“Daddy?”He stopped mid-sentence and looked at the little girl standing next to him.“You said you’d have tea with me and Mrs.Burns today.It’s today, and you’re still busy.”
“I’m never too busy for tea with you and Mrs.Burns.”He didn’t have any idea which doll shewas carrying was Mrs.Burns, but she’d bet she served good tea.“Come on, let’s go get the pot ready.”
The only person in the world who could get him to stop was in his arms, and he would never turn anything she wanted down.His daughter and only child, Cindy.And his wife, Amber, of course.
While the water was warming up, he asked about the tea cups.They were looking a little worn, so he’d have to change them out soon.He didn’t want anyone hurt from a broken teacup.Smiling at Cindy, he asked where mommy was and if she should be having tea with them too.
“Mommy said that she’s too busy today, but promised that she’d do it tomorrow.Aunt Brandy is having her go over some paperwork that is really important to the business.She said that as soon as she’s done with it, she was going to have to ferry it over to her.”
“Ferry, huh?I wonder where you picked that word up from?”Even though he didn’t require an answer, he got one from George.“George is teaching you all kinds of words, isn’t he?Make sure you use it around Mommy or me before you use it outside the house.Remember the last time he taught you some words that didn’t sit well with your teachers.”
“I remember.They were powerful mad about it.”They had been, but both Amber and he had thought it was funny that she’d used it perfectly.“Hogwash wasn’t a word that people, especially little people, used, is it, Daddy?”
“No, not normally.But you be careful now.”She promised that she would just as he was filling up the teapot with warm water.Cindy had everything set up on the table for them, and he got down the jar of cookies they could have with their tea.“Which one is Mrs.Burns, and why is she having tea with us today?”
“It’s her birthday.”He should have known it was something he didn’t get a gift for.Laughing to himself, he handed a cookie to Mrs.Burns and told her happy birthday.Cindy, for a five-year-old, had a vivid imagination and enjoyed it when you played along with her.“Daddy, have a cookie too.You know they’re good for you.”
“They’re not, but that’s all right.I’ll only have one.I’m going to have Mrs.Jacobson bake us some that don’t have raisins in them.I don’t care for them.”He loved every other fruit in cookies, but he couldn’t stand raisins.They looked like rat turds to him.“You can have two, but that’s all.Dinner will be soon, and we don’t want mommy mad at us again because we spoiled your dinner.”
“All right.”They enjoyed two cups of tea each, one with too much sugar because he’d forgotten what a sweet tooth Cindy had, and one he’d made so it would be tolerable.After they were finished with their snack of tea and cookies, Cindy wanted to go to her room and talk to the dolls about the upcoming sweep and get them ready.He didn’t have any idea what the sweep was, but he figured it would keep her busy for a while, and he was all right with that.Just as he was going back to his writing, George asked to speak to him.
“Sure.But I’m not going to go hunting for your treasure in the rain.It’s bad enough that we have to go digging for it anyway, but the rain will make it twice as hard.What can I do for you, old friend?”He said he had a ghost that needed his help.“What kind of help?You know I’m not solving murders in this book.They’ll have to wait until I get to this deadline before I can go hunting again.”
“They said that he can wait.It’s Mr.Jacobson again.”They’d had trouble with him before.He was the husband of their cook, and he’d been killed in prison and still felt like he owned Mae.“He said that she’s holding out on him and wants her to turn over all his money back to him so that he can make you bring him back.I already told him that you can’t do that, and you told him.But he don’t listen.I’d tar and feather him if I had the chance I had before I had to die.But he’s not listening.”
“I’m going to have to get with Selma and have him sent on.I didn’t want to bother her with him, but I’m beginning to see I have no choice.”George said he was tired of dealing with him, too.“I wish sometimes I had the ability to send them on, but that’s reserved for Selma.She’ll do it once I tell her what’s been going on with him.Is he still bothering Mae at night?”
“Yes, sir.If you ask me, he needs to be strung up by his balls and left for the crows.”That was the kind of thing that would get his daughter in trouble at school, but for now, he ignored his words.“You’d think he might have learned something when he was in prison, the dirty bugger.”
“I’ll talk to Selma now and see if she can do something about him.Usually, she can just call them to her and be done with them, so we’ll have to see this time.”He loved his nieces and nephews, but Selma and Harley held a special place in his heart because they’d pampered him once when he’d been hurt by a baseball bat to the head.He still had the cards they’d made him when he’d been laid up at their house.
After talking to her, she said she’d take care of him.All he had to worry about now was whether or not she got hurt when dealing with him.He hoped not.He’d feel really bad if something were to have happened to her because of a ghost that he couldn’t take care of himself.He’d have to get with her later and see what had happened with him and make sure he didn’t owe her anything for being injured.
This was only the second time that he’d had to have her help on a ghost, and she’d been extremely helpful then, too.Selma could see and deal with them better than he could, and he was happy for her help.He went back to writing as soon as he closed the connection to her.
Amber interrupted him next.She said it was dinner time, and he was happy that she had.Just seeing his beautiful wife would make his day seem the best, and he loved seeing her heavy with his child.Or in this case, children.His little mate was going to have twin girls in three months, and he couldn’t wait.
“I got the paperwork finished up in time.The business that Brandy was thinking of buying was telling her that they’d not had a profit-sharing bonus in six years.I found not only have they had one every year, but the employees, who are supposed to benefit from it as well, haven’t been included in them at all.That’s part of their bonus, too, and they’ve not been paying them.”He asked why they’d do that.“So that they could get her to buy it cheap and then they could take all the profit from the sale.Again, the employees are supposed to benefit from that.”
“So they’d make it so that Brandy had to pay out the bonus from the sale, and they’d not have to bother.That’s dirty and underhanded.”Amber said that wasn’t all.“Tell me that they’ve paid their taxes for their employees?”
“They’d not paid anything.The retirement fund is gone.There is no money to pay the taxes when they come due.However, the owners are now getting bonuses that they shouldn’t because of the way they’ve rigged the books.It’s terrible.And I found that they’re getting bonuses in the six-figure area.I think they hoped that Brandy wouldn’t find it.”
Once they sat down to dinner, all talk of business would be stopped.It was a place where they talked about family things and nothing more.There were no cell phones at the table either.He enjoyed that when he went to his brother’s home, too.No cells at the table.
Dinner was fun.It usually was when it was just the three of them.This time next year, they’d be a family of five, and he couldn’t wait.Amber had decided that she wanted one more child, and they’d gotten two.He couldn’t have been happier if they’d had ten children by now, but it was her body and her pregnancy.He loved that woman with all that he was.
“Did you hear that your brothers are going to the Smokies over the next couple of weeks?”He said that he’d not.“The others are getting ready to do some vacationing of their own.What do you say we fly up to Canada and have a nice time in the cabin?It’ll be nice this time of year, and you know that you can write there just as easily as you can here.”
“I’d like that.We’ve not been there since Cindy was a toddler.”She said that she’d enjoy getting away for a while.“Yes, there is no cell signal up there, but family can still contact us.”She said that they’d not care if family got in touch with them so long as it wasn’t work-related.“I agree.We can leave just about any time.Cindy is on school break now, and it’ll be easy to just go.We don’t even have to pack that much when we go there.”
It was a cabin in the deep part of the Canadian region.They’d go fishing and hiking while there and enjoy the cooler weather.It was the best vacation they had taken as far as he was concerned.No one would bother them, and they had the whole house to themselves.Just the way they liked it.
After Cindy was put to bed after her bath and story, the two of them sat in the office and talkedabout their day.They’d been headed to the living room, but the phone had rang, and she answered it from Brandy.She was sending her fax reports of the paperwork she’d found about the business they’d been talking about earlier.There was a lot more going on with the business than anyone ever thought.
Guy went to his office when it looked like Amber was going to be caught up on the phone call for a while.He was greeted with two ghosts that he knew but didn’t want to have to deal with.He was pretty good at ignoring them, but this couple wouldn’t leave.He sat back in his chair and had to deal with them.
“You owe me.”He said that he’d never known them when they were alive, so how was that possible?“I wanted you to bet on the horses for me, and you completely ignored me.My pony was going to come in, and I would have won fifty-four to one in the races.”He asked him what he would have done with the money.“I would have paid you for helping me.You don’t have to worry about that.”
