The Dead and the Dark(41)

Ashley paused. “Would’ve made what weird?”

Logan said nothing. She wasn’t sure what she meant.

They reached the gravel turnout at the edge of the trees and Logan hopped out of the truck and stretched her arms. Ashley unfolded herself from the driver’s seat while Elexis remained in the back seat, lying down with his jacket draped over his face. Logan knocked on his window.

“C’mon,” she said. “We’ve got ghost busting to do.”

Elexis groaned.

“I’m confused, though. If the thing lit up at your dad, shouldn’t we be talking to him?” Ashley asked.

“Brandon is only part of it. I’m talking about the gear, though. I watched a few other episodes just to check, and they never point the ThermoGeist at Brandon. They point it at Alejo sometimes and nothing. But on Brandon it registered, like, immediately.”

Logan had spent the past few days holed up in her motel room with her eyes glued to the TV. Saying she’d watched “a few” episodes was an understatement. She’d known that they were potentially dealing with something paranormal, but she’d never thought Brandon himself was the source. She thought of the Brandon from her dream, garbed in strange darkness, voice deeper than an ocean. Maybe none of it was connected, maybe it was all connected.

She needed to get the ghosts at the cabin to talk.

She needed the truth.

Elexis hoisted himself out of the back seat. “Okay. Pretending that any of this is real, what does that mean?”

“It means the ThermoGeist flagged something paranormal on him. Maybe a spirit? Something bad.” Logan shouldered her tote bag and locked the car door. The gravel turnout was quieter in the daytime. Logan shook off the feeling that she was trespassing. “Which means the gear works. We can use it on the ghosts in the cabin.”

“And then we’ll talk to Brandon?” Ashley asked.

“Maybe.” Logan scratched the back of her head. “I don’t know.”

Ashley frowned.

“Why bring me?” Elexis asked. “I thought this was you guys’ thing.”

“We’re family,” Logan said. “Family helps each other.”

“You don’t help me with anything.”

“I would if you asked.”

Elexis shrugged and straightened his beanie. It wasn’t just about family, though. Since the party, something had changed in Logan’s chest. Looking at Ashley felt different now. There was the same irritation, the same skepticism, the same doubt she always felt. But it was like she’d been looking at a blurry photo before, and now the details had come into focus. She looked at Ashley and she saw eyes the color of clear water, lips that hinted at a phantom smile, the gentle way she turned her head when she looked at Logan. This dumb, tugging feeling about straight girls wasn’t new, and it was never worth it. But Ashley wasn’t just a straight girl. She was the daughter of a sworn enemy, she had the power to throw Logan out of town in the blink of an eye, and she was searching for her missing boyfriend, whom she still seemed very into.

Elexis wasn’t just family—he was a buffer.

Logan cast a glance at Ashley. She stared into the trees, but her gaze was unfixed. She idly ran her fingers through the end of her ponytail without a word.

Logan inched closer. “Are you feeling okay?”

“What?” Ashley blinked to life. “Oh, yeah. I don’t know. I feel like something’s weird today.”

“Yeah,” Logan mused. She turned to Elexis. “Nick didn’t wanna come with? I figured you guys were like a two-for-one kind of deal.”

Elexis frowned. “I think he got grounded for going to that party.”

Logan sucked in a breath. “Yikes.”

She pulled the ThermoGeist reader from her bag and smacked it until it turned on. She’d never actually held this one before, but she’d watched Alejo fire it up on TV a million times. It was a black plastic square with two silver rods protruding from its back. According to the show, the ThermoGeist was supposed to detect patches of disparate temperature in the atmosphere. Cold patches—patches that made the ThermoGeist’s little screen flash blue—indicated the presence of spirits. She’d always assumed that the ThermoGeist’s accuracy, like everything else on ParaSpectors, was exaggerated. But something about the quick way Alejo had angled the rods away from Brandon said he knew he’d unveiled a secret. Logan couldn’t shake the image. The piercing cold of the blue.

So, she’d stolen it. Alejo and Brandon were in Ontario for the day getting groceries and making phone calls for the show. She’d packed a few other devices from their gear trunk just to be safe. The SonusX was a walkie-talkie-shaped device that emitted loud crashing sounds and could detect ghostly voices. The Umbro Illustrator was a scanner that rendered animation of any humanoid spirits in the vicinity. The Scripto8G was a chip that plugged into the headphone port of her phone. It was her favorite of her fathers’ ridiculous devices—apparently it allowed them to receive texts from ghosts.

She’d mostly brought that one for fun.

They made their way to the cabin and Logan’s stomach churned. Today, there was no piano music, no voices through the splintered wood, no breathing like Ashley had described. Logan calibrated the ThermoGeist and pointed it at the cabin, but the screen remained blank.