Nine Lives and Alibis, page 1
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Table of Contents
About the Author
Copyright Page
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For Glenn, who taught me everything I ever wanted to know about funeral homes
Acknowledgments
I’ve been obsessed with ghosts and funeral homes for many years, and I was thrilled to be able to combine the two in this book. Thank you to one of my best and oldest friends, Glenn Burlamachi, who runs multiple funeral homes and has given me so much good info I’ll never be able to use it all. And for letting me sit in on all kinds of things that most people would think are way too morbid …
Thank you to my editor, Nettie Finn, for making the book even better; to my agent, John Talbot; and the team at St. Martin’s for bringing this book to life. As always, the cover captures Daybreak Island perfectly—thanks to amazing designer Danielle Christopher and cover illustrator Scott Zelazny. And thank you to production editor Nathan Weaver for all your hard work on the logistics of getting the book out the door.
Thank you to my Wicked Author sisters—Sherry Harris, Jessica Ellicott, Maddie Day / Edith Maxwell, Julie Hennrikus / Julia Henry, and Barbara Ross for always being there for support. It never gets old to say I wouldn’t want to be on this ride without all of you.
And as always, thank you to the readers—without you, this series wouldn’t exist. Keep reading!
Chapter 1
From the Daybreak Island Chamber of Commerce website
Haunted Spots on Daybreak Island
While Daybreak Island has a ghostly history with its long parade of sailors and sea captains and the tragedies that naturally come with a life at sea, the Inn at Lighthouse Point in Daybreak Harbor is the only truly haunted residence on the island. It was built by Captain William Swain in 1850 for his bride. Sadly, Captain Swain died at sea shortly after his wedding, and his bride of ten days, Louisa, never recovered. She was said to have become a recluse in the house, leaving only at night to walk the cliffs, staring out to sea. Some said she was searching for her lost husband. Others said she was contemplating suicide on those nightly walks.
Until finally, she leapt from the cliffs on the one-year anniversary of her wedding.
The house sat empty for ten years, eventually falling into disrepair, since Swain had no other family and no children. It was purchased by the Blair family in 1861, and they restored and renovated the home and turned it into an inn. It’s been in the Blair family ever since.
Louisa Swain has kept the family company in her prior home from day one. She is said to walk the cliffs at night in her very best blue dress, the one she wore waiting for her husband to return from sea. Guests have reported seeing her roaming the property, watching for her husband, though they’ve only seen her from behind—she never turns to face anyone.
While Louisa is the first ghost to have graced the property, she’s been joined by other spirits over the years. Guests have reported ghostly happenings, including furniture being moved around, the sounds of a child laughing, lights turning on and off, and music playing in the middle of the night. On the fifth floor in particular, guests have reported feeling violently cold air sweep through the room and have woken to find a woman standing at the foot of their beds.
If you’re visiting the island and love ghost stories, this is the place to stay! The fifth floor is no longer open to guests, but there are plenty of haunted happenings on the other floors to experience. Make your reservations today.
Chapter 2
Monday
“What do you mean, the psychic can’t stay at the haunted inn? That’s kind of the whole point of bringing him here. To do readings at the haunted inn, in the haunted rooms. That’s one of the reasons he agreed to come.” Did I really need to explain this?
Planning for Halloween festivities was supposed to be fun. It was why I’d let myself get roped into being on this committee. Although to be honest, I didn’t have much choice after my mother and sister agreed to spearhead this shindig. When one James got involved in something, all the Jameses got involved. But this—not fun right now. Not with so many egos and neuroses trying to fit at the table that there was barely any room to breathe.
My mother, sitting directly across from me, shot me a warning look. I was quite familiar with this look. It said, Maddie, behave. I’d been getting it from multiple family members since I was a little girl. Being Maddie James meant always being on my best behavior, because my parents were BIG DEALS on Daybreak Island. My dad, Brian, was the CEO of Daybreak Hospital, the only hospital on the island. My mom, Sophie, was not only his sidekick but a force in her own right—running multiple businesses over the years, managing the hospital’s social events, and participating in all kinds of community events. In this case, she and my youngest sister, Sam, had brought the idea of the Daybreak Island Haunted Halloween Festival to the Chamber of Commerce, whose leadership and membership had all blessed the idea. As long as my mom took the lead.
Sure, she’d said. Sam and I would be happy to. Which meant my sister Val and I had better be happy to also. I wasn’t really sure what my role actually was, though my mother called me her right hand. Which meant she was letting me handle all the day-to-day fun of planning this thing. Val had been tapped to manage the events taking place during the festival, which was a coup for her. She’d launched her own event planning business last year and she’d already made a huge name for herself, especially after some celebrity attention we’d gotten over the summer.
And Grandpa Leo was involved too. I’d made sure of that. Our cat cafe, JJ’s House of Purrs, was running the pet costume parade, and I’d made Grandpa point man on the project. It got him involved, but it meant he didn’t have to spend his time in meetings. Committees weren’t really his thing.
A shame, because I was totally contemplating handing my seat over to him. At least that way I wouldn’t have to sit in this funeral home any longer.
Oh yeah—we were having our committee meeting in a conference room at the Tunnicliffe Funeral Home. Someone’s idea of a twisted joke, I had to assume. Picking this place for a meeting was weird, I don’t care how much of a Halloween junkie you are. The last time I’d been here was when my grandma died a year and a half ago, and I’d have been happy to never return. But no one else seemed bothered, so here we all were. Right next to the room where Mrs. Phyllis Handy was getting embalmed. Well, maybe not right next door, but you get the picture. Creepy.
JJ, my orange rescue cat, didn’t agree. In fact, he was in all his sniffing glory, nose pressed to the floor around us, intent on whatever smells were lingering inside this place.
I didn’t really want to think about what those might be.
Jacob Blair, the owner of the haunted Inn at Lighthouse Point where the psychic was supposed to be staying and where a large part of the festivities were meant to occur, didn’t seem to notice me teetering on the brink of self-destruction. He was too busy drumming his manicured fingers on the table as he stared into space, thinking very hard about this conundrum, taking all of it way too seriously.
“I would think this … psychic agreed to be here because he recognized that our town was quite up and coming on the Halloween front, not just because of the inn,” he said finally, steepling his fingers under his chin and fixing his intense gaze on me. “Also, because his mother asked him.”
That part was true. Balfour Dempsey, known in his circles as simply Balfour, the renowned psychic medium and tarot reader who usually spent his Octobers in the famed witchy town of Salem, had grown up on the island. He and his mother, Alice, had moved here when he was one or two years old. He’d left right after high school and never returned—something we’d had in common until I came back last year—but his mother still lived here. She actually worked part-time at the Daybreak Island Gazette, our local newspaper. So Sam had tapped into my best friend, Gazette editor Becky Walsh, to enlist Alice’s help in getting him to commit.
“Maddie, forgive me for balking at such late notice, but I’m just not sure we want to … cheapen the inn’s reputation by making it the setting for a, well, let’s be honest—a show,” Jacob said.
Sal Bonnadonna, owner of Bonnadonna Liquors—the giant liquor store that continued to be one of the most popular places on the island regardless of season—gave a thoughtful nod. “I agree. It’s a little theatrical. But they’re used to the way they do it in Salem, right? It’s all a big freak show up there.” His disapproval was obvious in the slight sneer of his upper lip as he tipped his chair back. I hoped the two back legs could hold out under his weight—Sal was a big, beefy guy, akin to a six-foot Danny DeVito. He had a lot of energy for a guy who had to be pushing seventy-five, and also a lot of weird-uncle vibes.
I felt myself gritting my teeth so hard I was sure I was going to chip one of them. I worked to turn my grimace i
Sal bristled. “We don’t need to compete with Salem!”
My mother smiled. “Oh, Sal. Let’s be honest with ourselves. Of course we do.”
Everyone laughed.
I shot my mother a grateful look. “So, thanks to Sam, we signed on a high-profile guest who the entire island is talking about. Salem usually gets him, but this year, we have him.”
Damian Shaw, my friend and the owner of the Lobstah Shack, applauded. “Yay, Sam.”
Sam smiled modestly.
“Long story short,” I said, “we’re lucky we have Balfour. He wants to stay at the haunted inn, we’re having tours there, and it will add to the atmosphere, so I’m not sure what the problem is. What more could you want? You already agreed to this, and if you back out now you’ll be turning people away. This is only a good thing for your business.”
“And,” Sam added, “he’s definitely not a fake.”
I sat back and watched all eyes turn to Jacob.
“Maddie’s right,” said Donald Tunnicliffe, the funeral director. Donald was short and round, with round glasses and a round, mostly bald head. “What’s the harm? It will generate a lot of attention for you. I’d even offer to have him do the readings here, but I’m pretty much guaranteed customers anyway.” He winked.
I resisted the urge to recoil. I supposed humor was a must in that line of business. But at least he was backing me up.
Jacob’s face puckered, as if he’d been sucking on a lemon. My mother, sensing from across the table that I was about to lose my patience, jumped in.
“Is there something in particular you’re worried about?” she asked, turning that charming, Sophie James smile on him. I’d seen that smile work on even the most disagreeable people, so I knew it would be no match for Jacob.
Within seconds, his face relaxed and he was smiling back at my mother. “I just want to be sure we’re upholding the inn’s reputation,” he said. “I don’t want it to become a kitschy tourist trap. People are already talking about some of the … history at the inn, which makes me wary of all the hype.”
I assumed that in addition to the typical ghost stories the inn was famous for, he was referencing the unsolved murder that had taken place there forty years ago, not long before Halloween. Naturally, people were gossiping about the death like they did every year around the anniversary and, since Balfour had been known to work with police around the country on cold cases, there was a lot of speculation on his fan pages that he was here to solve the mystery.
My mother nodded sympathetically. “I completely understand, Jacob. And I can personally attest from the work I’ve been doing with the Chamber that your inn is one of the biggest draws to the island year-round. In the most serious way possible,” she added, to ensure she’d made her point. “Haunted inns on islands seem to be treated with reverence because people feel like they can understand the stories that come from a hard life on the sea back in earlier times. And your inn, in particular, has such a fascinating history.”
I had to hold back my laughter. My mother was a true master. I could feel the table holding its collective breath. Our whole event was built around this centerpiece, and to have it pulled now would do a lot of harm to the work we’d all been doing.
Jacob finally smiled and nodded. “Thank you for that, Sophie. As long as you promise me that the inn’s reputation won’t suffer, then I will allow it.”
I let my breath out slowly, winking at Sam across the table. JJ jumped onto my lap, squeaking his signature squeak, a victory cry.
My mother beamed. “You won’t be sorry. This is going to bring even more positive attention to the inn. People will be dying to stay there.”
“Oh, Sophie, you’re too kind. But that might be a stretch. After all, we haven’t lost a guest in at least forty years,” Jacob said.
I thought it was the first time I’d heard him crack a joke.
Chapter 3
With the crisis averted, my mother took back control of the meeting and ran down the official event timeline.
“Okay,” she said briskly, tapping her iPad. “Balfour arrives tomorrow—Tuesday. Tours of the inn start on Thursday and continue through next week, up until Halloween night when we have our big bash. And Balfour will be doing readings beginning this Thursday night through next Friday night, with Monday and Tuesday off.”
Sam piped up. “Don’t forget he’s touring the cat cafe.”
“Right, but that’s not public, is it?” My mother looked at me.
Sam answered first, which was good because I wasn’t sure I’d remembered this part of the itinerary. “No. It’s so he can get a feel for the place before he brings Balfour Jr. over to meet people for the cat costume parade.”
My mother nodded. “Okay. Then the outdoor bazaar starts Friday and runs through this weekend and next weekend. It will remain open on Sunday, even though Halloween is Saturday. Gives people an extra chance to shop. The cat costume parade is this Saturday—” She glanced at me for a quick confirmation.
I nodded.
“—followed by the party for the cats at Damian’s where the costume winners will be announced. The chosen shelter cat will be master of ceremonies. Then the pumpkin-carving contest is Sunday, then Macbeth is Thursday night. Our horror author will be here Friday night, then next Saturday will be trick or treat at the cat cafe, followed by the big Halloween bash on Saturday night at Jade Moon.”
Jade Moon was a newer bar on the island. Jade Bennett, the owner, was dating my ex-boyfriend, Craig Tomlin, who was a cop on the island. Jade and her bar were cool. Too cool, almost. I could never tell what she really thought of me.
My mother studied her screen for a second, then looked up to see if anyone had any changes, corrections, or objections. No one did. It was a packed two weeks, but it would be worth it. If this went well, Daybreak Harbor’s Halloween reputation would be on the map. And that meant tourism dollars for the island for at least an extra month of the year, which was a good thing, especially for all us business owners.
I was about to suggest we adjourn before someone brought up something that would keep us here for another hour when the door burst open. All our heads swiveled around to see Leopard Man standing there, his face grave. Even his trademark leopard-print clothing looked a little droopy today, and his tail was nowhere in sight.
Leopard Man was our island’s quirky character. He did have a real name, which I’d found out much to my chagrin. It was Carl. I never called him that. To me, he’d always be the guy who wore head-to-toe leopard print, a matching tail on good days, spoke mainly in Shakespeare, and worshiped cats. People like that were not named Carl, for crying out loud.
He was on the committee, but he’d been absent today. Which was unusual for him. We’d been so busy dealing with the Jacob problem that I hadn’t had much time to think about it. But now here he was, and he didn’t look happy.
“What’s wrong, darling?” His girlfriend Ellen stood up, a look of concern on her face. Ellen was one of the town librarians. They’d fallen in love over, you guessed it, Shakespeare. And they were co-leading the local production of Macbeth that was our Thursday-before-Halloween headliner. “Is everything okay?”
Leopard Man hesitated. “Though it be honest, it is never good to bring bad news: give to a gracious message a host of tongues; but let ill tidings tell themselves when they be felt,” he said.
The man was brilliant—he could pull out a phrase from Shakespeare’s most obscure work to fit any situation. Since I was just a tad competitive, I’d been refreshing my Shakespeare brain so I could identify the works. It was like my own daily trivia game. I didn’t know this one, though.
But Ellen did, not surprisingly. “Antony and Cleopatra,” she said promptly. “But does that mean you have bad news?”
