“I told you we shouldn’t have come,” Priya said.

The police officers sized up the four teenagers. “We could haul you in and see if the owner wants to lay charges,” Perkins pointed out.

Xander’s eyes widened. Priya turned pale. Omar’s lips trembled. Li was the only one able to speak. “Please don’t. My mom would kill me. Please.”

Omar joined in. “We won’t come back here—we promise.”

Perkins let her threat hang in the air, eyeing the panicked kids. She took her time, switching her gaze from one scared face to another. Finally she spoke. “This time I’m going to let you off with a warning. Clear out of here and don’t come back.”

Omar said, “Yes, officer.”

The others nodded and agreed. “Yes. We’re not coming back. Ever.”

“Okay. Let’s get you out of this place,” Perkins said.

Hawkes led the way. “Yeah, we don’t want those ghosts to get us. Oooo.”

“Shut up, Hawkes.”

Xander cracked a grin at Priya as they headed down the hall. They had saved Quest and Rainbow’s home.

Chapter Thirteen

Perkins climbed into the police car parked outside the hospital, grabbed a clipboard and a pen from the seat and began writing. Hawkes stood with the kids at the side of the car, the red and blue lights striping across his face.

Omar stuffed his hands in his pockets and approached Officer Hawkes. “You said there were ghosts in the hospital. Who are they?”

Hawkes glanced at his partner filling out paperwork, then turned to Omar. “Do you really want to know?”

“Please,” Omar said.

“Okay, I’ll tell you. But you have to keep it to yourselves.” Hawkes stepped away from the car, drawing the kids nearer to him. They gathered around.

“Were there really experiments done here?”

Hawkes shook his head. “No. There were no experiments of any kind. My uncle worked at the Wickerman as an intern in the 1960s. He said this was just a normal hospital until one day when disaster struck.”

“What happened?” Li asked.

“There was a fire in the psych ward,” Hawkes explained. “The firefighters tried to rescue everyone inside. My uncle said they got most of the patients out, but there was a group of people who were convinced the firemen were government agents. They locked themselves in one of the rooms. They refused to come out, and the fire got to them before the firefighters did. They all died in that room.”

“Then what happened?” Omar asked.

“After that night, my uncle said, the ghosts of the dead patients haunted the hallways. They would follow people through the hospital, but you’d only hear footsteps. They also liked to push furniture around. Beds would roll by themselves across a room. Chairs would be stacked on top of each other. Gurneys would flip over on their own. The nightshift nurses were so scared, they asked for an escort whenever they had to walk to their cars. Sometimes the ghosts would whisper strange things in people’s ears. My uncle said once he heard a ghost tell him he’d catch him on the flip side.”