Page 36 of Spooked
“Mine too?” Mouse asks with a slight chuckle.
Suddenly the scene in front of me flickers, and without another warning, Maeve is present in the room once again.
“Hound?” She races forward, crashing into me. I have to tense my muscles in my unbroken leg to stop us both from falling to the ground. With force, she hits me. I’m hard pushed to think she’s anything other than here in the flesh. “Thank God you’re here! It felt like I was in a never-ending nightmare and that I was never going to get out.”
Substance or not, her trembling ignites the protective part of me. “You’re okay, I got you.” I wrap both of my arms around her, holding her tight.
“Who the fuck’s Hound talking to?” Drummer snarls, his voice making me conscious that my brothers have now climbed the stairs and are on the second floor.
“Hound, Brother…” Peg’s hand lands on my shoulder, giving a supportive squeeze, but I shrug him off. There are more important things to deal with.
“What’s happening, darlin’?” I speak to the woman who feels so right in my arms, her figure fitting as though she’d been built for me. But I put that strange thought aside, concentrating on her trembling body, and trying to calm her down, repeating, “You’re okay now. I’ve got you.”
“Hound?” When I don’t respond, one of my brothers adds, “Doesn’t anyone think we ought to call for a medic?”
“Shut it, Blade,” Mouse snarls. “Hound is fine. Leave him alone.” As my hands smooth up and down Maeve’s back, I glance around at him, only to see his nostrils flaring, and his eyes open wide. “Brothers, don’t you feel there’s an existential presence? Or a strange odour in the air?”
“I can smell rotten eggs,” Drummer replies.
“Sulphur,” Blade corrects.
“Get out of here now!” It seems Siobhan’s chauffeur wasn’t able to corral her into the car, as she appears, with her driver running behind her. “You’ve no business being here. I’ve called the cops.”
I might be holding onto a woman whose physical form is lying elsewhere in a hospital bed, but I still have some wits about me. What other reason could Siobhan have for wanting us out of the house, unless there’s something here that she doesn’t want us to find?
“Jesus fuckin’ Christ!” The unnaturally high-pitched scream from Blade is so unusual that it makes me spin around.
For a moment, my emotions are completely in tune with his as the shimmering image of a woman appears, gradually solidifying in front of my eyes. She’s got the same colouring and eyes and could be the twin of the woman I’m holding. Adding two and two together, I come up with the answer that she might well be the mother of the woman I’m comforting, evidence added when the newcomer’s face softens as it rests on her daughter.
My thoughts are confirmed when Maeve gasps, “Mom?”
The sound of furniture overturning shifts my focus. Swinging around, I see Siobhan has stumbled back and lost her balance, falling into a table. Is it wrong that I feel some satisfaction seeing her lying on her back, floundering like an upturned turtle?
There’s nothing wrong with her eyes, though, or her mouth. “You’re dead!” Siobhan cries out.
“So am I.” It’s a new voice, deep and somehow musical. At first, there’s nothing accompanying it, then slowly another form appears.
Drummer’s, “Oh fuck,” Peg’s gasp of horror, and Blade’s sudden step back complement the new apparition.
But it’s this form that has Siobhan screaming and covering her face with her hands. I recognise it immediately as Emerald, one of the participants in the X-rated display I’d been subjected to the last time I was in the house.
Except for the strangeness of the situation, deep in my gut, I know the ghosts haven’t appeared to terrorise us. Instead, theyseem intent on targeting Maeve’s aunt, which they are doing a great job of. Siobhan scrambles backward to get away from them, while holding her hands over her face as if to deny what she’s seeing.
I stiffen. The appearance of Emerald has triggered a memory in my brain and planted a seed of excitement in my head. Something so imperative I just have to act on it now. While my companions are distracted, probably trying to come to terms with seeing spirits from beyond this world, while nothing now would surprise me, I take Maeve’s hand and rush her out of the room.
As I approach her gramma’s bedroom, Maeve hangs back, her head shaking rapidly side to side. “I don’t want to go in there again.”
The overwhelming sensation that I have to do this has me tugging at her hand. “I won’t let anything hurt you.” I hope I say it convincingly, but a loud rumble of thunder rattling the house unnerves me.Is it a warning not to go inside?Dismissing that notion, having a whole-hearted belief it’s the right thing to do, I follow my gut and continue on.
Ignoring the other doorways, stepping over the gaping holes in the floorboards—one in particular proving a challenge for my crutch, needing me to leave my fragile masculine side behind momentarily—I accept Maeve’s hand to help me over it. The door to my destination is closed, and I hesitate before opening it with my hand hovering over the knob, unsure if I want to see it in its current derelict state or in all its magnificence as I’d seen it before. My hand at the ready to hide Maeve’s eyes from any ghost peepshow, I pluck up the courage, turn the handle, and expose the room behind the door.
There are no ghosts here, kinky or not. The room stinks of musk, the furniture covered in dust and cobwebs. Only the frame of the bed remains. Bird droppings cover the floor, and abat swoops close by before ascending and disappearing via the hole in the ceiling that must lead to the upper floor. I clasp Maeve tight as she squeals and ducks her head.
“I don’t like this,” she confides.
I eye the dressing table that had been here before, but the elegance has faded, and it still lies shattered and discarded on the floor. The delicate wood inlays can still be seen on the surface, along with dust and fingerprints galore. The main drawer lies open and discarded.It’s obviously been searched.Feeling downcast for a moment, I surmise whatever I expected has probably long gone.
Not ready to give up just yet, I close my eyes for a second, delving into the vision I’d had, the one I’d tried so hard to forget, of Bertie approaching the dressing table and how he made the hidden compartment appear. As I recall the details, I open my eyes once more and see, while toppled and drawerless, that part of the furniture is still relatively untouched. My heart rate speeds up in anticipation.It can’t be that easy, can it?
