The Traveler: Book 5, The Eddie McCloskey Paranormal Mystery Series (The Unearthed) (24 page)

Christie followed the GPS to Engel’s house. It was three story and sat not far from the road, but it looked like the property extended pretty far back. Before they’d gotten divorced, she and her ex-husband had briefly house-hunted and she had gotten good at guessing property values. This one she put around five hundred thousand.

But before they could go down that path and secure a mortgage, the marriage had ended. Which was actually good timing, because it was one less major asset they had to divide.

“Nice pad,” Eddie said.

“Yes.”

“You should see Stan’s sometime,” he said.

Again he was flirting with her.

And she liked it.

She knew it wouldn’t go anywhere. She wouldn’t
let
it go anywhere. For many reasons. Eddie didn’t seem like the type to settle into a long-distance relationship, and she wasn’t looking for a one-night stand. But the thought kept entering her mind. Her subconscious was telling her something.

She said, “Stan’s house is bigger than this?”

“We used to call it the Stansion.”

“I hate puns.”

“That’s not a pun.”

“Are you sure?”

“Relatively sure.”

“Fine. But I still hate puns.”

They got out of the car.

“Still got that back-up piece on you?” Eddie asked, wicked grin on his face.

“Yes. Let’s hope we don’t need it.”

He moved confidently toward Engel’s house, like he’d braced a suspect just as many times as her. If he didn’t have a problem with authority and could follow somebody else’s lead, he might have actually made a good cop.

Christie didn’t think Engel or his ex-wife were their perps, but Daria and Stan had the Schuberts covered. The other brother, Wallace, was still out somewhere. When she’d questioned his younger brother, Jon, the man had claimed not to know where he was. She’d then called their mother, who also expressed surprise at Wallace not being around.

So it was the perfect time to talk to Engel again.

He met them at the door. “Hello.”

“Do you mind if we come in?” Christie said.

“Please do.”

Christie immediately took out the digital recorder. “I’m going to record this interview, Mr. Engel, if that’s okay with you?”

He looked a little worried. But everybody got nervous when they were being recorded. “That’s fine. How do you want to do this?”

Christie hit RECORD. “We’d like to get readings of the house. Eddie will ask questions as we go along.”

Eddie took his K2 meter out. “Max, could you lead us to places where the ghost has visited you?”

“Uh, sure…do you think this ghost is dangerous?”

Eddie said, “It could be.”

“Should we do something to protect ourselves?”

Eddie smiled. “Get ready to run. That’s the best thing you can do.”

Engel’s eyes almost popped out of his head. “What can I do if it attacks me in my home? There has to be something.”

Eddie held out the K2. Christie didn’t have a good angle so she couldn’t see if it was lighting up or not.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. So far it hasn’t attacked you yet so it’s best for you not to kick the hornet’s nest.”

Engel clearly didn’t like that answer. He turned and started walking through the foyer. “I don’t like the idea of waiting for it to attack before I defend myself. Isn’t there something I can do?”

Eddie gave Christie a quick nod. He’d gotten a hit.

Eddie said, “Is there something you’re not telling us, Mr. Engel?”

Engel stopped before he reached the hallway leading out of the foyer. “No. Why would you think that?”

Christie took a good, long look at the man. The bags under his eyes had gotten worse in the last twenty-four hours, which meant he’d endured another sleepless night last night. She was starting to get a feeling about him. He was hiding something. She didn’t think it was related to their case, but the man was definitely on his guard. Also, Eddie had shared the details of his earlier conversation with Engel, emphasizing the slight variation in Engel’s story this afternoon compared to yesterday. She didn’t think it was that big a difference. She knew from bitter experience that people often changed their stories over time and very often it was due to the vagaries of memory, or because the same question was asked a little differently.

Eddie said, “You didn’t seem that concerned yesterday.”

“Yesterday I didn’t know a ghost was capable of killing people. Today I heard the mayor say that.”

“You listened to the broadcast?” Christie asked.

“Yes.”

“By the way, where were you this afternoon?”

Engel frowned. “I had a meeting that cancelled and I didn’t feel like going back to the office. So I took a drive to try and sort things out.”

“What things?” Christie asked.

“The business. I’m afraid one of our potential buyers is going to walk away from the table.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. That’s what I was trying to figure out.”

Christie nodded. “I’m sorry. I interrupted you. Can you take us where Eddie had asked?”

Engel turned and led them down a short hallway that opened to the kitchen and living room. A fire burned in the fireplace by the widescreen TV. Engel stepped into the middle of the living room.

“It usually visits me here.”

“And what is it doing?” Eddie held out the K2 and as he turned Christie saw the lights on the meter blink rapidly. She didn’t know for sure but assumed that meant he was getting hits.

“The more I think about it,” Engel said. “I think it’s trying to frighten me.”

Christie watched Engel’s face. She didn’t spot an obvious lie. She wondered if what he’d told them yesterday had been false. But why would he try to hide the fact that a ghost was scaring him yesterday? Probably because of the mayor’s press conference.

“Why do you say that?” Eddie asked.

“I don’t know. I mean, what else could it be doing?”

***

“So what have we learned?” Christie asked.

“That house is alive. There is a lot of energy in there.”

Christie drove them back to the station. They were due to provide the chief with a status update. Daria and Stan were still tailing the Schubert brothers, but had called in with more information.

“How do we start ruling these people out?” Christie asked. “We have hits on Mark, Jon, and now Max too.”

“The only way I can think is to go dark in their houses with the men present and provoke the ghost or ghosts into appearing.”

“Will that work?”

“Only one way to find out.”

“It’s getting late,” she said.

He knew what she meant. “It is.”

“The ghost hasn’t taken a night off.”

“I know.”

“Where does it go next?”

“Can you put somebody on Engel?”

“Yes. Us.”

“I think we should do it.”

“Okay. Let’s bring the chief up to speed. I’ll get somebody to cover till we can get back out there.”

They pulled into the station and Christie parked near the entrance. Eddie’s stomach rumbled from hunger. They hadn’t eaten dinner yet and it was after seven.

“We’ll pick something up on our way back to Engel’s,” she said.

“You read my mind.”

“I heard your stomach.”

Christie led him through the station once again, and this time straight back to the chief’s office. He acknowledged the developments in the case, but wasn’t satisfied with the lack of results.

***

Back in the conference room, Christie and Eddie just stared at the boxes of police files and the writing on the whiteboard. He sensed that his frustration matched hers.

“We’re getting closer,” she said.

“Sure.”

“We are.”

“Not close enough. Now we’re just waiting for something to happen.”

Christie nodded. “Sometimes that’s all we can do. It’s a crap shoot. That’s what Jug always said.”

Her phone rang. “Hello.”

She listened for a moment. “Okay, thanks. Stay with the house for now, until someone gets back to you.”

She hung up.

“What happened?”

“Engel’s not home.”

Eddie frowned. “We were just there an hour ago.”

Christie nodded. “I’m calling him direct and telling him we need to go dark at his house tonight. Midnight work?”

“Yes.”

She hit SEND. Eddie waited. He heard Engel’s voicemail pick up.

“Mr. Engel, this is Detective Christie. We’d like to take some readings inside your house tonight. That will give us a better idea of whether you’re in danger. Please call me back as soon as you get this.”

She hung up.

“Time for food,” Eddie said.

She ordered a salad and he got a cheesesteak. They ate in the conference room. At the end of the meal, with a fully belly, Eddie’s exhaustion came back.

“What do we know about Wallace?” Eddie asked.

Before Christie could answer, the chief came in and shut the door. “Has Renee Helmke come up in your investigation?”

Christie shook her head no. “What happened?”

The chief sat down at the conference table. “She lives in town. Lakes police called ten minutes ago. They found her dead in her mother’s house. Both women were strangled. Looks like a home invasion.”

Eddie wondered what it meant. It had happened in the afternoon and in a different town, very different than the other killings. But what were the odds another local had died in a home invasion while these psychic attacks were happening?

Christie said, “We’ll take a look at her.”

The chief nodded. “I’ll put the detective out there in touch with you. I know him, he’s a good guy. This investigation is a two-way street. Don’t be afraid to send him what you have on our killings if you think there’s a connection.”

“Roger that.”

The chief left.

Christie got on her laptop. “I’ll get into this.”

Eddie expected to be up the rest of the night at Engel’s or at one of the brother’s houses. “You mind if I catch an hour or two?”

She didn’t take her eyes off the screen. “Go for it. I might do the same here.”

“Care to join me?”

She shook her head. “Never quit, do you?”

“Call me if Engel or Wallace turn up.”

Eddie checked in with Stan and Daria during the ten minute drive back to the motel. They had nothing new to report. Stan had gotten good hits on Jon’s house but planned on getting closer for a better look. Daria had followed Mark back to his place and was trying to figure out how to do the same thing. He thanked them both.

He parked in front of his door. He was tired but his mind was racing. Even if he laid down, he probably wouldn’t sleep. But he didn’t know what else he could do, aside from driving to Engel’s or Wallace’s house and breaking in to do a sweep. Christie probably wouldn’t be too happy about that.

He went into his motel room and locked the door. The room was dark. He got the creepy-crawlies and decided to do a quick sweep with the K2. No activity.

He peeled off his jeans and button-down shirt and slipped under the sheets in his undershirt and boxers. His head hit the pillow and he was instantly drowsy. Eddie set up an alarm on his cell phone to give himself two hours.

He started thinking about all the angles. They’d narrowed their search but still the possibilities seemed endless. Was the ghost Tonya Schubert or Tiffany Engel? Both options branched off in different directions with more and more questions.

If it was Tonya, was she working with one, two, or all three of her brothers? It seemed far-fetched that all three would agree to help her commit murder. Or was she working with somebody they hadn’t even identified yet?

If it was Tiffany…

He was starting to think it wasn’t Tiffany.

According to her husband, she’d called him recently to check in on the police investigation. Eddie agreed with Christie: they could likely believe this story from her husband because it didn’t serve his own self-interest. Which meant Tiffany was probably alive. And if she was alive, she wasn’t showing up in people’s homes as a ghost. Not unless she’d figured out how to haunt while still alive—so far Eddie was aware of that happening only once in the history of paranormal investigation.

But more to the point. If Tiffany was still alive, she didn’t need anybody to help her. She could go about her business on her own, moving freely from house to house. She wouldn’t need anybody lurking outside of Stahl’s house in the darkness. She could have just haunted the place herself and attacked. Hell, if she’d figured out how to haunt a place while still living,
she didn’t even need to be close to the place she was haunting.

She didn’t need anybody to help her, and that conflicted with Mrs. O’Donnell’s account. She was convinced that a living person had been in the house with the ghost. She had heard its footsteps.

It wasn’t Tiffany. It couldn’t be. Max wouldn’t lie about her calling him. It was against his own self-interest.

Of course, maybe Max had something else going on, and pretending like Tiffany was still alive was a ruse to keep Christie and Eddie focused away from him.

Eddie shook his head. He could play these what-if games all night long and not get any sleep at all.

He tried to quiet his mind, but now he was thinking about the case and couldn’t stop. He shouldn’t be sleeping. He should be going dark somewhere and trying to find the ghost. But Engel and Wallace weren’t around and they didn’t want to show their hand to Mark and Jon just yet. They had to amass more evidence showing that one or all of them were linked to a ghost. Then they could confront the Schuberts, from a position of power.

The only other place he could have gone dark was Felicity and Alicia’s. He knew they were scared. They would probably readily invite him in and welcome his help.

Eddie sat up on the bed. His subconscious was again telling him that Felicity and Alicia were important to the investigation. But he couldn’t see how.

Christie and he had gone round and round. Two of the six people that had been haunted were connected. The rest weren’t. He knew that was significant somehow. Two were connected, four weren’t. Two were connected, four weren’t.

What did it mean?

He heard a noise outside his door. Instantly on alert, Eddie came wide awake. Quietly he got out of bed and padded silently toward the door.

He checked out the peephole.

Nobody was there.

Then there was a noise behind him. It sounded like it had come from the bathroom.

The hairs on his neck became like needles on a cactus.

Something was here.

A sharp pain ripped through his head. He’d never had a migraine before but assumed this was what it was like. The room was dark but he squinted his eyes anyway. The least bit of light to him felt like he was staring directly into the sun.

He stumbled toward the bathroom. Each step was difficult. His muscles both jumped and locked up.

Something was here.

The ghost.

It had found him.

The pressure spread out across his chest. Pain ran into his neck and arm. Was he having a heart attack?

He fell to one knee, barely able to move.

The invisible knife that had skewered his brain slid a little bit deeper. The headache went nuclear.

What was happening to him?

He had to get out of the room. Eddie pushed himself to his feet. He was unsteady on his legs, and the effort to stand made the pressure in his chest worse.

He was going to die.

He turned from the bed. The door was only four steps away. He could do this. He wasn’t going to die in this motel room.

One step.

The heart attack-like pain in his arm doubled.

“…fuck…”

Another step.

The motel room before him dissolved and a new scene appeared in his mind. He knew what was happening. The headache was the tremors before the earthquake that would be the psychic attack. The vision came to him.

Stan and Moira kneeling in their living room. Both in tears.

“…no…”

Eddie took another step. He knew what he was seeing wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real. Stan was here, in town, helping him with the investigation.

Moira threw herself to the ground. Her body convulsed with each sob.

“…God…”

Moira looked up at him and then the rest of the floor came into view.

Maddy was there too.

She wasn’t moving.

“…please…”

This couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be.

Or was it?

Maybe it hadn’t happened yet, but it was going to happen in the future. Stan and Moira were going to lose Maddy.

God, no.

He took another step and the pain drove him to his knees. Stan was beside him, sobbing over his daughter’s tiny, immobile body. Moira howled on the ground.

“The ghost!” she screamed. “The ghost did this!”

“No!” Eddie shouted.

He bent at the waist and took a closer look at Maddy. Her little hand had let go of her favorite doll. Her eyes were half-open. Her chest wasn’t moving.

“NOOOOO!”

The ghost was going to kill Maddy.

“This is Eddie’s fault!” Moira screamed.

The pain in his chest was unbearable. He wanted to lay down. If he let the ghost kill him, maybe it would leave Stan, Moira, and Maddy alone. He would sacrifice himself. He was nothing compared to his friends and that beautiful little girl. He owed them this. He could repay them for all the years he’d been a lousy human being and an even worse friend.

The ghost was behind him. He could
feel
it.

It was sucking the life out of him. He had no energy and didn’t even think he was capable of moving.

This was it.

It felt like there was an ice pick in his left arm. His heart. It was going to stop beating any second now and that would be it. Lights out.

No.

He wasn’t going to die in some fucking hotel room in a town he’d never heard of before a few days ago. He had to get to Christie. He knew now, having shared this psychic link with her, that the ghost was pure evil.

And he knew it was a woman. Somehow, he knew.

He had to get that information to Christie, or more people would die.

He took a deep, calming breath. He needed to slow himself down. The shrink had shown him how.

He pictured the creek that ran behind his house growing up. He’d always loved going out there, digging for fossils (he’d never found any), jumping it, creating tiny bridges for the ants to get across. He’d pretended like he was engineering his own world.

The image of Stan and Moira over Maddy’s corpse jarred its way into his mind, but again he focused on that creek.

Deep breaths.

Slowly, the pain in his arm died down and the pressure in his chest improved to not-as-excruciating. Eddie was able to crawl forward on his hands and knees.

He heard something hiss.
The ghost
.

The migraine returned and it almost flattened Eddie against the floor. But he fought through the blinding, searing pain and crawled to the door. Managed to get his hand on the knob and pull himself to his feet. He unlocked the deadbolt.

But it flipped back into place.

He rested his head against the door. The pressure in his chest was turning into pain and he couldn’t breathe. The ghost was beginning to wear him down with her psychic attacks. But she had revealed something important to the investigation.

“You can unlock doors,” he said.

The pain died a little. His words had distracted the ghost.

She was right behind him. If he could just get a good look at her, he could compare her to Tonya, or Tiffany, or whoever they wanted. He could crack this case right now.

The pain was coming back. He managed to twist his torso and turn his neck, and he could just make out a thin, blue haze. But everything was fuzzy. He realized it was his own eyes failing him. The loss of his sight terrified him. He worried it would be a permanent condition, assuming he got out of this room alive.

He couldn’t make out the ghost. She was just there, on the edge of his vision. She had long, stringy hair that obscured most of her face.

“You let him in,” Eddie said. “He gets you to the place and then you let him in.”

The ghost hissed. He could barely move again. He figured his life would last another ten seconds if he didn’t get out.

With the last of his strength, he flipped the deadbolt and turned the knob at the same time. He got the door open just enough, then fell out of the room.

“HELP!”