Free The Realm of the Shadows (Tropical Breeze Cozy Mystery Book 2) by Mary Bowers Page B

the water.”
    The videographer suddenly focused away from the star and the crew aimed everything at the river. The moss-green of the water glowed where they pointed, and somewhere at the edge of the circle, there was a dark shadow.
    “I see him!” somebody shouted, pointing with his whole arm. Pluto took a huge gasp of air and went under again, quickly followed by Jazz. More crew members were jumping into the water now, and Michael and I stood transfixed at the life-or-death drama that these fools had created. I took Michael’s arm and hugged myself against him.
    “Oh, God, Michael. That beautiful boy!”
    “He’s all right. It’s all a part of the show. He’s probably got a tank of air under the water or something. Pretty good stuff, huh?” He tried to smile but it was no good; his lips were frozen. He was as worried as I was.
    Suddenly it seemed as if everybody under the water surfaced at once, and Pluto and Jazz were on either side of a limp figure. Seth’s face was still down in the water, and they didn’t have the presence of mind to lift it. Equipment was thrown down on the ground by most of the crew while the videographer stayed focused on the action, and arms reached down for the sodden figure of a man, his light hair swaying in the water like seaweed.
    They hauled him over the seawall, leaving Pluto, Jazz and assorted flunkies to climb over the wall by themselves.
    I had to look away. I’d hauled a drowning victim out of the water myself once. I couldn’t watch. I heard the counting, the squish of the wet clothes against the slim body, the increasing desperation that filled the air around the huddled figures.
    “Come on, Seth,” Teddy urged.
    I tried to convince myself that it had all been a hoax, a vortex of terror created for the TV cameras, and in a minute Seth would cough a few times, sit up and ask what all the fuss was about, but I didn’t really believe it.
    “They’re on the way,” somebody said. “It’s a long way in from the main road, though. Even the ambulance is going to have to take it easy on that dirt road in the dark. Keep pushing.”
    The man doing CPR kept pushing.
    It finally came home to me that Seth was really dead. Not TV dead. Dead.
    I sat down on the ground and cried.
     
    I knew Kyle Longley, the Sheriff of Flagler County. He showed up shortly after the ambulance and came straight to me and Michael.
    “What happened?”
    Still emotional, I said, “The damn fools pulled a prank to make a TV show, and it went wrong. A man drowned.”
    He inhaled loudly through his nostrils. “You have got to be kidding me,” he muttered.
    “Does it look like I’m kidding?”
    “What kind of a show?”
    Michael answered. “A ghost-hunting show. The Realm of the Shadows .”
    Kyle gave us an incredulous frown. “Wasn’t that a movie or something? Long time ago?”
    “It was a clever idea that caught on. This show is only one of half a dozen reality ghost shows running. I guess they were trying to out-do the competition.”
    “By making their own ghosts?” Kyle said. “Well, I’d better go talk to them and see what they have to say for themselves. It was all a phony set-up, you think?”
    “I don’t know,” I told him. “Nobody seemed surprised to see him jump into the river, but they genuinely panicked when he didn’t come up again. I think it just went wrong, Kyle. They recorded the whole thing. Make them give you the camera.”
    He looked at Michael. “Better take your lady inside now. I’ll talk to you two later, if I need to. She looks about done in.”
    For once I didn’t mind a little masculine protectiveness, and when Michael put his arm around me, I held onto it with both hands.
     
    I couldn’t sleep.
    We had taken the master bedroom, and we went up and collapsed into bed. About an hour later I realized that staring at the ceiling wasn’t going to take me to dreamland. My body was tired, but my mind was overwrought.
    Trying not to disturb Michael, I got out