The man to Senior's side bent down to tie his shoe, and suddenly something clicked in my head. "You!" I said as I pointed to him.
Senior and Junior stopped yelling at each other long enough to look in my direction. The man by Senior's side looked up at me, and I knew I wasn't wrong. I'd never had a close look at him, but there was something familiar about his movements and build. "You were the one who followed us up here," I began, my voice angry as I walked over to Steven, my finger still pointing in the man's direction.
"Who the hell are you?" Senior asked me.
"Never mind that," I spit at him. "Your goon was the one who followed us that night into the woods. He was the one who was in the tunnel and the one who tried to kill us and, if I'm not mistaken, also the one who broke into your house, Steven!"
Sable Senior rolled his eyes and crossed his arms. "Great theatrics, sweetheart. Now why don't you let the men here deal with business and you run along somewhere else."
"Do not speak to her like that!" Junior roared.
"I've seen him before," Maria said, sidling up from the corridor leading to the kitchen. "You were that surveyor that Andrew hired last year to parcel off Willis's house."
I looked from Maria back to the man standing next to Sable Senior. "That's how you knew about the secret door! You did try to blow us up in the tunnel!"
The man seemed to shrink back slightly at the accusation. Senior turned to him and said, "Bill? What the hell are they talking about?"
The man named Bill smiled crookedly at Senior before he said, "Just doing my job, sir."
"So you hired him?" Steven asked his father. "You bastard!"
Sable Senior seemed to waffle for a moment as he thought through what Bill had just revealed. "Hold on there," he said, putting up his hands. "I never told you to blow anyone up!"
"Sometimes things get messy," Bill sneered, and I could feel the malice oozing from him. "Sometimes they get extra messy, and you have to take care of things your own way. Sometimes—like now, that is." And with that he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a gun, pointing it at us.
"Put that thing away!" Senior said. Bill pointed the gun at him, and that shut him up. I heard a yelp from behind me and looked up to see Maria fleeing into the kitchen.
"Hey!" Bill yelled, turning to aim the gun at her. Thinking fast, I picked up a small bronze statue from a table to my right and chucked it at him. It hit him square in the kneecap, and he buckled and sprawled on the floor.
Steven pulled me down low and hauled me quickly around a corner. As we scanned the area, trying to find the safest possible place, I could hear Bill swearing about his knee, while Sable Senior screamed at Bill that he was fired. Suddenly, there was an explosion, then a loud thump that sounded an awful lot like a body hitting the marble floor.
Steven ran hunched over to the left, holding tight to my shirt as he guided me along the maze of rooms that made up the ground floor. We ducked behind a couch in the sitting room, my heart pounding in my chest. I looked behind us and through the window saw Maria hurrying across the lawn over to the path in the woods. I prayed that she'd be able to reach help in time.
Footfalls echoed from the hallway off the sitting room where we were hidden, growing closer, by the sound. I felt Steven squeeze me tightly as the footsteps stopped just outside the room.
"I'm going to find you, ya know," Bill said, sounding decidedly unhinged. "Can't leave any witnesses behind." I wanted to remind him that one witness had already escaped, but given the fact that he held a gun and I held nothing, I thought I'd better pick my battles.
After a bit we heard the footsteps fade again, and Steven whispered, "Come with me." Crouching low, we hurried as quietly as possible out of the sitting room and into the hallway. I held my breath as we saw Bill's back when he turned left and went into the study. Steven motioned me forward frantically and we darted into the kitchen. I followed him around to the island, and we ducked down low as we listened again for the footfalls. They sounded very faintly from the other side of the house. "When I give the signal," Steven said, "we run out the back door. You must get to the woods and take the path to Mirabelle's."
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to get Bill's attention and lead him away from you. I'll take the other fork and head for Willis's. That should give you enough time to get to safety and call for help."
"But—" I protested.
"No," Steven said adamantly. "Do as I say, M.J. Go to Mirabelle's and wait for me there."
I wavered as I looked at him. I thought the plan was dumb. We both needed to head to Mirabelle's. She had a gun there, and I was fairly certain it packed a bigger punch than that handgun Bill held. Steven's eyes, however, held a stern look, and I finally nodded. "Fine," I mumbled. "On your signal then …" and as if on cue we heard a great groaning and creaking noise just to our left.
"Aw, crap! The damn elevator's waking up!" I hissed as Bill's footsteps pounded through the house, heading right toward us. Steven scrambled up to a bent-over position and grabbed my shirt as he took me with him. We could see the elevator doors begin to open five feet to our left, and the door to the outside seemed much farther away. Bill was coming too quickly for us to make it, I realized with a sinking sensation, and Steven must have felt that too as, with a grunt, he pushed me forward, away from the back door, and half threw, half helped me through the opening of the elevator. He joined me a split second later, crashing against the side of the boxcar.
"Hit the button!" he shouted, and I reached for the CLOSE DOOR button. To my relief, the doors stopped separating and began to close. Just then a powerful sound like a firecracker filled my ears, and something hot whizzed past me just to my side. "Down!" Steven said as he crouched low.
I ducked, but another gunshot echoed all around us as I saw Steven's hand snap back and he crumpled to the floor. I slammed my hand on the button panel of the boxcar, and the doors finally closed. Another slam on a button and the old elevator gave a jolt upward and we began to move. There was another explosion, followed quickly by a dent in the door, and immediately after a great howl of pain from outside.
Steven held his hand as it oozed a fountain of red. "Ohmigod!" I said as I sat next to him. "You've been hit!"
Steven's breathing was labored and his face was contorted in pain. "I need to stop the bleeding," he said. "M.J., take off my shirt and see if you can rip a strip from it."
I looked at his white face and thought there was no way I was going to try to lift his shirt off and risk hurting his hand even more. I reached under my sweater and tugged my tank top up. Wriggling, I got it over my head, and quickly put my arms back through the sleeves of my sweater.
I pulled hard at the tank top's seams and it split open. Using my teeth I ripped again and had a good long strip. "What floor did you press?" Steven asked through gritted teeth.
"The third. We still have a little way to go," I said, looking up as the dial on the top of the boxcar indicated we were just approaching the second floor. "Thank God this thing takes forever," I added as I wadded up the rest of the shirt and gently took Steven's hand away from covering his other one. He hissed through his teeth, and what was revealed made me woozy, but I swallowed hard and placed the shirt over the gaping hole in the top of his hand, wrapping it tightly with the strip I'd torn off.
"He'll be waiting for us," Steven said as I worked, his face chalky and his brow sweaty.
"I'm not sure about that," I said, tying the strip. “That boy doesn't seem to be very bright. That last bullet ricocheted. He may be down for the count."
"I will distract him," Steven said. "When I do, you run like hell and get away."
"Don't be an idiot," I said as I sat back and listened to the wheels and gears groan. "First he has to find where this thing lets out. Remember the hard time we had?"
"Do as I say," Steven said to me as he pulled his hand close to his chest.
"Or what?" I asked as I stood up and helped him to his feet. "You'll box me
for it?"
Just then we heard the gears slow down, and with a jolt of panic I saw the dial at the top creep up to the number three. "It's go time," I said as I moved Steven and me over to the side of the boxcar, which would offer us only the briefest protection as the doors opened. The dial and the boxcar stopped at the same time, but the doors did not open. A sudden chill filled the elevator.
"Andrew," I whispered as I felt a knock on my energy.
Willis said to help you, he said in my mind.
"Where is the man with the gun?" I said aloud. "Can you see him, Andrew? Can you see the intruder with the gun?"
I felt him nod. He's coming up the stairs, he said.
Steven sagged beside me, and I knew that we had very little time before he lost consciousness. In my mind I called out to Andrew, Please! Find Maureen for me, Andrew! Bring her here now!
Instantly I felt Maureen's presence enter the boxcar. I called out to both of them with a plea, hoping against hope that they would assist me. "Maureen," I said aloud. "There's someone on the staircase who wants to hurt your daughter." The fact that he wanted to hurt us first was a small sticking point at this moment. "He needs to be stopped, Maureen, or he'll hurt Mirabelle. Can you stop him? Can you go to the staircase and stop him from reaching the top?"
The energy around me seemed to swirl for a moment, and I could feel Andrew and Maureen having a heated discussion. I knew this was not the best way to use my medium skills, but figured I'd deal with that karmic lesson later. I could feel Maureen's energy shift angrily as she talked with Andrew, and a second later she left the boxcar, though Andrew's energy remained. As we waited and my heart beat frantically against my chest, we suddenly heard a shriek, followed by another gunshot.
My first reaction was to duck, even though we were tucked away in the elevator. Steven's breathing quickened, and I knew he was fading into shock. Then we heard an oddly familiar sound. It was the tumbling of a body down the staircase and ended with a thud that shook the house. Just then I heard Andrew say, You're safe now, and Willis says I need to go with him. Take care of them, won't you? And with that, his energy left the boxcar and the doors of the elevator opened up.
I helped Steven to the bed and laid him down. With a shaking hand I reached for the phone, but in the distance I heard the sound of approaching sirens, so I pulled my hand back. Help would be here in a few moments, and as I sat on the bed with Steven and watched the tank top around his hand turn crimson, I could only pray that it got here in time.
Chapter 14
I stayed with Steven until the police and ambulance arrived. They found the senior Sable in the front foyer, a nasty bullet wound to the shoulder and a very large bump on his head, but otherwise no worse for the wear.
Bill was sprawled at the bottom of the staircase, still alive, with a bullet in his thigh from the ricochet off the elevator and a broken back that left him paralyzed from the hips down. The police said that when they found him, they could have sworn they saw a cluster of funny-looking lights hovering over him like a swarm of bees.
Steven was rushed to the emergency room and treated for shock and blood loss. They flew in a colleague of his, one of the best hand surgeons in the world. The doctor attempted to repair Steven's hand, but we learned later that there was just too much damage done. He would most likely never hold a scalpel again.
Gilley and I returned to Boston, and Gil recovered in no time from his broken tailbone. Of course, Bradley— completely undaunted by Gilley's fire drill—had a lot to do with the tender loving care Gil received in the weeks that followed.
We also found an unexpected surge in business following our return. Many of our clients were personally referred by a certain doctor with a funny take on English, and I was busy busting houses in the some of the wealthier suburbs of Boston.
And even though I was content with work, and Gil was on the mend, I found that when I was left alone with my thoughts, they often drifted to Steven. I hadn't heard from him since Gil and I had visited with him briefly at the hospital, and I suspected he needed to go through a period where he could be left to deal with the fact that he would never operate again. I couldn't imagine how that must feel, and a part of me really wanted to lend him some support, but another side felt that he needed to process it on his own for now.
I was rationalizing this to Teeko one afternoon at Mama Dell's about six weeks after we closed the Sable case. "So I think it's important to wait before I call him. I mean, he's probably not even in town. I'll bet he's gone back to Germany, even."
Teeko's face never registered anything other than a patient smile as I rambled on. "Uh-huh," she said as she sipped her coffee.
"Yeah, so the fact that I'm still thinking about him and wondering how he's doing is a waste of time. I need to freaking move on already."
"So what's stopping you?" she asked demurely.
I paused and stared into my own coffee for a minute. "In a small, completely insignificant way, I think I might miss him."
"Insignificant, you say?"
I leveled a look at her. "Whatever. The point is moot, because Steven's out of the country."
"Really? What country might I be in?" I heard a baritone voice thick with an accent say from behind me.
I felt my jaw drop, and the smirk on Teeko's face opened into a big, fat grin as she said, "Dr. Sable, so nice to see you again. M.J. was just telling me how much she misses you. Won't you have a seat?"
"Thank you, Karen," Steven said as he sat down next to me and edged his chair very close.
I felt my cheeks grow hot, and I made sure to glare at Teeko before swiveling around to Steven. "Hey," I said.
"Oh, my goodness!" Teeko cried as she looked at her watchless wrist. "I have an appointment I have to get to. Would you two please excuse me?" And with that she gathered up her things and hurried away from the table.
"Is this true?" Steven said when she'd gone.
"What?" I asked.
"That you are missing me?"
I forced a laugh and hurried to explain. "Oh, that! No, I'm afraid what Karen meant by that was that I missed you after you left the hospital. I called, but you had already been released."
"I see," he said, the smile on his face telling me that he wasn't buying it for a minute.
I fiddled with my swizzle stick and tried think of a way to change the topic quickly. I noticed his hand was still wrapped in a huge bandage and my heart went out to him. "How's it doing?" I asked, pointing to it.
Steven glanced down. "It will heal, and with some physical therapy I'll manage quite well."
"Do you think there's a chance you'll be able to operate again?"
Steven's eyes held mine quietly for a long moment, and I could see that he'd come to terms with his reality. "No," he said. "But I have been offered the opportunity stay on as a lecturer at the university, so all is not lost."
"That's fantastic!" I said brightly, then cleared my throat and added in a more subdued tone, "So you'll be staying here, then?"
"Yes. I think I will stay in the United States for a time. There are other things I want to do. Which brings me to this," he said, and reached down to lift a large shopping bag onto the tabletop.
"What's that?"
"A gift," he said, and pushed the bag toward me.
I smiled and peeked over the rim. There was a box wrapped in pink paper and a colorful bow. "For me?"
"Yes. Open it," he encouraged.
Inside the box was a brand-new night-vision camera. "Oh, wow!" I said, as I turned the camera over. "It's so light," I said.
"State-of-the-artist stuff," he said to me. "I gave Gilley the same model a few minutes ago."
"You went to see Gil?" I asked.
"No. I went to see you, but Gilley was there, so I gave him his gift and he said you were here."
"Ah," I said, and busied myself by putting the camera away. "This is really kind of you. We're very grateful."
"The least I could do after your old camera went for a swim."
I nodded, and he continued. "So, the real reason I'm here is that I have made some decisions, and I wanted to talk to you about them."
"Shoot," I said, then glanced at his hand and instantly regretted it.
Steven chuckled. "First, I have moved Maria into Willis's cabin. I learned that she and her sister weren't getting along as well as she first suggested, and I think she has suffered enough for her sins, don't you?"
I smiled at him. "I think that's a great idea."
"Next, I need you to come back with me to Uphamshire. I remember that you told me my grandfather had gone with Willis, that he had crossed over, but we need to take care of Maureen as well."
My smile widened. "Gil and I already took care of that while you were recovering after surgery. Actually, we even got Mirabelle involved. Maureen was far more willing to listen to me with Mirabelle on hand, and she went to the other side without too much trouble."
Steven looked slightly disappointed. "I see," he said, and sat back in his chair. "Well, then that leaves only one more thing to discuss."
"Which is… ?"
"I want to offer you funding."
I cocked my head. "What do you mean, funding?"
"I want to invest in your business. I have seen your work and believe that you offer a great service, but that with the right equipment, like the proper monitors and cameras and measuring equipment, you and Gilley won't have to struggle so much to close your cases."
"That's awfully generous of you," I said incredulously, thinking that Gilley would foam at the mouth if he heard Steven make this offer. "But what would you want in return?"
Steven sat back in his chair as his finger swirled small circles on the tabletop. He took a moment before answering, and finally said, "I would want to join your team."
"As our financial backer?"
"No. I would want to join you on the hunt."
I grinned at him. Was he really asking me what I thought he was? "You want to be a ghostbuster," I said, more statement than fact.
"Yes," Steven said. "When we were on our bust at the lodge, I felt. .. how do you say … like with energy and adrenaline?"
What's a Ghoul to Do? Page 26