Lethal Game (GhostWalkers 16)

Burnell shook his head. “We don’t know him.”

Malichai sighed. “Call in your partner.”

“What if Craig is creeping around out there and sets fire to your room or something?”

“Call your partner in, Burnell. And just so we’re on the same page, the man you’re talking about is about five-ten, light brown hair, brown eyes, dresses in sport jacket and jeans? That’s the one you’re calling Craig Williams?”

Burnell nodded several times. “That’s him.” He got up, opened Malichai’s door and beckoned to his partner.

While he whispered to Jay, Malichai texted his brother, asking for all the information they had already gathered on Burnell, Jay and the third man, Craig Williams. Malichai had gotten his name from Marie. She’d told him he came from Georgia. Craig had been there nearly as long as Burnell and Jay, arriving the day after they’d checked in. Malichai was beginning to feel as if he were playing a hypothetical Clue game.

Jay seated himself next to Burnell. “Thanks for listening to us. I told Burnell breaking into your room in the dead of night wasn’t the best approach, but he insisted it was the safest.”

“It wasn’t,” Malichai said. “You’re lucky I didn’t call the cops or slit your throat. Either could have happened. Speaking of cops, why haven’t you called them?”

The two men looked at each other and both shook their heads. “We’re life partners,” Jay explained. “That means a lot of time no one takes what we say seriously. We own a very respectable art gallery in Los Angeles, but we still get those looks, as if we’re not quite bright. Or something is wrong with us. We don’t have any proof against this man.”

Jay was easier to deal with. He spoke directly and logically to Malichai, without Burnell’s drama.

“I didn’t agree with Burnell’s plan to enlist your aid, but at least you’re listening to us and not dismissing what we have to say because of who we are.”

“Jay”—Malichai leaned toward them—“no one would dismiss this because of who you are. It just doesn’t make a lot of sense. You’ve never met this man in your life?”

Both men shook their heads.

“Have you had threats? Against you? Against the gallery?”

More head shakes. Malichai drummed his fingers on his thigh, searching his brain for anything that could tie Williams, from Georgia, to Jay and Burnell from Southern California. “When did you first notice him?”

“We were with Anna and Bryon Cooper, at the beach. We’d spent a good portion of the day together and were walking back to the B and B together,” Jay said. “Anna spotted this little shop, a magic shop. It looked very old chic. Nostalgic. Very cool. We all went in together. We wandered around the shop and found so many cool magic tricks from other eras, but no one ever came out from behind the curtain to take our money. We could have robbed the place.”

Burnell nodded. “The store is set back from the street in this little alley between the building next door and a stamp shop. Have you seen the alley?”

Malichai had. Artists often set up their wares there and sold to tourists. Many of them seemed to be making a lot of money. He’d seen the outside of the magic shop, but he’d never gone in.

“We went behind the counter where this curtain was hung in the doorway,” Burnell took up the story. “Anna started to call out because we could hear a bunch of people talking. It sounded like some kind of meeting, so we decided to leave. I figured they’d just forgotten to put the closed sign on the door. It was late. But then we heard something about killing the maximum amount of people. That’s what the man was saying. The maximum amount of people.” He said the last almost defiantly, looking at Jay. “He repeated those words and they were very clear.”

A chill went down Malichai’s spine. “Who said that?”

“I don’t know,” Burnell admitted. “I didn’t see anyone. We were afraid to pull the curtain aside. It was scary.”

“They didn’t say that,” Jay objected. “Anna and Burnell thought that was said, but Bryon and I didn’t hear that at all. It was more like, we have to make a clean sweep across the board. I thought they were playing a game of some kind. You know, a board game.”

“It isn’t like there are that many murder board games where they have to kill the maximum amount of people, Jay.”

Malichai held up his hand to stop any arguments. “Where does Craig Williams come into all of this?”

“We left the shop fast,” Jay said. “Anna was very upset and wanted to go to the cops. Bryon told her no, that she didn’t hear what she thought she’d heard. We hurried out to the main street and Craig was standing there, just watching us. There was something very scary about him. He just stared at us like someone out of one of those horror films.”