Foretold (A Ghost Gifts Novel Book 2)

by Laura Spinella

  As a teenage Zeke awaited his fate, the lilt of a brogue seeped into Aubrey’s head. “Ailish . . . ,” Aubrey whispered. Present among them was a woman, her spirit cloaked in motherly light. She belonged to the hungry boy. Warding off her presence, Aubrey forced her diviner senses onto the physical scene before her.

  It wasn’t that difficult.

  Zeke was a shrewd talker—a skill that might have been effective on a social worker, a law-enforcement officer, even a judge. But with Heinz-Bodette’s seasoned carnival owner, it was useless subterfuge. Charley paused her inquisition to tempt the gangly teenager with her lunch. Zeke pounced on a cold grilled cheese sandwich. Between massive bites, the boy explained that the Heinz-Bodette troupe had thwarted his honest means of obtaining a meal. Workers had emptied trash bins of discarded funnel cakes and half-eaten hot dogs before he could scavenge through. Zeke proudly admitted to tracking the carnival through six stops before they’d been caught.

  Charley immediately wanted to know about the “they.” One boy might be a lone drifter; two were most likely trouble. She’d suggested Zeke’s partner in crime might be in greater peril if she were to call the police. Young Zeke had swiped his dirty sleeve across his mouth, reassessing.

  He went on to talk about his life the way you might let a suspenseful story seep out, each morsel detailing an existence that made carnival life sound mundane. Zeke’s tale of rootlessness wove on, peaking as he admitted to his grandest act of thievery: stealing his sister from foster home number four. When Charley asked why, Zeke was clear: “We’d done okay until then. But on the last placement, we got separated.” The gusto with which he’d eaten the sandwich petered out to no appetite. “The home where Nora got put, there was an older boy . . .” Zeke was quiet, and discomfort settled over the room. “We couldn’t do any worse after what happened to Nora—or what happened to land us in foster care in the first place.”

  Aubrey was surprised that Charley didn’t ask about Zeke and Nora’s parents. They were apparent to her—the mother, Ailish, and the equally Irish father, who had also passed. She stifled a gasp. A violent passing, she surmised, hearing a gun fire over and over. Red . . . a flood of red . . . The startling taste of blood swamped her mouth, overtaking the Sour Patch candy she’d eaten. The parents hovered distantly, and this told Aubrey something: they wanted Zeke and Nora where they were.

  From her hiding spot, Aubrey recalled something else. A few days earlier, Charley had been in an ill-tempered mood. A vivid dream had woken her; it involved a double-talking teenage boy and a wispy girl close to Aubrey’s age. It was one of countless curiosities associated with Aubrey’s psychic gift. Often, her grandmother would dream of a live person connected to a dead soul Aubrey would soon encounter.

  That day, Zeke’s story was all Charley needed to hear; it was all Aubrey remembered, except for the fact that when the Heinz-Bodette troupe left Yellow Springs, Ohio, it had two new hands with it. Aubrey finished out the season thinking the brother and sister would blend in like she had—one of the few permanent fixtures in a traveling life.

  It wasn’t to be.

  That summer, on the morning of their last stop, Zeke and Nora had vanished. No explanation, no note. Charley, who understood itinerants, took the news far better than Aubrey. Not unlike her own parents’ abrupt abandonment, Zeke and Nora’s desertion haunted her. Maybe this was the reason Aubrey felt that something lost was found when Zeke and Nora turned up in Boonsboro, Maryland, the following year. A number of seasons would come and go before her friendship with Zeke blossomed, bursting like a bright flower on a winding, waiting vine.

  The current summer had grown intense, with Aubrey entertaining fantasies about changing the wandering aspects of Zeke. Earlier, she’d tested the theory; the conversation hadn’t gone well. The two of them stared into the campfire now, one of hundreds they’d shared. Zeke nudged her arm with the beer bottle. She took it, finishing the beer and, in turn, agreeing to a truce. “You’re right,” she said. “After I graduate . . . after next May, that’s a long way off. Who knows what I’ll want? Maybe I will take a job in Paris. Such an old city—imagine the spirit population lying in wait.”

  Zeke stole a glance. “Don’t reverse psychology me, Miss Magna Cum, whatever sash UNM hangs around you. Like Marie Antoinette’s ghost would interest you.”

  “I won’t deny that it’s a rare and interesting thing when a well-known spirit shows up. I still swear it was Edgar Allan Poe in Havre de Grace last summer.”

  “And I still say that’s what I get for teaching you to drink.” Zeke pulled his lanky frame out of his chair and straddled Aubrey in hers; his knees sank into the sandy surround of the fire pit. “And so you know. If you did go to Paris, I might turn up.” He kissed her, and Aubrey felt warmer than the fire in front of them. “Let it go,” he said. “Just pretend it’s any other year. Nora and me, we’ve stayed longer than usual. Can’t it be enough? Wear the necklace and think of me. Leave it like that—just the way it’s been.”

  Aubrey put down the beer bottle and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “On one condition.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Tell me where you’ll go this off-season.”

  “Can’t tell you what I don’t know.” He smiled; she softened.

  “A hint?” she asked. He kissed her again, his hands sliding beneath the green flannel. “A direction, at least, north . . . south?”

  “Sorry, sweetheart. Depends on the wind. We’ll find a way to make a buck and not get ourselves labeled grifters.” He stood, pulling Aubrey to her feet. “Let’s go back inside. You can write down the directions to the desert Southwest. Maybe come Christmas we’ll show up, surprise you.”

  And that was the thing about Zeke Dublin—you never knew when or where he might turn up.

  Zeke stood in front of Charlotte’s desk, his belongings packed in a duffel bag beside him. He waited for her to initiate conversation.

  “That was a first,” Charlotte said. “Aubrey leaving before you and Nora.”

  “If she’s as smart as I think she is, she’ll keep going. She won’t come back because of me.”

  “Nor me.” Charlotte leaned back and looked out the window of the Winnebago as if she might catch of glimpse of her granddaughter, who’d boarded a flight over an hour ago. “But of course we’re both old carnie liars,” she said. “Of course we both want her to.”

  Zeke grinned, a charm that he knew had greater effect on Aubrey than her grandmother. “I just want her to be happy. We both do.”

  Charlotte tapped red-painted fingernails on the ledger in front of her. “And you’re positive that equation doesn’t include you?”

  “Only to the extent that I’ll be there should she ever need me.” He hesitated, taking his own glance out the window. “Come on, Charlotte. Nobody needs a grifter in their life—not permanently.”

  She didn’t argue, jowls bobbing in what looked like agreement. “So where are you and Nora headed? As always, you’re welcome to visit New Mexico, maybe for the holidays?”

  It was a good offer. A few times, for Nora’s sake, he’d considered it. He couldn’t do it; Zeke couldn’t call any place home. Not after the horrifying one they’d left behind when he and Nora were Dunnes, not Dublins. “We didn’t do so bad with Indian gaming venues last year, picked up some work. New Orleans riverboat before that.”

  “I gathered as much when the two of you showed up in a car this season, not desperate for a meal or a paycheck.”

  “Right. Anyway, not sure where this winter will take us. Not just yet . . .” He spoke while trying not to eye the safe behind her. The door was closed. But the lever pointed to three o’clock, indicating it wasn’t locked—this wasn’t Zeke’s first carnival. “Whatever direction, we really need to get moving.”

  “Of course. Carmine made the bank run this morning. Cash isn’t how I’d like to make payroll, but it’s what carnies prefer.”

  “True.” Zeke cocked his chin toward the safe, which se
emed appropriate considering the conversation. The fuzzy buzz of a walkie-talkie cut in, Joe’s voice crackling through.

  “Hey, Charlotte, you busy?”

  “Just settling the books with Zeke. What’s going on?”

  “I got no idea how this happened, but it looks like some hooligan dumped a liter of Coke into the motor of the Whip.”

  “You’re joking?”

  “Wish I were. We did have a rowdy band of teenage boys roll through here right before closing. Do you want to call the cops?”

  Charlotte sighed, shaking her head at Zeke. “This is why people have jobs in the real world.”

  “So they don’t have to put up with stuff like that?”

  “No. So they can take a vacation and visit a carnival.” She clicked on the talk button. “Let me come take a look.” She guffawed at Zeke while talking to Joe. “I’m not sure if it’s worth the bother. I can’t remember the last time local law enforcement was inclined to take our side on vandalism. ‘Not in our town,’” she said mockingly. Charlotte talked, and Zeke drew a pack of Camels from his shirt pocket. He dropped them on the desk as she made the cumbersome rise. Zeke rose too and darted ahead, holding open the door of the Winnebago. “Be back shortly,” Charlotte said. “And don’t smoke in here!”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He waited, not ducking back inside until Charlotte rounded the corner near the Skee-Ball and other games of chance. The Whip was located on the far side of the carnival setup; she’d be gone at least twenty minutes. He was sorry about the liter of Coke; the repair would be costly. He’d leave a few extra hundred dollars behind. Zeke moved through the air-conditioned motor home, the space dedicated to the business side of the Heinz-Bodette carnival. Passing by the desk, he absently grabbed the pack of Camels and tucked them into his shirt pocket; his line of vision honed in on the Heinz-Bodette safe.

  Seconds later, he knelt before the cool metal box like it was an altar. Zeke wiggled his fingers and hesitated. Then he gripped the iron handle and pulled. His heart hammered as if the Holy Grail were stored inside. “It’s not stealing,” he assured himself. “Not that kind, anyway.” Zeke plunged his hand into the heavy Hamilton safe, past money he could smell. Stored behind the cash was the thing for which he had come.

  Locked inside Charlotte’s safe was a leather-clad box. Inside the box were her son’s—Peter Ellis’s—ghost gifts, just bits of paper, really. But unlike Aubrey’s ghost gifts, which were more like mementos that connected to the past, these ghost gifts were all about the future, or so Zeke had learned.

  Without them, last winter would have been a survivor’s challenge. And it wasn’t as if Zeke were taking them for himself. Hell, he could get by on a park bench as long as he picked a warm enough climate. He was doing this for Nora. Nora, who didn’t have her brother’s survival instincts, who shouldn’t spend any nights on a bench or under a bridge. Nora, who’d already spent nights in worse places.

  By the time Zeke pumped the pep talk through his head, he was sitting at Charlotte’s desk. In front of him was the rectangular box. It was an curious thing that attracted the eye and had a cover like a book. But the interior was hollow: the perfect place to store scraps of paper. So many that no one would ever notice if a few were missing. The box’s double knot told him Charlotte hadn’t opened it either, not since Zeke hunted through its contents last September.

  He undid the leather tie, pausing to rub clammy hands on denim-covered thighs. “Quit being such a fucking pussy. It’s not like Peter Ellis is gonna haunt you for swiping a few of his ghost gifts.” At least he didn’t think so, and he boldly flipped open the cover. He stared at the papers, which came in every shape, color, and purpose. Anything you could think of to write on: napkins, business cards, the corner of a menu, ticket stubs, letterhead, matchbooks, construction paper, sheets ripped out of notebooks and legal pads. Each piece of paper, no matter its format, contained a prediction.

  Zeke glanced out the window before refocusing on the box and his quest for a slice of guaranteed future: places, names, dates—there were hundreds, maybe a thousand. Many made no sense. Most read like omens. His hand hovered over a business card, print side up. He remembered the red lettering from last year. Watt’s Fertilizer. We Spread Miracles. Noble, Oklahoma.

  Fertilizer?

  It was the kind of card nobody but a farmer, maybe a crop duster, would look at twice. Zeke turned it over and forced a wad of spit down his throat. On the back, Peter Ellis had written the word “Murrah.” The next words he read aloud: “April massacre . . .” Recent facts slammed into his head. The Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. A horrific bomb blast crystallized, one where hundreds of people had perished, and a tragedy Peter Ellis had predicted. It proved the depth and validity of his ghost gifts. It had to; the man died years before the terrorist act occurred.

  An ill feeling wove through Zeke, and he dropped the card back in the box like it was on fire. It was too much prophecy, the kind no person would want to be responsible for. In the icebox hollow of the Winnie, Zeke wiped a bead of sweat from his lip. Less ill-omened writings passed through his fingers, clearer predictions that had long passed. They included World Series winners and prizefight champions. On plain white paper were a sketch of an apple and the words “Lisa project.” He didn’t know what it meant. Zeke stared at the contents, which also included numerous predictions that only bore numbers—maybe twenty or thirty of them. He shrugged, unable to put rhyme or reason to those predictions either.

  Finally, Zeke found what he was looking for, information he could use. These scraps of paper were similar to the ones he’d taken last summer. They’d read: “Thunder Gulch . . . Derby winner . . . long shot . . .” along with the year, and “Tyson, knockout, eighty-nine seconds . . .” Both prophecies had turned into big paydays—enough to feed him and Nora and to buy a car to bring them back to the carnival this summer. It sure as hell beat dish washing and hitchhiking.

  Now Zeke dealt himself a fresh hand of ghost gifts. As he closed the lid, a paper bearing a crayon-drawn cowboy hat and three large Xs caught his eye. The exhilaration of future pay dirt pumped through him, sure of how the Dallas Cowboys would fare in Super Bowl XXX. He added it to the papers he’d already taken. Hell, horse racing was legal and so were Vegas wagers. Zeke glanced back at the safe. It wasn’t like taking piles of money that didn’t belong to him. These were random scraps of paper that no one was using for anything. How much harm could it do, guaranteeing what was to come? What was so wrong, Zeke thought, in helping himself and Nora to a little bit of a future?

  CHAPTER ONE

  Boston, Massachusetts

  Present Day

  “One more time, Miss Ellis, from the top.” FBI agent Jack Hanlin leaned muscular arms into the table, his face coming closer to hers than in previous rounds of questioning. “Explain to me again how it is you had prior knowledge of today’s Prudential Tower explosion.”

  Aubrey’s legs felt like bags of sand, her brain having washed out to sea hours ago. “I don’t know how many ways I can say it.” She shifted in the chair. Did her lie gain or lose credibility with each repetition? “I overheard some men talking outside the Grind Café on Huntington Ave. When I got the gist of their conversation, I went straight to the nearest security guard.” The rhetoric had been her hardline stance since the midmorning explosion. The blast had left a gaping hole on the lower level of the iconic Boston venue. It was an explosion that Aubrey had been forewarned about by a surprising but accurate ghostly prediction.

  Hanlin glared at his suspect, then turned tightly in the gray cement space. Wiggle room was in short supply—so was his patience, she guessed. During the inquiry, Aubrey had made a thorough assessment of Agent Hanlin—a tough, but not without compassion, by-the-book man. If the situation weren’t so ridiculously dreadful, it might be comical. His demeanor reminded her of Levi’s—Aubrey’s significant other for the past dozen years. Well, a dozen years less five months. Levi . . . She sucked in a breath and focused on the di
saster at hand.

  At the end of hour one, the agent had removed his branded FBI jacket; just past hour two, he’d turned up his starched white shirtsleeves with succinct movements. His forearm bore a tattoo. Via an ethereal nudge, Aubrey recognized it: Navy SEAL. A probing spirit was clearly attached to it, and she’d wisely pushed it away. Hour three had segued into a round of good cop, bad cop. Agent Hanlin exited and an Agent Kirkpatrick entered the tomb-like room. While his breath and disposition were harsher than Hanlin’s, Aubrey didn’t waver—not without earthly backup, which she thought might have arrived by now.

  Fortunately, iron will was among her assets, and Aubrey tuned out Kirkpatrick like she would an ardent specter. In answer to his questions, she only reiterated hers: Would they please contact Deputy Chief Sullivan? Aubrey felt certain her own FBI contact would be her best advocate. But by the end of hour four, hope had dwindled. She thought future high points might include a custody transfer, landing her in the sort of place where terrorist types were never heard from again. Kirkpatrick left, knocking over a chair, spewing threats that sounded like an episode of Law & Order.

  Daylight had to be fading, though it was hard to tell in the windowless room. With Levi and their son, Pete, no longer living at home, no one would wonder where she was. Aubrey swallowed down that reality as Agent Hanlin returned. She was strangely glad to see him. She wanted to ask the time, but something about him had changed. His mood was evident by the way he yanked up the chair, jamming it into the table. The force was enough to shove the opposite side into Aubrey. Her captor had an envelope and an iPad with him. Agent Hanlin laid the iPad on the table and held on to the envelope.