The Awakening: A Sisterhood of Spirits Novel by Yvonne Heidt Page A

from the apartments above and distorting the sounds here. Yes, that was it. Pleased with the explanations, she opened the door and froze.
    The room looked like it had been hit with a bomb. Wet clothes were stuck to the wall and floor, the two washers were on their sides, and the dryers were moved away from the wall with their doors open.
    As she stood there, a gray T-shirt fell from the ceiling to plop on the wet floor. Jordan bent to grab it, and when she stood, she saw the words written in red on the wall.
    Leave, bitch.
    Somewhere under the rage she felt at the vandalism, the cop in her took over and she pulled out her phone to take pictures of the destruction. It was personal then. Some asshole in the building had a grudge against the police. Ghosts, my ass . It wasn’t the first time that some lowlife had found out what she did for a living and written things on her truck or door.
    Jordan debated calling it in and decided not to. She was still new, and she didn’t want to draw attention to herself and invite other cops into her personal life. They’d question the sweet old landlady, who would tell them about ghosts, and Jordan would never live it down. Nope, she wasn’t going to go there.
    The last picture she took was of a laundry soap container that looked, well, melted was the only explanation she could come up with. Jordan looked around at the mess. She didn’t have time to clean it by herself, and she didn’t want Agnes to have to come and help. She called Steve instead. He would just have to wake his happy ass up and help her. “’Lo?”
    Jordan heard the sleep in his voice. “Come down to the laundry room right now.”
    “What time is it?”
    “You have five minutes before I take these pictures to your grandmother.” Jordan snapped her phone shut. She wouldn’t really scare Agnes, but she knew that the threat would get him moving faster.
    Jordan defiantly put her clothes in the last standing washer and dug out more quarters. There didn’t seem to be any damage to them other than the wild, wet party they’d apparently been to in the last hour.
    She heard the door slam then approaching footsteps and waited for Steve to enter. What was he doing, she asked herself when she heard the strange snorting noises. Waiting for an invitation? Jordan pulled open the door.
    The hall was empty. “Not funny, asshole!” she yelled. There had to be someone hiding in one of the storage cages. It was the only logical explanation.
    The metal door clicked, and Steve appeared in the entry, his hair standing up in tufts around his head.
    She waited for him to reach her. “Did you see anyone out there?”
    “No. What’s going on?”
    She pushed him into the messy room and handed him her phone.
    “Whoa.” His face took on a serious tone as he looked at the snapshots and the remaining mess. “When did this happen?”
    “Within the last hour. I came down to switch the clothes and found this.” She gestured around the room. “I’m so over this shit.” She rounded on him. “And don’t you dare tell me a ghost did this.”
    Steve’s eyes were wide. “Must be a poltergeist. I’ve read they can move heavy objects around and throw stuff.”
    Jordan rolled her eyes at him. “Right. You really need to give that horse a rest. The rest of this mess is all yours, buddy.”
    “How come I’m in trouble?”
    “I have to get ready for my shift,” she answered, and quickly shut the door.
    Thirty minutes later, Jordan left for work. When she drove out of the back parking lot and past the front of the building, a familiar car caught her attention. Before she could place it and who it belonged to, the light turned green and she drove through it, still steaming over the vandalism.
     
    *
     
    Sunny parked and grabbed her briefcase before crossing the street. Originally built for officers of the naval shipyard, the old brick building was in a U-shape, the center area filled with grass and border flowers. She could feel the