Page 35 of Crazy Spooky Love

My heart sinks when I arrive alone at Brimsdale Road.

Two large, dark sedans lounge at the curb; I recognize one of them as Donovan Scarborough’s but I don’t think I’ve seen the other one before.

Lestat rides shotgun next to me on the bench seat, and as Babs shudders to a halt he looks at me reproachfully.

“Sorry, buddy,” I say. “I told you that you wouldn’t like it, but you wouldn’t have it. ”

He’d insisted on coming this morning, and I relented in the end because I’m fast learning that it’s easier to give him what he wants than face the consequences.

“What do we do now?” I ask him quietly, scanning the house for movement.

He stands up and puts his paws on the dash, as if he’s genuinely considering my question.

It strikes me that if I go in there now, I’m going to have to take him with me.

It’s enough to make me reach for the ignition, but I’m thwarted by the appearance of Donovan Scarborough storming down the path.

There’s no doubt that he’s seen me; he’s heading straight for Babs and there’s no mistaking his expression either. He’s furious.

I surreptitiously push the door lock down with my elbow and then slowly wind the window down as he raps his knuckles onit.

“Mr. Scarborough,” I say, smiling. “Lovely morning.”

“No, it bloody well is not!” he says, far louder than is necessary, given that his face is less than a foot away from mine. Lestat moves to stand on my lap and eyeballs Scarborough, and for a moment they’re involved in a bulgy-eyed stare-off.

“I was just about to leave…” I say, but he shakes his head and rattles my door to try to slide it open.

“No, no, no you don’t,” he mutters, reaching his arm inside Babs and feeling around for the handle.

By anyone’s standards this would be considered a gross invasion of privacy, and I’m no exception.

I’m about to protest when Lestat takes matters into his own hands and lunges for Scarborough’s searching fingers.

I silently vow to offer Lestat a bag of cheese and onion crisps to himself tonight; in Marina’s absence he’s stepped up to the plate as a most excellent bouncer.

“My dog would like it if you took your arm out of my vehicle,” I say, staying just on the right side of polite. He doesn’t afford me the same courtesy.

“Get in there and control those sodding ghosts,” he practically yells. “What exactly am I paying you and Snapes’s two-bit brother for? Neither of you have done a bloody thing!”

I’d like to reply that he hasn’t actually parted with a penny for either of us yet, and won’t unless one of us is successful, but I don’t because he looks like he might be about to pop a vein, probably the one in his forehead that’s pulsing like it has a life of its own.

“Is there a problem in there?” I look toward the house, closely mimicking Keira Knightley’s tone of voice because she’s cool and sophisticated and she can make people do whatever she wants.

“Is there a problem in there?” Scarborough repeats under his breath, but he adds a little unhinged laugh at the end as he looks away into the distance and his fingers drum, fast and furious, on the van’s window frame.

“ Yes, there’s a problem in there,” he barks.

“The potential buyers wanted to check over some measurements inside the house, and they’re now holed up in the master bedroom refusing to leave because they’re goddamn terrified!

” He bangs his fist down between his last three words for emphasis.

“But you knew we hadn’t finished the job yet,” I say calmly. “Would you like me to come in and see if I can help?”

He’s distracted from answering by the screech of brakes, and a second later Leo jumps from his car and runs over to join Scarborough beside Babs.

“You didn’t need to call both of us,” he mutters, scowling at me. “I told you I’d be here in fifteen minutes and here I am.”

“I didn’t call her,” Scarborough says irritably.

To be perfectly honest, they’re both starting to piss me off.

It’s Saturday morning and I fully expected to have the place to myself, yet Scarborough is acting as if I’m on his payroll and Leo’s acting as if I’m in his way.

Well, excuse me and my dog for breathing.

Leo shoots me a filthy look and then gives Lestat a longer, curious stare.

“You got yourself a one-eared pug.” He speaks deliberately slowly, as if Lestat is the most shocking creature he’s ever laid his eyeson.

He isn’t a dog person. He isn’t an animal person really, unless it’s a cow, served medium rare with a decent Shiraz, or the mink trim on his vintage Russian Cossack hat.

Leo’s world isn’t designed to accommodate pets—it’s glamorous and he is always the center of it.

Vikki and Nikki are probably as close as he’ll get.

“He has two ears and he can hear just fine,” I grumble, unlocking my door and sliding it open.

Lestat rolls out onto the pavement like a furry bowling ball, sniffing Donovan Scarborough’s expensive loafers with the kind of keen interest that usually means he’s about to cock his leg.

I jump out of Babs and steer him away and, looking up at the two men who are now towering over me, make a mental note to get Marina to train me to walk in high heels without looking as if I’m playing dress-up.

I only own one pair and I’ve never actually left the house in them, but I wish I had them on my feet right now so I could sashay away from these guys like a female assassin rather than schlep after them toward the house, with one lace undone as if they’ve just picked me up from school.

Lestat isn’t helping. He’s wildly interested in his new surroundings and is charging ahead of us like a small, determined bull, piddling as he goes to mark his territory.

“Can’t you leave him in the van?” Scarborough turns to speak to me as we approach the house.

“Dogs die in hot cars.” I shoot him a withering “everyone knows that” look, which silences him.

Leo huffs at Lestat as we reach the front door and makes a last attempt. “Can’t you at least put him on a lead and tie him up out here?”

I glance down at Lestat and hope he didn’t hear Leo.

“He takes offense at the word lead, ” I say, mouthing the last word just in case.

It’s not a lie. The resettlement pack that came with Lestat had a tick list, and someone, presumably the American Tom Jones, had scrawled “hell no!” next to the box where it asked if he was trained on a lead.

I took it with a pinch of salt and bought one anyway; I’ve seen enough TV dogs go bonkers with happiness at the mere mention of a walk.

Not this dog. Oh, it’s fair to say he went bonkers, but not with happiness.

It was more like pure, unadulterated rage.

He doesn’t mind the odd stroll as long as the weather’s decent, but it’s strictly on equal terms, just two dudes out taking the air and chewing the cud.

“He’ll be all right once he’s in there,” I say. “He’s just excited to be somewhere new.”

Leo sighs and slots his key into the front door, and the moment he pushes it open we can hear muffled shouts.

“How long have they been up there?” Leo frowns as he throws his keys on a side table and prepares to head upstairs.

He sounds more like a doctor on call than a ghost hunter, and for a second I’m struck by two things: 1) I gave him the vintage Bowie tour T-shirt he’s wearing, and 2) despite our differences he’s undeniably a damn fine-looking man.

He has a brooding charisma, and even though he’s somewhat partial to guy-liner, he wouldn’t struggle to put a shelf up or wire a plug.

He could tackle a flat pack chest of drawers with a screwdriver and a lot of swearing, but I wouldn’t trust him to, say, build my kids a tree house from scratch.

When I have kids. Or trees. There was a time in our lives when I’d started to wonder if my children would be his children, if we’d have a garden with trees and share a bed at the end of each day.

Man alive, all this from the way he threw his keys down on the hall table and acted like an actual grown-up?

Once this case is over, I’m going to have a stern word with myself.

First I snog the face off Fletcher Gunn, and now I’m daydreaming about playing house with Leo Dark.

Can you have a selective frontal lobotomy? I’d really like it if they could just nip in and remove my faulty romance-gene by laser surgery and replace it with one that makes me attracted to men who aren’t lethal for both my heart and my business.

By now, Leo has gone on up the stairs, with Donovan Scarborough behind him, so I hang back and wait to see what happens for a few minutes; even I can see that running up there and trying to outsmart Leo would make me look like an idiot.

I’m not waiting alone; Lestat is scoping the place out thoroughly, face to the floor and backside in the air as he inches his way around the skirting, and Douglas puts in an appearance the moment Leo is out of sight, strolling from the lounge like an actor walking onstage in a farce.

“Sashay away upstairs and look, Isaac’s gone totally loco.” He grins wickedly as he heads for the stairs, and I stare at him when he turns back to me expectantly.

“Did you just say ‘sashay away’?”

“Girl, I watch RuPaul, ” he laughs.

“Just stick to the sport and the kids’ channels, for God’s sake.” I dread to think of some of the late-night stuff that he could come across.

Douglas’s eyes sparkle with fun. “Too late. I’m quite ruined, Melody, and it’s all your fault.”