Page 1 of Trick Me
Prologue
ERYNN
Death smells like peppermint and regret, at least when it’s wearing an expensive suit and trying to buy forgiveness for cheating on his wife before he died.
“She needs to know about the Cyprus account,” the ghost insists, his translucent form flickering like bad reception on an old television. He’s still wearing the same charcoal suit he died in, though the three bullet holes add a certainje ne sais quoito the ensemble. The bloodstains have gone rusty brown in death. Funny how ghosts keep the worst parts of how they died but lose all the good stuff, like being able to actually touch the people they’re haunting.
I’m wrapped in three sweaters despite it being August in Helsinki, my breath misting in the consultation room’s suddenly arctic air. The cold is always thefirst price I pay for my ability to speak to the dead, and my body temperature drops with every second I hold the connection open. By the end of an hour session, I’ll be shaking like a chihuahua in a freezer.
“Your husband wants you to know about Cyprus,” I tell Mrs. Lindqvist, trying to keep my teeth from chattering. The consultation room is painted in what our decorator called Soothing Sage, but right now it looks more like Institutional Prison Green. The mahogany table and the chairs are some ergonomic nightmare that’s supposed to promote spiritual openness. Mostly they promote back pain.
Mrs. Lindqvist sits ramrod straight, her face pulled so tight from surgical enhancements that I’m genuinely concerned she might crack if she tries to frown. She’s dripping in diamonds that could fund a small country’s revolution, from earrings to a necklace to rings on seven of her ten fingers. Her platinum blonde hair is shellacked into a helmet that could probably stop bullets, which is ironic considering her husband didn’t have the same protection.
“Cyprus?” She leans forward, the bridge of her nose scrunching up. “We never went to Cyprus.”
The ghost, Mr. Erik Lindqvist, former black-market artifact dealer, current pain in my frozen ass, waves his arms frantically. His edges blur when he gets emotional, like someone is smudging him with an eraser. “The account! Tell her about the account! Threemillion euros! The password is her mother’s maiden name!”
“He says there’s an account there. Three million. Password is your mother’s maiden name.”
Her eyes narrow to slits. “My mother’s maiden name or that whore’s mother’s maiden name?”
Erik flinches. Even dead, he knows he’s in trouble. “Tell her it wasn’t like that?—”
“He says it’s not—” I dutifully relay but am interrupted.
“Then what was it like?” Her voice is venom, staring at me and then at the room around her, never quite in his direction. “When he was meeting with that artifact broker? When she was evaluating his collection? When her boyfriend put three bullets in his chest?”
Erik’s form solidifies, and suddenly he’s easier to see—the web of broken capillaries across his nose from too much expensive whiskey, the soft jaw of a man who hired others to do his dangerous work, the manicured hands that most likely never did the hard tasks. In death, all our pretty lies become transparent.
“She seduced me!” he wails. “It was a trap from the beginning! Tell her?—”
The cold suddenly spikes, frost spreading across the table’s polished surface. My nose starts bleeding, another fun side effect of channeling the dead for toolong. The crimson drops freeze before they hit my lap. I quickly grab a tissue from the box on the table.
“Mr. Lindqvist says…” I pause, dabbing at my nose. “He insists it was a trap.”
“Yeah, right!” Mrs. Lindqvist’s laugh is ear-piercing. “Is that what he’s calling it when he thinks with his?—”
Erik’s ghost suddenly rushes forward, and his form shifts into something altogether less human. His face elongates, jaw unhinging like a snake’s, empty eye sockets weeping black mist. This is what happens when spirits get too emotional—they stop pretending to be human and show what death really looks like underneath.
“TELL HER I’M SORRY!” His voice layers, becoming a harmony of screams. “TELL HER ABOUT THE MONEY SHE CAN HAVE! TELL HER?—”
I slam my hand on the table. “Silence. Please.”
The room goes quiet except for my ragged breathing. Erik shrinks back to his human shape, looking petulant. Mrs. Lindqvist can’t see any of this, of course. She just sees me, pale and bleeding and probably looking like I’m having a stroke.
“Perhaps,” I manage through chattering teeth. “We should continue this next week. The connection is… unstable today.”
“What does that mean?” Mrs. Lindqvist clutches her bag like she wants to beat someone with it.Probably me. “I’m paying two thousand gold coins and blood for this.”
And I’m literally freezing my soul off for your marital drama, I think but don’t say. Customer service, even for the dead and their insufferable widows.
“Spirits don’t… process emotions the same way after crossing over,” I explain, the lie rolling smooth as silk off my tongue. Truth is, some spirits are just assholes; death didn’t improve them any. “Your husband seems quite agitated. It might be better to let him settle.”
She stands abruptly, the chair scraping against the imported marble floor. “Next week, I want real answers. About the rest of the money. About her. About everything.”
“Of course,” I say, though what I’m thinking isMaybe try a therapist instead of a medium, lady.
She storms out, her heels clicking on the marble. The door, heavy oak with sound-dampening spells woven into the grain, closes with a whisper instead of a slam. We paid extra for that feature after too many clients tried to dramatically exit.
