There was no such thing as a hostess on duty, so after a moment’s hesitation to survey the terrain, Derek took my hand and pulled me after him down the two steps to the concrete floor and through the madding crowd. We ended up at a small table for two tucked into a corner by the door to the kitchen, where Derek put me out of harm’s way and risked his own life and limb sitting with his back to the room and the swinging door.
It wasn’t long before a gum-popping coed in a skin-tight T-shirt and low-riding jeans wiggled her way over to our table. Her name was Candy, and she was at our-or rather at Derek’s-service. She looked at him when she said it, and for all the attention she paid me, he might as well have been there alone.
I rolled my eyes but hesitated to assert ownership. For one thing, I wasn’t sure just how firmly cemented our relationship was-four months ago, I hadn’t known this guy existed-and besides, she’d probably just look at me down the length of her perfect nose and smile pityingly. So I kept my mouth shut and my teeth firmly clenched while Derek ordered a pizza with everything, a Diet Coke for me, and a Moxie for himself.
“Be right back,” Candy promised, making sure to swish both her hips and her ponytail as she sashayed away from the table. Derek turned to me and opened his mouth, but before he could get a word out, another female hip bumped him companionably in the shoulder.
“What are you two doing here? Hi, Avery.”
The hip was attached to a tall, ultra-feminine body with a milky white complexion and long, mahogany red hair. At almost twenty, Shannon McGillicutty had her mother’s centerfold figure, and tonight, it was set off to full advantage in jeans and a cropped, white sweater. In her ears were dangling rhinestone earrings, very similar to the one I had in my pocket. Shannon adored Derek, whom she’d had a bit of a crush on when she was younger, and she seemed to like me well enough, too. Any crush she’d had seemed to be a thing of the past.
“Eating,” Derek answered. “What are you doing here?”
“Same thing.” Shannon smiled at him then hooked a thumb over her shoulder. “Josh and Paige and Ricky are at a table over on the other side. We’ve got room for two more, if you want to join us.”
Derek glanced at me. I glanced at the rhinestones in Shannon ’s ears. “Sure. It isn’t like we’d have much privacy as it is.”
“This definitely isn’t the place for a romantic tête-à tête,” Shannon agreed. “C’mon.” She grabbed Derek’s arm and hauled him to his feet. He waited until I’d stepped out from the corner before he took my hand and towed me through the crowd again, this time toward the far wall.
In a big booth built into the far corner sat Shannon ’s friend Paige. The petite blonde was flanked on either side by tall, dark-haired young men, and appeared dwarfed by them both.
The young man on her left I was familiar with. His name was Josh, and he was the son of Kate’s boyfriend, Waterfield Chief of Police Wayne Rasmussen. Josh had his dad’s lanky height of six feet four inches or so, and dark, curly hair. He also had round glasses and a healthy disrespect for authority, unless that authority happened to be his best friend’s. Shannon had him firmly wrapped around her finger. I wondered if she knew that he was crazy about her, and that was why he put up with her bossing him around. He didn’t make a big deal of it, but if I had figured it out just a few weeks after moving here, it didn’t seem likely that Shannon hadn’t. Yet, if she knew, she gave no sign.
The other young man was a stranger to me. He looked like he might be a couple of years older than the others, in his early twenties rather than hanging on to his teens by the skin of his teeth, and he was broader in the shoulders and chest than Josh and a few inches shorter, wearing a denim shirt, collar open and sleeves rolled up to show muscular forearms.
“Ricky, this is Derek and Avery,” Shannon said, sliding into the booth next to Josh. Ricky nodded shyly, a pair of bright blue eyes peering out at us through curtains of dark hair. “Ricky Swanson, you two. You remember Paige, of course.”
I nodded. “Hi, Paige. I haven’t seen you in a while.”
“I’ve been busy,” Paige murmured, with a surreptitious glance at Ricky.
“So what are you two doing out this way?” Josh wanted to know. “Not exactly your usual haunt, is it?”
“So far from the bright lights of downtown Waterfield, you mean?” Derek grinned.
I snorted, and he put an arm around my shoulders and laughed. Waterfield is a very small, sleepy town, with no bright lights to speak of. No nightlife beyond the Shamrock and places like Guido’s, and very little excitement. Melissa James was doing her best to change that, with her petitions to the city council and zoning board to be allowed to develop more land, build more houses, and bring in more business, but Waterfield still clung to its small-town atmosphere. When I first moved here from Manhattan, I thought it was the slowest, most somnolent, boring place on the face of the earth. Now that I’d been here a while, I’d developed an appreciation for the slow pace and friendly folks, although it must be said that I hadn’t tried to stay through a winter yet. Derek had warned me that the downeast winters could be brutal, and I’ll readily admit I wasn’t looking forward to it.
I turned to Ricky. “Did you grow up around here?”
“ Pittsburgh,” Ricky said.
“He transferred in at the beginning of the semester,” Paige explained. “Professor Alexander asked Josh to show him around.”
I guess she was trying to explain what he was doing with their tight-knit little threesome.
“Oh. Too bad. I hoped you might be able to tell me whether there’s any truth to the rumors that the house on Becklea is haunted.” I tried to make it sound like I didn’t care much, but I didn’t succeed very well.
Josh replied for the group. “We were very small when the murders happened, Avery. Shannon wasn’t here yet. And I don’t remember hearing anything about ghosts when I was growing up. You, Paige?” He looked over at Paige, who shook her head. “By the time we got to high school, though, some of the older kids would dare each other to go over there and spend the night.”
“Really?” I said. Ricky ducked his head for a sip of Coke. Derek and I still hadn’t gotten our drinks. I guess maybe our change of tables had flummoxed the nubile Candy, and she was wandering around looking for us. “That’s a dare I don’t think I’d take. We met one of the neighbors, and he said he hears… um… noises at night.”
“Noises?” Shannon repeated. Ricky peered sideways at me through his curtains of hair.
“Screams,” I said succinctly, and then changed the subject, looking around. “Do you suppose Candy is lost? I want my Diet Coke.”
“I’ll go look for her,” Shannon said readily, getting up. I opened my mouth to argue-I was sitting on the end and could just as easily do it; in fact, it was part of the reason I had suggested it-but she added, “You’re not familiar with this place, Avery. Just let me find her, OK? I have something to say to Candy anyway.”
“Sure,” I said, sinking back down. It was a small cinderblock building, no likelihood of my getting lost, but if Shannon wanted to talk to Candy, she was welcome to.
“Screams?” Josh repeated when Shannon had walked away and he could no longer see her.
So much for changing the subject. I sighed. Derek nodded. “We think maybe he heard the hinges on the basement door. It sounds like a cat in heat.”
“And I heard footsteps this afternoon,” I added. “When nobody was there.”
“Cool!” Josh said. “Can we check it out sometime?”
“How are you with a palm sander?” Derek answered. Josh was in the midst of explaining just how wonderfully handy he was when Shannon slid back into the booth next to him. Hard on her heels was Candy with our drinks, followed by two other ponytailed coeds carrying pizzas.