The Bone Orchard (13 page)

“Like what?”

“Boone Jennings was one of the country’s first serial killers. He’s not too well-known because he was always on the move, never stayed in one place long enough to terrorize the press and stir up a reputation. But he was Jack the fucking Ripper any way you look at it. And during the couple weeks you had me look up, there were five unsolved murders here, all within about a ten-block radius. All of them with the same MO as this Boone Jennings guy, all of them
after
he was hanged.”

“After?”

“After. There are no reports of him ever using a partner, no one coming forward as a copycat, so . . . it’s a little weird.”

“Are you seriously saying you think these people were killed by a ghost?” the smaller man asked.

“Doc, I’m just saying the way Ezra Johns was murdered is . . . weird.”

“You have no idea, son,” Ambrose grumbled.

Owen grinned crookedly. “So what do you say? You want to do some ghost hunting with me on vacation?”

The three of them shared some glances, communicating silently. They’d obviously all worked together in some fashion. Ezra was leaning toward guessing they were military. He was even more proud.

Finally, Nick nodded. “We’ll give you a weekend. Try to figure out what the hell happened to Ezra and Ambrose.”

Owen grinned widely.

“But you’re buying,” Doc added.

Owen banged his hand on the table. “Deal.”

Ezra stepped back from them, pulling Ambrose with him. “This is exciting! We might be able to make them see us or speak with us! He has a blood connection to me, it might be strong enough.”

Ambrose chuckled, but then it faded into another sound, one that never failed to send chills up Ezra’s spine: The maniacal, strident laughter he’d heard from the gallows one night when he’d still been alive. The laughter he heard every night when he awoke in the street in a pool of long-dried blood. The malevolent, vicious cackling of Boone Jennings. It echoed off the marble halls of the Palace Hotel’s lobby.

People stopped what they were doing, cocking their heads as if hearing a distant noise. Owen and his friends looked around, frowning like they could
feel
the sound around them.

But the laughter was deafening to Ezra’s ears. If his heart were still pounding, the fear would have stopped it cold. Boone Jennings had found his next intended victims.

Ambrose took off toward the lobby, and soon the laughter faded away. Ezra stood rooted to the spot, standing guard over the table where his great-great-great nephew sat, unaware of how much danger he was in.

He didn’t dare leave them to go after Ambrose and Jennings. He and Ambrose had learned to trust each other over the years. It wasn’t like they could lose their lives if they went off alone. Owen and his companions, though, their lives could still be lost.

Ezra gritted his teeth when he saw Ambrose stalking back toward them.

“Lost him.”

“He intends to hurt my nephew, Ambrose.”

Ambrose nodded. Then a smile graced his handsome face, and he narrowed his eyes and gave Ezra a vicious grin. “He’ll hurt them over our dead bodies.”

Ezra nodded grimly. “Indeed.” He put a protective hand on Owen’s shoulder.

“Don’t touch me, man,” Owen grunted.

“I didn’t touch you,” Doc said through a mouthful of bread.

Owen glanced over his shoulder, frowning in confusion.

Ezra and Ambrose shared a determined look. “We have work to do,” Ezra said.

“That’s what we’re here for.”

They followed the boys up to the third floor. The third floor was Ambrose’s favorite, though he wasn’t sure why. All the rooms were the same, and all the floors were identical, so having a favorite floor seemed silly.

Ambrose could feel Ezra buzzing with excitement beside him as they trailed along after the four men.

“They’re going to start feeling you behind them if you don’t keep calm.”

“I’m trying to calm myself, but it’s just such a thrill!” Ezra accompanied his words with a wave of his hand that knocked over a vase on a hallway table. It toppled and rolled off the edge, bouncing on the cushioned carpet.

All four men spun around, and both Owen and Nick reached for weapons at their belts. The action was instinctive, and Ambrose drew his own gun in reaction. He stood pointing a ghost gun at two men who couldn’t see him as Ezra clapped both hands over his mouth and held his breath.

Ambrose uncocked the hammer on his six-shooter. “Why are you holding your breath? You don’t breathe.”

“Force of habit,” Ezra mumbled from behind his fingers. “Same reason you drew on them when you can’t shoot them.”

They remained where they were, watching the men. Over the years, they’d seen plenty of reactions from people when they somehow made their presence known. Some folks studiously ignored it, some ran and never looked back. Many merely shrugged and continued about their business.

For the most part, modern folks could explain away what Ambrose and Ezra did with modern inventions. The world had grown so noisy that sounds were easily dismissed. Strange feelings were attributed to electronics or stress. Objects moving—something that had at one time immediately drawn accusations of spirits—were now attributed to earthquakes, vibrations from traffic, or shoddy craftsmanship.

Ambrose often judged a person on how they handled it. Ezra’s nephew and his friends seemed immediately on edge, each of them alert like a feral cat.

“They definitely got battle training,” Ambrose said out the side of his mouth.

Ezra stepped forward, nodding as he studied his nephew. “Perhaps they’ll be more aware than most, more likely to save themselves if we can’t.”

“You going to try to get him to see you?”

Ezra looked the man up and down. He could see fear in the man’s eyes. Owen might be here looking for answers to the mystery of Ezra’s death, but he wasn’t here looking for Ezra. “No,” he finally said. “No, let’s try to do this with stealth.”

“Are we calling this ghosts, yet?” Doc asked as the four men slowly relaxed.

Owen’s eyes darted around the hallway before he shrugged and turned away from Ambrose and Ezra. “Let’s call it jetlag for now.”

Nick laughed. “You drove here.”

“Shut up,” Owen grumbled. They sauntered off down the hallway, heading for their rooms.

Ambrose came abreast of Ezra and ran his fingers down Ezra’s arm. They both began following after the men. “He’ll strike tonight. We both know it.”

Ezra was chewing on his lip. “He will. It appears they’ve booked two rooms. Shall we divide and conquer?”

“You’re the brains.”

“I’ll go with my nephew. You take the others.”

Ambrose nodded obligingly, and they split off. Nick and Doc were in a room across the hall from Owen and the other man, whose name still hadn’t been mentioned. Ambrose followed the former pair into their room, sidling past before the door could swing shut.

He strode into the room, heading for the windows. He liked to watch from the upper floors to see how the city was changing. They didn’t get out of the hotel often, and he’d found that the first thing guests usually did when they walked into a room was close the curtains to block out the world.

When he turned around, the two men had tossed their bags onto one of the beds, and to Ambrose’s shock, they were embracing. He looked away quickly, clearing his throat. Well, that explained why Owen and the others hadn’t raised an eyebrow at learning about him and Ezra falling in love. Two of them were a couple.

When he glanced at them again, the embrace had become decidedly more heated, with Nick’s hands under the Doc’s shirt and moving lower. Ambrose was trapped in the room unless he wanted to blatantly open the door, and these two men were about to go at it like dogs in heat.

“Fuck that.” He took the fabric of the curtain and yanked on it, making the metal rings at the top screech along their track. “None of that, now.”

Both men whipped their heads around, eyes darting for the source of the movement. Ambrose noticed a holster under Nick’s jacket, and a worn spot on his belt that might have held a badge. Doc, though his nickname implied he might be a medic, was coiled and ready to attack. They were alert and prepared.

Boone Jennings wouldn’t make any noise before he struck, though.

“Button it up, fellers,” Ambrose said to them, though his voice wouldn’t reach their ears. “Got a long night coming.”

Ezra loitered in the hallway, pacing back and forth as he waited for Ambrose to return from his reconnoiter. Ezra had slipped out of the room when the man named Digger went to get ice, but Ambrose appeared to have been held up by something.

One advantage of being a ghost, he’d found, was not having to worry about something bad happening to his partner. The instinct still remained, though, and so Ezra paced.

He whirled around when he heard the door latch thrown. Ambrose came slinking out of the room with the other two men.

“Where the hell have you been?” Ezra shouted.

“These . . . two.” Ambrose fluttered his fingers at Nick and Doc. “They’re not just friends.”

Ezra raised an eyebrow. “Were they . . .?”

“I kept banging things to distract them. They finally unpacked their bags instead.”

Ezra stepped out of the way so the two men could knock on the door of his nephew’s room.

“What’d you learn from the other two?” Ambrose asked.

“They’ve known each other a long time. They were Marines. And they’re here to . . . ghost hunt.”

“They’re going to get more than they bargained for.”

Owen answered the door, studying his friends with narrowed eyes.

“Our room is haunted,” Doc announced.

Owen shrugged and shook his head.

“It doesn’t want us to get laid.”

“Well that makes two of us,” Owen grunted. He stepped aside to let them in. Ambrose and Ezra had to hustle to get in with them.

Ezra pulled Ambrose into the bathroom. “The kid, Owen? He keeps looking at me,” Ezra whispered. “Like he can feel me watching him.

“Makes sense. He’s got a blood connection to you.”

“I don’t want to spook him, so I’m staying distant.”

Ambrose leaned to his side to peer out the bathroom door. “These boys, they might not need our help like most.”

“You and I both know they will.”

Ambrose met his eyes and nodded. Over the years, the rage and evil inside Boone Jennings had warped him into something that slunk around the shadows and took strength from the night. The true monster under the bed. They had until the sun fell to come up with a plan.

An hour later, Owen and his friends were still trying to come up with their own plan.

“So, should we split up?” Digger asked.

“No, bad idea,” Ambrose grunted.

“Good idea, we’ll cover more ground,” Nick said.

Ambrose smacked his hand against his face.

“What exactly are we looking for?” Doc asked. “I mean . . .”

Owen sat on the end of one of the beds, looking down at Ezra’s journal. He swept his fingers over it. “I don’t even know. I just want to know what happened to them, you know?”

Ezra moved closer, an ache in his chest. He reached instinctively, meaning to put his hand on Owen’s shoulder, but stopped himself just in time. Owen shivered as Ezra pulled his hand back.

Nick sat on the bed beside him, brushing past Ezra and almost stepping through him. Ezra stumbled away. Being walked through was still one of the most unpleasant sensations.

“Look, bud, I understand where you’re coming from here. But how much are you expecting to learn by walking around with a recorder and a . . . feeling that someone’s watching you?”

“Do you feel like someone’s watching you?” Owen asked.

“Little bit.”

“Me too.”

Ezra met Ambrose’s eyes with a wince. “Told you.”

“Maybe if you just try to make him see you, he’ll be satisfied, and they’ll leave and be safe.”

“I can’t make him see me, Ambrose, that would . . . that would stir his mind all up.”

“What do you think Boone Jennings’ll do to him?”

Ezra gritted his teeth. “So we just keep him away from them. They’ll never know they’re in danger, they’ll never know we’re here. They’ll never know
he’s
out there.”