Spirit Prophecy (The Gateway Trilogy Book 2) (18 page)

Hannah turned to go. I blurted out after her, “Do you want me to come with you?”

She turned back. “No, I’ll be fine. I might see if I can find Milo.”

This caused the familiar little stab of jealousy, but I was prepared for it. Stronger, though, was the resentment of knowing that Finn Carey would be there to hear whatever Finvarra had to say to my sister. I tried not to glare at his retreating back, but focused instead on what seemed like an important reminder. “Don’t forget what Karen said when she was giving us our clan colors.”

“I won’t,” Hannah said, her eyes shining with genuine excitement. “See you later, then. Wish me luck!”

We all did, and watched her return to Keira, now beckoning to her from the cloisters. I felt a little pang of loss as she walked away, her tiny shoulders squared and her long hair swinging behind her. Someone that small ought to have someone holding her hand.

“Wow, a summons to the North Tower,” Mackie said with a low whistle. “That must be some special ability she’s got. Finvarra doesn’t often deal with the new Apprentices directly.”

“Straight to the headmistress is never good, in my experience,” Savvy added, lighting a cigarette and immediately dropping it in the grass as she failed to stifle a huge yawn.

“Don’t be daft, she’s not being punished,” Mackie said. “Come on then, let’s go eat.”

But though I waited over an hour, staring at my soup until it had gone cold, Hannah didn’t show up in the dining room, and at last I gave up and went back to our room to wait for her there. To take my mind off of her, I sat down at my computer and checked my email. There was still nothing from Pierce, but there was a message from Tia, and it made my nerves jangle even more.

The subject line was “Pierce.” I clicked it and read the cryptically short message. “Skype me as soon as you get this.”

Heart hammering, I signed in and requested a chat with Tia. My leg bounced up and down, waiting for the connection.

“So?’ I said, as soon as her face appeared.

“So, you’re not going to like it.”

I waited, but Tia just sat there, avoiding my gaze.

“Just tell me already!” I cried.

“I started with the yellow pages. I thought that his home address was the most logical place to find him. He lives right in Worcester, not even fifteen minutes from the campus.

“And?”

“He hasn’t been there for a couple of weeks.”

My heart sank. “How do you know?”

“His grass hasn’t been mowed and his front porch is covered in newspapers and mail. Wherever he is, he forgot to forward his mail or have it held at the post office.”

“And if he knew he was going away for the whole semester, he would have taken care of that,” I said. “I know he’s a little eccentric, but he’s not irresponsible. I mean, the man has a doctorate for godssake.”

“Right. I tried to call his home number too, but no luck. He isn’t having his calls forwarded, and his voicemail message doesn’t give any other information about where to reach him. Also, his voice mailbox is full. I couldn’t leave a message even if I wanted to. He’s got too many on there that he hasn’t listened to yet.”

“Well, I guess that’s it then,” I said with a sigh. “Thanks for trying, Tia.”

“What do you mean, you guess that’s it? I wasn’t going to give up that easily! Who do you think you’re talking to?” Tia said in mild indignation.

“Oh! Right, sorry,” I said with smile. “I’m not trying to underestimate you, but it’s only been a day since you started looking! I can’t believe you’ve found out that much already. Continue, super sleuth!”

“I thought our next best bet was to find out what we could about this alleged sabbatical, so I had Sam snoop around the science department a bit to see what he could dig up. None of the professors had any conversations with Pierce about his leaving, and several of them were very surprised. They said he gave no indication that he was leaving.”

“I knew it! I knew this had to be a sudden thing! He would have mentioned it to me!”

“So then Sam sort of … broke into Pierce’s file in the department head’s office.”

“He did what?” I asked.

Tia grimaced. “I told him not to, but he’s just as mystified about this as you are. He really loved working for Pierce, and he agrees with you that the whole thing seems kind of fishy. He thought maybe Pierce was fired or put on leave, and the administration was trying to cover it up.”

“But he was getting those new classes… ”

“But you’ve said it yourself, he’s had a hard time proving himself as a real scientist here. And he does have a temper. Sam thought Pierce might have flown off the handle and said something that got him suspended or something, and the school could just be trying to save face.”

I couldn’t deny this was a definite possibility, and one I hadn’t considered.

“So, Sam offered to file some papers in the department office, and then he just slipped into the faculty records. He found Pierce’s folder and there was some very hastily filed sabbatical paperwork in there.”

“How hasty? From when?”

“Filed and approved the day after you left.”

“Did it give any details about where he was going?”

Tia nodded. She ducked out of camera range for a moment, and when she reappeared, she had a yellow legal pad in her hand. “He’s supposed to be in upstate New York, at a two hundred-year-old inn called The Deer Creek Inn and Tavern. It has a long history of intense paranormal activity and was being renovated under new ownership, but the renovations have stopped.”

“Why?”

“The alleged spirit activity has grown so violent and constant that all of the workers have walked off the job and refuse to return to the site. There have been dozens of injuries and even one death.”

“Is that all it said? He’s just going to check out a haunted building? He could do that on the weekend, or over the summer, couldn’t he? Why would he need to miss an entire semester?”

“You’re asking me? I don’t have a clue. You or Sam would have a much better idea about how long something like that would take. But the paperwork said that no one has ever been allowed to investigate the place; the last owners refused to let ghost hunters in. But the new owners are eager for the activity to stop so that they can continue with their renovations.”

I said nothing, taking in the new information.

“This sounds pretty serious,” Tia said, looking down at the writing on her legal pad and shaking her head. “In the world of paranormal investigation, this sounds like an emergency case. Injuries? Deaths? It might be the kind of thing he’d drop everything else to go and help with. There was even a preliminary book proposal included in the paperwork.”

“I guess so,” I said, still not convinced. “He was always really eager to get into places that other teams hadn’t explored. He practically did a tap dance when he got the permission to investigate the library, mostly because St. Matt’s had never allowed paranormal teams into any of its buildings before. Well, if he was going to this place, did he leave any contact information for where he’d be staying?”

“Yes, and we’ve already tried the phone number. It rang a few times and went to voicemail, but it was one of those automated voices. Sam left a message, but we haven’t heard back.”

“Okay,” I said, sliding out of my chair and starting to pace. “No emails being answered, no phone messages being returned. Something is definitely still off. There has to be someone else we can … wait! The whole team must be with him, right? I’ve seen what one of those investigations entails, and there is no way it’s a one person job. We just need to get in touch with one of the other team members, and I’m sure they could tell us what was going on!”

“That’s a brilliant idea!” Tia said. “Jess, um, could you come sit back down? You’re making me dizzy and I can only hear like half of what you’re saying.”

“Right. Sorry,” I said, and hopped back into my chair. “Does Sam have any way of getting in touch with any of the other team members?”

Tia bit her lip. “I don’t know. I’ll ask him. Do you?”

“No, I only met them that one time. Well, except for Annabelle, and she…wait, I think Pierce said she’s got a shop in the city.”

“Oh, really? That would be a good place to start. Do you know what it’s called?”

“No, but she does palm and tarot readings, and she sells all that mystical garbage—you know, like candles and crystals and books about auras.”

Tia raised an eyebrow. “Mystical garbage? Really, Jess? Haven’t we had enough experience with all of this to at least acknowledge that it isn’t garbage?”

I pressed my hands over my eyes and took a deep breath. “I know, I know. My entire existence right now is a sea of this ‘garbage.’ I’m trying to kill my inner skeptic, but she’s not going down easily. She’s a plucky little bastard.”

“One of the many reasons I love her,” Tia said. “But seriously, how hard can it be to find? How many shops like that can there be in town? I’ll hop on the internet and get searching. In the meantime, tell me what you know about the other team members and I’ll put Sam to work tracking them down.”

I wracked my brain for any details I could come up with about the rest of the group. “I don’t even know most of their last names. Dan was a recent MIT grad. Oscar was a local historian —I think Pierce said he’d written some books on haunted locations in the area. Iggy was…huge and tattooed, that’s pretty much all I know about him. And come on, Iggy can’t be his legal name anyway, can it? I mean, who names their poor kid Iggy?”

Tia’s lips twitched as she continued scribbling.

“Annabelle’s last name is Rabinski. And Neil’s last name is Caddigan, but I’m not sure if he’d be much help, he wasn’t a regular team member. Actually,” I said, with a sudden spark of realization, “Neil was there the day I said goodbye to Pierce. He came by Pierce’s office as I was leaving.”

Tia stopped writing and looked up at me. “Really? Do you think it’s possible he knows something? Could he even have told Pierce about the Deer Creek Inn?”

“Yeah, maybe,” I said. “Pierce said Neil is a demonologist. Maybe he even thought the activity at the Deer Creek Inn was demonic, because of how violent it was?”

Tia shivered. “Wow, I really hope not. Ghosts are bad enough, aren’t they?”

“Yeah, they are,” I said. “But even if he isn’t involved in the Deer

Creek thing, he could still have some information. Pierce could have said something to him about it. And he’s from England!” I suddenly remembered. “Maybe I could even track him down over here.”

“Good idea,” Tia said. She looked down at her notepad and sighed. “Well, I’ve got a few good leads here, so Sam and I will get started.”

Sam’s name made me remember something else, something equally important, if totally unrelated.

“Hey, I never asked you! How was dinner at Bellini’s?” Tia flushed and a broad grin slowly crept across her face. “It was really, really nice. We had a great time. He brought me flowers and everything.”

It was my turn to grin. “And?”

“And what?”

“Oh, come on, Ti, don’t make me beg! Did he kiss you or not?”

Tia flung her hands up over her face, and I watched her ears turn from pink to scarlet. Then she nodded, emitting a little high-pitched giggle that was muffled by her hands.

“Woohoo!” I proceeded with an elaborate celebratory dance that turned her giggles to gales of laughter, and by the time I had completed the finale (a truly epic kick line complete with jazz hands) we were both wiping away tears of mirth. Finally, we laughed ourselves into silence.

“Thanks for helping me with this, Tia. And I’m really happy for you and Sam.”

“Thanks, Jess. We’ll figure this out, I promise.”

“I know. And in the meantime, just tell me one other thing.”

“What?”

“Is Sam a good kisser? Too much tongue, or…?”

She hung up on me. As expected.

I was still cackling to myself when the door opened and Hannah came in.

“Who were you just talking to?” she asked me. She glanced around as though expecting to find someone, living or dead, sitting in the room with us.

“Tia. She was filling me in on what she found out about Pierce.”

“Oh, what is it? Did they find him? Is he okay?” she asked, crossing to her desk and depositing her bag on it.

“No, we still don’t know where he is, but never mind that for a minute,” I said, with an impatient wave of my hand. “I can fill you in on that stuff later. What’s going on? Tell me what happened…I mean, if you want to, obviously you don’t have to,” I finished lamely.

“Of course I want to,” Hannah said, and she smiled at me, and the smile lit an answering smile on my face.

This was still such a shaky, fragile thing that had grown up between us. I felt like one mild disagreement or one stiff breeze could topple it right to the ground. I just sat and waited for her to talk.

“Well, once Keira had me away from the rest of the group, she explained that Finn’s rune should have stopped any spirits from getting across, even if we wanted them to be there,” Hannah said. “And so she asked me about how they got there in the first place, and I told her as best I could.”