Page 38 of The Haunting of Lockton
“Me too,” I said. “Fuck, this is awesome.”
Julian rubbed at his chest again. “I’ve never felt anything like this.”
“Like what?” Paxton asked him.
My brother gave a weak smile. “So much pain.”
“We usually don’t see this kind of activity so early on in the investigation,” I said, excited. “Our subscribers will lose their shit. Ivy Grove is a freaking gold mine.”
Paxton frowned at me. “Is that all this is to you? A way to make money?”
“Well… sort of,” I responded. “Itisour job. Getting paid is pretty damn important.”
Julian did this to uncover the mystery of a haunting and to give answers to those who reached out to us, but me? I didn’t really care about any of that. I did the show for him. The fat paycheck was my other driving force.
“And the ghosts?” Paxton asked. “What about them? Do you even care that people have suffered and died where you’re standing? That there are ghosts who walk these halls reliving their pain over and over? Or is money all you care about?”
Why was he so ticked off all of a sudden?
“Money pays my bills, Paxton,” I shot back, feeling my irritation rising too. “So excuse the hell out of me if I’m excited about giving our subscribers the kind of content that will help us make bank.”
“I understand that, but you can be more respectful.”
“Respectful? To who, the little floating orbs? I doubt they care.”
“Wow.” Paxton looked like I’d pissed in his Cheerios by the death glare he gave me. Whatever connection we’d had earlier had been snapped in two.
“I think that’s enough for tonight,” Julian said. “Let’s gather our equipment and head back to Redwood.”
Paxton stormed off.
I stared after him, wishing I could erase the past few minutes. Have a do-over. As though knowing I wasn’t in the mood to chat, Julian didn’t say anything as we packed up our things and returned to the SUV.
Paxton leaned against the side of the vehicle with his arms crossed but helped us load everything into the back. Even when annoyed, he couldn’t stand by and do nothing. Another good quality of his.
Meanwhile, I was nothing but a mix of phony arrogance and bad decisions.
“Do you mind driving?” Julian asked me. “I can barely keep my eyes open.”
He looked exhausted. Sometimes that happened to him when we investigated places with high paranormal activity. Almost like by communicating with the ghosts, they took some of his spiritual energy.
“Sure.” I slid into the driver’s side while Julian hopped into the back seat and leaned his head against the headrest, shutting his eyes.
Paxton opened the passenger-side door and climbed in beside me, not saying a word. He buckled his seat belt. The only sound came from the engine as we traveled down the narrow road leading from the asylum.
“Interesting night,” I said, breaking the silence after a few minutes.
“Yeah. I bet thelittle floating orbsthought it was interesting too.” Paxton stared out the window as dark trees blurred past.
I heaved a sigh and turned to get on the main road, the steering wheel sliding through my hand as the wheels straightened out. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
“I thought you cared about the history of Lockton and the people who lost their lives.” Paxton kept his gaze on the window. “Seems I was wrong about you.”
“I do care.”
“You have a funny way of showing it.”
“I can be an insensitive asshole sometimes,” I said. “And yeah, maybe I don’t take all of this as seriously as Julian does. We’ve found good evidence over the years, but it’s mostly been orbs, occasional shadowy figures, and disembodied voices. I’ve never actually seen a legit apparition. So ghosts just seem… I don’t know. Like things rather than people.”
