“Shut up,” Meador told her again for about the hundredth time. But he sounded worn down, like a broken record. Carmela was getting to him. They’d been driving for ten minutes, weaving through nasty traffic, crawling down narrow secondary streets.

And even though Carmela was putting up an aggressive and brave front, she was terrified. She’d come to the quick realization that Jack Meador had probably killed Melody. And now she was Meador’s prisoner. She wasn’t sure how she was going to get free, but she knew she had to.

The van spun fast around a corner and Carmela, who’d been kneeling, making another impassioned plea, was suddenly sent sprawling. By the time she’d righted herself, the van had rocked to a hard stop.

“What do you want?” Carmela screamed at the top of her lungs. She’d somehow managed to dislodge the bandana that was tied across her mouth.

No answer. Jack Meador no longer sat in the driver’s seat.

The back door flew open and Meador grabbed for her. Quick as a rattlesnake, Carmela struck back, kicking him hard on the chin, losing a shoe in the scuffle. Meador back-handed her hard on the side of the head, causing her to skitter away from him.

He beckoned her with his fingers and a wave of the gun. “Come here. I want to show you something.”

Carmela instinctively knew she’d have a better chance if she was out of the van. Inside, she was helpless, a total prisoner.

Grudgingly, she edged toward him. “What?”

When she was within reach, Meador grabbed the rope that bound her hands and waist and pulled her rudely out the back. She landed in darkness. No streetlamps, nobody around to call for help.

Carmela glanced up, saw the outline of a familiar turret, and was stunned when she realized they were directly in front of Medusa Manor!

“I want something,” Meador told her as he marched her up the dark walk. “And you’re going to get it for me.” He shoved her up against the front door, stuck a short pry bar in the doorjamb, and popped the door off its hinges. “Get inside,” he growled.

“You’re crazy!” yelled Carmela, stumbling her way into the dark building, stiff-legged and tightly bound.

“There’s something here that I want,” Meador repeated.

“What are you talking about?” Carmela screamed as Meador pushed and shoved her to the center of the room.

Meador bent forward and, in a stage whisper, said, “I want that painting.”

“What?” Carmela was momentarily stunned. Painting? What painting?

“Where is it?” Meador demanded.

Carmela’s head snapped around, taking in the first-floor parlor. “Over on that wall,” she told him, nodding at a desultory landscape, a grouping of bare willow trees.

Meador shook a finger at her angrily. “Not that piece of crap, the real painting. The Ivern.”

Carmela gave a slow blink. That’s what this is about? A painting?

“Ivern?” she said, genuinely perplexed.

“Emilio Ivern,” snapped Meador. “As in student of Goya.”

Shit, thought Carmela. I really should have paid more attention in art history class.

“Oh, that painting,” she said to him, nodding slowly, as if comprehension were slowly dawning. The one I tucked under my arm and carried downstairs to the library.

“Where is it?” Meador demanded.

“Upstairs,” Carmela told him, without hesitation.

“Go,” said Meador, shoving her toward the stairs.

Carmela balked. “First untie me.”

Meador shook his head. “No way.”

“I can barely move like this, let alone climb those stairs.”

Jack Meador seemed to consider this for a few moments, then loosened one of the ropes that ran around Carmela’s hips.

“C’mon, man.” She gave him a look of disgust.

Meador adjusted more ropes and loosened one arm. “That’s all you get. And never forget, I have a gun!”

“I’m not going anywhere,” said Carmela. She trudged slowly upstairs, feigning difficulty. “The Ivern,” she said when they reached the landing. “It’s worth something?”

Meador nudged her in the back. “A small fortune. Keep moving, please.”

When they reached the second floor, Carmela paused. Meador was anxious now. “Come on, come on.”

“I’m all turned around in the dark,” she told him in a whiny voice. “And we’ve moved things around so many times, trying different—”

“It’s a small painting,” he said, practically gnashing his teeth.

“So I think it’s in . . .” She hesitated. “The bedroom.”

“There are four bedrooms,” Meador snarled. “Think hard and don’t get cute.”

Carmela stared down the long dark hallway, then lifted her right shoulder. “That one.”

Meador nudged her in the back again. “Go.”

Carmela walked stiffly into the ghost bride bedroom. “I think we hung it on the back wall . . .”

The words weren’t out of her mouth when she plunged directly into the dark room with its cotillion of hanging ghost brides. Dodging left, she set an entire row in motion; zigzagging right, she ran low, feeling the stiff, frayed dresses brush against her.

“Hey!” screamed Meador, suddenly tangled by the furor she’d stirred up. As if life had been breathed into their bodies, the entire room of ghost brides swayed frantically, their dresses a whisper of rustles and sighs.

“Get back here!” Meador screamed at the top of his lungs.

But Carmela was running for her life! Dashing from the ghost bride bedroom, she ducked into the connecting closet, emerging in the Exorcist bedroom.

Frantic now, Meador ran back out into the hallway, listened for a few moments, then cautiously stepped into the Witches’ Lair.

That was all Carmela needed. She tiptoed stealthily toward the back stairs, praying for a clean getaway.

The second step down tripped her up. A loud squeak rent the stillness, and then Jack Meador was pounding after her in the darkness!

A zombie on the lower steps went flying, hanging bats banged her in the head, and spiderwebs were filmy barriers that Carmela virtually flew through.

And still Jack Meador was hot on her trail!

Tripping on the last step, crashing painfully to her knees, Carmela scrambled to pull herself up, losing a few more of her ropes and grabbing a nearby brass candlestick in the process.

“I see you!” bellowed Meador. One hand reached out and pawed at the back of her blouse, but Carmela lunged around a corner into the Morgue of Madness. She skittered slightly, dancing around the metal table, then shoved it at Meador. Because there was no place else to run to, Carmela flung open the door and ran full-tilt into the crematorium.

Meador, hampered momentarily by the heavy table, came crashing in ten seconds later.

Carmela was ready for him. With the heavy candlestick poised high above her head, she brought it down hard on top of Meador’s head. There was an ugly crunch, followed by a high-pitched scream, as it glanced off the back of his neck. Meador swore as he staggered, sank to his knees, then went facedown on the floor.

Without hesitating, Carmela lunged for the huge metal switch on the wall and pulled it down hard. Then she was slaloming out the door, slamming it closed behind her.

Inside the crematorium, the newly installed special effects jumped to life in a spectacularly frightening manner. Heat lamps glowed with full intensity, flames leaped and danced on the walls, and a motor roared like a jet engine.

And Jack Meador, stunned by the blow to his head, threw his hands over his face and screamed as though the flesh on his body were being scorched by the hellish flames of eternity.