Sean looked to me and then back to Jeremy. “Who’s Wallace?”
“He’s my handler.” Jeremy leaned back in his chair and delivered the line as if it somehow made him special.
“What do you mean ‘handler’?” Sean asked and looked to me again. How did Sean know a heap of other stuff but not know about mediums’ afterlife handlers? Surely he’d come across this situation before.
Jeremy jumped to his feet and knocked his chair to the floor. “My afterlife contact, you imbecile!”
Sean tucked his clipboard under his arm and held his hands up as if he could pat Jeremy’s anger down. “Now, there’s no need—”
“Get him now!” Jeremy screamed like a five-year-old having a tantrum. He picked up his pen and flung it at Sean. It flew through the air like a dart and bounced off Sean’s chest. It left a tiny black dot of ink where it impacted. Jeremy picked up his stack of forms and flung them in Sean’s direction too. They didn’t reach Sean but rained down on the people in the front row like huge chunks of confetti. The zombies batted the paper out of the way without looking up, completely oblivious to the drama.
Sean’s face was slack with shock. “Now, now, let’s just—”
“Now!” Jeremy roared. “Are you stupid? Have whatever happy pills you’re on rotted your brain.”
Sean gaped at Jeremy, hurt all over his face. Before I really understood why Sean’s unhappiness bothered me so much I grabbed Sean’s clipboard and I strode to the other side of the room. I came to an abrupt halt right in front of Jeremy.
“Oh, what are you going to do? Call your friend back to fight your battles for you?” he sneered. If I’d been calmer I’d have pointed out the irony in that statement, since he was having a tantrum to make his “friend” come and rescue him. But I wasn’t calmer. So I lifted the clipboard and tapped it down on his forehead.
Not hard enough to do any real damage. Or any damage at all. It was really just a tap. Jeremy stumbled back from me, clutching his forehead as if I’d taken a sledgehammer to it.
“Bridget …” Sean breathed from the other side of the room and I was pretty sure it was awe in his voice.
“You’re crazy!” Jeremy screeched, both hands holding his forehead. I really hadn’t tapped him that hard. It had been more to shock him out of his attitude.
“I was trying to knock some sense into you,” I said.
“Is that what you’d like me to put in the report, Ms Sway?” Officer Leonard asked from behind me.
“I’d prefer you not to write a report at all.” I stepped back so Officer Leonard could see that Jeremy was unharmed.
“Finally! Get me out of this place,” Jeremy demanded.
“I’ve told you. You need to fill out those forms.” I made a sweeping gesture to encompass the mess of paper scattered in front of him.
Jeremy stepped closer to Officer Leonard. “Do something, Wallace.”
Chapter Nine
“I was hoping you’d be here early,” I called to Sabrina, who was sitting by the stone marker outside the fort.
“Aww, I missed you too, sweetie pie,” Sabrina cooed and watched as I struggled to cover the small distance to her, wobbling as my heels partially sank into the grass. “Do you need some help?”
“I’m fine.” Beautiful as my four-inch heels were, they were not made for walking on grass. Why had this never been a problem before? Surely, I’d walked on grass in my alive life.
“Really? Because it looks like the grass is swallowing your shoes. Why don’t you take them off?”
“Do you have any idea how long I’ve had to wait for these?” I managed to pull one shoe out of the mud only to find I’d pushed the other in deeper. It wasn’t even like it had rained—how was the ground so soft? I scowled at Sabrina, stepped out of my shoes and crossed the distance to her.
Sabrina looked up at me. “Are you going to sit down?”
I pinched the material of my jumpsuit and held it out to the side. “I’m wearing white.”
“Okay. I can’t deal with Eyeliner Bridget anymore today. Can Normal Bridget come out to play for a bit?”
“I’m not schizophrenic.”
“Of course you’re not,” Sabrina said in a tone that implied she thought the opposite. “Will you please sit down? It’s hurting my neck to look up at you.”
“Right, because you couldn’t stand up.”
Sabrina grabbed my hand and pulled me down. I landed in a heap next to her on the grass.
“That was not cool. If I have grass stains—”
“You’ll what? Have to wear one of your other white VTP jumpsuits? Nightmare.” Sabrina rolled her eyes. “So what did you need me here early for?”
“There was another medium at Arrivals today,” I said while arranging my shoes neatly in front of me. “Sean said because he didn’t have a death timeline he was a double M. And then Jeremy pitched a fit, so I tapped him on the head with Sean’s clipboard and Wallace showed up to take him away.”
“You always do this to me,” Sabrina complained. “You drop these huge bombs like they’re casual facts.”
“Well, that’s what you get for being mean about my shoes,” I countered.
“Tell me from the beginning.”
I related the afternoon’s events.
Sabrina nodded to herself. “Just to be clear on what we’re saying here: Two mediums have been murdered. Wallace is Officer Leonard. He took Jeremy away somewhere. If you don’t remember the seconds immediately before and immediately after your death, you’ve been murdered. And GBs use mediums as some sort of alive snitch.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I think that’s everything. Although I’m not a hundred percent on the whole alive snitch thing.”
“Who do they use them to snitch on?” Sabrina asked.
“Did you hear the part where the GBs interrupted my interrogation of Magnificent Malcolm and how Jeremy wouldn’t tell me anything?” I asked.
“Are your feet hurting from walking in those shoes? Is that why you’re grumpy?” Sabrina asked.
“I’m not grumpy. And my feet are hurting because I keep having to take my beautiful shoes off.”
“If you have to keep taking them off what’s the point in wearing them?” Sabrina asked and then waved away my response before I could make it. “We need to warn Madame Zorina if someone is bumping off mediums.”
“Initially, I thought that too, but Magnificent Malcolm and Jeremy were informants. Of some kind. They knew Wallace. Madame Zorina doesn’t.”
“That we know of,” Sabrina interrupted.
“Do you remember all her questions about the afterlife? I’m fairly sure she’s not an informant and I’m pretty sure if we tell her she’ll be jumping at her shadow and summoning me every two minutes.”
Sabrina frowned. “I don’t think she’d be that bad.”
“Yeah, that’s because it wasn’t you she summoned four times in a row to keep turning her neighbour’s music down.”
“Fair point. Ohhhh.” Sabrina grabbed my arm. “What if we text Edith under the pretence of being worried about Madame Zorina and then question Edith about Tommy and Jeremy?”
“It’s not really a pretence, is it? And why didn’t we fake something like that in the first place?” I asked.
Sabrina shook her head. “It’s all this being around dead people. It’s dulling my edge.”
“Didn’t you say Edith said she had other plans tonight, though?”
“She and Madame Zorina are friends, though, right? So, I’m pretty sure Madame Zorina’s safety trumps Edith’s other plans.”
“Maybe. And are we really not going to tell Madame Zorina? I feel a bit weird about not telling her there’s a medium-murdering murderer on the loose.”
“What? You just said you didn’t want to tell her because she’d summon you all the time,” Sabrina accused.
“I don’t want to be summoned all the time but I feel weird about—” I cut myself off with a sigh. “Nope. I was right the first time. Let’s
not tell her.”
“Will you make up your mind? You’re making me dizzy.”
I offered Sabrina my hand. Sabrina stared at it for a confused moment, then slapped her hand into mine. “She’s summoning you? Wait, are we going to tell her or not?”
“Maybe. Or maybe not?” Just as I let the summoning connect I realised I wasn’t wearing shoes. I tried to grab them but my hand passed through them. If they weren’t there when I returned, regardless of it being my fault, everyone was going to feel my shoeless wrath.
We landed on Madame Zorina’s office floor in the same positions we’d been sitting on the grass. It was dark and empty.
“Are you sure she summoned you?” Sabrina scanned the room as she stood.
“No, maybe it was a sneeze.”
“Really? Are they quite similar sensations?” Sabrina asked as we stood up.
“Not even slightly.”
“So where is she?” Sabrina asked, holding her hands up and spinning around to showcase the empty office.
“Oh, she’s hiding behind her desk ready to spring out and shout surprise.”
Sabrina dropped her arms and frowned at me. “Why would she—”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Were you about to ask me another question I had no way to answer?”
“Is this attitude because I suggested you take off your shoes?” Sabrina asked as she checked behind the desk anyway.
“If they’re not still there when I get back I’m going to be incredibly unhappy with you.”
“Okay, you took them off. How about you take responsibility for that?” Sabrina asked as she peered out of the windows on one side of the room. “Aren’t you always arguing with Oz about how you’re responsible for yourself?”
“Yes, but I refuse to take responsibility for this because that would mean that if they’re not there when I get back it will be my fault and I can’t accept that.” I walked to the door and tried the handle. The door was locked. “If she’s out getting coffee again and summoned me so she doesn’t have to wait on me I’ll be so annoyed.”
“It was definitely her that summoned you?” Sabrina frowned around the locked room.
“Are we going through this again? Yes, it was her. Definitely not a sneeze. Definitely not the computer programmer next door working some voodoo.”
“You’re positive?” Sabrina stressed.
“Yes. Her summonings always have an impatient tinge to them.”
“This is weird. I think we should go.” Sabrina motioned me back into the centre of the room, checking over her shoulders. “If Madame Zorina did summon you, she’s obviously not here yet, so she can summon you again later.”
“Yes, because it’s such a pleasant experience. What if we go back and Eleanor calls the meeting to order and then I have to fight off Madame Zorina’s summoning the whole time? I’d just rather wait a minute. And to be able to summon me here she can’t be too far away anyway.”
“How far?” Sabrina asked.
I shrugged. “Why?”
“Maybe she’s testing limits because that wasn’t up to her usual summoning standard. You’re sure it was her?”
“Are you seriously asking me again? But I’m glad you said that about her standards because I thought it felt a bit rough. Like she was distracted or—”
The realisation hit us both at the same time. I ran across the room to the door on my tiptoes, Sabrina close behind. Sabrina rattled the door handle while I concentrated and stepped through the door.
We’d been practising misting, moving through solid objects, for a while. I was decent enough at it to manage a door while stressed but Sabrina wasn’t. I stepped out into the corridor while she fiddled with picking the lock.
The dimly lit hallway stretched out ahead of me. At the other end a dark figure stumbled as if he were drunk. Something about the way he was moving struck me as wrong. So I did what any self respecting person who is trying to not be murdered would do. I shouted and ran towards him.
The figure disappeared and revealed Madame Zorina. She dropped to the floor on all fours, coughing.
“What’s going on?” she rasped. One hand around her throat, she sat up and put her back against the wall.
“I think someone tried to kill you,” I said.
“Oh, really? Like I hadn’t worked that out myself,” she snapped and then coughed.
“Well, what did you ask for then?” I snapped back. “And that does not sound like gratitude for saving your life.”
“Saving my life!” she hissed at me, her face red with the effort of trying to shout. “I summoned you ages ago!”
“It wasn’t ages ago and still, I saved your life, so a little more gratitude would be appreciated, okay?”
“Gratitude?” she hissed. “Gratitude?”
“What happened?” Sabrina asked, jogging down the corridor and eyeing my folded arm, frowny face stance.
“Oh, nothing. I saved Madame Zorina’s life and now she’s giving me attitude.” I turned to Sabrina and pointed at my face. “She’s not even commented on my eyeliner.”
Sabrina whistled and shook her head at Madame Zorina. “You are so self-involved.”
I arched an eyebrow at Sabrina. “Don’t think I don’t know you’re mocking me right now.”
“Why is someone trying to kill me?” Madame Zorina asked, looking up at us.
“Probably because they met you and realised you’re ungrateful,” I said.
Sabrina shook her head at me. “What is wrong with you and this eyeliner? It’s like it’s rotted your brain. Did you at least get a good look at the attacker?”
I nodded. “It was someone. Someone definitely attacked her.”
“Someone?” Sabrina gave me a flat stare. “Seriously?”
“They might have been dressed in black. And I think it was a man because they were big enough to completely obscure Madame Zorina from my vision.”
“Oh my god! Was it the Grim Reaper?” Madame Zorina hissed.
I opened my mouth to tell her that was ridiculous, but really, who knew how we were pulled from our alive lives? I remembered the bus about to hit me and Charon showing up afterward but not the actual moment my afterlife body separated from my alive life body. I glanced at Sabrina, expecting her to say something comforting but from the expression on her face I assumed her brain had stalled out like mine. I doubted there was such a thing as the Grim Reaper. And if there was I doubly doubted he strangled your ghost out of your body. That seemed unnecessarily harsh.
“Probably not,” I said.
“What do you mean probably not?” Madame Zorina screeched. It sounded like air wheezing out of a balloon.
I shrugged. “That’s what I mean. Probably not.”
“It wasn’t Charon?” Sabrina asked and I shook my head.
“He wouldn’t get his hands dirty like that. I don’t think he really likes touching livies. Or dead folk. Or anyone, really. Also, he wouldn’t disappear if I showed up.”
“Even if he was killing someone?” Sabrina asked.
I thought about that for a second. “Yeah, he doesn’t really have much concern about that kind of stuff.”
“I don’t think either of you have the relevant level of concern about this stuff,” Madame Zorina hissed and pointed to her neck. “I nearly died.”
I rolled my eyes at her dramatics. “Yeah, well, we’re already dead so excuse me if I’m not massively disturbed by that. We came here and saved you, didn’t we? Don’t be so ungrateful because we’re not cooing over you and your slight injuries. It’s not like we’ve never been injured. You’ve never asked me about my gunshot wound, have you? No.”
“Someone shot you?” Madame Zorina’s attention ricocheted between Sabrina and me. “When did someone shoot you?”
“Is it me or are you incredibly touchy today?” Sabrina asked, giving me a sidelong glance.
“I look really pretty today and she’s not even noticed,” I said. Yes, it was whiny but I was proud of myself for not pouting. “I alwa
ys tell people when they look nice. Except for Anna because I don’t like her. But, in general.”
“I was nearly strangled here!” Madame Zorina slapped the floor with her hand to emphasise her point.
“Yeah, you nearly died, big deal.” I pointed to my face. “I have eyeliner on.”
Madame Zorina pushed to her feet. She looked like she was about to get in my face about my eyeliner but she stumbled forward. I reached out to catch her and yelped as she stepped on my bare foot.
I jabbed a finger at Sabrina, rubbing the top of my foot on the calf of my other leg. “My shoes better still be there when we get back or you and I are going to have a serious problem.”
All expression dropped from Sabrina’s face. She stared down at my hands holding onto Madame Zorina’s arm. It took me a second to realise what the problem was. When I did, I flung Madame Zorina away from me as if she were diseased.
“Hey!” Madame Zorina cried but we ignored it.
“What does this mean?” I asked Sabrina.
Sabrina shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“What does what mean?” Madame Zorina looked between us. I reached out to her, tentatively. As if she were likely to bite my fingers off. She didn’t. But she did watch my finger as it jabbed into her shoulder.
“Yep,” I said as I jumped back and wiped my hand on my trousers. I didn’t know why but touching her had super creeped me out. “She’s definitely solid.”
“Of course I’m solid, you pair of fools!” she hissed at us.
“You shouldn’t be,” Sabrina said with a shake of her head. “Not to us.”
“Why?” Madame Zorina pushed her curls out of her face. She already knew why. “No. You’re doing it wrong.”
“Doing what wrong?” I asked.
She shook her head again “Touching me. You’re touching me wrong.”
“How can I touch you wrong?” I asked.
“You can touch someone inappropriately,” Sabrina offered.
“Yes, that was helpful input here when talking to our newly dead friend,” I said to Sabrina.
“I only meant—”
I waggled my hand at Sabrina to shush her. “When Jeremy died he could still lean on stuff. At least for the first minute or so, before he realised he was dead.”
Dead and Buried: A Bridget Sway Novel (A Paranormal Ghost Cozy Mystery Series Book 4) Page 10