Oh, I was surprised, all right.
I clutched one hand around the casket that contained Eliot Ness’s ashes and used the other one to put a hand to my chin to push my mouth shut.
‘It worked! It worked! We really surprised you, didn’t we, honey?’ My mother grinned like a teenaged prom queen and wound an arm through mine so she could drag me farther into the office. ‘I knew we could do it,’ she told Ella who beamed me a smile.
‘I don’t really need all those pictures of all those mausoleums. Not anytime soon.’ Ella was so pleased with herself, I thought she would burst. ‘I just wanted to get you out of the office so we could decorate.’
‘Out of the office to decorate for …’ I looked around. There were finger sandwiches on china plates on my desk along with pink punch in a cut glass bowl I knew had once belonged to my grandmother. Now that I was close enough, I saw that the pink icing on the cake spelled out Congratulations, Pepper!
But Ella and my mom, they couldn’t have known I’d found the ashes. So why would they congratulate me? They couldn’t have known what I was going to do with the ashes, either, so that couldn’t have been it. Heck, even I didn’t know what I was going to do with the ashes.
I suspected I resembled a deer in headlights, and it’s so not a good look for me, so I pulled myself together at the same time I made a move toward the door. Ashes, remember, and whatever I was going to do, I needed to make up my mind and do it. Fast.
‘Oh, no!’ My mother held on like a limpet. ‘You’re not going anywhere. We’re here to have some fun!’
‘But I’ve got to go …’ I tried for the door again, but if there’s one thing I should have learned years earlier, it was that the woman who’d given birth to me could be just as stubborn as I was. I gave up with a sound that was half grumble, half sigh.
‘What’s going on here, anyway?’ I didn’t bother asking my mother. Or even Ella. I looked at her daughters because something told me if I was going to get an answer that made any sense, it would come from them. ‘What are you all doing here?’
Rachel glanced at her mother. ‘Her idea.’
Sarah slugged down the rest of the punch in her glass. ‘And you know how she gets.’
Ariel’s mouth screwed into a grimace. ‘You can’t say no to the woman. You should know that by now, Pepper.’
I looked to Ella.
‘It’s a shower,’ she squealed.
‘A shower.’ The words felt as uncomfortable as my insides suddenly did. ‘But there’s no wedding. Not yet.’ And maybe never, the voice inside my head reminded me. Because even if I didn’t know how to handle the ashes, I was one hundred percent sure I didn’t want to marry a man who had Al Capone inside him calling the shots. ‘That means there shouldn’t be a shower, and that means I really should be going …’ Once again, my mother grabbed on tight and refused to let go when I made a move toward the door.
‘It’s not a wedding shower.’ Since she still had a hold on me, I had no choice but to go along when Barb dragged me over to the table, poured a glass of very pink punch, and handed it to me.
‘It can’t be an engagement shower, either,’ I told her. ‘I told you, Mom. Quinn and I, we’re not—’
‘Of course it’s not an engagement shower!’ Mom laughed. ‘It’s a pre-engagement pre-shower shower.’ She actually said this with a straight face. ‘You know, just a little gathering to help get you ready for when the big moment really does arrive.’
Which it never would if Quinn was still being held hostage by the meanest son-of-a-bitch ever to walk the streets of Chicago.
‘That’s terrific.’ The words somehow formed on my lips. ‘But I’ve got this thing I have to take care of and it’s really important and—’
‘Oh, no! You’re not dashing off anywhere.’ My mother actually hauled me across the room. Before she deposited me in a chair festooned with pink crepe paper, I managed to put the box of ashes on my desk. ‘We’ve been planning this for a long time and we’re going to enjoy every minute of it. We’re going to play Bridal Bingo.’
‘And take a quiz about romantic movie quotes,’ Ella added.
‘And don’t forget!’ My mother’s smile was radiant. ‘Wedding Jeopardy!’
For one second, I wondered if Caleb would know all the answers. In the next, I wondered how the hell I was going to get out of there.
Before I had the chance to figure out an escape plan, Ella looked at her daughters. ‘What do you think?’ she asked Rachel, Sarah, and Ariel who, it should be noted, looked as horrified at the goings-on as I felt. ‘Do we eat first or open gifts?’
I didn’t wait for them to answer. ‘This is all really lovely and I really appreciate it, but—’ When I stood up, my mother pushed me back into the chair.
‘I told you she’d be embarrassed.’ Ella’s laugh filled my office. ‘You have a wonderful daughter, Barb, and I told you she wouldn’t want to put us out. What she needs to remember …’ Ella came over and patted my hand. ‘You need to remember that we’re your friends and we love this chance to spoil you. So’ – she reached for a gift wrapped in green and blue paper – ‘Let’s start with the presents!’
Thankfully, there weren’t many. Rachel and Sarah went in together and got me a silver frame and said I could use it for a picture of me and Quinn.
I couldn’t help but imagine Al Capone standing between us in the photograph.
Ariel got me a book (of course) about how to plan a wedding.
And I had to question how Melvil Dewey would classify it, and where he’d put it on the shelves.
Ella presented me with a CD called Perfect Wedding Music and told me that Quinn and I would have such fun choosing the songs we’d like for the ceremony.
And before I could stop myself, I checked the song titles and wondered if any of them included banjo music.
My mother, it should be noted, really did spend a whole lot of time and effort on her gift. It was a photo album that she created online, pictures of me as a baby and a toddler and a kid. ‘You were so adorable,’ she told me. ‘As soon as Quinn sees this, of course he’ll propose right away.’
Oh, how I hoped not!
I didn’t exactly like the thought of being married to a mobster.
There were a couple other little gifts, too, and honestly, I would have appreciated them more along with all the time and effort Ella and my mom put in to surprising me if I wasn’t so anxious and so nervous and so darned worried, I thought my heart would pound its way out of my chest.
I was grateful for one thing, though.
At least nobody gave me any elephants.
By the time it was all over, it was long past dark. Rachel, Sarah and Ariel left at the same time, but not before they’d each given me a hug and whispered a quick apology. I thanked them for being such good sports.
Mom, Ella, and I walked out to our cars together, and I set the box of ashes on the front seat next to me and closed my eyes, doing my best to get my brain back on track. It would have been easier if I wasn’t on a sugar high from the punch and the cake. Ella left the parking lot with mom’s car right behind her so Ella could lead her through the cemetery and out the back gate that Wally must have come in the night he killed Dean McClure and stashed the ashes in the mausoleum. Once they were on their way, I started my car and followed.
I’ve mentioned how twisty and turny the roads are in the cemetery, right? It all has to do with the notion from back in the day that cemeteries were places of peace and quiet and yes, of romance, too. I mean, really, more than one hundred years ago, guys used to bring their dates to the cemetery in carriages so they could drive around and enjoy the scenery.
Go figure.
With all that romancey stuff in mind, I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when I rounded a gentle curve and my headlights hit the figure standing in the middle of the road, blocking my way.
Quinn!
I slammed on my breaks just inches from where he stood, his expression blank, and for the space of a dozen heartbeats, I sat there like I’d been flash frozen, my fingers clutching the steering wheel and my stomach in my throat. Call me psychic (and I’m really not since I can’t see the future or read peoples’ minds, I can only talk to the dead), but one look and I knew he wasn’t the Quinn I knew and loved.
That guy wouldn’t be lurking in the cemetery in the middle of the night. He wouldn’t be standing square in front of my car, either, legs locked, feet apart, his arms at his sides and his hands curled into fists.
I slammed my car into reverse, backed up and tried to remember where I was and what was around me.
Angel statue on my right. I knew that, even in the dark, just like I knew that if I mowed it down, our insurance rates would skyrocket and Ella would never speak to me again.
Row of mausoleums behind me that were historic and valuable so there was no way out in that direction, either.
Shrubbery on my left that edged a family plot and heck, as far as I was concerned, shrubbery was replaceable.
I put the car in drive and shot forward, intending to go around Quinn and over the shrubs. Don’t ask me how he moved that fast, but before I got as far as squishing even one branch, Quinn was right in front of me.
This time when I hit the brakes, I lurched forward and my head knocked into the steering wheel. By the time I shook away the resulting fuzziness, Quinn stood at the driver’s door.
‘No!’ I felt along the controls on the inside of the driver’s door for the lock button, but my head didn’t cooperate and my movements were jerky.
Quinn’s were as smooth as butter when he grabbed the door handle and yanked.
Cool night air slapped me out of my stupor but not fast enough. Quinn unbuckled my seatbelt and hauled me out of the car.
‘Where are they?’ he demanded.
It’s hard to play it cool with knees knocking like castanets. I did my best, and while I was at it, I raised my chin and sent a laser look at the man I loved.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘I know you have them. Where are they?’
‘Well, how would you know I have them in the first place?’ I demanded. ‘If you’ve got a connection to some kind of 1-800 psychic line, then you would have found the stupid ashes all by yourself a long time before this. Unless—’ The thought hit, and I swallowed hard. ‘You’ve been following me.’
‘Hey, when you’ve got a guy with skills like this guy’s …’ Capone was talking about Quinn. In Quinn’s body. Using third person. It was enough to make my head spin. ‘Hand them over, and we can all get on with our lives.’
‘Except you don’t have one.’
His laugh was anything but friendly. ‘And you think your friend here will have much of a life left by the time I’m done with him?’
Funny (and not in a ha-ha way), but ever since I found the ashes, I’d been dithering about what to do with them. Here in the dark, surrounded by the dead and face to face with evil, I had a moment of clarity.
‘You’re a bully.’ I put both hands to Quinn’s chest and shoved as hard as I could. When he stumbled back, I closed in on him. ‘You have no right to jump in and out of peoples’ bodies and make them do what you want them to. In fact, you shouldn’t be here at all. You’re dead, Capone. Get it?’ I glared into Quinn’s eyes, grateful that it was dark and I couldn’t get upended by whatever it was I might have seen looking back at me.
I spun around and stepped back toward my car. ‘I’ve got a really good idea,’ I told Al Capone. ‘How about if you go back to whatever hell you crawled out of.’
It was a great parting shot, or at least it would have been if the parting part ever happened. The way it was, before I ever got back to the car, Quinn’s arms closed around my midsection. He lifted me off my feet, spun me around, and shook me so hard my head rattled.
‘The ashes.’ His words were fire. ‘I want them and I want them now.’
The way he was hanging on to me, I couldn’t move my arms, but there was nothing that kept me from rearing back and giving him a good head butt. The hollow sound of my skull connecting with his chin made me cringe, but good news, it made Quinn loosen his hold.
I wormed out of his grasp and, while I was at it, slammed my foot down on his, and when he yelped and staggered, I put some distance between us.
I was almost to the car when he grabbed me again.
‘You can’t get away,’ he said, and maybe he was right, because the way his fingers dug into my skin and held on tight, there was no way I could move.
‘I need those ashes and I need them now.’ This time, he didn’t give me a chance to come up with a smart-ass reply. He backhanded me across the face, and I went flying.
The last thing I remember, I landed in a heap in those shrubs I’d planned to run over just a short time before.
I don’t know how long I was knocked out. I do know that by the time I woke up, the night air was cold against my skin and drops of dew mixed with the sheen of sweat on my forehead. Fog hugged what was left of the shrubbery where I’d landed and, shivering, I sat up, picked bits of greenery out of my hair, and tried to put together the pieces of what had happened. When they fell into place, I went right on shivering and dragged myself to my feet.
My car was right where I left it, the engine still running, the door still open, and I staggered toward it and watched the cemetery around me turn to a water-color image of itself thanks to the tears in my eyes. I really didn’t need to go over to the passenger side door and look. I knew I’d find the seat there empty, and when I did, my shoulders sagged and my heart ached and I laid my forehead against the door frame.
‘Sorry, Mr Ness,’ I whispered. ‘I tried. I’m sorry I lost your ashes.’
I dragged around to the other side of the car and, ribs protesting with every breath, I got in. Not that it mattered anymore, but when I did, I made sure the car doors were locked.
The way my head spun, it wouldn’t be easy finding my way out of the cemetery, but I knew if I did, at least I’d be close to home. And then …
I couldn’t think that far ahead. Instead, I leaned forward, peering out the windshield and inching my way down the dark road.
Fog whirlpooled around the car, and the windows misted, and as I neared the chapel and the little lake where I’d first met Eliot Ness, I was forced to slow down even more. It was a good thing I did, or I never would have seen Quinn off by the side of the road.
Yeah, yeah, I know … considering what had happened (was it minutes ago or hours?) the smart thing to do would be to keep on driving. But nobody ever said love was smart or that I was either, and even though every bone in my body ached and I realized that my pants were torn and my left knee was bloody, I was out of the car fast.
Quinn was propped against the Ness memorial, his eyes closed and, like Wally when I found him under the mattress in his bedroom, his breathing shallow. I knelt down and grabbed his shoulders so that I could slide his head away from the cold granite and put it on my lap. When I took his hand, it was even colder and clammier than mine.
‘Quinn, can you hear me?’
He didn’t answer or even open his eyes. But he did move his head from side to side and groan and this cheered me no end at the same time it shot panic through my insides.
‘Quinn!’ I hated that I sounded fragile and afraid, that tears clogged my voice and my heart thumped loud enough to be heard in the next county. Whatever was going on inside Quinn, whoever he was at that moment, I owed him more than helplessness. ‘It’s going to be OK, Quinn,’ I promised him. ‘Only you have to open your eyes. You have to tell me how you’re feeling.’
His eyes fluttered open, but not long enough for me to find out who might be in there looking back at me. They flickered shut, and his breathing slowed.
And I knew if I didn’t do something fast, I was going to lose him.
Sure, I could have called 911 and gotten a team of paramedics over there to help, but let’s face it, it’s hard to explain ghostly possession. At least to anybody in their right mind.
Which meant the only person who could help Quinn was someone who wasn’t.