Happy Medium: (Intermix) (6 page)

DeZavala regarded her with narrowed eyes. “Okay sweetheart, before we go any further with this, who are you and who do you work for. Cause it sure as hell isn’t Ray Ramos. If he needed help with research, he’d go to his sister, Rosie. She’s a pro.”

Emma considered arguing, but there didn’t seem to be much future in it. Plus she had a feeling Gracie DeZavala could be more valuable as a source than anything she found in the historical society files, given her apparent knowledge of everybody in the district. “My name is Emma Shea and I work for DeVere Productions. We’re filming a show at Ray’s house, and he actually did agree to let me do some research about the place.”

DeZavala’s eyes stayed narrow, but she shrugged. “Okay, that particular house was Allard Hampton’s place until he died. Those good-for-nothing nieces and nephews of his let it go to seed while they fought over who was going to make the most money off it.”

“Could I find some information about Mr. Hampton here?”

She shrugged again. “I doubt it. Allard owned a box factory down on the west side. He retired about twenty years before he died. A more placid soul you’ll never find. So far as I know, the only things he was interested in were whooping cranes and golf.”

Emma had a feeling what Gracie didn’t know wouldn’t help her. “What about the people who owned the house before he did? It must be close to a hundred years old.”

“Oh it’s all of that, but nobody famous lived there. Or infamous, so far as that goes.”

“And how would I find the names of the owners?”

“You’d go to the county offices and check the deeds, only most of that information’s online now.”

Thank the Lord for small favors.
“Are the society’s records online too?”

Gracie gave her a slow smile. “Nope. A lot of it’s digitized, but you’ll have to use it here. We’re strictly private.”

Emma blew out a breath. “So I can get the names from the county records, then come back here and check your records to see if you have any information about the people.”

DeZavala nodded. “That’s about the size of it.”

Emma bit back a sigh and turned toward the door.

“Of course . . .” DeZavala’s voice came from behind her.

Emma turned back.

“Of course, you could always use one of our computers to access the county records and then check the files here to see if any of the owners show up. That would be a lot easier, I’d say.” DeZavala gave her a Cheshire cat smile.

Emma smiled through gritted teeth. “I’d say so too.”

“Computers are back there,” DeZavala said, nodding toward the rear of the building. “Go to it.”

Emma went.

Chapter 5

Ray’s plan was to work himself to exhaustion, which, given the state of the house, wasn’t likely to be too difficult. He picked the room that Gabrielle DeVere had labeled “impossible” and began removing damaged sheetrock from the walls. This involved a reciprocating saw, a pry bar, and so much dust that he hung plastic sheets over the doors to keep most of it inside the room.

By the time he was ready to quit, he resembled a golem. Plaster dust covered him from head to foot. When he removed his goggles and dust mask, his face looked like he was wearing clown makeup. He shook the dust off his feet, then walked out into the backyard where he stripped down to his shorts and rinsed himself and his clothes with the garden hose.

He figured any neighbors watching him could just live with it. The less limestone dust that went down his drain, the better.

Later he took a long rinse in the upstairs bathroom. The water pressure wasn’t great, but at least the shower worked. He figured he had enough energy left for dinner and an hour or so of TV, but after that he was going to crash.

And this time he was going to sleep long and quietly, with no interruptions.

He deliberately ate his ham sandwich in the kitchen with the TV blaring. He hadn’t been back in the dining room since the night before, and he had no intention of going in there this evening. Whatever had happened in that room was all over. He intended to ignore it from now on. Or at least until Gabrielle DeVere and her film crew showed up on his front step, whenever that might be.

He did his best not to think about Emma Shea either. He’d spent the day not mulling over the fact that they’d both been through something weird last night while Gabrielle DeVere had apparently been immune to the whole thing. And he’d also worked on not thinking about her expression when he’d walked out on her at the coffee house. And not remembering the way her curls fell across her forehead when she leaned forward to talk to him.

He’d just as soon not have any psychic experiences in common with her or anybody else, thank you very much. And her plans for “joining forces” were clearly ridiculous. Join forces to do what? He wouldn’t even know where to start.

Maybe you could begin by trying to figure that out.

Maybe he wouldn’t.

At nine he climbed the stairs to his bedroom, exhaustion dulling the faint stirrings of unease in his gut. He was tired. He’d sleep. There was nothing to worry about.

Except, of course, for the shadowy woman who appeared as soon as he managed to drop off. He could feel her hands on his body, her mouth leaving a searing line from his chest to his abdomen, her nails digging into the flesh of his back. He started to tell her to stop but moaned instead as her lips fastened on the head of his cock.

Bloodred mist swam in front of his eyes. He dug his fingers into the woman’s hair, feeling silken strands against his fingertips as he tried to pull her away. But she seemed to have fastened herself to his body like climbing ivy. Or like a wood tick. Her nails dug into his buttocks so deep they must be drawing blood.

His pulse accelerated, the sound of his breath whistling in his ears. His body thrummed with arousal and fear in equal amounts.
No. Don’t. Stop.
Whatever was happening to him wasn’t good, wasn’t right, but he couldn’t seem to end it.

He tried to see through the mist to the woman’s face but could only get a rough sense of golden hair bending over him, white hands grasping his thighs, the nails red with blood. His blood.

“Stop it,” he managed to groan, but she didn’t look up, didn’t pause. His body tightened, his muscles taut, the climax gathering at the base of his spine. Somewhere in the back of his mind something told him that having an orgasm with this woman would be a really bad idea.

“Stop it,” a voice said.

At first he thought it was his own, that he’d somehow managed to make himself speak again. Then he realized he hadn’t.

“Push her away,” the voice snapped. “Do it now.”

He shoved hard against the woman’s shoulders. Her grasp on his thighs loosened, although she kept her mouth on his cock.

“Get her off you. Give her a kick if you have to.”

The woman reared back, her face lost in mist. And then she was gone as quickly as she’d come.

Ray stood in the mist, drawing air into his lungs in great gulps. The nagging sense of confusion over why the dream had suddenly become so real was pushed to the back of his mind as he leaned forward to catch his breath, bracing his hands on his knees. His arousal disappeared abruptly.

“A narrow escape.”

The mist was no longer bloodred, but it was still thick. Wisps of grayish silver seemed to move in front of his face, half masking the figure a few feet away.

A woman, but not the woman who’d been sucking his dick only a moment ago. This figure stood straight and tall, both hands resting on a cane. Beyond that he couldn’t make her out—she was mostly a silhouette in the darkness.

“Who are you?” he blurted.

She didn’t answer, shaking her head as she looked at him.

He started to step toward her but found he couldn’t move, which should have been frightening but somehow wasn’t.

“Can you come closer so I can see you?” he asked.

She still said nothing, but the fact that she stayed where she was seemed to be an answer. Ray dropped his hands to his sides, waiting and wishing mightily that he was wearing some clothes. He’d never felt so vulnerable in a dream before.

After another moment, she inclined her head. “There’s danger,” she muttered.

“The woman?”

She nodded slowly.

“Who was she?”

She stared at him silently. He could see the shape of her head and body now. She was taller than he’d thought, and ramrod straight in spite of the cane she leaned upon. Her long dress covered her feet. Her hair seemed piled on the top of her head.
Old fashioned.
But how old he hadn’t a clue.

She seemed to be studying him, almost assessing him. He had no idea what he was supposed to say.

“Thank you,” he said finally. “Thank you for helping me drive her off.”

She inclined her head again. “Danger.”

He frowned. “In this house?”

She didn’t answer, maybe because the answer was obvious.

“Who was she?” he asked again.

“Listen to the sensitive,” she said, turning away from him.

“What? The sensitive? What’s that?”

“Listen to her.”

The mist thickened again, obscuring her figure as she seemed to move away. She didn’t walk exactly, just . . . moved.

He squinted after her. “Who is the sensitive?”

The mists billowed around where she’d stood only a moment ago, blanking the space between them. He tried to move again, then jerked against the force that seemed to be weighing on his feet.

And woke up. In his bed. In the master bedroom of the house that he’d been told was dangerous. He lay still for a moment, trying to catch his breath as he rubbed an arm across his forehead. He felt as if he’d been in a fender bender without a seatbelt.

After another moment, he pushed himself to his feet, heading to the bathroom for a glass of water. His back ached as if he’d been sleeping crookedly.

He turned, staring at himself in the bathroom mirror. A line of red marks marched along the flesh of his back to his buttocks.

Fingernails
.

Ray braced his hands on the sink, taking deep breaths to try to slow down his hammering heart. At least if he had to throw up, he was in the right place.

***

Emma drove up to the house on the dot of nine the next day, carrying two large coffees. She figured Ray was bound to be awake by then, but maybe he wouldn’t have had his coffee yet.

And maybe he’d be willing to talk to her now that they’d put a little space between themselves and the admittedly weird events that had taken place at the séance. She was hoping he’d feel differently today because she needed to talk about the work she’d done yesterday at the historical society. And to broach the whole “joining forces” thing again. They had to get going on that sooner or later—better together than alone.

She took a deep breath before she stepped from her car. She could do this. Ray Ramos was just a guy. She had no reason to feel this nervous.

Just a guy. Yeah right, Emma.

He was sitting on the front steps again as she headed up the walk. She wondered if he did that every morning. Not that it wasn’t a nice place to sit with your morning coffee. She turned and looked up at the pale blue sky, already shimmering with heat. The dark shade of the gallery made a nice contrast with the moist warmth of the day.

“Good morning,” she said, pushing her lips into an overly bright smile and extending one of the cups.

When he looked up at her, she almost dropped the coffee. Whatever had happened to him since she’d seen him last hadn’t been good. His face was pale and he hadn’t shaved—his beard was dark gold against his skin. His eyes looked hollow, the flesh around them pulled tight. And his face seemed thinner somehow, as if the skin had been drawn in.

Overall he looked like he was either exhausted or he’d been on an epic bender.

“Whatever you’re doing you should stop,” she blurted.

He snorted, taking the coffee from her hand. “I’ll take that under advisement.”

“What happened?”

He stared at her for a long moment, as if he were considering what and how much to tell her. “Dreams,” he muttered finally. He took a deep swallow of the coffee.

She watched the smooth column of his throat move as he swallowed. “Dreams of what?”

He looked away. “Just . . . dreams.”

She sank onto the steps beside him. “Is it the house?”

He paused again, then nodded. “Got to be. I never had nightmares like this before.” He stared across the yard for a moment, sipping the coffee again absently. “But I need to get to work.”

In her opinion, that was absolutely the last thing he needed to do. “Come to breakfast with me first.”

“I’ve already had breakfast.” He gazed down at her again. “Thanks for the offer, but I can’t let this thing beat me. I’ve got work to do here. A lot of work.”

She licked her lips, trying to figure out what to say next, then shrugged. “I’ll help.”

He narrowed his eyes, studying her. “Like that?”

She glanced down at her navy skirt and cream silk blouse. She’d left her suit jacket in the car because she planned on going to the historical society after she’d finished talking to him.
Oh well.
“I’ll be fine. You can show me what to do.”

He took another long swallow of his coffee, then shrugged. “Okay by me. Come on.” He pushed himself to his feet, heading back across the gallery.

She followed him, telling herself she knew exactly what she was getting into and it wasn’t a problem.
And how’s the weather in the Land of Denial these days?

As it turned out, of course, she had no idea what she was getting into, but it wasn’t as much of a problem as she’d feared. He gave her an apron that must have come with the house, judging from its threadbare condition, along with a paint scraper. Then he put her to work scraping off the remains of the carpet pads in the upstairs bedrooms. She wasn’t sure what exactly he was doing downstairs, but it involved a lot of banging and sawing. When she finally ventured down at one o’clock, there was a line of white dust in the plastic-draped doorway of the back room.

She peeked in to see Ray Ramos, stripped to the waist and streaked with white, using an iron bar to pry loose a piece of wallboard from the studs. The floor was covered with a thin layer of plaster bits.

She stared around the room, open-mouthed. She’d never seen the innards of a wall before.

He paused, his bar shoved behind another piece of wallboard. “Finished?”

“I got everything scraped up in the one room, yeah. I can start on the others next.”

He lowered his bar, then turned toward her, wiping his hands on his jeans.

She swallowed hard, trying not to stare at the hard slabs of muscle with a slight dusting of golden hair on his chest. His jeans rode low on his hips, showing his navel and the arrow of darker hair aiming down toward his zipper. His whole body was covered in a thin layer of white dust.

He raised an eyebrow. “You want some lunch?”

She nodded, trying to think of something to say that didn’t involve the words
chest
or
muscles.
Brain freeze.

“Let me get cleaned up. There’s a place in the Blue Star Complex—it’s not far from here.”

“Okay,” she croaked. At least he didn’t have that pole-axed look anymore. Of course, she probably looked a little pole-axed herself right then.

They sat outside next to the San Antonio River. He’d washed up and put on a shirt, unfortunately. If she was any judge, tearing off wallboard all morning had made some difference in his mental outlook. But he was still a couple of miles from the confident, faintly sarcastic guy she’d first met when she’d decided to pretend his house was haunted. A decision she was rapidly deciding was one of the worst she’d ever made.

Whatever he’d dreamt was bad.
Very bad.

“I wanted to touch base with you,” she said after his burger had arrived, along with her tossed salad.

He gave her a guarded look as he took a bite. “About what?”

“I started researching the house at the King William Historical Society.” She forked up a leaf of arugula, dipping it in the woefully thin diet dressing.

“Ah,” he nodded. “Gracie DeZavala.”

Emma stopped chewing. “You know her?”

He shrugged. “Everybody knows her, around the district anyhow. And she knows most of what there is to know about King William. Whatever you find, you should run it by Gracie.”

“I found some names, but I’m guessing they won’t mean much to you.” She pushed her list of owners’ names across the table toward him as she speared a grape tomato.

He glanced down at it, then shook his head. “I don’t know much about the history of the district because I grew up in the northwest part of town. The only name I recognize here is Allard Hampton, the guy who owned the house before we bought it from his estate.”