“Samantha. ”
“Yeah, Jeff?” she answered.
“I didn’t say anything,” Jeff responded.
Samantha flung a startled look over her shoulder toward Jeff just as she felt a cold wisp encircle her ankle. “I think I found her. ” Swiftly kneeling, Samantha held out her hands, skimming them over the cement. There was a distinctly cold area in just one spot and it seemed to be growing in size.
“It’s a cold spot,” Jeff said excitedly, joining her. He waved his EVP back and forth, watching the results excitedly. “It’s growing, too. ”
“Cassidy?” Samantha called out. “You there?
The coldness wrapped around her turned to ice, forcing a startled gasp from Samantha’s lips. Cassidy’s dead face emerged from the concrete as though rising out of water. Once her body was clearly visible, the dead woman’s eyes opened.
“Samantha,” Cassidy said, her fingers tight around Samantha’s leg.
“She’s here now,” Samantha informed Jeff, tossing a quick glance in his direction.
His widened eyes and open mouth said it all. He could see her, too.
“Jeff?”
“Sam, I see her. I can see her!” Jeff exclaimed.
“Stop geeking out. Help me! What do I do?”
Snatching up his bag, Jeff rummaged through it excitedly. “Talk to her. ”
“Samantha, he hurt me,” Cassidy cried out. Her grievous wounds looked garish in the sunlight. Her flesh, tanned in life, was now gray and bloodless. “He hurt me so much. He wouldn’t stop. ”
“I’m so sorry, Cassidy. I am,” Samantha answered. She tentatively forced her quivering fingers toward the woman’s wrist. The grip on her ankle was pretty tight, but didn’t feel like anything more than icy air. Curious if she could feel the ghost, Samantha laid her hand on the specter’s arm. To her shock, she felt substance. It didn’t feel like flesh, but it was almost solid. Wrapping her fingers around the dead woman’s wrist, she felt it gaining mass.
“Okay, let me snap a few pictures,” Jeff was muttering, raising his digital camera.
“No!” Cassidy lashed out at him, her hand impacting with the camera. It flew through the air, hit the cement walkway, skittered, then tumbled into the lake.
“What the hell?” Jeff gasped.
“No! Not like this!” Cassidy wailed. She continued to lash out at Jeff, flailing in anger.
“Cassidy, he’s not the one who hurt you!” Samantha grabbed onto the woman’s shoulders and tried to wrestle her back.
Jeff fell back as the ghost clawed at him. Intestines spilled out of her nearly empty torso to lie wetly on the ground as she crawled closer to Jeff, trying to gain purchase.
“You let him do this to me!” Cassidy wailed. “You didn’t protect me!”
Samantha tried to haul the dead woman back, but she was growing heavier and stronger with every second.
With a yelp, Jeff grabbed one of the ghost’s hands, trying to keep it from his face. Red scratch marks already marred his arms and his left cheek. “Samantha, let go of her!”
“She’ll hurt you!”
“Let go!”
Samantha let out a cry of frustration, releasing Cassidy. “Cassidy, stop hurting him!”
Cassidy wailed, striking out at Jeff angrily, but her body lost cohesion, misted, and sank away into the cold cement. Gasping, Jeff and Samantha stared at each other in shock.
“What was that?” Jeff cried out.