Out of the Shadows

by Kay Hooper

  But now he realized that her abrupt collapse was more than a little odd. “I assumed it was because of your shield. That all the energy you had trapped inside all this time had finally burst free. I knew as soon as I touched you that the shield was completely gone; that's how I was able to get through to you.”

  She got up to refill her coffee cup, still frowning. Instead of returning to the table, she leaned back against the counter near the sink and looked at him steadily. “No, that isn't what happened. I know it's what you were worried about, but I was able to control that energy without letting it damage me. Years of practice. There were side effects, sure—the headaches, for one. But nothing that could have caused that sort of ultimate collapse, and certainly not without warning.”

  “Then what did cause it?”

  Miranda set her cup on the counter. “I was in the living room?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then whatever caused it must have been in there.” She went into the living room and Bishop followed. They studied the room, which looked entirely peaceful and unthreatening.

  Miranda sat on the couch, gazing at the Ouija board on the coffee table. “Why is this here? I could swear Bonnie told me they were up in her room when they used it.”

  “They wouldn't have carried it down here for any reason?”

  “I can't think why they would have. Or why my housekeeper would have.”

  Bishop sat beside her. He reached out and idly moved the planchette to the center of the board. “If this is what they used to contact… whoever it was they contacted … then it's a literal doorway.”

  She looked at him. “And maybe Bonnie forgot to close the door.”

  “Or closed it too late,” he suggested. “I don't know too much about this sort of thing; like I told you, we've had trouble coming up with any viable tests or measurements, and the research on the subject is shaky at best. But I seem to remember you telling me once that there was no way for a medium to control what came through an open door.”

  “As far as I know, that's true. Sometimes a medium can partially block a doorway to narrow the opening, but that's it. And the danger is that it's usually the angriest, most negative spirit that rushes through the first open door it sees.”

  “The most recently and violently killed.”

  Miranda nodded. “Usually.”

  “Which in this case is likely to be Steve Penman, or maybe Lynet Grainger. Both were killed more quickly than the other two, with less time to even try to accept what was going to happen to them.”

  “True.” Miranda thought about it for a minute. “Bonnie confessed that she and Amy had tried once before to contact someone who could help us locate Steve. It was a brief attempt, stopped pretty abruptly—but the name spelled out as their contact was Lynet's.”

  “She didn't strike me as the angry sort,” Bishop said.

  “No, she was a … very quiet, sweet-tempered girl.” Miranda drew a breath. “But she died an adolescent, and the sheer emotional energy of that could easily be destructive. She could be desperate enough to live that she didn't stop to count the cost to anyone else.”

  Bishop tapped the board with a finger. “If this is the doorway Bonnie used, the place where she focused her energies, then her own mind was somewhat protected. Right?”

  “Yes, especially if she raised her own shields immediately after they made contact. Kara and I taught her when she was very small how to protect herself as much as possible, and by now it's an automatic defense.”

  “Then what would happen if the doorway was open just long enough for a spirit to come through—but not long enough for it to find Bonnie's mind accessible?”

  “Then the spirit would be … here.” Miranda looked around. “In the house.”

  “Confined here?”

  “Probably, at least for a while. Some are able to migrate to other places through connections with people they knew in life, but if this is where it came in, then it's stuck here until it gets its bearings and is able to gain and focus strength.”

  Slightly distracted by possibilities, Bishop said, “In that case, I hope the kid isn't a voyeur.”

  Miranda smiled. “According to Bonnie and other mediums I've talked to, spirits trapped in our world aren't completely here. They're only able to see the living people who are able to see them; the rest of us exist to them only as … the flicker of shadows caught out of the corner of their eyes.”

  Bishop grimaced. “The way most of us see them.”

  “Exactly. They don't drift around watching the living because they can't really see us. We just happen to inhabit the same space, I suppose on different dimensional planes.”

  Bishop thought about that. “Okay, that relieves my mind, at least on that point. Now—Bonnie and her friends make contact and then promptly leave the house. The only person left here is your housekeeper, who is probably not psychic.”

  “Definitely not psychic.”

  “Then she leaves. And the next person to come in— is you.”

  “Yes, but my shields were—” Miranda broke off, the wheels of memory almost visibly turning. “Wait a minute. I remember now. I came in here after taking a shower, and something made me think there might be an intruder in the house.”

  “What?”

  “The board. The Ouija board was on the floor. When I first got home it was here on the coffee table. I knew I should search the house, but I… I decided to drop my shields instead. Just for a moment, so I could check the house faster and more thoroughly.”

  “And you opened a door,” Bishop said.

  With the clinic all but empty, they'd had their choice of rooms, but Seth's father had casually asked his son and Bonnie to sleep in the four-bed ward with the youngest patients, two little girls, and “keep them company.”

  Whether it was for the sake of propriety or in case the girls needed them, neither Seth nor Bonnie objected. In any case, Seth didn't intend to close his eyes, not tonight. Long after the girls and Bonnie had settled into sleep, he sat in the lounge near the door and listened to the storm raging outside the dim, quiet room.

  As the hours passed, he fought off drowsiness several times, jerking awake to peer around the room uneasily, to listen the way someone snatched from sleep by a nightmare would listen for the stealthy footsteps of an intruder.

  If asked, he couldn't have explained just what he was feeling. Anxiety over Bonnie, of course, because he thought this spirit business upset her more than she was saying. Lingering shock over the tragedy that had all but destroyed her family, and lingering astonishment that Steve's body had been found just where that damned Ouija board had claimed it would be.

  A Ouija board, for Christ's sake.

  He didn't believe in any of that shit. Well… he hadn't. But something about Bonnie's attitude had told him loud and clear that he'd better readjust his thinking if his future included her—which it most certainly did. And the damned thing had been right,there was no getting away from that.

  Brooding, Seth shifted restlessly in his chair at least twice before it occurred to him that something was wrong. He didn't know what it was at first, but when the storm stilled for several minutes, he heard it. The sound was so low he'd noticed it only subconsciously, but now the hair on the nape of his neck was stirring, and he felt a chill of unease so strong it brought him up out of his chair.

  He checked out the ward, moving slowly, pausing often to listen and silently cursing the storm as it picked up again. It was difficult to hear anything else, but as he circled the room and ended up at Bonnie's bedside, he heard it.

  A faint rustling sound, almost like … whispering. It was low and quiet, but rose and fell, teasing his senses as he tried to grasp it and understand what it was. An insect? A mouse in the wall? A voice?

  Seth bent over Bonnie and listened, but the hushed, rustling sounds weren't coming from her. She was sleeping, apparently peacefully, and he had to fight the urge to wake her just to make certain she was all right.

  He
forced himself to leave her in order to circle the room once again, and again ended up standing beside her bed looking down at her. That whispering … It wasn't an insect, and it wasn't a mouse, he was sure of that.

  He was also sure of something else. Whatever it was, the sound was here. All around Bonnie. It wasn't coming from her, and yet… it was here. As if the very air above her relaxed, sleeping body contained something….

  A deeper chill swept through him, and he reached out to wake Bonnie, suddenly convinced beyond all reason that she was in desperate, deadly danger.

  Before he could touch her, the storm quieted in another lull, and the silence of the room closed about him. He heard Bonnie breathing softly. Heard one of the little girls shift in her bed and murmur something unintelligible. Nothing else.

  Seth drew back his hand and listened intently for several minutes, but there was only peaceful quiet inside and the storm outside.

  Half under his breath, he said, “Daniels, you're losing it.”

  But he moved his uncomfortable chair closer to Bonnie's bed. And he didn't feel drowsy again, not for a long, long time.

  “I'm not a medium,” Miranda protested.

  “No, which is why the spirit couldn't inhabit your mind,” Bishop said. “But it tried. Tried to force its way, to cut your mind and spirit free of your body so it could have a vessel of its own again. And when your defenses slammed up, their normal strength magnified by all the force you'd been building inside …”

  “It was too much,” she finished slowly. “My system couldn't handle it, physically or mentally. My spirit very nearly was cut loose, drifting away. And without that, my body was—”

  “Dying. It makes sense. As much as any of this makes sense, that is.”

  Miranda smiled slightly. “So you did save my life. Thank you.”

  Bishop had a vague memory of growling something at her about doing whatever it took to keep her alive, and half hoped she'd forgotten that. He was fully aware that the ruthless aspect of his nature made her wary, and he wasn't sure if, given his actions in the past, she had any confidence in his ability to use that ruthlessness wisely.

  “You're welcome,” he said.

  Miranda laughed under her breath, then went grave again as she looked down at the Ouija board. “So whatever spirit they contacted is probably still here, in the house.” She kept her voice matter-of-fact, even though her skin crawled at the idea of a spirit so angry or desperate to escape, it had ruthlessly attacked her.

  “Are you sure of that?”

  “No. But I think we'd better assume it for now.”

  “And both of us are psychically blind as a couple of bats. Even if we were mediumistic, neither of us could open a door for it—to come into us or to leave here. So we're safe from it, at least for now. But when we regain our abilities we'll have to be careful; if it attacked you only because your shields were down, then anyone with any kind of psychic ability could be at risk.”

  “Bonnie can't come back here,” Miranda said.

  “At least not until we regain our abilities and figure out what to do about it,” he agreed. “Young as she is, we can't take the chance she might not be able to protect herself—especially if, say, it's the spirit of Steve Penman, who by most accounts did have a lot of anger in his nature.”

  Recalling the force of the attack against her, Miranda felt a chill. Bonnie had good shields, strong shields, but they could be weakened by physical weariness or slip because of carelessness or inattention. Just a slight opening, a weak point in the defenses, and an angry spirit could force its way in—especially into the mind of a mediumistic psychic designed by nature to be receptive to the contact.

  “She'll be all right, Miranda.”

  He was, she decided, getting entirely too good at reading her, especially without benefit of his extra senses. “I know.”

  “You said it would take time for the spirit to gain enough energy, enough strength, to leave here. Right?”

  “Right.” As far as I know. But do I know enough to be sure?

  “Then we have a little breathing room. And there is a more immediate threat we have to consider.”

  He was right. Pushing aside the unknown, Miranda said, “Gossip is spreading fast about how we were able to find Steve's body. Sooner or later, the killer is going to find out Bonnie poses a danger to him.”

  “Yes—assuming he even believes in what she can do.”

  “You said it yourself, Bishop—this killer wants to think he's in control and all-powerful; it will only reinforce his ego if he thinks the only way we can interfere with his plans is by using paranormal means. That's right, isn't it? He'll be eager to accept the idea that the ghost of one of his victims sent us to find Steve Penman.”

  “He'll also be eager to make sure we can't use that tool again. Especially if it unsettles him to believe his victims can speak through Bonnie, can accuse him of his crimes. So I'd say we have far more to fear from the living than the dead, for the present anyway.”

  Miranda got up and moved across the room to the big front window. The streetlights were barely visible through the swirling, blowing snow, and the moaning of the wind was constant.

  “I hate this,” she muttered. “We're isolated, cut off from everything, helpless to do anything but wait. While that maniac is out there somewhere, probably pissed and thinking about his next victim. I just hope to God he's trapped inside like the rest of us.”

  Bishop came up behind her and slid his arms around her. “You know, for an atheist you have an interesting relationship with God.”

  She was stiff for just an instant, then relaxed against him. “Oh, you noticed that?”

  “I did, yes.”

  She chuckled, grateful for the momentary distraction from her worries. “Just habit, I suppose, to use the word. The name. No disrespect intended or offense meant. And no belief in a deity. Malign fate, maybe, but no benevolent intelligence watching over us.”

  “Yet you know something of us survives death.”

  “To me, that's not a religious thing—not a question of faith or belief, or any notion that surviving death is some kind of reward for a life well lived. It's a certainty. It's like knowing a tree sheds its leaves year after year, cultivating a new set each spring of its life cycle. The tree grows and sinks its roots deeper and deeper, and wears a new set of leaves each spring until it finally grows as large as it can, reaches the end of its life, and dies.”

  “Our bodies are the … leaves of our soul?”

  “Why not?” She shrugged. “We tend to think what's real and lasting is only what we can see, but that doesn't mean we're right. Maybe our skin and bones and the faces we see in the mirror are really the most transitory things about us. Maybe we just wear our bodies the way that tree wears its leaves, our physical selves being born and maturing and dying over and over while inside our spirits grow and learn.”

  “It has its attractions, that theory,” Bishop said. “And maybe it explains …”

  “Explains what?”

  He hesitated, and when he replied he made sure his tone was light. “Explains what I felt the first time I set eyes on you. Do you suppose one soul can recognize another even wearing a different set of leaves?”

  After a moment, she said in an equally casual tone, “I guess that would depend on the soul. An old soul would probably have more practice at it, especially if you believe the karmic theory that says we travel through our existence surrounded by many of the same souls in life after life. Maybe we're psychic because we're old souls, and these abilities of ours are simply the result of a … spiritual evolution.”

  Bishop wondered if neither of them wanted to probe too deeply and question their own feelings because they were afraid of the answers they might find. But he accepted the tacit avoidance, and his own relief told him he was not yet ready to risk pushing Miranda in that direction.

  “Another theory that has its own attractions,” he said judiciously. “Nice to think of oneself as a highl
y evolved soul. Do you suppose an earlier set of my leaves might have been Charlemagne?”

  Miranda turned to smile up at him. “More likely Rasputin,” she said. “Although I suppose you could have been both, given the dates.”

  “The Mad Monk? Thanks a lot.”

  She slid her arms up around his neck. “There's just something about those eyes. Absolutely hypnotic.”

  “If you'll forgive a bad pun—look who's talking.” He kissed her, then said, “We won't let anyone harm Bonnie, Miranda. Not in this life or from the next.”

  “Promise?” Immediately, she shook her head. “No, that's not fair. And not realistic.”

  Bishop lifted a hand to smooth a strand of her silky black hair from her face. He knew she was right, knew that to make such a promise right now, with everything that was going on around them, was unreasonable and even irrational. But he wasn't very surprised to hear himself say steadily, “I promise, Miranda.”

  Sunday, January 16

  Deputy Sandy Lynch refilled her coffee cup and returned to her desk after a brief look out the window. The wind had finally died down, at least for the moment, and the snow had slowed to gently drifting flakes; if she'd been a fan of winter wonderlands, she would have loved it. But with a foot or so of snow on the ground and power outages being reported now that people were up and about, it promised to be a difficult, busy day for the Sheriff's Department.

  Especially if, as the Weather Service was predicting, the back side of the storm blew through later today.

  Sandy sipped her coffee and then rubbed her eyes wearily. Spending most of the night reading old classified ads hadn't been a lot of fun, but at least it had kept her occupied. Not that she really knew what she was looking for. As instructed, she was making a list of similar ads that had run around the time of each of more than a dozen reported disappearances of teens passing through the area. But in doing so, she had noticed that several businesses appeared to run ads all or most of the time—like the paper mill, for instance, which always seemed to need to hire more employees.

  The car dealerships and garages also appeared to have a high turnover, the school system always seemed to be looking for bus drivers and janitors, and even the town of Gladstone itself offered a fairly constant stream of opportunities for transient labor such as street cleaning and litter control, grounds maintenance, and various kinds of painting and repairs.