Spooked (12 page)

He nodded. “Yup. That’s what they do. They enter someone close to you through the nose, mouth, or ears. Sometimes all three. They use the information the person knows about you against you, to lure you away.” Jude shook his head. “They’re pretty nasty.”

I stared at him. “Do they ever…”

“Kill people? Yes. They do. But that wasn’t the purpose of sending them after you.” His eyes flicked over my face. “Lucky for you.”

“What happens to the people they enter?” I asked, hearing the way my words quivered. I had pretty much expected the worst for Delia, and I believed that I would never see her alive again.

He shrugged. “Sometimes they are fine. They either remember what happened to them and what they did when the shadow spook took them over, or they don’t. Sometimes possession by the spooks leaves their brains scrambled, and they are not much other than zombies. Sometimes they…die.”

I stared at him, fear and dread skittering over me like spiders, making me want to scream and scream until I had no voice left. “They die?”

“Do you really want to hear this?”

“No. But I need to.”

He took a deep breath. “Sometimes, the person who used to be in the body is so horrified that they just want to get away from the shadow spook, so they leave the body. They don’t care where they’re going, they just take off.”

I bit my tongue, trying to focus on the physical pain instead of the grief that clawed at my insides. If I let the sorrow over possibly losing Delia take me over, I’d be rendered useless.

“When they’ve delivered the target to the destination, they might hang out for a while, especially if they’re called on to hold up for a bit. But if the host has left the body, the spook can’t stay for long.”

“Why is that?” I asked, my voice barely a murmur.

“If the original person has left the body, the spook eventually dissolves the body they inhabit. The body goes bad.” Jude went on. “When that happens, the body isn’t more than a grease spot when the spook is done with them.”

I watched him, speechless. I remembered the rotting smell of Delia.

“I know. It’s horrible. But chances are that your aunt is fine. She may just have a wicked headache right now and be wondering whether she had a knock on the head that gave her amnesia.”

I nodded, slowly. “I hope so.” But I knew that she was gone.

He stood and laid a hand on my back. “Me, too, Lorelei. Best to think of that scenario, because you won’t know as long as you’re here.”

“Which means what? That I may never know?”

Jude held my gaze for a moment before pushing in a chair and holding his hand out to me. “Come on. I’ll take you back to your room.”

I understood that he was just being polite. I really had no choice in the matter.

***

During the silent walk back to my room—which I thought of as a cell, really—I was overwhelmed by how helpless I felt. I was bone tired, emotionally drained, and tried to swallow back the gnawing grief and fear I felt. I pressed my quivering lips together and felt my eyes well up. This ticked me off, because I really didn’t want to cry in front of Jude, though for some reason I believed that I could trust him.

I swiped at a tear and blinked back the others ready to make tracks down my cheeks.

“It won’t help you in here.” Jude’s voice was soft next to me. “I’m sorry.”

I looked up at him.

“Crying.” He glanced at me from under black locks.

“I know.” I took a shuddering breath. “I can’t seem to help it.”

We got to my door and he stopped and turned to me. “If it helps you any, your gift helped that Tim guy today. You do have a purpose here. You can do some good.”

“I have a purpose at home. There are missing girls in my town. I was using my ability to find them before I was taken.” I looked into his eyes. “Please. Can you help me get out of here? I need to find those girls, and I need to find out who is abducting them before any more are stolen.”

He shook his head, watching me sadly. “I wish I could, Lorelei. But even if I managed to get you out of here, if I’m caught, they will kill someone I care about. In a really nasty way.” He let out a deep breath. “I’ve heard stories. You don’t want to know what they do.”

I thought of Delia. Of Mick. “How could Lucian do this to people? Doesn’t he have a soul?”

Jude thought for a moment, and then said, “For all we know, he might be the Devil.”

***

Well, he wasn’t getting my soul.

I had to get the hell out of there.

“Has anyone ever made it out alive, without dire consequences?” I kept my head down as I spoke.

We’d been sent outside to rake the dead leaves out of the gardens. The substantial property—enormous, really—was surrounded by woods. I had no idea how many acres of forest there were around us, but I had a feeling that if I went running into them, I’d have a hell of a time finding my way to any kind of civilization. Lucian’s property was set deliberately in the middle of nowhere.

Jude kept his back to me as he gathered leaves off the end of his rake with gloved hands. “Drop it, Lorelei. You’re going to get us both punished.”

Anger and frustration made me grit my teeth, but underneath the rage was a deep sense of hopelessness that I fought off by working harder.

The other kids were working around the area. Strummer drove a riding lawn mower, shredding leaves on the ground as he went. He looked at me for a moment with a dark, intense stare and I felt fear slither over me. I looked down, focusing on my work.

Two girls I hadn’t yet met were working in another area of the yard. I didn’t know what they were laboring on, because I have no idea in the least about gardening, but they worked in the colorful flower beds around the gardens. I wondered what their talents were. I could easily find out if I used my ability on them, but I was afraid they would know, and I’d be reprimanded. I figured by how afraid Jude was of repercussions that being reprimanded would be a very unpleasant thing.

The work would be endless, I knew. Lucian could easily hire a full outdoor staff, but he wanted to keep us busy. The busier you are, the less mischief you’re likely to get into. At least, that was the theory. If we were dead tired by day’s end, we had no strength for shenanigans.

I was deep in thought when the leaves in the flower beds began swirling upward. I frowned; I hadn’t noticed any wind. The autumn day was cool and sunny, but the air was calm. The only wind appeared to be in the flower beds. I stepped back and watched as the leaves on the ground lifted up, dancing around one another and coming together. More and more leaves moved together, twirling in a tornado pattern.

“Oh, shit.” Jude came up to me and I felt his hand pull my arm backward. “Come on. Move it.”

“What is it?”

I watched in awe as the leaf tornado moved into a giant heart shape, hovering there in front of us, and then moving higher, so that we were looking up at it.

Jude pulled me backward.

The heart broke apart, the leaves scattering momentarily until they came together again in the shape of a bird, its wings flapping rapidly.

I watched, open-mouthed and amazed, as the bird came toward me and wrapped me in its wings.

Jude cried out and yanked me away as the leaf-bird broke apart and the leaves fell on me and on the ground around me, the sound like a sharp whisper.

I fell backwards, on my rear end, awestruck. I looked around me. “What just happened?”

Jude helped me, taking both my hands and pulling me up. “Strummer just sent you a greeting card of woodland spirits. Apparently, he likes you.”

I turned and looked behind me, my gaze finding Strummer sitting on the riding mower, grinning. He nodded his head once, and then started the mower moving again, the smile not leaving his face.

“You never know what he’ll send. Woodland spirits are mostly harmless,” Jude said. “But he’s not.”

“Awesome,” I said. My luck just kept getting better.

***

After working in the yard, we were given lunch, made by Lucian’s chef, whose name I learned was Matt. The best chicken noodle soup I’d ever had, with thick turkey and provolone cheese sandwiches. The bread was definitely homemade.

“Wow. Delicious.” I took another bite of my sandwich.

“Yeah. Matt’s got skills,” one of the girls from the gardens said. She had shiny golden hair tied back in a ponytail and merry brown eyes. “I’m Betty, by the way.”

“That’s a name you don’t hear much,” I said. “I like it.”

“Thanks. It works. I was named after a great-grandmother. She was Elizabeth, shortened to Betty. I’m just Betty.”

“It does work,” I said

She smiled at me and I smiled back. Betty was apparently a happy person. I figured that her cheeriness was either contagious or annoying to people. I liked it. Her attitude was a welcome change.

“What is your special skill, Betty?” I asked her.

She grinned, sat back and looked into my eyes. Her face became expressionless.

Suddenly, I felt someone in my head. My right hand picked up a corn muffin and tossed it at Jude. A musical laugh came bubbling up my throat and both hands came up to cover my giggle.

“Nice, Betty,” Jude said, brushing muffing crumbs off his shirt. He then began buttering the muffin, which had fallen onto his plate.

Just as suddenly as she’d appeared inside me, she left, and I felt her absence the way you feel when your best friend who was just sitting next to you suddenly leaves the room.

She came alive again, giving a little laugh and seeming quite pleased with herself. She reached for a piece of chocolate cake. “That’s my skill.”

“Wow,” I said. “That’s a handy talent to have.”

“It does come in handy sometimes. But it’s dangerous to do for more than a few minutes, really.”

“Is it harder to leave someone if you stay too long?” I asked.

“It is. And it’s not a good idea to leave your body for long. There are bad spirits who can take over your body when you’re not in it.” Her face had become serious.

“I’ve heard,” I said.

“And…there are terrible people who will do things to your body while you’re not in it.” She was no longer smiling. “But then, sometimes that is when my talent comes in the handiest.” She was quiet, staring at her plate.

I shivered inwardly. Leo. I’m sure she didn’t dare inhabit Leo to make him back off. He’d tell Lucian, and leave out the whole sexual assault part of it. Maybe she’d even tried, and been punished. The guy needed a serious ass-whooping, and I decided wholeheartedly that someday I’d be the one to give it to him.

“What is the longest you’ve been inside someone else?” I asked her.

She thought for a moment, chewing a bite of cake slowly. “I helped my twin brother through a math test for about twenty minutes once.”

I grinned. “Did he do well on the test?”

“He aced it,” she told me, winking.

“Can you go into animals?”

“Yes,” Betty said. “I prefer cats. But I’ve been inside dogs, horses, birds, a frog, and a shark.”

I stared at her. “A shark?”

She nodded. “At an aquarium when I was really little. I didn’t know I was going to do it. I was just watching him so closely that I went into him, right through the glass. My mother was holding me, thank goodness. She thought I’d just fallen asleep. I was three.”

“What was it like?”

She shuddered. “Cold. Alien. There was really nothing there. I left the shark pretty fast. It scared me.”

“I bet it did.”

“I just started crying and couldn’t stop. My parents had to take me home.”

I ate in silence for a moment, thinking about Betty’s family and wondering where they were.

“How long have you been here, Betty?” I finally asked her.

“About six months. It’s not so bad. Mostly. My talent is used outside this building.”

I could only imagine what they made her do when she entered someone else’s body.

“Someday I’ll go back home,” she said. “If I do a good job and don’t complain. We all will. I’m sure of it.”

I offered her a little smile, but I wasn’t as optimistic.

I let my mind wander a little, wondering what was going on in my town. I wondered whether Mick was looking for me. “Are we allowed to watch the news, read the paper, or listen to the radio? I really want to know what’s going on in my town. If I could just jump on the Internet and read the town newspaper online, it would mean a lot to me. Does anyone even know where we are?”

“We’re nowhere,” Jude said, a hard edge to his voice. “Don’t ask that question again.”

I said to Betty, “Two girls from my high school have gone missing. They vanished within days of each other. I was using my ability to find people’s secrets when I was taken.”

Betty’s eyes grew round. “Missing girls? That’s terrible. There is one person who has more privileges than the rest of us.”

Jude looked up at Betty, a warning look in his eye.

Betty rolled her eyes. “Oh, for God’s sake. Two girls have disappeared from her town, Jude. This is important. She’s going to figure it out anyway.”

“I’m going to figure what out?” I asked, looking back and forth from one to the other.

Jude sighed, shaking his head and staying silent.

“Morgan’s been here the longest and has access to all those things, but don’t bother asking her because she won’t help you. There is one person who might,” Betty said coyly.

“Who is it?” I asked, frustration tingeing my words.

“Paula. You haven’t met her yet. She dines with Lucian, mostly. She was helping me in the flower beds earlier, just because she wanted to hang out with me. But she’s Lucian’s…” she struggled to find the right word.

“Pet,” Jude said, not looking up from his plate. “As a result of her other special skills.”

“Oh,” I said, lifting my eyebrows.

Betty tipped her head in the affirmative. “He really likes her. She can come and go pretty much as she pleases. He takes her out a lot. Dinners, movies, vacations. Whatever she likes. She stays in his house with him.”

Betty was a fountain of information. The more I discovered about the people who did Lucian’s bidding, or bedding in this case, the more I found out about Lucian. “Is that why she stays? Because he lavishes her with special treatment?”