by Amie Gibbons
“Whatever this ghost is, I summoned it,” I said. “I… I think I did. I’m… this is all my fault.”
“Don’t even think about sinking down into depression,” Carvi snapped. “You don’t get to sit here and sulk. You don’t get to feel bad for yourself. Suck it the fuck up and do your job.”
I glared at him.
“Oh, I mean it,” he said, eyes hardening.
“Carvi,” Quil said, standing up. He looked at me across the bathroom but didn’t make a move towards me.
“She needs to be pushed right now, Quil,” Carvi said. “She doesn’t want to be, because it’s hard and it hurts, but she needs to be pushed, otherwise, she’ll let herself sink.”
That got through some crack in my shell of depression.
“I will not!” I snapped. “I’m not fifteen anymore. I’m not that same little girl. I may never have dealt with this, but I’m not that weak. Not anymore.”
Carvi grinned. “Ah, there’s our girl.”
I took a deep breath, crossing my arms. “What’s our next step?”
“I’ll take over the investigation,” Mender said. “I already have an ambulance on the way for Grant and Dr. Kincaid. We’ll have to bring in another tech.”
“Is Dr. Kincaid okay?” I asked.
“She’s unconscious, got a nasty cut, and most likely a concussion,” Mender said. “I can’t say more than that, but I’m betting she’ll be out of commission for the night.”
I nodded.
Some small petty part of me thought, Good.
I quashed it.
Dr. Kincaid was good at what she did and she had an open mind, took the magic stuff when it came without a flinch. That’s why she got the job. The fact that she was now off the case was bad for the case, and that was all that mattered.
Ha! No, it wasn’t.
She was sleeping with Gr-
Nope.
My stomach rolled up. Couldn’t go there.
Seriously, the thought of them together made me want to puke.
Her being good at her job wasn’t all that mattered.
It was all that should’ve mattered though.
“Do we have another tech comin’?” I asked.
“Yes,” Mender said. “Someone from Metro.”
I wrinkled my nose.
“I don’t like them either, but we’ll have to suck it up and play nice,” Mender said. “I don’t know how many bodies we’ll be looking at, but we’re going to need the M.E.s and techs on all of them. Trying to find that common thread.”
“We already know the common thread,” Quil said. “The ghost told us. We need to start looking into these men’s pasts and who they’ve slept with.”
“It’s got to be the first guy murdered this morning, right?” I asked. “The guy here?”
“Not necessarily. Whoever started this may have sicced it on this man for revenge, and then it got loose, but something about that doesn’t sit right with me. Something’s off.”
“I agree,” Carvi said. “It could’ve been a former lover here, but if the person who summoned this ghost knew what they were doing enough to direct it to the exact right man first, why didn’t they know enough to be able to control it?”
“And why now?” I asked. “If someone decided to get revenge on a guy, wouldn’t it be for something done recently? I mean, he’s been married for years and has a kid… unless he cheated and that’s why he broke her heart?”
“Why would anyone summon a ghost like this in the first place?” Mender asked.
The guys looked at each other and I snorted.
“What?” Mender said.
“You summon a ghost like this because you’re mad,” I said. “Because you’re broken, and you want to do something, anything, to get back at the person. Because you have to do something to make the pain stop.”
Everyone was staring at me.
“I mean,” I said, tryin’ not to flinch, “murder’s pretty far to go, but… I get it. I get the desire to get revenge. Maybe she killed herself out of depression and is now going after guys who did the same thing that was done to her. Maybe she just summoned it.”
Mender nodded. “So it’s either a ghost on its own or a summoned one that, what? Escaped? Started attacking anyone who fit the profile?”
“Maybe,” Carvi said, “but ghosts can’t generally do that. There has to be something tethering them to this world. That’s what I can’t figure out about this. Ghosts have to be tied to a specific place, thing or person.”
“So we start with figuring out the common thread physically between these guys,” I said. “Maybe… what passes between people?”
I slammed a palm to my forehead.
“What if it’s attached to a piece of money!” I said. “What if that’s how it’s getting around the city… no, wait, that’d explain it if random people just died, and a few, because how often can money change hands in one day, and this ghost also seems to-”
“Sweets,” Quil said, walking to me.
I shut up and smiled my big nervous smile. “Sorry.”
“We have men dying all over the city. Way too many for it to be something that is randomly passed like money,” Carvi said. “And that was a very specific ghost. Also, did no one else notice that it looked like Ariana?”
“Yep, noticed that,” I said. “I swear, it’s like everyone’s seen me naked.”
“I’ve seen your Facebook posts the last few months,” Carvi said. “Everyone’s already seen you naked, it was just emotionally.”
“Excuse you!”
“You really need to watch what you post on there. Anyone reading could tell you were going through a slow meltdown.”
“I was not!”
He raised his eyebrows at me. “Lea, you were posting a ton of crap about stuff from romantic comedies and how if a guy cares, he calls, and how sad and you felt and how friends don’t do stuff like ignore you, and blah, blah, blah. You were disintegrating before everyone’s eyes. I think you need to lay off the social media. You’re way too dramatic on there for a professional.”
My mouth fell open and I looked at Quil.
He shrugged. “I did say something to that effect.”
I narrowed my eyes at him.
“Well, I never,” I said. “Fine!”
“What about their social media?” Mender asked. “Has anyone checked that?”
She was doing a pretty good job of ignoring my drama.
“Dan’s on it back at the office,” I said. “He was tryin’ to find the connection too. We should probably call him and tell him what the ghost is after at least.”
“And the ghost looking like Agent Ryder,” Mender said, directing it at the guys. “Is that relevant?”
“Yes,” the vamps said together.
“Ghosts look like themselves,” Carvi said. “The fact that this one looked like Ariana is telling. I don’t know what, but it is telling.”
“It may not be a ghost at all,” Quil said, squinting in his thinking face.
“Then what?” I asked. “A demon?”
“Summoned to attack men like this?” Carvi lifted his hands and put them up and down like he was weighing something. “Possibly. But that doesn’t explain the EMF. Or how it didn’t have a body. Demons usually have to come over in a body that can withstand this world, or possess one right away.”
Mender took in a deep breath, letting it huff out. “Are you telling me whatever this thing is doesn’t fit the pattern of anything we know of?”
“Yes,” Quil said.
She clenched her fists and closed her eyes for a moment. “Ryder, go back into the astral plane and interview the men. I’m assuming you can do that.”
“Astral?” I asked. “I thought they were in limbo?”
“They are,” Carvi said.
“Whatever,” Mender said. “Just talk to them. I want to know everyone they’ve ever slept with.”
“Every virgin,” Carvi said. “Like I said, that ghost was specific. A
nd that should narrow it down.”
“Good point,” Mender said. “Write them down, anything the guys can tell us about them. We’ll start by tracking them down once you have those.”
“How do we keep the ghost from killing in the meantime?” I asked.
Mender pinched her nose. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out right now.”
###
“Hey again,” I said, sitting next to Thomas on the cold concrete.
“Hey, cutie,” he said.
The grey swirled around Carvi as he sat on the other side where he could see Thomas’s face turned towards him.
I didn’t want to have to look at Thomas.
We’d already talked to a few of the guys through town on our way over here, starting with the man at the house. His name was Oliver Manning and all he’d done was lose it to a girl when they were both virgins, had it go badly, and after that he moved for college. I’m betting she saw him leaving like that as a betrayal, but, at least from his perspective, he didn’t lie or even really push her.
They’d been in love.
Most of the guys we’d talked to on our way across town had similar stories. Some were worse than others, but none were even as bad as my story where I’d been upset and drunk.
“I’m sorry, we kinda have to ask you a few delicate questions,” I said. “Is that okay. I mean we-”
“Names of all the virgins you’ve fucked,” Carvi said. “We’ve got eighteen of these guys to talk to total, lea. And your Southern slowness is taking up way more time than I wanted to spend.”
My jaw dropped. “Well, you are-”
“Efficient,” he said, voice cold and sharp. “People dying, maybe right now. Thomas, any virgins?”
He let out a nervous chuckle. “Is that relevant?”
“Yes.”
“It’s the thread,” I said. “The ghost attacked, and the things she was sayin’, well, we’re pretty sure she’s going after men who took virginity and then ditched the girl or betrayed her or something like that.”
“Shit,” he hissed. “You think that’s it? A bitch was pissed I didn’t call her after?”
My lip pulled up. “I’m suddenly thinkin’ we wouldn’t get along so well. So that’s a yes? You actually did that to a virgin?”
Maybe I was wrong before.
Maybe guys who did that did deserve to die.
Okay, maybe murder was a little extreme.
“I didn’t… it’s more complicated than that,” he said.
“Name,” Carvi said. “Seriously, we’ve got ten more of these.”
“Nine,” I said. “We’ve talked to eight others, he’s nine. There’s eighteen total.”
Carvi met my eyes over the corpse. “And Grant makes nineteen.”
Adrenaline shot through me like lightning and I jumped to my feet. “No! I am not facing him! I don’t need to! And he wasn’t there when we talked to Oliver anyway.”
“And I already told you that’s because he hadn’t formed in this plane yet, so we’d have to go back.”
“Why? We know his history. He was… collateral damage, not-”
“We don’t know what he saw or would remember,” Carvi said. “We’ll talk to him after we’re done with the others. He should be formed by then, and I don’t want to hear any whining about it.”
My blood hummed.
The thought of facing Grant after that… after I…
My heart seized and I pulled my arms tight around myself.
Nope, couldn’t do it.
“Thomas, name?” Carvi said.
“I’ve had three virgins,” Thomas said.
“Had? Real nice,” I said.
“Ariana,” Carvi said. “Not now.”
I stuck my tongue out at him.
He stared at me.
“Do it,” I said, pointin’ at him. “Grab it. I dare ya.”
“Stop acting like a child. We don’t have time for this,” he said. “Thomas, names?”
“Two were back in Germany. And neither was left on bad terms. The one here though. It was seven years ago. During medical school. She… her name was Annabeth Williamson. I thought she just wanted to lose her virginity. She was a little old to be a virgin, she said that’s what she wanted. But after that…”
“But after that, what?” I asked.
“It didn’t go well. We were both drinking. And when I went in, it hurt her. Even after that, it was terrible. On a scale of one to ten, it was a point five,” Thomas said, voice rising. “She said it was bad too. That’s not just me. I don’t understand why she got so upset. And then, she just went nuts! She kept trying to talk to me and saying all this stuff she felt, like it was my fault. And then she started telling people what I did, like I did something wrong.”
“You did!” I said.
“It was perfectly legal. She consented before we even started drinking. I even asked during, kept checking to make sure she was okay. I asked before I did anything, like putting it in or when I put in her ass. I asked!”
“You did anal with a drunk virgin!” I snapped. “What the qu-?”
“I asked!” he said. “She said yes.”
“She was drunk.”
“She wasn’t too drunk to not say yes. Several times. I asked and she was answering and she wasn’t slurring. It was perfectly legal.”
“That doesn’t make it right, you walkin’ herpe!” I said.
He muttered something in what I assume was German.
“Okay, raise of hands, who votes we leave him in here?” I said, raising my hand for a second before dropping it.
“Keep talking, Thomas,” Carvi said. “You piss her off enough, we just might be able to summon the ghost here by overidentifying.”
I flinched.
“This isn’t about you, Ariana,” Carvi said. “Stop attacking the victim.”
“Sounds to me like he’s the bad guy,” I said. “That ghost was right, you deserve this.”
I paused, pulling my head back, and held up a hand in a stop motion.
“No, you don’t,” I said. “You deserve to have your name up on a website saying that you did this, you deserve syphilis for a while, you deserve to have your heart broken too, but you didn’t deserve to die. You definitely don’t deserve to be stuck in limbo forever.”
“Thanks,” Thomas drawled. “Anyway, if it was AB, why would all those other men be dead?”
“Ghost either set on them to take out all men who do this to women, or summoner can’t control it and it ran amok, or something to that effect,” I said. “We really aren’t sure.”
“I… I hurt AB. I honestly thought my wife leaving me might have been karma for how much I hurt her for a while there, but she… she might have done something like put my name up on a website. She knows that would hurt me by hurting my career. I’ve been scared she might do that lately. But I don’t see her doing something like this.”
“Lately?” Carvi asked.
“We hadn’t seen each other in years. I moved for my residency. After I came back, we ran into each other. She’s doing her residency at Vanderbilt. We got to talking and it was nice, like when we first met. We became friends. We were hanging out and it was good. I met a lot of great people through her, but…” His eyes moved like they were searchin’ for answers.
“She wanted more,” I said. “She never got over you and she saw this as her second chance.”
“I was trying to ignore it,” he said. “She said she had a crush on me again, but was hoping it’d go away. And then last month I hooked up with a nurse. Nothing serious, both of us knew it was casual, and the nurse was moving anyway. She just broke up with her boyfriend and asked me over to help her feel better. And we’re cool, still in touch. But it got around because her roommate has a big mouth, and AB… she went crazy again.”
“What did she do, Thomas?” Carvi asked.
“She was so mad, she wasn’t yelling, but she was… doing this cold snapping at me, said I hadn’t learned my lesson, sa
id I was the same user I’d always been. I argued back. It was ugly. I said some cruel things I am not proud of.
“A friend at work said she’d been posting about me on Facebook for about a week. Vague stuff, but enough for anyone who knows us both to know she was talking about me.
“She was flipping out on me. I don’t understand it. We… we never would have worked, even if we had tried past that night. Based on that fight, when we weren’t even dating, we would’ve been the type of couple who screamed and threw things at each other. I mean, we would’ve ki…”
“Killed each other?” I said.
“It’s a figure of speech,” he said. “AB has issues. And I don’t understand what the fuck her problem is. And she can be a raging bitch when she’s pissed off. But even if she completely snapped and did send something after me, she wouldn’t do anything that could affect other people.”
“You sure about that?” Carvi said.
“Positive. Everyone else comments on how rational and logical she is. Says she’s practically a guy. Far as I can tell, she saves all her crazy for me.”
“She may have done it and just not meant to,” I said.
“What happened after your fight?” Carvi asked.
“We haven’t spoken since,” Thomas said. “Our friend is helping her with her issues. She unfriended the doctor who told me so I don’t know what she’s been posting since then. Haven’t seen her since.”
“But you work in the same place,” I said.
“Big hospital. I’m in psychiatry and she’s in cancer research. Different floors, and neither one of us has gone to the others’.”
“So, friendship over?” I asked. “Just like that? Even after you said you guys were hanging out and it was nice, you were friends, it was all cool. How can you throw people away like that?”
“Ariana,” Carvi said. “Really not about you right now.”
“I’m just askin’,” I said. “I don’t get it. How could somebody do that?”
“She posted shit about me on Facebook,” he said. “So obvious that more than one person figured out she was talking about me and asked me about it. So how many people do you think figured out it was me and didn’t bother mentioning it was me? Then, she told our friends that if she was doing something with them, that I couldn’t. Basically blocking me from seeing them most of the time since they always hang out together. She flipped back into a bitch and I don’t know about you, but that’s not someone I want to be around.”
