Fatal Family Secrets, page 9
Breia snapped her arms around Ryan’s neck, hugging and whispering, “Thank God!”
“Thank God our parents tried to murder me just now?” he asked, but he hugged her back.
“Thank God it wasn’t you.” She wiped at her eyes. “You’ve been so depressed. I didn’t even realize how much, until I saw the change in you at Kiley’s house. It was like a dark cloud had lifted.”
“Because it had,” Johnny said. “And it will again once we get you back to the house. That’s our goal for right now, okay?” He tried to sound confident and sure of himself, when inside he wondered if the gang from Spook Central had met its match. These ghosts were powerful. And furious.
A siren wailed nearer as an ambulance pulled up alongside the road.
Johnny moved a few steps away and placed a video call to headquarters. Maya answered from the computer bar in the office. He could see off to her side that the tree limb was gone. So were the curtains. There was cardboard duct-taped over the big sunny window in the library.
“What is that?” Maya asked. “Is that an ambulance behind you?”
He realized he’d been pacing with the phone. “Yeah, everyone’s okay. I think. We found Ryan out cold in his house with the gas turned on. His parents locked him in, tried to kill him.”
“Holy shit. Is he okay?”
“I think so. EMTs are giving him the once over.” He turned the phone to show her. Ryan was behind an oxygen mask, with an EMT and Breia both crouching nearby.
“You need to get him back here as soon as he gets the medical all-clear, Johnny. This is the only place he’s safe.”
“But he wasn’t even safe there.”
“Yes, he was,” Maya insisted. “They didn’t get in here. I mean, it was close, and they did some damage. They were even able throw things at us, but they could not get in. Just like at the cemetery.”
“That’s what Breia said, too. Your wards are that good?”
“No,” Maya said. “They’re not. That assault was way too powerful for my skill level. But all the same, they didn’t get in here.”
She was saying something without really saying it. And he remembered Ryan’s feeling that something was in the house. It sounded like one of those topics he and Maya could dissect for hours. He guessed they didn’t do that anymore. No, he thought. They didn’t do that right now. But maybe they would again.
“We need you back here, Johnny.”
“I’m on my way. Just as soon as I can.”
“Be careful. These things…they’re powerful. And angry. I’ve never felt such anger.”
“I know. I feel it, too.”
“We’re changing, you know,” she said. “Working together, I think it’s somehow enhancing all our abilities. I mean, I couldn’t slam a door from a distance before. And your power has changed, too. And I think something’s up with Kiley. We need to discuss this, all of us together. But first we just need you here, safe. Okay?”
“Okay. I’ll see you soon,” he said, and it came out kind of raspy and dumb. He ended the call, pocketed the phone. Ryan was still holding an oxygen mask to his face, and the medic crouched nearby, speaking to him, her eyes sharp and observant. Breia’s focus was riveted to her brother. Around them, nothing seemed unusual, but all the same, that chill on the back of Johnny’s neck remained.
He saw the EMT packing up his kit and returned to Ryan, who was getting up onto his feet again with Breia’s help.
“He’s okay,” she said. “We can have him check in with a doctor if there are any symptoms.”
“Thank God,” Johnny said, and he clapped Ryan’s shoulder. “You sure you feel okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m good.”
“And what about the house?” he asked Breia.
She nodded toward the open door. Fire fighters were going in and out. “I’m leaving them a key so they can lock up when they finish here,” she said.
“I think we should get you both back to Kiley’s, then. It’s clearly not safe anywhere else.”
“Wait,” Ryan said. “Why are we not discussing the fact that my parents just tried to gas me? After splitting my sister’s head open, which could’ve killed her?” Ryan’s face was lax with shock as he seemed to digest the enormity of it all, now that he’d survived the attempt.
“Why are they doing this?”
Johnny felt the blip coming and moved two steps from their line of sight just before he fell into the past.
There was a little boy riding his bicycle across an all but empty parking lot. In the distance, teenage Breia was clapping her hands and whooping as the little guy sped, wobbling dangerously and yelling, “I’m doing it! I’m doing it!” He was curving directly toward the road, though, and panic came over his face and he said, “I can’t steer! Help, I can’t stop!”
Breia lunged toward him with superhuman speed, but she wasn’t fast enough. Ryan didn’t have control and a car was speeding nearer. There was no question the two were going to collide, but then, just as Ryan wobbled into the road screaming, the car veered to the right and hit a pole. Just drove right into it. Crunch.
Breia reached Ryan, who had wiped out and lay on the pavement crying. She carried him and his bike out of the road and headed for the safe area nearby.
Johnny threw up a stop sign hand and said, “Wait, wait,” and time froze. It was so surreal he had to take a breath and close his eyes to get his bearings. There was a small dandelion seed, fluffy and floating right in front of his face. It just hung there, motionless, suspended. He saw a butterfly, a bee, a person on a pogo stick a block away, not quite touching the sidewalk.
He moved his hand from right to left, and time reversed. Or that’s what it felt like. He stopped moving his hand just before Ryan reached the spot where parking lot spilled onto busy road. “Okay, now, slowly…” He moved his hand very slowly right, and time crept forward in ultra slow-mo. Ryan and his bike moved inch by inch into the path of the car, which was closer to him with every frame. Then there was something, a distortion between the car and the kid, a shape. But not one made of light, like the forms in the Polaroid shots Jack had taken at the cemetery. This was a misshapen blob of light gray.
This time, Johhny was right on top of it as it happened. Ryan’s bike went over sideways as he panicked and Johnny reached for the kid by sheer instinct. His hand skimmed Ryan’s shoulder. For just an instant, Johnny felt the road skinning Ryan’s knee right through his jeans and the terror of what was coming next, as if both were happening to him. He looked up and saw a man and a woman standing there in the road right between him and the car. The woman screamed and swung her arms in a right to left arc, and the car moved in the exact same motion, swinging suddenly sideways and right into the pole. And then the two of them returned to Ryan, leaning over him.
It’s okay, we won’t let anything hurt you, you’re safe. They said the things parents say to comfort terrified children. They were not scary looking. Kind of translucent and gray, but otherwise, they resembled the photos he’d spotted inside the house, except that they looked tired, or maybe hungover.
Then Breia put her hands on Ryan, and Johnny blipped back into the present. He took stock of where he was and who could see him. He was near his truck, partially hidden by its nose. The EMTs were still packing up.
“You okay, Johnny?” Breia asked.
He nodded, but he couldn’t stop looking at Ryan. He didn’t look the way he’d looked before. He looked way more shaken and terrified. And no wonder.
Up until recently, he’d had a pair of soggy looking guardian angels watching over him. Now, apparently, they were trying to kill him.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
When the house was aired out sufficiently, Ryan and Breia were allowed back inside to pick up a few things. Johnny didn’t like it, but he felt like there was a pattern. The ghosts were always quiet for a while between incidents. He estimated they would still have time to get back to Spook Central safely before they had the energy to try again.
While he was waiting for Breia and Ryan, he got a call he didn’t expect. The return number was simply POLICE.
It made his heart jump a little as he picked up. “Hello?”
“It’s Lieutenant Mendosa,” she said. He’d have recognized her voice. “Listen, um, I had the local PD do a wellness check on your grandfather at that address you gave me.”
“And?” He waited, almost holding his breath.
“A retired couple live there. Say they know him, but haven’t seen him in years. They have no idea why he would say he was going there.”
He frowned hard, not comprehending.
“Listen, do you want me to open a missing persons case? He’s old. Nobody knows where he is. And he’s gone silent for what, four days now?”
“Almost,” Johnny said. “And yes, I think that missing persons thing is a good idea. I mean, I guess.” Then again, he didn’t know his grandfather. Had barely spent any time at all with him before he’d up and left. Surely someone would know if something had happened to him? But would anyone notify Johnny? Had his grandfather even told anyone he existed?
“Okay, I’ll do it.”
“We’re ready.” Breia came down the stairs, a wheeled suitcase thumping behind her. She came over to him at the door, and smiled up into his eyes.
Johnny said, “Thank you, Lieutenant. I appreciate the help.”
“De nada,” she replied and disconnected.
He pocketed his phone. Breia said, “You’ve become… our hero, I guess.”
“Yeah, don’t thank me until we’ve solved the problem.” Speaking of which, do you have anything of your parents’?”
She paused, frowning. “There’s a whole box of stuff in the garage. Maybe two. There were some things I just couldn’t get rid of, but couldn’t have around the house either, you know?”
“Can we bring them along?”
“We can grab them on the way out. Gosh, it’s been years. Ryan had just started to walk when I packed it all away.”
Ryan came thundering down the stairs with a bulging backpack over his shoulder and a computer bag in hand.
“What, we don’t have enough computers for you?” Johnny asked.
His eyes were still kind of hollow, probably still in shock from having his parents try to kill him. Not to mention the after effects of propane inhalation. “My gaming laptop. Chris said he’d tweak it out for me.”
“Is that a technical term?” Breia asked, taking Johnny’s cue to try and lighten the mood.
Ryan gave a token smile and nodded, and then they went out to the truck. With everyone inside and their bags stowed in the back, Johnny backed up to the garage door and got out to open it. Then he backed right inside next to Breia’s little car.
It occurred to him that she might want her car with her, but he decided not to suggest it in case the ghosts caused trouble. He kept getting chills up his spine as Breia moved aside a few boxes to find the ones she wanted while Ryan sat in the truck, motionless, earbuds in place.
“Here they are. Three boxes. More than I thought.”
“Let me, let me.” He took the box she’d pulled out and set it in the back of the truck, then turned and she handed him another. She brought the third box and leaned over the truck to put it in. “That’s it.” She looked around. “And no murder attempts. Nice.”
“So far, so good.” He walked her right up to the passenger door, feeling like an anvil was going to fall from the sky at any moment. She got in, and he closed her door and hurried around to his side. He kept getting chills and his nerves were jumping. The air was electric, like during a lightning storm. As far as he was concerned, the faster they were back at Spook Central, the better.
Kiley sat in the office, in the sitting area she loved, with a cup of tea. Maya had brewed a full pot of this minty herbal blend she said had calming and healing properties and would help them all recover from the trauma of the attack.
Jack was outside with the contractor who was replacing the window glass. The frame was undamaged and original to the house, so he was replacing the large pane of glass.
Chris was at the computer bar, researching Robert and Mindi Sousa. Every now and then he would shout out an interesting tidbit. “Robert’s grandparents immigrated from Greece all the way back in the forties.” Or “Mindi worked for Future-Tech in New York. Quit the year Breia was born.”
She sipped her tea and waited for the calm to happen.
Maya’s phone buzzed. She said, “It’s Johnny,” then put it on speaker and set the phone on the coffee table.
“We thought you’d be back by now,” she said. “Everything all right?
Chris came over to the sitting area so he could hear better.
“We’re on our way,” Johnny said. “We got some of the parents’ personal things.”
“That’s a really good idea,” Maya said.
“Um, listen, Lieutenant Mendosa called. My grandfather isn’t in Florida. His friends there say he never was. So she’s getting a missing persons case going.”
“What!” Kiley’s explosive word was not a question. “Johnny, do you think something’s happened to him? My God…”
“You all probably know him better than I do. Maybe he just wanted some space.”
“That’s not it, Johnny,” Maya said. “He was out of his mind happy you found him, and so proud. He told me so.”
Jack heard it as he came through the French doors into the room and moved closer to the phone. “He told me the same,” Jack said. “We’ll find him, rookie. Don’t worry. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re kind of a good team.”
“We are.”
“We’ll watch for you,” Maya said. “Be careful, Johnny. This has escalated in a very dark way.”
“Yeah. If we’d have been a few minutes later finding Ryan… Anyway, we’re heading back now.”
Jack said. “What’s your ETA?”
“Ten minutes.”
“Good. Sooner the better. See you then.”
The call ended. Maya tapped the phone. “Something has changed,” she said, looking at the others. “Up to now, these two have been trying to protect Ryan. Now they’re trying to kill him. What happened to Breia might have been unintentional, but locking Ryan in the house and cranking on the gas was no accident. What’s different?”
“We are,” Chris said. “We’re getting in their way. Getting in between them and their kids.”
“Yeah, and we aren’t the only ones.” Everyone looked at Kiley. She took a breath and took another sip of tea.
“Something chased those ghosts out of here,” Chris said. “They got past Maya’s wards and threw a tree at us, hit Breia in the head with a street sign, and would’ve done worse, but something stopped them. And I really want to know what it was. I just…felt it. Like a shock wave from a distant blast.”
“That’s good, that’s good, that’s how it felt to me, too,” Kiley said. “And it shouted like a thousand tone-deaf hell demons.”
Tone deaf? How dare you!
She frowned and looked at them all. “Okay, so, did no one else hear that?”
Chris and Maya exchanged a look. Jack nodded at Kiley. “What did she say this time?”
“She was offended by the tone deaf part. Not the demon part, mind you.”
“She?” Chris asked. “She, who?”
“You know how you smelled cigarette smoke earlier, Chris?” Kiley asked.
He nodded. “Lilac scented tobacco, yes.”
“I thought I saw a woman move past the doorway,” she pointed as she spoke. “Big red hair, slinky dress, cigarette in a long holder. And then you smelled the smoke.”
He nodded, looked around and said, “I’m allergic,” in a really loud voice.
“And when we were painting the porch, Maya,” Kiley rushed on, “and you said no ghost could get in, I heard her laughing.”
“Holy shit. A house ghost? We have a house ghost?” Maya seemed weirdly excited about the prospect, which made Kiley want to smack her.
“Is that a thing?” she asked.
Maya shrugged. “Apparently. And you felt like it was this house ghost who chased the parental-ghosts away?”
“It makes perfect sense,” Jack said. “They couldn’t come into the cemetery because they can’t go where ghosts are.”
“Where non-physical beings are,” Maya said. “I don’t think those cemetery dwellers were ghosts.”
“I was furious,” Kiley said. “I sort of let my temper blast out, you know? I leaned toward the window yelled at the ghosts to get out of my house, and when I did, it felt like something else yelled it, too. Like it joined in and made me bigger, louder, and we sort of roared together. And then they were gone.”
“I feel entirely left out,” Jack said. “I’m the guy who talks to dead people.”
Kiley shrugged. “Sorry to walk on your lawn, but it is what it is.”
“Well,” Maya said, “At least she’s on our side. Whoever she is.” She looked around the room up high, as one does. “I guess the polite thing would be to thank her.”
“Yeah,” Kiley said, and she got up from the sofa and said, “Thank you,” expressively spreading her arms. “You might have saved our lives and we’re grateful. If there’s anything we can do for you in return, we’d be more than – ” BANG. “What the hell?”
A large framed print that had been on the wall was now on the floor with a crack across its glass. It had been Chris’s contribution to their office decor. Dogs Playing Poker.
“Everybody’s a critic,” Chris said.
A vehicle approached and gave a beep-beep. “That’s Johnny.” Maya rushed to the front door. Everyone spilled out onto the porch, and Kiley waved as the pickup came closer, and then suddenly, the whole world started to shake.
A wave moved beneath her feet, lifting the porch up and down, and Kiley grabbed the railing with one hand and Jack with the other.
“Earthquake!” Chris said, moving into the doorway and bracing his hands on the frame while Maya clung to the railing at the top of the porch steps.
