Ann put her own hands above her head. “This is no time for—”
She caught her distorted reflection in the window and there it sat, floating a couple of inches over her hair. Beyond the glass, the jumper slumped broken and skewered halfway down the lamppost, the lamp housing shattered but still radiating a sickly yellow light. As she tried to gather enough air to speak, the jumper slid down and separated himself from the pole. He patted it as if to say, “It’s here when you need it.”
“Get Wayne Wilson,” Ann said.
Duncan opened his mouth to protest, but Ann twisted her face into Bitch Mode. He nodded and retreated.
After the door closed, Ann went to the bathroom and checked the mirror. The halo looked as solid as forged steel. She grabbed at it, not knowing what she’d do when she had it, but her fingers passed through. Her eyes glittered in fright but her face was locked into Bitch Mode, no matter how much she worked her jowls to erase the expression.
She hated to admit it, but the halo was a nice accessory to Bitch Mode.
There had to be a scientific explanation, even if her brain was flooding itself with toxins and upsetting her perception.
As a researcher, she understood that the simplest answer was usually the right one.
And, in this case, that meant she was most likely a demonic bitch possessed by a denizen of hell.
And it wasn’t so bad.
A smile wended its way into the Bitch Mode facade.
Chapter 27
Wayne hummed the Monkees tune “I’m a Believer.”
He’d seen her face, and now he could no longer doubt. He didn’t know what she was now—a lost soul, a displaced memory of God, a photographic impression on the emulsion of reality, or simply an angel—but she was back again.
When she’d said “Forever,” she meant it.
Wayne couldn’t decide whether Amelia or Cristos would be the better channeler, but somehow he had to maintain contact with Beth. He rounded the corner toward 218 and nearly slammed into Burton.
“Digger,” Burton said. “Where ya been?”
“Busy,” Wayne said.
“Roach is AWOL, and so is the hotel manager, the MAC Attack is on the fritz, and we’re getting lots of actives. If I didn’t know better, I’d say all hell is breaking loose.”
“Cancel the hunts,” Wayne said.
Burton’s jaw dropped. “Fifty-seven registered and we got a lot of money tied up—”
“Give it back. I’ve got something more important to do.”
Wayne brushed past Burton, who grabbed at his shoulder. Wayne slapped the hand away and wheeled, eyes narrowed. “She’s here. I don’t care what the machines say.”
“Boss, we better—”
“Handle it,” Wayne said, already halfway down the hall. “The Digger is hanging up his shovel.”
He decided on Cristos Rubio, remembering how the man’s eyes had darkened while conning Gelbaugh. As Wayne descended the stairs, music and laughter trickled from the bar. Probably some of the hunters had found an outlet for their spare time.
You could pop in for a quick one. Just one little bitty shot.
He licked his lips and could almost taste the whiskey. His head swam in imagined pleasure and he nearly lost his balance on the steps. That was just the kind of thinking that caused people to say, “The Devil made me do it.” Because who’d ever want to own up to poor choices, bad behavior, and swallowing sweet poison when there was someone or something else to blame?
“What’s the harm in it, Digger?”
He looked around, unsure where the voice had come from. Someone was laughing on the second floor, but that voice was distant. This one had been near his ear.
He continued down the stairs, intent on passing the bar without a glance. A Rolling Stones song was grinding across the room and spilling from the door like cigarette smoke. Glass clinked and several dozen tongues blended into one thick murmur, televisions casting kaleidoscopic light. He couldn’t help himself. Blame the bar mirror, blame the Devil, blame the goddamned weather, but he had to look.
His eyes went first to the row of amber bottles stacked at the back of the bar, then over to the bartender, a spike-haired young man with a thick neck, then back to the bottles. He told his feet to keep right on walking, because he had a date with his dead wife, but drunks knew how to screw things up at the most inconvenient times. That’s what they did best, and who was he to try to be better? When the devil made you do something, well, what could you expect besides the worst?
Besides, Cristos Rubio was sitting at the bar, perched on a stool like a frog sitting on a lakeside rock and waiting for a fly.
I can kill two birds with one stone.
Wayne was already through the door before he realized there was no second bird. He waved to a group of ghost hunters gathered in a booth. A couple nodded at him, apparently harboring no ill will over the disrupted schedule. Booze greased the squeakiest wheels, Wayne well knew, and he was feeling a bit rusty himself. The beer signs, dart board, karaoke stage, cigarette machine, and half-empty glasses were screaming “Welcome home,” and even the solemn Cristos was smiling at him.
Wayne made it to the bar before his knees went weak, and the bar stool was there to catch him.
“Deegger Weelson,” Cristos slurred in this thick accent.
“Cristos, I need some help.”
“You need a drink, compadre.”
Wayne swallowed. He’d promised Kendra. He’d even promised Beth, in the closest thing that ever passed for a prayer from his lips. Today I can do it. Today will be different. This time I can control myself.
“No, I just want to talk to you about something,” he said. On the television in the corner, two prize fighters were swapping body punches, one of them riding the ropes as if waiting out the bell.
“I know,” Cristos said. “That’s why I wait here for you.”
Cristos slid a drink coaster toward him. Wayne looked down at the design. It was the same snake illustration that had adorned Gelbaugh’s surprise Tarot card, the serpent entwined with a tree, its forked tongue flicking out from a vague reptilian smile.
“How did you do that?” Wayne asked, but Cristos was signaling the bartender. The Peruvian seer tapped his glass and held up two brown fingers.
“You wonder about fate,” Cristos said. “The will versus the randomness of chance.”
“I...had an experience.” Actually, he’d had several, but lies were easier than promises.
“Chance or will?”
“Does it matter?”
“I have read the cards for many years. The outcome is always the same.”
“I saw my dead wife.”
Cristos stared at his own reflection in the bar mirror. Wayne looked beyond the row of glistening bottles and saw Violet at a table, leaning forward and talking with a handsome, curly-haired man. He considered asking her about Janey Mays, but then the bartender was pushing a whiskey sour under his nose and his world was reduced to four ounces of golden fluid and half a dozen ice cubes.
“We see what we want to see,” Cristos said.
“Don’t give me that crap about wishful thinking,” Wayne said. “I’ve been selling it for years.”
“And it led you to the White Horse Inn, Black Rock, North Carolina. The way it should be.” Cristos tilted back his head and tasted his fresh drink.
“I’ve been here before.”
“We each live many lives.”
“No, I mean in this one. My wife and I were staying here sixteen years ago when we made a pact. If one of us died, we’d meet here.”
“And now you are surprised. Would you not have kept the promise if you had been first to die?”