“Like you were going to do to me?”
He switched on the TV. “That’s still a possibility. I get the feeling first chance you get, you’ll be causing trouble.”
I removed the bag from my head and placed it on my tailbone. The spot throbbed. The slightest pressure made me grimace.
“I’m not here to cause trouble. Just on business.”
“Right,” Roan said.
I didn’t like his tone, as if he knew more about me than what he was saying. “What’re you talking about?”
The television’s sound blared.“Tonight on Ghost Wranglers, we’re at a haunted hotel in Nashville, Tennessee. My name’s Xavier Bibb. I never thought the paranormal was real until I came face-to-face with it. Now I’m tracking down ghosts and sending them back where they belong so that you can sleep soundly at night. I’m putting the boogeyman in the corner so you don’t have to.”
“Oh no, not that guy,” I groaned.
“You don’t likeGhost Wranglers?” He said it like it was the surprise of the century. Like everyone and their mama loved the show.
“No,” I said sharply. “That guy’s a con man. The whole thing’s for show.”
“You an expert?”
I couldn’t exactly say,well yes, I am. The Ghost Team was off the grid. We weren’t government, but that’s where the funds came from. We investigated spirit phenomenon when it interfered with the human world.
Well, I guess Anita and her team did.
I coughed. Ugh. That made my rear end hurt. “No. I’m not an expert. I think it’s obvious. That guy is so full of crap it’s up to his eyes. Can’t you tell?”
Roan shrugged. “I don’t watch the show. Guests do. I keep it on for them. Adds to the ambiance of the town.”
“Adds to something.”
Roan's dark eyes studied me. “Aren’t you just a pocketful of posies?”
I opened my mouth to argue that I was not a pocketful of anything unless it was a ham sandwich with a scorpion hiding inside, but the front door blew open.
I blinked. No, it couldn’t be. I had to be going blind. No, I had a concussion and was imagining things. Had to be.
A man filled the doorframe. He spotted me. Our gazes collided. My stomach plummeted to the floor. A second man dressed all in black swept past him. He aimed a camera at the blond man.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Xavier Bibb said to the camera. “We’ve found her. Our search for the woman who had lunch with a ghost has ended.”
I sucked air. What in the world was he doing here? Oh no. I’d never even considered the fact that my lunch with a ghost would go viral. How stupid of me—of courseit would go viral. Even though eating lunch with a ghost wasn’t a big deal to me, it was huge to the world. Xavier Bibb must’ve seen the footage and hopped on his private jet to track me down and investigate the town of Haunted Hollow.
I was sunk for sure. Lucky Strike would hear about the attention on the town and go into hiding.
Crap and double crap.
Or…maybe not. The camera crew might get Lucky Strike excited. He might use the attention to make a big splash, gain some attention. After all, since he’d blown the power out of half the Southeast a few years ago, he’d been relatively quiet. It was about time Lucky got back in the action.
Which meant now was my chance.
My gaze swept over Xavier Bibb and his goons from the showGhost Wranglers. I plastered on my biggest smile and shifted toward him, doing my best to ignore the pain zinging up my spine.
“My name’s Blissful Breneaux, and I had lunch with a ghost.”
FOUR
“Ghost Wranglersis here live in Haunted Hollow, Alabama, the second most haunted city in the country.”
