A Ghostly Ride in Gulfport (Gulf Coast Paranormal Book 10) Read online

  I’d finished up the final details at last. This wasn’t the unhappy portrait of Ben’s death. This was a snapshot from earlier that night at the dance. When he wore his best suit and a bright blue shirt. When he started to dance with Stephanie. Funny how even though he never dated her, it was Stephanie that Ben thought about when he was leaving this world. He had regrets about her, about not going back to have that dance.

  The radio played hair-metal ballads tonight. I usually listened to instrumental stuff when I painted, but this seemed appropriate. I think Ben would have liked it. I know he would have. When I stepped back to inspect the painting, I felt my heart melt at the sight of the young man’s happy face. His hair was perfect and big, his smile bright and even bigger. But my favorite thing about this painting was his eyes. His eyes were so happy and hopeful. He never imagined he would die later that night.

  “Brittany is doing okay, Benjamin. She’s in a good place now. You really came through for her, and I know that she would want to thank you for that if she could. Give her some time, Ben. She will be okay.”

  The song changed, and the air felt heavy with expectancy. Would Ben show up again? I doubted it, but stranger things had happened. Much stranger. I hoped Ben did know how much people loved him. His mom, his sister.

  “By the way, you can keep the ring if you really want it. I’m okay with that. Midas and I have each other, and we can get another ring.” I smiled at him one last time, scooped up Domino and headed to my room to fold the laundry I had dumped on the bed earlier. What a slob I was. I couldn’t ignore my housework forever.

  I folded the clothes and put them in neat piles all over my bed. My mischievous cat did his best to knock things down, but I moved too fast for him to wreak too much destruction.

  When I turned to grab the last pile of t-shirts, I nearly jumped out of my skin.

  There was the ring. It was shining in the middle of the freshly made bed. I’d made this bed every day for several days, and the ring had not been there. I didn’t have to guess where it came from. This was no coincidence.

  I picked it up with shaking hands and put it on my finger. All this time, I’d given up getting my ring back, but Ben had kindly returned it. Another sign that wherever he was, he was satisfied. He had moved on, and he wanted us to do the same.

  “Thanks, Ben,” I said softly. I closed the door and walked to the kitchen to call Midas.

  Want to read about Jocelyn’s adventures at the Leaf Academy?

  Read on for an excerpt from The October People,

  a Gulf Coast Paranormal Extra

  I returned to the room where I’d found the box that held the journal and sifted through it hoping to find more of the same. Most of the items were uninteresting, just as I first believed, but then I found an old red paper folder. Inside were the missing pages. These were drawings, a child’s drawings by the look of them.

  And they were terrible to look at.

  A small boy sitting in a chair in the auditorium, a gruesome smile on his face. A dead man lying on the stage with a knife in his chest. A woman floating above him, her mouth open as if she were screaming or singing or saying something. And there were so many eyes, all around the boy and the stage. I took pictures of the horrible images because that was all I could think to do. A shudder shot through me as I slid the papers around and my eyes fell on the last sheet of paper.

  This was me.

  It had to be me. I was sitting next to the boy, and beside me was the man in the black jacket, the one I believed to be Gary Holloway. This was no Rembrandt painting, but the artist had enough skill for me to identify myself easily enough. My dreadlocks were hanging over my shoulders, a camera dangled from my neck—and my neck! Why was it hanging at such an odd angle?

  Why did my neck look like that? Was it broken?

  “No!” I said as I let the picture flutter to the ground. I heard the sound of an old-fashioned lighter clicking in the hallway. Sherman heard it too. He got quiet, but his eyes were focused on the open door. He wasn’t sitting beside me now, as was his custom whenever I got still. No, the furry canine was poised to pounce, run or snap at the intruder. A shadow passed the door. Sherman began to bark, but like a good dog he didn’t abandon me.

  Okay, Jocelyn Graves! Get it together! You’ve got a job to do. Remember?

  “Hey!” I yelled as I stepped out into the hallway. I didn’t have my camera, but I had my phone. I fumbled with the screen and tapped the camera app. It opened, and I took a panoramic burst of photos. “Who is out here?” No one answered, and my voice echoed back to me. “Are you Moriah Mitchell? Mr. McCandlish? Ollie? Is that you?” Sherman barked once as a small shadow swept across the hall. And then all was still. I petted the dog on his head.

  “Well, boy, if we’re going to chase shadows, we better do it right. Come on,” I said as I hurried back to my room to gather my audio recorder and anything else I could manage to carry. So much for research. The spirits of the Leaf Academy were stirring now, and I was ready to capture the evidence of their existence. Non timebo mala. I will fear no evil. I was beginning to understand why they had that engraved over the door. Had the builders of the Leaf Academy always known this place was a spiritual hot spot?

  That’s when I noticed the picture on my cot, but I’d just dropped it in the other room. I couldn’t help but pick it up. Only there were figures missing from the sketch—the man in the leather jacket wasn’t sitting beside me now. He was gone, and so was the boy.

  I was sitting alone in the auditorium. With my neck twisted at an awkward angle.

  Connect with M.L. Bullock on Facebook. To receive updates on her latest releases, visit her website at M.L. Bullock and subscribe to her mailing list. You can also contact her at [email protected].

  About the Author

  Author of the best-selling Seven Sisters series and the Desert Queen series, M.L. Bullock has been storytelling since she was a child. A student of archaeology, she loves weaving stories that feature her favorite historical characters—including Nefertiti. She currently lives on the Gulf Coast with her family but travels frequently to explore the southern states she loves so much.

  Read more from M.L. Bullock

  The Nike Chronicles

  Blue Water

  Blue Wake

  Blue Tide

  The Seven Sisters Series

  Seven Sisters

  Moonlight Falls on Seven Sisters

  Shadows Stir at Seven Sisters

  The Stars that Fell

  The Stars We Walked Upon

  The Sun Rises Over Seven Sisters

  Christmas at Seven Sisters (bonus short stories)

  Ghost on a Swing (series prequel)

  The Idlewood Series

  The Ghosts of Idlewood

  Dreams of Idlewood

  The Whispering Saint

  The Haunted Child

  Return to Seven Sisters

  (A Seven Sisters Sequel Series)

  The Roses of Mobile

  All the Summer Roses

  Blooms Torn Asunder

  A Garden of Thorns

  The Gulf Coast Paranormal Series

  The Ghosts of Kali Oka Road

  The Ghosts of the Crescent Theater

  A Haunting on Bloodgood Row

  The Legend of the Ghost Queen

  A Haunting at Dixie House

  The Ghost Lights of Forrest Field

  The Ghost of Gabrielle Bonet

  The Ghost of Harrington Farm

  The Creature on Crenshaw Road

  A Ghostly Ride in Gulfport

  Gulf Coast Paranormal Extras

  The October People

  Shabby Hearts Paranormal Cozy Mystery Series

  A Touch of Shabby

  Shabbier by the Minute

  Shabby by Night

  The Sugar Hill Series

  Wife of the Left Hand

  Fire on the Ramparts

  Blood by Candlelight

  The Starlight Ball

 
; His Lovely Garden

  Ghosts of Summerleigh Series

  The Belles of Desire, Mississippi

  The Ghost of Jeopardy Belle

  The Lady in White

  The Vampires of Rock and Roll Series

  Elegant Black

  Lost Camelot Series

  Guinevere Forever

  Guinevere Unconquered

  The Desert Queen Series

  The Tale of Nefret

  The Falcon Rises

  The Kingdom of Nefertiti

  The Song of the Bee-Eater

  Standalone books

  Ghosts on a Plane