Read Online A Hard Day’s Fright by Casey Daniels - Free Book Online

I’m not just talking about the sex, though, when we were together, I thought that was the only thing Quinn and I had in common. Looking back on it, I guess there was more going on between us.
    That would explain why I felt like there was still a hole in my chest where my heart used to be.
    “Harrumph.” That was me offering my opinion of all the Quinn memories—good and bad—tromping through my head. I crossed my arms over my chest and sat back to settle in and wallow in a little well-deserved self-pity just as the rapid lurched around a corner and under a bridge. The lights flickered and, for a second, went out altogether.
    When they came back on again, Lucy was in the seat next to me.
    “Geez oh Pete!” I jammed one hand against my chest. It was that or risk my heart slamming out of my ribs and going bumping down the aisle. “Can’t you ghosts play some kind of spooky music or something before you show up? You know, like a warning?”
    Lucy’s face was as impassive as if it were carved of stone. Her golden lips were set in a thin, defiant line. She stared at the seat in front of ours when she said, “I figured you didn’t need a warning. After all, you’re the one who didn’t want to be bothered with me.” Her sigh was epic. “As I recall, you said you couldn’t help me.”
    “Yeah, well, that was before.”
    Still refusing to look at me, she lifted her chin and pulled back her shoulders. “Before what?”
    I hate it when the dead play hard to get.
    But not nearly as much as I hate it when I actually care.
    I set the thought aside, not as inconsequential, but as less important than a little revenge.
    Lucy was chilly (I mean emotionally chilly; I’ve already established that, physically, she was way past that stage); I was just as chilly back. The better to catch her off guard when I nonchalantly threw out the comment, “Before I found out that you were friends with Ella.”
    The Ice Queen thawed in a nanosecond. Her mouth fell open and she turned in her seat. “You know Ella Bender?”
    “Well, her name is Ella Silverman now,” I told her. “And she’s my boss at Garden View Cemetery.”
    Lucy’s eyes sparkled. “Little Ella! I always wondered what happened to her. She’s a boss, huh? I’m not surprised. The kid had brains. Of course, she didn’t know it yet, not back then. She was just a kid. Now Ella, she’s a boss.” A huge smile revealed Lucy’s sparkling white teeth. “Not bad for a girl.”
    We’d already had the I-am-woman-hear-me-roar talk. I wasn’t going to go into it again. Besides, Lucy didn’t give me the chance. She barreled right on.
    “So you talked to Ella about me? She told you about what happened to me, right?”
    “Not exactly. She told me you disappeared. Not that you’re dead.”
    Lucy tipped her head, thinking this over. “You mean nobody knows I’m dead?”
    “Nobody’s been able to prove it. On account of how they’ve never found your body. I’m guessing that, unlike Ella, who’s being the ultimate Queen of Denial, most people are smart enough to know that after forty-five years—”
    Lucy sat up like a shot, a glint in her eyes as icy as her ectoplasm. “Are you saying Ella’s not smart? You take that back! Right now. Ella’s a great little kid.”
    I chose my words carefully, and not just because I couldn’t imagine anyone, anywhere thinking of Ella as a little kid, but because I knew it would be easier to deal with Lucy if she wasn’t angry at me. What I said now would determine if my investigation would go smoothly, or if it would be as full of bumps as a bowl of Ben & Jerry’s Everything But the…
    “Ella’s very smart.” This was true so it wasn’t like I was pimping for my case. “She’s raised three daughters, all on her own.” (It should be noted that I did not add the word successfully to this statement.) “And she keeps things at Garden View running like clockwork. Only Ella…” I wrestled with the idea of glossing over