Sinister Entity (19 page)

“You want to see how I know you’re wrong?” she asked.
 

Eddie leaned against the open doorway. “Does the mirror have ectoplasm or something on it?”

“You’re a totally different guy at night, you know that?”

“I get cranky when I get woken up by troubled, Olympic track star teens.”

She smiled. “Well, be cranky no more.”

She held the phone’s display to his face, deriving great satisfaction when she saw his jaw go slack.
 

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” he muttered.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The next morning, Jessica and Eddie met in the breakfast area at nine. The room was packed with people loading plates with bagels, muffins, boxes of cereal and fruit. Everyone seemed to be of the same mind that a free continental breakfast meant you had to gather up enough food to hold you over until dinner. Most of the kids were already in their bathing suits and quite a few moms were wearing straw sunhats.
 

Eddie peeled an orange and asked to see her phone again. He studied the picture for several minutes while she chomped on a bland toasted bagel with cream cheese and grape jelly. “I was thinking that this would all seem very different in the light of day, but I was way wrong,” he said, sliding the phone across the table.
 

“I downloaded it to my laptop before I went to sleep so I could see it blown up. I also played around with the contrast and light so I could make her out better. I’m not afraid to admit I was a little creeped out.”

Eddie popped an orange slice in his mouth, tilted back in his chair. A passing child bumped into him and pitched him forward. He scowled, but said nothing to the kid who was just eager to join his parents as they were leaving. “We were both there, about a foot away from her, and she looked as real as anyone around us. She interacted with the physical world just as any living person would. Proof of that is in the car she steamrolled. That picture just doesn’t make sense.”

“Of course it does. Eddie, we’re human. We perceive what we want to perceive and when things appear in front of us that our brains can’t comprehend, we just fill in the gaps so they fit with the paradigm we’re comfortable with. Cameras don’t have a mind or a soul. They only show us what was in front of the lens the moment the picture was taken. Doppelgangers have appeared to people in dozens of different ways, so this isn’t that far of a stretch.”

Eddie mulled her words over, then pointed an orange slice at her. “I understand that some people see doppelgangers as a living person with depth and dimension, while others have reported them to look pretty much like your average wispy ghost. What I’m having a hard time with is the discrepancy between what we saw and what the picture shows, even with your explanation.”

“That aside, do you agree something odd, possibly paranormal, happened last night?”

He chewed on the top of a corn muffin. “Yes. And I’m also wondering why I’m not picking up a damn thing around the Leigh house or Selena’s doppelganger. That could all be a personal problem and have nothing to do with them. I keep thinking that Edwin’s EB screwed me up somehow. I never made contact with a spirit that drained me physically like that.”

When they finished, they walked to the pool area. The gates had just been opened and children swarmed from every corner of the hotel to jump in, despite the water being chilly so early in the morning. They sat at a nearby picnic table and watched the controlled chaos.
 

Jessica said, “So, do we go pay a visit to Rita and Selena this morning? It’s Tuesday, so I’m pretty sure Greg would be at work.”

“I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. If Greg found out, and he will, that could be the end of it.”

“As far as Greg is concerned, it
is
over. What happened last night changes things.”

“Right, for
us
it changes things. Not so much for him. He’ll think we’re just making it up.”

“What about when I show him the picture?”

“He’ll assume you doctored up a picture of his daughter. It doesn’t take much to fake a ghost picture nowadays. In fact, it’s so easy that you almost have to throw out any photos taken over the past ten years.”

A soaked girl wearing water wings scampered behind Jessica, giggling. Her older brother shot her with a water pistol and they ran back into the pool. Eddie laughed when he saw that the boy had gotten Jessica’s hair wet in the process.
 

“Kind of hard to talk about something so weird and serious in this setting,” Eddie said.
 

“You think? What do you want to do next?”

“You should call Rita and tell her what happened last night. Better that than an email or text that her husband can come across. While you do that, I’m going to call Dr. Froemer at The Rhine.”

“Who’s Dr. Froemer?”

“I was the prize lab ape when I was there and he was the head scientist.” He saw the shocked look on Jessica’s face and added, “It was more like a student-professor kind of relationship. He’s as nice as he is smart, and that’s saying a lot. I’m wondering if he knows anything about doppelgangers or could at least point me in the right direction.”

Jessica smacked the table and stood. “Sounds like a plan. Knock on my door when you’re done.”

Eddie took one last look at the families having fun in the pool and tried to remember if his own family had ever had a moment like this. There was that one time they had gone to Disney Land, but then he remembered his father being separated from them, only to be found at the hotel pool later chatting up a pretty girl lounging in a bikini who was at least ten years younger than him. It was no wonder he turned out this way, talking to a dead man so he could find his ghost-hunting daughter and be accosted by poltergeists and doppelgangers. Dysfunctional childhoods led to dysfunctional adults.
 

He chuckled, then went to his room to call his mentor.
 

Dr. Froemer sounded distracted, which meant he was preparing the next day’s tests with the subject du jour. Despite that, it was good to hear his voice. Eddie never thought he’d feel homesick for The Rhine, especially so soon after leaving.
 

“I know you’re busy, but I was hoping you could help me out with a little situation I’ve stumbled upon here.”

“Nonsense, I’m never too busy to talk to you.” He heard a heavy
thunk
, as if the doctor had dropped a large book on his desk. “Now, where would
here
be?”

“I’m currently in New Hampshire.”

“Live free or die!”

“What’s that?”

“It’s the state slogan. One of my favorites. I thought you had moved to New York.”

Eddie turned on the air conditioner and sat at the small table beside the window. He put his feet up on the bed. “I did. I’m here for a few days. I’m with Jessica Backman. You know,
the girl
.”

Dr. Froemer was silent.
 

“I mean I came with her on an investigation,” Eddie clarified. “I’m not actually
with
her.”

“I have to hand it to you, Eddie, you are a very resourceful man. I’m a little embarrassed to admit that we’ve had a few wagers over the probability of your successfully meeting this mystery girl of yours. It looks like I’m out ten dollars. Oh well, easy come, easy go. So, what’s she like?”

Eddie paused and answered carefully. “She’s tough as nails and passionate in her beliefs. She’s not your average nineteen-year-old.”

“If the stories are true, I suspect she grew up very fast. So, how can I be of assistance?”

“This is actually my second investigation with her. The first involved a very peeved spirit that had power beyond anything I’ve ever heard. It knocked me out. I’ll tell you more about that another day. What we have here in sunny New England is not your typical haunting.” He thought about Selena’s doppelganger slamming into the car mirror, how it didn’t even slow her down, and felt a cramp in the pit of his stomach. “What do you know about doppelgangers?”

Dr. Froemer exhaled into the phone. “Whew, when you said you had something rare, you weren’t kidding. A doppelganger. Have you seen it?”

He told him about his suspicions when they pulled up to the Leighs’ house and how they had stormed it like a couple of paratroopers. He tried not to leave a single detail out as he relayed the encounter just a few hours earlier and how the Leigh family members, house and doppelganger were all coming up as psychic black holes.
 

“I have to admit, this is a little out of my area of expertise. I’ve read papers on the doppelganger phenomenon and how it relates to artists and the workings of their overactive subconscious. Over the years, I’ve heard of the odd case here and there of a doppelganger appearing to an individual or a family, but
 
I’m not entirely sure I trust the sources. With you, I don’t doubt the source one bit.”

“And we have proof,” Eddie added, thinking about the photo captured on Jessica’s phone.
 

“Give me a moment, I have something I want to look up.”

Eddie heard his chair squeal and the doctor mumbling as he shuffled around his office. He could picture him, fingers resting on his chin, eyeballing the rows of books that surrounded his desk, his memory better than any card catalogue. There was a knock at Eddie’s door, but this time it was only housekeeping. He opened the door and asked if she could come back later, then slipped the plastic Do Not Disturb sign over the door handle. By the time the maid, a pretty blonde girl with a Russian accent, had finished apologizing, the doctor was back on the line.
 

“I’m not the expert on this subject, but I do know a couple that have had an experience similar to yours. The man, Morgan Stern, wrote to me ten years ago describing his multiple run-ins with the doppelganger of his father. When his father, who had been in a nursing home at the time, passed on, the doppelganger vanished, but Mr. Stern swore that the ordeal had left him with psychic abilities he’d never had previous to the apparition’s appearance. He was living with a woman, Gigi Staub, at the time, and it was through her urging that they came here to have him tested.
 

“They stayed here for one week and we put him through everything we could think of. He scored a remarkable above-average on several tests, high enough to pique my interest at the time. Whatever untapped powers that had been opened to him from the encounter with the doppelganger, if that was truly the catalyst, were sadly short-lived. Within a year, he reported back to me that he was no longer anticipating what people would say before they spoke or having visions of events moments before they occurred. It was as if it had given his brain a short-lived charge that could power his extra sensory abilities until it just fizzled out. That wasn’t unique in and of itself, but the fact that he and his girlfriend had been seeing a doppelganger before it happened was.”

Eddie wasn’t sure where this was going or how this information was supposed to help him. Dr. Froemer didn’t keep him hanging long.

“Morgan Stern and Gigi Staub lived in Massachusetts at the time, a little north of Boston. I could see if their phone number still works and ask if they could meet you. They’re a nice couple, very sincere. Maybe talking to them could help shine a light on your situation.”

“That would be fantastic. We’re about an hour away from Boston, so we could meet them any time.”

“Good. I’ll call them later this morning, after my meeting. I’ll let you know.”

Eddie hung up and knocked on the connecting door to Jessica’s room.
 

“Any luck?” she asked.
 

“There’s a couple near Boston that had their own experience with a doppelganger. We may be able to meet them.”

Jessica gave him a hard fist bump. “We’re two for two. I just got off the phone with Rita Leigh. Greg is at work and she wants us there. We’re going back now.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

After Rita Leigh had gotten off the phone with Jessica, she asked Selena if she could take Ricky out to the park so they could both get some air. Selena had eyed her suspiciously, but there were times when a mother had to protect her kids. Rita did not want either of them around when Jessica and Eddie returned. First, she wasn’t sure how Selena would react to seeing a picture of her double. Second, she didn’t want them to have to lie to their father. This way, they were none the wiser about the entire thing.
 

Jessica and Eddie rang her bell fifteen minutes after Selena had taken Ricky with great reluctance to the field several blocks away. Neither of the ghost hunters looked as if they had slept much. “Can I get you both some coffee?” she asked, showing them into the living room.

“Coffee would be great,” Jessica said.
 

Rita couldn’t help but notice her shaking hands as she stuffed the filter into the coffee maker and poured in the water. She was nervous as hell. Preparing coffee delayed the viewing of the picture, which would mean complete validation of everything that had been happening. It was a welcomed validation as much as it was terrifying. It meant they weren’t all crazy, but it also meant they had a bigger issue to face.
 

She laid out some cookies and sat across from them.