Chapter 55

KATHERINE.

We’d found Chelsea’s friend. Ernest had led us straight to her – she had been hidden in a cavity in a wall on the third floor and she had been unconscious and badly injured. She had broken bones, cuts all over her body, and a head wound from the speed at which the ghost had carried her through the forest and I couldn't help but feel bad for her because she must have been terrified and in pain before she passed out.

We'd passed her off to Oliver so he could take her to the school's clinic because her wounds had been healing rather slowly, and we'd stayed behind to catch the ghosts that weren't meant to be here and return them to their primary haunting place. We had to do that because if we trapped them where they weren't meant to be, they could easily break out after hours or days.

Theo would be the one doing the catching though, we'd just stayed behind to watch and assist him. We'd be mostly watching because he clearly didn't need any help – he'd singlehandedly taken care of the ghosts that came our way while Ernest was leading us to where Chelsea's friend was – and when we'd made it clear that we weren't leaving after we passed the unconscious girl off to Oliver, he'd reiterated what he told us earlier.

If either of us got hurt, it was going to be our problem. If we got dragged off, he'd only come for us when he felt like.

He was as serious as a heart attack when he repeated it so I was taking it to heart.

The absorber activated, parts of it glowing bright green as it sucked a shrieking ghost into its chamber like a vacuum. The hum the device emitted was even louder as it did that and when it was done sucking the ghost in, it immediately stopped humming and the markings on it began to glow blue.

“I would cheer for you but you'd just get mad if I do,” Josie said as Theo set the absorber on the ground and picked up the empty one next to it.

“Good that you know,” he replied and the urge to cheer just to annoy him pricked at me but I decided against it.

“Guys, we got Menendez! Josie announced and a moment later, Hunter, Keith and Diana replied with ‘Okay!’ from the floors they were on. This was how we'd been keeping track of the ghosts that had been trapped since we couldn't text because the presence of ghosts interfered with the signal.

“Everhart’s on the fourth floor,” Theo said before he began to head in that direction and we followed him.

Theo, Hunter, Keith and Diana had already trapped all the ghosts that shouldn't be here except Everhart because she was rather elusive. Just before we pulled Chelsea's friend out of the wall, she'd come to stop us and scratched me in the process. The wound hurt like a bitch and it still did because it hadn't healed yet.

The stairs groaned as we walked up it and even though the noise was most likely due to the age of the building, I couldn't help but associate it to a ghost.

“What if there's a malevolent spirit up there?” I asked Josie, tightening my hold on the poker, and as she opened her mouth to speak, Theo responded.

“That's not possible.”

“How are you so sure?”

“Because Blackwood won't let that happen.”

I raised a brow at the back of his head. “They're letting ‘this’ happen.”

“Violent spirits will probably kill someone. Malevolent spirits will definitely kill someone. So no, Blackwood won't let them get out of their haunting place.”

“Oh.” Okay, there was a difference but it was still weird that they were letting this happen.

We got to the fourth floor and after spending several minutes going through the rooms and waiting for her to show up, there was no sign of her. I drew my brows together while swinging the flashlight up and down the hallway again as we came out of a room we checked for the third time. There were some floor-to-ceiling windows up here and most of them were broken in some places so I could clearly see outside the building. I couldn’t see if Hunter or Keith were outside because the windows were at the back of the building, but as I stared at the forest, a thought occurred to me.

“Did she leave?”

“No, she's here,” Theo replied and I turned to face him while he heaved a sigh, glancing around. “She's playing with us.”

“The game's not fun.”

The corner of his mouth turned up at that and I couldn’t stop the small smile that crept onto my face. “They hardly are.”

“Can you come out now?” Josie said and I glanced at her to see her staring at the ceiling. “I’m starving.”

“You can leave. No one’s holding you here,” Theo stated and her eyes darted to him while I scanned our surroundings to see if we were still alone. We were.

“No. I want to be the one to trap her in the absorber.”

“Why?”

“Look what she did to my hair,” she replied, holding up her hair so he could see the uneven ends and I shot her a sympathetic look because she was going to have to cut it.

“You shouldn’t have gone after her with no defense.”

“I had to get Lenore back.”

“And you didn’t,” he said, earning a growl from her. “Just saying.”

“Why don’t you use that pulse thing in your backpack?”

“What pulse thing?” I cut in.

“The one that gives off a charge that attracts ghosts to the source.”

“Oh.”

“I don’t want to disturb the other spirits here because of her,” Theo replied and I pursed my lips. From what I’d seen, Ernest was nice and the other spirits that also haunted Renfield – which I’d found out about a couple of minutes ago – hadn’t bothered us so I understood Theo.

“Okay,” Josie muttered, and just as she asked, “Should we search the rooms again?”, Everhart suddenly burst out of the wall right in front of me while screaming, making me jerk back in shock. I must have moved too far and too fast because the next thing I knew, the sound of glass breaking filled my ears and I could see the inky canopy of darkness freckled by stars as I fell backward.

A scream tore from my throat while Josie yelled something and I reached out my hand, trying to grab onto something, but it was futile. I was going to fall. We were on the fourth floor so if I didn’t die from the force of the impact, I was going to end up with serious injuries.

As that went through my head, a hand shot out, firmly grasping mine, and my body hit the wall of the building with a soft thud.

‘Oh my God!’ were the words I repeated in my head as my heart threatened to beat out of my chest while I glanced at the ground below before looking up to see Theo hauling me back up.

Once he pulled me up halfway, he wrapped his other hand around me and pulled me the remaining way up. The moment my feet touched the ground, he let go of me before grabbing me again as my knees buckled.

“Oh my God,” I muttered before lifting my gaze to his and my breath hitched in my throat as I realized just how close we were. One strong breeze and our faces would be touching. A frisson of tension buzzed between us and I swallowed while he blinked at me once, twice. “...Thank you,” I said softly before he gently set me on the ground.

“Don’t mention it.”