Coldhearted (9781311888433) Page 23

  “What?” Gunnar asked, and then exited Lavinia’s room, now standing in the hallway. He turned his camera on Jules, then in the direction her camera was in, looking down the dark hall. “What’d you see?”

  “Nothing,” Jules said, “but I heard something.”

  They were all in the hallway now, their cameras pointing in the same direction. Everything was bathed in green.

  Quinn was standing beside Edie. “Was it a door creaking or something like that?” he asked Jules.

  “Yeah,” she said, nodding. “You heard it too?”

  “Yeah,” he said back, “but it wasn’t exactly a door, I don’t think.”

  “C’mon,” Amee urged. “We’ll never know until we start investigating.”

  Gunnar led the group, with everyone following behind, Edie and Quinn at the rear. Edie’s view was blocked by the others in front of her, so she turned around and aimed her camera toward the other end of the hallway.

  They weren’t alone. Tall as a man with broad shoulders, the shadow figure was facing her, eyes glowing white in the gloom.

  Her hands were trembling, but she managed to compose herself. “Uh, guys? There’s someone staring at me.” She could hear rather than see everyone turn around. Now she was the one in front, the leader.

  “What is it?” Gunnar asked, from the back.

  She told them what (or more precisely who) she was seeing. The shadow figure with illuminated eyes had yet to move. Despite this, Edie’s heart beat even faster.

  “This is your chance, Edie,” Quinn encouraged. He placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Ask him about your ghost.”

  “Uh, okay, um…do you see any other ghosts?” She raised the pitch of her voice, considering the shadow figure—to her relief—was still standing at the end of the hall. “Do you see one with me right now?”

  Dead silence.

  “Try the recorder,” Jules suggested.

  “Oh, yeah,” Edie said. Quinn handed it back to her. She fumbled for the record button, and then repeated her questions, adding, “Do you know how to make a ghost go away? Can you tell me how to detach a ghost?” She waited a few seconds for the shadow to answer, then pushed stop, and looked over her shoulder at everyone. “Do y’all see that shadow?”

  Bree said, “No—wait, oh yeah, I do. Wow. He’s just standing there.”

  Everyone else then confirmed that they were seeing the shadow man too.

  Edie turned back to face the hall in front of her and discovered the shadow man was starting to move. “Uh, guys?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I see it,” Gunnar said. She could hear him making his way through the crowd. He was now behind her. “Play back your recorder, Edie.”

  The shadow man was moving but in slow motion. Edie’s hands were shaking. Quinn helped her again and pushed play. There were several seconds of silence, until a voice that didn’t belong to any of them, came through:

  “Ghosts?” the shadow man repeated with a hint of disbelief. “There’s only one ghost here…girlie girl.” He chuckled. “Oh, Edie, how stupid you are, how easily you’ve been played. You should’ve listened to Mason. He told you this was all a trick. There is no ghost community. There is no knowledge of how to rid me from your life. I’m yours and you’re mine. We’ll be together forever, Edie.” Tristan paused, and then continued, “Let’s have a little fun, shall we?”

  Edie dropped the recorder when the shadow man came rushing at her, swooping in like a bird of prey. She ducked, afraid it was full of teeth and talons, and crouched on the floor, hearing a chorus of screams all around her. She was attacked by hands, groping and grabbing, fondling and pinching, and slithering its fingers like cold snakes across her skin.

  She didn’t have her necklace to comfort her, but she thought of that island, its clear blue waters and the yellow sun, and she regained some composure, some relief, against Tristan’s attack.

  “…deliver us from evil,” she recited, finishing the Lord’s Prayer, as she waited to be saved.

  “Edie?!”

  The voice was familiar, full of panic. It was Quinn. He found her on the floor and helped her up. She turned her camera on him. His eyes were wide, frightened.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  He nodded. “Yeah, are you?”

  She nodded back, and then looked around for the others. “Where’s everyone?”

  Quinn realized that they were alone. “They must have fled. I would have too, but I felt like I was being pinned down by some unseen force. And I was shivering, cold, almost paralyzed.” He shook his head at the memory of it. “C’mon, let’s go find them.”

  As Edie and Quinn walked side by side down the dark hallway, their free hands found each other and they held on, interlacing their fingers. It wasn’t romantic. They were holding onto each other because they were afraid. She’d given herself orders before she’d arrived that she wouldn’t show any fear, but that was nearly impossible when a scary poltergeist was charging full speed ahead at you.

  “Gunnar?! Rory?! Jules?! Amee?! Bree?!”

  Quinn had been shouting their names down every hallway that they’d turned, but he’d been met with silence. After many twists and turns, they somehow had crossed from the main building to one of the extended wards. The sign above the door read: Crematorium.

  “Just great,” Quinn said.

  Still holding her hand, he turned them back around, but the door they’d come through was now suddenly locked.

  “It’s Tristan,” Edie said, unnecessarily. She sighed loudly, hugged the wall, and slid down on the dirty floor, bringing Quinn with her. They sat in the dark. “I should’ve known better. I should’ve listened to Mason. He told me that Tristan was just playing tricks on me, making me believe that he was afraid of this place, when in fact, he’s not afraid of anyplace or anyone.” She knocked the back of her head against the wall. “I’m doomed. I’ll never be rid of him and he knows it. Game over.”

  Quinn squeezed her hand. “Don’t worry, we’ll get through this. First, we have to get out of this place, and then we’ll ghost-bust this Tristan jerk.”

  “Oh, with what?” she asked sarcastically. “You’ve got a proton pack I’m unaware of?”

  Quinn chuckled. “Ghostbusters reference—nice—but no, I don’t. Wish I did, though.” He paused, and then said, “You know, I’ve been thinking about your situation…”

  “And?”

  “I think Tristan Lockhart is in love with you.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah, I mean it’s a twisted, sick love, but it is love, nonetheless. Didn’t you hear him on the recording? ‘I’m yours and you’re mine.’ He’s completely psychotic, of course, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t love.”

  “You’re psychotic,” she accused in a tone.

  Quinn didn’t take offense. “Well, I’m in the right place, aren’t I?”

  Edie took his hand and held it against her cheek. “Sorry,” she apologized. “I’m just going through a lot.”

  Quinn released her hand, then took his and caressed her cheek, wiping away a tear that’d fallen with his thumb. “Don’t worry, Edie. We’ll get through this.”

  Suddenly, the door that’d been locked now opened with a loud bang! Edie expected to see the shadow man and braced herself for another assault, but as she focused her camera, she realized with relief that it was Gunnar, followed by the others.

  When Edie and Quinn stood, the lights mysteriously came back on, while at the same time, Edie’s camera died. She lowered it by her side, no longer needing it.

  “Oh, thank goodness,” Jules said. She rushed over and gave Edie a bear hug.

  “What about me?” Quinn asked, sounding hurt.

  Jules gave him a bear hug too, and then socked his arm. “Where have you two been?!” she fussed like a worried mother.

  Before he got a chance to answer, Rory cursed.

  “My camera’s just died,” he explained his outburst.

  “Mine too,” Edie said.
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br />   Gunnar, Quinn, Bree, and Amee checked over theirs, and then echoed Edie’s statement.

  “And the electricity’s back on,” Gunnar said, unnecessarily.

  Edie looked up at the lit fluorescent bulbs, making buzzing noises, as if a hive of bees were causing the electrical current to stay charged.

  “But who could’ve done it?” Amee asked. “We’re all here and the breaker box is located in the central building, all the way on the other side of the structure.”

  Bree gave her sister a knowing look. “We all know who did it,” she said, then turned toward Edie, and explained, “He’s killed all our cameras. Ghosts can do that. Mess with electronics.” Bree didn’t seem mad. She was smiling because a simultaneous failure of equipment meant that there was a ghost around.

  Edie wasn’t that thrilled and gave hers back to Gunnar, who stuffed it into the backpack over his shoulder. “What happened to y’all?” she asked next. “Where’d y’all run off to?”

  Edie knew she sounded accusatory—and southern as all get out—but they were supposed to be trained ghost hunters. They shouldn’t have fled!

  “We didn’t run off,” Amee said, sounding defensive. “One second, that shadow man was rushing us, and the next second, we were inside Lavinia’s cell, locked up.”

  “I did feel someone or something push us inside,” Rory said, recounting the event.

  “Cold hands,” Gunnar added, remembering too.

  “We saw you pass by,” Jules said next, “and we screamed out for you, but you didn’t hear us.”

  “We didn’t hear you,” Quinn said, and then gestured at the crematorium. “We somehow ended up here.”

  “The door was locked,” Edie added. She waved at the one Jules and the others had magically come through. “We couldn’t get out.”

  “How’d you get out of Lavinia’s cell?” Quinn asked Gunnar.

  “We kept banging on it forever until it just opened,” he replied with a shrug.

  “And how’d you find us?” Edie asked.

  “Quinn’s cologne,” Jules replied, and then made a gagging sound. “That stuff’s toxic.”

  Quinn wrapped his arm around Jules’s shoulders. She shrugged him off. “Yeah, well, that toxic poison led you to us. Otherwise Edie and I would’ve spent all night down here, alone.” He thought on that enticing prospect, and then cursed, “Damn!” because now it wouldn’t happen.

  Edie laughed, knowing it’d never happen, and then tugged on his red shirt. “At least you’re alive,” she said. “See, you had nothing to worry about.”

  Quinn sighed. “Yeah, I guess—”

  He was cut off by the sound of something creaking. Jules and Quinn had heard it before in the so-called dormitory, where the residents’ cells were. The corridor to the crematorium was narrow, so they all had to stand practically single file to witness a vacant wheelchair, slowly moving on its own, until it stopped with a sudden jerk.

  Quinn positioned himself in front of Edie in a defensive posture. “All right, Tristan, you screwed up sorry excuse for a ghost! Stop messing with us and leave Edie alone! Go back wherever the hell you came from, you sick bastard!”

  Edie grabbed Quinn’s arm. “What’re you doing?” she asked, panicking.

  “Provoking the son of a bitch,” he said, as if it were obvious. “What does he think? Making a wheelchair move on its own is going to make me crap my pants?”

  “Oh, I can do so much more,” a cold, deep voice threatened in Edie’s ear.

  She’d been holding onto Quinn, urging him to relent, but suddenly, he was snatched from her grasp and thrown right into the wheelchair. He struggled, trying to break free, but some kind of unseen bindings were holding him stubbornly in place. Everyone was rushing to free him, but he was jerked back from them at full speed, as the wheelchair rolled fast, spun around, and then sped on toward the crematorium.

  “NO!” Edie shouted. She took off, reaching out as she went, trying to grab hold of the bars.

  Quinn was cursing the entire way down the makeshift racetrack, but then fell silent, as he busted through the swinging doors of the crematorium. The wheelchair came to a screeching halt and threw him out to land on the floor, where his head collided with the hard surface. He opened his mouth to curse again, but found that he didn’t have the strength.

  Everyone had followed behind Edie, and now they were attending to Quinn. When Edie secured his head into her hands, she noticed her palms were stained with his blood. There was a nasty gash on his forehead.

  “We have to get him to the hospital,” Edie urged, frantic.

  Tristan blew a cold breath in her ear. “He’s beyond the point of saving. Let’s just put him out of his misery, shall we? I promise it’ll be quick.”

  Suddenly, the crematorium came to life. The oven doors shot open and the fire inside ignited, beckoning for a body to be burned. The heat in the room was overwhelming and for once, Edie wished for the numbing cold of winter.

  “Someone’s coming,” Jules said in a hushed, panicked tone.

  Everyone turned toward the crematorium doors, but Edie kept her eyes fixed on Quinn’s. They were a warm, brown color with flecks of gold. She’d never noticed that before. He was looking at her, smiling, as if nothing were wrong.

  “I’m sorry,” she apologized. “We’ll get you to a hospital. You’re going to be all right.”

  He blinked his eyes, as if he were fighting off sleep. “Do the nurses still give sponge baths?”

  She laughed, despite the tenuous situation that they were in. “If you stay conscious, I’ll give you a sponge bath myself.”

  He grinned, liking the sound of that, and then closed his eyes, as he slumped into her arms. She felt for a pulse and found his heart beating, faintly. He was alive but he needed medical attention immediately. The wound—on the upper part of his forehead, near the hairline—was bad, bleeding profusely. She feared that he didn’t have long and clamped her hand over the gash, hoping to stop the rush and save his life.

  And someone was coming, or rather, several someone(s). She heard the boots charging down the narrow hall, and then the doors burst open.

  “Edie?!” a familiar voice called out, panicky.

  Edie focused to see her uncle, and behind him, a bunch of uniformed cops.

  “It’s past midnight, isn’t it?” she said, remembering the conversation that they’d had at the house.

  He said nothing in response and surveyed the scene: she holding an unconscious guy, bleeding, on the floor of a lit crematorium.

  Orders were barked and carried out. Soon, an ambulance arrived and Quinn was being taken away to the hospital. The cops left Edie and others alone. Edie figured either her uncle had talked to them or bribed them, she didn’t know which. Anyway, Jules sped off in her Tahoe toward the hospital, followed by Gunnar, Rory, Bree, and Amee in the Land Rover.

  Uncle Landon wanted to take her home, but Edie pitched a fit about needing to see Quinn, so he drove her to the hospital.

  “You go back,” she told him, after they’d arrived at Grimsby General. “Jules will take me home when we know Quinn is all right.”

  He shook his head. She was about to argue when he said, “I’ll bring your car up here myself, and then take a taxi home. I don’t want you dependent on this Jules. She might end up staying the entire day, and Edie, I want you home as soon as possible, yeah?”

  Edie stifled an eye roll, knowing that if she needed to leave, Jules wouldn’t force her to stay. “Okay,” she told her uncle.

  “Aren’t you going to say ‘thank you?’” he asked, sounding tired.

  Edie smiled, gave her thanks, and then she added, “Sorry for making you worry.”

  She got out of the car, but didn’t make it far, hearing the passenger window being rolled down. She turned back around and leaned in, facing her uncle, who was leaning toward her.

  “Yeah?” she asked.

  “So you were really hunting ghosts?”

  She nodded.

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p; “Did you find any?”

  She shook her head. It wasn’t a lie. Tristan had always been around.

  “How’d your friend get hurt?”

  “He fell,” she partially lied, and then she asked, “Were the lights on when you and the cops arrived?”

  He shook his head. “No. They found the breaker and turned everything on inside the building. Why?” He gave her a half smile. “Thought it was paranormal activity?”

  She returned his crooked smile. “They’re here,” she sang in an eerie tone.

  “Yeah, well, I’ll believe it when I see it.” He sighed. “Please stay here and don’t go anywhere else, yeah? I don’t want to have to call the cops again, worried sick that something had happened to you. I mean it, Edie. You’re my only family. I’m here to look after you until you turn eighteen. After that, you can do whatever you want, even though I’d like you to keep a clear and rational head.” He paused, and then continued, “It’s what Loren, your father, would’ve wanted. And your mother,” he added in a soft, bereaved tone.

  Now was not the time to bring up her suspicion that he’d been (and still was) in love with her mom. That was for a later time, maybe. Right now, she needed to see Quinn, or at least be with the others in solidarity for his quick recovery.

  She gave her uncle a nod. “I’ll be good. You go home and get some rest. I’ll be fine.”

  They said their goodbyes and she made her way into the ER, joining the others. They were forbidden to see Quinn for quite some time. Quinn’s parents had already arrived and were currently with the attending physician. Gunnar had gone to the vending machines, and bought sugary sodas and sugary sweets for them.

  They snacked in silence and waited.

  Chapter 21

  Quinn was going to be all right.

  The head wound wasn’t as severe as it’d first seemed, but the doctor wanted to keep him a few days for observation, so he was moved to a room.

  Quinn’s parents stayed with him, while Edie and the others remained in a small, waiting room on the same floor, nearby. Three hours later, Edie saw Mr. and Mrs. McDermott leaving his room. Jules informed Edie that Mrs. McDermott was diabetic and probably needed to get some food and rest. As Quinn’s parents passed them, Gunnar rose to apologize for Quinn’s injuries on behalf of the group. Mr. and Mrs. McDermott weren’t upset. They knew Quinn was a ghost hunter and that he’d been at the sanatorium. They thanked everyone, and then departed, soon to return.