Fiction River: Hex in the City (26 page)

There are two.

***

When I look up at Frey, he has a darkly concerned frown on his face. We’re seated side by side on the bed.

He presses his lips together. “I’m sorry I wasn’t straight with you. I was afraid if I told you why we were coming here, you’d think I was nuts. Now I think I’m the one who’s nuts. You looked pretty spooked downstairs. It was the ghost, wasn’t it? Did she threaten you?”

Should I tell him that it wasn’t Imogene? And while it was nothing overt, the touch of that icy finger didn’t exactly feel welcoming.

I force myself to smile, swallowing down the guilt that now I’m the one fudging the truth. “Don’t look so concerned. For whatever reason, I think your ghost is trying to communicate with me. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

Before he can speak, I take his hand. “Listen, Frey, I don’t know what’s going to happen tonight but I’m not sure you should be a part of it. Let me stay in the room by myself. ”

Frey blows out a breath. “Believe me, I’d love to leave this to you. But there’s no way I’m going to let you face this ghost on your own. I didn’t tell you what she does to the male guests, did I?”

I wave my hand in a go-on motion. Frey takes my hand “She smothers them. Puts a hand over their mouths and around their necks. They wake up fighting for breath. In the last two weeks alone, there have been three incidents. One man almost died from a heart attack and two stroked out. She may not seem threatening to you, but she has it in for men and one of these days, she’s going to kill someone.”

If this conversation had taken place two years ago, I would have written it off as urban legend. And told Frey that the men who claimed to have been attacked by a ghost were delusional. Now, battling monsters of every denomination, not to mention my own visitation by Max’s ghost, I sit here wondering what strategy I can use to persuade this ghost to move on.

If not to a better place, then at least to another hotel.

One where Frey has no connections.

Now, how to ask the next question without raising undue suspicion. I spy the newspaper articles on the nightstand.

“Okay.” I glance at my watch. “The article mentioned Imogene was killed after ten o’clock. It’s ten fifteen now. Come on, my handsome hunk of ghost bait, time for bed.”

Frey grabs his duffel and heads into the bathroom. As soon I hear water running, I snatch the articles and slip them into my bag. In fifteen minutes, a scrubbed Frey wearing a pair of tighty-whities is back and headed for the bed. He waves a hand at me, presumably a “good-night” gesture, and settles under the covers.

Now that’s a switch. He’s gotten into bed alone and with underwear on. There hasn’t been a night since we’ve been married that if we were in the same town, we didn’t make love before going to sleep. The fact that he didn’t even kiss me before pulling those covers up means he really is spooked.

“Frey?”

He opens one eye. “Let’s get this over with. The sooner we make contact, the sooner I don’t have to sleep alone.”

I lean over and plant a kiss on his forehead, then move into the bathroom to change from my jeans into shorts and a camisole top. By the time I reenter the bedroom and click off the light, Frey’s deep, regular breathing is the only sound in the room.

I gather throw pillows and a blanket and try to make a nest for myself in one of the rocking chairs.

Not
the one that set to rocking by itself this afternoon.

She may consider that her chair.

Once settled, I turn again to the articles. Luckily, a vampire’s sight is better than night vision goggles so reading in the dark is no challenge.

None of the articles mention much about the man who attacked Imogene. His name: Everett Black. His relationship to Imogene: a business acquaintance of her father. No previous criminal record. He was married, had two children.

So what made him go after Imogene?

I curl my legs under me, rest my head back, close my eyes. If he’s the second ghost in the Monte Vista, it’s a question I can ask him when we meet.

***

From far away, a sound.

Gasping.

I burrow deeper against the cushions. Shut it out.

It comes again. A strangled sob. Louder now. Pleading.

Something stirs in the back of my consciousness.

Anna. Wake up.

I struggle up through the depths of a dream sluggishly, like a bubble through molasses.

My eyes stay shut. But my ears pick up sounds like an echo bouncing off the wall of a cave.

Rustling of silk. Thrashing of bedclothes. Sobs, both male and female. I recognize the male voice.

Frey.

My eyes fly open.

Frey’s hands are at his throat, clawing at his attacker.

The girl leans over him, transparent as mist, her face grim and determined. She presses a body that should be weightless against his chest, squeezes hands that should be incapable of inflicting damage around his throat. Frey fights to throw her off, his own face darkening as he struggles for air.

When she senses that I’m awake, she looks over at me. Her cheeks are wet with tears. She’s so young, her pretty face unlined, cheeks and bow mouth touched with rouge. She’s dressed in an off-the-shoulder gown of red fabric, ribbed bodice, sleek, pencil style skirt. It looks like something out of the ’40s with its puffed sleeves and satin fan hip bow. Her party dress. Her shroud.

The only thing to mar the perfection of her milky skin are the angry, red marks that circle her own throat. Strangle marks. And the anger that blazes from her eyes.

Her grip on Frey doesn’t weaken.

I stand up and approach the bed. “Please stop.”

She’s staring in my direction, but I can’t tell if it’s me she’s seeing. Her gaze seems to pass through me. To something behind me. Her features shift, from anger to fear.

Another spirit has joined us. I feel the presence like a cold draft on the back of my neck.

When I turn, I see him, too.

A man. Laughing. Dressed in dark evening clothes. He pulls a white silk scarf from around his neck. He’s in his thirties, dressed like a dandy. He would be handsome but for the complete lack of compassion in his face.

“Everett Black?”

His eyes, dark and hard as flint, flick to me.

“Let her go.”

There is no touch of humanity in those eyes. He is a killer and in that instant, I know. Imogene was not his only victim
—
only the last before her father took his life. Everett smiles at me as if acknowledging what I’ve guessed as truth and daring me to stop him.

Imogene has let go of Frey. Backing off the bed, she cringes in a corner.

Frey rolls into a sitting position, coughing, sucking in great draughts of air. He sees the man, too. He moves to stop him, but his hands pass through the specter and he’s left clutching at a void.

Everett advances upon the girl, twirling the scarf in his hands. He’s trapped Imogene, his last victim, bound here by his anger to relive her death again and again.

I lunge for him, but like Frey, I pass through his spectral body and land in the corner beside the girl. She reaches out to me for protection, clings to my arm.

Protection I’m powerless to give.

Yet, I feel her touch. Frey and the other men she attacked felt her. I look toward her killer.

I grab her hands. “Use these. Protect
yourself
.”

She doesn’t understand. Her eyes beg for my help.

I point to Frey. “Attack him the way you attacked my friend. Use your strength, your will. You can do it.”

She pulls her hands out of mine, her shoulders slump in a gesture of despair, resignation. She has no grasp of what I am telling her to do. Her eyes bore into mine, communicating her pain.

“There is nothing I can do.” Her gaze slides away, to the man approaching.

I understand. She thinks this is her destiny. She thinks she has no choice. She thinks what happened is her fault. Her frustration is tangible. Frustration she takes out the only way she can—on men she finds at the scene of her own murder.

The killer is a step away. He pays no attention to me.

I grab the girl by the shoulders. Shake her until her eyes once again find mine. “You think you are doomed to relive this night again and again. You may be wrong. Fight him. Just once. Take the power away from him. What do you have to lose?”

The girl hesitates, still afraid, still not convinced.

“Listen to me. You are taking your anger out on the wrong victims. Your attacker is right there. Don’t let him hurt you again.”

Suddenly there is a subtle change—a shadow passes from the depths of her eyes. A spark of hope makes her square her shoulders. She pulls away from me and watches the wraith approach.

“Will you stay?”

I nod.

She stands to meet him. He pauses then, tilts his head, telegraphing his thoughts with body language. Contempt. Excitement. This is something new. He grins. She is challenging him? No more the frightened child he found so easy to subdue before.

He likes it. He licks his lips. It will make the taking so much more delicious.

The girl moves away from me. He counters, the scarf held in front of him like an offering. He sneers at her clumsy efforts. He thinks she is trying to flee. He closes the distance between them, quickly grown tired of the game. He wants only the pleasure of the kill and what comes after. He wants what has been and what will be for eternity.

The girl moves away again, quickly, an apparition dissolving and reappearing like an object in fog. This time she is behind him. She gathers her strength, pushes him.

Startled, he loses his footing and falls onto the bed. Frey scrambles off, though neither the girl nor her attacker pay any attention to us. Frey joins me in the corner.

“Can you do anything to help her?” he asks.

I shake my head. “She has to do this herself.”

The girl falls upon the back of the man. His mouth is open, as if bellowing in rage but no sound reaches our ears. Her hands grab for the scarf, yank it from his clutching fingers, wind it around his throat. She wraps her legs around his thrashing body, riding him, refusing to let go, refusing to allow him to gain leverage against her. She, too, seems to be screaming whether in rage or satisfaction we have no way of knowing. She hangs on, tightening the scarf, twisting it so savagely the fabric disappears into the skin. As it does, the marks on her own neck fade.

A few more minutes of thrashing, a startled, gasping cry from the man.

Then, it’s over.

The man disappears with a scream that echoes in our ears. Like a performer in a carnival magic show, he’s there one minute and gone the next.

I hear Frey draw a sharp breath beside me.

The girl is still with us. She’s standing beside the bed, touching her unmarked neck, her expression a marvel of relief and joy. When she looks at me, warmth floods my body. I feel her peace.

It’s her parting gift to me.

***

Frey and I are seated in the manager’s office, an open, half-empty bottle of Scotch on the desk. Frey is massaging his neck, still bearing the marks from the girl’s attack. He’s dressed in jeans and a tee shirt now, a glass in the hand not working at the bruises on his neck. I’ve changed into jeans, too, a hoodie over my camisole.

I notice the grimace as he takes tiny sips of the liquor.

“Hurt to swallow?” I ask.

“Like a son of a bitch. That little girl had a mean grip.”

Phil is seated across from us. I’ve placed the newspaper articles on the desk. “You’re sure this is over?”

He’s tall and lean and has a mop of dark auburn curls touched with gray. His face reflects years of living under the sun, lines radiate out from the corners of his eyes and his tan skin is worn to leather. Right now, he’s still frowning, looking from Frey to me and back again as if afraid to accept what we’ve told him.

“As sure as we can be,” I reply. “Imogene stood up for herself for the first time. She took back her power. I think she’s moved on.”

I think of the last image I have of her back in the room. Instinctively, I pick up the newspaper article with the photo, the glowing studio portrait of a happy sixteen year old. Her smile hadn’t changed. It was still full of promise. But I see something else. I see peace.

Frey doesn’t want to spend another minute longer in the hotel then we have to. So with Phil’s protestations of undying gratitude ringing in our ears, we gather our things and beat the sun out of town.

Once back on the road, I cast Frey a suspicious glance. “Any more surprises?”

He makes a little cross over his heart. “Nope. Promise.”

“Good.” I lean towards him. “Stop the car.”

He glances over as if unsure what he heard. “What?”

“Stop the car.”

Frey slows the Jeep and pulls onto the shoulder of the deserted highway. “What’s the matter?”