“Ready?” I asked, fitting the key in the ignition.
Patrick nodded and closed his eyes, as if bracing himself.
“Let her rip,” said Bodhi.
I turned the key, and the truck’s engine rumbled to life. For a second, nothing happened, and I wondered if Patrick and Alex had connected the jumper cables to the battery incorrectly. Then, at the same time, Bodhi and Patrick convulsed.
I yelled instinctively, reaching for the key to turn off the car, but Alex bolted to my window and yanked my hand away from the ignition.
“Leave it on,” he ordered, pinning my fingers to my side. “They’re fine. Look.”
I took a second look. Bodhi shook from head to toe, bracing himself against the hood of the truck, but other than that, he appeared to be unharmed. He even gave me the thumb’s up with his free hand.
Patrick, on the other hand, glowed with an ethereal white light. His entire body vibrated as he absorbed the energy from the truck with Bodhi’s help. It was like staring at a star explosion. I covered my eyes as the light brightened to a blinding force. Bodhi squeezed his eyelids shut, shuddering as Patrick took everything he could. The truck whined underneath me. With one last flare from Patrick, the engine died. The truck’s rumble quieted. The light faded into the sky.
And Patrick was the thirty-seven-year-old man that he was meant to be.
We stared at him in silent awe. Like Alex, he aged well, or he would have if he had been given the chance. His hair was shorter and neater, a shadow of a beard grew on his cheeks, and his jaw and cheekbones had hardened into strong, handsome features. He appeared in tailored jeans, a collared shirt, and his signature deck shoes, as though he was ready to take the Winchesters’ sailboat out on the bay for their weekly family trip. All in all, he looked like a younger version of his father.
Patrick stared at his hands, which now sported the wear and tear of years in the sun behind the wheel of a sailboat. “I’ll be damned.”
Bodhi dropped the jumper cable. To my great relief, he was fine, if a bit shaky on his feet. I stumbled out of the truck to meet him, but even as we caught each other, we couldn’t look away from Patrick’s new face. Alex was likewise dumbstruck, but he recovered first. He stretched out his hand toward Patrick, who paused before shaking it, and then Alex tugged Patrick into a hug.
“I never thought I’d get to see you like this,” Alex admitted, thumping Patrick on the back. “It’s surreal, man.”
“You’re telling me,” Patrick mumbled. “Anyone have a mirror?”
Everyone laughed as Patrick ambled over to the truck, looked in the side view mirror, and traced the new lines around his mouth. He ran a hand through his hair, which had lightened in color, staring wide-eyed at the man in the mirror. He straightened up quickly, the set of his mouth solidifying into a determined smirk.
“Let’s get Caroline.”
Alex handed me the keys to his SUV, returned to his place near the hood, and picked up the jumper cables. “Way ahead of you. Let’s do this.”
With renewed confidence, I hopped into Alex’s SUV, fitted the keys into the ignition, and revved the engine. Like before, a few seconds passed without action. Alex waited patiently, his arms outstretched over the hood of the car as though offering them up for Caroline to take. My breath caught in my throat as a breeze disturbed Alex’s borrowed shirt. She was here.
The light began slowly this time. A tiny orb appeared between Alex’s extended arms and hovered in the space there. It grew in size and intensity, gradually elongating and brightening until it filled my vision. I closed my eyes, the glow pressing red against the darkness behind my lids. The SUV sputtered out. I waited a beat, buzzing with anticipation. Then I looked out the windshield.
Caroline, thirty-five and eternally beautiful at any age, stood between Alex’s arms. He stared at her, stunned, and she smiled like a radiant sun.
34
In Exultation
“You can probably set the jumper cables down, Alex,” Caroline said with a smirk. Her voice was everything and nothing like I’d expected. It was a little huskier than it had been in the videos I’d seen of her as a teenager, and it also conveyed the sense that she knew more about the world than anyone else did.
Alex’s lips parted as he gazed down at her in disbelief as his fingers unclenched and the cables dropped from his hands. They clattered against the grill of the SUV, but Alex couldn’t care less about the state of his car. He wasn’t the only one enthralled with Caroline’s appearance. Bodhi and Patrick were similarly entranced, and I’d admit myself that seeing Caroline in the flesh felt like an out-of-this-world experience.
She wore a long, flowing, summery dress. It was a peachy white color, like the color of clouds at sunrise, and decorated with delicate lace trim. Her flaxen hair was pinned away from her face, but the rest of it rained down the tanned skin of her back. Her eyes were sharp, her brows defined, and her lips set in a sly, satisfied smile that I imagined was a permanent fixture on her face. Like Patrick mirrored his father, so Caroline reflected her mother. There was no denying the flawlessness of the Winchester gene pool.
Since we all were frozen in place, Caroline made the first move. She stood up on her tiptoes, steadying herself on Alex’s forearms, and gently kissed his lips. He responded in kind for a short second before shifting away.
“I’m married,” he told her.
“I’m dead,” she reminded him with a nonchalant shrug. “It’s not cheating if the other woman isn’t even alive. I just wanted to remember what that felt like.”
Alex continued to stare at her, unable to process her existence. She hovered there for a minute, waiting for him to respond. When he remained unmoving, she ducked beneath his arm.
“Patrick!”
Caroline jumped into Patrick’s arms. He whirled her around, and the skirts of her dress spiraled like wispy clouds. Patrick set his sister firmly on the ground. “It’s nice to see you,” he said. “It’s been a while.”
Caroline playfully squeezed his shoulders. “I know. I can’t believe you’re real. God, you got old. Are those crow’s feet?”
“Um, excuse me. Have you looked in a mirror?”
Bodhi cleared his throat loudly, and Caroline peeked around Patrick to get a glimpse of him. She smiled widely and approached Bodhi. “But of course. How could I forget our magnificent hosts? Can I give you a hug?”
He eyed her warily. “I’d rather have an apology.”
Caroline had the decency to bow her head sheepishly. “You’re right. Forgive me for the trouble I’ve caused you.”
Bodhi nodded toward me. “Tell that to my wife.”
Caroline revolved, finally finding me near the door of Alex’s SUV. A hesitant smile tipped her lips upward as she walked over to me. “Bailey.”
I held on to the car to keep myself from shaking. “Caroline.”
“I’m so sorry,” she said. She gestured to my walking boot and skinned knees. “I have no excuse for the way I’ve treated you other than impatience. I saw a chance to get someone’s attention, and I took it.”
“That’s all right.”
“It’s not,” she replied, shaking her head. She seemed hesitant to fully approach me, as if I might scold her for all the injuries I sustained as a result of her wrath. “I was immature and irrational. I should’ve found a better way to contact you.”
I mustered my courage and closed the distance between me and Caroline, taking her hands. “Caroline. You did what you thought you had to do. I forgive you for that.”
Her lower lip trembled. Without warning, she threw her arms around my neck and hugged me fast. I felt as though I was hugging both Carolines at once: the callow teenaged ghost and the corporeal apologetic woman in front of me.
“Thank you,” she murmured. “You could’ve run, but you didn’t. No one else stayed.”
“You’re welcome,” I said back. “You deserve to be free.” I pulled away from Caroline, sniffling. She smelled familiar, like the perf
ume that lingered on the soccer jersey I’d borrowed, and I finally recognized the scent as calla lilies. I cleared my throat, gazing around at our odd party.
“Well?” Alex prompted. “What’s next?”
Caroline’s demeanor changed at once. She wiped teardrops from her eyelashes and pursed her lips.
“Next,” she declared. “We find Ethan Powell.”
Saturday morning saw three living people and two dead ones crowded around the tiny card table in the Winchesters’ otherwise empty family room to discuss strategy. We were a mismatched bunch: Bodhi with his long hair and bare feet; Alex with his baseball cap and Lido’s T-shirt; Caroline who, in a pair of riding pants and a crisp collared shirt, looked more like she belonged at the equestrian center for the day; Patrick, whose wiser and more mature face I couldn’t get used to; and me, in paint-stained shorts, a tank top that hadn’t been washed in a few days, and the plaster cast encasing my ankle that was filthier than a bar floor. If any of the locals walked in on us, they would be sure to wonder what an amalgamation of characters had to do with one another.
The subject of the morning was how to get Ethan Powell around to the Winchester house again. We hadn’t gone into town since that night at the Sanctuary. Groceries were running light, as was our toilet paper supply, but we didn’t want to risk meeting Ethan if it was avoidable. Now, our goal had flipped. We needed to locate Ethan, and we needed to lure him up the bluff before he realized exactly what was happening. The problem was executing such a plan without the locals getting suspicious. It took us two hours to solidify an arrangement, and even then, most of it relied on where Alex found Ethan, who he was with at the time, and whether or not we could get him alone.
We parted in the early afternoon to put our plan into action. Caroline and Patrick jumped the cars. Apparently, once ghosts were fully charged, they were able to lend their own energy again without much consequence. Alex got a head start, trundling out of the front yard in his SUV and down the dirt road. Bodhi and I followed shortly after. When we got into town, we drove straight toward Lido’s Restaurant. As it was a balmy Saturday morning, the locals were out in full force. The park was full of families and dogs. The marina was a flurry of sailboats and speedboats trying to get out on the water. The main street boasted refreshed businesswomen enjoying their weekend freedom as they shopped at Black Bay’s various boutiques. We waved and smiled at the familiar faces, doing our best to look natural. This was part of the plan. The more people who saw us driving through town, the better. It gave us an alibi.
We pulled into the employee lot beside Lido’s, where the dumpsters were, and parked out of sight of the main road. The restaurant was already loaded with customers, many of which were eating their lunch on the patio out back. This presented a little bit of a challenge. If Ethan gave us any trouble at all, he would surely alert any and all of Lido’s patrons to our ruse. Nevertheless, we had no other choice, so Bodhi and I settled in to wait for Alex to pull off his part of the plan. The radio played faintly in the background as the truck idled. The stale smell of the dumpsters permeated the cab. I wrinkled my nose. Hopefully, Alex wouldn’t take too long.
Bodhi rubbed the corner of his eye, blinking his drowsiness away. He hadn’t slept well the night before. None of us had. The weight of the day settled on my chest like an anvil. The purpose of our mission hadn’t escaped me, but I tried to temper the anxiety that rose in my throat every time I thought about the fact that we were helping a pair of ghosts to murder someone.
“You okay?” I asked Bodhi, flipping up the armrest between us to shuffle over to him. The seat belt jabbed into my hip, but I ignored the nuisance as he snaked an arm around me to rub my back.
“As okay as I can be,” he replied, but he stared absentmindedly through the front windshield at the part of the bay visible to us.
“Everything’s going to be all right,” I promised him. I didn’t entirely believe it. There were too many things that could go wrong. But in that moment, Bodhi needed reassurance, and if we went into this without at least a little bit of faith, it would go much worse than we anticipated.
We could’ve talked through the plan again. We could’ve spoken about the dubious morality of what might occur in the next few hours. We could’ve talked about how the day’s events would affect us in the long run, or what would happen if we got caught, or who might suffer if Ethan got the best of us. Instead, we waited for Alex to arrive in comfortable silence, curled up together like a pair of cats in the sunshine. At some point, I think we even dozed off because when Bodhi’s cell phone rang to warn us of Alex’s arrival, we both jerked out of our sun-soaked stupor.
“Is he here?” I asked, peeking over Bodhi’s shoulder to see the message.
“They’re pulling in now. Let’s get ready.”
We hopped out of the truck, opened the tailgate, and gathered our materials. Then we stationed ourselves on either side of the restaurant’s back door. My heart pounded. Blood rushed through my ears. I pressed myself to the building, feeling the rough, warm bricks press against my back through the fabric of my shirt, and willed myself to calm down. Across from me, Bodhi mouthed silent words, standing at the ready.
When the door handle turned, I coiled like a spring, my fingers tightening over the rag between my fingers. As the door opened, Alex’s voice rang out.
“You should see this smoker, Ethan,” Alex was saying. “I can’t wait to start trying my hand at smoking my own meats. The customers are going to go wild. It’s just out back—”
“The customers?” Ethan rumbled with a laugh. “I’m going to go wild.”
My breath stopped as Ethan’s boot led the way through the back door and into the parking lot. Time slowed. Ethan’s head turned to the left ever-so-slightly. Toward me.
The three of us lunged at the same time. Alex tackled Ethan from behind, tangling himself around Ethan’s knees to send him crashing to the pavement. Bodhi rocketed forward before Ethan even landed. He kneeled on Ethan’s upper back to prevent him from moving as Alex pinned his legs to the ground. While Bodhi secured Ethan’s hands behind his back with a rope knot that Alex had taught him that morning, I shoved the rag into Ethan’s mouth. Thankfully, he was too dazed from our sneak attack to put up much of a fight at first. Without his hands to break his fall, Ethan had smacked his head pretty hard against the asphalt. As his eyes cleared, he yelled for help, but the rag muffled his voice. No one inside Lido’s or sitting on the patio would hear him over the commotion of midday Saturday.
Alex and Bodhi hauled Ethan to his feet and heaved him into the back of the pickup truck. Alex leapt into the bed of the truck, forcing Ethan to lie flat so that no one would notice him as we drove through town. We slammed the tailgate shut, got into the cab, and peeled out of the parking lot as quickly as possible.
I kept watch in the side view mirror as we rode back up to the bluff. From a distance, no one would think twice about our jaunt through town. Alex stretched out in the back, waving merrily to passing locals. We were simply enjoying the day, just like everyone else. Still, it was a massive relief to find the sanctuary of the woods at the base of the bluff. As we rode into the shadows, I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. The hardest part was over. Or was it?
Caroline and Patrick lingered in the doorway of the house. As Alex unloaded Ethan, Caroline took a step inside. The siblings wore similar expressions, a balance between hate and fear, as they regarded the man who had ruined their lives so long ago. Alex forced Ethan to his knees in the dirt and ripped the rag out of his mouth.
Ethan let loose a string of expletives. “What the hell, Alex? Have you completely lost your mind?”
“Don’t play stupid with me, Ethan,” Alex spat. “I know what you did.”
“And what did I do?” Ethan challenged him. “Huh? What sort of nonsense did Bailey and Bodhi put into your mind? Did they feed you that ghost story too?”
Caroline emerged from the house. The sun highlighted her high cheekbones. “It
was no story, Mr. Powell.”
Ethan squinted upward. “Who the hell are you?”
“You don’t recognize me?”
When it finally hit Ethan who he was staring at, I could see the realization in his eyes. He gazed up at Caroline, and a look of something like horror and shock crossed his features. “No,” he sputtered. “It can’t be.”
Patrick joined Caroline in the front yard. “Did you miss us?”
Ethan squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. “No, no, no. This isn’t real. You’re dead!”
“You’re right on that count,” said Caroline. She knelt down, took Ethan’s chin between her fingers, and forced him to look at her. “You made sure of that. But you already knew that I wasn’t entirely gone, didn’t you? You used to come here once a month to check up on me, but you never thought I had the ability to touch you. Guess what, Ethan? Karma’s a bitch.” She stood and spat in the dirt in front of Ethan. Then she looked up at Alex, who watched with uncertainty by the truck door. “You should go,” Caroline told him.
“What? No!”
Caroline circled toward Alex, giving Ethan a wide berth, and took his hands in hers. “Alex. Please. I don’t want you to be a part of this.”
“I’m not leaving you,” he insisted.
“She’s right,” Patrick said as he approached Alex as well. “You shouldn’t have to watch this, Alex.”
Alex looked between the siblings. “You both want me to go?”
Caroline nodded. “It’s for the best.”
“So is this goodbye then?”
A sense of infinite sadness radiated outward from the trio. This wasn’t the first time Alex had to let go of his best friends. Was it easier or harder the second time around?
“We’ll always be with you,” Patrick told him. “Don’t forget that.”
He gave Alex a hug then retreated toward me and Bodhi to allow Caroline a moment alone with him. She entwined her fingers around his neck. Instinctively, he pulled her closer.
The Haunting of Winchester Mansion Omnibus Page 38