My eardrums flexed again as the funnel between planes sucked shut, and I swayed on my feet. Jacob didn’t ask if the ghost had been taken care of—he trusted his feelings, and he didn’t need to verify what he already knew.
The connection I’d had to the white light sputtered to a stop. If there’s a way to taper off gracefully, I’ve never figured it out. One minute I’m hopped up on mojo and the next I’m incoherent and loopy. Belatedly, I tried to ground myself. But I was using the candy display to keep myself standing.
Jacob hovered beside me with concern creasing his brow. “Is it safe to…can I…?” His hand flapped.
I let go of whatever was left of my white balloon. “Yeah, it’s fine.”
Even so, he got a little zap when he grabbed my arm and our energies leveled. “You look pale.”
“I’m fine.”
He leaned in. “And you’re squinting. I know by now what it looks like when you overextend your ability—”
But before he could launch into a full blown “take it easy” lecture, a pointed clearing of the throat reminded us that while the ghost might be gone, we weren’t exactly alone. We turned and found the clerk watching us with her hands on her hips. She was going for assertive…but her eyes were a little too wide. Still, she gave the tough-cookie act her best shot, nodded at the dripping bottle of Florida Water dangling from my grasp, and said, “You gonna pay for that?”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
WE WAITED IN the car while an F-Pimp cleanup crew descended on the corner store…and not just to mop up the Florida Water I’d spewed around. Whereas we used to call it a day once a ghost was handled, nowadays we phoned it in so the FPMP could figure out what needed following up. Our colleagues might find the victim of Bloody Hands buried under the floorboards…or a blue-haired grocery clerk might need to sign an NDA to receive a nice chunk of hush-money. But whatever the fallout, they’d deal with it.
True, I didn’t quite trust the Federal Psychic Monitoring Program…but I was grateful the organization was in place to handle the details so I didn’t have to.
Maybe none of that mattered, as long as I had Jacob. He couldn’t see Bloody Hands, but he definitely felt the ghost. And he’d put himself between me and the threat without a second thought.
My hand dropped to cover his where it rested on the seat between us, and I smoothed my thumb along his pinkie. Our car was probably bugged, so I couldn’t be too specific…but that was okay for what I had to tell him. “In case I don’t say it enough, I just want you to know how much it means to me that you’re in my corner.”
“Vic….” He sounded unusually somber.
“It’s true.” I gave his hand a squeeze. “Having someone I can trust, well…. I don’t take it for granted. Just thought it needed saying.”
Jacob did the half-shrug that passed for a blush on him. “We’re partners,” he said simply.
Maybe so. But that didn’t necessarily guarantee someone would step in front of a ghost for you. It was instinctive to save yourself. But Jacob’s instinct was to step between me and any threat.
Later that night, the office told us that nearly a century ago, Bloody Hands had actually confessed to his wife’s murder, though her body had never been found. What did I recommend? Well, if it had been Helen’s ghost begging me for justice, I might have leaned toward searching the place. But the shop owner seemed to have enough on his plate without the government tearing up the floorboards.
And who knows, maybe business would pick up, now that his store was no longer haunted.
I often wondered what civilians could feel in a place like that—if the reason haunted spots were so desolate was because the heebie-jeebies drove everyone away. The next day, I sought out Evelyn, who was just finishing up with Bethany. Not doing yoga, either…but testing out her SPECs.
“Anything new?” I asked them. “If that’s not top-secret, classified, need-to-know-basis intel.”
Bethany was easily as demanding of herself as she was of her students. She tossed her long, dark hair in annoyance. “Not a single projection.”
“Maybe it just takes time,” I said—though I wasn’t really sold on that idea. Back when I’d put on those SPECs, I felt a difference right away. So, it’s possible that what I truly meant was, maybe they didn’t have any effect on the astral plane. All mediums weren’t created equal. And while we were all connected to our subtle bodies with a different type of tether than most people, we weren’t all attuned to the same body. Bethany couldn’t see a ghost if it was standing right beside her. And I couldn’t astral project without a GhosTV.
“Ghost emotions,” I blurted out. Both women stared. I backed my brain up a few paces. “I was thinking about this haunted store and…well, I was just wondering, if a sizeable chunk of the population is borderline empath, could an empath get a read from a ghost? Or would ghost emotions not register because they only exist on the etheric plane?”
“That would make a fascinating study,” Evelyn said, “but it would be hard to prove anything.”
“Right. Because there aren’t exactly a bunch of test ghosts around here eager to satisfy our curiosity.”
“Not only that,” she said, “but the planes of being are largely undocumented. Mystical traditions often speak of many different subtle bodies beyond the astral.”
I’d seen evidence of that myself in Camp Hell, tripping hard on fucked-up, experimental psyactives—waving my own hand in front of my eyes and watching tracers of multiple hands follow.
It was an experience I hoped never to repeat…which was why I hesitated when Evelyn opened up the SPECs case and offered the glasses to me, saying, “Since you’re here, would you mind indulging my curiosity?”
“I, uh….”
