Oleander House: Bay City Paranormal Investigations, Book 1

found covered in her blood, non-verbal and almost completely unresponsive. The young man committed suicide three months later in the hospital, claiming in the note he scrawled in his own blood on the wall that what killed the girl had come through him from somewhere else .
It sounded far too much like the history of Oleander House. Sam tried not to think of its similarity to his own first paranormal experience. He dropped the magazine on the floor and picked up the next one.
A yellowed scrap of paper was wedged between the pages about halfway through. Curious, Sam pulled it out and unfolded it. His jaw dropped open when he saw the words scrawled in large, ragged letters across the torn and stained paper.
We never should have come back. Lily was so angry with me when she found out that we were going to Oleander House instead of New Orleans like I’d promised her, that I’d bribed the caretaker for the key and we were essentially breaking in. I should have known then that it was wrong. But I was drawn here, drawn like a magnet, and even now I find that I can’t leave. Or maybe I can’t leave now because Lily will never leave here again, and I brought her to this fate.
It got Lily today. Came right through and got her. My Lily, I told you to stop shouting at me, I told you the door OPENS when I’m angry, but you wouldn’t listen, you never did, and what am I to do now? They won’t believe me. They’ll lock me up like the boy in that article.
Unless they don’t find me. Unless the door swings in both directions.
If anyone finds this note, please know that I never harmed her. It was something else, and I think I’ve gone to find it.
Forgive me, Lily. Maybe I deserve to suffer for what happened to you, and maybe I will suffer. But God help me, I have to know.
Josephine
    “Oh my God,” Sam whispered, staring wide-eyed at the paper in his hand. Josephine Royce’s last communication with the world.
Chapter Thirteen
    Sam spent the next hour frantically leafing through the remaining issues of the journal and several books. The hope that Josephine had left further clues as to hers and Lily’s fates was a slim one, and ultimately proved fruitless. A few books and magazines had notes scrawled into the margins, but none looked like the same handwriting and Sam couldn’t make them out anyway. Finally, he plopped into the big leather chair with a sigh.
    Closing his eyes, he promised himself that he’d rest for only a few minutes, then start looking again. Just a quick rest, to clear his head and soothe the dryness from his eyes…
    Someone was screaming. Shrieking, actually, the sound high and wild with agony. It stirred something primitive and bloodthirsty in him. He looked down at the naked man pinned underneath him, legs over his shoulders. The man’s face was shrouded in shadow. His body thrashed and bucked with desperate strength. Sam responded by pounding into his unknown partner savagely hard.
    The volume of the screams increased. He looked between their bodies. Blood flowed from his partner’s anus with every thrust of his cock. Which, he realized with a shock, was covered in short, cruelly sharp spines. He ripped free of the man’s body with a roar that he didn’t recognize as his own voice. Blood flew in a hot shower, inundating his face and chest, the sharp copper smell of it blazing through his brain. His claws dug into his doomed lover’s abdomen, the screaming peaked and went silent, and he came, his semen mingling with the blood…
    Sam woke with a shout, covered in a cold sweat, his pulse throbbing in his ears. He scrambled to his feet, trying to stare into every corner at once. The library suddenly seemed cramped and full of shadows.
    “Goddamn,” Sam swore, running a shaking hand over his face. He took a deep breath and let it out. Some of the horror of the dream drained away with it. “These fucking dreams,” he declared aloud, “are gonna kill me.”
    At least he wasn’t hard, he realized with a profound sense of relief. The thought of being aroused by the horrific dream was beyond disturbing.
    He glanced at the clock. Almost five a.m. Sam sighed. He wanted to go upstairs, crawl into bed and sleep the day away. His brain felt fuzzy and slow with exhaustion. The possibility of the dream he’d just had recurring was what drove him to haul a pile of books to the table and start reading again.
    Somewhere in this vast collection of books and magazines, Sam felt sure he would find something