The Ghoul Next Door

  If things took an ugly turn, Heath and I could be at Luke’s side in under a minute, armed to the rafters with magnetic spikes and our newest weapon, the Super Spooker Smasher—Gilley’s term, I swear—which is basically a tennis racket restrung with magnetized wire. We’d had only one occasion to use it, but it’d come in super-spooker handy.

  Once we’d worked out all the details, we left Gilley at his condo and headed to Courtney’s place, arriving at a lovely brownstone on Commonwealth Avenue. I got out of the car and stood at the bottom of the steps looking up at it, trying to feel out the ether of the place.

  Heath came up next to me and for several moments we simply stood silently while our collective intuition reached through the walls of the building and poked around, looking for trouble.

  Heath was the first to break the silence. “I’m not sensing anything negative,” he said.

  “Me either.”

  “Which is weird, right?” he said. “I mean, we should be feeling something, shouldn’t we?”

  I frowned. “If Luke is telling the truth, yeah, I think there’d at least be something icky hanging around in the ether.”

  “Should we go in?”

  “Oh, please, would you?” Gilley’s impatient voice said into my earpiece. I’d forgotten that Gil was connected to us through the Bluetooth Heath and I were both wearing.

  Next to me, Heath chuckled softly and put a hand on my shoulder, motioning for me to go in. We climbed the stairs and I unlocked the door before stepping inside to a dim interior. All the blinds downstairs were drawn, but from what I could see, Courtney had lovely taste.

  “What’s it look like?” Gilley called into my ear. With a sigh I hit the FaceTime option on my iPhone before holding it up so he could see before I began the tour.

  Light wood floors spread out from the entryway to a formal dining room on the left, and a small study on the right. The staircase faced us, and to the left of it the hallway looked like it dead-ended at the kitchen.

  The walls were painted a beautiful steel blue with bright white crown molding and gold-bronze accents placed just so. Several oil paintings in gilded frames were spaced artfully about the hallway and dining room, and as I followed the corridor back toward the kitchen, I found the entry to the living room just behind the stairs.

  The kitchen was to die for: the granite countertops a swirl of teal, white, and yellow perfectly setting off the lightly stained cabinets and stainless steel appliances. The living room (really not more than a parlor) was another delightful surprise, set in a pale yellow only a hint past the shade of parchment. An off-white suede sofa and love seat dominated the space with a pop of color from the tangerine throw pillows and matching cashmere throw. Under our feet was a creamy Berber carpet and on one wall were a marble hearth and a gas log fireplace. It was the sort of space that begged you to come sit a spell.

  “Nice,” Heath said, coming up from behind me after he’d inspected the kitchen.

  “Yep.”

  “You okay?”

  “Perfect.”

  “Uh . . . okay?”

  “She’s upset because Courtney has amazing taste,” Gil said. I could hear him munching on something that sounded like popcorn. He was enjoying the show . . . the little bastard.

  “Why would that make her upset?” Heath asked, like I wasn’t standing right in front of him.

  “Can we just forget it?” I snapped, and moved around Heath back toward the stairs. Climbing them quickly, I crested the landing and found the upstairs mirrored the downstairs in its elegance.

  The master bedroom was a lighter shade of steel blue, but only slightly, and the bed was an elaborate affair with a huge Indian-inspired headboard and silk bedding that looked straight out of a magazine. On the nightstand was a picture of Courtney and Steven, their foreheads pressed together in an intimate and beautiful moment. I want to say that it didn’t hurt to look at that photo, but it did. I wondered if Steven and I had ever had a moment as sweet as that, and I suddenly couldn’t think of one.

  “Hey,” I heard Heath call from the doorway. I jumped and turned quickly away from the photo.

  “Hey,” I said, trying to recover myself. “Should we set up a camera in here?”

  Heath eyed the large bedroom suite. “Wouldn’t hurt and we’ve got extras.”

  “I’m limiting you guys to five cameras,” Gilley said into my ear.

  “Why five?” Heath asked.

  “Beyond that, it gets too hard to monitor,” Gil said.

  “Okay, so one in here, two in Luke’s room, and maybe one in the kitchen facing out into the hallway and one over the front door facing the stairs and the hallway,” I suggested.

  “That’d be perfect,” Gil told me.

  “I’ll tackle Luke’s room,” Heath said, walking forward to hand me a camera from the shoulder bag he carried.

  “No,” I said, taking the camera and holding out my hand for another. “You set up in here. I’ll do Luke’s room.”

  Heath eyed me curiously but didn’t protest, and quick as I could, I left the room and that photo on the nightstand.

  When I got to Luke’s room, I was taken a bit aback by the neatness and orderliness of the place. Luke’s bed was perfectly made, complete with fluffed-up pillows, and a bedspread you could bounce a quarter off. He’d mentioned that he didn’t normally make the bed, and I wondered at the change in habit. Then I realized it was likely because Luke’s life must feel out of control, and perhaps this new dedication to neatness was about providing himself with some small sense of control. It also was probably easy to identify right away if any of his things had been messed with. I continued to look around the room noting the arrangement of his things.

  On the nightstand was a thriller by Lee Child, but no other clutter. I opened the drawer to the nightstand and there was the remote control for the TV, which sat on the bureau across the room. I turned on the set. It was tuned to ESPN.

  Clicking it off, I moved to the closet. Inside I found only five shirts and about as many pairs of jeans, hanging perfectly spaced a few inches apart. Luke’s three pairs of shoes were also arranged neatly on the floor.

  Stepping back out into the bedroom, which was smaller than the master but still a nice size, I looked around. I knew that Luke was staying with his sister, who must’ve been responsible for decorating the room in a soft gray with buttercream curtains, but there wasn’t much in it to suggest anyone was living here other than the contents of the closet and the book on the nightstand. I wondered where any other personal effects might be. A magazine, or dirty laundry, or loose change, but all of that seemed to be absent, as if Luke was trying hard not to disturb the atmosphere, to linger as quietly as possible in this room and still his energy so as not to leave an imprint.

  I felt out the space with my own radar, and found it lacking any presence of malice or wickedness, and again I wondered what the deal was. Why was there nothing residual in the ether to indicate that Luke was telling the truth? Certainly some trace of this spook would get left behind, wouldn’t it?

  With a sigh I got to work setting up the two cameras. One I placed over the door and the other I put over the entrance to the closet. That would be our main camera as it gave the best view of the bed. I coordinated with Gil to make sure he was getting a good feed and then headed out to see if Heath needed help downstairs.

  I found him perched on a chair from the kitchen, struggling with the camera over the front door. “It’s not sticking,” he said.

  “We might have to drill a hole.”

  “There’s a drill in the van,” Gil said helpfully. “In the toolbox.”

  Heath went out to get the drill and Gilley said, “Sooooo, how you doin’, honey?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Really?” he asked skeptically. “In the home of Steven’s new fiancée, you’re ‘fine’?”

>   “Peachy.”

  “Even after seeing that little love nest upstairs?” he said, poking the tiger, as only Gilley knew how to do.

  “Can we drop this?” I said, digging around in Heath’s bag for the remaining camera to put in the kitchen.

  “Oh, come on, M.J. I know it’s bugging you! Steven’s not only found someone new, but the man’s engaged. To a neurosurgeon. Doesn’t that drive you a little crazy?”

  “No,” I said, moving toward the kitchen.

  “A beautiful neurosurgeon,” Gil continued. “Who’s, like, super nice too and has ahhh-mazing taste.”

  I got to the kitchen and slammed the camera on the counter. “Fine, Gil. It drives me crazy! You happy? It hurts, because as much as I’ve moved on, there’s still a part of me that wonders what would’ve happened if Steven and I had tried a little harder.”

  “Uh, guys?” I heard Heath’s voice say into my earpiece. “You know I can hear you, right?”

  I sucked in a breath and slapped my forehead. “Oh, God! Heath . . . I’m . . .”

  I heard the front door open and turned to see Heath step through to the entryway. He held up the drill and said, “Found it.”

  I could see the hurt on his face and I felt a wave of guilt hit me right in the gut. I was about to go to him when he turned away and climbed back onto the chair to begin drilling.

  “Well, that was awkward,” Gil said.

  I balled my hands into fists. “Gil.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Shut it before I shut it for you.”

  “Roger that, M.J.”

  Heath and I finished placing the cameras and locked up before heading out. He hadn’t said another word to me, and every time I’d tried to look at him, he avoided my eyes. Once we were back in the van, I made sure my headset was off before turning to him. “Can I explain?”

  Heath started the engine and checked his side mirror. “It’s cool, Em.”

  I put a hand on his arm and waited for him to look at me. “No, it’s not. It’s not cool at all. And I’m sorry.”

  Heath sighed and put the van into park again, but stared straight out the windshield. “I can’t blame you. I pushed you into taking this case,” he said. “I wanted you to get that you’d made the right choice by picking me.”

  “Of course I made the right choice,” I told him. When he still wouldn’t look at me, I leaned in and cupped his face, turning it toward me. “I love you. And even more important, I love us. We make an incredible team, and not even Gilley understands and accepts me the way you do. That means everything to me, especially since Steven never quite either understood or accepted me for me. But you do, and I love being with you and only you.”

  A smile began to tug at the corners of Heath’s mouth. “You’re only saying that because the sex is so awesome.”

  I burst out laughing and kissed him sweetly. “Yes, how could I forget about the awesome sex?”

  “Don’t know,” he chuckled. “Next time you apologize, maybe you should lead with that.”

  “Noted.”

  “You ready to get out of here?” he asked. “Maybe grab a bite to eat before we head back to the condo?”

  I kissed him again, this time passionately as I wound my hand through his silky black hair. When we were both a little breathless, I said, “How about we head back to the condo first and have some awesome makeup sex?”

  Heath turned away from me to focus once again on the road in front of him before squealing out of the parking space. We made it home in record time.

  • • •

  Around eleven p.m. Heath and I went to the twenty-four-hour diner to meet Steven, Courtney, and Luke. “You’ve seen the cameras?” I asked them as we all sat down.

  “We have,” Steven said. “May I ask why there’s one in Courtney’s room?”

  I saw Courtney shift subtly in her seat, and I knew the question had been prompted by her. I could imagine that as cool as she seemed about the fact that Steven and I used to date, it was a whole other thing to have his ex put a camera in her bedroom.

  Thinking it wise to hold my tongue, I let Heath answer. “We can’t have an area of the house out of sight,” he said. “And Courtney’s room is right next door to Luke’s. If this spook wants to roam the house before getting at Luke, we want to know where it likes to hang out.”

  “Did you get a sense of anything when you were there?” Courtney asked, and I noticed that she barely suppressed a shudder. It had to be hard to live with a sibling being haunted by an evil ghost. I gave her props for being brave and opening her home to Luke.

  “No,” I said.

  “Nothing on the meters?” Steven pressed, obviously remembering the old days when he used to come along on my ghostbusts.

  “Not a blip,” I told him.

  “So what’s the plan?” Luke asked. “I mean, I’m just supposed to go stay in the house by myself?”

  I focused on him and saw that the dark circles under his eyes were a little more pronounced tonight. I’d told him that if he could stay awake today, it might be better. We needed him tired enough to fall asleep quickly so we could see what happened. Judging by his slumped shoulders and exhausted expression, he’d followed instructions. “That’s exactly what we’d like you to do. Go home, make yourself comfortable, and try to sleep. We’ll be watching you the whole time, Luke, and we’re just a few blocks away. If things start to get weird, we can be at your house in a flash with one of these.” I pointed to the stack of magnetic spikes I’d put on the table, which was totally for Luke and Courtney’s benefit. I wanted to show them that we meant business, and that they could take us seriously.

  Luke picked up one of the spikes. “It’s heavy.”

  I lifted my spoon and held it close to the spike in his hand. It flew out of my fingers and attached itself to the spike. “It’s magnetized.”

  Luke took the spoon away from the spike before letting them clink together again. “So, what? If this thing shows up, you’re going to come stab it?”

  “In a manner of speaking,” Heath said. “But it’ll probably get the hell out of there when it sees us coming with one of these. Spooks can’t stand to be around magnets. It causes them major discomfort and most can’t tolerate them. If this spook runs, though, we’ll give chase.”

  “You’ll give chase?” Courtney asked.

  Heath nodded. “We need to know where this thing comes from. If it’s sinister, then it’ll have a link to the lower realms, and to float between this plane and that one, it’ll need a portal.”

  Courtney blinked. Then she blinked a second time. “Come again?”

  I smiled. To Courtney’s ears, Heath probably sounded like he was speaking in code. I decided to step in and explain. “On the spirit plane there are essentially three realms. There’s our realm, where our souls are carried around inside our bodies and we can interact easily with each other. Then there’s the higher realm, or what most people think of as heaven or the other side, and then there’s the lower realm, which is where lots of negative energy lurks. Grounded spirits—like the one we think is currently haunting your brother—for a variety of reasons can become trapped here in our realm. Some become trapped because they don’t realize they’re dead, and they keep trying to interact with us as if they still had a body. The way they see this realm can remain fixed, and they aren’t aware of time. These are your more traditional ghosts, and, usually, they’re harmless.

  “Other grounded spirits, however, can become trapped because they don’t want to cross over into heaven out of fear of what kind of judgment might await them on the other side. They literally carry the fear of God within them, and if they were bad people here, they might feel that God will be harsh on them when they cross. They’re here because they’re stalling, so to speak. They think God will come down hard on them.”

  “If they were bad people
, wouldn’t He?” Courtney asked.

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. From my experience as a medium I can tell you that most of the souls I’ve connected with all suggest that the only judgment we face when we cross over is one of our own creation. We judge ourselves and we aren’t able to take with us the veil of denial, so we see ourselves as we truly are, warts and all. It can be quite painful for a soul who led a corrupt or selfish life to be stripped bare and really take a good hard look at themselves.”

  “So is that what this spook is?” Luke asked. “That kind?”

  I sighed. “I don’t think so, Luke,” I whispered.

  His brow furrowed. “Then what kind is he?”

  “I don’t know, but I suspect he may be a third kind of spook. The kind that wouldn’t be allowed to cross over even if he were willing.”

  Luke’s mouth fell open. “You mean, the kind that would be sent to hell?”

  I nodded again. “And may already have been. That’s the lower realm I’m talking about. Some spooks like to float back and forth between the two realms. They create a portal where they can easily come and go.”

  “Why wouldn’t they just stay down there?” Courtney asked me.

  “Because it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun,” Heath said, without a hint of mirth. “Spooks like that want access to the lower realm to learn how to manipulate things in our plane.”

  “What do you mean, ‘manipulate things’?” she pressed.

  “Well, they learn how to gain and utilize energy. If they can invoke fear in you, they can raise the electromagnetic current you produce. Your own electromagnetic energy gets a boost, the same way your heart beats faster when you exercise. These spooks can hitch a ride off that energy and use it to their advantage by moving or throwing things like rocks and small stones, by manipulating electrical currents to start fires, or by taking over a person.”

  Courtney gave in to her shudder this time and Steven wrapped an arm around her and began rubbing her back. “This is so scary,” she whispered.