Only The Good Die Young

Jensen Murphy, Ghost for Hire - 1

by

Chris Marie Green

To every writer’s group I’ve been a part of over the years. Your support and knowledge are the building blocks of what I love to do. Thank you!

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

As always, I want to thank Ginjer Buchanan for believing in me! That also goes for my agent, Pamela Harty, and my critique partners, Sheri Whitefeather and Judy Duarte, plus my family. You guys are all inspirations to me.

And speaking of inspiration, thank you to Deborah J. Ross and Linda Thomas-Sundstrom. As writers, we are often asked how we get book ideas, and the most accurate thing I can come up with is that every story has its genesis, starting with one domino, and then growing stronger as each one connects with the one before, causing others to fall into what becomes a real, live book.

The dominos for this series were set in motion at a lunch during the 2011 World Fantasy Con. A private, profound story from Deborah was the first domino, and it connected to the next one while Linda and I were on our way back to the workshops, exchanging thoughts about what we’d heard from our friend. The next one fell as we moved on to chatting about true crime books, in particular the excellent The Cases That Haunt Us by John E. Douglas and Mark Olshaker. I told Linda about the stories in it—profiles of the JonBenét Ramsey, O. J. Simpson, and Jack the Ripper cases, among others—and then Linda referred back to the title of the book. “People like [a certain killer] should be haunted,” she said. Bam! “What if there was a ghost who worked for an agency that tried to scare confessions out of people?” I blurted out. Linda and I laughed, and from that point on, Jensen Murphy started talking to me in her ’eighties, dead-girl, justice-seeking ghost voice.

Lest you think I forgot about my final thank-you (not quite!), much appreciation goes to my readers. You are always there, always supportive, and always awesome. It’s an honor to know you on Facebook and Twitter, and it makes my week when I meet you in person. Hope you enjoy this new series—it’s all yours.

A FREE SPIRIT

The second I snapped out of what Amanda Lee called my “residual haunting phase”—a time loop I was clearly stuck in until she yanked me out of it with the psychic mojo in her voice and the sight of the bracelets from my era—I knew just what I was.

Dead.

Deader than a doornail. Deader than a shrunken head. Deader than when video killed the radio star.

Very dead indeed. Actually, I had been living that truth over and over for a long time in that forest, so death didn’t seem like all that big an issue when I became an intelligent spirit. What actually freaked me out more than anything was the fact that I didn’t remember who my killer was. I guess I’d spent so much time in my noninteractive ghost state that I’d gone a little numb. Or maybe, as Amanda Lee suggested, I had some sort of “fright wall” erected in my brain, and that was the only thing keeping my fragile spirit psyche together.

Amanda Lee thought my memories would all come back to me, though, just as soon as I was ready to deal. And, being a total rich-lady do-gooder, she promised to help me figure out my deal. To her, I was a real live… I mean… not totally alive mystery.

In the Beginning…

On the anniversary of Jensen Murphy’s disappearance, the psychic knew, without a doubt, that this was finally the night she would find her.

Amanda Lee Minter walked alone through the night-shaded trees of Elfin Forest, a place where haunted energy filled the air with legends like the White Lady and the insane asylum that was supposed to have burned to the ground and left many a soul to wander. And there had to be at least a hundred other ghost stories besides these, all pressed around the windy trails that snaked from the Southern California coast and then inland like long, gnarled fingers beckoning people to enter the darkness.

To get lost and maybe never found, just like Jensen Murphy.

After the police had finished all their interviews and investigations, it became public knowledge that twenty-three-year-old Jensen and her friends had ventured into the forest on that fateful night to scare themselves silly with the help of some of those ghost stories and, at least for the other kids, booze. Jensen had refrained that night since she’d been the designated driver.

But the group at large was only doing what so many others had done over the years, driving up to the security-guarded gates of Questhaven—a supposed cult church that was really only a spiritual retreat—and trooping through the woods nearby so that they might get a peek of the hooded figures that were supposed to roam the area.

Amanda Lee was too darn old to be frightened by that nonsense, though. Fifty-two years of psychic intuition had shown her some real hauntings.

And so had life itself.

As leaves crunched under her fringed boots, she knew just where to go, and she looked around at the shadows, drawing her shawl tighter, feeling the night’s chill on her face. Then she made her way deeper into the woods until she stopped, cocked her head, listened to what no normal person would be able to pick up in the air.

A buzzing.

A… presence?

After months of preparing herself for this moment, she moved forward, taking shelter behind a tree, finding what she had been looking for all along.

Jensen Murphy.

Amanda Lee could barely breathe as she watched the young woman crouching near the trunk of an oak on all fours nearby.

Carefully, with her heart catching in her throat, Amanda Lee kneeled, her skirt spreading around her.

The girl was unnaturally gray under the shadow-filtered moonlight, her fingers scratching at the dirt, her eyes wide with animal fright as she fixed her attention on something in the distance. Amanda Lee thought of a picture she’d seen of Jensen Murphy from the night she’d disappeared: a rosy-cheeked face, long and straight strawberry summer hair, freckles sprinkled over her nose, a glimmer of mischief in her green eyes as she posed with a Mello Yello she’d been drinking that night at the party. She was dressed in a pair of Levi’s jeans and a light blue top rolled up at the sleeves and tied at the waist with a white tank underneath.

She was the all-American girl who’d been popular in high school, everybody’s best friend.

And someone’s prey.

“Jensen?” Amanda Lee whispered.

The girl didn’t react.

She’s in a state of numbness, Amanda Lee thought, and she tried to reach her again, louder now.

“Jensen?”

Nearby, an owl took off in a flutter of wings, shaking a few leaves off a branch.

But even then, Jensen Murphy didn’t move. Her terrified gaze was still fixed on the trees to the right of Amanda Lee.

The eerie silence scratched down her spine. She didn’t look around, though. Nothing would be there. At least nothing that could hurt her. Her sixth sense had already told her that.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” Amanda Lee said, her voice stronger. “I’m going to help you.”

The girl began to shake her head, crawling behind the tree trunk, as if it could hide her from whatever was out there.

“Jensen—”

A strangled sound—half scream, half cry—came out of Jensen Murphy just before she sprang to her feet and started to run, her white sneakers flashing in the moonlight.

Amanda Lee pressed a hand over her mouth as she watched helplessly: Jensen making it only a few steps away before she crashed to the ground on her stomach. Jensen screaming as she turned onto her back, lifting her arms and pleading, sheltering her face, and then—

Then there was… nothing.

No more Jensen, no more missing girl.

Nothing except for the empty air, traced by a smell that stole into Amanda Lee’s senses. Fear. Sweat. And the faint hint of something else she couldn’t identify yet.

She calmed her heartbeat, her intuition telling her there would be more to come. She reached into her skirt pocket and gripped an object she had brought with her—something that would be all too familiar to Jensen.

“I’m only here to help you,” Amanda Lee whispered again.

Nothing moved—not unless you counted the near-distant creak of a branch, the wind whistling through trees.

Still, she waited.

Waited.

Until Jensen popped into existence again, out of thin air.

Hardly surprised at this turn of events, Amanda Lee watched as the girl repeated everything she had done before, as if she were in a time loop: crouching beneath the tree, her wide gaze on something in the near distance—

This time, though, Amanda Lee held out the objects in her hand—a black-banded network of rubber bracelets like the ones Madonna used to wear before she’d gone fully mainstream. They were dull with age.

Ignoring them, Jensen was already shaking her head, inching back toward the tree.

“Jensen!” Amanda Lee had focused every bit of mental energy and desperate sympathy she had into the name, and now…

Now, with a burst that felt electric and startling, Jensen Murphy swiveled her gaze over to Amanda Lee.

Air whooshed out of her lungs, and for a breathless second, she didn’t know what to do. She’d never encountered anything like this before.

But Amanda Lee recovered soon enough, straightening her spine as Jensen’s gaze locked onto the bracelets.

“You lost jewelry just like this that night,” Amanda Lee said, offering the objects again, just as if the conversation she was having with Jensen were perfectly normal, as if, every day, she encountered missing women like this.

She shook the jewelry, reclaiming the girl’s focus. “These could have been yours.”

Jensen narrowed her eyes, obviously confused now. Then, spooked, she looked around the forest, then back at Amanda Lee, whose blood was rushing to her head, making her dizzy with surreal success.

“You have a sort of amnesia,” Amanda Lee said as gently as possible. “I hear it isn’t unusual, and it should disappear as you get over the initial shock.”

“I’m…” Jensen trailed off.

The word had sounded like a burst of static, but somehow Amanda Lee understood it clearly.

“It’s March fifteenth.” Amanda Lee smiled at Jensen, her gaze going fuzzy with oncoming tears. Emotion that she couldn’t hold back for much longer. “I’ve tried to find you on other nights, but then I realized… you might come and go, but you would definitely be here now, on this date, after midnight. That’s when your friends noticed you hadn’t returned to their party here in the woods.”

The young woman lifted her colorless gray hand, looking at it as if she was just now recalling something vague, something that was slowly coming back to her. “This… is the night…”

She was having trouble forming words, but Amanda Lee had no problem supplying them.

“That’s right,” she said softly, gradually walking toward her. “This is the night you died, nearly thirty years ago, and I’m here to help you figure out who killed you.”

She didn’t add that she had something else in mind for Jensen Murphy, too.

She reached out to touch the ghost’s face, but Amanda Lee felt only a zapping chill when her hand met the freezing air.

1

It took me a while to get used to being a real ghost, and I only say that because, since my death, I guess I was in some kind of state of shock.

That’s what Amanda Lee told me, anyway.

My so-called savior was an intuitive and—well, let’s just be honest—a different lady. First of all, when she pronounces her name, it sounds a lot like that creepy house in the book Rebecca. Remember “Manderley”? That’s just about how Amanda Lee says her name, except with an a at the beginning. “A MANdaley.” I think it’s because of the years she spent living in Virginia before moving to SoCal. She told me a little bit about that after she rescued me from the woods, but we’ve basically been talking about me instead ever since then.

At least, she’s been telling me what she knows of my story.

Based on what my friends had said to the police about that night, the tale went a little something like this: a young college dropout slash Round Table Pizza waitress and her buddies went out late to frolic in the spooky old forest out of sheer boredom. Said waitress had been drying out from a bender the night before, so she’d drunk scads of soda pop because she’d been in charge of carting around her doped-up buddies, then wandered off to take a pee, never to return.

And that’s all she wrote. No body, no blood at my death spot, no trace of evidence that would help the cops to find me—not much of anything, really.

Weirdly, when I heard what’d happened to me, it didn’t surprise me all that much, because the second I snapped out of what Amanda Lee called my “residual haunting phase”—a time loop I was clearly stuck in until she yanked me out of it with the psychic mojo in her voice and the sight of the bracelets from my era—I knew just what I was.

Dead.

Deader than a doornail. Deader than a shrunken head. Deader than when video killed the radio star.

Very dead indeed. Actually, I had been living that truth over and over for a long time in that forest, so death didn’t seem like all that big an issue when I became an intelligent spirit. What actually freaked me out more than anything was the fact that I didn’t remember who my killer was. I guess I’d spent so much time in my noninteractive ghost state that I’d gone a little numb. Or maybe, as Amanda Lee suggested, I had some sort of “fright wall” erected in my brain, and that was the only thing keeping my fragile spirit psyche together.

Amanda Lee thought my memories would all come back to me, though, just as soon as I was ready to deal. And, being a total rich-lady do-gooder, she promised to help me figure out my deal. To her, I was a real live… I mean… not totally alive mystery.

I’d latched onto Amanda Lee’s offer to help me straightaway, mainly because she’d also told me I’m probably “tethered” to this plane because of being killed, and the only way my soul can find peace would be to take care of my earthly business.

Funny, huh? That word—tethered. Like I was a volleyball tied to a pole, winding around it and around it, going nowhere.

About a week after Amanda Lee found me, I felt about as aimless as that ball as I hovered in front of a computer in a teeny casita guesthouse on her property. Since Amanda Lee theorized that spirits are composed of energy—she mentioned electromagnetic radiation—you could say that I was using my connection with the electricity in the air to manipulate what she called “Web pages.” Even if the screen always futzed a bit when I got too close, I had already done a ton of research into my killing and had hit every barrier imaginable. Now I’d graduated to satisfying my curiosity about things such as whether Jane Fonda ruled the planet yet, or if there was any place you could still buy Pop Rocks.

By the way, I couldn’t get over this Internet. It was like the mind of a communal, confused, sometimes idiotic god.

Amanda Lee eased open the door and strolled into the room, wearing designer hippy-dippy boots under a flowered skirt, a long-sleeved sheer purple top over a camisole, and a clump of turquoise necklaces. Pretty hip for her age. She reminded me of the type of cool, got-it-together mom who’d lived on my suburban block when I was a kid—and her house would’ve had the swimming pool that everyone liked to visit because she was never home except to say hi. Her hair was a deep red with white streaks framing her face, pulled back in a low ponytail today. She was tall and slender, with a longish face and high cheekbones, her eyes a clear gray.

She had a way of looking at me all the time with what I’d call a “soft” tone, as if she was always thinking sympathetic thoughts or maybe even pitying my fate.

Poor Casper me, right? The eternal houseguest.

“Anything interesting on the World Wide Web on a Sunday?” she asked in a voice that a pool mother would’ve used when she poked her head out to ask kids if they wanted any lemonade.

I hadn’t heard a tone like that in… you guessed it, aeons. But it wasn’t just because I’d been dead awhile. My parents had gone on a fateful sailing trip on their catamaran a year and a half before I’d passed on. In a way, I was relieved that Mom and Dad hadn’t had to go through the pain of my missing-person case. Imagine dealing with their only daughter vanishing off the face of the planet. Ugh.

“I’ve discovered,” I said, since talking was much easier now that I’d had some practice with Amanda Lee, “that I’m still just a stranger in a strange land. One minute, I’m playing Duran Duran’s first album on a turntable. The next I’m looking out the window decades later, seeing thirteen-year-olds walking home from school with… smartphones?”

I was still getting used to all the lingo.

Amanda Lee nodded, looking pleased with me. If I were a dog, my tail would’ve been wagging.

I float-walked away from the computer. “When I was thirteen, I was utterly amazed at how a record needle picked up sound. It was magic. Now kids can hold every piece of music ever created in their palms. Hell, these days, I wouldn’t be surprised if you can get information chips in your brains and the mark of Satan on your foreheads.”

Once, a friend had told me to read The Late Great Planet Earth after we’d gotten into a weed-fueled discussion about how the world was going to end. It was actually the last book I’d picked up before I died. Funny how I could recall that and not the finer details of important stuff in life like… oh, who’d killed me or anything.

“I’ve already had my mark of evil cosmetically removed with a Martian laser,” Amanda Lee said.

I actually believed her until she laughed. But can you blame me for being gullible, even for a sec?

I wasn’t sure I liked this new age. The ’eighties had been much… quainter.

As if tuning in to my thoughts, Amanda Lee said, “Don’t grow old before your time, Jensen.”

“I’m not sure I have a time anymore.”

I smiled, bringing another one out in her, too. Just in the week I’d been here, I’d learned that she was the only person I knew of who could see me smile or, hell, even see my altered appearance well enough to inform me that I looked like a black-and-white TV version of a person and not so real at all.

And you know what’s also a bummer? Being barred from communicating with other humans, like the gardener who trimmed Amanda Lee’s herb and flower garden or the newspaper guy who tossed the newest edition to the porch of her Mediterranean-style house at every crack of dawn. It’s so boring to be invisible to most people. I mean, the best distractions I had going were this Internet thing and the programs and movies on the TV Amanda Lee had also left for sleepless ol’ me.

She sat on a carved-wood, leather sofa, one of many antiques in the casita, then folded her hands in her lap. “I should tell you that I didn’t exactly come here to listen to your existential crisis.”

“But I’ll bet you’re fascinated so far.”

A raised eyebrow paid tribute to my flippancy. Then, “I was wondering if you would like to take a field trip.”

My body went on the fritz, just like a TV did, but it wasn’t from excitement. Not even.

Amanda Lee lowered her voice to an understanding whisper. “It’ll be okay this time, Jensen.”

“Will it?”

“I know the first trip was rough on you. But you wanted to see Suzanne.”

Yes, I had wanted.

See, at first, I had gone a little nuts with this spirit stuff, flying around like a maniac, feeling the wind brush all over me. I’d learned right away that I could travel on electric currents and, I mean, it was totally Star Trek time—one place to another in a space-age minute.

It took me a bit longer to sober up and get to the more serious issues, though, like being invisible.

Like visiting friends who’d gone on to a life without me.

My first visit had been during a field trip to an Irish pub in the Gaslamp Quarter. “It might be healthy to get in touch with the past,” Amanda Lee had said in a gentle drawl that had somewhat been ironed out by years of West Coast living. “Suzanne was with you earlier on the night you died, before you left for Elfin Forest. Maybe seeing her will trigger a useful memory about your killing.”

So she had taken her car to the pub as I caught a current and surfed it into a dark-wooded room, which smelled of hops and cabbage. While Amanda Lee had ordered a sausage roll, I had floated to a corner of the bar, rocked at seeing my best friend for the first time in ages.

Suze was over fifty-three years old now, and she looked every second of it, with gray glinting in the long brown curls of hair, with her blue eyes as washed out as the holey jeans she used to wear. It was near the end of her bartending shift, and afterward, she had gone home to a matchbox of an apartment, eating dinner at the table by herself as she looked out the dark window at the guttering lights of her junky neighborhood.

The sight of her alienation pierced me. Earlier, she’d been surrounded by people, only to go back to a lonely hovel, almost as if she were a ghost herself.

Before I could even ask myself what Suze might’ve known about my last night as a person, I zoomed back to the casita and got lost in the most welcome distraction of the TV. Amanda Lee had left me alone, probably thinking that our field trip had drained me because we’d been so far from my death spot. It hadn’t been all that bad.

“What kind of torture do you have in mind for me this time?” I asked now.

Amanda Lee could obviously tell I was being difficult. “You’ve been wondering about him, haven’t you?”

I bristled, knowing exactly whom she was talking about. “Just because I’ve been wondering doesn’t mean I should pay a visit to him.”

Amanda Lee folded her hands on her lap instead of saying anything to that. As if she’d had to compose herself for some reason, she smiled slightly.

“Seeing him was only an idea,” she said.

Had she wanted to say something else to me?

I couldn’t help myself. I float-walked to her, reaching out to touch her out of pure instinct, just like one person would’ve put her hand on another’s shoulder when she thought something might be wrong and she was encouraging the other person to talk about it.

At the contact, she sucked in a harsh breath, shivering. “Jensen.”

I flinched away.

“You know what touching me does,” she said. “You’re chilly.”

“Sorry.”

But I was confused.

Touching her had done more than make her shiver. I’d actually intuited something from Amanda Lee for the first time ever. I’d made contact with her only once before, but she’d obviously been prepared that time, and I’d only seen a field of gray in her. Understandably, she hadn’t wanted me in her head.

Yet, this go-round, I’d seen a sparkling flash in her mind—a diamond image—before it’d gone gray.

Yeah, I’d gotten something all right. At least, enough to tell me that I might be able to empathize with humans—and maybe not just Amanda Lee, either.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, brushing her hands down her skirt as she stood, then went to access the computer. She delicately typed with her manicured nails until a map showed up on the screen.

“Even if Dean wasn’t in Elfin Forest that night, seeing him might jar your recollection about what happened all those years ago.” She’d thought the same about visiting Suze.

She gestured toward the screen. “I’ve put his location up here, if you’d like to study it.”

“But…”

“Just think it over.”

After she left, I thought about how the Suze field trip had left me in a funk for days. But I had to admit it—I wanted to see my old boyfriend. The temptation was overwhelming.

I glanced at the directions on the computer. What was I going to do for the rest of the decade—just sit here and not care about solving my own crime?

Besides, the sad fact was that I did want to see Dean. I’d been wanting to ever since I was pulled out of the imprint, and now…

Now I took in the lay of the land on the computer, then went to the door, seeping through the crack under it, riding a current out of the chichi vibe of Amanda Lee’s Rancho Santa Fe neighborhood and north, toward the suburbs of San Marcos.

As I traveled, it seemed as if I was in the middle of a humming, pulsating tunnel—it felt like an artery, with me as the blood.

When I was human, I’d never realized that spirits have the ability to appear in different locations. Sure, I’d heard the stories about how Elvis haunted this house and that one, but I’d chalked all that up to kooky people seeing what they wanted to see. Elvis is a pretty popular guy, after all, high in demand, even in death. But now I know that, if the old dude is actually a ghost now, he could easily go from one place to the next if he needed some excitement. Or maybe he just has a purpose in being in more than one place.

Any way you slice it, it seems the farther we spirits travel from our death spots, the weaker we get. I’ve learned this much from my few experiences so far, and my saving grace is that Amanda Lee doesn’t live too far from Elfin Forest, and she also has batteries in the casita, which keep me healthy and glowing. If it wasn’t for those, Amanda Lee thought I might run the risk of being pulled back into that noninteractive imprint mode she found me in.

No, thanks.

As I slipped out of the current’s tunnel, I shuddered, discombobulated, hanging in the air above a street that featured cookie-cutter ranch houses. I sensed that I was in the general area of where I’d been aiming—a neighborhood with grass yards shining under a warm, spring, late-afternoon sun. I have to say that there was a sort of high I got as I floated onward, whisking close to humans who lay on lounges in their backyards or who washed the cars in their driveways, having no idea why it’d suddenly gotten chilly, only to immediately warm up again.

I tracked the address Amanda Lee had given me until I came to the one I was looking for: 297 Sajen Road. A cute white house with green trim around the windows, an old Toyota in the driveway, even a damned white picket fence. No kidding.

Then I focused in on the kids and the man behind the fence.

He was throwing a football back and forth with a teenage boy, probably his son, and a slightly older girl was nearby, practicing cheers with her red-and-white pom-poms, egging the team on.

Daddy sent her a fond smile, then sent a zinger to his son.

I didn’t know if a spirit’s heart could ache, but it sure felt like that’s what mine was doing, because the last time I’d seen Dean Morgan, it’d been almost six months before I bought it.

His hair had been surfer blond and cut straight to his chin back then. He’d been tan, his muscles lean on a streamlined body. His eyes were the color of a shot of whiskey, his smile enough to disassemble me and put me back together all in the space of a second.

“Don’t worry, Jen,” he’d said to me the last time I saw him while he stood in front of his beat-up Camaro, which was loaded with milk cartons full of clothes and cassette tapes. “I’ll be coming back.”

But he never did. There’d only been graduate school across the country at Columbia and phone calls filled with the same promise. I’d believed him, though, thinking it was true love.

Maybe it had been, back then.

I blew out a breath, stirring the leaves of the elm tree I was hovering next to. A bird jumped to another branch with a frantic tweet.

The sound caught Dean’s attention, and for a heart-jamming moment, he looked up.

Straight through me.

If I’d had blood in me, it would’ve stopped. That’s what this spirit version of heartbreak felt like, at least. But then, second by second, as he went back to playing catch with the son he’d had with someone else, I saw that his hair wasn’t so blond anymore. He was a little older than Amanda Lee, gray, with a paunch and wrinkles around his eyes.

He was a different person who had moved on after my death, and I couldn’t feel a connection to him anymore. I wasn’t even sure I’d ever really known him.

As I retreated away from the tree, the bird chirped, like it was relieved I was going. Damned fucking bird.

Damned fucking whoever had killed me, because maybe, if I had run a little faster or if my friends and I had gone to the forest on any other night, I could’ve been in this yard today, with Dean. But my death had taken that from me.

It had taken everything, and every time I made one of these field trips, the pain of loss just got worse.

I had to get away, but just before I summoned a travel artery, I saw Amanda Lee’s Bentley down the road. She was behind the steering wheel, her hands resting on it, just as if she’d known I would happen on by and she’d been as prepared as always.

She power-rolled down the window, allowing me to slide inside the car, and I sensed her shudder as my cool essence raked by.

The radio, which crackled in my presence, was playing a low tune—something blue by a woman who sounded like she’d been crying into her drink all night.

“It’s not fair,” she said, “is it?”

“Dean forgot me. I think they all have.”

“No, I guarantee they still remember, and there’s no doubt in my mind that they miss you, Jensen. But they went forward because life allowed them to.”

“Life allowed that?”

At my anger, the radio buzzed, almost like a chain saw, and Amanda Lee shut it off.

I calmed down. “Was it life that spared them and cornered me by that tree in the forest?”

“No, it wasn’t.” Amanda Lee turned in her seat to look at me, and it felt good to have someone on this earth who knew I was still here. “A human monster made the choice to hurt you.”

“I wish…”

“What?” She still watched me as if I were real enough to matter.

She made it so easy for all my resentment to boil out. “I wish I would’ve been strong enough to fight back that night.”

“And if you could have fought back?”

“I would’ve killed him before he killed me.”

I didn’t even know if the murderer was a “him,” but that wasn’t the point. Him, her, it—I hated whatever it was.

Amanda Lee leaned back in her seat, her gaze on the windshield, like she saw a thousand psychic things outside that I would never see. And maybe she did.

“Would you have really gone that far?” she asked. There was a tiny tremor in her voice.

I didn’t even have to think about an answer. “Of course I would’ve.”

“Good. I knew you’d be a fighter. That’s why I tried so hard to find you. I would go back to that forest night after night, attempting to find the place where you would materialize. And I did, on your anniversary.”

The crackle of my surroundings—the electricity that’s all around us, whether we’re ghosts or humans—snapped over my essence, pinching me.

“Why exactly did you want to find me?” I asked.

Amanda Lee looked at me again with that everything-will-be-fine smile. “The moment I heard your story, I wanted to bring your soul peace, dear. I still do. But there’s more to it.”

I thought of how, when I’d touched Amanda Lee the very first time, she’d been so cryptic. I’d had the feeling that she was purposely shutting me out.

“What have you been keeping from me?” I asked.

“Nothing nefarious.” Her smile dimmed. “As a psychic and medium, I used to have my share of people who invited me to dinner parties and afternoon teas. And every time, I realized I was there only because I sensed the dead and read the future.”

“And?” I still didn’t understand the direction of this chat. “Are you going to drag me to a luncheon so I can entertain your friends?”

“I don’t have many friends.” Amanda Lee offered a self-aware shrug.

I almost reached out to her, but thought better of it as she went on.

“I’d never fully connected to a spirit before you came along, Jensen. I would pick up energy from others, or I would hear their voices, but they would only give me fragments, pieces of conversation that didn’t always make sense. I also went to my share of death scenes, trying to find someone just like you.”

“A fighter,” I said.

“Yes. But none of them was nearly equipped to do what I’m about to ask you to do.”

I had a bad feeling about this. “Go on.”

Amanda Lee took a deep breath.

I had a real bad feeling.

“A while ago,” she said, “I was approached by one of the only true friends I do have, and he begged for my help.”

“Doing what?”

Amanda Lee’s voice was like a flatline in a quiet room. “Justice for a murder, just as you want justice for yours.”

I could feel myself blipping, like that TV on the fritz.

Justice?

Amanda Lee sat up, rushing on now that she had my complete attention. “I know the person my friend suspects as a killer is guilty—just as guilty as whoever took your life. And, just like your murderer, this one is getting away with it.”

“Why?” It sounded like a disembodied croak.

“Because this man thinks he’s above the law, and I have to agree. I’m sure he covered his tracks damned well.” Amanda Lee’s gray eyes were wider than I’d ever seen them, brimming with her belief.

It was almost like… well, like Amanda Lee had had something bad happen to her in the past, and she was identifying with this friend all too well.

My mind spun, and Amanda Lee took advantage of that.

“The victim’s name,” she said, “was Elizabeth Dalton.”

I didn’t want to hear this just as much as I did want to hear it. I turned away from Amanda Lee, gazing down the block, in the direction of Dean’s house. I imagined myself, all happy and joyful and human on the lawn with him again.

And for the first time, I heard in my head something new from the night I’d died.

Stop! Please! Why’re you doing this?

My voice, begging.

My last words?

I didn’t like the thought of having to plead like that. I didn’t like the idea of ever letting someone evil have so much power over me or Elizabeth Dalton or anyone.

Amanda Lee took a photo out of her purse. It showed an older gentleman dressed in a gray suit, his silver hair clipped and neat. He was standing in front of a fountain in Balboa Park, his arm around a much younger woman who beamed, her teeth white against her deep red lipstick, her blond hair in a slicked-back pixie cut.

“My friend Jon tells me that Elizabeth was a good person,” Amanda Lee said. “He left the country after she died, retreating to a cottage outside London, just to forget her. He can’t stand the reminders here.”

“What was she like?”

“She smiled a lot, told funny jokes to cheer up whoever needed cheering… But about three years ago, a killer found her. And he stabbed her, once, twice… thirteen times. When that wasn’t enough for him, he cut her up in…”

As she trailed off, I felt something like a stab, too, and I glanced away from the picture of Amanda Lee’s friend and Elizabeth.

Amanda Lee swallowed. “They found her pieces by some hiking trails near the beach. And when they brought the killer in for questioning, he denied it. He had a weak alibi—said he was working late by himself—but he had all the motivation in the world.”

“Why?”

“Because Elizabeth Dalton had broken off an engagement to him, and he was jealous when she found someone else to love. My friend.”

A crime of passion?

I didn’t want to think about Elizabeth Dalton as the cops had found her, piece by piece. You know why?

Because deep inside, I suspected that’s how they would find my remains one day, if they ever did.

A burning sensation crisped the fringes of my shape, searing into me, and I knew that I was only feeling the unfairness of it all.

Amanda Lee lowered her voice to a whisper, just like the one she’d used on the night she’d rescued me from the time loop in Elfin Forest.

“It isn’t right that the killer goes on without a punishment while Elizabeth’s friends and loved ones suffer.” She shook her head. “People like him should live with the ghosts of what they do. They should literally have the truth scared out of them.”

As she waited for her meaning to seep into every bit of my essence, I thought about the unknown killer in Elfin Forest with blood on his hands.

My blood.

And I had to agree.

2

His name was Gavin Edgett, and the Internet said that he had made a mint creating video games, and I’m not talking Ms. Pac-Man or Donkey Kong, either. From my marathon TV and computer binges, I noticed that a lot of modern game play basically trained a person to mutilate and butcher.

And guess what. Our suspect in Elizabeth Dalton’s murder had gifted society with Blood and Blades about four years ago.

Coincidence?

That was my question of the day, but Amanda Lee sure seemed to have all the answers after we met back at the casita.

“I’ve already done my homework when it comes to Gavin Edgett,” she said, standing by the window and watching dusk fall over her gardens. “But I haven’t gotten what I’ve needed yet. There’s nothing in the gossip columns, or my intuition, or even small talk around the community that’s offered much for a very personal profile on him.”

“Have you played any of his games?”

“As much as I could stomach. And what I saw of them told me enough.”

“That he’s violent.”

“I would say that his dark side is certainly on full display.” She sent a glance to me, her fingers entwined with the lace window curtain. “Perhaps I should leave all the game playing to you.”

I knew she was talking about more than Blood and Blades. She wanted me to mess with Gavin Edgett, affect him as much as Elizabeth Dalton had been affected, all for the sake of her friend Jon in that photo.

Revenge. Justice. She sure looked like the cool mom on the block, but there was some blackness beneath the smiles.

What was it like in Amanda Lee’s mind? If she’d had visions about Gavin Edgett and Elizabeth Dalton—enough of them to persuade her to carry out her friend Jon’s wish—how haunted was she every single day? Did all her visions steer her toward justice because she’d lived them vicariously?

I couldn’t imagine being that sensitive.

Even though I was on board with punishing the guilty, my temper had cooled during the flight back, and I’d started wondering exactly what Amanda Lee had in mind for me to do with this man. Actually, I had no idea what I was even capable of doing with him.

“I’m happy to do all the homework I can,” I said. “It kind of seems to me that we’re moving a little fast here, though.”

“All right. Tell me how we can slow it down.”

“Well, first off, I’d like to see for myself that this guy is guilty before we start the justice part.”

She slid a concerned glance to me. “I get the feeling you don’t want to do this.”

Chased through the trees, caught, yanked toward someone who was pulling me to my death…

“Actually, I want to do this very much.” Even if I got the vibe that Amanda Lee had pulled me out of my time loop more to be her pet spirit than to right all my wrongs. “I just think it’d make sense to go about this in a more… measured way.”

“Such as… ?”

“Such as haunting a confession out of this suspect instead of barging into him with all guns blazing and exacting vengeance.”

Amanda Lee stared at an oil painting of a serene summer pond, which hung on the wall. For a second, I thought she might be getting some kind of reading. The air even trembled a little, tickling me.

Then she nodded. “Yes, you’re right. You’re absolutely right.”

That made me feel better. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Amanda Lee’s psychic vibes, but I’d always been a “show me” person, especially after hearing all the platitudes that well-meaning people handed out to me at my parents’ wake. The “things will be fine”s and the “they’re in a better place”s never felt true to me. Nobody could prove that life was going to get better.

In fact, it hadn’t.

Amanda Lee went to the computer, and within a minute, she had conjured a picture of a mansion with red tile roofing and an Italian Renaissance vibe.

“Here’s your first piece of information,” she said. “This is where he’s staying for the time being.”

Yeah, this Gavin guy was rich, but something altogether different struck me about how easy it’d been for Amanda Lee to show me his house.

She raised a slim eyebrow, as if intuiting my discomfort. “There’s no such thing as privacy nowadays.”

Gross. What had the real world come to? Big Brother was definitely in residence.

Amanda Lee was looking at the computer again. “He’s what you might call a ‘free spirit,’ no pun intended. He travels the world with his laptop as his office.”

I had to wrap my head around that. He had freedom—a gift that had been taken away from Elizabeth Dalton. No justice there.

Amanda Lee gestured toward the picture of the mansion. “This is his family’s estate, and he returned to it recently.”

“Is he wrapped up in Mama’s apron strings or something?”

“Hardly.”

She clicked off the mansion picture and to another screen, where an image appeared of a tall man ambling down a beachside street carrying a paper cup of coffee, his other hand fisted at his side, like he was wound up tight.

Something took an unsettling whirl in the center of me. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because of the cut of his brown hair—very short, no-nonsense, as if the last thing he wanted to be doing was gelling and styling it in front of a mirror. Maybe it was because of the look the camera had caught in his eyes—almost a bruised, pugilistic way of gazing at the world around him. Or maybe it was because I could just about see him in motion, with a self-assured walk that told everyone around him that he knew just who he was and where he was going.

Even in a frozen-in-time photograph, he still vibrated with life for me, and I couldn’t look away, even if I’d wanted to.

Amanda Lee thinks he cut a woman apart, I thought, putting my head back where it belonged.

“He’s thirty years old,” Amanda Lee said, and for a psychic, she seemed pretty clueless about the palpitating spirit right behind her.

“Born around the time I ate the dust,” I said. “So why’s he at home if he’s old enough to have his own life?”

“He’s the oldest child—the most responsible one. His mom passed on nearly a decade ago, and his father has been on a succession of business trips all over the world for the past four years or so.”

She always called Gavin “he,” as if that somehow put him at a distance from her. “He normally lives in hotel suites and doesn’t call any place but an official base residence across the country home, but I intuited that the younger son, Noah, needs a parental hand lately, and the father’s not at home to provide it.”

Okay. She’d gotten some kind of psychic woo-woo about it. “Why not just hire a nanny?”

“The kids are too old for that—Noah’s seventeen and Wendy’s fifteen. However, his slightly younger sister, Farah, has lived on the property with them since the dad started traveling.” She fiddled with the computer again.

Amanda Lee finally made the screen switch to another picture, and it showed a stunning twentysomething socialite in a gossip column photo, svelte in a white dress, her sable hair long and gleaming over one shoulder, her legs endless.

“I’m sure,” Amanda Lee said, “Farah called him home to provide some male guidance for Noah.”

She must not have had photos of the kids ready, because she didn’t access the computer.

I cozied against a battery pack resting on a cherrywood end table. Amanda Lee had laid it out earlier, and it was available for whenever I needed to pull energy. Every once in a while, the mild distance between me and my death spot got to me, but juicing myself up like this helped.

I went back to asking about the family situation. “Why’re the kids so much younger than Farah and Gavin?”

“Noah and Wendy are adopted. It wasn’t like this in your time, but nowadays, collecting children in need is a status symbol.”

“That’s pretty cynical. Besides, aren’t you a Richie Rich, too?”

“I only live off a relatively modest inheritance and investments, dear. I wasn’t born with a silver spoon gagging me.”

She gave me a wry “Got it, Valley Girl?” look, and I didn’t bother to tell her that my friends and I had made a sport of mocking hard-core mall rats in my time.

“You sure know a lot about the family,” I said. “Have you communicated with Elizabeth Dalton in any way whatsoever? Or did any other spirits leave you partial messages from beyond?”

She slowly shook her head, just as she’d done after we’d first met and I’d quizzed her all about whom she’d contacted from the other side, especially my parents. This past week, she’d tried to get ahold of them, but nothing had happened.

I forged on. “If you haven’t talked to Elizabeth, how do you know all this information about the Edgetts? From visions?”

Amanda Lee’s skin went a little pink, and she started to mess around with the computer again, avoiding my question.

So I gave her a chilly tap on the shoulder.

“Jensen—”

“I know. I’m cold. And I’m sure I can be a lot colder.”

She sighed. “All right. Jon hired a private investigator—another friend of ours—to watch him.”

Obsessed a little? “Elizabeth’s Jon?”

“I told you,” Amanda Lee said. “The killer has ruined lives. Wrongful death tends to do that to people like Jon.”

I couldn’t argue. My own life sure hadn’t been the same after Mom and Dad had gone. And I doubted they would’ve been all that happy about their sweet lil’, former straight-A student dropping out of college to hang out in dark forests with toking friends.

Amanda Lee turned away from the computer to face me. With those gray strands of hair framing her face, she seemed older than usual.

“Are you ready to visit him?” she asked. “To get a feeling for the kind of man you think he might be?”

A murderer?

I nodded, on board, even though I wasn’t going to speed into this whole thing like Amanda Lee had obviously wanted me to. Satisfied, she showed me the Edgetts’ address and the directions.

As full night claimed the sky, I finally took off toward that mansion near La Jolla, grabbing a travel current and speeding through that artery tunnel. I mean, why wait? It’s not like I had a ton of other things to do.

After I tumbled out of the tunnel, I hovered in the air, getting a bead on where I was. The beach, painted by sand and murmuring waves. Since I still had the ability to smell, I took a second to absorb the brine and wood smoke, too.

It was like all those summer nights with Dean.

I brushed off the thought and followed my senses toward the cliffs, where mansions loomed over the shoreline, burning light through their massive windows.

Rising high, then putting on some speed, I sketched over the rooftops, ruffling leaves on palm trees, until I got to the red roof of the Edgett mansion.

These people were rich. The place was made up of two wings, with a lagoon-shaped, rock-edged pool, a pool house, and a guest cottage. The palms waved, casting moonlit shadows over white walls and villa windows.

I listened, still hovering above the estate, until I picked up the sound of voices. Then I shot down to it, my essence pulsing with…

Was it excitement?

I took a spot near a sliding patio door, which was blocked by a screen. I didn’t want to see what it would feel like if I slid through that. Who needed to be grated ghost cheese?

“What did you just say to me?”

It was the voice of a young girl, and when I took a peek inside the mansion, I spied her near a marble kitchen counter, her back to me. But I could still see waist-length, straight black hair and a tiny sparrowlike body dressed in a dark minidress with torn tights and combat boots.

Wendy, the younger sister?

A teenage boy—Noah?—had propped his sneakered feet on the kitchen counter and was leaning back in a tall barstool. A hank of dirty brown hair covered one eye, and his skin was a toasty shade.

He’d been in the process of shrugging her off. “Aw, come on, Wen. I said it was just a spur-of-the-moment get-together.”

“It was a gathering of troglodytes, and you left a mess that the maids had to spend all day picking up. Thanks to you, Gavin’s gonna lock us down.”

“Hey, I helped clean up,” Noah said, and he looked pretty sincere about it.

Wendy shook her head and stalked all the way into the kitchen, toward the fridge.

I floated toward the open window there, getting a better look at her after she shut the appliance’s door and came out with a can that said Red Bull on it. She didn’t look anything like Noah, with his rosy tan skin and big dark eyes. Actually, she seemed Asian—a kind of cool nerd with a pink streak down the side of her hair.

Noah had sat up on his stool, revealing a T-shirt that said RADIOHEAD.

“Wen,” he said as she drank her Red Bull stuff. “I said I’m sorry.”

She took the can away from her lips. “Tell that to the homework I didn’t get finished.”

“Screw homework.”

“So says the guy who once got kicked out of prep school. Dumb-ass.”

Nearby me, I heard a strange, whining kitty sound. Sure enough, it’d come from a black-and-white cat that shot off into the bushes at my presence. I wasn’t positive it’d even seen me, but it was a sensitive little cuss.

Someone else walked into the massive kitchen, high-heeled shoes tapping on the marble floor.

“What is it with you two now?” Her voice was cultured. It actually reminded me of Princess Leia during her less “Han Solo, you really suck” moments.

“It’s the party again,” Noah said.

Wendy gave one of those loud, disgusted sounds that teens did so well. Once, I’d been excellent at them, too.

“Yeah, it was no biggie,” she said, “especially when your friends were pounding on my door and calling for ‘the geek’ to come out and play.”

The high-heeled woman walked into my view. If I weren’t a spirit who’d already resigned herself to being eternally unstylish—seeing as I couldn’t seem to find a way to change the long-sleeved blue shirt over the white tank and jeans I’d died in—I would’ve immediately been envious of Farah.

With a thick mass of smooth brunette hair spilling over her shoulder in a stylish braid, with her long legs and champagne-stem waist and her red designer cocktail dress, she belonged on the cover of a fashion mag with Christie Brinkley. She was obviously on her way to a social function, probably a charity event where she’d raise millions with just a sultry wink and smile.

I watched as she languidly rested against the marble counter, composed, even in the middle of a teenage war zone. Impressive.

But could Sex Bomb do this?

I tested out my ghost skills for the first time on the Edgetts, letting out a soft moan, just to see if they could hear me—but mostly to see if I’d be able to use this skill to invisibly mess with people. I had to know what I could do and when I should do it for when Gavin showed up.

Wendy did hear, and she tilted her head, wrinkling her eyebrows as she paused in drinking that Bull junk. She peered toward me.

Could she see me?

When she didn’t glance away, I thought she could. But then she went back to drinking, her forehead furrowed as she flipped off Noah and left the kitchen.

Farah shook her finger at Noah in a halfhearted scold. “Gavin’s on his way home. Maybe you shouldn’t take advantage of his business trips like that.”

“You’re not sticking up for me?”

“Sure.” She ruffled his hair. “All for one and one for all, right, Noah? I’ll always be by your side.”

When she kissed him on the head, a long look passed between them, and Noah glanced away.

“You’re gonna crush my good times,” he said, like he was trying to lighten up.

“That’s what sisters are for.”

“Sisters. Can’t live with ’em…”

“Can’t send some of them back to China,” she said, strolling past him and tweaking his cheek.

He watched her pass, but I didn’t see anything beyond that, because I smelled her perfume, and it made me back away from the window.

God, it was like roses. My mom used to keep those in our living room when I was a kid—

A door slammed from inside, and I went back to the sliding screen. Was it… ?

Yes. The man I’d been looking for.

Gavin Edgett.

He appeared in the kitchen, dressed in an untucked white shirt, blue jeans, and work boots. Sparks burned in me. If he’d seemed alive in that picture on the computer, the feeling was multiplied now.

Clipped brown hair, wide shoulders… chest… arms… He came off as strong and taciturn, not like a rich guy at all, but more like one who liked to sit in bars and watch football games. Yet he also had kind of a bookish vibe, like he always had something on his mind.

Still, it was his life force that filled me most of all, just like a heartbeat. He just seemed so vivid next to everyone else, and it wasn’t a good feeling.

Murderer, I kept telling myself. A killer, just like my own?

Farah was right behind him, taking baby steps on her pumps and holding a clutch bag in her hand. “Gavin, come on… .”

But he was focused on Noah, who’d slipped off his stool and pushed back his rebel hair.

Gavin tossed his sunglasses on the counter. “I’m gone less than twenty-four hours and you manage not only to piss off the neighbors but to lie to me about studying for that history test. Didn’t we have a deal after you were expelled from your last school?”

“I haven’t cheated since then,” Noah said in a much less confident tone than before. “Besides, I just invited a few friends over, and someone posted it on Facebook.”

Gavin wasn’t hearing any of that, though, and I wasn’t, either. I was just watching… feeling.

It started out as a shiver, deep in the belly, and it spread outward, tingling.

But spirits couldn’t get turned on. Could they?

And why would I, out of all the spirits in the world, be drawn to this could-be killer?

Maybe it was just because I hadn’t seen Gavin up close in that picture of him, but I was fixated on his eyes. They were a pale blue, surrounded by thick lashes… .

Gavin was still talking, low and level, using the type of tone parents usually used when you’d pushed them too far.

“You think this is your own private palace?” he asked Noah. “You think it’s yours to dirty up with your friends?”

A wave of emotion from Noah crept into me and… Good God, I could feel his fear. It was like pure energy, working its way into me, taking the place of the strength that was leaking out of me bit by bit because I wasn’t close to my death spot.

Noah sputtered. “I—”

“I asked you a question,” Gavin said with such an edge that his voice sounded serrated.

A picture came to me, whipped up by imagination: Gavin angry. Gavin stalking Elizabeth Dalton…

Farah placed a hand on Gavin’s shoulder, then ran it down his arm. “Maybe we should shelve this for now.”

Gavin shrugged away from her touch, giving her a look that I couldn’t decipher.

She backed off, glancing away, retreating to the edge of the kitchen.

But I wanted to know what was driving Gavin right now, what was filling his head. So I started to flow into the screen door, thinking that maybe I could pass through if I just tried hard enough.

Nope.

I gasped at the pain of the screen separating my essence. Gasped so loud that everyone in the room turned toward me.

Rushing all the way back to the other side of the screen, I felt my essence being sucked back together.

I felt… exposed.

Could they see me now? Were any of them sensitive like Amanda Lee?

Gavin slowly walked toward the patio door and, emboldened, I came toward it.

All that was separating us was that screen, and I could smell him—the scent of soap and skin, shockingly human. He was bigger than I’d thought, broader and taller, his face all rough-hewn angles. The warmth from his body hushed against me, but that’s where it stopped—just outside, around my edges, as if my invisible outline was the only smart part of me and wouldn’t allow him to burrow any further.

But… that life force of his.

Without thinking, I raised my hand, putting it near the screen.

He paused, raising his hand, too, and I could’ve sworn he knew I was there.

His blue eyes widened; then…

Then he shivered, stepping back, and I just stood there, like he’d cut me.

But that was how I should’ve been feeling, right? Repulsed by this possible killer. And I was just now realizing it again.

As he went back to the kitchen, laying into Noah, I didn’t move. My energy seemed lower than before, but I think it was because I felt like nothing.

I would recover, but I just needed a minute.

Just a minute.

I took a little bit more than that, actually. I floated outside that patio door for I don’t know how many minutes. Enough time for everyone to leave the kitchen. Enough time for the numbness of being ignored to skulk away. Enough time so that I needed to start figuring out a way to get inside the mansion, where I’d be able to tail Gavin and collect information on him.

But then, just as I was about to move around the side of the mansion, I heard something behind me.

A whisper.

“Jenny.”

I looked behind me at the pool, not seeing anything except for the play of wind over the blue-lit water.

Then I heard it again, this time from near the guesthouse.

“Over here, Jenny.”

I rose high into the air, like I couldn’t control myself. That voice…

It sounded just like Dean’s used to.

I listened for it to carry on the wind another time.

One second. One minute.

Two minutes.

The voice didn’t come again, and I started to get back to business.

But then my old boyfriend stepped out from around the pool house.

Dean?

I almost dissipated. Was I only seeing what I wanted to see, like all those people who’d witnessed Elvis?

This wasn’t the older man I’d watched earlier today, tossing a football back and forth with his son.

This was the beautiful guy who’d looked down on me one night on the beach, years and years ago as we’d sat on a blanket under the stars, as the moon had made his straight blond, chin-length hair so light that it almost glowed. This was the boy with the whiskey brown eyes that had looked at me with such affection.

And those eyes were seeing me now.

Actually seeing me, when I’d believed no one but Amanda Lee could.

He smiled that crooked smile that had won me over the first time he leveled it on me.

What the hell was happening?

“Why’re you so surprised?” he asked. “I told you when I drove off to Columbia that I’d come back for you someday so we could be together.”

“Dean?”

He held up a hand. “You gonna get outta here with me or what?”

Before I could think straight, I nodded, barely, unsurely, because I still wanted this, wanted the past, wanted him—

Out of nowhere, a whoosh of sparking air blew me back, and I lost my balance, tumbling near the ground, rolling in the air and righting myself again near the pool.

By the time I regained my equilibrium, he was gone.

I turned around and around, looking for him. He’d completely disappeared. Why? What had—

He popped in front of me, taking me into his arms.

“Then let’s go,” he whispered, dragging me into an electric current and plunging me into absolute darkness.

3

One second I was by the swimming pool; the next—

I popped out of nowhere, rolling over the ground, everything around me a vicious tumble of confusion until my momentum stopped and I was lying on my back, out of breath, staring skyward until my vision adjusted.

But all I saw was darkness. Pure, spreading, unending deep purple.

What just happened?

As my brain tried to catch up, I angled to my side, planting one of my hands on the ground.

That’s right. It was planted. As if I’d become solid for some reason…

I quickly glanced around, but I didn’t see my old boyfriend anywhere. Had it even been Dean?

If not… then what the hell?

When nothing attacked me—no Dean, no more truly messed-up supernatural surprises—my pulse finally slowed, my lungs filling with crisp air as I seriously took in my location.

At first, everything above and around me didn’t register very well.

It all seemed to be a purple haze, like layer upon layer of the gaseous clouds you’d see in middle school science textbooks when you studied astronomy and celestial bodies. And there were stars dotting the plane.

I thought that maybe I was still stunned and my head wasn’t working right, so I closed my eyes and opened them again to get rid of the haziness and starriness. But the twinklers were still there, hanging in the midst of the purple, most of them far enough away so that you could almost wish on them, but some near enough so that they seemed like shapes that should’ve been familiar but weren’t.

Then I looked down to where my palms were plastered to the ground.

Damn!

I jumped away from the sight, because, fuck, there was nothing there. Just more sky, almost like a glass ceiling that was holding me up over a gazillion miles of empty, purple space.

Skittering backward, I tried to distance myself from all of it, even though I couldn’t. It’s just that my adrenaline was ruling me.

Yes—I had adrenaline again. Why? How?

I was solid here, in heaven, or limbo, or wherever Dean had taken me.

When I crashed into something behind me, I startled, jumping away from that, too. But when I faced it I discovered it was only a knee-high, circular wall of white that glowed ever so slightly.

It looked like… a fancy aboveground pool? Something that belonged in a Roman villa?

Peering around me again, I saw that I was just as alone as I’d been before. Still nothing but sky and stars.

If I hadn’t known I was dead before, this was the clincher. I had to be in heaven, right? Maybe I had only been cheating mortality for nearly thirty years, and when Amanda Lee had pulled me out of my time loop in Elfin Forest, she’d put into motion my true demise.

Had the powers that be finally sucked me into oblivion?

Gradually, an even more disturbing question dawned on me. If this was genuine death, then what had “Dean” been?

Was he the Angel of Death, disguised as my old boyfriend, luring me to its arms only to deposit me here?

I grabbed the edge of the circular wall, dragging myself upward, only to stare at what I saw below me in the pool.

Glowing, swirling, the water or whatever was absolutely beautiful. If I had to describe it, I could only say that I was watching a bunch of flowing, liquid, filmy, white-winged lotus leaves waving in water, serene and welcoming.

Real and unreal, I thought, leaning over it more, a little lulled, suddenly not afraid of where I’d landed.

Finally feeling a bit of peace in all this chaos.

The leaves kept opening, then closing, and I started to feel heavy.

Heavier.

You have found us, they seemed to say. Come in. Reach down your hand. Feel the warmth… .

I smiled. Who cared about solving those mysteries back on earth? Who needed justice?

Not me. Not when I had the ultimate Jacuzzi.

I leaned even closer, the lotus’s sweet scent infiltrating me, the leaves beckoning—

When a neon white hand clawed out of the water, grabbing at me, I screamed, falling backward, my ass smacking the ground just in time to avoid getting pulled in.

As the fist disappeared below the wall line, milky light splashed up, and everything around me was placid again.

My pulse was back to tearing through me, and while I stood, I pressed a hand against my chest, almost like I could stuff my heart back into its place.

Then I heard laughter.

When I turned around, I knew whom I was going to see, and as I caught sight of that surfer-boy smile, the straight, chin-length blond hair, the lanky, young body of my old boyfriend, I gritted my teeth.

“You’re not Dean,” I said through them.

“Just repeat that a thousand times, and maybe you’ll believe it.”

That voice—untouched by age, heart-wrenchingly vivid, like he wasn’t a lie at all.

“You’re… ,” I said. “Hell, I don’t know what you are, and I’d hate to guess.”

“Why don’t you do it anyway?” He was wearing a white T-shirt, faded jeans, blue Vans. How had this thing found out Dean’s usual wardrobe? “Tell me—what do you think I am?”

Was he flirting? “I’m not going to play games with you. I just want to know why you brought me here.”

He glanced around, like he’d never seen this star place before. Or maybe he was just like a guy who was admiring his first apartment when he’s finally brought his girlfriend there.

“You don’t like it?” he asked in the exact same charming way Dean would’ve. I would know, because charm was what had gotten me into his first apartment all those years ago. And it was what had gotten him into my . . .

Like it mattered right now.

“Are you expecting me to like it here?” I asked. “Maybe you should know that something in your pool just tried to molest me. Plus, any second, I feel like I’m going to drop through this weird floor.”

I motioned below me, to the clear purple expanse of nothing. It made me a little sick to be suspended in space like this.

“Yeah,” fake Dean said, following my gesture. “Most ghosts take a few to get used to these digs.”

I couldn’t stop looking at him. My Dean. But I forced myself to not care.

“It’d be nice if you’d just tell me why you kidnapped me,” I said.

He shrugged. “It’s what I do.”

“Kidnap ghosts?”

“Sure.”

I glanced at the purple haze, the stars, the glowing lotus pool, which was also starting to make sense.

Come to me, it’d said.

Was it the thing we call “the light”? The pathway to a real heaven since I was starting to think that this was just some kind of way station?

If it was the light, then humans had been right about it all along. The light wasn’t just a cliché or a story to tell ourselves on earth so we could comfort our what-comes-after-this fears.

I thought I should’ve been happy about solving such a great mystery. But it wasn’t easy to be happy when I just wanted to run.

When I looked back at the fake Dean, he mildly stuck his hands in his jeans pockets. I remembered those jeans. He’d ripped off a back pocket once since it was already loose, and he’d given it to me in a moment of odd romance, just as if it were a bunch of roses.

“To remember me by,” he’d said, kidding around. But I’d kept it in a drawer in my room, never letting go of it after he left for school.

He grinned. “I can tell your active mind has already got some theories about all this.”

“You’re the Grim Reaper,” I blurted. “And you caught me.”

He didn’t say anything to that, just took a couple of steps closer. I stood, totally on guard, my hackles raised. When he saw how defensive I was, he stopped and held his hands up, like he was showing me he was harmless.

“Whoa, Jenny,” he said. “Out of everything you’re thinking, I certainly didn’t bring you here to hurt you.”

Jenny. If a ghost—or whatever solid form I was right now—could melt, I would’ve been another lotus pool.

“You’re the Grim Reaper,” I repeated, getting back on track, “and you came here to get me into the light.”

“Not unless you want to go.” He tilted his head. “But I’m getting the feeling that you’re more tied to earth than most. Some ghosts are like that, though, at first. It takes some time for them to get bored with what’s down there.”

“So you’re going to let me go now?”

“Damn, Jenny. You talk too much.”

He took another easy step closer, and with the sound of my nickname still rolling through me, I actually allowed it.

And he took another step—he was so close now, I could catch the scent of the soap he’d always used. Something clean that had mixed with the sea salt on his skin.

I could almost feel his warmth, too.

But if he was something spiritual, how could he be warm? Was coldness reserved just for garden-variety ghosts like me?

My breathing was coming faster, and for a moment I could almost believe that this really was Dean, maybe because I wanted to believe it with everything I had. Everything I’d lost.

His smile grew as he saw how he was affecting me. “Looks like I sure picked the right identity to interest you.”

And—bam—just like that, I was back to being defensive.

But he clearly liked playing around with me, this guy. And he didn’t give up just because of my mood change; he only looked into my eyes, his own gaze going as soft as a tough guy’s gaze ever could.

“Come here, Jenny,” he whispered. “You know you want to. You’re curious. You’re thinking, ‘Is he really Dean? If not, just how well can he imitate everything about him?’” Another grin. “I can assure you that I don’t disappoint.”

I shook my head, recalling what’d happened when I gave in to him back at the Edgett mansion.

“Remember the last time I kissed you?” he asked.

Not fair.

“You aren’t Dean,” I said, like these were magic words that’d shoo him off. “You never kissed me.”

“Why don’t you come here and find out for sure?”

“No.” I kept shaking my head, lowering my gaze so I didn’t have to look at him.

Too tempting.

Too much.

When I felt his fingers on my cheek, I nearly jumped out of my body because of the heat of him, the sparks he created inside me.

How could this be happening, though? Whenever I made contact with anyone as a ghost, I gave them chills.

What kind of place were we in that the rules didn’t apply anymore?

Shivers cascaded down the skin that I had in this place—shivers of longing that I thought I’d never be able to feel again.

“That’s right,” he said quietly, even closer now. “You can feel this way for the rest of your existence. For a ghost, there’s only coldness, isn’t there? You’ll never be able to touch anyone like this again—especially not the real Dean. Besides, you saw him today, and he was old, not the same boy you remember. He was nearly unrecognizable.”

“So are you.”

He only laughed at that.

When his fingers trailed down my cheek to my jaw, my stomach tumbled, bringing the heat to the same rogue places that’d gotten so excited when I saw Gavin earlier tonight.

But this was… different. This was my Dean.

Or the closest I’d ever get to him again.

“I could make you so happy,” he said. “Just like you should’ve been. You only have to say yes to me.”

Yes, I thought, because somewhere deep inside, I still loved him.

And it was this part of me that started shooting off silent questions: So what if this version of Dean wasn’t real? Wasn’t I feeling something that felt better than anything I had now, down on the earth? Wasn’t that a far improvement from coldness and invisibility and nothingness?

He was offering me something so much better… .

As he stroked my skin, that yes was on the tip of my tongue.

But, out of the corner of my eye, the twinkle of one of those stars kept me from answering.

There was something… off… about those stars. Something about the shapes that I wasn’t quite understanding yet.

There was something very wrong about all of this—

I jerked away from “Dean,” wiping my jaw on my shirt, like that was going to erase him from me. It didn’t—my skin still burned where he’d touched me—but it was a good show.

“No,” I said.

He didn’t look disappointed as I took a couple of steps away from him. In fact, he seemed cockier than ever, with an expression that said, “You’ll come around.”

I almost expected him to pursue me as I increased the distance between us, but he was just standing there, as cool as shade.

And that’s when I realized that this… thing… might not be as powerful as I’d feared.

“You can’t force me to do what I don’t want to do,” I said, “can you? You can’t force me to kiss you, to give in to you… or to go into the light.”

He hooked his thumbs in his belt loops, his T-shirt slumped just over his hands. He grinned that arrogant “I’m still not worried” grin.

Then I found out why.

A rumbling shook the nonexistent floor, and I wobbled down to my knees, off balance. When the clear floor began to crack, fragmenting around what seemed to be the center of the quake, Dean or the angel of death or—hell, what should I call him?—merely turned around and walked away from me, one hand up in a casual farewell.

“Another day, Jenny,” he said as a hole wrenched open and I dropped through it.

I grasped onto the edge, swinging in space.

Was he trying to kill me?

If I could even be killed?

As I dangled in the sky, watching him through the clear floor, praying that I wouldn’t fall farther, I noticed that the back of his jeans was missing that pocket Dean had once given to me.

Dean.

Stupidly, automatically, I found myself reaching up my free hand in his direction, like I wanted to stay with him.

But then I focused on a star that was closer than the others, and just as I was beginning to see a certain shape to it, the hole snapped open wider, and I lost my grip, tumbling down into a travel tunnel.

And going fuck knew where the Grim Reaper was sending me this time.

4

I was spit out into the night in front of Amanda Lee’s main house, skimming the ground until I finally landed in her garden.

Right away, I knew I had a ghost body again when I shot upward, the thorns in the bed of roses parting my essence.

“Crap!” I said, even as my “body” knit back together. Without dwelling on fake Dean, I headed over to the light in Amanda Lee’s window. I was busting with all the information I’d found out during the Edgett visit and my side trip to purple-haze limbo.

Amanda Lee was gonna freak out when she heard what I’d been through, wasn’t she?

On my way to the window, I noticed that the sky was nearly black, without all that many stars in it—totally different from the sky I’d just been in.

Even though I couldn’t explain any of it, I came to her window, thinking that she, of all people, could maybe offer some insight.

But since she was the one who always approached me for a discussion, I mulled over how to let her know I needed to talk.

I thought of all the ghost movies I’d ever seen, where trees scratched against windows to get the attention of someone inside a house, just like a spirit was manipulating the branches.

But how could ghosts do that?

And wouldn’t it be nice if I had a master ghost to teach me these things?

I focused on what was around the window frame—a bush, which was too low to scratch at the panes. Flowers in a window box—too soft to make sounds against the glass.

Then I saw a pair of gardening shears in the box.

You think?

I’d never done shit like this before, so I did what came naturally. I concentrated, picturing the shears rising and then tapping on the window with the handle, like I was an awesome Jedi.

And… I wasn’t. At all.

The shears hadn’t gone anywhere, so I tried again.

Shouldn’t this be working if I had the electromagnetic boogaloo in the air on my side? Plus, Amanda Lee had speculated that I was made of energy, too, and now that I was back on the earth from that star place, I could feel the currents in me, keeping me together. If I could manipulate the computer and TV with my electricity, why not something more physical, too?

I stared at the shears, trying to decide how to go about this, and—

Whoa! Without concentrating too hard, I totally Jedied them, making them hover in the air.

How about that?

But when I directed the shears toward the glass, only intending to tap-tap-tap it with the plastic part, I somehow screwed up.

The shears whipped around, just as if they had a mind of their own, and zing! They were out of control.

Crash, went the blades, right through the window.

Damn, went Jensen.

Screeeeammm, went Amanda Lee inside the room.

I zipped toward the glass-sharded hole as the shears dropped back into the box.

“Sorry, Amanda Lee. It’s just me. Don’t be scared.”

A few seconds later, when she pushed the curtain aside and peered out, I offered my most all-American-girl smile and shrugged.

She tried to smile as she inspected the damage, blowing it off, but I could tell she was calling on her patience.

I said, “This was my first time manipulating something physical like that. I need to refine my technique.”

“You will.” She looked me over good, from head to toe. “You’ve got a colorful glow. What happened tonight?”

Oh, was I a shade warmer than my usual gray? Fake Dean had probably gotten something started in me before his star place floor had cracked open and swallowed me up.

“I can’t explain any glow I might have,” I said. “All I can say is that tonight was… interesting.”

“How interesting?”

I figured I should start off with the Edgetts, so I began with Noah and Wendy’s fight in the kitchen, their older sister Farah’s appearance, then built up to big brother Gavin.

Naturally, I left out the part in which he was much more attractive in real life than in a picture. That wasn’t important.

In the end, a superficial explanation wasn’t enough for Amanda Lee.

“Were you capable of intuiting anything from him?”

“Are you asking if I could touch him and read his mind or something?”

“You don’t have that capability?”

I didn’t say much about that, because earlier in the day, I’d caught only a flash from Amanda Lee’s closed mind. And it wasn’t like I’d had contact with any other humans to know if I could infiltrate their thoughts or feelings.

“I’m finding out what I’m capable of by the hour,” I said. “But I didn’t have a chance to get real close to Gavin. Just from seeing their family dynamics, though, I can tell you he’s definitely the boss of the house. He’s also more perceptive than your average bear.”

“What do you mean by that?”

I guess Amanda Lee wanted me to be more plainspoken. “It was almost like he knew I was there, watching them.” I described when he’d walked over to me at the screen door, where I’d been standing, as if he’d vibed me. “Wendy might be sensitive, too.”

Amanda Lee didn’t say anything. The curtain was draped over the back of her so I couldn’t see into her house, and I felt like she was in one world and I was in another.

But wasn’t that the truth?

Finally, she spoke. “So that’s all you got from him. Superficial impressions.”

“Pretty much. I was about to go into the mansion when…” All right. How should I explain the Dean part?

Here went nothing. “I think I ran into the angel of death tonight.”

Maybe I should’ve finessed that a little more, because Amanda Lee literally reared back, her hand to her chest.

“He obviously didn’t get me,” I said, trying to chill her out.

“Why would you think it was an angel of death?”

“For one thing, he was hoping I’d go into a light.” I described the lotus pool, the purple, the stars, the nonexistent floor that’d still managed to hold me up. I even told her about how I’d felt human again, flesh and blood.

A little too much of both, really.

Still, I didn’t inform her of the effect he’d had on me. Between fake Dean and Gavin, she was going to think I was some kind of undependable horndog or something.

Even so, I was actually enjoying the possibilities of what I could do; I was feeling my supernatural power more and more as each night passed. And I was coming to realize that Amanda Lee was right—I really could make a difference.

I had the ability to settle scores now.

As a person, I hadn’t done much of anything in life. Who knew that dying would bring such opportunity?

After I told Amanda Lee about how the angel had assumed Dean’s appearance, she graduated to looking absolutely horrified.

“That’s how he was going to lure you into the light?” she asked. “By pretending he was the boy you loved?”

“See, that’s the thing.” I shook my ghost head. “This angel, or what-have-you, was honest about not being Dean. I mean, he seemed tickled that I was responding to how he looked and everything, but he kept going back and forth with actually acting like him. I think he was getting his jollies by toying with me.”

Amanda Lee frowned. I was coming to learn that her frowns were more serious than the others I’d encountered in life. She frowned only when something struck her as pretty bad.

A second later, she was back to normal, smiling at me like a cool mom. “The most important thing is that you got away from him.”

“Yeah,” I said, making like it was no biggie. “I managed. He finally got frustrated with how I wasn’t giving in to him and… Well, he might’ve actually just dismissed me out of sheer irritation. But whatever works to my benefit, you know?”

“And he couldn’t force you into the light.” Was there a thread of respect winding through her words?

Excellent.

“That was my impression.” I paused. “Truthfully, I can’t tell you much more about that star place. If it’s above or below us, or if it’s a plane that comes and goes in the blink of an eye.”

She fixed that clear gaze on me. “No matter what it is, I’m happy that you’re back here, safe.”

Just as I thought that maybe Amanda Lee would invite me in for the equivalent of ghost biscuits and tea, she gestured toward her front door.

“To the casita?” she asked.

All right.

She stepped away from the window, the curtain dropping back over it. A tiny breeze blew through the hole in the glass, ruffling the material.

I had to be more careful. Not spaz out so much with things like, oh, gardening shears and some such.

After I flew around the house, I saw Amanda Lee standing outside, below the glow of her porch lamp on her pink sweet pea–lined walkway.

When she caught sight of me, she began strolling toward my casita.

“While you were gone, I did more thinking.”

Was she going to tell me that she’d been overreacting earlier when she mentioned that she and her friend Jon wanted Elizabeth’s killer to pay an eye for an eye?

Nope.

“So… about haunting a confession out of him.” She was talking about Gavin, but just didn’t want to give a name to the guy she believed was a killer. “I think I know a good way to go about that.”

“By seeing if he’s guilty first. We already agreed on that.”

“Certainly.” She pushed open the casita door and I followed her in. “You shouldn’t doubt that this will be a genuinely righteous haunting. But before now, I wasn’t certain about the details of driving him to a confession.”

This woman was a hard-core general, by God.

She went over to the computer, turning it on, and I felt the needling buzz from it.

“Despite the hour,” she said, “I called Jon in England to talk, and he mentioned something worrisome. He wanted to know if there was any way we might end up being connected to this haunting.”

“You and Jon?”

“Yes. We can’t afford for anyone to know we would be behind a confession from the killer. In fact, we need that confession to seem as unforced by human influence as possible. The haunting has to seem natural, with no ties to Jon or me whatsoever.”

I prepared to ask “Why?” again, but Amanda Lee raised an eyebrow.

“You’re thinking like a human who doesn’t know spirits exist. If you were the killer, and you came to a point where you realized that a ghost was after you and haunting you because of a crime you committed, what would you do? And don’t allow anything to inhibit your imagination.”

She’d never really asked me to strategize in major supernatural terms before. “Since Gavin has money, he can afford just about anything, so…”

Amanda Lee jumped in. “What if he got ahold of someone who could send other ghosts to stop the one that’s haunting him?”

I just stared at her, and the lyrics from a Kinks song ran through my head. Paranoia, the destroyer…

“It’s just a theory,” she said, “but not out of the question. An open-minded individual could very well defend himself against a haunting. Another ghost—a stronger one—could even get information out of you that a human wouldn’t be able to.”

“And that information might lead Gavin to you and Jon?”

“Right. So do you see why we don’t want him to even remotely suspect what’s happening?”

I nodded. She had more experience with weird phenomena than I did, so I would listen to her advice. But the part about another ghost stuck with me, and I asked, “What makes you think that other spirits might come after us?”

“It’s only speculation. Anything is possible in this world now, Jensen, and we have to think smart.”

“So you’ve never actually met bad ghosts who’d do that?”

“No. Remember how I told you that you’re the first one I connected with fully?”

“How about other psychics or mediums? Do you think they know any of those bad spirits?”

“Not that I’m aware of.” She hesitated. “I hope I haven’t scared you off.”

I actually had been thinking about what a rival ghost might do to me—would he have more power? Could he mess me up in a ghost fight?

Then I shook my head. “No. I’m not afraid.”

And I wasn’t. Instead of being scared of the possibility, I was kind of revved up. In life, I’d been thwarted in the cruelest way. But I felt like I had more control in death, and I wasn’t going to back away from a justified cause merely because of some what-ifs.

It just meant I had a lot to learn and to get used to as a ghost.

I wandered over to the battery on the nearby table, making contact with it, juicing myself to make up for the energy I’d lost tonight. “So, how are we going to go about taking you and Jon out of the haunting equation?”

She looked a little nervous, like she was about to lay something big on me. “Since there’s a teenage girl in the Edgett household, what if you acted as a poltergeist to throw any investigators off our scent? And, of course, you would have to be subtle about introducing Elizabeth into the details of Gavin’s haunting—he would have to come to the conclusion that she might be haunting him all on his own.”

I guessed I didn’t get the full thrust of her suggestion. “I remember that word, poltergeist. I saw that movie before I died.”

“Do you know what one is?” she asked. But she sounded relieved, grateful that I wasn’t backing out.

“Isn’t it a bunch of mean ghosts scaring the crap out of cute kids by coming through TVs and sending clown dolls after them?”

Amanda Lee gave me a you-poor-naive-thing smile, then said, “It’s an old German word meaning ‘noisy ghost.’ But there’s a school of thought that says a poltergeist is a psychokinetic event that usually stems from an unstable young person in a household, a female, most of the time.”

Wait. That didn’t sound so ghostly to me. “Psychokinetic event? Are you saying that poltergeists actually have nothing to do with ghosts? That it’s a person who uses her mind to throw things around a room?”

Amanda Lee offered a shrug, and the turquoise necklaces clinked together. “That’s what some think, and that’s what we would depend on for an explanation as to the activity you’d bring to the Edgett household. We would hope that any experts who might be consulted would think that it’s not a ghost causing trouble—that it’s a poltergeist generated by Wendy’s troubled energy, since it’s often centered on a puberty-aged agent who has a lot of teenage angst and sexual puzzlement inside her.”

I was trying to piece this all together. “Are there really more to poltergeists than just that?”

“I happen to believe so.”

I waited for her to explain.

“I think,” she said, “that malevolent spirits can be drawn to people who are as troubled and confused as young women in particular can be, and there’s your true poltergeist.”

Now I didn’t like where this was going. “If you’re suggesting that I harass that girl Wendy while I’m haunting Gavin, just so I can cover our tracks with a good reason for the sudden activity, you’ve got the wrong ghost.”

“I’m suggesting no such thing.” Amanda Lee seemed hurt, her gaze going sad. “I’m not asking you to harm Wendy.”

Even so, this was leaving a bad taste in my… you know.

I’d been so caught up in notions of giving bad people what they deserved that I’d failed to truly think about everyone around them.

Amanda Lee continued. “You might have to do one or two things to point the activity in Wendy’s direction, but sometimes poltergeists can favor the agent and intensely dislike others in the household. That’s my recommendation for how we go about this.”

“So you’re hoping that any experts they might call in would decide that Wendy is causing all our haunting, and that her bad energy is being aimed at Gavin because she’s a moody teen. I hate to tell you, though—from what I saw, it didn’t look like she hates him.”

“You never know what’s going on behind the picket fences,” Amanda Lee said. “And this is a good bet for us if we want to cover ourselves.”

She must’ve read my remaining doubts. “Sincerely, I hate this as much as you do. But when he decided to kill and defile Elizabeth Dalton, he brought pain and suffering to everyone around him. It was only a matter of time until it came back to…”

“Haunt all of them?”

I really looked at her, and she seemed to know it, because she lowered her gaze. She was really invested in this.

As if she’d read my mind—and maybe she had—she offered an explanation.

“I had a husband once,” she said, her voice twisted. “They said it was an accident when he died, but I knew better. He was hit by a car, and he knew the driver—it was a man he’d had a falling-out over work with. My husband was a lawyer, and the man believed that Michael had maliciously gone after him during a dispute about an inheritance. He felt robbed. And to this day, I believe he got his revenge.”

Damn. What could I say but “I’m sorry, Amanda Lee”?

“You shouldn’t be the sorry one. And that’s my point in all this. None of us victims should ever be sorry. We shouldn’t have to wish that scores were settled and life should be fairer than it is.”

I felt close to her, even though I was feet away. Both of us were on the outside, isolated from what was right. “Can I ask what happened to the man who killed Michael?”

Amanda Lee finally looked up. “I didn’t have a ghost to help me back then, so he got away with the ‘accident.’ And no matter what the police said, I knew he was guilty. I felt it with every chill in my bones and every vision that kept me up at night. He died without ever paying for what he did.” Her words wobbled. “So when my good friend Jon—”

Her voice broke before she put it back together.

“When he went through the same thing with Elizabeth, I understood completely. And I wasn’t going to allow what happened to me to happen to him when I could do something to ease his pain. You see, Elizabeth’s murderer is still alive and Michael’s isn’t.”

So it was almost like she was living through Jon.

She stared at the computer. “I’m the one who told Jon to go out of the country while I took care of this. There’s no reason for him to go through the process of seeking a reckoning. You see, he’s… frail.” She paused, then said, “And I’m not anymore.”

I was quiet, thinking of a response to that. Pain. Jon had it. Amanda Lee had it. I had it. But I didn’t want there to be more than there needed to be.

There had to be a way to do this haunting without affecting the innocent people in a killer’s family.

Amanda Lee seemed to catch on to that thought, too. “We’ve got a higher purpose, Jensen. There will be hard choices, and this is only one of them.” She swallowed. “For whatever you can do for Jon, thank you. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.”

Silence dominated, and she obviously felt it was a good time to leave, because she gave me one last, pleading glance, then left the casita.

And her story really gnawed at me, too, because if I had the chance to punish the evil man who’d killed me, I would’ve hoped that there was some righteous friend out there who cared enough about me to put things in place and set the world straight.

I mean, isn’t there a saying about that?

All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to stand by and do nothing.

I’d read something like that before I’d died, and I’d admired it. It sounded noble to a girl who’d blamed her parents’ deaths on a cruel, unfair force of nature. A girl who hadn’t known exactly what she believed after she’d dropped out of college and waited tables so she could save up for the community college classes that she told herself she’d take someday.

But it didn’t mean half as much to me as it meant now.

I wandered away from the battery, feeling stronger, then stood in front of the computer, which blipped every so often from my presence. Amanda Lee had apparently sensed that I would want to do some research after our talk, and that’s why she’d turned on the machine.

First, I manipulated the screen to show me more about poltergeists, and I found a page that claimed that ghosts could cause high emotion in agents so that they got stressed enough to unleash all that psychokinetic energy. But, again, that would mean focusing negative energy on Wendy.

No, thanks. But Amanda Lee had a point—if Gavin pulled any experts into this haunting, they might do a little too much investigating and find out that this wasn’t just about a poltergeist, and I didn’t want to implicate Jon and Amanda Lee for trying to catch a killer.

But I did like Amanda Lee’s idea of the poltergeist favoring certain people in the family and focusing all the bad energy on just one.

The deserving one.

As I went from computer page to page, inspiration came out of nowhere.

I thought of that short story everyone read in high school, “The Tell-Tale Heart.” I thought of how I could be that heart, unseen but still thumping and pumping so only the guilty murderer could hear it in his own head, driving him insane enough for him to yell out a confession one day.

And maybe I could do all this subtle haunting away from the rest of the family while planting enough clues to make anyone think that Wendy could be the center of the activity.

Ugh—I didn’t like the idea of framing her and giving her that reputation. But maybe there’d be another option.

Since I had no one around to teach me how to be a real ghost, I looked up hauntings, because how could I be Gavin’s telltale heart if I had no idea how to beat?

Any way about it, I would start with subtle scares, working my way up to the ones that would urge Gavin to confess.

Subtle. That would be key. I could worm my way into Gavin’s psyche and not depend on Wendy so much.

Feeling better, I initiated a new search on the computer, this time about Elizabeth Dalton—every personal detail I could dig up from postmurder interviews with anonymous friends. The jokes she liked to tell. The charities she supported. Even the type of perfume she wore and the way she would laugh. Things people missed about her.

Then I went on to research the probable killer himself and his relationship to her, finding links for the news about their engagement—an event that seemed to capture more than a few society column headlines.

There were pictures that I could barely look at: blond, tanned, beautiful Elizabeth on Gavin’s arm at society functions. He seemed rougher than she was in some way that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, because there he was, wearing a tux and seeming polished.

It was his eyes, really. A tough man who held everything in except when he was looking at the woman he loved.

And in these photos, he was looking down at Elizabeth as if she were the most precious thing in creation and he would do anything for her.

Was there an air of possession there, too?

My chest area went tight. Was this the way a killer watched his future prey? Had my murderer been tracking me in the same way, hiding his bloodlust from anyone who might’ve been looking?

I didn’t want to think that, maybe, it’d been one of my party friends who’d found me alone in the woods that night.

God, no way.

The mere thought gave me the creeps, so I went back to Gavin.

Had he been thinking about sliding a blade into Elizabeth time and again when these pictures were taken? Had some kind of fatal obsession been brewing in him?

I switched to another page, but thoughts of my killer kept coming back, so I just gave in to them, closing my eyes in an effort to remember what had happened that night.

Yet nothing struck me. That dark wall was still there in my head, blocking all memory… .

I heard the computer make a whimpering sound, and I opened my eyes again. I’d sucked electricity from the device, so I waited until it recovered, then went on with my research.

There were links referring to the nasty breakup between Gavin and Elizabeth, but that’s all I could find—there were no details about why they’d parted ways, just references to the apparent bad feelings between fiancé and fiancée.

Well, hadn’t Amanda Lee said that the family had tried to keep a lot of this under wraps?

The same rule seemed to go for the coverage of Elizabeth’s murder.

Sure, there were lurid articles filled with a few facts I already knew: how the cops thought Elizabeth had been attacked—and strangled as well as stabbed, I noted now. How she’d been killed in the middle of nowhere. How her body had been dismantled and dumped. But here, too, it seemed like the Edgetts’ money had won the day, because the articles soon turned from fact to speculation. Some “insiders” even theorized that Elizabeth had led a double life—a socialite one moment, a trampy skank meeting men in remote parking lots that led to walking trails the next, a spurned woman looking for pleasure in the night from someone new when she’d met the wrong Mr. Goodbar. There were even more comments from Elizabeth’s anonymous “friends” about Gavin and his possible part in the murder.

Gavin was possessive, they said. He had still been calling Elizabeth after their breakup, even after she’d found someone else to love—a reference to Jon, I guessed.

I couldn’t blame those friends for staying undercover when there was a killer running around who could easily track them down and wipe them out. And I suspected one of those unknown friends might’ve been Jon before he’d left the country.

I pictured him, with his gray hair and wrinkles around his eyes, in the photo Amanda Lee had shown me. Weighed down, I continued my fact-finding, but the rest of the articles were more of the same: bad news. News that the cops had shut the files on Elizabeth’s case down, the killer uncaught. Unofficially, she’d been the victim of a random crime.

But there was one article from a tabloid that caught my eye. Here, some of Elizabeth’s friends seemed to be coming out of the woodwork after the police investigation had closed. Were they trying to find anonymous justice on their own at this point?

One unnamed friend reported that Elizabeth had been getting threatening phone calls. She didn’t know whom they were from, but she suspected an ex-boyfriend.

Another said that Elizabeth had bought a gun the week before.

But just when I thought I was getting somewhere, the article ended, and again, it reminded me of my own disappearance.

No more articles after I’d become old news. No one left to keep searching.

Both me and Elizabeth, the forgotten.

Thank God it didn’t have to be that way from now on.

5

Fully recharged by my batteries as well as my research, I went back to the Edgett mansion.

I hadn’t exactly accomplished my mission there earlier in the night, thanks to fake Dean, and every energized cell of me needed to get inside that building, to find out more about Gavin Edgett and the crimes he very well might’ve committed.

And if he had committed them… Let’s just say that he deserved to be driven to the level of insanity that would make him shout out his guilt.

When I swept up to the mansion using the same route I’d used before, it was the darkest part of night. The witching hour lent dead silence to the pool’s blue glow while it competed with the outside security lights around the property.

I did a flyby over the red tile roof and palm trees, then went in to do my business.

Because of my research, I knew even more now about the Edgetts’ Italian Renaissance mansion. Twenty-seven rooms, including six bedrooms, a basement and an attic, and even a wine storage room that’d been used during Prohibition.

Like I said before, money. Lots of it. Enough to cover up a crime and then some.

It wasn’t hard to find a way inside—I just made like Santa and slipped down one of the chimneys, feeling lucky that it wasn’t closed off.

So far, so good.

Mostly, it was dark inside, except for a few dim lights here and there, and I traveled around the house, getting a feel for it: all cream colors, chandeliers, curved staircases, and marble floors. I even indulged myself—can you blame me?—by floating over to one of those wicked seats that Cleopatra would’ve been right at home on while stretched out, eating grapes plucked from trays.

I sighed and shaped myself to the piece of furniture for a few minutes, and when that got old, I meandered down a hallway, into what looked like a game room, with a big wall that resembled a slab of rock with handles poking out of it. Gym equipment was all over the place, too, but it was computerized, like something superhumans from a sci-fi movie would use.

I suspected that Gavin spent more time in this room than anyone, judging by his broad shoulders and solid arms. Or maybe he’d always been strong—enough to grab a woman, drag her to a dark, deserted place, and choke and stab her without getting much of a fight in return.

I got a little grim then. After Amanda Lee had pulled me out of my time loop, she’d told me about what she’d seen during my last moments in Elfin Forest when I’d been confronted by my own killer.

And that hadn’t turned out so well.

I was ready to check out the upper floor, seeking out Gavin’s room, so I went up the grand staircase, hovering in the right-hand hallway.

So quiet, I thought. Everything was that way.

No one in the house had any idea what was coming for Gavin.

I’d never thought of myself as dangerous, but it occurred to me that I actually was as I lingered in that hall. And it made me feel true power for the very first time in my life… or death.

Bolstered, I went to the first door on my left, seeping under the crack between wood and luxurious carpet.

My energy wavered as I took stock of the room: clothes on the floor, the stench of dirty socks, computers on sleek desks, a bank of huge, thin TVs with a leather couch in front of them, posters of dead-eyed rock bands under the slice of light from a partly curtained window.

Even before I saw the scrawny body lying on the king-sized bed with all the covers kicked off, I knew this was the younger brother Noah’s room. The dirty socks had been enough of a clue.

But he wasn’t the one who interested me.

After I slipped out, I came to a door a bit farther down the hall with a hint of light leaking from underneath it. Someone was up.

I waited outside, then heard a muffled voice. A woman.

Farah, Older Sister Socialite Barbie?

She must’ve been talking on her phone, and she didn’t sound too happy with whoever was on the other end of the line. I could only hear garbles from his end.

“Nice, James,” she said. “I thought you could at least have some sympathy because I can’t find Rum Tum Tugger. He never goes far.”

I told myself to remember the name. James. Whoever he was. And I figured that Rum Tum Tugger might’ve been the cat who’d hated me and run off.

“Really?” she said after a pause. “I can’t believe you sometimes. I don’t know whether you love or hate me… .”

She trailed off, then gave in to a surge of emotion.

“Fine. If that’s the way you want it. Good fucking night to you, too, baby.”

I thought she hung up, because she stopped talking and her light went off. Even with the boyfriend drama, she didn’t compel me enough for me to go inside her room.

Where was Gavin?

I continued on my way, passing empty rooms, then deciding to scoot to the other wing.

And… bingo.

There were two closed doors there, both dark around the edges. One of them was sure to be Gavin’s bedroom, if he hadn’t taken off again on one of his business trips.

I chose the room on the right, entering in my usual way, then looking around at what had to be the master suite. I mean, seriously, it was Caesars Palace in here, with marble columns and a long window that stretched from one end of the room to another, the curtains open to reveal a balcony with a view of the ocean.

I saw his dark shape in the bed, the sheets bunched around his bare waist, one thick arm flung over his head. Sleeping like a total babe in the woods.

I’d given lots of thought as to how I’d go about a haunting tonight, so I started off slow… for now. Also, I’d been practicing some of my skills before I left my casita, and I was eager to see how they worked.

I moved toward his bed, taking a moment to look down on him, hovering.

Something in my belly area twisted, because he felt so warm, and all I wanted to do was get some of that warmth into me. But that’s not why I was here.

Subtle, I thought. Start slow.

“Gavin… ,” I breathed.

He didn’t stir, but that was okay. I hadn’t meant to wake him up yet.

“Gavin…”

This time, he turned his face away from me, his even breathing catching on a snag.

I flew around to the other side of the bed, daring to inch closer to him. He smelled of skin and shampoo, but I didn’t let that trip me up.

“Why, Gavin?” I whispered.

I was near enough to send some coolness to his ear, and he lowered his arm, frowning in the fog of his sleep.

Somewhere in Slumberland, he’d heard me, maybe even felt me.

If he’d sensed the chill of me when he’d come to the screen door earlier, standing just inches from my essence, he might recognize me now. Was he remembering what my essence had felt like and was putting two and two together in his subconscious?

I tried not to think that it was so very special that he, out of only a couple of other people, seemed to be aware of me. At the same time, I attempted not to feel his life force.

There was just something about him… warmth that pulled me in. Pure energy that I didn’t get from any other human I’d met so far.

Getting to real work now, I floated to the wall, shaping myself into what I thought of as a fist.

I threw myself against it.

Knock.

And again.

Knock.

Right away, I could feel a teeny bit of strength seep out of me because of the exertion. It wasn’t that much, but I’d have to pace myself.

I knocked only twice more, louder this time, following it with another vocal plea, a louder whisper this time.

“Gavin!”

He started awake, his eyes wide as he fixed them on the ceiling.

Now that I had his attention, a thrill shot through me, smoky giddiness, reminding me of what it’d been like to be high.

This haunting stuff was actually working!

I closed my eyes and thought of the smell of orange blossoms. Would this work, too? I’d read that ghosts could produce smells, so why couldn’t I?

But an even bigger question was: was the smell of Elizabeth’s perfume subtle?

I wouldn’t use too much of it. Just enough to make him wonder if it was really there.

He sniffed, looked around the room. I swear I could hear his heart beating.

“Elizabeth?” he asked.

At her name, I froze, motionless against the wall. If I’d had a body, I probably would’ve looked like my spine was pasted to the plaster.

I’d done it—re-created the perfume I’d read she wore. One of her anonymous friends had talked about it being something she’d missed about Elizabeth, along with her sunny smile and her laugh.

When Gavin rubbed his bare arms, I knew that my temperature was getting to him. Every muscle in his arms and back was tense as I looked down on him from the wall.

Should I say one more thing, just to make sure that telltale heart was up and running in his conscience?

Slowly, I allowed my essence to peel away from the wall, slanting down toward him until I was just above his head.

He looked up, like he really could feel me.

“Why?” I asked, ruffling his hair with the word, my voice sounding reedy, sad, and maybe a little bit like an accusation.

He bolted out of the bed, turning around, like he could find me.

Fear. I could feel it. But there was also anger there, and that was even better. It increased the energy in me, around me.

But when he couldn’t find anything to blame for the sounds and the perfume, his fear decreased, and it felt like something had pushed me lower, down and down, until I was floating just above the bed.

He’d overcome his emotions frighteningly fast.

“All right, Noah,” he said. “That’s funny. If I look around here and find those minispeakers and microphones you put in Wendy’s room last month to scare the shit out of her, I’m going to wring your neck.”

What?

No. It wasn’t supposed to go like this. He was supposed to be primed for more, not thinking that his younger brother was fooling around.

Was the rich guy going to get out of this haunting, just as he’d gotten out of paying for a bloody crime? Not even.

I was pushing the limits of subtlety when I closed my eyes again, imagining the orange blossom perfume. Noah couldn’t replicate that.

Then I whispered, “Not… Noah…”

When he laughed, a cutting “bullshit” sound, that was all I could take.

Before I could tell myself it was a bad idea, I rushed over to Gavin, stopping in front of him, shivering with a pent-up frustration that had come on me so fast that it consumed me.

Not going to get away with it. Not this time.

I made contact with his upper arm, just as I’d done with Amanda Lee, wanting so badly to connect with Gavin’s mind as I’d briefly linked with hers before she’d shut me out.

It was like I’d entered him, then bitten down on a frayed wire, and I shook with a rapid succession of thoughts that roared through his mind.

A flash of Elizabeth’s light hair.

A laugh that sounded like a song.

Elizabeth crying softly.

Elizabeth crying hysterically.

Blood on her pale skin.

A slap from her open hand, a desperate punch to the chest from her closed fist, followed by another and another—

The images cut off so sharply that it felt like my stomach had been pulled out and some of my juice drained.

Weaker now, I took a second to see Gavin backing away, his gaze on where I was, like he really could see me.

I didn’t move. I actually couldn’t do it very well because something had taken a dose of energy right out of me.

“What the hell?” he whispered, his face a mask of true terror now.

Even if I was a ghost and I didn’t need oxygen, I went through the automatic motion of holding my breath. I faintly rose upward, toward the ceiling, planting myself there.

Had I already blown it? Shit.

Gavin’s gaze stayed on where I’d just been, so obviously he couldn’t see me now. But had he before?

Had I somehow materialized for a split second and that’s why I’d lost energy so fast?

If I had, I wasn’t sure how I’d managed it, and when he went to a chair, yanked a shirt off it, put it on, and then opened his bedroom door to exit, I stayed put, fears running through me.

Did he have any idea what was going on?

Had I gotten through to him in any way?

I floated toward an electrical outlet, absorbing some of the charge. The longer I stayed put, the more I gathered my energy again and came to my senses. He couldn’t have known a ghost was visiting him. Most rational people wouldn’t believe it at first, even if the proof had been right in the same room. I would back off from him for a while, letting his conscience go to work.

Slightly renewed by the electricity, I floated into the hallway, tracking him.

I found him downstairs in the study with all the lights on, his hands clutching the ends of his leather chair’s armrests.

On his lap, a pearl-handled gun rested.

Good instincts, I thought. But guns aren’t going to get me.

Then again, I didn’t know any ghosts who could tell me any different, so maybe I’d have to take a bullet to find out.

I thought about what I’d seen in his head: Elizabeth crying, Elizabeth striking out at him. I couldn’t tell if those had been her last moments, if she’d fought back like I had during my own death, but the pain they carried had removed all sense of sympathy from me.

As I retreated from the room, I knew that I’d done my job for now, starting to set wrong to right.

It’d just be a matter of time before I could do the same thing for myself.

•   •   •

Feeling pretty satisfied, I whizzed back to Amanda Lee’s, thinking about whether I should try to tap on one of her windows again so I could tell her about my success.

Was it worth breaking another pane?

When I got there, I stopped by the hole-marred window first, noticing that she’d taped up the damage from the shears. I expected it’d be fixed by tomorrow, since I couldn’t imagine Amanda Lee tolerating even a day of something broken in her home.

The light wasn’t on in there anyway, so I took a whirl around her two-story home, thinking she was tucked away in bed, until I found an illuminated upper window in the back.

As usual, the curtain was drawn.

But not all the way.

I had a teensy view of a room that was so awesome that it could’ve come from the pages of I Have Splendid Taste—Check Me Out magazine. I could almost smell jasmine incense by looking at the mosquito netting that covered the exotic circle-shaped bed, the shadow from the blades of a ceiling fan slanting over the white spread.

When I saw Amanda Lee, dressed in a long white nightgown, crossing my field of vision, I peered around outside for something I could manipulate for a tap on the window.

Nothing.

But I’d done some fine knocking back at the Edgetts’, so I shaped myself into that fist again and rapped.

Knock, knock.

But she’d already walked out of my sight, maybe even out of the room.

Well, damn. I wasn’t about to hover here all night, so I did the next best thing—I went for the chimney, since that maneuver had worked nicely back at the Edgett mansion, too.

I swooped over the roof and, feeling good about my ever-expanding powers, decided I’d go for a ta-da dive into the flue.

I arced above it, paused, then fell down and down—

At the opening, I slammed into what felt like a brick wall.

Stunned, I felt my essence numbed, ringing like a gong.

It took a few moments for my thoughts to solidify, but when they did, I inspected the chimney.

What had blocked me? The opening was clear. But when I pressed against it, there was definitely something invisible barring me from entering.

Seriously? What was this?

On closer inspection, I found white grains sprinkled around.

Something I’d read on the Internet came back to me. Salt?

Hadn’t one of those amateur ghost-hunting pages said that the substance blocked spirits from entering places? But why would Amanda Lee use it on me?

I went back to her bedroom window, and this time I looked closely at the window frame.

Salt there, too.

Had there been some on the window that I busted open with the shears and I just hadn’t noticed?

I peeked inside her room. She was back, sitting on the edge of her bed.

And what I witnessed embarrassed me because I’m sure I wasn’t meant to see it.

She was looking at something on her finger. A ring, and the expression on her face was… I guess you could say impossible to glance away from.

She seemed devastated as she kept staring at it.

I got the feeling that remembering her husband might be a nightly ritual before she went to bed. Or maybe she couldn’t get to sleep and this was how she spent the wee hours, haunted.

She would wither away from mortification if she knew I was seeing this, and I was just about to move away from the window out of pure discomfort. Truly. But then the air must’ve kicked on—I heard the rev of it through the wall—and the left corner of the curtain belled up.

That’s when I saw something hanging on her other wall.

As the air kept the curtain billowing, I spied a bulletin board with a full-color picture taped right to the middle of it.

My picture from the last night I’d been alive.

I took in the image of the carefree girl with the reddish blond hair spilling over her shoulders, her slight freckles, the Mello Yello in her hand, and the tomboy clothes. She had no idea what was going to happen in a few hours.

Newspaper articles surrounded my photo like they were orbiting it.

But my bulletin board wasn’t the only one on that wall. There were three others, all with big pictures of men and women in the middle, clippings circling them, too.

I hovered closer to the window, wishing I could come in and read those articles, see who those other people were, but then a body blocked my view.

Amanda Lee, holding back the curtain, stunned.

Even if the window was shut, I could hear her voice through the panes. “Jensen…”

The obvious emotion confused me. Who was this woman? What did she really want with me by reducing me to a bulletin board of newspaper clippings and a tragic photo?

I sped away from her window, going in the opposite direction of my casita. I was damned if I knew where I was going.

But it sure wasn’t to my room, just like a prisoner who didn’t have any other purpose but to obey Amanda Lee’s orders.

6

I was as aimless now as I’d been in life, heading to nowhere in particular, but it didn’t feel as freeing as I’d thought it would.

What did I really know about Amanda Lee? Not much. And seeing my picture posted on the bulletin board alongside the others made me feel like an object. Part of a collection.

It was the first time I’d realized that, even if I could still think like a human and act like one, I wasn’t even close. Amanda Lee had clearly never thought of me that way, either, since it was obvious that she had something she’d never shared with me up her sleeve. I was definitely a dead person to her.

Was she tracking down other killers, using other ghosts—the ones on the bulletin boards?

None of it made sense, and I just wished I could ask someone if this was a normal existence for a ghost. Besides, now that my trust in Amanda Lee had been rattled, I wanted to see if there was a reason she had been keeping me to herself in that casita.

As the night enclosed the sky, I sat on some power lines, absorbing energy since I was farther than I’d ever been from my death spot. After I left Amanda Lee’s, I’d zoomed away so fast that I hadn’t been thinking about where I was going. The travel tunnel had blocked out any view of where I was, too, so I had ended up busting out of the artery way down in south San Diego County, on Coronado Island.

It was a mellow community, with high-end houses and beachfront real estate, populated by affluents and military families. Training for Navy SEALs went down nearby on the beach, near the island’s most famous landmark, the Hotel del Coronado, with its red, upside-down cone roofs and white wooden walls.

The hotel was just across the street from where I was sitting in the streetlamp-dim dark. The place was timeless, with its resort feel, flags flying from the rooftops, and the black ocean spreading out behind it.

Back when I was alive, I didn’t spend a lot of time in the south county. My parents had died just off the coast down here, so I liked my apartment in the north, by San Marcos, far enough away for me to distance myself from the nightmare. I’d never even visited the Hotel del, but I’d always heard that there were ghosts here.

Now I wanted to go in to find someone like me so I could get better answers than I’d been getting.

I was just starting to float down from the power lines when all my plans were shot to shit.

Something sped past me so fast that it zapped me, sending me flying down the street until I recovered in midair. As I tried to figure out what it was, I only hoped it wasn’t fake Dean. Like I needed another old-boyfriend encounter to top off my night.

I waited to find out what’d hit me, so when I heard the air buzzing nearby, I followed the sound past the sleepy, closed boutiques and shops to the white-planked facade of a bar that rested under a dormant neon palm tree sign.

Near the door I saw the atmosphere yawning open to show what looked to be the arterial inside of a travel tunnel. An electric blur popped out of it, just as I always did when I got to my destination.

Another ghost?

The entity coalesced for one instant into a gray figure right before it slipped under the door and disappeared into the bar.

Oh my God.

Too cool to see someone else using a travel tunnel. I wanted to know what this ghost’s story was, like if he or she had his or her own Amanda Lee. Or a fake Dean.

But what if this was a territorial ghost and got pissed at me for invading his or her turf? What if it was one of those mean ghosts Amanda Lee had theorized about?

I’d never know if I just hovered here.

It was no doubt way past closing time, and no one else was around, so I gathered up my courage and slid under the door, coming up on the other side into a dark place that smelled like beer plus grease from burgers and fries, and with a bar running the length of most of the room. Total dive.

“Who’s there?” asked a high-pitched male voice.

I went still, then darted to a corner. Whoever this ghost was, he sounded drunk. Maybe it’d be a good idea to visit the Hotel del instead, after all.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” he slurred.

I heard his essence humming near the back of the bar, where he’d obviously gone first. He was in the front room now.

Oh, screw it.

I showed myself, smiling, hoping he wouldn’t ghost-jump me.

Even in the dimness, I could see every bit of him because of his gray electric glow. He was swaying like an inebriated sailor. In fact, he was a sailor, dressed in one of those white uniforms with a flap for a collar and a Popeye hat dipping off his head. He was also a kid, probably just old enough to have joined the navy the minute he was eligible.

When he saw me, he perked up, his dark eyes widening in a face that… Okay, let’s be honest. He looked like someone’s nerdy younger brother.

“Hey, doll!” he said.

Doll? I was going to guess he wasn’t a modern ghost. But at least he seemed cool.

“Hi. Sorry for barging in like this, but—”

“You’re not bargin’ in.” His voice broke like Peter Brady’s every so often, and he had a thick Southern accent.

He floated to a stool and patted the bar next to him. It didn’t make a sound. “Come join Petty Officer Randy Randall fer a drink.”

His name was beyond fun.

“Ghosts can’t drink.” I knew this because I’d already tried it. Same with eating, and frankly, it’s pretty crappy to be able to smell pizza on the wind and not be able to scarf it down.

Sailor Randy Randall gave me that wide-eyed stare again and then fell into a fit of laughter, silently pounding the bar. When he finished, he slurred, “I can see you’re a new kid, ain’t ya? Welcome to Boo World.”

I sensed that I was going to get an education tonight that Amanda Lee might not approve of. Maybe she’d kept me away from other ghosts so that I would be her little specter slave while not knowing there were other ways to exist.

I moved to a seat close to Randy, but not right next to him. He laughed at that, too.

“New ’n’ careful,” he said with exaggeration in his tone. “I like ya new ghosts. You’re a real gas.”

Now that I was nearer to him, his essence tickled me. I could also get a better gander at his features: wavy light hair under his cap, a tilted-up nose, crooked teeth. He winked at me, knowing I was checking him out.

Then he zinged upward and flew toward the liquor shelf, knocking down a bottle. It hit the ledge below, breaking open and spilling whiskey.

“Oh,” I said.

“Don’t worry. The ownersh know the bar has ‘activity’ every once in a while.”

Ownersh?

“And you’re the activity,” I said.

“Smart new ghost, too.” Still slurring most of those s’s.

He bent down—he wasn’t a big guy to begin with—and caught falling whiskey drops in his mouth. The liquid ran right through him, leaving a sparky trail, and splattered to the floor.

“Why bother doing that?” I asked.

“Why bother drinkin’ it when you’re alive? Because it’s there.” He gave me a goofy grin. “Plus, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m in a perpet… perpetial…”

“Perpetual?”

“Thass it. Perpetial state of drunkenness.”

“Because that’s how you…” I was about to say, “Because that’s how you died?” But that might be rude.

He didn’t seem to care. “Yup. I died completely soused.”

Whoa. So that’s why I was a spaz who just wanted to go-go-go—because I’d been slightly hopped up on Mello Yello when I’d died. I guess if I’d been toking with my friends in the forest that night—and I would’ve if I hadn’t been on driving duty—I would’ve come out on the other side as a wasted ghost.

Randy said, “Here I am, still a drunken bum. My girlfriend told me that once, in a letter. Jus’ before I was supposed to ship out to the South Pacific.”

World War II. Was he that old?

After another “drink,” he stood back up. “Haven’t met other ghosts, have ya?”

I thought about fake Dean, but decided he wasn’t so much my and Randy’s kind. “No.”

“I can tell. Ya look at me funny. Also, ya don’t know ghost etiquette.”

“Sorry.”

“Forget it, doll. All of us start somewheres.”

And here’s where my education would begin. Hopefully. “What am I supposed to do when I meet a fellow ghost?”

“Oh, it’s not so much what you’re supposed to do. It’s what you’re ’spected to do. Tell your story. Here, I’ll go first.” He was making a lot of hand gestures. “It happened seaside. I always loved the ocean. And one night, near downtown, I was standin’ on a bank of rocks with my girlfriend’s last letter in my hand. I was mooning over her when… Oops. Lost my footing on them rocks.”

“You… drowned?” That’s what’d happened to my parents in the boating accident.

“Nah.” He knocked on his head. “Slammed the ol’ noggin. Bled right out. The worst part is that I let go of Magnolia’s letter when I fell, and I’ve been trying to find it ever since. Then again, we all have our tether.”

Amanda Lee had mentioned that last word to me—it was what she thought kept us tied to the earth, unable to move on.

Randy was watching me like he was expecting me to reveal my tether. But I had a question for him first, ghost etiquette or not.

“What if you never find that letter?” Because he wouldn’t. By now, the paper would’ve disintegrated, right?

He didn’t seem very concerned. “That bothered me at first, I must admit. But ya know what? I haven’t lost hope that I’m gonna find it. I will one day.”

Okay. I dropped the subject. No use in upsetting him with the truth.

“So, it’s my turn?” I asked.

“Ya never hear a ghost’s story without telling him your own. It’s terrible form. Terrible.”

“All right. But it’s not pretty.”

“Toots, if you’re roaming this plane after your death, chances are ya got a sad tale. I’ve been around, and I’ve heard it all. Try me.”

I laid it on him—Elfin Forest, partying with my friends, nineteen eighties, going missing in the woods. He’d been around Boo World for so long that he even knew things, like how “dope” in my era didn’t mean what it did in his, as in “You got the dope on the shindig tonight?” I told him that I didn’t remember my death, and he actually understood perfectly.

“Thass why you’re still here,” he said. “Because you’ll search and search until ya find out how ya died. It could take aeons.”

I didn’t mention how Amanda Lee told me she was going to help me solve my murder. I wasn’t sure how that’d work out anymore. Besides, I didn’t feel like talking about her much.

Randy kind of jumped and then arched over the bar, landing in the seat next to me, my essence going staticky and sensing his cool temperature as I shifted.

“So why’d ya follow me in here tonight?” he asked with a tilted grin. “Bored?”

“I… Not really. I wanted to meet someone who was like me.”

“Right. Besides, you’re too new to be bored yet. But I’m gonna tell ya—watch out for boredom, toots… .”

“Jensen. You can call me Jensen or Jen.”

“I like that. Jen. I know ’nother ghost from the nineteen ’eighties.” He waggled an unsteady finger. “You’re not like her. She’s got hair thass all these colors, and she wears petticoats as skirts, too. They didn’t even do that in the dance halls.”

Sounded like a total Valley Girl to me.

Randy touched his wrist. “She’s got black bandy things on her arms, too. They’re ’cause of Madonna.”

He seemed very proud to name-drop someone from the ’eighties.

“Very good, Randy.” But I wasn’t happy that I had been wearing those same bracelets before I died. I’d lost them at the forest party, so they weren’t a permanent part of my ghost wardrobe. I’d had a total love-hate thing with Madonna: liking that she sassed all the boys while not liking her mainstreamness. I was more an Oingo Boingo SoCal girl.

“Anyway, I was talking about boredom, wasn’t I?” Randy scratched his head under his hat, scrunching his eyebrows together. “Thass right. Ya need to know that boredom is bad for us, Jen. Very bad. Ya said you were caught in a time loop?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that can happen again. Don’t think it won’t. When one of us doesn’t recharge, we lose power, and we go into that time-loop imprint. The pros call it a ‘noninteractive’ spirit.”

“Pros? Like…”

“Psychics. Mediums. Hunters. What have ya.”

Again with Amanda Lee. I couldn’t seem to get away from the thought of her.

“What do they call ghosts like us?” I asked.

“Interactives. Intelligent spirits. We still have our personalities and we can think, unlike the nons. But there’re a boatload more, like anonymous spirits, who’re confused and afraid and won’t come out to play like we do, poor fatheads.”

I wished I could take notes from Randy Randall. This was the best.

“What else?” I asked.

“It’ll take more than a night for ya to know everything. Besides, I gotta go off the island and look for my letter soon.”

“Maybe I can help you.”

He smiled with those crooked teeth, and his voice went all crackly again when he said, “Thass a girl.”

In life, I’d managed to have a lot of friends, especially in high school, where people elected me to stuff like the student council and even made me Homecoming Queen, not that you’d know it by looking at me now.

Damn, I wished ghosts could do wardrobe changes.

Just as I was thinking that it might be pretty easy to make ghost friends, too, Randy shifted gears.

“Ya know how ghosts appear in different places? It’s not just because they have a purpose in being there—sometimes they need a change of loo-cation, and they get happy by changing up their routines. We get a real charge outta reactions from people when we scare ’em, too. Thass because it’s fun.”

I gave him a curious glance.

“Don’t worry. I just boo the jerks, no one nice.” He looked me up and down. “I’d say ya got some kind of charge tonight yourself.”

“I was out on some power lines before.”

“Nah… not from that. An inner charge. Like ya feel more alive for some reason. Ya got some color to your gray.”

Hadn’t Amanda Lee noticed my slight color, too, after I’d come back from the star place?

Now was my chance to ask about fake Dean, but Randy was looking yearningly behind the bar at the whiskey, which had slowed to infrequent drips. This sailor was an exercise in futility, I feared, but I liked him.

“You said there’s a boatload of ghost types,” I said.

“Yeah.”

“Like… ?” I urged.

Randy glanced away from the booze, his gaze focusing on me again. “Like malevolent spirits. Never pal around with one of those, Jen.” He hiccuped.

Was he talking about the type of ghosts Amanda Lee had mentioned? “What do you mean… malevolent?”

“Negative ghosts, ones that’re attracted to despair and bad feelings. Sometimes ya can’t even tell ’em apart from any other ghosts. But only sometimes.” He hiccuped again. “And don’t confuse them with demons.”

Shit. Demons actually existed?

Could Gavin summon one of those to go after me? Not cool at all.

Randy leaned closer. He wasn’t producing a smell right now; otherwise I’m sure I would’ve been knocked over by alcohol fumes.

“Ghosts aren’t demons, in case you’re wondering,” he said. “They’re spiritual entities that’ve always existed.”

“Can they hurt us?”

“Demons? Gosh, yeah. Avoid ’em.”

Instead of avoiding, I just might be putting myself into the path of bad by engaging in Gavin’s haunting. But what were the odds of him reaching out to a demon for help against us? Amanda Lee was only being ultracareful when she’d mentioned the slight possibility of spiritual enemies.

Paranoia, the destroyer…

I wasn’t scared. I just wanted to be prepared. “Can ghosts hurt other ghosts?”

“Sure, jus’ like humans can hurt other humans, but it’s not something we usually do. Why? You thinkin’ of takin’ me on?”

He held up his fists and shadow-boxed at me, then laughed. His sudden movements made him lose his balance and spill off his stool, but he regained his floating, pushing his hat higher on his head.

I couldn’t help laughing, too. He was something.

“About them demons, though?” he said, coming back to the stool. “They don’t go after ghosts so much. Jus’ humans, and anyone who asks to tangle with one deserves what they get. They possess people when they can.”

I narrowed my gaze. “Can ghosts possess, too?”

“Only with the willing. I’ve never done it. If you’re not experienced”—he mangled that word, too—“it’s supposed to suck so much energy out of ya afterward that you’ll probably turn into an imprint.”

He started hovering out of his seat, toward the booze, like he couldn’t fight it anymore. But I stopped his progress with my next question.

“Have you ever met an angel of death?”

His energy fritzed as he hung in midair, then turned to me, wary.

“We all meet ’em at some point,” he said, “but they’re not angels. We call ’em wranglers, and their job’s to—”

“Bring us to the light?”

He nodded, and I almost thought he’d gone sober.

“I didn’t meet my wrangler for the first time till…” He shrugged. “Gosh, not till they started buildin’ the Coronado Bay Bridge. The nineteen sixties?”

I didn’t know much about the history of that. “So he’s visited you more than once?”

“Sure. They check in every once in a while, jus’ to see if you’re ready. But I wouldn’t call wranglers ‘he.’ They’re sort of like… its. Ya can’t tell what they are because they got veils and they’re all covered up.” He got closer to me. His skin had gotten a little grayer. “Did one already visit ya?”

My stomach area had gone truly hollow. “I’m thinking this wasn’t so much of a wrangler.”

I described fake Dean, the lotus pool, the star place.

By the time I was done, Randy’s mouth was hanging open. Then he said, “That wasn’t a wrangler, Jen. I don’t know what the hay that was.”

Maybe I did need a drink—or the closest I could get to one.

I floated off my stool, joining Randy as he went behind the bar again. I bent to catch a drip of whiskey in my mouth, feeling a sizzle in me.

It was… hell, different.

That word described a lot of things as a ghost. And I assumed it was an important word, because different was an enemy of boredom, which Randy said could be a negative.

“Don’t worry.” He seemed as if he wanted to pat me on the back or something. I think he even tried and I couldn’t feel it except for a blip of coldness and a buzz. “I’ll ask around, see if anyone’s met something like your… Dean. Thass his name, right? Your old boyfriend?”

I nodded, wishing the whiskey would drip some more.

“I wonder, though,” he said. “There’re… legends, even here in Boo World.”

“Legends.”

“Rumors about entities that like to suck energy off new, traumatized ghosts who carry lots of fear with ’em. But ya don’t seem all that fearful. He must’ve found that out and rejected ya.”

Ouch. I took that personally, because somewhere in my sick soul, I sort of liked that “Dean” had wanted me again. I knew it wasn’t really Dean, but still. Vanity works in strange ways.

Also, being a needy girlfriend sucks.

Then I recalled fake Dean’s last words to me. “Another day, Jenny.”

“I don’t think he’s done with me,” I said.

Randy got a protective scowl on his face. And why not? We’d kind of bonded so far. Sweet.

I told him everything fake Dean had said before sending me through the cracked floor.

“Yup,” Randy said when I was done. “I’m definitely talkin’ to the others about this.”

There was a lull in our conversation as Randy looked at the liquor pooled on the ledge. A tiny wave of it rolled to the edge and tumbled off. He smiled at how he’d manipulated the booze into a new fall of drops and bent down to catch some.

“You do that so easily,” I said.

“What? Drink?”

“Well, that. But… manipulating. I’m not very good at it yet.”

“Ya will be. It takes practice. So do things like causin’ hallucinazions”—he continued his championship streak of word-screwing—“in humans and bein’ able to empathize with ’em.”

I was still back at the hallucination part. “We can make them see things?”

“Oh, sugar, ya don’t even know. Remember when I said I scare jerks?”

“Yeah.”

“I usually do it when I’m downtown, and some guy is handlin’ his girl in the wrong way. All it takes is a long touch and your imagination and, voilà, instant nightmare flashin’ in front of the jerk’s gaze. It never fails to make ’em behave from that minute on.”

Wow. I decided not to tell him about haunting Gavin because I wasn’t sure how Randy would judge that. But this news was bad to the bone.

Immediately, my thoughts started whirring with the possibilities.

“How about empathizing?” I asked. “How do you do that right?”

“A softer, less intense touch. Those are the ones I use on the dames.” He waggled his eyebrows.

Then it was as if a ticking clock had sounded an alarm in Randy, because he whipped his gaze toward the door and float-hopped over the bar.

“Sunrise,” he said. “There’s light enough for me to look for my gal’s letter.”

He must’ve forgotten that I’d told him I’d help, because he was under and out the door before I could remind him.

Drunk ghost ADD.

But honestly, I was excited about the information he’d given me, and I couldn’t wait to put this hallucination and empathy stuff in action.

I smiled, knowing exactly where I’d be going today—a possible murderer’s mind.

And maybe even beyond that.

7

Gavin wasn’t at the mansion.

For the first time, I felt an energy suck that had nothing to do with traveling too far or putting out too much effort. Sailor Randy hadn’t gotten around to explaining the fact that disappointment could also take a bit of the charge out of a ghost.

But Gavin had to be home sometime—I just hadn’t expected him to be gone shortly after dawn.

I’d already done a sweep of the property, and not only was his door open, but his bed was made. Most of all, I just couldn’t sense his life force—a warmth that always stood out from everyone else’s.

The first thing I wondered was if he’d run off because of last night. I highly doubted that, though, since he seemed the type to stand up to trouble, even if it came at him invisibly. Maybe he’d just gone in to work early, distracting himself from his fears by immersing himself in video game designing. What better way to escape this world than to invent your own?

The bummer was that I had no idea where he might have an office—I’d have to hit the Internet again for that. Or if he’d taken off on another of those business trips Noah and Wendy had been talking about yesterday.

Just on the off chance that he’d run out to get groceries or something—right, like Mr. Rich Pants wouldn’t have his housekeeping staff take care of that—I decided to pay a longer visit to his room before I left.

If I couldn’t try out some empathizing or hallucinations on him, maybe I could at least get to know my person of interest better by playing detective.

More bummerville, though. His bedroom turned out to be like a hotel: all expensive, starched sheets, closed closets, and anonymous vibes. He’d left nothing on the granite desk near the full-length window, and I wondered if he ever even worked in here. There wasn’t a damn thing that showed he had made this room his own and, unfortunately, when I tried to open drawers or cabinets, I didn’t have the skills.

Not yet, anyway.

Even the bathroom didn’t tell me much about Gavin. As I said, I couldn’t get into his cabinets to view even what kind of toothpaste he used, and knowing that he liked Paul Mitchell shampoo wasn’t exactly earthshaking information that convinced me of his murderous guilt. At least his walk-in closet was a little better—full of jeans and casual tops, a few business suits, a tux or two, plus what looked like hiking gear.

A dream date and an outdoorsman, huh?

Had Gavin done any serious walking near the beach on out-of-the-way trails, like the one Elizabeth’s remains had been found by?

Spurred on, I made my way downstairs before anyone in the house was up and about. I didn’t beat the cook to the kitchen, though—she was already laying out a buffet in the dining room.

Ultimately, I discovered a room off the garage that had all kinds of sporting equipment and accessories in it: a kayak, surfboards, wet suits. This gear was way better quality than any boards and suits Dean and I had ever used, but that wasn’t the point.

I’m not sure there was a point, because nothing gave me a clue about Gavin’s relationship with Elizabeth. Even the study I found on the first floor was as neat as a pin, in spite of the computer equipment riddling a few desktops in there.

Then again, had I expected to find, like, a bloody knife lying around? The murder had happened nearly three years ago.

I decided that I would continue my search later, because the cook was done with arranging the breakfast buffet, and that meant people were going to be coming downstairs and there’d be some good eavesdropping to be had.

I settled into a corner near the ceiling. The maid never even paid me the slightest bit of attention.

Farah appeared in the dining room first, her long, thick brown hair trailing down her back, her white silk robe wrapped around her. She smiled at the gray-uniformed maid, who nodded good morning.

“Noah hasn’t been down here for coffee yet?”

“No, Miss Farah.”

She blew out a breath and accepted a steaming porcelain cup of tea with a saucer from the woman. “I told him that he needs to be out of bed early today since Joseph is taking him to school for a newspaper staff meeting.”

Joseph must be their chauffeur or whatever. But… newspaper? Noah with the scruffy hair and attitude was a prep school reporter?

As Farah went to the massive buffet board and grabbed a plate from next to the eggs, fresh muffins, fruit, and cereals, I decided that the socialite wasn’t about to have a profound conversation with the maid, so I took the chimney route outside, to the pool, to see what was in the pool house back there.

A maintenance guy was already using a net to skim the water, and I slowed down as I passed him.

Something was niggling at me, and it had to do with that pool guy. I didn’t know why, because he looked presentable enough—late twenties, blond hair, an entrepreneur dressed in khakis and a polo top with his company’s logo on it.

But he kept glancing at an upper-story mansion window that overlooked the pool, like he was waiting to see something there. He also kept whistling a low tune that I didn’t recognize.

I couldn’t see what he was seeing, even when I flew up to the window to take a peek inside to find a girl’s bedroom, with a king-sized bed and comic-book artwork on the walls.

What was he waiting for?

Forget the pool house for now, I thought. My bad feeling told me that I should go to that room.

When I got to Wendy’s door, I shuddered. Bad feeling times a million.

I threaded under her door, hoping that she wasn’t on some schedule where she strutted around in a towel with her curtains wide-open every morning, cluelessly putting on a regular show for the pool guy.

But after I eased into her room, I merely saw her near—not in front of—the wide expanse of glass, the sun streaming in behind her to light over her long, dark pink-streaked hair, which was still wet from the shower. She was wearing torn black sweats that slumped down one of her shoulders, ’eighties-like.

Behind her, hanging on the closet, was what looked to be her prep school uniform, all-plaid skirt, white linen shirt, and slim tie, and she was holding a clarinet in her hands, carefully cleaning it and then putting it into a case that rested on a window-side table.

Up close, I could see more about the artwork on the walls now: round-eyed comic book characters with big, sometimes spiky hair. Some of them even had schoolgirl outfits a lot sexier than hers.

As Wendy coughed a couple of times—she sounded only slightly sick—I inched over to the window, wanting to know if the pool guy was still watching.

Yup. He was near the guesthouse in a stealthy spot, cleaning his net, still looking up here every so often.

Did he have a thing for teenage Wendy? Young Asian girls? In life, my guy friends had joked about the last one every so often, confessing to certain fetishes, so I knew that it was a male fantasy for some. But wasn’t Wendy just fifteen?

I’d been so focused on Pool Guy that I hadn’t noticed Wendy had her arms crossed over her chest and was looking around.

She’d already felt me.

I backed off from her, but I couldn’t just let her be a sitting duck for the pool guy’s eyes, and when the air kicked on, I decided to do her a favor and pass the curtain, very casually, fluttering it enough so that it came loose from the teak holder that held it back, and drawing her attention to the window.

She must’ve thought I was the air, because she went to the curtain, like she was going to put it back in place, then peered down at the pool.

She made a small, impatient sound and tugged the curtains shut without any more fanfare.

Did the pool guy see her up here every day? Had she caught on to his peeping?

Just then, her newfangled phone dinged from where it sat on the bed, the screen lighting up.

She rushed to it, clearly forgetting all about the cold spot in her room. Even so, I tried to keep my distance as I looked over her shoulder while she accessed what Amanda Lee had once told me was a “text message.”

I’ll call school to clear your absence. Had early business. See you later, though. Bringing home chicken soup from deli that you like.

The name at the top of the small screen said GAVIN, and I noticed that there were previous texts from Wendy telling him that she wouldn’t be going to her classes today.

I could feel energy leak out of her as her shoulders slumped. She plopped down on the bed, sadness pulling down on her mouth. She rubbed her arms, still cold, then typed into her phone with her thumbs, coughing more as I positioned myself to see again.

I hoped u’d wrk hre and hang out with me, she’d answered.

When Amanda Lee had told me about texts, she’d also mentioned that they were the downfall of the English language. I was starting to believe her, because Wendy seemed much smarter than her spelling.

Amanda Lee. I was thinking about her too much. Wondering when I should go back.

Wondering if I wanted to.

Gavin had responded by now.

Meetings with game script writers and staff. Dinner this weekend instead?

Wendy made like she was going to throw her phone, but she pulled back and hatefully typed Whatevr. No huge thng.

Then she did toss it away, giving in to a moment of teenage drama and falling back on the bed, where she coughed once more and then closed her eyes.

Well. At least I knew that Gavin had gone in to work. She didn’t move from the bed, even when her phone dinged again with a message from Gavin, telling her to get well. And when another message came a few minutes later, she only kicked the phone away and crawled up to her pillows, burying her face there.

Like a nosy-nose, I looked at the last message. It was from Farah.

Gavin told me ur sick. Constanza will check in on you.

And that was it from big sis.

I marveled at that. Farah was just downstairs and she couldn’t be bothered to come up and tell Wendy this in person? Wow, they were really close.

Soon enough, Wendy gave in and glanced at the phone, seeming totally unimpressed with the messages. She only grabbed a remote from a wicker nightstand and flicked on her huge space-age TV, arriving at a channel that was playing cartoons that had characters just like the ones in her wall art.

It occurred to me that I had an opportunity to actually study my poltergeist agent, if I chose to go that route. So I stayed, even when the maid showed up to bring Wendy a tray of breakfast food and ruffle her hair. Even when, after wolfing down her grub, Wendy got some shut-eye.

I took advantage of the situation and poked around her room—everywhere from her open closet filled with holey, edgy clothing and enough boots to make me think she was obsessed with them, to a gaped desk drawer with art materials stuffed into it. Her bathroom was just as boring as Gavin’s, except Wendy had some beauty aids that caught my eye and made me want to be a girl again. I might’ve looked like a slob in my last moments on the earth, but I’d had a weakness for body splashes and lotions just like any other chick.

Hours went by as I also inspected the house again, finding nothing majorly interesting.

It was only when afternoon rolled around that things got good.

I was back in Wendy’s room when a “laptop” computer that sat on a low table near a bamboo-framed couch made a ringing sound.

Sickness forgotten, Wendy bounded out of bed and over to the machine, pressing a key while she sat down.

“Hey,” she said to the screen while she sprawled over the couch cushions.

“Hey,” came an answer from the computer.

Amanda Lee’s computer hadn’t held conversations. I had to see this.

I got nearer, pasting myself up against the wall in back of Wendy, checking out Exhibit A in Tomorrowland.

A girl with big hazel eyes, mousy brown hair, freckles, and the same prep school uniform that hung on Wendy’s closet was on the screen. “You’re sick?” she asked.

“I was, but I’m way better now. I slammed NyQuil and slept all day.”

“I was going to bring you some goodies, like those chewy red cough drops and ice cream. Still want?”

“Thanks, but that’s okay, Torrey. Gavin’s got the sick-girl food covered when he gets here tonight.”

“Got it. He didn’t work from home?”

“No, and I thought he’d be able to swing it.” Wendy huffed out a sigh, her gaze straying from the computer. For a second, her shoulders lifted, like a little of my coldness had traveled down from the wall to the back of her neck. But then she returned her focus to the screen. “He promised he’d try to be home more…”

“Wen, you and your abandonment issues, I swear. He’s not your dad, you know.”

Note to Jensen: Do a computer search on Daddy-O. Amanda Lee had said he was still alive and that he was constantly on trips away from home, but that’s all I really knew about him.

“Don’t tell me—I’ve got issues,” Wendy said, sinking into the couch.

“You’re such a nerd.” Torrey laughed, taking off a headband while she talked into the lens. In the background, I could see a bedroom, pink and frilly. “You’ve always said that your family’s nutty and thank God you were only adopted into it. Why you keep getting depressed when one of them is gone is beyond me.”

“You like Gavin as much as I do.”

“Because he’s hot.”

Oh, little girl, I thought. Look deeper than that.

Wendy was gagging at her friend’s comment.

“Anyway,” Torrey continued, “when we graduate, you can get out of that house, room with me, and Gavin can visit all you want. That way, you won’t have to ever see Farah or Noah or deal with your cuckoo family dynamics ever again.”

My ghost ears perked.

“Nobody’s cuckoo here,” Wendy said.

Except for maybe your brother.

Wendy added, “It’s just that I feel like they’re one family and I’m another. Except for Gavin. I’m not sure I know Dad well enough to include him.”

A touch of energy seemed to spin out of me, extending toward Wendy.

Lonely. A kindred soul. She wasn’t as glamorous as her older sister or as cool as Gavin or as seemingly party-popular as Noah.

They were one set of Edgetts; she was another. What a way to live.

A voice off-camera on Torrey’s side made her look away from Wendy. Then she turned back to her.

“The tutor’s here,” she said. “See you tomorrow?”

“I suppose.”

They signed off, but Wendy just sat there on the couch, like she didn’t know where to go now.

So it seemed that Wendy did have a few adolescent issues to work with, poltergeist-wise. Bottled anger at Gavin for not being around when he’d promised to be. Anger at Farah and Noah for not accepting her. Anger at the dad, wherever he was.

I felt so bad for Wendy that I even started to think dumb things—ways to show her that I was already sorry for the haunting that’d be taking place.

Empathy. Hallucinations.

I’d been so fixated on haunting Gavin this whole time that I hadn’t extended my thoughts beyond that. But with these powers Sailor Randy had told me about, couldn’t I do more than just scare someone?

Rashly, I floated away from the wall and touched Wendy on the cheek.

It’s okay, I thought.

A tiny lightning flash struck me, and it must’ve done the same to her, because she flinched. But she didn’t pull away.

And in that fleeting second, I got a peek into Wendy Edgett’s mind.

Looking up at the grand staircase of this house, a feeling of absolute anxiety splitting down the middle as a beautiful woman with long blond hair and clear blue eyes bent down, smiling, saying, “Welcome to your new home, Wendy.”

Then a grave marker shaped as a marble angel.

Then yelling from a room down the hallway, a girl’s voice…

Gavin yelling, too…

Then Wendy’s gaze looking around her new room with its new furniture. This room. A new place that made her feel safe…

By the time the last image faded away, I realized that Wendy had sensed that something was wrong around her now, and her thoughts had turned to questions.

What’s going on?

Why is it so cold?

I scrambled to distract her, and out of sheer panic, I did something really stupid.

You know how there’re some babysitters who give a crying kid booze from Ma and Pa’s liquor cabinet just to quiet him down?

Without thinking, I did the ghost equivalent of that, pressing more of my essence against Wendy’s cheek, intensifying the contact. It was almost like I was reaching past her skin and into her face, putting my energy into something that would mellow her out for now.

I started to think of something relaxing to get her mind off my presence.

Hallucinations, right? The beach. That would do it.

I wasn’t so sure what happened next.

I started to sink into her, tumbling, going past the act of just giving her a few light images to enjoy. Somehow I became a part of Wendy, feeling her experiences and her thoughts, as the room itself filled with…

Waves, washing up to our feet, lapping at them before the water retreats. A blue sky and warm sun take the place of the bedroom ceiling, sand covering the floor.

As the roar of the ocean calls out, we smell salt, feel its heaviness on our skin. Our heart thuds even as everything around us makes us think of summer vacation.

Waves pounding, hissing away from the shore until another comes to take its place… God, we miss summer. It’d meant we didn’t have to go to school, with all those assholes calling us a bore and an arty farty.

A seagull flies overhead, skimming the ceiling.

We bend down, digging our hand into the sand, coming up with a fistful and letting it sift away, blown by a coastal wind… .

When I strained out of Wendy’s conscious with a jarring pop, the room was back to normal—comic book art, school uniform hanging on the closet, girl sitting on the couch with an open mouth and wide, unfocused eyes. She was shivering, like my touch had caused a freeze in her.

Around me, there was no more beach. I definitely wasn’t in Wendy’s head anymore as I hovered nearby, my essence rushing back together as I became me again.

That had been more than weird. I’d known that I wanted to show her the beach, but I hadn’t been thinking about the images, just experiencing them as they came. And I hadn’t taken over Wendy’s body so much as…

What? Had I mind-melded with her? Become a part of what was going on inside her head even as those beach images played out in front of her in this very room? Because that’s what hallucinations are, right? Mirages?

It sure hadn’t been like using empathy, where I was fully in control while I watched what was going on in her head. With hallucinations, only a small part of me had been aware that I still existed while I’d been in her head. I had been implanted in there, experiencing the water, sand, and sun as they appeared in this room.

That’s right. I had experienced everything, right along with Wendy… .

She rubbed her arms, blinked her eyes, like she was only now recovering from what I’d created for her. She’d thought it was real. Her breathing was even beach-day smooth and peaceful until it starting speeding up as reality hit her.

Bafflement took over her face while she sat up and rapidly glanced around the room.

Damn, when would I get the hang of “subtle”?

Her gaze landed on me. Almost like… No, she couldn’t see me. Or, more to the point, she didn’t get a look on her face that confirmed she did. There was only a bewildered expression there.

She was off the couch before I could inch too far back. Swiveling her gaze around the room some more, she crossed her arms over her chest, trembling.

“Hello?”

I hovered, waiting.

“Hello?” she said with more force this time, like she was half afraid and half exhilarated at the possibility of something in her room, messing with her mind.

Her gaze landed on the bed, on her phone. She made a dive for the device, but I didn’t whoosh to the door and confirm everything she was probably thinking with a huge show of my ghostliness.

I would just creep out of here, saving the big tricks for another day when Gavin was around.

So I stayed in place, rising to the ceiling as I’d done with Gavin, hoping I could hide in plain sight until she lost interest.

But then she aimed the phone toward me, just like she could feel where my coldness was coming from, and a camera-type flash blinded me.

Too late, I remembered that Amanda Lee had once mentioned that there were cameras on these new phones.

Wendy was already taking more pictures by the time I decided to cut my losses and scram, zipping down to the door and underneath it, then out of the mansion, fearing I’d already screwed up the haunting and all those higher ideals about justice that had been filling me with a purpose.

Without much of one now, I figured there was really only one place I belonged. One place that could offer me a sort of warped comfort while I figured out what to do next.

And that place sure as hell wasn’t back at Amanda Lee’s.

8

Elfin Forest by day sure was a lot different than it was at night.

I had landed away from my death spot, and I supposed the woods looked like a lot of others in SoCal during spring: a thrust of green bursting out, pygmy oaks coming alive with their long, thick branches winding over the ground and then up into the air. They were almost like fingers of smoke that writhed and nearly entangled with each other in a still dance.

Power from being close to my death spot hummed through me, and I started feeling less pessimistic than I had felt back at the Edgett mansion. Then again, I wasn’t all that optimistic, either, since I didn’t seem to be nailing all this haunting stuff as well as I should’ve been.

But maybe that was the former A student in me—the one who’d wanted to be an anthropologist before my parents’ deaths had sent me reeling.

Why an anthropologist? Well, because I’d seen Raiders of the Lost Ark like everyone else, and archaeology required too many science classes, so I’d adjusted my goals slightly.

Practical, if not a little romantic.

I wandered among the gnarled branches, pulled toward my death spot. And when I saw one branch that dipped into a U just like a Mother Nature–made chair, I vaguely remembered it from the worst night of my life.

Why? Had I run past it as I fled from my killer and the sight branded itself into my psyche? I didn’t know, but as I moved closer, a turbo-humming sensation blasted through me.

I reached out to run my hand just over the bark—I couldn’t actually touch it—and the answer to why this branch was giving me the electric willies seemed closer than ever, just as out of reach as that tree was.

I kept trailing my fingers over the bark, and as I came to the dip in the branch—

A jagged screech of imagery assaulted me: darkness, a pale face—

Then, as quickly as it’d jarred me, it was gone, yanked away from memory.

I didn’t move for a second, even though my essence was still in the middle of a tug-of-war between this spot and my death place.

What I’d seen… God, it hadn’t looked like a real face. But I couldn’t hold on to enough details about it to be sure. I only had a wispy feeling of adrenaline-to-the-heart terror, as if faces like that shouldn’t exist in real life.

Unnerved, I floated away, allowing that pulling sensation to take me right to my death spot. I hadn’t visited the forest since Amanda Lee had rescued me from it, so I hadn’t been able to investigate my own murder yet. But as I skimmed along the leaf-strewn ground, that disturbing big-time humming feeling increased, got louder, making me shake. Making me think I should’ve come back here way before now.

Then there I was—Death Central.

The noise and the trembling suddenly stopped. Was it because this was where everything had stopped for me? It was almost like I was hovering over a hole that wanted to suck me in, keeping me here in a silent, dark embrace. Already my senses were getting hazy with a mixture of dread and confusion… and comfort.

But when I bent to get closer to the ground on which I’d died, that sharp screaming sensation I’d felt before lanced me one last time, like a final, humming cut.

A flash of pale, withered face, so awful that—

A big black wall slammed down in my head, dividing me from that face, like I didn’t want to remember.

But I did want. I had to want!

I slumped the rest of the way to the ground, lying there for a while as time passed and the sun tumbled from morning to afternoon. All the while, death energy enveloped me. A pure energy—not the kind I got from batteries.

It was almost like granola versus Froot Loops. Both would keep you going, but one was better for you than the other.

Eventually, I heard footsteps shuffling through the leaves, but I didn’t move. A casual hiker or nature lover wouldn’t see me anyway. Then I heard a familiar voice.

“I had a feeling I might find you here.”

Amanda Lee.

I still didn’t stir. It was just so cozy here, but only cozy in the way your bed feels on days when you’re too depressed to get out of it.

She spoke again. “I kept thinking you would return to the casita, and when you didn’t, I began to worry. This was the first place I checked.”

I turned my head to glance at her. A tall woman in laced-up dark boots and a Southwest-patterned skirt and a red silk blouse, her auburn hair pinned back from her face to feature those gray streaks curving near her high cheekbones. Her gray eyes showed me she wasn’t lying about being worried.

“You were checking in on me?” I asked. “Couldn’t you just look at your bulletin board if you wanted to get a load of me?”

Amanda Lee folded her hands. “I didn’t mean for you to see my war room.”

“If you’re expecting me to say sorry for spying on you, sure, I’ll do it.” I sat up. “But I didn’t go there to spy.”

“You don’t have to apologize.” She found a seat of sorts on a thick, level oak branch that stuck out from the trunk, but she tested its weight before she gingerly rested on it. “I like my privacy, even if we’re partners.”

“I’m not sure that’s the word for us. Partners don’t use tricks to put each other at a distance. That’s what the salt around your windows and your chimney was for, wasn’t it? Shutting me out?”

She shook her head. “That was nothing personal. I’ve been barring spirits from my home for years.”

Still. “I’m just going to lay it out, Amanda Lee. I can’t work with you if you keep secrets in general, and the first one I want to know is what’s going on with those bulletin boards.”

Her shoulders lost a bit of their tension, like she was relieved that I hadn’t asked about the ring she’d been longingly gazing at while sitting on her bed in her nightgown. Maybe she thought I hadn’t seen that part. Or maybe she thought I had already gotten the idea that it was from her dead husband.

“The bulletin board with your picture,” she said, “is a collection of your data—articles published after your death and reports that a private investigator gave to me. I told you before that I had been looking into your life and death, trying to contact you because I wanted to help you.”

“You wanted to do more than that,” I said, referring to her other agenda.

“True. But I’m not lying when I tell you that I also want to solve your murder. I merely have… priorities.”

Fair enough. “And the other bulletin boards on the wall?”

She didn’t even hesitate. “I studied those victims before you. I used the same private investigator friend who’s been looking into the Edgetts. I’ve consulted on some of his cases in the past when he’s stuck. But I’m here to tell you that I’ve never been successful in making contact with those other people on the boards.”

“So why keep their information posted?”

She seemed baffled at the question. “Why? Because dismantling their boards would be the same as dismantling them. They had suspicious deaths, just like you, and…”

Oh my God. I knew what she was going to say before she said it.

“You’re thinking of using me to solve their murders, too?” I asked. “And maybe to haunt their killers when we’re done with Elizabeth and before my tether is broken?”

“The idea had crossed my mind.”

Hell. Amanda Lee had ambitions, didn’t she? Her husband’s death had given her some major purpose, scarred her, maybe even resurrected her into a different justice-seeking crusader. Like the Wonder Woman of dead people.

I could’ve been deeply offended that Amanda Lee had manipulated me, the only ghost she’d ever fully connected to. She’d dragged me into her mission.

But I couldn’t muster up the outrage when I understood her so well.

“You’re a real piece of work,” I said.

She was running a thumb over her wedding ring finger, like she was touching a phantom piece of shining jewelry.

“You know the reason I am what I am,” she whispered.

I looked at the fractured woman in front of me. It was all in her eyes as she stared into the distance, as if seeing her Michael standing there, always with her.

I could feel myself pulled closer to her, even if I wasn’t willing myself to move anywhere.

“Do you ever see him?” I asked.

“No.”

That was probably a good thing, because when I’d seen my Dean… Well, trouble. It had ensued.

She glanced down at her ring finger. “I’m afraid this case is making me maudlin. I was never like that before. Believe it or not, I used to be a social butterfly, happy. I used to have a lot of friends, back when I was young.”

“Before Michael died?”

“Actually, before I began…” She motioned to her eyes, but I knew she meant the second sight. “It kicked in when I was twelve, and I began to withdraw from all my friends. They didn’t understand why, and I never told them. The sight made me too different. I couldn’t relate to anyone normal anymore. But at college, I met…”

“Michael. And he didn’t care?”

She shook her head, pursing her lips, and I could tell she was on the edge of crying.

So I shut up. And since she’d explained that ring I’d seen on her finger without my having to ask her, my trust in her shot up about five degrees from zero.

“You’ll tell me everything from now on?” I asked after a decent amount of time had passed and she had gathered herself back up.

A faint smile made her gaze go soft. “As much as you need to know. A woman always has secrets. You should realize that.”

Gulp. Had she caught on to the way Gavin piqued my interest in ways he shouldn’t be poking?

No, she wouldn’t still be smiling at me if she knew.

Sniffing, dabbing at her eyes, Amanda Lee stood. “Is the air cleared between us now?”

“Sure.” I was more than willing to give this another chance. There was too much at stake for the both of us.

She seemed appreciative of that, and I was pretty certain that if she could’ve given me a sisterhood hug, she would’ve done it.

“So you had a day off from me,” she said instead.

“Just like Ferris Bueller.”

She laughed a bit.

Actually, I hadn’t seen that movie when I was alive. I’d found it on the TV after settling into the casita, curious about what’d happened in the ’eighties after I’d left it. Ferris was way cool, and surely he was still cool in this day and age.

“Anyway,” I said, “the most important thing for you to know is that I didn’t take a day off from Elizabeth’s case. I think I made progress with Gavin.”

Amanda Lee’s smile erased any of the lingering sadness. “What sort of progress?”

Ghostly whispers, orange blossom perfume, Gavin getting his gun… I spilled all of it, even the part where I pushed matters a bit too far and entered Gavin’s mind.

“I wasn’t going to do that so early,” I said. “It just…”

“Happened? If it was successful, then I would say it doesn’t matter.”

Hey—she wasn’t put off by my inexperienced phantom fumbling. Cool.

Amanda Lee strolled over to my death spot since I had floated away from it to get closer to her. As she looked down at the patch of nondescript ground, it was almost like she was standing over my real body.

I rose from the dirt. “There’s a bunch more to tell you. There’s this other ghost I met—”

She turned to me, lifting those eyebrows.

“Oh, don’t worry,” I said. “He was a good ghost, a kid from the ’forties.”

“Really?” Fascinated now.

“Yeah. He told me all sorts of ghost tips, gave me pointers on how to empathize with humans and… Did you know that I can cause hallucinations?”

Fascination times a thousand. She looked delighted.

“That makes perfect sense,” she said. “That’s why haunted people see horrific images—because you can make them.”

“If I can get the hang of it.” I shrugged. “I went back to the Edgett mansion this morning to try some of that ghost stuff out, but Gavin wasn’t home.”

“Last night’s haunted activity chased him off?”

“Not really. He just went to work, wherever that is.”

“La Jolla. His office is on Prospect Street.”

She was all over it, as usual. “Good to know. But today, I thought that it might be smart to comb the mansion for any clues, or at least to get to know my subjects, right? So I hung around. I studied Wendy, mostly, you know, just in case I do the poltergeist thing.”

“Wise move.”

I felt like she’d stuck a gold-star sticker on my bulletin board.

“Wendy’s got some anger for sure,” I said. “So it isn’t out of the realm of possibility that she’d be frustrated enough to psychokinetically throw around some furniture in the near future—especially in Gavin’s room. She’s pissed that he’s not home enough, just like their dad, who pretty much abandoned them.”

Amanda Lee just took it all in.

“But I have to tell you,” I said, “that since I don’t have a handle on these powers yet, I also might’ve gone too far with Wendy.”

Her smile dimmed. “How so?”

“Like I mentioned, I wanted to experiment with the powers Randy told me about. I figured I shouldn’t start right out with them on Gavin. Besides, I realized that I don’t have to just use those powers for haunting—I can use them for good.”

“What did you do?” Total maternal tone now.

“I tried both on her?” It was a question, even though there was no question that I’d done it.

Amanda Lee made a tell-me-everything gesture with her fingers.

All right. “The empathy went fine with Wendy, and from the little I saw in her mind, she’s still carrying a lot of grief around about her adopted mom’s death years ago. And there seems to have been some sort of ugly incident when she was younger involving other people in the household. I’m not sure who, though, besides Gavin.”

“Describe, please.”

“In her mind, I heard him yelling down a hallway after there was a female scream.”

“Elizabeth?” Amanda Lee’s eyes had gone wide.

“I’m not sure. But it’s something to go on.”

“Maybe so.” She had narrowed her eyes and was absently pacing now, circling my death spot. “Did you say that you also tested out this hallucination power?”

“Briefly.”

I must’ve been unsettled, because my psychic mentor stopped moving around and fixed her steady gaze on me.

I went on. “Randy, the ghost I met, told me that I had to use a more intense touch, going deeper, to cause hallucinations. So I did that with Wendy. All I wanted to do was make her feel better after a bummer day.”

“And… ?”

I thought of how I’d mind-melded with the girl, feeling the sun and sand on my skin just as much as she must’ve while witnessing the hallucination I’d brought her.

“See, I knew what I wanted to do when I went into her—make her feel better, right?” I said. “But I hadn’t planned what to specifically show her. I just thought, Beach, and the details just came all on their own, without any effort from me. I experienced them just like I was her, Amanda Lee. I was there in the room, looking at the beach as Wendy, hallucinating, too.”

“Beaches aren’t hard to imagine, but I wonder if the details are coming from your own subconscious, which is still intact even as a ghost.” Amanda Lee processed all of it, just as she did with everything else, and it didn’t take her long to add, “You’re going to have to be careful going forward. When you haunt our killer, you could end up scaring yourself if you have no idea what’s coming. Mind that, Jensen.”

The good news just kept on trucking, didn’t it?

Even so, I said, “If you’re afraid that a hallucination could spook me just as much as it could Gavin, don’t worry. If I find proof that he’s our man, I won’t hold back on wielding the full force of any images.”

Wasn’t I sounding bold? I’d had no control over those beach images with Wendy, only the good intentions. This haunting deal was packaged with more strings attached than I’d anticipated. But I’d known it wouldn’t be easy.

And I still wasn’t scared.

Seriously—how bad could I freak myself out? Sailor Randy hadn’t said anything about ghosts booing themselves back into a time loop. Or maybe he just hadn’t gotten around to it.

I’d have to hunt him down again soon to get more info.

“Don’t worry, Amanda Lee,” I said. “I’m not going to quit on this.”

“Especially because we’ll find your killer, too?”

I tried to smile, but I have to say—the longer I stayed here, near my death spot, the more surreal everything was starting to seem. It was still comfortable, but in the same way it’s comfortable to huddle under a thick blanket in the dark of night when you think there’s something in the closet.

And there were more somethings in closets than I had ever suspected while I was living.

How had Elizabeth Dalton reacted when her own personal bogeyman came calling? Had she been afraid at first to see Gavin? Had he been phoning and harassing her after they’d broken up and she’d tried to run away from him when he’d confronted her in person instead?

What had been going through her mind?

“I just wish,” I said, “you could’ve gotten in contact with Elizabeth on the other side. It’d be helpful.”

She looked away from me, then at the ground. Had I said something wrong?

“I know,” I said. “You’ve been trying to contact her. I don’t mean to make you feel bad about being unsuccessful.”

“No, I don’t feel bad. I told you that this case does things to me.” After a second, she added, “It’s so hard to wallow in lost chances. You and Elizabeth make me think of Michael and how life can end in the blink of an eye. One moment, everything is beautiful. The next, the phone rings and…”

Something psychic must’ve struck her right then, because she got really thoughtful, resuming her pacing around my death spot.

She came to a hard stop at the nearest tree, laying her hand against the trunk.

“So many times,” she said, softer now, “I would come here, trying to find you. But there’s something different today. New sensations. Maybe it’s because you’re here with me with far more power in you than the night you emerged from the residual haunting imprint.”

Was she saying she had something now? Information about my death? I started to tremble in my core. I wanted to know.

Didn’t I?

“Come here, Jensen,” she whispered with such urgency in her voice that I zipped over to her.

Then she made another request. “Lie down. I think there’s a lot of psychic energy that’s been gathering with you nearby, and it suddenly flared.”

I wasn’t scared.

Numbing myself, I lay down, realizing intuitively that I’d assumed the exact pose of my death. I shuddered.

Amanda Lee reared back her head, her mouth agape.

At first, I thought she might be having a heart attack, and I surged upward, wanting to help her with one of my ghost powers. What kind of power, though?

Who the hell knew?

She fell backward, away from my death spot, before I could even reach out to her, then stumbled and regained her balance. Her eyes were open, one hand clutching the silken front of her blouse.

Then she slowly walked toward me, raising her other hand.

Night of the Living Dead, I thought, just standing there and waiting for her to get to me.

She arrived, and before I knew what she was doing, she took that hand and swiped it through the air, passing it through me.

Making contact and delivering an image that rocked me.

Running, fast, faster. Gotta get away… .

Was it here? Near?

Silence.

Maybe it was gone.

Maybe I’d lost it a few minutes back. Maybe if I didn’t breathe, it wouldn’t find me again—

Stop! Please! Why’re you doing this?

My voice, pleading. Then my scream, because out of nowhere came that mask, that hideous, gaped mouth of a hag, leering, laughing, only inches away.

Then the ax, raised over its head…

Speeding down toward me—

Banging my vision to black.

9

It took me a few hours to recover.

I mean, damn, how do you ever come to terms with the fact that you’d once starred in your own horror movie? That there’d been an ax-wielding maniac in the woods and you’d been one of the stupid dime-a-dozen, dead-meat kids who usually get picked off one by one with low-budget special effects?

I didn’t know what I’d expected my killer to be like. Just a regular old Joe wandering through Elfin Forest with an itch to murder? Just a jealous ex-boyfriend who’d seized the chance to get me alone and take some blood-ridden revenge, à la Gavin Edgett and Elizabeth Dalton?

I also wondered why my own personal Jason Voorhees hadn’t gone after the kids I’d been with, too. Had something scared the killer away and saved them? Or had he been stalking me and me alone, and once his mission was accomplished, he was done? Also, if my killer had gotten me with an ax, why wasn’t there any blood at my death spot?

After I traveled from the forest and back to the casita, I soothed myself with the computer, doing a search for everything I could find out about serial killers, especially when it came to psychology. But there was so much to cover. Too much.

And the distraction wasn’t keeping away the willies.

I just kept hearing Amanda Lee’s frantic voice when she’d pulled me out of the vision.

“Jensen, you come back to me! Don’t leave me!”

Her pleas had worked because, with that familiar backward sucking sensation, I was yanked out of the vision, returned to the world, Amanda Lee coming into focus second by confusing second.

“Jensen?” she asked, still panicked while reaching out to me.

I dodged her hand. She didn’t like to get cold, and that’s what she would be if she made contact with me. For some demented reason, that fact was first and foremost in my mind during the fuzzy aftermath.

As if remembering my coldness, she backed off. But her voice didn’t calm down.

“You’re so gray right now,” she said. “Just like you were when I first met you.”

As I checked out my essence—definitely no color here—she’d gone on to tell me that my pallor had been going grayer and grayer while we were sharing her vision, and she’d been afraid that I was about to return to my residual haunting phase.

So what was the lesson here? That I shouldn’t be partaking in any more of Amanda Lee’s murder visions. But the ramifications of what’d happened today in Elfin Forest extended even beyond that.

Was this what would happen to me if I scared myself to death with a hallucination during a haunting? Should I be taking Amanda Lee’s psychic vision as a warning for how much terror I could tolerate?

Those were the questions dogging me during my serial killer research, so I finally broke it off and did the next best thing.

I went outside and restlessly hopped into a travel tunnel, already leaving my killer in a “to be continued” mental file. Seriously, since the ax and the old granny mask had added about five hundred notches of creep to my story, the only thing that made me feel better about it was putting it at a distance for the rest of the day.

I told myself it’d been another girl in that vision today, a different Jensen Murphy.

It hadn’t been me. Couldn’t have been.

And I kept telling myself that as I surged to my next destination on the Jensen Justice Tour, popping into the atmosphere right across the street from the shorefront building that housed Gavin Edgett’s gaming company.

I was invisible to the tourists who trooped by on the village sidewalk, some looking for the Hard Rock Café, which I guess used to be in the building I was pseudo-leaning against. They were only background noise, though, because I had to decide, here and now, if scaring myself back into a time loop was going to be worth catching killers.

But would I even know that I’d returned to that numb state? Would I even care, just as long as people like Gavin Edgett made a confession that led to punishment?

My killer’s granny mask flashed before me again. So did the glint of that ax blade.

And it was there, on the sidewalk, facing the windows of Gavin’s building as the sun threatened to dip below the ocean, that I decided that no amount of danger was going to stop me, ever.

In for a penny, in for a pound of flesh.

As I surveyed the two-story structure, I knew what I had to do now—restrict myself to only playing full-on detective with Gavin today, using my empathy to get into his head so I could be sure of his guilt and then get to the real haunting stuff.

Since the clock hadn’t struck five yet, I’d been betting that he was still inside his office, so I rose above the heads of a family dressed in tropical shirts, shorts, and flip-flops, then floated over the traffic toward the building.

It was easy enough to get inside, because I just followed a punky-looking girl with dreadlocked hair through the door, then the lobby. I took a detour up some stairs and through a quiet white hallway. When I got to a place marked ON EDGE PRODUCTIONS, I breezed inside.

Way busier in here. I navigated what seemed like a maze of modern-art-like pale walls that slanted away from the main hall, then cubicles where workers—mostly nerdy guys—were chatting away and having a grand old time while others wore headsets and played games on their computers.

All around, there were cardboard cutouts of characters that probably starred in the games On Edge Productions made, and the same characters were framed on the walls. Some of them even looked like the ones in Wendy’s room.

I flattened myself against the ceiling, flowing along at a crawl as employees strolled below me. I swung down to glance in every open office door I passed.

No Gavin anywhere.

When I got to the only closed door, near the corner of the building—a place for a boss to have an office—I took a chance and slid underneath.

And there he was. The boss.

He wasn’t working behind his computer-cluttered desk, though. He wasn’t even staring out the window at the palm-studded street below and seemingly dreaming up all those blood and blades featured in his video games.

The big guy was fast asleep on a couch, one hand hanging off it until his blunt fingers almost brushed the floor.

Was he catching up on the sleep he’d lost last night, during the haunting?

Electricity beat through me, and I tried not to think about how it would feel to whoosh by him, trailing my hand over his short brown hair. I tried not to look at him up close, noticing the thickness of his lashes against his otherwise hard features.

But I did both anyway, flying over him, then hovering.

What’s going on in your head? I wondered, face-to-face, now that I could get away with it. What was the trigger that made you kill Elizabeth, if you really did it?

I braced myself—make it subtle, Jen—then touched his cheek, thinking what a shame it was that a killer had to be this brutally handsome.

But maybe that had been his best weapon, just like Ted Bundy.

Something like anger boiled in me—anger at him, at anyone who’d take a knife or an ax to another person—and before I knew it, I was pressing harder on his cheek than I intended.

Beyond an empathetic touch and into hallucination territory.

Without warning, I got sucked into him, turning, flailing, flying, then landing in what seemed to be a blank space.

Why did I keep ending up in these situations?

God.

Then I realized that I could still feel me in this new place. This wasn’t like the hallucination I’d shared with Wendy, when the beach had come into her room, thanks to my efforts.

I was in complete control as Jensen right now. And I was still floating in complete blackness inside Gavin’s psyche.

If this wasn’t a hallucination, then what was it? Definitely not the more superficial thought-empathy.

I heard a warped knocking sound to my right. Slow motion, drawn out, unclear.

This was more like… a dream?

Gavin’s dream?

Shit. Did it make a difference if the hauntee was asleep or awake when I went into him? Drunken Sailor Randy hadn’t gotten around to that explanation, either, but it sure looked like I’d become a part of Gavin’s psyche in a different way than how hallucinations or empathy worked.

I was deeper inside his head because he was totally unguarded in sleep.

Well, since I was here, I had to go for it, right? Actually, this was pretty awesome, when it came right down to it. How many detectives had opportunities like this to investigate their subjects?

A faint outline was gradually appearing where that knocking was coming from, and the sight resembled a door with a light on behind it.

But the light was… blurred. Smudgy.

Another draggy knock sounded on it.

In what seemed like slow motion, I went over and reached out to open the door, but as I looked down, the soft light showed me something I hadn’t expected.

I had a hand.

Even though fear struck me—was I actually in another part of the star place? Was fake Dean the one knocking?—I went ahead and opened that door, letting in a flood of blinding light.

It washed over me, and girding myself, I walked through it.

Once I was on the other side, the light drew back, revealing the most fucked-up thing I’d ever experienced, even as a ghost.

Everything was in slow motion, from the walls that moved upward like golden waves, to the sky that rolled with contained fire. And in that sky were things that made no sense whatsoever—a Victorian-looking air machine that was being piloted by a little dark-haired girl in goggles and a leather jacket. A big black bird winging just above the machine, casting a shadow over it.

Before I could even say, “Huh?” something more surreal reared up on my left.

A dragon rising out of the water wall, bellowing.

Just get out of here, I thought, but my brain and my body seemed to have been reduced to the same twisted lack of speed that was affecting this entire dream room.

Then I saw the worst part of all—the dragon had the face of an older man but sort of crushed, unrecognizable.

I absorbed that just before the thing plunged back into the moving ocean wall.

If the star place was almost heaven, this was almost hell, with brimstone and a sky of fire.

At least I had the presence of mind to glance down at myself, just to make sure I hadn’t turned into something strange, too.

But I was me. With a body.

Just like in the star place.

What was the connection here? I didn’t get it. I didn’t have the brainpower right now… .

It took me a few moments to realize that I wasn’t alone, either. Someone… something… was behind me.

Fake Dean?

As in a dream, it felt like forever and a day had passed by as I turned around to see who it was.

When I spied Gavin Edgett, with his startling blue eyes, short brown hair, and accusing expression, I wasn’t sure if he was better or worse than fake Dean.

“What are you doing in here?” Dream Gavin asked, his words stretched, echoing like a god’s.

It was like he couldn’t give a crap about the chaos going on around him. I was the big problem.

I searched for an answer, but came up empty.

In dream time, his hand reached out, then rested on my shoulder. A flood of sparks burned me, and I bit down on any response I might’ve had.

“You’re… real,” he said.

Above us, in the flaming sky, the air machine sputtered. When I pulled my gaze up to it, the little girl pilot was peering down at us, her long, dark hair trailing out from under her leather helmet, a worshipful expression on her goggle-hidden face as she lavished a look on Gavin.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked, my words dragging together as I finally backed away from his hand. I didn’t want him touching me.

He ignored the dragon as it resurfaced again behind him, then dove underwater.

“It’s a game.” He kept watching me, his gaze so intense that I thought he could see everything about me.

Something in my chest clenched.

“A game,” I repeated. Then I understood. “Your game?”

Was this the project he’d been working on when he was falling asleep? Flying machines… big ugly birds… dragons with human faces?

Where were the blood and blades from his other games?

Just as the question faded in my mind, the dragon thrust itself out of the water wall again, but it was going for the sky this time.

Its neck was so endlessly long that the monster’s teeth would be able to crunch down on the air machine that the little girl was flying.

Just as I started to slow-scream for her to watch out, I felt Gavin covering my eyes with his rough-skinned hand, like he didn’t want me to see.

I heard the sound of steel being unsheathed.

Then, in a flash of black, we were someplace else.

A room stacked with books on heaven-high shelves, but one wall was missing, and it opened to the lagoon-shaped pool just outside the Edgetts’ mansion.

Gavin was sitting across from me in the same chair he’d been seated in last night, both feet planted on the carpet as his hands clutched the armrests. Blood from his fingers trailed down the creamy leather, and he had a pearl-handled gun on his lap.

Now he talked in normal time, his voice deep and a little raspy as he checked me out.

“You’re so familiar,” he whispered. “Have I seen you before?”

Along with his speech, my thoughts were up to speed, too. So was my heartbeat.

Was he talking about last night, when I might’ve accidentally appeared to him during the haunting? Had he seen me then?

But this was a dream, and nothing made sense. Why should he?

“You just saw me in that other room,” I said. “Remember?”

The way he was staring me down made me shift, and I realized that I was perched on the edge of a desk in the study that I’d visited during a tour of the mansion. One of my legs was crossed over the other, and I had my hands braced on the edges.

He slowly leaned forward, too, and I felt locked in his sights.

“Who are you?” he asked.

Outside, the pool water splashed, like someone was swimming. From the open wall, I could see gentle waves lapping out of the pool and against the concrete.

“I’m just a figment of your imagination,” I said.

Then I had an idea.

Could I make even better use of my time in his dreamland? Could I actually plant a seed in his subconscious—if that’s where we were—for all the odd things he would be experiencing about Elizabeth while I drove him to a confession?

Hell, I’d just seen Inception on HBO about a week ago. It’d sure worked there.

He rested his forearms on his thighs and stared me down with those pale blue eyes. They were such a deep, dream-enhanced extra-blue that I had to tell myself not to fall in.

Then he stood, coming toward me with a deliberation that made my stomach flip. The gun had disappeared from his lap.

“I know you,” he said.

Outside, it sounded like someone was getting out of the pool, water smacking concrete.

Gavin got close enough to me so I could hear him breathing, even in a dreamland. And every breath made my dream heart beat louder.

Danger, I thought. But that didn’t make me back away from him.

Just as he was opening his mouth to say something else, someone entered through the empty wall.

“Gavin?”

A light, bright voice. A woman.

And as he turned around, I saw that Elizabeth Dalton was standing there in a one-piece white bathing suit that would’ve been right at home in the ’fifties, when movie stars still shone with glamour and mystery.

Her short, wet blond hair was slicked back, her mouth lipstick red as she held a towel in one hand.

As Gavin began walking toward her, he fisted his hands at his sides, his body stiff.

Then Elizabeth disappeared into thin air, her towel dropping to the carpet.

But instead of a towel, it was a fashionable white scarf, lying prone on the floor like a corpse. And now…

Now there was blood all over it.

In slow motion—yeah, it was back, slower and more terrible than ever—Gavin turned to me.

He was wearing a mask.

Just like my killer had, but this one was different.

Before the details settled into my brain, horror screamed through me, and I shut my eyes.

Out. Out now!

With a rushed yank backward, I flew out of him, violently popping into the world again, back to where I was before.

In his office.

But this time I was on what I had for an ass, spread over the floor in front of his couch.

My essence quaked. I wasn’t a body anymore. Everything was back to ghost-normal, and he was still sleeping, although now he’d changed position, clearly restless, riddled with what had to be a nightmare.

I took a moment, just in case his subconscious was playing a trick on me and I was actually still in his dream. Horror movies always finished that way, with a shock ending that you don’t expect, just like Halloween, where Michael Meyers isn’t really dead.

When nothing happened, I relaxed. What the hell had everything meant in that dream, anyway?

Dragons. Air machines. A video game in action.

Elizabeth.

But what haunted me the most was Gavin’s face as he was turning around during those last moments.

Now that I was safe, my brain let me see what I’d blocked out as I’d exited the dream, allowing me to realize that his mask had been made of clear plastic, eerily dulling his features.

And emphasizing the trails of bloody tears running down his cheeks.

10

By the time I flew back to home base, night had fallen, and before I could stab another window in Amanda Lee’s house with shears again, I found her in the backyard, in the hot tub near her own modest pool.

She was neck deep in bubbling water, her red-and-gray-streaked hair pinned up. Actually, she looked like a bobbing head, just like that fortune-teller in the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland.

“What a night,” I said.

“Why, hello to you, too, Jensen,” she said as I settled over a wicker chair that faced the tub. She sounded real vegged out.

Until I told her about the dreamland in Gavin’s head.

She was giving off some nervous energy during my story—I could feel waves of it from her—but when I was done, a satisfied smile ended up taking over her mouth, like his dream was nearly as good as a confession.

“We’re so close to making everything right,” she said. “Do you know that? Just a few more pushes toward the truth…”

Pushes. From me. This haunting had really started.

“I figure that having Gavin asleep made our interaction a little different today,” I said. “Being in his head was like conducting an interview in Hades, but I think I learned a thing or two about him.”

“I think so, too. And, for future reference, we know a little bit more about how you work. When humans are awake, you enter a hallucinatory plane with them. When they’re asleep, you’re in what you call a dreamland.”

“Yeah, definitely good to know. But you know what was extra-strange about today?”

“There seem to be many levels of strange going on.”

No kidding. “Well, on this particular level, the dreamland had similarities to that star place. You know, with fake Dean?”

“Right. What sort of similarities?”

“I had a solid form in this dreamland, just like I did in the star place. What’s that about?”

A frown from Amanda Lee. Uh-oh.

“That is strange,” she said. “I wonder…”

Of course there was a huge BUT.

She shook her head, laughed a bit. “It’s a ridiculous idea. Never mind.”

“We went beyond ridiculous a while ago,” I said, gesturing to myself, because… seriously?

She inclined her head toward me. “All right. You were in a solid body during this dream today. And you were solid in the star place. Is there a possibility that this fake Dean character had the power to put you into a sort of sleeping state and then he entered your dream? Or maybe it’s even the other way around. You were in his mind?”

“I’m not sure if a creature like him has a regular mind.” I had no clue what that jerk was capable of. I mean, if he wasn’t an angel of death, then what the hell was he? In this Boo World, anything was possible.

“So you’re saying that the star place might not even be a place,” I said. “It’s more a state of mind.”

“It’s only a theory.”

The murmur of the spa’s water continued, and Amanda Lee straightened up, exposing the red halter straps of her suit as she cupped water in her hands and splashed it over her face.

“Long day, huh?” I said.

“Just an interesting one. It’s too bad you can’t come in here, too, for some unwinding.”

I laughed, and Amanda Lee closed her eyes and leaned back again.

“You feeling better about what happened in the forest?” she asked.

“Yeah.” I still didn’t want to talk about the spooky psychic vision she’d shared with me today. “Way better.”

“Good. I knew you’d bounce back.”

“Luckily, it didn’t take me long to juice up again.” My death spot had given me enough natural energy to last for a while, I supposed. “After I entered Gavin’s dream, I even had enough rah-rah to comb through his office for information before he started to wake up. I didn’t find much, though.”

“No evidence about Elizabeth?”

“None. Not out in the open, at least.” I still couldn’t figure out how to open drawers and closets—and squirming into them through the cracks only left me in closed and dark places—so who knew what was hidden away from me?

She let her arms float on the top of the churning water, as weightless as I was. Maybe she needed a lot of weight taken off her today and this was just another way a psychic and medium could do it.

“I want you to tell me every detail about his dream,” she said. “Nothing is too minor for you not to mention. We’re going to see what we can get out of it, and what it tells us about his state of mind.”

I did what she asked, and when I was done, her eyes were wide.

“I could interpret that dream for hours,” she said. “Wasn’t it terrifying to be in there?”

“Nah.”

Seriously, it was, but I wasn’t about to shout it out.

“When I have visions,” she said, “they aren’t even that intense. I’ve had a few that have come close, but…” She looked up at the sky, like it held every answer she needed. “Where do I even start with this one?”

“The dragon?” I asked.

“It’s as fine a place as any, but I have to tell you that the problem with interpreting dreams is that it’s more effective when you have feedback from the dreamer. That’s how it is when I read the tarot, too.”

So she was an experienced dream interpreter. Surprise, surprise.

“What do dragons even mean?” I asked.

“In this dream, it could be a symbol of a fiery, passionate nature. But those two traits can lead to trouble in a person. It could also mean the killer knows he needs some self-control.” She looked straight ahead. “Yet isn’t that something every murderer needs?”

I wished all killers had it, believe me. “What about the huge black bird in the fire sky?”

“Usually a bird signifies hopes and goals, but this creature sounds like a protector since it was flying over the girl in her air machine, like a wingman. Still, it was a black bird. A crow?”

“I think so.”

“Death,” she said. “Misfortune, disharmony. Or even a new phase in life on a metaphorical level. Death seems the most appropriate reading.”

Or was that the reading she wanted?

I still wasn’t sure. “And that weird air machine with the girl in it?”

“It could mean our subject is trying to rise to a new level, above the crime he committed. An escape from it. The girl, though… I wonder if she’s the feminine side of him, the feeling side, and it’s flying free even while shadowed by Elizabeth’s death, and that’s producing the disharmony.”

She sounded so positive of Gavin’s guilt that I felt naive for still wanting more definite proof. True, the bloody towel/scarf Elizabeth had dropped had looked pretty bad, but it still wasn’t enough for me.

She went on. “As far as the fire sky goes, it could mean destruction or desire or purification… or anger. That would apply most of all to him. And the walls with the water rising upward could mean that he’s overcome by his emotions. Since the water is moving toward that fire, it’s as if it’s trying to put out that anger in him because it’s burning him up.”

A thought intruded into my head. Anger that still remained after Elizabeth’s death, right? I wasn’t sure about that, either.

“At the end of that portion of the dream,” she said, “he shielded your eyes as you heard the sound of a sword, which put an end to those insane images and started a batch of new ones.”

“In the room with the books.” I added my two cents. “Books mean knowledge.”

“Yes, and also calmness.”

“He sure was calm in that chair.” With the blood running down from his fingers and the gun in his lap.

“It’s interesting to note that he wasn’t afraid of you, only curious. And since that part of his dream played out in real time, I think his brain was clearer than it was before in the fire and water room. I believe the things you saw in the book room are far more straightforward.”

“So the blood on Elizabeth’s scarf is his guilt coming out.” I think I’d read about a scarf the investigators had found in a pond near her body. The blood hadn’t come all the way out of it, and it was believed that the killer had used it to choke her.

I wanted to counter Amanda Lee’s interpretation with another dream image—the tears of blood on his masked face. It just didn’t sit right with me for some reason, and I didn’t know if it was because the red streaks made him look like a suffering martyr or an even bigger monster than I’d thought.

“At any rate,” she said, “the closed books mean he’s mysterious, which we already knew.”

“Could they also mean that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover?”

If she could stare a hole through me, she would’ve.

“Just asking,” I said.

She sighed. “You’re right. That actually could be an interpretation. But do you really think it is, based on what you experienced? Remember how he was sitting in that chair, with blood coming down it, as if he was the commander of death. And when Elizabeth came out of his pool… that was something he could’ve seen in real life many times, but here it’s a moment that plays over and over again in his subconscious. She’s dressed in white, innocent, and she’s there to remind him that he’s guilty while those symbols of blood and death surround him.”

And here I’d thought his dream might’ve only been elements of his video game being recycled in his mind, sprinkled with a cryptic Elizabeth cameo. I think I still had a case for that.

“Amanda Lee,” I said, “when I cruised around the office before his staff left, I found some employees working on designs that resembled those air machines and that dragon.”

“Don’t underestimate the meaning of what went through his mind when you visited, Jensen. There are clues all over the place in there. We just need to figure them out. And to use them.”

“In hallucinations?” The things that were supposed to needle his guilty conscience and bring him to a confession?

“Exactly.”

Inspiration struck. “If I’m capable of getting into his head and collecting clues and planting ideas in dreamland, why do I need to pretend there’s a poltergeist going on? Isn’t getting into his head enough?”

Then we could leave Wendy out of this altogether.

“A poltergeist is still only an option, if we find that we need a cover story.”

Amanda Lee began to rise from the water. “You have so many gifts that I don’t have, and we shouldn’t dismiss anything that your abilities let us accomplish.”

Water dripped from her skin as she stepped out of the hot tub, reaching for a towel hanging from a nearby chair. I wasn’t into girls or anything, but Amanda Lee’s bikini showed off a hard body for an older woman.

Then again, I was kind of an old woman, too, wasn’t I? Except I’d never be old.

As she wrapped the towel around her, I couldn’t help comparing Amanda Lee, with her wet, slicked-back hair, to the dream image I’d seen of Elizabeth, just out of the pool.

It was a visual echo that disturbed me.

“Come on,” she said, motioning toward the cute wooden shack that served as a pool house. “We’ve got work to do and a full night ahead, if you’re up to it.”

Why not? It’s not like I needed sleep or anything.

The pool house wasn’t as big as the one the Edgetts had on their property, but as I floated inside with her, I noticed it was roomy enough, with a cushioned bench under a moonlit window and a closet that held beach clothing and supplies. Amanda Lee even had an old, tiny TV with bunny ears stored in here, perched near a swinging window that probably opened and doubled as a bar.

Somehow, I doubted she had many poolside soirees.

After she dried off and put on a caftan, she sat on the bench, the moon shadowing her.

“Are you ready for some exercise?” she asked.

“Always.” I’d been on the volleyball team during high school, but I knew she meant something way different here. Kinda cool that I didn’t have to run or diet to stay in shape anymore.

She said, “While you were gone, I was looking into hallucinations and how they’re connected to ghosts.”

Oh, I could barely wait for this. “And?”

“It seems there are some theories that say electromagnetic field exposure lowers melatonin levels in human bodies—”

Whoa, Nelly. “Melatonin?”

“Let’s just say it acts as an anticonvulsive. If you don’t have much in your system, the right temporal lobe of your brain will be vulnerable to small epileptic seizures.”

I sorted through the garble, then said, “And that can cause hallucinations.”

“Slight ones, if a ghost should touch a human. Your touch freezes us with electricity and lowers our melatonin level. So they say.”

So that’s another way I worked. It made me wonder how long it would take the world to definitely accept scientific explanations for ghosts. After all, back in my day, we wouldn’t have dreamed of owning lights that turned on and off when you clapped, like Amanda Lee had in the casita. That was most definitely magic, and I’d missed having those in my own apartment by only a few years because it hadn’t hit popular stride yet.

And yes, I had been that lazy after my parents had died. I’d mostly sat around watching TV, drinking beer, chilling out, getting up to shower and go to work, and starting all over again.

I suppose being caffeinated on Mello Yello when I was killed had given me some much-needed oomph as a ghost, at least.

When Amanda Lee crooked her finger at me, Come here, I approached.

“You need to master your form, especially when it comes to these hallucinations,” she said. “Seeing you become so gray today and almost retreat into another imprint worried me. You were shocked so badly that I feared losing you.”

I hovered there, not knowing what to say. Someone actually cared about me these days.

“So what’re we going to do to keep me from going gray again?” I asked softly.

She smiled. “You’re going to try a hallucination on me to see how much you can take.”

I backed up a bit. Was this Amanda Lee talking? The woman who had sprinkled salt around her windows and chimney to block spirits and also blacked me out when I’d tried to empathize with her?

When she lifted a finger, I knew there’d be caveats.

“This isn’t empathizing, understand? We’re attempting this experiment only one time, and you’ll have a specific purpose for coming into me. I think that’s part of the reason you can make humans hallucinate—knowing exactly what you want to get out of them.”

Such as making them happy, like I’d done with Wendy.

Or getting them to blurt out their crimes.

Amanda Lee was very serious now. “I’m warning you. I won’t give you emotional access, Jensen. The moment I feel you worming your way into my soul instead of my head—and I’ll know if you’re doing that—we’re done. This is only a test, and I’m trusting you.”

I nodded, eager to get started. Part of the reason I’d had a lot of friends way back when was that I’d never double-crossed them.

And I knew Amanda Lee had researched that.

Hell, I felt her confidence in me with every psychic vibe she was sending my way. Maybe she’d even foreseen the outcome of exercising my skills.

“What’s my goal?” I asked. “How about I get you to tell me about a minor scare in your life?”

That wouldn’t be so hard on Amanda Lee’s emotions—not like the far more horrific hallucinations I would be throwing at Gavin.

“We can be more ambitious than that.”

“But I don’t want to freak you out.”

“That’s the point, though. Scaring me. I want to see how you handle something a little more strenuous than the images you gave to Wendy.”

Okay. That did make sense. But it wasn’t like I was looking forward to booing her, much less booing me.

She understood my reluctance. “Don’t worry. I’ll be here, and if I feel you going into a time loop, I’ll pull you out again.”

“What if you’re too affected by the hallucination to do anything?”

She laughed. “We’ll begin with something mild.”

If she was this certain about it, I should be, too.

“All right,” I said. “Name your cup of terror.”

“Certainly. But one more thing—what I’m asking you to show me is a traumatic moment that will elicit a powerful reaction from me. Not strong enough to send me spinning, but enough to matter.”

“So what do you have in mind?” No pun intended.

She laughed again. “Don’t look so scared, Jensen.”

Not scared.

When she saw my resolve, she said, “I was in a car accident once, around the time you died. I won’t tell you any more details than that because I’d like to see what comes out of your spontaneous imagination. Are we set?”

I sucked it up. “Set.”

With another reassuring smile, she let herself relax, folding her hands on her lap as she waited for my touch.

I floated toward her, hovering over her cheek, tempted for one second to merely empathize, just to see the ins and outs of my partner.

But I pressed my essence against her skin hard instead, going deep, rushing right into her head, and—

Cactus, sand, desert, right outside the pool house window, rushing past, just like this pool house was a car, speeding down a road.

In front of us, a stretch of gray highway cut by headlights, whirring under the tires of the room.

The spinning sound of rubber over concrete. Eyelids getting heavy.

One blink. So tired.

Another blink, eyes closing longer this time.

Tired. Such a long trip.

We leave our eyes closed, giving in to the lull of the highway.

Blankness. Finally, some peace after an endless day… .

The electronic scream of a horn.

Our eyes blast open as—

I jerked out of the hallucination, pushing out of Amanda Lee and into the real world so quickly that I practically skidded to a stop near the opposite wall.

Across the room, which had gone back to normal, she was gripping the bench cushion, her gaze shocked, her body trembling.

Was she cold from my touch, just like Wendy had been?

“Why did you stop?” she asked.

“Because we were about to crash!” God, why else would I have stopped?

“Damn it.” She was shaking her head. “This is what I was afraid of. You’re holding back because you don’t want to experience what comes next. We weren’t really going to crash, even if I saw the other car coming toward us in this room as if it was really happening.”

Her criticism stung because she was right.

Was I really that much of a chicken?

“Your body,” I said. “You’re trembling, like you’re afraid. Like there’s adrenaline tearing you up.”

“I’m fine.” Then her voice gentled as she ran a gaze over me. “You’re no grayer than you were before, but how do you feel?”

I took stock of myself. “Fine, too.”

“That’s good.” She rubbed her arms, warming herself, then straightened in her seat, getting comfortable again.

Determination in action.

“Just for the record,” she said, “I didn’t live in California at the time. The accident happened back east, during winter, in the daylight. And I didn’t fall asleep at the wheel. Even so, I can feel my heart beating out of my chest right now. Everything was very real, so kudos for that.”

This woman was definitely a warrior. I wanted to be one, too.

“I’m ready whenever you are,” I said, sidling up to her.

She nodded, and I pushed against her cheek, zooming right into the hallucina—

Winter outside, snowy trees, gray sky flying past the pool house windows.

Tires over slush-laden concrete, the floor of the room becoming the road.

The sound of the radio. Air Supply. Mushy love.

Getting lost in the song, humming along with it.

“Here I am, the one that you love…” An oldie but goody—

The blare of a horn as two headlights appear on the wall, like a truck just now came over a hill, bearing down on us.

A scream. Yanking the wheel to the right, toward a guardrail emerging out of the wall—

I barely felt myself starting to pull out of her, but I wouldn’t. Not this time.

Flying all the way back into her, I saw—

—a guardrail, rushing toward us, the wheel out of control underneath our hands, taken over by the tires.

We crash, our seat belt strap knifes the air out of our lungs, our knees hit the dashboard, the car hood bunches, steam hisses from the engine.

The radio still plays.

“. . . asking for another day…”

We don’t move because our body won’t let us.

Got to start the car, we keep thinking, willing our hand to reach up and turn the key in the ignition.

Dull thoughts, knees hurting, steam hissing.

Got to start the car again…

This time, when I pulled out of her, I did it shakily, slowly, like I was getting out of that scrunched, seething compact car and stumbling away from it.

I was weaker, but still okay. Amanda Lee, though?

Not so sure.

“Hey,” I said, going back to her. She was dazed, her hand cupped over her chest, her body quaking harder. Was she only freezing from my touch? Or worse?

“Amanda Lee?”

I wanted to shake her, but then she blinked, leaned forward, her breathing harsh. She could only shake her head, gasp for oxygen.

Out of pure worry, I did the last thing she’d wanted me to do. Automatically, I touched her, only meaning to try and ghost-heal or something. To do whatever I could to help her.

But that’s not what happened at all.

Because of the visceral car crash, her defenses were down for a splinter of time. At even a slight touch, I zoomed right in.

For the first time ever, I crashed through the black wall she’d erected around her emotions, just like I was bursting through a bank of dark ice.

In my empathy, the whir of her thoughts circled my vision. It was like she was in shock from the car accident. She’d brushed right by death, and moments of remorse had taken her over.

Standing over a grave, touching the headstone.

Thinking of blond hair, blue eyes, a secret smile that said, “Someday they’ll all know.”

Thinking of the one voice that had mattered more than anyone else’s before it’d been silenced.

Her voice…

Unlike most times when I’d been jarred out of a human, this exit was slow, like I had lost heart and was trudging away from the person who’d taken it.

Numb once again, I hovered over Amanda Lee, waiting for her to tell me why she’d been lying to me about knowing Elizabeth Dalton.

11

After a few minutes, Amanda Lee let her hand fall away from her chest.

She was still shaking. “I’m going to guess that you know.”

I wanted answers too much to fly off the handle. “You were friends with Elizabeth?”

She sent me a lowered glance, like she was trying to puzzle out just how much I’d gleaned from my empathy. There was a bit of accusation there, too, but she wouldn’t dare chide me for accidentally going where I shouldn’t have gone with her.

Instead, she merely rubbed her arms, probably still cold from my empathy. “I should have been sure about what I was doing. Should have waited for a vision or feeling to tell me that this exercise wouldn’t get out of control. I knew you were trustworthy, but that obviously wasn’t enough. I was too eager. You’re important to me, and I wanted to see that you were going to be okay during intense hallucinations.”

“This isn’t an explanation I’m hearing.” My tone was so even-keeled that I barely realized it was my own.

She was still quaking. So was her voice. “I was going to tell you everything.” Then she swallowed. “Eventually.”

My laugh was cutting, electric blades. “You’re just going to talk in circles, aren’t you?”

“I…” She let out a beaten sigh. “You have to understand. I was so afraid you’d leave me. I didn’t want you to think that I was too close to this case, that I lacked perspective.” Her gaze was devastated. “You’re the only one I have in all this, Jensen.”

The only ghost.

The only friend?

“Jon,” I said. “He doesn’t exist. You don’t have a friend who asked you to look into Elizabeth’s murder for him.”

She shook her head.

My ghost-heart began to crack, especially as she stayed on her knees, just like she was about to beg me to understand.

I thought of that photograph Jon had been in. The dignified older man, the way he’d been standing next to Elizabeth.

“But I saw that picture of him with her,” I said.

“He was her last cousin, and he passed away two years ago. They were at a wedding, and I found the picture in her private effects after she died. She… left what she had at my house. There was no one else to claim her belongings.”

Something I’d heard in Amanda Lee’s thoughts rushed back to me.

“‘Someday they’ll all know,’” I repeated. “That’s what Elizabeth told you once. What does that even mean?”

Amanda Lee turned her face up to me again, and in the moonlight, I could see in her the greatest pain a person could have. Heartbreak.

It took me a second. Maybe two. Then…

Oh.

Her eyes got misty. “We met online. A book readers’ club. She loved mysteries, so did I, and we started up a friendship. I’ve told you I’m not one to get out much. I always find myself lying to people about my abilities because they never understand them—they’re always a joke. ‘Can you tell me my future?’ ‘Can you use your divine powers to tell us who Jack the Ripper was?’ It never stops.” Her voice had gone too hoarse, so she had to take a moment. Then, “It’s so much easier to keep to the house, to the computer, where you don’t feel that you have as much responsibility to another person as you would if you met face-to-face.”

Her smile wobbled. “But Liz was such a force of nature, so easy to talk to and so persuasive, that I wanted to come out of my shell. I told myself, just this once, I would give friendship a try. And we met for coffee nearby. Much to my surprise, coffee turned into dinner. And it went from there.”

My head was swimming with questions, most of which were probably too indelicate to ask.

So I played dumb. “You’re telling me that you’re out to get justice for your best friend, then.”

Amanda Lee gave me a look that could’ve been pity for my naïveté.

See, when I was alive, I didn’t know anyone who was a homosexual. They were people on TV who protested against politicians because of their stance on AIDS. They were the focus of jokes in movies and from kids who lisped and minced around for a laugh.

Amanda Lee was right—I was knocked for a loop.

“You come from a different time,” she said, no doubt vibing what I was thinking. “I told you that I withheld the truth about knowing Liz because I didn’t want you to think I was too close to this case. But I also wasn’t sure what you would think of me after you found out that we were…”

She couldn’t even say it.

“Someday they’ll all know.”

Was she more afraid of what I would’ve thought about her relationship with Elizabeth, or was she more fearful of saying it out loud?

“You and Elizabeth never told anyone?” I asked.

“No. Neither of us was ready to come out. This was a first for us.”

She was still gauging how I was taking the news. Truthfully, I was still digesting it.

“Were you afraid of how other people would treat you?” I asked.

“I was.” Amanda Lee wiped a hand over her face. “Lord knows why. I don’t have a family left who would care. And my neighbors? Hardly. I wasn’t ready to admit who I was. Liz was closer to that point, though. She wanted to reveal everything to the world.”

Amanda Lee had been ashamed of being in love with another woman. And now she was ashamed of that shame.

How awful. I was still wary of her and her lies, but I felt sorry for her, too.

Even in my frustration with Amanda Lee, I made an attempt to make her feel better about Elizabeth, at least. “It sounds like she loved you a lot.”

She pressed her lips together, nodding. The soft part of me wanted to put my hand on her again, to comfort her, but I knew I would just make her cold.

When she was ready to talk again, she said, “Liz didn’t even care that I was older than she was. And she accepted everything about me—my shut-in tendencies, my out-of-the-ordinary abilities. But it seems those psychic talents didn’t help her in the end. They didn’t show me what would happen that night.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” I said flatly.

Her eyes were red now as she fixed a gaze on me. “Oh, I know very well whose fault it was. And when Liz told him that she’d broken up with him to be with another woman, he flew off the handle. He ultimately showed her well and good that he wouldn’t ever stand for being cast aside, especially in this way. His manhood couldn’t take it.”

“Gavin confronted you and said that?”

“No. Liz didn’t tell him who I was, but she said he took the breakup hard. And it wasn’t long afterward that she was dead.”

I didn’t tell her that I hadn’t seen sure proof of a murderer in him yet, but I was beginning to think that I didn’t want him to be guilty as much as she did.

She hadn’t even gotten any readings off him as evidence. So what the hell should I believe?

All I knew was that losing someone you loved changed your life in a lot of ways you would never expect. It changed how you thought, how you acted, how you made decisions. It bent those choices around until you wouldn’t have recognized the way you were acting anymore.

She bowed her head, shaking it. “I’m sorry for the way I went about this. But I couldn’t take the chance of alienating you. You were my only hope, and finding justice for Liz means too damned much. It means everything.”

“I know. She’s a priority.” Even more than catching my own killer. I paused. “And what about your husband, Michael? Did he ever exist?”

Amanda Lee paused, gave me another shameful glance, then shook her head again.

Shit. Where did the lies end?

“But,” I said, “I saw you with a wedding ring that night I looked in your room… .”

“It wasn’t from a wedding.” Her words choked off until she found them again. “There was no marriage for me and Liz. I never even had the chance to give her something that showed we were bound together, no matter what.”

I was speechless.

Amanda Lee rushed on. “I needed to give you a reason for my being so motivated in this case, and I was willing to go as far as I had to. If that included a made-up friend or a husband who’d had a tragic death, so be it.”

That was the last straw, and frustration powered me to the other side of the room, away from her. I felt like a churning ball of bad energy.

“So the truth is that you put salt around your house to keep me out, not just a bunch of generic spirits. You kept those bulletin boards a secret. Then you lied about Jon, Michael, and Elizabeth, too. You used me as a tool. So how can I know that you’re not setting me up to do harm to the Edgett household with more of your lies? How can I ever trust you again?”

Quietly, the proud woman in front of me on the ground began to weep. “I… never wanted you to… turn away from me… .”

I trembled, deeply affected, feeling my own anguish in her.

And I couldn’t stand to watch it.

“Damn you,” I said, my voice sounding funny. Could ghosts cry?

When she looked at me again, it was with a sense of profound regret. She was making this so hard.

“I don’t know what to do,” I said. “I want to help Elizabeth, but I don’t know if I’m doing it for the right reasons now. Because here’s the thing—you don’t want justice, Amanda Lee. You want vengeance. I’ll do one but not the other.”

Even as I said it, I wondered if that was true. When it came time to confront my killer, would I be singing the same song?

As if Amanda Lee hadn’t heard everything else I’d said, she grasped the edge of the bench, pulling herself to her feet. “Please don’t give up on Liz. You can give up on me all you want, but not her.”

What else could I say? I was invested more than I’d ever imagined I could be.

“I’m not abandoning her,” I said, already on my way to the door. “But I can’t stay here, either.”

I was still smarting so bad that I couldn’t help delivering a little pain to her.

“You know,” I said, “for a time, I thought you were the only one I could depend on, too.”

And before I could definitely see if ghosts had tears in them, I slipped under the door, hearing Amanda Lee softly crying again.

God help me, but I hovered outside, knowing it would be smart to go, but wanting to stay out of a sense of… I don’t know. Loyalty? Good-heartedness? Duty?

But there was something my friend Suze used to say, and even though she’d been talking about guys, it was more relevant than ever for me.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

And it sure as hell wasn’t going to happen a third time.

•   •   •

Once again, after being betrayed by Amanda Lee, I had no idea where to go. But I was getting good at bouncing back from her misguided moves and finding my own way around the world.

I did the sitting-on-the-power-lines thing again, just like the last time we’d hit a personal snag. Amanda Lee’s revelations had drained me. So had the hallucinations—something I’d discovered tonight only after I slightly sputtered halfway through the travel tunnel I’d created after I’d scrammed away from her home.

This sucked so bad, hanging out on power lines, bored silly. I mean, just imagine an existence where your thoughts are active all the time and you never can fall asleep, even if you’re sapped. And it wasn’t just Amanda Lee’s confessions that were whirling through my thoughts right now, but complete irony, too.

Funny, how I’d goaded a confession out of someone tonight, and it hadn’t been Gavin Edgett. Maybe I should at least be happy that my skills were improving.

And maybe there was another positive to come out of all this. I’d never stood up to anyone like I had with Amanda Lee. During my wasted early-twenties life, I’d floated along just as surely as I was doing as a ghost. But after tonight, I wasn’t going to play like that anymore. I had to start truly living sometime.

And you know what? I was going to begin by getting to the bottom of Elizabeth’s and my stories on my own terms.

Feeling a little better, I lay on the lines all night, restoring myself, weaning myself off them at dawn with an idea about how to go about my missions.

Sailor Randy had given me good spiritual advice last time. He was more of a mentor than Amanda Lee could be, and I needed his input if I was going to go alone down a road that might very well send me into a time loop, aka the ghost version of a coma.

But where could I find him?

Where had he said he searched for his girlfriend’s letter during the light of day? Near downtown, by the water, on some rocks, right? And that narrowed a search down pretty well.

It didn’t take me long to find him balancing on a bank of dark rocks as the sun climbed over the rigging on the Star of India, a windjammer ship that’d been home-ported near the embarcadero longer than even when I was a kid.

Randy, his form just as black-and-white-TV-worthy as ever, was poking among the rocks near a seafood restaurant that sat on a dock over the water as I landed a few feet away from him.

“Need some help?” I asked.

When he glanced at me, he smiled, exposing his crooked teeth. His sailor hat was askew, just like last time, his cracked voice still goofy.

“Why, it’s the new ghost,” he slurred. “Jen-Jen.”

If I was stuck with that nickname for all eternity or however long it took to break my tether, I’d die all over again.

“Just Jen,” I said.

“You’re lookin’ a little grayer ’n’ usual.”

Oh yeah. “I had a bit of an… incident yesterday.”

“Ya gotta watch what ya get into out there. Know what I mean?”

He went back to searching.

“You having any luck with your girlfriend’s letter?” I asked.

“Nah. I swear I dropped it along here, though.”

He tripped over a rock, and I sucked in a pseudobreath, reaching out to catch him. But he righted himself before he got to my hands, and all I felt was that fuzzy sensation of ghost-near-ghost.

“Ooopsh,” he said, shrugging. “Hate when that happens.”

“Do you ever…” I motioned to the rocks. “You know. Fall and die, just like you actually did in life?”

He laughed. “Nah, I’m not an imprint, so I don’t hafta relive that nightmare over ’n’ over.”

I started to join his fruitless quest, poking under rocks. “I’m sure you get a lot of energy from being around your death spot, though.”

“It helps. Besides, I like to be on the rocks—espeshly if it involves a good drink.”

I wanted to laugh. Randy was a crack-up, but I was still sore in my essence from what’d happened with Amanda Lee.

Randy might’ve been a drunk, but he was perceptive, and he sat on the rocks and leveled a look at me as, above us nearby, an early plane flew overhead to land at the airport.

When it’d passed, he narrowed his gaze. “Ya got troubles?”

I sat down, too, thankful he’d opened that door. “I’m not even sure where to start.”

“Oh. One of those stories.” He looked bored already.

Right. Drunk ADD.

I tried to make it short but sweet. “You know how I told you I was murdered?”

“Yup.”

I went for it, filling him in on how Amanda Lee had persuaded me to haunt Gavin, then lied to me about her real reasons for roping me in.

“So those are my issues right now,” I said in conclusion.

“Hmm,” Randy said.

The water kept licking at the rocks as the sun rolled higher in the sky. Boats were starting to cut through the water in the bay. Nearby, on the Star of India, I thought I saw a gray ghostly figure on deck: a teen who waved to us.

Randy waved back, just like he’d forgotten I’d told him a story and was waiting for a decent response. Meanwhile, I just smiled and gave the other ghost a bit of a wave, too.

“Thass John Campbell,” Randy said. “Poor kid was a stowaway. Fell from the mainmast and crushed his legs, then died a few days later. Ouch.”

I nodded, wondering if I’d have to repeat my story to Mr. ADD to refresh his memory and get more than a “hmm” out of him.

Evidently not, because he took up where I’d left off. “Ya really stepped into it, didn’t ya?”

“With Amanda Lee? I suppose I did.”

“I wouldn’t wanna be you, Just Jen. A fake wrangler on your tail is bad enough. But you’re askin’ for a lot of pain by gettin’ involved with human stuff, ain’t ya?”

I didn’t love his tone. Or maybe I was just chafed from the whole Amanda Lee thing and I wanted to be a rag to someone.

“Dude,” I said. “I came here for advice. Do you actually have any for me?”

He sobered. “Yeah, I do. Stay out of it.”

“But my tether… You told me that I’d be stuck on this plane until I resolved what was tying me here.”

“I didn’t tell ya to stick your nose in every death out there, did I?”

He gave no indication of being morally offended by my going after someone who could possibly be innocent in a killing. Had Randy lived so long that he was immune to what went on in the world outside of his girlfriend’s letter and getting eternally wasted?

“I don’t get it,” I said. “You don’t care about any of them?”

“Humans?” He seemed thoughtful. “Sure I care. I care that they keep my bars stocked. I care that they leave me alone and let me keep lookin’ for my gal’s letter.”

Damn. I’d expected for him to come out of this conversation appalled, not me.

“Hey, now,” he said, “you’re new. You’ll forget about most of it in time. You’ll find other ways of not bein’ bored.”

I faced front, wrapping my so-called arms around my bent legs. A salty breeze blew through me.

“Ya mad?” he asked.

“Not mad. Just… astounded.”

“’Cause I don’t sound… human?”

There it was again—the reminder that I was thinking too much like one of them, that I hadn’t even begun to let go.

Silence chomped the buzzing space between us.

But then I realized that this was dumb. I had a seasoned ghost by my side, and I wasn’t grilling him about so many things I needed to know. Besides, it wasn’t so much the fact that he’d said those things to me that hurt. It was the fact that, if Randy was any kind of example, one day I wouldn’t care much about anything going on around me, either.

Would that be the day I really became a ghost?

“You didn’t tell me about going into people’s heads while they were asleep,” I said, moving on to a new topic. But I still sort of sounded like a rag.

Randy perked up, not minding the bitchy part. “Have ya been practicing goin’ into humans?”

“Yeah. And I found out about dream-digging, no thanks to you.”

“Dream-diggin’.”

“That’s what I’m going to call it. Going into their dreams when they’re sleeping. You know?”

He frowned. “I coulda sworn I told ya all about that.”

“Nope.”

“Ah, well. A fella can’t get everything out durin’ a couple o’ drinks.” He lifted an eyebrow. “How’d it go?”

I shrugged. “Pretty well. It was trippy, seeing all the things in this human’s head.”

“You were scared as a sinner in a cyclone, huh?”

Before I could deny or confirm, he said, “First time I did it, I had no idea what was happenin’. I was tryin’ for a hallucinazion.”

There he went, mangling that last word again, just like the other night.

“What did you see in your human?” I asked.

“Giraffe ballerinas, mostly.”

“Really?” How would Amanda Lee interpret that?

But I wasn’t going to think about her.

“No lies,” Randy said, holding up his hands. “I was touchin’ a fella who worked at the zoo. Passed out clean on the sidewalk downtown. He’d been manhandlin’ his gal and—”

“You wanted to boo him. I know.”

I barely smiled at Randy as he returned the gesture, but much more effervescently.

“I jus’ hate when humans sleep,” he said. “No ghost likes to be ignored.”

“Is that why ghosts wake people up at night? So they can get a charge from their screams?”

“You’re catchin’ on, new ghost.”

When he got up to restart his search for the letter, I joined him. We were silent until he spoke again.

“Maybe you could use a little pickup. How about ya come with me today, and I’ll show ya what real ghosts do to stay active?”

I had so much on my plate, so many clues to hunt down, but I needed Randy. Needed way more advice, more interaction with my kind.

“Will we meet others like us?” I asked.

“Will we ever!”

With that lopsided grin, he conjured a travel tunnel. It burst into the air like an open mouth, and he waved me toward it.

After just a slight hesitation—still so much to do out here, so much to investigate—I nonetheless jumped in.

In for a penny…

… in for a pound of Boo World.

12

When Randy and I popped out of the tunnel in front of a two-story pine cabin house nestled into a flurry of oak trees in some bum-fuck part of nowhere, I thought he’d gotten his directions mixed up.

“Did you bring me to Grizzly Adams’s place or something?” I asked.

“Huh?” Randy scratched under his sailor cap as the travel tunnel folded up behind him.

I wondered if Randy and I should have a TV marathon someday. The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams had provided many nights of homey watching with my parents.

Randy started float-swaggering to the cabin before I could explain my love for the bear man.

“If you’re askin’ where we are,” he said, “we’re near Escondido.” Esh-con-di-do.

That was the town where I’d grown up. Holly Avenue. Hidden Valley Middle School. Orange Glen High School. We had to be on the outskirts, here in the boondocks, unless a bomb had dropped on Escondido and sent it back into the Grizzly Adams ages.

But I knew that wasn’t the case when I heard a series of rhythmic thuds coming out of the house.

Music. Disco?

Pale lights flashed in the downstairs windows as a different song played even louder over the first.

Buddy Holly rock ’n’ roll.

Randy was laughing as he moved forward, urging me to follow. “It’s war!”

“What?”

“Just come ’n’ see.”

We got to the daylight-dappled porch, where the front door was halfway open. So we threaded ourselves through the slim entrance and went to a large living room that had a circular black metal fireplace sunk into the middle of it, surrounded by shag-carpeted stairs.

Whatever had been making the lights flash on and off had stopped, but wisps of smoke were coming from the fireplace. I thought it was weird to have a fire going on a day that wasn’t so cold.

The blaring music switched from Buddy Holly to Mexican guitars as I took a good look at what was happening on those stairs.

Partying ghosts.

They were in old TV shades of black-and-white, just like me and Randy. Ghosts in long, Mexican fiesta dresses that looked like they belonged in Old Town as the women with braided hair swirled their skirts in time to the guitars. Ghosts who seemed to have arrived from Chinatown.

Nearest to us, there was a black man ghost dressed in a factory uniform; he raised his hands and seemed to wipe away the music that was playing and brought in a blare of ‘forties-sounding jazz. That encouraged an outraged hoot from a teenage ghost with greased hair, a plaid shirt over a tee, and jeans rolled up to his ankles. Near him were a housewife from the ’seventies, a guy wearing Old West garb, and even an old couple who balanced on top of a couch just off the edge of the fire pit, dancing cheek to cheek, no matter what music was on.

The housewife, with her dishwater blond ponytail, pale lipstick, paisley blouse, and flare-bottom polyester pants, wiped her hand through the air, bringing back the disco as the ’fifties teen booed.

Next to me, Randy struck a John Travolta pose, which he’d obviously learned from the housewife, who spotted him and waved frantically at him in greeting.

He went back to normal, shrugged like a dork, and yelled at me over the music, “So what do ya think?”

“I don’t know what to think!”

The ’fifties boy made a high whistling sound and the music stopped. That’s when I noticed that the room smelled like…

I do say, someone in here was smoking the ganja.

Everyone stared at me, smiling at the new girl. Even the old folks dancing on the couch paused to check me out.

“Hey, you all,” Randy said.

“Rand!” they all chorused.

Aw, they liked him.

Randy swept an arm out to me. “This here’s Jensen. Murdered by an ax in Elfin Forest.”

Several ghosts nodded in sympathy during this moment of etiquette, but the housewife spoke up in a chirpy voice.

“I know another ghost who died there. A hiker. You know him? Daniel Ashbury, longish hair, scruffy beard, looks like Jesus a little?”

“Sorry. I don’t.” I would’ve noticed Superstar in Elfin Forest. “I didn’t meet any ghosts there.”

“Oh,” the housewife said. “There’re more than a few. Mostly nice ones, except for the White Lady and the witch.”

My curiosity flared. On the night I’d died, my friends and I had planned to search for the White Lady. After they’d had a little liquid courage, of course. Being the designated driver, I’d been armed only with mischievous bravery.

Randy slurred, “Jensen didn’t hang around her death spot long. She’s a new ghost, got pulled out of a time loop by a spiritual medium.” Sch-pir-tual.

Everyone made interested sounds, and just when I thought they were all going to offer their own death stories, the ’fifties kid waved his hand, brought back Buddy Holly, and the dancing recommenced.

All right, then.

I glanced at Randy, who only winked.

“They’ll get around to talkin’ to ya!” he yelled. “A music war always wins out, even over a new ghost!”

So much for etiquette. But I could handle it.

As some flamenco guitar riffs filled the room, Randy waved me to a corner, where someone I hadn’t noticed yet had been sitting in a lounge chair the whole time. A human?

At least, that’s what I thought he was, with his ridiculously long black hair, which covered all of his face except for his mouth. He was a cross between Cousin It and Joey Ramone, sporting a black T-shirt with a skull and crossbones on it, ratty jeans, and bare, dirty feet.

It wasn’t hard to guess who was the pothead in the room, since he was holding some Mary Jane between his thumb and forefinger and practically emanating smoke from every pore.

I wished ghosts could get secondhand highs.

Randy motioned to him. “This here’s McGlinn. It’s his house.”

McGlinn didn’t move a muscle as he muttered, “Yo.”

“Good to meet you,” I answered, but when he didn’t acknowledge me further, I shot Randy a glance.

The verbose McGlinn took a hit off his weed, and Randy guided me away from him, an indication that we didn’t have to hang around the only human in here.

By now, the old couple from the couch had taken over the music war, airing one of those songs you’d probably hear in a Catskills resort back in the day. You know—all smooth clarinets, soft drums in the background, and lazy, muted trumpets. They were dancing cheek to cheek again, even though, as I got closer, I saw that they actually weren’t touching each other. Maybe they were just enjoying the ritual of dancing.

The other ghosts had mellowed out, some wandering to the power outlets, where they were clearly getting a buzz from sticking their fingers into the sockets and pulling them out. This was what had been making the lights flash on and off. Others were vegging and chatting. The black man was closing his eyes to the music, sitting on a fire pit step by himself.

Randy headed for the main stairway, talking over his shoulder. “There’s someone I want ya to meet, and she’s prob’ly up top.”

He zipped away from me, flying to the second floor. Used to his ADD, I followed.

But when I caught up, I stopped him. “Wait. Questions here.”

“You can get everyone’s stories later. They won’t mind.”

“Cool, but… there was a human down there. Isn’t that a little out of the ordinary?”

He thought about it for a sec. “Yeah. It’s odd to have a human in a house where ghosts are dancin’ around. But his grandparents gave this place to McGlinn, along with a bundle of money, so he has a ’tachment to it.”

“How does he even see us?”

“He can’t, under all that hair. And thass the point, I guess, ’cause it bothers McGlinn that he’s a seer. Thass what we call a human who knows we’re around. McGlinn, though… he’d rather get numb with those smokes than face the reality.”

McGlinn sounded a little like Amanda Lee when it came to living with his abilities. But, compared to him, she seemed really evolved. In a way.

“Then why does McGlinn let all these ghosts party here if they bother him so much?” I asked.

“Did ya see the old folks dancin’ on the couch? Those good-time people are his grandparents.”

Oh, man.

Randy said, “It’s awful, isn’t it? They died here. Double death. Gramps was cleanin’ his gun when it went off, and Gran didn’t wanna live without him, so—”

I didn’t want to hear it, and I held up a hand to stop Randy.

“Sorry,” he said.

After a second, I shook my head. “You shouldn’t apologize. I mean, death is our life, right?”

I just couldn’t stand any more sadness right now, and thinking of that old man and lady downstairs going out like that was… ugh. As hard as I was trying not to imagine it, I was, picturing them with heinous gunshot wounds and—

Wait.

“Randy, why don’t we ghosts show any effects of our deaths? You don’t have a bloody head from where you hit the rocks. And I’m not in pieces from an ax.”

Funny how I could say it so casually. Distancing myself from that Jensen was obviously working.

“I don’t know the big answers,” he said. “No one does. Not about our existence, not about the ultimate death. If a ghost goes with a wrangler ’n’ he finds an afterlife, he never comes back to tell us what he saw there. We’re jus’ as dumb as we were when we lived.”

That was heartening.

“As for McGlinn,” he said, “he sees how his gramps ’n’ gran’re so happy here with each other. So, deep down, it gives him a lil’ peace. The rest of us are the same when we’re here. Happy.”

“That’s why ghosts are drawn to this house? Because they like to be with others who’re happy?”

“You bet. Ghosts say that this property’s built over an eighteen hundreds anonymous graveyard, so the house’s got some energy that attracts spirits, espeshly the ones buried here from Western times. Ya saw Old Seth down there in his cowboy gear. He’s a graveyard regular. The rest of ’em? Jus’ travelers.”

“Lots of activity,” I said. “Because of the buried spirits who’re already here.”

“Yup, it’s active, all right, ’cept when McGlinn goes to sleep. Then he lays down the law, and Gramps ’n’ Gran enforce it. They guard his slumber.”

Done chatting, Randy meandered down the hall with me on his tail.

But I wasn’t done. “How did they produce that music? Were they doing it in the same way I can make smaller sounds, like knocks on walls?”

“Somethin’ like that. Only bigger.”

No doy. “They’re good at the music thing.”

“You’ll be, too, with practice.”

He urged me to a bedroom, where the door was shut tight. After we slipped underneath, I saw that a twin-sized bed with a wagon-wheel-decorated quilt was the only piece of furniture, the walls a stark white.

“McGlinn’s room?” I asked, taking a wild guess. I didn’t know why Randy would want to show me that, though.

“Nope. Jus’ wait, ’n’ you’ll see. We always introduce new ghosts to our good friend here.”

Randy stood by the bed and waved me over to wait next to him. Respectfully, he folded his hands behind his back, every inch a gray-toned military man. I copied him, lingering politely.

Within moments, the image of a young boy—five years old?—blinked to black-and-white animation on the mattress. Sweat matted his hair to his head, and his breath rasped in and out of him. His hands were propped in the air, like there were invisible people on either side who were holding on to him, grasping onto the kid for dear life.

“I… love you… Mommy… ,” he whispered, just before his image fluttered, then blinked out altogether, leaving the bed empty again.

Ouch. My chest area hurt, just from seeing what I knew was a time loop.

“McGlinn’s uncle Kevin,” Randy said softly in a moment of soberness. “He was jus’ a kid when he died here with his parents sittin’ by the bed. They took him out of the hospital to be with the family ‘cause they knew he was goin’. Cancer.” He slid me a glance. “Does this also show you why McGlinn won’t leave?”

I nodded slowly, not trusting myself to speak.

Randy spent one more second by the bed before he led me out of the room. Then, outside the door, he hesitated.

“Every so often, we’ll try to get Kevin outta the loop. Can’t ever manage it, though.”

Some upbeat Southern rock music had started downstairs, where the party was going on, oblivious of the tragedy up here. But they knew, didn’t they? They had probably been celebrating downstairs from Kevin for years, accepting that this was how it was in Boo World and there was no changing things.

We all had ways of coping, whether it was McGlinn and his dope or ghosts and their music. Death was always a heartbeat away somewhere, so why should I be concerned about it?

Randy was already in a better mood, like he’d had a lot of practice leaving dark times behind. “I’ve been lookin’ forward to showin’ ya this.”

I hoped it would be happier.

We were standing in front of an open door leading to a master bedroom with a bed covered by a dull brown spread, decorated with only a worn-down dresser. Inside, I heard someone moving around in the attached bathroom.

Randy plunged inside like the drunken imp he was.

I met him in that bathroom, where he was already hover-sitting on top of the toilet tank by the shower. But forget Randy. My attention was fixed on the chick standing in front of the mirror, fussing with her hair.

And what hair it was, one side of it all black and straight, streaming over her shoulder, the other side teased and colored with what I thought might be rainbow hues, even though I couldn’t tell with her grayish tone. Part of her scalp was shaved down to stubble, too.

She was wearing a dark corset, petticoats, fishnet stockings, and ankle boots, plus the pièce de résistance.

Madonna bracelets.

Randy was holding back a laugh as the girl caught sight of me in the mirror, then whipped around, her face megapale, her eyes ringed with lots of liner. She looked like half Cyndi Lauper and half Robert Smith from the Cure.

“Goddamn it, Randy,” she said, turning around again and throwing a punch at him. She only swiped through his arm with a bzzt of energy. Randy still flinched, though.

She huffed. “I’m not, like, fit to meet anyone.”

“Ya never are.” Randy presented me. “This here’s Jensen, from the ’eighties.”

When the superfreak just looked me over with a sneer on her lips, I began to question Randy’s friend-matching skills.

“Jensen,” he said, “meet Twyla from the ’eighties.”

Instead of saying hi, she chuffed, “Grody.”

Yeah, yeah, my clothes. I wasn’t thrilled about the eternal statement they made, either.

“Hi to you, too,” I said.

She rolled her eyes, turning back to the mirror, stabbing a hand at her hair. “Like, really, Randy? You sincerely think I look decent or something?”

Like, whatever. I wanted to be with the fun ghosts downstairs again.

Randy was enjoying her sass. “Twyla’s jus’ in a bad mood. She died on a Friday night before goin’ to the clubs. Got a charge out of a malfuck… malfunken…”

“Malfunctioning?” both Twyla and I said.

We ignored our stereo correction as Randy said, “Yeah. That. Her hair dryer cord thing dropped in a full sink and gave her a sizzle while she was experimentin’ with her look, comparin’ one side to the other. She got so…”

“Extra-crispy,” she said, rolling her eyes again.

“Yeah, she got so extra-crispy from the dryer that she ended up only dyeing one side of her hair black ’fore she became a Kentucky Fried Corpse.”

Again, Randy looked proud of his ability to drop modern pop names.

Twyla cared only about the hair. “Like he said, I was comparing how I looked with Lauper in the mirror and then with the Goth. I died right before I decided to stay with the colors and right after I filled the sink with water to wash my hair. So sue me.”

Randy busted out with “Jensen got murdered.”

Twyla’s hands stilled. “Bag your face! Seriously?”

“Seriously,” I said.

Suddenly, I was queen of cool while Randy told her every detail he could, obviously relishing my story.

“Oh my Ga-od.” Twyla looked half Goth, but she sang out the phrase like a true Val. “You’re, like, interesting.”

“Totally,” I said, not sure if I was mocking her or just falling into the bad habit of aping her speech. That sometimes happened to SoCal girls—even the resistant non–Pod People who hung out at the beach or sheltered ourselves with normal friends. Val talk had been a plague that you could catch without knowing it.

“Jen’s jus’ learnin’ the ghost ropes,” Randy slurred. “She jus’ joined her first human dream yesterday.”

“Ah, dreams.” Twyla went back to the hair, testing out ways to hide the shaved part of her head with her longer hanks. “I’ll go into one of their dreams just so I can feel what it’s like to be touched again, you know?”

Randy couldn’t help himself. “Jen likes humans even more ’an that. She’s on a mission for one of ’em.”

And he spilled everything about my former alliance with Amanda Lee and her crusade.

When he was done, Twyla gave me a perplexed look in the mirror. “Like, why would you go through the trouble?”

“I asked her that, too,” Randy said. “Why worry ’bout anything but your own state?”

Twyla shrugged. “Come to think of it, caring about humans’ problems is sooooo cute. It really is.”

I wasn’t sure if she was being sarcastic or genuine. Either way, I didn’t dig her attitude.

“It keeps me from being bored,” I said, not wasting my time on any more complex explanations. She wouldn’t get it.

Randy floated off the toilet tank. “Jen’s also managed to find a strange buddy in the otherworld.”

Awesome. It was now time for fake Dean stories.

“He or it seems like a wrangler,” Randy said, “but I ain’t sure. Ya ever meet up with a thing that took ya to a starry place?”

The Goth Val seemed highly intrigued. “No. What happened?”

I started to suspect that Randy got more of a kick out of telling my stories than I did.

“It snatched her off this plane, and it looked like her ex-boyfriend.”

“Awww,” Twyla said. “And… ew.”

I casually shrugged at both as Randy continued.

“The thing tried to get Jensen into a light—and I don’t think it was our light. Then, when she wouldn’t go in, it dumped her.”

“What a dick!” Twyla said. “Have you seen him after?”

“No.” And it tripped me out that it hadn’t been so long since my sick rendezvous with fake Dean. A day? Two? Ghost time sure blurred a lot.

“I’m guessin’,” Randy said, “you’ve never come across something like that, Twy.”

“No day, no way. But it is a pretty gnarly tale.” She hopped up to hover-sit on the counter very ghost-gracefully. “But if you do run into your boy toy again, Jensen, you should make the most of it. Ask him who murdered you, you know?”

Again, she might’ve been playing around with me. I’d had a so-called friend like that in middle school who took great pleasure in tormenting everyone with mind games. Twyla might be one of those.

But I had to admit, her comment was a grain of an idea. Was fake Dean a higher being or just a really talented kind of ghost? He’d created a star place, after all. Would he know more than any other regular ghost?

I shoved the thought aside as Twyla spoke.

“By the way, I was joking about shooting the breeze with this thing you ran into.”

Well, good for her.

“Seriously, you should be afraid of it.” She leaned forward on that counter. “You should be afraid of everything at first, when you’re a new little ghostie who thinks she’s a bitchin’ tuff but isn’t. You don’t want to be destroyed before your life here has, like, even started.”

“Destroyed?” I asked. “You mean going back into a time loop?”

Twyla exchanged a jaded glance with Randy.

“Noooo,” she said. “I mean that, besides the odd spiritual beings you’re bound to meet, there’re stories of ghosts getting into less exotic trouble, too. Like ghosts who’ve gotten stuck in the gut by, like, iron daggers and they just disappeared, never to be seen again. There’re humans who know how to do stuff like that to clean us out of their presence.”

Randy said, “Thass why we call ’em cleaners.”

Twyla was just warming up. “They can chase ghosts from houses they’re haunting or whatever. They ban us from places we get comfortable in by using gaggy smells and sensations from energy machines.”

“They can banish a spirit from a location,” Randy slurred, “but not from the earthly plane.” He took a good look at me, measuring my reaction.

Did I have a constipated look on my face or something? I checked the mirror and, yeah, I did.

Answers would help me calm down. “Where are we sent when we’re pierced with iron in our… gut?”

Twyla clucked her tongue and rolled her eyes. “Like we know? I’ve never gotten the stuff stuck in me.”

Randy was more diplomatic. “No one ever comes back to tell, ’member? But I heard that iron can separate our forms into mist. It’s poison.”

Dead ghosts tell no tales, evidently.

He added, “But about them time loops, as ya call ’em… there’re lots of things that can suck up our energy and send us into ’em. Too much communicatin’ with humans is one.”

Twyla nodded. “And that’s why we use Ouija boards, medium channeling, raps on the walls, and automatic writing instead.”

Helpful advice from the Laup-Goth. Maybe it was worth meeting her, after all.

I said, “That’s strange, because communicating with Amanda Lee didn’t take much out of me.”

Randy answered. “Thass ’cause she’s a medium.”

“Duh,” Twyla added. “You know, she’s a conduit who can see into parts of Boo World? For some, like, reason there was a connection between you two. So talking to her is like talking to one of us.”

Randy was already on to the next comment. “Materializin’. That’ll sap ya, too.”

I blinked. Randy was right, because hadn’t I felt a loss of more power than usual after I thought I’d materialized to Gavin? Maybe I did need to watch myself more. Maybe I’d just been a lucky ghost so far.

Both Twyla and Randy were laughing now, and I knew why. From what I saw in the mirror, I was definitely less confident, and they were just having some fun with the new ghost by piling it on me.

But as they cooled out, Randy had an expression on him that told me he actually wanted me to be safe. But Twyla? I still wasn’t sure if she’d just enjoyed poking at me or if she was a good egg.

She hopped off the counter, free-falling to the floor, her petticoats flaring for the briefest, kind of impressive instant.

“Let’s get downstairs before Old Seth starts up with the country music,” she said. Then to me, “He’s an ancient fart, but he picked up on Waylon Jennings somewhere along the way and it makes me want to, like, barf.”

She sashayed out of the bathroom, and with a good-natured shrug, Randy followed.

I did, too, thinking that a little fun with the others wouldn’t kill me.

13

I partied like it was 1999.

For hours, we threw different music at one another, and with me being the new ghost in town, everyone let me practice my sound skills. I pulled songs out of the air—or maybe it was out of my memory—and let my favorites ring through McGlinn’s house.

The Cramps, Siouxsie and the Banshees… I got very good at conjuring anything I wanted, even though Twyla Smart-Ass interjected tunes like “Mickey” and “Jessie’s Girl” every once in a while.

Even with her love of pop songs, though, I could still tell that half of her liked my alternative stuff.

Eventually, we came to the point in all parties where everyone collapses on couches and chairs, pulls out cigarettes, and turns on the TV because you’re done but you can’t bring yourself to go home.

Ghosts are no different. We draped ourselves on the stairs around the fire, which Randy had told me McGlinn kept stoked because of the preternatural chill the bunch of us brought to the room. And instead of ciggies, the guys from Chinatown and Cassie the ’seventies housewife were nipping at the ends of frayed live wires until Yul, Lee, and Feng—gamblers who’d passed on during a fire in a mid–eighteen hundreds den in downtown San Diego—moseyed out of the house and back to their death spots for the night.

Old Seth was leaning against the wall in the corner near McGlinn, who looked like he was passed out on his lounger, although I wasn’t sure about that since he seemed out of it when he was awake, too. The bearded cowboy was idly manipulating McGlinn’s camera that’d been sitting on an end table, making the flash go off again and again. It gave the firelit room a strobe effect while the rest of us hung out.

Little by little, I’d gotten all their death stories, just as I’d done with Twyla and the Chinatown guys. Carlota, one of the Mexican women in the big skirts, was the only ghost in her group who hadn’t left yet, and she’d told me that she and her friends had been victims of a doomed wagon ride on the way back from a fiesta when a snake-spooked horse had gone crazy. Louis, the black man in the factory uniform, was a contemporary of Randy’s; he’d worked in a bayside aircraft plant during World War II after the pool of local white workers had been exhausted, and he’d died when he was driving home one night, bone-tired, his car veering off the road.

No one here had perished in their sleep or anything peaceful like that.

When I brought that up, Louis said, “If you had a good death, you’d already be in the good place.”

“Heaven?” I asked.

They all thought that was precious. Twyla laughed extra hard from her spot by the wall, where she’d wandered over to suck on a wire next to ’seventies Cassie after the Chinatown gamblers had left. The energy sent subtle waves of color through the electricity-sucking ghosts as Cassie kept mothering Twyla, doing things like telling her how darling her hair looked tonight.

From his place next to me on the fire pit stairs, Randy gave me a tolerant grin. “I already told Jen about heaven, or whatever’s waitin’ for us.”

Carlota yawned, then said, “Qué lastima, is it not?”

I nodded. I had enough high school Spanish to infer that it was a shame we didn’t know for sure.

Scott, the teen from the ’fifties who’d choked on a chicken bone in a diner during a date, said, “I don’t care about what’s waiting for us.”

Randy watched him like he saw through the teenage bravado. “I do, ’cause wherever it is we’re goin’, Magnolia’s there right now.”

Everyone mumbled good-naturedly under their breath, obviously having heard him wax on about Magnolia before.

But I wanted to hear more about her. “How do you know she isn’t still alive? She had to be young when you died. That would make her…” In her nineties? Older?

“I stopped keepin’ track of age a long time ago,” he said. “And when computers started showin’ up all around, I learned to do a search or two on my gal. She’s gone as gone can be.”

Louis floated down to the fireplace, bending down to watch the flames. The light flickered through his factory uniform, giving his gray tones a warmer quality. I’d noticed that he and Randy in particular didn’t interact much, and I wondered if it was because of some kind of segregation they’d had as humans.

Randy added, “All I have to do is find her letter, and…”

“Then you can be with her,” Scott said, clearly by rote. But then his tone gentled. “We can only hope, Rand.”

From the way no one else said anything, I knew that every ghost present realized that Randy’s letter would never be found. No delusions here. So why did Randy continue, day after day?

Boredom, I thought. And a weird kind of optimism that kept ghosts like him going.

From the socket in the corner, Twyla took too much of an electric hit, and she squealed.

Cassie the housewife gave her a chiding glance. “How many times do I have to tell you to slow down, honey?”

As everyone laughed, seconding Cassie’s comment, I looked around at my new friends, seeing in their faces a reminder of my old buds—the people I’d partied with, the ones who’d been like anesthetic to my sorrows when they’d shared beer and smokes with me.

Were we bound to repeat our pasts, even as ghosts? I wasn’t in any time loop, but I told myself that I wouldn’t fall into a useless trap again, wasting my life away and sitting around, new friends or not. I was going to do what I needed to do, no matter how nice it felt being around them.

I rose from my stair. “Well, guys, sorry to run, but I’ve got a full night.”

Louis looked up at me. He had a middle-age-dad vibe about him. I’d also found out that he had a college degree but had considered it his patriotic duty to work for the wartime effort after he’d been turned down for military duty because of a bad heart.

“You going off to do your haunting?” he asked.

Naturally, they’d all been filled in, courtesy of Randy.

“I was planning on it,” I said.

Louis stood, brushing off his uniform pants. “Not to overstep, Miss Jensen, but you could use more thinking time on this.”

Man, I’d asked him not to call me “miss” already. It made me feel uncomfortable, but it seemed to be a habit for him.

I said, “Twyla and Randy already warned me about cleaners and all the things that go bump in the night for a ghost. I’ll be okay.”

“I’m not just talking about cleaners. I mean you’re rushing into haunting. Unless you’re planning to throw some music at this Gavin and hope that does the job.”

Next to me, Randy was stoically watching him, making me wonder where he’d come from—a small Southern town where he would drink at one water fountain while Louis would drink at another?

“It’s okay,” I said to Louis. “I already did some decent tricks to the hauntee. I re-created his possible victim’s perfume, whispered to him…”

Scott used a hand to slick back his hair. “Haunting. I haven’t fiddled with a human in a while.”

Randy grinned, then said, “I favor givin’ a welt or two to the jerks downtown. That and a good hallucinazion”—as always, the word was barely recognizable—“always does the trick.”

“Welts?” I asked.

A human voice from the corner spoke up.

“That’d scare me to death,” McGlinn said, his long, face-obscuring hair moving over his words.

He speaks. But I guess Gramps and Gran, who were sitting on the couch quietly, would’ve chased us out of here by now if their grandson had passed out or fallen asleep.

Twyla got up from her electrical socket, floating Cassie the cord she’d been sucking on. The housewife shrugged, double-fisted, then sucked on them both.

“Pinches, scratches, welts… ,” Twyla said. “Humans tend to shit a glazed donut when you use any of those tricks. All you have to do is—”

Suddenly, she flew at McGlinn, motioning out to pinch him. He jumped in his lounger, then settled back, sticking his middle finger up at her. When she bent down to plant an air-kiss on his head, he shivered. Nearby, Old Seth chuckled and hooked his thumbs in his gun belt as he leaned against the wall.

Did they have a teasing thing going on that I wasn’t a part of yet?

Anyway, I wasn’t a fan of the pinching, scratching, and welts idea—those were poltergeist territory.

“I’d like to stick to the mind games,” I said. “My hauntee’s a tough guy, and scratches would probably just annoy him.”

Twyla rolled her eyes as she sat on McGlinn’s armrest. “Jen, if you’re going to haunt, commit to it.”

Louis merely turned to the fire again, so I couldn’t see his face. Scott nodded his agreement with Twyla.

She continued. “Come on, just, like, go all out. You know that if anything went wrong, we’d back you up, right?”

I almost choked on my invisible tongue as Randy stood. Twyla was offering support?

“What Twyla means,” he said lightly, “is that humans ain’t any more powerful ’n we are, and we could take ’em.”

“Does the same go for bad spirits?” I asked, thinking of one of the concerns Amanda Lee had shared with me about the dangers of haunting Gavin. “You know what I’m talking about—the entities that a human could summon to fight me?”

Louis talked over his shoulder. “That’s a rare scenario. I’d be more concerned with cleaners. But you do have friends. All you have to do is shout our names, and if we’re in range, we’ll hear.”

Very cool.

I smiled at him, and he did the same before going back to the fire, alone as usual. I was starting to think that he just liked being around the noise in this house. I’d been like that, too, when I lived by myself in my apartment after Dean had gone off to college. I would put on the TV for white noise all the time, because it made me think that I was a part of something.

Without any more debate on the subject, I said my good-byes, promising I’d be back to hang out someday soon. Randy walked me to the door, and on the way, we passed Gramps and Gran on the couch, where they were sitting and holding hands, watching their grandson across the room, just like kind sentinels.

“Will he be okay?” I asked Randy when we got to the door.

“He always is. McGlinn can recover from a wild day like nobody’s business.”

Randy slid through the door and to the porch with me. It was a chillier than usual night with wood smoke from McGlinn’s fire on the breeze.

“So… you’re off to that mansion?” asked Randy.

“Well, I’m sure not going back to Amanda Lee’s.” I chased the bitterness from my tone. “There’s just a lot to get done with Gavin Edgett, and I want to see it through.”

Randy laid a hand on my shoulder, even though I couldn’t feel much but a hmmzt. “We all need independence, so good on you for not goin’ back to your human like a puppy.”

“I know.” I nodded. “I’m so over her.”

So why did I feel like shit about staying away? It sucked to think of Amanda Lee still crying in the pool house, especially because it’d sounded like she’d been pinning her final hopes on me, and I wasn’t sure what my absence would do to her.

“’Kay, kid,” Randy said, making a chipper clicking sound with the side of his mouth while winking at me one more time. “Be careful out there.”

“And you don’t work too hard with that letter.”

When he smiled, I saw the recognition of futility in his gaze.

Ouch.

Still, I winked back at him, then conjured a travel tunnel and dove into it.

As I tumbled through, I was in a sentimental mood. It could’ve been because of Randy, or because of seeing Gramps and Gran watching McGlinn. It even could’ve been the comradeship of being with friends again.

Or it could’ve been just because I was so close to where I’d grown up, being near Escondido and all.

Whatever it was, I decided to make a tiny detour before heading for the coast. I mean, I was in town, you know?

I went for my old neighborhood in Escondido—the one where I’d grown up and had the best years of my life playing paper dolls on the front lawn with Dede Fitzpatrick, my next-door neighbor, and where my parents had always brought out their folding chairs on Saturday evenings with a box of wine and the other adults would just wander over with glasses and watch us kids play hopscotch on the sidewalk.

When I landed in front of the beige one-story track house, I gaped.

Damn, it seemed small. And at some point, it’d been painted beige instead of yellow. The bushes in front had been taken out, and the porch swing was gone. Most of the houses around it were run-down with junky cars parked on the street. No one was outside playing or drinking wine.

My not-really heart sank.

“To everything, turn, turn,” said a low voice just over my shoulder.

I startled, spinning around to find…

Oh, shit. Fake Dean.

My electric pulse seemed to jam in my essence. In spite of myself, I wanted to touch his chin-length blond hair, run my fingertips over his slight stubble. Worst of all, I just wanted to lean my head against his chest while he put his arms around me.

Asshole.

“What’re you doing here?” I asked.

“You were thinking about me earlier, so I thought you might be happy to see me.”

Crap. While meeting Twyla, I’d let actual positive thoughts of him enter my mind. How did he know that, though?

He was next to an anemic birch that hadn’t existed when I was a kid, and he leaned against it. When it tilted a little, I realized that he was putting weight on it.

What the hell? What was he made of?

He anticipated my question. “And you thought I was a ghost. A reaper. Isn’t that what you were telling everyone at first?”

I didn’t answer directly. “Have you been keeping tabs on me or something?”

He sent me a teasing smile. “Now, Jenny. How much fun would it be for me if I gave you all the answers right away?”

“Oh, so you do usually give answers to ghosts like me. Or do you just get off on this kind of constant mind fuckery?”

His expression said, Oo, feisty.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” he said in the real Dean’s smooth, charming voice. “I’m not a reaper. More of a… I guess you could say keeper.”

I didn’t like the way that sounded at all.

As I took a step back from him, I realized that… yes, I had a body again, just like him.

He angled his head, inviting comment.

“But we’re not in the star place,” I said.

“So whatever could that mean?”

I began walking—literally walking—away from him, past my house, getting away while I could.

As if I could.

“Hey.” From the sound of his voice behind me, he hadn’t moved. “Don’t you want to go inside for a tour of your old house? I can arrange it so the new family never even realizes we’re there.”

“Bug off.”

Fat chance, because he suddenly appeared right in front of me, and I smacked into his broad chest.

Goddamn it, why did he have to have muscles like Dean?

My heartbeat skittered along. “You know what one of my ghost friends said about you?”

“That I get my jollies from toying with new ghosts. Yeah, I overheard that, too.”

“How?”

He sighed, crossing his arms over his chest. Under the streetlights, I saw triceps flex in the back of his arms, and I couldn’t help remembering the real Dean’s arms, honed from surfing, strong and smooth. Forever young.

“Jenny, Jenny,” he said. “Are you going to ask me anything I can actually answer?”

“Like what?”

“You can start with something like ‘Do you genuinely exist just to get your jollies from new ghosts?’”

We stared at each other, and I realized that fake Dean wasn’t going to leave anytime soon unless I played his games.

So I went along with him. “Do you exist just to piss me off, dick-weed?”

He laughed, enjoying the hell out of himself. “Mostly. However, I do have other responsibilities.”

“You’re saying that I’m just one of many lucky targets.”

“I do stay busy.”

I kept staring him down, but it was hard when those sparkling light brown eyes were getting to me. The true Dean could always flip my stomach with a look and a cocky grin, just like this one.

And if he kept looking at me like that, I was going to forget he wasn’t my Dean.

I dragged my gaze off him, giving up. “What do you want from me? Just tell me once and for all.”

“Maybe we should couch this in different terms. If you could ask anything of me, what would it be?”

His switchback left me confused.

He continued. “I know what you’re up to with Elizabeth Dalton. You’re trying to solve a murder that isn’t your own, and that’s not normal ghost behavior, darlin’. Your kind is usually more self-involved.”

Chills flew up my spine. He hadn’t missed anything that had been going on with me, and it was like I’d been standing in front of a window at night, never realizing that there was someone outside watching every move I made. But, sick pup that I am, I was kind of turned on by that, because it was Dean. Or the closest I’d ever come to him again.

My voice sounded thick. “I suppose you’re going to help me solve Elizabeth’s murder because you’re impressed with my gumption or something. Is that why you’re hounding me?”

Sarcasm was still dripping from my words when he took a step closer.

“You’re different, and different makes my existence just as interesting as it makes any creature’s. That doesn’t mean I’m going to solve her murder—or yours—for you, though.”

“So why did you ask what I wanted from you?”

“I was truly curious to see if you’d request a solution to her murder or yours first.”

Bastard. “Gee, did I pass your test? If those are the kinds of traps you set up for your lucky targets, then you must be really bored in whatever land you come from.”

His face lost its amusement, and I knew I’d hit a target. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to verbally go at it with this thing like I was doing.

Then he tilted his head again. “Is it out of the realm of possibility that I might be a helpful kind of entity and I’m only giving you a hard time before getting down to business?”

That sounded ominous, so I zipped my lip.

Then he seemed to consider something and changed his tone, sounding like he was actually a rational being.

“It’s too bad that even my powers are limited. If I could’ve, I would’ve put you in contact with Elizabeth so you can ask her what really happened.”

“And what would be the cost of that?”

He only smiled, but it was a smile that mixed me up even more. It seemed sincere.

Was he experiencing an emotion other than amusement right now?

His tone softened. “Next time you see Amanda Lee, you might want to tell her that Elizabeth moved on immediately after her death.”

It took me a second to process that he’d just come right out and given me a huge piece of information without my having to sell my soul to him or anything. I’d been half fearing that this was the reason he kept stalking me and he was merely getting around to it in his own time.

Why had he just said this, though?

He took another step closer, and I could smell Dean again—soap, sea salt, skin. Oh, man.

He added, “Elizabeth is in the same place your parents are. Does that make you feel better?”

That’s when I welled up, my throat burning.

“Where are they?” I managed to ask.

He laughed gently. “That’s been your question of the day, hasn’t it? But I can’t tell you any more than you’ve learned. Not even I know what’s beyond us, because once you go there, you don’t come back. It might be heaven or hell, nirvana, or even a parallel dimension where everyone gets another chance in a reincarnated life.”

“You don’t even know?”

“No.”

I had the feeling he was lying to me, just as he might’ve been when he’d so “earnestly” told me about Elizabeth moving on. But I wanted to hear about my parents and decide for myself if he was telling the truth. I wasn’t about to sass him again.

“My mom and dad are happy?” I asked.

“Yeah, Jenny, wherever they are, I can guarantee it. I know a guy who knows a guy who knows that good people move on and get their just reward, like humans have always hoped.”

Now that I had a body, I was able to tear up, and my vision went bleary. Fake Dean became a watery blob of white T-shirt and blond hair. I didn’t want him to see me crying, though, and I turned away.

He was right behind me now. “Hey, I didn’t think that would make you weepy. That’s good news, isn’t it?”

I nodded, speechless, my throat scratched so thoroughly that I didn’t think I’d ever be able to talk again.

I could hear him breathing right behind me, and goose bumps covered my skin. If he put his hand on my shoulder, I might break apart. If he took one more step toward me, I might crumble.

Finally, I swallowed enough so that my throat was better. “Why’re you telling me these things?”

“Because you’ve wondered, and I just want to see you happy.” He blew out a breath. “Most of all, though, I don’t like to see you sad.”

I looked up and cuffed a rogue tear away from my cheek. Once, when real Dean and I had fought about something stupid—I couldn’t even remember what it was—he’d said those exact words to me.

This Dean’s words swayed me more than I would’ve liked.

He must’ve seen that in me, because he was more forthcoming now, like I’d let down my guard a little more than I should have and that’s what he’d been hoping for.

“And here’s more to keep you from being sad,” he said. “Just because Elizabeth Dalton was murdered, that doesn’t mean she had to stick around and haunt this plane. Not every spirit lingers or falls into a time loop. Sometimes there’s so much anguish connected to their deaths or the people they leave behind that they can’t stand the aftermath. Some spirits seek the light right away. Others go your route and fall into a numb imprint.”

I held my breath. Was he about to tell me something to do with my death?

When he put his hand on my shoulder, I didn’t shrug him off. He was so warm. Not even Gavin’s life force or a fire could match the glow this entity put in me. And, honestly, I sank into his touch ever so slightly, missing it so bad. Just wanting to relive Dean for a few more minutes.

His voice was low and quiet now. “You’re wondering about the night you died.”

I couldn’t even swallow because of the lump in my throat, so I only clipped out a nod.

“You don’t want to know,” he said. “And that’s because you’re not prepared to know. I’m not going to tell you, either, because I’ll be damned if I send you back into a loop with the shock of the details at this point.”

I found my voice. “I already saw the ax, the mask.”

When I shut the images right out of my mind, I guess that only proved his point, because his fingers bunched on my shoulder, massaging me, getting a better grip on me.

My gut wrenched, twisted, but in a way that heated me up even more.

I even forgot he wasn’t really my Dean, because sweet gestures like this had defined my old boyfriend. He would slide his hand over to cover my collarbone, moving his fingers gently, making me go weak, knowing that it would distract me from whatever issue was dogging me that day.

“If you won’t tell me about my murder,” I said, breathless, “then tell me about the Edgetts.”

His voice eased through me, all vibration and warmth. “You mean that Gavin guy?”

Jealousy?

Even that turned me on in a way it shouldn’t have, just like Gavin himself. Both of these guys were bad ideas, but maybe I’d been without men in my life for so long that I was a glutton for them, no matter who they were.

A beating instant passed as Dean’s touch got a little more possessive on my shoulder. I held back a small sound of pleasure.

Get away from him, my common sense was telling me. But common sense was a distant second to everything else right now.

“I’ll tell you one thing about the Edgetts,” he said. “Watch out. That girl Wendy captured your image on her camera phone.”

I recalled when she’d aimed her phone at me, then the flash. Shit.

“Tonight, she shared the pictures with Gavin,” Dean said.

His fingers branded my skin and I bowed my head, totally under his control.

Needing his touch so badly.

That was a ghost’s curse, wasn’t it? Needing what we couldn’t easily get?

His hand eased up to my neck, skimming over my flesh. My body responded, starving for touch after being robbed of it for so long. My skin prickled, my nipples tightened, the spot between my legs ached hard. My eyes closed, fighting it.

Go away, Jen. Don’t be stupid.

But I was staying, remembering Dean’s skin against mine. Remembering how he used to run his fingertips up my spine and down again, then kiss his way up my back to the nape of my neck, melting me.

Even though I had a body, I felt as if I was floating again. Rising, full of heat, dizzy with wanting…

In a haze, I opened my eyes, and I didn’t see grass or sidewalk around me anymore.

I saw purple. Stars floating past.

The star place?

Just as I started coming out of my lapse, I felt him holding on to me as we rose. And I saw that those stars were closer than before, and they had that strange shape I’d noticed during the first visit.

But now, so near, they definitely looked like…

Pale, glowing, hanging bodies?

Jarred, I screamed, breaking away from fake Dean, falling, falling through the purple…

As I tumbled through space, using all my energy to control my essence, he didn’t follow me. But why wasn’t he giving chase?

Rushing toward the ground, I thought for sure I was about to splat over the asphalt below me.

Pull up!

I summoned everything I had, curving up and scooping into the sky just before I could smack into the street.

Hovering, trembling, I heaved in a pseudobreath, realizing I was back in my old neighborhood, the streetlights yellow and wan. I looked up to the sky at the true stars, wondering what was actually hanging and glowing in the “star” place.

And why fake Dean had called himself a keeper instead of a reaper.

14

If there was one lesson I’d learned in these past twenty-four hours, it was that I couldn’t trust anyone but my new ghost pals.

Amanda Lee certainly wasn’t a finalist in my Inner Circle Sweepstakes. And do I really have to mention the entity that tried to seduce me up to his star place, just like a predator who invites women into his apartment and does heaven knows what to them?

I just wished I had the capacity to shrug off fake Dean as I’d done with Amanda Lee. But it seemed that he was intrigued by me and my different-strokes ghost attitude.

Even worse, those things he’d told me about Elizabeth, my parents, the afterlife, and the Edgetts had really done a number on my mentality. How much of his information had been valid and how much had he just been making up in order to lull me into a position vulnerable enough to take me to his star place? And what would happen the next time he tried to lure me with slick words and soft touches that he knew would undo me?

Boo World had more questions in it than even real life. All I knew for sure, though, was that the next time fake Dean appeared, I wouldn’t give him an inch. It seemed he needed me to come willingly every time he tried to get me to his lair.

Since I’d wasted enough time today, I sailed off to the Edgett mansion, even though fake Dean had warned me about Wendy’s camera pictures and how Gavin knew about them. We would see if Star Guy had been telling the truth about that, though, wouldn’t we?

When I arrived, Constanza the maid was standing in front of the guest cottage outside, unlocking the door. I guessed she lived there.

I swept over her head and she gasped, drawing her collar closer to her stout body. But I was already on my way up to the main roof and chimney, taking the passage down to the foyer fireplace and coming out into all that marble grandeur. I listened for a beat, and when I heard voices down the right-side hallway, I followed the sound.

I found three out of four Edgetts in the study, gathered around a pool table with balls scattered over the felt. A lone light cast illumination over the green as the rest of the room waited in dim relief. Noah was holding a cue stick, dressed in a school uniform like Wendy. Farah was in a pair of pink sweats, her dark hair in a sleek side ponytail, and she was wearing cute strappy pumps, which made no sense to me. Sweats were for working out, right?

Anyway, Gavin wasn’t here, but those books I’d seen in his dream last night sure were. They gave me the jeebs as the details rushed back.

Blood coming from his fingers over the chair… Elizabeth, walking into the room in her bathing suit, dropping a red-stained scarf to the floor…

“. . . so just leave it to Wendy to put him in another bad mood,” Noah was saying, lining up his next shot. His navy blue school tie was loose, his careless dark brown hair hanging over his forehead. His rosy-tan skin looked more flushed than it had the first time I’d seen him, like he’d been outside cutting class a lot.

As he cracked the cue ball into a solid one, putting it into a corner pocket, Wendy crossed her arms over her chest. Was it because she was fending off Noah’s comment or because I’d entered the room and she was cold?

“If you’re going to haunt,” Twyla the Unfriendly Ghost had told me, “commit to it.”

So I wouldn’t fear that I was being too obvious with my presence. I was beyond that now.

Noah straightened up, then hunted down another solid ball. “What did you show Gavin that put him in such a funk, anyway, Wen?”

She fidgeted. “Nothing much.”

But I knew. The photos of me.

So fake Dean hadn’t been lying about that.

I swept thoughts of him aside to think about later as Farah sat half on the edge of the pool table. For some reason, she looked sad, even with her CoverGirl makeup job.

“Gavin just gets in these moods, Noah—you know that.”

Her adopted brother sent her an assessing glance, his mouth firming into a straight line as he took another shot on the table, then missed.

Wendy seemed to be in her own orbit, as usual, wandering toward the sliding glass doors that overlooked the glowing pool outside. But instead of shutting out her siblings, she opened herself up.

“I only showed him something that I thought he’d actually laugh at,” she said. “Pictures.”

Noah snorted, like he was trying too hard to be flip. “Were they of you? I’d laugh.”

“Shut up, Noah.”

“I’m just being honest. He’s your big brother, not Wendy’s Super Special Teenage Crush. Stop trying to impress him with your dumb arts and crafts. He couldn’t give a shit.”

Wendy glared at him. “You’re disgusting.”

He didn’t notice that Farah gave him a look that was just as taken aback before she straightened her face and rose from the table.

I followed her, positioning myself against the wall, spreading over an art deco painting so I could be in front of her and monitor her expressions. I thought I already had a good emotional bead on Wendy.

But my maneuver didn’t pay off, because all I got from Farah was blankness while she pretended to diagnose the sharp, colorful angles of the art.

Wendy had come back from the window to confront Noah. “You’re a real fuckroid sometimes. Why would you even say something like that?”

The kid shrugged. His whole demeanor had changed, his shoulders stiff, like he regretted going too far with his teasing but wasn’t about to admit it.

“God,” Wendy said. “This damned family. Sometimes I hate you guys.”

“That’s never obvious.” Back to normal, Noah went to put the cue stick back in its wall holder. “Maybe you should just trade us in, Wendy. Or maybe your real family will call from Beijing and want you back someday.”

“Maybe yours will ride across the border on a burro and pack you off.” She added something in Chinese, I think, and whatever it was, it sounded nasty.

As she rushed out of the room, she had a look on her face that told me she regretted what she’d said. Noah was back to regretting, too. But Farah?

She’d mentally checked out, probably so used to these arguments that she didn’t pay attention anymore.

As Noah came back to the table and shoved the rest of the pool balls into pockets, I wondered if Wendy would’ve carried through with describing to her siblings what’d been in those pictures she’d shown to Gavin.

Oh well.

Before Noah headed toward the door, he checked on Farah with a glance. When she didn’t acknowledge him, he stuffed his hands in his pockets, then went on his way, his hair hiding part of his eyes.

Farah rubbed her hands over her arms, still standing in front of me, clueless that she was looking at more than a painting. This might be a good time to try some empathy on her. I was feeling really strong tonight, thanks to the power surge I usually got whenever fake Dean touched me.

I eased away from the painting, and just before I reached out to touch Farah’s face, she pulled away, feeling my chill.

Then she shook her head, like she was telling herself it’d just been a gust of wind from a seal that needed replacing on a window, and ran from the room the best she could in those Charro pumps.

A burst of energy flew through me. Was it because of her fear?

Whatever, it felt good. Just like it used to feel to get a blast of adrenaline when I was in a close volleyball game.

Giving slow chase, I left the study behind. I didn’t like it in there anyway, mostly because of Gavin’s dream. But also because of how Wendy, Noah, and Farah had left the room with that dysfunctional vibe that seemed to be the hallmark of the Edgett family.

Where was Daddy when you needed him?

It occurred to me that I would have to find another computer to use, instead of Amanda Lee’s, if I wanted to research the man. Would a library have one?

Anyway, I’d see about that later. Right now, though, Farah was still close by.

Flying out of the room, I heard her down the hall, and as I passed the game room with all the high-tech equipment, I saw her pacing, her cell phone to her ear.

“James,” she said. “Please tell me you’re home. Call me right back. Or I’ll try you again, just in case you couldn’t get to the phone.”

She was leaving a message. I knew all about these new phones and how they worked, thanks to Amanda Lee.

After redialing, Farah paced, her fingers playing with her ponytail. Then a man’s faint voice came on the other end of the line. I focused my energy on James, hearing him loud and clear in the air. He sounded put out that Farah had called.

“What’re you doing right now?” she asked. “I need to see you so badly.”

The boyfriend she’d been arguing with the other night said, “Jesus, then just come over. You don’t need an invitation.”

“Be there soon,” she said, either totally missing his impatience with her or ignoring it.

He hung up, and she didn’t go anywhere… until she looked around, like she felt me nearby.

“Rum Tum Tugger?” she asked.

Huh? Oh yeah. The cat.

“Tug… ger…” I could tell she was hoping it was her pet she felt in the room.

When the animal didn’t show itself, Farah scuttled away, and I got another rush of energy from her unadorned fear, then went after her.

As a fancy glass grandfather clock downstairs struck nine o’clock, I flew behind Farah as she ascended the grand staircase. She kept looking around for whatever was probably sending bumps over her flesh.

And I kept buzzing with the rush.

In her room, she grabbed her purse and keys as I prepared to corner her for an empathy session.

But then a visitor showed up at her door. Guess who.

Every time I saw Gavin—the rich guy with the face of a fighter, a face that didn’t belong in this mansion—I paused, struck by his life force.

“You were supposed to stop by my room,” he said. “That was a half hour ago.”

“I got sidetracked.” She tucked her prim little purse under her arm. “And I’m busy now.”

He nodded slowly, and I got the feeling he wasn’t happy with her.

“When will you not be busy, Farah?”

She hadn’t looked at him since he’d come in. “I can’t say. Tomorrow morning. Afternoon.”

He made a dismissive motion and started to leave her room.

She went after him. “Don’t act like that, Gav.”

“Like what? Like you have no interest whatsoever in helping me with Noah and Wendy?”

“You’re mad at me?”

“I’m just…” He laughed a little, then gritted his jaw. “I’m done with even asking you. Go to James or whatever his name is.”

She lifted her chin, and as Gavin walked away, it trembled.

“Don’t you care that you’ve never met him?” she asked.

“What you do outside this house is your business, Farah. Have fun with him.”

The air just hung there, heavier than I was.

“You bet I’ll have fun,” she finally said. “A lot of it.”

When he didn’t even offer a backward glance, she hurried toward the staircase, like she was desperate to leave the House of Usher.

As for me, I forgot all about Farah and went after Gavin, my main target. I tracked him to his room and whooshed by his boots just before he closed his door.

He went to sit at that big marble desk by the ocean-view window, where a laptop computer waited. His blue eyes were even paler in the glow of the screen, his features rough as he gazed at wherever he was seeing.

I flowed behind him, already knowing what would be capturing his attention.

Me.

And I’d bet the shirt on my back that he’d only been wanting to show Farah Wendy’s camera work, then discuss either the fact that (A) their house was haunted or (B) Wendy had some issues.

He was inspecting the computerized photos with such intensity that I suspected he was taking proof of a ghost seriously. And why wouldn’t he after I’d already been at him with the knocks on the wall and my shady voice?

He clicked on to another picture and a zap of worry flicked through me, causing the computer screen to blink. I’m not sure it was even something the human eye could catch, because Gavin didn’t seem to notice. But there I was in one of the pictures Wendy had taken, a cloudy shape hovering near her ceiling. A faint outline of a faceless woman who looked as if she was suspended in a pool, floating facedown, her hair spread out.

Almost… angelic. Me.

I couldn’t help myself—I curved around, to the front of the computer as it fritzed, wanting to see what his expression looked like now.

Was it right to say that he was… taken with the image in the photo? Enthralled?

It was like a bunch of shimmers rained through me, but I told myself not to get excited. I wouldn’t be asking him to be my sweetheart anytime soon just because I’d seen him looking at me with the kind of glance that said he was a little fascinated.

A little… No, not smitten. Fascinated was a much better description.

Those shimmers stayed with me as I moved in back of him again, while he checked his computer connections because of the fritzing, then switched to another picture. This one was more of the same, except it was taken when I’d clearly decided that having a camera aimed at me wasn’t a good thing and I was heading for the exit.

The last one showed my essence halfway under the door. Subtle. Yup, that’s what I was.

“If you’re going to haunt, commit to it.”

I didn’t like Twyla much, but she was right.

I flattened my essence like a hand, then leaned down, hovering only a micrometer away from Gavin’s skin, letting him know I was here.

The fine hairs at his hairline prickled.

He stood, and I eased away from him, stretching myself so that I was as tall as he was, mocking his shape. I was in his face, staring right into those eyes.

I dare you to say something, I thought.

“It’s you, isn’t it?” he asked between his teeth.

Yeah, he was a brave one, wasn’t he? I could feel only a trace of adrenaline from him, but not exactly fear. Mostly, I could vibe that he was on an edge, like he was clinging to it before losing his grip.

Was he remembering the dream he’d had yesterday at the office? Or did he at least know, subconsciously, what had happened in it, and he was carrying around a deep, dark feeling of dread because of my visitation?

Inspiration filled me as I saw the cell phone he’d set on the far side of his desk. I smiled, even though he couldn’t see my face. Then I extended myself toward the phone, sending my energy to it, making it ring.

Easy peasy.

Instead of a regular ring, the song from Peter Gunn played. Dun-dun-dah-dun-dah-dun-dah-dun…

Just as I thought Gavin might reach out to feel the air in front of him, confronting his invisible tormentor, he backed off, getting the phone without even checking the ID screen.

Concentrating, I thought of Elizabeth’s laugh—what it had sounded like, clear and musical.

It echoed over the static on the phone.

He pulled the device away from his ear, terror etching itself into his expression. Now there was some fear in him, and I ate it up. Wanting more, I made the phantom voice speak.

“Gavin… ?” Elizabeth sounded warped, utterly inhuman, like she was talking from under the dirt of a grave. “Why, Gavin?”

He turned off the call.

Yeah. Good try, babe.

I made the phone ring again. Dun-dun-dah-dun-dah-dun-dah-dun…

He merely stared at it as the music wore on. But I just knew he wouldn’t let it go.

He turned it on, and before I could start in, he said, “Who the fuck is this?”

His tone was jagged, and I liked that, too. I shivered with his rising anger and fear.

“Tell them the truth,” I had Elizabeth say in her cemetery voice. “Please.”

“Whoever this is, the joke stops now. Fuck off.”

I made Elizabeth weep, long, drawn-out sobs that caused Gavin to close his eyes and cover his face before he clicked off the call again.

This time he shut off the phone altogether.

Undeterred, I made it ring once more.

He stared at it like it was an intruder, shadowing his every move. Then he walked away from the desk, toward the sliding glass door, running his hand through his short hair.

Dun-dun-dah-dun-dah-dun-dah-dun…

He darted over to the phone, picked it up, went to the sliding glass window, opened it, then hurled the phone to the balcony floor.

Pieces flew off the balcony, but that wasn’t good enough for him. He crushed the rest of the phone under his bootheel, backing off when he thought that was sufficient.

But was it? Hmm. I don’t think so. I put all my strength into trying to make it ring again. It wasn’t hard, either, thanks to his fear.

The remnants of the phone rang, weakly, like a woman crying out during her last, blood-soaked moments.

He picked up what was left of the phone and, in a fit of fury, chucked it so far that it arced over the edge of the property and into oblivion.

Well. Someone had a temper. And I’d seen signs of guilt and torn emotion that were undeniable. All of those were just pieces of his puzzle, though, and I still had to fit them together.

As he leaned on the balcony railing, his head down, I checked myself. He’d shut off his fear, just like that, and a bit of energy leaked out of me. Was it because I’d exerted myself so much and, without his fear, I got sapped?

My ghost friends had been right when they said that communicating was a bruiser. The first time I’d whispered in Elizabeth’s voice to Gavin a few nights ago, I hadn’t been very loud, and a phone hadn’t been involved. But tonight had been Advanced Ghost Trick Time, and my essence had paid a small price.

Yet no matter how much gas I’d burned, this was the perfect time to get into Gavin’s head. He wasn’t sleeping, so I couldn’t go dream-digging, but I’d already worked him up enough so that I didn’t need a hallucination, either.

So I went for empathy.

He was still on the balcony, grasping the stone railing. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled to his elbows, so I could see the veins standing away from his skin.

I touched his cheek softly, taking care that I didn’t go into hallucination territory, and after tumbling into his thoughts, I got my bearings, joining the stream of his consciousness.

Elizabeth laughing, just as she had been on the phone tonight, but now her blue eyes were sparkling as she looked at the diamond ring on her finger. “It’s beautiful, Gav. Just as pretty as the rest of our lives will be…”

A crash of emotion, the sight of Elizabeth on another day, giving that ring back. Then her piercing words, running into each other: “Fell out of love… Someone else… A woman…”

Another stab of emotion, a cut to darkness, the sound of Elizabeth crying…

The sudden sight of Elizabeth desperately hitting him, the bruises she left on his arms, his chest, his face. Elizabeth, accidentally scratching her face as she flailed.

Rage building up, up, more and more—

Then there was nothing, because Gavin had pulled away from me, alert now, going back inside his room with his hands fisted by his sides.

I barely made it inside before he forcefully shut the glass door.

He glanced at his computer, where the final picture Wendy had taken was still on-screen amid static. But in that photo, I’d already gone under the door.

“Elizabeth?” he asked, turning away from the table. “Is it you?”

The fear was back. I had him halfway to where I needed him. Maybe a confession would even be around the corner. I thought of materializing to him, seeing if I could pull off looking like Elizabeth, but then he started talking.

“God, what I am saying? There’s no such thing as ghosts.”

Parrying, I conjured her perfume, just as I’d done that first night, and that jolted him, all right.

“Why’re you here?” he asked, his voice a wreck.

“My death…”

I’d spoken like her, but it was harder to do now, after expelling energy on the phone call and then the empathy. He wasn’t so scared that he could fill me all the way up with his fear again.

He was shaking his head, fixing his gaze back on the computer. He even sat heavily in his chair, and when he accessed the keyboard to flip back to the picture where I was hovering near the ceiling—the best view of me—he kept shaking his head.

“It doesn’t look like you. Your hair wasn’t long like this.”

He turned around in his chair, like he was seeking me out in the room. But I’d shifted to the right of his desk and he wasn’t even looking in my direction.

Yet I could still see how this man had ice in his veins, how he forced himself to calm so very quickly.

He scanned the vicinity, gaze narrowed. “You didn’t expect to be on film. You had no idea that Wendy was one of those kids who’s addicted to the strange. She watches things like ghost programs on cable channels, and that’s where she got the idea to grab a camera and capture your image. I didn’t believe her at first, but now… ?”

I didn’t let his taunting stop me.

“Murderer… ,” I whispered.

In my quickly climbing weakness, my voice didn’t quite sound like Elizabeth’s anymore, and he noticed that, finding me with his glare, locking me into his sights, just as he’d done in the study during his dream.

“I don’t know who you are,” he said, “but you’re wrong. I didn’t kill her.”

I stayed silent, and that seemed to be a very effective haunting technique, too.

“Elizabeth…” His voice got tight. Then he took a moment, his jaw clenching, before he tried again. I could feel the turmoil in him, but I couldn’t identify what it was about exactly.

“Elizabeth tore me apart,” he said, “but when she broke off our engagement, that was nothing compared to what I felt when she was murdered. I’ve wanted to go after whoever it was for years. I hired private investigators, and they’ve come up as empty as the police. I’m not—”

He stopped. But had he been about to say that he wasn’t a killer?

He leaned back in his chair, and by the light of the computer, I could see how weary he was. It looked like he hadn’t been sleeping very well.

Haunted, I thought. But that was the goal.

The thing was, my vibes were telling me that he was unloading the truth right now. Sure, he was a rage-filled guy—in private, it was like he was set to explode at any second—but had he murdered his ex-fiancée?

There was something about him that I couldn’t put my finger on.

I went back to him for more empathy, but when I touched his cheek and swooped inside this time, there was only blackness.

An utter and complete blank.

The son of a bitch had shut me down, and he seemed to know it as I pulled out and he fixed a lethal stare in front of him, right at invisible me again. He might not know just how I worked, but he knew enough to turn off his fear and also block me.

As I stood there, toe-to-figurative-toe with him, that heat from his body, his life force, trickled into me. I hated that he could make me warm. Why was it that the only entities that could do that were two guys who should leave me cold?

Gavin looked extrapugilistic as he got out of his chair, walked over to an end table, grabbed a remote, then clicked on the TV. A program with a bunch of talky doctors came on, but he didn’t seem to care. He just sat at his desk in front of the computer again, and it was like he made a big show out of not giving a shit that there was something with him in the room.

Ignored.

Randy had said ghosts hate that, and for the first time, I understood a hundred percent. Being ignored like this sucked the big weenie from hell, but as Gavin kept doing it, I didn’t give up like some ghosts might. I stuck around, waiting for him to go to sleep, so I could reach into his dreams and see what was playing inside his head that night.

It was a battle of wills as he stayed up. He even went into his bathroom to pop a few antisleeping pills, which was cheating, if you ask me.

Thanks to those, he stayed up all damned night.

I think the contest would’ve lasted a lot longer, too—past dawn, past the breakfast that he had brought up to his room—if Constanza hadn’t knocked at his door a second time, announcing that the family had a visitor. A woman named Alicia who said that she was hand-delivering a parcel of vintage clothing for Farah, and she insisted on giving it to someone in the family before she left.

Knowing deep inside that something was off, I went downstairs before Gavin did.

And when I saw Amanda Lee sitting in the parlor, my ghost mouth almost hit the floor.

15

“Hello,” she said softly to me, just like we’d agreed to meet here and everything was copasetic.

I was still gaping as Amanda Lee folded her hands in her lap. She was wearing a smart linen business suit and tasteful bronze jewelry that looked antique-y. But her totally not Amanda Lee clothing wasn’t what really caught my attention. She’d done something to her face with makeup, and her flat cheekbones seemed even higher, her nose longer, her eyes bigger. And she was wearing fashionable thick-rimmed glasses. She’d even dyed her hair a dark brown and pinned it into a loose bun at the nape of her neck. She was a businesswoman who faded into the woodwork.

So what do you say when someone has such balls of steel?

Before I recovered from seeing her here, Gavin walked in, and I sensed the hackles rising all over Amanda Lee at the sight of the man she thought had murdered the women she loved. But I’ll give this to her—she was a bitchin’ actress, and he didn’t seem to notice anything amiss.

Rising from her seat, she nodded to Gavin, who remained at the entrance to the cream-and-marble parlor, greeting her and faintly smiling like he was waiting for her to explain her presence better than Constanza had done when she came upstairs to fetch him.

“I’m sorry to inconvenience you,” Amanda Lee said, laying on the Virginia accent that she’d shed during her years in SoCal. “But I don’t feel right about just leaving these one-of-a-kind pieces off with anyone, even if Ms. Edgett has already paid for them.”

She sent a discreet glance to Constanza, who stood just behind Gavin.

I think Amanda Lee’s portrayal of “Alicia” included a bit of snobbery, and Constanza only narrowed her eyes at her in return.

Gavin’s smile went tight before he planted his hands on his jeaned hips. “I’ll take the merchandise off your hands. Farah mentioned consulting with a new personal shopper, but I didn’t know she was having anything delivered today.”

“There’s a Chanel evening gown in here,” Amanda Lee said, emphasizing the designer and really pushing the snobby angle. “When Farah saw it, she could barely contain herself.”

I wasn’t big into fashion, but even I recognized “Chanel.” How had Amanda Lee gotten ahold of clothing of this caliber? More to the point, what was she doing with it here?

Gavin motioned to the wheeled dress rack near the sofa where Amanda Lee… er, Alicia was sitting. Garment bags hung from it.

“I would’ve trusted Constanza to accept these,” he said, turning to grin at the maid, who gave him a warm smile in return, then left the room.

Amanda Lee also smiled, but at the maid’s retreating back. Then she aimed the gesture at Gavin. Sugary lemonade sweet.

“I’m on a working vacation from out of state for a short time,” she said, “and when I attended the Locksley Foundation dinner last week, I heard about Farah’s weakness for vintage designs. She mentioned to one of my associates that she was fond of Chanel in particular, and word gets around. So when I came across this exquisite dress for a steal yesterday, I thought of her immediately and arranged a quick meeting. Would you like to take a look at it, Mr. Edgett?”

“No, thanks.” Polite, but direct.

Amanda Lee didn’t seem surprised when he didn’t say anything more. He was obviously waiting for her to take her leave.

When she began to head for the door, I was a smidge surprised. Surely she had more than this up her sleeve. And… yup.

She made a delicate show of sucking in a breath as she passed by me.

“Oh my,” she said.

Gavin slowed his steps, giving her a curious glance.

Amanda Lee seemed embarrassed as she said, “Pardon me, Mr. Edgett, but… well, my friends back home say I’m eccentric, so keep that in mind. However, do you have some paranormal activity in this house?”

My essence nearly flipped upside down. What the hell?

Gavin seemed just as stunned while she continued.

“Maybe it’s nothing, but I’m known for my psychic moments, and you have something out of the ordinary going on here. Haven’t you noticed?”

I could tell he was about to say she should get lost. As for me, I was about to pinch the fucking shit out of Amanda Lee like the world’s most furious poltergeist. What was she up to?

She wandered closer to where I was hovering near the sitting room’s doorframe. I slid up the wood like water going against gravity.

She said, “Its presence is stronger in some places than others. Is there a certain room where there are… odd… occurrences?”

He paused, his gaze going hard. I thought he was thinking about his bedroom in particular, but he wasn’t about to confide in this near stranger.

Ultimately, he only shook his head. “I haven’t noticed anything, Ms… .”

“Dantès. Alicia Dantès.”

The last name sounded familiar. I couldn’t say why, though. Frankly, I wasn’t in an analytical mood as I spread over the ceiling, waiting until Amanda Alicia Lee got her ass out of here so I could follow and read her the riot act.

Brusquely, Gavin walked through the foyer and to the door, which he held open for her.

Once outside, Amanda Lee put on a concerned face, then opened the purse she had slung over her shoulder and extracted a pad of paper, plus a pen.

“Mr. Edgett, I sense disquietude in you. So I say this in all earnestness—if you find that whatever is in your home is bothering you or escalates its activity, please feel free to contact me.” She handed him the paper. “I’ve encountered the supernatural before, and I know how disturbing it can be. Now, I’ve never dealt with activity on a large scale, but there’s certainly something here, and I’d be glad to help, even if it’s only to call up friends who do contend with matters of this nature on a regular basis.”

“Thank you, Ms. Dantès.” He didn’t seem impressed by the flaky psychic who’d just bashed into his life. “I’ll take care of the clothing for Farah.”

Alicia Actress paused, her smile fading, and I knew it was only a matter of superior self-control that kept the real Amanda Lee from revealing herself.

But then she turned on that lemonade smile again. “I appreciate your help. So sorry to bother you.”

As he closed the door, I slipped through. She strolled to a Mercedes I’d never seen before—a rental?—in the circular driveway, where a fountain splashed in the middle. I didn’t have the chance to see how Gavin reacted or if he threw away the paper she’d given him, because I was already beelining for her car.

Her windows were open, like she’d expected me and wasn’t going to make my grand entrance any harder than it had to be.

Once I was inside and she started the engine, I let loose. “Are you insane, pointing out that there’s a ghost haunting the house?”

“Not remotely,” she said, reverting to her regular speech pattern.

She wheeled around the driveway and down to the gates, which automatically opened for her. Farah had probably left “Alicia’s” name for Constanza.

It was only when we were off-property, driving oh so casually as she slipped off her glasses with her free hand, that she continued.

“I knew you were going to be in that mansion, and I joined you because I had to.”

“You had to?”

“I’ve been busy while you’ve been away, Jensen. We need to catch up with each other.”

Oh, like we hadn’t had a huge fight the other night or something.

“Alicia,” I said, “I actually had everything under control. But with you barging in like that, I’m not so sure now.”

She seemed interested. “And how far have you gotten with a confession from the killer?”

I refused to tell her about last night with Gavin and the phone that wouldn’t die. But I did say, “I’ve gotten far enough to think that Gavin didn’t murder Elizabeth.”

Amanda Lee squealed over to the side of the road, where bird-of-paradise plants waved in the aftermath of the dust from the tires. When she glanced at me, she was on fire.

“What did you just say?”

“Gavin told me he didn’t kill her.”

Her breathing was getting choppy. “Then if he didn’t, who did?”

That was a conversation stopper. It was like a boulder had crushed the car, and us with it.

As we both cooled down, she started surveying me, like she was just now noticing that I had a mite of color left over from my latest fake Dean encounter. Yeah, like I was going to tell her about that.

She must’ve gotten my nonverbal cue loud and clear, because she lowered her voice, an attempt at calm. “After you left, I didn’t know what to do. I’m not even sure I moved from the pool house floor for hours. But all the while, I wished you would come back.”

“Because I’m your fetch-it girl.”

“No. Among other things, I wanted another chance to earn your trust. And that’s what I’m doing now.”

“By crashing the haunting? Awesome plan, Amanda Lee.”

“Just hear me out.”

I stared at her. She seemed utterly sincere, but I still couldn’t bring myself to believe that.

She deftly loosened the clasp of her old, heavy bronze necklace, doffing it and tossing it into the backseat. She breathed a sigh of relief.

“I spent all of my time after you were gone in meditation, scrying into crystals, gazing into a crystal ball, everything you can think of. And finally, I got something. Two visions.” She leaned her head back against her car seat. “They were tangential, but it was as if someone somewhere was showing me a way to finish what we started, and I realized that all our previous plans weren’t good enough.”

Was she thinking it was Elizabeth who had contacted her and was making her reevaluate how to go about the haunting? That would explain the guts she’d displayed, coming into the Edgett house and meeting the person she hated the most when, before, she’d wanted to stay completely undercover.

I closed what I had for eyes, torn about telling her what fake Dean had said about Elizabeth moving on. But even though he’d been right about Wendy showing Gavin my pictures, I didn’t trust him way more than anyone. So I kept the news to myself for now.

Amanda Lee said, “In the first vision, I saw Farah at that Locksley Foundation dinner, even though I wasn’t actually there. I heard her talking about fashion to a group of women, and when she mentioned her favorite designers, this new plan came to me.”

“A plan to fix her up with a Chanel.”

“Yes. I’ve had a collection in storage that I felt she might be interested in—”

“Part of that inheritance of yours?”

“My mother’s. The dresses are valuable, but there’s nothing I wouldn’t sacrifice for Liz.”

“So you called Farah yesterday, pretending to be a personal shopper.”

“More of a stylist, and I was able to set up a meeting with her so she could look at the clothing. She’s a tough sell, though, and she wanted to think about it, but about an hour later, she called, wanting to bargain for them. And since Farah doesn’t have an office, or a job besides working for different charities, I told her I would make a delivery to her home today, whether she was there or not. Honestly, I was hoping she would be in instead of her brother.”

A muscle twitched in her cheek, and she bent down to the passenger side, where she’d stored her purse. I shifted away from her, not because I knew she’d be cold from my essence, but because I didn’t want her touching me.

She faltered at my distant attitude, but then slowly extracted a tissue from her purse. “When I first saw him, I almost killed him.”

Like I was going to join her pity party. Sure, I had sympathy for her, but…

Fool me twice, shame on me.

“For your information,” I said, “your trip wasn’t necessary. Gavin already knows I exist.”

“I realize that, because that was what my second vision centered on. I saw that the girl, Wendy, showed him pictures of you. That was what convinced me to come here today most of all. You no longer had the advantage of surprise, and that’s a terrible loss. We need to get that back.”

I folded my arms over my chest. “A lack of surprise didn’t stop me from scaring Gavin, getting him to tell me that he didn’t kill Elizabeth.”

Amanda Lee didn’t acknowledge that. “Tell me… has he mentioned to anyone that there’s a ghost in the house?”

So much for being stubborn and withholding information from Amanda Lee. It looked like we really were in this together, whether I liked it or not.

“He let me know that he was aware of me,” I said.

“But he doesn’t want to admit it to anyone else.”

“I think he was about to show Wendy’s pictures to Farah before she left the house last night. Otherwise, I’m not sure. But I can tell you that he definitely won’t confide in a random, psychic stylist who seems like she’s off her rocker.”

She risked a smile at me, like she wanted to test the ground we were on. I didn’t smile back, giving her a definitive answer. Her gaze clouded.

Why did this have to be so hard? “I still don’t understand what your purpose was in telling him about ‘activity.’”

“I was getting around to that,” she said. “After that second vision, I realized that he’s going to be on his guard from now on, and your haunting efforts might be blocked.”

“Yeah. He figured out that I’m not Elizabeth, thanks to those pictures, so he fended off my attempts at empathy, and he refuses to sleep so I can dream-dig.”

“We need for him to think that you’re gone, then.”

My brain was catching up to what she was proposing.

She said, “Remember a few days ago, when we talked about the family perhaps calling in someone or something else to get rid of you if they became aware of your presence? I’m going to be that person.”

Wow. It made perfect sense. I wouldn’t want to go up against Amanda Lee in chess or war.

She looked satisfied that I wasn’t putting down her idea. “This is how I’m going to do it: if Gavin doesn’t call me back by noon, I plan on contacting Farah again, just to ‘follow up on the delivery.’ But I’ll find a way to work in a comment about the house’s activity. Have you had any contact with her so she might be predisposed to believing me?”

“Enough contact to make her wonder if what you’re telling her could be true.”

“Good.” Amanda Lee looked in the rearview mirror while wiping off some of the makeup that had altered her face. “This way, the Edgetts won’t call in another psychic who’ll intuit what’s actually happening. I’ll get there first. And I’ll pretend to get rid of you, lulling Gavin into letting down his defenses so you can regain that element of surprise with him. That way, you can use your empathy to read more of him, and you can dream-dig.”

I took it all in, then asked, “What if Gavin gets suspicious and hires a human to look into your background?”

Amanda Lee clearly had this covered, too. “Remember that PI friend I told you about?”

Her only friend? If he was even real. I mean, I’d only heard of him and still had to meet him. That’s when I’d believe he existed.

“I remember,” I said.

“He’s already helping me cover myself with false documents. If anyone should ask about Alicia, I’m confident they’ll be satisfied with what they hear. I’m even using a disposable phone for every contact.”

I was dying to meet this PI, but Amanda Lee was already talking again, just like we were buds.

“Speaking of PI help,” she said, “he’s been doing some research about Mr. Edgett senior, as well.”

I couldn’t help it—she’d hooked me. “What did you find out about the dad?”

“He seems to have holed up somewhere in France. At least, that’s the speculation, and I haven’t intuited whether it’s true or not. That’s another reason I wanted to visit the Edgett mansion—to see if I could pick up any vibes on the family.”

I leaned forward, urging her on.

“I didn’t get a thing from that house, though,” she said. “I’m afraid it will take another trip for me to try again.” She crumpled the cosmetic-smudged tissue in her hand. “But I wish I could stay out of that place. I don’t like being in there, near him.”

Gavin. I didn’t like being near him, either, especially because I kept getting drawn to dark men. Talk about reliving the past. I couldn’t stay away from those murderers, real or imagined, could I?

Awkward silence separated me from Amanda Lee, and it felt like she was searching for something more to say, getting me to “trust” her again.

She cleared her throat, then said, “Have you been able to check into your own killing? Because I focused my scrying on that, too, although I didn’t have any visions. And my PI is still on your case.”

“No time for my business,” I said. “I’m pretty swamped here.”

She inhaled, blew out a breath. “I’m just going to say it. No matter how you feel about me, you need me.”

I shot her a hard look.

“Think about it,” she said. “Since there are no suspects or witnesses to your crime, you can’t empathize or dream-dig in order to solve your case on your own. You need a psychic’s visions and guidance.”

“Maybe I can break into some law enforcement computers to find any suspects they had.” Then I could go from there.

Her sad glance told me that there hadn’t been any strong suspects.

Her voice was soft. “I have a connection with you, whether you like it or not. If anyone is going to envision what happened on that night, it’s me.”

I hoped she wasn’t right. “Listen, I’ve got to get back there in case Gavin falls asleep.”

“Here’s to hoping that the dream-digging works out for you.”

I shrugged, still not willing to be pals.

“Either way,” she said, “I’ll be by the mansion again soon. Ideally tonight. And when I put on my fake séance or whatever I end up doing, just stay silent and follow my cues. Leave all the activity to me, Jensen—we want to save the real haunting for the killer himself. I’ll give him the afternoon to decide if he wants my help and to contact me, but if he doesn’t, I’m calling Farah.”

“You do what you need to do.”

As I began to coast out the window, Amanda Lee stopped me.

“One last thing. Have you thought about what should be done if he refuses to confess? If it looks as if he’s about to get away with murder?”

“No.” I hadn’t gotten that far.

“There are other ways to make him pay.”

I waited, already knowing I wasn’t going to like this.

She gripped the steering wheel. “This other ghost you have contact with… Randy. He already told you about possession.”

I realized what she was suggesting. This woman really was a lean, mean, retribution machine.

“Are you thinking that, if nothing else works out, I should punish Gavin by taking over his body and doing God knows what to it while his consciousness is still working?” I asked.

She kept gripping the wheel.

That’s when the straight-A student in me suddenly remembered where I’d heard the last name that Amanda Lee had used with Gavin. Edmond Dantès was the main character in The Count of Monte Cristo, a man who’d been out for revenge against those who’d ruined his life.

Vengeance, I thought. Not justice. Amanda Lee was never going to want the latter because it wouldn’t satisfy her.

“I feel sorry for you,” I said, not even wanting to explain to her that Randy had told me humans needed to willingly accept a possession and that demons were the ones who took over bodies without permission.

I was so disgusted that I did something awful. I threw out a sound to Amanda Lee.

Elizabeth weeping.

And I didn’t stick around to see the tragic sound of hurt and devastation haunting Amanda Lee as much as it did Gavin.

16

Immediately afterward, I started beating myself up for the cruel trick I’d pulled on Amanda Lee out of sheer frustration. She wasn’t a bad person, after all—just misguided, unwilling to listen to reason. Bullheaded.

But I was a little like that, too, and I feared we’d be butting heads from here on out, even if we were trying to get to the same goal.

Even so, what good would it do to dwell on her when Gavin was inside the mansion, maybe even falling asleep? I didn’t want to lose any momentum with him, so I headed back there to see if I could prod him even closer to revealing the absolute truth about him and Elizabeth.

If he hadn’t provided the truth already.

But would I be able to do that before Amanda Lee could return? With the empathy option off the table, maybe I should exercise some patience and charge up on some power lines, going back to Gavin in an hour or two to see if he’d fallen asleep then. Or it might be time for some full-on hallucination therapy instead. After all, I’d been able to perform those car accident mirages on Amanda Lee while she’d been blocking my empathy, so why wouldn’t the same technique work on him?

Sorting through my choices, I took a seat on the power lines outside the mansion, where fancy cars wound over the curvy road below me. The early-afternoon sun relaxed in the sky as electricity fed me like it was junk food, giving me a rush.

Just as I was getting way pumped, I felt a change in the lines, a shift in energy, and I looked around to see what was going on.

I startled when I saw Twyla a few yards away, her back propped against the power pole as she lay lengthwise on the wires. Her dark petticoats draped down, and she was winding her long black, straight hair around a finger. The other half of her hair was as light and teased out as ever.

“What’re you doing here?” I asked.

“Just popped in to say hi. I totally guessed where you were, too, because it had to be in, like, one of three places. Your death spot, here, or Amanda Lee’s. And what do you know? I was right and you’re predictable. Bravo, dipstick.”

Whatever. “What’s your cause?”

She fixed her eyelined sight on the red tile-roofed mansion, exhaling. “Okay. Honestly, I was bored. And I thought of how your haunting might be going. And just thinking of you made me more bored. But the whole haunting a murderer thing is actually, like, bitchin’. So I came.”

A hitchhiker ghost. Rad. “I thought you more experienced ghosts pooh-poohed the idea of getting involved with humans.”

“Sweetie, smart ghosts don’t get involved with human problems. We didn’t say anything about not enjoying a good show.”

“Forget it. You’re not going to watch me haunt.”

“Pretty please with sugar on top? Like, how entertaining would that be? It’s like seeing a retarded little girl at her first ballet recital stumbling through The Nutcracker.”

She was really something.

“You know,” I said, “besides your dismaying attitude, the last thing I need is for a ghost to cock-block my serious business.”

She laughed.

“Twyla, I’m not fooling around. I’m trying to find out if the man who lives here took the life of a woman. Why would that amuse you?”

Twyla’s dark-lipsticked mouth straightened into a line and she stopped playing with her hair.

Then she said, “I just wanted to see how you, like, went about this serious stuff.” She sighed and rolled her eyes. “It’s so easy to forget that things matter, you know? Because out here, we’ve seen it all. And there’s no end to it, just the hope that there’ll be something more interesting that comes along to create a spark in us.”

I didn’t dare interrupt her. I wasn’t sure Twyla had many soul-searching moments.

She shifted, poised over the wires like I was. “I haven’t really met a new ghost in years. Your kind is usually really, like, shy, and they either stay away or they find a group to dig in with. Ghost cliques, you know?”

I surveyed her half-Goth, half-Val appearance. “Which clique were you in back in the day?”

She swung her legs. “I don’t know, really. I was one of those kids in high school who changed who I was all the time, and I thought, after school ended, I would settle into an ID. But no.”

“How old were you when you died?” I’d never found out that detail.

“Nineteen, a few months after I said bye-bye to high school.”

Whoa. I’d thought she was older. Maybe it was the raccoon eyes, or how Randy had talked about her going clubbing on the night she’d passed on.

She continued. “Through senior year, I was the ultimate Val. I mean, can’t you tell?”

She pointed at her Lauper hair, then her clothes. She looked a little sad, her dark mouth turning down at the corners.

“Then I went to a Cure concert and… you know how it is. The music crept into me, and I thought I had found it. My purpose. Unfortunately, this was what I got.” She gestured to her Goth side. “Now I’m a schizoid forever because of a fucking hair dryer.”

“You’re not alone,” I said. “Ever since I met Amanda Lee, I’ve been pulled in two.”

“So don’t be around her anymore. Duh.”

I laughed. Twyla made it sound so simple.

The lines hummed beneath us, and Twyla lifted her face to the sky, like she could feel the sun or something. Now that I thought about it, there was energy there. Back during my wastoid days, I used to watch documentaries on PBS, and I remembered one that showed societies that used the sun’s rays to cook food.

Duh.

“So, what’s on the agenda?” Twyla asked.

“With the haunting? I’m still working it out.” What Amanda Lee had said about possession pinched at me.

“Have you ever taken over a human body?”

She looked at me like what I’d just said had made her visit very worthwhile indeed.

“Maybe I’ve possessed someone,” she said. “Are you thinking of it?”

“No. It sounds terrible.”

It almost sounded like we were talking about having sex for the first time.

“It’s only terrible,” she said, “if you do it on an unwilling human.”

I got my mind out of the gutter and said, “Randy told me that only demons possess the unwilling.”

Twyla rolled her eyes. “Okay, Gawd. Like you guys know everything.” Then she glanced around, like we were in a crowd or something, and whispered, “I’ve totally done it.”

“And… ?”

“And it was tubular! I could touch and be touched…” She went kind of dreamy before her expression faded. “Bummer is that you can’t stay in them for long, and when you get out of their bodies, you can’t function for a time. Possession takes every ounce of energy you have.”

“Did you go into a time loop because of it?”

“No. Another ghost was there to help me—it was Cassie from our party? She saved my bacon.”

I remembered the ’seventies housewife, and I nodded for Twyla to go on.

“Well, you know how Cassie’s megamotherly,” she said. “She had three kids who were at school the day she slit the old wrists. Usually, she’s depressed as hell, but she likes me well enough. So when I came out of the human’s body that night, she made sure I got to a nearby TV set.” She laughed. “The thing nearly exploded because of all the amps I was sucking from it!”

“Sounds like you weren’t so bored that time,” I said.

“No, but Cassie, like, said that if I ever did it again, she wouldn’t be around. So now I just like to go into dreams and be touched that way, like I said before.”

I wondered if Twyla had had a boyfriend when she died… or if she’d never had one and she regretted it, longed for what she’d missed.

“How did you do it?” I asked. “Possess, I mean?”

Twyla definitely wasn’t bored now. “You first pick someone who’s going to make it easy to let you in. Mine was a teenage girl who lived in my old neighborhood and listened to Black Sabbath all the time. I did it not long after I died.”

“You were curious.”

“Aren’t we all? I knew she was a metalhead wannabe, into the occult, stuff like that. So I, like, made contact one night, showing off my dark side in particular. It didn’t take me but a few days to talk her into trying out the let-me-be-you stuff. She was totally up for an adventure. From what I’d heard, I knew I had, oh, probably about an hour inside her, so we planned to go to her friend’s house, where I could be around people. I mentioned it to Cassie, and she’d never tried it, so she came along with us to watch.”

“How did you get inside the girl?”

“Like I said, easy.” Twyla looked annoyed by the question. “Like, you just slip in. It’s as simple as walking through a doorway, nimrod.”

“It’s simple because she was letting you in.”

“Yes, Jen, you’re really catching on fast.”

An eye roll and a sneer. I was moving up the ranks of approval, all right.

Now, I don’t know why I was so interested in the possession thing in the first place, but I had to say that, while Twyla had been talking, a bad idea had been taking shape in my mind, and it was fully formed now.

I kept thinking of Wendy, who watched ghost shows and didn’t seem to be that afraid of me. In time, how valuable would a willing host be to me in that mansion for opening the drawers and closets I wanted to get into during my investigation? Perish the thought, right?

Twyla was back to swinging her legs, her petticoats fluffing. “So?”

“So what?”

“Let’s go inside that mansion,” she said, waggling her eyebrows.

“I don’t think so.”

“Come on. I’m totally dying for action here.”

I held up a finger. “I’ve worked too hard on this case already for you to go in there and ‘have fun’ or whatever you had in mind.”

“A case. How official. Just listen to you—a regular Magnum, PI, except his mustache was prettier.”

I held a hand to my facial area. “I don’t have a must—”

“Psych!”

Twyla was laughing so hard that she fell off the wire. She recovered fast, though, flying upward to hover in front of me.

“Jen, you know I’m going in there with or without you.”

What could I do? Was this a time when I should be calling for elder ghosts like Louis or Randy so they could get Twyla under control?

She must’ve felt my vibes. “I’ll be good. I really, really promise.”

She seemed genuine. But I’d been about zero for fifty in the judgment category lately with Amanda Lee, and I didn’t want to be naive here, too.

“Just a peek?” Twyla said. Then she held three fingers to her temple in a Girl Scout salute. “On my honor, I do, like, realize how important this is to you, and I will not be a pain in your ass. I just want a look around, that’s all.”

I hesitated, then free-fell off the wire, charged up enough now to feel confident in my haunting abilities. “Okay. But if you screw around, I’m calling Cassie.”

Ding-ding-ding! I’d hit it, because Twyla looked like I’d twisted her ear. I had some leverage with this Cassie thing.

She waited for me to zoom toward the mansion’s chimney, then trailed me.

“I swear to God,” she said from behind me. “I can even help you. I can be your shotgun rider.”

So she’d watched a few Westerns. “Save it for Old Seth, Twyla. I don’t need help.”

With that, I plunged down the chimney, knowing she was right on my tail, and when we emerged into the luxurious sitting room, she found her so-called footing and gasped, looking around.

“This is bangin’!”

“Would you shut up?” I whispered.

“God, they can’t hear us. Are you kidding me?”

I gave her the I’m-telling-Cassie look and she zipped her lip. But she didn’t keep it zipped for as long as I would’ve liked.

When she spied the grand staircase, she squealed. “Oh my Ga-od! I’ve been in mansions before, but… A Gone With the Wind staircase. Be still, my heart.”

She slipped up and over the marble railing, sitting for a moment, then letting out a “Yee-haw!” and ghost-riding up to the second floor.

I was almost ready to tell her to get back down here when Gavin sauntered out of the upstairs left-hand hallway and began to descend the steps.

Lying stomach down on the railing, Twyla lifted her head, pointing to him, then making a lustful face.

Jesus.

When he was on his way to the downstairs right hallway, she spoke up.

“What a hunk!” she said, sliding back down, her petticoats huffing until she dismounted at the bottom. “No wonder you’re on this case. I’d, like, really enjoy sliding inside his head. That’s the one whose dreams you saw?”

“Yeah, but do you remember those dreams when Randy described them to you?”

Her mouth made an O shape.

Dragons, blood, a plastic mask with red tears. Very sexy.

Even so, I could feel that life force of his trailing behind him as he came out of the hallway and into the foyer, car keys in hand. He looked exhausted.

“He’s leaving,” Twyla said.

“Probably for work.” I saw from his wet hair that he’d showered. Had he popped a few antisleeping pills, too?

I followed him out the door with Twyla behind me, then waited for him to come out from the garage in his car and ride down the driveway. Even those few minutes made Twyla slightly restless. She kept fluffing her hair, like she was craving a mirror so she could correct her final cosmetic mistakes.

“So what’s next?” she asked.

“I track him to wherever he’s going, watch him, look for an opportunity to get what I need.”

“Ugh.” She got squirrely.

I sighed. “Bored now?”

“Totally. You know, I think I’m gonna dash. Nothing much is going on here, and the beach is close. Surfers, right?”

Thank God for ghost ADD. She’d lost interest because there were probably a million more hunks in wet suits nearby. Maybe one would fall asleep on the beach and she could dream-dig, getting those touches she adored.

“Later,” I said.

She jerked her chin at me, smiled, then flew off, just before Gavin’s Jaguar roared out from the side of the house where the garage was, then down the driveway.

I took off after him, a ghost in the daylight.

A nightmare waiting to happen.

17

The first part of the day was uneventful: Gavin did go to work, and he was a bummer deal there, too. He buried himself in his computer, utterly ignoring me even when I tried to mess with him by blowing along his arms and chilling him, reminding him that he wasn’t alone.

But he was smart, this guy, and not only was he pretending I didn’t exist—he’d kept his office door open after asking a few of his designers to stay inside for hours as they worked on that Victorian aircraft/fire/dragon game.

That didn’t exactly stop me from trying to initiate a hallucination, in spite of his coworkers, but even that didn’t seem to be working today. He’d somehow found a way to block me even better than Amanda Lee.

The only interesting thing that boded well for the haunting was the fact that Gavin kept his phone in the corner of his desk, and he occasionally glanced at it, then up in the air, in my cold direction.

Every time he did, I dipped down and gave him another feel of my fingers over his skin.

Ghosts exist, I thought to him, like he could hear. Just ask Alicia Dantès.

After I touched him about fifty times—no joke, I was on a roll—he finally reached his limit, grabbing the phone and fishing a piece of paper from his jeans pocket as he walked out of his office, telling his employees he’d be back.

Had I driven him to falling into our mild trap?

I trailed him, recognizing that paper in his hand. Amanda Lee had written on it earlier in the day, and now I could see that it said “Alicia Dantès” just above the number of her disposable phone.

I could feel the tension in him as he went into the hallway restroom, then stared at the writing, then at the phone. After a few strained minutes, he cursed and dialed.

Since I could hear everything, I didn’t miss the barely concealed satisfaction in Amanda Lee’s voice as he asked her to come over tonight to do what she usually did with ghosts.

For the rest of the day, it was like Gavin was pissed at himself for giving in to superstition, and there were a few times he picked up the phone again and paced in front of his long office window as his employees watched him. But he never canceled the appointment, and he even called Constanza to let her know that they would have company tonight. Also, he left a message for Farah before retreating to the office’s bigger work floor, where he lost himself in other consultations with his employees.

Snore.

But when dusk seethed over his office building, he had to go home, and right after we stepped foot into the mansion’s foyer, Farah rushed to the door to stand in front of Gavin.

“I just got home,” she said.

“Good for you.”

“What are you doing, Gavin? What’s going on in the sitting room?”

“I left you a message about it.”

“My phone ran out of juice while I was running errands, and I haven’t plugged it in yet.” She was plucking at her designer lavender pencil skirt, obviously rattled by Gavin’s strange visitor. “Constanza said that you asked that stylist to come in and set up a table with a crystal ball.”

I guessed Amanda Lee had never talked to Farah today, owing to the fact that Gavin had gotten hold of her first.

“Yes, I did clear it, and if you think I’m out of my mind for doing it, I would say you’re right.” I was pretty sure he meant it. “It’s good that she’s already here. That means we can get this over and done with.”

“Get what over?” She looked freaked. “A séance?”

“If that’s what she’s going to do for us. And if you’d met with me last night instead of taking off to James’s, you’d know more about why Alicia Dantès is here. You didn’t listen to my message at all?”

“No. Constanza isn’t sure why there’s a crystal ball involved, either.”

These people might as well have lived in separate caves. I’d never known families like this in life, hadn’t known one could even exist except for on programs like Dynasty.

It just took being a ghost to find out that not every family was normal.

“This woman’s psychic,” Gavin said, “and when she delivered your clothes today, she felt something in this place.”

Farah hugged herself, looking around. I ate her fear right up.

Gavin wasn’t afraid, though. “Wendy and I have been aware of strange things going on here, too.”

He gave her a searching glance, like he was asking her if she’d felt anything. Farah shook her head, but I could tell she’d been asking herself what that chill was last night. What had been following her.

What might’ve chased Rum Tum Tugger away.

Gavin seemed impatient as he ambled over to the sitting room’s entrance with me flying well above him and, sure enough, Amanda Lee was in there, dressed in her businesswoman-in-glasses costume again, smoothing a linen cloth over a big round table. A sketch pad and a pen waited on it, along with a crystal ball.

She was going all out.

When Farah dragged Gavin back into the foyer to further discuss this with him, I cruised into the room, to Amanda Lee.

“You can thank me for having Gavin call you today,” I said. “I think I irritated him enough so that he reached his wits’ end.”

As the murmur of Gavin and Farah’s chatter crept into the room, Amanda Lee only looked sidelong at me with a faint smile. I guessed it wasn’t time to converse with the ghost yet. And when she fixed a significant glance on the other side of the room, I understood why she wasn’t speaking to me.

Wendy Edgett was standing by a fireplace, staring straight at me. Or, at least, where I would be if I existed.

“Is that her?” she asked Amanda Lee, who only kept smiling, except mysteriously now.

Good God, this girl was sharp for a nonseer.

“I do sense a presence in the room,” Amanda Lee said in her Virginia lilt. “How did you know?”

Wendy only shrugged and knit her eyebrows together. She had slung her dark hair back into a high ponytail except for her pink streak, which framed her face on both sides. She was still wearing her school uniform. “You can say there’s a sort of… I don’t know. A cloud that I can barely see.”

I tried not to have a cow. She could kind of see me?

“Who is she, Ms. Dantès?” Wendy asked.

“I don’t know yet.”

It was weird watching and listening to them like I wasn’t even here.

Outside the room entrance, Farah’s voice got panicked. She was asking Gavin to not dabble in this “dark stuff” with psychics and séances.

Grudgingly, I had to respect a man who wasn’t so macho that he was beyond accepting help when he needed it. Then again, maybe Gavin was just desperate to “get rid” of me. I would be, too, if I had something giving me waking nightmares.

Wendy was shaking her head, sending Amanda Lee a sheepish look. “Farah might not be interested in all this, but I sure am.”

“Not everyone is, and I assume that includes your sister.” Amanda Lee gave one final neat-freak swipe to the tablecloth, then adjusted her glasses. “It’s hard for some people to accept that their house has been occupied by something uninvited. Farah’s just one of them.”

“This place has always been full of uninvited stuff.” Wendy crossed her arms over her chest. “Can’t you feel that?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

I floated closer to Wendy, kind of sorry for her. I’d been lucky during my teenage years—accepted, befriended, having a loving family without siblings who made me feel like crap.

Wendy came to the table, tracing the linen with a finger. “There’re bad feelings all over this house, and they were here way before I took those ghost pictures. We all seem to hate each other… except for me and Gavin. Mostly, it’s Farah and him who argue all the time. And me and Noah. And Farah couldn’t give a rat’s ass about me.” She chuffed. “They say that you have to love family, but we’re the things that make this house dark.”

Amanda Lee smiled sympathetically at the girl, and I was pretty sure she wasn’t just acting. “Families can be strange.”

“Mine takes the cake.”

Just as I thought Amanda Lee was about to casually investigate the subject by encouraging Wendy to go on, the girl took a deep breath and sat heavily in one of the chairs around the table as she exhaled. “You know what I’m thinking?”

“Let’s see… being a psychic, I have a good chance of guessing. Should I give it a shot?”

Wendy laughed, and it was nice to see her happy for once.

She glanced at the room’s entrance, toward the continued utterances of her brother and sister, then back to Amanda Lee. “I think I know who the ghost is.”

I freaked out a little, my energy zitzing. Amanda Lee raised an eyebrow, but she didn’t look at me.

“Who?” she asked.

Wendy’s brown eyes were wide. “My adoptive mom.”

Oh. God, this wasn’t where I’d wanted the haunting to go at all.

I could sense Amanda Lee’s relief that Wendy hadn’t guessed some strawberry blond stranger was haunting her house, but there was a bit of sadness in her, too. “Why would you say that?”

“Mom died when I was little,” Wendy said, “and this ghost has been nice to me. She wanted to comfort me. And I think Farah doesn’t want you to summon her tonight because she didn’t get along with Mom. I was young, and I barely remember how they acted with each other, but Farah gets real quiet whenever someone brings her up, and she always has a bitter look on her face before she changes the subject.”

Amanda Lee walked toward Wendy, and she looked like she always did when she was feeling sorry for someone… usually me. Or was she just now realizing that Wendy, the girl she’d wanted to pin a poltergeist on, was a real person, not just a pawn?

“I don’t know who this ghost is,” she said softly. “But we’ll find out soon enough.”

Wendy wasn’t done. “You know what else makes me think she’s Mom? Noah hasn’t had any contact with her, but it’s only because she decided to leave him alone. She knew he liked his independence—when he was little, he always played by himself in his room. She respected that.”

“So he hasn’t felt a presence here?”

“He hasn’t said anything about it. I’m not even sure Gavin showed him my pictures last night or this morning. Plus, Farah brought me home from art class just ten minutes ago, and I didn’t run into Noah before I came in here, so I didn’t see how he reacted to Gavin inviting you over.”

“And the rest of your family?” Amanda Lee said, her jaw tight. “What do they think?”

“When I showed Gavin those pictures, he wasn’t afraid.” She laughed. “Well, maybe he was kinda uncomfortable. I got the feeling a ghost wasn’t a surprise to him, though. That Mom had been around him, too, even if he wasn’t telling me about it.”

“Why wouldn’t he let you know if he’s felt a presence in the house?”

“Gavin? He doesn’t tell us anything. But that’s all right. He’s a good brother anyway. He’s what my friend Torrey calls a ‘man’s man.’”

Amanda Lee really looked at Wendy. “It bothers you that he shuts you out.”

“Yeah, but he tries his best with us.”

It looked like Amanda Lee was about to put a hand on Wendy’s shoulder—two misfits connecting—but then Gavin, Farah, and even Noah entered, and Amanda Lee straightened up.

She had that lemonade smile again, and I think I was the only one who saw her back slightly stiffen at the presence of her prime suspect.

“Are we ready?” she asked.

“No,” Farah said. “I’m not sure this is a good idea.”

“Which part?” Amanda Lee asked in that lilt. “Contacting the spirit who’s joined your household or telling it to leave you alone?”

Gavin didn’t say anything as he walked to the table, taking a seat, sinking into it. His eyes were reddened, and I suspected he just wanted to get the badness out of the mansion so he could get some sleep.

“Let’s do this,” he said.

Farah was standing in front of Noah, who seemed interested in ghost night, even if his sister wasn’t.

“Why is this necessary?” she asked. “Wendy’s an artist, and this isn’t the first time she’s Photoshopped her pictures.”

Gavin must’ve shared them with Farah, probably on his smartphone, while they’d been arguing in the foyer.

It seemed Wendy was about to argue, but Farah sent her a nervous glance that quieted her.

Amanda Lee sat in the chair with the paper and pen in front of it. “Ghosts, Ms. Edgett, can escalate their behavior, and I think you might agree that it would be best to identify who this one is and if she’s trying to convey a message to someone in this house before you get to an unsettling point.”

“I don’t like this,” Farah whispered.

Noah pushed back that hank of dark hair that kept slumping over his forehead. “I didn’t even know there was a ghost around.”

That’s because I didn’t get to you yet, I thought.

I was near the ceiling, looking down on all this. Wendy kept glancing up, like she was scanning for me.

I wished I would have better news for her tonight, wished my identity would make her smile again.

Amanda Lee gestured toward the two open chairs at the table. “We’re going to initiate a low-key contact. It won’t be painful for anyone.”

Wendy was jogging her leg, excited. “Isn’t there a chance that we could be opening some kind of portal?”

“Something has already opened it. And something already came through.” Amanda Lee slyly gazed upward, and I knew she was sending me a nonverbal message.

This séance was only a show—a prelude to supposedly getting rid of me so that Gavin would let down that guard of his. She could sling around as much bullshit about portals as she wanted to because we were in control.

“Noah,” she said. “Would you please dim the lights and join us? Ms. Edgett, we have a seat waiting just for you.”

They both didn’t move.

Then Wendy sent puppy-dog eyes at them. “Come on. Please?”

Noah still seemed resistant, but maybe only because Farah was, because I could tell he was hooked. Maybe he did belong on the school newspaper, after all.

Wendy used her most compelling argument, aiming it at Noah. “I think the ghost could be Mom, and she’s trying to tell us something.”

“Really?” Noah asked. “How do you know?”

“Would I joke about Mom like this? The woman in the picture has the same blond hair…”

And that’s all it took for Noah. He made an I’m-strong-enough-to-give-this-a-try look and went to dim the lights by using a panel near the entrance.

As he arrived at the table, Farah watched him, then closed her eyes, gritted her jaw, and joined everyone.

Gavin was surveying his family closely, but I could guess what was probably running through his mind: if Wendy’s theory was right, then why would his mom would be so cruel to him with phone calls and phantom sounds from Elizabeth?

“I know this is nerve-racking,” Amanda Lee said. “But you’re all doing just fine. I’ll be summoning our guest now, and if I’m successful she might communicate verbally through me. If that fails, I have paper and pen for automatic writing.”

“What’s that?” Noah asked.

Wendy impatiently let out a breath, then said, “That’s a way of channeling, too. The spirit writes down what it wants to say by going through Ms. Dantès.”

Amanda Lee looked around the circle, but I noticed she didn’t linger very long on Gavin.

“Are we set?” she asked.

Wendy was the only one who nodded.

“Wonderful. Let’s hold hands.”

Amanda Lee was between Wendy and Noah. Thank goodness, because I was pretty sure her acting skills wouldn’t have been good enough for her to endure touching Gavin.

As everyone linked hands, I hung back, ready to follow Amanda Lee’s cues.

For a few minutes, she only closed her eyes and sat silently, and the others followed suit, although Noah kept peeking out from under his lashes at everyone.

Then, just as the ticktock of the near-distant grandfather clock in the foyer built up an unbearable tension, she spoke softly.

“I’m addressing the spirit in this house. We’re here to talk to you. Would you please visit with us? I’m open for you to communicate with the people here, and we want to hear what you have to say.”

Silence, chopped up only by those tick . . . tocks, tick . . . tocks.

“Don’t be shy,” Amanda Lee said. “We’re sympathetic to you.”

Farah was practically squeezing Gavin’s and Noah’s hands off, while Wendy was scrunching her eyes in concentration so hard that I was afraid she’d combust.

I stood by, waiting to see if Amanda Lee would need anything from me, even though, earlier today, she’d told me she would do all the work. Just when I thought she’d changed her mind about going through with this, she bolted up in her seat, still holding Wendy’s and Noah’s hands, her eyes electrocution-wide, her mouth open.

She looked like she had that day in Elfin Forest, when the vision of my killer had hit her.

Shit.

I readied myself to swoop in and knock her away from the table, making her break the circle link. But then she fell forward, still holding hands with the others, who seemed horrified at what was happening.

When she sat up again, she was normal, and she locked her gaze on Wendy.

“Wendy,” she said gently, in her Virginia Alicia Dantès voice. “It seems the ghost is focused on you.”

Nothing whatsoever had happened to Amanda Lee. She was just bullshitting. And I had a bad feeling that she was about to blame a poltergeist on Wendy.

The girl was already asking questions. “What do you mean, Ms. Dantès?”

“The spirit is attracted to the negative feelings you’ve been repressing,” Amanda Lee said. “Put simply, it likes you because you give it energy, but it wants to hurt everyone around you.”

She looked stunned, then bit by bit, crushed. “It’s not my mom?” she whispered.

Amanda Lee hesitated, like she really didn’t want to carry through. But then she said, “No, it’s not your—”

“Cut it out,” I said from my place near the ceiling. I supported her telling Wendy the truth about the ghost not being her mother, but I didn’t want Amanda Lee to go the poltergeist route, either.

But she forged on. “Poltergeists often center on someone who’s upset in the family, and they can produce smells and images and far worse things than the chills you’ve been feeling. They can get much worse. That’s why we’re going to banish it.”

Gavin sat back in his chair, still keeping the link alive. I had a sense that he’d been studying all kinds of ghosts on his computer since the other night, when he’d first met one.

I slowly floated downward, coming to Amanda Lee’s head, exerting pressure on her. “Just do whatever you’re going to do and then we’re done. No more putting a trip on Wendy.”

And that’s when I felt it.

Something else besides me in the room.

Something so fast and cold that it slammed me away from Amanda Lee.

My energy froze, spangling outward as I arced up and away from her, flattening against the ceiling with the force of the thing’s speed.

It retreated immediately, and went to Amanda Lee.

Below me, I could only watch in terror as she started moving like a puppet, disconnecting from Wendy’s and Noah’s hands, grabbing the pen, setting it to the paper like she couldn’t control the writing.

The pen swerved, creating sloppy words. Her breathing was quick, and I knew she wasn’t the one writing at all.

You will pay, the note said.

Shivering from the electric chill the other entity had sent through me, I saw a dark haze around Amanda Lee. What was it?

Before I could recognize any identifying features, it darted up and zoomed toward me again, still harrowingly unfamiliar, then cut through me like a blade this time.

I screamed, the sensation of a sharp edge digging into me, burying itself, energy splattering like blood.

Imitating my human death.

Amanda Lee’s voice rang out. “In the name of all that’s holy, leave us!”

It didn’t take more than that, and the thing whirled away from me as my essence wailed, feeling like ripped flesh.

With a crash, it shattered the nearest window, the curtains flaring out, the wind moaning in its aftermath.

It was like it’d done what it’d set out to do, and that was that.

The room was silent as the Edgetts gripped the table and I slowly came back together, shaking. Had Wendy been right? Had Amanda Lee opened a portal and let something far worse than me in, even though the other ghosts said meeting bad spirits didn’t happen that often?

Maybe it just took a séance.

Farah went slack and Noah hugged her to him. Gavin slowly stood.

“It’s out,” he said to Amanda Lee. “Will that be all?”

My thoughts were fuzzy, but even I knew that Gavin was wrong. Whatever had flown through the window wasn’t me. The family was far worse off now.

Amanda Lee clung to her Virginia accent, even as her voice quavered. “Let me fortify your house, just to be—”

“No. We’re done here. Thank you, Ms. Dantès.”

I thought for sure that Amanda Lee was about to tell him she’d messed up, but Gavin stepped away from the table, indicating she could leave.

“You did what you came here to do,” he said. “We’ll be fine.”

Amanda Lee paused, then cut her losses and gathered her crystal ball into her arms.

Wendy just stared at the broken window.

There was a movie I’d seen on Amanda Lee’s TV after I’d been pulled from my loop. The Silence of the Lambs. Jodie Foster, awesomely grown-up from Freaky Friday, had been an FBI trainee on the trail of a serial killer, and in one scene, she’d gone into a warehouse, where she’d found a jar with a head in it.

She’d had the same enthralled, fearful look on her face Wendy had right now.

As Amanda Lee left the room, she passed Constanza, who’d come to the entrance. The maid produced a small hissing sound as Amanda Lee walked by, hugging the crystal ball, ignoring her. Or maybe not hearing her because of the worry of what she’d accidentally unleashed.

When the front door shut and Amanda Lee was gone, Constanza talked calmly to the family.

“You don’t like her, Mr. Gavin. Me, either. So we let her go. But she was correct in one matter. Let me call someone who can make the house safe right away so the spirit never visits again.”

“It’s finished, Constanza,” Gavin said, his gaze dark.

“I know of a woman from my church,” she said doggedly. “I saw what went out the window, and I must call her tonight so we never have to worry about this again.”

Even in my fear-lined state, I knew she was talking about getting a cleaner in here.

18

I took the quickest way out of the mansion to catch Amanda Lee—the broken window.

I didn’t even think about what might happen if that dark spirit was waiting outside. Didn’t even stop to remember how my new friends had told me that meeting bad ghosts was rare and, good God, what was this one doing here?

I exited just in time to see Amanda Lee’s car tear out of the driveway and onto the road. I had to haul ass, but as she squealed around a corner, I hitched onto her roof and hooked my essence into the thin crack that she’d left in her window.

Then I leaned against the glass, shaping part of myself into a fist and banging.

“Amanda Lee!”

When she heard me, she jumped in her seat and swerved the steering wheel, almost veering into the next lane, where a car was coming.

For an endless split second, it felt like this was a replay of that car accident hallucination I’d given her the other night, with the headlights coming straight at us… .

Amanda Lee hit the brakes, skidding to a beach-view turnoff near a guardrail, dust rising as she cut the engine and fell against the steering wheel.

Still against the window, I watched her weeping, her proud figure collapsed into an emotional mess. But I was weak enough to lose my posture, too. That dark spirit had scared me, and I was just now feeling it.

Sinking over the edge of the window, then down the inside of it, I hunkered into the backseat, letting Amanda Lee cry great wrenching sobs.

She spoke around them. “I have no idea what I let loose tonight… Goddamn it, how could I have been so arrogant?”

Because you always believe that your way is the best way, I thought. And it backfired.

I didn’t think I needed to tell her that, though.

She shook her head, swallowing, coming up to wipe a hand over her face and push off those glasses. “What did I do, Jensen? Oh God, Liz would hate me. I wouldn’t ever have summoned something that dark, even by mistake, when she was alive. I wouldn’t have gone to these lengths, but it’s just that…” She glanced in the rearview mirror as I rested in back. Her eyes were red. “Sometimes I’m the one who feels dead and emotionless without her here. I don’t even recognize myself anymore.”

She trailed a hand down her face so hard that she left long, faint red marks from her fingernails, like she was punishing herself. But she seemed to realize that she was crumbling, and she drew in a quivering breath, taking really good stock of me behind her in that mirror.

“But just look at you,” she said. “You’ve lost all the color you had. Goddamn me, I’m so, so sorry.”

“I’m fine.” I’d been through worse.

“You’re barely fine. That… thing attacked you. It came out of nowhere.”

I didn’t tell her that I planned to make matters better by rising to the power lines in a minute, just for a mini-fill-up. And I wouldn’t stay too long here in the car with her because the cleaner was coming to the mansion, and I had one last chance at Gavin, because I was sure this ghost chaser would spirit-proof his office and car and wherever else he was going to be, too.

When Amanda Lee had calmed down, I injected some levelness back into our conversation. “Can you tell me what that dark thing was?”

“I don’t know. Maybe an entity that was attached to the property, a relative who’s still clinging to the family… I was going to ask if you saw more of it than I did. Did it look like it might be your fake Dean?”

“No.” Then again, how could I be sure? I had no idea what that “keeper, not a reaper” looked like under its facade.

She began shaking her head again and wouldn’t stop. “I opened a portal. When Wendy mentioned it to me before the séance, I was so sure I could keep everything under control, but something was waiting to come through. It happened so fast, and if that something hadn’t been hanging around…” A sob shuddered through her. “Do you think it was Liz, and she became so angry in the afterlife that she’s a dark sprit now?”

Oh my God. “No, Amanda Lee. It couldn’t have been Elizabeth. She loved you and would never do that to you and…” Should I tell her? Could I trust fake Dean’s information enough?

Like that mattered anymore.

“I know that Elizabeth moved on after she died,” I said. “Don’t ask me how. You just need to believe what I’m telling you.”

She turned to me with her tearstained face, hope filling her eyes. “Do you think it’s true?”

Without hesitation, I nodded. “With my entire heart.”

Who was lying now?

The news seemed to strengthen her. Maybe, later, she would come to doubt me, but sometimes we believe what we need to in order to go on.

As the occasional car drove by on the road behind us, I expected the hard-core general to take Amanda Lee over again. But her voice was still unconfident, shaky.

“That dark spirit truly wanted to announce itself tonight.”

“It did the job. But what interests me is that message it left. ‘You will pay.’ Who was it talking about?”

Amanda Lee sent a slow glance to me. “Any one of us in that room. Me. You.”

Gavin? I thought.

But if the dark spirit wasn’t Elizabeth, why would it be after him?

A terrible notion nudged me. “What if Wendy was right on? What if her mom came back and…”

“What?”

“I don’t know. That family is so damned cold and messed up that there could be a million scenarios.” A million family secrets that we hadn’t uncovered yet.

“The spirit flew out of the house, though, didn’t it?” Amanda Lee asked, still fixated on the dangerous part. “It did leave.”

“Yeah. I think you expelled it. And the Edgetts seem to believe that I was that spirit and the house is now free of a haunting. But their live-in maid talked to them after you left and she’s calling a cleaner to make sure the mansion is extra safe.”

Amanda Lee nodded, giving me another mortified glance in the mirror. “I’m glad the cleaner is coming. I shouldn’t have done what I did to Wendy, and not only will a cleaning keep her safe, but it’ll put an end to any poltergeist speculation.” She sighed. “It was one thing for me to talk about collateral damage during a haunting, but actually seeing what happened tonight when that spirit crashed the séance… it’s not just talk anymore. It’s real.”

“No shit. By the way, I was trying to stop you from framing Wendy.”

“I noticed, and I almost didn’t carry through. Then…”

I took an educated guess. “Then you thought of our mission.”

She nodded, the tears teeming in her eyes again.

“Amanda Lee,” I said. “I want to stay here with you, but the cleaner’s going to be there soon, and that limits my time with Gavin. I can still—”

“You’re not going back there.”

Um… what?

She was shaking her head again, this time harder. “That dark spirit changes everything. It could harm you in so many ways.”

“But what about bringing closure to Elizabeth?”

She wiped her nose. All the makeup was getting smudged—lipstick, mascara, extra foundation and contouring. “Liz wouldn’t want you to go back there. There’s something evil in or near that house now, and there’s got to be a better way to see that Gavin gets his just deserts one day.”

She was being emotional, not thinking things through. So was I the one who needed to solve this mystery now? Somehow it had taken the place of my own murder, showing me that, someday, I could get closure for myself, too. It gave me hope.

“I’m not scared to go back,” I said, meaning it. I’d died a victim, but that didn’t mean I had to be one forever.

“Jensen…”

I had to get on with this. “It’s also a good idea for me to be in that house with Wendy and the other innocents, just in case that dark spirit decides to come around again before the cleaner arrives. I can protect them from what we brought over.”

She couldn’t argue with that part.

“Do you have salt in this car?” I asked.

She seemed to sense that I was going to do what I was going to do, no matter what. “I always carry some in my purse.”

“Good. Why don’t you sprinkle it around in your car to keep that dark spirit out of here in case it was writing that ‘You will pay’ note to you?”

“You’re right. Okay.”

I already knew that her house was protected. And that she knew how to at least temporarily shoo a spirit away. I felt good about the odds of her security. Honestly, she was the last person I was worried about with this dark spirit. My fears ran more to the Edgetts, the innocent ones in particular.

Amanda Lee was already in motion, opening the car door, her purse in hand. She dug into it for the salt and circled it at every opening of the car while I waited.

“You won’t be able to ride in here anytime soon,” she said.

“I’m more of a VW Bug sort of girl anyway.”

We looked at each other, and she still seemed ashamed. Maybe that was a good thing. Maybe she could start the rest of her life tonight.

As for me? I was continuing what I’d started.

“Drive safe,” I said, rising in the air.

“I still wish you wouldn’t go back.”

“No chance.” Not only was I without fear, but I was humming with anticipation.

She got back into the Mercedes, and from behind her closed window, she pressed her fingers to the glass in good-bye. I lifted my hand, imitating the shape of her hand on the window.

Then, with one last swipe to her eyes, she started the engine, pulling onto the quiet road while I flew up to the power lines. Just for a short time.

As soon as I could—maybe even too soon—I jammed out of there, up the road again, to the mansion. The first thing I noticed was that every light was shining through the windows, and someone had already boarded up the broken sitting room pane.

Was Constanza savvy enough to have blocked off the chimney, too, just until the house could be cleaned?

I traveled to the roof, braced myself on top of the chimney, then rolled down into it, expecting to be barricaded at any instant. When I wasn’t, I got a little jittery, like I’d had another can of predeath Mello Yello.

If I could get back in the house, then the dark spirit could be anywhere, too. But had it just used Amanda Lee’s portal to arrive in this dimension and it was gone now?

I found everyone in the kitchen, their backs to the cabinets as they sat on the marble-tiled floor. Farah and Noah were huddled side by side while Wendy and Constanza stayed near each other. Gavin, the lone wolf, was the only one left standing, his arms crossed over his thick chest as he leaned against a counter and looked out the window toward the pool.

My first instinct was to go to him, see if I could lure him away from the others so I could continue my haunting, but then I saw the salt on the floor. It was in a circle around them, on the tile, on the counter.

Of course, I thought. Even a rich household wouldn’t have an unlimited supply of salt, and they’d made do with what they had on hand until the cleaner arrived. She had obviously advised the Edgetts about what to do to safeguard themselves, just in case.

I also noticed that everyone but Gavin was holding either a cross or a crucifix, which was a fine idea, seeing as they might affect a dark spirit. But not me.

Still, I kept a good distance away so I wouldn’t alert them with my temperature.

“Do you see anything out there?” Farah asked Gavin. She was looking at her older brother like he was a commando who was there to guard them all. A protector. But he also seemed just as sleep-deprived as he had before, even worse now, actually, with red smudges under his eyes and a five o’clock shadow making him even rougher.

“I told you,” he said. “There’s nothing to worry about. You saw the spirit fly out the window as clearly as I did.”

“I didn’t like what it forced that psychic to write,” she whispered. “‘You will pay.’ What did that even mean?”

“It’s gone, and hopefully we’ll never know.”

As he spoke, Wendy was watching everyone’s faces, like she had no idea who these people were. And she probably didn’t. She was still the half-scared, half-spellbound teenage girl she’d been when the spirit had made its appearance, and she peered to the side of her, like she’d sensed that something had changed in the room.

Something like me.

I backed up a little while Gavin glanced at the watch on his wrist, then impatiently ran his fingers through his hair, cursing under his breath.

“This is ridiculous, Constanza. The spirit left. We don’t need to be surrounded by salt when there’s nothing to be afraid of anymore.”

Constanza shook her head. “Mr. Gavin, please. Make me happy by staying here. There is nothing more important for you to be doing.”

He smiled wryly. “How about sleeping? I could use some of that. I’m dying for my bed.”

“Just sleep on the floor here,” Wendy said.

“Wen.” His voice softened. “That mattress is a Vividus, and it’s all I want right now.”

When he started to step out of the salt circle, his family yelled at him.

Farah’s voice was the loudest out of everyone’s as she stood, darting toward him, catching his shirttail and pulling him back into the circle. “You’re the one who brought that séance to us. You owe us some peace of mind, so stay here.”

He slowly glanced down at her hand, which had landed on his waist. Farah backed off, head down.

I saw that, nearby, a black-beaded rosary with a crucifix attached was curled on the counter by a fruit basket. Gavin took hold of it and held it up.

“How’s this?” he asked. “I’ll take it with me, and nothing will be able to get to me. Then Constanza’s friend will come, and she’ll help us all.” He said that last part facetiously.

“She will help, Mr. Gavin,” Constanza said.

He lowered his head, then looked back up, an eyebrow raised. “You admitted that she only dabbles in the paranormal. She’s supposedly cleaned one haunted house before, and she’s more of an enthusiast than anything.”

“She will help.”

How perfect was this? I’d already seen how arrogance had been Amanda Lee’s downfall tonight, and Gavin was falling into the same trap by being an unbeliever. Right into my invisible hands.

“Mr. Gavin,” Constanza said, “your best protection is in the circle. Eileen said so.”

Eileen, the name of the inexperienced cleaner?

“If that thing comes back to get me,” he said, “I’ll haul myself back here in a hurry. I swear on my mattress.”

As he stepped out of the circle, everyone else got to their feet, even Noah.

Gavin smiled, and since he didn’t do smiles all that much, it caught me.

“I’m not scared,” he said, walking away from his family.

His words echoed in me.

As his family nervously watched him leave, I followed him down the brightly lit hall, to the foyer, up the stairs, to his room. He headed straight for his bed, the “Vividus,” he’d called it. It did look thick and comfy and puffy, and as he collapsed back onto it, spilling the crucifix by his side to the stark white bedspread, I almost wanted to crash with him.

I wouldn’t be able to feel any mattress, though. It was just memories of a good night’s sleep that seemed so appealing.

Outside the window, the sound of waves rushed up the shore and back out. Gavin sighed with exhaustion, then closed his eyes, rubbing his temples. He was so damned sure that Amanda Lee had expelled his tormentor from the mansion that he relaxed quickly enough, his breathing evening out, the rough lines on his face smoothing out. I didn’t know if he was fully asleep yet, but he was definitely mine for the empathetic taking.

I deftly swooped in, touching his cheek, hoping against hope that, this time, empathy would work on him. But as usual, I couldn’t get in to his thoughts, so I pressed harder against his cheek, thinking that a hallucination would relax him fully while he still wasn’t expecting a ghost.

All of this had taken only a flashing second, and he didn’t have any time for fear or thought.

He didn’t have time to react quickly enough for anything, and I was in before he could stop the hallucination… .

We are in water, the ocean, floating and feeling the sun on our face.

Warm, bobbing up and down on slight waves.

Silence, except for the dull roar of the sea in our ears…

And then something happened that I totally didn’t expect.

I somehow tumbled into his mind.

He hadn’t just relaxed—he’d fallen asleep from the hallucination and his complete exhaustion. I knew it because that eerie slow-motion passage of time surrounded me as I opened my eyes and saw a red sky above me, clouds dripping from it like the bloody tears I’d once seen on Gavin’s plastic-masked face in his first dream.

As I rolled from my back to tread water, I saw that I was actually in a pool. The lagoon pool, outside the mansion.

I wasn’t moving in the double-slow-motion time that had distinguished Gavin’s original fire-sky and wall-of-water dream from the relatively more realistic second dream half that had taken place in the study. Even so, I still moved at a drag as I swam to the side of the pool, clutching the edge.

A sound from my left won my attention, and I swiveled my gaze over to see the pool guy who’d been peeping at Wendy the other morning hiding in the bushes. Blond, good-looking… he should’ve been a welcome sight to any girl, but he had a grimace on his face that was so heart-shocking to the dream body I now had that I had to press a hand over my thudding chest.

What the fuck was he doing here?

It seemed to take hours for me to get out of the pool—time enough for him to step back into the foliage and disappear.

Blood raced through me because I was filled with dread—and that was saying something, seeing as I had already gone through a whacked-out dream with Gavin along with visions of my own murder. I was used to weird, but being in the pool under a bloodred sky was more unsettling than usual for some reason.

When I glanced at the mansion, a wall had rolled open to reveal the study with the heaven-high shelves of books.

Water dripped from me, plopping onto the concrete in slightly suspended time as I looked down at my body.

At the white swimsuit I was wearing.

I couldn’t stop myself from grabbing the towel on a nearby chair and covering myself up. Couldn’t stop the realization that I was playing the part of dream Elizabeth tonight.

With the towel around me, I told myself that this was just a dream, and I found myself walking toward the opening in the study. The room was empty, except for all the books strewn around.

When the fourth wall slammed shut behind me, I slow-whipped around, dropping the towel at the same time. Belatedly, I grabbed at it, but it disappeared in my hand, just as quickly as the pool guy had faded into the bushes outside.

Now I was dressed in my unfortunate Jensen clothes again: blue jeans and sneakers. No towel. No more white bathing suit. No more me-being-Elizabeth.

When I looked up, Gavin was sitting in that leather chair he’d occupied in the original dream. But there wasn’t any blood trailing from his fingers and over the leather this time. He was sedately reading one of the books, the tome open in his lap. He looked up at me as if he’d been expecting me.

“You,” he said simply, and he was watching me like…

Whoa. Like he was seeing that half-angelic spirit in Wendy’s photograph, with light-colored hair spread out in the air. Beautiful, ethereal, spellbinding.

And he looked completely bewitched by me.

My dream heart pumped excitement through my body as he closed the book, speaking again.

“Were you there tonight?” His words were slightly dream-slurred. And he didn’t need to explain that he was talking about the séance.

“Yes, I was,” I said.

“That psychic let something in that should’ve stayed out… .”

“I don’t know what it was.”

“Why don’t you?”

I only shook my head. I should be the one asking him a million “why”s.

No… Elizabeth should be the one.

I walked closer to him, and his pale eyes lit up, like he appreciated that I wanted to be near.

He couldn’t take his gaze off me. He was even smiling, warmer in this dream than he’d ever been in life.

I was going to take full advantage of his fascination, even if my dream libido was beating, telling me to go in another direction altogether. A taboo one.

“What happened that night?” I asked, talking about Elizabeth’s murder. “You have to tell me.”

“That night?”

He seemed confused and—

Without warning, the room went dark, the lights turning off. I hit the floor just as a slant of illumination angled out of a corner of the room. But as the light got brighter, I saw that this wasn’t a room anymore.

I was in the desert, but not like one I’d ever seen. The red sky had followed me here, and the cactus plants had stiletto knives instead of needles sticking out of them. Blood dripped from the blades as well as the sky. The sand looked like crushed skulls beneath my tennis shoes, and when a tumbleweed undulated by, it was composed of hissing asps.

My perception had slowed a hundred times to a barely moving flow, and I realized that this dream of Gavin’s was the opposite of his original one—the faintly less surreal portion coming first and the weird-as-shit part coming second.

A hand grabbed my arm. Awareness tingled in me, claiming every cell.

But it was only Gavin standing next to me, touching me. A normal guy against the fucked-uppery of this land. A cipher who might never be solved.

He let his fingers trail down my arm, his gaze following his gentle touch. He looked like he wanted to confirm I was real. But there was an edge in his irises, too—black splinters cutting through the blue.

He was attracted and repulsed by what I was—his compelling, torturing devil. A floating ghost who looked like an angel of death in Levi’s jeans.

I closed my eyes, trying not to let him affect me.

In the near distance, a humming sound claimed the atmosphere, and I opened my eyes to see that a Victorian air machine was slicing through the red sky. It was the same machine as in the original dream, with the little girl pilot and her dark hair flowing from her helmet.

But wait. There were two machines this time.

I was so busy slow-watching the skies that I was barely aware that Gavin had started pulling me back from something, forcing me to get behind him with such suspended speed that it took me forever to process what was going on.

But when a hideous, huge black spider appeared in front of us, I screamed.

Its face… crushed, just like the dragon’s had been in Gavin’s original dream.

I watched helplessly as the spider dangled and those air machines flew over us, dipping low, the first little girl pilot in her goggles, leather uniform, and flying long dark hair. She was waving at Gavin. The second machine began a drawn-out dive, too.

But that’s when the spider turned toward the girls, opened its mouth, then shot out a bony, skeletal web that flew with rickety grace at the first air machine, caging it. Yanking it down and crashing it into the shattered skull-sand.

As the dust flew around the wreckage, that first little girl cried out, her scream one long echo. The other, airborne pilot didn’t seem to notice the danger, and she kept diving in her air machine, the same long dark hair streaming out of her leather helmet behind her.

The spider scuttled toward the trapped pilot as she wailed.

“No… ! No, please, no… !”

Gavin tried to take a step toward her, but his boots were mired in the crushed skulls. I tried to move, too, but fear had me in its hold.

Then, suddenly, another cry filled the air. Inhuman. Crowlike.

At next glance, I saw that the huge bird that had been shadowing the first little girl’s machine in the original dream had materialized and it was diving down, aiming for the hanging spider. And when it impaled the creature, black blood flew everywhere—over the cacti and the sand.

When the liquid hit Gavin, speckling his white shirt, it was like the blood freed him, and he began to run toward the first girl, even though his boots were getting sucked into the broken skulls.

With every step, he sank deeper… deeper… . But he wasn’t giving up, and with a ragged cry, he stretched his arms toward the massive bird and the spider, who was getting impaled over and over again.

When Gavin raised his fist and punched through what was left of the spider, drawing out a dark blob of a heart, he held it up, staring at it. Then falling into a spent heap to the ground.

As the other girl’s machine kept diving toward us, the first pilot crawled out from the wreckage and then between the bones of her cage to Gavin, ignoring the bird and the spider like they were invisible. When she got out, she threw herself over Gavin’s back, clinging to him as he lay belly down, motionless on the ground.

In the sky above, the second machine pulled up from its long dive, then flew past us, continuing its journey like nothing had happened below. The little girl’s hair kept flowing, just like a dark river, and I saw her waving back at us until she faded away.

The bird began to bury the spider beneath the skulls while the rescued first little girl kissed Gavin.

“My hero,” she said worshipfully, clinging to him.

Then it was as if all of it—the girl, the bird, the cacti, and the skull-sand—had never existed. Just Gavin in a red, empty space. Just me, still on the ground, unable to move.

And then footsteps that thudded like a reanimated corpse’s.

It took a few dream seconds, but I looked over my shoulder to see who’d arrived. Elizabeth?

She was naked except for the bloody white scarf tied over her eyes, blinding her. Worst of all, her limbs were attached by large, thready stitches, like someone had tried to put her back together after her killer had dismembered her.

She didn’t say a word to us, only shaking her head in sad pity.

From somewhere, the sound of a muffled bell shook me, and when I looked at Gavin, he wasn’t next to me anymore. I should’ve known that was the end of the dream, even before my body got yanked once, twice, and then I flew backward, out of the red land, through the darkness, back to Gavin’s bedroom.

Expelled, I skittered over the carpet, leeched of energy.

Before looking anywhere else, I spied a wall socket, and I began moving toward it so I could stick myself into it for a rush of energy. The hallucination, the dream, the residual effects from the dark spirit had done their work on me, even with my power-line fill-up.

Behind me, Gavin’s voice came, wide awake. No fear. No energy I could take from him to make me feel better.

“You came back,” he said, almost regretfully. “You really should’ve stayed away from this place.”

I could barely look at him, but when I did, I saw a man sitting up on his bed, forearms braced on his thighs, his hair bed-ruffled. He had a longing on his face I didn’t understand.

Until I realized that he would do anything to protect his family—even get rid of the angel-ghost he’d touched in his dream.

The doorbell rang, and I realized that was what I’d heard in his subconscious. And before the cleaner could enter the mansion, I left the bedroom as fast as I could, trying to get downstairs to the chimney and to safety.

But I wasn’t nearly fast enough.

19

I’d had so much energy sucked out of me tonight that this latest experience had reduced me to a thin mass of coldness that could only inch over the carpet.

The doorbell rang again as I slid into the hall, then down the stairs, pushing myself to my limits, just like I used to when I played sports or went surfing with real Dean.

Faster. Faster!

But I moved more like I had a hangover, which I supposed I did.

Halfway down the stairs, I remembered a toy I had played with when I was a kid—the Slinky—and I let my essence tumble end over end down the steps. I was almost at the bottom when the door opened and a woman walked inside.

“Hello? Constanza? Is everyone all right?”

Under the lights that were blaring, the petite woman—it had to be Eileen the cleaner—seemed shiny and new, even if she was middle-aged. She had rosy tan skin like Noah’s that glowed from good health, a delicate nose and cheekbones, and dark brown hair that flipped into a Jackie O do. Her pristine light pink two-piece suit hugged her skinny figure, and her small feet were tipped by pink-and-white pumps.

She carried a big white vinyl bag that bulged. “Constanza!”

I heard the maid’s voice from the kitchen. “We are in a salt circle in here!”

“Good. Stay there for a moment while I get a feel for what’s around me, all right?”

“Yes!”

From the second story, Gavin’s footsteps thumped on the floor. I couldn’t summon the energy to look at him. I just rested, hoping my strength would come back. Wishing I could move.

Eileen looked up at Gavin, smiling, her teeth white. “You must be Gavin. I’m Eileen Perez.”

“Thanks for coming over,” he said. He didn’t seem put out that she was here, because he knew I was back and that I couldn’t stay.

I focused on the door that was still cracked open behind the cleaner. Have to get out before she traps me…

I pushed myself over the marble as she reached behind her, giving the door a push. Going… going…

It shut while I was only a couple of feet away from it.

I remained as still as untouched water. Could cleaners see ghosts? Or did they just sense them? Was I fucked here?

I rested my head over the floor, waiting for her to address me, to sprinkle holy water on me or whatever cleaners used. Then I remembered Twyla talking about iron daggers in the gut and how that was the way to “kill” a ghost.

When nothing happened, I turned my head to glance at Eileen, but she was only looking around, her dark eyes narrowed. She rubbed one hand over her opposite arm while addressing Gavin, like she felt a chill.

“I tried to make it in better time,” she said, “but I hadn’t charged my car up enough yet. So much for trying to save the environment, huh?”

I wasn’t sure what she meant by charging up a car, but I was concentrating on the fact that she was so damned nice and casual instead. Also, I was praying that her inexperience would cut me a break.

She added, “Constanza told me everything she could. Has the spirit returned?”

“I’m not sure.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“The spirit that went out the window earlier was dark, but there’s a ghost here now that’s… I want to say light, but I’m not sure that’s a good description.”

“She feels different from the other spirit?”

“Yeah, but I want all of them gone for my family’s sake.”

Eileen reached into her big bag, taking out a small device. She turned it on and lifted it up to Gavin.

“Do you mind if I set this recorder down on a table?” There was an antique white one by the door. “It’ll capture sounds, and I can replay the tape to see if this ghost is trying to communicate through channels that we don’t hear. And I have a few more I’ll put throughout the house. But I might be able to expel your spirit or spirits before we get any EVPs.”

“Electronic voice phenomena?”

He had been studying.

“That’s right.” She seemed pleased as she put down the recorder. Then she brought out a square, boxy thing that looked like the phones everyone was using. When she turned it on and waited, then slowly moved it around her, I guessed it must’ve been either a temperature gauge or something that read electricity in the air. Either way, I was screwed. But she still hadn’t seen me, so I guess that was good news.

“I’m getting a high reading,” she said. “Your spirits could be biding their time, watching us even now. I certainly feel their coolness. This happened in the other house I visited.”

“Constanza said you chased a ghost out of that one.”

“Yes. He was a sad man who’d overdosed. Helping him to move on was a blessing. I’m part of a group who studies these things, so we knew just what to do for him.”

Hell, she just might get to chalk up another ghost banishment tonight.

Gavin was finally coming down the stairs. “As far as these two spirits are concerned, there’s been one in particular that’s been at me. The other psychic who was here said it was a poltergeist, so I thought the dark spirit that we all saw fly out the window was it. But then I got to thinking—why didn’t it look like the spirit in Wendy’s pictures?”

“Constanza told me about the photos.” Her voice was sweet, and I imagined that she could get just about anyone to talk to her. Even screwed spirits. “May I see those pictures?”

“I’ve got them right here on my phone. I’ll also tell you about the experience I just had… and what’s gone on with one of the spirits before.”

He reached the bottom of the stairs, and I decided that it was now or never to attempt an escape.

The door was pretty tightly shut, but if there’s one thing I was learning, it’s that there’s always an opening, no matter how small. As a ghost, I recognized the wispy needle of light on the side of the door, where age had warped the wood and left an opening that maybe a microorganism could fit through.

I could change my shape, but would I be able to get that thin? And how long would it take me to get my entire, snaking essence through? God, why hadn’t I been an anorexic?

I didn’t have a choice about what I was or wasn’t now, because Eileen was walking toward Gavin, getting ready to stride straight through me, her heels clicking on the marble as she put that reader into her purse and Gavin handed her his phone.

The last thing I needed was to be stabbed.

I don’t know how I did it, but I rolled out of the way just as she stepped right where I’d been, her pump heel slicing down until it touched marble instead of me.

Have you ever been so damned sick that you had to literally drag yourself out of bed so you could throw up in a toilet? Charming, I know, but that’s exactly what it felt like as I didn’t look back at Eileen and made my eternal way to the door, keeping my gaze on the hairbreadth of light at the edge of it.

But the door seemed so high up, and with every passing second, I was getting weaker. It felt like it was a continent away.

What I needed was some death spot energy. Obviously, a few minutes on the power lines had only gotten me so far after that dark spirit had messed with me, and Gavin’s dream had sucked out more of my juice.

In the background, the cleaner and Gavin talked about the pictures, and I gathered everything I had in me, then eased up the door, sighting that slim line of welcoming light and nothing else. Don’t stop. Don’t get caught. Just go, go, go… .

When I got to the line, I shriveled into the tiniest thread I could, and that made me dizzy, even nauseated. But it didn’t matter. All I saw was that light from the lamp outside.

Gotta get there…

It was like trying to squeeze into a pair of jeans that didn’t fit anymore, but I was making it.

I didn’t know what I’d do on the other side yet. First things first. But at least I wouldn’t have a cleaner’s iron dagger in my belly.

I oozed through, slipping down the door on the other side, using gravity to pull me through the slit. An hour seemed to pass. Maybe one had passed. But I made it. I couldn’t move as I lay on the stoop and my essence sucked back into its regular form, yet at least I was out of that mansion.

Nearby, power lines stood against the night sky, but I couldn’t reach them.

Minute by minute, I waited for my energy to return, but I realized it wasn’t happening. I probably even looked as gray as smog. Hell, I could even feel myself flickering.

I tucked into a ball, not knowing what to do, until Louis the ghost’s words came back to me from the night of the party in the cabin.

“You’re rushing into haunting,” he had said.

Maybe I’d needed more help.

Louis, I thought, feeling drowsy, disconnected from the sound of the driveway’s fountain, the near-distant hiss of waves climbing back from the beach, the pound of new surf on the sand, each wave taking the place of the one before it.

He’d told me something else important. But what? Why was it so hard to remember right now?

But then I did remember.

“All you have to do is shout our names, and if we’re in range, we’ll hear.”

I wanted to cry. I didn’t have the strength to shout.

I was barely able to roll to my side, locking my gaze on the fountain and the water that played out of it. And there was a funny, cartoonish white car in back of it that resembled a bubble.

The future, I thought dizzily. Jetson cars, Logan’s Run, Star Wars Land Cruisers.

And I had hardly seen any of this future yet. I hadn’t gotten to live this second life that’d been given to me.

The thought shook me. God, I couldn’t let myself go back into a time loop. There was too much to see, so much to explore in this new chance at existing…

“Louis,” I moaned. “Twyla.”

Was she still on the beach, or had her ghost ADD carried her to another place way earlier in the day, after she’d left me?

I flickered brutally, my sight stuck on that strange car. Battery. That thing had to have a battery…

With one last zipt, my sight went still.

•   •   •

“Oh, this is some double doo-doo.”

In the gray matter of my mind, I heard a voice. Young. Worried.

Then another voice. Older. Wiser.

“She’s sure in a bad way.”

It took me a sec, but… Louis?

Whoever it was continued, his voice clearer now, and I’d never heard anything so wonderful.

“Give her some room, Scott.”

I groaned, trying to make my eyes work again. I barely could, only seeing the world through a frozen picture, like I was a zombie and I couldn’t move. But it was enough to see Louis come into my view in his ’forties factory worker uniform, plus Scott, the nineteen fifties greased-up kid. They both were bending down to peer at me while they kneeled.

I wanted to tell them I loved them, that I would marry them and have their ghosty babies if they wanted me to. But I couldn’t utter a word.

“She’s so gray,” Scott said.

I gave it the All-American try. “Bat… ter… y…”

Scott grinned as Louis stood, glancing at that space-age car behind the fountain. “That’s exactly what I’ve been thinking since we landed. What we have there is an electric car, and it’s got a huge battery pack to propel the engine.”

I imagined Scott probably had a hot rod when he was alive, and he’d probably been lusting after every car model that had come along for decades, wishing he could go to one last drive-in movie with a girl in each one of them.

Louis shook his head. “We can’t take her over there ourselves.”

Scott proved that point when he tried to grab my arm. His hand went straight through with a faint buzz.

Louis sighed. “You know better than that. She doesn’t have the energy to harden herself.”

Huh?

“This is my first rescue, so cut me a break,” Scott said. “All these years, and I’ve never seen something like this.” This close, Scott had long lashes, big blue eyes, and a full mouth. “What’re we gonna do? She’s a nice chick. I don’t wanna see her in an imprint.”

Louis smiled down at me, like he had an idea. Next thing I knew, I heard a car starting up, quietlike, not like a regular engine, and Scott and Louis weren’t next to me anymore.

Now I was flickering every few seconds, coming to a bad end, getting colder and colder, like I was freezing up.

I was barely aware of the Jetson car rolling to a stop by the steps.

When Louis materialized from under the hood and Scott seeped out of the crack in the driver’s-side window, I laughed in my head. I couldn’t manage to do anything more.

Ghosts in the machine.

“Jen,” Louis said, bending down to me. He seemed winded, his essence blipping. “You’re going to have to take it from here. Slide under the hood, just like I did, and you’ll find the promised land.”

“A battery pack really is in there,” Scott said, equally weakened. “I don’t know who drives this turd, but I’ve got the feeling they won’t be able to leave after you’ve sucked out this thing’s energy source.”

A cleaner owns it, I wanted to tell them, warning them. But I couldn’t.

Maybe the danger nearby gave me extra incentive. I’d pulled them into a dangerous place, and they’d come. I owed them.

“Come on, Jen,” Scott said, his essence getting grayer. “Moving this car took a lot out of us. Get your keister under the hood so Louis and I can take a sit on those power lines.”

I could feel the buzz of those batteries so close that I could almost taste the charge in them. I strained, making it an inch off the stoop.

“That’s the way,” Louis said, waving me on. “A little more.”

Another inch.

They encouraged me all the way, until I’d slithered up the car and, after making myself into a Slim Jen again, in between the crack of the hood to the battery pack.

Lying on it, feeling the zmmmmmm of energy, I sighed. I was pretty sure I passed out again, too, because the next thing I knew, I was awake and ready to rock.

This time, when I made myself thready enough to slip through that hood crack again, it didn’t take much out of me, and I came to stand by the car, looking up at the nearby power lines to find Louis and Scott balanced on them. As they sent me chipper waves, I saw they weren’t alone now.

Twyla was there, too, her petticoats hanging down. Just in time for the party, huh?

They all flew to me, checking me out on the way.

Louis said, “You look right as rain. You gave us a scare, Miss Jensen.”

“I didn’t mean to. God, I owe you everything for coming. If it wasn’t for you guys…”

“We were at a bash nearby,” Scott said. “No big thing.”

Twyla snorted. “You are sooooo lame. Total amateur move, Jen.”

Scott didn’t look at her as he threw out an insult. “And who was the flake who needed Cassie’s help once upon a time?”

“Oh yeah.”

Airhead. Twyla must’ve just remembered that she’d told me about her embarrassing possession screwup earlier in the day.

Then she gave me a sassy glance. “Were you doing what I think you were doing in that mansion? Is that why you almost went imprint again, because you overhaunted?”

I couldn’t believe we were just hanging out, nattering away, while there was a cleaner nearby.

When I nodded at her question, Twyla and Scott thought my adventures were supercool, and he gave me a thumbs-up; she did a pivoty dance move that brought out her Lauper. Louis just crossed his arms.

I rushed to speak. “I’ll tell you everything after we put some space between us and this place. There’s a cleaner in that mansion right now.”

Twyla just about jumped out of her petticoats. “No way!”

Louis and Scott flew to the windows, pasting themselves against them for a look-see.

What?

“Death wish, anyone?” I asked.

Twyla was floating toward another window, a little more cautious than the guys. “Cleaners are, like, pop stars.” Then to the others, “Can you see them or what?”

“Nope,” Scott said.

I’d done what I could to warn them. “Maybe you should be asking if she can see you?”

“Okay,” Twyla said. “Can she?”

“No,” I said. “At least, she couldn’t see me. But she had this gauge thingamabob in her hand that read the temperature or whatever. And she sensed me, so she knew I was around.”

Louis flew to yet another window, almost like they were playing peeping leapfrog. “She might’ve been using an electromagnetometer. It’s one of the tools of the trade. Measures electrical conductivity variations.”

I shifted on the steps. “You guys, you’re making me nervous. This is a chance we don’t have to take. I guess she’s not super experienced, but who knows?”

I was cautious, not scared. And certainly not dumb.

Scott laughed and followed Louis to his new viewing spot. “We’re not in the house, Jen. And we’re all powered up besides. If the cleaner comes this way, we’ll take off in a jiff. She can’t exactly expel us from the earth like she can a domain.”

Still.

I said, “Then maybe you’ll listen to reason when I say that she was called to this place because one of those bad spirits you guys pooh-poohed the other day invaded the mansion.”

Twyla made a frustrated sound. “I knew I should’ve stayed with you today.”

Boredom. It made even ghosts yearn for ridiculous things, like getting into it with a baddie they’d taken the time to warn me about.

They made me tell them all about the séance and everything. Suddenly, Amanda Lee was even a pop star to them, too, and they asked every question in the book about her.

“You’re gonna show her to us, aren’t you?” Twyla asked in the end.

Oh, brother. “I wasn’t planning on it.”

Then Louis started asking a lot of questions about Gavin’s latest dream that I’d entered, and I realized that I hadn’t had a second to even figure out the meaning of all those symbols.

And would you believe it—one of the things that was bugging me the most about that dream was the random appearance of that pool guy. His cameo niggled at me even more than the spider and Elizabeth’s chilling walk-on.

I would figure it all out later, though, because right now the front door was opening, and we all flew back to it, taking cover behind the car. Such brave souls.

Eileen appeared in the doorway along with Constanza, who was still in her gray maid uniform. When they hugged, Constanza clung to her.

“Gracias,” she said, her cheek against the woman’s flipped-up hair. She smiled through her tears as she pulled away from Eileen, still holding on to her arms.

Next to me, Louis let out a low whistle. He was looking at Eileen like she was a foxy woman who’d caught his eye.

“Careful,” I whispered, just in case she had supersonic hearing. Also, having a crush on a cleaner wouldn’t be cool.

Eileen smoothed back Constanza’s brown hair. “The purified water, salting, and incantations should work. And if I didn’t help the spirit or spirits to cross over, you call me at the first sign of anything strange. I can bring my group next time, if I have enough time to gather them.”

Sounded like a quilting club or something.

“I feel a change already,” Cosntanza said. “No bad energy in there now.”

“There was a lot of residue. Female and male. One of them has a deep determination, holding a belief that she’s doing something right. The other one, though?” She exhaled. “That’s the spirit who has an anger that goes beyond the pale.”

The dark spirit. Male. Got it. But I wished she’d found out more.

Eileen patted Constanza’s arm. “See you at church this weekend?”

“Yes. God bless you, cariño. I owe you a big dinner at Mr. A’s.”

“You don’t owe me a thing. This is what I was born to do.”

Gavin appeared behind them, and I bit my lip as all my ghost friends glanced at me. I shrugged, because I knew they were thinking what Twyla had thought earlier.

I liked being around the hunk, even while I was haunting him.

Wrong.

Eileen looked at Gavin. “Are you ready to go to your office now?”

He nodded.

Naturally, they were going to clean that out, too, since I’d done my share of haunting there.

As he and Eileen came outside, Constanza stayed on the lamplit stoop. Noah, Farah, and Wendy appeared behind her to say their thanks.

Eileen smiled. “Your cat should be home soon, too. Animals are very sensitive to spirits, and he didn’t want to be around them.”

Then, as she went to her car, she slowed, looking at it, then at the fountain, where the vehicle had been parked before. But she didn’t seem rattled up. She only glanced around, as if reading the area, looking for spirits. And when she reached into her bag of tricks to extract one of her toys, I took off. Same with the others.

We slowed halfway down the road, near a turnoff that led to the incline of a foliage-shaded driveway with a looming iron gate and gas lamps in front of it.

Even though we were laughing, Twyla managed to say, “Did you see her face?”

Everyone cracked up harder. Who thought I’d have been laughing at anything just an hour ago?

My laughter stopped first, and I glanced around the circle of my new friends. They trailed off, too.

“You guys came for me,” I said. “I still can’t believe it.”

Louis and Scott just kind of shuffled in manly embarrassment while Twyla rolled her eyes.

“Whatever,” she said. “I didn’t have anything better to do on the beach anyway.”

Like, sure.

Even Scott and Louis bit back smiles until Twyla said, “So, you gonna show us Amanda Lee now? Your haunting is over, so why not?”

Hearing her say this about the haunting made it real. But it couldn’t be over. It would never be over for Elizabeth and Amanda Lee, so why for Gavin or whoever the killer really was?

“I suppose I could take you to her place,” I said. “I need to figure out what comes next anyway.”

Louis said, “She should get you to your death spot, just so you can juice up properly.”

In agreement, we all rose into the sky as one, ready to conjure our travel tunnels. But I stayed behind just a millisecond longer, looking back at the Edgett mansion’s red tile roof in the near distance.

Thinking that there was no way this was over.

20

Amanda Lee was expecting us.

I didn’t ask her if she’d gotten a vision about us coming over before she’d gone outside and sat on her porch swing, which had a circle of salt around it to protect her. But since she’d removed all that makeup and was wearing a large turquoise cross around her neck, as well as a very-Amanda-Lee silk blouse and skirt that smelled of potpourri, I suspected that she hadn’t gotten out of her Alicia Dantès clothes and into these for nothing.

When she saw us approach, she stood, locking in on me.

“You’re safe.” She sounded like she’d been hoping and praying for me all night, maybe even keeping vigil for me, sitting under the porch light and hearing the night breathe around her.

“Safe enough.” Why tell her about how unsafe I’d been a short time before? “These are my friends. They wanted to meet you while I took a break.”

When she glanced around, I realized that she couldn’t see them like she could see me.

Next to me, Louis said, “Looks like you’re her special ghost, Miss Jensen. She’s a medium for the spirits who connect with her, but she’s not a true seer like McGlinn.”

It was like Amanda Lee was half-blind as she addressed the group. “It’s good to meet you. Who is everyone?”

I introduced Louis, Scott, and Twyla, describing them to her: the dignified World War II factory worker, the Bye Bye Birdie dude, and Schizoid Valley Girl.

All the while, Twyla hung out by my side, giving Amanda Lee the Sherlock eye.

“She’s so boho,” she whispered after I’d finished with the niceties. “Total wannabe Stevie Nicks, you know?”

I nudged Twyla, even though my elbow only buzzed against her essence.

Amanda Lee raised her brow. “Just because I can’t see you doesn’t mean I can’t hear bits and pieces. Unlike the others, you’re more static than anything.”

“Oops,” Twyla said, shutting up.

I got down to brass tacks with Amanda Lee. “Did you have any visits from the dark spirit?”

“No. It’s been a quiet night. Too quiet. I couldn’t stop thinking of what you were doing.”

“It all worked out.” I’d almost been annihilated, but no biggie. “Even when the cleaner came, I got out of the mansion, thanks to these guys. I lost some energy, but they were there to help me out.”

“Thank goodness.”

Scott had started poking around the porch, inspecting the aloe plants and sweet peas like they would tell him more about Amanda Lee’s personality. Twyla and Louis began nosing around, too. Obviously, studying a human’s life keenly interested them, especially when there’d been verbal contact.

“Do you know of an Eileen Perez?” I asked Amanda Lee. “She’s the one who came over to clean the mansion.”

“I don’t. But it sounds as if she did a good enough job so that you can’t get back into it.”

“Actually, I didn’t try to reenter. But I’ll do that after I visit my death spot for an energy boost.”

Amanda Lee’s eyes couldn’t have been wider.

“Yeah, I just told you that I’m going back.”

“I’ve already said you don’t have to—”

I held up my hands. “It’s not over till it’s over.”

There was a conviction in my voice that even caught the other ghosts’ attention. It sure as hell caught mine, because I’d never felt strongly about much before in life.

From the expression on Amanda Lee’s face, I realized something: even if we came at things from different angles, she had begun to respect me. I wasn’t her tool anymore.

Louis looked over at me from where he was checking out a colorful birdhouse, grinning. Nothing got past this guy.

Then he said, “Tell her about Gavin’s dream. She’ll be able to interpret it, right?”

Amanda Lee must’ve heard at least part of what he said, because she scooted forward on the swing, stopping its mournful creaking. Revitalized.

So I told her about the dream red sky and the swimming pool, about me in the white bathing suit, walking into the study to find Gavin reading a book. Then about the desert, the spider, the two girls in the air machines, and the final image of blindfolded Elizabeth.

Amanda Lee didn’t say anything for a while, just leaned back in her porch swing and let it sway back and forth as she touched the cross around her neck. The swing’s chains moaned again as Louis and Scott gathered near me, done with scrutinizing the porch.

But Twyla actually walked up the first step for a better look at Amanda Lee, who turned her face to her, feeling her coolness. Unflustered, she didn’t say anything about the ghost eyeballing her.

“I only wish I were a better detective,” Amanda Lee said softly, looking at me again. “Then I would understand what all these images mean when we put them together.”

“Then let’s take them one by one,” I said.

She was game. “All right. A swimming pool could signify the need for a mental recess—that Gavin is taking a moment to try and understand his feelings.”

“That’s a good thing,” I said. “The haunting is making him sort himself out. Maybe he’ll be easier to access from this point on.”

Or maybe not. But pessimism would get me nowhere.

Louis asked, “How about that pool man who appeared in the dream?”

Amanda Lee addressed the location of his voice. “That’s a new element. One I don’t have a ready answer for.”

He rested on a step, and Scott followed his example, engaged in the conversation, too. Twyla was meandering closer to Amanda Lee, and I had the feeling that she was actually checking out the chunky turquoise cross necklace on my part-time ally. What a fashion victim.

“Could the pool man be a keeper of Gavin’s emotions?” Louis asked. “Could it be that he somehow maintains order for Gavin’s feelings in his mind?”

When I gave Louis a check-you-out look, he seemed humble. Then he offered something like an apology for being so smart.

“I like learning,” he said casually. “I couldn’t get enough education in life, so I spend a lot of time in libraries looking over shoulders at books and, these days, computers. Lord knows I have the time to fill.”

When this was all over, I was dying to have a talk with Louis about why he was so mild when he could do just about any damned thing he wanted to as a ghost. He’d existed awhile, through Civil Rights and everything. But it could be that earth-shattering stuff like that didn’t get to beings like us.

“Maybe,” I said, going on, “in Gavin’s psyche, the pool man plays the part you mentioned, Louis. But why do I get the feeling there’s something more to him in general?”

Amanda Lee said, “It’s because of the way the pool man was lingering under Wendy’s window that morning you visited her.”

Twyla took a detour from her Amanda Lee surveillance and wrinkled her nose. “Grody. From what Jen told us before, it sounds like pool boy is a barf bag.”

“Anyway,” I said, moving on to Amanda Lee again. “How about the desert imagery? What do you make of that?”

“Isolation, loss, misfortune.”

Louis chimed in once more. “That’s where this Gavin fellow has been wandering all this time in his head. A figurative desert. But what about the spider that showed up?”

“Spiders,” Amanda Lee said, clearly hearing Louis now, “are powerful forces that can protect. Would it make sense that the spider is attempting to discourage the dreamer from continuing any more destructive behavior?”

“Like mur-ders,” Twyla singsonged, but I didn’t think Amanda Lee heard her. Or maybe she’d already learned to ignore shit like this very fast.

“However,” Louis said to Amanda Lee, “a spider creates webs…”

Scott volunteered his view. “And webs trap things. Or people.”

Did I have a crack team or what?

“A spider,” Amanda Lee said, “might symbolize trapped memories for the dreamer. If we take into account the fact that Liz appeared later in the dream, I’d venture to guess that he’s caged with the recollection of her, and it’s a constant punishment for what he did.”

I’d told the others about my doubts regarding Gavin’s guilt and Amanda Lee’s belief in it, so I looked first to Louis for a reaction. He didn’t have one. Neither did Scott. It seemed all of them were deep in thinking mode—even Twyla, who’d just sat on the porch with her petticoats spread around her, her chin in her hand.

Louis finally said, “That bird, though… it killed the spider.”

My turn. “Based on the original dream, we figured the bird was a protector.”

“Or a shadow of guilt,” added Amanda Lee.

Louis leaned an elbow on the top step. “It seems to me that the bird killed the spider to protect that little girl, who was brought down by the spider’s web.”

“Amanda Lee thought she was an expression of Gavin’s repressed feminine side,” I said.

“His anima?”

Amanda Lee seemed like she hadn’t heard him correctly, but then she asked me a question that confirmed she had. “Louis said that, didn’t he?”

“Yes.”

“Has he studied Jungian psychology and dream analysis?”

Louis’s smile told all. With the amount of time he hung out in libraries, he probably knew everything by now.

“I’d say so,” I said to Amanda Lee as Twyla turned to Scott and made a finger-shoved-down-the-throat gesture. He only laughed, like he was used to Louis’s turbo brain.

As for Amanda Lee, she seemed like she’d love to take on another ghost pet, and my hackles rose, not because I felt like I was being replaced but… well, would Amanda Lee make plans for him, just like she’d done for me?

She asked me, “Does Louis know everything about the first dream?”

“We’ve talked about it before.” At McGlinn’s party.

He said, “Not that I’m adding much to the conversation right now. Honestly, I’d like to spend some time thinking all this through, Miss Amanda Lee, before I volunteer more theories.”

“I would love to hear them, Louis. And please, it’s Amanda Lee.”

“Won’t do any good to ask him to call you that,” I said, smiling at Louis, who only shrugged.

Twyla was still gagging, but Scott was ignoring her now.

Who wasn’t? “I have a theory, and you’re not going to like it, Amanda Lee. It’s about that part of the dream when Elizabeth appeared in that bloody blindfold shaking her head.”

“Ooo!” Twyla raised her hand, wanting desperately to be constructive. “I know this one. Elizabeth’s, like, the statue of justice.”

I could tell Amanda Lee still couldn’t hear her as much as she could Louis, and I repeated what Twyla had said, then added my two cents.

“That’s a good thought, but I think Gavin’s dream was trying to tell me something through Elizabeth. She’s saying that we’re not seeing everything we should be seeing, and she was shaking her head because we’re on the wrong track with all our theories.”

Of course, Amanda Lee didn’t agree. “But what about all the blood you’ve seen in his subconscious? All the guilt and darkness and fire… ?”

Louis came to a slow stand. “Not to belabor the point, but I could be applying myself to this with a little elbow grease.”

“There’s a computer in the casita where you could look up dream analysis and come up with more ideas,” I said. “Amanda Lee could fill you in on anything you might be missing.”

He glanced at her. “May I?”

“Be my guest.”

As he whooshed over to the small house, I kind of felt like he’d indeed taken my place. But Amanda Lee was watching me with a look that said she wasn’t going to use Louis like she’d used me.

She’d learned something tonight. I just hoped the lesson stuck.

Twyla was halfway down the steps now, near where Scott had already stood up, too.

“Why does Louis get to have the fun?” she asked.

“Don’t be a brat,” Scott said, sticking his hands in his jeans pockets. Then he sent me a sideswipe smile. “But I’m wondering the same thing. I wanna be in on this, too.”

“What?” I asked. “Solving the mystery?”

Before Twyla could go, “Duh!” Scott laughed.

“Face it,” he said, “you need some help. You don’t know how to get into that mansion anymore, so you won’t have easy access to your suspect.”

“And you’ll help… how?”

Twyla fluttered the rest of the way down the steps, just like she anticipated what Scott was thinking. And she looked ecstatic about it.

Scott said, “We can do a little booing of our own so you can lure Gavin or anyone else you want to question to wherever you need them to be.”

Amanda Lee was leaning toward the conversation, like she was listening to a garbled radio transmission. I didn’t take the time to translate for her.

“You want to play good cop, bad cop?” I asked Scott, already loving the idea.

“Why not? My dad was one, so I know how the game goes.”

“I can do it, too,” Twyla said. “I’m, like, a major Remington Steele. And guess what. While Louis is doing his thing in that tiny house over there, your fellow ghost budders can make sure no one interrupts your time with haunting tonight. We’ll be useful to the max!”

I glanced at Amanda Lee, then at my ghost friends—or “ghost budders,” as Twyla had said.

To me, even with their gray tones, they were so lively and full of… well, spirit. I hadn’t realized until now how cold and sad human life could be, how soulless, just like most of the Edgett family.

I spoke to Scott and Twyla. “Okay, you two. But you have to promise that you’ll leave the actual haunting to me. I need to see all the pieces of Gavin’s mind firsthand so I can figure out the big picture. Deal?”

Twyla raised her hand to high-five me, and when I gave in, our hands only met charged air. But that didn’t take away from anyone’s enthusiasm. Even Amanda Lee seemed to know that we were ready and raring to go, and she looked scared and excited at the same time.

I mean, the dark spirit was still out there, and we were going to where it’d last been seen and everything. But tonight I was going to do one of two things to end this case with the help of the ghost budders.

Finally haunt a confession out of Gavin Edgett.

Or prove his innocence once and for all.

21

After a brief visit to my death spot, Scott, Twyla, and I made our way to the Edgett mansion near midnight.

We peered in the windows, but they were shuttered and curtained. Was it sleepy time for the Edgetts? Had the maid Constanza retreated to her quarters by now?

I could at least try to find out, and I went to my favorite mansion entry point, the chimney. Plus, I wanted to see if the cleaner had successfully banished me from the domain, after all.

After I dove down, then bounced out of the flue right away, Twyla and Scott were waiting for me on the roof, braying at the sight of me being expectorated, just like the chimney was hocking a loogie.

“I know,” I said while my head rang. “It’s hilarious to see a fellow ghost humiliated.”

Twyla was the most amused. “You looked like a special little child running into a sliding glass door.”

Ignoring. “Now that we know for sure that I can’t get in, how’re you guys going to handle bringing Gavin out here? I assume you have a plan.”

“We did come up with something,” Twyla said, cockily smoothing back the straight Goth side of her hair.

Scott was reclining on the roof, acting just like he wanted to catch some UVs, even if it was full night. “How would you like to have your own place to haunt, Jen?”

I didn’t get it at first.

“’Cause if you want one,” he said, grinning, “no sweat.” He jerked his chin toward the pool house down below.

My own place to haunt.

Using something other than the mansion would give me… oh, let’s just say some further intimacy with my dear Gavin. If I wasn’t barred from the pool house.

Just as I was about to float off the roof to go there and check it out a bit more, I shivered, because suddenly I felt… something. And it sure wasn’t Scott’s or Twyla’s essence. Whatever it was, it felt like eyes watching us.

“Do you guys feel that?” I whispered.

Scott glanced around, but Twyla just fluffed the teased side of her hair.

“Feel what?” she asked.

Maybe I had ghost nerves because of tonight’s activities. Maybe the dark spirit from earlier had shaken me more than I’d admitted before. Or maybe it had come back… ?

Paranoia, the destroyer.

“It’s nothing,” I said, focusing on the pool house below again. The creepy sensation was gone, anyway, and I wasn’t going to torture myself with oh-my-Gods and what-ifs. “You guys do know that the pool house is surrounded by a salt circle, too, right? I already checked when we flew by it earlier.”

Scott and Twyla glanced at each other, laughed, then darted up and coasted off the roof at the same time, down to the blue-lit lagoon pool.

I took one last look around the roof area, finding nothing out of the ordinary. No more chills for me. So I joined Scott in front of a shuttered villa window that had salt sprinkled on the sill, as well as around the rest of the pool house.

Behind us, Twyla had taken the scenic route, screwing around, and she zinged by us so fast that she caused some wind. A sill-bound potted plant toppled to the ground, shattering, spreading dirt and daisies over the concrete.

I was just about to yell at her when Scott whispered, “All part of the plan, baby.”

Twyla landed in front of the ornate wooden door. “A guy like Gavin will come out to check a noise like that, if he heard it. We can always graduate to something, like, more attention-worthy if we need to. Let’s see if this gets anyone out here first.”

“We don’t want to make any threatening noises,” Scott said. “No exploding pool houses or anything.” He looked sidelong at Twyla. “Got it, troublemaker?”

“Ha-ha. Your confidence in me touches my tender heart.”

“It’s just that you get a little excited sometimes, that’s all.” Scott slicked back his greased dark hair, totally in no hurry.

She merely bent to the foot of the door, then pursed her dark-shaded mouth, giving a great exhalation that disturbed the line of salt at the threshold, creating a slim opening. Without further ado, she zoomed through the lane and under the door.

“Hey… ,” I began.

Scott was having the time of his life, laughing at my surprise. “First of all, she got in because she’s not the one who was being banished from the dwellings here. You and the dark spirit were the focus of the cleaner’s energies.” He went back to his hair. “As far as the salt goes… see, humans have their nifty tricks that make them feel safe, so they use stuff like salt to keep us away. Basically, though, it works on ghosts who just fell off the turnip truck and don’t know to pucker up and blow. And it works way better on demons than us.”

This really was a game to these two. Luckily, they were good players. “Don’t cleaners know how easy it is for experienced ghosts to bypass salt?”

“Jen.” Scott made a clicking noise with his tongue. “It’s pretty obvious this cleaner is sparky, but untried. She’ll learn, though.”

I put my hands on my hips. “You think you could’ve told me about this earlier? You know, before I was bounced out of the chimney?”

Scott offered a smile that told me that he was a fan of practical jokes in any form. “Twyla and me knew about the salt when we saw it around the mansion earlier, but you wouldn’t have brought us if you didn’t think you needed us.”

Then he got back to haunting. “We’ll go into this little house here after Twyla finishes frying any silent alarms inside. She’s quick about it, too, so nothing should’ve gone off at all. We don’t want anyone to think anything spooky is happening out here.”

“We just want to attract mild attention.”

“You’ve got it.”

I was about to ask him how he and Twyla had become experts at break-ins, but what was the point? They could probably take over the War Games computers or whatever the government used nowadays for national defense, if they wanted to.

When a sharp series of knocks sounded on the door—bump, bump-ba-bump-bump… bump-bump—Scott went to it and swept his arm out.

“After you, milady,” he said, bowing.

Cute. “The salt’s gone, but what if I can’t get in because of the cleaner’s incantations or whatever?”

“If you’re susceptible to them, we’ll find out right away. But you gotta get in there to find out.”

What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right?

I went for it, slimming myself to a pencillike proportion and streaming under the door, into the pool house, filling out to my regular shape once I was in.

I waited, but nothing happened to make me explode or wither away or fly off to ghosty Never Never Land. Rad.

As I felt Scott entering through the same route, I took in my surroundings. It’d be dark in here for a human with the windows shuttered and the lights off, but I could see just fine. And I could surely say that, for a pool house, this was gnarly. But what else did I expect from the Edgetts? It wasn’t marble and palatial like the mansion, but it had a big old leather couch in front of a huge, flat TV, a kitchen, a bar, and a hallway that seemed to lead to a bedroom.

Scott was surveying me. “Looks like either someone has an immunity to cleaner tactics or the Edgetts didn’t bother safeguarding the pool house all the way.”

“No one lives here,” Twyla said, stepping out of nowhere in front of me. “So, like, why not just salt the outside and spend incantation time on the big house instead?”

The sound of a door opening and then shutting outside made us all look at each other. Through the barely gaped slats of the shutters, the security lights came on, creating minuscule lines on the far wall.

“A human,” Scott said, flying to the window and attempting to peer through the slats. “From what I can see, it isn’t Gavin, either. It’s one of the girls.”

Farah or Wendy. But Farah was a chicken compared to the younger Edgett. She wouldn’t be out here inspecting anything.

“Can you see what she’s doing?” I asked.

“She’s looking at the pot Twyla destroyed earlier. And take a listen to what she’s saying… .”

I definitely heard Farah’s voice outside.

“Tugger? Is that you? Come here, little boy. Mama’s missed you.”

Well, well. “When she heard the pot go down, she thought her kitty did it, but she probably waited to see that everything was clear out here,” I said. After all, Eileen Perez had told the family that their pet might come home, now that the house was clean.

The Edgetts were feeling really safe, weren’t they?

Scott and Twyla exchanged a smug glance. They’d been there to hear the cleaner talking about Rum Tum Tugger, and I had the feeling they were going to run with that.

Twyla had slimmed the front part of herself, slipping through a shutter slat. It gave her the appearance of a gray ghost with no head. “She must’ve been up, drinking coffee in the kitchen. It’s all over the front of her nightgown, like she spilled it when she heard the crash here.” She pulled out of the slat and grew back her head, talking excitedly to Scott. “You ready?”

“For what?” I asked.

“Ready to get Gavin out here instead of this useless skank.”

Something told me to slow all this down. I’d never been able to go into Farah’s mind. Why not now? Why not get more than just Gavin’s puzzle pieces?

“Wait,” I said. “Let’s bring her in here first. Then we’ll go for Gavin.”

Without questioning, Scott gave me the okay sign, then flew to the door and under it. But Twyla sent me a daredevil glance, then got real close to the door. Even though she didn’t open her mouth, she threw out some sound.

A loud, long meow.

Electricity pumped through me, because I knew what she was up to. She was luring Farah into the pool house with the bait of her missing phantom pet cat.

Twyla slipped under the door just before Farah tried the knob. But the door was locked.

Picking up where Twyla had left off, I threw sound toward the door.

Meow.

The night seemed dead as I waited for Farah to either stay or go.

Just come in, I thought. I only want to invade your mind for the good of the world.

I heard a scraping sound, like a pot being moved over concrete. A spare key?

When the tumble of the lock rang through the room, I hovered. The plan was working.

With a long groan, the door opened, and Farah stepped inside, almost looking like a ghost herself, wearing a spaghetti-strap nightgown with a coffee stain marring the white material. Her long dark hair was in a side braid, dipping over her shoulder, and she was carrying a phone in her hand, like she was still worried about what was out here… and a phone was going to help.

Just her presence gave me a rush of trembling energy.

“Rum Tum Tugger?” she whispered. “Is this where you’ve been hiding out?”

Perversely, in anticipation of her fear, I meowed again.

“Tugger?” she asked, leaving the door open a crack behind her.

Pretty, but not very smart. In Friday the 13th, she’d be toast by now.

I projected a purring noise to a dark corner where the slats of light from the shutters and the sliver of illumination from the door didn’t bleed into the black.

Farah laughed nervously. “Tugger, Mama’s missed you. Just come out now. Come here, kitty kitty.”

A trace of fear had started to hum inside her, and I reveled in it. Her fear even made me forget that I liked to take it easy on the innocents, and I went a little further than usual.

I threw another purr to the corner as Farah sauntered toward that darkest part of the room. I eased my essence over there, too, as more energy rustled through me, making me light-headed and greedy from her growing fear.

As I got closer, closer, still redirecting those purrs, I smelled her soft perfume. Jasmine. Saw how her pale skin darkened in the shadows.

“Tugger… ?” she said as I came up behind her.

She reached toward the wall, obviously for a light switch. I kept purring.

Her growing fear had put ideas into me: I needed to do more than just look into her mind. The Edgetts were such a cold, unfeeling family that I had to get a rise out of them to get information.

They needed to remember Elizabeth, needed to think of her death so I could tap in to any memories they might have of what Gavin could’ve done to her. And they needed to be scared enough to do that.

I cut off the purrs and sprang at Farah, skipping the empathy reading and going straight for a hallucination as I pressed against her cheek and, not knowing what kind of images would come, brought her to a scene that would definitely make her think of the night Elizabeth had died…

Cold. Shivering.

We have to find Tugger.

Darkness in front of us. Can’t see the cat.

Can’t see anything.

Still reaching for the light switch, we feel the wall under our fingertips. Paint, bumpy and smooth at the same time.

We run our hand over the wall, trailing our fingertips, grasping for the switch that we know is there.

Then we feel… something.

We don’t know what it is at first. Smooth, but not like the wall. Bumps, but not like the wall, either.

When we realize that it’s skin under our hand, we can’t even scream. We can’t do anything but drop our phone.

Slick, wet skin, like there’s something all over it.

God, there’s a nose… a mouth… and the mouth’s open because we feel the teeth, like something’s smiling—

As our hand pulls away from the wall, the lights flash on by themselves for an icy, thrusting instant.

Then we see it.

A face.

A woman with red-matted blond hair, wide blue eyes, and a grotesque smile.

Elizabeth?

We scream as the lights go out. We fall to the floor, scrabbling backward, full of coldness, away from the face as the lights go on again, showing only a head mounted on the wall.

As the lights slam off, it’s not our screams we hear now, but Elizabeth’s—

Farah’s mind went blank.

Stuck in sheer blackness, I jammed out of her, then floated above her body, seeing her lying like a used rag doll on the carpet. She’d fainted, for God’s sake.

I gave myself a quick check, too, but instead of being drained or scared by that awful, uncontrolled hallucination, I was fizzing, nearly giddy with the rush of what I’d been able to do.

Mainly, though, it’d been her fear that pumped me up.

But damn it, I couldn’t get an empathy reading from her now. Would I be able to get inside her subconscious for a dream, though? Or for anything since I’d gotten her mind on Elizabeth and could now witness what Farah might know about her?

I didn’t have the chance to find out, because the door opened wider behind me, bringing slightly more light into the room.

Noah came in, dressed in boxers and a T-shirt. “Farah?”

I zoomed toward the corner, letting him run to her and get to his knees. As he shook her, Scott and Twyla entered, floating near the doorway.

“We didn’t stop him,” Scott said casually. “We thought you might want an interview, but I have to say it looks like the last one didn’t go that swell.”

Twyla hopped up and down. “Check you out, Murph! You made that chick faint! What did you do to her, you exquisite bitch of terror?”

Twyla’s excitement gave me a reality check. As the high from Farah’s fear mellowed in me, I looked at her splayed on the floor, looked at Noah lightly slapping her face. Maybe I shouldn’t feel so good about doing this to anyone but a real suspect… .

“I’ll tell you the gory details later,” I said. “Just keep an eye out for Gavin. I suppose Noah heard Farah scream and that’s why he came.”

“We saw him rushing out of the house when she started up,” Scott said. “He must’ve come downstairs for a glass of water or midnight snack or to see if Farah was still up.”

Twyla said, “Any way you slice it, Gavin wasn’t with Noah. But I volunteer to try and go in the house to see if he’s there, you know?”

“No.”

Scott was shaking his head, but Twyla simpered away from him.

“I already know the layout, loser,” she said, “and I couldn’t care less if I get belted out of there because of that cleaner’s incantations or purified water or… whatever. They’re not directed at me, like, anyway. You can come with me if you want, but you’re not keeping me out.”

Twyla was unstoppable, and telling her no just made her determination flourish.

Scott sighed. “Just don’t go overboard in there. You remember what happened a couple years ago when we came across that converted church… .”

“Oh, eat my shorts,” she said, turning on her heel and swishing out the door.

Noah was still trying to awaken Farah, and he’d started to panic. His fear warped me, addicted me. And I couldn’t resist it.

“Just keep an eye on Twyla,” I said to Scott.

“Roger that.”

He paused, giving me a welcome-to-Boo-World-for-real look, then grinned. But there was more to this for me than just being a ghost and amusing myself.

Elizabeth needed this. I needed this.

The door stayed gaped as Scott flew off, leaving me with Noah.

He’d stood up, going toward an antique phone, probably to call an ambulance. His dark hair was wild after digging his fingers through it in fright.

I positioned myself at Farah’s side and threw some sound out.

Her voice.

“Noah?” I imitated.

Right away, he forgot the phone, dropping it as he went back to his sister. “Farah… ?”

Then he realized that she wasn’t moving.

When he got to his knees next to her, I smiled, feeling his unadulterated fear, as pure as iced volts. In my state of highness, I wallowed in his mounting quivers. I couldn’t stop it. I wanted to really scare him, getting this mystery solved. I wanted to know what he knew about Elizabeth.

“Noah?” I said again. But this time, it was in Elizabeth’s voice.

His eyes widened in incomprehension, then terror, and I leeched hard to his cheek, scaring him even more.

Someone is in the room with us.

And we aren’t sure where.

We scan the near darkness—the unlit corners, the spot behind the sofa that we haven’t checked yet, the gnarled shadows from the wavering pool water light that’s coming through the door, like fingers clawing down the wall.

“Who’s there?” we ask.

The spirit from earlier? Had it hurt Farah?

Should we be running away?

Our heart beats so hard that it slams our chest, wailing to get out. Our limbs feel cold, like if we moved them they would crack like icicles.

“Is anyone there?” we say, louder.

Silence. The sound of our short breathing.

Then, little by little, the sound of someone else’s breathing.

Move, we think. Why can’t we move?

As we hold our breath, we see something rise from behind a kitchen counter in the faint trail of light from the open doorway.

It has blond hair wetted down by fresh blood.

A demonic, smiling face that we should recognize but don’t, because its skin is blue, and who has blue skin?

Even worse, a red-soaked rope is tied around its neck so tightly that we can’t help thinking that this thing must’ve been choked to death.

As we watch in frozen horror, its tongue lolls out of its mouth.

Before we can yell, it flies at us, the tongue whipping out, wrapping around our neck, squeezing, cutting off oxygen. We fall to the floor, grabbing at that tongue, but there’s nothing there.

Nothing at all.

Still, the face is hovering over ours, and the thing is laughing, and the laugh sounds so familiar. Musical. A song.

Elizabeth Dalton’s laugh… ?

Before Noah could faint, I pulled out of him, having the presence of mind to lighten the pressure against his cheek for an empathy reading.

And memories came through strong and clear.

“What the fuck did you do?”

A white scarf in his hands, throwing it back into the dirt that was surrounded by tall grass in the night.

Dragging his gaze from that scarf to the body next to it.

A long-legged woman in a white dress, her eyes staring at him blankly—

Blackness came crashing at me, and I shot out of the images like a silver bullet, my essence surging with electricity as I ripped out of Noah and over the floor, scabbed by the contact. But I quickly mended as I scrambled upright, still buzzing crazily.

Noah was on the floor, next to Farah, just as passed out as she was now. I wasn’t sure if it was because he’d been overcome by the hallucination and then the empathy, or if it was because I’d had a power surge in him when I’d seen Elizabeth in that car trunk.

Jesus, I thought as my essence thudded. Noah had seen her dead… or at least unconscious. But she’d looked pretty dead to me.

I realized that I was even more excited from the hallucinations and the empathy than I’d been with Farah. Was that a good thing that I wasn’t getting scared back into a time loop, as Amanda Lee had feared?

I didn’t have time to think about that, or more important, whom Noah might’ve been talking to or whose car that was, when a loud roaring came from outside.

Scott came thundering to the door. “Get your butt out here!”

I zipped out of the pool house to find the mansion’s outside lights flashing. And when a chair came crashing through a window and into the pool, I instinctively ducked as another followed it, sailing over my head.

“It’s Twyla!” Scott said. “I knew this might happen when she encountered the cleaner’s remaining energy. That Goth side of her always did hate religious stuff… .”

As he trailed off, Gavin busted out of the mansion, carrying Wendy in his arms like she weighed nothing.

Was she okay? Shit.

“Take care of the girl,” I shouted to Scott as a huge screech came out of the mansion. “Make sure she’s safe.”

And the only reason I requested this was that, without any preamble, I set upon Gavin, pounding against him with such determination that he dropped Wendy to her feet and went to his knees.

He yelled, just like he was angry at a force of nature. “What do you want?”

Belligerent. But that was fine. It filled me up with even more strength than his fear.

I had to catch him off guard, so I improvised. With a burst of materialization, I showed myself to him—an angel.

Just as he sucked in his breath, stupefied, I screamed like the devil, then bashed against him, pressing hard against his cheek, making sure his mind was on Elizabeth’s murder.

“Gavin?”

We hear her in the pool, splashing.

Her laughter. Then she appears, hoisting herself up and over the ledge to sit down, her bare legs still dangling in the water.

She’s as normal as we’ve ever seen her, blond hair slicked back, beaded water slipping down her skin. Her smile is just as sunny, too, even at night.

But her words aren’t.

“Why did you kill me?” she asks us conversationally. “Just tell me and I’ll go away.”

Our heart twists, just like it’s trying to turn away from the sight of her, so healthy, so alive.

We try to say something… God, how we try, but our lips are glued together. Literally.

Then she begins to crawl all the way out of the pool, dragging herself over the concrete, leaving a trail of blood behind her.

We choke, unable to look, even though we can’t stop looking.

“Gavin… ,” she moans.

One of her legs slides off, like it’s been suddenly sliced, then the other.

Still, she pulls herself toward us, her expression devastated.

“Tell me why, Gavin… .”

One arm falls away from her, leaving her with a lone limb that she still uses to crawl toward us.

Our stomach roils. Tears fill our eyes.

Then the other arm rolls away from her, left behind.

Even so, she keeps coming to us.

“Gavin… help me?”

The hallucination started fritzing, so I must’ve automatically lessened the pressure on Gavin’s cheek, turning to an empathetic state in his mind. But it was almost like the hallucination hadn’t stopped at all as I saw into his thoughts… .

A view from a balcony. A body on the ground.

Not Elizabeth’s.

Blond hair had turned to black, the body lying facedown on a patch of bloodied concrete at night.

A man?—

I was jerked out of Gavin then, pulled back into the world, twirling until I regained balance, already gearing up to go back into him to get more.

But what I saw on Gavin Edgett’s ravaged face stopped me.

Complete devastation. A thrashed man, his shoulders rounded as he pressed his hands over his face, like he couldn’t bear any more from me.

“Liz… ,” he said, shaking his head. “My God, Liz…”

He didn’t say anything about the dead man I’d seen in his thoughts, and I couldn’t just let it go.

As I reared up in the air, I could see the lights in the mansion flashing. Twyla, turned on and out of control. At the same time, I realized that Gavin’s sadness had left me weaker. But believe me, I still had a lot left.

Then I heard a voice behind me. “Stop hurting us, please!”

When I turned around, I saw Wendy standing there, her blue nightgown catching the crazy lights from the mansion. Behind her, Scott was hovering with a stunned expression.

But Wendy was just as stunned as he was while she looked at me, not through me.

She could see.

22

The lights in the mansion went dark, dimming the outside as Wendy and I just stared at each other.

Was this true? Did she have a connection with me like Amanda Lee?

I said the first thing that came to mind. “How long have you been able to see me?”

Talk about throwing someone off their rocker. Wendy answered like she couldn’t believe I’d responded to her.

“I could see you a little more every time you visited. But you never came here with anyone before tonight. You brought that Happy Days kid and Hair Girl. Plus that other ghost.”

Whoa. She wasn’t like Amanda Lee, who could relate to limited ghosts. She was a true seer, like McGlinn. How had this happened?

“You saw the dark spirit?” I asked.

She took a few seconds, probably getting used to the fact that she was having a conversation like she’d never had before.

“Yeah,” she finally said. “It was a… him?”

I knew what she was getting at. “It wasn’t your mom, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

Wendy closed her eyes, sighing. Relief just about poured off her. Disappointment, too.

But the fact that she had to ask if that spirit with male energy had been her mother told me that she hadn’t recognized anything about him—facial features, a body, a scent. Nothing.

Shivering, she crossed her arms over her chest. It looked like a belly-deep shivering that I remembered so well, when you had experienced something shocking and it was just starting to get to you.

She was watching Gavin, whose back was hunched as he planted his hands on his thighs, still kneeling and shaking his head, like he was attempting to get Elizabeth out of it.

I floated closer to Wendy. Time for another interview, but this one wouldn’t have to be a mind invasion. I mean, it wasn’t like I thought she had anything to do with Elizabeth’s death, but what if she could help me out with Gavin?

“Wendy—” I started.

She interrupted. “Why’re you doing this to us?”

What could I say? I’m a ghost and this is what I do?

“This is about Elizabeth Dalton,” I said.

She glanced at me, puzzled. “Elizabeth? What does she have to do with—”

“She was murdered.”

“Right.” Wendy hugged her stomach.

I gentled my voice. “How well did you know her?”

“Well enough. She was nice to me. Gavin loved her. Why?”

This was going to be the tough part. “Ghosts haunt for a reason. A lot of times, we’re concerned with righting wrongs, and as far as Elizabeth is concerned—”

“I still don’t understand why you’re scaring us.”

“Wendy, I need to find out if Gavin had anything to do with her death.”

She flinched. I’d gut-punched her.

“Who are you?” she asked. “Elizabeth’s friend in the otherworld or something?”

“Close enough.”

“Then if you know her in your ghost city, or whatever, she would’ve told you that Gavin never would’ve hurt her.” She looked around, obviously aware that my friends were here, too. “I don’t see her. Why isn’t she the one asking questions?”

“Because she’s moved on, but there are still some people left on earth who care what happened to her.”

“And they summoned you.”

Pretty much, but I only shrugged, unwilling to continue this discussion when there was so much more to get to the bottom of.

She went back to watching Gavin pull himself back together, and I waited for a second, then said softly, “I don’t think he killed Elizabeth.” But that didn’t rule out the other male corpse I’d seen in his mind.

She added, “So you’ll leave him alone now?”

I couldn’t. Not until I knew who that dead man was. Not until I figured out those dreams I’d seen in Gavin and what they meant. And not until I got a lead on who’d killed Elizabeth if Gavin hadn’t.

I realized at that point that Wendy and Gavin weren’t emitting fear or anger. Just sadness and numbness. I had nothing to feed off from them, and I began to feel the effects of all the work I’d done tonight—especially materializing. I felt grayer by the minute.

I glanced at Scott, who’d wandered over to the diving board during all this.

“Sweetie, smart ghosts don’t get involved with human problems,” Twyla had told me. And it sure looked like Scott was smart enough to get out of the game while the getting was good. Same with Twyla, because she was leaning against the outside wall, her hand on an electrical breaker box. She was charging up, smiling dizzily in the afterglow of her spree.

This was my mess to clean up.

Now Wendy was getting used to me. “Did you hear me ask if you’re going to leave my brother alone now?”

“I heard you, but I can’t do that.”

“Why? Did he commit another murder or something?” A cutting joke.

But not to me. “Why don’t you ask him?”

Another flinch, and after she gave me an ultraconfused glance, she purposefully walked to Gavin. He was still so lost in the Elizabeth hallucinations that he obviously hadn’t even started to wonder why Wendy was talking to herself out here.

She kneeled down beside him. “Are you okay?”

“Liz… ,” he whispered.

“I know.”

She looked up at me—see, he’s a good guy and you shouldn’t have put him through this—and put her hand on his shoulder. That seemed to soothe him. But her voice had quavered. No matter how tough she acted, she was still jarred.

“Gavin, did you do what she says you did?” she asked.

When he glanced up, he seemed more tired than ever. Bruised inside. Totally ethered out.

“Who’re you talking about, Wen?”

She bent her head, her pink hair streak hanging over her face. She’d been talking to him like he could see ghosts, too, and I bet she just realized it.

“I just need to know if you’ve ever killed anyone,” she said, skipping over his question.

He reared back onto his heels, and from the naked expression of horror on him, I knew that Wendy had stripped off the layer he’d always worn on the outside.

“What makes you say that?” he asked.

“Just tell me no, and this will all be over.”

“Wendy, you’ve got to answer me.”

She stood, backing away from him. “Why can’t you just say no?”

“Why would you ask me that?” His voice went bone-deep.

Once again, the steely man was back, and Gavin’s face lost all expression except for the shadows in his eyes.

Wendy glanced at me, like I could explain everything to her. She seemed afraid now, like she’d realized that she didn’t want to know anything terrible about her fantastic, loving big brother.

But then the door to the pool house opened wide, the hinges groaning, and every gaze went there.

Farah stumbled out, clutching her phone in her hand. She was, as they say, as white as a sheet.

I gritted my nonexistent teeth at the sight of her. Why couldn’t Noah, who’d had such promising empathetic thoughts, have been the first one up and about so I could continue the interviews with him?

Gavin and Wendy had gone still while watching their sister. She couldn’t even walk straight. Actually, she looked drunk, even though I knew she wasn’t.

“He needs help,” she said, pointing back to the pool house. “Noah. Passed out.”

Even though the Edgetts seemed to hate one another most times, both Gavin and Wendy got up. He went to catch Farah before she fell while Wendy ran into the pool house.

On the way, she glared at me, and I offered an okay-it-was-my-fault shrug. She was obviously liking me less and less. I wouldn’t have liked me, either, if I’d accused my favorite brother of murder.

Gavin was trying to get the phone out of Farah’s hand as they walked, but she wasn’t having it. She stopped, pushing away from him, cradling the device.

“I need to call that woman,” she said, slurring. “The amateur ghost chaser. She failed. It’s here again.”

“The spirit?”

Farah nodded emphatically, and a seriously weird laugh came out of her. A frightened trill. But it wasn’t until she followed up with a fully nerve-racked bigger laugh that the willies crept over me. And when there was a rustle in the bushes next to the building and Rum Tum Tugger appeared in all his black-and-white glory, she laughed even louder.

“There’s the cat! Here, Tugger! Are you working with the ghost? Are you two in on this together?”

“Farah… ,” Gavin said.

“It’s still here,” she said again as the cat ducked back into the bushes. “I know who’s been following me through the house. I know who it is. She never left the mansion tonight like we thought, because she’s here for revenge. I saw her.”

“Who?” Gavin asked. He’d collected his emotions fast. Then again, I was pretty sure that’s what he’d done for his family for a while now while raising them, keeping them together.

Farah threw herself against him, burying her face in his neck, her lips against his skin as she grasped his arms… .

My God—why did this remind me of something?

As she clung to him, rubbing against his neck, I knew what was bugging me: Gavin’s last subconscious-revealing dream, when the first little pilot had been caged by the spider and Gavin had rescued her. The girl had kissed her rescuer, clinging to him just like this.

But it was no dream at all when Gavin firmly took hold of Farah’s arms and pulled her off him. “Don’t.”

I was getting real strange vibes off them. Then again, that was nothing new. Wendy even made comments about her odd family. She must’ve meant Farah mostly. Why hadn’t I gone into her head earlier?

Farah was wobbling on her feet as she started to back away from Gavin. Then she started to run.

“Get back here!” he shouted. “Farah!”

When she rounded the corner of the mansion, Gavin cursed.

V. C. Andrews, anyone?

Based purely on instinct, I turned to Scott, who’d taken a premium seat on the diving board.

“I’ve got to go,” I said. “Stay here and look after Wendy?”

He must’ve known I was thinking that the dark spirit might come back. “You bet, Jen.”

Twyla had gotten my drift, too. “I hope that dark noob does come back. I’m in a mood for some fightin’.”

“Have at it,” I said, then took off after Farah around the corner.

As I flew, I caught a glimpse of the guesthouse at the edge of the property across from the large garage. Constanza was peering around the lace curtain and out the window; she must’ve been hiding in there, unwilling to come out. Maybe she’d even already been on the phone to Eileen the cleaner.

The sound of squealing rubber was only a prelude to the red sports car that exploded out of the garage and onto the driveway. Before Farah could get far, I surged forward and hooked on to the sill of the passenger-side’s open window, then flipped my essence inside, hoping the wind wouldn’t fling me out as we picked up speed.

Where was Farah off to in the middle of the night, and in such a hurry that she hadn’t put on shoes or changed out of her nightgown?

I soon found out when she used one hand to fiddle with a button on her steering wheel and a ringing sound filled the car.

When a voice answered, she didn’t hesitate. “James, please tell me you’re at home.”

Huh? Had seeing Elizabeth and then passing out made Farah horny or something?

“What’s wrong now?” he asked over the car’s speakers.

“She came back for me. Elizabeth. She’s trying to kill me.”

Her fear was so strong that it had me juiced up. It almost overcame the substance of what had just come out of her mouth. Was she saying what I think she was saying?

I’d already judged Gavin wrong—at least when it came to Elizabeth—so I made myself listen to more of what Farah had to spill before I pounced on her for an empathy reading.

“I saw her tonight.” The car screeched around a corner, down a palm-clawed hill. The ocean looked like black ooze next to us. “I told you earlier about that dark ghost that left the house. I thought it was Elizabeth then, and I’m positive it was her now.”

Do tell.

“Farah,” James said. “It’s been years since she died.”

“And you’re still almost the only one I can count on.”

“Almost.” James sounded fully in control here. I tried to put a face to the smooth voice, but I could only come up with a black visage, like one of those interviews where Deep Throat or whatever didn’t want to reveal his identity.

“You have to help me,” Farah said.

“And how would I do that?”

“I don’t know. Maybe Elizabeth’s haunting the mansion and she can’t get to me anyplace else but there. That’s why I’m driving to your house.”

“O… kay.”

Farah was white-knuckling the steering wheel as she turned onto a street that hugged the beach, toward a stretch of upscale homes.

“I tried to tell Gavin that it was a bad idea to let that first psychic come in and do a séance,” she said. “You don’t play with spirits like that, but he insisted on it.”

“You believe in ghosts?”

“That’s not the point! Why’re you being such an asshole?”

“Because I’m not the one talking like a psycho.”

He didn’t sound like a loving boyfriend at all. More like… menacing.

Farah swallowed. “Just tell me you’re on my side. You owe me that much.”

“Do I?”

“I’ve kept you happy, damn it. You got me, you bought out your boss’s business, and you own a new house. I’ve given you everything you’ve ever asked for within reason.”

“Sometimes a guy also gets more ambitious than he’s ever been, Farah. We’ve talked about this before, and there’s a hell of a lot more you could part with if you cared that much.”

There was something far beyond the normal here. And I hoped Farah would arrive at James’s place soon so I could take a look around in his noggin. Her fear was giving me enough nourishment to sustain me for another round of investigation.

“I’m almost there,” she said, taking another corner at breakneck speed, just like she was afraid James would hang up on her if she didn’t get to him within the next couple of seconds.

As she skidded to a stop at a curb that edged a modern glass-and-wood house with huge windows, then disconnected the phone, I did first things first before I went to James.

To start, I summoned Elizabeth’s orange blossom perfume as Farah killed the engine.

It took over the car, and she froze in the front seat, her hand on the keys she hadn’t taken out of the ignition yet. She made a tiny whining sound in her throat, and I shifted to the center of the backseat, in direct line of the rearview mirror.

“Look at me,” I said, throwing my voice, disguising it as Elizabeth’s.

Farah gave a tiny sob, then shook her head, but I knew she wouldn’t be able to help herself. I would get her to look sometime.

“You’re going to see me whether you want to or not, Farah, because I’m not gone yet. You were right. I really am still here.” And I’m going to look into your innermost thoughts to see how you killed me and how you got away with it for years.

Slowly, she glanced up, into the rearview mirror, and when she saw Elizabeth, aka me in materialized disguise, she jolted toward the door, fumbling with the handle and finally getting it open.

She ran to the house’s driveway but, damn, she was slow, and I popped in front of her, materializing as Elizabeth again in that classy white dress I’d seen in Noah’s empathetic thoughts.

Then I shimmered to bloody dust as she screamed.

Her breath was coming in spurts, and she was faintly able to say, “I’ll kill you again if I have to!”

I think it was safe to say that now was a good time for some empathy, even if I was weaker after materializing. But her fear made up for the drain on me.

I made a dive toward her, and it took all I had to only lightly touch her face, so I could read her thoughts and see—

Gavin, silent while looking out a window toward the ocean, facing away.

“Just what did Elizabeth do to you?” asked Farah’s voice.

Brokenhearted words, barely existing, as he kept peering out the window.

“She loves someone else. Not me. That’s what she did.”

Anger, burning low and hot, because Gavin had always been there for her, and she’d never had the chance to do the same for him. She owed him everything. Her life. Her soul.

Reaching out to touch his back, hesitating, knowing he didn’t like to be touched like that by her, even though…

Even though she didn’t know how else to say thank you for all he’d done in the past with Dad.

He’d always suspected she’d felt that way after he’d stood up for her in a manner no man had ever done before.

A year ago, when she’d seen their father stealthily looking at eleven-year-old Wendy like he’d looked at Farah when she was the same age whenever he got home from a business trip…

Then…

A flash…

Another memory—

A birthday dinner for Noah, the four of them gathered around the table, thirteen candles flickering on a cake.

Gazing at Gavin, wanting to cling to him and never let him leave on one of his own business trips, which he seemed to be taking more and more these days, ever since Dad had gone.

Wendy and Noah, frowning as they watched her. Noah, wrinkling his brow, then blowing out the candles so the table went dark…

A tumble of memories:

Wendy, casting odd, assessing glances at Farah every once in a while, especially when they were with Gavin. Noah, trying to figure out Gavin, then reaching out to Farah and offering brotherly comfort whenever Gavin wasn’t there.

Noah, who would do anything for her, too… .

Back to the first memory—

Gavin with his back turned to her, looking out that window, his words floating in the air—“She loves someone else. Not me. That’s what she did.”—as he walked away, his pride smashed.

Intolerable. Unthinkable.

Getting into the car, driving to Elizabeth’s condo, waiting outside, seething because she was a heartless bitch. Watching as her Corvette rolled out of the garage. A gift that Gavin had given her two months ago for her birthday.

Following her up a shore-lined freeway as night pulled itself over the sky like a blanket over a corpse.

Elizabeth, taking an off-ramp, driving into a deserted beach-access parking lot, as if she’d seen this car following her.

Parking there, too, getting out of the car, yelling, “Who do you think you are, you cunt?”

Elizabeth, holding up her hands in entreaty. She looked so fresh in her white dress and a scarf draped over her shoulders, her light hair like an old-time movie star’s, flirted with by the wind. Why should she look so good when she was bad to the core?

“Calm down, Farah. Let’s talk about this.”

Calming down. Nodding. Pretending, when all the while, hate was hissing inside like a building scream.

No one treated Gavin like this.

Had to fight for him just as much as he’d fought for her.

Elizabeth, smiling sheepishly as she began walking toward a dirt path under the emerging moon.

“Come with me. We used to take walks together,” she said. “I would hate for that to stop.”

No answer. Couldn’t answer. Too much hate to answer.

Elizabeth, offering excuses for betraying Gavin and betraying the whole family.

Hatred, swelling.

“I hope we can still be friends after all this.”

A laugh, stabbing the quiet air.

Noticing that no one else was around out here. Just the night and the tall grass and a pond close by.

“Maybe in time.” Elizabeth, smiling again.

That self-satisfied smile, full of knowing that she could get away with any damned thing she wanted to and would never suffer the consequences. Why were some people that lucky?

How many consequences have I had to suffer? Why me and not her?

A blast of anger. Hands reaching out to grab Elizabeth’s scarf, whipping it around her neck, pulling on both ends.

Felt good. So good.

The bitch, gagging, clutching at the scarf. The bitch’s eyes bulging, the bitch choking, a sound sweeter than the bitch’s fucking magical laugh that seemed to enrapture everyone who heard it.

Especially Gavin.

Then the bitch, on the ground, eyes as blank as the moon that loomed overhead.

Happy that she was out of their lives and she would never hurt anyone again.

Ecstatic.

Then… reality.

Waves rushing in from the nearby beach. Head, muddled. Murder. Dead.

Panic.

No one around. Adrenaline racing while dialing the phone.

“Noah, help. I did something. I have no idea what got over me.”

Noah, arriving, in spite of not having a license yet. Didn’t matter for people like them. People with money.

Noah, crashing through the tall grass, dropping to his knees by the bitch. “What the fuck did you do?”

Not sure. “Help me? God, how am I going to get out of this?”

Noah, looking like he didn’t know the stranger who was standing in front of him.

But… an idea. A morbid one, yet one that no one would ever pin on a socialite.

“Noah, I could go to jail forever. I didn’t mean to do this. Please, if you love me, help me?”

“You know I do.”

“You don’t want me to suffer in jail. I’d never make it there. All for one and one for all, like I’ve been telling you since the day you came into our house. Right, Noah?”

“Okay.” In tears. So young, so impressionable. So useful tonight.

Noah, taking off to go home and return with a long knife from their father’s hunting collection and a saw.

Dragging Elizabeth far off the path and into the tall grass, where no one would see her.

Knife… stabs. Many stabs, like a psychopath who’d found her walking alone in the night. Then the saw.

A cover story.

“A random, deranged killer. That’s who did it, Noah. No one will ever know it was me, especially after we dump the knife and saw as far as we can in that pond.”

Noah’s face, slack. Skin pale as he retched but didn’t throw up.

Good. Can’t leave any obvious DNA behind.

Washing off blood from skin, scrubbing blood and fingerprints off weapons in the nearby pond off the trail. Cleaning up everything as best as possible. Drag marks, evidence that might’ve fallen off their own bodies.

One last look at the bitch with the bloody white dress covering a now-anonymous torso, then the detached head. Food for the animals.

Throwing the bloody scarf in the pond, far enough from the shore yet near enough to still see it floating on the water under the moonlight.

A flash:

A sunny day, by the pool all alone, peaceful, lying out on a lounge chair, the trees winter-bare, the sun unseasonably warm. Phone ringing.

Noah, on the other end. “You know what day this is?”

“You always have to mention her anniversary, don’t you?”

“I never forget. I mention it every year.”

“That’s three years too many.” A sigh. “Elizabeth is out of our lives, and no one knows how it happened. I got away with it, so act like you don’t care, just like we talked about, and don’t blow it because you’re sorry. Do you want to see me in jail?”

“You always say that.”

“Well, do you?”

“No, of course not.”

“Then get back to class. I love you, Noah. I’m the one who loves you most here. Just remember that.”

“I know.”

Hanging up, going back to the sun, reaching for a pair of Ray-Bans with a steady hand on the nearby table.

Seeing the blond pool guy smiling as he stood by the bushes, hands planted on his hips…

I simply backed out of Farah’s thoughts, and the ease of my exit should’ve worried me. She hadn’t even fainted this time, and I had a good guess why that was.

Because she’d known that when she arrived, her boyfriend would be coming out of the house she’d given him.

A few lights had gone on in the neighbor’s Colonial home, and as James stood in half-darkness on the concrete stairway leading to the window-paneled second floor, one hand in the pocket of his khaki pants and the other resting on the railing, I recognized him from Farah’s empathy reading…

… and from the Edgetts’ house.

“Hello, Pool Guy,” I whispered, already looking forward to this.

23

Farah held a hand to her head as she recovered and ran from me to James on the stairway.

“She’s here!” she yelled. “Can you feel her?”

“No, but we’re going inside so you don’t put on a show for the neighbors.”

He took her by the upper arm and pulled her the rest of the way up the steps, toward the open sliding-glass door on the balcony. And you know I totally followed.

He shut the door behind us, and in the lamplight, I was close enough to notice the fine blond hairs standing up on his arms.

Cold out tonight, wasn’t it?

Now that I got a good look at James the pool guy, he was less attractive than ever. He’d gone from coming off as the preppy baddie in a sleazy beach movie, to a Peeping Tom, to this—an obvious blackmailer, based on what I’d seen in Farah’s head.

Scumbag. Skank. As much of an accessory to murder as Noah had been.

I was still trying to wrap my mind around that part. The kid would have been only fourteen when Elizabeth died, and Farah had ruined him for life, just because he loved her the most in his family. I could just imagine what it might’ve been like to be adopted from another country, to probably not know the language and to have a glamorous older sister like Farah, who had probably been truly close to him… although I doubted it was as close as Farah wanted to get to Gavin.

I wished Noah had been old enough and strong enough to tell her to go to hell.

James had taken a seat on one of the sleek, skeletal metallic chairs that filled the upstairs sitting room. With the wide windows and the modern furniture, it felt like a glass coffin in here.

I took my usual comfort spot in a ceiling corner, not liking those windows one bit, even though no one could see me.

James was surveying Farah, looking her up and down as she stood and shivered in her coffee-stained white nightgown.

“You’re looking a little rough,” he said.

“I told you why. Elizabeth is after me.”

He laughed, and her face reddened.

“This isn’t funny, James. I saw Elizabeth in the pool house tonight, then in my car. She was sitting right in my backseat, and when I came up your driveway, she did something to me. I don’t know what it was, but it was cold and awful, just like in the pool house.”

“Maybe you actually got probed by an alien and you just don’t remember the trip to the UFO.”

Patronizing. I hated him already.

“Stop it,” Farah said. “She made my head hurt.”

“Poor little rich girl. Here.” He patted his lap. “Come and tell me all about it.”

“You’re a jerk.”

“Why’s that?” James crooked his finger at her, adding to his invitation. “I just want to make you forget about your bad dreams.”

Farah bunched her fists and pressed them to her temples. “You’re not listening! These aren’t dreams. She’s real, and she’s outside.”

As he laughed again, I wondered if it was worth listening to the rest of the conversation or if I should go ahead and make another empathy run into Farah. As usual, her fear had juiced me, and now that I’d discovered how Elizabeth had been killed, I was keen to learn more about what Gavin had done to protect Farah from her dad around four years ago, if I could judge by how many candles had been on Noah’s birthday cake.

I had my suspicions about what’d happened. But I needed confirmation.

I gave James and Farah a little more time, though, because I might get something interesting out of this.

He just kept laughing, and she kept getting more unhinged.

“Shut up!” she screamed at him. “Just shut. Up!”

“Farah,” he said, his humor disappearing. “There’s no such thing as ghosts.”

“God, Gavin says you’re too observant, that you’re always hanging around the pool like you’re watching and listening to us, but you sure are deaf, dumb, and blind now.”

I doubted Gavin had any idea that James was so observant that he watched Wendy in her bedroom window. But what Farah had just said made another lightbulb go off in me.

Gavin thought James was observant, right? So that would explain why the pool guy had shown up in Gavin’s second dream, lingering by the pool while I had climbed out of it. He’d been a natural part of the surreal dreamscape, but obviously Gavin had no idea how important the guy really was in the scheme of things. Or did he actually have a deep-seated discomfort with James, even while he had no clue about what the pool guy really knew?

James propped one ankle over his knee, hanging his arm on the back of his chair. “If I bother Gavin so much, then why doesn’t he just fire me?”

“Because I won’t let him.” Farah had almost hissed at him. “But you know that just as well as you know that you like to personally clean our pool because it gives you an excuse to be around me. At least, that’s why you say you don’t send any of your employees to do the work there.”

“I do like being around you, babe.”

Now he had the sexy voice going on. Uck.

She shook her head, hugging herself. “You said at the beginning that you had always loved me, even if you didn’t know me, and when you heard me talking about Elizabeth on the phone a few months ago, you already knew that you were going to protect my secret. So protect me now, James. I swear to God I’m telling the truth about Elizabeth coming back.”

He got out of his chair and went to her, putting his hands on her bare arms and rubbing up and down. “I have protected your secret, as well as you. I’ll protect you more than anyone ever will.”

“Will you?”

“Yeah. Even more than that lead detective you fucked so you could wrap him around your finger and persuade him that none of your family could’ve possibly murdered a woman in such cold blood.”

She gave him a wounded look.

He said, “I’m just pointing out how smart you were to cover your ass all over the place. You were good at it, too.”

“Until you overheard. You were supposed to have gone home.”

“Hey. I’m on your side.”

She went to embrace him, pressing her cheek to his chest as he pulled her close, looking bored. But she couldn’t see what a jackass he was. And she couldn’t see me watching her, noticing the emptiness in her own gaze.

Was she thinking about the lengths she went to in order to keep him happy? Or was she thinking about how Gavin had once protected her?

From one protector to another. That seemed to be her MO, and it rankled me to see her being such a victim. Or was she more of a chess player, like Amanda Lee?

James patted her back. “You don’t have anyone else who’ll understand you like I do. What other man is going to sympathize with you about what a bastard your dad is? Same with your mom, when she just stood by and let him sneak into your room at night?”

“Why do you have to talk about them?”

“We don’t.”

Manipulator. But Farah had to play along, didn’t she? She didn’t have a choice about dumping him, so why not make the most of it? Maybe she really did even have an odd, sexual connection with him, like in a Kathleen Turner movie.

They were quiet for a blessed moment, until James set Farah away at arm’s length.

“There’re some things we do need to talk about, though. You know that.”

She pushed out a sigh. “What is it this time? A hang glider? Another car? A newer house? My bank account’s going to start running low, James.”

“Secrets are expensive,” he said, tweaking her chin, acting like he was kidding.

I’d known from the get-go that he had no love for Farah. Maybe he liked her body—what red-blooded male wouldn’t?—but he liked her money more.

I could see Farah’s face going from the false security she’d just felt in his arms to betrayal. It was that fast. Didn’t James know what happened to people who betrayed her?

“Would you fight a ghost for me?” she asked.

He laughed. “Sure, Farah.”

Her smile was bitter. “You really do think I’m out of my head, don’t you? Maybe you always have.”

I was sure that my haunting had put everything in perspective for her, and she was desperate, scared.

Paranoia, the destroyer…

She was the one who was laughing now, softly. “When I came here for comfort, it didn’t take you but fifteen minutes to hold Elizabeth over my head. You couldn’t even do me the courtesy of pretending you believed I saw her outside.”

A man of little patience, the idiot said, “Maybe you should just call your therapist.”

“My therapist doesn’t know about Elizabeth. Are you insane? You wouldn’t even know about her, except you were creeping around the pool that day when I was talking on the phone.”

He didn’t ask to whom she’d been talking, so I assumed either that she’d told him about Noah’s part in the murder or that she’d lied her way around it.

“God,” she said. “I’ve been such a mess that I believed every promise you ever made to me. How pathetic is that?”

James chuffed. “What’s pathetic is that you suck the life out of everyone with your neediness.” Then he got real mean. “You’ve got to be crazy to think that I was in this for anything but what you gave me, and if that dries up…”

Farah’s chest was rising and falling. “What? Why don’t you finally say it? What happens if I don’t give you everything you’re always asking for, you greedy son of a bitch?”

His gaze traveled to a phone that was waiting on the nearby metallic bar.

“What’s Gavin’s number again?” he asked mockingly.

I don’t know how many times he’d used this line on her to get what he wanted, but he obviously couldn’t see that she was in unstable shape tonight after being traumatized by Elizabeth.

She sprinted toward the bar, but he was faster, beating her to the phone and holding it over his head, laughing all the while.

“You wouldn’t be able to stop me if you tried,” he said.

“Fuck you!”

“Oh, but remember? You’ve been doing that since I found out your little secret. And I have to say, the pleasure’s really wearing off.”

He was pushing Farah to her limits, and I don’t know what he thought he’d get out of this besides more anger.

As I said, Farah was not in the mood tonight. I’d broken her, and it’d been pretty easy, not to mention well deserved.

Tauntingly, he began to dial the phone, still raising it in the air, but she didn’t jump for it like a lot of women would. No, Farah calmly stared at him, and I could see the decision she made right then and there.

And when she reached to the end of the bar, where a vodka bottle was standing, I didn’t stop her from grabbing it.

“Oh, ho-ho,” James said. “What’re you gonna do with that, huh? Hit me wi—”

She’d already swung the bottle, and it crashed against his skull. It didn’t break, but it did make James drop the phone and stumble toward the bar.

“You fucking bitch.”

Then she used both hands to smash the bottle on the bar.

Liquid bled off the metal and dripped onto the shag carpet as she held up the jagged weapon and shoved it at him. Straight into his eye.

He dropped to the floor with a jolting thud, a long shard of glass sticking out of him as his other, intact eye locked onto the ceiling. Blood mingled with the vodka, running to the floor.

At first, Farah just stood there, staring some more.

I couldn’t believe I hadn’t done anything to stop her. But should I have? Could I have?

She began to laugh, relieved, hysterical. She laughed so hard that she sank to her knees by James and bent over, clutching her stomach.

I wasn’t sure I wanted to be in her mind anymore, but I had to go inside. I had to tie up all the loose ends. So I floated down out of my corner, ready to strike, but she must’ve felt me, because she yanked her head up, her gaze blazing with rage.

“You,” she said, her voice mangled. “You made me do this.”

I have to say, that pissed me off. I hated how she didn’t take responsibility for anything. I hated her right now, because I still remembered the look on Elizabeth’s face as she was being choked, the ultimate fear in her eyes as she realized that she was dying.

I was pretty sure I’d looked like that, too, when I was murdered.

Farah ticked me off so much that I did something out of my ordinary: my hand hardened, and when I reached for her side-braid, I made contact with her, pulling with everything I had. She screamed, her head rearing back, her hands reaching for her hair.

When I jerked it again, she flew off the floor, and I dragged her around the room as she’d dragged Elizabeth’s body into the tall grass that night.

Murderer, I thought as my own mind began to fritz with images of an old lady mask, an ax, a dark night in Elfin Forest…

As Farah squirmed on the floor, getting loose from my grip, my energy expanded. I liked her anger. Better than fear. More, more, more.

Lashing out at her, I made contact with her arm, and fingernail marks appeared.

She screamed again as I took another swipe, giving her more welts. Then I butted against her, and she went reeling a few feet, crashing into a metal table.

“I know what you did,” I yelled, not even pretending to be Elizabeth anymore. Not caring that communicating with her would sap me, because I was feeling strong. Feeling righteous.

I waved a hand through the air, manipulating the energy in it, and a standing battery-powered lamp sailed from one end of the room toward Farah as she struggled to get up. When it banged into her, sending her to the floor, I laughed, then summoned another skinny metallic lamp.

As its power cord pulled out of the wall, sparks zitzed and the light strobed. It caught Farah as she was rolling over.

“Stop!” she screamed.

“Stop?” I materialized to her for a blipping instant, then disappeared.

Now she was crying, clawing at the floor as she tried to get away from me.

“I’ll stop,” I said, “after you tell everyone what you’ve done.”

“Fuck you!”

“A generous soul and a rapier wit. You must be proud.”

I sent a potted bunch of decorative branches through the air, toward Farah, and she lifted her arms to fend them off. Somehow I made the pot halt in midair, and it hovered in front of her as she cowered.

“Did you know,” I said, calling on my computer research, “that there’s only one recorded death from a spirit in the history of the United States? The Bell Witch.”

Farah was sobbing at the implied threat and, in the state I was in, I didn’t even stop to ask myself why more ghosts didn’t kill asshole humans.

“The Bells were a pioneer family in Tennessee,” I said, “and some say a mean old woman came back from the grave to haunt the family out of revenge. Some say the father screwed her over in a land deal, and she wasn’t about to take that.”

I jerked the pot, and Farah winced.

“But I’m not here for revenge,” I said.

“You’re here for Elizabeth.” Her voice was a squeak.

“I’m here for justice.”

As the plant continued to hover and she shrank back more, my words rang through me, catching on the remaining memories of the mask and the ax that still haunted me.

Was this justice? Or was I getting revenge on my own killer the only way I could right now, by projecting him onto Farah?

The sound of a door opening downstairs made me lose concentration, and the pot dropped in front of her. She hauled in a breath, looking around for me, not finding me. Then, when footsteps thundered up a nearby staircase and voices yelled out Farah’s name, she cried back to them, all helpless and dumb.

“Here! Oh God, I’m here. Help me!”

I whooshed back to a corner of the ceiling, not knowing what to expect now but eager to see what happened. I thought I’d heard Gavin, Wendy, and Noah in the group, but would they have Eileen the cleaner with them?

Weird thought. Wasn’t the family here because Farah had run off like a loon, not because a spirit had captured her? But still. A ghost couldn’t be too careful.

As their footsteps pounded down the hallway, Farah wiped the tears off her face. She glanced at the dead James nearby, then at the room’s entrance.

I didn’t like the heavy, resigned smile that weighed down her mouth.

“I’m still going to get away with this,” she said, and I knew she was talking to me. “You can’t stop me.”

What the hell did she mean by that? I didn’t wait around to find out, because I barged from the room, going toward the footsteps.

When I saw Gavin, Wendy, and Noah rushing toward me, I zipped down to the floor and materialized for a second. It drained me slightly, but it worked, because the trio halted right away.

“Did you see that?” Gavin said. “It’s her.”

“I know,” Wendy said, much more accepting than her older brother.

But Noah, who must’ve recovered just fine from his fainting spell, took cover behind Gavin.

“Holy shit!” he said.

“Wear your big-boy pants, Noah,” Wendy said, her voice level. “It’s just the ghost who was at our house earlier. I don’t know why she’s here when I told all her other ghost friends to get lost, but…” She addressed me. “Why are you here?”

I wanted to ask why they were here instead, but I supposed Noah knew about James and had guessed Farah would retreat here since that was what she always seemed to do when things got stressful. He probably even had access to this address.

But this was no time for chatter, even though I wanted to ask Wendy why Scott and Twyla had so easily deserted her. Maybe they’d gotten bored with nothing happening at the mansion anymore. Or maybe they thought I had this under control now. Probably the bored part.

“Wendy,” I said, knowing she could see and hear me without my having to expend any more energy than usual. “Don’t go in there, please. Farah went off the deep end, and I don’t know what she’s going to do next. She murdered Elizabeth.”

Wendy suffered another gut punch. I was really throwing them around tonight.

Noah was gaping at his supernatural sister while Gavin searched around for me with his cautious gaze. Wendy had obviously filled them in on her developed talent on the car ride over.

“Just listen to me,” I said to her. “I don’t know what Noah told you, but I saw Farah murder Elizabeth. James, the guy who does your pool, knew about it. He’s been blackmailing her for months.”

Wendy’s mouth opened, and she jerked her gaze over to Noah. Obviously, he hadn’t revealed much except for that Farah had probably run off to her so-called boyfriend’s, distressed about the night’s events.

“She killed James to shut him up,” I said. “So don’t go in there. It’s grisly, and she’s dangerous. She’s got a screw that really got loose tonight.”

I didn’t tell Wendy why. The last thing I needed was a million questions about hallucinations and how I could be so callous as to haunt the shit out of Farah.

I realized that Wendy wasn’t listening to me anymore, and I swung around to see why.

Farah was standing in the hallway with the broken bottle in hand, a trickle of red coming from her temple where a lamp had hit her. Blood caked the long shard that she had obviously pulled out of James’s eye.

Noah clutched the back of Gavin’s shirt as his older brother stepped forward.

“Farah?” Gavin asked.

She was going to avoid punishment for Elizabeth’s murder, all right. I had a feeling that she meant to take her own life on her own terms.

I looked back at Wendy. “I think she’s about to kill herself. You can stop it, get her to confess, come clean so Elizabeth’s loved ones can have closure. Just work with me.”

I didn’t want her alive, but this wasn’t my call.

Wendy didn’t take much convincing. “What do you want me to do?”

“Do what anyone would do to convince her to live,” I said.

“She won’t listen to me, not ever.”

Gavin had backed Noah against the wall, keeping him safe and covered, and I realized that there was only one person Farah respected and admired above everyone else. One person she would listen to, if he knew just what to say. And he had taken Wendy’s hand and pulled her back to the wall, too.

“What’s going on, Wen?” Gavin asked with both his siblings behind him as Farah swayed on her feet.

“The ghost says Farah’s about to kill herself,” Wendy whispered. “And the ghost knows why.”

I had an idea, and it was a long shot, so I went to Gavin and pressed hard against his cheek, praying that he wouldn’t shut me out of him.

He didn’t, and I sent him a quick hallucination.

Farah standing in her long nightgown, gripping the broken bottle like a knife.

As she looks at us, she raises the shard toward her wrist.

“I killed Elizabeth for you, Gavin.”

Before we can stop her, she slices from the base of her hand up, opening her skin, blood pouring out. Then she lifts the glass to her throat and yanks it over her neck… .

I pulled out of him, hovering near his ear, whispering, “You’ve got to stop this. Tell her not to do it. If she confesses, everything will be okay. Hurry.”

He’d been through too much to doubt me. So he walked away from the wall while still using his arms to bar his siblings.

“Farah, we thought you might be here, with James. Noah knew the address.”

“James is dead.” Farah drifted toward the stair railing, leaning over it to look at the first floor, which was all cold, hardwood. “He tried to hurt me.”

All the Edgetts had gone pale at the news. Noah tried to break away from Gavin, but he pushed his younger brother back.

“Why don’t you give me the bottle?” he said to Farah. “You don’t need it anymore if James is gone. He can’t hurt you now.”

“He was going to tell everyone,” Farah said. “I couldn’t let him. There can’t be any witnesses or eavesdroppers left behind.”

Noah finally broke away from Gavin, and he rushed over to Farah before his brother could stop him.

“Don’t do this… ,” he said, reaching out for her.

But she reached out for him first, bringing the shard up to his throat.

Slow-motion shock—a little like a dream—took over. Wendy was screaming. Gavin was frozen. Farah was ready to cut her beloved brother’s throat, leaving no witnesses behind.

“All for one and one for all,” I heard her whisper to him.

I wouldn’t let her take any collateral damage with her, and I got a really crazy idea that had to work, even if it would drain me more than anything a ghost could ever do.

I whispered to Gavin, “I know what to say to stop her because I saw what happened that night. Let me in!”

And possession was that easy, just as Twyla told me it’d be, because, in his panic, Gavin was open to me.

I slipped in, praying this would work.

His body jerked as I filled it. At the same time, I had access to everything about him, including his memories.

First, I saw what I’d seen in him during empathy, but it was all so clear now: Elizabeth punching him, accidentally scratching herself in the process, drawing blood on her skin as she shouted, “You’ve got to let me go! I don’t love you. Can’t you get that?”

Then, in another flickering second, I knew without a doubt what he’d done to protect Farah four years ago.

I saw a man—Dad—outside the door of Wendy’s room one night after a lot of nights when Gavin had caught him giving his littlest sister the same looks he’d given Farah when she was younger. Gavin hadn’t known about the abuse then, not until Farah had spilled her secret to him after seeing Dad watching Wendy, too.

I saw Gavin taking his father by the scruff of his shirt and pulling him toward a glass-doored balcony in the hallway, opening the door, pushing him against the railing.

“Farah told me,” he said. “It’d better not be true.”

Dad refused to answer, fighting back instead and, just like that, Gavin lost his grip on him, and Dad was falling, falling.

Then he was on the ground, facedown in a pool of blood, and Farah had come up behind Gavin, witnessing the whole thing.

“Thank you,” she’d said, burying her face in his arm. “I knew you’d make him pay one day.”

No one else had ever been the wiser. Farah had talked Gavin into a plan for the sake of Wendy and Noah, and their money had bought them the luxury of “sending” Dad overseas on a series of business trips. Justice had been served.

Elizabeth clearly hadn’t been Farah’s first experience with killing. And I was pretty sure that Wendy had heard the skirmish in that hallway when she was a little girl, based on what I’d seen in her own empathy images.

As I pulled back from the memory, we heaved in a breath while I got used to having a heavy human body again with a truly beating heart, skin, blood. A voice.

“Farah!” I said, the world going back to normal speed. I sounded just like Gavin. “You don’t want to do this. I don’t blame you for what you did with Elizabeth.”

That got her attention.

I’d had him speak softly, with more emotion than I’d ever heard him use with his sister. There’d been too much guilt about what he’d done to Dad. He could barely look at her afterward, and with the way she’d always tried to thank him with her affection—it was the only way she knew to express gratitude—he’d distanced himself.

As her gaze softened while she looked at him, still holding the shard to a trembling Noah’s neck, I had Gavin take a step closer.

“You only wanted to make her pay for hurting me,” he said. “And I understand. I love you for that.”

I felt Gavin cringe inside. He was repelled by this Farah, saddened by what she was now.

Farah’s eyes filled up, and her smile was tragic.

“Elizabeth took away your pride,” she said. “So I wanted to take her out of your life, just like you did with Dad for me and Wendy.”

I heard a breath being sucked in behind us and knew it was a shaken, baffled Wendy.

But our focus was all on Farah, who wasn’t asking how Gavin could possibly know the details of what happened with Elizabeth so he could talk about it now.

I could see when she became suspicious, though. I could see in her eyes when, again, reality caught up to her.

She turned to Noah, still clutching the bottle to his cheek.

“For months, I’ve had to live under the thumb of someone who knew what went on that night. But I’m not going to live through that again. Do you understand, Noah? You were there, too. You helped me hide what I did, and you’re just as guilty as I am.”

I heard Wendy sob, felt Gavin’s heart shudder at the news.

“Do you love me enough to set me free?” she asked.

Noah shook his head. But even if he didn’t understand what she was asking him to do, I sure did. No witnesses, she’d said. No complications.

When she prepared to slice his neck, I forced Gavin to run toward them.

Yet Noah, who’d loved his sister so much that he’d committed a crime for her, reacted first.

He took her by the wrist and tried to wrestle the bottle out of her grasp. But in the struggle, she leaned over the rail and—

As they went over it, Wendy screamed, and I shot out of Gavin’s body at his shock. We both slumped to the floor, but at least he had enough strength to crawl toward the railing, calling Farah’s and Noah’s names.

As for me? I couldn’t go anywhere. My essence was fluttering hard, and I didn’t even have the energy to call for my ghostly friends to come and help me.

Instead, I was starting to relive my death again.

Running through the woods, got to get away.

Not running fast enough—

The old lady mask… the ax…

I felt it all playing out in front of me, felt me disappearing into that time loop.

But just as the present started to get lost in the looped past, I felt a pair of warm hands on me, and my world shut down altogether.

24

When I came to, I saw stars.

And I’m not talking about cartoon character stars that circled my head—I’m talking purple haze and glowing celestial bodies that were suspended around me in a cluster.

Real bodies.

White and hazy, lying flat on their backs, just like they were hanging from invisible strings, sleeping with their eyes open. Men, women, boys, girls…

I realized I was dangling in the air, too, with a true body that was just as pale and glowy as the rest of them. But it didn’t freak me out as much as it should’ve. The lack of sound was peaceful in a way. So was this watery-spacey sensation, like I was in one of my hallucinations, lifted by the purple ocean, made lazy by the warmth of a dark sun.

Even the memories of the monstrous night I’d had were subdued, like they were in the process of being buried. I could recall what’d happened, like Farah grabbing Noah and going over the railing, Wendy screaming, Gavin trying to get to them even if it was too late. But I didn’t feel anything.

I just rested, breathing slowly with my star-place body.

It was all going really well, too, until I saw the last entity that I wanted to see.

Fake Dean, sauntering to my side with his chin-razored surfer blond hair, hands shoved in his jeans pockets, and a shit-eating grin.

But of course.

“You’re awake,” he said in that voice that made me want to touch him, run my fingers down his arm. “You gave me a scare.”

I laughed sarcastically, and it took a hell of a lot of energy. And why not when I’d possessed Gavin and, as a consequence, had started to fall into a time loop?

“This isn’t what I remember happening when I was an imprint,” I whispered.

“That’s because you’re not in a residual haunting phase, thanks to me.”

Fake Dean put his hand on my leg, and tendrils of heat coursed through me, just like searing blood blasting through veins. I stifled a soft breath of pleasure, because those tendrils were inching up to a place I didn’t want to get warmed up.

He seemed to know it, because that grin only got cockier.

“Stop that,” I said, talking a little louder.

“What?”

“That.”

“It’s good for you,” he said tauntingly. “My touch makes you color up and get strong.”

“I don’t need what you have to give.”

“Is that so?” He laughed, sexy and low. “Darlin’, is it too soon to remind you that I saved your ass?”

“I didn’t ask for any favors.”

All right, in spite of my feistiness, I was kind of glad he’d been there. Why did he have to gloat about it, though?

He slid his hand over my knee, and my belly tightened even more.

Crap.

“Jenny, you already know I’ve been watching you. And you know that I would’ve considered it an epic waste if you’d fallen back into a loop.”

“So you brought me here? To ‘hang out’?”

“See? You’re in a better mood already. Before you know it, you’ll be making good puns.”

“I’m not up for this.”

“No,” he said softly. “I don’t guess you are. You went through some heavy stuff tonight.”

Damn it, the Edgett memories had almost faded, and here he was, bringing them back: death, destruction, innocent people stained by what’d gone on at James the pool guy’s.

“Just so you know,” he said, “Farah, Noah, and James are without a doubt dead. James and Noah were shaken up so bad that they’ll be time loops in that house.”

Oh, that sucked. Not so much for James, but I felt bad for Noah, even if he’d been an accessory to murder.

Fake Dean read the emotion in me. “There’s nothing you can do about it, Jenny.”

That’s right. I remembered how McGlinn’s uncle died on a regular basis in his house and the partying ghosts couldn’t bring him out of it.

“It might interest you to know,” he continued, “that Farah moved on.”

“What?” I was still weak, but his touch was doing wonders to revive me. “Why does she get to do that and not the others?”

“When she went over that rail, she’d already planned to die, so there wasn’t much shock for her. But after she realized she was dead, a wrangler showed up, and her shade was screaming bloody murder as she moved on. I can’t tell you what that means, exactly, but I don’t think it’s good.”

“How about Wendy and Gavin?” The alive ones. “What’s happening with them?”

“Wendy’s in a state of shock, but your Gavin’s got her covered.”

Your Gavin? Jealousy again? His words were tight, so I guess he was a little green.

“The cops are still in the house with them right now,” he said, “but Gavin and Wendy aren’t revealing everything. They had to come clean about James’s body and how Farah killed herself and her brother, but Wendy asked Gavin not to tell anyone about Farah murdering Elizabeth, because it would implicate Noah.”

That’s right. Farah hadn’t told her siblings all the details about how Noah had aided her, but she’d said enough. And I couldn’t blame Wendy for protecting her brother. Even if they’d fought like cats and dogs, she was probably making excuses for him, thinking of Farah’s hold on him, especially at the age of fourteen.

Besides, Farah had paid for her crime, and I was pretty sure Elizabeth—and Amanda Lee—would be satisfied with that.

Fake Dean and I didn’t talk for a beat—I was trying to get the memories out of me again—and I side-glanced at the closest body. She had long curls that had gone white from the star place’s glow, and they spiraled down from her head. Her gaze was fixed above her, and she had a slight, fizzy grin on her face.

“A keeper, not a reaper,” I said to fake Dean, changing the subject. I just wanted to leave the night behind me.

He quirked an eyebrow, clearly knowing just what I was up to, then letting me get away with it. “All of these bodies you see are willing, if that’s what’s bothering you. And when they want to go into the light, I let them.”

The light. I remembered that glowing pool of lotus leaves I’d seen during my first visit.

“If they came willingly,” I said, “why did you try to get me here unwillingly before?”

“It’s not about how you got here. It’s about how long you want to stay.”

“Stay?” He was delusional. “Let me consider that for a sec. Staring into space, not moving around. Yeah, that really seems like the life.”

“You’re getting even peppier. Good.”

He skimmed his hand from my knee to my lower thigh, and for some stupid reason, I let him stay there. As always, it was so easy to remember the real Dean and how he’d looked at me when he wanted me.

The same way this Dean was looking at me now.

“Anyway,” he said, jerking his chin toward the nearest star woman, “don’t knock what they have until you try it.”

“Wasn’t I just trying it before I woke up?” I didn’t recall anything that’d happened after I’d almost time-looped back at James’s house and then ended up here.

“You’ve been healing.” His fingers were playing along the inner seam of my jeans, making me liquid again. “You got a lot taken out of you when you possessed Gavin, and I was magnanimous enough to put it all back into you.”

As he coasted his hand up my leg, to the front of my thigh, he watched his progress, like he was appreciating my body. Almost like he was the true Dean, remembering it.

“Do you want to know why all these souls stay with me?” he asked.

Sure, why not?

“In their minds up here,” he said, “life is perfect. They don’t have to constantly amuse themselves on the earthly plane. They don’t have to deal with humans. This is a certain paradise for them, and they don’t have to go into the light and take a chance that there’s no heaven, no nirvana. It’s right here.”

“What kind of dope do you give them?”

He laughed, squeezing my leg. I bit my lip, then stopped, hoping he hadn’t noticed.

He had, but he did me the favor of not mentioning it.

“I just touch them,” he said. “In case you haven’t noticed, I can do things with a touch.”

Slowly, he eased his hand up and over my hip, to my waist. I was toasty inside. Perfect. Almost paradise. He wasn’t just bragging about his talents.

“Why do you collect, though?” I asked, trying not to sound affected. “What’s in it for you?”

As he toyed with the bottom of my shirt, he sighed. “I’m old. Living eternally is a long haul, you know. If you don’t find new spirits to enjoy—ones who’re a little different from everyone else—then time becomes a slog.”

He’d already told me he liked my get-up-and-go attitude, that most ghosts didn’t have it. Even though it was nice to be liked, there wasn’t a Dean in the universe who could make me consider hanging out in the star place forever.

“I don’t know what you are,” I said. “But I know you’re never going to tell me. Needless to say, I can’t deal with that kind of relationship.”

“We all compromise somewhere down the line.”

“Not me.” Not anymore.

I wanted to get back down to the earth to see how Wendy was doing with her fully realized gift of sight. I wanted to introduce her to McGlinn so they would know they weren’t alone. I wanted to see the ghosts who’d already grown on me. But most of all, there was an even bigger murder to solve down there.

Mine.

Fake Dean had slid his hand over my stomach, and I reached up, putting my palm over him, even though the warmth rayed through me, giving me more strength.

“No compromises,” I said, pushing his hand away. “Ever.”

He smiled, amused by my challenge. Beings like him probably thrived on those.

Then, out of nowhere, he changed.

It was a subliminal fraction of a second that I wasn’t even sure was real, but I saw a ghostly image of a man—only an impression of dark compelling eyes and cheekbones to die for—then…

Bam. A flash of an angry, roaring beast.

I bolted up and averted my head, but when I glanced back at fake Dean, he’d shed that awful last image, and he was my old boyfriend again, grinning as if I’d imagined everything.

“What was that?” I was floating in midair still, like I was on an invisible pallet.

“What?”

Damn, he liked screwing around, and I knew asking more about that image would go nowhere.

“I think I want to go now.”

“Come on, Jenny. You have me at your disposal. Don’t you want to know anything else? Like how I know all about Dean?”

“You’re not going to tell me.”

He shrugged, like he still thought I’d change my mind about staying. “You know that I watch everything that goes on. Time doesn’t exist for me like it exists for you. I can go back and forth at my leisure.”

Dean used to say that. At my leisure. The sound of it tweaked me.

“I was watching when the two of you met at the beach,” he said. “A summer’s day with your friends, lying on a blanket in your Lightning Bolt swimsuit. He was coming out of the water with his surfboard and a couple of buddies, and they were camped nearby. You liked him right away, and after you got to talking, you found out he was educated, cool, and had his whole life together. You weren’t far out of high school then, and you admired where he was going.”

“I wanted to go there, too, wherever it was,” I said.

“You still can.”

His gaze locked on mine, and he reached out, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. Then he pulled a dirty trick that he’d used before to great success.

He assumed my Dean’s personality, not just his appearance.

“When I pulled away from you in my car that day,” he said, “driving off to college, I almost turned back around. What if I had, Jenny? Where would we be now?”

I shook my head, shying away from his touch.

But he captured my chin between his thumb and forefinger. “You could find out right now.”

“By lying back down and becoming one of your collection?”

“Don’t think of it that way. Just think of how I’m waiting for you if you’d just relax and close your eyes. Why don’t you give it a try, and if you don’t like it…”

He nearly had me. I mean, why not when Dean was waiting for me? The Dean of my fantasies. The guy I’d lived for and died without.

He must’ve sensed that I needed more of a push, and he bent his head, his hair getting darker, his entire body transforming…

When he looked up, he’d become my mom, looking as she’d looked on the day I last saw her: tanned, with the same blond-red hair I had except short and windblown. She was still young enough to have freckles across her nose and cheeks and not have anyone mistake them as age spots.

“I’m there, too, Jen,” she said. “So is Suzanne. You haven’t seen her in years, and she hasn’t changed a bit.”

Suze. I’d visited her just after Amanda Lee had pulled me out of my time loop; she was old before her time, weary. I wished I’d never seen the present-day Suze, and here I was, being offered a chance to forget that one ever existed.

Next thing I knew, my dad was touching my cheek. My Brawny Paper Towel Man dad, with his mustache and carefree light brown hair.

“What’s down there that’s better than up here?” he asked. “Don’t you love us enough to be with us?”

I couldn’t look at him and not feel. He was the one who would always sneak me out of the house to get me chocolate-dipped ice-cream cones at Foster’s Freeze. He was the one who’d tried to be all tough and not to get emotional when Brad Shea had picked me up for my first date to homecoming.

I’d been a daddy’s girl, and to hear him ask if I didn’t love him anymore? It was too much to resist. Just imagine—a place where no one ever died or left you behind. A spot where I could forget what I’d experienced tonight with all the pain and blood. A haven where I’d never been killed.

What was our existence, anyway? A mirage? One big hallucination caused by the hugest spirit of all?

I almost allowed this entity to lure me into his star collection right then and there, but then something odd happened. In the quiet of the star place, I heard a voice echoing. Two voices.

And they sounded like Randy and Louis.

Immediately, my dad disappeared and fake Dean came to take his place, chuckling, obviously knowing that I wasn’t deaf.

“Looks like you’re strong enough to hear them now,” he said. “I was hoping I’d have enough time to woo you before that happened.”

“Why do I hear them?”

“They’re a part of the air, and they’ve been calling for you nonstop. Louis summoned Randy, and they’re with Amanda Lee, worrying about how long you’ve been away without reporting in. It’s an hour away from sunrise down there.”

I heard the concern in Randy’s and Louis’s voices as they faded.

Randy, who could have been knocking over bottles in bars instead. Louis, who could have been spending his time with his nose in a book.

I got off the invisi-pallet and stood, knowing that, if I left, I wouldn’t have this body anymore. I wouldn’t be able to feel the real Dean’s fingers on my face or my arms or legs unless I encountered him in a dream. And I wouldn’t see my mom and dad again unless I someday moved on, too.

I could have all that here, but was it what I really wanted? My old life?

“This sounds funny,” I said, “but I actually have too much to live for down there. Does that make any sense?”

I could see that I’d only ratcheted up fake Dean’s interest in me with my resistance. I could see it in his eyes.

“Nothing about you makes sense,” he said. “And everything, too.”

Cryptic, but what was new?

I had to get back. I didn’t like that Randy and Louis were worried. “Thanks for the save.”

“You’re welcome, but you realize one thing, don’t you? Someday you’re gonna come back to me.”

His words were playful but dark. He said this like he was only letting me go right now because he knew where the line between seduction and force was.

“Don’t hold your breath,” I said.

I started to walk away, and this show of independence would’ve been awesome except for the fact that I didn’t know where the exit to this damned place was.

As I put my hands on my hips, fake Dean laughed, but then got serious pretty quickly.

“One more thing,” he said. “Keep an eye out for what you call the ‘dark spirit.’ It’s still out there, and it’s just as interested in you as I am.”

That gave me the brrrs in my star-place body, but I wasn’t about to let him see that.

“Thanks for the warning. It’d help if you told me what it was… ?”

He only lifted that eyebrow, and I knew he was just like any spirit, finding amusement where he could because, otherwise, time was an emotion killer.

As he stood there, the invisible ground started to fall away below me, like ice cubes dropping out of a tray. Fake Dean grinned, enjoying his little jokes.

The floor opened up and I plunged back to earth, zooming like a comet, feeling my celestial body transform, taking me away from coma-paradise and back to the weirdness of life.

After I performed a very ungraceful landing in a strawberry field that spread under the starry sky, I realized that I’d dug a ditch from the force of my entrance. It smoked as I stood to check over my essence.

Colorful and uninjured. But why wouldn’t it be after fake Dean’s attentions?

Feeling like myself again—the ghost self I truly was—I looked up at the stars, wondering where I’d been hanging.

And why fake Dean had been so cocky about thinking that I’d be back someday.

25

When I got to Amanda Lee’s, she and Louis and Randy were indeed waiting for me on her front porch, near the swing.

But two other ghosts had shown up in the meantime.

Twyla and Scott flew over to me right away, leaving Randy and Louis behind as Amanda Lee stood from the swing, looking at me from a distance.

“Where’ve you been?” Scott asked as Twyla bobbed with curiosity, surveying my major color with a bit of awe.

“That’s a question I could ask you,” I said. “You guys left Wendy alone after I asked you to stay with her.”

Twyla put her hands on her hips. “After you chased Farah, Little China Girl told us to scram, and I wasn’t about to babysit a mouthy, emotionally on-fire trend queen who called my wardrobe ‘unfortunate.’ So I took off to UCSD, you know? There’s always some pinhead playing with a Ouija board in the dorms or whatever.”

Scott piped in. “There was nothing happening, so I went with Twyla. I guess we should’ve stayed… .”

He was baiting me for an explanation as to what’d gone on.

I shook my head. “I doubt your presence would’ve changed anything in the end. Just come with me to talk with the others.”

“Changed what?” they both asked, and I waved them on and floated toward the porch, where I would have to break the news to Amanda Lee.

By the time I got there, Amanda Lee could sense something big had gone down.

Randy’s relieved smile even died on his face when he saw my expression, and he took up that sober sailor stance he’d assumed when he’d hovered near the bed of McGlinn’s time-looped uncle the other day.

As I told Amanda Lee everything—from the pool house hauntings, to discovering Farah was the killer and Noah was the helper, to the revelation of Daddy Edgett’s abuse and his death via Gavin—she slowly sat down again. I couldn’t read her face, but I could feel how much the news pummeled her. I think Louis could feel that from her, too, because he hovered near her, faithful and good, no matter what dimension he lived in.

“Are you okay?” I asked her after she’d had a few minutes to absorb it all.

She only nodded and clutched at her turquoise cross around her neck. “Farah? She was the one who did it?”

“Yeah.”

Amanda Lee gradually pushed the swing back, and it idly fell forward as she rode it, the chains groaning. I’m not sure she realized she was even moving.

Louis tried to smooth the rough moment. “We talked all night about those dreams that Gavin had, but now every meaning we came up with is null and void, I suppose.”

There was still so much to work out about the case, wasn’t there? I wanted to unwind all its threads. Louis was definitely up for it. I’m sure it would help Amanda Lee to come to terms with everything, too.

“All those twisted clues,” I said. “Right there in Gavin’s mind. I guess the girl pilots in the dreams weren’t his anima, after all. The main pilot was Farah and the second one was Wendy, and the air machines were a symbol of their high-flying, wonderful childhoods, when you’re supposed to be able to laugh and soar and have fun.”

“And the big dark bird really was death,” Louis said. “The dad’s death. And it was shadowing Farah and Gavin.”

“That means the dragon with the crushed face was their dad, because he didn’t have much of a face after he fell from that balcony. He was trying to pluck Farah out of the air and victimize her in that first dream, and in the second, when he was the spider, he did get her with his web. Gavin saved her both times.”

Yes, the motivations for Farah’s crime had been there, in his baffling subconscious, all along for me to figure out. But since Gavin hadn’t known Farah was Elizabeth’s killer, his clues hadn’t been clear enough to me.

“I feel so awful for him,” I said. “I haunted him for killing Elizabeth when he actually did it to his dad. I’m not sure he meant to kill him, though.”

Actually, I had the feeling I was wrong about that, because in that second dream, I suspected that Gavin and the bird had been working together, killing the father. But did I care? Frighteningly, I didn’t, because if Wendy had escaped the man’s abuse thanks to his death, that was just fine by me.

Louis gave me a sympathetic glance. “If Gavin’s dreams were any indication of how he felt about Elizabeth, he was haunted before you even got to him. Thoughts of her death were tearing him apart.”

True. Gavin lived in a world of blood. He’d killed, and I’m sure even more dreams than I’d witnessed had featured him in leather chairs with red trailing from his fingertips, him wearing clear masks with gory tears slipping down his face.

He’d worn a mask for four years now, existing with memories of violence and despair. But I’d made it worse.

“Gawd,” Twyla said from where she was sitting on the porch railing. “When humans aren’t being clowns, they’re sure being bummers. Bleh.”

Louis, Randy, and Scott sent her chiding looks, but Twyla was Twyla, and she summoned a travel tunnel, flying toward it.

“You guys are being total bummers, too. Like, call me when you’re off your depresso pills.”

She shot off, the tunnel sucking up behind her like a mouth turning into nothing.

An oblivious Amanda Lee was just as pale as every other human I’d encountered tonight. “So this is what closure feels like.”

I didn’t know what to say.

But she was ready to talk now. “I feel horrible about Gavin and Wendy, as well.”

“As far as I know,” I said, “they decided to keep the whole truth to themselves. They didn’t tell the cops everything.”

“Then we won’t go to the law with our findings. Not that they would even believe us. I don’t want to, anyway, for their sakes. They’ve been through enough.”

“And Farah paid for what she did,” Louis said.

Amanda Lee looked toward his voice. “I don’t feel badly about Farah.”

When Scott added his two cents, it seemed she could hear him vaguely, too.

“She got her just deserts,” he said.

The only thing I regretted was that she’d gotten her way in the end, going out on her terms and taking Noah with her. I felt sad for the little girl who’d been abused and warped, but that part of her had died a long time ago.

“Noah didn’t deserve it,” Amanda Lee said. “I know he helped with…”

She didn’t have to say, “Desecrating Elizabeth’s body” to clarify.

Clearing her throat, she went on. “He was a casualty in that demented house, just as much as Wendy and Gavin. Why couldn’t I see any of this?”

Randy spoke. “Not everybody can see everything,” he said.

“Wendy turned out to see more than I expected, though,” I said. “How did that even happen?”

Amanda Lee let her hand fall from her cross. “We all work differently. You triggered something in her, Jensen, and her life will never be the same.”

Scott’s turn. “I just hope that dark spirit doesn’t come back for them or whoever it was after.”

“I wish I’d found out what that was,” I said.

Randy smiled. “You can’t do everything, either, Jen.”

Being a ghost, with all these powers, made me think I could. It seemed such a waste to screw around like Twyla for the rest of my existence when there was so much I could do.

But hadn’t Randy insinuated that, someday, I would change?

We all just sat or hovered there for a minute… until something hit me.

“Shit,” I said. “Shitshitshit. The Edgetts’ dad died on their property. You don’t think…”

“Shee-it,” Randy said, catching on.

I could tell Louis, Scott, and Amanda Lee were thinking the same thing.

Was the dark spirit Daddy Edgett, who’d come through a portal?

Amanda Lee was just about pulling at her necklace now, a vein throbbing in her throat. “This isn’t the end. We put one wrong to rights tonight, but there’s still so much to do.”

With other humans who might need closure? Or just the Edgetts and their maybe-dark-spirit dad?

I didn’t get the chance to ask, because Randy saluted me.

“Dawn’s comin’,” he said, then quickly summoned a travel tunnel to get the hell out. He was gone within fifteen seconds.

I shrugged to Amanda Lee. “Randy’s got a letter to look for.”

Louis nodded, almost to himself. I’d noticed he’d stayed after Amanda Lee had hinted at her penance. Scott, too.

“One thing you could do,” I said to Amanda Lee, “is set your mind on finding out whether Wendy’s mom ever moved on.”

I wasn’t about to ask fake Dean about that. Give me a break.

“Would you keep an eye on Wendy, as well?” Amanda Lee asked us ghosts. “And… Gavin?”

We all nodded. I wasn’t just doing it for Amanda Lee’s conscience, either. I’d grown a soft spot for Wendy, and I was worried about how she was dealing with tonight’s abysmal events.

Gavin, too. Yeah, there it was. I admitted it.

Amanda Lee stood, holding her hand out to me. “But most important, we’ve got your murder to solve. Can you trust me enough to do that?”

Louis smiled at her. “I’m with you.” Then he smiled at me, letting me know he was in for a penny, in for a pound.

“Count me in,” Scott said, floating up the stairs, standing on the other side of Amanda Lee. He looked like he wanted to make up for disappointing me tonight.

She couldn’t see them, but I could, and they made quite a team. Two ghosts I trusted and one human I still wasn’t sure about.

Funny. Even though I technically didn’t have a spine anymore, I’d somehow grown one. I wasn’t going to ever be manipulated again as Amanda Lee had done to me.

And with or without her, I was going to make my killer regret murdering me.

I went up to the porch, sweeping my essence over Amanda Lee’s outstretched hand, and for a second, Louis and Scott joined us in a huddle.

But when she shivered, we all backed off.

I told them there was somewhere I had to be, and I asked Louis and Scott to let me travel there alone.

The cops had obviously let Gavin and Wendy go home, and the mansion was ablaze with lights through some of the windows that had curtains open now. Even though I knew how to overcome salt barriers, I didn’t want to tangle with any incantations that’d been said against me by the cleaner, so I stayed outside. Besides, I’d had enough drama for the night, and I knew that the Edgetts wouldn’t want me nearby, so I respected that, peering in the windows instead, deciding to stick around in case the dark spirit, aka maybe-bad Dad, came by.

I found Gavin and Wendy in her room, where her curtains were parted.

They were on the floor, leaning back against the bed, which had a suitcase open on top of it and clothes strewn around, like Wendy had been packing items so they could get out of this house and maybe to somewhere with fewer memories before she’d abruptly stopped.

Below the bed, she was slumped in Gavin’s arms, fast asleep. I imagined how she might’ve been having a fit of emotion and they’d both sunk there and he hadn’t dared to move for fear of waking her up.

Gavin was finally sleeping, too, although his face looked tougher than ever, still a fighter, still a protector.

I almost left them in peace, but then I saw the pencil that must’ve fallen out of his hand and the drawings near his leg that he must’ve been creating as he’d cradled sleeping Wendy.

Drawings of a young woman with light, flowing hair. One who wore a long-sleeved blouse over a tank top, plus jeans and tennis shoes. She looked like… well, a denim angel.

She looked like me.

Touched in a way that was just as protective as Gavin was for his family, I backed away from the window, just one of many ghosts for the Edgetts.

A justifier who was going to do as much reckoning as she could.

Content

Only The Good Die Young
Jensen Murphy, Ghost for Hire - 1
by
Chris Marie Green

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A FREE SPIRIT

In the Beginning…

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