Haunted (48 page)

The phone rang.

I froze, halfway across the room.
Okay, Lucas, I’m sure you can hear the phone. This is the perfect excuse to come back inside—

The phone stopped ringing. Good. Now—

“Paige!” Savannah screamed.

Shit! Now what? No, wait, Lucas told her to leave me—Paige—alone, so she’ll take a message and—

Footsteps banged up the steps. I didn’t move. Couldn’t move.

The door swung open, and there stood my daughter. My beautiful fifteen-year-old daughter. Standing there. Looking right at me. At me—not glancing at a spot just to the left of her mother’s invisible ghost—but actually at me, seeing me—

“The phone,” she said, waggling it in front of my nose.

“What are you? Deaf? Geez.”

I willed my hand up. She lifted the phone over her head, out of my reach, a mischievous grin darting across her face. Then she handed it to me, mouthed, “Shorty,” sailed across the room, and plunked herself down on the other chair.

I stared at her for a moment, then wrenched my gaze away and lifted the phone to my ear.

“Paige Winterbourne.”

“Oh, thank God you’re home,” a woman’s voice said. “Liza didn’t know what to do and I said, ‘Let me call Paige. She’ll figure something out.’”

“Uh-huh. Well, I’m awfully busy right now. Could I call you—”

“Oh, it’ll just take a second. It’s about the EMRAW.”

“Em…?”

“The Elliott Memorial Run and Walk?” The woman laughed. “Guess all your charity events must run together after a while.”

“Uh, right.”

“Bottles or cups?”

“Huh?”

“The water. We need to have water for the participants. If we bought jugs and poured it into cups, we’d save a lot of money. But it might make us look cheap.”

“Cheap…”

“Right. So should we go with individual bottles instead?”

For a second, I could only sit there, a “what the hell?” expression on my face.

“Paige?”

“Oh, hell, buy Evian. It’s only charitable donations you’re spending, right?”

Silence buzzed down the line. I rolled my eyes.

“Cups, obviously,” I said. “It’s a charity event. If they expect bottled water, they can damned well go jog at the country club instead.”

More silence, then a shaky, “Right. I, uh, thought that’s what you’d choose, but—”

“Then why call?”

I hung up. Unbelievable. Donating time to charity is all very fine and noble, but how the hell could Paige find the patience for crap like that? She’s running around trying to save the world from the forces of evil, and has to deal with idiots who think “what kind of water should we serve?” is a life-or-death dilemma. You ask me, that crossed the line from goodness to martyrdom.

“Lucas was right. You are in a strange mood,” Savannah said, still twisting the chair back and forth. “Lucas said I can’t bug you ’cause you’re busy. But I didn’t interrupt you. The phone did. As long as you’re interrupted, though, there’s no harm in talking to you, right?”

I thought of Lucas, downstairs, alone with the Nix. “Uh, can we—”

“It’s about Trevor,” she said. “He’s acting—I don’t
get
him, you know. I think he wants to be with me—but then he acts all—” She groaned and stopped spinning the chair. “He’s being weird again.”

“And you—you want my advice?”

“Duh, no. I just want to know what you think. I mean, sure, if you want to give me advice, I can’t stop you. You always do anyway. But it’s not like I have to take it.”

I stood there, speechless. My daughter wanted my advice about a boy. How many times had I imagined this conversation, imagined what I’d say, what words of wisdom I could impart—or, considering my romantic track record, what warnings I could give.

Jaime’s laugh floated through the open window.

“Shit!” I said.

Savannah looked at me, one brow going up.

“Uh, Lucas,” I said. “I needed to tell him—Is he downstairs?”

“Nah, outside. Jaime wanted to see his bike. Like she hasn’t seen it before.”

“I need to—Hold that thought. About the boy. I’ll be right back.”

I bolted from the room, then heard Savannah following and checked my pace, settling for a quick march down the steps and to the back door. I threw it open. Jaime turned, and for a split second something very un-Jaime-like passed behind her eyes, a mental snarl of pique.

“Ah, Paige,” Lucas said. “Perfect timing. We need to discuss dinner.”

“Already?” Jaime said, forcing a laugh. “I thought maybe Lucas could take me for a ride—”

“Aren’t we having roast chicken?” Savannah said, slipping out behind me.

“We were,” Lucas said. “But Paige has been so busy with that site crash that she hasn’t had time to start it, so we’ll need an alternate plan.”

“Well, you guys figure that out, then,” Savannah said.

“Jaime and I need to talk.”

Jaime looked at her, frowning.

“You know,” Savannah said. “About that thing.”

“What thing is that?” I asked.

“Curry,” Lucas said.

I frowned. “They need to talk about curry?”

“No, for dinner. We’ll pick up Indian. You like Indian food, don’t you, Jaime?”

She smiled. “Love it.”

“Why don’t Paige and I go pick that up now, and we’ll have an early dinner.”

Savannah plucked at Jaime’s sleeve and nodded toward the house. As they went inside, I watched, still standing there as the door closed. So much for a mother-daughter boy chat. Maybe later.

I turned to Lucas. “Jaime doesn’t like Indian food, does she? The real Jaime, I mean.”

“Hates it.”

“Ah, so you didn’t quite believe me. You could have said so, you know, and we’d have thought up an easier way to test her…one that doesn’t require us leaving them alone while we go pick up dinner.”

He shook his head. “We’re not going to pick up dinner. The Indian query was simply a convenient opportunity to verify that the Nix is indeed still inhabiting Jaime’s body. I was quite sure of it when she lured me out here, but ‘quite sure’ is hardly sufficient, considering what we’re planning to do.”

He handed me Paige’s helmet, and took his own off the shelf.

“I thought you said—” I began.

“We must at least appear to leave. That will also provide us with the opportunity to sneak back and find out what Savannah meant—what she and Jaime needed to discuss.”

48

LUCAS PARKED THE MOTORCYCLE AT A TINY COMMUNITY
vegetable garden half a block away. We left our helmets locked to the bike, then hurried back to the house.

“Blur spell?” I asked as we drew close. “Or can you do that one yet?”

“I believe you’ll find my spell-casting much improved since our last meeting. Being bested by a witch casting sorcerer magic is bound to have a rousing impact on any sorcerer. I finally mastered the blur spell last year.”

“How about Paige? ’Cause I’m restricted to her level of magic here. My Aspicio powers aren’t working worth a damn.”

“Paige is reasonably adept at it as well. Anything I know, she knows…” A quarter-smile. “Or she is doing her best to learn.”

“How about the cover spell? If you can’t do it, I can cover you—”

“Paige isn’t the only one driven to expand her repertoire. I can cast most witch magic she knows, including the cover spell and binding spell, though she continues to be more proficient at the latter. I believe I’ve hit the racial-crossover wall with that one.”

“Well, you’re the first sorcerer I’ve met who can do it at all, so you’re well ahead of the game.”

We paused behind the neighbor’s fence. Lucas stood on tiptoe to peer over it. I tried…then realized I didn’t have a hope in hell of succeeding. Not at this height.

“There,” Lucas said. “I saw a movement in the living room. They’re in there, or just inside the dining room on the other side.”

“Hey, speaking of the dining room, did you know you have a resident residual?”

He frowned down at me.

“Er, never mind. I’ll explain later.”

We used our blur spells to get to the living room window, then replaced it with a cover spell. Sorcerer blur spells, as the name suggests, only blur your form. They don’t make you invisible. Witch cover spells make you invisible, but only if you’re standing still. Put the two together, and you have a decent stealth package.

Although the weather was still nippy, most of the windows in the house were cracked open. When we stood beside the living room side window, we could hear voices, but no words. After a moment of closed-eye concentration, I picked up Savannah’s conversation.

“…but if it’s dangerous—” she said.

Jaime laughed. “And since when has that bothered you?”

“It
has
to bother me. With my power, I can’t just go casting spells any way I want. I need to know exactly what I’m doing and what can happen or—”

Jaime laughed again, the sound taking on a harsh tone of mocking. “God, you sound like Paige. I never thought I’d see the day. Your mother would flip.”

I gritted my teeth.
No, baby, I wouldn’t flip. Paige is right. You
do
need to be careful. You need—

“Sure, Paige tells me to be careful,” Savannah said. “But it doesn’t mean I listen.”

“Look, Savannah, either you want to summon your mom or you don’t.”

My heart thudded.

“Of course I do,” Savannah said.

“Well, then, you have to be willing to assume the risks. Like you said, you have the power. This ritual wouldn’t work with anyone else. But you can do it. I’m sure you can.”

A hand touched my arm. I looked up to see Lucas, who’d broken his cover spell. He jerked his chin toward the sidewalk. I broke my spell and pointed at the house, gesturing that I wanted to hear more.

“Heard enough,” he mouthed.

I hesitated, then cast the blur spell and darted across the lawn and behind the neighbor’s fence.

“So that’s how she’ll do it,” I said. “She’ll make Savannah think she knows a way to contact me. And when we—you and Paige, I mean—wind up dead, she’ll say it was because of the spell, that Savannah screwed up.”

Lucas nodded and motioned for us to talk as we returned to the motorcycle.

“But how is she going to kill us while Savannah’s performing the ritual?” I said. “Necros can’t kill anyone—not with magic, at least.”

“I suspect the plan is to kill us ahead of time,” Lucas said. “Probably individually. That may have been part of her ruse with the bike. Find a way to kill me, hide the motorcycle, and claim I went off on an errand.”

“Then kill me—Paige—and, after the ritual, find us dead. Leaving Savannah to think that in her eagerness to contact me, she killed you two. God, when I get hold of that demi-demon bitch—”

“Careful. We have to take this slowly. Play at her pace.” He glanced at me. “Is that going to be a problem?”

“Not if it means I finally
will
get hold of her.”

As safe as we assumed Savannah was with the Nix, neither of us wanted to test that theory more than necessary, so we skipped the take-out run, and instead decided to tell Savannah and Jaime that the wait had been too long and we were opting for pizza—delivered—instead.

Lucas would do the explaining, leaving me to retreat to Paige’s office once again. Then, when he had the chance, he’d get Savannah away from Jamie, and with any luck, Jaime would take advantage of the opportunity to strike at me.

Up in Paige’s room, I did a quick drawer search. Took me a few minutes, but I found what I wanted: a length of strong ribbon. I used it to tie back Paige’s long, thick curls, adjusting the knot so it would pull free with only a tug. Lucas and I had decided on suffocation as the safest way to “almost” kill Jaime’s body. While I had every intention of putting my bare hands around her throat and looking into that demi-demon’s eyes as I throttled the life from her, I needed a backup tool. The ribbon would do.

Twenty minutes later, a loud
thump
sounded outside, followed by a shout from Savannah. I bolted from my chair and flew to the window. Another
thump,
coming from behind the house. Savannah groaned and yelled something. I opened the window farther, pried off the screen, and leaned out. Savannah and Lucas were at the far end of the driveway, playing basketball.

As I watched them, I thought of Kristof. I’d dreamed of boy-talk with Savannah. Is this what he dreamed of? Is this what I’d taken away from him? The thought pinged another, and I remembered what he’d said before I’d transmigrated into Paige’s body. That he’d stay close. My head shot up so fast I hit the windowsill and yelped. I imagined him laughing, and a shiver ran through me. I turned slowly.

“You’re here, aren’t you?” I said.

I scanned the room, and strained to listen, to see some sign of Kristof. It was one thing having a ghost around when you didn’t know it. But if you knew it, and if you tried hard enough, surely you should be able to pick up some sign. But I couldn’t.

“Savannah’s outside,” I said. “Playing basketball with Lucas.”

Nothing. Not even a twinge of awareness that told me he was there.

“Basketball was never your thing, was it?” I said with a smile. “Mine neither. But she’s good at it. And she likes it. That’s what counts.”

The silence swallowed my voice. I shivered, and the quaver went right down into my gut. What if something went wrong, and I couldn’t get back? Was this what it would be like, stuck here, talking to myself, wondering whether he was still listening? At least on the other side, I could see this world. From here, the separation was absolute.

Savannah yelled something outside, and I jerked up. If Savannah and Lucas were outside, that meant I was alone in here with the Nix. And if she was making no effort to come and get me, I had to give her a push.

“Sorry, Kris, but we gotta run.” I grinned. “Time to try getting myself killed.”