Aileen Johnson had been one of those darlings of the media. She’d been the only daughter and youngest child of a wealthy business man and had gained her fame by becoming a civil rights activist for lycanthropes. She had been well on her way to a long, successful life, only to have it cut short by a car accident.

Her file sat before me, one of those awful manila ones that showed it was handled by Bert. We’d taken to color coding our files, so if I took a case, I switched it into a crimson file folder. Aren’t I lucky? The picture before me was of Aileen right before she’d died. Her hair was long and blonde, falling in elegant waves just past the line of her ribs. Her sweater and tank clearly showed the early eighties influence and her smile was glowing. With her perfectly tan skin and impeccably white teeth, she could have been in a Crest commercial.

Instead, she was six feet under without a hope in the world.

Her mother had had the determined belief that her accident hadn’t been an accident at all and obviously passed that on to her son, who sat before me.

James Johnson, of the unfortunate name, was, in a word, androgynous. His hair was the same sandy hue as his sister’s, a bit long as it brushed his eyebrows and his golden brown eyes matched hers perfectly. His face was narrow, almost feminine, with full lips, and a snub nose. He sat forward, his thin form garbed in a white dress shirt and dark blue slacks.

He looked so god damned earnest, I nearly said yes. But something was off. I didn’t think it was the case, but the air tasted off. As if charged. As soon as I named the feeling, it passed.

“Mr. Johnson, why do you want me to raise your sister?” So far, I’d been sitting here, calmly sipping my coffee (out of my “I have pms and a gun. Any questions?” mug) and dancing around in circles with him. It was time to be direct.

“I… I want to know if…someone was after her.” His rubbed his long fingered hands together, and I felt my eyebrow arch. I smiled blandly.

“Why would you think such a thing?”

“Because …I think her ghost is haunting my parents’ place…” His eyes dropped and met mine again. Shit. He was almost as good at this as some of the women I’d met.

“You should call a medium for that…” He shook his head, vigorously.

“No! There’s only one medium that came to the house…and Ai threw him out. Literally.” I frowned. Poltergeists? It was rare, and usually only happened when someone paid attention to the spirits long enough.

My beeper when off and I flinched before giving a self-depreciative smile at Mr. Johnson’s concerned look. I checked the number. It was Zerbrowski, since Dolph was still on leave.

“I’ve got to take this. But I’ll raise your sister. Have Mary schedule an appointment, will you?” I flashed my best professional smile and hussled him out the door. Once that was done with, I picked up the phone and dialed the number.

“What?”

“Gee, Zerbrowski, any gruffer and you might actually sound like an adult.” Laughter trickled over the line.

“Anita, sweetheart, we need you down here.”

“Down where?”

“Guilty Pleasures.”