Sisters of Blood and Spirit
Page 30

“I brought my books on spirit communication and hauntings,” Kevin informed us. “I don’t know how much help they’ll be, but it’s a place to start. I’m still new to this whole medium thing, but I know a guy in Southbury who might be able to help us.”
I wouldn’t have thought of Southbury as a hotbed of ghostly activity, but hey, Ed and Lorraine Warren had based their paranormal investigation business in Monroe, and they were the ones who had investigated the house in Amityville. That movie The Conjuring had been based on one of their cases.
“How did you get into this?” I asked him.
He shrugged, his gaze guarded behind his glasses. “I saw things when I was a kid, you know?”
“Yeah,” I said drily. “I know.”
Was that actually a smile? “I’m not nearly as gifted as you, but I caught glimpses of ghosts. I could sense them, and sometimes they told me things.”
Gifted? He thought I was gifted? I could have fallen right out of my chair if I didn’t think everyone would laugh at my underwear.
“Anyway, I never thought much of it until the day you...” He cleared his throat. “The day Wren found me. It was like having someone scream in my face after a lifetime of whispers.”
I smiled. “She’s like that.”
He looked me in the eye, his dark blue eyes serious. “She was terrified, and I had no idea what the hell was going on.”
Not much wonder he wasn’t my number-one fan. “I’m sorry you got dragged into that.”
“Don’t be.”
Okay, fine. “I started digging into Haven Crest history,” I confided, wanting to change the subject before I could get jealous again. “Seems it’s been nasty for a long time. I need to find out the possible effects the place can have on Wren and me, given our connection to the other side. Ghosts can be real bullies, especially when they’re all crammed into one place.”
Sarah laughed. “The other side. You sound like one of those ghost-hunting shows.”
I turned to her. “The dead, then.”
“How are you going to find that out?” Ben asked. “I can’t imagine you can just look it up on Google.”
I took a sip of my latte. It was perfect. He’d even gotten them to add a shot of vanilla. Would he think I was crazy if I proposed to him? “Well, we could do a séance, or we take a trip to Haven Crest.”
They all looked at each other.
“Wouldn’t that be dangerous?” Gage asked.
“Yeah, but we’re going to have to do it eventually. We’ll have to go there to destroy the ghost. It would be safer to have a séance first.”
“That’s still contact with the ghost, isn’t it?” Ben asked. “How is that safer?”
I took another sip. “Because we’ll be on our own territory, and because Wren, Kevin and I can form a protective barrier against the ghost.”
Mace finally spoke. “How can we contact it if we don’t know who it is?”
Ah, good question, and one I was hoping no one would ask. “We don’t need to—it will come if you guys call it. And then I’ll know who it is.”
“How?” That was Kevin. “What if it doesn’t give its name?”
“I don’t know how, I just know that I’ll know.” That was the lamest answer ever. It was also totally honest. I really didn’t know why or how I could figure out who a ghost was.
“I’ll see it as it looked in life,” I told them, trying to find a better explanation. “I’ll be able to talk to it. Plus, Wren will be there, and she’ll be able to interact with it in ways I can’t.”
“What if it tries to hurt her?” Kevin asked.
His concern was actually sweet. I grimaced. “It can’t hurt her—” at least, not like he thought “—she’s already dead.”
He looked as though I’d just kicked his puppy.
“This is so weird,” Sarah remarked, shaking her pretty blond head. “And I thought my family was strange.”
I stared at her. There had to be a disconnect between her brain and her mouth. She just didn’t think before she spoke. Or maybe she did.
Ben defused what might have become a situation. “My uncle George used to walk around town in a top hat carrying his pet duck under his arm.”
“Don’t worry,” I told him. “I hear duck-carrying skips a generation.”
Brown eyes stared into mine for a second before he grinned. “Good to know.”
Okay, I was starting to crush on him a bit. I managed to smile back before it felt as though a piece of me that was loose got pushed back into place. The world slipped into a tighter focus, and I was a part of it.
Wren was here.
Kevin looked up—he felt her, too. I stared at him. Jerk. When he looked at me, one of his eyebrows arched. Oops. Guess I hadn’t done a very good job at hiding my thoughts.
“Be nice,” Wren said, tugging on a lock of my hair that I had somewhat contained behind a black headband—it made a nice contrast.
Kevin smiled. Oh, great, he could hear everything she said now?
“Don’t look at him like that,” she went on. “And no, he can’t hear me all the time when I talk to you. You and I have our own frequency.”
I didn’t ask how she knew that, I simply trusted that it was true. I wouldn’t suggest that she and I could read each other’s minds, but each of us understood how the other thought.