Chris Green - Only the Good Die Young

Complete devastation. A thrashed man, his shoulders rounded as he pressed his hands over his face, like he couldn’t bear any more from me.

“Liz… ,” he said, shaking his head. “My God, Liz…”

He didn’t say anything about the dead man I’d seen in his thoughts, and I couldn’t just let it go.

As I reared up in the air, I could see the lights in the mansion flashing. Twyla, turned on and out of control. At the same time, I realized that Gavin’s sadness had left me weaker. But believe me, I still had a lot left.

Then I heard a voice behind me. “Stop hurting us, please!”

When I turned around, I saw Wendy standing there, her blue nightgown catching the crazy lights from the mansion. Behind her, Scott was hovering with a stunned expression.

But Wendy was just as stunned as he was while she looked at me, not through me.

She could see.

The lights in the mansion went dark, dimming the outside as Wendy and I just stared at each other.

Was this true? Did she have a connection with me like Amanda Lee?

I said the first thing that came to mind. “How long have you been able to see me?”

Talk about throwing someone off their rocker. Wendy answered like she couldn’t believe I’d responded to her.

“I could see you a little more every time you visited. But you never came here with anyone before tonight. You brought that Happy Days kid and Hair Girl. Plus that other ghost.”

Whoa. She wasn’t like Amanda Lee, who could relate to limited ghosts. She was a true seer, like McGlinn. How had this happened?

“You saw the dark spirit?” I asked.

She took a few seconds, probably getting used to the fact that she was having a conversation like she’d never had before.

“Yeah,” she finally said. “It was a… him?”

I knew what she was getting at. “It wasn’t your mom, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

Wendy closed her eyes, sighing. Relief just about poured off her. Disappointment, too.

But the fact that she had to ask if that spirit with male energy had been her mother told me that she hadn’t recognized anything about him—facial features, a body, a scent. Nothing.

Shivering, she crossed her arms over her chest. It looked like a belly-deep shivering that I remembered so well, when you had experienced something shocking and it was just starting to get to you.

She was watching Gavin, whose back was hunched as he planted his hands on his thighs, still kneeling and shaking his head, like he was attempting to get Elizabeth out of it.

I floated closer to Wendy. Time for another interview, but this one wouldn’t have to be a mind invasion. I mean, it wasn’t like I thought she had anything to do with Elizabeth’s death, but what if she could help me out with Gavin?

“Wendy—” I started.

She interrupted. “Why’re you doing this to us?”

What could I say? I’m a ghost and this is what I do ?

“This is about Elizabeth Dalton,” I said.

She glanced at me, puzzled. “Elizabeth? What does she have to do with—”

“She was murdered.”

“Right.” Wendy hugged her stomach.

I gentled my voice. “How well did you know her?”

“Well enough. She was nice to me. Gavin loved her. Why?”

This was going to be the tough part. “Ghosts haunt for a reason. A lot of times, we’re concerned with righting wrongs, and as far as Elizabeth is concerned—”

“I still don’t understand why you’re scaring us.”

“Wendy, I need to find out if Gavin had anything to do with her death.”

She flinched. I’d gut-punched her.

“Who are you?” she asked. “Elizabeth’s friend in the otherworld or something?”

“Close enough.”

“Then if you know her in your ghost city, or whatever, she would’ve told you that Gavin never would’ve hurt her.” She looked around, obviously aware that my friends were here, too. “I don’t see her. Why isn’t she the one asking questions?”

“Because she’s moved on, but there are still some people left on earth who care what happened to her.”

“And they summoned you.”

Pretty much, but I only shrugged, unwilling to continue this discussion when there was so much more to get to the bottom of.

She went back to watching Gavin pull himself back together, and I waited for a second, then said softly, “I don’t think he killed Elizabeth.” But that didn’t rule out the other male corpse I’d seen in his mind.

She added, “So you’ll leave him alone now?”

I couldn’t. Not until I knew who that dead man was. Not until I figured out those dreams I’d seen in Gavin and what they meant. And not until I got a lead on who’d killed Elizabeth if Gavin hadn’t.

I realized at that point that Wendy and Gavin weren’t emitting fear or anger. Just sadness and numbness. I had nothing to feed off from them, and I began to feel the effects of all the work I’d done tonight—especially materializing. I felt grayer by the minute.

I glanced at Scott, who’d wandered over to the diving board during all this.

“Sweetie, smart ghosts don’t get involved with human problems,” Twyla had told me. And it sure looked like Scott was smart enough to get out of the game while the getting was good. Same with Twyla, because she was leaning against the outside wall, her hand on an electrical breaker box. She was charging up, smiling dizzily in the afterglow of her spree.

This was my mess to clean up.

Now Wendy was getting used to me. “Did you hear me ask if you’re going to leave my brother alone now?”

“I heard you, but I can’t do that.”

“Why? Did he commit another murder or something?” A cutting joke.

But not to me. “Why don’t you ask him ?”

Another flinch, and after she gave me an ultraconfused glance, she purposefully walked to Gavin. He was still so lost in the Elizabeth hallucinations that he obviously hadn’t even started to wonder why Wendy was talking to herself out here.

She kneeled down beside him. “Are you okay?”

“Liz… ,” he whispered.

“I know.”

She looked up at me— see, he’s a good guy and you shouldn’t have put him through this —and put her hand on his shoulder. That seemed to soothe him. But her voice had quavered. No matter how tough she acted, she was still jarred.

“Gavin, did you do what she says you did?” she asked.

When he glanced up, he seemed more tired than ever. Bruised inside. Totally ethered out.

“Who’re you talking about, Wen?”

She bent her head, her pink hair streak hanging over her face. She’d been talking to him like he could see ghosts, too, and I bet she just realized it.

“I just need to know if you’ve ever killed anyone,” she said, skipping over his question.

He reared back onto his heels, and from the naked expression of horror on him, I knew that Wendy had stripped off the layer he’d always worn on the outside.

“What makes you say that?” he asked.

“Just tell me no, and this will all be over.”

“Wendy, you’ve got to answer me.”

She stood, backing away from him. “Why can’t you just say no?”

“Why would you ask me that?” His voice went bone-deep.

Once again, the steely man was back, and Gavin’s face lost all expression except for the shadows in his eyes.

Wendy glanced at me, like I could explain everything to her. She seemed afraid now, like she’d realized that she didn’t want to know anything terrible about her fantastic, loving big brother.

But then the door to the pool house opened wide, the hinges groaning, and every gaze went there.