The Long Game (Haunted Series Book 19) Read online

  The Long Game

  A Haunted Series Novel by

  Alexie Aaron

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ~

  Copyright 2016 – Diane L. Fitch writing as Alexie Aaron

  ALSO BY ALEXIE AARON

  HAUNTED SERIES

  in order

  The Hauntings of Cold Creek Hollow

  Ghostly Attachments

  Sand Trap

  PEEPs Lite Eternal Maze 3.1

  PEEPs Lite Homecoming 3.2

  Darker than Dark

  The Garden

  Puzzle

  Old Bones

  Things that Go Bump in the Night

  Something Old

  PEEPs Lite Checking Out 9.1

  PEEPs Lite Ice and Steel 9.2

  The Middle House: Return to Cold Creek Hollow

  Renovation

  Mind Fray

  The Siege

  NOLA

  Never Forget

  The Old House

  Restitution

  A Rose by Any Other Name

  The Long Game

  NEW PARANORMAL INVESTIGATION SERIES

  COMING SOON!

  CID GARRETT P.I. SERIES

  Cid

  CIN FIN-LATHEN MYSTERIES

  Decomposing

  Death by Saxophone

  Discord

  The Wages of Cin

  Unforgivable Cin: An Opera in Three Acts

  I would like to dedicate this book to the friendly voices that came out of the ether and rescued this author from the winter that would never end.

  Thank you, Brian, Rebecca, Amanda, Jennifer, Ian, and those who wish to remain anonymous.

  Thank you to the Bliss Cottage crew. There would be no Alexie Aaron without you.

  Table of Contents

  Spring Storm

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Chapter Forty-two

  Chapter Forty-three

  Chapter Forty-four

  Chapter Forty-five

  Chapter Forty-six

  Chapter Forty-seven

  Chapter Forty-eight

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-one

  Free Music Download!

  Glossary

  Alexie Aaron

  Spring Storm

  The rain fell in waves of ever increasing volume. The first sprinkles saturated the green buds brave enough to venture out of the hibernation of winter. The forest was filled with the sound of dancing raindrops. Soon the dance became a riot, a deluge of water falling from the gray-black clouds that now dominated the sky. The rumble of distant thunder was replaced with more audible crashes, and the ground vibrated with each strike.

  Mia gazed out the window of the aerie ruing that she hadn’t left for the farmhouse sooner. She looked at her son placidly reading in the Imagination Alcove and made the decision not to try for the farm. Instead, she chose to wait out the storm in the library, at least until the rain let up. Mia wasn’t a fan of thunderstorms. Her past memories made it impossible to see the beauty in the electric light show that lit up an otherwise gray day. She picked up her phone and dialed her husband.

  “Ted’s house of inventions, head inventor speaking.”

  Mia feigned disappointment, “I was looking for Doctor Frankenstein. Perhaps I misdialed.”

  Ted laughed. “We are one in the same.”

  “Multiple mad-scientist personality disorder?” Mia challenged.

  “Disorder or genius?” Ted countered.

  “I choose genius,” Mia said. “Teddy Bear, Brian and I will be spending the afternoon at the aerie. The weather has trapped us…”

  “In a luxury guesthouse with five thousand books, two birdman-sized bedrooms, and a state-of-the-art kitchen that should have something in the freezer to heat up.”

  “I’m not used to roughing it, darling,” Mia said to cut off his description of the lush guesthouse on the hill overlooking the farm with a handy aerie built on top.

  “You could birdman your way over…” Ted said.

  “Not sure of the outcome in a full electrical onslaught. Brian and I will be here until further notice. If Dieter comes home early from Mark’s, we could use a few candles. In the meanwhile, I’m lighting the fire.”

  “Expecting the…”

  The barn was plunged into darkness. The computers beeped their warning from the PEEPs office. The backup generator kicked in. Ted navigated by the emergency lights out of the vast space to the office and began shutdown procedures. “Mia, I’ll call you back.”

  Mia pocketed her phone, moving quickly to Brian.

  “Mommy, the lights went out. Didn’t we pay our bills?”

  “What a thing to say? Of course we paid our bills.”

  “In Uncle Murphy’s television shows, the family doesn’t always pay the electricity bills.”

  “Sometimes bills are hard to manage, even in television land,” Mia explained, sitting down next to her son. “But our lights went out because of the storm. Out here in the country, it only takes one good lightning strike to a relay station to put us in darkness. Fortunately for us, Daddy has generators. Would you like to go with me to start the one for the library?”

  Brian’s face lit up. He knew that this was a big boy activity, normally taken care of by his Uncle Cid or his father. “Yes, Mommy.”

  Mia resisted the temptation to pick up her son. Brian could walk fine, and she would only be holding him for her own convenience and comfort. Her son reached up his hands. Mia handed him her cell phone with the light app selected. Together, they made their way to the kitchen and out through the doors into the furnace room. Mia looked at the battery from the windmill on the hill. It had been in a resupplying stage when the storm hit. There wouldn’t be enough electricity stored to keep the aerie lit for long. She opened up the slanted windows for ventilation before starting the generator. It roared to life, and she and Brian left the room, shutting the door between them and any fumes the machine could cast off into the guesthouse.

  “This will only last so long. We can preserve the power by turning off any unnecessary lights,” she explained. The two worked their way around the first floor turning off the ex
tra reading lights. Mia picked up Brian and carried him up the dark stairs. They checked out the second floor. Mia slid the lock on the stair to the third floor aerie. She wasn’t expecting any visitors this afternoon. Brian yawned.

  “Would you like to take your nap up here or on the couch downstairs?” she asked her son.

  “Downstairs so I can watch over you, Mommy. I know you don’t like thunderstorms.”

  “You’re my brave little man. Let’s grab a few blankets, and we’ll both take a nap on the big couch.”

  Brian smiled.

  Ted had just finished backing up the pertinent files when Cid burst in through the outside door. He brought with him a bucketful of rainwater. “I think it’s time to build a covered walkway from the house,” he said, grabbing a towel from the washroom to dry off his hair.

  “Or use an umbrella,” Ted said, mopping up the water on the floor with an old towel.

  “I’m going to head up and change my clothes, but before I do, do you want me to run up and check on Mia and Brian?”

  “Mia just called. They’re going to hold up there until the rain lessens,” Ted said, puzzled by the continuing water accumulation in the corner by the front door. “Murphy?” he asked.

  “It’s Murphy’s day in Chicago,” Cid said, staring at the manifesting entity in the corner of the room. “Hello, can we help you?”

  It took a moment for the water to flow off of the manifesting ghost. It was a man wearing the tattered remains of a Vietnam era United States Army uniform. His hair was long, his face weathered and bearded. He was almost skeletal in weight. A flash of lightning pulsed overhead. The ghost seemed to draw power from it. “Get Ryan!” he screamed. “Get Ryan now!” The ghost faded, but Ted and Cid still sensed his presence.

  “Ryan?” Cid asked. “Does he mean John Ryan?”

  Ted picked up the phone and pressed the independent line to the aerie.

  Mia had just put Brian on the couch, pushing a chair up beside it to negate Brian inadvertently taking a fall off the couch in his sleep. She grabbed the handset and answered in a whisper, “Hello?”

  “Mia, we have a ghost in the office asking for Ryan.”

  Mia looked at her son and then the storm that raged outside. “Murph?”

  “He’s in Chicago,” Ted reminded her.

  “Call John Ryan, tell him he has a visitor. I’ll bundle up Brian.”

  “No wait. Cid’s already running up there. Come down as soon as he gets there.”

  Mia met Cid with a warm blanket. “I put some sweats your size in the bathroom,” she said. “Tell me your impressions,” she insisted as she pulled on the rain poncho.

  “Vietnam soldier, ragged and underweight. Beard, longhair. I couldn’t make out anything on his uniform other than it looked frayed.”

  Mia nodded. She moved through the mudroom and out into the rain.

  The wind had picked up and half carried the petite blonde down the hillside. In ideal conditions Mia’s coordination was iffy at best. Today, the wind and rain had her sliding most of the way down the hillside on her bottom. She got up and ran the rest of the way to the office. Once inside, she shed her poncho and looked around through long ropes of platinum-blonde hair. She pulled her hair away from her face. “Where?”

  Ted tossed her a towel and pointed behind her.

  Mia turned around and stared into the eyes of a manic electric-powered ghost. “Have you called Ryan?”

  “He’s out overseeing an accident on Hillsdale Road. The dispatcher promised to relay our request for him to call us,” Ted said.

  “Hello, my name is Mia. I can see and hear you, so save your energy. We have called for John Ryan. Is this who you are looking for?” she asked.

  “Sergeant John Ryan of the 5th Special Forces group,” the ghost stated flatly, the manic look fading into one of determination.

  “We will find him,” Mia promised.

  “Tell him, all weren’t lost in the Cardamom Mountains.”

  “I will,” Mia said.

  The ghost faded and the door opened. Mia watched as the ghost let the wind take him into the swirling eddy of rain and leaves.

  Mia looked over at her husband. “I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

  “Tell me,” Ted said, rubbing her shoulders with another dry towel.

  “The ghost used the storm for transportation,” she explained.

  “Like the Wanderers?” Ted asked.

  “No, like a demon.”

  Chapter One

  John put his phone down and radioed Tom Braverman. “Deputy, I need to head out to the Martin farm. Cover for me.”

  “Cover, as in?”

  “Do the shit I do, Deputy!” Ryan barked into the radio.

  “Yes, sir,” Tom answered.

  Sheriff John Ryan got into his cruiser and told dispatch he was off duty until further notice and to contact Braverman with any questions that he normally dealt with. He drove quickly around Big Bear Lake, skirting the south side of the cemetery, and out towards the hollow. Mia’s description of the ghost pulled memories out of the crevices where he had jammed them trying to move forward with his life.

  The Cardamom Mountains of Cambodia weren’t mentioned in the annals of United States Military history. They shouldn’t have been there in the first place. But he and a squad of nine other Special Forces men had spent a week of hell there. What he had seen would haunt him forever. There had been only one survivor of the mission, a battered soldier named John Ryan.

  John pulled into the Martin parking lot, noting the lack of electricity. Mia had instructed him to come to the PEEPs office where they had encountered the ghost. Mia doubted that it would return, but why it had come looking for John there was a mystery that still needed to be solved.

  Mia looked up as John entered. She was coloring with her young son. Cid had his head in a large volume of maps.

  Ted walked over to the kitchenette and asked, “Can I get you a hot cup of coffee, Sheriff?”

  “Nah, been working on caffeine since this storm started. I would love a milk if you have it?”

  Brian looked up at the tall man and smiled. “Milk does the body good,” he parroted.

  “Sorry, Murphy and he have been watching too much television,” Mia explained. “I think Murphy has worked his way into the eighties sitcoms. Brian has latched onto some less than desirable catchphrases.”

  John sat down next to Mia and Brian and looked at a few of the pictures. Brian’s command of the media was in line with most of his peers, but the subject matter held deeper meaning than his fellow toddlers. John held up a whirling wind with hands and a face peeking out.

  “That’s what I saw,” Mia explained. “I told Brian about it, and he drew this for me.”

  “You don’t keep this stuff away from your child?” John questioned.

  “Here, a visit from a spirit is treated no different than a visit from the County Sheriff.”

  John studied Mia’s face a moment before asking, “Tell me again what happened here.”

  Ted walked over to the door and began his tale of the water pooling in the corner. Mia finished with the ghost’s request before he took off in the storm.

  “You’re sure he was looking for Sergeant John Ryan?”

  “Yes.”

  “And he mentioned the Cardamom Mountains, Cardamom as in the spice?” John specified.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I wasn’t a Sergeant when I was in the Cardamoms. I was a private, but there was a corporal who always called me Sarge because of my bossy nature. Corporal Shane Quivers, Shivers for short. He was a tall guy with eyes black as night.”

  “The kind that bore through you,” Mia said. “The ghost had a chipped tooth, here,” Mia pointed to her top right incisor.

  “Oh my God,” John said. “That sounds like Shivers.”

  “I take it Shivers is no longer with the living,” Ted commented.

  “He and eight others were lost in the mountains. The only way I got
out was by being smuggled out by a group of missionaries.”

  Mia watched as her son drew a man in a black cassock wearing a large cross. “Catholic missionaries?” Mia asked, angling her head so she could look into John’s eyes.

  His words confirmed what Mia saw there, “A very young priest named Paolo Santos saved my life. That’s where he and I first met, in the Cardamom Mountains in Cambodia.”

  Cid pushed the large atlas towards Ryan. “Can you show me where?”

  John looked down at the map. What he saw wouldn’t be listed on the map. He turned the page where the geographical map of the mountains was. He ran his finger over the page counting the crags, fighting the memories at the same time. “Here,” he circled with his finger. “They were all in these valleys and crags, cut into the limestone. They started to pick us off one by one here.”

  “They, as in Viet Cong?” Cid asked.

  “No, Khmer Rouge rebels. They were acting in concert with Pol Pot at the time. We were sent in on recon to see if it was worth it to widen the incursion to include the mountains.”

  “You said Father Santos saved you. What was he doing there?”

  “You would have to ask him yourself, Mia.”

  “Why do you think Shivers came here to look for you, and not your home or the county building?”

  “I don’t know. I’m not from here originally. Shivers wouldn’t have any intel on what happened to me in later years.”

  “You’d be surprised what kind of data can be found in certain vaults,” Mia mumbled.

  “Shivers was the first to disappear. He met Paolo. This is just a guess, but many a time in recent years, Paolo Santos and I met here at your farm. Perhaps Shivers, if he is a ghost, was attracted to the energy we left behind,” John offered.

  “It’s possible,” Mia said.

  “I wonder if Santos has been in contact with Shivers?” Ted asked.

  “I’ll call him,” John promised. “If the ghost shows up again…” John stopped speaking long enough to jot down his private cell and home number. “Call me immediately. I’ll alert the wife that your call is very important.”