The Ghost’s Obsession

2

RAVEN

I stared down at my phone. The only people who had this number were Caleb and Emmy, and as far as I knew, they still had six months left on their sentences. I didn't give my number out to strangers. Hell, I barely knew that many people to begin with.

I couldn't shake it off. I'd just gotten out. Who even knew I was free? William? No, he was still in for another ten years. Caleb and Emmy were impossible. So who was this?

The pain in my wrist stopped mattering. My mind was already spiraling.

I opened the door and stepped inside. The silence was the first thing I noticed. I wasn't used to it anymore.

The apartment looked like the photos, thankfully, just dustier. That was the least of my problems right now. I pulled the cover off the table, set my bag down, and dug out my laptop and charger. Found an outlet. Grabbed the things I'd had the house agent leave by the door.

I plugged my phone into the laptop and pulled up the message trace. If this number really belonged to someone at Ridgewood, the routing would say so. Instead, the signal bounced through three different relays before landing on a number that didn't match anything connected to Ridgewood.

I stared at the screen.

Someone had gone through the trouble of making it look like the message came from outside. That wasn't someone with a stolen phone and too much time. That was deliberate.

"Motherfucking Emmy." A laugh slipped out despite everything. Of course she would scare me half to death before saying hello.

If anyone inside Ridgewood could spoof a number and make it look like it came from somewhere else, it was her. Emmy had broken into systems that were supposed to be impossible and somehow made it look easy.

Still, I didn't appreciate the heart attack. ‘Don't scare me like that, you little s**t,’ I replied to her.

Her response came almost immediately. ‘Still dramatic, I see.’ I stared at the screen for a second before I smiled.

Of course. That was Emmy. Always annoying me first and asking if I was okay second.

‘You always did hate quiet places.’

My smile faded slightly.

I looked around the apartment.

"What?"

My fingers hovered over the keyboard.

‘What did you say?’

‘You heard me.’

A small chill ran through me.

Emmy knew me. She knew things about me almost nobody else did, but she never brought them up in random conversations, not like this.

‘Who are you?’ I typed, and this time the silence before the reply was loud.

All the sounds I'd been tuning out finally caught up to me: the wind whistling against the sheets draped over the furniture, the hum of an empty room. My back was turned when a loud bang cracked through the quiet.

I froze, then spun around fast. Just the balcony door, slammed shut by the wind. My shoulders dropped. I walked over, weaving around the covered furniture, and shut the other half behind it. The lock was old. The wind could move it. But why didn’t the manager shut it properly?

I was on the top floor. My room wasn't cheap, not for this building, one bedroom with a view I was only now noticing. Not much of a view either, just the neighboring tower crowding the glass. Somebody had touched up the listing photos. I usually spotted edited images easily. Prison didn't exactly leave me much time for apartment hunting.

"Bastard."

My phone chimed, and I jumped again. Emmy had replied.

‘You're such a puss puss for someone who acts tough all the time. Still the same Rae, I see.’

Puss puss. That eased something in my chest. She'd called me that for years.

‘Being on your own is still better than being with the nuns, right?’

I stared at that line longer than I should have. I never talked about the orphanage with Emmy, not really. Not because it was a secret. But because some things were easier left buried, and so I ignored her question.

That was a Caleb thing, something I let slip once during a bad week and made him swear never to bring up again. Maybe she'd heard it from him. Maybe I was remembering wrong. I let it go.

We talked a while, and she sounded like herself, said she'd been counting down the days, that the three of us would be together again once she and Caleb got out. She asked what my next move was. I told her I didn't have one yet. Before she signed off, her last message stuck with me.

‘Remember to close the doors. It gets cold in there.’

Doors. Plural. How did she know I had more than one? I told myself I was overthinking it. It had to be her; she knew things only Emmy would know. I chalked the rest up to prison messing with my head.

I tied my hair into a messy bun and left my phone charging while I cleaned. Two hours later, I screamed bloody murder at a rat the size of a small dog living in my kitchen.

"The exterminator will be there tomorrow, sorry for the inconvenience," the leasing agent said, and hung up before I could get a word out. So now I was sharing a room with a rat. Even in prison I never had a roommate this bad, just a quiet one who only talked to herself.

By ten I finally got my first bath of the day, sinking into water gone lukewarm. Music on low, wine straight from the bottle like a depressed thirty-five-year-old divorcee, which almost made me laugh. Almost. Mostly I just missed them. Emmy and Caleb were the closest thing I had to family.

My eyes kept slipping shut between sips, just for a second at a time, the music blurring at the edges until I couldn't tell if the next song had started or if I was still on the last one. The water had gone still around me. The warmth made it too easy to stop fighting sleep. I let my head tip back against the tub and the room went soft and far away, the way it does right before sleep actually takes you.

"I have to leave you, but I'll come back," the voice said, soft and familiar, closer now than the room had been a second ago. "I promise, Raven. Mommy's coming back for you."

"Don't leave me," I cried, and my hands were small, five-year-old small, reaching for a shape I couldn't hold onto.

A nun lifted me off the ground and carried me away while I screamed for her. "Mommy, please come back," I sobbed as the orphanage doors shut behind us, the sound of them slamming louder and louder until it wasn't a door at all.

It was my own music cutting out mid-song. My eyes flew open. For a second, I couldn't remember where I was. Then I saw it.

The portable heater I'd plugged in before getting into the bath had tipped forward, its cord hanging over the edge of the vanity, barely a foot from the water.

My blood ran cold.

If it had slipped any farther, I would have been dead.

I scrambled out of the tub, water splashing onto the tiles as I grabbed the nearest towel with trembling hands. My heart was still pounding as I yanked the heater's plug from the wall.

"Jesus..."

I stared at it for a long second.

Had I left it that close to the edge? I couldn't remember. Exhaustion. That's all this was. My brain was fried.

I picked up my phone from the bathroom counter and walked into my bedroom, still trying to slow my breathing.

The moment I stepped into the living room, a cold breeze brushed across my damp skin.

I stopped. The curtains swayed gently.

My eyes lifted to the balcony. The doors stood open, and my stomach dropped. No…

I'd closed it after the wind slammed it shut hours ago. I knew for a fact that I'd locked it.