Possess by Gretchen McNeil Page B

again, muffled in the background.
    She could hear them. They could hear her. Maybe she could use that to her advantage? Bridget placed her hand flat against the wall.
    The voices were still speaking nonsense, louder now, arguing among themselves. They seemed less terrifying when she pictured them as bickering old church ladies. The thought actually made her smile and gave her the courage to speak.
    “Get out,” she said.
    “It is speaking to us? Is the traitor speaking to us?”
    “Get out of this house.” Her voice sounded strong, even if she felt like she was going to ralph her vanilla ice cream all over the rug.
    “We don’t listen to you.”
    “We don’t listen to her.”
    “We were summoned. The Master wants us here.”
    “Well, I don’t want you here.”
    “Bridge?” Danny (or was it Manny?) sniffed.
    “It’s okay, boys. It’s going to be okay.”
    “This is our home now.”
    “Don’t talk to her. The Master wouldn’t like it.”
    “I want Mommy,” the other twin said.
    Bridget inched toward the door, keeping one hand on the wall while she herded the twins with the other. “Leave us alone.”
    The black mass shrank into the closet. “We’ll never leave. Never, never, never.”
    Bridget’s hand was on the doorknob. “Let us out of this room.”
    “We won’t! We won’t! We won’t!”
    “Now!”
    With another painful shriek from the voices, the bedroom door swung open. Whoa, they did what she told them to? Amazing. Somehow, she had power over them.
    She shepherded the boys through the door. “Get out. Get out of this house.”
    “How are you here?”
    “We only obey the Master.”
    “Her words burn like the white flame.”
    Bridget planted her feet on the floor and clenched her fist. “Get out of here!”
    The house moaned. The lights in the hallway flickered, and the voices in the walls let out a soul-wrenching wail.
    Then all was still.

Ten
    B RIDGET PAUSED. F ATHER S ANTOS FURIOUSLY scribbled notes, flipping new pages with mechanical precision. He seemed unaware that she’d stopped talking.
    “And how did Monsignor Renault learn of the incident?” he asked without looking up.
    “Can’t you ask Monsignor?”
    Father Santos still didn’t look at her. “How did he find out?”
    Bridget sighed. “Mrs. Ferguson called Monsignor and told him the whole story.”
    He glanced in her direction. “I take it they know each other?”
    Bridget shrugged. “They’re in the parish.”
    “Interesting. And Monsignor never mentioned anything about the Watchers or divine grace?”
    Was he serious? “Pretty sure I’d’ve remembered that.”
    Father Santos stopped writing and looked at her. “Are you sure?”
    Bridget returned his stare. “Someone tells me I’ve been touched by Jesus, I remember.”
    “Not Jesus,” he said in all seriousness. “The hand of God.”
    Bridget was getting tired of all the Bible talk. “Whatever.”
    “No, not whatever. There is a grave difference.” Father Santos bounced to his feet and scurried over to a pile of boxes in the middle of the room. He shifted the top two onto another pile, then drew a set of rosary beads out of his pocket. In a swift, clean motion he made the sign of the cross over the box, then used a sharp corner of the metal crucifix to break the seal on the packing tape, running it down the length of the box.
    Well, that’s something you don’t see every day.
    As he slipped the rosary back into his pocket, he caught Bridget’s eye.
    “Can’t seem to find any of my supplies,” he said, the color rising ever so slightly in his brown face. “You know, any port in a storm and all that.”
    Bridget nodded and hoped her face didn’t reflect what her brain was thinking, namely that Father Santos was a whackadoo.
    After a few moments digging through the sacrilegiously opened box, Father Santos pulled out a large volume, thick as a dictionary and encased in a crinkly plastic cover. He resumed his seat and placed the book carefully on