Read Online Sammy Keyes and the Night of Skulls by Wendelin Van Draanen - Free Book Online

the guy who runs the place, got tired of letting his low-life clients in and out all night. Plus, besides being old and run-down, the Heavenly’s not exactly the kind of place to have a buzzer system.
    That’d be much too sophisticated.
    Not to mention high-tech.
    “Hey,” André growls when he sees us. “This is a hotel, not a candy shop. Scram!”
    “Then why’s the light on?” I ask, walking up to the counter.
    “Huh?” He clamps his cigar stub between his front teeth and peels his lips back like an angry camel. “Sammy?”
    “Hi, André.”
    “And that’s Holly?” he says, bugging his eyes at her a little.
    Holly nods. “Hi, André.”
    He laughs. “You two sure aren’t playin’ up your good looks tonight.”
    “Hey, it’s the night of the dead,” I tell him. “We’re keeping with tradition.”
    André pulls some mint candies from behind the counter. “This is the best I can do, sorry.”
    “Actually,” I tell him as I take a mint, “we’re being followed by a creepy-looking guy in an old deli-mustard car—”
    “What’s a deli-mustard car?” he says, standing up.
    “I mean the color.”
    He starts coming around from behind the counter with a baseball bat, and for a guy who always keeps things to a low growl, he’s moving fast.
    “Wait!” I call after him, because it looks like he’s about to go beat in some windows. “We just want to ditch him. Can we go out the back way? And if he happens to come in looking for us, could you maybe tell him we were just trick-or-treating and went out
that
way?” I say, pointing to a side door.
    He stops in his tracks and eyes me suspiciously. “Why would he be comin’ in here?”
    “I’m not saying he
will
. I’m just saying if he
does.
”
    An eyebrow arches way up as he lowers the bat. “What have you gotten yourselves into this time?”
    I cringe. “Nothing?”
    “Yeah, right,” he grunts as he goes back behind the counter.
    “We’re not exactly sure what,” Holly says.
    I nod. “We were just out trick-or-treating and happened to cut through the graveyard—”
    “Just happened to, huh?” André says, rolling his eyes.
    “—and we wound up using that guy’s car as an escape ramp out of there.”
    He eyes me. “Because of course that was the only way out, right?”
    “It was!” I cringe again. “But we might’ve dented his roof.” I cringe a little harder. “And we definitely bent one of his wipers.”
    André’s back to clamping the cigar between his teeth. “So maybe I should turn you over to him?” But then all of a sudden he says, “Get down!”
    His voice is like a shotgun cocking, and believe me, we do what he says, diving for cover behind a display rack of brochures and free papers. We hold our breath and bug our eyes through the rack as the Heavenly’s door opens.
    A man walks in, but it’s not the Vampire.
    It’s a big man.
    Wearing a ball cap.
    “Can I help you?” André calls, because the guy’s just standing there scoping out the lobby.
    “I’m looking for my girls. They’re late comin’ home. Someone said they saw them trick-or-treating down here. Dressed up as a couple of zombies?”
    Now, there are a lot of big men in ball caps in this world,but the instant we hear his voice Holly and I look at each other like big-eyed mice in a cougar cage. There’s no doubt about it—it’s Shovel Man.
    “Sure,” André says. “They were just here. Went out that way. Probably at Maynard’s Market by now.”
    “Thanks, sir.”
    “No problem.”
    He’s already leaving when André says, “You want to leave a number in case you miss them and I see them walkin’ around?”
    “Nah. I’m sure I’ll find them.”
    The minute he’s gone, André says, “Stay low,” then goes across the lobby and does a real sly check of Broadway. After a minute he saunters back to the counter, saying, “Deli mustard is a good description.” He crouches beside us. “I get the feelin’ that fella’s bent about more