Came Back Haunted (Experiment in Terror #10) - Karina Halle Page 0,23

this discussion.

“I have no doubt you can do this…” I tell him.

“That we can do this.”

“Right. But for now let’s just…see how tonight goes before we start making grand plans. We don’t even know if we can communicate with the dead in a professional manner.”

He sighs and runs his hand over his beard. “There you go being the voice of reason. But you know I’m right, too. That this makes sense. And anyway, we still need a plan for right now. Tonight. In this house.”

“Atlas was leading us down there last time,” I say, gesturing to the darkness at the end of the hall. “Where you saw the ghost. He seemed to think that was the best place.”

“Yeah,” he says carefully. “Think I lost my balls down there though.” He lifts the camera up onto his shoulder. “Though seriously, fuck that guy. He wasn’t leading us anywhere. He was leading us away from something.”

“From what?”

“The third floor. The bathroom. Door was conveniently locked, wasn’t it? Didn’t have a key? Happened to also have a trail of bloody water leaking out of it? Not a fucking coincidence.”

“Then up we go,” I say, my voice going quiet. For some reason I’d rather take my chances in the dining room at the end, but Dex is probably right. Atlas didn’t seem surprised by the blood, which makes me think he wanted us to avoid it.

He turns, and we walk over to the wooden staircase, heading up. Our footfalls are soft despite the hard floors, like the house is devoid of an echo, as if sound doesn’t spread. For a moment I almost have a panic attack thinking there’s no air in here, but of course there is.

Then again, if this house really is the closest place to the Veil…

“I also think they’re full of shit,” Dex says, as if he’s been talking this whole time. Maybe he has.

“Who?” I say as we round the second floor and head up to the third. “Atlas and Harry?”

“Yeah. Or maybe just Atlas. I don’t know. But they’re lying to us, kiddo.”

“About what?”

“About everything. I don’t know.”

“And yet we’re here.”

“Fair is fair.” We both stop once we reach the third floor. “And obviously there’s something going on here. Look. The bathroom.”

He aims the camera light down the hall and I quickly shine my flashlight on the bathroom door. Like before, a trail of bloody water is slowly leaking out from underneath.

Almost as if it was waiting for us.

It probably is.

“So now what?” I ask, keeping my voice low.

“Take out the EMF meter,” he says, keeping the camera focused on the blood.

“For what? Proof? There’s blood. That’s proof.”

“Just do it.”

I grumble, fishing it out and flicking it on. The meter beeps, immediately shooting up to level four, going orange. Even though I figured it would go off, it still gives me the creeps. I quickly turn the volume down, since the beeping isn’t going anywhere.

Dex turns the camera on me now as I hold the meter.

“So what do you want to do?” he asks. A beat passes, darkness coming over his eyes. “Someone is inside the bathroom.”

Motherfucking chills run through me.

I try to shake it off, knowing I’m being filmed. “We don’t have to go in there,” I tell him.

“But his mother might be in there.”

“How did she die again?”

“Harry said she drowned.”

I look down at the bloody water. “Uh huh.” I look at the door. Part of me wants to open it, wants to go inside, but that feeling comes from a black place inside me, that sense of being compelled. I’m not sure I trust it. “Maybe we should save that for last.”

“For last?”

“We can always communicate with her right here. There’s blood. We’re at level four. She can hear us.” I pause. “She’s watching us.”

Or maybe a lot of them are watching us. We were standing right here last time when the lights went on for a second, showcasing a range of dead people in the house with us. Were they there just because it was Samhain? Or are they here all the time?

More chills. My nerves already feel shot.

“Okay,” Dex says, adjusting his camera on the door. “How do you want to do this? Want to say something?”

“Me?”

“Yeah you,” he says. “You’re the ghost whisperer.”

“Why am I the ghost whisperer?”

“You have the boobs,” he says, referencing Jennifer Love Hewitt. “And ghosts don’t like talking to me. They know I’m an asshole.”

He’s right, but still…I have no idea what I’m doing. Which is kind of