15 Amityville Horrible Read Online Free PDF Page A

Roaring Twenties night. I quickly turned away, as if I was just a regular person, with no supernatural abilities.
    “Help me. Please help me.”

Damn. The “regular person” shtick would work so much better if I could douse the spirit-world glow that marks me as a necromancer.
    I turned. The woman—about twenty, with a blond bob and beaded dress—was partway down the hall. Tears streamed down her face. There was blood on her dress. More spattered her bare arms.
    I took a slow step forward. “You aren’t real, are you?” I murmured. “You’re a residual.”
    “Please, help me.”
    Her gaze seemed to be fixed on mine. A trick of perspective, I told myself. She was just the psychic replay of a traumatic past event. Nothing more than a ghostly holograph, the real victim long since passed over to the other side, living a happy afterlife.
    Still, I took another step.
    “I need help,” she said. “He’s coming. Please—”
    She let out a shriek, eyes going huge, staring at something over my shoulder. Then she ran through a door.
    I looked behind me. There was nothing there.
    It’s a residual. You know it’s a residual.
    But she’d looked straight at me.
    A trick of the light. Real ghosts don’t run down halls in blood-spattered clothes fleeing invisible killers.
    Still…
    I looked each way, then took a deep breath and started after her.

Five
     
    That door the girl had run through? Clearly marked “Do Not Enter.” Of course I did. Of course it opened to reveal a set of steps leading down into a pitch-black basement.
    I looked over my shoulder, making sure no one was around, then took off my heels, flipped on the lights, stepped onto the first riser and closed the door behind me. Before I did, I made sure it would reopen, twisting it and checking for locks, then closing and reopening, just to be sure. I’ve had ghosts play tricks before, leading me into places I can’t get out of.
    I climbed down the steps. Given the amount of dust, I was sure no one had been down there in years. It certainly smelled that way. That made me particularly cautious on the wooden steps, but not one so much as creaked under me.
    The stairs ended in a small room. Four doorways branched off it. Two were closed, two open. The girl stood just inside one of the open ones.
    “Quick!” she said. “Follow me! He’s coming!”
    “Are you talking to me?” I said. “Can you see me?”
    Too late. She’d taken off. I looked back at the stairs, then at the dark room the girl had run into. She had to be a residual, but I was down here now. I couldn’t make a fool of myself if no one was around to watch me chasing an apparition.
    The worst thing that could happen was that I’d witness the replay of a crime I’d really rather not witness. That wouldn’t be anything new. As horrific as residuals could be, I’d learned to deal with them by reminding myself that the victims were safe now, and what I was seeing was nothing more than phantom photography.
    The girl had already made it across the room and through a second doorway. I raced after her.
    “If you’re really a ghost, this isn’t happening,” I called after her. “It can’t be happening. No one can hurt you now.”
    “He’s coming! Please! Save me!”
    Was she responding to my words? Or was the timing coincidental? Damn it. Everything in my experience insisted this had to be a residual. Chasing it was an amateur move, the kind of thing necromancers joked about— hey, remember the time you called 911 when you saw a residual jump off a bridge?
    But this seemed different. So, against all logic, I kept chasing the girl, flipping on lights as I went, through the next room to another hallway.
    “He’s coming!” she said. “Quick! We have to hide!”
    “There’s no one coming. You’re—” I paused. It’s never fun to tell a ghost she’s dead. Normally, though, that only happens if you have the misfortune of meeting one at the moment of death. From this girl’s