44 Book Five Read Free

getting worse. I see him every night now.”
    “Who?” I said.
    She was looking out the window again.
    “What’s that black rock all over the street?” she asked, her voice low and raspy. “When did they do that? Must help with the mud in winter.”
    I looked outside. I couldn’t see what she was talking about. The asphalt?
    “Who do you see every night, Paloma?” I said.
    She looked at me again.
    “Huh? Oh, he hangs out at the club. This guy, this spirit or whatever, he just stares at me. At first I thought he was real, I mean, human. You know, just a creep. I tried to have the bouncer throw out his ass. But no one else sees him. Just me.”
    It began in her eyes. The terror. They started to dance wildly. And then it swamped her like a canoe in a windstorm. She started shaking, the ice rattling in the clear plastic cup before she could put it down, her voice quivering.
    “Sorry,” she said as she looked down and ran her trembling hands through her short hair. “I haven’t been able to sleep in weeks. I know you don’t know me from Adam’s house cat, but this isn’t who I am. I don’t scare easy, but this pinchependejo , this thing, it frightens the shit out of me.”
    I believed her. I believed that she was really scared. But that wasn’t enough.
    We agreed to meet again.
    “Thanks,” she said, getting up. “You’re a good person for doing this.”
    “I’ll be in touch,” I said.
    She started walking to the door, but then stopped and took a few steps back toward me.
    “You know, sometimes right after I see him, I don’t feel myself. It’s almost like he’s—”
    But she didn’t finish. She just shook her head.
    I swallowed hard and watched her go outside. She stopped at the sidewalk and looked down at the street for a long time, stroking her chin. Then she got into her car and drove away.
     
    ***
     
    I had trouble sleeping that night.
    Paloma Suárez seemed a little out there. I wasn’t ready to buy into everything she was saying. But as I tossed and turned, I started thinking about the ghosts I had seen before. Some needed help. One even helped me. But I had never come in contact with a ghost like she was describing.
    Staring up at the ceiling in the dark, I knew that if what this woman was saying was true and if I decided to try and help her, I might be in over my head.
    I told myself that I was getting ahead of myself, that I still had a lot of fact finding to do before I crossed that river. After all, I had also felt like Annabelle and Spenser were “haunting” me when I first encountered them. But in the end, they just needed help. Maybe this was the same thing. Or maybe this Paloma Suárez just had a screw loose.
    But my mind refused to listen to logic. It raced far ahead like a runaway stagecoach through the long sleepless night.
     

 
    CHAPTER 3
     
    I got too far under the ball and watched as it sailed high, past the bright lights, and into the dark sky before bouncing out into the desert brush, nowhere near the goal.
    I should have done more with it. We had only been down a goal and there were still a few minutes left in the game. The shot could have made the difference. At least I could have rolled it in on target. If I had done that, there was the chance the goalkeeper could have tripped or been hit by lightning.
    The keeper took his time retrieving the ball and then kicked it far down field. I didn’t get it back again and the ref blew the whistle and it was official. We didn’t make the playoffs.
    “Darn it all,” Tim said.
    I was using stronger language in my head.
    His glasses were fogged up and sliding down his nose.
    “It was a long shot anyway. We don’t really belong in the playoffs,” he said. “We basically suck.”
    I went over to the sidelines. Tim was right. It hadn’t been a good season. I had barely practiced all summer and we only had won two games. It would have been a complete fluke to have advanced.
    I didn’t say much and grabbed my stuff,