With a twist, the ghost forced Katie’s hand open, and the metal trinket fell away, useless and steaming and covered in blood.
The bones in her wrist ground together under the grip of Emmaline Norstrom.
Below them, in the main room of the Inn, they heard a voice.
“Hello? Anyone home?”
Emmaline hesitated, turning to look over her shoulder through eyes of blood. She let go of Katie’s hand, and Katie’s body was able to unlock enough for her to fall back, onto the steps, her spine taking the brunt of it. Her feet shook like they wanted to run, but they couldn’t quite do it.
“Aunt Emmaline!” the rich, booming voice called up the stairs.
Pastor Jim Sutter. He was here.
Katie didn’t know whether to be relieved for her, or scared for him.
The ghost turned now, bloody dress flowing, bloody face staring.
When he saw Connor Norstrom lying broken on the floor at the base of the stairs, he stopped, and stood over his cousin for a moment. Katie could just see his lips moving in a prayer, and then he made the sign of the cross in the air above Connor.
A prayer for the dead. Jim was trying to ease Connor’s passage to the other side. Katie couldn’t believe he could be that compassionate to someone who had done such horrible things when she hadn’t been able to find it in herself to do the same.
Apparently, Emmaline couldn’t believe it either. She screamed, and howled in rage, and for a moment the air went dark around her as her fury manifested across the line between life and death.
Jim turned away from Connor with a heavy sigh. He came walking up the stairs, taking his time like he didn’t have a care in the world. “I see you, Aunt Emmaline. I see you.”
If his voice broke when he said that name this time, if his face looked like he was terrified down to his very soul, he didn’t let it stop him. He came up step, by step, until he was standing right in front of Emmaline.
“Jim,” Katie tried to warn him. “Don’t do it.”
He waved a hand at her. “Don’t you worry, Katie. Me and my aunt are just going to have a little conversation.”
The fingers of his hand were curled around something. What did he have? Katie couldn’t see what it was, but she could see her little metal cross melted into the rug not far from where he stood. She wanted to tell him that it wouldn’t work. The cross hadn’t saved her.
Emmaline reached out toward Jim. Still, he didn’t move.
Then she spoke.
“Angry.”
Jim nodded. “I don’t blame you.”
Then he brought up his hand, and uncurled his fingers to show what was lying in his palm.
The brooch with the ivory lady.
Emmaline startled, a ripple coursing across the bloody surface of her form as if someone had thrown a stone into a pond.
“Mine,” she said in a hollow warble. “Always mine.”
“It should have been buried with you,” Jim said. “You never took this off. It was important to you, and it got taken away when Connor refused to let you be buried with it. Take it back, now. It’s yours.”
Slowly, she reached out for that piece of jewelry. Gory fingers scooped it up from Jim’s hand, and she held it close to her chest.
And when she did, she melted away.
A cascade of blood across the stairs, and a smile that was no longer hideous or evil but peaceful instead...that was the end of Emmaline Norstrom’s ghost.
Jim stepped back, but it was only to keep from being splashed by Emmaline’s remains. In the next breath, he was coming right up to the stairs, jumping over the stains, to Katie, helping her up and holding her until she could stop shaking.
“How did you know?” she asked him when she got her breath back. “How did you know that would work?”
His laugh was thin. “I didn’t. Seemed like the thing to do, is all.”
Chapter 20
Katie hated hospitals. She always had.
She hated them even more now that she knew, at any moment, someone might die in their hospital bed, and then their ghost would be wandering the hallway for her to bump into.
A shiver ran up her spine. She’d had enough of ghosts for her whole entire lifetime.
Enough.
An image of the hideous, bloody face of Emmaline Norstrom flashed through her memory, and Katie winced, closing her eyes tight. Emmaline was gone now. She had to keep reminding herself of that.
It was all finally over.
Three days had passed since all that happened, and she hadn’t gotten more than a few hours of sleep the whole time. Whenever she tried, she saw Emmaline’s smile. She heard Emmaline’s voice.
“Angry...”
And when she wasn’t seeing Emmaline, she saw Connor with his knife, stabbing Riley in the chest.
Her eyes snapped open, and she jumped out of the chair in the corner of Riley’s hospital room, a scream about to burst out of her.
“Katie?” Riley sat up in bed, careful of the IV line still in his left forearm, and the bandages around that shoulder. “Hey, are you okay?”
She stopped, halfway across the room, heading for the door to leave. She didn’t want to go. Of course, she didn’t. She was just spooked. That was all.
She’d been sitting here in this room for most of the time Riley had been here. First, after the surgery to close his injury while he’d slept off the anesthesia for hours. Then, to keep him company during the last two days while he recuperated. The doctors had said he could go home today, maybe, if his fever came down and his electrolytes went up and a hundred other little maybes and ifs.
Her one hand sported a cast. Her wrist had been badly sprained but not broken, thank God. She’d been lucky.
Katie took a breath, and reminded herself that they were safe here in the hospital. She didn’t need to run. She needed to stay with Riley. They needed to stay together.
That was how they always got through anything. If she hadn’t found him, and if he wasn’t in Katie’s life, she really didn’t want to think about what she would do.
A life without Riley. Now that really was horrifying.
She went to his side, and sat on the edge of the bed, and laid down with him. Carefully, she slid her arm behind his head. “I love you,” she said to him. Just that, but it covered so much.
“I love you, too,” he told her. “What’s the update from the Inn?”
“You’re supposed to be resting.”
“I can rest and help you with our business at the same time. Try me.”
She grimaced, not even wanting to think about the Inn after everything they’d been through, but knowing that she had to just the same. It was her business. Their business, hers and Riley’s, just like he’d said. It was their responsibility.
“The police are done investigating.” That was as good a place to start as any, she supposed. “They found Garret’s body, and they found Devin’s body, and it was easy for them to believe that Connor Norstrom had done that, especially after what I found in his basement.”
Riley nodded. They had talked, just briefly, about what they were going to say to the police this time. That had been right before Riley had been taken to the hospital. They’d had plenty of practice in the past with lying to the police to cover up ghostly encounters. It was becoming almost too easy.
It was a simple story they were passing off this time. Connor had come to the Inn looking for Katie, and when he couldn’t find her he killed Devin, and Garret, and then he’d tried to kill Riley. Katie had pushed Connor down the stairs in self-defense, and he broke his neck on the way down. It was just luck that it had worked out that way. Just luck.
No ghosts.
“Did they believe you?” Riley asked. “About it being an accident? Self-defense?”
“Sure,” she said. “That was the easy part. I was worried that we were going to have to explain all the blood somehow. Now that would have been hard.”
They exchanged a look, because there was no reason to
talk about it. The blood had simply disappeared.
Not all of it. The blood that was Connor’s, from his fall, was still there. The blood that was Riley’s, from his injury, was still there. The rest of it had seeped into the floors and the walls and the ceiling, and disappeared.
All of it, that is, except the words on the wall. Not Dead. The police had taken lots of pictures of that. They told her that it just went to prove how crazy Connor Norstrom had been.
Katie didn’t argue the point. Connor might not have written those words, but he was still certifiably insane. Katie was fine with him taking the blame for everything.
It wasn’t just the blood that had disappeared, either. The brooch was gone. Returned to the grave with Emmaline where it was meant to be in the first place.
There had been a bit of good news among all the bad. When the Troopers had arrived and searched the Inn, they found Devin’s girlfriend, Melissa, alive and hiding in another room. Connor had missed her, and she’d had the good sense to stay hidden and quiet. She’d been terrified when they found her, babbling about seeing blood and hearing screams and a lot of things that just don’t make sense.
Shock, was how the police explained it. They were sure she’d be fine. In time.
Katie doubted that very much because right now, she wasn’t sure that she would ever be fine again herself.
This one had really taken its toll on her. She felt like she’d been sent through a dryer on high heat and then dragged a thousand miles through a desert. Or something like that. It was a hard sensation to describe. She felt...spent. Used up. Like she had nothing left to give.
Like she just wanted to pack her things, and leave, and never look back.
“Hey,” she said to Riley. “Remember when you were talking about leaving, and going back out west? Do you think...is that still something you still want to do?”
He brightened, sitting up straighter, looking into her eyes with an eager expression. “Well, yeah. Of course, it is. Do you? I thought you were against the idea.”
She twirled a lock of his hair through her fingers. “I was. I thought we were starting to make a life for ourselves here. I was even beginning to think about not flipping properties anymore and just making a go of it as an Innkeeper. I thought maybe the Heritage Inn could be our home forever. You know?”
“I think I understand.” He shrugged, the hospital gown shifting so that one of his strong shoulders was laid bare. “I liked Twilight Ridge, too. I liked being there with you, at least. It was just...”
“The ghosts.”
“Right. The ghosts.”
“And the nearly dying.”
“Right. And the nearly dying.”
“If we move,” she pointed out, “they might still find us. Different ghosts, in different places.”
“I know. Shouldn’t we take a chance that we can be free from them? A chance is all we need.”
“It’s all we’ve ever had.”
They kissed, and it was a long time before either of them came up for air. The hospital room was private, and she wondered if maybe they could draw the curtain on the ceiling around the bed and get naked and wild.
Under the hospital gown, she felt his body stirring. He was obviously having the same thoughts that she was.
Shifting on the bed, working to get her clothes off, she kissed him again, and listened to him murmur her name.
“Katie?”
“Yes, Riley?”
“We missed Halloween.”
“Good,” she said to him, slipping a hand under his gown. “I never want to celebrate another Halloween again. Ever.”
The Haunting Of The Voodoo Queen
Dedicated to the late Marie Laveau
Chapter 1
“The city of New Orleans is the largest city in the state of Louisiana, a major port of commerce for the southern United States.”
Well. That certainly was boring. Katie Pearson hadn’t come to Louisiana’s famous French quarter for boring. She was here for some excitement—and to take her mind off a lot of things. Vacations were good for the soul, or so a fortune cookie had once told her.
Looking through the rest of the brochure in her hands while she walked down the crowded sidewalk, she scanned ahead for something that would catch her interest.
“Let’s see. Named after the Duke of Orleans...sold to the United States by Napoleon in 1803...still bored here. The city is built on thousands of feet of sand and clay which means it continues to sink day by day...okay, that’s kind of interesting. What else? Ah. Here we go. Party vibe on Bourbon Street. Live music. Restaurants. Shopping. Old churches. Voodoo temples?”
Uh, definitely not that last one. Katie ran a hand through her windswept raven-black hair, trying to put it back in place, and quickly turned the brochure over. There had been too much scary paranormal stuff in her life as it was. Ghosts, and demons, and witches. It was like some horror movie directed by M. Night Shyamalan with a wicked twist every other Tuesday. She’d definitely had enough of that.
The rest of it was what she was here for. Fun. That was what she was here for. The shopping and the clubs and dancing until her brains fried.
On the back fold of the brochure there was a map. Time to get this party started. Now. If she was here...
Someone bumped into her, or she bumped into him, not watching where she was going.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said immediately, holding onto his shoulders while she balanced herself back on her feet. They were nice shoulders, she couldn’t help but notice. Strong and broad, under a red silk shirt that was open down the front to the third button.
His face was nice, too.
He skin was tan, like color of a good Caramel Brulee. He had strong cheekbones, and a sharp chin, and hair that was so light brown it was almost blonde.
It was his eyes that caught her attention. They were the most interesting pair of eyes she had ever seen. The iris of each was blue on the outer rim, darker and darker near the pupil until they were nearly purple.
“Bonsoir, Chere,” he said with a smile. The accent was sort of French, and sort of not. It was its own sort of music. “No worries. No harm done. Eh, you are new for around here, oui?”
“Um. Yes. I am.” Katie liked how friendly the people were here. Usually, she was very careful around strangers. A lot of people seemed friendly at first, until you saw what was underneath.
There was something about this guy, though. Something that made her want to trust him.
“And by yourself?” he asked.
Katie cleared her throat. Nice as he looked, she wasn’t going to risk a whole sleeping with the enemy thing here in the Big Easy--and he certainly did look nice. It wasn’t easy to walk away from him.
But that’s just what she was going to do.
“I’m going to say goodbye now. Sorry for bumping into you.”
“Carlson.”
Katie blinked at him. “What?”
“That be my name, Chere. Carlson Hastings, at your service.”
“Well. Nice to meet you, Carlson Hastings. I’m Katie Pearson.” She didn’t see any harm in giving him her real name. It wasn’t like they were going to see each other ever again. “So...I’m going to go now. Good night.”
“You should try the Spiral Club, ma chere. You will not be disappointed, I guarantee. Oh, do not look so surprised, ma chere. Every beautiful girl comes to New Orleans eventually, and they want to find the best of the good times. You go to the Spiral Club, just Uptown that way. You won’t be disappointed.”
“Uptown?” his way of talking was so mesmerizing. She couldn’t help but smile at him, and stare into those perfect eyes. “Which way is Uptown?’
“No directions here, Katie Pearson. In New Orleans there is no North or South. There is only Uptown and Downtown and Riverside and Lakeside. That is because our city exists in its own time, and its own place, no? You will see. The Spiral Club. Just up that way. Laissez les bon temps rouler.”
Katie had done enough r
esearch before coming here that she knew what that phrase meant. ‘Let the good times roll’ was the unofficial motto of New Orleans. That was exactly what she wanted to do.
“Thank you, Carlson. The Spiral Club it is.”
He winked at her and turned away, melting into the crowds around them. There was one last flash of that red shirt, and then he was gone.
Chapter 2
Katie couldn’t help but wonder, after Carlson was gone, if she had made a mistake in not asking him to be her personal guide.
A beautiful man bumps into her in the middle of an exotic city, and she just lets him go? What was that all about?
Yes, sure, she had a boyfriend back in Twilight Ridge, where she currently lived. Riley and her had decided to take a break after their last argument, proving once again that nothing was forever. Not even love.
She sighed as she checked the business names on the store fronts. You could find anything you wanted in this place. Clothing, jewelry, food, books, and all sorts of things that she never even knew she wanted to look at. There were psychics and palm readers and she lost count of how many voodoo themed shops she passed. That weirdo religion was everywhere down here. More for the tourists, she thought. It was hard to believe anyone could be a diehard voodoo practitioner in this modern age.
In the window of a place that specialized in alligator skin products, Katie checked herself over. Her hazel eyes stared back at her before she looked down to straighten the lines of her blue dress. The ribbons dangling off her left shoulder were black. It was a thing of beauty, and it had been an extravagance for her to buy it. Not that her bank account was in any danger. It was just the first time she’d ever spent four hundred dollars on a single piece of clothing.
If she was going to do New Orleans, then she was going to do it right.
She blinked and focused on the display of leather products in the window case. Alligator leather? Was it even legal to sell alligator leather? Were there really that many alligators in the bayou that people could skin them and tan them and turn them into...oh, those shoes were so super cute!
Sight Unseen Complete Series Box Set Page 83
