No Humans Involved (8 page)

"Ah. Of course." His gaze dipped away and I was certain he
did
look disappointed. Then he cleared his throat. "I'll see Robert alone then, and come to L.A. tomorrow. I'll help him with the preliminary research, to be polite, but I'll get away as soon as I can."

Part II

This was always the hardest part. Not only was it delicate work, but the smell was enough to unsettle even the strongest stomach. It didn't bother her as much as it did the others, and it wasn't so much the smell itself as the thought of what was burning.

They'd been careful not to use too much gasoline on the boy, but the flames had still licked the artifacts high above the concrete floor An interesting experiment, but not one they were likely to repeat… not unless this material proved significantly better than the rest.

She adjusted her mask and checked the temperature on their tiny version of a cremation oven, designed to incinerate the organs, which was all they needed.

This oven burned at a lower temperature than ones used by funeral homes, so the soft tissue turned to ash. Even then an auxiliary power supply was necessary. In Brentwood, a power spike would likely be attributed to marijuana growing and ignored—there were better uses for the police budget than stopping movie stars and pop singers growing a little weed—but it was always safest to provide no excuse for investigation.

After they'd taken the organs from the body, they'd needed to dispose of the remainder. Burning an entire corpse wasn't feasible. The boy's body—larger than that of their previous cases—would have been difficult to transport whole. So Don had recruited Murray's help, and they'd cut the body in two so they could carry it out in reinforced garbage bags.

It was then that Murray had snapped. Odd, she mused as she unraveled the bolt of cheesecloth. After all they'd been through together, it had been helping Don bisect the corpse that had done it.

Tina had calmed him down. She was good at that, one advantage to having a psychologist in the group. To reap the magic, they had to do things that were bound to affect the weaker among them, but Tina could always get the shaky back on track… and assess how likely they were to stay there.

The door opened, and Don walked in, nose wrinkling. She pointed at the stack of surgical masks, but he waved them away.

"How's Murray?" she asked.

"Better. Embarrassed about the whole thing now. Work's been stressful this past week."

She nodded. "It happens."

The timer sounded and she opened the oven, stepping back as heat poured out.

"He should take a vacation," she said as she examined the tray of gray and white ash.

"I'll suggest—"

"No.
Insist
."

Their eyes met. Don nodded.

"How was the new disposal site?" she asked.

"It's not as convenient as the garden, but it'll do."

She nodded. The terraced gardens had been convenient. Too convenient, and they'd used them more than they should have, with each disposal increasing the chance of being caught. Unacceptable.

She donned heavy gloves and shook the tray of ash, helping it cool faster.

"Looks like more this time," Don said, peering at it.

She smiled. "That's the advantage to using an older one."

Penalty Box

HAD MY TRIP TO PORTLAND and near-death experience put me any closer to banishing the spirits in the garden? I'd like to think so, but I was convinced I'd only made things worse. First, in the midst of problems on the set, I'd taken off, which wouldn't help. Second, Jeremy had finally joined me… only to leave again.

I needed to stop worrying about how to contact these ghosts and get simply rid of them.

My Nan raised me to regard ghosts the same way the average person sees door-to-door salespeople and telemarketers: an unavoidable nuisance of life, one that should be dealt with firmly and swiftly and, ultimately, ignored. As cruel as that sounds, it was rooted in self-preservation. Like salespeople, if you say yes to one, you'll suddenly be on the contact list for hundreds more. Rather than weed through the requests, taking only those you can manage, it's better to slam that door to all of them and walk away.

If I could speak to my Nan again, I'd ask her this: did it hurt you to say no and does it ever stop hurting? She always acted as if it didn't bother her, so I feel that it shouldn't bother me, and when it does, I feel weak. As much as I long for the day when it will stop hurting, part of me dreads it too, because I'm not sure I ever want to be that hard, that cold.

But now I needed to be cold. I had to banish these spirits. So when

I finally got back to the house, as the first light of dawn broke, I went to my room only long enough to retrieve my kit. Then I headed into the garden.

The moment I stepped out there something whizzed past me. Then the whispering started. Fingers brushed my hand. I kept walking until I reached the far rear corner, where I knelt in the shadows between the fence and a towering tiered garden bed, and tried to contact them one last time.

I performed each ritual methodically, completely focused on each step. As before, as long as I appeared to be trying to help them, they behaved, stroking my cheek or patting my hair as if telling me I was doing a good job. Though I still couldn't find any words in their whispers, I had a feeling that if I could, they'd be telling me to keep going, to keep trying.

I had to smile, reminded of when I'd first started doing this, under my Nan's guidance. I could see myself, kneeling in the basement of her old house, trying to summon a spirit. If I closed my eyes, I could feel her in those pats and caresses, hear her encouragement in those whispers.

When I tried to persuade the spirits—again—to find another way to communicate with me, they went silent at first, as if trying to do as I asked, but soon returned to the whispering, their caresses becoming pokes and prods. Like easily distracted children.

A chill raced through me.

When I did as they wanted, they caressed and patted me. Treating me as if I were a child? Or rewarding me in the only way they knew how.

I stood. A hand pulling at my top fell away, as did the one touching my hair. The whispering continued, but lower now. Fingers pulled at the edge of my skirt, like a child trying to get someone's attention. Pulling, poking, prodding… and when that failed, hitting and pinching.

Not possible. Necromancers rarely encountered child ghosts. There were stories of young adult ghosts who'd made contact, and were later discovered to have died as children, then allowed to grow to physical maturity rather than spend their afterlife trapped in a child's body.

How would a child ghost remain a child? Only if it was caught between dimensions, unable to step into ours and get help, unable to pass over and grow up.

That's what I had—not adult ghosts but children, trapped between the worlds. I couldn't just banish children. I had to help.

When these spirits first contacted me, I'd thought it was a random event. Happens all the time. I'll go someplace new and I attract some ghosts. But was that really all there was to it? Coincidence? I just happen to be billeted at a house with trapped child ghosts, a puzzle best solved by a necromancer with connections to the rest of the supernatural world?

Where others see coincidence, I see fate. And where I see fate, I see the hand of a higher power. I'm not sure if I see "God" as others would recognize him, but I see someone—a benevolent entity, maybe not as all-powerful as we'd like, but a concerned being with the ability to watch and the power to do something about it.

Maybe that higher power couldn't free these ghosts alone. Or maybe that's not her place—we must solve our problems ourselves and the best she could do was put someone here, in this house, who might be able to help. And maybe I've got too high of an opinion of myself if I think
I'd
be that person, but I still felt like I'd been given a mission, and damned if I wasn't going to do my best to fulfill it.

I PACED along the cobblestone path, Eve's ring clutched in my hand.

"Goddamn it," I muttered. "You said I could call you. Well, I'm calling and you'd damned well better not be ignoring me, you arrogant Cabal son—"

A sound behind me. I turned. Kristof stood there wearing… skates. And holding what I was pretty sure was a hockey stick.

" 'Son-of-a-bitch' is the phrase you wanted," he said. "I suppose it could have been simply 'Cabal son,' which, while accurate, isn't much of an insult." He leaned on the stick, musing. "Or, perhaps."

"I didn't mean—"

"Of course you did. I wasn't ignoring you, Jaime. If you've been calling me for a while, I'm afraid I didn't hear it. But now I'm here."

"If you're busy…"

"I was only in the penalty box. Again. Might as well serve my time here." A murmured incantation. The stick vanished and the skates changed to shoes. "What can I do for you?"

"I need Eve. And now it's urgent."

I told Kristof the story. He insisted on every detail, then tried to make contact with the spirits himself.

"There's something here," he said, frowning. "I can make out… flashes. And I heard the whispers, on both this side and the other."

"As if they're caught between the two."

"I don't like jumping to conclusions, but yes, I suppose so. And they
may
be children—your deduction is sound enough, but one has to be careful presenting a case to the Fates. Unlike human jurors, they aren't swayed by supposition, sympathy and theatrics. They deal in facts. The fact in this case is that these spirits exist, and they appear to be unable to cross either way. I'll ask them to send Eve back."

"Will it be enough?"

"It better be."

THE CATERER hadn't finished setting up for breakfast, so I went into the kitchen and helped myself to a coffee.

"Another early riser, I see," Becky said, walking in as I added cream.

I told her I'd been outside meditating. If I was going to be spending more time in the garden, it was good to establish an alibi up front, and this was one I always used in any situation where I might be seen sitting on the ground, talking to myself.

"Sounds like you found a little peace in this insanity. Now I really hope that I'm not about to undo that." She looked troubled. "It's about Grady. He still upset about the other night. I don't think I handled that as well as I could have. Now he's demanding— through Claudia of course—that he get a private performance to compensate."

I could feel her gaze on me, studying my reaction.

"Sounds fair to me," I said.

"Thank God," she breathed. "You're such a trouper, Jaime. I swear I won't let him steamroll over you after this."

"He's not steam—"

"He may be a huge name overseas. But you're a huge name here. I won't let him forget that. There'll be no more costar bashing on this show."

"Costar bashing?"

"I won't stand for it. Now, about this private seance. Do you mind watching, just to show support?"

BEFORE WE headed into breakfast, Becky's assistant, Will, came to tell her he'd conveyed the same invitation to the private seance to Angelique, but she'd refused, claiming she had a manicure appointment. Becky fumed, and I offered to talk to Angelique, but she didn't want me getting involved.

Over breakfast, we discussed the seance.

"First, where to conduct it?" Becky said. "Mr. Simon has checked all records for this house, and the only reference to a death he could find was some has-been producer who hanged himself. For excitement, that rates about a two. Must-snore TV."

I glanced at the hanging residual and sent up a silent apology to his ghost, wherever it was.

Grady leaned forward, tapping his knife on the table. "Perhaps, but it's the ones whose deaths
weren't
reported that are the most entertaining. "

"Accidental deaths, you mean?"

A smile creased his tanned face. "No, purposeful. Very purposeful. I have felt a dark presence in this house, a force of great evil, death so vile, so despicable that the heart freezes at the very thought—"

Claudia motioned for him to take it down a notch.

He cleared his throat, then sliced into his egg. "I have, you see, some experience with these things."

"And you sense… evil in this house?"

"Not surprisingly. It is in the seats of power that the demonic reigns. Those who crave the trappings of power—wealth, fame, beauty—are often driven into the service of Satan to achieve their goals." He turned to Claudia. "Have we ever visited a castle or an ancestral home where I
haven't
found evidence of satanic rites or devil worship ?"

Claudia gave a soft sigh. "Never."

Grady smiled.

Dowsing Rod For Evil

"I FELT A STRONG PRESENCE down here the other night," Grady said as he led us into the basement. "I know, Becky, that you were simply using the best available space for the party, but you should be careful about bringing spiritualists to subterranean realms. They're simply rife with evil spirits."

"Jaime?" Becky said. "Are you picking up anything?"

"I don't have Mr. Grady's nose for evil, I'm afraid."

"Of course she doesn't," he said. "What evil would dare show its hideousness in the face of such beauty?"

Claudia looked like she couldn't decide whether to gag or scratch my eyes out.

Grady took a compact from his pocket, did a makeup check and hair fluffing, then drew himself up straight.

"Camera, please." He lifted his hands, like a pianist preparing to play. "Robert, are you there?" Pause. "Yes. Yes, he is. Thank you, Bob."

Grady opened his eyes. "I have made contact with my spirit guide."

Huh. That was easy.
Eve? Are you taking notes
?

"For this session, I have selected Black Robert McGee as my guide," Grady continued. "He was a notorious pirate who terrorized the Caribbean. In the afterlife, he is trying to make amends, seeking redemption by helping my quest against the dark forces. Having lived on that dark side, he is the perfect guide for this segment of my journey."

A pirate spirit guide. Cool. Eve had been known to hang out with pirates, but I don't think that counted. She was, however, well acquainted with dark forces. As for seeking redemption, though… questionable. Very questionable.

Grady and "Bob" proceeded to wander the basement, Grady with his hands out, dowsing rods for evil.

"I see a dark room. Very dark. I—" His head jerked up, eyes closed, and he let out a whimper, then said in a high-pitched voice. "It's dark, Mommy, so dark…"

His head twitched and bobbed like a bird, then his eyes flew open.

"Bob? Yes? Thank you, Bob."

He pivoted and stopped facing a half-door that led into a crawl space under the stairs. He gave an exaggerated shudder, then looked into the camera.

"Bob tells me we will find the source of this great evil under those stairs. Inside there is a room. A room whose walls once ran red with blood. A family slaughtered. The satanic altar is beneath those steps."

"Amityville?" I mouthed to Becky.

"Yes!" Grady's face was feverish now as he spit the word. "Thank you, Bob. Bob has reminded me of another case similar to this. An American case in Maine, I believe."

"Long Island," I mouthed for him.

He nodded his thanks. "Long Island, thank you, Bob. The infamous Amityville horror. I have long believed that the rituals conducted within those walls were part of a wider ring of satanic activity."

"Faked!" I mouthed, gesturing to get his attention.

"Yes, Bob? Bob is trying to tell me about something but— Bob? Are you still there?"

Grady signaled for the camera to stop filming. "He's gone, I fear. This happens from time to time, particularly in places with such intense negative energy." He rolled his shoulders and rubbed his neck, then looked at me. "Jaime, I believe you were saying something?"

"Amityville was a hoax," I said.

I explained. The house had been the site of infamous killings—a young man who'd murdered his parents and four siblings. A year later, a family bought the house, claimed they saw blood dripping down the walls, demonic pigs, what-have-you, but stayed there— with their terrified kids—until they had enough details for a book. A best-selling book. And the guy who killed his family? His lawyer had been trying for a "devil made me do it" defense, and had been in contact with the haunted homeowners. The lawyer later claimed he and the couple had dreamed the whole scheme up over a bottle of wine. The family had since admitted, in court, that at least
some
of the things they claimed had never happened.

When I finished, Grady glanced at Claudia, who eyed me as if suspecting I was making it up.

"All true," Becky said. "A couple of years ago the Catholic Church revealed it had submitted a list of inaccuracies to the book publisher… which ignored them. Big hoax. Paid well, though," she added with admiration.

"I'm not surprised," Claudia muttered. "It's America. Land of 'anything for a buck.' "

Grady waved her to silence and went still, head cocked as if listening. "Bob has returned. We may begin again."

The camera started rolling.

"Thank you, Bob. Bob tells me the events of Amityville were, I fear, a false case predicated on greed and the lust for fame." A slow, sad shake of his head. "Unfortunately, such counterfeits do exist and we must be vigilant for them. However, as Bob also says, we must be careful not to let one falsehood blind us to the overwhelming truth of evil. It seems those responsible for Amityville used real events elsewhere as the basis for their fabrication, and here, in this house, we see one such example—"

His head jerked back, eyes closing. Her started shaking so violently that Becky tensed as if fearing a convulsion, but Claudia waved her down.

Grady's arms shot around his body, hugging himself, his teeth chattering, and I realized that his "convulsions" were supposed to be shivering.

"Momma?" he said in that high-pitched voice. "It's cold, so cold and so dark. I'm's-s-scared." A whine, more like a car engine than a child. "The bad man is coming. The bad man is—"

Grady roared, his head whipping back, teeth bared. His eyes flew open, rolling. Anyone who'd watched enough of his shows would have seen this coming, but Becky jumped and dropped her clipboard. As she scrambled for it, Grady allowed himself a tiny smile of satisfaction that morphed into a snarl, his head jerking back and forth, hands clawing the air.

"He's fighting possession by an evil spirit," Claudia explained in a monotone.

"I see," Becky said. "Is there any chance this spirit will win?"

"About ninety-five percent."

Becky smiled.

Grady jolted up onto his tiptoes, then went still. A moment's pause before he collapsed against the wall, panting and trembling.

"Damn," Becky muttered.

"Wait," Claudia whispered.

"Outside," Grady said between gasps. "Bob has shown me a room, a small, dark room. We mistakenly believed it was this one, but now he has realized his error and says we must go outside, to a shed."

He motioned for the camera to stop filming.

As Grady marched for the stairs, Becky hurried up beside him.

"The shed idea is great," she said. "It avoids, you know, connotations of Amityville, but there's a small problem. There isn't one."

"One what?"

"Shed."

He threw a smug smile over his shoulder as he started up the steps. "My dear, I never said there
is
a shed. I said there
was
one. It has, of course, long since been torn down… to hide the evidence."

OUTSIDE WE went. On the way, Grady thanked me for the information about Amityville. While unwarranted, he appreciated the thought. It was a step back into his good graces.

He stopped beside a koi pond. As our shadows passed over the water, the fish zoomed from under the lilies, their mouths breaking the surface. Was someone feeding them in their owner's absence? Probably. They looked expensive.

"Here, Bob?"

Grady lifted a hand for silence, although no one had spoken. Then he checked to make sure the camera was rolling before continuing.

"The shed was here? You're quite certain?" He paused. "No, no, I understand."

Grady turned to the camera. "Bob says he can't be certain this is exactly the right spot. The sense of darkness in this entire yard is overwhelming. This, however, appears to be reasonably close to the original location."

And so, Grady picked up where he'd left off, channeling the "spirit" of the dead girl. I tried to relax, but startled at every noise and movement, waiting for the children to come and make their presence known.

"What the hell is that?"

I jumped and glanced over to see Kristof staring at Grady, who was waving his arms, rolling his eyes, shaking and moaning.

"I think he's possessed," I said.

"By what? Epilepsy?"

"He's a famous TV medium from the U.K.," I said, as if that explained everything.

Kristof sniffed. "Not so famous that he can afford a decent tailor, evidently. Or acting lessons."

"They aren't letting Eve come back, are they?"

"No." He spat the word. After a moment, he went on. "I have, in the past two years, on occasion, tried to find reasons for them to let Eve return, if only temporarily."

"And they think you're tricking them again."

A humorless laugh. "Not 'again.' I haven't tricked them yet, damnable spirits. Eve's tried too. No luck. You can't blame us, but they get…" A dismissive wave. "Offended, as if we're insulting them, when the fact is that
we
are the ones who should be offended. We play by their rules. We assist in their enterprises. We are—" a twist of his lips, "—their
humble
servants, and yet when we ask for the briefest respite from our bargain, you'd think we were the most unrepentant convicts asking for a day pass."

I had no idea what he was talking about, but knew he couldn't explain.

"So they said no."

"They'll 'look into it.' And, perhaps, should I prove to be telling the truth, they'll find someone to help you."

"But not Eve."

He looked away, but not before loneliness and disappointment pushed the bitterness from his eyes. "No. Not Eve."

He pushed to his feet. "This is ridiculous. They cannot expect us to wait on their forbearance and trust that they will find someone suitable. Eve isn't the only person who can help us. The Fates won't like my choice, but that is their problem."

It seems to me that forbearance and trust are things a higher power
can
reasonably expect from mere mortals. But men like Kristof Nast are not accustomed to being refused, and being dead didn't change that. If his insolent determination helped my case, I wouldn't argue.

"Who are you—?" I began.

A dismissive wave. "You'll see."