Vengeful Spirits series Box Set

by Val Crowe

“Did you say something?”

  “Nope,” I said.

  “Well, anyway, Molly said she was going to fix it. She was twenty years old, and I thought she was going to find some way to get custody of me and Patrick. When she left, I thought that was what she was doing. But she never came back.” Lily sniffed. “They were letting Patrick and me stay in the house that my mother owned under Molly’s supervision until my father got things ready for us to come home with him. And I waited and waited, and she never came back. It had been two days, and we couldn’t get in touch with her. What was I supposed to do?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “But I guess you broke into your father’s house?”

  “How did you know?” She gave me a wide-eyed look, as if she thought I was mind reader.

  “You just told me you killed your father.” I pointed in the direction we had come from. She had been referring to the ghost thing, but I figured it had some basis in reality, after all. That was the way this story seemed to be going.

  “I had to,” she said. “Patrick was seventeen. He would have only had a year with him. But I… it would have been so long. I couldn’t do it. I had to fix it. Molly didn’t fix it, so I had to fix it.” Now, she was crying.

  I was annoyed with this.

  “I never knew what happened to her,” she said, still sobbing. “Why did Molly come here? What was she trying to do? Why didn’t she come back? I have to know the truth.”

  “Believe me, I understand,” I said. “I’ve been trying to get some information for a while now. And I’m getting nothing.”

  “Molly!” she suddenly yelled in her tearful voice. “Molly, where are you?”

  And then, there she was.

  Molly, just as I’d seen her before, holding out two handfuls of jewelry.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  “We had a deal, girly,” growled another voice. The man with a gun flickered into view right in front of her. “I asked you for cash to kill your father.”

  “He’s nothing to me,” said Molly, jutting out her chin. “And this is worth more than what you asked for.”

  “This ain’t the deal,” said the man. He apparently chewed tobacco, because he spit out a thin line of brown liquid.

  Molly moved her foot just in time to keep from getting hit by it. “I couldn’t get cash. I tried, but this was the best I could do. I swear to you it’s real.”

  “And what’s that worth to me, huh? You swearing you got real pearls?”

  “These are my mother’s jewels,” said Molly. “And she’s gone. It kills me to let them go, but I know she’d want him gone, the one I’m hiring you for. You are going to take them, aren’t you?”

  He eyed her, cocking his head in consideration. Then he nodded. “Sure, girly. I’ll take your jewelry.” Then he yanked out his gun and cocked it.

  Molly’s eyes widened.

  He shot at her.

  She turned and ran. “You double-crossing bastard!” She careened through the park as the bullets tore through the air behind her. She rounded a corner, kept going.

  Lily and I went after her.

  So did the gun man.

  It the distance, we saw her, still running. But his bullet caught her in the back and she stopped short. She fell forward, and the jewelry went everywhere, scattering against the pavement.

  The man stalked over and began scooping up the rings and necklaces.

  Lily ran over to the man and began to try to pick up the jewelry, to keep it from him. But her hands went right through the pearls. “You asshole.” She turned on the gunman. “You killed my sister. And for what?”

  “I know, right?” I said. “She was going to give him the jewelry anyway.”

  Lily tried to slap the gunman.

  Her hand went right through him, and he didn’t even acknowledge she was there. It was a loop, apparitions reliving something. They were stuck in their own time.

  “You fucking asshole,” she said again, and she stood up. She looked over at me. “He did it so that he didn’t have to kill my father. He reneged on the deal and killed her. He was a dirty double crosser.”

  I thought that it still didn’t make sense. Why not take the money and promise to pop the dad, but then just never show up? What was the point in killing Molly?

  But then the gunman turned to her, leering. He ran his fingers over her lifeless cheek.

  Eew. So, it was like that. Probably got more of a thrill after killing a pretty twenty-year-old girl than an old abusive guy with a crew cut.

  “Stop it!” said Lily, horrified. “Stop it now.”

  Of course, the gunman didn’t.

  Lily seemed determined to try, though.

  I gave up watching her or the ghosts, and mused over what I could possibly figure out to give them besides me. “You want a sacrifice?” I murmured. Who could they want?

  Well, there were limited options, and I didn’t think I could stomach giving them my mother. Furthermore, I didn’t even know where my mother was.

  Sighing, I went over to Lily and dragged her to her feet.

  “Deacon, what do you think he did with my sister’s body? Do you think it’s buried out here somewhere?”

  I didn’t answer her. I just dragged her to the shed where I’d locked up her brother. I had a moment of panic, because I wasn’t sure how I was going to open the padlock. But then I realized that the key was in the bottom of it.

  Had it always been there?

  Must have been.

  Handy.

  I smiled. I unlocked the shed.

  “Deacon?” came the voice of Patrick.

  Before he could rush me, I shoved Lily into the shed and shut the door.

  “Hey!” Patrick collided with the other side of the door.

  We struggled. He was trying to push it open. I was trying to keep it closed.

  He seemed to have the upper hand.

  My muscles screamed at me, and I clenched my teeth.

  And then I got another bit of strength, and I managed to get the door closed. I snapped the lock back on.

  Panting, I stepped back.

  “Take them, then,” I yelled at the sky. “I’ve got them here for you. Practically gift-wrapped.”

  There was no reply but the persistent buzz.

  * * *

  The sun beat down on my head. My mouth felt dry. Earlier, I had gone back to the camper before for lunch and eaten that sandwich, but I hadn’t gotten anything to drink.

  I began to daydream about water.

  I should go back and get some.

  Why hadn’t I brought some with me in the first place?

  Maybe, if I went and got water, by the time I got back, the park would have eaten Lily and Patrick, and then the spirits would be ready to tell me all about Negus.

  I decided that was a great idea.

  I went back to the Airstream and got some water out of my refrigerator. I guzzled it. Grabbing another bottle, I headed back into the park. I didn’t see my mother anywhere. I wondered where she was. She must still be in the park somewhere.

  Whatever.

  I got back to the shed.

  Patrick and Lily were still in there. They were talking.

  “What do you mean, you killed Dad? It was an intruder. A robber. Someone who broke into his house.”

  “No, I just took the TV to make it look good,” she said. “I threw it over the ravine the next day, to get rid of it. I figured if they found it in our house, it would be evidence.”

  “Geez, Lily, why didn’t you tell me?”

  “You never seemed to remember, Patrick. I wanted to protect you.”

  “But I’m your big brother.” He sounded near tears. “I’m supposed to protect you.”

  This wasn’t good. I paced outside of the shed, wishing there was some way to shut them up. Hearing them talk about this, hearing their emotions, it was making me feel guilty. They were like me. They’d been hurt as kids, and they’d had to grow up fast, and here I was, sacrificing them.

 
; It wasn’t cool.

  I paced some more, trying to think of what to do. Part of me wanted to let them out. Get the bolt cutters, find my mom, and get the hell out of here.

  But another part of me was annoyed that I had put so much into this for no reward. I still didn’t know about Negus.

  I wandered around with my bottle of water, drinking it all down, thinking about whether or not this was really much of a gift to the spirits here. I mean, what were they supposed to do with these guys, exactly? I had sort of expected the park to swallow them whole, for Patrick and Lily to simply disappear.

  A nagging voice at the back of my head tried to speak up to say that I couldn’t actually be sacrificing—

  I shut it down.

  I guessed it didn’t make sense to think that the park could consume them. There was no evidence of that. We had thought maybe that was what had happened to Molly. But it had turned out that Molly had been shot by a gun. Nothing supernatural about it. Of course, the fact that it had happened in the park had probably strengthened its supernatural energy. Violent events seemed to do that to places.

  So, that meant that the park probably couldn’t get rid of Patrick and Lily without possessing them. And I wasn’t sure, but I bet that possessing the two of them would be an expenditure of energy. Which wasn’t really much of a gift, was it?

  The spirits kept saying I needed to give.

  I sat down on the ground. The sun was bright and merciless. Sweat was forming at my brow. I rubbed at my cheeks, which were rough with stubble, and I wished I would have had time to shave.

  I was pretty sure that I knew what I had to do.

  But I didn’t want to. That voice inside, the one that was objecting to all of this, it got pretty loud when I started to even consider it.

  No, it said, no, no, no.

  And it projected images at me of red blood spattering everywhere and a putrid smell and the biggest, most important reason of all. I couldn’t kill people. It was unthinkable to actually kill someone. It was… no.

  I mean, okay, of course I’d considered killing someone before. Who hasn’t?

  But it was always pretty abstract. I had never thought about it down to the nitty gritty details. What would I use to do it? What would I do with the bodies? That sort of thing, I’d never considered.

  Here… I didn’t have to worry about bodies. The park would take care of that, I was sure.

  And as for what to use…

  I looked around, and it was just sitting there. Had it always been there? It must have been.

  It was an ax, gleaming in the sunlight, lying just a few feet away.

  I swallowed.

  I thought again of the image I’d imagined when I’d come into the park for the first time. Red hard candy, fallen out of its wrapper, sticky and melting in the afternoon sun, liquid, bright red…

  I picked up the ax.

  I unlocked the shed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  “All right,” I screamed, running into the shed and brandishing the ax, “how’s this for a gift?”

  It was dark in the shed, I couldn’t make much out. The sun came in through bright cracks in the wood in a few places. Lily yelled, putting up both of her hands to ward me off.

  I raised the ax above my head.

  Patrick tackled me.

  We fell on the ground, him on top of me. The ax fell out of my hand. I scrabbled behind me, trying to get to the handle.

  “What is wrong with you?” Patrick was shaking me, his face twisted and angry.

  Better not to talk to him. It would only shake me from my purpose. I had to know about Negus. It was the only thing that mattered. If they had to die so that I could get my information, then that was just the way it had to be. Anything that would knock me off this path was something I had to guard against. And talking to him might make me soft. I scrabbled to find the ax handle.

  Patrick seized my hand. “Stop. What are you doing?”

  I punched him.

  He cried out, falling away from me.

  I pressed my advantage, climbing on top of him, hitting him again and again. It was funny, because it didn’t hurt, and hitting people usually did. I didn’t really hit people all that often. I’d hit Wade recently, and it had hurt like hell. But I didn’t feel anything. I wondered what that was all about.

  Lily was on my back, wrapping her arms around me, pinning my arms down. “Leave my brother alone,” she shrieked.

  I threw her off and staggered to my feet. I felt… invincible now. Different. Not like a regular man, but like a hulking beast of a thing, something that could run and hit and kill and feel nothing. Maybe I was really a demon.

  I spied the ax on the ground and took several steps toward it. They seemed to be echoing, lumbering steps, as if I was a giant.

  Patrick got to his feet too. He shoved me.

  I backhanded him.

  He yelled.

  I reached down to pick up the ax.

  Lily kicked me in the back.

  I pitched forward, narrowly avoiding the ax blade myself. My face skidded against the floor of the shed. But that didn’t hurt either. Nothing hurt. I was the invincible man, after all. I laughed.

  Lily tried to pick up the ax.

  I snatched it out of her grasp.

  “No!” said Patrick.

  I used the ax to push myself to my feet.

  “Deacon, what is going on with you?” Lily was crying.

  I raised the ax over my shoulder and looked at them. I had never used an ax on a person before. I had a little bit of experience with splitting wood. I expected this would be easier than that. Although, maybe not, because they’d be moving. And also, they’d be trying to fight me. I should take down Patrick first, I figured. Lily would be easier to fight than him.

  I thought about the way the blade would cut into the flesh, the way the blood would splatter, the bone splinter.

  I could do this.

  Patrick rushed at me.

  I gripped the ax, flexing my muscles. Idiot. He was coming straight at me, and I was going to bury this ax right between his eyes. In four seconds, he would be close enough.

  Three.

  Two.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  “Deacon!” The screeching voice came from behind me, and it startled me so much that I jumped. It was my mother. She was standing in the doorway to the shed.

  And then Patrick plowed into me again. He grabbed at the ax.

  I struggled, trying to keep hold on it.

  “What are you doing?” my mother whispered.

  I yanked on the ax.

  “Deacon, this isn’t you,” said my mother. “I know you. This isn’t you. You would never, ever do something like this.”

  What was I doing? I blinked.

  “Deacon, stop,” said my mother.

  “Look, mom,” I growled. “You don’t understand. I have to do this. They want me to give them something, and this is a sacrifice. If I kill Patrick and Lily, it’s a violent event that releases more energy. It feeds them. And they won’t help if I don’t feed them. So, just back out of the shed and don’t watch.”

  Patrick yanked back on the ax. “You’re batshit insane, aren’t you?”

  “It’s not him!” My mother was coming into the shed.

  “Damn it, I told you to leave,” I said to her.

  She stopped right next to Patrick and me. “It’s the park, Patrick. It’s doing this to Deacon.”

  I tried to get the ax away from Patrick again, and I managed it.

  Patrick went stumbling backwards, and I lost a bit of my balance too. But I brought the ax up—

  And my mother was there, right in front of me. “Stop it, Deacon.”

  “Move,” I told her in a grating voice.

  “No,” she said. “If you want a sacrifice, use me. I’m the one who hurt you.”

  “Oh, you’re admitting that now?” I sneered. I took a step towards her, and I imagined bringing the ax down, just cutting lengthwi
se into her, shoulder to hip.

  “It’s making me remember,” she said. “The park has shown me so many things. So many terrible things.” Her face twisted.

  I didn’t like to see her upset like that. When I was a kid, I still remembered the rare times I saw my mother cry and how it wrecked me. I never wanted her to cry. “Stop it,” I whispered.

  My mother looked back at Patrick and Lily. “Go,” she said.

  Patrick reached for his sister’s hand. They started for the door.

  “No!” I tried to get to them.

  My mother blocked me. “You’ll have to kill me first.” To Patrick, “Go! Go now!”

  Patrick and Lily ran.

  I tried to bring the ax into my mother.

  Couldn’t.

  “Fuck!” I screamed.

  “Deacon!” My mother put her hand on my cheek.

  I started to shake.

  “Kiddo,” she whispered. “Stop.”

  I lowered the ax. I let my arm fall and the ax rested against the floor of the shed. “Mom…” I was starting to feel a creeping tiredness stealing over my limbs.

  I let go of the ax. It clattered harmlessly against the floor of the shed.

  “Deacon, sweetheart.” My mother put her other hand on my other cheek.

  I felt bile rising in the back of my throat. I shoved her off, and I staggered out of the shed. With every step, pain and exhaustion rushed into my body. My hands hurt where I had hit Patrick. My cheek hurt where I’d hit the floor of the shed. All my muscles felt tired. Plus there was a halo of exhaustion running through me, like the way I’d felt after being in Boonridge, where the spirits had feasted on my essence.

  They’d been feasting on me now, hadn’t they?

  It was what Mads had told me, but I’d been too stupid to listen to her, and now…

  I made it through the doorway and then collapsed on the ground.

  My mother knelt in front of me. “Deacon? Baby?”

  I just gazed up at her, barely sensible to the fact that she was even there. I was trying to make sense of everything. It all seemed odd now. Why had I done all those things? I had locked us in the park, and I had crushed the cell phones, and I had locked Patrick and Lily up here. I remembered doing it all, and I remembered that at the time, it all seemed perfectly reasonable, but now…