“Do either of you have family?” Jewel asked.
Belle had to admit, the couple sitting across from them seemed to care, but more than likely that was all part of the scam in some way or another.
“No,” Belle said, not giving out any more information than that. Her father had been dead for a long time and her mother just died of cancer four months ago, after the divorce from the slob was final. No brothers or sisters. A couple of nieces, but no one else. But these two strangers didn’t need to know that.
“Only a sister in California,” Nancy said.
Belle knew that Nancy’s parents had both died in a plane crash five years ago. Belle had helped Nancy with the estate and the grief, since Nancy’s husband had been worthless for even that.
“Are you both feeling stronger?” Jewel asked.
Belle nodded. She was, and the feeling of complete lack of energy and caring was passing as well.
Jewel looked at Tommy, then back at the two women. “We honestly have no idea what to do next to help you get going with this new life.”
“How about we just sit here for a short time,” Tommy said, “let them gain strength, and we can tell them about how we ended up dying and then becoming Ghost Agents.”
Belle watched as Jewel nodded.
“Honestly,” Belle said. “I don’t think there is much you can say that I’m going to believe. So how about Nancy and I just head home and you can give us that story later.”
Jewel looked at Tommy and he just smiled. Then he said, “Sounds like the best idea to me.”
Jewel just shook her head. “We’ll stay close when you have questions.”
“I think we’ll be just fine,” Belle said, standing. She was starting to get really angry at all this.
Nancy stood beside Belle and said to the two, “Thank you for your concern.”
With that, the two of them turned and headed for the front door to the restaurant. Belle wasn’t going to let some scam and a few magic tricks fool her. She wasn’t dead.
Far, far from it. She felt great.
And she continued to feel great right up to the big front door to the restaurant. It was a large wood door with a brass handle and a big window filling the center of it.
Belle reached for the handle to push it open. What seemed to be an image of the door pushed open, but the door itself stayed in place and her hand went right through it.
She stopped and yanked her hand back, looking at it.
The image of the door she had opened closed normally, vanishing back into the big real door.
“Oh, no,” Nancy said. “This is actually happening.”
Jewel and Tommy had followed them.
“A trick we learned is to push open the ghost door and pretend the other door isn’t there.” Jewel eased by Nancy and Belle and pushed open the image of the door and walked through the other door.
She stood holding the ghost door open.
“Close your eyes if you have to,” Tommy said.
At that moment, from behind them, a young kid and his girlfriend walked through Belle and Nancy, pushed the real door open, and went on out.
Belle got a clear image from the kid’s mind about trying to convince his date to get high with him that night.
And from the girl that had walked through Belle, she felt disgust at herself for even agreeing to dinner with the guy because he was such a loser.
“What just happened there?” Nancy asked.
“A live person walked through you and you could read their thoughts and emotions,” Tommy said. “It is one of the abilities you have as a Ghost Agent.”
“There are many more,” Jewel said as she held the ghost door open. The real door had swung closed again.
Belle just stood there, staring at the wooden and glass door in front of her, part of her mind saying this was all a nasty joke, part of her starting to believe this was actually happening.
Then she looked up at Jewel. “What do you think we should do?”
Jewel shrugged. “As we said, we don’t know. We’re brand new at this ourselves. So maybe learning how to move around and get home might be a good idea.”
“It’s what we did a while after we learned we were dead,” Tommy said, nodding.
Again, a live person came up suddenly behind them and walked through both Nancy and Belle, pushing open the door and going out. The guy was overweight and smelled awful, as if he hadn’t changed his clothes in weeks and lived on a cow farm.
“Oh, no!” Belle said as the thoughts of the man filled her mind. She could see that he had kidnapped two young girls from the Seattle area two days before and had them locked in soundproof rooms in his basement. He was looking forward to a night of playing with a young redhead before killing her.
“We’ve got to stop him,” Nancy said.
“What?” Tommy asked.
“That man has two young girls in his basement,” Nancy said.
Belle watched as both Tommy and Jewel instantly moved, both of them running after the man at full speed, both of them going through the walls of the restaurant.
Belle was stunned as Tommy reached the man first just as he was about to climb into a battered pick-up truck.
Tommy disappeared inside the guy and almost instantly the guy froze.
Jewel waved for Belle and Nancy to join them.
Belle took Nancy’s hand and with their eyes closed they stepped through the door and into the warm afternoon air.
The man had dropped to the pavement and was shaking.
As Belle watched, Tommy stuck his head out of the guy’s side and said to Jewel, “Get the police headed here quickly. This guy is a real sicko. And we’re going to have to help the police find the girls in his home. He has them well hidden.”
Belle just stood there, stunned as Tommy went back inside the guy and vanished. Beside her, Nancy pulled out her cell phone.
“Don’t I wish that would work,” Jewel said to Nancy. “Come on, I’ll show you how to call for real-world help.”
Jewel took off at a fast walk toward the restaurant again.
Belle glanced at the scared look in Nancy’s eyes and then took her hand and the two of them followed Jewel.
Belle was so glad Nancy was with her.
SEVEN
Jewel went through the door and headed for the front ordering area of the Sizzler where a young woman with colored blue-and-red hair stood behind the counter, waiting for a customer near the register.
As Jewel went through the counter toward the young girl, she glanced back at the new recruits. They had both managed to come through the wall of the restaurant, eyes shut, and were now following her.
They were learning, but this clearly wasn’t the best way to teach them. But there was no choice at the moment.
Jewel merged into the young girl behind the counter, learning instantly that her name was Francee spelled with two “e”s because it made her special and different. She was taking night classes at Boise State University and had a boyfriend named Rob who didn’t satisfy her in bed, but that she liked to game with.
Jewel quickly got Francee to look out the window and see the man sitting in the middle of the parking lot. Jewel made Francee feel extreme urgency as she grabbed the phone near the kitchen door and dialed 911.
Francee had already thought the guy creepy, so it didn’t take much for Jewel, through Francee, to convince the police the guy was going crazy and was dangerous and that they needed to get here quickly.
Then Jewel left Francee’s body after the police said they were on the way and faced Belle and Nancy. “That’s how we have to call for real help.”
“You can control a live person?” Nancy asked.
“We can,” Jewel said, heading back out to where Tommy had the pervert sitting on the sidewalk. “That’s what Tommy is doing with that guy to keep him from leaving.”
“I would never want to spend time in that man’s head,” Belle said, clearly disgusted.
“None of us do,” Jew
el said. “But it’s part of the job and, luckily, another person’s memories flush out of our minds quickly.”
Jewel went back through the wall of the restaurant just expecting the two new recruits to follow and not looking back.
She got close to the guy with the dirty clothes and bad farm smell on the parking lot and asked, “You all right, Tommy?”
“Just peachy,” Tommy said, sticking his head out of the side of the guy. “Trying to remember what exactly I did to the senator. Figured this guy could use a lot of that as well. He’s kidnapped and killed other girls before the two he has captive now. Want to help, Doc?”
“Not really,” Jewel said as the two recruits joined her. “But I will, so scoot over.”
Tommy’s head disappeared back inside the dirty man and Jewel ducked down and joined Tommy inside the pervert.
Belle and Nancy and Tommy had been correct. Jewel saw instantly that this guy was truly evil in all ways. Tommy had him contained completely, but even with that she could see what he had done to other poor girls, where he had buried them, and what he planned on doing to the two in his basement.
“Meet me in this pervert’s brain,” she said to Tommy and the two of them moved into the man’s brain, both shrinking down in size. Then, using her medical knowledge, she once again showed Tommy what to do to make this man scream in agony every time he thought of having sex, or even looked wrong at an underage girl or boy.
In fact, this guy was so disgusting, she helped Tommy make the pain feel worse. Even the slightest thought of sex and this guy would feel his entire penis burning like the worst urinary tract infection in history.
They had done the same thing to a senator who had been abusing young girls on their very first mission. They both figured it was the only way to protect young girls and kids from perverts like this guy and that senator.
“Police are arriving,” Belle said from outside the guy.
“Get this guy to confess,” Jewel said to Tommy, “and then let’s go find the two girls he has trapped. I’ll see what I can do to help the recruits understand what’s happening.”
“Not the kind of training I was expecting them to get,” Tommy said.
“But the kind we got,” Jewel said, remembering their first few hours as ghosts.
Jewel crawled out of the guy and stood, shaking herself and shuddering, trying to force the pervert’s memories back and down and out of her mind. The late fall afternoon air felt wonderful around her and she let herself take a deep breath and look at the beauty of the changing colors of the trees before focusing back on the task at hand.
Two Boise Police were approaching the guy, hands on their guns, asking if the guy was all right.
Jewel had the two new recruits step back and said to them, “Now watch this. Tommy is going to get the guy to confess.”
Suddenly the smelly pervert sitting on the sidewalk started shaking and sobbing. “I don’t want to hurt them. I don’t want to kill them. I have killed too many already.”
“Has he really?” Belle asked.
“I saw it when he went through me,” Nancy said. “He has.”
One cop immediately used a microphone on his shirt to call for backup and both of them drew their guns, standing their ground. Jewel could tell that they had parked their patrol car so that they were recording all of this.
The pervert was sobbing. “I have two girls in my basement, locked up. I don’t want to kill them. I don’t want to hurt them. Stop me, please stop me.”
“You want to calm down now, mister?” one cop said, “and tell us what you are talking about.
“Read me my rights, I’ll tell you everything. I’ll tell you who I have killed, where I buried their bodies, everything. Just stop me from killing innocent girls again.”
Jewel was impressed as one of the cops looked at the other and then started reading the pervert his rights.
Tommy just kept the pervert sobbing as he was read his rights and another patrol car pulled up.
“Do you understand these rights?”
Tommy had the pervert say, “I understand. Just stop me from killing the two girls in my basement.”
“Where is your home?” one cop asked.
Tommy had the pervert give the cop the address. “Just a few blocks from here up Franklin.”
Jewel and Belle and Nancy watched as for the next few minutes Tommy had the pervert recite names of who he had killed, where he had killed them, and where their bodies were buried.
Then Tommy made the pervert feel so much pain, he broke down crying and peed his own pants.
That’s when Tommy left, climbing out of the pervert and shuddering while taking deep breaths of the afternoon air.
“You all right?” Jewel asked, stepping up to Tommy and taking his hand.
“Going to take a little time to forget that,” Tommy said. “But right now we need to get to that guy’s house.”
“How are we going to do that?” Belle asked.
By now the guy was being handcuffed by two cops and being yanked to his feet. Jewel indicated that the two recruits follow Tommy as he strode to the cop clearly in charge, an older man, and merged with the guy’s body.
“Take that pervert to lock-up,” the older cop said. He then turned to another cop near him. “Get an emergency warrant for that residence. I’m headed there now.”
Jewel turned and indicated that the two recruits follow Tommy. He climbed inside the patrol car and Jewel waited for the two recruits to get near the car. Then she simply shoved first Belle, then Nancy through the side of the car and into the back seat. Jewel then went around and climbed into the front seat while the two were getting untangled.
“Sorry,” Jewel said as the two women got straightened out. “That’s how we did it the first time as well.”
With that, Tommy inside the cop clicked on his siren and headed out of the parking lot of the mall.
Jewel had seen the images of those two poor girls in that man’s basement. She just hoped they would get there in time. The girls had very little air. They were supposed to die if the pervert didn’t return within a certain time.
And that time was almost up.
EIGHT
Belle felt stunned riding in the back of the police car next to Nancy, speeding out Franklin Boulevard, sirens going on full. She wasn’t sure if her mind could take much more in one day.
She was starting to become convinced she was a ghost after all, that she and Nancy really had been killed in that horrid accident downtown earlier. She had now walked through walls of restaurants, had a pervert walk through her, and been pushed through the wall of a police car. Yet she and Nancy seemed to be sitting fine on the back seat.
She had no idea how any of that worked.
Or if this was even real.
In the front seat the ghost named Jewel was watching the road ahead as her partner, Tommy, was inside the real cop who was driving.
“You all right?” Belle asked Nancy, turning to face her best friend in the world. Nancy looked stressed and worried, Belle could tell that much.
“In shock I think,” Nancy said. “Too much information.”
At that moment the cop slid the car onto a driveway and sped up a dirt road between trees.
Belle glanced back as two other police cars followed.
They came to a sliding stop in front of a single story ranch house that had needed paint for a decade or more. Belle couldn’t even tell what color it had originally been. What had been a nice lawn at one point had now grown up into dried weeds and brush.
Jewel turned around to Belle and Nancy. “You’ll have to climb out on your own. Just like going through a restaurant door, just pretend you are opening the door and climb out.”
Then Jewel did just that as the cop in the front seat got out as well.
“Ready?” Belle asked Nancy.
“Don’t see a choice unless we want to spend the rest of our lives riding in a cop car.”
“Supposedly, we’re dead,”
Belle said. “So I guess that would be the afterlife riding in a police car.”
“Still not fun,” Nancy said.
Belle watched as Nancy reached for the door handle, then in one motion opened the car ghost door and climbed out, going through the real door as if it were an illusion.
Belle took a deep breath and did the same thing on her side, her eyes closed.
A moment later she found herself standing outside the car.
Jewel and the officer Tommy was inside were headed for the front door over a worn front porch.
“We got the emergency warrant!” another cop shouted from another patrol car, then slammed the door.
The cop Tommy was inside kicked open the front door and went in, gun drawn.
Two other cops and Jewel followed.
Belle and Nancy followed all of them.
The inside was a trash dump and smelled like a backed-up sewer.
“Girls are in the basement,” Jewel said as they entered the room.
Then Jewel turned and headed down the stairs. The three cops were clearly already headed down.
Belle glanced at Nancy, then shrugged. “I suppose it would be tough to hurt us,” Belle said.
“Physically, yes,” Nancy said.
Belle knew she had to see what she and Nancy had started. She had to see it through. So she quickly got out of the way of another young cop headed down the stairs and then followed him.
The basement smelled worse than the sewer smell of the house as she went down the wooden stairs.
Far, far, worse.
Mold and death and rot.
The smell choked her and she covered her nose and tried not to be sick.
The only light besides police flashlights was a single bulb hanging in the middle of the mostly empty room.
“They are hidden back here,” the cop that Tommy was riding in said as he started to pull aside a shelf.
Behind the shelf was what looked like a metal wall with a combination dial on the side.
Belle knew that huge walk-in safe had to be more expensive than this entire dump of a house.
Tommy stepped away from the cop, looking panicked. “I don’t remember getting the combination from the pervert.”
Smith's Monthly #13 Page 10
