Learn how your ad can appear here! Get Your Vision Board Iphone/Ipod App and start moving toward your dreams today! Books by this Author Ghost of a Chance True love is like a ghost. Many people believe in both, but few find either. Samantha Shade has been hired to find out if there is something more than rats and feral cats haunting the crumbling San Rafael Mission, home of Father Rodriguez's impoverished flock. But soon, the donut-addicted rookie private investigator is sidetracked by a series of murders occurring within the parish-and by the bookish, yet attractive, police detective leading the investigation.   Mummy's the Word When Samantha Shade is offered the opportunity to run Nightshade Investigation, her uncle's private detective agency, she literally jumps at the chance. It has always been her dream to work at the famously quirky firm. But when a wealthy, eccentric client hires Nightshade to protect a priceless artifact, and the relic is almost immediately stolen from right under Samantha's nose-her dream turns into a terrible nightmare.   This Just In When a presidential candidate’s young son disappears into the Arizona desert, TV reporter Jillanne Caldwell gets her first chance at a real news story. But the former beauty queen will soon be forced to face her worst nightmares—and perhaps realize her biggest dreams—in her own hilarious way.   Feature Articles: - In Defense of Maurice Clarett... Click here for more >>

Several young men are found executed in the same gruesome manner-and each is discovered with a marigold between his lips. The clues all seem to lead to someone at the San Rafael Mission. Who could be responsible? Soon Samantha comes all too close to the answer as she is led through the crypts below San Rafael's cemetery on a journey that could only end on the Day of the Dead.

Chapter 1

"I ain't afraid of no ghost," I told my stakeout partner, hoping it was true.

Outside the windows of our hearse, the crumbling remains of the San Rafael Mission seemed to glow under the ochre spell of a late-October moon. Built by Catholic friars in the days when Arizona was claimed by Mexico --and Mexico by Spain --it had once been an architectural marvel, towering over the vast and barren Sonoran Desert . But in the last two centuries, Phoenix and its suburbs had grown up around it. Now San Rafael crouched in a barrio, its adobe walls profaned by graffiti and overrun with thorny bougainvillea. Even so, the mission looked beautiful. It looked ethereal. It looked . . . haunted.

I quit looking.

"You ain't afraid of ghosts, either," I assured my partner with a pat on her velvety head. If Clueless noticed that my hand shook a little, she was too polite to mention it. I waited for a witty comeback, but although the Weimaraner is about my age in dog years (twenty-three) she must have missed Ghostbusters growing up. Or maybe she wasn't into lighthearted banter. She'd wanted to go home about the time we ran out of snacks.

"Just a little longer," I promised as I picked up the crossword puzzle I'd been working.

My partner sighed and lowered her head to lick crumbs of powdered sugar from my lap.

Maybe I should introduce myself. I'm Samantha Shade, interim head of Nightshade Investigation and a rookie detective who is hopelessly addicted to crossword puzzles and powdered-sugar donuts. The first is pretty benign as vices go, but the second is bad. So bad, in fact, that now it's giving me nightmares.

Just the other day (I work nights, sleep days), I dreamed I was Batgirl: black spandex unitard, yellow knee-high boots--the works. I'd draw you a more vivid mental picture but, believe me, you don't want to imagine me in spandex astride a Bat Cycle. In the dream I tore back to my Fat Cave in humiliation. I'd let the bad guys have Gotham City before I'd let the citizens get a gander at my love handles.

I've always dreamed of being a superhero. I think that's what makes me so self-conscious about my figure. I mean, can you name one member of the Justice League with thunder thighs? No, Superman doesn't count. Name a female member who doesn't look like Angelina Jolie. Think about it. I'll wait.

My point exactly.

Remembering the nightmare, I frowned down at my supposedly slimming black pants and sucked in my tummy. Nothing moved.

Clueless lapped at the crumbs of sugar on the seat. (Powdered-sugar donuts are not only fattening, they're messy.) "Enjoy it while you can," I told her. "It's carrot sticks for us from here on out. As of this second, I am on a diet." Clueless snorted. Or maybe she sneezed. Whatever she did, it meant the same thing. I'd threatened to diet before, but this time I'd do it. I'd lose those love handles if it meant eating rabbit food for the rest of my life.

I turned on the seat and leaned against the door to make myself more comfortable while I divided my time between working the puzzle, watching the old mission for signs of a ghost, and daydreaming of a more wraithlike me. In the meantime, Clueless explored the floorboards for any remaining atoms of powdered sugar.

I was staring at the mission and contemplating what a great setting it would be for a horror flick when somebody tapped on the window behind my shoulder. If I'd been a snake I'd have shed my skin. As it was, I set a new world record for long jumping across the bench seat of a hearse. Clueless--alert now that she'd been alerted--let out a shrill bark from the safety of my lap.

"Sorry, Sam," a deep, familiar voice said through the window. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"You didn't scare me!" I croaked. (It was a froglike croak, not an expired-on-the-spot kind of croak, though my heart had considered it.) I scooted out from under the dog and back over to the driver's side. Then I rolled down the window with one hand and pushed my partner back with the other. I had to keep pushing her because there's something about Thomas Casey--the handsome young police detective who'd almost given me a coronary--that attracts female attention, apparently even that of the canine variety.

"You shouldn't be out here alone," he said. Thom tends to be short on small talk and long on advice.

"I'm not alone," I said. "I brought a partner."

"Your partner's a dog."

I stroked the Weimaraner's velvety muzzle. "Don't you like dogs?"

"I like dogs fine."

I was glad to hear it. I was glad to hear anything I didn't already know about Thom, what with him being the new love of my life and all. "Do you have a dog?"

"No," he said. "I have a cat."

"What's its name?"

"Mr. Mistoffelees."

"A tomcat!" I said, hoping he would admire my quick wit.

"She's female."

"But I thought you said mister."

"The name is from T. S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats."

"Oh," I said. "I've been planning to read it." I said it as if it were on my nightstand atop volumes of H. G. Wells, e. e. cummings, and other notable men of letters Thom admires. In reality, I don't have a nightstand beside my bed, let alone any of those authors lying around. I fudged a little because Thom is a police detective by profession, but he's a literature professor at heart. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that he has stockpiled more books than the Mesa bishops' storehouse has grain.

I was about to change the subject from T. S. Eliot to anything else when a to-die-for dimple winked into Thom's cheek--something that happens when he frowns--and he changed the subject himself. "There was another murder."

I told you he was short on small talk.

"Where?"

"The body was found a few blocks from here. It's on the way to the morgue now. The victim was probably shot last night, but the corpse was dumped within the last couple of hours." He pulled a PDA from a jacket pocket. "You've been in the neighborhood. Can I ask you a few questions?"

I nodded. A few. A dozen. A hundred. A thousand. "Come in and sit down," I offered.

Thom's gorgeous gray eyes slid along the side of my uncle's hearse with something less than appreciation.

Some people. The hearse is a classic--a 1963 Superior Caddy in mint condition. It's easy to see why it's one of the earthly joys of my uncle Eddie's life. It's teal green with Nightshade Investigation in bold, black letters on the sides. Within the large letters is a smaller, greenish script that, like the print on our business cards, glows in the dark. (Very appropriate for a place that's open from 8 P.M. to 5 A.M. , don't you think?) It might not be the ideal vehicle for an ordinary stakeout, but what's ordinary about trying to catch a ghost?

"Where's your car?" Thom asked.

I sighed. I love my little black V-dub almost as much as Eddie loves his hearse. "You know how I told you the other day that she was going thwip-ping, thwip-ping?" I asked Thom. When he nodded tentatively, I said, "Well, then she started going thwup-pong, thwup-pong. And then she finally went thwip-thwup-pong-thwup-ZOING."

To read more of the first chapter, go to http://www.kerryblair.com/book_ghost.php.