Alexander Death (The Paranormals, Book 3)

by JL Bryan

  The falling ax couldn't be stopped, but Heather's blow had knocked him aside just enough that the ax head bit deep into the muscle and sinew between Seth's neck and shoulder. Seth gave a surprised yell and dropped to the floor next to Alexander.

  Jenny crawled toward Seth. “Seth, are you okay? Seth?”

  “He is not,” Alexander hissed. “We are all damned, all of our kind, Jenny.”

  Jenny helped Seth lift the ax from his shoulder. The white glow of Seth's skin grew brighter, and the ax wound healed instantly.

  Seth turned to face Alexander.

  “Kill me if you want,” Alexander said. “I'll be back again, and again.”

  “Dead-raiser,” Seth's voice rang out, and it was not his usual voice. Jenny knew what it was: the ancient, powerful voice of his soul. “The plague-bringer does not belong to you anymore. We only belong to each other. Remember that, if your memories remain in your next life. And remember that she may be your complement, but I am your cross, and I will destroy you.”

  Seth raised a hand, which glowed so bright Jenny could barely look at it. He seized Alexander's throat, and he squeezed.

  Alexander convulsed, his fingers scrabbling across the floorboards, his entire body shuddering so fast it seemed to vibrate. He levitated off the floor a few inches, then crashed down again, and he ceased all movement.

  Alexander's entire body had turned bleach-white, even his hair and the pupils of his eyes. He looked almost like a plaster mold of himself, a discarded shell.

  “Is he dead?” Heather asked, from where she leaned against the wall.

  “Dead,” Seth said. “Gone from this earth.” He looked at Jenny, and then both of them looked at Ashleigh.

  The girl was kneeling on the floor, coughing more glops of yellow fluid. Jenny had seen that before, when she spread Ashleigh pox through the crowd of pregnant girls on Easter, breaking Ashleigh's spell. That was Ashleigh's golden bonds dissolving.

  Jenny pushed herself to her feet and approached the girl.

  “No!” the girl shouted. “No, please. I am not Ashleigh.”

  “Then who are you?” Jenny asked.

  “I'm Esmeralda. See?” She hooked a finger under her necklace, then snapped the strand. Beads showered onto the floor. “The little bones. That's how she stayed in touch with me.” The girl broke the beaded bracelet she wore, then lifted the cuff of her pants and broke an anklet there. The beads scattered everywhere. “Don't hurt me, please.”

  “You're Alexander's opposite,” Seth said. “You're the channel she used to come back from the dead.”

  “Who is Alexander?” Esmeralda asked.

  Seth glanced at the white husk of Alexander's corpse. “He's nothing, now.”

  “Please, you have to understand,” Esmeralda said. “I didn't want any of this. There's a boy, Tommy—I came here to be with him, not Ashleigh. Ashleigh's magic tricked me. I feel like I've been wrapped up in a golden cocoon this whole time. At first, it was pleasant, but...”

  “But then you realize you're her slave,” Seth said, nodding.

  “Yes. So please.” Esmeralda rose to her feet, looking at the dead bodies all around them. “Please let me go.”

  Then she turned and ran down the stairs.

  “Should we go after her?” Seth asked Jenny.

  “I don't see why,” Jenny said. “She's just one more of Ashleigh's victims. Let her go pick up whatever pieces of her life Ashleigh didn't ruin.”

  Jenny helped Seth to his feet. “You really wiped out those zombies,” she said. “My hero.”

  “Ha. I didn't know I could do it.”

  “Should we keep going with our plan?” Jenny asked. She picked up Esmeralda's purse, which was stuffed with Power Bars. “Oh, yum. I'm so hungry.”

  “I'm starving. Give me one,” Seth said.

  “We have to. Homeland Security is still after us.”

  They both looked at Heather, whose face was pale, her eyelids drooping.

  “Heather, are you okay?” Seth asked.

  Heather looked around at the twisted and dismembered zombies, the colorless corpse of Alexander, and slowly shook her head. “I'm still just trying to adjust to all this. Zombies. Ghosts. Paranormal teenagers.” She sighed. “You know, the world just isn't the kind of place I thought it was.”

  “It never is,” Jenny said.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Tommy found the front gates at Barrett House unlocked, so he pulled one gate open and rolled his bike inside. He eased the gate back into place.

  He walked the bike up the curving front drive toward the dark, looming house, looking for a good place to hide it among the trees lining the drive. He wanted to sneak around, take a look, get an update on what Jenny and Seth were doing. That would help him plan for Ashleigh's inevitable arrival.

  Footsteps sounded up ahead. Tommy didn't have time to hide before he saw the figure of a girl running towards him.

  He touched the dagger sheathed at his hip. He'd stopped at a gun and knife expo in Missouri, searching for the perfect weapon with which to kill Ashleigh Goodling. The one he'd picked out was a long black blade with a silver serpent design etched into the handle. It was a bit of a poetic choice—Ashleigh herself was a snake with a forked tongue. It felt very right.

  “Tommy!” the girl shouted. It was Ashleigh, running towards him now, a panicked and desperate look in her eyes.

  “Ashleigh,” Tommy said. He gave her a wicked grin. “I didn't expect to find you so fast.”

  “Thank God, Tommy. Thank God you're here.” She reached up her arms to hug him, but Tommy blocked her and backed away. She looked confused and hurt, being her usual manipulative self. “We have to go. All of these people are crazy.”

  “And where do you want to go?” Tommy asked.

  “I just want to go home,” Esmeralda said. “I miss my mother.”

  Tommy snorted. “You miss Esmeralda's mom?”

  “I am Esmeralda.”

  “Right.”

  She frowned. “I mean it, Tommy. Just help me get out of here. We are still friends, aren't we?”

  “You must think I'm pretty stupid. I know it's you, Ashleigh. There's no point trying to trick me anymore.” Tommy raised the blade. “You took Esmeralda from me.”

  “What? Tommy, Ashleigh's gone. She won't be back. It's really me. Please, Tommy.”

  Tommy hesitated, taken in by the frightened expression on her face. For a moment, he saw her the way he'd first seen her, a beautiful and unhappy girl with a glittering butterfly on her T-shirt. He felt how his heart had swelled to the point of breaking as he looked on her.

  Then he pushed those feelings back. No matter what she said, this wasn't Esmeralda, it was Ashleigh. He couldn't trust his feelings, and he certainly couldn't take the risk of trusting her again.

  “You won't win this time, Ashleigh,” Tommy said. “You think you're all-powerful, but love doesn't always conquer all.” He tapped his chest with the blade. “Sometimes fear defeats love.” He moved toward her, raising the blade.

  “You want to kill me?” Esmeralda pulled open the front of her shirt. “Look, Tommy.”

  Tommy looked. The beaded necklace that held bits of Ashleigh's bone were gone. His gaze darted to her wrists. Those were bare, too.

  “Show me your ankles,” Tommy said.

  Esmeralda pulled up the legs of her slacks. The anklet was gone, too.

  “I told you,” Esmeralda said. “I got rid of her. Actually, it was that girl...Jenny. She burned Ashleigh out of me. I'm free, Tommy. It's me.”

  “Not Ashleigh?”

  “I fucking hate Ashleigh,” Esmeralda said.

  “Good,” Tommy said. “Then you'll be glad to know I dropped the rest of her bones into the Mississippi River on my way here. Nobody will ever find them again. They can't be found.”

  “That's perfect,” Esmeralda said.

  Tommy looked into her eyes—dark brown, no longer with a hint of gray. She didn't seem at all upset that he'd destroyed m
ost of Ashleigh's remaining connection to the physical world.

  “I'm the same girl you met that night at the farm,” Esmeralda said. “Remember? We were just kids? You gave me that gold coin...I've lost it now. But I've always kept it near me.”

  Tommy wanted to believe her. She did seem like a different person now. It could be a trick...but he felt a lot of affection for Esmeralda. It would be a risk to trust her. But if there was a chance he could finally have Esmeralda back, that might be worth taking.

  “Okay,” Tommy said. He dropped the dagger. “You want to get out of here?”

  “Please!” Esmeralda embraced him.

  They rode out from Barrett House, Esmeralda clinging to his back on the bike while Tommy opened up the throttle. They roared out into the darkness together.

  ***

  Jenny, Seth and Heather had to push their way through heaps of dead bodies choking the second-story hall. All the zombies who had never made it up to the third floor had simply fallen over, lifeless, with Alexander's death.

  Since the zombies had ripped Jenny and Heather's clothes to shreds, Jenny took her by a big walk-in closet full of vintage clothes. They changed quickly. Jenny saw bite wounds all over Heather's body. One of Heather's eyes was swelling shut.

  The three of them descended the front stairway, stepping over dead bodies the whole way down. Jenny shivered. It was so much like that Easter night, which seemed like it had happened both a million years ago and just yesterday. She vowed to herself to never use the Jenny pox again.

  They walked out through the mud room to the garage, where they climbed into Seth's Audi. They had left Jenny's car in Jenny's back yard, behind the fence, in case her dad wanted to sell it or use it for parts. Seth's car was smaller, faster and less conspicuous, so it made a better getaway vehicle.

  Heather sat in the passenger seat, while Jenny sat in Seth's lap. Seth opened the garage door with a remote clipped to his sun visor, then drove outside. He braked at the top of his driveway for a last look at his home. Jenny rubbed his neck with her hand.

  “What are you thinking about?” Jenny asked.

  “How glad my dad's going to be,” Seth said. “We're finally free of Alexander's sadistic game. The family curse. The ghost of great-grandfather.” Seth snorted. “He did all that just to amuse himself, didn't he?”

  “Alexander likes to leave his mark,” Jenny said.

  “He left it on us,” Seth said. “Now it's time to erase it.”

  They drove down to the front gates. Seth parked just inside the gate and wolfed down some of the Power Bars. They got out of the car again. Seth took Heather's hands and held them tight. Heather closed her eyes and smiled in pleasure as her wounds closed.

  “Not too much,” Heather said, pulling her hands back. “I need a little evidence on me.” She gazed at Seth, then wrapped him in a tight hug, pressing herself against him. “Thanks for everything,” she whispered. Her eyes lingered on Seth as she pulled, and Jenny got the sense that Heather wanted to kiss him. Jenny couldn't really blame her. Nothing in the world felt as good as Seth's healing touch.

  Heather turned to Jenny. “I'm sorry if I made your life hell.”

  “Don't worry,” Jenny said. “My life was hell long before you got involved.”

  Heather reached her hands toward Jenny, then hesitated. “Is it safe to hug you, or...?”

  “Just stay away from my head.” Jenny held up her gloved hands. “Everything else is covered. Believe me, I've had plenty of practice.”

  Heather hugged Jenny. Jenny hugged her back, awkwardly.

  Seth took one of the toy remote controls from his cargo pants. A strip of masking tape had two words in Jenny's dad's handwriting: Front Yard. “We'd better do the yard,” he said. “Don't want it blowing up in anyone's face. Are we ready?”

  “Ready,” Jenny said.

  Seth pushed both levers on the remote. A huge cloud of sod and decorative landscaping erupted in front of the house, followed by an earth-shuddering boom.

  “No zombies were harmed in that explosion,” Seth said. He took out the other remote. “Now, let's say good-bye to Barrett House. May there be nothing left but ashes and bad memories. God, my dad's going to be happy when he sees it's finally destroyed.”

  “Bye, Barrett House,” Jenny said.

  Seth shoved both levers forward. This remote was labeled Gas Main.

  The house seemed to shudder, and the first-floor windows blew out. Billowing flames erupted from the empty window sockets.

  The fire moved quickly upstairs, helped along by some minor accelerants they'd applied to the house—sawdust in the carpets, streaks of flammable varnish along the walls, hopefully nothing that would be too obvious to investigators. A column of fire ripped out through one of the second-story windows as the remaining Molotov cocktails exploded.

  Within minutes, flames and smoke poured from every door and window they could see.

  Seth tucked the remotes back into his pockets, and he smiled at Heather. “So, what happened tonight?”

  “You two kidnapped me from my house because you wanted to explain your side of the story, without Jenny getting taken into custody,” Heather said. “Then, everything I just saw—Alexander and the zombies, just like on the video from the Charleston morgue. All of that happened. Except...you and Jenny were both in the house when it went up in flames. I barely escaped, and only because you paranormals were too busy fighting to pay attention to me.”

  “And what advice will you give your bosses?” Jenny asked.

  “My professional medical opinion is that all human remains in this house should be incinerated immediately to avoid any contamination. There's no time for forensics or identifying individual remains. We don't want another outbreak of Fallen Oak Syndrome.”

  “We sure don't,” Jenny agreed.

  “They'll probably cover everything up,” Heather said. “The White House won't want any questions about where the remains of Fallen Oak's loved ones have been for the last four months.”

  “I hope you're right,” Seth said.

  Heather took a deep breath and brought out her cell phone. “I think that's everything.”

  “I think it is,” Jenny said.

  “Just give us twenty minutes,” Seth said.

  “You got it.” Heather winked at him, and Jenny rolled her eyes.

  They left Heather standing just inside the gate. As Seth drove them away, Jenny opened up Esmeralda's purse and unwrapped a few Power Bars, which he wolfed down in a single stack. Under the Power Bars, she found a cheap Flip video camera and a rainbow of credit cards, all of them with different names, probably stolen by Ashleigh and Tommy from different people. One of the cards caught Jenny's eye, and she frowned.

  “Seth,” Jenny said. “We have to make one extra stop.”

  “We can't, Jenny. We need to get to the airfield right now. Hale is waiting for us.” Seth's dad had paid a premium for Hale's help in smuggling Seth and Jenny out of the country, a huge fee that included Barrett Capital contracting with Hale Risk Management to evaluate a number of potential investments in India.

  “It'll only take a minute,” Jenny said. “I promise.”

  CHAPTER FORTY

  “Hi, welcome to Taco Bell,” Darcy Metcalf said, and then a look of wide-eyed shock appeared on her face. “Oh, holy cow.”

  “Hi, Darcy,” Seth said. “Can we talk with you a sec?”

  Darcy's eyes were huge as she stared at Jenny. Jenny gave her the best smile she could manage.

  “Jeepers,” Darcy said. “Um, okay. Did you want anything to eat?”

  “Six chili cheese burritos for me,” Seth said.

  “Just take a booth. I'll wheel 'em right out for you. Well, not wheel 'em, I mean I'll just carry 'em,” Darcy said.

  “Thanks.” Seth paid her, and then he and Jenny took a booth at the back corner of the Taco Bell.

  At the counter, Darcy stacked paper-wrapped burritos onto a tray. “Hey, Ramon,” she said. “Can you cover the r
egister? I'm going on break.”

  A young Mexican man walked to the counter from the kitchen. “You going to eat all that yourself?” he asked.

  “It's for my friends,” Darcy said. “Thanks for covering.”

  “You know I got you covered,” he said. He spanked Darcy's rear as she walked off with the tray, and Darcy giggled and blushed. She sat down across from Seth and Jenny, and Seth immediately tore into the burritos.

  “Did that guy just smack your ass?” Jenny asked.

  “Oh, yeah, Ramon.” Darcy sighed, looking back at him. “Isn't he the foxiest? He's so good with Neveah, too.”

  “Neveah?” Jenny asked.

  “My little girl,” Darcy said. “I named her that 'cause it's Heaven spelled backwards.”

  “Oh! Congratulations,” Jenny said.

  “She's the best. Even my dad is nice to her. He's still being a turd about Maybelle, though.”

  “Ashleigh's dog?” Seth asked.

  “Yeah, she lives in my room now,” Darcy said. “Daddy hates it, but too bad, you know? He can't boss me around forever. Me and Ramon are gonna get our own place soon, anyway.”

  “That's really great, Darcy.” Jenny couldn't help smiling. Darcy seemed genuinely happy. “Well, we won't take too much of your time. I just wanted to give you something.”

  Jenny took out a PayPal debit card, which had a small pink Post-It note affixed to the back side, and slid it across the table. The name on the card was FALLEN OAK GIRLS' OUTREACH. Darcy's brow furrowed as she studied it.

  “The password's on the back,” Jenny said. “That's all the money Ashleigh raised for the pregnant girls in town. I'm not sure how much is in there, but it might be a lot. She made the story into national news.”

  “Oh, wow,” Darcy said.

  “Darcy, you're in charge of this money now,” Jenny said. “Share it out with all the girls who need help.”

  “Really?” Darcy gaped at her. “Why me?”

  “Because I know we can trust you to do the right thing,” Jenny said.