Read Online Enthralled: Paranormal Diversions by Melissa Marr and Kelley Armstrong - Free Book Online
Authors: Melissa Marr and Kelley Armstrong
Ads: Link
filthy garage. Wes was adjusting some kind of gadget that looked like a giant calculator, with a meter and a needle where the display would normally have been. “We know enough.”
“Enough for what?” She imagined the two of them wandering around with their oversized calculators, searching for ghosts the way people troll the beach for loose change and jewelry with metal detectors.
“I told you, we hunt ghosts.” Wes tossed the device to Trip, who opened the back with a screwdriver and changed the batteries.
Edie settled into the cushions on the ratty plaid couch. “So you hang out in haunted houses and take pictures, like those guys on TV?”
Trip laughed. “Hardly. Those guys aren’t ghost hunters. They’re glorified photographers. We don’t stand around taking pictures.” Trip tossed the screwdriver onto the rotting workbench. “We send the ghosts back where they belong.”
Wes and Trip weren’t as stupid as Edie had assumed. In fact, if the two of them had ever bothered to enter the science fair, they would’ve won. They knew more about science, physics mainly—energy, electromagnetism, frequency, and matter— than any of the teachers at school. And they were practically engineers, capable of building almost anything with some wires and scrap metal. Wes explained that the human body was made up of electricity—electrical impulses that keep you alive. When a person died, those impulses changed form, resulting in ghosts.
Edie only understood about half of what he was saying. “How do you know? Maybe it just disappears.”
Trip shook his head. “Impossible. Energy can’t be destroyed. Physics 101. Those electrical impulses have to go somewhere.”
“So they change into ghosts, just like that?”
“I wouldn’t say ‘ just like that.’ I gave you the simplified version,” Trip said, attaching another wire to his tricked-out calculator.
“What is that thing?” she asked.
“This—” Trip held it up proudly, “is an EMF meter. It picks up electromagnetic fields and frequencies, movement we can’t detect. The kind created by ghosts.”
“That’s how we find them,” Wes said, taking a swig from an old can of Mountain Dew. “Then we kill them.”
Edie was still thinking about that day in the garage when she smelled something horrible coming from outside. It was suffocating—heavy and chemical, like burning plastic. She rolled up her window, even though the air inside the Jeep immediately became stifling.
“Don’t you want to let some air in?” the blue-eyed boy ventured.
“I’m more concerned about letting something out.”
He waited for Edie to explain, but she didn’t. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Shoot,” she said.
“If you believe there’s a ghost on this road, why are you driving out here all alone at night?”
Edie took a deep breath and spoke the words she had rehearsed in her mind since the moment he climbed into the car. “The ghost that haunts Red Run killed my brother, and I’m going to destroy it.”
Edie watched as the fear swept over him.
The realization.
“What are you talking about? How do you kill a ghost?”
He didn’t know.
Edie took her time answering. She had waited a long time for this. “Ghosts are made of energy like everything else. Scatter the energy, you destroy the ghost.”
“How do you plan to do that?”
Edie knocked on the black plastic paneling on her door. It was the same paneling that covered every inch of the Jeep’s interior. “Ghosts absorb the electrical impulses around them— from power lines, machines, cars—even people. I have these two friends who are pretty smart. They made this stuff. Some compounds conduct electricity.” She ran her palm over the paneling. “Others block it.”
“So you’re going to trap a ghost in the car with you and— what? Wait till it shorts out like a lightbulb?”
“It’s not that simple,” Edie said, without taking her eyes off the road. “Energy can’t be
“Enough for what?” She imagined the two of them wandering around with their oversized calculators, searching for ghosts the way people troll the beach for loose change and jewelry with metal detectors.
“I told you, we hunt ghosts.” Wes tossed the device to Trip, who opened the back with a screwdriver and changed the batteries.
Edie settled into the cushions on the ratty plaid couch. “So you hang out in haunted houses and take pictures, like those guys on TV?”
Trip laughed. “Hardly. Those guys aren’t ghost hunters. They’re glorified photographers. We don’t stand around taking pictures.” Trip tossed the screwdriver onto the rotting workbench. “We send the ghosts back where they belong.”
Wes and Trip weren’t as stupid as Edie had assumed. In fact, if the two of them had ever bothered to enter the science fair, they would’ve won. They knew more about science, physics mainly—energy, electromagnetism, frequency, and matter— than any of the teachers at school. And they were practically engineers, capable of building almost anything with some wires and scrap metal. Wes explained that the human body was made up of electricity—electrical impulses that keep you alive. When a person died, those impulses changed form, resulting in ghosts.
Edie only understood about half of what he was saying. “How do you know? Maybe it just disappears.”
Trip shook his head. “Impossible. Energy can’t be destroyed. Physics 101. Those electrical impulses have to go somewhere.”
“So they change into ghosts, just like that?”
“I wouldn’t say ‘ just like that.’ I gave you the simplified version,” Trip said, attaching another wire to his tricked-out calculator.
“What is that thing?” she asked.
“This—” Trip held it up proudly, “is an EMF meter. It picks up electromagnetic fields and frequencies, movement we can’t detect. The kind created by ghosts.”
“That’s how we find them,” Wes said, taking a swig from an old can of Mountain Dew. “Then we kill them.”
Edie was still thinking about that day in the garage when she smelled something horrible coming from outside. It was suffocating—heavy and chemical, like burning plastic. She rolled up her window, even though the air inside the Jeep immediately became stifling.
“Don’t you want to let some air in?” the blue-eyed boy ventured.
“I’m more concerned about letting something out.”
He waited for Edie to explain, but she didn’t. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Shoot,” she said.
“If you believe there’s a ghost on this road, why are you driving out here all alone at night?”
Edie took a deep breath and spoke the words she had rehearsed in her mind since the moment he climbed into the car. “The ghost that haunts Red Run killed my brother, and I’m going to destroy it.”
Edie watched as the fear swept over him.
The realization.
“What are you talking about? How do you kill a ghost?”
He didn’t know.
Edie took her time answering. She had waited a long time for this. “Ghosts are made of energy like everything else. Scatter the energy, you destroy the ghost.”
“How do you plan to do that?”
Edie knocked on the black plastic paneling on her door. It was the same paneling that covered every inch of the Jeep’s interior. “Ghosts absorb the electrical impulses around them— from power lines, machines, cars—even people. I have these two friends who are pretty smart. They made this stuff. Some compounds conduct electricity.” She ran her palm over the paneling. “Others block it.”
“So you’re going to trap a ghost in the car with you and— what? Wait till it shorts out like a lightbulb?”
“It’s not that simple,” Edie said, without taking her eyes off the road. “Energy can’t be
Similar Books
