The Ghoul Next Door (23 page)

Foster leaned forward, his gaze locked on mine. I had his full attention.

“Something lives in that house,” I said next. “Something evil.”

Subconsciously I saw Foster nod his head slightly.

I raised my hands and hovered them close to my temples. “And that evil starts to get inside your mind. It starts to take over your thoughts. It turns people . . .” I let my voice trail off and watched Foster carefully. He didn’t even blink. It was like he couldn’t believe I knew what’d happened inside that house. That someone was believing in his long-held secret.

“It turned Dan Foster into Deadly Dan. Am I right?”

The unexpected happened, something neither Kendra nor I could have foreseen. Dan Foster began to laugh. He shook his head and said, “You have no idea what you’re playing with, little girl,” he said so softly I almost didn’t hear him. Then he looked up at me again and added, “You’re playing with the devil himself and if you’re not careful, he’ll come to your house next.”

I felt a chill go right through me. There was something so foreboding about what he’d just said, and I tried to shrug it off as Foster simply wanting to scare us, but it was hard to continue to look him in the eye.

I decided to carry on with the interview. If Foster was this cocky, maybe he’d reveal something about the origins of Sy the Slayer. “When was the last time you saw the shadowman?” I asked boldly.

Foster laughed again like he thought my questions were ridiculous—like I was a child asking why the sky was blue. “The shadowman?” he said, and I knew he was about to toy with me. “I see lots of shadows, lady. One came to my cell two days ago and told me he’d found a new playmate. Said her name’s Mary. I don’t know who she is, or where she is, but she’ll be dead before the month is out. You wait. It’ll happen.”

My pulse quickened and my breath caught. I knew then that Foster was saying Sy visited him regularly and Sy was referring to me. What I didn’t know was whether Foster knew that I was Mary. I had to work very hard to continue to sit there calmly and not bolt out the door with the intention of booking the next flight out of Dodge. I could also see Kendra turn the camera toward me, and I knew she was as stunned as I was because I’d told her that I’d introduced myself to Guy Walker as Mary. And that Ken Chamblis had turned to me at the bar and called me Mary.

“Do you know who’s going to do the deed?” I asked Dan.

He shook his head. “No,” he said. “Won’t be me, though,” he said, holding up his chains with a wicked grin. “The shadowman, he’s got somebody on the outside. I always knew there were others like me.”

I lifted my cell phone and tapped the photo app to show him the closet from Stoughton Street. Foster leaned forward a little to look and that wicked smile spread. “That Luke name is new,” he said, squinting. “Maybe he’s the guy for the deed. Maybe he’s the one that murdered my sweet Bethany. I loved her, you know,” he added, and I didn’t believe him for a second. “I would never hurt my sweet Beth.”

I put the phone down into my lap as much to take the image away from Foster as to hide the fact that my hands had started shaking. I knew without a doubt that Dan had been present for at least a portion of Bethany’s murder. He’d been present of mind when he cut her throat. I knew it as certain as I knew anything. Still, Foster seemed to be having fun toying with me and that was good for gathering more information. “Did you know any of the other men the shadow used?” I asked.

“Nah,” Foster said casually, and I could sense he was lying. What I didn’t know was how many of the other men he’d met.

“I have a theory about who the shadowman is,” I said, lifting the phone again to point to the photo. “I think he’s the first name in this closet. Sy the Slayer.”

Dan leaned forward, but it was a bit more like a lunge and he said, “If you’re not careful, he’ll answer when you call his name.”

Kendra and I both sat back a little and the guard leaned forward and put a hand on Foster’s shoulder. It was a warning and Foster immediately sat back. “Sorry,” he said, but given the sick grin he wore, he obviously wasn’t.

Still, he was answering all my questions, so I decided to press on. “It’s okay,” I said. “Do you have any idea where the shadowman might’ve come from?”

Foster shook his head. “Nope.”

That reply seemed genuine. And then I decided to gauge his reaction to a running theory I had. “Do you think he might have a connection to the house’s landlord?”

“Lester?”

I blinked. “Who?”

“The landlord. Lester Atkins. I only met him once when I signed the lease a couple of years ago. Nice old geezer. Don’t know if he’s connected to the shadowman or not, lady.”

“Actually, I was thinking of Ray Eades.”

“Don’t know him,” Foster said, and he was starting to look bored.

“Ah,” I said, wondering if we’d just hit pay dirt on the owner of the house. I made a mental note to get Gilley to look into a Lester Atkins for later and then tried to think of more questions to ask before I lost his attention completely, but at that moment a sudden and bitter chill came over the room. And it was a chill I was all too familiar with. Foster seemed to be aware of it at the same moment I was, because he sat up straight and his eyes moved from side to side. “Shit,” he whispered. “Here’s Johnny . . . ”

All of a sudden something dark seemed to appear right behind him and then it was gone. And so was Dan Foster. His body was still in front of us, but his entire expression had changed into one I recognized. Instinctively I sat as far back in my chair as I could. “Hello, Mary,” Foster said. “I was hoping you’d come see me again.”

Next to me, I heard Kendra’s sharp intake of air.

Foster turned to her as if seeing her for the first time. “And you’ve brought a friend,” he said. “How nice. A double date.”

“Sy!” I said loudly to get his attention off Kendra. He seemed far too interested in her. “Who are you and where did you come from?”

Sy kept his eyes on Kendra, as if he knew it was bothering me. It was clearly bothering her, because she scooted her chair back a bit. “Where did I come from? I came from Sheedy’s. Didn’t you see me there?” he taunted, finally pulling his gaze away from Kendra to stare at me. “I saw you, Mary, didn’t I?”

“What other eyes have you been looking through, Sy?” I asked.

Foster leaned back in his chair and laughed evilly. “Through a few special eyes, Mary. Through Dan’s, and Bill’s, and Mike’s, and Ken’s, and Guy’s, and Luke’s. Such willing eyes all of them. They lust for it as much as I do. As much as I lust for you, Mary.” Foster licked his lips seductively and it was all I could do to hold still in my chair and not bolt out of there.

And then, Foster’s gaze lifted above my right shoulder and he said, “Who’s the old Indian?”

For a brief moment I didn’t know what he was talking about, but then I realized he must be talking about Sam. “He’s here to protect me from the likes of you,” I told him, bolstered by the knowledge that Sam was right behind me.

Foster wiped his lips with his fingers. “Oh, yeah?” he said, and I could hear the challenge in his voice. “Maybe I ought to see how safe you feel around that other Indian, Mary. Maybe I’ll go visit with him now. . . .”

I jumped to my feet, my fists balled and anger coursing through me. “You leave him alone, Sy!” I yelled, but it was already too late. Dan Foster blinked and I knew I was looking at him again.

“He’ll get to him before you can,” he rasped as if hosting Sy the Slayer had taken all of his energy.

I didn’t even wait long enough to comment. I grabbed Kendra and ran for the door.

To say that I urged Kendra to get us home as quickly as possible is to suggest that Gilley can get a little pitchy when he goes all howler monkey. We arrived at my condo and I sprinted from the car even before it’d come to a full stop. I’d called Heath over and over from the prison and from the car, but he hadn’t answered, and neither had Gilley when, in desperation, I’d called him. I didn’t know what was happening, but I feared the worst.

Skipping the elevator, I took the stairs two at a time, rounding the landing of Gilley’s floor just as he was coming out. “Oh, hey,” he said, holding up his phone. “I was just about to call you back. Sorry I didn’t pick up, I was on the phone with Micha.”

I ignored him and kept going, pushing my aching muscles to climb the stairs faster. I could hear Gil call after me, but I didn’t have time to explain. Before I’d reached the landing, I called out to Heath, and I didn’t care which neighbors I might be disturbing. “Heath!” I shouted.
“Heath!”
I got to my floor and my rubbery legs barely kept up as I forced them to sprint to the door. I pounded on it with one fist while reaching into my messenger bag for my keys.
“Heath!”

At last the door was pulled open and my sweetheart stood there. The sight of him, though, made me catch my breath. He stared at me with such intensity that for a moment I felt terrified that Sy had managed to worm his way into Heath’s mind. But then he reached out and took me into his arms and pulled me close. “Em,” he said with a tremendous sigh of relief. “He’s been after me for the past twenty minutes!”

“Call up your grandfather!” I told him, panting hard but trying to hold on to him as tightly as I could manage. I knew he was under assault and it was my worst fear to lose him to this evil spirit.

“Call up Whitefeather!” I said next. Whitefeather was another ancestor of Heath’s. A very powerful warrior and spirit who’d helped us once when we’d needed him most.

I leaned back and cupped Heath’s face between my hands. “Call out to Whitefeather!” I insisted. Intuitively I felt that was the answer and at the same time I also opened up my own sixth sense. The energy around Heath was intense, but as I begged him to call upon his ancestor, there was a shift. It was subtle at first, and then it expanded, growing larger, calmer, more protective. In my mind’s eye I could see the brave warrior Whitefeather, standing behind Heath—the two nearly identical in appearance even down to that gorgeous white stripe of hair at the temple. And then, the energy shifted even more and the tension in Heath’s eyes relaxed. “It’s gone,” he said.

I sagged against him, squeezing him tight again. “Thank God!” And then I thought about the fright I’d had, knowing Sy was trying to get into his mind. “Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

Heath’s body shifted and I saw him reach for his phone in his back pocket. “Huh,” he said. “It’s dead. Sorry. I didn’t know you were trying to call me or I would’ve picked up.”

From behind us I could hear Gilley coming up the stairs. I ignored him and leaned back to plant a kiss on my boyfriend’s lips, so happy to have him fully back and not under attack by Sy the Slayer anymore.

And then I heard Gilley say, “Hello, Mary.”

Heath and I both stiffened. I was afraid to turn around. “Hey!” I heard Kendra call from the stairwell. “Is everybody okay?”

I risked taking a peek over my shoulder and saw Gilley, his gaze turning away from Heath and me as he looked toward Kendra slowly climbing those stairs. “Kendra!” I yelled, twisting around. “Go back to your car!”

But she kept climbing and stopped just a few stairs away from Gilley. “Oh, hey,” she said to him. “How’s your fiancée?”

“My fiancée?” he repeated. “I only have eyes for you, Kendra.” The way Gilley said her name made me shudder. It was Gilley’s voice, but with more rasp, and the inflections were all wrong. Gone was that slight Southern lilt he had when he spoke, and there was a definite South Boston accent now present in his speech. Also, he reached up with his left hand to scratch at his chin.

“What’s with you?” she asked him, coming up the next few stairs.

I rushed forward and grabbed Gilley by the arm. Pulling hard, I twirled him around and pushed him straight toward my condo. “Go home, Kendra!” I shouted, continuing to push Gilley as hard as I could.

“M.J.!” I heard her call out, but I still slammed the door behind us.

Heath had read my mind and he was already approaching Gilley with one of the magnetic vests. “Oh, Mary,” Gilley said, reaching down to grab my wrist in a viselike grip. “Don’t play with me. You know how this will end.”

I winced because Gilley’s grip became tighter and tighter, and just as I was about to cry out, Heath wrapped the vest around him.

Gil’s hand immediately relaxed and he swayed a little, but then he blinked and it was my best friend again. “Where’s the fire?” he asked.

I was shaking so much with adrenaline and fear that my eyes misted. “You okay?” I asked him, cupping his face just as I’d done to Heath.

“Of course I’m okay,” he said. “What’s with you? And why’d you race up here like the place was on fire?”

I dropped my hands to hug him fiercely. “Would someone please tell me what the hell’s going on?” he snapped.

I hugged him tighter. With Whitefeather’s help, Heath could fend off Sy. But Gil was a completely different matter. He was already vulnerable to spooks, and now that Sy had been inside his mind, the access door would always be open and Gilley would always be vulnerable. My mind raced with the possibilities of Gilley ending up like Luke, and it was in that moment that I fully understood Courtney’s fierce loyalty to her brother and her fear that she was losing him.

“Em,” Heath said softly.

I let go of Gilley, who looked both perplexed and frustrated because he knew we weren’t telling him something. “Do me a favor,” I said to him. “Until I say otherwise, wear this vest.”

Gil looked down and shifted under the weight of the vest. “When did I put this on?”

“Just wear it, Gil,” I said sternly.

“It’s hot,” he complained. “And why’re you insisting I wear this?”

I decided to go with a half-truth. “Sy the Slayer paid a visit to Heath. I’m worried that because the spooks like you, you might also be a target.”

Gilley’s hand flew to his mouth. “He was
here
?”

“Sort of,” Heath said. “I managed to fend him off, but, Gil, I think it’s best if while you and I are in the same building, you wear that.”

Gilley reached down and began buttoning the vest. “I’m going back downstairs,” he announced. “I’ll turn up the air and live in this thing, but, guys, we gotta figure out how to shut this spook down, okay? My honey is coming home in four days and I can’t greet him at the door wearing this!”

I thought of something else then, that mental note I’d made to myself at the prison. “Gil, can you research one more name for me?”

Gil dropped his chin and looked up at me in that “Are you kidding me?” way.

“Just one more name, I promise.”

“Who is it this time?”

“A guy named Lester Atkins.”

“Why?”

“Just do a search and see if he comes up as a possible murder suspect in any unsolved murder cases. In fact, do a broad search of him and see what you can come up with.”

“Lester Atkins. Sounds made up.”

I sighed. I wanted Gilley to leave and have a project so that Heath and I could talk about what to do. “Please, Gil?”

“Fine, but you owe me,” he said.

“Yes, yes. I owe you. I’ll just leave everything to you in my will, okay?”

Gil rolled his eyes, but he turned on his heel and left, so I breathed a sigh of relief.

“That’s bad,” Heath said the minute the door closed behind Gilley.

“Really bad,” I agreed. “What do we do?”

“We have to find the source, Em. Now, more than ever, we have to find out who Sy the Slayer is and where he’s hidden his portal.”

I nodded. “Let’s go over what we know,” I said. And then I told him all about the interview with Dan Foster.

“It’s obvious to me that Foster had a mean streak in him before he started renting that house on Stoughton,” I said once I’d filled him in. “And I’m convinced that he was present in his own mind at least in part when Bethany was murdered. He didn’t look even slightly remorseful about it either.”

Heath walked over to my laptop and typed in something. He then swiveled it around to show me the screen. “A lot of the evidence used at Foster’s trial is available online. I found this after you guys left this morning.”

I moved over to the couch and pulled the laptop close. “Bethany had a restraining order out on him,” I said. “That confirms my suspicion.”

“Yep. And she’d reported him to the police six months earlier during their breakup because he’d gotten physical with her. He cracked one of her ribs and gave her a black eye.”

“Bastard.”

Heath nodded. “Before that, she told several friends that she was scared to break it off with him because he had a temper and he’d gotten physical with her while they were together.”

“So, Sy just helped him do what he was probably going to do all along,” I said.

“That’s what I think.”

I rubbed my temples and tried to put some order to my own thoughts. “What I don’t understand is how Luke fits into all this. The men who rented that house that we’ve managed to track down all had an edge to them, Heath. They’re not good men, and likely weren’t good men before they rented that house. And I don’t know where that leaves us.”

“Where that leaves us? Regarding what, Em?”

“Luke. I know we only met him twice, but he just doesn’t seem the type, you know? But I have to admit that Kendra showed me a new piece of evidence this morning that’s starting to shake my faith in him.” I then told him about the photo Kendra had shown me of Brook.

“So Luke
knew
her?”

“Apparently. She worked at the hospital as some fund-raising coordinator or something and they met there.”

“What was the fund-raiser?”

“I don’t know. Some old people’s home or something. The point is that Luke and Brook knew each other and were even spotted hanging out together. There were rumors that their relationship was romantic, but as far as I can tell, that’s only a rumor.”

“So we’re still back at square one,” Heath said with a sigh. “Killer Ken is on the loose, and we also think he got away with at least one murder. Sy the Slayer could have other accomplices roaming the city, and he has it out for you, too.”

I didn’t tell Heath about Sy telling me that I was going to die by one of his accomplices’ hands; I thought it best to keep that mum for the moment. But then something else jumped into my mind and I dug through my messenger bag for my phone. Pulling it up, I dialed Kendra’s number, but either she wouldn’t pick up or she wasn’t near it, because I got her voice mail. “Kendra, it’s me. Please call me. I owe you a big explanation, I know, and I’m sorry for slamming the door in your face. I swear there’s a good reason, though, so call me back, okay?”

“Think she’s mad?” Heath asked as I set the phone down in the middle of the ottoman.

“Oh, I’m sure she’s mad. It’s just a question of how soon she’ll cool off enough to let me explain. I also want to tell her to take some extra safety precautions. Sy was pretty interested in her when he took over Foster’s body at the jailhouse.”

Heath’s expression became concerned. “Do you think she’ll listen to you about being cautious?”

I shrugged. “Maybe. She seemed pretty freaked-out when Foster morphed into Sy. I think it’ll be enough to convince her to be careful.”

We both stared at my phone for a moment and I knew Heath was willing it to ring just like I was. Finally I picked the phone back up and texted her, requesting she call me back right away. We spent another few minutes staring at the phone again, but Kendra didn’t call back and I growled with irritation. I had a feeling she was purposely ignoring me. “How long do you think she’ll stay mad at you?” Heath asked.

I shrugged. “Dunno. Maybe an hour. Kendra’s pretty headstrong and I got my way a whole lot today. She may take the rest of the morning to get back to me.” I then picked up the phone a third time and texted Kendra a longer message, telling her that after our interview with Foster, I thought it a really good idea if she was careful and took some precautions for her own safety. I hoped that even if she was too irritated to talk to me, my cautionary message would at least sink in.

“What do we do now?” Heath asked after I showed him the message I’d sent her.

I frowned at the phone one more time, irritated that Kendra seemed to be playing games and wouldn’t call me back. I felt anxious and overwhelmed and frustrated. This was such a difficult and complicated case that I desperately wanted to take a break from it. Permanently. But I couldn’t because Sy had found a way into Gilley’s mind, and that would have me sticking with it until I locked that evil son of a bitch into his portal if I had to chase him through hell to do it. “How about we get some index cards and spend a little time figuring out what we know, and what we don’t know?”

“How are we gonna know what we don’t know?” Heath said with a playful grin as he wrapped an arm around me.

“Oh, trust me, that pile of index cards is gonna be the biggest pile.”

Heath and I spent the next two hours laying out the case on three-by-five index cards while Doc serenaded us with bits of songs Gilley had taught him. All the songs had altered lyrics and were inappropriate for audiences under eighteen.

Still, there was something kind of hilarious about a little gray bird singing, “I’m too sexy for my feathers, I’m too sexy for my feathers, I’m too
sexy
.”

“So, on the list of things we know,” I said once we’d laid out all the cards, “is that Guy Walker killed Amy Montgomery in nineteen seventy-five. He’s currently in prison and unable to do Sy’s dirty work. Then,” I added, picking up the next card, which had required a bit of Internet searching to fill out completely, “we have Killer Ken, aka Ken Chamblis. Based on the fact that Sy obviously gets inside Ken’s head, and the fact that, like the other girls, Gracie’s throat was slashed, we’re fairly convinced Ken was responsible for killing Gracie Stewart in the alley behind Sheedy’s Place on April tenth, twenty ten. What he’s been up to since then is a mystery, but he’s no longer living at the Stoughton house. He’s also right-handed, so he
could
be a suspect in Brook Astor’s murder.”

“He’s definitely still under Sy’s influence,” Heath said. “And Sheedy’s is a hike from Comm Avenue, but who knows what Ken’s got for transportation?”

“Right,” I said, tapping my finger against my lips while I thought of another question we hadn’t asked. “We need to know where Ken lives. See if maybe his residence is closer to Comm Ave these days.”

Heath moved over to the computer and began to click the keys. “According to Switchboard.com, Ken has several different addresses. Not sure which one is his current address, but he definitely once lived on Stoughton Street.”

“Any of those addresses bring him close to Comm Ave?”

“Two,” Heath said, writing them down. “One is about three miles south, and the other is two and a half miles northwest.”

“Within walking distance of Brook’s murder scene.”

“Looks like it.”

I sighed and fished around for the next card on the floor. “After Ken, we’ve got Dan Foster, who killed Bethany Sullivan in the park across from her apartment—”

“That’s about ten miles from the Stoughton Street house,” Heath interrupted. We’d come up with that little tidbit, thanks to Google Maps.

“Yes, but his car was found not far from the murder scene and, according to the evidence posted online you found an hour ago, Dan’s steering wheel had traces of blood on it, and the tank was empty. He obviously murdered Bethany and tried to drive away, but he ran out of gas—which is why the cops found him wandering the streets not long after discovering Bethany’s body.

“Anyway, the only thing that’s really relevant to us right now is that Dan was in prison and he couldn’t have murdered Brook. Which leaves two names on our list that we have yet to identify. Butcher Bill and Murdering Mike. Oh, and Sy the Slayer.”

Heath squatted next to me to peer over my shoulder. “We’re missing some years,” he said.

“Hmm?”

“Well, if Sy was already dead when Guy Walker was available to be possessed, and he was running loose in nineteen seventy-five, then Sy must’ve been killing people before ’seventy-five.”

“Yeah, but the question is, how many years before? This psycho could be from the eighteen hundreds for all we know.”

“I don’t think so,” Heath said. “I think evil spooks like him don’t lie low for long before they start looking for ways to entertain themselves.”

“You’re thinking Sy could’ve been alive in the sixties or even early seventies?”

“It’s possible.”

I scribbled a note on the index card and went back to the other two. “We need to find out who Butcher Bill and Murdering Mike are.” I then reached for my phone and called Gilley. “How ya doin’?” I asked, still worried about him.

Gilley yawned. “I’m fine now that I’ve had a little nap. What’s up?”

I felt my temper flare. “What’s up? What’s
up
? Are you for real, Gil?”

“What?” he asked innocently.