Haunted (15 page)

I swore you could actually see the stress leave his body. I didn't need to; I felt it all around me.

“Okay then, yeah. Sure, that'll be fine,” he said, starting to walk out the door. “Can I go now?”

He looked twitchy as hell, like he needed a fix. I couldn't believe I hadn't put two and two together sooner. He was practically a junkie. The irony was that what he was doing to save his sanity would likely cost him his life; it seemed a bad trade and I felt helpless to stop him. Sean looked at him strangely, but said nothing, only nodding once. Cooper took off out of the apartment at just a shade below a run.

Way to play it normal, Coop.

“Is that the erratic behavior you've been talking about?” Sean asked.

“Kinda. I think he's just beyond tired. It makes him a bit jumpy.”

“I see,” he said, looking unconvinced. “A bit jumpy indeed.”

Subject change, subject change, subject…

“So when do you want me to detail that alibi for you?” I asked, putting myself back in the hot seat.

“I'll come back tomorrow. That should give you time to get it done,” he said, turning to leave. The men with him looked somewhat dissatisfied with that plan. Jer felt the need to vocalize his displeasure, as always.

“So we're just going to walk away and leave her to kill someone else?”

“No. We're going to leave her here to get her story together,” Sean said plainly. “He was my brother too, Jer. Don't forget that.”

“She's going to take us all out one by one, don't you see it, or are you too blinded by this sick obsession of yours?” he asked, challenging Sean's judgment.

Sean didn't appear to be a fan of that. Jer went flying for the second time that night. He smashed into a wall, sending plaster and dust everywhere. It left a doozy of a hole.

“Cass was a sympathizer, Jer. Ruby would gain nothing by killing him,” Sean snarled, coming to hover over Jer’s face.

Sympathizer?

“Yes, Sean, but she wouldn't know that, would she? Neither would her psychotic other half. He was with us at the raid in Utah, and at the safe house with Sophie. They know he's one of us,” he said, voice dropping. “Was one of us, and that would be enough. The Rouge wants us all dead. Probably even you.”

“She didn't do this and I'll prove it to you. For now, we're leaving to let her get her story mapped out. We'll deal with the rest later,” he said authoritatively. “We're going. Now.”

18

As expected, Sean showed up the next day looking for the detailed account of my whereabouts. I felt like it was pretty solid since I only had a few times where nobody could confirm my story. The blank spots were short enough that I would have had a difficult time driving to Boston, killing someone, and making it back for dinner; I hoped the PC saw it that way too.

He came alone but it wasn't a social call; he was all business. He looked over the piece of paper stoically, without a trace of what he was thinking crossing his face. He mumbled something to himself when he finished, then turned to leave. He said he'd check it out and get back to me; it didn't make me especially hopeful.

I spent most of the day trying to get in contact with Cooper to see how his private meeting with the brothers went. I wanted to see if he'd gotten a better read on the situation. He seemed relieved that the finger was being pointed at me and not him, and I hoped that he wouldn't throw me under the bus to be certain that no suspicion fell his direction.

Peyta came home at dinner time, which usually ran around seven p.m. at my place, so I got an opportunity to grill her about her visit with Gregory. She said it was anticlimactic; he popped in for a few minutes and left as a customer was coming in. He promised to see her later in the week. That was it. It seemed benign enough, so I let it go.

My cell phone rang while she was filling me in on the short of it, so I went to check it after she finished briefing me. I listened to a message from Ronnie who was just touching base to let me know that the situation out there was still uncertain, and she didn’t have a clear idea as to when she'd be back. She also wanted to make sure that everything was working out okay with Peyta’s arrangement. I called her back to let her know that things were great and that I was trying to put together a little party for Peyta's birthday.

“I don't know who to invite though,” I said. “I don't know her friends. None of them have been by the house or the shop.”

“Peyta has a few close friends, but doesn't seem to mesh well with the other kids in her high school. She seems too mature for them, having interests outside of sex, drugs and Facebook,” Ronnie explained. “If you can get your hands on her cell phone you could look up Maggie and Gina. She's known them for a long time, but they don't go to her school. They're great kids.”

“OK…Maggie and Gina,” I repeated, scribbling it down on a scrap receipt beside me on my nightstand. “Got it. I'll do my best. Otherwise it'll be just me, Peyta and Cooper, if I can hunt him down for the night. Oh, and I'll invite Gregory, too, if I can figure out how to get a hold of him as well.”

“Gregory? Who's that?” Ronnie asked with intrigue.

Shit – she doesn't know.

“Um…I think he's just a friend…you know? The one she went to the movies with the other night? He comes by the store sometimes.”

“She hasn't mentioned him again since she went to the movies. Have you met him?” she asked with an edge to her tone.

“No, not yet. I was hoping to this weekend,” I replied, scrambling for some way to rescue the conversation. “I'll get him there. Don't worry, Cooper will keep him in line.”

I laughed, trying to lighten the mood, and she eventually joined in. She liked, and better yet trusted, Cooper, so knowing he was on the case seemed to be just what she needed to alleviate her concern.

“Okay then, sounds good. Tell Peyta I'll check in with her tomorrow after school.”

“Will do. Hope things start looking up on your end.”

“Me too, Ruby. Thanks. I'll talk to you soon.”

“Bye, Ronnie.”

I breathed a sigh of relief knowing that yet another bullet had been narrowly dodged. My luck was going to run out eventually.

* * *

I relayed the message to Peyta as soon as I got off of the phone so I wouldn't forget. After dinner I turned in early after apologizing profusely to her; I told her she'd understand one day when she was old, too. She laughed and told me to leave my cane by the bed so I could find it when I got up in the middle of the night to pee.

I left her in the dark about her mother’s reaction to Gregory, mainly because I was the one that had caused it in the first place. Angering Peyta for spilling the beans seemed a bad idea. Our relationship was the only one besides Matty's that wasn't overly strained and I wasn't going to screw it up on purpose. I'd find a way to smooth it over eventually. Maybe a really sweet birthday present? I hoped it would be that easy.

19

The bells at the store jingled as Peyta came bounding through the door right after school. She was earlier than usual which was fantastic for me; I needed to run to the post office and hadn't been able to all day.

“Hey P, I hate to bail on you so quickly but I have to get to the post office to ship a couple of orders,” I explained as I threw on my jacket. “I'll be twenty, maybe thirty minutes tops.”

“No problem, Ruby. I'll get the inventory started while you're gone.”

“I couldn't ask for better help,” I said, smiling as I walked out of the door backwards. “Thirty minutes. Promise.”

“Whatever you say, boss.”

It was a nice day, sunny without a cloud in the sky, so I walked the few blocks to the post office. The downtown charm was abundant and I soaked it up along the way, thinking to myself that I'd made a great choice in moving to the seacoast after my parents died. I had needed to start fresh and Portsmouth allowed me that opportunity. My parents were buried in Lyme, New Hampshire, and I hadn't been back there since the funeral. It was only an hour and a half away, but it felt so much further; it might as well have been Siberia. I sold essentially everything when they died, and between that and my inheritance I was left with enough to live a comfortable life without ever really having to work – that I did because I liked it.

My parents wouldn't have approved of my career, my home, or my choice in friends, though I could see where they'd be coming from on the last point at times. I never realized how sheltered I was until they were gone. Gaining my vision changed my life in so many ways, but as I acclimated to the seeing world I realized that not being under my parents' thumb changed it even more. It was harsh to know that their absence may have actually allowed me to have a more fulfilling life. I felt guilty every time I thought it.

Pushing those feelings aside, I entered the post office. The line was enormous and I came to the inevitable conclusion that I was going to be late. I hurried through my transaction and delicately pushed my way out of the tiny building, but it had taken thirty minutes just to get that far in the process. My guilt was in full effect for leaving Peyta alone in the store yet again, so I jogged my way home. Thankfully my Frye boots were comfortable enough to do that in as my usual choice in footwear would not have been.

I flew through the door, whacking the bells so hard they only chimed once collectively. The door had not even closed before I was overcome with an unwelcome sensation – the same one that I always felt in Cooper's room after his night terrors. A prickly heat engulfed me and I was petrified that whatever was haunting Cooper was now attaching itself to Peyta, no longer limiting itself to my apartment. It was on the move.

“Peyta? Where are you?” I called with an edge of panic in my voice.

“I'm in the back. What's up?”

I breathed an instant sigh of relief. She emerged from the design room looking happy as could be, not at all like the tormented soul I feared she would.

“Are you okay?” I asked, trying to sound less concerned.

“Yeah, I'm great? Why do you look so pale?” she asked.

“Well I am practically albino, Peyta,” I joked as sweat began to bead on my back.

“Yeah, but you look worse, like you're sick.”

“Oh, that? I just ran from the post office because I felt bad ditching you,” I explained, trying to play it off. “I promised thirty minutes. Guess I'm either a liar or a terrible judge of time.”

“No worries, I'm just getting started on the inventory now.”

I mulled over in my head how best to approach the subject. Something had been in my shop, and that something was the reason for Cooper going off the deep end. I needed to find out what happened while I was gone, and if Peyta had seen anything strange since that night in Cooper's room. I hadn't brought it up since because she seemed a bit sensitive about it after Sean's indelicate handling of the situation. Sensitive or not, I needed answers.

“Peyta,” I said with a seriousness that stopped her in her tracks. “I need to ask you something.”

“What?” she asked with a pensive expression masking her face.

“Have you been seeing things since that night in Cooper's room? Ghosts?”

“Not around your place, no,” she replied, still seeming to be lost as to what my point was.

“You've seen them elsewhere?”

“No, I don't think so, but it's really hard to say. The ones in Cooper's room really threw me off. They looked so real…if I saw others like them around town, I don't think I'd know they were ghosts.”

I didn't want to alarm her with my suspicions that the pack, or whatever was after Cooper, may now be after her, but I really needed to know exactly what went down while I was gone.

“Have you seen anything here? In the store?”

“No,” she answered, looking confused. “Why?” She walked towards me slowly, tentatively, as if her movements would dictate the outcome of our conversation. She wasn't the only one faking a calm facade.

“Tell me what happened while I was gone.”

“I don't understand why—”

“Just walk me through it. When you're done I'll explain,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose, the start of another headache coming on. Managing all the CF's in my life appeared to be affecting me physically.

“Okay,” she said, looking mildly irritated. “But there's not much to say. Nothing exciting has happened. You left, then there were two phone calls. One was a woman calling about silver earrings, the other a man calling the wrong number. There were no customers. Gregory stopped by quickly to say hi. We hung out in the front for about ten or fifteen minutes before I told him I needed to go in the back and do inventory. He said he'd leave and let me get back to work. He walked out just before you got here. I'm surprised you didn't see him.”

“So neither of you noticed anything odd?”

“NO! Now are you going to tell me what's going on?” she asked, her voice raising.

“Fine! I think you've attracted the attention of whatever is haunting Cooper, okay? Happy now?” I shouted back. She faltered backward a step and I wasn't certain if it was my tone or my revelation that caused it.

“Why? Why do you think that? It doesn't make sense. I could see them if they were here,” she said, trying to be the voice of reason. That voice had an edge of panic to it that I didn't like at all.