Jasper opened the door. Stacy jumped in, quickly repeating her "No ghost" mantra under her breath. Thunder licked at her clasped hands in an attempt to bring her some comfort. Jasper closed the car door and made his way back around to the front of the vehicle. He suddenly stopped and looked directly through the front windshield of the heavily-tinted SUV. Show yourselves, you cowards…what? How can that be? Jasper's thoughts rolled through his head with so much force, this time Thunder heard them loud and clear and began to bark once again. Jasper felt Thunder’s emotion wash over him ever so slightly. Jasper was broken from his almost hypnotized gaze and immediately got into the car.
"What did you see, Jasper?"
"Nothing…the windshield fogged up in front of me like frost. It was like they turned their air conditioner on to the nuclear winter setting. The glass frosted over in less than two seconds. Weird...the SUV isn't even turned on. Mechanically that isn't possible.” Jasper changed his voice pitch. "Molly, you’re in danger, girl."
Stacy straightened up in her seat and slapped Jasper's arm. “A Whoopi Goldberg impersonation...really! You had to pick the movie Ghost, why not pick Twister or Tom Hanks in Turner & Hooch…your sense of humor is way off this time. I’m not feeling the love here Jasper.”
Jasper grunted as he said to himself, Okay, note to self, Stacy hates ghost movies and ghosts in general. "We need to get out of dodge now!" They backed out of their parking space. Thunder growled as he looked out the back window. The black SUV followed, and there was more than one. Three in a row, each with a frosted front windshield. Suddenly one of Jasper’s favorite movie quotes came to mind. In his head echoed the words and voice of Jeff Goldblum’s character from the movie Jurassic Park, “Go faster, must go faster!”
Stacy nodded in agreement. Her death grip had returned, but this time it was attached solely to her seat belt.
They eased onto I-69 and sped away.
CHAPTER seven
The skies over them darkened by the second; so dark, in fact, that the Buick Park Avenue’s instrumentation panel lit up as the daylight sensor indicated it was approaching night. Curious drivers pulled off of southbound I-69 to see if a tornado was about to drop upon them. Jasper and Stacy knew differently. This wasn’t a simple weather phenomenon; this was pure evil, and it was after them.
Jasper was glad to see people pulling off the road. It meant fewer obstacles for him to go around. At least this section of the road was a straightaway. The three black SUVs began to overtake them. Jasper moved into the passing lane to block them in behind him. The SUV directly to his rear rammed the back bumper and went up over the top of it, causing the Buick’s front nose to lift momentarily in the air. The SUV backed off, and the bumper was left hanging by a thread and scraping the pavement at 75 miles an hour. Sparks lit up the darkness around them. As one SUV dropped off to avoid the damaged bumper, the second SUV swerved away to Jasper’s left and the third skated the shoulder on the right in heavy pursuit. They boxed Jasper in on both sides.
Jasper’s testosterone was pumping hard, trumping any fear he was feeling. He pushed the accelerator to the floor. Then jerking the wheel in a hard left, they collided with the SUV, sending it on a screeching spin. The SUV was out of control. Clearly its driver wasn’t expecting Jasper to strike back. It dove down into the drainage culvert on a sideways roll and landed with a sickening and abrupt thud. Stacy was horrified.
Jasper was relieved. “Do you see them?”
Stacy shook her head no, then…“Wait a second; there they are, about two car lengths behind us and closing fast. Jasper, you need to floor it!”
“We’re starting to overheat…this car is too old…I can’t hold it at 90 forever.”
“They’re right behind us. They’re going to ram us off the road.”
Jasper could hear the panic in Stacy’s voice, “It could be worse,” Jasper said with a shrug of his shoulders.
“What?” Stacy screamed with her most perplexing voice and matching scowl upon her face. She knew Jasper was attempting a stab at humor to somehow lighten the seriousness of the moment. She didn’t want to hear it but all the same wondered in the moment…Oh, why not? “How can it be worse than this?”
“It could be an ice cream truck chasing us instead of two SUVs. I hate ice cream trucks; they are worse than clowns!” Jasper shouted over the noise of the engine. The coolant light flashed bright red on the dashboard. The car wouldn’t be able to tolerate much more abuse.
“Evil is trying to kill us this isn’t the time to review your childhood fears.”
Jasper maneuvered around the semi-truck by passing it on the left shoulder. One SUV was getting ready to smash them from behind, and the other passed the semi-truck from the right lane and shot ahead of Jasper. What Jasper saw next made him cringe…orange construction cones and signs that read “Be Prepared to Stop.” Traffic was indeed stopped ahead of them. Jasper knew in that moment he could not elude the spectacular accident that was soon to come. The black SUV that was ahead of them spun completely around and was now charging directly at them in what was sure to be a head-on explosion.
“Stacy! Release your seat belt and grab onto Thunder’s waist with me!” Without thinking Stacy unbuckled herself and latched ahold of Thunder, who was between the seats. She knew the time had come for a ridiculous move of desperation that only Jasper could imagine. Jasper reached out with his thoughts to Thunder. Thunder stood up the best he could. They were just seconds from impact and Jasper whispered, “Maloof.”
The sides and top of the Buick exploded out of its metal frame, whipping away from the vehicle at intense speed. Thunder rocketed into the air high above the traffic as a massive pterodactyl. Jasper and Stacy were safely riding upon his back. Below them, missing them by mere seconds, it happened: the fireball was so immense that it lit up like the sun. The advances of the darkness in that moment were halted. A lone black SUV with a frosted windshield backed away to an off-ramp a few miles behind it. Jasper and Stacy had escaped death on the back of what could only be called a Thunder-bird.
The red flash of light I saw out of the corner of my eye while I was on my back in the parking lot…it was a GPS transmitter…they have been following us since we left Allegan. Do they know where we are going? Are they already there… just waiting? We have to hurry. “Fly, Thunder, fly!”
CHAPTER eight
Jasper leaned forward with his arms wrapped tightly around Stacy. They were both pressed as close as they could be to Thunder, eyes closed, holding on for dear life. Jasper sent his thoughts to Thunder-flight directions just like a road map. Thunder hid between the clouds that were slowly dissipating. Jasper had no concerns of being seen, and besides, it wouldn’t be long before the night sky revealed itself. Stacy shivered. Cold air rolled past them. Unable to put into words or fully process the crash that almost took their lives, they flew in silence. They were both shaken. The white noise of Thunder’s rhythmic, flapping wings was a welcome sound.
Thunder flew quickly. In just over an hour they had landed by a small pond outside of town, about two miles southeast of a little town called Ireland. State Road 56 was close by. Jasper had transformed Thunder back into a horse. Thunder was more than happy to save the lives of his family, but he was so pleased to be drinking water at this moment that he had completely lost himself waist-deep in the pond. Finally, they had arrived at the “birth place.” Stacy was already working her GPS app on her smartphone. They needed to obtain their current location in order to know which direction to go. Jasper figured they had to be close. The latitude and longitude map coordinates he had viewed seemed to be seared into the back of his eyelids. They both knew returning to the place where all this began must hold some type of answers.
“Which way do we go?”
Stacy made no attempt to answer his question. She was locked in concentration and wouldn’t remove her gaze from the electronic map until her problem was solved. It was in these types of moments that Jasper loved to watch her competitive kille
r instincts take over. Stacy had a strong sense of motivation when she felt a challenge had been issued.
Jasper gave a quick nod of his head and decided to call Thunder out of the pond. She is so sexy smart, Jasper thought to himself. Is it possible even her brain turns me on? Best not to rush her, neither one of us needs additional self-inflicted stress. “Mr. Thunder!” Jasper said in amazement, as he was still drinking water. “How about leaving some water for the fish? Hey, buddy, let’s get going. Time for a little walk.”
Thunder snorted. He trotted up out of the water to where Jasper waited and licked his face. “Yes, Thunder, I’m happy you are safe as well. Wow, what a big tongue you have…maybe I left you in dog form for too long a time…breath mint, Thunder, you need a breath mint.”
“If you two boys are done kissing each other, I believe we can be at our destination in under 30 minutes. We are at most 1700 yards away, about a mile. Follow me.” Stacy headed east through the trees. She led them across State Road 56 and into the woods on the opposite side. Soon they crossed 350 West and were just south of 200 North Road. Stacy stopped. “This is it, we’re here.” They were standing facing north on what appeared to be a well-traveled, two-track dirt road that headed from east to west. But there was nothing but trees and tall grass. No structure of any kind, nothing for as far as they could see.
“Stacy, is it possible that only the foundation remains? I bet the authorities would have demolished any remaining structure for safety reasons. Who would want kids playing in an old burnt-out house?”
“Your logic is sound, Jasper, but give me a second…do you hear a flapping noise?” Stacy tilted her head in the direction of the noise she heard. “The wind is blowing through the trees mildly, and yet I know leaves don’t make that sound. It sounds like a flag.OMG, your birth home had better not be a haunted house.”
“No way…I don’t know any ghost personally, but I’m reasonably sure they can’t haunt something that isn’t there. I think you’re hearing things…” Jasper stopped his mocking at that moment as he noticed Thunder was walking straight toward the direction in which Stacy’s head was tilted. Jasper didn’t need to point Thunder’s actions out to Stacy. She was already watching him. “Thunder…where are you going?”
Thunder gave out a rather loud snort and stomped his right hoof hard to the ground as he stopped moving forward. It was as if he had walked into an invisible wall. Jasper and Stacy could hardly believe what they saw next. Thunder moved to his right, went forward ever so little and circled left as if trotting around a barrel…then he completely and totally vanished.
“He fell in a hole!” Stacy yelled as she ran to the last spot where she had seen Thunder.
“No! He hasn’t. Slow down, wait. It’s not a hole!” Jasper screamed as he caught up to Stacy. “It is, however, a very sophisticated stealth fence.”
“It is positioned to block the view of this entrance from three different directions. From what and for whom, I wonder?” Stacy slowly peeked around the edge of the wall. She was careful, not touching it, just in case it carried a security voltage that could impale them and alert any guards. She saw Thunder munching on a very well-groomed patch of three-inch grass. “What in the world is that?”
Jasper couldn’t take the suspense any longer. He jumped around Stacy to get his own view of what she was now seeing. All at once he was speechless. There in the distance of about 100 yards, wedged in on the northeast, and also the west by a thin forest of oak trees, was a very old, much-worn-out-looking redbrick mansion. It stood some three stories high and all the windows were shuttered closed. There was nothing here to indicate a burnt-out home or anything else destroyed by a fire. On both sides were outbuildings. Jasper recognized the ones on the left to be horse stables and the ones on the right to be greenhouses. Both sets of buildings were lofty with a brick-built base of at least eight feet, clearly designed to stand the test of time. Directly in front of the mansion was a flagpole. Flying at the top of that pole was no simple state banner. Rather, it was the national flag of the old British Empire, the Union Jack flag of the United Kingdom.
They walked up the bricked driveway. It led to a circle drive at the front of the mansion. They walked left around the circle. In the center of the circle was a decaying brick fountain. It looked tired, as if untouched for years. Stacy thought it looked more like a potted plant then a fountain. It was filled with dirt and leaves. It was visibly on its last leg, yet there remained an old world-charm to it.
“This fountain hasn’t been used in ages,” Stacy said in a soft, curious whisper. They stopped at the widest part of the circle, looking in all directions. “Just look at that vaulted roofing on this part of the mansion. There must be a ballroom inside.”
Wide-eyed Jasper was looking toward the area of the stables. “Would you look at that…a semi-detached garage with four stalls running along the west? Is this place a self-contained fortress?”
“I’m just as bewildered as you, Jasper. This place looks unoccupied, and yet there is some type of projected stealth technology at work here to keep the place hidden from the casual passersby. Look at the size of that chimney. It is enormous. It should be on the side of a factory, not a home. I’m completely puzzled.”
“I want some answers, so let’s go knock on the front door.” Jasper was anxious, but all Stacy saw was a steel resolve.
They continued their slow walk around the circle to the front porch stairs. It was a grand porch that covered the entire portion of the mansion that faced south. A broken wooden swing rested against the porch rail. The chains were still attached into the ceiling of the porch. They walked up the stairs side by side. Thunder stayed behind to munch on the tall grass between the mansion and the circle.
“Should I knock or just use the key?” Jasper patted down his front jean pocket that held the key.
“It won’t work. That door lock is shiny and new…best to just knock.” Stacy nodded her head quickly and then took a quick step behind Jasper’s right shoulder.
“Be ready for anything,” Jasper said cautiously over his shoulder. He reached out and lifted the big brass door knocker and brought it down three times. The sound echoed as if traveling through a cavernous hallway. They waited. No one came to the door. Jasper was reaching to attempt a second round of knocking when the door pulled open.
“I am the butler, Lance. You are Jasper Indiana, and you are early. Come back next year when you have graduated.” Without ceremony or any further ado the old English speaking butler coldly slammed the door shut.
CHAPTER nine
“WHAT!” Infuriated Stacy shouted. “I did not fly down here on the back of a prehistoric animal to have a door slammed in my face. When I get through with the butler I’ll have him screaming ‘Possum!’” Stacy pushed past Jasper and charged through the door. Jasper followed, as did a very meddlesome Thunder.
“JASPER, this is appalling! You cannot bring your farm animal into the manor. Remove him this very instant.” The butler, Lance, gave both of the kids a glare that could have refrozen the thawing polar ice caps, but neither Jasper nor Stacy moved an inch.
Thunder gave an intense snort through his nose from between their shoulders. He picked up on Jasper’s thoughts and feelings and knew at once that the funny old man was speaking ill of him; and he didn’t care for it, no, not for a single second.
The tense moment passed soon enough as Lance regained his composure and resigned to simply releasing out a gasp of air. “Oh, come in and sit, both of you. Do not stand in the doorway; it is rude. I will tender your horse to the stable and join you shortly. Please see yourselves into the parlor. Do not play the grand piano; it is out of tune.” Lance made haste across the foyer to remove the horse from the premises. It was deplorable to him that he was allowed to enter in the first place. American teenagers, the lot of them, retain no regard for well-mannered conduct, Lance said to himself as he passed them both with his nose in the air. He led Thunder back outside, only stopping to close the door be
hind him. His movements were fluid, as if he had closed and opened that door a hundred million times.
Jasper and Stacy moved slowly into the parlor. The vast interior of the manor left them both stunned. Italian marble blended seamlessly with hardwood floors as they crossed through the exquisite French doors that guarded the entry into the parlor. They both stopped in the doorway and gazed up at the winding, grand staircase that was adorned with large hand-painted family portraits. Some were as large as tapestries, and the rest were the size of large mirrors. They were endless. Between each portrait, a light fixture; glowing like a candle. Each light gave a warm radiance to the canvas on which it shined, giving each person an afterglow from days past.
“I guess you really can’t judge a book by its cover,” Jasper stated without emotion.
“This is magnificent. Can all of those paintings be your family? They are all so stately looking. Their ceremonial apparel has a warm elegance. This place is, without question, the very definition of upper-class.”
“Then answer me this: why is the outside so pitiful?”
The French doors closed behind them, startling them both. They turned around quickly. “Because you are one year early, Master Indiana, please sit so we may discuss the intention behind your unannounced visit.” Lance motioned for them to be seated on the Victorian lounge. Lance seated himself on the piano bench. “This manor has been in lockdown mode for the last 16 years. The exterior renovations are due to begin this summer and will be completed before the conclusion of autumn. I assure you, Master Indiana, your ancestral home will be more than ready for your arrival next summer…” Lance paused to follow Jasper’s gaze. Jasper’s stare was fixed upon the rocking chair that rested squarely between the grand piano and the brick fireplace. Jasper looked as if he was stuck in a distant memory.
Jasper: Purple Flamingos Fly at Midnight (Jasper - Purple Flamingos Fly at Midnight Book 1) Page 7