholar, and still referred to him so formally.
“I haven’t, I’m afraid.Is he missing?”
The three women entered the room at that point, Holly and Marla immediately making a beeline to a table for two that sat overlooking the hyacinth bower.That table was a hot commodity within the wedding party, and everyone coveted it for both the lovely scenery and the fact that the hotel’s cat frequently sunned himself on the ledge, within easy petting distance.
“No, I’m sure he caught the early train he said he was thinking of taking, since it would allow him more time to work on the day’s puzzles.Emily—”
