The Ghoul Next Door (6 page)

“What’s it about?” I asked, thinking she might want to do an interview about jogging and health.

Kendra said, “Sorry. What’s your name?”

I didn’t like the fact that she was being so pushy, but I’d been raised in the South, where manners count. “M.J.,” I said, and she scribbled that into her notepad. “M. J. Holliday.”

Kendra stopped scribbling, and when she stopped scribbling, her grin seemed genuine. “Thanks, M.J. I’d really like to hear your opinion about the trial.”

I blinked. “Trial?”

She eyed me curiously, like she couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard about it. “Yes, the trial of Daniel Foster.” I blinked again, and Kendra explained (like I was slow in the head), “The man on trial for the murder of Bethany Sullivan. It’s been all over the news for the past four weeks.”

I shook my head. “Sorry. I’ve been out of the country. I have no idea who you’re talking about.”

Kendra’s expression went back to desperate. “Oh,” she said, but then shook her head like she didn’t care. “That’s okay. I can give you a quick overview and you can just give me your opinion.”

I sighed. I really wanted to get back to my run, but Kendra wasn’t easily put off. “Fine,” I said. “What’s the case?”

Kendra grabbed her microphone and began to speak to me so rapidly that I had a hard time making out everything that she said. “Bethany Sullivan was a resident of Medford who, last September, while out jogging, was brutally murdered by a man wielding a knife. The police arrested her ex-boyfriend Daniel Foster, found walking erratically a half mile away from the crime scene, covered in the victim’s blood. He claimed that he was sleepwalking at the time and has no memory of the actual murder. His trial wrapped up yesterday, and the jury is now deliberating.”

I looked around. The courthouse was miles away from the lake, and I wondered why she’d chosen this spot and, quite frankly, someone like me to ask about what I thought of the trial. “I guess I could express an opinion,” I said. “But wouldn’t you have more luck finding someone who’d heard of the case closer to the courthouse?”

Kendra nodded. “Coming here was my producer’s idea,” she said.

“Why would he send you here?”

Kendra pointed to the ground next to us. “This is where Kendra was murdered. She was out running just like you when Daniel allegedly jumped out and stabbed her before slitting her throat.”

I felt goose pimples line my arms and the hair on the back of my neck stood up on end. And then I had the very strong sense that a spook was present.

From the corner of my eye I saw a glimmer of movement and turned my head slightly. About fifteen yards away a small, round, wavy vortex showed up in midair. It looked a little like the shimmering air that comes off pavement on very hot days, but it was round and suspended about five feet off the ground. “She wasn’t murdered here,” I said, drawn to the energy like a bee to a flower.

“Yes, she . . . hey! Wait! Can I get your comment about the trial?”

But my focus was on the vortex, and I’d already opened up my sixth sense to the hovering energy. I could feel the young woman, sense her pain, and the urgency of her situation. Behind me, I could hear Kendra’s footfalls following me. I stopped when I’d reached the orb. “She was murdered here,” I said aloud, not caring if Kendra accepted that or not. “On this very spot.”

“You look weird,” Kendra said, eyeing me closely. “What’s happening?”

I ignored her and focused on Bethany.
Hi, Bethany,
I said in my mind.
I’m here to help you.

Why?
I heard her cry in response.
Whywhywhywhywhy?!!!

I closed my eyes and started to talk to her in the hopes that I might set her spirit at ease.
I’m so sorry that happened to you,
I began.
And I know you’re scared, and I know you don’t really understand what’s happened, but I’m willing to tell you if you want.

I don’t know what I expected, but it certainly wasn’t what happened next. Bethany sort of entered my energy, and she filled my senses with her last moments. They unfolded like an awful nightmare, and what I didn’t fully realize was that I was narrating the events as they happened in my mind. “She was running because she wanted to lose weight for her best friend’s wedding. She worked crazy hours at the law firm, and she didn’t get out that day until late. She was hungry and tired, but she figured if she could just get in a few miles, she could have a decent dinner for once, and a glass of wine. She had a special bottle of Zinfandel chilling in an ice bucket at home. She couldn’t wait to curl up with her cat, Sprinkles, and relax. It was a little past eight, and it made her nervous to run in the dark, but again, she thought it was just a few miles and she was so close to home.”

I turned and stared across the grassy knolls; then I lifted my hand and pointed. “She lived over there. She felt safe if she was within sight of her condo.”

Behind me I heard Kendra say something like, “I have no idea, but keep rolling!” It didn’t register because my mind was still filled with Bethany.

“She had just one more loop left when she heard footsteps run up behind her. They came so fast they scared her and she jumped, shrieking a little.” I turned again and stared behind me. “She looked over her shoulder, but there was no one there. No one. And she couldn’t explain it, because she’d heard the footsteps, and then, just when she was facing forward again, Dan came out of nowhere—he appeared like a ghost right in front her. He was just standing there. For just a split second she was almost relieved to see him, only because his was a familiar face, but then in the next instant she saw his eyes. She saw something terrible in them. . . . She saw murder in them, and she knew her worst fears were coming true. And then she saw the knife in his hand. She tried to pivot away from him. . . . Her ankle turned. She started to fall and then something that felt hot and searing like lightning struck her right in the back and with it the most awful pain she’d ever felt. She screamed and then more lightning struck her on the right side.”

I clutched my ribs and bent forward. “And then, there was one more slice of lightning. Right across her neck. It was the worst of all. After that, the pain ended abruptly. It was like someone flipped a switch and the pain vanished. But ever since then, she’s been trying to go home, to call the police, but she can’t seem to get there. She can see it, her condo, from here, but she can’t make it home. It’s like her feet are made of lead, and they won’t work right. And other people just pass her even though she’s been asking everyone to stop and help her.”

I stood up straight again and squeezed my eyes shut, forcefully pushing Bethany’s energy away from me so that I could think for myself again.
Bethany,
I said sternly in my mind.
You have to listen to me. Dan hurt you. He hurt you in a way that your body will never recover from. I know you want to get back to your condo, but the reason you can’t go there is because you need to be somewhere else. Do you understand?

Why?
she asked me desperately again.

I answered her truthfully.
Honey, I don’t know. But I think if you focus on what I’m telling you, that question might eventually get answered.

For a few long seconds Bethany said nothing more to me. She simply hovered close by as if wavering on whether to listen to me or try again to go to her condo. At last I decided to help her make up her mind. “You need to move on to the other side, Bethany. There’s nothing for you here. You need to look up, and search for the light, and then you need to let it take you.”

Bethany reacted by attempting to enter my energy again, and I knew she was scared and simply wanted to feel what it was like to be alive again, but I resisted her with everything that I had. I couldn’t allow her to be tempted into staying in the state she was in. “Honey, it’ll be okay,” I whispered. “I promise you, it’ll be okay.”

Finally, as if she’d exhausted herself, she stopped trying to fight me, and she sort of gave in to my suggestion. I had a vision of her lifting her chin slightly, and I realized what a beautiful girl she’d been, with ash-blond hair, light brown eyes, and a beautiful face fit for the cover of a magazine. That face lit up as the light above her approached, and I saw her gasp and her eyes open wide and in the very next instant there was a slight zap in the ether, Bethany disappeared, and behind me I heard, “What the hell?”

“Mike?” Kendra asked. “What’s wrong?”

I turned and saw that Kendra was holding up the microphone toward me and her cameraman was eyeing his camera with alarm. “There was a power surge and then the camera died,” he said, turning the camera over in his hands. “And the battery’s dead even though I just got through charging it.”

I realized then that they’d caught my whole encounter with Bethany on film, and feeling a bit overexposed, I began to edge away from them. Kendra was quick to step forward, and after tucking her microphone under her arm, she said, “What the heck was that?”

I sighed. I was furiously trying to recall what I might have said aloud in front of her, but the truth was that I’d gone into a little bit of a trance and the memory of what I’d actually said was fuzzy. “I gotta go,” I told her.

“Wait!”

But I suddenly wanted no part of her interview and turned away to start running again. I heard her call my name several times and beg me to come back, but that only made me run faster. The last thing I wanted was to become some sort of spectacle on the nightly news.

I didn’t stop running until I was home again, and as I came through the door, I heard the water running in the shower.

I smiled and felt the tension in my shoulders ease. Slipping out of my sweaty clothes, I headed into the bathroom and slid into the shower. Heath had his head under the spray and I moved in to wrap my arms around him from behind. He jumped a little but then put his hands on mine. “Well, hey, there,” he purred.

“Hey, sexy,” I whispered. “Feel like getting soapy?”

“Sure. But we should be quick because my girlfriend’s going to be home any minute.”

I laughed and swatted his butt. His oh so amazing derriere. Heath turned, exposing a few other oh so amazing things, and there wasn’t much room for conversation after that. We stepped out of the shower long after the hot water had turned lukewarm and got dressed. Okay, so maybe we went for round two in the bedroom first, but
eventually
we managed to get ourselves together. “Wanna grab lunch?” I asked as I was dabbing on some mascara.

Heath looked at his phone. “Sorry, Em,” he said. “I have an appointment—” He stopped speaking abruptly, like he seemed to catch himself, and I realized why he’d gone suddenly mute.

“It’s okay,” I said. “Gilley told me you were doing readings again.”

Heath scowled. “That guy can’t keep anything to himself.”

I laughed. “I love that it’s taken you this long to figure that out.”

My sweetie stepped forward to wrap me in his arms and nuzzle my neck. “You’re not mad, are you?”

“Why would I be mad?”

He shrugged. “I know you got really burned out on them, but I miss doing readings. It’s fun.”

“It can be,” I agreed. “But it can also be crazy draining.”

“So can chasing spooks.”

I sighed and looked at the two of us in the mirror. Heath was so exotically beautiful, with his jet-black hair, high cheekbones, deep-set eyes, and square jaw. He’d acquired a thin streak of white hair at one temple and it made him even more striking. “I think I might start up again,” I confessed.

He cocked his head. “Reading for clients?”

I nodded. “We could really use the money.”

His arms wrapped tighter around my waist. “Let me take that on,” he said. “I can make enough over the hiatus to cover us.”

I cocked an eyebrow. “Oh, it’s all on you, huh?”

He went back to nuzzling my neck. “I just don’t want you to do something that’s hard on you,” he said sweetly. “I don’t mind it, so let me do it.”

But I’m not the type to let someone else do all the work. I’m a fifty-fifty sort of gal. “I can take a few clients,” I told him. “And if we both work at it, we’ll have double the money and we can spend some time in Santa Fe in the fall before the show starts up again.”

Heath had agreed to spend the summer with me in Boston even though his mom and family were back in New Mexico. And it hadn’t even been my idea—he’d offered. It’d meant the world to me.

He backed up and turned me around to face him. “You’d come to Santa Fe again to hang out?”

The last time we’d been in Heath’s neck of the woods, it’d been a wee(
eeeeeeee
) bit intense.

“I would,” I said, reaching up to pull him in for a kiss. “If I get enough clients, we could relax about our cash flow for a change.” We’d been paid well by the network that hosted our ghostbusting show, but living in Boston was superexpensive and I always worried about my long-term finances.

“Okay, babe,” Heath said. “But the minute it gets to be too much for you, stop, okay?”

I grinned. “I’ll be fine,” I assured him.

Heath left and I checked my phone. I had a message from Courtney. Trying her back, I was relieved to reach her. “Have you come up with a plan to help us?” she asked.

“We’re working on one,” I told her. “But before we jump in, we’ll need to know exactly what we’re up against. We’d like to sit down with your brother and interview him, if he’s open to it.”

“He will be,” she said quickly, and I could feel her relief vibrating through the phone. “Would you three like to come over to my place tonight? Steven and I are both off in a few hours.”

“Actually, we’d prefer to interview Luke in a public setting.” Courtney was quiet and I knew she must have been wondering why I didn’t want to talk with Luke someplace private, so I explained our concerns. “The three of us have dealt with some of the nastiest, most dangerous spooks on the planet, Courtney,” I told her. “And we’ve learned to be cautious when dealing with something that doesn’t act like your run-of-the-mill spook.”

“There are run-of-the-mill ghosts?”

I chuckled. “Yes. Most spooks are actually quite harmless. They just get stuck between worlds, and their confusion can sometimes make them disruptive. Usually all it takes to deal with them is some gentle coaxing.”

“But you don’t think that’s what we’re dealing with here,” she said.

“No,” I confessed. “I think we’re dealing with something much darker. And because of that, I think that Heath and I could be vulnerable. This spook has attached itself to a person, and these types of spirits can be very fickle. Because Heath and I are mediums, we could be quite appealing to a spook like the one haunting your brother, and until we know more about who or what this shadow man is, neither Heath nor I am willing to risk having the ghost latch onto us.”

Courtney was quiet again.

“I know that may seem cold,” I said, hearing the words I’d said echo in my mind. “But, Courtney, something like this ghost could really become an issue for us, and we’ve taken so many risks in the past couple of months with the scariest, most demonic spirits you could ever imagine that Heath and I have to set some clear boundaries. We’re no longer willing to put our lives or our sanity on the line.”

“I understand,” she said, and I felt that she did. “Where and when would you like to meet Luke?”

I turned in a half circle to eye the clock over the stove. “Would five o’clock at the hospital work for you?”

“That’d be perfect,” she said. “Luke is here in the waiting room trying to take a nap. I think he’ll be thrilled to talk to someone who understands what he’s going through.”

“Good.”

We finalized where to meet and then I called Gilley.

“I’ve been trying to call you!” he yelled the moment he picked up the line on his end.

That took me by surprise. “Why? What’s happened?”

“I’ve got a reporter calling the office nonstop!”

My eyes widened. Uh-oh. “Which reporter?”

“A Kendra something . . . I don’t know,” Gil said impatiently. “She was full of questions about who you are and how you could know so many details about some lady who was murdered in the park. Which brings me to my next question:
What
did you say to her, M.J.?”

I covered my eyes with my hand and sighed. “Nothing,” I began.

“Oh, this can’t be nothing. Seriously, what’d you say?”

“I’m on my way,” I told him, avoiding the question, and clicked off without even telling him about the meeting set for later with Luke, Courtney, and Steven. I found Gilley back on the phone when I walked through the door of the office. My inner suite door was shut and I could hear Heath’s voice waft faintly from inside. I figured he was still in with his client. “Can you hold, please?” Gilley said tightly before putting the phone to his chest. “It’s your new best friend,” he said. “Kendra.”