Chapter 9

Ileft the bakery feeling down and dejected over the fact my next hit is about as bad as my last.

As much as I don't want to pump my shiny new boyfriend full of bullets, I'm less eager to pump them into Johnny the Meatball Marino.

His poor family has been through enough, considering the fact Johnny's brother Sal isn't even cold yet. But the investigation into his murder is growing just that by the minute. Which is why I packed up my pooches and headed back to the scene of the crime. Not only am I on the hunt for clues, but I'd be darned if I let another day slip by without getting my hands on those cannolis. Sure, they won't be free, considering I'm not in costume, but I bet they'll be worth every dollar.

I gasp as I spot the bunny ears sitting on the passenger side of my car and promptly plop them back on my head where those pink fuzzy cuties belong.

It looks as if I'm back in business.

I leash up both Watson and Spooky and we make our way toward the haunted mansion where everything unraveled for Sal last night.

"Would you wait?" a female voice squawks and I turn around to see Niki barreling this way, her cat ears and that long furry tail adhered to her body. "I've been following you all the way down Main Street. You drive like you're in the Daytona 500. Were you trying to lose me?"

"Lose you? It's a straight line from the bakery to here."

"Well, I wasn't at the bakery," she says, adjusting her ears and taking Spooky's leash from me. "I was at my place of employment, the Honey Pot Diner. Keelie said I could have the rest of the afternoon off."

Keelie would be the manager of the Honey Pot Diner and she also happens to be Naomi Turner's twin sister—the prettier, nicer twin in my opinion. The one who knows how to keep her head about her. As for the Honey Pot Diner, it's attached to the bakery via a walkthrough, so it takes the exact same straight line to get here. But this is Niki I'm dealing with, so it's a moot point.

"Are you ready to get our cannolis on?" I tease as we turn to the dilapidated haunted house covered in enough spiderwebs to blanket the planet twice.

"That and watch you take down the other goof that owns this place. Aunt Cat filled me in on the dirty deets once you sped out the door."

"Nice to know she can keep a secret," I muse as we head on into the dark maw waiting to swallow us whole.

Creepy organ music plays a touch too loud. Naomi Turner greets us, and yet again we watch as she plucks off her noggin, sets it on a platter, and asks us to follow her to the patio.

"Does it ever get old?" I ask her as she leads us through the darkened hallway of horrors with pictures that shift to sinister versions of themselves as we walk past them and a couple of skeletons that look as if they're making out on a dusty sofa nearby.

"Watching people cry out in terror never gets old," that head of hers shouts while doing its best to look up at me. "I rather enjoy watching people look as if they're about to be sick. Sort of the way you look now."

"Don't worry," I tell her. "It's nothing a couple of cannolis can't fix. Although I'm not sure they'll do much for you."

We no sooner get out to the makeshift cemetery that's taken over the back patio than I spot the exact person I was hoping to see, Cooper's sister. She's seated alone, clad in black yoga gear while solemnly staring out at the water.

The sky is growing increasingly dark, the air is nippy and crisp, and those lavender twinkle lights that crisscross overhead cast an unearthly glow over her.

"That's Loretta Salami" I hiss to Niki. "I want to have a word with her."

"You mean Loretta the Black Widow Lazzari," Naomi croaks from the platter. "It's a nickname she's earned, considering she lost two husbands within a couple of years. Her boyfriend, Johnny, is the one that owns this place. If I were him, I'd watch my back for stray bullets."

Niki nudges me. "Or not-so-stray bullets."

Seeing that I'm shooting them, they'll most likely be stray.

"Thanks for the heads-up," I say to Naomi and cringe as we part ways.

Niki and I head straight over to the Black Widow's table and take a seat across from her.

"Loretta," I say as she looks abruptly our way. Her face is powder white, her eyes are heavily outlined with kohl, and her lashes are as thick as a moth's wing and twice as long. Her lips are ruby red, and judging by the dirty look she's giving us, she wishes we were dead. "It's me, Effie. We met last night. I just saw you sitting here and wanted to see how you were doing."

"Who?" She reaches for her phone as if she's about to call the cops.

"Cooper's girlfriend," I say. "You know, the whore with the chore."

Niki gasps and giggles herself into a conniption and I give her the side-eye before casting the same dirty look to Loretta for making me go there to begin with.

I told Niki all about it late last night when she stopped by with cookies. We may not live together, but since she's always at my place I think it's time to start charging her half the rent.

"Oh yeah." Loretta honks out a laugh like a seal, and the sound alone seems to arrest all activity on the lake. "Where's my big brother?" She cranes her neck past me with a glimmer of hope. "He didn't say anything about bringing his puttana."

Niki chirps out a laugh. "She just called you a whore in two languages."

"I'm aware," I grunt before sitting straight as a pin. "You mean you're meeting Cooper for lunch?"

"Why else would I be sitting alone in a restaurant without food or drink?" She looks at me like I'm an idiot and I'm starting to feel that way.

It's time to make an exit—and fast.

"Well, it was nice seeing?—"

A shadow darkens our table before I can finish my sentence, and considering the fact the sky is almost black as pitch that's saying a lot.

"Well, well." Niki looks up and grins. "Look who the headless puttana dragged in."