I’m not sure which was worse. The thought of being in that situation someday myself—if I were lucky enough to live that long—or the fact that I’d believed Hale’s lie about not owning a cell phone. Still...the bedwetting didn’t necessarily mean he wasn’t being haunted. Maybe the two were even connected in some kind of overall sleep disturbance, like Bly and his nightmares.
I’d tried being friendly, and I’d tried being blunt, but Sylvester Hale was harder to manipulate than the drug dealer’s sister. As he made a show of collecting his things to get away from me, I pulled the only tool out of my arsenal I hadn’t yet tried: the truth.
“I saw her.”
He paused with his hand on his cane. “Saw whom?”
“Amelia Griggs. I saw her. And she pointed the finger directly at you.”
Hale burst out laughing. “Stick with your obnoxious think-pieces, Mr. Baine. Your attempts at plausible fiction are truly wretched.”
“Laugh all you want, old man. I’m a certified medium and I’m on an assignment to figure out whether or not you’ve got talent.”
“And if you truly must plagiarize—don’t lift the plot directly out of the latest Thomas Cruise movie.”
Says the guy who just claimed to date a historical character from Liquid Sight. Hale tried to slip me yet again, but I wasn’t about to let him get away with it this time. While he might have been able to argue circles around me, I was a heck of a lot faster, and phenomenally motivated. I jumped up and inserted myself between him and the treadmills, only to find a couple of young, fit guys in the gym’s signature black T-shirts closing in on me from ten o’clock.
“Sir,” one of them said, the one whose body language screamed mall cop, “there’s a strict policy of anti-harassment here—”
“What? There’s no harassment. We’re having a simple discussion.”
“Sir,” he repeated, “threatening behavior is not tolerated on the premises. I’ll need to see your membership card.”
If ever I wanted to shove a badge in someone’s face and tell them to get the hell out of my way…but all I had was a fake driver’s license. I dug out my day pass receipt and gave it to the guy, who fell back to confer with his deputy about what recourse they’d have since they couldn’t threaten my membership. Meanwhile, the complainer said, “These two look pretty official. You need to tell them about the rowing machines before anyone else gets hurt.”
I angled away from the gym security goons and said to the shimmery outline of the complainer, “To prevent another fatality, or to make you feel like less of a dumbass for exercising yourself to death?”
I thought I was being pretty smooth, but apparently my ventriloquism left a lot to be desired. The gym goons heard me. One backed up a step, and the other one—the braver one—got all puffed up and macho. Great. Now I looked like Mr. Greenhouse Gas ranting to himself in the cafe. “Sir, we’re going to have to ask you to leave.”
“This isn’t what you think.”
“Sir—” he said sternly, with a strong inflection of don’t make me do anything I’ll regret.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m going.” I’d blown my chance with Hale anyway. I turned toward the door and the goons fell into step on either side of me, with the flabby complainer sidling along beside them.
“That’s it?” the ghost demanded. “You’re just gonna fold?”
Frankly, I wanted to. No matter which angle I tried, I came up short. But when else would I get the chance to observe Hale’s behavior around an active spirit? I tried to rally. “Look, I just paid eighteen bucks for a day pass not ten minutes ago.”
The brave guy said, “Then you should’ve thought of that before you started bullying one of our patrons.”
Hale was waiting for us at the front desk, watching me get the bum’s rush with palpable satisfaction.
“Did you want us to call the police?” the receptionist asked him.
“Don’t be silly,” Hale said grandly. “My dear neighbor wouldn’t hurt a fly. He’s just very…excitable.”
“We have a zero tolerance policy for this sort of behavior,” the receptionist told me. “I’ll have to ask you never to come back.”
As the gym guys escorted me out the door, Hale treated me to a finger-wave and an evil little smile.
What the hell just happened?
I stood there on the sidewalk, squinting at the pale winter sun, wondering why Hale was so eager to discredit me.
And then I realized what was going on.
When homicide seemed unlikely, I went for manslaughter—and when I’d tried to get him to admit to pushing Amelia Griggs too far, instead of confessing, he’d revealed the source of his powerful ambivalence toward me.
Envy.
Oh, he passed it off as a joke, all right, with his little “if I were three hundred years younger” type comments. But when the FPMP stagers crafted a persona the old man could relate to, they’d done too good a job. Hale saw the douchebag juggling a buff husband and another piece on the side, publishing in all those bone dry journals he respected, then stealing the show at Faldstool Fridays. Knocking me down a few pegs must’ve really tickled him pink.
I might not be too swift on the uptake at figuring out what’s going on in someone else’s head. But I had Hale’s number now. I was sure of it.
“That didn’t go too well,” said the vague shimmer by the bus stop.
He got that right. I shielded my eyes against glare on ice, sucked down some metaphysical light, and took a better look at the complainer. He was a distortion of light against the side of the building, though I caught glimpses of more detail where he overlaid the shadows. Yeah, he was dead. But not scary-dead.
And so…maybe I could work with him. “Tell me something. Was Hale able to see you?”
“No. Why would he be?”
“Hypothetically, if he could. Would you know?”
“Why should I tell you anything? You haven’t been very helpful to me.”
It wasn’t so much that I was sore at them for kicking me out…but if I got those self-important fitness jerks in trouble, it would definitely be a bonus. “Fine. Give me your info and I’ll have someone in the office take another look at your case. Now, answer the question. Can you tell if you’re dealing with a medium?”
“I…guess so. But aside from you, there was only one other guy at the gym who lit up—this slow guy they used to bring to water aerobics. But I haven’t seen him in a while.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. No, these days, Richie had his plate full with the Sit and be Fit classes at his nursing home. I should know. He bitched about it every time I saw him.
If my insight held any water—if I really did have Hale all figured out—then not only was he no medium, but he had nothing to do with the death of Amelia Griggs. I’d need to go break the news to the scary rat ghost in my attic that she was mistaken.
Damn it.
The complainer said, “You’re really some kind of big-shot professional psychic?”
“That’s what they tell me.”
A city bus passed by, and I caught a flicker of his dubious expression in a fleeting shadow. “Then, seriously, what the hell is with those pants?”
32
The report that ended up in Laura’s inbox was nothing like the first one I’d filled out. I definitively ruled Hale’s claims of psychic ability as fabrications. After the whole getting-thrown-out-of-the-gym incident I felt a particular satisfaction in doing so.
I tried to be as dry and clinical in my narrative as possible. Even so, five minutes after I launched the form into the aether, a call from HQ lit up my phone.
Laura Kim.
“I can have the gym evacuated in fifteen minutes,” she said. “What do you need for the exorcism?”
I was currently ensconced at my uncomfortable dining room table with Bly, who’d been checking the fridge every few seconds to see if additional pancakes had magically appeared. I hadn’t yet worked out how to break it to our boss that the ghost
at the gym was a powderpuff compared to the one we had upstairs. But somehow, I managed.
Laura didn’t throw a fit when I told her about Amelia Griggs, though I suspected her eye might be twitching. “I’m sending reinforcements,” she said.
“I’m perfectly willing to exorcise a repeater,” I told her, “but the thing is, this isn’t a repeater. She’s got her consciousness intact.” And I didn’t think she’d like being forcefully ejected from the attic any more than I liked getting tossed out of the gym. “I need to reason with her first.”
“I’m not happy about this.” Laura was silent for a long moment. “Not even a little…but you’re the expert. Just don’t go it alone. I’m sending in backup.”
The thing about Laura is that when she wants to make something happen, it happens. Quickly, too. She’d spent so many years as The Fixer for Con Dreyfuss that moving Heaven and Earth was all in a day’s work. By the time I had my new underwear locked and loaded, a plain black van had already pulled up in front of the townhouse, and five FPMP agents in black tactical gear streamed out. I even recognized two of them: my officemate Carl, and my buddy from the shooting range, Jodi Watts.
I guessed if anyone could shoot a moving rat in the dark, it was her. But I hoped she wouldn’t have to.
I backed up against the electric fireplace and watched the federal agents swarm in, and I tried to determine which part of the equation was the most surreal. I couldn’t really pinpoint any one thing in particular. And somehow that failed to surprise me.
The agents were all looking to Carl, who had that whole surprise-badass thing going on again. Though when he approached me, instead of barking orders, he said, “There was no accessible attic on the property record.”
“I know.” I nodded toward the stairs and said, “And sorry to rain on your parade, but the cavalry isn’t really necessary—all I need to do is go up there and have a conversation.”
“That’s fine. Just a precaution, in case things escalate.”
I sniggered, “Into what?” Because it wasn’t as if the attic could get more haunted.
But then I realized the goons in black weren’t there to apprehend the spirit—they were there to make sure that if the FPMP’s star medium got hijacked, he wouldn’t get far.
Funny. I always think I’m over Camp Hell. Until I realize I’m not.
Suddenly, the three agents I didn’t know looked less like random coworkers and more like the big, lurking orderlies pawing through my meager personal belongings while they searched for any good reason to make me feel off-kilter.
“Suit up,” Carl said. He handed Bly and me each a set of coveralls while two of the goons unpacked nets and cages. I zipped myself into the coveralls, taking care to cinch the cuffs at the bottom tightly, and did my best to ignore my budding panic. The crew was here to wrangle the rats. Not me.
Unless I came up possessed. In which case, they’d wrangle me good.
By the time we got to the third-floor closet, I was drenched in sweat, and not just because I was wearing so many layers. I took a deep breath and shook out my arms as one of the goons hooked the latch to pull down the folding stairs.
“Retrofit,” Carl said. “She had this installed later.” Which explained why it wasn’t in the plans.
No rats fell out—this was good—but even so, my anxiety had started to peak to the point where my feet felt numb and my peripheral vision was a little bit sparkly. I told myself it was just the white light I’d been drinking down, but that was just my wishful thinking. I was one rapid heartbeat away from hyperventilating.
When a hand landed on my shoulder, I flinched. Hard. But it wasn’t some random musclebound FPMP goon, it was the one I’d been sharing a bed with. “I’d ask if you’re okay…” he murmured. “What’s going on?”
“Oh, you know,” I said breezily. “Just a healthy wariness.” To the agents who didn’t know me, I’d sound like I was talking ghost. But Bly saw me cut my eyes in the direction of our new visitors.
He gave me a small, private nod and a manly clap on the shoulder, and said, “Don’t worry, Bayne, I’ve got your back.”
Funny, how the empath managed to calm me down without tinkering in my emotions, not even a little.
Bly turned toward the group and said, “Listen, there’s not much room up there. Give us five minutes alone to see what’s what.”
The team looked toward Carl—who obviously knew that elbow room (or lack thereof) had nothing to do with Bly’s request. But Bly wasn’t in the upper echelons of FPMP Midwest for nothing, and Carl didn’t challenge him.
My budding panic attack eased off the throttle as I realized my fake husband had somehow turned into a real friend. I nodded my thanks.
Pitched low so only I could hear, he added, “But if a rat runs up my leg and I scream like a little girl, I’m telling everyone it was you.”
Carl rigged up Bly with a flashlight bright enough to see from orbit, and me with Dr. K’s new salt gun—I presume the kinks were all worked out. He deployed Jodi and the three goons at strategic points to catch anything that might scurry down the stairs—ostensibly, rats. But they’d be just as eager to grab a possessed medium. Bly noticed me eyeing them and clapped me on the shoulder again. “You got this.”
I nodded grimly, set my foot on the folding stairs, and climbed.
I’d been in such a hurry to high-tail it out of there before, I’d left the lights on, but it was still hard to tell what was what. The unfinished beams cast crazy shadows and ate the light. My eyes went to the shop light first, and when I looked away, all I could see were dancing spots. At least, I hoped it was just a trick of my eyes, and not a swarm of rats. But I heard Bly come up behind me without screaming…so probably it was just spots.
“Jesus,” he said as he took in the sprawling habitat with a swing of his high-powered flashlight. “Looks like Amelia was busy.”
“If the homeowner’s association was on her to get rid of her pets—thanks to Hale—this would’ve been a good place to stash them, up in a crawl space that nobody knew about but her.”
I edged in deeper, tiny steps, and Bly stuck to me like glue. That might’ve bothered me before I knew him, when I would’ve figured he was just waiting for me to screw up. Now I knew he just really hated rats. “Thanks for vouching for me down there,” I said quietly. “You were pretty convincing.”
“What makes you think I was blowing smoke? I might not trust you to make a decent pot of coffee, but I mean it when I say you got this.”
No pressure.
The rafters were quiet and motion-free. And more importantly, I didn’t have that prickly not-alone feeling I got in the presence of the dead—the one I only notice once I tease it apart from my general free-floating anxiety.
“She’s not here,” I said.
“Maybe she moved on. If she was, what, a complainer? Then maybe she just wanted someone to know her story. As much as we humans think we’re the center of the universe, we’re still social creatures. Maybe it was enough for you to know the chain of events: Hale pestering her to the point where she had to come up with such an elaborate workaround, the stress of which eventually killed her.”
Maybe. I lowered the nozzle of my salt gun and pulled up my phone. “But what about the rats? Were they real? Or just a figment of my…imagination?”
As I spoke, the last word left my mouth in a curl of frozen vapor, and the lights flickered. Not just the glaring shop lamp…but Bly’s flashlight, too. The flashlight settled into a thin, bluish-white beam while the shop lamp strobed in an irregular pattern punctuated by an eerie electrical buzzing. The temperature dropped from sweater-cold to parka-cold in the span of a heartbeat, so fast that a swirl of frozen vapor undulated in the flickering light.
“Aw, hell,” Bly said.
I figured I might as well take advantage of his non-medium perception. “Are the rats real? Can you see them?”
“Yeah. They’re real, all right.”
He had to be second-guessing
his impulse to volunteer as my backup, but he didn’t bail. I focused on sucking down white light and extending my protective barrier to include him.
There was movement all around us, subtle shifting shadows and frost swirling through flickering light—and then there was more. The movement of dozens of small, quick rodents, streaming through the rafters like a river.
Either Bly’s fear was so unlike my own, or my white light was so topped off, it was obvious which panic was mine and which was his. Funny, how many flavors there are to fear. But I was more freaked out that a bunch of muscular goons might give me a repeat performance of Camp Hell than I was by the thought of feeling tiny paws on my leg.
“Amelia Griggs,” I called out—true and clear. “I did what you asked, I looked into Hale. Now it’s time for you to move on.”
The rats skittered and swarmed, and then piled into a humanoid shape.
Bly drew a shaky breath and his panic spiked. His flashlight beam bounced off the ceiling.
I grabbed his arm and squeezed it hard. “Don’t black out. We got this.” And I didn’t know whether or not psychic empathy worked that way, but after all the time I’d tried to shield my emotions from him, to minimize my self-doubt and discouragement and protect the real me from scrutiny, I tried the opposite. With a psychic push, I tried to override his panic. Of course I felt healthy fear. But it was shored up with the knowledge that if I’d been able to keep Jennifer Chance out from under my skin, I could handle what was happening now.
“Amelia,” I repeated. “You’re dead. And I know you feel the pull of the veil—but you haven’t been dead that long, and I can tell you this: the more you resist it, the stronger it’ll get, until all that’s left is some burning obsession that wipes out the rest of your personality. You had a good life—a full life. And now it’s time to move on to whatever comes next.”
The rat pile roiled around, forming and re-forming the shape of a person. Of Amelia. Bly leaned on me hard as his knees started to buckle, and I dug my fingers into his forearm.
“C’mon, man,” I told him. “Stay with me.”
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