Page 91 of Deadly Blooms (Psychic Unraveled #1)

She looked up at me one last time. Serious. Grounded. Witch-mode fully engaged.

“Remember— no matter what happens, ” she said, her voice dropping to a whisper, “ don’t move. ”

“Anything I can do, darling?” Silas asked, peering over Katie’s shoulder.

Darling?

Oh, so things are going in Katie’s favor in wooing Silas.

“Yes,” Katie said, focused. “I’ll need you to concentrate on shielding from the spiritual plane. I’ll use my potion again, but ultimately—you’ve got the most pull. You’re already there.”

Great. I’m entrusting my soul to the ghost who hijacked my body.

She paused, eyes widening. “Oh! Almost forgot.” she opened the door and craned her head into the stairwell.

“Chester—! Here, kitty, kitty,” she cooed.

I inhaled, the unease snaking through my chest. I wasn’t ready to have another evil spirit inside, but what choice did I have?

“What are you planning to do with him?”

“Cats protect their masters from evil spirits,” Katie said, already scanning the steps. “And from what I’ve seen? He’s claimed you. ”

The tinkling of Chester’s bell echoed up the stairs.

“Up here, buddy!” I yelled.

His tiny face popped around the top step.

“Mew?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake—get up here, you insufferable little fuzzball,” Silas muttered, floating down the hall and sweeping right past him.

Chester startled and leapt into the attic with a hiss—just as Silas’s ghost-wind slammed the door behind him.

I shot Silas a look that could have cut marble.

“Watch it.”

Silas held up his hands. “Honestly. He overreacts to everything.”

Katie didn’t even look up. “Alright, Derek—you good?”

Derek gave a curt nod, but Katie didn’t wait. She dropped onto the couch and pulled out the same tiny vial from the first séance—the one that blurred reality like a knife through water.

She popped the cap and downed it in one go.

A heartbeat later, her body went slack. Spirit lifting. Floating free.

At least it happened the same way it did last time.

That was… comforting .

Sort of.

I closed my eyes and waited for the dead to answer.

The room was silent. The kind of silent where if a pin dropped, it’s shatter my fucking eardrum. Until it wasn’t and the air shifted. A bitter cold swept through the attic, taking any confidence I had with it.

We weren’t alone.

I opened my eyes.

They were every where .

Naked. Staring.

A circle of death pressed in around me—spectral, slack-jawed, and impossibly still.

The victims.

Their faces flickered through my memory, each one aligning with the crime scene photos burned into my brain. I knew who they were. Where they were found. How they were killed.

But knowing it didn’t make it any easier.

Carmen Gallows stood directly in front of me, slick with decay and bloated limbs heavy with water. Her body was distorted and blue-gray beneath translucent skin. Her veins spread like cracks across glass left too long in the cold.

The stench hit next. Rot and river mud, thick and clinging. It curled at the back of my throat. Damp earth. Sour skin. Something feral underneath it all.

The dirt clung to her throat, her lips, the beds of her fingernails.

And then she moved. Slow and perfectly paced.

Her hands slid over her breasts, over the edges of the diamond shaped hole in her torso before moving in between her legs.

My stomach turned, but I didn’t flinch or look away. I’d seen dead bodies before.

Hell, I’d made dead bodies before.

But this?

This was something else.

This was desecration dressed in performance.

She tilted her head like she sensed me understanding it. Then stepped back, unblinking—not in fear, but in recognition.

She raised her hand and motioned to the others.

And then just like that?—

They vanished.

And the attic moved again. The shadows surging, crawling up the walls like ink bleeding through cracked glass.

But it wasn’t just darkness. It was something lurking, pulsing, waiting to strike when we least expected it.

I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Whatever this thing was, it had me in a chokehold without laying a hand on me. Then?—

Katie’s voice cut through the dark. Sharp. Rhythmic. Otherworldly.

Latin? I thought. Witches loved Latin, right?

The air snapped, the pressure cracked like the attic released the breath it’d held since I requested a séance.

And in an instant, the victims reappeared— solid, haunting, just feet from me.

Carmen stood closest.

Still dripping. Still watching.

Her gaze swept over me like she was waiting to see if I passed some kind of test.

“Go ahead, old boy,” Silas said, circling above like a nervous hawk. “Before it’s too late.”

I forced my thoughts to settle.

Think, Locke—don’t waste this.

They didn’t die where they were found. They were moved. Staged.

All except Morty… and that felt like a mistake. After him, she got smarter, more careful, until she wasn’t.

I took a slow breath. Looked to Carmen, then the others.

“Do any of you remember the place you were taken?” I asked, my voice breaking at the realization of what I was speaking to. “A smell? A sound? Anything?”

Carmen didn’t blink, but something flickered behind her eyes.

“Deep in the forest,” she whispered, “where it’s neither water nor land… beating and beating… but stolen by devil’s hand.”

She flickered—body stuttering like a dying projector—as she stepped closer. Her eyes stretched too wide. Too white.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I muttered. “Just say what you mean.”

Katie’s chanting hadn’t faltered, but her hands trembled—rubbing her fingers together like she was trying to grind the nerves out of them. Her eyes bounced between Carmen and me, calculating something I couldn’t predict.

“Hurry it along, Graham,” Derek warned. “I don’t like what I’m seeing.”

I almost missed it.

Too focused on Carmen’s cryptic shit to notice the others. Their movements were wrong. Jerky and sudden, like puppets with tangled strings. Their mouths fell open. But no screams came out.

Just thick, black sludge.

It poured from their jaws, slow and heavy. Oozing down their chins, dripping onto the floor, pooling like oil at their feet.

Carmen didn’t flinch. “In the water, mixed with ground,” she rasped, voice stretching into something not human.“Beating, beating… there they’ll be found.”

She vanished, followed by the others.

One by one.

Gone.

And just like that?—

It was over.

I stood in the circle, chest heaving.God I hated that.

Katie murmured the closing of the séance, voice hoarse but steady—thanking any lingering spirits for staying peaceful, blessing them on their journey.

Her spirit hovered for a second above her body, then sat back into herself like it had never left—seamless.

“Don’t touch her,” Derek warned, eyes still scanning the circle. “Not until she wakes up.”

I nodded. “Are we good? Can I move?”

“Go for it,” Derek said, already dropping into his gamer chair.

I stepped carefully over the salt line, feeling like I’d just climbed out of another goddamn war zone. “Any idea what the fuck Carmen was talking about?”

Derek shrugged. “Well, she said, ‘where water meets ground,’ right? And you said she had a flower in her hair when they found her?”

“Yeah. A skunk cabbage bloom. They figured she must’ve died near a swamp. But we’ve got so many around here it’s a dead end.”

“Mm… only if you’re lazy,” Derek said. “All they had to do was sample the mud from her body and compare it to local ecosystems. If the micro-organisms matched, they could’ve narrowed it down to a location.”

“That sounds like a lot of effort for Port Grey,” I muttered.

“Right?” He snorted. “The whole north side’s riddled with swamps, estuaries, and watersheds. Fourteen, minimum.”

“Christ. The precinct doesn’t have enough manpower to cover that.”

Then Derek’s computer blipped.

He leaned forward, eyebrows shooting up. “We’re in. Portia’s security feed—look!”

I rushed over, heart pounding, bracing for a glimpse of Maggie.

Instead, we saw Portia pacing and panicked, and yelling at her driver.

“Hey—does this thing have sound?” I asked, gripping the back of Derek’s chair, eyes locked on the screen.

“Just a sec.” Derek pressed a few keys, scrubbing back through the footage.

Onscreen, Portia paced the driveway, panic written all over her face. “Why would you take her there ?!”

The driver responded, voice muffled.

“Turn it up,” I said, leaning in, blood pounding in my ears.

Derek adjusted the audio and replayed it.

The driver sounded pissed—like he was confused why she was mad.

“You said no witnesses!”

Portia stopped short, shaking her head, voice tight and terrified.

“He’ll kill her.”

I stood up straight, something in my chest locking into place. “She’s not the one doing the killing.”

Derek looked up, blinking. “What?”

“She’s covering for someone,” I said, rubbing my brow. “But now? Now she’s scared.”

Katie groaned from the couch, rubbing her temples. “God… remind me to take an aspirin—or twenty.”

Silas tightened his grip on her hand, brow furrowed, concern washed over his face. “My dear, that was far too much. I’d rather you not turn into a ghost just yet.”

She let out a weak laugh. “Yeah? Who would you bicker with then?”

Derek, still laser-focused on the screen, glanced at her. “You’re up just in time—because I think I know where they took her.”

He froze, hand hovering over the keyboard.

“Holy shit.”

My gut dropped. “What?”

He exhaled sharply, gripping the mouse tighter.

“Portia always had money, but she never inherited the family estate. There’s another property. Still under the name Valmont.”

“So?” Katie muttered, still massaging her temples.

Derek swallowed hard. “It’s still in the family—but the listed owner?”

“Gregory.”

Silas’s expression shifted. Dark. Certain.

My stomach bottomed out.

Derek nodded. “Last known address?—”

He froze.

I already knew what he was going to say.

“—in the fucking swamp.”

I was already moving. My boot hit the first stair before I even registered it.

“Text me the address! Now!”

My voice barely sounded like mine—raw, shredded, crushed under the weight of maybe being too late.

Halfway down the stairs, Katie called out behind me.

“Graham, wait ? —”

I didn’t.

I couldn’t.

Silas materialized in front of me, hands clasped behind his back, blocking the stairwell.

“Locke. I shall be accompanying you.”

I scowled. “How Silas? You’re a fucking ghost. I don’t have time for this.”

He raised a brow, unbothered. “Portia took my life. I refuse to let her take my niece’s. You, of all people, should know that.”

“Silas, you can’t leave,” Katie said, rushing forward, grabbing his sleeve. “We bound you to the house.”

He tilted his head, calm as ever.

“If I may offer a suggestion… perhaps a temporary vessel?”

Katie pressed her fingers to her temples. “It’s not that simple, Silas.”

“ Fucking Christ,” I cut in. “We don’t have time for a goddamn ritual .”

Derek snapped his fingers. “Doesn’t need to be a full binding. The pocket mirror?” He said it like it was obvious. Like he’d read every grimoire ever written.

Katie blinked, then nodded. “That—yeah. That could hold him. Temporarily.”

Silas turned to me, offering a cheeky grin. “When have I ever been anything but temporary?”

Katie swayed slightly but pushed to her feet, grabbing a silver pocket mirror from the dresser.

“I swear to God, Silas,” she muttered, holding it steady, “if you get stuck in this thing forever, you’re gonna wish you stayed dead.”

She whispered a quick incantation. The glass fogged instantly, clouding over with swirling mist.

I snatched the mirror from her hands. “You’d better not be deadweight.”

Silas adjusted his cuffs. “Locke, I’ve been dead everything for quite some time. Do try to keep up.”

The mist inside the mirror churned.

Then, with a final, exasperated sigh?—

Silas vanished, pulled inside like smoke through a keyhole.