Chapter 28
Ezra vanished into the Thayersons’ apartment after giving them lots of smiles and friendly banter I had yet to encounter from the guy, and we searched for the line.
The fact that we’d caught the kid acting strange on camera, and it hadn’t been only me to see it this time, weighed heavily on my mind. Distracting, to say the least.
We wandered the halls, Angel and I purposely keeping our distance to see if he was muting my magic somehow, but neither I, nor Bobby’s scanner, found any trace of the line.
Angel grew more agitated the further we explored, his gaze often warming my back as I took the lead.
Was he worried I’d run into something? Each time I glanced his way, he seemed to calm, and always offered a tight smile.
“Let me test my understanding,” Bobby said as we browsed the storage area, wandering between the cages now that we had a key from management.
While we couldn’t get into each unit, we could see and scan into each one, and so far, like everything else, we’d found nothing.
I had a sinking feeling that this was a wild goose chase that would end in everyone being disappointed with me. “You saw the line in the lobby first.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Then when you got off the elevator on the Thayersons’ floor.”
I nodded.
“Then followed it all the way down here, but it was fading the whole time. Like the energy was waning, maybe?”
“Sure?”
“What if we go up?” Wade asked.
“I was thinking that, too. We followed all the way down, but maybe it didn’t start on the Thayersons’ floor. Maybe that’s why you were seeing it fade. We weren’t near enough to the source?” Bobby said.
“Uh, okay,” I agreed.
“Energy theory,” Bobby said. “It’s a little more complicated when it comes from across the Veil, but I have a few books that philosophize about how it works.”
“Yeah?” I asked. “Can I borrow them sometime?”
“Sure,” Bobby said, then waved his scanner. “Let’s head up.”
“The top two floors are one unit,” Wade said.
“Penthouse.” He held up his phone, showing a picture of schematics.
“A small roof deck, which is actually on the third from the top, and that floor and the one below it are split into two large units, only one of which is filled. Penthouse is filled, but it looks like it’s rented to a company for business rather than a regular tenant. ”
“We won’t have access to the penthouse,” Bobby said. “Not without a warrant. We need a special key for it, and a business isn’t going to let us waltz around even if there isn’t anyone staying right now. But we can check the floors below, and the roof deck.”
Since we hadn’t run into Cassidy yet, I hoped he’d left while we were busy elsewhere.
We all returned to the elevator. Ezra had not joined us, and Angel said he had gotten a message that Ezra would be uploading more video files to our portal once he was done, but that he was back in the van.
For a guy who was really good at getting people to talk when he interviewed them, Ezra seemed to be the least social person on the team. Or maybe it was me he was avoiding.
The two floors above the Thayersons’ met us with crickets, which made me sigh in frustration.
Angel slipped his fingers into mine and tugged me toward the stairway instead of the elevator.
His energy curled around me like a warm hug, and I wished I could sink into his arms right that minute.
Chasing ghosts, or a ghost of magic if that’s what this was, whittled away at my confidence.
We took the stairs to the next level, clearing three, then headed to the floor below the roof deck. Before he could open the door, I grabbed Angel’s hand and pulled it from the handle. A chill ran through me. I shivered and shook my head.
“I smell ozone,” Angel said. His gaze met mine. “What are you sensing?”
I squeezed his hand hard. “Feels like someone is dancing on my grave. I don’t know how else to describe it. A chill down my spine? Only, multiplied by a thousand.”
Bobby and Wade appeared behind us, scanner up. Wade was ready with taser pulled.
“Everyone ready?” Wade asked.
I swallowed hard, but nodded.
Wade flipped the handle and shoved the door open, all of us taking cover to each side of the frame, out of sight range, but silence stretched beyond the door. Wade went first, taser pointing into the hall. Bobby behind him. Angel took up the rear, behind me.
“I don’t smell anyone,” Wade said. “Or hear any heartbeats that aren’t ours.”
Handy senses, I thought as I tiptoed through the opening, worrying about whatever weird magical signature might be giving me the heebie-jeebies.
A giant splat of purple ran across one wall, a thousand cracks spanning outward like creepy fingers.
I pointed at the wall and glanced at Bobby’s scanner, but it showed nothing. Fuck.
He ran the scanner both ways, slowly panning. If this was like those creepy kid handprints, it wasn’t showing up.
“I have other settings to try,” Bobby said, fiddling with the machine. Wade wandered to the end of the hall and back.
“Great. Another useless superpower: Seeing magical graffiti that’s invisible to multi-million dollar tech. I’m a human spooky-doodle detector,” I griped.
“This side has one resident who is currently out of the country.” He stared at his notes. Then nodded to the side where I’d indicated the color swatch of energy lingered. “This one is empty. I can go down and see if they will let us in, since the unit isn’t rented.”
“Describe what you see,” Angel said to me. “And don’t touch anything.”
I glared at him, then waved my hand at the wall that spanned the length of the hall.
The webbing of color overlaid the single door and curved around the far wall as if stretching for the other apartment.
“It’s like a giant, purple, smoky spider web,” I said, adding a long list of details, including where it started and ended.
“Undulating.” I had to shake my head as staring at it too long made my head hurt. What the hell was it?
“For the record,” Bobby said, “Jude’s eyes are black.”
“And being near me isn’t muting that ability,” Angel added as he stood at my back, as though ready to grab me if something went south fast.
“What does it mean?” I asked. “A Veil tear?” I tiptoed closer to the doorway, wondering if I could determine the source. “It almost looks like ice? Wrong color, but like something inside began to freeze and turn into this purple stuff.”
“Maybe,” Bobby said. He cursed softly, though I still caught it.
“None of your settings are working?”
“Sorry.”
I hovered my hand a half foot above the nearest mark, wondering if I could sense anything more. Why couldn’t they detect it? Was this some weird demon energy? Or something else? Angel slipped his arm around my waist.
“I’m not going to touch it,” I promised him.
“Mhmm,” he grumbled, sticking close.
“The door looks weird, like… fuck. I’m not poetic at all.
But if I were reading a book about fairy magic, I’d think it was some kind of barrier made of otherworldly ice?
” I leaned in to examine a line and a face popped through the door, semitransparent and screaming.
I gasped, and jolted backward, Angel catching me as I flailed.
I sucked in air and glared at the door; the face gone. “Please tell me you caught that on camera.”
“Sorry,” Bobby said, taking a few seconds to rewind the recording from his gadget. “I’ve tried every setting I have.”
“What did you see?” Angel asked.
“A face. It came through the door.”
He glanced down the hall and back.
“It went back in.” I waved at the door.
“Your eyes are red now,” Bobby said.
“A ghost?” Wade wondered.
“Maybe?”
“Let me call Ezra and see if he can get the keys. This apartment is supposed to be empty and there’s no history of any deaths in this building,” Wade said. He glanced my way. “Don’t touch anything.”
I stared at him, overwhelmed, and frustration hitting hard. Why was I the only one who could see it?
“Stand next to Bobby, please,” Angel said, giving me a little push as Wade made his way down the hall to make his call.
“Why?” I asked. But as soon as I stood beside Bobby, Angel began to strip. I blinked, unable to tear my gaze away from those ink covered shoulders, arms, and his sculpted torso.
His hands went to his pants, eyes meeting mine as he tilted his head, daring me to watch as he unbuttoned his pants.
I turned my head to give him a sense of privacy, heat burning my face.
The air filled with a strange, heated tickle, and I expected to hear bones popping or something, but other than a small huff, there was nothing.
Then Angel in cat form nuzzled my fingers, seeking pets.
I gave him scratches for a few seconds before he wandered to the door, sniffing low.
“His nose is one of the best in all of SED,” Bobby said. He kept the scanner on the door as he tried a few more settings. “Are you still seeing anything?”
“Just the purple web. Do you and him have one of those talk to each other mind bonds like him and Victor?” I asked.
“No. That’s a regular vampire thing, and as far as I know, Victor is the only one who has it with Angel.”
“Yeah?” I had a lot of questions, but Angel focused on the door, sniffing close along the lines as though he could smell them.
“You smell anything?” He stared at me a minute, wandering the length of the hall and back.
The elevator dinged, and Ezra stepped out with someone not in an SED uniform.
The man hesitated when he saw Angel’s cat form a few feet away.
“That’s one of our agents,” Wade said. “Trying to determine a scent.”
“For something you don’t know how to explain?” The man said, sounding annoyed. “Whatever.” He stomped past us all to the door and unlocked it, shoving it open and standing off to the side. “It’s unoccupied, as I told your other agent.”
Angel darted through the door first and I followed, worried he’d walk into a zombie nightmare.
But inside, the place was wide open, bright light shining through the windows, and completely empty.
Whatever purple stretched across the walls outside either hadn’t penetrated into the apartment or my power had stopped working.
Wade and Bobby wandered in behind us. Ezra remained at the door with the apartment manager. I followed Angel from room to room, searching for a sign of the magic, or whatever that purple web had been, but found nothing. Fuck.
My gut flipped over with anxiety. Maybe it was all in my head? I caught Angel’s gaze and shook my head. He let out a tiny huff and ushered me toward the door. Bobby scanned everything with the setting he’d used to find the handprints, but if he found something, he didn’t share.
I stepped out of the apartment, glanced back at the wall, and found the purple mesh gone. Angel lifted his snout and sniffed, and I knew he had lost the scent of ozone too. Maybe I had caused this?
“So, to be clear,” I said, gathering Angel’s clothes, “the one time I want a magical crime scene to stick around, it ghosts me. Literally.”
Ezra stared above our heads; arms crossed over his chest as if annoyed.
The manager texted someone, and Wade and Bobby left the apartment, thanking the man for his time.
Angel huffed at Wade and led me down to the elevator.
I was more than ready to get out of there, and maybe check myself into a mental institution.