by D. G. Swank
What did that mean for him?
We walked around the back of my car. I’d intended to put the daggers in the trunk, but after surviving two demon ambushes in the past few hours, I was reluctant to part with them. Instead, I led him around the side of the car and opened the back door. “Get in.”
He was nervous, and for a second I didn’t think he’d do it, but then he scrambled in as though in a panic.
I squatted next to the open door. “You’ll be safe at my house.”
Then I gave him a soft smile and the fear left his eyes.
He nodded. “Okay, Piper.”
I needed to call Beth and give her the good news and bad news, but I decided to wait until after I got Tommy situated at home.
Where was I going to put him? And what would Hudson say?
I turned on the satellite radio and tuned it to the fifties channel, and to my surprise Tommy started to sing along. I looked in the rearview mirror but only saw a shimmer of light.
Panicked, I whipped my head around, relieved to see a normal-looking five-year-old who happened to be wearing vintage clothes. To my amazement, he was beaming. “Sing with me, Piper!”
I grinned, trying to slow my now rapidly beating heart. “I don’t know this song,” I said, turning back to face the road. “Teach it to me.”
The rest of the drive consisted of him singing loudly and slightly off-key as though the increased volume would help me learn the lyrics.
When I pulled into the driveway, I was relieved that Hudson’s car wasn’t there yet. I needed time to figure out how to break the news to him. Tommy slid closer to the passenger window to look up at the house. “You live here?”
“I do.”
“With your mommy and daddy?”
“No. My friend Hudson lives with me.”
“Is he a little boy too?”
“No, he’s a grown-up.”
“Where are your mommy and daddy?”
I hesitated to tell him, but I realized it might help him come to terms with his own loss. “They died when I was a little girl.”
His mouth turned down and he leaned forward to pat my cheek. “I’m sorry.”
Tears filled my eyes, and I swiped at my cheek as one escaped. “Today’s my birthday.”
What had possessed me to tell him that? Because my father had bartered his life to make sure I reached this birthday without interference from the Guardians? Would they come for me tomorrow? Had the woman I’d noticed in the campus parking lot been with the Guardians? I’d almost forgotten about her given everything that had happened since then.
“How old are you?” he asked with a serious expression.
I grinned, swiping away another tear. “Twenty-five.”
“You’re old,” he said in awe.
I laughed as I picked up the daggers with one hand and reached for the door with the other. “Okay, enough of that. Let’s get you inside.” I got out and opened the back door for him, but he stayed frozen in the backseat.
Oh God. What if he’d attached himself to my car? I couldn’t imagine leaving him in there alone for hours on end. He was a ghost, so it wasn’t like he’d asphyxiate or die of heat stroke in the car, but I hated the thought of it.
I stretched my hand toward him. “Come on, Tommy. Let’s go inside.”
He leaned over and placed his hand in mine, and my hair stood slightly on end. Had Tommy gotten stronger, or was this energy surge due to his fear?
“It’s okay,” I said softly as he scooted across the seat. “I won’t let anything happen to you here.”
That bolstered his courage and he got out, squeezing my hand tighter. Relief coursed through me at this confirmation that he wasn’t stuck in the car.
“When we go inside, I want you to tell me what you see, okay?”
He nodded.
After a bit of shuffling that ended up with Tommy wrapped around my legs, I dug out my keys and unlocked the door. Then I pried the little ghost boy off me and brought him inside.
The kitchen looked like our kitchen, and Tommy looked around with wide eyes, taking it all in. I felt a slight electrical shock shoot from his hand into mine.
“You okay?” I asked.
He nodded. “It looks all shiny.”
My parents had remodeled the kitchen when I was in first grade. It looked like a spaceship compared to his mid-century kitchen.
I dropped the daggers onto the kitchen table. The blades were still covered in black demon blood. They needed to be cleaned, but getting Tommy settled in took precedence. “This is the kitchen…obviously.” I moved toward the door to the dining room. “Come on, I’ll show you the rest of the house.”
He followed behind me but stuck close to my legs. He glanced around the combined dining room and living room space, then back up at me.
“Ready to see upstairs?” I asked.
He nodded.
We climbed the steps and I started showing him the bedrooms, trying to figure out where to put him.
“This is my room,” I said, letting him peer inside.
I briefly considered having him stay there with me, but I was worried he’d get bored. And since Hudson didn’t know about Tommy yet, it might be better to put a little more distance between them. I decided to put him in the attic.
“Do I have a room, Piper?”
“Of course you do,” I said, forcing a cheerful tone I wasn’t feeling. “You get the biggest bedroom in the house.”
“I do?”
“Yeah.”
It occurred to me that while Tommy saw this house as it was now, it hadn’t always looked this way. I knew for a fact that the attic had been a playroom for several generations. While my grandparents and several grandparents past had used part of the attic for storage, my mother said they’d limited the unused section to the area without windows. The front part with dormer windows had once been a playroom. When my mother was a teenager, my grandmother had cleaned out all the toys. By the time I was born, my parents were living in the house and the space had become my father’s study. It was still full of his office furniture.
But my mom used to tell me how wonderful the attic had been when she was a girl. She’d shown me photos of her, my grandmother, and my-great grandfather playing in the attic—surrounded by children’s toys—a giant rocking horse, a dollhouse, a small table and chairs, and even a daybed.
What if I could make the attic like that for Tommy?
Where had that thought even come from? Maybe the same place inside myself that had known to pull my power to the surface of my skin to fight off the demon’s icy temperature. I had nothing to lose by following my instincts.
I stopped in front of the door to the attic and squatted in front of him. “Listen. My mom and her mother and even her grandfather used to play up here. And sometimes they’d even sleep up here in a special bed. I want this to be your special place. Your new home.”
Looking at me with wide, trusting eyes, he nodded. “Okay, Piper.”
“There’s a rocking horse and a dollhouse and lots of other toys,” I said. “I can’t wait for you to see it.” I paused for a long moment, focusing on the photos I’d seen in our old family albums, then opened the door. As I crossed the threshold and started to go upstairs, I felt electricity crackle across my skin, accompanied by a slight drain in energy. Tommy’s hand still clung to mine, and if he felt anything, he didn’t let on. I kept my gaze down, still trying to push the old version of the attic into the present one.
When we reached the top of the steps, I closed my eyes. “What do you see?”
He was silent for several seconds, and I started to worry it hadn’t worked. In all honesty, I had no idea why it would have.
I opened my eyes and gasped. The room had been transformed into the playroom in the photos.
Tommy looked up at me. “This is my room?”
“Yeah…”
He dropped my hand and walked over to a table covered with Lincoln Logs.
I went stock-stil
l as I realized this version of the attic wasn’t superimposed over my father’s study like I’d expected. The attic had become the old playroom. My father’s study was gone.
I walked over to the daybed my mother had described to me—a white, wrought iron, three-sided bed covered with a quilt made of triangles of white, pale pink, and blue. Fluffy pillows surrounded all three sides. It was here even though I’d never seen it before, not even in photos. I pressed my hand on the mattress, surprised when it gave underneath my hand and then bounced back up when I pulled away.
This was real.
What was happening?
Testing it further, I sat on the bed, shocked I didn’t fall to the ground. In my father’s version of this room, there had been nothing along this wall. While I’d been able to see Tommy’s version of Beth’s house, none of the objects there had been tangible to me.
The only explanation I could think of was that I’d somehow created this space in Tommy’s dimension.
Tommy had moved to the rocking horse in front of one of the dormer windows, now framed with billowing white gauzy curtains.
“Do you like it?” I asked, hopping off the bed. My filthy clothes hadn’t left any marks on the white quilt.
Tommy nodded. “Is this really my room?”
“Yes. This is your room,” I said. “You’re safe here.” But then I wondered if that was really true. A demon had found him at his old house. What if one found him here?
I knew exactly one demon expert, and I was ashamed of how badly I’d treated him.
“I need to call Jack,” I said with a sigh. “Will you be okay here by yourself for a little bit?”
He gave me a fearful look.
“I’ll be back before you know it.” He was in a room in his own dimension, which was the safest place he could be. Our world was the one that had been infiltrated by demons, although for all I knew, they could be wandering around on this plane too.
“Okay.”
I got up to leave, then stopped at the top of the stairs. “I’m going to take a shower too. So I might be gone for a little while, but I promise I’m coming back.”
“Okay,” he said, devoting his attention to a pile of comic books.
As soon as I reached the bottom of the stairs and walked over the threshold, I felt that same electrical zap. I pulled out my phone, surprised to see several missed calls along with two voicemails and texts from Jack. I read those first.
Still waiting to be called back to a room.
Ten minutes later: I’m in a room, but don’t know how long I’ll be. Please call or text me so I know if you’re okay.
Ten minutes ago: Piper, I know you’re upset with me, but I’m genuinely concerned. Please call me.
I called him back as I headed to my room to get a change of clothes. The wound in my right palm had begun to throb.
“Piper,” Jack said in a gush when he answered. “Are you okay?”
“For the most part.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I dealt with a demon.”
“You did what? You told me you wouldn’t handle one alone!” he said, sounding irate.
“I know,” I said, starting to sit on the bed before I remembered the state of my jeans. I put Jack on speakerphone and tossed my cell onto the bed as I started to strip them off. “Trust me, I didn’t want to deal with it alone, but it was threatening Tommy.”
“What? Oh God,” he said, sounding devastated. “Did he turn evil like Edna?”
“No,” I said as I shimmied out of my jeans, “but it used Tommy to get to me. Just like the one the other night. But this one was bigger and badder. It looked identical to the demon in the garage, only it made ice and frost instead of fire.”
“What happened to it?”
“I killed it. I considered distracting it so we could get away, but I knew I’d just have to deal with it later, and since it knew about my special blood, I didn’t think it was a good idea to let it get away.”
“Blood? How did it know about your blood? Did it hurt you?”
I unfastened the button on my shirt. “It’s a long story I don’t want to get into over the phone. I’m safe and relatively unscathed. We can discuss it later, but for now, I need your help figuring out how to protect Tommy from demons.”
“Where is he?”
I pulled the shirt over my head and dropped it onto the floor by my jeans. “He’s in my attic and he seems happy there, but I need to make sure the demons can’t get to him again. Any idea how I can protect him?”
“He went with you?”
“I tried to break it to him that he’s dead, but it didn’t go so well. And Beth was scaring him, not to mention the whole thing with the demon…I had to get him out of there.”
“I’m just surprised he willingly left the house.”
“I know. I was too. Now, about that protection…?”
“Uh…maybe some crystals.”
“Crystals?”
“Yeah. Don’t knock it. That one around your neck helps you with the ghosts. You could try going to the New Age crystal shop downtown and asking the clerks which ones to get.”
“Okay. That’s a good idea.” If I could trust them. I’d always figured the place was a tourist trap. Then again, I’d always figured the supernatural could be explained away as being people’s overactive imaginations. “Have you gotten your stitches yet?”
“They gave me staples, but now they’ve decided to give me a CAT scan.”
“Oh my God. Why?”
“They said they’re worried about a concussion, but I told them I’m fine. Not even a headache.”
“Do what they tell you, Jack. I need you as backup.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” he said softly. “I can come check on you and Tommy when I get out.”
“That’s okay. I have plans tonight, so I need to get this taken care of before I go.”
“You mean training?” he asked.
“I have the night off.” I could have added more, but after the scene at the hospital, the last thing I wanted to do was admit I was seeing Abel. Or was I? Rupert had seemed to think so, but it occurred to me that he may have been working on outdated information. Something else I didn’t want to think about. We had enough troubles. “I’ll let you know if I get the crystals.”
“And I’ll see if I can find anything with my own research.”
“Thanks.” I started to hang up.
“Piper. Wait.” When I didn’t protest, he said, “We need to talk about what happened.”
I pushed out a sigh. “Actually, I think we covered it all.”
“Do you have any ghost appointments tomorrow?”
“Only two.”
“I want to go with you.”
Part of me wanted to tell him no, but it was probably a good idea for me to have backup—as much as it hurt my pride for my backup to be Jack, but Rhys currently didn’t want to have anything to do with me. Maybe she never would. “My first appointment is at eleven. I’ll text you the address.”
“Thanks.” He paused. “I really am sorry, Piper.”
“Water under the bridge.” I hung up before he could say anything else, then listened to my other messages.
The first was from Olivia who told me not to worry about the O’Keefe mess. She and Officer Stedman had repeated the bear story often enough, and straight-faced enough, that no one was questioning it. I was in the clear. (I was still confused about how the bear was supposed to have started the fire, but at least it was no longer my concern.) The second message caught me by surprise.
“Uh…Piper, this is Autumn.” Her voice broke. “Call me back. I think it’s important.”
My stomach churned as I placed the call. Had they found Lars’s body too?
“Thanks for calling me back,” Autumn said as soon as she answered.
“Of course.”
“I just heard that Gwen Stigler’s dead.”
Was Gwen the student in the morgue? “Did you know her?”
“Not very well, but we shared a mutual friend, Vicki. Vicki was just telling me that Gwen had changed too. Like Lars. Then she disappeared.” She started to cry.
“I’m so sorry, Autumn. I’m sure Detective Powell is doing everything she can to find him.”
“There’s something I should tell the police, but if my parents find out…” She hesitated. “If I have to tell someone, I’d rather tell you.”
I took a breath. Did she have information that could help? “Do you want me to meet you somewhere?”
“No,” she said hastily. “I’d rather tell you on the phone. I didn’t think this was important when I spoke to you and Father Jack, but I found out that something similar happened to Gwen.”
That caught my attention. “What?”
“There’s this party in an old warehouse outside of Fairview. They have it every Friday and Saturday night. It’s supposed to be only for UNCA students, but word’s getting out and more people have started coming.”
“I take it both Lars and Gwen went to the party?”
“Yeah, but more importantly, they were both invited to the VIP section.”
If it had a VIP section, it seemed more likely to be a club than a party, but I kept the thought to myself.
“Why are you afraid to talk about this? Are your parents super strict?” No doubt there was underage drinking, but Autumn could always claim she hadn’t partaken in it.
“No, they’re not that strict, but the things going on there…if my parents found out, they’d make me move out of the dorm and come back home. I have a hard enough time getting them to let me live here when they’re only ten minutes from campus. This would cinch it.”
“What happens at these parties, Autumn?”
“Drinking, dancing…and a lot of sex.”
“Sex?”
“Yeah. Like people doing it on the dance floor and no one stopping them.”
My mouth dropped open. “Uh…wow. Okay.”
“Lars and I had no idea what it would be like when we went. Once we got there and figured it out, I wanted to leave, but Lars started acting weird. Like he was enthralled. Then he got invited to the VIP section and left me in that…” She paused. “I was so pissed I texted him that he could stay if he wanted, but I was going home. So I did.”