She worked as slowly as she dared, doing her best work.
“Hurry it up!”
“Hey, I’m not you, and you’re not really creating this work, but I’m doing my best to be as good as possible!” she snapped back.
He surveyed her through the mirror as she worked. “Not bad—beautiful and creepy. Just what I want!”
She worked with the mascara on the dressing table, taking all the time she could—and hoping Jackson had gotten the message she had given him.
“I’m going to create a distraction,” Roger Newsome said. “I have to . . . I need to be able to push something . . . to rattle some chains. I don’t have any chains. But . . .”
“That’s good enough!” David Andre snapped. “Time for Ghouls in Shining Armor!”
“Should I go for Jackson?” Roger’s ghost asked.
In reply, she looked at David Andre.
“Jackson will find me,” she said.
“Right, of course. You gave him a clue as to where this wretched excuse for humanity plans on taking you,” Roger said.
“That’s part of my point. Not my original point, but . . . I’m working on it. Maybe I can find a way to make one of you kill the other—now, that would add directing to my credits! Then again, this is a big park. May take him far too long to find you. At any rate, Princess Ghoul, it’s time!”
He shoved the gun in her face. She stood. And walked ahead of him.
The ghost of Roger Newsome hurried on before her, looking desperately for a way that a ghost with no substance could save a living woman.
Chapter 8
Night.
Jackson was grateful for the relationship he had with his wife; they were best friends, lovers, and partners.
He talked to Ken Kendall as he drove.
“Yes, she’s been with one of the officers—” Kendall began.
“No, she’s with David Andre, wearing a uniform he stole from a cop he smashed in the head at the hospital,” Jackson said impatiently.
“We are going to bring him down—”
“No, listen to me. I need you to get people out to the Ghouls in Shining Armor area,” he said. “But without being seen. They’ll need to be careful. I’m getting there as soon as I can.”
“But how—”
“Trust me; I know where they’re going,” Jackson said. “They can’t be seen; he’ll kill Angela right away if they’re seen.”
“So, through the back—”
“No, David Andre will have had her at costuming—”
“He must know the place is crawling with real cops!”
“He doesn’t care. We’re on end game,” Jackson said. “They can’t be seen. I’ll be there within minutes. That’s the most important; they can’t be seen.”
“I’ve got it,” Kendall promised him quietly.
Jackson used his light and siren until he neared the theme park. At the gate, he got out of the car, and he started to run. He wouldn’t slow until he had neared his objective.
David Andre was clever.
But he couldn’t be everywhere at the same time.
He knew the ghost of Roger Newsome would still be with Angela, not leaving her side. But even experienced ghosts had difficulty “haunting” people—moving objects, making things rattle.
Adrenalin could give people extra strength. He hoped it could work with ghosts.
*
Ghouls in Shining Armor had been set up with the façade of a castle. Grotesque knights lumbered up steps to save a princess from a wicked witch.
A young prince led the army of ghouls. In the strange mix of the moon’s glow and the night lights, the place was eerie indeed.
A princess stood by a throne. The witch figure had created a swirling black pit—and there were several of the zombie-knights lying dead in the pit, having failed in their quest against the witch to save the princess.
“See—you get to be the princess.” David Andre said, pushing the princess figure into the pit. She crashed down at the bottom. The “pit” was an underground work area, she could see from her place on the steps by the throne.
“Great. But I don’t understand this,” she said. “I’m the princess, but I’m not your work. I put on the costume, and I did my own make-up.”
“At my direction!” he snapped angrily.
“Still, my work.”
They both jumped when one of the zombie-knights crashed to the ground.
David Andre started shooting at the thing—assuming someone else had been playing at costuming. Then he aimed the gun at her as he walked toward that direction. He kicked the metal that had been the zombie-knight, doing so until it fell into the pit. “These things have motion sensors!” he said.
“They might—but I did that!” Roger’s ghost cried proudly.
“These stupid people. Everything here is shoddy work!”
“No, look!”
Angela waved an arm, and it seemed all the knights shifted.
“Everything here is for people to get to enjoy Halloween,” Angela told him.
“But even then, the work should be better! Special effects and make-up are what make movies great. I mean think back about Rick Baker and ‘An American Werewolf in London.’ The hydraulics used! Brilliant. But not enough people get respect.”
“Artists get respect,” she said. “But—art is something you love, too.”
“I do love what I do! And aren’t you lucky—I’m going to get to prove it with you tonight!”
*
Jackson prayed he’d made the right moves.
He knew David Andre would simply shoot Angela in front of him if he was confronted. Or he might pretend he was going to make a trade, get him to relinquish his gun . . .
If he even sensed he was going down, Andre would kill Angela first.
There had to be a way to get close to him.
Ken Kendall had met him at the gate, telling him officers could see David Andre and Angela, but they didn’t have a clear shot. In fact, they didn’t have any shot; Andre knew someone would eventually be coming.
“I know. That’s why I need to move—fast!” Jackson had told him.
He moved fast.
And now . . .
Now he just had to make the right movement at the right time.
*
“It’s now,” David Andre said, looking at Angela and then around the area again. He smiled
