Last Impressions (The Marnie Baranuik Files) (11 page)

“He wasn’t real clear on that,” Schenk said.

“Well, ghosts are a fun theory if you’re writing a scary movie, but you can't fantasize an explanation for what's happened,” I said.
“That's not science. Maybe he should stick to training his puppies.” I frowned at myself. “Did that sound overly bitchy, or just bitchy enough? Sometimes it’s hard for me to tell. Either way, he’s dead
wrong.”

Schenk finished mopping up the yolk with his last crust of rye
toast, ate it, wiped his mouth, put away his notes, and stowed the pencil. “I’m glad to hear you say that. Wanna go talk to him with
me?”

Score
. I might have liked to find Mr. Merritt, North House, and a hot bath, but it was just before noon and the obliging detective was still in detecting mode; I nodded. “It would be my pleasure, Longshanks.”

Schenk shook his head at me, but the Blue Sense reported a wash of grudging acceptance. He snagged the bill before it hit the table, told me to shut up when I offered to pay my half, and off we went.

THE COVERED PORCH
of the rectory smelled pungently of damp wool, mothballs, mildewed laundry, old boots, and wet dog. There was a rack full of leashes above a half-filled shoe tree, with a row of
salt-encrusted hiking boots lined up toe-to-wall like bodyguards on either side of a single pair of black, pointy-toed dress shoes. I’d had a
brief glimpse of Scarrow in person when he peeked through the
inched-
open door to greet us, which he'd pulled closed again to secure his dogs.

While we waited I texted the number Mr. Merritt had given me to check on Harry. It was unlike me to trust anyone with Harry’s
well-
being without more assurance of competence (
unless it's with a
corpse-licking ogre or a vampire hunter with a hundred and five hash marks on his
sexy, sexy chest?
my guilty conscience taunted), but the fact that
Harry trusted Mr. Merritt enough to hire him and keep him on
retainer gave
me some comfort; Harry was not one to let me shirk my duties
unless
he was in safe hands. It hadn’t occurred to me until now to be
insulted about the fact that Harry passed his care to Mr. Merritt’s without the slightest fuss. Within moments my phone buzzed with a reply:
Lord D. is well and secure
.

My next idea was to text Batten under the pretense of checking
on Wesley and Mr. Duchoslav. When the thought of contacting
Batten made something flutter low in my belly, I reconsidered; maybe the time away from Batten would be healthy for me. After all, I was
moving on. I was dating. Sort of. Not that any of the men in my life seemed to take that seriously. Harry viewed it as a pointless,
distracting hobby I’d taken up. Batten apparently found it straight-up hilarious.
What’s up with that?
I wondered if Batten was dating; the thought made me want to vomit up my toenails. I shoved the phone in my back pocket and pulled my gloves on.

“Everything okay?” Schenk asked.

I didn’t think Schenk needed to hear about my pathetic excuse for a love life, which consisted mostly of sexual jealousy and a jumbo pack of batteries. “Why the pencil?”

Schenk didn’t seem to be paying attention to me, but I’d been around enough cops to know that he was seeing every detail around him. We had a great view of the rectory’s office through the screen door, and I'd have bet my favorite pair of frog-bedecked panties his seemingly-casual inspection was anything but. I’d even wager plain
old cash that he
also
hadn’t missed my text from his elevated
viewpoint, nor my momentary hesitation to send another.

“The pencil,” I repeated. It was again pinched between his
fingers like a cigarette. I pointed to it helpfully. “Why not a pen?”

“It’s thirty below zero,” he said. “Ink freezes.”

“Lead breaks,” I pointed out. “Are you carrying a concealed pencil sharpener?”

“I’ll never tell.”

I pointed to his side. “Well, there’s
something
in your pocket.” I didn't even sound salacious when I said it, which was probably the surest sign that I was mentally off-balance.

Schenk gave me a
who-can-say
shrug. I opened my mouth to retort when Mr. Scarrow returned.

He was a scrawny little dude, way too old to be wearing skinny jeans but pulling the look off with a poised insouciance that
reminded me of Harry, an unflinching denim fuck-you to fashion propriety. He
was still (
again?)
clad in black-on-black, a turtleneck cupping his pale, pointy chin. His dark hair was getting a little long, and looked
like he
styled it by running his hands through it all day long when he
wasn’t out in the wind with his dogs. Many secrets to a man’s personality can be revealed by the state of his hands, so I took a quick peek at
them. Maybe he sensed my inspection; they disappeared into his pants pockets, but not before I saw smallish fingers with bony
knuckles and
the hint of calluses, thin but powerful. I got the impression he’d have no trouble handling leashes, or reins, or any other method of
controlling
various beasts. I wasn’t entirely sure that didn’t turn me on and
scare
me at the same time. I swallowed hard, and glanced up at Schenk for reassurance against some nervous giggles that began to well up inside me.

During brief introductions Scarrow doled out the bulk of his attention to the cop, allowing a minute or so for my dissecting eyes
to take a second pass. Multiple earring holes, closed over, but not long enough to remove all traces. Narrow hips, square shoulders, lacking the solid muscle of the cop between us; I wasn’t foolish enough to think that would make him any less dangerous in a confrontation.
What Schenk’s photos hadn’t captured was the sunken, wary
hardness in Scarrow’s eyes; this was a man who had seen some shit, handled that shit, only to be handed more shit. He fully expected the fecal deluge to continue, and welcomed the opportunity to whip that shit into submission. He might not initiate the shit-flinging, but it looked like the fucks stopped here.

I was keenly glad that Mr. Merritt wasn't totting up my losses based on the run of my thoughts.

The Blue Sense flickered to life with some uncomfortable
warnings:
Ren Scarrow felt like a man who viewed the world from behind a cynic’s lens, with a cynic’s expectation that something bad would
always be
followed by something worse. Rather than avoiding trouble,
however, he chased it, comfortably certain he could dominate it. Furthermore, the Blue Sense reported, Scarrow had decided I was something bad, or possibly something worse. This man was used to being in control,
and, like a cheetah picking out the weak gazelle, he’d instantly
marked me as someone he could (and maybe should) take down. I’d been
filed under “Prey”
.
Instinct told me that, matched against the vital,
wiry old bastard, my survival might depend on his good graces. Whether or not he had any to depend upon was still a question. I didn't really want to have to find out.

I clenched my fists, felt the leather creak, and contemplated
taking off my gloves to do some Groping around the room a bit to judge if I was, indeed, in any immediate danger. The old me would have thought
stick close to Schenk
, but I was running Marnie three-point-oh up in this bitch, and the fact that Scarrow intimidated me dialed my
mood to
show no fear,
bordering on the temptation to prove his predatory ass wrong. I was a gazelle who wanted to show off her
middle hoof, though I was pretty sure that violated ungulate anatomy.

Scarrow invited Schenk, by name and title, down the hall and into his office. He didn’t mention me, so I hung back, watching the
two of
them, diametric opposites but for the self-assurance they shared. When I made no move to join them, Scarrow was finally forced to
acknowledge
me, but he only did so with his eyes, which said,
Do you need an
engraved
invitation, or do I drag you in by your ears?
Awfully cheeky for a
stranger. I stood my ground until he returned to the hall. It was only two steps, but I counted them as a minor victory. I waited until Schenk was deep into the office before I spoke, keeping my voice at a lower and more intimate volume.

“Renfield Aquinas Thackeray Scarrow,” I said. “Your initials spell—”

“Say that word and I rip off your nipples.” Was that a smile? And why did the threatened body parts seem
into
that? My nipples are assholes
.

I blinked once, and heard words sliding out of my mouth on an exhale. “I like ‘em where they are, thanks.”

Scarrow eyed my chest. “So do I. May I take your gloves?”

“Um, no, thank you.” I plunged my fists into the pockets of my parka. “I’ll keep them on.”

He looked at my pockets. “May I take your coat?”

“Nah. Bit chilly.”
And I need to protect my nipples from all that ripping business, Mr. Rats.

“May I take your gun?”

I don’t have one. Probably should.
“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Scarrow.”

“How about the hat?” He smiled up at it. “Cute. My five-year-old nephew has one just like it.”

I whipped it off, shoved it in my pocket, and glared at him from
beneath my static-frizzed blonde mop. For a moment the Blue Sense warred with my self-destructive need to tell him off, and then
something else rushed in to crowd both of those feelings out: the ridiculous
need to laugh. And not just laugh as though someone told a mildly amusing joke, no. I clamped my teeth together against an
inexplicable and ill-timed wave of what threatened to become a belly-juddering gigglefest. Was the church itself to blame? I’d never been the child to
giggle during a service; as the oldest daughter, I’d been in charge of keeping the littler ones quiet as they sat wriggling, bookended
between
my mother and me on the pew. Now, I was the one trying
desperately
to squelch some unnamed, mischievous mirth, and with every
breath the urge to burst out into merry giggles continued.

Father Skinny Jeans missed it, thankfully, while he indicated that I should join Schenk in the office. I had to pass the dogs’ rooms to get there, and did so while mentally scolding myself to keep it together. Big black noses snuffled the closed doors as I passed, and one of the dogs let out a yip; I knew they could smell Harry’s indelible mark on me, my Bond with an immortal, the faint hint of burnt sugar.

“Interesting place,” Schenk said as we joined him, now openly admiring the spacious room.

“A little ghoulish, if you ask me,” I said, watching Schenk stroll from one window to the next. I knew what he was looking for: did Scarrow’s office have a view of the canal? The yard seemed fairly deep; I wondered how far you’d have to walk to get there.

I checked out the exorcist’s old-timey record player and
collection of vinyl in a rack by the desk. His tastes ran from Rush to Uriah Heap to Neil Young, with enough old Brit-punk thrown in to quirk my eyebrow. On the back desk there was an old, battered, single-ball bowling bag, navy blue leather with a sporty stripe that might have at one time been white but had aged to the yellow of smokers’ teeth. There was a little blue sticky note on the desktop, face down, that looked like it had lost its stick and fallen off the bag.

I asked, “What kind of whackaloon wants to live on an old
cemetery plot, Mr. Scarrow?”

“I bought this land knowing what was once here,” Scarrow said. “I train my dogs here, and breed them especially for the purpose.”

My belly quivered with the inexplicable need to laugh again. “To sniff out corpses?”
That’s not funny at all, Marnie, what the blooming fuck?

“Those are the cadaver dogs,” Scarrow answered; his eyes
narrowed, and I hoped he wasn’t noticing my internal struggle. “I train dogs to track ghosts.”

I blinked. “The graveyard is gone, but you’re saying there are ghosts on this property?”

“Oh, dozens. This was not just any burial ground, Miss…?”

“Baranuik.”

He made an affirmative noise, like I’d cleared up some mystery, or checked something off an internal list he'd been tallying. He folded his hands loosely in front of his flat belly. “This was the final resting place of several soldiers from the War of 1812, men who died
horribly, and who remain to this day. They’re lost, but relatively harmless; there’s only one resident who ever enters the rectory itself.”

“'Resident,'” I repeated, looking around the room, wondering
how quickly Harry’s skin would break out in an abandoned church and rectory, not to mention the clangor and clamor he'd hear if it was, in fact, home to the unquiet spirits Scarrow said it was. “Why would they haunt the cemetery and not the battlefield where they fell?”

“Fell,” Scarrow repeated, losing his calm for a split second of acid contempt that I didn't need the Blue Sense to catch.

“Died,” I corrected, noting the silent cop moving around the
room behind me but saying nothing. I wasn’t accustomed to a cop giving me free reign or room to move, and certainly Batten never let me take the lead. “Does it bother you when I call it that?”

“
Fell
is too soft a word for how their life ended,” Scarrow said, but he regained his composure with the easy mask-switch of your average salesman. “And these spirits do not haunt. Haunting is a malicious act. The spirits on this property are not malicious.”