Page 51 of Into the Dark

“Soshecan be the one to kill us?” Chris exclaimed. “Good plan, A.”

She glared back at them. “I don’t hear you coming up with anything.”

Nigel turned to his boyfriend, who sat staring into nothing, a pensive expression on his face. “Oscar? What do you think?”

Oscar let out a long sigh and scrubbed at his face. “I…I don’t know. I came here to help the ghosts that Mamaw couldn’t. The ones she was trapped with for so many years. I wanted to wait, get more experience under my belt…but this is my only chance.”

Dr. Lawson’s mouth softened. “Not even a medium can live for the dead, Fox,” she said gently.

“I know, but this is my family’s legacy. From my mamaw, and her mamaw, and who knows how many generations of women and men. Mountain grannies and root workers and spirit callers.” He sighed. “But I dragged all my friends into this, and now everyone is in danger, and…I just don’t know.”

Nigel reached out and took his hand. If only he could wave a magic wand and make everything okay. “Tomorrow, when the sun is up, we’ll go to the storage area and see if we can find any records that might shed light on the spirits we’ve encountered. We’ll arm ourselves with salt and flashlights, just in case the sunlight isn’t enough to keep everything quiet. Maybe we can find something to help.”

“And if we can’t?”

“Then we have a decision to make, I suppose.”

Zeek fluffed his hair, then destroyed his work by putting his cap back on. “Let’s sleep on it, okay? It’s getting late, and I don’t think anyone wants to go back in there tonight.”

“Definitely not,” Adrienne agreed.

Dr. Lawson didn’t look happy. No doubt she’d hoped they’d all agree to leave Ms. Montague sitting alone in her tent, Ethan choking on their dust as they drove away. “Fine. But if we go inside tomorrow, weallgo, except for Cabeza.” She held up her hand when Tina started to protest. “We need someone on the outside, in case things go badly wrong inside.”

“You can watch on the cams while we get dragged into hell,” Chris said, but their voice lacked its usual upbeat tone. They sounded tired, dark circles under their eyes, the cheerful pink streak in their hair contrasting sharply with their demeanor.

Tina sighed. “Well, on that happy note, let’s go to bed and hope nothing else happens before dawn.”

CHAPTER

NINETEEN

“Do you want to talk?”Nigel asked softly, as they made their way toward the tent with their cots.

Weariness dragged at Oscar, and a part of him wanted only to pass out on his pillow and not think for several hours. But he came to a halt and let everyone else go by, before taking Nigel’s hand. The two of them walked away from the tents and asylum both, past the van, and a little way down the crumbling driveway.

Nigel’s breath wheezed in his nose, and Oscar winced. “Forget looking for records tomorrow. I’ll take you to the urgent care in Weston.”

“No.” Nigel took both of Oscar’s hands in his own. “I’ll be fine for one more day. As you pointed out, this is our only chance to get this done.”

A weight seemed to settle over Oscar’s shoulders. The weight of expectation, of heritage, of responsibility. “I haven’t done what Mamaw would have wanted.”

Nigel’s fingers tightened on his. “You never met her in life, and only glimpsed her in death. You don’t know what she would have wanted.”

In his mind’s eye, Oscar could still see the short films that were all that remained of Barbara Fox. She’d been so vibrant, soalive.A part of her community, helping both the living and the dead. Carrying on the traditions of their family, loving her husband and her child.

And ended her life here. His mind spun a dozen different possibilities: the nurse had terrorized her, the chute ghost’s banging had echoed in her head, Mariah had kept her from bathing. Until the living nurses grew tired of her seeing things they couldn’t, and injected her with the massive doses of drugs used to keep patients quiet back in the day. Which would have rendered her even more helpless to keep away the angry dead, her body leaden, unable to react while they screamed into her ears…

“I have to fix this,” he said. “But I think you and Chris should go to Weston tomorrow. Go to the doctor, then check into a hotel. Tina should be okay, she won’t come inside, but?—”

“Stop it.” Nigel let go of his hands and wrapped his arms around Oscar. Oscar hugged him back, burying his face in Nigel’s hair. Breathing in the scent of the dry shampoo they’d all been using to stay clean, feeling his slight form.

“I love you, and I’m not leaving you. I’m going to help you find records tomorrow,” Nigel went on, words muffled against Oscar’s chest. “If we can figure out some way of laying the spirits to rest that won’t get us killed, then I’m going to lend a hand. And if we can’t, then we all leave at sundown. Together. Deal?”

Mamaw wouldn’t have run. Abandoned the dead to linger in torment.

Oscar sighed heavily. “Deal.”

Thanks to his congestion making it difficult to breathe, Nigel woke early. Sitting up in his cot, he saw Tina and Adrienne were both gone, but everyone else still slept soundly. One of the women had brewed coffee, so he poured himself a cup and headed for the command center. Tina had already set up in front of her monitors, scrubbing through the footage from the static cams overnight. Adrienne was doing the same on her laptop.

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