Chapter One
One
Monterey, California
Present day
“As one of the oldest towns in California, Monterey is home to ghosts and ghouls of all types!” intoned the leader of the ghost tour. His voice dropped to a theatrical whisper. “Look around you, and open yourselves up to the possibilities, and you just might realize that ghosts are everywhere.”
Harper fixed her gaze on the restaurant’s shiny brass-framed front door, willing her friend Tariq to walk in. Where the hell was he? He was the reason she was here tonight, waiting for a ghost tour she did not want to go on in the first place.
It was her own damned fault. She should have known better than to make a bet after drinking too much sparkling wine at her birthday party.
She was no kid, after all. Which was the point: Harper had just turned forty.
Forty. Hard to know whether to celebrate embarking on a new decade, or to mourn the too-rapid passing of the years.
But she had made the bet, and she had lost, and she was a woman of her word.
So now here she sat, in a historic Fisherman’s Wharf restaurant, along with the other participants of Joel’s Amazing and Wondrous Ghost Tour of Old Monterey.
A full moon sent silvery light streaming in through the wall of windows overlooking the glistening, serene Monterey Bay.
The incessant barking of nearby sea lions could be heard over the clink of silverware and glasses in the busy establishment, where garish neon lights promoted beers and promised a good time, and tacky Halloween decorations—spiderwebs, jack-o’-lanterns, and witches on brooms—abounded.
Harper glanced at her phone. Ten more minutes, and if Tariq doesn’t show, I’m out of here. Losing a bet was one thing, but she’d be damned if she would attend this event alone.
The other tour participants were abuzz with anticipation at the thought of encountering a ghost, their expressions somewhere between excited and nervous.
There was a mother and her teenage daughter visiting from Iowa; a very affectionate couple from France on their honeymoon; an older, retired couple from Arizona; a tall, muscled man with a thick five-o’clock shadow who scowled and seemed as out of place as Harper; and a rather breathless twentysomething blonde who talked a lot about being a “teensy bit psychic.” Such was their group of intrepid ghost hunters this evening.
“May I have your attention please, everyone,” declared the ghost tour guide, clapping his hands.
Boyishly handsome, with a slight build and artistically tousled dark brown hair, Joel Aristide appeared to be in his mid-thirties.
He was dressed for tonight’s tour in an anachronistic Victorian ensemble featuring a black top hat, a white shirt with billowy sleeves, and a waistcoat of green velvet.
As a concession to the Halloween season, he had draped an orange scarf featuring black cat silhouettes around his neck, and in one hand he held a bright orange aluminum water bottle emblazoned with witches on broomsticks and the slogan I ain’t afraid of no ghosts.
“From long before the Gold Rush of 1849 to the Roaring Twenties to today,” said Joel, “our fair city has been host to scandals, fortunes won and lost, jealousy, and intrigue. But before we begin, I must ask: Do any of you consider yourselves…” He paused for dramatic effect, leaning forward and tilting his head as though listening to voices only he could hear. “Sensitive?”
The members of the tour group tittered and exchanged glances.
“By ‘sensitive,’ ” Joel clarified, “I mean, of course, sensitive to the spirit world beyond the veil?”
The young blond woman raised her hand and said, “Maybe, like, a teensy bit?”
“Excellent!” said Joel with gusto. He had an annoying habit of bouncing on the balls of his feet, up and down, up and down. “And perhaps the rest of you will discover tonight heretofore unacknowledged sensitivities to the spirit world. One never knows.”
Harper gave in to a yawn, trying her best to hide it behind her hand, when she felt an elbow digging into her ribs.
“Are we having fun yet?” whispered Tariq, slightly out of breath and carrying the scent of the cold briny air blowing off Monterey Bay.
“Where have you been?” Harper whispered. “You leave me here, alone and defenseless, to face Joel-the-Wondrous-Ghost-Tour-Leader?”
“Give the guy a chance,” Tariq murmured. “You might enjoy yourself. Stranger things have happened.”
“If anyone sees me here, my already questionable reputation will be ruined.”
“Is that why you’re in disguise?” Tariq smiled, noting the knit hat she had pulled down around her ears and the dark-rimmed glasses she didn’t normally wear.
“It’s cold. And my contacts were bothering me.”
“Uh-huh.”
“People are taking photos, and nothing remains a secret anymore with social media. My colleagues would not be amused.”
“You’re being paranoid.”
“I’m being realistic.”
“That’s what paranoids always say,” Tariq said, looking around the restaurant as Joel nattered on. “Besides, don’t you refuse to engage with social media?”
“The moment those social platforms are run by smart women who give away most of their ill-gotten gains for fear of being damned to hell, as exceedingly rich people have done throughout the millennia, I’ll create a social media account. I may even participate.”
Tariq let out a loud bark of a laugh.
Joel halted his spiel and, eyebrows raised, stared pointedly at the pair of them.
“Sorry,” Tariq murmured.
“Is everything all right?” Joel asked.
“Quite,” Harper replied with a fake smile, though “everything” was decidedly not all right.
From what she’d heard so far, Joel had chosen his ghostly tales from the silliest, most credulous popular books and websites.
She should know; she was familiar with them.
She was Doctor Harper Grae, a professor of history specializing in the folklore of ghosts, witchcraft, and all manner of undead.
She had worked hard to complete her degree and establish an academic career.
It had cost her one job, her marriage, and the opportunity to have children and a home.
But it was worth it because history wasn’t trivial.
History mattered.
“Ready, ghost hunters? Let’s go!” Joel said, bouncing up and down a few times before leading the group out of the restaurant and down the historic Fisherman’s Wharf toward the oldest part of town, where several two-story adobe structures held pride of place around a public plaza.
“Here we have the Old Custom House, which is the oldest surviving government building in California, erected in 1827 by the Spanish,” said Joel.
“Probably it was built by the indigenous people, forced to work for the Spaniards, right?” asked the teenage girl.
“I, um, well, I’m not exactly sure. What I do know is that it is said to be haunted by the victims of two gruesome murders: a man and a boy who were killed while guarding the secret location of buried gold.
Here in Monterey, Indians and explorers, priests and pirates, foreigners, farmers, and fishermen…
” Joel intoned. He apparently deemed the phrase worthy of repetition and said again, “Yes, Indians and explorers, priests and pirates, foreigners, farmers, and fishermen…”
“…and a partridge in a pear tree,” Harper muttered.
“Each left their immutable imprint on our little town, be it for good or…for evil.” Like all good showmen, Joel made a point of pausing to make eye contact with each member of the tour.
“Intrigues, swindles, secret affairs, hangings, and shipwrecks…this town has seen them all and then some! Shall we then be surprised that we are home to so many restless spirits?”
“I don’t know. Shall we?” Harper grumbled under her breath, trailing the tour group as it shuffled past a modern conference center and hotel.
“You promised to be good,” whispered Tariq with a low chuckle.
“I promised no such thing. Only that I would go on this ridiculous ghost tour with you. A bet’s a bet.”
“Don’t gamble if you can’t afford to lose,” Tariq said sagely, smiling at Harper’s glare. “Why are you in such a mood lately?”
“What was it that Cate Blanchett said? ‘Never pick a fight with a woman older than forty. They’re full of rage and sick of everyone’s shit.’ Something along those lines.”
“You just turned forty yesterday.”
“I’ve always been precocious.”
“Is there a problem back there?” Joel stared pointedly at Harper and Tariq like a teacher admonishing mischievous second graders on a field trip. The group had halted in front of a large Victorian building fronted with bay windows: the historic Monterey Hotel.
“Not at all,” said Tariq, flashing his bright white, slightly crooked smile. It had won him forgiveness on more than one occasion, including having shown up late to meet Harper.
“Our apologies,” Harper said to Joel. “Please, carry on. You were discussing the spirit that lives in the Monterey Hotel? Fred, is it?”
“Yes. Fred was a carpenter and for years worked for the hotel. He died long ago, but to this day he has been seen fixing the main staircase. To say thank you, the hotel staff keep an altar to him in the basement, well supplied with chocolate and cigarettes, coins, and the occasional bottle of fine Kentucky bourbon.” Joel winked and bounced a couple of times.
“I’ve half a mind to fix those stairs myself! ”
A few chuckles rippled through the tour group, and Joel preened. Bounce, bounce.
The tall, beefy man raised his hand and growled, “Is it true that ghosts are more likely to appear in cases of violent death?”
“Excellent question, Mario!” Joel said. “According to the experts, there are many reasons a spirit might remain earthbound instead of transitioning beyond the veil. But—alas!—as with all experts, they never seem to agree on a single cause.”
The tour group snickered, and Harper found herself paying more attention.