Silence. All of them looking anywhere but at me.
“She’s right.” The voice that made everyone jump was Mace’s, loud and sharp, coming from the phone in Kevin’s hand. Out of all of them he probably had the most reason to resent me—after all, he’d found me bleeding to death after slitting my wrists. He’d saved me, and I’d...
Well, I saved him, too, that night at Haven Crest. So we were even.
Roxi nodded. “Yeah. Sorry, Lark. I know this isn’t your fault. It’s just kind of freaky.”
“And Daria wasn’t?” I asked.
She smiled. “She was just a tiny girl, and she didn’t come looking to kill any of us.”
“Yeah, well, you could have fooled me. You weren’t there when she tried to off me.”
Her eyes widened. “I would have hit her with some salt if I’d been there.”
“I know you would, Rox.” I turned to Kevin. “Are you sure you haven’t made contact with any ghost other than Wren lately?”
He shook his head. “None.”
I stared at him. “You’re sure?”
He frowned. “No, because I channel in my sleep all the time, just like that chick on Medium.”
“Dude, I loved that show,” Gage piped up.
I stared at him, ready to rip him a new one, but he looked so goofy and harmless. He genuinely loved the show, I guess. I laughed. And then, everyone else did, too.
And just like that, it felt like we were good again, and I was glad. It had been a long time since I’d had friends I could just be me with, and I wasn’t in any hurry to lose them.
“Okay,” I began once we’d all stopped chuckling. “So right now, all we have is the Haven Crest connection. Do we know if records from the ’60s and ’70s are available online?”
“They are,” Gage said. “I downloaded all the accessible records after we dealt with Bent.” He saw us all staring at him and shrugged sheepishly. “You know, just in case.”
“I could kiss you,” I said, and I meant it. “Seriously, you’re a rock star.” And so much smarter than he looked, but I didn’t say that.
He blushed as Roxi hugged him. “They’re on my computer at home.”
“There had to be a lot of guys during that time that looked like our ghost,” Kevin said, killing my buzz. “How are we going to narrow it down?”
“Description, photos.” I shrugged. “Homicidal tendencies.”
Kevin actually smiled at me. “A penchant for patchouli.”
I grinned, though how either of us could find the attack funny I had no idea. “The hospital would have started photographing patients by then. There were photos of some of the people we thought the ghost could have been before we discovered it was Bent, right?”
“There are pictures,” Gage confirmed. He wrinkled his nose. “Some are kind of sick. Wounds and stuff.”
Unfortunately, that sort of thing might give us even more information. “Can you email them to each of us when you get home, or in the morning?” I asked.
“Sure. The sooner we figure this out, the smaller the chance that Woodstock comes for the rest of us.” Gage rose to his feet. “I’ll go do it now if we’re done here.”
I looked around. No one protested. “Yeah, let’s go home,” I said. “Everyone, salt your windows and doors, and keep iron nearby.” Not that I thought the rest of them were in danger, unless our hippie ass-hat was going to visit each of them one by one. My gut told me Kevin had been his one and only target.
They all agreed that they would take precautions, and our little group broke up. Mace said goodbye and disconnected, promising to let Sarah know what was going on. Funny that no one had thought to call her. But then, Sarah didn’t feel like part of the group. It was pretty obvious to me that if she wasn’t Mace’s girlfriend, she wouldn’t have anything to do with any of us. He could do so much better.
I made sure Kevin was okay with being left alone before Ben and I walked out to our cars.
“Do you blame me for this?” I heard myself ask.
Ben shook his head. “You were right. We went looking for ghosts, and we found them. Had nothing to do with you. Now stop talking and kiss me.”
I smiled as his lips touched mine. Leaning against Nan’s car, we kissed until my head felt light and the world melted away. If Wren reached out to me at that moment, I don’t know if I’d answer her either.
“I’ll be over at noon,” Ben told me, when he finally let me go. “We’ll look through the records together, okay?”
I nodded, still a little dizzy. “Okay. Good night.”
He grinned and kissed me again. “’Night. You make sure you protect yourself, as well. This guy’s gotten a taste of you, too.”
I didn’t want to think about just how much of a “taste” Woodstock had wanted. “I will.”
“I’ll ask my grandmother if she has any advice,” he added. “An attack by a vengeful spirit is right up her alley.”