beyond the grave 03 - a ghostly demise Read online

  Even though Hoss seemed like a fairly nice guy, he was still a con artist.

  “I tried to cut him off a few times but he wouldn’t hear of it.” Hoss moved on to cleaning more glasses. “The last bet was his last bet. I told him that.”

  “You mean the last bet he’d ever place before he?” I made the knife sign across my neck. “Um . . . disappeared?”

  He looked like I had two heads asking such a thing. “The last bet I was ever going to place for him.”

  “What was it?” I was curious.

  “He knew what he was doing.” He shook his head. “He wanted to place a bet on the state wrestling championship.”

  “Wait.” I pulled back. My mind exploded with the past few days and all I had learned about Cephus and his family. “He was betting on his son?”

  I recalled the pictures in the newspaper of the state finals and how he lost.

  “Wait. You said it was his biggest payday yet.” I gulped. I couldn’t believe the words were about to leave my mouth. Hoss just stared at me. “You mean to tell me, Cephus bet against his own son?”

  Slowly, Hoss raised his head, then lowered it.

  “Do you happen to know who he wrestled against?” I asked as the fear knotted around my throat, almost choking me.

  I probably didn’t need to see what Hoss had to show me because I had already figured it out in my head. Only my heart wished it weren’t true.

  Hoss pulled out a sack. “It’s all there. Ten thousand dollars. Plus the article.”

  I had never seen ten thousand dollars. I unrolled the top of the bag and peeked in. There it was. All that cash. On top was an article from the Lexington newspaper. I pulled it out.

  There was a photo of the winner with a big smile on his face. The headline read, DIGGER SPEARS WINS STATE CHAMPIONSHIP UPSETTING PREDICTED WINNER.

  “Oh my God. Teddy.” I looked up at Hoss. “Hoss, please trust me with this money. I promise to give it to Cephus’s widow, Leotta.”

  “Sure, but why do you think he bet against his own kid?”

  “I don’t know, but I think his kid found out about it and killed him.” I grabbed the bag and put the article in it before I rushed out the door.

  “Emma Lee, don’t you dare,” Cephus warned me. He ran beside me as I darted out of the Watering Hole and into the parking lot. “Don’t you dare.”

  “Don’t you listen to him.” Digger Spears appeared. “Yes, you better. I bet you are right, that the sore loser couldn’t take it that I beat him.”

  “Shut up or I’ll take you out right here, right now.” The two of them danced around the hearse.

  “Emma Lee, I’m begging you. I don’t care to stay here in the Between as long as my boy, my precious baby boy.” Cephus broke down into a full-out cry. Sobbing.

  Digger and I stood there watching him. It was heartbreaking to see a grown man cry. Especially one who had just found out that it was his own son who had murdered him.

  “I’m sorry, Cephus. I can’t let him get away with two murders.” I knew in my heart Teddy had also killed Digger Spears. “Digger, your daddy said you hadn’t been back since high school. Was that the last time you saw Teddy?”

  He looked up in the air, scratched his head, and said, “You know, you’re right. I haven’t been back and before I left, Teddy told me that if he ever caught me back in Sleepy Hollow, he was going to wring my neck for beating him and embarrassing him like that.”

  The more he talked, the more it made sense that Teddy tried to kill me that day at the old mill. How did he know what I was up to?

  My phone chirped a text. I grabbed it out of my back pocket and looked to see who it was. If Jack Henry woke up and found me gone, I was going to have some explaining to do.

  Cephus and Digger both looked over my shoulder. My hand shook and I immediately got sick to my stomach, right there in the parking lot of the Watering Hole. It wasn’t because I’d had too many ice-cold beers. It was the picture of Granny tied up to her moped and the words that read Meet me at the mill. Come alone or she goes up in flames just like the mill did.

  It wasn’t signed and I didn’t recognize the number, but I knew who it was from.

  Teddy.

  Chapter 24

  Oh God, Emma Lee, what are you going to do?” Cephus was so upset he could barely ask his questions.

  “I don’t know, Cephus.” I zoomed back to town as fast as the hearse could go and made it to the other side of town in record time. “I guess I’m going to have to see what he has to say.”

  “I never thought he was capable of this.” Cephus didn’t look up. He kept his head down.

  “I’m sorry, but I think he needs to be taught a lesson.” Digger was fuming.

  It was time to tune out the ghosts and try to figure out what I needed to do. Granny was by far the most important person in my life and I would do anything to save her.

  The old mill was only a shell of what it was a few days ago. The charred smell filled the air when I got out of the hearse. There were still smoldering coals and puffs of black smoke from the ashes.

  “Hello? I’m here.” I called out into the dark midnight air.

  “Are you alone?” Teddy called back.

  “Yes. I would never do anything to hurt my Granny. Though you would,” I murmured.

  “Follow the blinks.” Teddy clicked a flashlight off and on a couple times.

  I did what he said and walked over. He lit a kerosene lamp once I was there and I could see that Granny was fine. A little pissed. But fine.

  “Let her go. She’s an old lady,” I encouraged him.

  “I would, but I’m not sure I can.” Teddy stepped into the light. He had a sawed-off shotgun pointed at me.

  Cephus and Digger Spears appeared next to Teddy. Digger was doing some sort of wrestling move while Cephus cried and begged Teddy to put the gun down.

  “I love you, son. I forgive you,” Cephus tried to reason with him even though he knew Teddy couldn’t see or hear him.

  “Why, Teddy?” If I was going to join Cephus and Teddy on the other side, I was going to do it with all my questions answered.

  I eased my hand in my back pocket and pressed the record button on my phone in hopes someone would find my body and find a phone with a confession on it.

  “Why what, funeral girl?” Teddy teased. “Why did I kill my dad?”

  “Your dad loved you.” I wondered if I could appeal to his sensitive side.

  “My dad didn’t love me. He didn’t love my mom or my sister. I accepted that.” His words were filled with hate. “My dad drank away all the money we had. Then he bet on my match. The biggest match of my life and he bet against me.”

  “How do you know that?” I questioned. I knew it, but how did he figure it out?

  “He bet our house mortgage on it,” Teddy spat. His bald head shone in the moonlight. “I overheard him on the phone with his bookie saying he was betting the house against me. All the equity in the house. There wasn’t much.”

  “Yeah, you wimp!” Digger swayed back and forth with his arms out like he was about to attack Teddy.

  “I couldn’t do that to my mom. She was going to be left out in the cold. I didn’t give a shit about his sorry ass. So I threw the match so he would win that damn bet.” Tears streamed down his face. His hand with the gun dropped to his side. “I knew my mom had become friends with Vernon Baxter, so even before the match, I told my dad I saw Vernon and Momma make out. It was a lie to get my dad over there.”

  Cephus stood there, taking it all in.

  “I waited in the bushes to see what was going to happen. I wanted Vernon Baxter to beat the shit out of him. When they didn’t come to blows, I called Vernon’s house so he would go inside, leaving my dad outside.” He jerked the gun back up and pointed it at me. “When my dad wasn’t looking, I jumped him. Put him in a Teddy Bear Sleeper Hold, but I didn’t stop there. It killed him. I took off his ring and flung it into Vernon’s garden so the idiot police would find it. I
dragged his body into the woods because I knew they would find him eventually.”

  “Were you nervous for days?” I wanted to keep him talking.

  “Hell, yeah. When nobody found the ring or his body, I just went on with the tale that he left on his own. It was rough on Momma, but I didn’t care. It was better than the life she had with him.” He sucked in a big deep breath. “I was good until I came back here and saw that idiot Digger Spears. He made fun of me. I told him I was going to kill him if he ever came back to Sleepy Hollow and I kept my promise.”

  “How did you know I was looking into it?” I asked.

  “You mean this?” He pointed to the old-mill skeleton. “Easy. Mary Anna started asking questions because she said you were asking about Dad. Terk Rhinehammer was also looking into it and I needed to stop you both. You know the day you went to the courthouse and asked all those questions from the clerk when we were standing outside campaigning with Bea Allen?” he asked.

  I nodded.

  “I gave the deputy clerk a signed headshot of my new WWE promotional photo and asked her what the funeral girl wanted. Since it’s all public knowledge, she was all too generous with her information. I knew the old mill was where the Sleepy Hollow paper was produced and that my dad put the smackdown on that bitch who ran it because she was going to expose him for gambling. Not to mention that the old mayor, Anna Grace May, was in on the gambling. She’s the one who didn’t let any store owners rent to the bitch paper lady.”

  All of my questions were being answered.

  “It was a bonus that she”—he pointed the gun at Granny, who closed her eyes as Teddy continued—“was fighting with Digger. After I snuck up on him and hit him, he fell in and drowned.” He told me the exact same story that Digger had told me and how Digger came to his own death. “I had to get you somehow. I grabbed one of those obnoxious signs and drove it right through his dead heart.”

  Cephus sat next to Granny. His head was buried in his hands. He sobbed. Digger continued dancing around in circles like he was waiting to make his move.

  “Now I’m going to have to get rid of you and her because that dumb-ass boyfriend of yours couldn’t solve a crime if it was laid out in front of him.”

  I watched in slow motion as Teddy brought his arm up and focused the gun on Granny. Shots rang out and like a cannonball I shot across the grass toward him.

  He fell, hitting his head so hard against the ground it shook underneath me.

  “Stay back, Emma Lee,” Jack Henry called out into the nighttime sky just as lights from several police cars turned on, illuminating the darkness.

  Cephus stood next to his son’s lifeless body, begging Digger for forgiveness.

  “See ya, Emma Lee,” Digger Spears called from the tree line. “I’m counting on that beer when you cross over.”

  I smiled. One day I would make good on that beer, but not anytime soon.

  “Are you okay?” Jack Henry didn’t bother checking on me. He was next to Granny, untying her from her beloved moped.

  “A little shaken, but I’ll be fine.” She stood up and dusted herself off. “I’ve got an election to get back on track. If you’ll excuse me.”

  “Oh no you don’t.” Jack Henry took her keys. “You need to come down to the station along with Emma Lee to give a statement.”

  Jack Henry pushed Granny’s moped; Granny was spitting mad. She cursed and said that she didn’t have time to worry about convicts and killers. Jack Henry didn’t pay her any attention. He hoisted the moped in the trunk of his cruiser and tied it down.

  “You go with Emma Lee,” he instructed Granny, and came over to give me a big kiss.

  “How did you know where I was?” I asked, knowing that I had left him sound asleep.

  He let out a big snore and pulled the piece of paper with the editor’s names on it. “You know I’m a light sleeper. How on earth did you think I didn’t hear you rummaging around trying to find clothes?” He grabbed me up and kissed me on the head. “I followed you to the Watering Hole and sat in my car until you came out. Then I followed you here. After I saw the flashlight flicking, I knew something strange was going down. I also knew you weren’t going to call me, so I called in backup.”

  “My hero.” I batted my eyes the way Granny had taught me.

  She always told me to never underestimate a good eye bat.

  Chapter 25

  It took Leotta almost a week for her to accept the fact and the confession that Teddy had killed his father and Digger Spears. She also had a hard time taking the money I had told her was Cephus’s savings.

  I couldn’t bring myself to tell her that he had bet their life savings, their equity in their home, on his last bet. Jack Henry went along with me about finding the money in a box at the mill. Mary Anna was a different story. She was glad that the fate of her father—though not the outcome they wanted—had finally been figured out.

  Right before Teddy was taken to the state penitentiary, he came to and he told Jack Henry where he had buried Cephus’s body. In a box in the woods near the old mill. Jack Henry hired John Howard Lloyd to go out there and dig until they found the box.

  There was nothing left but some bone dust and the clothes Cephus Hardy was wearing the day he went to confront Vernon Baxter. Short-sleeved plaid shirt, polyester taupe pants, brown belt and white, patent-leather shoes.

  Mary Anna had cleaned the clothes for her momma. They wanted to bury Cephus in those clothes.

  The election results were too close to call the night of the election. The town council stayed up all night and hand counted all the votes. Granny lost by two votes and she already had it in her head who the two were.

  Though mad, Granny did take some carrot-cake muffins over to Burns Funeral Home as a peace offering. I went with her to make sure she didn’t get into any scuffle.

  “Is the new mayor here?” Granny swallowed her pride and asked Bea Allen, who answered the residence door of the funeral home.

  “He’s gone to the office already.” Bea Allen’s voice accelerated. “What’s that?” Her eyes were drawn to the plate Granny held.

  “I wanted to bring over a little congratulations offering.” Granny lifted the edge of the tea towel she had placed over it. “Carrot-cake muffins. I knew O’Dell likes them.”

  “That was mighty nice of you,” Bea Allen said.

  Bea Allen grabbed the edge of the plate. She tugged harder. Granny was having a hard time letting go. I put my hand on Granny’s arm to encourage her to let go.

  “Did you get the carrots from Dottie Kramer?” Bea Allen asked, and lifted the tea towel to take one more look.

  “Hell no.” Granny stomped. “She voted for O’Dell even though I told her I would make sure Sanford’s goats wouldn’t get out again.”

  I nudged Granny. The lie needed to end. Granny sabotaged Sanford and Dottie.

  “Granny has her own special recipe and that is it.” I smiled. “Did you ask O’Dell about the newspaper proposal?”

  Over the past few days, I had had coffee with Bea Allen. I still had to make good on my promise to Fluggie Callahan. Bea Allen thought it was a great idea to bring back a small-town paper. If anyone could talk O’Dell into anything, it was her.

  “O’Dell said he would consider it,” she noted.

  “Okay, we better get going.” I took a step backward. “Today is Cephus Hardy’s funeral and we need to get back.”

  “I do have to say that we here at Burns were saddened when Leotta didn’t lay Cephus to rest with us.” Her emphasis was on we.

  “We?” I couldn’t just let that one slip by like I did most of her emphasized words.

  “Yes.” She pushed up the edges of her frizzy hair. “I have enjoyed my time back in Sleepy Hollow working with O’Dell on the campaign. I thought I would take over the funeral home while he runs the town.”

  “I’ve heard enough.” Granny grabbed my arm and squeezed it. “Congratulations. Let’s go.”

  I wanted to stay and argue th
e fact that she had never gone to school to be an undertaker, but she would give me some line that she was going to manage the place. It was a lost cause. My dreams of O’Dell’s closing Burns Funeral or taking fewer clients because the job of mayor was going to take up his time was just a flash in the pan.

  “The feud continues,” I muttered, as Granny and I made our way back to the hearse.

  I wanted to give myself a swift kick in the butt.

  “That’s my girl,” Granny said proudly.

  We both rode in silence as I drove back to Eternal Slumber. We pulled up and John Howard Lloyd had already taken down the big billboard of Granny that took up all of the front lawn of the funeral home. Charlotte Rae was probably pleased as a peach to have it down.

  There was already a line out the door and down the sidewalk for Cephus’s funeral.

  We walked to the back of the funeral home and made our way into the viewing room. Charlotte Rae gave a slight nod when she saw me. Granny made her way over to the gossip section. People were still asking her about coming eye-to-eye with the shotgun. Every time she told the story, she added something that never happened. Soon the story would be that Granny did some sort of ninja move, taking down Teddy.

  “Doesn’t he look good?” Leotta hugged me around the waist when I walked up.

  Leotta had insisted on an open casket even though there was no body. Mary Anna had placed Cephus’s clean clothes in the casket. She had blown up a large photo of his face and tucked it inside the collar of the shirt. His gold ring with the large, square, black onyx lay on his chest.

  “Yes. He looks great.” I rubbed my hand down her arm.

  I stood by the casket for a few minutes. Cephus was still there. He hadn’t really bothered me a lot over the past week, but he wanted to spend time with his family before it was time for him to cross over.

  Cephus meandered over to the group from the Watering Hole seated in the front of the viewing room. He laughed out loud a couple of times as they told Cephus Hardy stories.