Creep: Karma Inc. Case 4

by Gillian Zane

She took his hand limply and nodded.

  “He’s going to help get the ghosts out of the house,” I said, and a flicker of hope passed over Helena’s face. “You don’t have to be here, we’ll take care of things. Go see a movie or something with your daughter. I promise they’ll be gone when you come back.”

  “I would rather stay,” she said. Her trust was shot. She wasn’t going to let us do this the easy way. So, now it would have to be the hard way.

  James produced numerous smelly bundles of sticks and lit them on fire. I walked around with a bowl of water, that I claimed was blessed and splashed it in all the corners while repeating a prayer that I hadn’t said since I was a kid. I made sure to manifest up flickering lights and a few stray gusts of winds for the grand finale when Drake led the Johnsons out of the house to a Transitions rep that was waiting on the lawn.

  For a final effect, I charged the air with energy particles, raising our hair like we were touching one of those static balls, and giving the house a faint aroma of ozone. Helena began to cry.

  “It’s done,” she cried.

  “It’s done,” I repeated. James nodded with a huge smile on his face.

  But, technically, it wasn’t done. It wouldn’t be done until I turned in the laptop to the police. Raul was still in possession of his negative energy.

  20

  Proof Positive

  Sitting in the small diner that held my access door to Karma, I kept one hand on the messenger bag and the other around my warm coffee. Hours had passed, but I wasn’t going into Karma without getting the lay of the land from Drake. The case wasn’t officially closed yet.

  When the night lengthened, and the patrons dwindled, I saw his familiar shape leave the girl’s bathroom and head toward me. I gave him a tired smile, and he returned it with one of his own.

  “How’d it go?” I asked.

  “James was on point. He even managed to round up their parents and have them waiting for them when we got there. I didn’t know this, but souls that pass on before they become of age are treated a little differently.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, they don’t get jobs like we do, but I couldn’t tell you what happens. Always a secret,” he sighed.

  “Wouldn’t want the mere mortals to know too much,” I half-heartedly joked.

  “No, but I’m going to make it a point to find out,” Drake said this like it was a certainty.

  “I don’t think that’s possible, Drake,” I replied, my doubt over the current life I lived soul deep. I wasn’t enjoying my current existence, but it wasn’t like I had much of a choice.

  “It is. We can do it, Cassie.” He took my hand and I couldn’t help but believe him. Maybe we could. If we did it together.

  “But, before we take on the establishment and break down some truth, first I’m going to be a bit selfish. I’m going to find out another truth.” He squeezed my hand and my eyes shot up to his, my entire body locked on his in anticipation.

  “You ready?” he asked. I was unable to look away. Nothing was hidden from him in this moment.

  “No,” I said, but it was a lie.

  “You still need proof, right?” he asked.

  I could only nod.

  “You know it’s a ridiculous request.”

  “If we don’t, I’ll always have doubts.” I pulled my hand back from his and clasped them together in my lap, staring down at them because they were much more interesting than his dark gaze.

  “Let’s do this then. You sure you won’t accept that I wasn’t all hot and bothered when you took down Raul and Roselle?”

  “You weren’t even on this plane of existence.” I looked up and he had that smirk plastered across his face. He probably could read minds. He probably knew exactly what I was going to say before I said it. He could be so infuriating at times.

  “There’s a bar a block down, best place to hunt down some negative energy, grab Raul’s bag.” He stood and I followed. I had no other choice.

  Cousin Jeff’s was a hole in the wall bar a block away from the diner. It was getting late, but there were a few cars parked out front. Bars were the perfect place to find bad karma, Drake had said. And I had to agree. On the walk over, I slipped into a dark corner and changed my looks, back to the “original” Cassie with blond hair and a baby doll dress, because, frankly, blue-haired, psychic Cas would stand out like a sore thumb in a dive like Cousin Jeff’s.

  Drake did a double take when I joined him on the sidewalk. I looked exactly like I had when I walked into his office for the first time. I even wore the same dress.

  “What happened to the blue?” he inquired, wrapping a blonde lock around his finger.

  “I think this works better,” I said, glancing down at the short dress. Sex appeal always worked best on quickie jobs. Hard to admit, but I couldn’t deny end results.

  “The blue was growing on me.”

  “Me too.”

  “I kind of like this look too.” His eyes were fixedly staring down the front of my dress. Men were too easy.

  As we walked in, a memory of the last time Drake and I were in a bar flashed through my mind. I didn’t want to go there. He had no idea what I was back then. All he knew was I was some silly bartender who had a connection to a murder case. That I might be a thief, that I liked to hook up with guys who were engaged, and I might even be connected to a killer.

  How things had changed.

  Drake walked to the bar and ordered a drink while I scoped the place. It wasn’t hard to find my target. He sat alone at the bar. A young guy, barely skirting thirty. Hard lines were already forming around his eyes and his hair was starting to thin. The beer belly that he was currently expanding wasn’t helping him look any better either.

  He had gotten used to being good looking, so the descent into mediocrity was a soul killer. He had been voted “Most Eligible” in high school, and even dated a few of the popular girls because of his position on the football team. Now, he was lucky to get a date. He had been so stuck on high school and his accomplishments that he had gotten his degree in teaching and taken a position at the same high school he graduated from to maintain that connection. He had even landed a position as the assistant football coach. Someday he hoped to be the actual, real coach.

  Making a beeline for the former wide receiver, I sat down next to him and made a point of crossing my legs so the skirt rode up on his side. He glanced over, a little startled to see me sitting there. This was a small bar, not as popular as the more popular inner city ones, and there weren’t too many solo females floating around the place on a school night. He was suspicious at first, but then his ego won. Why wouldn’t a hot chick want to sit next to him?

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hi,” he mumbled and picked up his beer and took a big gulp.

  His name was Ben Rocheblave. He taught Social Studies and offered tutoring to certain students. Usually, nabbing one of his prized tutoring slots depended on bra size and hair color. Blondes were preferred.

  At first he had been content to only look. He would make a few tawdry comments, stare down their shirts as they bent over their books, and then jerk off to it afterwards. That had been his usual M.O. and he was okay with it. Every now and again he would manage to land a few dates that would lead to bodily fluid exchanges, and he would imagine these aging desperate women he fondled were his young students. He was okay with that also, until recently.

  Until Kiki Lamponi. Kiki whose cousin told her it was better to lose her virginity to someone older because they made better lovers. Kiki who had self-esteem issues and thought the attention given to her by her Social Studies teacher was flattering. Kiki who didn’t get much attention from home and was now making better grades and having orgasms with a thirty year old man. She thought this was very sophisticated, even if she didn’t find him as attractive as the guys her own age.

  Kiki who was only fifteen years old.

  Ben justified their affair by saying she looked like she was at least
eighteen. And she was the one that had come on to him. She had, in a very juvenile way, with a stuttered, “You’re very good looking for your age.” during one tutoring session.

  Ben’s inflated ego had taken over, and he had made it his mission to win Kiki over. It wasn’t hard.

  They had been sleeping together for three months. Meeting once a week under the cover of their tutoring. It wasn’t enough for Ben. He wanted her tonight, he wanted her every night. Kiki was something special.

  They had worked out a special code when they texted back and forth. Kiki’s mom sometimes checked her phone, but Ben was a little drunk and he was justifying why he should text her tonight.

  Drunkenness, fueled by a bit of anger, was winning over his logic. He was upset because Kiki was punished because she had gotten a low mid-term grade and her mom had sat in on their tutoring session so she could see what progress Kiki was making. Her mother was a raging bitch and Ben didn’t get the sex he needed.

  It had been almost two weeks now. He was restless. And horny. He had been resisting the urge to text her, but now that this chick was sitting next to him; he was getting worked up again. The girl next to him was blonde like Kiki and her cleavage was even better, plus she smelled like a dream. She smelled rich and sexy. Kiki wore cheap teenage perfume, this girl’s was better, it made him hornier. If she came on to him, he might give in. He would fuck her, but he would feel guilty. Kiki was his number one.

  His dick was hard and he shifted uncomfortably in his stool. The girl next to him looked unimpressed. He missed Kiki. He wanted to meet her tonight. He needed to meet her tonight. He was so horny and she had this way of lying back and letting him do whatever the hell he wanted.

  Damn her parents. He needed her.

  They didn’t care about her anyway. Not like he did.

  He pulled out his phone.

  His message was lewd, what he thought was a sexy and endearing request, but it wasn’t anywhere close to what he thought it was. It was a perverted message, sent by a grown man, to a young girl. A young girl whose mother had recently begun to take her phone away from her at bedtime. A young girl whose mother happened to be awake when the text came in and was curious as to who was texting her child at this hour. A young girl whose mother saw a text come in from the girl’s teacher that talked of things she didn’t even do with her husband.

  The mother had known that the teacher texted her daughter from time to time. She knew they were engaged in after school tutoring. She was even paying the teacher for his tutoring, thought he was a good influence on her child. Kiki’s grades had gone up. She seemed happier, more mature.

  The young girl’s mother threw up everything she had eaten for dinner and then she called the police.

  I felt like puking too, as I slipped out of Ben’s head and drained him of all that negative energy that had been building for years.

  21

  Experimentation

  The entire experiment only took a few minutes. Teacher Ben would be arrested at the school tomorrow, in front of all his colleagues, even if he wasn’t guilty, which he was, but he would be tried in the court of public opinion. His face would be on the noon broadcast of the local news, on the evening news nationwide.

  His negative energy poured into me like alcohol, warming me from the outside in. It tasted like desperation and self-loathing. It was a high I couldn’t recreate in any other form. I devoured it like it was…

  Food.

  “It definitely makes you more appealing, but this,” Drake was at my side the moment I was saturated with the energy. He trailed a finger down my upper arm. I could almost see the energy transferring to him in thick, syrupy tendrils. “Is not why I want you.”

  “But, it feels so amazing,” I breathed.

  “It does, but it’s like perfume, or lingerie. It spices up the package, but it’s what’s underneath that I’m after.”

  “Fuck, Drake.”

  “That’s the idea. Let’s get out of here.”

  Drake gave me no time to come down. We stumble stepped our way back to the shop, stopping every few moments so we could touch lightly. We never came together for too long though, that would break down our self-control, and if I broke that invisible barrier there would be no going back. A light touch here against my hair, my fingers along his jawline. Each touch tingled and reverberated through my body until I was so amped up I was jittering by the time we made it to my shop.

  We were barely through the front door when his hands were on me, his mouth descending over mine. He took everything that I gave. His hands touched everywhere, leaving hot scorch marks on my skin that satisfied and left me wanting at the same time. My head buzzed with the energy of the night and rang with the sensations he ignited inside me. He devoured me and the energy that encased me, pushing and pulling it back into me until it became us, it became our energy.

  When our bare skin finally touched, I wanted to give myself completely to him in every way possible. He could take what he wanted. There was nothing I would hold back from him. Nothing anymore. He would know everything. Now there could only be us.

  I was nude. I must have manifested everything away. He maneuvered me to the table in the center of the room. The table where I was supposed to tell fortunes. I knew the future, now. It was Drake. Drake’s mouth. Drake’s fingers. Drake’s….

  His lips were everywhere. His hands spread my legs and his mouth found my core. He was perfection. I let myself fall into the total submersion of pleasure. He made me scream his name and pull at his hair, but he wouldn’t stop. He only submitted to my desperate cries when they began to sound like sobs. Then he finally slid his body over mine and buried himself inside me.

  We stopped when we realized the glass windows of the shop gave everyone a grand view of what was going on inside. It was late at night, so hopefully no one saw what we had been up to. I was embarrassed for all of two minutes until we hurried into the back area and he had me braced on the sofa and was entering me from behind.

  There was no more pretending I was alive and human. There was no more pretending I had to rest. There was only Drake, a demigod who wanted me, no matter what darkness clung to me.

  22

  The Next Case

  We were back where we started. We sat in an idling car that was heading to the police station. This time we idled because of a red light, and not because I had forced Drake off the road. But, again, semantics.

  The chime of his phone cut through the nervous silence that had taken over the interior of the vehicle. I wiped my sweaty palms along the jeans that encased my thighs, trying not to peer over his shoulder and see who the text was from.

  Drake set down his phone and made a noise I couldn’t interpret.

  “What is it?” His other hand had been lightly playing with my long blonde hair that cascaded over my shoulder. His light touch calmed my nervousness, and from the way he kept it up I figured he knew this.

  “You have another case,” he said, with a hint of embarrassment in his tone.

  “Not even a little break?” I sighed.

  “It’s worse. It’s at your old precinct. Cassandra’s old police station.” I sucked in a breath.

  When I had made the decision to turn in Raul’s laptop myself, I had decided on a precinct as far away from my old stomping grounds as possible.

  “And you’re still playing Cas,” he said. His hand fell to my thigh and gave me a reassuring squeeze.

  “Why would I still be Cas?” I asked, unbelieving of what was happening.

  “You’ve been hired to solve cold cases as a psychic.”

  “Someone up there is fucking with me.”

  “I think you’re right,” Drake said and put the car in gear.

  Thank you for taking the time to read CREEP.

  All reviews are appreciated and will be rewarded with good Karma.

  Ready for Cassie’s next case? Coming soon…

  About the Author

  Gillian Zane is a bestselling author, known
for her NOLA Zombie series. Zane is the pen name of a prominent blogger in the publishing industry, which will remain a mystery unless you Google it. Since she can remember her goal has been to become Master of the Universe and has decided to focus first on the literary world. Things are progressing nicely.

  Zane has been a freelance writer for the last ten years and has published a few non-fiction works, none of which were very exciting. Zombies, ghosts, and other paranormal creatures are much more exciting. When she isn’t stockpiling MREs (Meal’s Ready to Eat) or researching how to build a cistern on a budget which will become quite handy when the zombie apocalypse hits, she’s taking care of her little family and exploring the city that she loves, New Orleans. You can find Gillian Zane on twitter @GillianZane.

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  Books by Gillian Zane

  The Karma Inc. Series

  Cheat (Karma Inc. Book 1)

  Shark (Karma Inc. Book 2)

  Liar (Karma Inc. Book 3)

  The NOLA Zombie Series:

  SHTF (NOLA Zombie Prequel)

  RUN (NOLA Zombie Book 1)

  FIGHT (NOLA Zombie Book 2)

  LIVE (NOLA Zombie Book 3)

  JUSTICE (NOLA Zombie Book 4)

  HONOR (NOLA Zombie Book 5)

  Stand Alones:

  The Haunted Sultan

  Contemporary Erotic Shorts:

  Pink Bikini Bliss