“I’ll take one of the shotguns,” Aubrey said, and something in his voice was light, even though I knew he was serious. I thumbed through the logs, found the most recent missed call, and selected the menu option that returned it. Aubrey sat next to me. The branches of the cherry tree shifted in the breeze.
“Hello?” a woman said. I thought the voice was the same, but it seemed tighter.
“Hi,” I said. “This is Jayne Heller. I think you called my uncle Eric?”
“Oh, thank God,” the woman said. She sounded like she was crying. “Oh, thank God.”
I’D EXPECTED at the soonest, we’d arrange to meet the woman and her dog sometime in the morning. But ten minutes after I ended the call, Aubrey and I were in his minivan headed north for Boulder.
“It used to be left-wing hippie central, kind of the way Colorado Springs is the home port of all the right-wing nut jobs,” Aubrey said. “There were a lot of people dabbling in alternative spiritualities and magic and drugs and things. These days, it’s mostly people who feel like they’re saving the planet because they’re buying groceries from Whole Foods.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Did she tell you anything about what was going on?”
“Just that her dog wanted her to call us,” I said. “I think it has to do with her boyfriend too, but I’m not sure.”
“She was pretty upset, sounds like.”
“Yeah,” I said. Ahead of us, taillights tracked off into the darkness, lines of red in the black. “Yeah, she was pretty messed up. I don’t know what we’re doing, though. I don’t know anything about what Eric used to do.”
“I know enough to start,” Aubrey said. “Hopefully it’ll be simple.”
We turned onto Highway 36, and then sooner than I’d expected, we were pulling onto the South Boulder Road exit. A knot was tying itself in my belly, embarrassment and fear.
I was embarrassed because I was about to go talk to a stranger-a desperate one-about supernatural ghosties slipping into her dog’s mind, and only half of me thought it was possible. The fear was because the other half thought it was.
Candace Dorn’s house was a pretty bungalow with a wide porch, complete with swing. A huge tree commanded the yard, choking out all competition. Even the grass looked thin and unlikely where the tree’s shadow would have fallen in daylight. All the lights were on, the windows blazing, like the woman was trying to push back night itself. Aubrey killed the engine, then reached into the backseat for the leather satchel he’d packed before we left. I grabbed my backpack.
One of the shotguns was back there too. He didn’t take it out, and as we headed up the root-cracked concrete walk to the house, I wasn’t sure if I was relieved at that or worried.
The woman who answered the door reminded me of my high school art teacher. She had dark, curly hair and skin that had tanned too many times, now permanently dark and leathery. She had a dieter’s figure and a pianist’s hands. Something in the way she held herself caught my attention, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“Candace Dorn? I’m Jayne,” I said. “This is Aubrey. He’s here to help.”
“Please come in,” she said, standing back. I wondered whether she’d have done the same thing if we’d had a shotgun. Something made me think she would. “Thank you for coming out. I don’t…I just don’t know what to do. I don’t believe any of this is really happening.”
“Can you tell us what exactly is going on?” Aubrey asked.
The house had hardwood floors and pale patterned rugs. Tin Mexican wall sconces threw white light up the walls, and clunky, colorful paintings struggled to give individuality to furniture that all came from IKEA. I noticed that there was a wicker basket by the fireplace cradling a crushed pillow slicked with white and brown dog hair.
“It started maybe a week ago,” Candace Dorn said. “Charlie-that’s my dog-woke up acting really strange. He was biting himself and barking at my fiance, who he always just loved before. He wouldn’t eat, he wouldn’t let me go out of the house. He’s never been like that before.”
“What did the vet say?” I asked.
Candace paced the length of her living room without answering me. Aubrey sat on the arm of an overstuffed chair.
“I don’t believe in…voodoo or whatever,” Candace said at last.
“What makes you think this is voodoo,” I asked. “Or, you know, whatever?”
Candace opened her mouth, closed it, then walked back toward the rear of the house. Aubrey met my eyes with an unspoken question. I followed her.
The kitchen showed some signs of disarray. One of the cabinet doors was resting against the wall, its hinges broken. The wooden table had a long, fresh gouge white as a scar against the dark varnish. Candace walked to the back door, and I realized what about her stance bothered me. My first semester at college, I’d agreed to play tackle football with some friends even though they’d been drinking. I’d broken one rib and cracked another. For a month afterward, I’d walked just like Candace did now.
When she opened the door, a German shepherd was waiting. He froze when he saw us, his gaze shifting from Aubrey to me and back again. This was Charlie.
“These are the people I called,” Candace said. Her voice was unsteady. “They’re the ones who can help.”
I had never watched an animal’s expression change before. Charlie’s unease became something else. He nodded to me and then to Aubrey. If he’d been human, it would have been a perfect gesture of masculine greeting.
“Charlie,” I said, acting on a hunch, “could you go to Aubrey’s right hand and touch it with your left forepaw?”
Charlie barked once, and then did exactly as I’d asked. Aubrey’s brows rose. Candace Dorn touched her hand to her mouth. There were tears in her eyes.
“That isn’t Charlie in there, is it?” I asked.
She shook her head. The dog looked up at me with an intelligence that I could only think of as human.
“Before this happened,” Aubrey asked, “had anything else changed? A new piece of art or some new person coming into your home? Was anything different?”
“No,” she said. “Nothing happened. It was just one day…”
“And when did your fiance start beating you up?” I asked.
The silence was total. When Candace spoke again, she sounded defeated.
“After I called you,” she said. “After he found out that I’d called.”
Aubrey let out his breath like someone had punched him. Charlie the dog looked up at me, brown eyes fearful and resolute. When I knelt and put my hand on his ruff, he whimpered once.
“There are some things that can displace people,” Aubrey said. “Move into a body and cast the former owner out.”
“Like into an animal,” I said. “Unclean spirits. So when you said that you could handle the easy ones, this wasn’t what you had in mind, was it?”
“Not so much, no,” Aubrey said. “I think we’ll need Ex. If any of us can fix this, it’ll be him. He used to be a Jesuit. Casting out spirits was one part of the coursework.”
Candace Dorn stepped forward, her hand out as if she was stopping us. The unease in her expression made perfect sense to me. We’d just come into this sudden surreal hell that her life had become and started talking like we understood it.
“What are you saying?” she demanded. “What’s going on here?”
“There are things called riders,” I said, surprised by how informed and competent I sounded given that I only knew what I’d been told in the last day or so. “They’re spirits. Our best guess is that one of them took over your fiance’s body and pushed his soul, or whatever you want to call it…”
I pointed at the dog. Charlie whined again. Candace didn’t kneel down so much as melt. Her spun, emptied expression was perfectly familiar. I’d felt exactly like that since my first visit with Eric’s lawyer.
“Aaron?” she said.
The dog-Charlie or Aaron or some combination of the two-stood up and walked over to her. The movement had a dignity that spoke as eloquently as words. I would never have done this to you. Candace started crying in
