I got to my feet, winced at the stiffness and pain, and rotated my neck and shoulders to get the kinks out. I'd be lucky if I could get on my bike in five hours, let alone pedal the frigging thing.

I made my way to the back door, down the ramp, and to the sidewalk that led to the barn-the same path we'd used during our en ma.s.se exodus earlier. I shuffled along, barely able to keep my eyes open.

All right. All right. I did the zombie walk. I was working on less than three hours of sleep spent camped out on the floor of a haunted murder house. Give me a break.

I slow-moed my way down the sidewalk, each step an accomplishment. My "walker" steps took me down the short sidewalk to the porch of the barn. I frowned at the now dark structure, and sleepily ripped whoever had turned the lights off a new one. I climbed the porch steps and tried to recall where the john was located.

The buzz-buzz of a mosquito tickled my ear, and I slapped it away.

"Bloodsuckers!" I mumbled.

I remembered my cell phone and took it from my pocket, hitting the b.u.t.ton to wake it up. I held it out in front of me to light the way.

I took another "walker" step, hesitating at the porch rail when I caught the outline of a figure on the bench to my right.

Busted!

Some 'fraidy cat had crept out of the house to bed down on the bench. I did a forehead b.u.mp with the b.u.t.t of my hand. Why hadn't I thought of that?

I approached the sacked-out sleeper, curious to see who had struck out on their own.

A mosquito dive-bombed me. Then another. And another.

Slap! Slap! Slap!

"d.a.m.n." I was being eaten alive. I swatted another potential taste-tester away and decided I'd better wake the oblivious sleeper or, come morning, he or she would be a prime candidate for West Nile Virus.

"Hey! You! Not a good place to crash," I said.

No reaction.

"h.e.l.loo." I bent over and put a hand on the sleeper's shoulder and shook. "You're so gonna regret this in the morning," I said. "You'll wake up short a pint of whole blood."

I pulled my hand back. It felt wet.

I frowned, and pushed the b.u.t.ton on my phone, shining what wimpy illumination it provided at my fingertips. I stared down at my hand.

It wasn't. It couldn't be. Uh-uh. No way was that dark red, wet, sticky substance blood. No way.

I raised my fingers for a closer look.

It sure looked like blood.

My phone went dark.

I said a few words I promised to ask forgiveness for and fumbled around getting the phone to wake up.

"Hey. You. There." I said.

Finally, the phone's light illuminated the sleeper's profile. I sucked in a ragged breath.

Vinny Vincent, the dark shadow of blood standing out in sharp contrast to the white collar of his shirt, lay sprawled out on the bench.

Holy h.e.l.l-Raiser!

I could see the headlines now: Hollywood agent gets the ax!

And one cursed cub reporter?

She gets the shaft.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

I stared at the phone number displayed on my cell and bit my lip.

To answer or not to answer? That was the question.

I opted to punt and hit "ignore."

In the dawn's early light, my vantage point from the second floor/hayloft level of the Murder House barn provided a spectacular view. The small, white two-story at the corner of South Sixth Avenue and East Second Street in Villisca, Iowa, probably hadn't seen this amount of curious gawker foot traffic since the infamous morning of June 10, 1912, when-according to Frankie-a good share of the citizenry tromped through a ma.s.s murder crime scene, moving bodies and cleaning up blood, and destroying evidence that might have helped solve the crime.

Back then, however, they didn't have things like live links, satellite trucks, or smart phones to broadcast the unfolding events to a worldwide audience live.

Gotta love twenty-first century technology.

Patrick and Manny, along with local law enforcement, had herded us up to an area staged for tour group talks. A row of old theater seats, along with webbed lawn chairs, provided seating for those who took the tour.

"And you didn't take any pictures? Any at all?" Van Vleet asked again.

"Gee, I'm sorry, Drew. It didn't occur to me to snap pictures of an unconscious and bleeding a.s.sault victim before I dialed 9-1-1," I said.

"What about afterwards?" Van Vleet pressed, and I gave him my version of the you-are-pond-sc.u.m' stare. Take my word for it. It's intimidating.

"Looks like you could use a cup." Patrick appeared and pressed a cup of coffee into my hand. "And...a bit of a break." He performed a get-lost nod in Van Vleet's direction.

"Coffee does sound good," Van Vleet said, an up-and-down of his Adam's apple showing he received the trooper's message loud and clear.

"So. How is he? Vinny, I mean?" I asked, cupping the warm coffee with both hands.

"He'll live. Actually, his injury isn't all that severe. A slight concussion at worst."

"But all that blood-"

"Head wounds bleed buckets," Patrick said. "And often look much worse than they actually are. Mr. Vincent is being evaluated in a hospital, but it appears the injury isn't serious."

I let out a long, relieved breath.

"Thank goodness. Has he said anything about what happened? How he was injured?"

"He says he was having a smoke on the bench, felt a sharp pain, and it was lights out until he came to with you standing over him."

"Surely he doesn't think I-"

At Patrick's expression, I stopped. Of course, he did. Hadn't he spent the better part of the bike ride accusing me of all kinds of nefarious criminal activity? Why not a blitz attack?

"He was blind-sided. He didn't see or hear a thing," Patrick said, trying to rea.s.sure me.

"I'm sure Vinny has his own theory." It didn't taken a ton of smarts to figure out Vinny had given me the finger. I mean fingered me. Oh, you know what I mean.

Patrick shrugged. "At this point, anyone in the house or in the vicinity of the house is a suspect."

"How's Manny handling the fallout?" I asked. When you're supposed to be in charge of security and an a.s.sault with injuries occurs right under your nose, it's gotta suck.

"Manny's...highly motivated to discover who's responsible."

I figured "highly motivated" was an understatement. Manny was probably ready to bust a kneecap or two over the incident. But I'm only speculating here.

"He's suggested that Keelie reconsider the bike ride," Patrick went on.

"Oh? What does Keelie think?"

"She's refusing to pull out."

"I see." I chewed my bottom lip. Just the reaction you'd expect from the reality star if she knew for certain she wasn't in any real danger. "I bet the show's producers are tickled green-as in advertising bucks green-at Keelie's show-must-go-on att.i.tude," I mused aloud.

Patrick grimaced. "I don't get all the reality show hype and popularity," he said. "Apparently, living vicariously through others appeals to a certain demographic of the populace."

I was with Patrick on this one. I'd never been comfortable cast in the role of a sideline observer.

Oh, I see. You could tell that about me, huh?

"So, what happens now?"

"The locals investigate," Patrick said. "With a.s.sistance from the state."

"Couldn't we figure out if anyone left the house at the approximate time of the attack by looking at the cameraman's footage?" I asked.

Patrick shook his head. "I wish. They shut down for the night shortly after the little brouhaha with Jax Whitver."

"Oh? What about your moves on the dance floor? Did your stint on the chorus line end up going viral?"

He reddened.

"G.o.d, I hope not or else I'll never live it down. I had a devil of a time getting permission from the bra.s.s to partic.i.p.ate in the first place. I should have known it wasn't the sort of setting a small town Iowa boy would comfortably fit into."

I put a hand on his shoulder.

"There, there, Mr. State Trooper. Everything will be okay. I promise."

"Am I interrupting?"

I turned. Taylor, looking like a harbinger of death, stood there.

"You're not interrupting a thing," I said. "Why? What's up?"

Taylor held her phone out to me.

"It's for you," she said, tight-lipped and curt. "It's Rick. He says he's been trying to reach you for hours."

My tummy did a flip-flop like it used to when my dad took us out on what he used to call "belly-b.u.t.ton hills." You know. Where you're going really fast and your tummy feels like it's in your throat. One of those numbers.

"Oh. Well, er, my phone's like really low on its charge, so I turned it off to save the battery."

"Uh-huh. Well, lucky for you, I have a full charge," she said. "So take all the time you need to catch up."

"Oh, uh, thanks," I said, feeling anything but grateful as I swallowed past the wad in my throat.

"We'll just give you a little privacy, won't we, Patrick?" Taylor said, and spirited the trooper away.

I cleared my throat.

"Uh, h.e.l.lo?"

"Good to see you figured out how a cell phone works," Ranger Rick said. "Well, other than as a flashlight to point out unconscious a.s.sault victims at the haunted Murder House, that is."

Okay. I deserved the sarcastic salvo. Avoidance has always been my fatal flaw. Okay. One of my fatal flaws. Geez. What is this? Pig-pile on Tressa Turner day?

"Sawree," I said, and meant it. "You know I'm not a phone person."

"I'm well aware of your phone phobia, Tressa," Ranger Rick said, "But I thought even you could manage to hit a b.u.t.ton when your phone rings, put it to your ear, and say h.e.l.lo."

I grimaced. Things were not sunny in Jellystone Park.

"You're right," I said, too weary and too weirded out by the previous night's events to adequately defend myself. "Like I said. Sorry."

One of those a.s.s-awkward phone hesitations I referenced earlier followed.

"Wow. Now that I didn't expect," Ranger Rick said, and I frowned into the phone.

"Expect...what?"