Dark Lily: Shadows, Book 4 by Jenna Ryan Page A

stuff that burned today.” She gave Fred’s desk behind her a meaningful tap. “You tell Harley I’m not happy about that. Also mention I know where he keeps his stash of vintage X-Men comic books.”
    “Actually, those are mine…” Fred cleared his throat. “I’ll tell him, Gaby. It’s getting kind of dark outside, don’t you think?”
    “Clouds are thickening up.”
    Mitchell opened the door to look and listen. “You know,” he mused, “anywhere else, brooding black clouds and air that’s not moving would be a halfway cool indication that a storm was about to break. On Bokur, it feels more like a portent of doom.”
    “Other things than weather systems break on Bokur.” Gaby came to stand behind him. “What charges the atmosphere changes the sensibilities.”
    Mitchell thought he almost understood that, which was damn near as spooky as the spikes of concern currently doing handsprings in his belly.
    She slipped past him. “Clouds in any form won’t hurt us. While that’s all we’re facing, we should drive around the island, see if we stumble across a suspicious camper van.”
    “Let’s stumble over to the hotel first,” Mitchell suggested. “Eliminate the obvious.”
    Fred’s chair scraped back. “I’ll get your badge. I mean, it wouldn’t hurt to wear it, right?”
    The phrase “impersonating an officer” sprang to mind, but Mitchell shrugged it off. What the hell. No one on Bokur was likely to arrest him. He took the badge and Gaby’s arm.
    “I already talked to Annie,” she remarked as they crossed the weirdly silent road to the hotel. “The workers who are staying with her came down from Shreveport. They’re related to one of the island’s oldest residents. You might meet her at some point. She has a regular corner spot over at the tearoom.”
    “Remind me later to ask you why those remarks made the hair on my neck stand on end. What else did you learn?”
    “Most of the tourists are couples. Four of them use canes. There’s a family—mom, dad and three kids. The only single, other than the workers, is a woman in her mid-fifties. She came to Bokur to meet and sketch ghosts.”
    “Great. We’ll start with the crazy lady.”
    “This from a man who admits, however reluctantly, that he has poltergeists?”
    “I’ve heard Jasper and Bruce in the storeroom, but I’ve never seen them, and I doubt anyone’s ever tried to paint them.”
    “You have a really big push-me-pull-you in that head of yours, Mitchell. Why don’t you give your grandfather’s genes a rest, stop and take in the sound of voodoo drums.”
    He shot her a sharp look. “You hear voodoo drums?”
    “Not at the moment, but sometimes I do.”
    “So if I develop a sudden slamming headache—highly likely at this point—the source of it could be someone sticking pins in my skull?”
    “That’s not how poppets are generally used, but it never hurts to keep an eye on your personal possessions. Anything intimate goes missing, you let me know. I’ll send Billy out to find it.” Halting at the hotel entrance, she surprised him by reaching up and kissing him hard on the mouth. “Word of warning. Old Joe works the desk most afternoons. He likes to kick back and play the blues on his guitar.”
    Mitchell’s brows came together. “That sounds normal enough. What’s the catch?”
    “No catch.” Smiling, she nipped his bottom lip. “Joe’s a real regular guy. Who just happens to have died three months ago.”
    * * * * *
    CJ Best’s world had been going dark for years, ever since the invisible entity that was Leshad had slithered into it. And God help him, meeting Phoebe years before that fateful—or maybe he meant fatal—juncture hadn’t made the slide into blackness any easier. In retrospect at any rate.
    Leshad had initiated their first contact. By phone, because there’d been no Internet in those early days. He’d known from the start about CJ’s relationship with Phoebe, but it hadn’t seemed