The Ghost Host: Episode 1 (The Ghost Host Series) Read online

  Hands grip my hips from behind and pull. I almost yelp until I realize it’s Malachi pulling me into his lap. Then I don’t mind so much. Once I’m snuggled up against him, he asks, “How are you doing?”

  Shrugging, I say, “Okay, I guess.”

  “It’ll get easier,” he promises. “I only moved across town when I moved out, but it was still hard. I like being on my own, but I miss having my family around all the time.”

  “I feel like a jerk leaving the twins behind.” I lean my head against his chest, really needing comfort.

  “You had to do it eventually, Carrots.” He brushes my hair back, letting his hand linger on my face. “What are we going to do about tonight?”

  Caught off guard by his change in topics, I’m more than a little confused. “Holden already claimed you as a sleepover buddy. Didn’t you hear him at the elevator?”

  Malachi chuckles. “I meant the whole talking to ghosts in your sleep thing, but good to know where your mind goes to first.”

  My blushing only makes Malachi laugh even more. I’m quick to move on. “I don’t know what I can do about the talking. I had no idea I was even doing it until last night.”

  “Have you told Holden and Zara?” he asks.

  When I shake my head, he nods. It’s not like I don’t want to tell them. I just haven’t had time. “I will, though. At least they’ll know what’s going on if nothing else.”

  “Do you want me to stay awake and…listen?” Malachi asks. He seems a little uncertain of his offer, but I think it’s more because he’s not sure I’ll want him listening in than his willingness to do it.

  Since I really can’t imagine what I’d say that would seem incriminating, I nod. “Yeah, I guess so. If you don’t mind. It’d be nice to know what I’m saying. The twins were a little vague.”

  Malachi nods in agreement. Later, when we tell Holden and Zara about the talking as we eat, Holden seems particularly intrigued and offers to stay up with Malachi. Zara is the one to suggest one of them record whatever I say on their phone. By the time we’re settling down and getting ready for bed, I’m too anxious to sleep.

  “Scoot over,” Malachi says after half an hour. Holden immediately goes into big brother mode, but holds off commenting. Zara is already out beside me, so I can only give him so much room. Unfortunately, it’s not enough.

  Malachi pushes me forward and slips in behind me, pulling me back so my head is leaning against his chest. His fingers start running though my hair slowly. It makes me smile that he loves my hair so much. The feel of his fingers moving through my hair, brushing against my neck at times, is bliss. When he starts humming a song I don’t recognize, I can honestly say I have never felt so safe in my entire life. I’m not sure how long I last before my eyes close and my mind leaves the world of the living.

  ***

  “Is she asleep?” Holden asks.

  I nod, keeping an eye on him out of the corner of his eye. “She just needed to feel safe,” I say in my defense. “I’m not planning to stay here all night.”

  Holden doesn’t say anything for a while. It’s plain on his face that he’s struggling with this whole situation. I believe him when he says he doesn’t have romantic feelings for Echo, but I know what it feels like as a brother to watch a sister walk into something dangerous. Even growing up as the baby of the family, protecting my sisters from stupid decisions and bad guys was as natural as breathing. If I’d had a sister as vulnerable and potentially fragile as Echo is, I’d be just as on edge as Holden is right now.

  “All of this…it’s so unlike her,” Holden says after several minutes of silence.

  “Taking risks?”

  Holden frowns and shakes his head. “Making decisions.”

  Curious, I look over at him. “What do you mean? I’m sure she makes decisions all the time.”

  “Not really,” Holden says. “She’s always let someone else be in charge of her life, I guess because she felt she needed it. He parents have kept her on a tight leash. They decide who she hangs out with, where she goes, whether or not she works, what extracurricular activities she’s allowed to take part in. It was in their hands, always.”

  “She didn’t get a say in it?” I ask.

  Holden shrugs. “She didn’t want one for a long time. Maybe she was just used to it because it’s been like that for so long, but I think handling the ghosts was just all she could deal with for a long time. Having someone else step in and direct her life was a relief. Until she got older.”

  “Is that when she started fighting back, or takin’ charge or whatever?”

  Lying back against the headboard, Holden shakes his head. “No, that’s when she started resenting the restrictions everyone put on her and the people doing it…including me.”

  “She knows you’re just trying to protect her,” I offer.

  Holden sighs. “Yeah, but she still resents it in some ways. Her parents were just trying to protect her, too. I, at least, believed her about the ghosts, which I think kept her from hating me. I should have backed off at some point, but I’ve been her wall of protection at school and with friends for so long, it isn’t easy to stop.”

  I can’t say I would have done anything different if I were in Holden’s place. He cares about her a great deal. Having something happen to her when he could have stopped it would kill him.

  “When did things start to change with Echo?” I ask quietly.

  Glancing over at me, Holden gives me a look that says I should already know the answer. When I don’t respond, he shakes his head. “The minute she read your email. That’s when things changed.”

  My expression easily shows my confusion. Thankfully, Holden explains. “Echo is not allowed to interact with anyone having to do with the show. My rule. One I strictly enforced. She’d never even attempted to break it until I showed her your email. Suddenly, it was like a switch got flipped. She trusted her instincts about you and broke every rule surrounding the show. I was pissed, but I was kind of proud of her, too.”

  Thinking back to our first few conversations, I get it now why she sounded so scared on the phone, why she worried so much about what Holden would think. I understand, too, why he was so mad about the situation. I probably would have freaked out, too.

  “I can’t pretend to understand why, but Echo trusts you, a lot. More than she’s trusted anyone else in a long time,” Holden says. “I’m glad, but it scares me, too.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  Holden sighs and locks his hands behind his head. “Because I don’t know if she’s capable of handling everything on her own. Trying to tame the ghosts while she was at home, yeah, it’s tough because her parents wouldn’t help, but doing it out here on her own? And doing this stuff with the FBI? Not to mention trying to start a new relationship, which she has absolutely no experience at…it’s scary, man.”

  “She won’t be on her own,” I say.

  “No offense, Malachi, but you’re pretty new to the rodeo. I’m not saying you can’t handle it all, but you’re in for a ride, one with a pretty steep learning curve. I want to stay, make sure she’s okay, but my dad…”

  I feel for him. He’s obviously under a lot of pressure from his parents, but it’s tearing him apart to abandon Echo without knowing she’ll be okay. “Zara will be here…”

  Holden scoffs right away. “I love my cousin, but she isn’t terribly reliable. She’s there for Echo, all right, but researching stuff or digging up information that might be important, she’ll get distracted and find something more entertaining to do.”

  That’s not exactly what I was hoping to hear, but I suck it up and deal. I was planning to put my full focus into helping and protecting Echo anyway. “What do you…?”

  My words cut off as Echo’s whispery voice catches my attention. Reaching for my phone, I wake it up and bring up a recorder. I don’t start it yet, but Holden—who’s kneeling next to the bed now—listens intently.

  “Not my…no…sorry, I can’t….it…you
….” She continues mumbling incoherent strings of words for several minutes before I put the phone back down. I have no idea whether she’s just talking in her sleep or communicating with a ghost right now. When I look to Holden for answers, he shrugs.

  A few more minutes pass with nothing more than muttering. Holden starts to get up so he can lay back down, but he pauses halfway through the motion, his eyes widening. “Do you feel that?”

  “Feel wha…” My voice trails off as the cold air slithers up my arms. “What’s going on?”

  “Ghosts,” Holden says. “One particularly bothersome ghost, most likely.”

  Needing no further explanation, my hold tightens on Echo as my eyes dart around the room. In my head, I know I won’t be able to see anything, but I can’t help looking for the source of the cold. Holden has a canister of salt in his hand. I’m not sure where he got it from, but I’m glad he has it on hand.

  “No,” Echo says more forcefully. “No, please…don’t go…I can’t…please, Archer…stay with me…please.”

  The pleading in her voice is haunting. Whoever this messed up ghost is, she knows him. She has a history with him. That becomes even clearer when a small spot of frost blooms on Echo’s cheek, trailing down her jawline like a lover’s touch. The cold and the frost vanish a moment later, allowing Holden and I to breathe again.

  “Holy shit,” Holden says. I nod, echoing his sentiment exactly. I can see just from the look on his face that my thoughts from a few seconds ago match his exactly.

  “That’s what the message means,” I say. “He wants to leave, but she’s keeping him here. When she’s asleep, he can talk to her rationally, but when she wakes up, she doesn’t seem to remember him or understand what he wants and he gets angry.”

  “Archer,” Holden mumbles as he begins pacing. “Who the hell is Archer?” Fisting his hair, he’s on edge. “She doesn’t know anyone named Archer.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  Holden throws his hands up. “Because we’ve always been together. If she met him, it would have had to be either at school or before kindergarten when we met, and what are the chances of her falling in love with someone as a toddler?”

  “Whoa,” I snap. “In love?”

  “Whoever this Archer guy is, or used to be, he’s certainly in love with her. Did you see that frost? It wasn’t something a friend would do,” Holden argues. “She met this guy somewhere. He must have died, and somehow attached himself to her, only now he wants free and can’t get away because she’s keeping him here.”

  Whatever I thought I knew about this situation, it all just flew out the window. “Why would she keep him here?” My voice sounds strange, not like myself. Flat, scared. “He terrifies her when he tries to talk during the day.”

  “She doesn’t remember him when she’s awake, but whatever happened between them, it must have really affected her. Subconsciously, she’s preventing him from moving on.” Holden drops to the bed looking exhausted.

  I’m so confused and freaked out right now, there’s no way I’m sleeping for hours and hours. “If he’s, you know, in love with her or whatever…why does he want to leave her?”

  Holden shrugs. “I don’t know, man. Ghost aren’t meant to stick around. The ones that do, they have a purpose, a message to pass on. It keeps them focused, keeps them from turning vengeful. If this guy wants to go home and can’t, that’s plenty of reason to get agitated. Add in the person keeping him here has no clue what he wants when he tries to communicate with her…yeah, he’d get pretty pissed off after a while.”

  “This just got an awful lot more complicated,” I say with a sigh. Holden shakes his head, and I can tell a war of indecision is raging inside his head. No doubt it’s centered around the internship he’s supposed to begin in two weeks and Echo’s fate.

  Sitting back up, Holden stares at nothing. “We have to tell her.”

  My first thought is that of course we have to tell her, but then I realize why Holden seems sickened by the idea. When Echo learns she’s the one tormenting this spirit, it’s definitely going to affect her.

  “We’ll never figure out who he is without telling her,” I agree, but I’m not happy about it.

  Holden looks even more beat than before, and for the first time, I realize this is what he’s been doing most of his life. Watching out for Echo, making decisions, directing her, protecting her from everything he can. It’s not just the trip that has him exhausted. It’s the responsibility. Setting my phone down and moving so I can lie Echo down on her pillow, I approach the other bed. I sit down and look over at Holden seriously.

  “You don’t have to do this on your own anymore.”

  I know he’s had his doubts about me, but the sigh of relief that pulses out of him is genuine. He reaches over and grips my offered hand tightly. “Thanks, Malachi.”

  I nod and we both lie down and stare at the ceiling for a while. Holden drops off before I do. I can’t turn off my thoughts long enough to fall asleep. Echo’s dad was right that I didn’t fully understand what it means to be responsible for protecting Echo. I still don’t. What I do know is that I’m willing to do it, no matter what that means.

  It’s only as I finally begin drifting off that I remember Grandma Maddie’s message. Along with getting rid of Echo’s vengeful ex-whatever, I still need to face my own demons and go back to the old estate to get whatever she left for me there. Suddenly, exhaustion pulls me under, blocking out everything I’m not ready to think about.

  19: Simple Touch

  (Echo)

  I should be more excited. I’m walking around my first apartment, listening to the manager tell us all the details of the space and complex. Zara is drinking it all in with a grin. All I can think about is…Archer. Who is he? Why is he so attached to me? How do I know him? Did I know him when he was alive, or did we become friends as he is now? Could that really happen? Befriend someone in your sleep without even knowing it? The line between what can and can’t happen has always been a fuzzy one for me.

  Malachi comes up next to me and takes my hand. I seem to start breathing again at his touch. He’s the only thing keeping me grounded right now. He squeezes my hand and asks, “What do you think?”

  It takes me a second to realize he’s talking about the apartment. Glancing around, I try to take it all in quickly. The beige walls are nothing special, but the layout seems nice and not too cramped. Two bedrooms are off to the side, the doors open so I can see a small corner of each room. The kitchen is nicer than I expected, really just an extension of the living room, but it’ll do the job.

  “It’s great,” I say. I sure hope someone else was listening to whatever it is the manager just said. Zara didn’t, I’m sure of that, but no doubt Holden took notes.

  “Want to know what the best part about this place is?” Malachi asks as he pulls me under his arm.

  “What?” Does it have a pool? I can’t even remember.

  Malachi stops and engulfs me in a massive hug. “It’s only five minutes from my place.”

  “Mmm, that is a nice perk,” I say, smiling for the first time today.

  Grinning down at me, Malachi says, “I doubt that had anything to do with Agent Morton choosing this place, but I’ll take it.”

  “He didn’t exactly chose it,” I say. “The FBI keeps several apartments here for agents on loan or whatever. I think he’s actually staying somewhere in the complex, too.”

  Malachi looks a little put off by that, but I’m actually pretty relieved to know he’s close by. Meeting Malachi in person has allayed a lot of my fears about this move going horribly wrong. It’s reassuring to have a grown adult I trust to protect me—unlike my parents—only a few minutes away. Still, being nearby Malachi isn’t exactly a downside.

  I pull in a little closer, soaking up the comfort he always seems to give me. I want to stay there all day, but the manager reappears and leads us down to the office to sign a bunch of paperwork.

  My dad already paid the d
eposit and first month’s rent at his insistence, but made it very clear that if I want to be out on my own, I had to do it on my own. Get a job, pay bills, be a grown up. He has no idea about me getting involved with the FBI, and I want to keep it that way, so I didn’t object to his obvious strategy.

  I think he thought laying down an ultimatum would either make me change my mind about going, or send me packing up and heading home at the end of the summer. I almost told him how wrong he was, but I kept it to myself that money isn’t exactly a problem right now.

  I was underage when I started doing the Ghost Host show. It gathered a following pretty fast, and when the opportunity to make money off our online videos of the show came up, I jumped at it.

  In the beginning, it required asking my parents to set up an advertising account so I could get paid. They set it up and forgot about it, clearly not expecting it to do much. With each of our episodes getting at least a million views within the first few weeks of posting them…my parents were wrong.

  As soon as I turned eighteen, I set up a new account and transferred everything into my name. Everything we make is split between Zara, Holden, and I, but they both insisted I get a bigger share. Even so, we’re all more than set for a while. It’s going to take a lot more than not giving me rent money to send me running home to my parents.

  After signing our names a million times, Zara and I finally have the keys to our new apartment. I’ve been fairly out of it all morning, but holding the key to my first place in my hand finally clears away the cobwebs. “I have my own apartment,” I say quietly.

  Malachi is the only one close enough to hear me, but he grins and leans in next to my ear. “Yes you do.” His mouth moves closer to my ear and he pulls me against his chest. “I think we should celebrate. How about Kyran and I christen ya’ll as Southerners by cooking up some of our favorites for dinner. You can’t live in Georgia without loving sweet tea, fried okra, or pulled pork sandwiches, not to mention peach and pecan pie.”