The Medium (Emily Chambers Spirit Medium Trilogy #1) (13 page)

"No, it's
the dead one." He crossed his arms and challenged me with that glare of
his in the mirror's reflection.

My own glare faltered.
I looked away, mortified and at a loss for words. There was no suitable comeback
to his response, let alone a witty one.

He sat on the
foot of my bed with a sigh. "I didn't want all the fuss and formality of you
and your sister meeting me in the drawing room and your new maid serving us tea
as if this were a proper social call. There is nothing proper about my visits,
Emily. Nothing at all." His voice faded towards the end, as if he wasn't
sure he wanted to say it.

"It's just
a little disconcerting," I said. "Most of the ghosts I see are ones
I've summoned. Occasionally I come across a spirit haunting a building but I've
never had one come and go in my house before. Besides which, I'm not used to
male company in the drawing room let alone my bedroom."

He leaned back
against one of the posts at the foot of my bed. "This is not how I
envisaged our talk to go but somehow...somehow our conversations never do seem
to head in the direction I want them to." I was trying to decipher his
meaning when he tilted his head to the side and looked at me puppy-like, giving
me his crooked smile. "I just wanted to speak to you."

Only speak? If he
gave me that smile and that look I'd let him do almost anything.

The thought made
my insides clench. Oh lord, was I the sort of woman my sister called a wanton?

"What did
you want to talk to me about?" If I didn't rein in my wild thoughts I
might find myself saying, and doing, something I regretted.

"I went to
see Blunt."

"Ah. The
master of the North London School for Domestic Service. Did you haunt him?"

"I did."
The smile was back but it lacked the sense of fun of earlier.

"And?"

"And
sometimes I like being a ghost. I gave him the full spiritual experience—flying
objects, knocking, emptying the bedpan, and my personal favorite, writing a note
ordering him to cease his visits to the girl's dormitory.

"Do you
think he'll comply?"

"The note
told him that if he did not, the hauntings will continue. If his begging for
mercy is anything to go by, I think he has seen the error of his ways."

I clapped my
hands. "On behalf of all the poor children at the school who'll never know
what you did for them, thank you, Jacob. You're a true hero."

His fingers
plucked at my quilt. "Don't, Emily."

"Why not? What
you did tonight was a wonderful, selfless act. It'll bring about a change in
Blunt's behavior, I'm sure of it."

He shook his
head. "That may be, but don't call me a hero. It's easy to do what's right
when there are no consequences like grave injury, a ruined reputation or death."

The sad edge to
his voice pierced my heart. I wanted to see his face but his gaze was downcast
so I crept out of the covers to the foot of the bed where he sat. I no longer
cared if he saw me in my nightgown. It covered me from neck to toe anyway.

His fingers
stilled and he glanced up at me without lifting his head. "Don't come any
closer," he said.

I ignored him
and sat knee to knee with him. He shifted his leg away. "Why not?" I
asked.

"Your
sister—."

"Forget
about Celia. This isn't about her, or me, this is about what's troubling you."

He shook his
head. "Just don’t come any closer to me. It...disturbs me."

"What about
it disturbs you?"

He stood and
paced the room, going from one side to the other in five easy strides. My bedroom
wasn't large but nor was it small. He had very long legs. "I didn't just come
here to discuss Blunt." The conversation was leaping back and forth like a
skittish hare. I had no choice but to try and follow.

"Then what else
did you want to talk about?"

"There was
a death tonight."

I sat back on my
haunches. "Who died?"

He stopped
pacing and finally looked at me. "A footman on his night off. He'd had a
few drinks at The Lion's Head in Holborn and fell into a drunken sleep in a
nearby alley. I don't know his name." He started pacing again. "Bloody
hell, I should have found out his name!"

I shivered. I
knew where this was going. "It was the demon, wasn't it?" I
whispered.

He stopped
again, nodded, and rubbed a hand over his face. He looked tired, which was
absurd given he no longer required sleep. "This is the second victim."

"Second?"

"The first,
a woman, didn't die. Yet."

I breathed
deeply in an attempt to calm my churning stomach but it did nothing. I still
felt like throwing up. "Do you think...?" Oh God, it was too horrible
to even say it but I had to. "Do you think someone directed the demon to
attack these two people? These two specifically, I mean?"

He shrugged. "I
don't know. The Administrators are giving me as much information as they have
and so far there seems to be nothing linking the two incidents. The victims
aren't known to each other and the attacks occurred in separate parts of the
city. The first one, the woman, happened in Whitechapel. She's a prostitute, no
family, lived alone in a single room she used for her work."

The poorest of
the poor then.

"The footman
died in a better part of town. If he had any money on him, it was gone when his
body was found the next morning."

"So the
attacks were completely random?"

"Possibly. If
the demon is out of control then it would attack the easiest target—a woman
alone, a man asleep in the alley. Shape-shifting demons may have a large
appetite but they don't like to work too hard for their food if they don't have
to. But there's more to it that makes me think the second attack at least
wasn’t random."

"What?"

"The house
where the footman worked was burgled soon after his death."

"Burgled! You
don't think it's simply a coincidence?"

"There
doesn't appear to be any broken windows or doors, no sign of forced entry."

It took a few
moments for his words to sink in. Then it hit me like a punch to the chest. "The
demon took on the form of the footman it killed and someone unwittingly let it
in thinking it was the real servant."

Jacob nodded
grimly. "It probably wandered up to the service entrance and was let in by
one of the staff."

I shivered and
wrapped my arms around myself.

"You're
cold." Jacob was beside me in a heartbeat, my shawl in his hands. He came
up behind me and placed it around my shoulders but instead of letting go, he
kept a hold of the edges. He was very close. I could feel his strength, his
essence, pulsing between us, as alive and real to me as my own. Without
thinking, I leaned into him. His body was hard, solid, a comfort despite the
lack of a heartbeat or warmth. If I turned around, tilted my head, I could kiss
him...

He suddenly
stood and moved away.

"I
shouldn't have come here," he said. And then he was gone. Just like that. No
warning, no discussion, just gone.

"No! Jacob,
come back!" I scrambled off the bed and stood on the spot where he'd been.
"Come back, I want to talk to you. I have something important I need to
ask you. Please, Jacob." My voice was a whine but I didn't care. I just
wanted him to return. Partly for me—because I selfishly wanted him there—but
partly because I suspect he needed to speak about what had happened. Not to the
Administrators or anyone else in the Waiting Area but to
me
.

"I know you
can hear me," I said, knowing nothing of the sort. "Listen. I want to
stop this demon from hurting anyone else. Help me decide what to do next."
I waited but he didn't reappear. "Talk to me Jacob. Tell me how to
proceed." Still no answer. "Very well, I'll tell you what I think I
should do. I'll wait for the peddler to come but I have a suspicion she won't."
If she'd been the one to curse the amulet then she'd be a fool to show up again.
"So I'll simply have to find out more about the two victims, see if there
is indeed no link between them."

"You'll do
no such thing," Jacob said, reappearing in front of me, hands on his hips.
He looked very big, very powerful, and very dangerous.

I smiled. "Good.
Now please stop popping out like that. I find it more disturbing than your
sudden appearances."

"You will
not go into Whitechapel on your own, and you will not ask questions about
either victim." He held up his hands, warding me off. "Let me
rephrase that. You will not go into Whitechapel
at all
. Ever. With or
without me, and with or without the entire British Army at your disposal. Disregard
everything you've ever heard about that place, it's ten times worse. Do you
understand?"

I nodded. "Of
course."

He eyed me
closely. "You won't go venturing into that part of London?"

"I won't."

His eyes
narrowed to slits. Clearly he didn't believe me. "You don't strike me as a
stupid female."

"Thank you,
I think." It was probably unwise to tell him I'd only said I'd follow up
on the victims in order to get him to return to my room. I had no intention of
investigating on my own. "Now that we've established that, do you think
you could stay awhile. Sit." I indicated the stool at my dressing table. "Talk
to me."

He crossed his
arms and remained standing. "You should go back to sleep. Dawn's still an
hour away."

"I won't get
any more sleep tonight."

He gave an
apologetic grimace. "I shouldn't have woken you and burdened you with the
gruesome events of the evening. There's nothing you can do about them."

"I'm glad
you did wake me. I'm one link in the chain that led to the demon being summoned
and I want to be kept informed of everything it does." I sighed. "At
least we now know why the demon was summoned here."

"To kill a servant
from a rich household, take their form then burgle the master's house." He
scrubbed a hand over his chin. "Unfortunately there are hundreds of houses
that could be targeted next and thousands of servants."

Which meant we
were no better off than before. We couldn't anticipate where the next attack
would be, couldn't alert potential victims.

"Good
night, Emily."

"Wait,
don't go yet." I searched for something to keep him in my room and said
the first thing that popped into my head. It happened to be the most honest
thing. "I'm also glad you came here tonight because I...I wanted to see
you."

"Why?"

Ah. Well. I
could
tell him I just liked gazing at his handsome face or that I enjoyed his
company, but I wasn't a fool. Jacob was used to girls noticing him. George
Culvert told me so. Even his mother had admired Jacob. So why would he want yet
another girl—and a middle-class oddity of dubious parentage at that—staring at
him? I might be the only person who could see him now that he was a ghost but
he'd had a lifetime of people staring at him. He must be heartily sick of it. Indeed,
that's probably why he'd tuned most people out when he was alive. Too many
admirers must make one immune after a while.

So instead of
telling him that, I made up something else. "I tried once before to summon
my mother's ghost but she never came. I was wondering...if...perhaps you could ask
the Administrators in the Waiting Area about her." I had wanted to ask him
about Mama ever since he'd arrived in our drawing room, and now seemed like the
perfect opportunity. "Perhaps they can tell you if she's already crossed. I've
tried to summon her but...she hasn't answered."

He reached out
and I thought he was going to touch my face or my hair but instead he fingered
the fringe of my shawl. "I'm sorry. She's gone. I already asked the
Administrators after I met you the first time and they told me your mother had
crossed quickly into her assigned section of the Otherworld."

"But that
means she had nothing to tie her here." No outstanding business, nothing
to say to anyone. Nothing to say to
me
. How could she not want to tell
me about my father when she knew how important it was to me?

"There is
an aunt in the Waiting Area though. Do you want to summon her?"

"An aunt? You
mean
my
aunt?"

He smiled. "Yes,
your aunt. Your mother's sister, a Mrs. Catherine Sloane. She died about a
month ago and hasn't yet crossed."

"I have an
aunt? Had," I corrected myself. Catherine Sloane was dead.

He nodded. "She
might know...something about your mother." He was too much of a gentleman
to mention the unmentionable—the question of my father's identity. "Do you
want to summon her?"

I caught his
fingers and squeezed. He stared at our linked hands, a look of alarm on his
face. Then he squeezed back. "Yes," I said. "Yes I do."

He separated our
hands. "Then I'll leave you alone to talk."