Soul Walk Read online

  SOUL

  WALK

  Book 7 of the Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud Mystery Series

  Melissa Bowersock

  Copyright © 2018 by Melissa Bowersock

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in an online review or one printed in a newspaper, magazine or journal.

  First Printing

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Cover image by coversbydesign.net.

  ISBN-13: 978-1983512407

  ISBN-10: 1983512400

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Despite growing up in the San Fernando Valley and having Hollywood in my back yard, my inside knowledge of the film industry is limited. My brother got into it and was a make-up man for many years; my husband is an actor and enjoys creating characters onscreen. My experience, however, only amounts to being on a few morning shows with my books and a ten-minute stint on a ghost show for a well-known network.

  Luckily I have lots of sources for information about the behind-the-scenes process, so my portrayal here, although truncated, is fairly accurate. However, I do want to emphasize that all the characters portrayed here are fictional and not meant to represent anyone, nor does the Unexplained Channel represent any existing network. It is not my intention to cast shadows on any show or any film workers and the machinations of the people in this book purely serve the story. This is entirely a work of fiction, and as such succeeds when the reader can suspend belief in what is and enter the world of what might be.

  Books by Melissa Bowersock

  The Appaloosa Connection

  The Blue Crystal

  Burning Through

  Finding Travis

  (No Time for Travis Series Book 1)

  Being Travis

  (No Time for Travis Series Book 2)

  Fleischerhaus

  Ghost Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 1)

  Skin Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 2)

  Star Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 3)

  Dream Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 4)

  Dragon Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 5)

  Demon Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 6)

  Soul Walk

  (Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud

  Mystery Book 7)

  Goddess Rising

  Lightning Strikes

  Love’s Savage Armpit by Amber Flame

  (Originally published as The Pits of Passion)

  The Man in the Black Hat

  Marcia Gates: Angel of Bataan

  Queen’s Gold

  The Rare Breed

  Remember Me

  Sonnets for Heidi

  Stone’s Ghost

  Superstition Gold

  SOUL

  WALK

  Melissa Bowersock

  ONE

  Forty-eight… forty-nine… fifty.

  Lacey finished her lat pulldowns and released the handles on the weight machine just as her phone chimed. She laid back against the padded bench for a moment, giving herself a chance to pull in a few deep breaths before she picked up her phone. Unknown name, but an LA area code.

  “Hello?”

  “Is this Lacey Fitzpatrick?” A female voice.

  “Yes.”

  “This is Diana Lynch. I’m a production assistant at the Unexplained Channel for a show called The Restless Dead. I’d like to talk to you for a few minutes; is this a good time?”

  “Sure,” Lacey said. She sat up and passed a towel over her face, wiping the last bit of salt and sweat from her workout. She had thought about doing some crunches, but decided this phone call was a good reason to call it done.

  “Great.” Diana’s voice smiled. “Are you, uh, familiar with the show at all?”

  “Not really,” Lacey said. “I don’t watch a lot of TV.” She flipped the towel over her shoulder and headed back to her apartment down the hall.

  “Well,” Diana said, “It’s very similar to what you and your partner do, I believe. The principles on the show are Webb Gannet, our investigator, and Esmeralda Clark, a medium. They investigate claims of haunted homes and businesses and find out how the owners can clear out the ghosts. Isn’t that what you and Sam do?”

  Lacey let herself into her apartment and grabbed a bottle of Gatorade before flopping on the couch. “Yeah, pretty much. I didn’t realize there was a TV show like that.”

  “Oh, yes,” Diana said. “Our show is on its third season. Ghosts are very popular right now, which is why I’m calling. We’re actually thinking of launching a new show, and we think you and Sam would be perfect for it.”

  Lacey almost choked on her Gatorade. She swallowed quickly and wiped a dribble from her chin with her hand.

  “Really?” she managed.

  “Yes. We’ve been reading about you two in the paper, seen you on some morning shows, and we think you could work very well in a TV setting. We’d love to have you come in and talk with us about it.”

  Lacey blinked at the phone. She and Sam had joked about getting their own TV show, but they’d never really thought… This was crazy. Funny, but crazy.

  “Are you there?” Diana asked.

  “Uh, yeah,” Lacey said. “Just, you know, surprised.”

  “I know, right?” Diana’s voice reflected a cheerful appreciation for the unexpected offer. “It’s very exciting. I’m wondering if I can pencil you in for a meeting later this week. Maybe Friday at two p.m.?”

  Lacey didn’t have to look at a calendar. She knew they had nothing in the works.

  “That’s possible,” she said. “I’ll have to check with Sam.”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” Diana bubbled. “Let me give you my number. We’re located in Burbank, on Buena Vista Street, not far from the Disney studios. The address is…”

  Lacey took down the information in her trusty notebook. “And who would we be meeting with?”

  “It’ll be me and our producer, Barry Poldarek. He’ll explain the premise to you, and answer any questions you might have. It’s very exciting.”

  “And you said the name of the show was…?”

  “The Restless Dead. It’s on Wednesday nights at eight p.m. You can download past season shows on iTunes for ninety-nine cents, and there are also a few shows posted on YouTube you can watch. As I said, it’s very popular.”

  “Okay,” Lacey said. “I’ll check it out, get with Sam and let you know. It sounds… interesting.”

  “Oh, it is,” Diana agreed. “Very exciting. I’ll look forward to hearing from you, and then seeing you on Friday. Have a great day.”

  Lacey ended the call in a bit of a daze. A TV show? Their own TV show? She laughed out loud, once, a quick summation of the shock and disbelief she was feeling. Too frickin’ weird. Or, as Diana said, very exciting.

  She doubted it would ever happen. After a couple of appearances on morning shows, Sam had almost made Lacey swear they would never do TV again. Her stoic Navajo partner was uncomfortable in the limelight, and the show hosts’ invasive and flippant questions annoyed him no end. What was to others a curious and titillating oddity, to Sam, his mediumistic talent was a spiritual calling, a way to restore harmony to the world, one lost soul at a time. And although the attentio
n and notoriety provided by the TV appearances brought them to the public’s awareness and gave them more opportunities to help, it also set them up as a target for non-believers. Fame was definitely a two-edged sword.

  She checked the time: barely nine a.m. She wouldn’t call Sam until he was home this evening. He worked construction, and stopping to pick up a call in the middle of setting a ceiling joist or pouring concrete was just not possible. Anyway, it would give her time to check out the show.

  It was not lost on her that this coming weekend was also when she was moving back into Sam’s apartment. She had planned on taking her time packing up the initial loads, but now felt like she’d better get it in gear and start earlier. It was going to feel odd to move back in, after their first failed attempt at living together. But back then, she had been healing from a bullet wound and had felt useless and cranky. This time, there were no peripheral issues to confuse things. It was just her and Sam, taking their relationship to the next level.

  For now, though, she needed to research this show. After a quick shower and a bit of breakfast, she settled in front of her laptop and searched YouTube for The Restless Dead. She found a dozen or so episodes: The Devil in Darlington, Murders in Mobile, The Undead of Utica. Having just come off their own case of dealing with evil—The Witch of San Juan Capistrano, she joked—she chose The Devil in Darlington and sat back in her chair to watch.

  The brief setup to each episode pointed up some similarities and some differences in the way the two principles worked compared to her and Sam. Although Webb and Esmeralda were partners, once they started on a case, they never met or spoke until the end, when each would bring their own impressions and discoveries to the property owners.

  Interesting, Lacey thought, since she and Sam worked side by side throughout their cases.

  Each show started with Esmeralda making a walk through the property, accompanied only by a videographer and a cameraman to film them both. Much like Sam, Esmeralda knew nothing about the ghostly presence or its actions before she walked. There the similarity stopped.

  Lacey watched, fascinated, as Esmeralda walked through the house in Darlington, Illinois. The woman was… animated, for sure. She had long, dark hair and piercing blue eyes, both of which she used to good effect. Lacey noticed she often dipped her head, letting her hair fall in front of her face like a curtain, and then looked up slowly, her blue eyes revealing the shock and horror she was apparently sensing. In some instances, her eyes rolled back in her head and she seemed to be gripped by a supernatural force that shuddered through her body.

  “Jeez,” Lacey breathed as she watched. Could the woman be any more melodramatic? Lacey contrasted her actions with Sam’s. He walked slowly, mindfully, his eyes usually no more than slits. He spoke very little, while this woman talked almost constantly unless she was gasping in shock. Compared to her, Sam was practically catatonic.

  The show switched to Webb, the investigative half of the team. Webb had been a detective on the San Francisco Police Department, and looked made for TV. Tall, well-built, with thick auburn hair and brown eyes, he had an intensity that he leveled at people with those dark eyes and which helped to project the seriousness of his investigations. Without knowing what Esmeralda was sensing, he went after the history of the property, and researched much as Lacey did—although she doubted he did the research himself. He met with city officials to look at property records and interviewed the property owners as well as relatives, neighbors and local historians to find out what the ghostly manifestations were. Invariably, the witnesses described being terrorized to the point of physical illness, mental breakdowns and fear of death itself.

  Well, Lacey had to give them that. She and Sam had encountered similar reactions, although never quite expressed with as much dramatic overacting as these people were doing.

  The episode continued by cutting back and forth from Esmeralda to Webb, each adding to the overall picture of the threat. Esmeralda saying, “It’s a dark force. It collects the souls of people that have died here, and it’s willing to kill to get more.” Webb hearing about multiple accidental deaths on the property: falling down stairs, car crashes, sudden terminal illnesses. The show heaped threat upon threat until the viewer staggered under the weight of the danger inhabiting the house. It sounded like a person might be struck dead simply by stepping inside the front door.

  The “reveal” was the culmination of all the research, physical and metaphysical. Webb and Esmeralda sat across from the property owner in a comfortable living room setting. The haunted house? Lacey couldn’t tell. Esmeralda spoke of the things she sensed on her walk, the property owner listening with rapt attention, and alternately nodding or gasping at the information given to him. Then Webb provided newspaper clippings and grainy photos to corroborate the suspicious deaths throughout the life of the home. For all intents and purposes, Esmeralda’s impressions matched the owner’s experiences. Her sensations of greater danger corresponded to the places where past deaths had occurred: the stairs, the master bedroom, the road outside.

  “What can I do?” the owner pleaded.

  Lacey tried to be sympathetic. She and Sam had heard similar pleas many times, just not as… dramatic. The man looked frantic.

  “Smudge the house to purify it,” Esmeralda said. “Then find a priest who will come in and perform an exorcism and bless the house.”

  “That’ll get rid of it?’ the man asked.

  Esmeralda nodded sagely. “Yes. That should be the end of it.”

  Lacey thought it was interesting that Esmeralda employed smudging, as Sam did. Perhaps she mixed Native American tradition with her other supernatural defenses?

  The show ended with a short epilog. The home owner did everything he was told to do, and had had no further instances of paranormal activity to date.

  Case closed.

  Lacey got up and rewarmed a cup of coffee in the microwave, then stood and stared out her sliding glass door. Dark clouds were rolling in off the west coast, shrouding LA in November gloom. No doubt they’d have rain off and on over the next several weeks, interspersed with the warmer, sunny days Southern California was famous for. Being a native Angelino, Lacey could gripe a little about the cold, but not too much. She knew she had it better than people in the entire northern half of the country.

  But The Restless Dead… Would the producer expect Sam to react the way Esmeralda did? Roll his eyes and shudder with dread? Lacey thought if she ever saw him react like that, she’d burst into laughter. That wouldn’t go over well at all.

  And would they break Sam and Lacey up, have them each doing their parts separately, as Webb and Esmeralda did? She didn’t care for that idea at all. She and Sam worked as a team, bounced ideas off each other and fed on each other’s hunches. Yes, she did a lot of the research on her own, but could always call on Sam to help if she got stuck.

  And what about the research? Would the TV people do all that, then just feed it to her? That sounded… vexing. If she wasn’t going to do her half of the work, what was the point? A needle of discomfort worked its way under her skin. What if they found more information than she might? They would most likely have whole brigades of researchers to dig deep into old records. Lacey had always prided herself on finding all the information they needed to resolve a case, but what if these people outdid her? It was more than a little disquieting to think she might be shown to be less productive than a team of strangers.

  She sipped the coffee and grimaced at the bitter taste. Maybe they just wouldn’t do this TV show. Sam wouldn’t want to anyway, she was sure. Maybe they should just stick to doing what they were good at.

  But it was kind of a nice fantasy, at least for a few minutes.

  ~~~

  TWO

  “A what?” Sam couldn’t have sounded more surprised if she’d offered him a ticket to the moon.

  “A TV show. Have you ever watched The Restless Dead?”

  “No. I’ve heard of it but never seen it.”

&nb
sp; “I hadn’t either,” she said, settling on the couch and cradling her phone to her ear. “But I watched an episode on YouTube today.”

  “And…?” His voice was blatantly suspicious.

  “It’s basically what we do, but… different.” She gave him a quick rundown of the process, noting the similarities and the differences in their own routine. “If they want us to do it like Webb and Esmeralda do, I’d say no way, Jose. But I don’t know. Maybe they’d let us do it the way we always do.”

  “Hmm.” Sam was quiet for a moment, and Lacey knew he was assimilating the information. This was one time she was glad to let him think through the pros and cons in his slow, thoughtful way. “It would, as you’re always telling me, get us out there so we’d be more well-known and able to help more people.”

  “True,” she said, surprised that Sam was even admitting that.

  “I wonder if we could convince these people to show our process in a respectful way? Not all hyped up and sensationalized, but concentrating on the spirits, telling their stories?” He paused, and Lacey didn’t hurry him. “Are all their episodes about harmful spirits?”

  “I don’t know,” Lacey said. “I only watched the one, but judging by the titles, it sounded like it.”

  “And most of the spirits we’ve encountered are perfectly normal people, just victims caught in an ethereal net of anguished emotions. It would be nice to be able to tell these people’s stories, show the viewers that not all ghosts are harmful.”

  Lacey realized that while she’d been listening to Sam think out loud, her jaw had dropped further and further in mounting surprise. “You’re actually considering doing this?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Why? You’re not?”

  She sat up and switched the phone to her other ear. “You hate doing TV. I have to practically drag you in to do a ten minute spot, and you’re thinking of doing an hour show? A series?”