“There is no such thing as just a pentagram—”
“Why did you decide to use the Ouija board?” Aiden asked, lightly touching my arm in warning.
I took a deep breath and tried to calm down—a hard task in the face of such stupidity.
“We were all drinking and bitching, and I was going on about not being allowed to marry Garrett, and then Janice suggested I get a little supernatural payback.”
“And Aron didn’t speak up against this?” Aiden said, surprise evident.
“He did, but Janice convinced him it was just a bit of fun and no real harm would come of it.”
“So that’s when the Ouija board came into play,” I said.
She nodded. “None of us took it seriously, not even Janice.”
Which was their first mistake. Not taking things seriously was a good way to piss off the good spirits and invite in the bad.
“So what happened?”
She hesitated. “Nothing at first. Then the planchette began to move in this weird figure-eight pattern. We kept asking questions, but it was like it wasn’t interested in helping.”
“That’s because it wasn’t,” I said. “It was trying to control the board.”
“What happened after that,” Aiden said, with another warning glance at me.
I crossed my arms and returned his gaze evenly. He’d asked for my help, so he was damn well going to put up with my questions and comments as well.
“Nothing much,” Larissa said. “Janice started accusing us of moving the planchette and trying to scare her. She demanded that we stop.”
“And did you?”
“Yeah. It was getting weirdly cold and dark in the room, so we just gave it up.”
“Did you close the connection first?” I asked. “And did you wrap both the planchette and the board up in separate cloths and store them apart?”
“I don’t fucking know. I left not long after that.”
I swore again. “So it’s possible we’re dealing with a still-open connection.”
“Meaning what?” Aiden asked.
I raised my gaze to his. “If we don’t close it, a soul eater could be the least of our problems.”
Chapter Eleven
Aiden rubbed a hand across his chin. In the sharp silence of the hall, it sounded like rough sandpaper. “What do we need to do?”
“Immediately find that board and close the connection down.”
He swore and returned his gaze to Larissa. “When did all this happen?”
“Three days before Aron was murdered.”
“And you went into hiding two days before then,” I said. “Why?”
“Because I got a call from Frankie saying something weird was happening in her house, that it felt as if something was there with her, trying to get her, and she was scared.” She paused, and something close to fear crept into her expression again. “She said we’d let something bad in when we were using the board, and that she needed someplace to stay while she got the place cleansed.”
Which wouldn’t have done one bit of damn good if the Ouija doorway was still open. “And your response?”