Psychic Wanted (Un)Dead or Alive (The SDF Paranormal Mysteries Book 4)

by Amie Gibbons

  I looked over at her and she kept her eyes glued on Paige.

  “If I was declaring war,” AB said, “I’d have hostages. It probably wanted to be able to use him against you.”

  I nodded. “I just thought of something. Where’s Kat?”

  “Who?”

  “Dr. Lang is back at the office, getting the rest of the men here,” Paige said.

  “Still?” I asked.

  She made a face. “It has been a while.”

  Something nagged at the back of my brain.

  I was missing something.

  “Okay,” I said.

  I was the psychic. If anyone could figure out what was missin’ from this puzzle, it was me.

  I focused on the tulpa.

  On the being made of a broken heart and rage at being betrayed.

  On her growing stronger with every man she killed.

  Flash.

  Her appearing in the mirror in front of Thomas as a naked, younger and skinnier AB in his bathroom mirror, making him go flying.

  Her coming up as another girl, obviously a teen, making Trey put the gun in his mouth.

  More and more of them.

  The stories the dead bodies told playing out in front of me.

  But no new ones.

  Not since Grant.

  Why?

  The world went solid and misty grey and I looked around the fogged up lab.

  Most of the men were still on their gurneys, but two in here were empty.

  “Hey guys,” I said, imagining my voice rippling through this little made corner of limbo. “Can you come back here?”

  Thomas and Grant appeared in front of me, Stewart right behind them.

  My heart seized at the sight of Grant and I took a deep breath.

  I could do this.

  I could shove it down til this was dealt with.

  “How much do you guys know?” I asked.

  “What we’ve seen by our bodies,” Grant said. “Why?”

  “So you know it’s a tulpa, sir?”

  I couldn’t look him in the eye.

  “Yes. Made by a spell, and that you can get us out of here.”

  I nodded.

  “Really?” Thomas asked, voice heavy. “You… please don’t give us false hope.”

  “Hope is never false,” I said, lookin’ him square in the eye. “We have a plan. We just need to get Paige to undo the spell.”

  “Who?” Stewart asked.

  “Edmund’s ex. By the way, your ex is a siren, it’s why she was acting so crazy. Lust powers fightin’ against the Southern Baptist upbringing. Carvi’s gonna help her.”

  Emotions fought on his face and he looked down.

  “Guys, do any of you know where the tulpa is?” I asked. “Or why she hasn’t attacked since Grant?”

  “Because I wasn’t supposed to be attacked,” Grant said. “I didn’t fit her program. So now she’s having a harder time doing what she was made to do.”

  I looked at him now.

  His eyes showed nothing.

  No emotion. No recognition.

  He may as well have been talkin’ to a stranger about all this.

  “You sure?” I asked.

  He raised his eyebrows at me.

  “You’re not my boss right now, or still, actually,” I said, making my voice hard. “Right now, you’re a victim, one I’m trying to help, so when I ask if you’re sure, I expect an answer and an explanation.”

  The eyebrows stayed up.

  “Yes, I’m sure,” he said. “I know it.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  That wasn’t an explanation.

  But what did I expect from Grant?

  “Good enough,” I said. “Any idea how to find this thing? I was trying to and I came here.”

  “It has psychic powers,” Grant said. “Not powerful, not yet, but enough to hide from you. And me.”

  “Crap on a cracker,” I said under my breath. “It’s plannin’ something. Next question, any idea how to get Paige to take it back?”

  “She has to deal with it,” Thomas said.

  I looked at him.

  “Psychiatrist, remember?” he said.

  “Then why were you such a jerk to AB?” I asked.

  He frowned at me.

  “What?” I said. “You didn’t help her deal with it, now did ya?”

  “The it she needs to deal with is me, I can’t help.”

  “You could’ve before you blew up your friendship. You didn’t want to.”

  “Ryder, focus,” Grant said.

  “Right, sorry, sir,” I said on reflex.

  And bit my tongue.

  Wow, that was harder to break than I thought it would be.

  “How do I get her to deal with it?” I asked. “She’s deep in denial, and the only way we can think to stop this thing is getting her to take it back, but even then, she doesn’t remember what spell did it, she doesn’t even remember casting it, so how do we undo this?”

  The guys stared back at me.

  “Any ideas, guys?”

  “Why are you asking us?” Stewart said.

  I paused.

  That was a good question.

  “She’s not,” Thomas said. “She’s asking him.” He nodded at Grant.

  “You can get the spell off the tulpa,” Grant said. “If you can focus your powers enough to push past the block, but this Paige taking it back isn’t going to do anything if she doesn’t mean it. She has to accept the tulpa back first, and then undo the spell, accepting all of the consequences.”

  “How do you know that, Grant?” I asked. “What are you?”

  He didn’t say anything.

  I finally got it.

  “You won’t tell me because you don’t trust me,” I said. “That’s why you never told me.”

  He nodded once, strong and hard.

  I took a deep breath.

  Ouch.

  “I’m taking your word for it,” I said, pointing at him. “But you better be right.”

  “I am,” he said.

  I opened my eyes in the real world.

  I’d come so far tonight, I didn’t even need Carvi’s help to do this.

  Probably meant I didn’t need his help this entire time. I could’ve done all this if I’d only known I could.

  And that was the key, wasn’t it?

  I had to know I could find this damn tulpa.

  That was it.

  I just had to focus on it and know I could push past whatever barriers it had tossed up.

  Because I wasn’t just some normal psychic.

  Whatever I was, I had powers similar to Carvi’s. I could suck energy from places and people.

  That wasn’t normal psychic stuff.

  That was all me.

  And that gave me an edge over this tulpa.

  Because she didn’t know I could do that.

  She didn’t know I was more than your average psychic.

  I drew a deep breath and focused on the tulpa again.

  I’d find her.

  I’d make Paige see that she had to take her back.

  And then, once we were ready, we’d have her reverse the spell, and bring those innocent men back to life.

  And one good thing about me being crazy and siccing this thing on Grant?

  It wasn’t able to go after anyone else because of it.

  That was something at least.

  “Ryder!”

  “Ah!” I jumped and had my arms up before my brain registered Mender walking in.

  “Relax, Ryder,” she said. “Sorry we’re late.”

  “I didn’t know you were coming,” I said.

  She shrugged. “Wasn’t getting a lot accomplished sitting at the office.” She nodded at Paige. “This her?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Good.”

  Mender pulled out her gun and aimed it at Paige.

  Chapter eighteen

  “No!” I screamed, raising my hand and pulling on Mender’s gun
in my mind.

  Like that’d do anything.

  The gun ripped from her hands, soaring across the lab and smacking the wall behind me, and I stared at my hands for a beat too long.

  Boom, shattered my eardrums and I screamed, slapping my hands over my ears.

  I just took her gun away!

  Oh.

  That was behind me.

  My ears ached as I put my hands down.

  There was a hole right through Mender’s head.

  AB really was a good shot.

  The hole knitted itself back together.

  “Nice reflexes, and really nice shootin’,” I said, “but that’s the tulpa.”

  “Oh,” AB said, voice shaking and about an octave too high. “Shooting doesn’t work?”

  “Nope,” I said, my voice getting up there too.

  “What does?”

  “Well,” I picked up Mender’s gun as the tulpa’s head finished fixing itself, “I brained it pretty good back at the club and that got it down at least.”

  “And then?” AB asked, voice higher, and squeaky.

  “And then she ran,” I said. “Paige, get over here!”

  “What!” she screamed, looking between us and the tulpa as the tulpa walked straight through one counter and the gurney holding Trey.

  “Now! Not asking!” I snapped.

  She ran over to us, huddling behind us.

  “Paige, you got to take her back,” I said.

  “What! I don’t… It wasn’t me!”

  “Yes, it was,” the tulpa said, grinning wide as she walked through the next counter.

  “See,” I said. “You have to take her back, because right now, she’s tryin’ to kill you so you can’t.”

  The tulpa walked through Edmund.

  I swear, if the corporal beings slowed her down, she didn’t show it.

  “Run!” I screamed, turning and shoving the girls.

  They turned and ran.

  And we thundered down the hall.

  Who was to say the tulpa couldn’t just pop up anywhere?

  We hit the next lab.

  “Here, here!” I screamed, pulling the door open.

  The girls ran in first and I glanced behind us.

  No tulpa in sight.

  We ran in and I brought my knife up.

  I didn’t have my spare gun on me tonight since I was in costume, and hadn’t thought I’d need it.

  And I was okay with AB keeping my gun.

  She was a damn good shot.

  Even if it didn’t slow the tulpa down much.

  Sierra and the lab techs looked up and I waved the ladies to run in front of me.

  AB held my gun out and I shook my head. “You’re a good shot and you reacted damn skippy. I want you watchin’ my back.”

  Her jaw dropped and she waved the gun at me.

  “AB,” I said, “I trust you. You did good. You got this.”

  She nodded once and readjusted her grip on the handle.

  “Sierra, tulpa’s here,” I said. “Looks like Mender, but I think it can change at will. Protection spell. Now.”

  Her eyes flew wide and she whirled, grabbing her bag and pulling something out.

  She tossed it to me and I caught it on reflex.

  Salt?

  It was a freakin’ canister of salt.

  “You kidding?” I said.

  “No,” she said. “Doors, now.”

  I poured a line of salt across the threshold of the door behind us and she had already handed another canister to one of the techs and sent him to get the other door.

  “She can go through walls,” I said.

  Sierra looked at me. “Then pour a circle.”

  I looked at Paige.

  And pulled a stool out from the counter, pouring a circle around it and her.

  “Stay,” I said, pointing at the stool.

  She stared at me.

  “Paige, it wants to kill you. I don’t know why it didn’t try earlier, but now it is. Stay in the circle.”

  “Because killing her risks killing it,” Sierra said, pulling out yet another canister of salt and hitting the wall next to the door across from us, starting her salt line where the other left off.

  “But then why-” I said.

  “Because it figured out that she’s the only one who can stop it, by taking it back,” Sierra said, “and it probably decided it was strong enough to risk it.”

  “But I thought killing the person who made it wouldn’t hurt it?” I said.

  “Who told you that?” Sierra said.

  I started pouring salt from the line I’d drawn across the door, keeping it slow and steady so I didn’t break the trail at any point.

  “I… I assumed,” I said. “Something about people in Auschwitz accidentally making one from despair.”

  “Multiple people,” Sierra said. “Not one. If one person makes it, killing them will kill it until it’s powerful enough to live on its own. It’s probably hoping it is and decided to come after her once you figured out who started this because she has the power to undo this.”

  “Okay, makes as much sense as any of this,” I said. “Paige, you gotta take her back.”

  “I… I don’t know how!” she said. “I don’t even remember doing this.”

  “I don’t know what to tell ya,” I said, still pouring. “But this thing is tough and it can go solid and not at will. Makes it pretty freakin’ hard to fight.”

  “Tell me how and I’ll do it,” she said, voice pinched with panic.

  “I can’t!” I said. “You have to make peace with this. You have to be okay with it. You have to face it.”

  “Tell me how. Tell me what to do, what steps to take, and I’ll do it.”

  The tulpa walked through the wall in front of me, still wearing Mender’s skin, and I scrambled backwards, flicking the salt canister at her, making her flinch.

  But not much else.

  “Where’s the real Mender?” I asked, backing up with the canister held up like a weapon.

  “Still at the office, wondering where the hell she left her phone.” The tulpa smiled and it was nasty.

  “And Kat?”

  She chuckled. “Bargaining chip, just like your boyfriend.”

  “Already found him,” I said.

  “Yes, but he’s still not up here, is he?” she asked, grinning wider. “Makes you wonder what nasty little surprise I left.”

  My blood ran cold.

  “If you hurt him,” I said, voice low and dangerous.

  Kinda like Carvi’s.

  She shrugged.

  “What are you going to do about it, little psychic? You can’t touch me unless I let you.”

  “Paige!” I yelled. “You need to deal with your issues. You don’t have to do it right now. Just be willing to face them! Be willing to have that pain, and accept that you can deal with it.”

  “I don’t know how!” she shouted back.

  I growled.

  And did the only thing I could think of.

  Lunged forward, pouring speed through my limbs like I was in the astral plane and could will myself to do it.

  And I moved fast. Like a vampire. Fast enough to get a hold of the tulpa.

  I stared her in the eyes.

  And the world shimmered.

  Dropping us in the astral plane.

  “Plenty,” I said, slamming her across the face with a fist.

  “AB,” I thought out at the real world, “talk to Paige, make her do this.”

  “Ariana?” came through extremely slow, half shocking me.

  That actually worked?

  “Yep, I’m in the astral plane with this thing. Get Paige to accept this.”

  “Too fast,” came back after too long.

  Ohhhhhh. The time difference between the planes.

  “But I think I get it,” she said. “Get Paige to accept this.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I gotta stall til then.”

  I pictured the lab around us, with e
quipment and chemicals, and pulled my gun up.

  Cuz I had whatever I wanted in here.

  “You can’t hold me,” the tulpa said.

  “Maybe not for long,” I said.

  And shot her in the chest, the sound as muffled in here as it would be by a suppressor in real life, making a pop and not much else.

  Much easier on the ears.

  “But all I have to do is stall long enough for her to talk Paige into sucking you back in,” I said.

  She snorted. “You say that like it’s easy.”

  “No, it’s hard,” I said, shooting her again, making her jerk back. “It’s impossible. But this woman had enough will to make you. I’d say that speaks pretty well of her strength of mind. Soon as she decides to take you back, she can.”

  I grinned. “I just have to keep you occupied til then. And you aren’t gettin’ out of here without my say so.”

  She rushed me and I got off another shot, barely slowing her down as she barreled into me.

  We slammed into the counter and I smashed the palm of my hand up into her nose, feeling something break.

  I focused on her and she went flying off of me.

  “This is my realm,” I said. “I’m psychic. This plane is my fucking playground.”

  Where did that come from?

  I lifted my hands and the lab burst into flames around me.

  The tulpa turned and ran and I thrust my hands forward, picturing grabbing her.

  She flew backwards towards me and I grinned as she slammed into one of the counters.

  She fell through it and I grabbed her leg, my hand going through her.

  She disappeared and I bounced on the balls of my feet, looking around.

  She couldn’t leave here without me letting her.

  Right?

  “Carvi?” I called mentally, picturing my voice traveling through walls of brick and sound to him partying over on Division Street.

  “Lea?” he asked a second later.

  “Hey,” I said. “It’s not AB, it’s Paige.”

  “Who?” he asked.

  “That Dr. Donahue, the one that snapped at me. It was her! She didn’t remember. I’ve got the tulpa in the astral plane. At least I did. She may have slipped away. Could use a little help.”

  Carvi appeared next to me, naked and hard.

  And dripping wet.

  “I…” I pointed at him. “Never mind. Not gonna ask.”

  “Tulpa still here?” he asked.

  “Don’t know. I had her. I pulled her in here, but she ran.”

  He grinned. “You’re learning fast, lea. I’m so proud. Focus on her.”