Sinister Entity (6 page)

“I don’t even waste my time if I sense there isn’t something credible there. And trust me, I know. Don’t ask me how, I just know. I’ve been able to ever since…”

Her mind had wandered for a moment, drifting back to a cold cabin in a distant place.
 

“I know, honey. I know,” Angela had said, reaching out to hold her hands in her own.
 

The physical contact had broken the pull of her past. “Yeah. Well, truth is, I don’t give a shit about debunking because if there’s nothing real there, I’ll have that figured out at least after my first few hours in the house. The only reason I do this is to show them the truth. Maybe if more people weren’t blind, life on the planet would be different. And if it’s something with some bad juju, I’m there to make it disappear.”

Jessica smirked at the memory as she kicked the Jeep’s door closed.
 

The front lawn smelled of sweet, fresh-cut grass and she could hear kids splashing in a pool.
 

Tim and Kristen McCammon must have been waiting by the window because they opened the door a second before Jess rang the bell. Tim was wearing an extra loud Hawaiian shirt from the Tommy Bahama middle-aged-white-guy collection and khaki cargo shorts that exposed a pair of hairless legs. Kristen looked as if she had just come back from the tennis club, her tan skin in sharp contrast to her white blouse and thigh-high shorts. Neither looked as if they had been sleeping well.
 

“The girls are out in the back swimming with their older cousin,” Kristen said as she led her into the house. “I told them not to come in so you wouldn’t have to worry about showing us anything you may have recorded.”

“That’s good, because there’s some stuff in here that’s pretty intense.”

“Maybe we should join the girls,” Tim joked, his forced laughter unable to hide his trepidation.
 

Jessica put her laptop on the kitchen table and started it up while connecting a larger monitor.
 

“When I show you the video and you hear the audio, you have to remember that I was egging it on. I don’t want you to think that this is something that will be a nightly occurrence. Like I told you, I’m kind of a lightning rod for this stuff. The good news is, we can rule out any of the girls as the catalyst.”

“What’s the bad news? If there’s good news, there’s always bad news to follow,” Kristen said, pressing her hand to her heart. Tim reassuringly rubbed the tops of her shoulders.
 

“I wouldn’t call it bad news. Let’s just say I have a little more work to do. I may be young, but I’m old school when it comes to what I do. I don’t just make recordings and run, which is why I’ve been to your house more times than the mailman the past month. There’s something I still need to figure out here. I’ll show you in a minute.”

Her computer beeped to life and Jess entered her password to access her laptop. “Tim, if you can just sit on the other side of me, I’ll go through everything I caught.”

Chapter Ten

Summer had just started, but the thermometer told Greg Leigh it was in full force no matter what the calendar said. He slipped on a sleeveless T-shirt and his bathing suit, tried to comb his short, wiry, salt-and-pepper hair—though more salt than pepper lately—and admitted defeat by clamping his old Portland Sea Dogs baseball cap on his head.
 

Rita and Selena were sitting in the breakfast nook, talking over bowls of cereal. Selena wore pajamas that were too small and too tight on her burgeoning curves for his taste, but he’d been told numerous times by Rita to leave the dress code to her. “Where’s Rick?” he asked as he reached for a box of cereal bars.
 

Rita answered, “He went with Sean and his mom to baseball practice. I told him I could get ready and watch him but he said he’s too old to have his mom and dad there.”

Selena rolled her eyes. “He almost cried when you couldn’t be at practice just three weeks ago.”

“He’s at that age, honey,” Rita said with a shrug. “One minute he wants to be a man, the next he wants to be a boy. It’s not easy. Look at your father. He’s still struggling with it.” She smiled at Greg over her coffee mug.
 

“Don’t be jealous of my youth,” he said before shoving an entire breakfast bar in his mouth. “Anyone like seafood?” he mumbled.
 

“Gross, Dad. No one wants to see your chewed up food. I see what you mean, Mom.”
 

Selena took her empty bowl to the sink and went upstairs to her room.
 

“Tough crowd,” Greg said.
 

“There’s nothing cool or amusing about us right now. She’ll snap out of it just in time to ask you to pay for her wedding.”

“I don’t even want to think about that. I guess that leaves me with no helpers to change the oil and wash and wax the car, unless you want to be my buddy?” Greg tipped the bill of his cap up with a flick of his finger and sauntered over to Rita. “What say you, pardner?”

She patted his chest as she rose from her chair. “I’d love to, but I have an appointment to get my mani-pedi. After that, I have to do anything that doesn’t involve changing oil or washing and waxing cars.”

“You don’t know what you’re missing. When I’m buff and bronze from being outside all day, you’ll wish you took me up on my offer.”

“I’ll take my chances. Have fun.”
 

Greg watched her walk away, still disbelieving that the toned body outlined by the sun passing through her thin robe belonged to his wife of almost twenty years. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about her transformation. He was equal parts impressed by her determination, turned on and, to be honest, intimidated and a bit uneasy. It was as if she were becoming a new person, and when she did, would he still have a place in her new life? He shook his head to chase the thoughts of his own insecurities away.
 

“Time to play with the Charger.”

The air was heavy and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. He pulled the well-worn metal ramps out from under his work bench and went into the driveway to inspect the alignment. The sun warmed the back of his neck and arms. He placed a cinderblock behind each ramp so they wouldn’t slip out from under his tires as he pulled up onto them. It was foolish to drive onto the ramp without a spotter, but he’d done it so many times he considered himself an expert. One wrong move and he could easily drive up and over the crest of the ramp and wedge it under his car. Shuddering at the thought, he walked back out to the driveway.
 

He waved to Mr. Murphy across the street. The old man was out weeding his garden, garbed in his typical yellow polo shirt, plaid shorts that had seen better days, black socks, loafers and straw hat. Rita had told him often how she would leave him if he ever developed Mr. Murphy’s fashion sense in his dotage. He secretly admired the old man’s lack of giving a frog’s fat ass what anyone thought. That was one of the benefits of growing old. You no longer had to care about the small stuff.
 

Everyone considered Mr. Murphy the patriarch of the neighborhood and out of respect, couldn’t bring themselves to call him by his first name, Al.
 

The sun felt good on Greg’s skin and the air still carried a little of the dampness from the night before. If he timed things just right, he’d be done with the car around noon, which meant he could spend the rest of the day sitting back on the porch and watching the day go by with a few beers.
 

His black ’74 Dodge Charger sat in the driveway, looking as if it had just rolled off the factory floor. He’d bought it at an auction ten years ago when it was in pretty sorry shape. Back when he was in high school and college, he and his friend Fred made it a hobby to buy old Mustangs, restore them to their former glory and resell them for a tidy profit. It beat the hell out of working in a retail store or waiting tables, and it was fun. That all changed when Fred joined the army and was sent to Fort Bliss in the searing heat of southern Texas. Rebuilding cars without Fred wasn’t as much fun, so Greg put on a dress shirt and tie and got his first office job. Before he knew it, he was married and raising a family, so there wasn’t any time to get dirty under a hood.
 

That all changed when the kids got old enough to go an hour without crying and Rita told him he needed a hobby. She didn’t have to tell him twice and he knew just what he wanted to do.
 

The Charger was a real challenge, but damn it was worth every ounce of effort. He considered it his third child. And this one he raised all by himself.
 

He noticed a smudge mark by the rear quarter panel. Greg pulled out a soft cloth to buff it away.
 

“It sure is nice to see a real car on the block,” Mr. Murphy called over. “Not like these new cars that look the same. All these rice burners have the charm of a shoe box. You do good work, Greg.”

“Thanks. Someone has to keep tradition alive,” he replied with a grin.
 

“You need any help getting it on the ramps?” Mr. Murphy fiddled with a pair of pruning shears. His straw hat, frayed at the ends and looking as if a breeze would undo the loosening weave, started to slip off. He snatched it in midair and crushed it back onto his head. Greg laughed inwardly. The old codger still had good reflexes.
 

“I’ll be fine. Let me know if
you
need any help mowing the lawn.”

Mr. Murphy waved him off. “My power mower just about does all the work by itself. All I need to do is steer the damn thing.” His laughter degraded to a hacking cough. He’d been a lifetime smoker, tearing off the filters so he could get the good stuff, as he liked to call it. At age eighty, it hadn’t slowed him down a bit. The man had good genes.
 

Mr. Murphy went back to his garden and Greg got behind the wheel. The black leather seat was already hot enough to bake the back of his legs and the steering wheel was no better. He turned the key and the engine gave a low, steady purr. The old car vibrated like a racehorse itching to burst from the starting gate.
 

“Easy there, girl.”

Greg dropped the gear into drive and eased off the brake. The car rolled slowly up the driveway and halfway into the garage. He stopped when he heard the scrape of the metal ramps on concrete as the front tires hit the lip. He got out to make sure the tires were lined up with the exact center of the ramps, checked the blocks behind them and slid back into the driver’s seat.
 

This was where it got tricky. He had to give it just enough gas to get to the top of the ramp. Too much and he’d overshoot them. If he did it too fast, the pressure might cause one of the ramps to scoot forward.
 

He toed the gas pedal and made sure the wheel was locked in position. The Charger started its slow, steady ascent. The view out of the windshield changed as it rose higher, the ceiling now in full view.
 

Greg waited for the telltale
thunk
as the tires hit the depressed slots at the top of the ramp. Any second.
 

He looked up and gasped.
 

What the hell was Selena doing in front of the car?

Because he was doing it alone, he hadn’t left much space between where the car would rest and the back wall. If she stayed there, she could be pinned between the car and the wall.
 

“Selena, get out of there!” he shouted as he slammed the brakes.
 

She looked at him with cold, emotionless eyes. If he hadn’t just seen her fifteen minutes before, he would have sworn she was sleepwalking. She had gone through a terrifying phase of it when she was twelve. He and Rita called it
The Year Without Sleep
. Months of counseling did nothing to stop it. The day after she turned thirteen, it simply stopped. No rhyme, no reason.
 

Suddenly, the right side of the car dipped and the ramp shot forward like a cannon ball.
 

He didn’t even have time to scream at his daughter to move. The ramp clanged off the wall the same time as the car slammed down on its struts. Greg was jolted to his side and lost sight of Selena.
 

He jammed into park and jumped out of the car, sure to find Selena in a crumpled heap on the cold floor. He cursed himself for setting the ramps up so far into the garage and for not locking the door that led to it.
 

His heart stopped when he looked down and saw nothing but an empty, oil-and-grease-spotted floor.
 

“Selena?”

Panicking, he dropped to his knees and looked under the car.
 

Please, please, please, don’t be hurt,
he silently begged.
 

She wasn’t under the car, either.
 

“Selena?” he said, his voice cracking with concern.

He was answered with a muffled, “What?”

It was Selena, but she was upstairs in the room above the garage.
 

“Honey, are you okay? You scared the hell out of me,” he called up through the ceiling.
 

Her footsteps walked across the floor and down the steps. She opened the door, saw the tilted car and said, “What did I do now? Why are you asking if I’m okay?”