Only the Good Die Young

15

“Hello,” she said softly to me, just like we’d agreed to meet here and everything was copasetic.

I was still gaping as Amanda Lee folded her hands in her lap. She was wearing a smart linen business suit and tasteful bronze jewelry that looked antique-y. But her totally not Amanda Lee clothing wasn’t what really caught my attention. She’d done something to her face with makeup, and her flat cheekbones seemed even higher, her nose longer, her eyes bigger. And she was wearing fashionable thick-rimmed glasses. She’d even dyed her hair a dark brown and pinned it into a loose bun at the nape of her neck. She was a businesswoman who faded into the woodwork.

So what do you say when someone has such balls of steel?

Before I recovered from seeing her here, Gavin walked in, and I sensed the hackles rising all over Amanda Lee at the sight of the man she thought had murdered the women she loved. But I’ll give this to her—she was a bitchin’ actress, and he didn’t seem to notice anything amiss.

Rising from her seat, she nodded to Gavin, who remained at the entrance to the cream-and-marble parlor, greeting her and faintly smiling like he was waiting for her to explain her presence better than Constanza had done when she came upstairs to fetch him.

“I’m sorry to inconvenience you,” Amanda Lee said, laying on the Virginia accent that she’d shed during her years in SoCal. “But I don’t feel right about just leaving these one-of-a-kind pieces off with anyone, even if Ms. Edgett has already paid for them.”

She sent a discreet glance to Constanza, who stood just behind Gavin.

I think Amanda Lee’s portrayal of “Alicia” included a bit of snobbery, and Constanza only narrowed her eyes at her in return.

Gavin’s smile went tight before he planted his hands on his jeaned hips. “I’ll take the merchandise off your hands. Farah mentioned consulting with a new personal shopper, but I didn’t know she was having anything delivered today.”

“There’s a Chanel evening gown in here,” Amanda Lee said, emphasizing the designer and really pushing the snobby angle. “When Farah saw it, she could barely contain herself.”

I wasn’t big into fashion, but even I recognized “Chanel.” How had Amanda Lee gotten ahold of clothing of this caliber? More to the point, what was she doing with it here?

Gavin motioned to the wheeled dress rack near the sofa where Amanda Lee… er, Alicia was sitting. Garment bags hung from it.

“I would’ve trusted Constanza to accept these,” he said, turning to grin at the maid, who gave him a warm smile in return, then left the room.

Amanda Lee also smiled, but at the maid’s retreating back. Then she aimed the gesture at Gavin. Sugary lemonade sweet.

“I’m on a working vacation from out of state for a short time,” she said, “and when I attended the Locksley Foundation dinner last week, I heard about Farah’s weakness for vintage designs. She mentioned to one of my associates that she was fond of Chanel in particular, and word gets around. So when I came across this exquisite dress for a steal yesterday, I thought of her immediately and arranged a quick meeting. Would you like to take a look at it, Mr. Edgett?”

“No, thanks.” Polite, but direct.

Amanda Lee didn’t seem surprised when he didn’t say anything more. He was obviously waiting for her to take her leave.

When she began to head for the door, I was a smidge surprised. Surely she had more than this up her sleeve. And… yup.

She made a delicate show of sucking in a breath as she passed by me.

“Oh my,” she said.

Gavin slowed his steps, giving her a curious glance.

Amanda Lee seemed embarrassed as she said, “Pardon me, Mr. Edgett, but… well, my friends back home say I’m eccentric, so keep that in mind. However, do you have some paranormal activity in this house?”

My essence nearly flipped upside down. What the hell?

Gavin seemed just as stunned while she continued.

“Maybe it’s nothing, but I’m known for my psychic moments, and you have something out of the ordinary going on here. Haven’t you noticed?”

I could tell he was about to say she should get lost. As for me, I was about to pinch the fucking shit out of Amanda Lee like the world’s most furious poltergeist. What was she up to?

She wandered closer to where I was hovering near the sitting room’s doorframe. I slid up the wood like water going against gravity.

She said, “Its presence is stronger in some places than others. Is there a certain room where there are… odd… occurrences?”

He paused, his gaze going hard. I thought he was thinking about his bedroom in particular, but he wasn’t about to confide in this near stranger.

Ultimately, he only shook his head. “I haven’t noticed anything, Ms… .”

“Dantès. Alicia Dantès.”

The last name sounded familiar. I couldn’t say why, though. Frankly, I wasn’t in an analytical mood as I spread over the ceiling, waiting until Amanda Alicia Lee got her ass out of here so I could follow and read her the riot act.

Brusquely, Gavin walked through the foyer and to the door, which he held open for her.

Once outside, Amanda Lee put on a concerned face, then opened the purse she had slung over her shoulder and extracted a pad of paper, plus a pen.

“Mr. Edgett, I sense disquietude in you. So I say this in all earnestness—if you find that whatever is in your home is bothering you or escalates its activity, please feel free to contact me.” She handed him the paper. “I’ve encountered the supernatural before, and I know how disturbing it can be. Now, I’ve never dealt with activity on a large scale, but there’s certainly something here, and I’d be glad to help, even if it’s only to call up friends who do contend with matters of this nature on a regular basis.”

“Thank you, Ms. Dantès.” He didn’t seem impressed by the flaky psychic who’d just bashed into his life. “I’ll take care of the clothing for Farah.”

Alicia Actress paused, her smile fading, and I knew it was only a matter of superior self-control that kept the real Amanda Lee from revealing herself.

But then she turned on that lemonade smile again. “I appreciate your help. So sorry to bother you.”

As he closed the door, I slipped through. She strolled to a Mercedes I’d never seen before—a rental?—in the circular driveway, where a fountain splashed in the middle. I didn’t have the chance to see how Gavin reacted or if he threw away the paper she’d given him, because I was already beelining for her car.

Her windows were open, like she’d expected me and wasn’t going to make my grand entrance any harder than it had to be.

Once I was inside and she started the engine, I let loose. “Are you insane, pointing out that there’s a ghost haunting the house?”

“Not remotely,” she said, reverting to her regular speech pattern.

She wheeled around the driveway and down to the gates, which automatically opened for her. Farah had probably left “Alicia’s” name for Constanza.

It was only when we were off-property, driving oh so casually as she slipped off her glasses with her free hand, that she continued.

“I knew you were going to be in that mansion, and I joined you because I had to.”

“You had to?”

“I’ve been busy while you’ve been away, Jensen. We need to catch up with each other.”

Oh, like we hadn’t had a huge fight the other night or something.

“Alicia,” I said, “I actually had everything under control. But with you barging in like that, I’m not so sure now.”

She seemed interested. “And how far have you gotten with a confession from the killer?”

I refused to tell her about last night with Gavin and the phone that wouldn’t die. But I did say, “I’ve gotten far enough to think that Gavin didn’t murder Elizabeth.”

Amanda Lee squealed over to the side of the road, where bird-of-paradise plants waved in the aftermath of the dust from the tires. When she glanced at me, she was on fire.

“What did you just say?”

“Gavin told me he didn’t kill her.”

Her breathing was getting choppy. “Then if he didn’t, who did?”

That was a conversation stopper. It was like a boulder had crushed the car, and us with it.

As we both cooled down, she started surveying me, like she was just now noticing that I had a mite of color left over from my latest fake Dean encounter. Yeah, like I was going to tell her about that.

She must’ve gotten my nonverbal cue loud and clear, because she lowered her voice, an attempt at calm. “After you left, I didn’t know what to do. I’m not even sure I moved from the pool house floor for hours. But all the while, I wished you would come back.”

“Because I’m your fetch-it girl.”

“No. Among other things, I wanted another chance to earn your trust. And that’s what I’m doing now.”

“By crashing the haunting? Awesome plan, Amanda Lee.”

“Just hear me out.”

I stared at her. She seemed utterly sincere, but I still couldn’t bring myself to believe that.

She deftly loosened the clasp of her old, heavy bronze necklace, doffing it and tossing it into the backseat. She breathed a sigh of relief.

“I spent all of my time after you were gone in meditation, scrying into crystals, gazing into a crystal ball, everything you can think of. And finally, I got something. Two visions.” She leaned her head back against her car seat. “They were tangential, but it was as if someone somewhere was showing me a way to finish what we started, and I realized that all our previous plans weren’t good enough.”

Was she thinking it was Elizabeth who had contacted her and was making her reevaluate how to go about the haunting? That would explain the guts she’d displayed, coming into the Edgett house and meeting the person she hated the most when, before, she’d wanted to stay completely undercover.

I closed what I had for eyes, torn about telling her what fake Dean had said about Elizabeth moving on. But even though he’d been right about Wendy showing Gavin my pictures, I didn’t trust him way more than anyone. So I kept the news to myself for now.

Amanda Lee said, “In the first vision, I saw Farah at that Locksley Foundation dinner, even though I wasn’t actually there. I heard her talking about fashion to a group of women, and when she mentioned her favorite designers, this new plan came to me.”

“A plan to fix her up with a Chanel.”

“Yes. I’ve had a collection in storage that I felt she might be interested in—”

“Part of that inheritance of yours?”

“My mother’s. The dresses are valuable, but there’s nothing I wouldn’t sacrifice for Liz.”

“So you called Farah yesterday, pretending to be a personal shopper.”

“More of a stylist, and I was able to set up a meeting with her so she could look at the clothing. She’s a tough sell, though, and she wanted to think about it, but about an hour later, she called, wanting to bargain for them. And since Farah doesn’t have an office, or a job besides working for different charities, I told her I would make a delivery to her home today, whether she was there or not. Honestly, I was hoping she would be in instead of her brother.”

A muscle twitched in her cheek, and she bent down to the passenger side, where she’d stored her purse. I shifted away from her, not because I knew she’d be cold from my essence, but because I didn’t want her touching me.

She faltered at my distant attitude, but then slowly extracted a tissue from her purse. “When I first saw him, I almost killed him.”

Like I was going to join her pity party. Sure, I had sympathy for her, but…

Fool me twice, shame on me.

“For your information,” I said, “your trip wasn’t necessary. Gavin already knows I exist.”

“I realize that, because that was what my second vision centered on. I saw that the girl, Wendy, showed him pictures of you. That was what convinced me to come here today most of all. You no longer had the advantage of surprise, and that’s a terrible loss. We need to get that back.”

I folded my arms over my chest. “A lack of surprise didn’t stop me from scaring Gavin, getting him to tell me that he didn’t kill Elizabeth.”

Amanda Lee didn’t acknowledge that. “Tell me… has he mentioned to anyone that there’s a ghost in the house?”

So much for being stubborn and withholding information from Amanda Lee. It looked like we really were in this together, whether I liked it or not.

“He let me know that he was aware of me,” I said.

“But he doesn’t want to admit it to anyone else.”

“I think he was about to show Wendy’s pictures to Farah before she left the house last night. Otherwise, I’m not sure. But I can tell you that he definitely won’t confide in a random, psychic stylist who seems like she’s off her rocker.”

She risked a smile at me, like she wanted to test the ground we were on. I didn’t smile back, giving her a definitive answer. Her gaze clouded.

Why did this have to be so hard? “I still don’t understand what your purpose was in telling him about ‘activity.’”

“I was getting around to that,” she said. “After that second vision, I realized that he’s going to be on his guard from now on, and your haunting efforts might be blocked.”

“Yeah. He figured out that I’m not Elizabeth, thanks to those pictures, so he fended off my attempts at empathy, and he refuses to sleep so I can dream-dig.”

“We need for him to think that you’re gone, then.”

My brain was catching up to what she was proposing.

She said, “Remember a few days ago, when we talked about the family perhaps calling in someone or something else to get rid of you if they became aware of your presence? I’m going to be that person.”

Wow. It made perfect sense. I wouldn’t want to go up against Amanda Lee in chess or war.

She looked satisfied that I wasn’t putting down her idea. “This is how I’m going to do it: if Gavin doesn’t call me back by noon, I plan on contacting Farah again, just to ‘follow up on the delivery.’ But I’ll find a way to work in a comment about the house’s activity. Have you had any contact with her so she might be predisposed to believing me?”

“Enough contact to make her wonder if what you’re telling her could be true.”

“Good.” Amanda Lee looked in the rearview mirror while wiping off some of the makeup that had altered her face. “This way, the Edgetts won’t call in another psychic who’ll intuit what’s actually happening. I’ll get there first. And I’ll pretend to get rid of you, lulling Gavin into letting down his defenses so you can regain that element of surprise with him. That way, you can use your empathy to read more of him, and you can dream-dig.”

I took it all in, then asked, “What if Gavin gets suspicious and hires a human to look into your background?”

Amanda Lee clearly had this covered, too. “Remember that PI friend I told you about?”

Her only friend? If he was even real. I mean, I’d only heard of him and still had to meet him. That’s when I’d believe he existed.

“I remember,” I said.

“He’s already helping me cover myself with false documents. If anyone should ask about Alicia, I’m confident they’ll be satisfied with what they hear. I’m even using a disposable phone for every contact.”

I was dying to meet this PI, but Amanda Lee was already talking again, just like we were buds.

“Speaking of PI help,” she said, “he’s been doing some research about Mr. Edgett senior, as well.”

I couldn’t help it—she’d hooked me. “What did you find out about the dad?”

“He seems to have holed up somewhere in France. At least, that’s the speculation, and I haven’t intuited whether it’s true or not. That’s another reason I wanted to visit the Edgett mansion—to see if I could pick up any vibes on the family.”

I leaned forward, urging her on.

“I didn’t get a thing from that house, though,” she said. “I’m afraid it will take another trip for me to try again.” She crumpled the cosmetic-smudged tissue in her hand. “But I wish I could stay out of that place. I don’t like being in there, near him.”

Gavin. I didn’t like being near him, either, especially because I kept getting drawn to dark men. Talk about reliving the past. I couldn’t stay away from those murderers, real or imagined, could I?

Awkward silence separated me from Amanda Lee, and it felt like she was searching for something more to say, getting me to “trust” her again.

She cleared her throat, then said, “Have you been able to check into your own killing? Because I focused my scrying on that, too, although I didn’t have any visions. And my PI is still on your case.”

“No time for my business,” I said. “I’m pretty swamped here.”

She inhaled, blew out a breath. “I’m just going to say it. No matter how you feel about me, you need me.”

I shot her a hard look.

“Think about it,” she said. “Since there are no suspects or witnesses to your crime, you can’t empathize or dream-dig in order to solve your case on your own. You need a psychic’s visions and guidance.”

“Maybe I can break into some law enforcement computers to find any suspects they had.” Then I could go from there.

Her sad glance told me that there hadn’t been any strong suspects.

Her voice was soft. “I have a connection with you, whether you like it or not. If anyone is going to envision what happened on that night, it’s me.”

I hoped she wasn’t right. “Listen, I’ve got to get back there in case Gavin falls asleep.”

“Here’s to hoping that the dream-digging works out for you.”

I shrugged, still not willing to be pals.

“Either way,” she said, “I’ll be by the mansion again soon. Ideally tonight. And when I put on my fake séance or whatever I end up doing, just stay silent and follow my cues. Leave all the activity to me, Jensen—we want to save the real haunting for the killer himself. I’ll give him the afternoon to decide if he wants my help and to contact me, but if he doesn’t, I’m calling Farah.”

“You do what you need to do.”

As I began to coast out the window, Amanda Lee stopped me.

“One last thing. Have you thought about what should be done if he refuses to confess? If it looks as if he’s about to get away with murder?”

“No.” I hadn’t gotten that far.

“There are other ways to make him pay.”

I waited, already knowing I wasn’t going to like this.

She gripped the steering wheel. “This other ghost you have contact with… Randy. He already told you about possession.”

I realized what she was suggesting. This woman really was a lean, mean, retribution machine.

“Are you thinking that, if nothing else works out, I should punish Gavin by taking over his body and doing God knows what to it while his consciousness is still working?” I asked.

She kept gripping the wheel.

That’s when the straight-A student in me suddenly remembered where I’d heard the last name that Amanda Lee had used with Gavin. Edmond Dantès was the main character in The Count of Monte Cristo, a man who’d been out for revenge against those who’d ruined his life.

Vengeance, I thought. Not justice. Amanda Lee was never going to want the latter because it wouldn’t satisfy her.

“I feel sorry for you,” I said, not even wanting to explain to her that Randy had told me humans needed to willingly accept a possession and that demons were the ones who took over bodies without permission.

I was so disgusted that I did something awful. I threw out a sound to Amanda Lee.

Elizabeth weeping.

And I didn’t stick around to see the tragic sound of hurt and devastation haunting Amanda Lee as much as it did Gavin.