A Brady Paranormal Investigations Box Set

by Harper Crowley

  “But we don’t have internet out there. Why get them geared up for a livestream investigation if we can’t give them that?”

  He grins. “Check this out.” His fingers fly across the keyboard and then he turns it to face me. On the screen is a small black device with what looks like an antenna on one end. “It’s a cell phone signal booster we can connect to our phones. I think if we use that, with a portable battery, we should be able to boost our reception, which should then improve our mobile hot spot capabilities.” His brow furrows in thought. “At least, that’s how it should work in theory. There aren’t really any guides on this stuff.”

  I lean closer and peer at the prices. Holy crap. I don’t have half of a grand to drop on something like this, especially after sending money to my aunt. “That’s kind of expensive, don’t you think?”

  “I know, and I think I found an answer to that, as well.” He closes and opens a web page and then flips the computer toward me again.

  He can’t be serious. “No. Absolutely not. You’re not meeting someone from Craigslist after dark to pick up a cell phone booster. No.”

  “Come on, it’s like half the price of online, and we can get it and go tonight. Larry said he’s got the day off.”

  “Larry, huh? If that isn’t the name of someone who still lives in their parents’ basement while streaming adult videos on an old iMac, then I don’t know what is.”

  Jess snorts. “Larry’s okay. Russ already talked to him on the phone.”

  I groan. They’ve been busy in such a short time. “Or he could be an undercover cop and this phone booster thingy is code for some sort of drug. We’re going to show up, give this Larry the money, and then get busted by a bunch of cops.”

  Russ jumps up and pulls out his phone. “So that’s a yes then? I didn’t hear a no.”

  I glance from him to my sister. The hopeful, excited expressions on their faces make me feel like crap for bursting their bubbles. “I still think this can wait until morning. You know, when it’s daylight and there aren’t as many dangerous animals or disappearing dead bodies.”

  Russ flicks the light off in the motel room and turns the flashlight on his phone on and shines it under his face, giving himself an eerie, Crypt Keeper look. “But where’s the fun in that?”

  Desperate to stop what I sense is a train wreck waiting to happen, I latch on to the only shred of logic I have left. “What about the portable battery? We still need one of those.”

  Russ looks like I’m an idiot. “Ever heard of Wal-Mart? Seriously, Mer. They have everything and they’re open twenty-four hours a day.”

  “But what if they don’t have any?” I cross my fingers behind my back. If they don’t carry these portable batteries, then Jess and Russ might wait until morning when we can go somewhere else.

  Russ grins, and the enthusiasm in his eyes tells me just how excited he is. “There’s only one way to find out.”

  Chapter 24

  “These things better be worth it,” I say, glaring at the bag of supplies and then at Russ sitting next to me in the passenger’s seat. “I didn’t drop a couple hundred bucks just to hope it all works.”

  “It’ll work, I promise,” Russ says, practically rubbing his hands together in glee. “Besides, some of that is the pepper spray and other stuff you bought. Don’t blame it all on me.” Sitting in the passenger seat, he opens the bag and pulls out the portable charger and the power adapter so he can hook it up to the van’s cigarette lighter and charge it on the drive there. “I’ve been thinking a lot about it, and if we can get as close as we can with reception and leave the bag someplace, then we shouldn’t lose reception much at all as long as we stay within the booster’s range.”

  “Whoa. Wait a minute.” I almost jam on the brakes. “I am so not losing all of this stuff in the middle of the woods.”

  A grin stretches across Russ’s face. “I know. Geez. Calm down. I made you buy a GPS tile, too.”

  I snort. “Is that the little square thing?” Okay, so I guess that’s kind of impressive. He really did think this through. Doesn’t mean I’m not going to give him a hard time, though.

  “Hey, I have to make everything as idiot-proof as possible. I don’t want to confuse you too much,” he says.

  Jess snorts. I grab a crumpled fast-food wrapper from the center console and chuck it at her.

  For the rest of the drive, I listen to Russ and Jess go over the plan. If Jess’s hunch is correct, we might actually be able to find something and take pictures and video of it so we don’t end up empty handed this time. The other supplies Russ mentioned are to keep us safe from the human variety of predators. I learned a thing or two from the Oak Cliff investigation.

  Using Russ’s map, we soon find the two-track road that led us to the site we found before. In the dark, the trees tower on either side of the highway, the spaces between them inky black and menacing. I can almost feel the predatory eyes of the creature that made that noise as they follow our van and smell its skunky, swamp-like scent. Here, in the darkness, as the only vehicle bumping along down an overgrown road, I believe the legends. And now we’re heading straight into the thick of danger, because even if I want to, I can’t protect my sister forever, and if there’s a chance we can solve this mystery, we need to take it. I just have to keep telling myself that like Jess said, we’ve been through worse and survived. We can do this.

  “Do we still have reception?” I ask, fighting to keep the car going straight on the uneven rutted tracks. It’s almost as bad as the potholes in Michigan. Almost. Now that our viewers know what’s going on, I don’t want to disappoint them and not live stream, if possible.

  “Slow down for a sec,” Jess says. She holds her cell phone up to the light. “It looks like I still have a bar here, so let’s see how far we can go.”

  I keep going past where we left the van before and drive deeper into the forest. As far as I can tell, we should be skirting the clearing where we found the body by now. Just as we’re about to pass it, Russ tells me to stop.

  “Can you park here?” he asks. “We have some reception, but I’m not sure how much farther we can go before we lose it. Let’s leave the van before we get stuck and see if we can find the spot on foot.”

  “Good idea,” I say. I definitely don’t want to get stranded out here. That’s like the intro for the quintessential horror movie. A stranded vehicle in the middle of the forest full of people our ages makes perfect story fodder.

  “I still have a bar here, too.” Jess grins triumphantly. “Let’s see how far we can go and still make the signal booster work.”

  Hefting one of the heavy-duty flashlights, I keep watch while Russ and Jess divvy up the gear. We each get a GoPro, Russ and I get harnesses, and Jess wields the selfie stick. I hand each of them a large pocket knife and a pepper spray, which I show them how to use. It’s pretty easy, just point, press, and shoot.

  “I hope we don’t have to use any of this,” I say, gesturing at their weapons and mine, “but it’s better to be safe than dead.”

  “Ain’t that the truth,” Russ says with a grimace.

  Jess says nothing, but she’s a little paler as she pockets the pepper spray and the knife. I wonder if she’s thinking about the close call we had in Georgia. I kind of want to grab her by the shoulders and shake her and tell her, “See? This is why I wanted to protect you,” but I don’t. She’s right on that, too. I can’t protect her forever.

  I clip Bear’s leash to one of the belt loops on my jeans and start the livestream while Russ gets the signal booster going and tucks it, along with our other nonessential supplies, in his backpack. Jess films a quick intro and then it’s time to find the clearing.

  Luck is on our side for once, and the tree’s open right up. I recognize the strange circle of grass, the low hanging branches by the tree where we found the skull, everything. Russ strides over to the pile of brush and picks up the deer skull. “This is ridiculous. Where is the skull?” He scans the trees around
us with his high-beamed flashlight. “I just don’t see how they could have gotten rid of it that quickly. I mean, they had to have been close, right?” he asks, echoing my earlier thoughts.

  Bear sniffs the ground. For a second, I think he’s on to something, but then he flops onto his back and starts rolling around. He probably found some deer poop. He seems to love the stuff. “Seriously?” I drag him away from the enticing aroma. “You’re disgusting, dog.”

  “Over here!” Jess waves at us from about ten feet away, just past the spot where we found the trail cam. “I think I found a path of some kind.”

  With my heart racing, Russ and I join her and I shine my light on a narrow trail that ducks between two trees before disappearing around a thicket. “How did the cops miss this?”

  “I don’t think they were looking that hard,” Jess says. “I didn’t check this area when I was searching because I wanted to stay as far away from that annoying deputy as possible.”

  I don’t blame her one bit. After finding the deer’s skull, I doubt either the sheriff or his deputy cared enough to look much farther. They’d already made up their minds that there was nothing here.

  “Do you want to follow it?” Jess asks.

  I check my phone. One bar. “What if we lose reception?”

  “Then we’ll just do the best we can. It’ll pick back up when we get within range again, so it shouldn’t be too bad.”

  “If you say so.” I hate working in the boondocks like this. Our next case had better be someplace more civilized, hopefully with 4G.

  Bear and I take the lead as we navigate the scraggly underbrush, the darkness creeping closer with every step. Branches reach out, snagging my clothes and tangling in my hair. The wind whispers and calls out my name, but I keep going.

  We follow the trail for about fifteen minutes, and our reception fades in and out along the way. I bet it’s driving our viewers nuts, but we’ll deal with it later. They’re were all over us searching for Bigfoot before the case started, so they’ll have to understand that we won’t find him sipping a latte at Starbucks.

  After we go around a bend in the trail, the trees end abruptly at a shallow stream, it’s gentle rippling water glimmering under the moonlight. Across from that, an old shack hunches at the far side of a clearing carved out from the trees, it’s boards and windows broken and weathered enough to make George Smith’s cabin look like a luxury condo. To the right of the shack, there’s a pile of sticks and trash, as if someone’s been clearing out the brush and burning their garbage at the same time.

  “Maybe this is the illegal hunting cabin that belongs the person who shot the deer?” Jess asks, her voice hushed.

  Maybe, but I don’t think so. It’s all too suspicious. There are deer everywhere out here, there’s no reason someone would have to go all of the way into the middle of nowhere to shoot one. “Do we have any reception?”

  Jess glances down at her phone’s screen. “One bar, but it’s iffy.” She eyes the shack. “Maybe you were right. This is way too dangerous. We should go back.”

  Before I can answer, an earsplitting howl rips through the air. It’s a long, drawn-out, undulating sound, terrifying and eerie and a lot closer than the one we heard earlier when we were with George.

  I scoop Bear up, and we scramble together with our backs to each other, our flashlights pointing out as we scan the trees surrounding us. Heart racing, I take a deep breath, and then another, waiting for a huge hairy monster to leap out from the undergrowth.

  “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God,” Jess says, her breath coming in short, shallow gasps.

  “It’s probably just a coyote,” Russ says, trying to reassure her.

  Yeah, no. That doesn’t sound like any coyote I’ve ever heard. I don’t say anything, though, because his comment seems to calm Jess down.

  “Are we still streaming?” I ask, scanning the trees with my flashlight.

  “Barely,” Russ says. “It keeps going in and out. The booster makes it stronger when we have it, but it’s not perfect. What do you want to do?” His question dies away, and slowly a couple of birds and an owl take up their songs. We should go back, it’d be safer that way, but.... But we’re already here. Still, I hesitate a few more seconds, waiting or my inner voice to talk me out of my decision.

  “It’d be kind of a waste of time if we didn’t look around, at least a little bit.”

  Russ looks at me like I’ve grown a third head. “Are you sure?”

  “No. I’m definitely not sure, but we are already out here, so...” I take a deep breath and decide to lead by example and step away from our protective triangle.

  My foot hasn’t even sunk into the grass when another eerie howl slices through the night. This one sounds even closer, as if it’s on top of us. Every single hair on the back of my neck and my arms stands up.

  “I don’t think that’s a coyote,” Jess says. “That sounds more like the Bigfoot call George taught us.” She cocks her head as the sound fades into nothing. “You know, George said they’re harmless, and I bet he’s right. If it wanted to attack us, it would have by now. Want me to try to call it in? I think I can do it.”

  I grimace. I’m not fooling anyone with my denial, so I give it up. “No. Why would you want it any closer? Jesus, Jess. Maybe if you could speak Bigfoot for get-the-hell-away-from-me, then go for it, but I don’t want you just shrieking like a banshee, trying to lure it in. You don’t even know what those calls mean. You might be inviting it in for a midnight snack for all you know.”

  Jess plants her free hand on her hip. “George said Bigfoots don’t kill people. What if we actually got a good video of one? We’d be famous. We’d have our own TV show and you could write that book you talked about. What if we never get another chance like this?”

  “Being famous wouldn’t do us any good if Bigfoot eats us.”

  “I can’t believe you!” She throws her hands up in the air. “We’re out here searching for the dead body of someone who may or may not have been murdered, even though we could potentially run into the person who murdered them, and you’re more worried about a wild animal that might not even exist?”

  “A seven-foot-tall wild animal that can throw boulders and rip trees from the ground is not the same thing as a cute little bunny rabbit, Jess.”

  Something crashes through the branches on the near side of the clearing, and we race away from it to the left of the shack. Crap. That was close. Too close. We might be getting our sighting after all, just not how I imagined it.

  “How’s the reception?” I ask.

  She glances at the screen in her white-knuckled grip. “Gone. But I had some over on the other side, so we can still look around and it’ll upload when we get back there.”

  “Good, let’s check out the clearing first, and then the shack.” I eye my sister and the way the flashlight trembles in her grasp. “Russ, do you mind searching that part of the clearing?” I gesture to the side where the rustling had come from. “Jess and I will take this side.”

  “Why me?” he mutters. “That thing’s over there.”

  “Remember that time you made me sit with George on the ATV?” I smile sweetly. “Consider this payback.”

  He gives me a dirty look and hurries away with the camera in one hand and his flashlight in the other. I remind myself he has his pepper spray and pocket knife. Not they’d do a lot of good against Bigfoot, but anything could help.

  “Let’s start over here.” I point at the pile of burnt garbage and start poking through it with a stick. “There might be something useful we can find.” And it’s on the other side of whatever that was, so that’s a plus, too.

  Jess snorts. A couple charred empty bottles of antifreeze and bleach rest near the edge of the burnt debris, and she nudges them aside. “Uh huh, sure. This is disgusting. Maybe I should have went with Russ.”

  My shoe crunches on a box, and I shine my flashlight on it. It’s a box from extra-strength cold medicine. Next to it is an empty ble
ach bottle, and another that used to contain antifreeze. I can only think of one reason someone might have cold medicine, antifreeze, and bleach out in the middle of nowhere, and it’s not because they’re poaching deer.

  Jess rummages around in the pile some more, using her shoe so she doesn’t have to touch anything. Good idea. All of those chemicals could leave nasty burns. “What do you think’s going on here?”

  “Ever watch the show Breaking Bad?”

  “No. That was way before my time.” She smirks.

  “I’m not that old.”

  Jess kicks aside a scorched piece of wood. Then she stops and stares at the ground. “Oh God.” She jumps back, pointing at the spot she just uncovered. “Look.”

  My heart stops. That was fear in her voice. I crouch down next to the spot and point my flashlight on the ground.

  At first, I don’t see anything strange. Then, in the harsh beam of the flashlight, I see it. A piece of garbage that looks a little too rounded to have been melted in the fire. I grab Jess’s stick and poke it. The blackened globe rolls easily, its empty eye sockets turning to face the sky. “What the hell? Russ, get over here.”

  He rushes over to us and draws in a sharp breath when he sees the skull. “Do you think it’s the same one we saw earlier?”

  “Um, yeah,” I say. “I highly doubt there are a bunch of dead bodies stashed all over the woods. I bet whoever took it tried to burn it with their trash.” Which isn’t really trash, if my hunch is correct on what we’ll find in the shack.

  “So what do you want to do?” Jess asks. She takes out her phone and snaps some pictures. “I don’t want it to disappear again. Maybe we should take it with us.”

  “Um, no. I’m not going to stick a human skull in my pocket, if that’s what you’re thinking. That’s disgusting and probably illegal.” Bear scratches at the ashes, and I pull him away. Not a chance, mutt. I’m not letting my him roll around in more gross things.

  “But we can’t leave it here,” Jess says, mulishly.