Earthbound : A gripping crime thriller full of twists and supernatural suspense by Fynn Perry (popular romance novels TXT) 📗

Jennifer realized that a response was expected. “Maybe,” she replied as calmly as she could, attempting to stare through the glowing face that dominated her field of vision and, instead, focus on Hardwell, like everyone else in the room. She feared that looking into those burning eyes would set off a panic that she couldn’t hope to contain.

She felt a prickly sensation on her forehead. Beads of sweat would form very soon and give her away. Gratefully, she registered movement around Hardwell. A second paramedic had arrived to help, and she noticed the suspect was coming around.

Jennifer channeled her pent-up stress into an excited tone, as she exclaimed to the detective, “He’s opening his eyes!”

The spirit immediately pulled his head out of the glass and spun around to look at Hardwell, who had started mumbling something in a disoriented daze. He repeated it, and this time it was clearer. “I’m sorry. The evil…the evil said I should do it!” His eyes welled with tears as his head descended back into his hands to hide his face.

She saw Hardwell sit bolt upright as the spirit returned to his body and a flash of excruciating pain registered on his face before his features settled and his glowing stare found Williams. The tears and mumbling immediately stopped.

“What do you mean, ‘the evil said I should do it’?” Williams asked.

Hardwell said nothing.

“If the boy you stabbed dies, you’re looking at Murder One here. We’ve seen your little photo collection—that’s premeditation, so quit playing these stupid games with me, Hardwell!” Williams shouted.

Hardwell’s lips twitched in a half-smile. Jennifer’s eyes widened for a second time as she looked on in horror as the spirit re-emerged and passed into Robert Devereux, Hardwell’s lawyer and her father’s ex-colleague. Again, the television monitor over the window failed to register the movement. Devereux suddenly stiffened, but the change went unnoticed by everyone except Jennifer. At the same time, Hardwell’s head and chest returned to their previous resting place with a heavy thud, causing further commotion in the viewing room.

Shit! Now it’s possessed the lawyer! Jennifer thought. She then listened as Devereux spoke.

“I demand this interview is stopped on the grounds of the mental instability of my client. He needs a full psychiatric evaluation!” As the possessed Devereux spoke, two paramedics returned and were again attempting to revive Hardwell. He eventually came to and was immediately helped to his feet and escorted out, with Devereux following.

“Pumpkin, are you OK?” Her father interrupted Jennifer’s spinning thoughts. She hadn’t realized how her breathing had quickened. In fact, she was on the verge of hyperventilating, her body desperate for a release from the shock she had experienced.

Sergeant Clarke took her hands, pressing them around the opening of a paper bag and motioning to her to place it over her mouth and breathe into it. Within a couple of minutes, she had her breathing back to normal.

“Just a momentary flashback. I’m fine, Dad...really!” As much as she wanted to tell her father what she had seen, she stopped herself, knowing that he would never believe her. She could hardly believe it herself.

“Listen, can you wait here a while? You’re not strictly supposed to be here. I don’t want you running into Hardwell’s lawyer out there.”

You have no idea, Jennifer thought.

Jennifer poured herself a coffee from the coffeemaker sitting in the corner of the viewing room, and waited fifteen minutes before leaving.

Outside the precinct, Jennifer made her way to an Uber she had ordered. Before she got in it, she heard Robert Devereux’s voice behind her.

“Jennifer Miller? David Miller’s daughter?” he asked loudly enough to illicit a response.

Shit! Her heart thumped an accelerated beat in her head. She turned around to face him, trying to appear casual with her response. “Yes . . .”

“What a terrible ordeal you’ve had.”

She sensed insincerity in his voice and noticed that the orange fire in his eyes became fiercer. She tried not to picture the expression of pure hatred on the face of the spirit inside Devereux.

“I’m fine, thank you, Mr. Devereux.” It took all her nerve to fake a warm reply.

“What were you doing at the precinct?” he asked solicitously.

“I think you can understand that’s private, counselor. You have to excuse me,” she said in a tone of fake outrage at the impropriety of his question. She impressed herself with how adept her response was, but her voice, unfaltering until this point, had changed tone––a tone that could betray fear.

Devereux’s eyes momentarily reached a flash point as if gasoline had been added. She turned her back on him and walked toward her car, feeling his eyes penetrating her again.

“I am sure we will catch up with each other soon,” he called out after her.

His parting words caused her to involuntarily shiver.

Back in her bedroom, Jennifer gave John an account of her experiences at the station and drew him a sketch of the uncannily Jesus-looking spirit. Neither one of them had any idea who it could be, or what it could possibly want from them.

“Hardwell was like a different person when it was in him,” she said, pointing at her sketch. “He had this confident, creepy smile. Then when the spirit left him, he looked so pathetic and he kept mumbling. First about him being sorry, then he said something like the ‘evil said I should do it.’ He definitely stabbed you, John. I had no doubts when I saw his face, but when he did it, I think he wasn’t alone…I mean, I think this thing had possessed him.”

They sat in silence for a long time after that, before a ping announced the arrival of a text message on Jennifer’s phone:

Will be home after 7. Love Dad.

“He never works late, he’s only staying late to avoid my mom, who is supposed to pick me up at six,” she sighed, grateful for the opportunity to think about something else, even something as mundane as her