He settled back comfortably in his chair. “Are you drunk, Aubs?”
“No!” I shouted, maybe a bit louder than necessary.
“You’re more wound up than an old watch. Good thing that man of yours is flying in today. I swear, we’ve been saying it all month—you need a vacation.”
I felt like I was going to burst a blood vessel. I raised my hands, because even though I liked Herb, I was going to strangle him. “The house is closed off right now. I have to go make a phone call.”
“Uh-huh.” He shut his eyes and rocked the chair.
I jumped off the porch steps and raced through the gardens. That Wednesday was tropical-paradise perfect. Between the beach-going sunshine, balmy breeze, and vivid beauty of all the flowers in bloom, it was almost possible to forget about Skelly lounging around in the closet, making friends with the store-brand cleaning supplies.
Almost.
A shiver ofick, yuck, ew, oh my Godwent up my spine, and I ran a little faster to a building that served as our ticket booth and gift shop. I entered through the back door and walked along the messy corridors created solely out of inventory because Adam Love, who manned the inside, was seemingly unable or unwilling to put anything away.
“No ticket sales today!” I said, rushing into the main room.
Adam startled and turned from the register to give me a look. He was a huge guy. Like, linebacker huge. A regular bull in a china shop, although to his credit, he’d yet to break a single tacky knickknack on the shelves. He was the newest hire, about four months ago now. And young—I think twenty-five at most. The kid had moved to the Keys to start an adventure. I wasn’t sure if Adam considered selling fifteen-dollar tickets to an old house particularly exciting, but hey, beggars couldn’t be choosers.
“Why not?” he asked.
“There’s a—long story. But no visits to the house, okay? Garden tours only.”
“Sure,” he slowly said.
I walked into the mess of the backroom and toward the nook that served as my office. The walls around my desk were merely boxes of holiday decorations, old stock we couldn’t move, and various antiques coming and going to the home. I sat in my chair, took some more deep breaths, then picked up the landline. This didn’t seem 911-worthy. Frankly, Skelly looked to have been there for a while. If he hadn’t been, we’d have all smelled a decaying body.
Once, I had a dead opossum in the walls of my apartment back in New York City. What the fuck an opossum was doing in Brooklyn, let alone in the walls of my apartment, I had no clue. But it reeked, and the super had to tear through the drywall to fish it out. So yeah, Skelly was old news. Still bad news that needed to be handled immediately, but not like he-might-still-be-breathing kind of priority.
I called the main number to the local police department instead. “Yes, hello. My name’s Aubrey Grant. I’m the property manager of the Smith Home on Whitehead Street. I have a rather unusual situation. … No, no. No drunks on our porch, but thank you for sending an officer last week.”
Tourists had a tendency to get trashed on Duval Street, get lost looking for their rental cottage or B&B in the middle of the night, and then end up passed out on my front steps. Such was life.
“There’s a very dead person inside my supply closet.”
“There’s awhat?” Adam shouted.
I jumped and turned to see him hovering in the doorway, watching me with bug eyes. I shooed him, but he didn’t budge. “What’s that? … Yeah. A dead—yes. It’s a skeleton. I found it inside a false wall.”
“What the shit?” Adam asked.
I made a face at him. “Sorry?” I asked the person on the call. “I’m being interrupted by an employee, say that again?” I sighed and shook my head. “No ma’am, I am completely sober. Thank you for checking.”
“AUBS!”
“I don’t want to talk about it until the cops arrive,” I answered.
Adam had locked the gift shop and followed me out the back door after I’d finished the phone call and had collected myself in the bathroom. He ran ahead of me, put a firm hand on my chest, and stopped me like I’d just walked into a brick wall.
I referred to myself as fun size. Like the candy at Halloween. Adam was movie-theater size. And my supercool, not-exactly-boyfriend, who was arriving around 10:00 a.m. to visit me, fell somewhere around share-size candy.
I was fixated on candy.
I quit smoking a month ago. It was fucking killing me.
Anyway. I was five feet three when I didn’t slouch and probably weighed a hundred and twenty pounds soaking wet, so Adam had no trouble stopping me with a finger jab. Sometimes I wondered if me being his boss bothered him. He’s younger, sure, but Isodon’t assume a managerial appearance. Adam dressed like—I don’t know how to describe it. Like a good boy. Me? I’m pushing forty and still wear dirty Chucks, skinny jeans, and at times, tastefully offensive T-shirts. My hair was bleached white, I wore zero-gauge plugs and a nose ring—butKey West. The number of people who care, I could count on one hand.
“Is there really a dead man in the home?” Adam asked, his voice a loud whisper.
