“Nothing happened. It was just… flirting. Sort of.” Her body stilled. “
“Joo know Eduardo?” Sylvia asked, excitement quickening her already rapid-fire words. “We gonna see him? If he was in cahoots with Oscar, I got some t’ings to say to him.”
Cait reached out to hit the switch. The doors slid open onto a dark hallway. “Jesus, what the fuck now?” She peeked outside the car. Red beams of light pierced the darkness up and down the hallway. She released a relieved breath and stepped out. “Flashlights.”
“The power’s out?” Jason whispered, as he joined her in the hallway.
“I see a spirit!” Madame Xavier’s voice echoed in the darkness. “Her essence is bright, luminous. She’s right beside you, Cait.”
Cait was instantly glad for the darkness because she rolled her eyes. “Sam?” she called.
“Right behind Madame,” he said, irritation deepening his voice. “I see you had some success.”
Cait made a face as he shone the light at her. “A lot of good it’s gonna do.”
“I don’ like thees,” Sylvia hissed with a shake of her head.
“You don’t have a thing to worry about,” Cait whispered out of the side of her mouth. “You don’t have anything any demon here wants.”
“Got more than joo do,
Glad for once that no one else could hear or see what Sylvia did, Cait moved forward, meeting Sam in the middle of the corridor.
He lifted her hand and slapped a flashlight against her palm. “Clayton insisted,” he said, his voice growling with irritation. “They’re using infrared.”
“Super,” she murmured. “Which means we’re left in the dark.”
“You’re the one who thought this was a good idea.”
Mina rushed forward. “I see a large smudge, roundish, next to Cait.” Her voice was tight with excitement.
“I not round,” Sylvia grumbled.
“Round is a shape,” Cait quipped.
Cait aimed her flashlight past Mina, in the direction of the hallway where the bodies were found. “Sparky hasn’t joined us yet?”
“Not a peep,” Sam muttered. “Beginning to think this might be a bust.”
A shadow ducked from around the corner of the possessed hall, and then back.
“You see that?” Cait asked, pointing. “Somebody else is up here.”
“We sure about that?” Sam asked, then raised his voice to shout, “Booger, Clayton!”
“We’re watching the feed,” came a muffled response. “We’ve already got some great stuff. Orbs, that round smudge Madame Xavier saw.”
“I not round.”
Cait scowled. “Shush, the only one who can hear you is me.”
“Huh. How nice for joo. See how joo like bein’ ignored.
“Seriously, you’re gonna sing that?”
“I’m a Mexican woman, not Patrick Swayze.
“Sylvia, this is not the place!” Cait hissed.
“I’m scared.” She shook her head, blonde hair flipping from cheek to cheek. “Somet’ing don’ feel right.”
“You feel?”
“O’ course. I feel the floor beneat’ my feet ot’erwise I’d be falling t’rough it.”
“Can you feel me?”
Sylvia moved to touch her arm, but her fingers slipped right through her.
“That tickled.”
“I didn’t touch you,” Jason said beside her.
“Wasn’t talking to you.” Cait shot a glare to the side.
“She still there?”
“Sharpie-outlined lips and all.”
Sylvia huffed again. “Stays on longer than lipstick. No matter how much thees lips get kissed.”
“I’ll say,” Cait drawled. “And TMI, by the way.”
From farther down the hall, Madame Xavier fluttered her fingers. “I’ve never seen a spirit that dense or large.”
“She callin’ me fat? She’s got two cheens.”
Cait bit back a laugh. “You’re growing on me, Syl.”
She glanced back down the hall.
Madame Xavier had moved farther away. Her head cocked toward the forbidden hallway. She took several timid steps forward.
“I told her not to go within twenty feet of that hall,” Sam said, his feet stomping beside her.
A pop sounded, and then a bright light shone from the hall. Standing in profile, Madame Xavier craned her neck to stare down the hallway, her gaze snagging on something, her eyes growing round.
“Sam, it’s charging up!” They were ten feet away, but Cait knew they weren’t going to make it.
“Oh my Lord,” the large redheadeded psychic said before a blinding arc darted outward, striking her wrist and then pulling upward like a whip.
Her arm jerked up, and she screamed.
She and Sam raced the last few feet but were too late. The arc whipped again and pulled Madame Xavier off her feet and out of sight, her scream halting abruptly. Another, fainter flash lit the hall.
If Cait had blinked she wouldn’t have seen them. Five nearly transparent spirits, faces locked in horror, Madame Xavier’s among them.
“Ohmygod… ohmygod.” Clayton fell to his knees and dragged in a deep, wheezing breath. “Mina, tell me you got that!”
“What a prince,” Syl whispered, her face ashen, even for a ghost.
The overhead lights flickered on.
Cait blinked then swung her head, finding Sam’s position before she could let loose the panic gripping her chest and manage to form a thought. Because for a second, her mind had frozen with fear.
“Madame looked thinner,” Sylvia said, her eyes tearing up.
Aiming a quelling glare at Sylvia, Cait edged toward Sam as he darted a glance around the corner. His shoulders dropped. “Nothing.
“She’ll be famous.”
They both turned their heads to stare at Clayton, who’d snuck up behind Cait.
The large man’s face was ghostly pale, his eyes a little wild. “I know it’s sad, but she was well aware of the danger.”
Sam gripped the neck of Clayton’s T-shirt and backed him up against the opposite wall. “Did you talk her into going there?”
Clayton’s mouth opened and closed like a widemouthed bass. “She said she’d never seen anything like this place before. It’s what she wanted. To look beyond the veil, she said.”
Sam gave him a little shake, then loosened his grip. “I seriously doubt she intended to commit suicide,” he said, raking a hand through his hair and glaring.
“No, she thought perhaps she could communicate through it.”
Sam gave him one more disgusted stare, and then swept everyone gathered in the hallway. “That’s it. Everyone back. You,” he said, pointing at Clayton. “Get back into your room and close the fucking door. If anyone pops a nose outside, I’ll shoot it off.”
As the Reel PIs crew ambled back into their room, soft sobs sounded beside Cait. Glancing sideways, she
