What Hides Inside: Bay City Paranormal Investigations, Book 2

managed a halfhearted smile. “Thanks.”
“Any time.” Laying a hand on Sam’s arm, Dean squeezed briefly before wandering over to where David crouched against the wall.
Sam drew a few deep breaths, composing himself before he joined them. He didn’t want David to read the heartache on his face, and he didn’t want either of them to notice his annoyingly persistent attraction to Dean.
“We could set up cameras at any point along here,” David said, rising and brushing dirt off his hands. “Thank God for tripods. This damp air’s gonna be bad enough, I hate to think what sitting on the ground would do to the cameras.”
“Do we have enough extension cord?” Sam played his flashlight beam over the walls. Patches of fungus sprouted from the dirt, giving off a strong, musty odor. Sam wrinkled his nose.
David shrugged. “I hope so. I picked up some more on my way home yesterday, who the hell knows if it’s enough. If not I guess we don’t get any video.”
Pointing his flashlight beam down the tunnel, Dean peered into the dense darkness. “I can’t see the end of this thing, y’all. We should hustle if we want to get done with this in an hour.”
“Yeah, the sooner we get out of here the better,” David said.
“We still have to come back with the EMF detectors and thermometers and stuff,” Sam reminded him. The thought was not pleasant.
“Don’t remind me,” David grumbled. “Come on.”
The three of them plodded methodically down the tunnel, sweeping every inch of it with their lights to be sure they didn’t miss anything. About ten yards in, a section of high, irregular ceiling and a significant narrowing of the passageway marked where the partial collapse of the tunnel had occurred decades before. The tunnel opened up again after one hundred feet or so.
Sam let his mind expand just a little, feeling cautiously for the sense of wrongness he’d felt before. It was there, a ribbon of cold menace winding through the heat of the tunnel. He backed off as fast as he could, slamming shut the strange door in his mind that let him connect with whatever inhabited the other side.
David glanced at him with a knowing look in his eyes. “You feeling it again?”
“Yeah.” Sam’s mouth felt dry and dusty, his head pounding from the brief contact with the thing. “It’s strong here. I barely even tried, and I still felt it.”
“You didn’t have to try in Oleander House,” David pointed out. “You, Andre and Cecile all felt it without trying at all.”
“Yeah, but it’s different here. More focused, or something. I have to reach out to it to pick it up, but when I do it’s…” Sam tapped his pen against the notepad, trying to find the words to describe what he’d sensed. “It’s sharper, and more localized. It’s like there’s a single point where it’s coming from, rather than all over the place like it was at Oleander House. I’m definitely getting a stronger sense of it here than I did in the main tunnel.”
Tilting his head to one side, Dean gazed thoughtfully at Sam. “That’s interesting. I had no idea that psychic phenomena strengthened or dissipated proportionate to distance.”
Sam shrugged. “I don’t know if they do or not, normally. Maybe this is different because what Cecile, Andre and I are picking up here has an actual, physical source.”
“The dimensional doorway, if that’s what it is.” Dean nodded, scratching his belly with one hand. “Makes sense.”
“Guys, this is interesting, but can we move a little faster? I’m dying here.” David mopped his flushed face again and gave Sam and Dean a pleading look.
Sam couldn’t help laughing. Working with David and Dean, he decided, was the perfect way to forget his hurt, at least for a little while.
They hadn’t gone much further when the tunnel began to curve to the right. David frowned. “I hope this thing doesn’t start branching off. If it does, I—”
“Shhhh.” Dean held up a hand, stopping David’s protest. When he spoke, his voice was barely audible. “Y’all hear that?”
“What?” Sam whispered. “I didn’t hear anything.”
Listen, Dean mouthed silently, his gaze fixed on the place where the tunnel arced. Sam held his breath and listened. And heard it.
A movement. Scuffling noises, and something that sounded like muffled speech. Adrenaline rushed through Sam’s veins, making the blood pound in his ears. He shot a wide-eyed glance at Dean and David.
“Someone’s there,” Sam murmured as