“The freaky thing,” the first woman said, “is that I’m pretty sure I saw him a couple days ago. I was eating lunch at the park near campus, and I could have sworn I saw a guy with a camera standing behind a tree.”
“You think he was photographing you?” the reporter asked.
“Maybe? Both guys had the same general build and light hair, but he also could have been birdwatching,” the woman said, color rising in her cheeks. “There’s a popular rose garden there too, so maybe he was photographing something else but just came off as really creepy. I feel so paranoid now.”
Riley shivered.
The screen returned to the news anchor, a blonde woman in a pink blouse and black slacks, standing on a sidewalk talking to the camera. “Another woman told me that last night, she’d been doing laundry in her apartment complex laundromat. As she came and went from her apartment and the laundry room, she didn’t lock her door. When she came back from one such trip, she found her front door ajar. Too scared to go back inside on her own, since she’d been hearing rumors about the Nob Hill Prowler, she went across the hall to her neighbor’s apartment. The young man went in to check that the coast was clear, and found the young woman’s bedroom window wide open, and the screen slashed. The prowler had also rifled through the woman’s drawers before fleeing the scene.”
The grainy picture of the man was back on screen now.
“If you have any information about this quickly evolving situation, please contact the Albuquerque police department,” the woman said.
The memory of that small vase of roses on Riley’s porch popped up in her mind. Hurry up, my little medium, the note had said. I’m going crazy waiting ...
Hank had put a tracker on Riley’s car. He’d taken pictures of her as she walked to her car after her shift at The Laughing Tiger. He’d traveled to her work, to her parents’ house, to Jade’s house—and had taken pictures of all those places, too. Then he’d emailed the pictures to her to make sure she knew he had been watching.
She could only imagine how much more terrified she’d have been if Hank had gotten inside her apartment. Or if he’d ever gone through her belongings.
Peeping, Riley knew, was like a gateway crime. For a small percentage of peeping toms, voyeurism was where they started. The longer they went without getting caught, the more apt they were to escalate to more dangerous, invasive crimes—breaking and entering, assault, murder. She had to hope that the media coverage would scare the guy off, and that this was as far as he’d go.
Grabbing the remote off the couch, she powered it off. So much for watching TV all day until she could look at the pictures with Jade.
Full of nervous energy, Riley went grocery shopping half an hour away. Before she loaded her new purchases into her fridge, she scrubbed every inch of it. Then she scrubbed her cabinets, the bathroom, and mopped the small swatch of tile floor in the kitchen. The woman in the yellow dress never materialized during Riley’s cleaning binge, but Riley was almost positive she was loitering in the apartment, watching Riley slowly grow delirious from cleaning-product fumes.
A little after 4:30, her phone chimed from where it had been lying on the coffee table next to the package of photos that were practically burning a hole in the surface.
Jade: Girl! I’m having a D A Y. I’m stuck at work longer than planned, but I can get there by like 6:30?
Riley: I can go to you if that’s easier. Traffic will be a nightmare for you.
Jade: Yes! You’re my favorite person! I’ll be home by 6!
Exhausted from all the cleaning, Riley made herself a snack, then arranged everything in her closet by color.
When 5:45 finally—finally!—rolled around, Riley snatched up the pictures, threw them in her purse, and practically sprinted to her car. While flooring it on her way to Jade’s house, she swerved slightly when she thought she saw the woman in the yellow dress walking down the sidewalk. It was a miracle she arrived in one piece.
Riley had just pulled into the driveway when the front door of Jade’s house flew open and Jade came rushing out onto the porch. She was already in pajamas, and somehow she made even those look chic. Her curly hair was pulled back into a messy bun, and she wore house slippers.
“Get your butt in here!” Jade whisper-shouted as Riley stepped out of her car. “I’m losing my mind over here.”
Riley grabbed just the package of photos and her keys out of her purse and left the rest on her passenger seat. “Me too!” she said as she hurried across the cement pathway to the front door. “My apartment has never been this clean!”
She followed Jade inside and across the wooden floors toward the kitchen. The house smelled amazing, and Riley soon found the source: a crockpot on the counter, the glass lid dimpled with beads of steam. They each pulled up a stool positioned along one side of the kitchen counter. Riley dropped the package of photos on the faux-stone surface.
Jade visibly swallowed. “So that’s them, huh?”
“Yep …”
After a long beat of silence, Jade said, “Now I’m scared, too!”
The front door opened then. “Jade?”
“Oh crap …” Jade said.
“Is someone here?” he asked.
Riley turned on her stool. “Hey, Jonah.”
Jonah was best described as a Black Clark Kent—boy-next-door good looks, glasses, and wholesome charm. He smiled, revealing bright white teeth. “Hey, Riley.”
Hopping off the stool long enough to give him a quick hug, she said, “I just came by to … uhh … ask Jade something,” she managed, realizing halfway through her sentence that she wasn’t sure if it was safe for Jonah to know the reason for her visit, as the reason could be tied back to his kryptonite—vintage tech.
He’d been informed of Riley’s ghost-seeing abilities a couple of months ago. Despite being a man firmly rooted in science and technology, he had accepted her ability without much of a fuss. Years of friendship dating back to college surely had played the biggest role in that acceptance, though. He wasn’t any more of a fan of Paranormal Playground than Riley was, but that had more to do with his healthy distaste for “reality” TV than his belief in the supernatural.
He shrugged out of his jacket, which he draped on the back of a dining room chair. He deposited his keys and wallet on the table, then continued into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge.
“There’s stew in the crockpot if you’re hungry,” Jade said, trying to discreetly pull the package of pictures off the counter before he saw it. She wasn’t quick enough.
“What’s that?” Jonah asked.
Riley shot Jade a side-eye as she slid back onto her stool.
“Nothing?” Jade ventured.
Jonah rounded the center island and stopped on the other side of the counter. He rested his folded arms on the surface and looked at Riley and his fiancée in turn. “Jade, honey, you are an awful liar. So is Riley.”
“Hey,” Riley said, mock-offended, but she’d heard the same from Michael countless times.
Jade groaned and dropped the unopened package on the counter again. “You have to promise not to go snooping! I need them for the wedding.”
He stared at her for a beat. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
After Jade had explained everything to him—from acquiring three more vintage cameras, finding a roll of film, and sending it off to get developed—Jonah looked hurt more than anything. “Sorry I ruined that other camera,” he said softly. “I’m bummed you felt like you had to hide this, though. Finding old footage is low-key a dream for me.”
Jade reached across the counter to place a hand on his arm. Sweetly, she said, “You know I love you, but if you had destroyed another camera, I would have had to murder you and we’ve already spent so much money on this wedding …”
Jonah laughed, dispelling the tension. “And then I would have been forced to haunt Riley and we both know she would have hated that.”
“So much.” Even though Riley ha
d been desperate to look at the pictures all day, she asked, “Will you forgive us if I let you open the package?”
Jade offered her a thankful smile.
“Yep!” Jonah said, standing up to full height and quickly opening and closing his outstretched hand in a “gimme, gimme, gimme” gesture.
Jade slid the brown envelope over to him.
Grabbing hold of the red pull tab with two fingers, he bit down on his bottom lip. “I’m sort of nervous. I feel like I need a drum roll or something.”
Jade rolled her eyes. Riley, however, slapped her palms on the counter in her best attempt at a drum solo.
“Thank you, Riley,” he said, offering Jade an exaggerated look of disappointment, then tore the package open.
As he pulled the envelope of pictures free, Riley and Jade leaned forward. Jonah carefully pulled the prints out. He studied the first photo, then placed it face up in front of Riley and Jade.
Riley gasped, immediately recognizing the woman in the yellow dress, except here, she wore a T-shirt and jeans and was just about to get into her car. The next was of her walking down the sidewalk while she talked on her phone. In the next, she was caught mid-stride as she crossed the street. Photo after photo of the woman in the yellow dress doing various everyday tasks.
“I wonder who she is,” Jonah said, still slowly placing the photos on the counter as he made his way through the stack. “This is kind of creepy, right? Like someone was watching her? Do you think the previous owner of the camera was a PI or something?”
“The woman in the picture …” Riley said. “Her ghost appeared in my apartment the same day Jade bought the cameras.”
“Oh …” Jonah said. “Well … shit.”
Riley sighed. “Yeah. I still don’t know who she is, though.”
“There are time stamps on these,” Jade said suddenly. “I just noticed. I was too caught up in the creepy surveillance part of it. These were all taken in 2005. So that’s two years after Brynn and Shawna, right?”
“Wait. This last one is of someone else,” Jonah said.
Riley took the offered picture and whooshed out a breath. The time stamp on this one was 2003. “Holy shit.”
“What?” Jade asked, leaning over. “Who is it?”
“Shawna Mack.”
“No way …”
“Can someone fill me in?” Jonah asked.
Riley mulled over the implications while Jade explained this next part of the mystery to Jonah. Did the owner of the camera stalk women before he killed them? Would another roll have Brynn on it? Had this roll been left in the camera as an oversight? Riley wished she knew who had owned the storage unit this film had come from. Someone, until three months before the sale of the unit, had been paying rent. Had the person suddenly died?
“Damn,” Jonah said softly.
Riley, elbows on the counter and fists propped under her chin, scanned the rows of pictures of her ghost. “I don’t know what to do.”
“You know …” Jonah said, his folded arms on the counter. “I bet I could scan these and run a face-recognition search. My company is working on perfecting the technology for a project we’re working on. Could I keep a few of the ones that have a clear shot of her face?”
“Yeah, that would be awesome,” Riley said. “Thanks.”
As Jonah studied the pictures to pick out the best candidates, Jade turned on her stool to face Riley, an arm resting on the lip of the counter. “You have crazy-face. What’s going on in that head of yours?”
Riley chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment. “I still don’t know why the police would actively investigate any of this if I brought it to them. I know the woman is dead, but as far as anyone else knows, she could just be a missing person. I don’t have any proof she’s dead other than the fact that she pops up in my apartment and has—on at least one occasion—scared the crap out of Michael’s cat.” She paused. “Are these cameras the property of a serial killer?”
Jonah was clearly on a train of thought of his own. “You said the connection between this woman and the one from your dream … Brittany?” he asked, looking up from his perusal of the twenty-four photos.
“Brynn,” Riley corrected.
“Right. Brynn,” Jonah said. “There’s a connection between the ghost lady and Brynn, partly because your dream happened after the ghost showed up. There’s a clear connection to Shawna now too, since she’s on the same roll of film as the other lady …”
“Where are you going with this, babe?” Jade asked.
“What exactly do you see in that dream of Brynn?” Jonah asked. “Maybe there’s something else in it that’s a clue you haven’t been paying the right amount of attention to. Or maybe you’re looking at small details when you should be looking at the bigger picture somehow.”
Riley couldn’t recall much from memory other than the profile of the crying woman with her arms wrapped around her bent knee, the date of the crime, and Brynn’s name. She sighed.
Jade patted her shoulder. “You’ve had the dream a few times now. If you have it again, try to take down notes when you wake up next time, okay?”
Riley nodded.
Jade’s stomach grumbled loudly.
“All right, you two need to eat dinner,” Riley said.
“Want some?” Jonah asked. “There’s plenty.”
“Nah, I’m okay.” The adrenaline rush was waning, and Riley suddenly felt deflated. The daylong rollercoaster of emotions had completely wrung her out.
They collected the rest of the photos. Jonah’s selected three were in a small stack off to the side. Once she had the pictures secured, she hugged Jonah goodbye and thanked him for the help.
Jade walked her to the door and gave her arm a squeeze. “You okay? You can crash here if you’re too tired to drive home.”
Of course Jade would be able to take one look at Riley and know how she was feeling. “I’m all right.”
Jade frowned slightly, but changed the subject. “You have your first post-ghost-hunt client consult tomorrow, right? Are you going to talk to the daughter too?”
“Not sure. Nina hasn’t even brought up the possibility of tracking down Amy yet but I assume that’s on the agenda at some point. The message Iris has been trying to send is that her death wasn’t a suicide. I’m sure Julie is interested to learn who’s haunting her house, but I don’t know if our discovery will be enough for Iris. It’s possible the haunting won’t stop until Amy knows it, too.”
“I have the coolest best friend,” Jade said, sighing happily.
Riley rolled her eyes. Jade hugged her anyway.
At home, she took a long hot shower, leaving the package of pictures on her bed for safekeeping. She had just emerged from the bathroom, clad in pajamas and drying her hair, when a chill slid down her spine. She spun to find the woman in the yellow dress standing in the corner of her room.
Riley wished she could hug her the way she’d hugged Jade and Jonah earlier. She needed the woman to know how invested she was now. “I’ll figure this out, okay? I’ll keep searching until I have enough to share with the police.”
The woman didn’t speak. Instead, she placed a hand over her chest and bowed her head slightly. Thank you, the gesture said. Then she was gone.
Riley hoped like hell she didn’t let her down.
CHAPTER 12
The front door to Nina’s house swung open just as Riley reached the top step of her porch the following morning at 9 am.
“I made coffee,” Nina said in greeting.
“You’re an angel.”
“I’ve got everything set up in the dining room,” Nina said after she closed the front door and led the way across the creaky living room floor, past the low bookshelf covered in owls, and into the circular dining area surrounded by windows on three sides. The blinds were open, one of the windows cracked and letting in both warm morning sunlight and a breeze of slightly chilly autumn air. Four chairs ringed the table, and the two opposite the windows had been p
ushed close together before an open laptop. “Have a seat and I’ll grab the coffee.”
Riley dropped her purse onto one of the open chairs and sat, staring at Nina’s computer screen. It appeared to be a movie-making program, the background dark, with two small boxes making up the top half, and one long rectangular box taking up the bottom. The left box was cluttered with files and folders labeled in white text, while the right had a black box with blue lines of varying heights. The rectangular area at the bottom appeared to be an enlarged version of the righthand box. A ruler ran along the top, time stamps marked at intervals.
Nina set a mug adorned with a yawning cat by Riley’s elbow, placing small containers of sugar and creamer nearby, along with a spoon. Riley dumped a generous serving of each into her coffee and gave it a stir while Nina got situated beside her.
“Okay, so I have four EVPs that are significant enough to share with Julie, as well as one video,” Nina said, taking hold of her mouse and guiding the cursor to a file in the upper left box on the screen.
“Did the cameras pick up anything after we left?” Riley asked.
“Not a thing,” Nina said. “It was a very boring five hours—multiplied by four.”
“Yikes. You watched all twenty hours by yourself?”
“Yep. And close to twelve hours of EVPs to listen for,” Nina said. “It’s a very glamorous job, ghost hunting. At least I can do other things while listening to recordings—a lot of housework gets done then. But watching the video?” She wrinkled her nose. “That’s the real slog.”
Somehow the mundane nature of this part of it centered Riley. Information had always been the thing that soothed her. This—these snippets of audio and visuals—were a way of taking something unknown and rooting them in the concrete land of data. It was a form of proof that could be used to prove people like Riley and Nina weren’t making things up.
“All right,” Nina said, getting the first clip cued up. “First you’ll hear Olivia asking a question, followed by a reply.” She hit play.
Riley tightly grasped her coffee mug with both hands, letting the warmth seep into her palms.
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