“Ask her what she wants,” I whispered.
“She’s looking at the board. Maybe she’s trying to show us—wait!” He tipped his head slightly. “That’s weird.”
“What’s weird?” He’d been seeing ghosts for months now, so what could be weirder than that?
“It’s like she keeps glitching.”
I still couldn’t see anything, so I took Cooper’s word for it. “You mean like fading in and out.”
“No. I mean switching back and forth between the bloody version of Jane that I’ve seen here before and a version of herself pre-death that’s much easier on the eyes.”
Why would a ghost glitch? And how?
“Now she’s backing down the hall into the shadows again, motioning for me to follow her.” But he didn’t move.
“You need to follow her. She might have something important to show you.”
“About what? I already know how she died.”
“I don’t know. Maybe something else about Masterson.”
He locked onto my elbow. “Fine, but you’re coming with me.”
I dragged my feet. “What? No, Cooper. I think she wants you to see whatever is back there, not me.”
“Yeah, well I want you to see it, too.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Why are you being so chicken? You took on a shitload of Chimera with just a crowbar.”
“But I could see those things. I can’t see anything here. I’m going in blind.”
“It’s a good thing I’m here then. Come on.” He tugged me along behind him, leading the way into the shadows.
I tried to turn on the lights as we passed the switch, but they weren’t working, of course. I was having bad luck with lights lately.
Up ahead, Jerry’s office door clicked open.
I slinked along behind Cooper, feeling like Scooby-Doo following Shaggy through a haunted castle, only our ghost wasn’t wearing a sheet. Cooper hesitated at the door. Darkness waited on the other side of the threshold.
“What’s wrong?” I whispered.
“I can’t see her in there.” He led the way inside.
Once again, the light wasn’t working. Cooper pulled a flashlight from his belt and clicked it on. The beam flickered for a few seconds, then stayed strong. He shined it around the room while I half hid behind him, worrying Jane would suddenly appear and rush toward us at any second.
After a few seconds had passed and there was still no sign of Jane, my shoulders relaxed. The room looked the same as the last time I’d been in it—same desk, same filing cabinet, same pictures on the walls.
“Do you smell that?” he asked in a low voice.
I sniffed, expecting to smell a trace of Jane’s favorite fruity and floral perfume that she had worn to work daily. Instead, I noticed there was an underlying hint of something aged in a cellar for too long. “Yeah. It’s like mildew or dry-rot.”
“Do you see her yet?” I whispered.
“No.” He shined the light behind us, leading out into the hallway to search one way and then the other before focusing back inside. “She’s not out there either.”
A creaking sound in the room made me clench from head to toe. I glued myself to Cooper’s side, holding his arm in a death grip. “You heard that, right?”
“Jesus, Parker! Would you get off of my foot. You’re crushing my toes.”
“Whatever, crybaby.” I eased back but didn’t let go of him. “Shine the light below the desk.”
He obliged.
Everything looked the same as before, including no creepy dead boss hiding under it staring out at us.
Before I could breathe a sigh of relief, movement at the edge of the halo of light made me jerk back, tugging his arm with me.
The flashlight slipped out of his hand, but he caught it before it hit the floor.
“Damn it, Parker!” he whispered
“Sorry, but I saw something.” I grabbed his wrist, redirecting the beam so it spotlighted the closet. “Over th …”
I froze.
“Fuck,” he said quietly.
I gulped. “You see that, don’t you?”
“I’m standing right here next to you.”
My breath wheezed. “Now what?”
We stared at the open closet door in silence. The same closet door that had been sealed shut for weeks. A flickering glow came up through the trapdoor in the floor that led to the basement—and the Hellhole waiting there.
“Jane told us to stay out of there,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“So, why is she letting us in there now?”
“Good question.” He took a step toward it. “So, who’s going down there first? The big bad Executioner or the guy who knows what he’s doing?”
Chapter Twelve
In the end, I talked Cooper into waiting for Doc and Cornelius before either one of us took a peek down in the basement, which was really more of an oversized crawlspace. When I called Doc, I ended up having to leave a voice mail telling him to come to Calamity Jane Realty’s office immediately, and if he were stuck somewhere, to call me instead. As for Cornelius, I’d opted to send a simple text message with: Closet door open in Jerry’s office.
Neither Cooper nor I wanted to leave the open closet unattended in case Jane tried to close it again, so we hung out in Jerry’s office while we waited for our company to arrive. Cooper had even lodged one of the visitor chairs diagonally into the closet doorframe as added insurance.
I’d found a couple more flashlights in Mona’s and Ben’s desks out front, which were helping to light up Jerry’s office since Jane still wasn’t letting us turn on any lights other than those out front. Too bad Natalie wasn’t here. She might have enjoyed a quiet moment alone with Cooper in the dark.
Me? I just wanted to go home and scarf down whatever I could find in the cheese drawer while basking in the light of Aunt Zoe’s fridge. My stomach rumbled, echoing my brain’s wish. Since Harvey had a date tonight and Aunt Zoe was working, cheese might end up being the appetizer, main course, and dessert, unless someone ordered
