Inspector Specter, page 29
Okay, so I was a bad hostess. I gestured them in and then led them to the movie room, where the mood changed noticeably when the crowd saw the lieutenant and her husband there.
“Fuzz,” Maxie said.
“I know her,” Everett told her. “She’s a police officer, right?” Everett’s memories of his homeless days are sketchy; he remembers his military years better.
“Yeah,” Maxie answered. “And she doesn’t like people like us.”
“She doesn’t like couples?” Everett seemed truly puzzled, but Maxie grinned at the word couples.
“Ghosts,” Paul corrected him.
“I think you both know my mother and Melissa.” But McElone was looking up into the air in the room, not toward any of the ghosts in particular, but she didn’t know that.
“I have something for you,” she said too loudly. “To say thank you for helping.”
“Who’s she talking to?” Dad asked.
McElone reached into the bag and pulled out the item she’d rescued from the Harbor Haven Police Department’s evidence bin, probably long forgotten. But when it became visible, Maxie gasped audibly, which was impressive, given that she doesn’t actually take in air.
“My laptop!” she squealed. Sure enough, the notebook computer McElone had confiscated from my first investigation—finding Paul and Maxie’s killer—was in the lieutenant’s hands. For a moment. Maxie swooped down and took it from her. McElone looked like someone had deliberately given her an electric shock. I looked over at Paul, but he wasn’t even pointing a finger.
Thomas was also staring, but he seemed more amused than unnerved at the “flying” laptop.
“I did a little digging, and it was still there,” McElone said to the laptop over her head. “I’m sorry it hasn’t been returned for so long, but for a while it was evidence, and you were . . .”
“I know,” Maxie said, even though McElone couldn’t hear her. She showed the laptop to Everett, who seemed a little baffled at all the fuss but pleased Maxie was so thrilled. She showed it to Kitty, who also seemed confused as to its great significance.
“It’s lovely, dear,” she said.
Maxie rolled her eyes, but in a playful way. “Moms,” she said.
I looked over at McElone. “You’ve made her very happy,” I said. “She thanks you from the bottom of her heart.”
“It’s true,” Maxie said, hugging the laptop to her. “Thank her. Over and over and over again. She’s so nice!” Forget that this, too, had been my idea. A boyfriend and a recovered computer, yet do I get any credit? The world is a funny place.
McElone reached into the bag and also pulled out my own beaten, battered, ancient notebook computer and handed it to me. “We might need it for evidence against Vinnie, but I doubt it,” she said. “Thank you for your help.”
“Her help?” Maxie swooped back down, laptop in hand. “I did it all!” And then everyone who could hear her—including Maxie herself—laughed.
McElone looked up at the laptop, which to her eye was floating in midair and clicking on its keys by itself.
“I’m not ever going to get used to this,” she said.
E.J. Copperman, Inspector Specter
