Free The Secrets of Ghosts by Sarah Painter

mean?’
    ‘Apparently her grandmother could speak to the dead. Sort of.’
    ‘What does “sort of” mean?’
    ‘She touched corpses and knew how they’d died.’
    ‘Like in
CSI
?’
    Gwen nodded.
    ‘Gruesome power,’ Katie said, but she didn’t look especially shocked. More intrigued. Gwen kept forgetting how strong she was, how motivated. She had to stop thinking of her as a frightened fourteen-year-old. ‘So. What do I do about Mr Cole? Is there any way I can try to talk to him? Instigate contact, kind of thing. I mean, he’s obviously trying to talk to me and if I want the nightmares to stop, maybe I should try harder to listen.’
    That made perfect sense. Gwen felt uneasy about it, but she couldn’t think of any way out of it. Katie was asking for her help. And since she was probably the one who had cursed her with this, she had to get rid of it. Cure Katie. ‘There’s a spell we can try. Like a sort of summoning.’
    ‘Like a séance?’
    ‘I suppose. Iris has put down the bare details but with so little description, it’s clear she didn’t approve.’
    ‘Good thing she’s not here, then,’ Katie said. ‘Can we get on with it?’ She drained her smoothie, making sucking sounds with the straw.
    ‘I thought you’d say that.’ Gwen went back into the house and picked up the first candle to hand. It was a bergamot pillar candle she used in the kitchen to get rid of the smell after cooking curry. Back outside, she put it on the floor in front of the bench and sat cross-legged on the grass. Katie abandoned the bench and sat opposite.
    Gwen lit the candle and reached for Katie’s hands. They were cold and she squeezed them gently.
    Katie looked excited, as if they were having an adventure. ‘What should I be doing?’
    ‘I think we just listen,’ Gwen said. She stared at the candle flame and willed herself to relax.
    ‘Focused or meditative?’ Katie said, after a moment. That girl really had been reading her books.
    ‘Meditative. We need to open a space for Oliver Cole to enter.’
    ‘He’s not entering me, thank you very much,’ Katie said, but then she closed her eyes and went quiet.
    Gwen did the same and, after a while, she felt herself slip into the dream space between waking and sleeping. Instead of a man who might be Katie’s Mr Cole, she saw Katie lying in the hospital bed, aged fourteen and close to death. Gwen opened her eyes. Katie was in front of her. Twenty-one years old. Healthy. Alive.
    Gwen was covered in goose bumps and she squeezed Katie’s hands. ‘Sorry. I can’t.’
    Katie opened her eyes. ‘It’s okay,’ she said, evidently seeing something alarming in Gwen’s expression. ‘I’ll find his watch. I don’t need his help.’ She smiled. ‘I actually met someone else who is looking for it. He seems like the kind of person who gets what he wants. If I stick with him, I bet he’ll lead me to it.’
    ‘He?’ Gwen said. She’d seen the kind of smile Katie was wearing before and knew exactly what it meant. ‘Would this be an attractive kind of “he”, by any chance?’
    ‘Maybe,’ Katie said. ‘But don’t worry, I’m being very sensible.’
    ‘That’s not what worries me.’ Katie was always so cautious. She didn’t trust people easily and was careful of every possible danger. While part of Gwen had welcomed that, knowing that Katie was never going to drink too much or take drugs or get into a car with a drunk driver, another part of her worried that she was never going to live either. That her safe world was going to get smaller and smaller until it comprised her own flat, End House, and that mausoleum of a hotel on the hill. Maybe not even the last one if Mr Cole continued to harass her from beyond the grave.
    Katie drank some smoothie and laid her head on the back of the bench. She stretched into an enormous yawn, one that could rival Cat, and wiped her face. ‘Sorry. Not sleeping well.’
    ‘Take a nap, here,’ Gwen said, taking Katie’s glass