Read Online In the Dead of Night by Aiden James - Free Book Online Page B

clearly.
    “I have to agree,” said Fiona, her suspicion evident in her tone. “Classic phantoms of this sort are featureless, completely. I can see the silver clip on the belt…and it looks like the figure is wearing a complete mask, like what I told Jimmy about earlier today.”
    They all looked at her and then me. She held me in her gaze as well, probably wondering how much detail I left out from last night’s investigation. Perhaps some of her irritation with me was because this information might’ve helped her define the images she psychically picked up from Dickey’s office earlier that day.
    “It does look like some ninja dude,” I observed, feeling the growing weight of everyone’s stares. “Or—”
    “It could be a female,” offered Angie, drawing some of the attention away from me, thank God. She shrugged her shoulders indifferently. “Look at the figure...svelte in build. Granted, the person’s crouched in the bushes, and maybe it’s other shadows across the chest, but….”
    “She’s got boobs,” said Jackie, picking up where Angie left off.
    “I’m not so sure,” Fiona advised, shaking her head. “If that’s an actual phantom and not physically tangible, then maybe it is female. But if it is somebody among the living…someone who followed you guys to the investigation, then I’m still convinced a male is involved here. Whoever killed my friends— our friends, since y’all have gotten to know them too—is a male. A bitterly angry guy.”
    Just as she finished talking, a loud noise resounded from the house. At least that’s where I thought it came from, since it sounded like something heavy crashed onto the kitchen floor. Hearing anything outside the studio would’ve been impossible, given the main room’s thick insulation, if Tom hadn’t left the main door open ajar.
    The color drained from his face, and I wasn’t sure he’d escape a real heart attack this time. Nor could I believe how quickly he clambered out of his chair and raced back to the house, with the rest of us running behind him
    “No-o-o!!”
    By the time we caught up with him, Tom was on his hands and knees cleaning up the broken plates and glasses thrown in a pile on the floor. Open flour and sugar sacks lay nearby, and a full drawer of silverware had been tossed upside down on top. Poking out of the mess beneath the drawer were the handles of several large cooking pots and pans from the kitchen island nearby.
    “Who in the hell did this?”
    Even before I voiced the question, I took a precautionary gaze around the kitchen, peering into the living room and down the hall to the bedrooms. Hard to say without a full search, but it didn’t feel like anyone else was there. Just a deeper coolness than when we loaded the dishwasher earlier, and its heat should’ve warmed the air around us. Not so.
    “Tom, I sense anger and protectiveness near us…in here,” said Fiona, who had joined him on the floor in his efforts to pick up the bigger porcelain and glass shards from the pile.
    Meanwhile, Justin and Angie headed down the hall, while Tony moved through the dining room on his way to the living room. Jackie went to look outside. That left me to find a broom and dustpan, which Tom told me would be in the pantry.
    “You haven’t told us everything about the house, or what attracted you to buy this one over the others you considered in Green Hills,” continued Fiona, to which he jerked his head around to face her. “I’ve felt this for awhile, but out of respect for your privacy I’ve never mentioned it.”
    “How’d you know?” he asked, his tone subdued, like a dirty little secret had just been revealed. For a moment he seemed to forget about the mess around him.
    Now I was confused. And no doubt the others would be, too, in a moment.
    “Whoever did this must’ve split, man!” Justin announced, once he and Angie returned to the kitchen. She shrugged her shoulders again, her confirmation the place was