The Mystery of Bloody Mary

By J. P. Greer

Up until now, chasing ghosts with their parents meant long summers of lugging equipment and watching computer monitors for the children. Little do Joey and Meghan know that not only are there really ghosts in this house, but that the ghosts want out, and they’ll do anything do get their wish. A strange secret has trapped the ghosts in the house, and an evil witch will try and use her wicked powers to finish what she started 100 years before. But to accomplish her task, she needs two more ingredients for her spell that she hasn’t been able to obtain – until now.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Apr 29, 2014
• ISBN: 9781312148512

Book preview

The Mystery of Bloody Mary

The Mystery of Bloody Mary

By J. P. Greer

Copyright © 2013, J. P. Greer

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted by any means—whether auditory, graphic, mechanical, or electronic—without written permission of both publisher and author. Unauthorized reproduction of any part of this work is illegal and is punishable by law.

ISBN: 978-1-312-14851-2

Prologue

July 25, 1903:

Hannah was nearly out of breath from running.  Her dress caused her to stumble up the last few steps and she twisted her ankle.  Ignoring the pain, she ran down the hallway to her room.  She could hear he name being screamed from one of the floors below her.

They'll be here soon, the little girl whispered to herself.  They’ll save me from this madness.

Hannah was still in shock from what she had discovered. It all seemed so unbelievable, but she knew it to be true.  If only her aunt and uncle would return home, she would be able to tell them all she had found and put an end to her nightmare, but with the latest turn of events she wasn’t sure she was going to be able to tell anyone. Opening the door to her room, she jumped when she heard her name screamed again.  The voice was shrill, and carried throughout the house.  Haaaannnnaaahhh! Where are you, you rotten girl?  She looked into the mirror that stood next to her dresser; startled by the wide eyed, disheveled thirteen year old girl that stared back at her. She spun the mirror so that it faced the wall, hiding her image, and closed and locked the door behind her.  Crossing over to her bed, she hurriedly pulled her diary from under her pillow, sat down, and began to write, quickening her pace when she heard her name called again. The voice was closer now.  She was running out of time. She paused for a moment, as if thinking hard about what to put down on the paper, then began writing again. The screaming had stopped momentarily, and for a brief moment, she thought that her pursuer had given up, but then the doorknob to her room began to turn, stopping when the lock caught. The person on the other side of the door began rattling the knob, then began pounding on the door, causing Hannah to jump again.

The shrill voice screamed again.  Hannah! Open this door right now!

The pounding got harder as if someone was throwing themselves at the door. Between the screaming and the pounding, the sound was deafening. Hannah stopped writing when she heard the door begin to splinter from its frame. It wasn’t going to hold for much longer. She tore the page that she had been writing on from the diary and looked frantically around her room.  Spotting her favorite doll, she scooped it up and smoothed its curly hair. The round smiling face stared back her, with blue eyes and red lips. Smiling back sadly, she lifted the doll’s dress, rolled the page into a tube and stuffed it through a small opening in the stitching on its stomach, thanking God that she had never found the time to fix the hole. She placed it back on the shelf just as the door crashed open. She knew then that they would never come in time to help her.

Chapter 1

June 2012

We’re here! Joey’s father announced cheerfully as the car turned into the drive.

Here we go again, Joey muttered. He sighed and looked back out the car window. He had been staring out at coastline for the last half-hour of the six-hour drive in their cramped car.  It was the first day of summer vacation, and the sun was shining down brightly. He should have been happy that they had finally reached their destination, but he wasn’t.

It’s beautiful, his mother replied.

Joey followed his mother’s gaze. An old four-story mansion with its huge windows and slate roof stood staring back at him. Four tall chimneys protruded from either side of the house with two more jutting from the middle.  A ‘For Sale’ sign protruded from the tall grass just outside the entrance to the drive, with a small Sold sign pasted to the front. He looked at the front of the house, which was covered with a tangle of thick vines. It looked ordinary enough to him, he thought, staring out the window of the car as they passed through the old iron gates at the entrance. But it couldn’t be ordinary if they were here. Oh no. If they were here there was something extremely un-ordinary with the house, and nothing as mundane as a leaking roof, or plumbing that needed repair. This was because his parents weren’t ordinary either. No. Not Michael and Marilyn Shepard. Why couldn’t he have parents that were doctors or lawyers or even, ugh, teachers. No, his parents had to be two of the best paranormal investigators in the world. When they weren’t lecturing at different colleges and universities, they were off trying to discover new haunted places. Unfortunately for Joey, often times, this required many weeks or even months of research and investigation at a particular haunted site.   Summer was the best time, since the kids would be out of school. This was why he had spent the last six hours stuffed in a car, dragged away from yet another summer vacation.

Suddenly a loud ‘Wow!’ broke him out of his reverie. He looked over at the source of the exclamation. It had come from his thirteen-year-old twin sister Meghan. She was looking excitedly out the window and bouncing up and down in her seat, straining against her seatbelt. She paused long enough to push her yellow-gold bangs out of her face and then continued bouncing. Meghan loved all the research and the excitement of seeing new places and had been looking forward to this trip. Except for her blond hair where his was dark brown, she was definitely his sister, with the same big brown eyes and freckles across her nose that he had. That was where the similarities ended. Where Joey was shy and reserved, Meghan was very outgoing and sometimes let her excitement get the better of her.  Joey sighed and looked back out the window. This trip wasn’t exciting for him. To him, this just meant another summer of lugging equipment around for his parents and being away from his friends. In the past, he hadn’t minded so much. In fact, he almost kind of liked it; watching his parents in action, exploring new places, and trying to solve mysteries. But this summer was different. They had recently moved to a new town three months earlier. He had just started to make some friends before the summer break.  He had been looking forward to hanging out with them for the summer swimming at the local lake, but now his plans were ruined.  He was stuck hanging out with a thirteen-year-old girl who thought nothing was better than chasing ghosts and poltergeists.

He leaned over and gave Meghan a slight shove. Knock it off will you, he said, scowling at her. You’ve been bouncing for hours and you’re making me sick.

You knock it off, Meghan answered shoving him back, a little harder.

Joey was about to give her another push when his father interrupted.

You both better knock it off if you know what’s good for you. He had been watching the exchange from the rear-view mirror. Joey lowered his arm as Meghan stopped bouncing. She stuck her tongue out at him and turned back towards the window.

Joey sighed and leaned his forehead on the window of the car. The coolness of the glass felt good on his skin and calmed him down a bit. Looking back up at the house, he did have to admit that it was pretty impressive. First of all, it was enormous. Secondly, it was right next to the ocean. As they drove the last couple of miles on the road leading to the house, he had stared out at the waves and watched the pelicans diving for their dinner. He knew from the map his parents had shown him that the house sat on a peninsula that jutted out from the mainland between a bay called Clear Rain and the ocean. The peninsula was about two miles wide by twelve miles long.

Joey shrugged. Ghosts? This place sure looked like the kind of place ghosts usually hung out. But he didn’t believe in them, did he? No. At least not like the rest of his family did. This was because, in all the years he could remember tagging along with his parents, no ghost had ever appeared to them in the flesh, so to speak. He guessed he was more like his mother than his father in this respect. She was the skeptical one, and was more inclined to try to disprove a haunting than to try and confirm it. But Joey’s father truly believed that there was something out there, something that could be communicated with. This was why he spent his life attempting to reach out to the other side, to try and find the answers. And why they were here investigating another supposed haunting instead of being back home.  Joey sighed again. He guessed that there had been a couple weird encounters over the years. And his parents were renowned as having gathered some of the most well documented and well respected evidence in the paranormal world. There were the pictures his father had taken of what looked like a confederate soldier that haunted a southern plantation, and the pictures of what appeared to be a white ellipse with a strange demon-like face of a specter haunting a castle in Ireland. These pictures were all examined by prominent parapsychologists and paranormal organizations and authenticated. But all the years spent researching haunted sites had not brought his father much closer to solving the mystery of the paranormal.

Unfortunately for Joey’s parents, there were many people who had tried to trick them over the years, and others that thought their exploits were nothing more than a big joke. Joey looked at his mother and father and smiled. The two could sometimes not be more opposite, which is why they probably made such a good team. His father ran off every time someone called to tell them about a new site to further his search, and his mother always looked for reasons to disprove it.

Joey looked back over at his sister who had started bouncing again. Even if he did believe in ghosts, he thought, he would never admit it, especially to Meghan.

He looked back up at the house. According to his parents, the house had been vacant almost continuously for the past one hundred years. All that Joey really knew about the house was that it had recently been purchased by a couple who fell in love with the house and its location and wanted to turn it into a Bed and Breakfast.  They thought that they would be able to make a killing with the tourist market with its location. The problem was that the house needed a lot of repairs and the little savings they had left after purchasing the house had been spent on fixing it up. Now they were financially strapped and couldn’t come up with the rest of the money on their own.  They had found a couple of potential backers for the business and were trying to convince them to invest; but before they could clinch the deal they had to assure the backers that the money would not be lost due to the reputation that the house had. That’s why their parents had been called.

Joey remembered the phone conversation he had overheard between his mother and the owners, the Johnsons, the previous night. He had been sneaking down to the kitchen for a late night snack when he heard his mother talking in the kitchen.  The owners were apparently very upset about something and his mother was trying to calm them down.

Now describe what happened to me again. He heard his mother say.  You say Brian woke up screaming?  A shadow?  Are you sure he wasn’t just having a bad dream? … But why?   I see…  Joey shivered and sat down on the bottom step as his mother continued.

Being watched?  By who?  But Elaine, I’m sure it’s just their imagination….  I’m sure it’s fine.  You’ll see when we get there tomorrow….  You’re leaving right now?  But it’s 11:00!  No, no, I understand completely….  Of course, we’ll still be going.  Yes.  We’ll be there around noon tomorrow.  Okay.  We’ll look for her.  Fine.  Have a good night.

After she had hung up the phone, Joey admitted to his eavesdropping and tried to press his mother for information, but all she would tell him was that the owners were heading back to the mainland and were not planning on returning to the house for a while.

As they drove up the gravel drive to the house, Joey saw a woman standing on the front porch.

Their mother waved.  Oh, that must be Mrs. Melhur, she said.

Mrs. Melhur had been the real-estate agent that had sold the house to the new owners and had graciously agreed to meet Joey’s family at the house when they arrived. Although from the looks of her, there was nothing gracious about her, thought Joey, when the woman failed to return his mother’s wave. According to their mother, she was also the local librarian. She certainly looked the part. She was dressed in a black business suit and wore heavy red lipstick and nails, but no other makeup. Her face was almost deathly pale, by contrast, and her peppered black hair was pulled back into a bun from which a pencil protruded.

Joey’s father drove the car up to the end of the driveway and turned off the ignition.  Hello Mrs. Melhur, he called cheerfully, getting out of the car. I hope you weren’t waiting long.

Mrs. Melhur stared at him through thick-rimmed glasses, and then shook her head. Oh no, not at all, she replied in a nasally voice. I only just arrived myself.  She gingerly stepped down from the porch to meet them at the car.

This place is so cool, exclaimed Meghan, pushing open the car door. Joey followed her out of the car and looked around. The front of the house was completely overgrown, although it looked as if someone had attempted to cut things back a bit. Grass clippings lay in large piles on the lawn and a push mower was left leaning against a porch rail. It looks like a dump to me, Joey mumbled to himself.

Their father walked quickly up to Mrs. Melhur and stuck out his hand. Michael Shepard.  Very nice to meet you Mrs. Melhur, he said brightly. And this is my wife Marilyn, and my children, Joey and Meghan.

Mrs. Melhur hesitated a moment before taking his hand to shake it. She had a cool, unfriendly smile. Her squinty eyes flashed as she studied the children. Good to meet you, she replied slowly, her eyes lingering on them before turning to their mother .

It’s very nice to meet you too, Mrs. Melhur, said their mother. It was very nice of you to meet us here.

Mrs. Melhur checked her watch.

Yes, well, I had a little time before my next appointment.

Have you gone in yet?  Mr. Shepard asked, staring up at the house.

Mrs. Melhur turned to their father. No. I was just admiring the view from the porch while I waited, she replied. Her eyes darted briefly back to the children, scanned the packed car and then settled back on Mr. Shepard.

Joey looked back up at the house. A huge porch with sagging boards waited for them in front with some of the porch rails broken or missing. Meghan started to walk away from the group, surveying the house. Joey watched her round the corner of the house, then trotted after her, not wanting to be left alone with the adults. Tall grass grew all around. As he waded through the grass, he stared up at the house.  The many empty windows of the upper floors stared back down at him. Some had been boarded up, but many still showed curtains through their dusty windows. Some of the remaining shutters hung at odd angles at either side of the windows. There must be a lot of rooms, he thought. Suddenly he got the feeling he was being watched. He looked over at Meghan, but she was still wandering around the yard. His parents were still engrossed in a conversation with Mrs. Melhur. He looked back up at the house and was startled to see someone or something staring back at him from the shadows of one of the windows on the third floor.  He held his hand up to his head, and, squinting against the sun, tried to make out what he had seen. Whatever it was, it didn’t move, but he thought he could make out eyes looking down at him. The hair on the back of his neck rose, and as nonchalantly as he could he made his way over to Meghan.

Meghan, look up at the window on the corner, he whispered.  Someone’s up there watching us!

Meghan shifted her gaze from the gardens she had been surveying and looked over at him, stifling a giggle. Don’t tell me you saw a ghost already? she teased. Joey looked up at the window again then back to Meghan.

Knock it off, Joey replied nervously, glancing over at his parents. I’m not seeing things. I saw something. In the window. Right there. He pointed back up at the house.

You knock it off, you big baby, Meghan retorted, and gave him a shove. If Dad hears you talking about ghosts he’ll have us bring up all the equipment now in order to investigate, and I want to look around a bit first.

Joey looked over at the overloaded car and groaned, knowing that he would eventually have to lug the stuff in anyway.

Please, just look, he hissed through clenched teeth.

Fine.  Where am I looking?

Joey looked up at the window and pointed, and heard Meghan gasp.

Give me the cellphone!

What? Why? You going to call the police?

Don’t be a dummy, give me the cellphone! Quick!

Joey pulled the new cell phone his parents have given them just before the trip from his pocket and handed it to Meghan.

Meghan held up the phone and began to snap pictures of the window, zooming in as far as the camera on the phone would let her. The thing continued to peer down at them, seeming oblivious of being photographed. Finally Meghan stopped