The Ghost Illusion

THE OLD HOUSE CREAKED AND GROANED. EVE SHIVERED AND PULLED her robe a little closer around her. She’d told herself that in time she’d get used to the place, grow accustomed to the ominous sounds and eerie, shifting movements in the shadows, but she had lived in the home she had inherited from her uncle for more than two months and the unsettling disturbances had only grown worse.

She tried to tell herself it was just her imagination, the wind playing tricks on her, the movement of the wood inside the walls of the hundred-year-old home. But the ghostly moans, whispers, and cruel laughter, the sound of running footsteps in the hallway, were impossible to ignore.

At those times, the darkness came alive, the air in the room seemed to thicken and pulse, and it took all her will just to make herself breathe.

Eve shivered as the howl of the wind outside increased, rattling the shutters on the paned-glass windows, but no wind she had ever heard sounded like angry words being whispered in the darkness.

Rising from the antique rocker in the living room, she moved the chair closer to the fireplace, hoping to dispel the chill. The smokeless coal she was required to burn wasn’t the same as a roaring blaze, but the glowing embers somehow made her feel better.

A noise in the hall caught her attention and she went still. It was the whispering she had heard before, like men speaking in low tones somewhere just out of sight. Time and again, she had gone to see who was there, but the hall was always empty.

Goose bumps crept over her skin. Today she had finally done something about it. Setting aside her closed-mindedness, she had gone on the Internet and googled information on ghosts, haunted houses, anything she could think of that might give her some answers.

It didn’t take long to realize she wasn’t the only person who had trouble with spirits or ghosts or whatever they turned out to be. Not everyone believed in ghosts, but there were people out there who were convinced they were real.

Eve had sent an email to a group in America called Paranormal Investigations, Inc., a team of experts who traveled the world to research problems like hers. Their website was discreet. No photos of the people who worked there, no names, just a picture of the office in a redbrick building near the waterfront in Seattle. At the bottom, the page simply read, If you need help, we are here for you.

Interested, but not satisfied with the limited information provided, Eve continued her research. The man who had started the company was a billionaire in Seattle named Ransom King. King owned dozens of extremely profitable corporations, including several hotel chains, one of them the five-star King’s Inns, as well as high-rise buildings, and real-estate developments around the country. He was a good-looking, broad-shouldered man, tall, with blue eyes and wavy black hair.

Paranormal Investigations wasn’t a business King ran for profit. According to one of myriad articles she’d read about him, researching paranormal phenomena had become his passion, a hunger for knowledge that seemed to have settled deep in his bones. He had founded the company after losing his wife and three-year-old daughter in a car accident. King had been driving the night a violent rainstorm had sent the car careening off the road into a tree.

Eve could only imagine how grief-stricken he must have been.

Intrigued and desperate for help, Eve had filled out the brief contact information form on the website, giving her name, phone number, and address. Her message simply said:

My name is Eve St. Clair. I’m an American living in England. I think there is something in my house, something dark and sinister that is not of this world. Can you help me? I live alone. I’m not crazy, and I’m not making this up. Please help me if you can.

She glanced over at the burgundy settee where she had been sleeping for nearly a week. On the surface, it seemed ridiculous, but she couldn’t face going upstairs to her bedroom. Down here, she would at least be able to run if something bad happened.

She reminded herself to put away the blanket and pillows in the morning before her weekly housekeeper, Mrs. Pennyworth, arrived. The older woman was a notorious gossip. Eve certainly didn’t want her knowing she was too frightened to sleep in her own bed.

A scratching noise sent a chill sliding down her spine. It was probably just branches outside the window, scraping against the glass. At least that’s what she told herself.

Eve settled back in the chair and started rocking, the movement easing some of the tension between her shoulder blades. When what sounded like a dozen footsteps thundered down the hall, she prayed she would hear from the Americans soon.

* * *

Ransom King sat behind the computer on his wide, glass-topped desk in the King Enterprises’s high-rise building in downtown Seattle. The office was modern, with all the latest high-tech equipment, from a top-of-the-line iMac Pro to a seventy-inch flat screen with a wireless HDMI transmitter and receiver kit.

A gray leather sofa and chairs provided a comfortable conversation area with a chrome and glass coffee table, and a wall of glass overlooked the harbor and the blue waters of Elliott Bay.

On the computer screen in front of him, he reread the most recent email message that had come in from Eve St. Clair. They had corresponded several times. Her case looked interesting. Part of her note read:

I keep praying this isn’t real. If it is, at least I’ll know.

Ran understood the words in a way few people could. In the months following the accident that had killed his wife, Sabrina, and their daughter, Chrissy, he had seen Rina and Chrissy’s faces in his dreams a hundred times.

In his dreams. That’s what he’d told himself. But a person didn’t dream in the middle of the afternoon with his eyes open.

Talking to a shrink hadn’t helped. Every explanation centered around the overwhelming guilt he felt for the death of his wife and child. Which was true, but not a satisfactory explanation of the visions that had continued to plague him.

Desperate to do something—anything that would give him peace—he had finally gone to a psychic. He had managed to keep his visits secret, but in the end, it hadn’t mattered. Lillian Bouchon had turned out to be a fraud.

The woman was a fake and a con artist, like most of the charlatans who supposedly possessed supernatural abilities. He had run through a list of them, but during his pursuit of the truth, he’d met people whose abilities were real.

In a move that had caused him endless ridicule, he had assembled a team of paranormal experts. People with open minds, an interest in the field, and a determination to find answers to age-old questions—or some version of them.

Kathryn Collins and Jesse Stahl had been his first hires. The best in their fields, Katie handled the video equipment, while Jesse handled audio and other miscellaneous instruments. Ran dug up background information on each case and probed the history, looking into past events that might have influenced whatever was happening on the premises they were investigating.

A woman named Caroline Barclay had been the first psychic on the team. On certain occasions, she’d been able to sense and communicate with unseen energy, but she wasn’t always successful. Other people followed, mostly women, who seemed to be more intuitive than men.

Aside from the members of the team he kept on payroll, including a team coordinator to handle the logistics, Ran also brought in part-time help on occasion. A psychometrist named Sarah Owens, who could touch an object and know its past, and a former priest named Lucas Devereaux, formerly known as Father Luke.

What Ran had seen in the years since his formation of the team had convinced him that spirits were real, and though he’d never made contact with Sabrina or little Chrissy, the visions and dreams had finally faded, allowing him to find a fragile sort of peace.

Two years ago, he had hired Violet Sutton, a woman he had met in an online chat room for gifted people. Tests supported her claim that she was a sensitive, and occasionally clairvoyant. He had watched her work and hired her.

Ran glanced back at the screen and thought of the case in England. What the team did could be perilous. It could be wildly exciting, a rush like nothing he had ever felt before. But under certain circumstances, it could be deadly.

And there was Eve St. Clair, a woman he found surprisingly intriguing. He liked her intelligence and what seemed like sincerity in her emails. From photos he’d seen on social media, she was attractive, with a slender figure and very dark hair. He liked the open-mindedness she had shown in reaching out for help.

And there was the fear she worked so hard to hide. If what she was reporting was true, Eve might have good reason to be afraid.

Making a sudden decision, Ran called his executive assistant and asked her to clear his schedule for the next three days. If the team found something or encountered some kind of trouble, he would be there.

Ran checked his gold Rolex. Ten a.m. in Seattle. Six p.m. in Sunderland, England. He’d go out, maybe walk down to the Bell Harbor Marina, where he kept his forty-foot sailboat. He loved that boat, loved being out on the water, loved the solitude, the peace that usually eluded him.

Maybe when he returned, he’d find a message on his computer.

Maybe he’d have another email from Eve.