Free INK: Vanishing Point (Book 2) by Bella Roccaforte Page B

and
scared I just want to cry, but I have to pull myself together. “Carl,
what the hell was all of that?"
    “That was the Specter manifesting
itself in you to remove me from the equation. He’s looking for
a new way to get around not being able to possess you.” He
gauges Eli’s reaction.
    “Carl, is it really a good idea to
–” Carl cuts him off before he can finish.
    “Eli, I don’t care whether
you have the good sense to believe your own eyes or not. This was
real.” He points to his neck still red and possibly starting to
bruise. “She could have killed me if you hadn’t woke her
up.”
    Eli shakes his head in disbelief.
    I chime in, “If you’ve got a
better explanation I’d love to hear it.”
    “I don’t have an
explanation, but this is all so ridiculous.” Eli combs his
fingers through his hair. “I mean seriously, what is this Specter ?”
    “The Specter is an evil force that
attaches itself to people and it has taken quite an interest you. You
dream about it, right?”
    “Yes, and Gabriel.” My
insides ache when I say his name, it’s been so long since I’ve
seen him and I feel an emptiness inside. “But I haven’t
been dreaming, not really.” I think for a moment, “I know
I had a few dreams at the hospital; some of them were pretty bad and
I couldn’t really wake myself up. But they stopped.”
    “McNab asked me to stay with you
to serve as a protector in your dreams to keep you safe,” he
says and Eli huffs squirming in his seat. “I’ve been
trying to just keep you from dreaming altogether, but something was
different tonight. It got through.”
    “This is all really hard to
swallow.” Eli says standing to pace the floor. “How do
you keep her from dreaming?”
    Placing my hand on Eli’s arm to
try to calm him, I explain, “Carl has specialized training and
can do things .”
I sound so cool, like I’m in the know, but Eli’s still
not ready to get his ticket punched on the crazy train with us.
    “I’m not asking you to
swallow anything” Carl says then looks back to me, “Shay,
you need to tell me what happened in the dream.”
    I tell him about the writing on the wall
and the tendrils of smoke. That I felt drunk with power and didn’t
realize what I was doing. “Carl, I thought it was a dream and I
was trapped in the house. The windows were broken and the living room
burned out, I needed to get out of there to get to Gabriel.”
    Eli stops pacing and turns to me with
wide eyes. “Your living room was burned out in your dream?”
    “Yes, it was like half the house
was gutted and there was blood on the walls.” I describe the
scene and it feels like a memory, not a dream.
    He bends down and smells me, “Jesus,
you do smell like smoke.” He turns to Carl, “Smell her!”
    “I smelled the smoke on her. The
impression of the dream was very strong. If we went to the house we
may even find her blood on the door.” Carl looks directly at
Eli.
    “Wait, the fire was real?”
Please say no, please say it was just a dream.
    “I was going to tell you tonight
when you got up for dinner.” He stops shaking his head.
    “Oh no, this just keeps getting
better. Spill it” Carl and Eli exchange a knowing look.
    “There was a fire.” Eli sits
down beside me. “It’s not a total loss, but there’s
a lot of work that’s going to need to be done.”
    I straighten my shoulders and inhale
deeply. I’m staring down the barrel of homelessness and I don’t
like how it feels. “Okay, this is the part where one of you
tells me what happened.”
    They look at each other waiting for the
other to start. There’s a strange silent exchange between them.
    Eli shakes his head, “Here’s
what I know.” He turns to face me, “Someone called 9-1-1
that there had been a shooting and to send an ambulance.”
    “Who called 9-1-1?” Was it
Aiden?
    “We don’t know who called,”
Eli continues after searing Carl through with his eyes, “You
had been shot twice and the house