Ashes to Ashes (Experiment in Terror #8) (2 page)

I nodded as she took us out of
the Queen Anne district and headed back to downtown Seattle. I
rubbed the plastic over my tattoo, wanting to peek at it again but
having to restrain myself. “I know. It’s like I know there are tons
of paranormal hot spots all over the country—more now than ever,
according to websites.”

She brought out a cigarette and
rolled down the window before lighting it. “I sent a bunch of
suggestions to Jimmy too, but I think after Florida, he wants to
keep us closer to home.”

“
Because he’s
cheap.”

She exhaled a cloud of blue
smoke. “I guess having a sponsor didn’t really help.”

“
At least it’s
paying for your salary. We didn’t have that before.”

She gave me a shy glance. “So
you’re saying you don’t totally resent me for being on the show
with you?”

I looked at her incredulously.
“What? No! What makes you say that?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I
feel like the third wheel sometimes.”

“
You
are
the third wheel,” I said. She gave me a half
smile and I quickly continued. “Meaning, you’re the wheel. You
steer us, you keep us going in the right direction. Yeah, it’s
different for me and Dex, but sometimes I think it’s because our
relationship has changed too. Everything is different from the way
it used to be and that’s not a bad thing. Thanks to you, the shows
are tighter and we’re not wasting as much money, and Jimmy doesn’t
yell at us as much. The shows look better too—just having you
around to put up a second light or whatever. Seriously, Becs,
you’re awesome. You’re the reason Dex and I can still do this.
You’re a lifesaver.”

“
Well, you’re
way more fun to work with than Jenn,” she said. “Though that’s a
given.”

Sometimes I’d forget that
Dex started out at Shownet by being the cameraman for
Wine Babes
, filming Jenn and Rebecca as they talked about pairing
certain wines with McShit from McDonalds. That’s how he hooked up
with that bitch to start with. I tried to shrug off the questions,
wanting to ask Rebecca what they were like when filming together
versus the way Dex and I are. I was under the impression that they
were off humping like bunnies every time they worked together, and
though Dex and I weren’t that different, I think he was slightly
more professional around me. Which was good…right?

I rubbed my lips together,
keeping my mouth shut, and sat back as Rebecca put Lana Del Ray on
her stereo. I let the music rush over me and fidgeted in
anticipation of Dex’s reaction to my tattoo. I really hoped he
wasn’t going to think it was too much. Sure, we’d been together for
two months as an actual couple, but things were still so fresh and
new for us in so many ways.

CHAPTER TWO

We found parking on the street
just as the monorail trundled past our apartment, heading down 5th
Avenue, and made our way up to the apartment. As soon I as stuck my
key in the lock, I heard tiny little paws and claws scampering on
the ground and knew Fat Rabbit was launching himself across the
floor at rocket speed.

I turned around and eyed
Rebecca’s bare legs. “Be prepared.” Fat Rabbit had already ruined
countless pairs of tights from jumping on her, much like Dex had
ruined countless pairs of underwear by ripping them off of me.

I eased open the door to see
the drooling, elfin little face of Dex’s French bulldog jumping up
at me, emitting frantic barks of joy. I’d gotten used to the little
bugger, but Dex was still his master, his alpha. Fatty Rab treated
me like another dog, which was fine since I didn’t have to be the
one to discipline him. Actually, it was kind of charming when Dex
did have to lay the smackdown on him (not literally of course).
There was a warm feeling in the back of my head, the surprising
idea that he’d be a very good father.

But that was my silly brain
always getting ahead of everything. I constantly needed to remind
myself to concentrate on the present before my mind started
fantasizing about all these ridiculous plans for my future. One
step at a time….

I shooed the dog away with my
boot, knowing Dex wasn’t home yet, and we walked into the
apartment. Not a lot had changed since I moved in. It was my place
too now, and it felt like it, but it wasn’t like I’d always
harbored dreams of redoing Dex’s place. I had some vintage travel
posters framed and put on the walls alongside signed concert
posters, a few skull-embossed pillows added to the couch, a potted
plant in the corner near the balcony, and a small herb garden I
started on the windowsill, but that was about it. It was very
us—whatever that meant.

I made Rebecca and I a cup of
coffee with our new espresso machine, somehow managing to spray
coffee all over my shirt. While I was in the bedroom changing, I
heard Dex come in. Well, I heard Fat Rabbit erupt into a chorus of
happy barks.

I slipped on a long-sleeved
Henley, unbuttoning the top few buttons (Dex always said you gotta
work with what God gave you), and made sure the sleeve covered the
plastic over the tattoo. I poked my head out the door to see him
throwing his car keys into the bowl on the kitchen counter before
scooping Fat Rabbit into his arms.

Dear Lord, there was
never anything hotter than watching Dex cuddle his dog. And as
usual, he was looking good. The “pinch me, is he really
my
boyfriend?” kind of good. I literally asked myself that
every single day.

He was wearing his only
pair of blue jeans (most of his pants were either camo, grey, or
black) that were so worn it looked like he’d had them since he was
a teenager. They made his ass look amazing, regardless. On his feet
were his black army boots. His t-shirt was white, not too tight,
but you could still see his amazing shoulders and pecs, and his
biceps popped with that early summer color. He’d picked it up at
some thrift store, probably because it said
Ride the Mustache
across it.

He gave Fat Rabbit a kiss on
the head and said hello to Rebecca.

“
Where’s
Perry?” he asked. Before she could answer, his dark eyes quickly
flew over to me and he smiled as bright as day, his dimples showing
on his scruffy face. “There’s my woman.”

It felt like warm honey
poured down my spine and feather-winged butterflies flew up my
limbs. All it took was to see him, to hear those words that I
was
his
, and I was falling in love, so hard and so fast all over
again. It made me forget all my problems, lifted that ominous
weight off my back. He worked better than any
anti-depressant.

I grinned back at him as he put
Fat Rabbit on the ground and walked over to me. He put his arm
around the small of my back and pulled me close to him before
kissing me softly on the lips. He pulled away and brushed my hair
behind my ear. From the way his dark eyes were glinting as they
searched mine, I had to wonder what was on his mind, if somehow he
already knew about the tattoo.

“
Hey kiddo,”
he said, voice rough and soft at the same time.

Rebecca cleared her throat from
across the room and Dex looked back at her.

“
Sorry,” he
said, though I knew he wasn’t. “I guess you don’t want to get in on
this action. Do you?”

She rolled her eyes and I
quickly smacked him across his chest. He grinned cheekily back at
me and ran his hand through his thick black hair before taking mine
in his and leading me over to the couch.

“
Now I can
tell you two are hiding something from me because you both have
these devilish little girly smirks on your faces,” he said as he
sat me down.

I looked over at Rebecca, eyes
wide, and she quickly shrugged just before he turned to her.

“
But,” he
continued, giving her the stare down, “before I get it out of you
by nefarious means, we have to talk about the show.”

I swallowed hard, a lump
forming in my chest. I really hoped Jimmy wasn’t ragging on him
again about making Rebecca the host. Dex noticed the look on my
face and said, “Don’t worry. I think this is very good news.”

Rebecca stepped closer, folding
her arms. “Well, what is it?”

“
We’ve got a
show. And it seems like it’s going to be a good one.”

I exhaled noisily at that.

“
It’s about
time,” Rebecca said. “Where?”

He took in a deep breath before
saying, “A haunted school. On the Oregon Coast.” He looked at me
expectantly. “It’s just an hour away from your Uncle Al’s.”

I wasn’t sure how I felt about
that. “Oregon?”

“
We’re going
back to the beginning, baby,” he said, wagging his brows. “Only
there’s no lighthouse this time. As shit-your-pants scary as that
Old Roddy fucker was, we’ve got a school of dead children. But we
can handle it. And if we can’t, well that’s what Jack Daniels is
for.”

Rebecca pursed her lips. “Okay,
I’m going to need a bit more information than school of dead
children, Dex. What was wrong with all the suggestions I kept
giving to Jimmy? There are heaps of haunted places around with
actual documented phenomenon. In all my research, I’ve never come
across any kind of haunted school before on the Oregon Coast.”

“
To be fair,
Becs,” Dex said with a leveling gaze, “you’ve only been doing
research for, what, two months? Jimmy said this just came to his
attention the other day. He’s already discussed it with the
sponsors and the school and they’ve all agreed to it.” She frowned
at that, probably feeling that her role as production manager was
getting stepped on a bit by Jimmy himself. “And anyway, he showed
me the location and gave me the lowdown on the whole place. It
seems legit.”

He walked over to the fridge
and pulled out a beer. “Anyone want one?”

Rebecca and I shook our heads
while he came back, swigging on a bottle of Heineken. He sat down
on the couch beside me, his arm coming around my shoulder.

“
Where
on the coast?” I asked him, my mind still stewing over the fact
that I’d be not only returning to Oregon, but near the place that
started it all, the place where I first met Dex. It was a fucking
trip to think how full circle this could be, to go from running
into him in the lighthouse and staring at his face for the first
time to sitting beside him in
our
apartment, his arm around me,
in love. Did I even realize at the time what this strange man would
become to me? Everything.

“
There’s a
small town called Gary on the coast, just north of Tillamook. I
know you and I have driven past it before.”

I frowned, my memory jogging in
place.

He continued, “There’s a giant
smokestack there leftover from a mill that no longer exists. I
remember you telling me it looked creepy. I thought it looked like
an ancient dildo.”

“
You would,” I
said. I had a faint image of it in my head. “Is there a large G
carved into the mountainside?”

He nodded. “Yeah. The town
itself is nothing to look at, but there used to be a sanitarium
there. Sea Crest. Until the 50s it was used for children with
Tuberculosis. They believed the fresh ocean air would, I dunno,
clear their lungs or something. But it never did. There was no cure
until there was a cure. It was basically a house of death. The kids
would die in the end, all of them dropping like flies. You came in
to Sea Crest by the front door and you came out by the morgue.”

I shivered despite it being
warm in the room.

“
Sounds like a
bloody good time,” Rebecca said under her breath.

Dex slapped his knee, making me
and Fat Rabbit jump. He seemed to be a little too enthusiastic
about this. “Speaking of blood, when the patients died, the doctors
would put them on this special slab and drain their bodies of
blood. Apparently in the upper floors of the school, you can see
the rivers of blood in the floor that they couldn’t seem to clean
away.”

“
How is this
still being used?” I asked. “I mean, a school?”

He shrugged. “I know.
Apparently it’s a grade school for artistically gifted children.
Their old school was in Tillamook but it burned down a couple years
ago. Parents didn’t want to have to pay for a new building with an
increase in tuition so they decided to take over the old
sanitarium.”

I snorted, trying to ignore the
prickles of unease on my neck. “Great. All we need is a bunch of
creative art kids in a school full of ghost kids.”

“
That’s the
thing,” he said. He paused to take a swig of beer and settled back
against the couch, his hand rubbing my shoulder. “Things have been
fine until recently. That’s probably why, Rebecca, you didn’t hear
about the place before. They have a new teacher for painting and
drawing, Brenna McDonald or McSomething, and she’s the one who
reached out to Jimmy. It all seemed to start the minute she got
there.”

“
And so she
actually wants us to film it?” Rebecca asked.

“
So she
says.”

“
And the
school doesn’t have a problem with it?”

“
He said they
didn’t. Maybe they want the school to have some notoriety. I don’t
know, but we’re going. On Sunday we’ll pack up the Highlander and
go for it.”

“
That’s like
in two days,” I pointed out.

“
Then it’s
time to call your uncle and let him know you’ll be in town. Maybe
we can drop in on Sunday for dinner. I’m sure he’d like
that.”