Coffee and Ghosts: The Complete First Season (Coffee and Ghosts: The Complete Seasons Book 1) (24 page)

I open my mouth to contradict him, but Malcolm stands at the threshold, a finger pressed to his lips. So I bite down on my words.

“Would you like some coffee?” I say instead. “For you and your crew? It’s perfect drinking temperature, so I won’t be able to use it to catch anything. Hate to see it go to waste.”

I’m certain my offer doesn’t carry past the kitchen door, but it’s like I’ve broadcast it through the entire space. The kitchen fills with people. Someone brings in the sandwiches. Someone else passes around Styrofoam cups. I pour out every last drop that I have in the thermoses. People tap cups, make toasts, and drink.

The sprite leaves in a huff, smacking Malcolm on the back of the head on its way out.

“Like it’s my fault,” he whispers when he reaches my side.

“Let me introduce you to a few of our regulars,” Gregory says. “Nick, our tech support. Rajeev keeps us electrified. And of course, we couldn’t make contact at all without our medium, Terese.”

The two men nod, more interested in coffee than ghosts. Terese, ethereal, with flowing white hair and dusky skin, kisses first Malcolm and then me on both cheeks.

“And while you won’t see much of his face, we have Tim, who runs the cameras,” Gregory says.

I whirl around and confront the lens of a video camera, its eye trained on me.

“Are you filming this now?” I ask.

Gregory bursts out laughing. “Of course we are. And we’ll be streaming live tonight for Halloween, when we’ll finally rid this place of its ghosts. We’d love to have your help.”

“Halloween is our busy night,” I say.

“Trust me, all the action will be here. So, what do you say?” Gregory urges both Malcolm and me closer, placing a hand on each of our shoulders. “Can I count on K&M Ghost Eradication Specialists?”

I’m paralyzed by the lens trained on my face, but Malcolm’s voice comes sure and smooth.

“Of course. We’ll be here tonight.”

Gregory does something—I can’t say what, exactly—but Tim relaxes his hand and the camera sags in his grip.

“Perfect,” Gregory says. “Splice together a promo. Be sure to include Katy saying ‘Are you filming this now?’ It’s adorable. And plenty of Malcolm for the female demographic. In fact, fire up some of our sock puppets and have them start talking about the haunted hottie. That’ll up the views.”

He squeezes our shoulders before letting go and then claps his hands together. “Tonight’s the night, people. Tonight’s the night Ghost B Gone makes a true name for itself. No more scraps. No more begging. Everyone will come to us from now on.”

He shoos them from the kitchen and, as quickly as they arrived, they vanish, leaving behind stains on the marble countertop, a scattering of Styrofoam cups, and the scent of stale coffee and sweat.

“Is he going to put me on the internet?” I ask, although I’m pretty sure I know the answer.

Malcolm frowns. “I think he already has.”

“I don’t like this,” I say. “I don’t like that I can’t figure out whether it’s stagecraft or if he believes in what he’s doing.”

“Or if it’s a little bit of both.”

“And what did you two talk about that I wasn’t privileged enough to hear?”

Malcolm snorts. “He talked. Tim trailed us with his camera. I’m beginning to think I’m along just as eye candy.”

“The haunted hottie?”

His lip curls as if I’ve handed him a cold cup of coffee. He looks as appalled as I feel.

“Well, you do dress nicely,” I say. Malcolm does, in crisp oxford shirts and pressed trousers, all leftovers from his days as a broker for an investment firm in Minneapolis. “And you are handsome. You’re probably photogenic, too.”

“What did you call me?”

A flush invades my cheeks. Or more accurately, my right one. The spot on my left is stubborn and cold and waxy. Something about that pings in the back of my mind, but with Malcolm staring at me, one eyebrow slightly raised, I can’t grasp what that might be.

“Photogenic,” I say.

“No. The other.”

“Handsome.” My voice is maybe more breathy than it should be.

“Do you think that?”

“Maybe,” I say, giving my shoulders a shrug. “Or maybe it’s just a simple fact.”

His lip doesn’t curl at this, at least. For a long moment, he simply scrutinizes me. Then he laughs.

“So, partner,” Malcolm says, the humor still in his voice. “What do you think we should do tonight?”

I survey the kitchen. True, the electricity is out, and I doubt Gregory B. Gone will spare any from his generator. Still, there’s plenty of room for the camp stove. Through the window, I notice cloud cover has rolled in. The dark, menacing sky might just cancel Halloween.

“We could set up in here,” I say. “Halloween is one of the few nights Sadie’s sprites don’t bother her. We might even find them here.”

“So you don’t think there’s anything here but sprites?”

“I just saw the one. You?”

Malcolm shakes his head. “This place doesn’t even feel haunted, just empty.”

“Like it should have a family in it, some life,” I add.

He opens his mouth to speak, but no words come out. He takes a slow turn around the kitchen. “Does this place feel
too
empty to you?”

“Too empty, like what?”

“The mausoleum?”

Before I can inhale a deep breath, gauge whether the air here feels like that of the mausoleum with all its stale, lifeless stillness, thunder rumbles the house with so much force, the windows rattle. The rack above our heads creaks and sways. A fine sprinkling of plaster from the ceiling coats the marble slab. Malcolm grabs my hand and jerks us both away.

“Why don’t we go get ready for tonight?” he says.

“Are you sure?” I say. “This place could fall down around everybody’s ears.”

“If we’re here, with supplies, we can stop things. If the sprites get out of hand, we’ll just fire up the camp stove.”

I nod. That makes the most sense. Once the ghostly word gets out that something is happening here, it will draw the sprites. So many in one spot can be a problem. They aren’t the awful, evil things of movies and books, but so many together results in chaos.

“All right,” I say. “Let’s go get ready.”

We race through the rain to my truck. By the time I fling myself into the cab, my hair is slicked to my scalp. Drops slither down my spine. Malcolm’s shirt is so soaked, it’s gone from light blue to dark.

“You might want to change before tonight,” I say.

He squeezes water from a sleeve. “I think you might be right.”

I drop him at his apartment, and we agree to meet back at the Victorian half an hour before Ghost B Gone starts streaming their show. But as I turn the truck around and drive back the way I came—a way that takes me by the house again—I wonder if I’m missing something about tonight.

I let the engine idle, truck blocking the road, but this is a residential street that never sees much traffic. I blink, certain what I see is my imagination—or possibly part of Gregory’s stagecraft. The clouds hang lower over the place, the rain pelts harder, the air is darker, somehow.

Terese emerges from the house, hair whipping in the wind, and the strands look alive, like snakes or tentacles. I think that this, too, must be part of Gregory’s stagecraft. Her gaze lingers on me before she offers a smile.

I blink again. In that moment, I lose sight of her. She is no longer on the front porch, hair taking on a life of its own. She is not in the yard. I did not see her step back inside. She is not here.

She is nowhere.

* * *

I leave Belinda with a second pot of coffee and some sandwiches from the deli.

“I’m a terrible hostess,” I tell her. “Leaving you like this.”

“Are you kidding?” She already has the sandwiches cut into quarters, a cup of coffee poured, and my laptop fired up on the kitchen table. “This.” She points a sandwich quarter at the screen. “Is going to be awesome.”

On the screen is Ghost B Gone’s YouTube channel. And on their channel, right now? The promo for tonight’s show. Belinda has paused the video so I’m frozen in time, my mouth open to say:
Are you filming this now?

I sigh. She laughs, then sobers.

“Be careful, tonight, Katy,” she says. “I’m not sure I’d trust this Gregory guy.”

“He’s a lot of hot air and words.”

“Yeah, and if he manages to say the wrong ones? Who knows what he’ll conjure up?”

“It’s just sprites,” I say. “Malcolm and I checked out the place this morning. Low level, mischievous sort of haunting.”

Belinda is silent.

“You don’t think there could be anything more, do you?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “It’s just that your grandmother always told me not to go around looking for ghosts, or even asking if any were around. It draws them out.”

This is true. When we called out the meaner ones, we always did so with a cup of coffee and some Tupperware at the ready.

“They crave attention,” I say.

“Then again, this guy is so obnoxious, he’s lucky it’s Halloween. Otherwise, he might not even get any sprite action.”

“I was thinking of sneaking through the house and catching them all beforehand.”

“Oh, wouldn’t that ruin his day.”

She clicks play on the video. I leave before I can hear myself utter those inane words one more time.

* * *

The Victorian is ablaze with light when I pull up in my truck. Other vehicles crowd both sides of the street, so I have to park two blocks down and dodge raindrops on my way to the house. Someone on the porch is handing out candy to children and flyers to the adults. Someone calls my name, but when I turn around, I can’t see who it might be.

I stand in the rain for a heartbeat, considering whether I really did hear my name or not. Too many children squeal and cry out, too many adults scold. I can barely hear my thoughts. Pink cotton candy dresses and sparkly tiaras compete with black capes and white fluttering sheets. My heart stops at this last.

A child’s idea of a ghost.

Oh, there are so many tonight. All children, I tell myself. Just costumes, from the store. No bed sheets. No bridal veils.

No entity. Not here in Springside, and not here in this modern replica of a Victorian mansion. The rain splatters harder and chases me inside.

Gregory’s tech crew crowds the front part of the house. I push past the flow of people and duck into the kitchen. There, I find Malcolm. I exhale. I didn’t realize I’d swallowed a good dose of anxiety along with dinner.

“Hey,” he says. “You okay?”

I nod. “It’s just crazy out there.”

“Yeah, I’m not sure the sprites wanted that much attention. I can’t seem to tempt any of them out.”

His samovar is throwing aromatic steam into the air. I catch the hint of saffron and other exotic spices. That alone should be enough to lure a sprite. It certainly works on me.

“Is there enough that I can have a cup?” I ask.

“For you? Anything.”

He pours. I sip. The warmth spreads through me, melting away the last bit of my unease. Then I start in on my own brew.

“I’m beginning to think that if there’s going to be a show at all,” he says, “it’ll be up to us to bring the sprites. I mean, really. Do you sense anything? You’re better at that than I am.”

Maybe, but not by much. After I measure the coffee and set the percolator to brew, I take a slow walk around the kitchen.

“I called out that sprite earlier today, but I’m not really getting anything. You’d think with all of that—” I wave toward the front of the house. “They’d be ecstatic. Kids, grownups, everyone shrieking at their antics.”

The kitchen door flies open, and Gregory sticks his head in.

“Hey, you two, the show’s out here,” he says. “Don’t want to start without you.”

“We’re just getting some supplies ready,” Malcolm says.

“What did I tell you? Coffee won’t catch this thing.”

“It’s for the crew,” I pipe up. “In case it’s a late night.”

“How sweet.” He trains a dazzling grin on me. “Come on. The viewers will be disappointed if you’re not there when we start streaming. The haunted hottie already has a fan club.”

Malcolm waits until Gregory vanishes. Then he lets out a groan. I can’t help it. I giggle.

“Come on, partner.” I hold out my hand. “We wouldn’t want to disappoint your fan club.”

He contemplates my hand, but the expression on his face is odd, like he’s uncertain, but not about me. More like, he’s uncertain about himself. But he takes my hand, his skin warm like always, and we push through the kitchen door and into the main part of the house.

* * *

In a matter of hours, the Ghost B Gone crew has transformed the living room from airy and modern to cramped and closed. The space feels as though it has aged. Heavy drapes hide the big bay windows. The fireplace mantelpiece is loaded with ornately framed photographs of unsmiling ancestors. The red in the rolled-out Persian carpet looks like blood. The muted lighting gives the space a dank feel.