I grabbed what I was looking for and headed into the commercial grade kitchen. Darkness enveloped me. Everything was quiet. Too quiet. I reached out and touched what felt like the rim of the fryer. I could just make out the moon’s reflection in the grease.
An arm wound around my collar. I felt the sharp jab of metal on my neck. “I know all the nooks and crannies in this place. You can’t get away from me.”
What was Meredith, a cat? How’d she get here so fast?
“Cut me and I’ll drop the computer in the oil.” Meredith paused. My arm was extended over the fryer. “This isn’t a bluff.”
“Hand me the laptop and all this will be over. You’ll be messy,” Meredith said, “but I think I can get you cleaned up before folks start coming in.”
Where was Nancy when I needed her? Seriously. All I wanted was for the big, bad, scary ghost to show up, but she was hiding out.
“Give me the laptop,” she said tightly, “before I cut your throat.”
“Make one more move and I’ll drop it.”
Meredith released her hold. I turned to face her. We were at a standoff. She held the knife out as if to cut me, and I poised the laptop over the fryer.
“You don’t know how long I’ve waited to get my hands on it,” she said. “Slick was on to me. He took the laptop for safekeeping, reaching Xavier’s house before I did the night of the murder. How lucky that you found it for me. I’ll say you dragged me over to Slick’s, brought me back here and I killed you in self-defense.”
Come on, Nancy,was all I could think.
Meredith watched me. The kitchen was dark, but enough moonlight entered the windows that I could make out her features.
“I don’t have time for this.”
She lunged for me. I had two choices, drop the computer and fight, or let her cut me.
This computer could save me. The information on it would bring back my old life.
You know, sometimes your life wasn’t the reality you thought it was. You thought it was roses, but when you peeled back the petals, the flower was rotten.
I smirked. “You don’t have your talisman, Meredith. I do.”
The computer slipped from me and fell with a splash into the fryer. I knocked the knife from Meredith’s hand as she screamed.
“No!”
A ghostly figure appeared. Nancy, in full form, loomed in front of Meredith. Meredith glanced up.
“No! No! Don’t hurt me.”
Nancy opened her mouth and bellowed. It was glass shattering. I plugged my ears and watched as the ghost wrapped herself around Meredith and squeezed, draining the life from the restaurant owner.
When the spirit was finished, Meredith slumped to the floor. Nancy turned to me. I raised my hand and showed her the ghost mark.
The spirit studied it and nodded. “She killed me years ago,” Nancy said. “Stole the restaurant and told everyone I’d just vanished.”
The large woman’s gaze was sad. My heart tore for her. “I’m sorry.”
She sniffled. “I’m done. I’m ready to go to the light.”
I raised my hand and closed my eyes, concentrating on the light. When I opened them, a beam shot down from the ceiling. Nancy gazed into it. Her body slowly slipped away, drifting up into the heavens until she disappeared.
I stared at Meredith’s body, sad that people had to die at her hands. Her spirit slipped out, glanced back at her body and then looked around frantically.
“There’s a light for you, too. It’s dark though.”
A dark hole opened in the floor. Meredith screamed and fought, but she was dragged toward it by unseen forces.
