“He’s going to find me. I know he’s going to—”
She let out a shriek, head jerking up, eyes rounding. Then she fell back against the wall, hands up. Blood spread across her dress as she screamed. The knife plunged in again.
“Help! Please help!”
I did. Not by running to shield her or pull her away. I couldn’t do that. Instead, I focused on whoever was stabbing her, to see him, to pull him through the ether. I tried every trick I knew to summon the ghost attacking her, and I didn’t see so much as a flicker. An invisible force just kept stabbing her with an invisible knife until she lay there, heaped by the foot of the wall, eyes closed.
I knelt down to her and said, “Can you hear me? I don’t understand what’s—”
Her eyes flew open. “Help us. Stop him.”
Before I could say a word, she disappeared.
SIX
A third victim came after that, this one in a cleaning uniform and ponytail, the exact period difficult to guess but seemingly more modern. She ran in, she saw me, she entreated me to help her, then “he” came and she died. Again I tried with all my power to pull her attacker through—to no avail.
Then it started anew, with the first victim. This time, I concentrated on trying to make contact with the attacker, to get him to speak to me. Still nothing. She died, and the second girl returned. I asked her questions, begged her to reply. She didn’t. She looked right at me. She tried to get me to hide with her. But she wouldn’t—or couldn’t—answer my questions.
“I need you to talk to me!” I said as she faded. “I can’t help unless—”
“You can’t help.” It was a man’s voice behind me.
I turned. “Show yourself.”
His laughter fluttered around me.
“Who are you?” I said.
No answer.
“What am I seeing?” I said. “What did you do down here?”
Silence.
“Are you showing me this? What do you want?”
“Run,” his whisper snaked past, raising goose bumps on my arms.
“You’re a ghost,” I said. “I don’t run from ghosts.”
His voice, right at my ear: “You will.”
I stumbled back in spite of myself.
“Help me …”
I looked down to see the first girl, on the floor, lifting her hand.
“Help me …” The girl from the fifties appeared beside me, both hands reaching for me.
As I backed away, the cleaning girl whispered behind me, “Help me …”
“Help us,” all three said, all reaching for me, their hands covered in blood. “Help us or join—”
The doorknob rattled. I staggered away from the dead girls. A crack. The door flew open, light flooding through, and all I saw was a figure silhouetted there, and I pushed back into the corner—
“Jaime?”
I ran into Jeremy’s arms.
The natural first question, on finding your girlfriend locked in a basement room, would be, “How’d you get in here?” or at least, “What happened?” Jeremy just held me until I got myself together. Then I told him the whole story.
When I finished, I walked to the door and looked at it. “It was just jammed, wasn’t it?”
“We should go upstairs,” he said after a moment.
“The door. It wasn’t locked, was it? And don’t lie to make me feel better. There is no lock. I can see that.”
“Then the knob was jammed, because I had to break something to get in here.” He walked over and put his arms around me. “You were trapped, Jaime. Don’t tell yourself you made a mistake. And don’t tell yourself those were residuals, either.”
I nodded but said nothing.
“Residuals don’t talk to you,” he said.
“They didn’t talk to me. They talked at me.” I paused and shook my head. “I don’t know what they were. Maybe they were residuals, and I’m just under a lot of stress and—”
“No.”
“It’s a new show, and I—”
“No.” He took my chin in his hand and tilted my face up to his. “You have never hallucinated in your life. I don’t have an explanation for what you saw, but you saw something.”
“Can we stay somewhere else tonight?”
He chuckled. “We can absolutely stay somewhere else tonight. In fact, I insist.”
I paused.
“No,” he said.
“I was just—”
“There’s nothing here for you to do, and you won’t feel guilty about leaving.”
“Maybe I should try to contact any spirits—”
“I’ll have Elena research past crimes connected to this inn. If we find anything, we can come back after the show and you can attempt a proper summoning. After the show. You saw three victims spanning almost a century?”
I nodded.
“I’m not even sure how that’s possible, but it means we aren’t dealing with a serial killer who’ll strike in the next few days. You can walk away.” He met my gaze. “Guilt free.”
I kissed him. “Thank you.”
“Is it haunted?” Mike asked as he followed us down the inn’s front steps.
I threw a look over my shoulder.
“Okay, okay,” he said. “There’s no such thing as ghosts. But that could be why you’re checking out. We could say that’s the reason.”
“I don’t think the inn would appreciate that,” Jeremy said as he steered me toward the parking lot.
“Then you’d be dead wrong, my friend. Pun intended. Being haunted is a marketing bonus with places like this. The trick is to only have a room or two with ghosts, so guests have the option.” He paused. “Which room were you in?”
“My room was not—”
“Of course it wasn’t. But imagine the publicity. Oh! Hold on. We need to film you guys leaving. I’ll call Brad. We’ll use digital. Make it seem very spur-of-the-moment. You’re freaked out and fleeing—”
“Michael?” Jeremy said.
It may have been the use of his full name that stopped Mike mid-spiel, but I think it was the tone, one that’s been known to stop Clay mid–temper tantrum. It worked for Mike.
“Are you certain this wouldn’t actually detract from the feature?” Jeremy said. “If Jaime flees from an inn twenty miles from the set location, it’s clearly unrelated. That might dilute her reactions at the real house.”
“How do I explain you leaving, though?”
“Don’t,” Jeremy said. “There’s nothing wrong with a little mystery, particularly if you make it very clear that the inn did nothing to make her leave. Let people draw their own conclusions.”
We walked down the corridor to our new hotel room. I turned to say something to Jeremy and for a second I forgot what. I just stared at him, that moment of “hot damn” that never seems to go away. I remember when we first got together, thinking, “Well, at least now I’ll stop gaping at him like a love-struck teen.” Nope. Never happened. Never will.
Jeremy is fifteen years older than me. With a werewolf’s slow aging, he doesn’t look it. Not that it matters. When he’s ninety, I’ll still be thinking, Hot damn. He has the kind of face that catches your attention and holds it. Arresting. Dark eyes, dark hair, sharp cheekbones, sharp chin. A face more fox than wolf, which isn’t surprising. He’s also a kitsunegari, meaning he has Japanese kitsune—fox spirit—blood.
Jeremy gestured down the hall. “Not exactly what you’re accustomed to.”