Dead and Disorderly (Behind the Blue Line Series Book 2)

Dead and Disorderly

By

Alexis D. Craig

For Bert, because happy endings are worth it.

Nahia stood at the cash register in her shop, Wellington’s Magickal Apothecary, surveying her domain with pleasure. Business was good in the downtown Indianapolis store, selling herbs for teas and tinctures, as well as crystals and other items for varying practices of religion and divination, and she enjoyed interacting with her clientele. Everyone from the boho chic to the well-heeled blueblood came to her store to peruse her wares.

She snorted at her word choice; it wasn’t
that
kind of establishment. Yeah, it had the requisite dark jewel-toned walls, wind chimes, walls of various books, and tarot decks, not to mention the couple of rooms upstairs she rented out to a local clairvoyant, tarot, and palm reader, but she wasn’t all done up in faux-fortune teller broomstick skirts and jangly belly dancer belts. Today she had her turquoise streaked black mane tamed back into a long braid to her waist, her favorite Hello Kitty KISS shirt, and a pair of jeans that had been new two presidents ago. It wasn’t the mystical look, but it didn’t hurt the business at all.

She was ringing up a beginner tarot deck and a bag of tiger-eye runes when her cell phone sang from her pocket, Saint-Saëns’
Danse Macabre
. Even though it was her personal phone, she answered, “Wellington’s Magickal Apothecary, putting potion in motion, Nahia Wellington speaking.”

“Nye, it’s Nigel. I need a favor.”

“What kind of favor?” Nigel was Nigel Gooch, a childhood friend who now worked for the police department. They’d known each other so long that their parents referred to them as Nye, Squared. Nahia looked at her watch, a robust faced two pound wrist weight she was loath to part with and found it odd for him to be calling her so late in the day. He was normally a day shift car.

“The work-related kind.” He paused to snicker a bit, “I mean, your work, not mine.”

“Oh, this can’t be good.” Though she wasn’t exactly psychic in the traditional sense she was highly sensitive, somewhat clairvoyant and more often than not, clairaudient. For the life of her, she could think of no good scenarios for the police department needing her services. “The walls of roll call bleeding or something?” A simple haunting and a house blessing she could do. Locating missing people, not so much. Ghost hunting was a personal joy for her, with numerous pictures and audio evidence to her credit.

“No!” Nigel sounded unduly excited to be disagreeing with her. “Not like that, exactly. We had this guy go check a house. He got thrown out of the house.”

“That sounds like a situation for SWAT, not one for a friendly, neighborhood magickal implements supplier.” Wedging her phone between her chin and shoulder, she quietly tended to a customer, taking money in exchange for a rose quartz pendulum on a silver chain and a bundle of white sage.

“Not when the house is abandoned and whatever threw him out wasn’t visible to the human eye.”

Nahia smiled at the customer before turning to grab a piece of paper and a pen. “Now you have my attention. What was that address again?”

Nico Verrazzano disliked favors, at least as a concept. It wasn’t that he didn’t like people owing him, but the mercurial nature of the payback in the event that he was the one who owed always bothered him. In this case, he’d owed Nigel Gooch for covering for him on a missing persons case while he went to his cousin’s daughter’s birthday party, and now, as payment, Nigel had him sitting outside of this scary-looking abandoned mansion on the north side of town in his department vehicle. Looking around with his flashlight once he got out of the car, it was like a typical scary movie set, overgrown landscaping, broken windows on the bottom floor, and an overall sense of foreboding and despair. There were even gargoyles at the end of the drive, for fuck’s sake.

He turned around for the second time in as many minutes, feeling the tingly sensation of being watched, only to find the three story house looming over him with no movement in the blackened windows. This was not worth the original favor, definitely.

The reason for his presence was he was supposed to meet someone here, someone who was going to ‘ghost hunt’ in the house. Since it was abandoned, he didn’t have to worry, necessarily, about them trespassing, but more about the very live things that could be hanging out in the big old Gothic structure. Why they’d want to though, was beyond him. The place was damn creepy.

Though it was the middle of July, he found himself fighting a shiver that chased down his spine as the evening stretched leisurely across the sky and the lengthening shadows seemed to reach for him.

He was debating waiting inside his car when a pair of headlights pulled into the driveway behind him. A cute little Fiat, sky blue in color, bumped along to music barely contained within its confines. The door opened and the engine died simultaneously, giving him just enough time to detect the presence of U2 on the speakers.

Nigel hadn’t told Nico who he’d been waiting for, but when the tiny little brunette bounced out of the driver’s seat with all the eagerness of a puppy with a toy, he figured this was his charge. Watching her wasn’t going to be hardship at all, he mused, taking in her well-shaped ass and legs in a pair of jeans she had a closer relationship with than he did his dentist.

When he thought ‘ghost hunter’, she was nowhere close to what he’d imagined, though he’d be hard-pressed to describe his original suppositions. Maybe driving a hearse or dressed in a squad suit and carrying a proton pack, but not her. In a million years. Even before she marched up to him in her tight little black t-shirt with a large backpack slung over her shoulder, he knew she was going to be different than any other woman he’d met. And he’d met more than a few.

“Nahia Wellington.” She offered her hand with a confident grin. He could see lighter streaks woven through the braid over her shoulder opposite the imposing satchel.

Quickly pocketing his flashlight, he responded in kind. “Dominic Verrazzano. Like the bridge.” When she shook his hand, all his senses erupted, feeling everything all at once. Her delicate bone structure, her soft skin, her warmth. His breath arrested in his lungs until she released him. “You can call me Nico.”

“It’s…lovely to meet you, Nico.” She didn’t sound any steadier than he was, her quick shiver as she put her hand in her pocket had him on full alert, and the evening hadn’t even started yet. “Where’s Nigel?”

“He didn’t say.” Nico shrugged and reached for her backpack. He hoisted it onto his shoulder with one hand while checking his hip for his gun and his pocket for his flashlight. “He asked me to step in. I hope you don’t mind. I won’t get in your way.” Even as he said the words, he had no idea what he was agreeing to other than being her Sherpa.

Nahia stepped to his side and rummaged in her pack he had on his shoulder before coming away with her own flashlight, a camera around her wrist and small digital recorder. “Not at all. This’ll be fun.”

She stood before him in the dark, almost completely obscured by the night, a hand on her hip and chewing on her lip as she regarded him. He would have given the entire contents of his wallet to know what she thought. Rather than let the awkward moment grow between them, he took a step toward the house, feeling his muscles tighten in his legs in defiance of the action. Hopefully she didn’t notice the stutter in his step as he held out a hand. “Shall we?”

Not for the first time that evening, Nahia really wanted to kick Nigel’s ass. Nico…she rolled the name around in her mind as she followed behind the guy toting her bag who towered over her. Since she’d been expecting her best friend since childhood, the beautiful walking statue with the New York accent had definitely not been expected. As she followed behind him, enjoying the view of his broad shoulders in a white button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a pair of khakis that did amazing things for his ass, she was quickly amending her Christmas list.

He stopped outside the front door, allowing her to push it open and take the lead. If he looked uncomfortable, it certainly didn’t show. “After you, Dr. Livingstone.”

She heard, rather than saw, the grin in his voice. “Thank you, Stanley.” An educated man, more so than one who simply looked good, was the kind of guy to catch her eye, every single time. And the fact that Nico was clearly both,
yeah, Nigel was in for the beating of a lifetime.

Nahia stepped through the unlocked front door, flashlight out and blazing in one hand, her camera at the ready in the other. The door opened into the foyer, with beautiful black and white marble tile she had no problem imagining in its pristine heyday, under the layers of dirt and leaves and filth that covered it now. Directly in front of the foyer was the mahogany staircase, the first stop on their tour. “Stop here.” She directed him to drop her bag long enough to retrieve a digital night vision camera and train it on the staircase, from the ground to the first landing where it curved well above them.

“What’s up here?” He picked her backpack up with enviable ease, and shined his flashlight into the doorways of the two rooms that shot off their current location.

“This was where the officer encountered the entity physically. I figured if he wanted to show himself, herself, whatever, we’ll provide the opportunity.” Nahia took a deep breath and pulled the digital recorder from her pocket, balancing the flashlight between her pinky and ring finger while manipulating the recorder with her thumb and index. “We’re here to meet you. You have a lovely home. We’re not here to upset you. We’d just like to talk, if you feel like it.”

Following the feelings inside her, she walked off to the left, hoping Nico would know to follow her. He did her one better, taking her flashlight and holding it to the floor in front of her while he walked beside her. She didn’t normally have a partner on her adventures except for Nigel occasionally, which suited her fine. Suddenly, though, she could see the merit of it. Especially when the merit smelled so damn good, expensive but not froufrou, intense. It was almost enough to divide her focus, for the first time in a long line of hunts.

“What do you mean when you say that he ‘encountered the entity physically’?” he whispered, leaning close enough that she could feel his breath on her neck.

She fought a tremor and held herself still, trying to focus her feelings on her surroundings and not her internal workings, which were going haywire at Nico’s nearness. “Where the entity shoved him out of the house.” She took two more steps into a room featuring brass light fixtures and high ceilings. It felt to her like a sitting room, and she noticed immediately her companion had fallen back. “You don’t have to stay if you’re not comfortable, Nico. I can do this by myself. It’s really okay,” she offered quietly, not turning around, hoping to mask her disappointment.

He was silent for a moment. She honestly feared he would turn and go, though she blamed the burgeoning disappointment on the strange and instant connection she’d felt when they’d shaken hands, and not any kind of actual upset on her part. She was not a rookie and this was not her first rodeo, but having him with her, beside her, was a nice change of pace, and one she was enjoying greatly.

“You mean to tell me it can hurt us? Physically?”

She kept her snort of amusement at his skeptical tone to herself.
“More things in heaven and earth, Horatio…”
she murmured to herself. “Entirely possible. I don’t know,” she answered honestly as she turned to face him. She couldn’t see his features, just the beams of the two flashlights, but he hadn’t moved from where she’d left him, which she hoped was a good sign.

“But you still want to do this,” it was a question posed as a statement, and one of disbelief at that.

“I live for this. This is one of the joys of my life. I want to make contact, I want to take pictures, and I want to help them if I can.” She stared at him for a long time, doing her best not to will him forward, so she wouldn’t feel guilty later, if he did come and something freaky happened.

His sigh was one she recognized, having heard it from many people before him. Resignation. “Okay, I’m here if you’re here.” He took a step forward and then stopped again. “Bullets won’t help, will they?”

She laughed and turned back toward the doorway in the far end of the sitting room. “Afraid not in this instance, my friend. They are for the corporeal only.”

“That’s upsetting,” he muttered as he took his place beside her with the flashlights.

Nahia hummed a quick laugh, but didn’t speak. The further they walked into the house, the more her internal senses, the ones she relied on to lead her to the spirits in a location, were tuning up. She could already feel her ears straining for sounds, like there was speech she was just missing, sounds she could almost make out. She held out a hand, which Nico walked right into, her palm splayed against his warm chest. Holding out the recorder, the red light blinking in front of her, she said simply, “I know you’re here. I can feel you, and I’m assuming you can feel me, too. I’d like to talk to you.”

She heard footsteps not ten feet from her, heavy boots against the marble of the kitchen and then onto the hardwoods, a leisurely pace that wandered from the kitchen through to the hallway leading to another part of the house, still on the ground floor. She started snapping pictures as soon as she heard them. Nico heard them too, if his stiff stance and held breath were any indication. The flashlight beam swept around the kitchen, but so far as she could see, they were the only live people there, and the footsteps didn’t diminish. Out of practice, habit, whatever, she followed the footsteps, through the kitchen and toward a room filled with moonlight.

It had been a sun room once, a round glass room on the back of the house overlooking the garden and the multiple-car garage at the far end of the property. Now it was just a monument to broken glass, every tiny shard glistening in the silvery light. The footsteps receded through the other doorway to the room leading back into the main part house.

She listened for them, feeling alive as she gave chase at a respectful distance. They paused in the hallway leading to the room they’d seen to the right of the foyer, doors on either side of them.

“If we get to a basement, do we go down?” Nico sounded sincerely concerned.

Nahia scoffed, but took note of the crystal doorknobs and old brass hinges. “Hell no! Don’t you watch horror movies?” She was brave, but neither crazy nor stupid, and besides, what they wanted wasn’t down there.

The vehement sigh of relief behind her made her smile. He was being a real trooper, even though he clearly wasn’t as calm and collected as he appeared. Hearing the steps just beyond the doorway, she nodded and held out a hand to lead him with her, which he declined.