Death Whispers (Death Series, Book 1) (48 page)

“I wanna see,” Jonesy said, rushing forward.

We all stood in a circle around Jade, she was the
shortest one in the group so we all had a good view.

Slowly taking her hand away from her chest she
showed us what looked like a burn, just shy of the blistering kind.
It was the worst in the webbing which connects the thumb and index
finger. I touched a finger lightly to the worst spot.

“Yeah, it's tender.”

“Was it hot?” Jonesy asked.

Jade shook her head.

“Cold?” John guessed.

“Yeah... like colder than anything I've ever
touched.”

“Kinda like that time Carson put his wet tongue
to that frozen utility pole,” Jonesy smiled, remembering.

“And you pelted him with snowballs,” John
said.

“Ah-huh, that was the time,” Jonesy said in
that dreamy tone.

“Okay, so we know that they're dangerous,” Bry
said.

“Not to them,” John said.

Everyone looked at Tiff and I. Awkwardness.

Tiff said, “That's good, right? I mean, that's
the whole reason Jonesy thought we should come, we're the...”

“Contingency plan,” I finished.

“Yeah, that,” Tiff agreed.

I bent down and kissed Jade's hand and she smiled.

“All better,” I said.

“Pretty angry looking,” Sophie said, looking
closely at it.

“Yeah, it's a war wound,” Jonesy said, eyes
cutting to the staircase.

“Ah-no, haven't we had enough excitement for
tonight?” John asked.

“Never!” Jonesy enthused, running over to the
base of the staircase, Onyx at his heels.

“Wait a sec.... where did that ghost go?” Tiff
asked.

I pointed above my head and we all looked up at
the ceiling.

Jade said, “I'm game but no touchy.”

I squeezed her head underneath my chin, holding
her. “It doesn't seem like the ghost meant to.”

“
No,”
Jonesy said. “It definitely
didn't
want
to freeze my nuts off!”

Bry and John laughed.

Thanks Jonesy, so reassuring. “What I meant was,
I think Jade took it..”

“
...
him
,
”
Tiff clarified.

Right,
definitely male, “...
him
,
by surprise. He gave her the ice blast because she startled him.”

“It's a guy ghost ?” Sophie asked.

“Yeah,” Tiff said.

“Wow,
hate to see what he'd do to really freeze us,” Jonesy said.

“He was warm to us,” Tiff said.

John said, “It's the AFTD thing. You guys are
like the same element or something.”

“It was scared when I touched it,” Jade said.

“Evil?” John asked.

“Not
really but, it could be. He could be.”

“I bet they got personalities!” Jonesy
chortled.

“They do,” Jade said.

He stopped laughing, John and Bry's smile slipping
from their faces.

Tiff stepped forward. “They do?”

“
He
did,” Jade said.

Whoa. “What did he think or whatever?” I
asked.

“He didn't exactly think, I just got feelings
about him being disturbed and then there were some random images of
his life here.”

“Wait a sec, Jade, you're not AFTD?” Tiff
clarified.

“No, Empath.”

“So
how does she know anything about what it, okay, sorry, he thought?”

“I was holding her when she swiped the ghost.
We've noticed in the past that I can put the zombies back into the
ground better if I am touching Jade,” I said.

“Back-in-box, back-in-box,” Jonesy sang.

“Jonesy, come on,” Bry said.

Bry
stated his question, “His life here?”

“Yeah, he was the caretaker guy here,” Jade
said.

“Okay,” I said. “Let's cruise the upstairs
really fast then maybe we can rip by the hideaway after.”

“I don't know, that's way across town,” John
said.

“Who doesn't have a bike?” I asked.

Jonesy raised his hand.

“Be a peg-rider, dude,” Bry said.

“For five miles?” Jonesy asked.

“Who's driving?” John asked.

Our collective attention turned to Bry. He was the
smart one that brought up the peg idea.

“Oh come on! He can't last five miles on my
pegs.”

“Can you?” A direct challenge from the sister.

Bry's eyes narrowed to slits. “Yeah, I can do
it.”

John clapped his hand together. “Settled then!”

Jonesy air-pumped. “Let's investigate!”

“Wait!” I said, arcing the LED in the air
toward Jonesy, who smoothly caught it.

He took the steep steps two at a time never
slowing down, Onyx at his heels.

Bry and John racing after him, John slipped and
nailed a knee on the way up. “Ouch, damn,” he said, cupping the
offended joint, jumping up the rest in an ungainly frog hop.

Jade, Tiff and I climbed the steps with Sophie
slightly ahead. It was dark and I held the railing in a death grip
because the light was utterly non-existent here.

At the top of the staircase stood the gang, mouths
agape, looking at the scene in front of them.

Wisps of luminescent figures twirled and sailed
about, lighting the area with their phosphorescent glow, frantically
gliding back and forth, agitated. There were “eye-windows” on
either end of the eaves, caressing the floorboards, but the ceiling
was really tall down the central section of the roof. We couldn't
have touched it if we tried.

Jonesy
looked less enthusiastic than earlier and inching closer to the
staircase by the second. Our male ghost hovered in the middle,
looking intimidating. But I wasn't worried, he hadn’t been hostile
to Tiff and me. But he'd hurt Jade and about frozen Jonesy's jewels
off, caution was good.

Tiff looked at the agitated ghosts. “They're
kids.”

That made me stare. They were swirling so
furiously that it was hard to tell... but, I thought she was right.

I didn't want to leave Jade. I looked at Bry, he
nodded. Guy-speak, a wonderful thing.

He moved closer to Jade and I said, “Be right
back.”

Tiff followed me, turning around once to look at
John. “I'm shielding,” he said.

I kept approaching. The large male ghost was
hovering and I was seeing more of him this time. Tiff looked at me
with wide eyes, our hair starting to rise off our heads, floating
with static electricity. The small ghosts hovered around us, slowing
their frenetic spinning, calming. We stood in front of the one big
ghost, it held out what had once been hands, and Tiff and I each took
an opaque “hand.”

Images flowed into our minds; reverse history. We
saw his death, in broken images, like a kaleidoscope rapidly spinning
backwards, colors and shapes, jagged loneliness and care-taking,
feelings of accomplishing, then... a lonely death here in this house,
with no one to take care of him.

“So sad,” Tiff said through clenched teeth.

“Yes,” I agreed.

But the images weren't done. We saw the ghost's
pain as children were killed and he could do nothing. He took care of
their spirits, that much he could do. He was still the caretaker for
the dead.

He dropped our hands and floated back.

His message was clear, we could speak for these
dead children.

We could do what he could not.

“Wow,” Tiff said.

“Yeah.”

We moved back and the ghosts returned to swirling
again.

The
evilness of his message began to sink in. Children had been murdered
here
.
Kids.
Like us. Tiff and I looked at each other.

Jonesy said, “What's the deal?”

I said slowly, “The deal is, he is the
care-taker of a bunch of dead kids.”

“Told you!” Jonesy said.

“What?” Bry asked.

“I told everyone that some boy had died here.”

“
Jonesy's
right, he
did
say that a boy died here,” John said.

Jonesy scowled at John. “And, there's a helluva
lot more than just one.” He indicated the ghosts floating and
diving in the background, holographic in the moonlight.

We
all looked at them, Sophie said, “Why are
we
seeing them?”

“I
got this,” Tiff said. “I did read all the stuff...”

You
did?
Sophie mouthed silently.

“Ah-huh, and us AFTDs,” she looked at me and I
shrugged, I didn't know, “give off an aura so others can see stuff
like ghosts.”

“So, if Caleb and you take off, then they
disappear?”

“It sounds that way,” John said.

“Shit, that's swift,” Jonesy said, impressed.

The greater point of the murdered children was
being lost to the jack-in-the-box ghosts.

Bry chuckled. “He does have a way with words.”

“Yeah,” I agreed but was thinking about all
we'd seen. The horror of it felt like a splinter in my head.

“We'll have to do something about this,” Tiff
said.

“I know,” I said, grabbing Jade's hand,
comforted by the solidness of it after the creeping warmth of “our”
ghost.

“I wanna see if they'll disappear, Caleb,”
Jonesy said.

“Jonesy, give it a rest,” I said.

“Yeah, let's book. I want to check out this
hideout you guys have,” Bry said, glancing again at the ghosts.

John stood, mesmerized. “Not every day you see
ghosts.”

“Yeah, they're kinda pretty,” Sophie said.

Jonesy raised both eyebrows, uncomprehending.

Jade nodded in agreement with Sophie.

Our group headed down the stairs. Jade, Tiff and I
lingered. A palatable weight hung over us. Breaking contact, we
climbed back down the stairs.

Walking through the door we shut it softly behind
us, the sadness and horror clinging like smoke to our bodies.

CHAPTER 31

Coming out into the moonlight we sucked great
gulps of fresh air into our lungs, trying to expunge the cloying
feeling of claustrophobia the house had given us.

“Okay, so... let's shake that off,” Jonesy
said.

“Maybe
you can but not me, not for awhile,” Sophie shivered.

I agreed. It'd be awhile before Tiff and I would
get over that.

Jade looked around, seeing the group lounging by
the gate. “Let's pulse the adults.”

Bry said, “Great idea, mom's going to have a
kitten if we don't check in.”

Tiff nodded, letting her brother pulse for the
pair. One by one we shoved our pulses back into their respective
spots and looked around.

Jonesy got a strange light in his eyes. “What do
ya think...” he began.

“No.” John said.

“Right. What he said,” Jade agreed.

Bry said, “What, Jonesy?”

Tiff waggled a finger. “You don't know Jonesy
that well Bry, he gets these ideas,” she made the universal choking
gesture with both hands around her throat, “that usually get us all
in trouble.”

“Oh, I don't know about that, so far the night's
been pretty exciting,” he said, smiling.

“
See,
there's
a dude that knows how to keep the adventure rolling!” Jonesy said,
giving Bry guy acknowledgment.

My watch said it was only eleven; felt like hours
had passed.

“Looks like we got the green light to do more
screwin' around. Let's see who we can jerk outta the pasture here
Caleb.” Jonesy said, thumb in the direction of the old graveyard at
our backs.

“Nah, I don't want to. I've had enough for
tonight. And with ghosts so close, I don't know. Things could go bad.
Besides, it seems wrong to do it for sport or something.”

“The element of surprise!” Jonesy said,
ignoring me.

Bry blanched. “Would it be like Scenic?”

“May have been because Gran was a relative,” I
said.

“Well that one zombie, Chris, Claude...” Jade
began.

“Clyde,” I supplied.

“That's him!” she remembered.

“Yeah, he seems more aware,” John said.

“What do you mean? I've never seen the zombie
trick.” Sophie said.

“It's not a trick,” Tiff said, offended.

“I didn't mean anything by it, I'm just
sayin'...”

“Caleb's raised this particular zombie, what,
three times?” John looked at me for confirmation, I nodded. “So
each time he comes back he seems to be...”

“Smarter,” I said.

“Yes,” John agreed.

“Last time he seemed to communicate with the
other zombies like a captain or something,” Jade said.

“Captain of the Zombie Guard!” Jonesy laughed.

Right...
so
funny,
not-laughing.

“I don't want a repeat of the Gran Incident,”
Bry said.

“Yeah, that went pretty sideways,” Tiff
agreed.

“And then Garcia and his creepy partner showed
up...” Bry began.

“McGraw,” I added.

“Yeah, him,” Bry said with gravity.

We were all quiet for a little bit.

“So Garcia's corrupt?” John speculated.

“It's lookin' that way, I don't know for sure.
But they're pairing mundanes with paranormals now and McGraw was
quick to show us he was an Elemental, sorta like a threat,” I said.

“Wait, I hadn't heard they had decided that,
pairing mundanes and paranormals,” John said.