44 Book Four Read online

  Now, I thought.

  “Not today, kid,” I said out loud as I stepped into it. I lobbed it over him just right and watched it sail through the air, a work of art now more than a ball. But as I stood there admiring my skill, the boy somehow backed up and jumped high in the air, putting himself in position to make an awesome save.

  “Damn,” I said under my breath.

  The ball was heading straight for his hands. There was no way he could miss it.

  But he did.

  I stood there, breathing hard, amazed that the ball got past him, almost like it had gone right through him, and bounced into the goal.

  Adrenaline suddenly rushed through my body as I realized what he was.

  He looked up at me slowly and I staggered back. His large eyes had deep, black circles around them, his lips as pale as his face. I could see scratches and scars and bruises all over his arms. His face had a deep gash on the right side that ran down from his eyebrow to his neck.

  He was wearing jeans and a familiar Guns N’ Roses T-shirt.

  There was no ducking away or turning or hiding from this ghost. Our eyes locked and he knew that I had seen him. He stared at me somberly with washed out eyes, waiting.

  “Abby,” he said.

  I was numb with fear and I couldn’t move. I couldn’t run.

  “Abby,” he whispered again, almost prayer like, his haunting voice carried by the wind to my ears. “Help.”

  I heard the loose dog behind me again, breathing hard as it ran up, barking as it circled, the owner still chasing after it and calling its name.

  When I turned back toward the net, the ghost boy was gone.

  CHAPTER 10

  He knew me.

  The ghost knew my name.

  I sat in the Jeep with the doors locked, the windows rolled up tight, trying to shake off the chills that ran up and down my back and stared out at the empty field.

  It wasn’t like I hadn’t seen a ghost before. Or that I had stopped seeing them. I still saw them around town sometimes, walking along the sidewalks, sitting at tables in empty restaurants, walking in parks. But I never made eye contact, never acknowledged them even if I had a feeling they wanted to talk to me.

  And so far, it had worked out fine. Since I had been back from the island, the only ghost I talked to was Jesse.

  But somehow, I was too late in figuring it out with this kid. He saw that I saw him.

  And he knew my name.

  Even though I was getting used to seeing the dead, they still scared me. And I had never seen a kid ghost before. It left a sad feeling inside and I wondered how he had died. By the looks of the scars and cuts, it seemed certain that it wasn’t natural causes.

  The dog and his owner finally left. I watched the goal for a while longer, wondering if the ghost would return now that it was quiet, but he didn’t come back.

  I drank the rest of my water and tried to calm my nerves. I didn’t really know what to do and then I thought about my last conversation with Jesse.

  “Whatever you do, Craigers, don’t make any eye contact with them,” he said as we walked along the frozen river. It was in late February and a light snow had left a thin layer of white on everything. I was out for a run and I found Jesse in the park, standing next to the river.

  We stood and watched the ducks fly in and land on the water and then slide across the icy parts like it was a skating rink.

  “Don’t even look in their direction. That way, the ghosts will leave you alone.”

  I didn’t mind his advice. Truthfully, I was perfectly content talking to just one ghost. But it had felt right helping Annabelle and her family and I wondered if I should be helping more of them.

  “But maybe it’s what I’m supposed to do,” I said.

  “No, it’s not your job,” Jesse said. “Look, every ghost has a sad story. And there are a lot of them, trust me. You can’t waste all your energy being pulled into their problems. That’s not why you came back. If you let them, they’ll end up sucking the life out of you.”

  “That’s harsh,” I said, tugging at a tree branch that was covered in snow. All the plants and trees were a stark white. “I’m just saying that me seeing ghosts and helping them, well, maybe that’s the good in all this.”

  He sighed and shook his head.

  “The good in all of this is that you’re still alive,” he said. “And that you have an opportunity to live your life. For you, not for them.”

  He stared at me, his eyes slicing into mine. It seemed like we always ended up arguing when I talked about the ghosts I sometimes saw.

  “I know that and I didn’t mean it that way,” I said. “I meant that it could be another good thing that came out of my accident. That I can help people.”

  “They’re not people,” Jesse said bluntly. “Not anymore.”

  “But when I helped Annabelle, I also helped her son, who is very much alive.”

  After I mentioned it, I wished I hadn’t. It still bothered me that while we had been able to locate Annabelle’s body at the bottom of the Deschutes River, we hadn’t been able to help solve her murder. But at least her family now knew what had happened to her.

  “Craigers, the ghosts need to move on,” he said. “It’s not good for you and it’s not good for them to be staying in this world, so focused on their past.”

  I sighed.

  “We all leave this world with unfinished business, regrets, things we want to set right,” he said. “And it always comes too soon. But when it does come, that’s it. It’s time to move on. That’s what they need to realize. You need to listen to me and stay away from them.”

  “Come on,” I said. “Don’t be so dramatic. Not all the stories are of murders and brutal deaths. What about your dad? I helped him. I think I helped him a lot.”

  I was excited when we went over to the motorcycle shop and I told Mr. Stone that I could see and talk to his dead son. Jesse was so sure that his dad wouldn’t believe me, but he was wrong. Although Mr. Stone didn’t say much or ask any questions, he listened to everything Jesse told me to tell him with watery eyes and a kind smile. Jesse told him how much he loved him and missed him and that he was sorry about the accident.

  Jesse smiled suddenly, like he was remembering the visit too. He stopped and took my hand and kissed it.

  “I know,” he said. “And I loved talking to my dad like that with you. You’re right. It helped him. And it helped me too.”

  I nodded.

  “But these others, they’ll suck the life out of you, Craigers. They don’t care. And they know about you now, about how you can see them. Some are looking for you.”

  Goose bumps covered my arms.

  “What? What do you mean they’re looking for me?”

  My heart jumped into a sudden, crazy fast pace.

  “Just listen to what I’m saying. Walk past them and you’ll be fine. Focus on what you want to do with your life.”

  I stared out at the soccer field. The ghost still hadn’t come back.

  It wasn’t as simple as the see no ghosts, hear no ghosts, speak to no ghosts approach Jesse wanted me to take. Maybe I had a say in it, a choice to make. Maybe it wasn’t my destiny to help them, but if one of them came to me asking for help, it wasn’t in my nature to just turn away without a good reason.

  I wasn’t sure what the ghost boy wanted from me, but I had the feeling he would tell me.

  I turned on the car, cranked the heater, and sat back.

  And remembered.

  It wasn’t the first time. The ghost had been at the Badlands that day. He was on the trail, following Ty and me. It was the same kid that I saw when we were hiking.

  A fresh set of goose bumps ran down my arms. I pulled out of the lot. It was stormy up ahead, dark clouds gathering, the darkness looming.

  CHAPTER 11

  It had been crowded and super busy at Back Street the entire day. Working through the lunch hour was never as fun or relaxing as the night shifts, and I missed David.
I even missed Mo.

  Kate stopped by to say hello but didn’t stay for too long. I wasn’t able to take my break with her, and she seemed preoccupied. There was a constant line that always threatened to spill out the door, no matter how fast I took the orders. The longer wait and lack of seating made tempers short, causing some to leave in a huff.

  And even though it was busy, the hours snailed by. I was looking forward to the rest of the week, working nights and seeing David.

  There were a few other employees who worked during the day that I didn’t know that well. One was a woman who constantly talked about her daughter. And then there was Lyle, a photographer who had his work in a few of the galleries around town. He took a lot of nature shots. Mike had a few of them framed up on the walls over the tables. They were really good, shots of a climbers scaling Monkey Face at Smith Rock, Broken Top at sunrise, a fly fisherman casting at Hosmer Lake.

  But I didn’t talk too much to either of them, just to Mike, who had been in a good mood all day, like most days.

  After talking with David that night, I had sent Mike an email telling him about my summer river plans. I was worried that he might be mad or something, especially after I had disappeared on him at the end of last year. But he wasn’t. He asked me what the hours were like and I told him.

  “We’ll make it work,” he said, making a fresh pot of Costa Rica blend. “No problem. You’re a great employee and we’ll figure it out.”

  I was glad. It’s not like my big plan in life was to work here forever, but it felt right for now and it was nice to be appreciated.

  I tried to focus on what I was doing, but my thoughts drifted back to the ghost I had seen out on the soccer field. I couldn’t help wondering about how he died.

  He had said he needed help, but I didn’t know who he was or what he wanted. There was nothing I could do but wait. And in a strange way, I was hoping it wouldn’t be for too much longer. I didn’t like being stalked and would rather just deal with his problem, whatever that might be.

  By the last hour of my shift, I was exhausted and wishing it would slow down so Mike would send me home. I was ready for an afternoon nap. But there was no way. It was still wall to wall customers and I ended up staying later than I had been scheduled for.

  At just past six o’clock, I stepped outside, into the parking lot to finally head home. The sky was a light gray, all in clouds, but it was a little warmer than earlier. I saw David, his tires burning rubber as he swerved in and parked right next to me, a little too close.

  He was late, like he usually was.

  “Hello and goodbye, Abby Craig,” he said, jumping out of the old Camaro and brushing by me.

  “Hey, wait, how did the audition go?” I asked. I was glad that I had remembered.

  “Nailed it!Just got the call. Just call me Leo DiCaprio from now on,” he said.

  “That’s awesome, David,” I said. I leaned in and gave him a quick, awkward hug. He smiled and his eyes twinkled when I looked back at him.

  “Congratulations. You really must have wowed them.”

  “Yeah, I think I did,” he said, backing up toward the store. “So you’re coming, right? It’s at 2nd Street, but not until July.”

  “You know it,” I said.

  “Good. I’ll get you and your sister in the front row. Oh, and BB can come too, if he wants.”

  “That would be awesome,” I said.

  He smiled before running into Back Street.

  When I walked into the house, I found Kate sitting on the sofa and watching TV, already in her sweats and T-shirt, hair up and wearing an apron. I was still getting used to her new schedule, but I liked it. It was nice having her home for dinner every night.

  “Hey, Abby,” she said, getting up and meeting me at the door.

  “Wow, it smells great in here,” I said.

  Still, it was a strange moment. Me coming home from work and Kate making dinner. Like everything was upside down and mixed up in the universe.

  I walked into the kitchen and saw a large metal pot on the backburner of the stove and a stack of dishes in the sink. I was starving and it smelled amazing.

  “Hungry?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” I said.

  I went to my bedroom, threw down my stuff, and washed up.

  When I walked back out, the television was off, Miles Davis blowing his horn in the background. Two plates of Linguini Alfredo were on the table, with crusty slices of garlic bread in a basket between the dishes.

  “Wow, thanks,” I said as I sat down.

  It was one of Kate’s best dishes and it had been a long time since she made it. She grated some fresh parmesan over the pasta and then sat down, pouring herself some wine.

  “Want a glass?” she asked.

  “No, I’m okay,” I said. “Soda’s fine.”

  We sat and ate, mostly quiet, both of us lost in deep thought.

  “That was delicious,” I said for the fifth time when we had finished. But I couldn’t help it. It really was.

  “Good, I’m glad you liked it,” she said. “It’s kind of fun to cook again. But really, Abby, I miss your dishes. You’re really good and I hope you have some plans to start back soon.”

  I hadn’t cooked much since the kidnapping. I wasn’t sure why. Maybe it had to do with Simon, one of the scientists on the island who had showed me how to make risotto and talked about food like it was a religion. Or maybe I was just too busy.

  Sometimes I wondered how Simon was doing. I was pretty sure I’d see him at the trial. Kate had learned off the record that he was in witness protection, hidden away, waiting to testify. I was happy for him, his heart never seemed into holding me captive, and in the end he tried to help me escape. I wondered if he was working as a chef somewhere.

  “You should invite Ty over. He must not even know how great of a cook you are.”

  She was right. I hadn’t made him anything other than a few batches of cookies.

  I got up and started clearing the plates.

  “Oh, let’s leave them for a little while,” Kate said, picking up her glass and walking over to the sofa.

  It had taken me too long to figure out something was wrong. She had been too quiet over dinner and now leaving the dishes for later made it obvious.

  I grabbed another soda from the fridge and followed her over to the sofa.

  CHAPTER 12

  “So what’s up?” I asked.

  She pulled her eyes away from the window and leaned in close, lowering her voice.

  “Ben,” she said. “He finally wrote.”

  It had been nearly a month since we had heard from Dr. Mortimer, even though Kate wrote to him regularly, giving him updates, asking when he was coming back. But he had taken his brother’s death hard and we both worried that it would be something he could never be able to get past.

  “What’d he say?” I asked.

  Looking at her energy, I could tell it wasn’t good.

  “He’s not coming back.”

  She sighed heavily. Her face went pale and sad like it always did now when she talked about him. She turned her head to the side, staring back out the window. I could see she was holding back tears. We sat quiet for a moment.

  “Not yet,” I said after a while. “But he will, Kate. He just needs a little time.”

  It really hadn’t been that long. Five months wasn’t nearly enough time for Dr. Mortimer to come to terms with the fact that he had shot and killed his younger brother, even if it had been an accident.

  Dr. Mortimer never came back to Bend. After helping with my rescue and talking to the police and FBI, he left with his brother’s body for Boston, where they had been born and raised. After he buried Nathaniel, he sent in his resignation to the hospital, wrote to Kate telling her that he had to travel for a while to sort everything out, and had an agency close up his house on Awbrey Butte.

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  “India,” Kate said
. “He’s living in an ashram. And he says he’s going to stay there for a while. Years maybe.”

  That seemed like a good place for him, at least for now. I didn’t know too much about those places, but I remembered seeing something on TV once about a man searching for the meaning of life who ended up going to India and finding answers. Dr. Mortimer wouldn’t have been able to just come back here and pick up his life. He needed to make peace with what had happened. Because no matter how insane he was, Nathaniel had still been his brother and Dr. Mortimer had killed him.

  “At least he’s okay, right?” I said.

  “I guess he’s all right. But he sounds strange. Told me to say hi to you and to tell you again how sorry he is for everything. How you shouldn’t have been put through that horror. And that he still feels responsible for not keeping you safe.”

  I sighed.

  I knew from reading his energy that Nathaniel had never felt any guilt about the things he had done, the lives he had ruined, the people he had killed. And there were so many. I was one of the lucky ones. I had gotten away. And yet, here was his brother, who hadn’t done anything wrong, feeling guilty. It wasn’t right. We had all been trapped in Nathaniel’s insanity through no fault of our own. But Dr. Mortimer didn’t see it that way.

  “He has nothing to be sorry for,” I said.

  “The sins of the brother I guess,” Kate said.

  “Tell him next time you write to him. Tell him he doesn’t have one thing to be sorry about. I want him to know that I feel that way. It makes me mad that he’s feeling responsible for his brother.”

  It sent chills down my spine thinking about Nathaniel, those strange, almond eyes full of an intensity and excitement about his research. He was so sure of his ideas and his experiments, so positive that he had found a solution to death.

  I shivered as I thought of him, his body lying there on the floor that day I had been rescued.

  For a long time, I was sure that Nathaniel was wrong about his claim that he was the one who had saved me after I was dead for 44 minutes. I had drowned in a mountain lake and when they brought me into the hospital, I was gone. But Nathaniel was there, with his serum, and he injected me and somehow, soon afterwards, I woke up from death.