Spooky Business (Jane Garbo Mysteries Book 1) Read online

  Spooky Business

  (The Jane Garbo Mysteries, Book 1)

  by

  Addison Creek

  Copyright © 2017 by Addison Creek

  Cover Design © Broken Arrow Designs

  This novel is a work of fiction in which names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real persons, places, or events is completely coincidental.

  License Notes

  Thank you for downloading this eBook. This book remains the copyrighted property of

  the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial or non-commercial

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  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Epilogue

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  Chapter One

  “I regret to inform you that your contract has been terminated,” said my boss, a thin man with a thin face, pale eyes, and a receding hairline.

  “What does that mean?” I said.

  We were having a frantic week, and I’d scarcely had time to breathe since a new contract came in. I had been working day and night, and come late afternoon I didn’t have any energy for mysteries.

  I didn’t love my job. I just couldn’t afford to lose it.

  “It means you are no longer an employee here. Your desk is being packed as we speak. Please collect your things.” He was already looking down at his desk, intently examining the latest report on something unimportant.

  My boss was calm, but I was in shock. I barely caught myself in time to keep my wrist from twitching. Magic in front of a human was not allowed, even a scaly reptilian excuse for a human like this one.

  “Can you tell me why I was terminated?” I choked out. Didn’t they need a reason to fire me? Like, I’d made the copy machine erupt in flames or something like that?

  Just for the record, that wasn’t me. That was my story and I was sticking to it.

  “You’re late to work too much,” my boss informed me, his lips tight.

  “I’ve been late once and it was by three minutes,” I countered. This was true. I was a stickler for being on time. Probably because in my youth you never wanted to be late to feed an angry ghost.

  “Yes, well, I don’t believe that’s entirely accurate,” he huffed. Then he looked away again.

  “Pretty sure it is,” I informed him. He’d already fired me. There wasn’t much more to lose.

  He glared at me. “Are you calling me a liar?”

  “Only if you’re calling me late.” I braced my hands on my hips.

  I was rolling along in the conversation at this point. I wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

  “What about that time Cynthia’s lunch went missing?” he demanded.

  “That wasn’t me,” I argued.

  “Prove it,” he said.

  “She always gets cucumbers in her sandwiches. I hate them,” I said.

  “A likely story,” he countered.

  I rubbed my forehead hard. “You can’t just fire me,” I said desperately.

  “Why are you doing that?” My boss looked confused and concerned.

  “What?” I kept rubbing.

  He shook his head. “Fine,” he said. “But there was also the incident with the copy machine.”

  He watched me closely and must have read the defeat on my face. With a tight smile, he signaled that he knew he’d won, but I stood there for so long that he felt the need to say more.

  “You can’t possibly be upset. You must know how to handle this. Haven’t you been fired a bunch of times now?” His guilt must have been kicking in.

  “Does that mean you aren’t firing me?” I asked hopefully.

  “I’m definitely firing you,” he said. He was no longer guilty. He just wanted me gone. “Fired.”

  So, I was out of work.

  Again.

  If I didn’t find another job soon, something worse than death would happen.

  My hand found its way to my forehead again.

  It was going to happen. I just knew it. Every time I got fired, like clockwork, it happened.

  But this time would be different.

  This time I’d have to go home.

  Outside, the night was buzzing. Not with natural sounds, but with the sounds of city life. Cars racing past, the honking of a horn, music blaring from a high-rise.

  I went back to my shoebox of an apartment.

  My three roommates were out clubbing.

  Again.

  I stared at the blinking light on my answering machine for a long time. There was only one person who would call my landline, because there was only one reason I had a landline.

  I had a landline at the insistence of the person I feared most in all the world, the person we all, in my family, felt the need to obey.

  Mother.

  Blink, blink, blink.

  My face felt hot and my willpower weakened as the minutes stretched on. My hand would twist to press the on button, then I’d find my resolve again and pull it back.

  No way was I going to listen to the message just because she’d called me.

  She wasn’t the boss of me anymore. I could stand on my own. That’s why I lived in the city now.

  Wrenching myself away from the phone, I went to the kitchen, found a quart of chocolate ice cream, and started eating it. Passing back through the hallway with the ice cream in my hands, I couldn’t avoid seeing the flashing message light again.

  My hands were sweaty from the need to persevere, and cold from holding the ice cream.

  Message, message, message.

  She didn’t even have the courtesy to text instead of calling, sure proof that she wasn’t a good person.

  I kept walking.

  I could resist her nonsense!

  I was halfway to the living room when my legs started to shake and I had to admit that I couldn’t.

  Who was I kidding? Mom always won in the end.

  My eyes squeezed tightly shut. I pressed the button.

  “Hi, Jane, we could really use some help with the house this season. Let me know when you can get a train home. Rose, STOP that, damnit! Cookie, why are you encouraging her! You know how much Audrey hates it when Rose jumps on the counter!”

  I covered my face with my hands and kept listening.

  “Is that Jane?” an older voice crackled out. “Tell her to get her butt home! What job could be better than putting up with you people here?” Cookie’s voice was distant but still as sharp as Rose’s claws
.

  My mother battled through it to keep leaving her message.

  “Jane, right, am I still leaving a message? Is this thing on?” Tap tap tap. “I tried calling before and it was like the answering machine was unplugged. Very strange. Anyway, come home! See you soon!”

  “We could really use your help at the SpookyBooSpectacular,” Cookie gurgled gleefully.

  My shoulders slumped.

  I didn’t even bother to delete the message.

  The need to pack took me into the bathroom. The third time I passed the mirror I made the mistake of looking.

  My options were limited. They were actually non-existent. There was just the one left.

  There it was.

  Right there on my forehead: a monster zit. The stress had set in.

  I was going home.

  The sun was up but the day was still cool as I headed for the train station. I got plenty of strange looks as I lugged my old trunk along the street. Okay, sure, it had once belonged to a vampire, and it had stickers on it that said things like “Blood is good” in big lurid letters. But why should people judge?

  I did my best to hide my luggage once I was seated on the train. The conductor came by and gave me a funny look, so I used my heel to shove it even further out of view. Then I pressed my forehead to the cool window glass and tried to prepare myself for what was coming.

  The trees flew by. Occasionally a house jumped into the mix, but then it too streaked past the window. The train was empty the next morning, but I knew it would fill up as the ride went on.

  After one stop to let passengers on and off, a man wearing a top hat and a sullen expression slunk past me. We made eye contact for the briefest of moments, but he kept moving. We didn’t like to acknowledge each other in public, but he knew what I was and I knew what he was.

  I was a witch.

  He was a vampire.

  He’d sit in a different train car from me.

  I pressed my forehead against the glass once more, unable to believe that I was doing the one thing I had promised myself I would never do: return to Shimmerfield.

  Of course, that promise had been made before I’d gotten fired nine times in fourteen months after graduating from college.

  But who was counting?

  As easy as waving my hand, I was going home.

  I’d need more than a spell to save me now.

  Chapter Two

  The train was taking me to Shimmerfield, the village on the coast of Maine where I had grown up. I had nowhere else to turn and I was desperate, so I was on my way.

  The town of Shimmerfield was nice and quaint as only a small town could be. For that matter, the entire Maine coast was nice and quaint—and beautiful, and for the most part, empty.

  Which was why Maine was the perfect place for supernatural creatures to live.

  When I moved to the Big Apple after college, I thought I was starting with so much potential. Sure, I missed Haunted Bluff Mansion, but I had the world at my feet, and I was positive I’d never have to go back. What I had kept hidden, even from myself, was the certain knowledge in my heart of hearts that this day would come.

  And now it had. I was on a train heading back to Maine and Haunted Bluff Mansion, which my family owned, operated, and lived in.

  My family seat was a year-round haunted house.

  All the supernaturals who worked there scaring the paying guests were real, inhabiting a house that my great-grandfather had started with my great-grandmother. They had come up with the idea in response to the fact that there were all sorts of supernatural creatures, from ghosts and ghouls to bats and the odd flying monkey, that would get out of hand if they didn’t have something to do. The most requested supernaturals in the eyes of our customers were the skeletons, but le-haunts and ghosts followed closely behind.

  My great-grandfather wanted to gainfully employ all these troublesome types, and so he did, working with the talents they already had. Once ghosts, skeletons, vampires, and le-haunts had their occupations in the haunted house to keep them out of trouble, it was much better for everyone. As one skeleton said proudly, “I don’t even have to dress up for work now.”

  The ghosts particularly enjoyed their role, because they got to scare the humans and then fade into the background of the haunted mansion instead of being chased around with a broom they way ghosts usually have to work when they haunt someone. They’re likely to get yelled at either way, but they don’t mind that so much.

  Before my great-grandparents started the mansion, supernaturals had started acting out and causing problems. Ghosts would jump out at people when they weren’t supposed to. Vampires would stand outside people’s homes and look terrifying. For a while, witch families didn’t know what to do about the growing problem, but a solution soon became clear. For minor offenses, such as when a ghost decided to throw muffins and overturn tables, a stint at Haunted Bluff was in order. For major offenses, well, we weren’t to talk about that. Over time, the mansion my great-grandfather had envisioned became less of a haven and more of a halfway house for difficult creatures of the afterlife persuasion.

  We were open year-round, of course, since people were always up for a good scare.

  Lucky for us, because it kept the ghosts entertained and out of any real trouble.

  The mansion was gradually built up into an epic property, one where the magical world and the humans out for a spooky Friday night collided. We’ve chugged along for the last hundred years, and if you could ask my great-grandfather, what’s even better than our longevity is that so many people connected to the place have died that we now have a real live graveyard out front, which totally adds to the haunted house ambiance!

  My great-grandmother insisted that the graveyard be situated around the entrance gates, so everyone could see it and appreciate it as part of Haunted Bluff. Just because it wasn’t visible from the house didn’t mean my great-grandfather wasn’t excited about it. When I was ten he took me out to the family plot and showed me where I’d be buried. I cried for a week.

  Yup, that’s my family.

  Growing up at Haunted Bluff was no picnic. For one thing, a bunch of antiquated gender rules supposedly from times gone by were still alive and well in the witch community. As a witch, I hadn’t gotten to do most of the fun stuff. Mostly the men went out and hunted for supernaturals, especially the law-breaking ones, an activity we called haunt hunting. The witches stayed at home and tended to the mansion, not that you were any slouch if you were capable of doing that.

  There were the ghosts and the ghouls and of course the skeletons. Mostly they got along in harmony, but not all the time. When they argued, there was usually destruction of property involved (ours, not theirs), so I became adept at breaking up ghost fights. I had the unusual ability of being able to touch a ghost, which was very rare even in the witching world.

  Hoping to retain at least a shred of my dignity, I hadn’t told my family I was coming home. Even so, when my taxi drove up to the house I wasn’t surprised to see my grandmother Cookie out front in a full black witch’s costume–which witches don’t actually wear–standing in front of a massive cauldron–which witches don’t actually use–stirring slowly.

  When I saw the old burn splotches on her clothes, I found myself rubbing at the angry bump on my face. Skin issues always mirrored my mood.

  Cookie thought her antics added to the ambiance for visitors, but the rest of us knew the truth. She was hoping she could scare off anyone and everyone who came near the place.

  Oftentimes, it worked. If you had to talk to Grandma Cookie, you’d be scared too.

  I was breaking a rule by bringing a regular taxicab onto the property during the day (humans were allowed on the property only during business hours), but given how much stuff I had brought, there really was no choice.

  Cookie took one look at me and her eyes went huge. She dropped her broom into the cauldron, turned around, and sprinted toward the house, long black skirts flapping.

  W
hoever said she was getting frail had definitely been lying.

  “I hope she’s happier to see you than she looks,” said the cab driver in confusion.

  “That’s about how she always reacts when she sees me,” I said.

  The cab driver started to cluck with sympathy until I added, “And she’s not the only one.”

  I raised my eyebrows at him in the mirror and he stopped chuckling. The fact that it was true didn’t give him a right to point it out.

  Suddenly, realizing that he was in a very strange place all by himself, with a girl whose trunk extolled the virtues of vampires, he clamped his mouth shut and stopped the car abruptly. Then he hopped out as quickly as he could, hustled around to open the trunk, and fetched my suitcases, placing them reverently on the loose stones of the driveway.

  As he took in the imposing mansion, his mouth fell open. To his credit, the house was special enough to inspire that reaction.

  Old black stone soared up five stories, fashioned into towers and framing broken windows and creepy-looking black ones. (The rooms with the broken windows were just for setting the mood. You had to use one only if you were in trouble with the powers that be, i.e., my grandmother.) The right color curtains did wonders to intensify the effect.

  The cabby had already driven past the black iron gates, complete with the statues of two watchful cats, with some bats and skeletons thrown in for good measure. To top it all off there was a spire in the middle of the house with a giant cat on it: the family symbol. My great-grandfather had made it up because he thought it made him seem more official.

  The cumulative effect finally got to the cabdriver. “This is quite the place,” he said. “What did you say your family did here?”

  “It’s a year-round haunted house.” I fired off the standard line I used with anyone who actually knew where I lived. At dinner parties in New York, you’d better believe I lied about my family’s occupation!

  The man nodded, but he still looked skeptical.

  “It’s very authentic-looking,” he murmured, tipping his cap.