Ah, yes. This is why I haven’t attempted to talk to the guy. He’s a dirtbag.
“All I remember is leaving the bar that night and taking Spooky Hollow Road.”
My neck aches and I attempt to rub it out, listening to Billy’s account of the night he died. I’m not sure if it’s that fact alone or something else that has me on edge, but my gut twists and my hands tingle.
That voice inside of me whispers to pay attention.
“I vaguely remember looking down to change the song on the radio, and bam—I was hit.”
It sounds fairly standard. Curvy road at night, distracted by the radio, impact as the accident occurs... so why did the homicide unit get involved?
“My neighbor is a homicide detective, and your death hit his desk. Why?”
He blows out a breath, lips flapping as the air expels. “It was suspicious. Or at least, my mother fought for the police to treat it as such, according to Harry.”
“Do you remember anything else about how you died, Billy? What did you hit?”
“It wasn’t what I hit, but who hit me. I was run off the road.”
The recount of his death sparks multiple emotions at once. Anger. Fear. Sadness. That’s when it hits me. Spooky Hollow Road, accidents...
“We’re connected by our shared accidents on the same road.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Corinne says, sounding more excited than she should, considering people died in both cases.“Let’s pull some cards to determine what or who else is present in this house.”
She grabs a different deck and begins to shuffle them quickly, and one card flies out, but that’s not abnormal. What is, is the other decks shuffling themselves in midair and additional cards flying out.
“Corinne?” I say, backing away from the table.
She quickly scoops up all the cards that flew from the decks and flips them over.
Corinne looks up at me, gripping the table with white knuckles. “They’re all Death.”
The house begins to shake, pictures falling off the walls. “Get under the table,” I yell, dashing underneath, pulling Corinne down with me.
“What’s happening?” Corinne bellows, as the walls tremble and groan in a chilling, otherworldly show.
“Earthquake?” I scream above the noise.
There’s no doubt in my mind this is something else, but I don’t want to admit it out loud.
Billy bends down, looking under the table at Corinne and me. “This is no earthquake. Something’s here again.”
“A ghost?”
He shrugs, and if a ghost’s face is able to pale, Billy’s does. “This isn’t looking good for you,” he murmurs. “Nothing like this happened when I arrived. This has to be a demon.”
“Seriously?” My voice pitches. I don’t know if he’s serious or messing with me, but my body trembles. “Get your sage. Where’s your bag?” Corinne apparently doesn’t hear me over the chattering of her own teeth.
I can only hope she managed to grab sage this time. It seems more likely the only thing she carries is rosemary, and we’re well and truly screwed.
A piercing scream that doesn’t belong to me or Corinne rattles the house. My hands fly to my ears to prevent my eardrums from bursting. In a far corner, a woman blinks in and out, more transparent than solid, wholly unlike Billy. Her face is contorted in a scream. Her dark hair is caked to her face, and there’s dirt or something like it all over her clothes. She looks like something straight out of a horror movie.
After several minutes of the house sounding like it’s going to cave in, everything stills into a deafening silence. We all seem to hold our breaths, waiting for what’s to come.
The woman appears to be gone. Thank god.
“What the—” a deep male voice booms from the foyer.
