Chapter 3 brings the haunting home in the most unsettling way possible: not to Dean, but to his three-year-old daughter, Joanna. While Jaz prepares dinner in their heavily warded Errington Security apartment, she overhears her daughter calmly chatting with a stranger’s voice through the bedroom wall, and readers get to watch a mother’s instincts kick into overdrive in real time, chef’s knife in hand, tactical breathing exercises engaged, fully expecting to fight for her child’s life.

What she finds instead is stranger than any physical threat: a glowing blue apparition, later revealed to be Bob, has somehow bypassed some of the best magical and mundane security in the city to end up in a toddler’s bedroom. The scene works because it plays the contrast so well — Jaz’s controlled, lethal readiness against Joanna’s total lack of fear, chatting with the ghost like he’s just another visitor, insisting he isn’t bad, just scared and lost.

Series longtime fans will also clock the pointed choice of name here. This Joanna, Dean and Jaz’s young daughter, shares her name with the mysterious, eyepatch-wearing woman introduced elsewhere in the series who claims to be operating from decades in the future — a connection the books haven’t confirmed yet but one this chapter quietly invites readers to start piecing together. Whatever the truth turns out to be, the chapter ends with Jaz demanding real answers from Dean about how his work followed him home into their daughter’s room, and readers will want those answers just as badly.

📖 Start Dean’s next case — get The Paramedic’s Siren on Jamie Davis’s site:

jamiedavisbooks.com/books/the-paramedics-siren/

 

The Paramedic’s Siren — Chapter 3

Dean pulled into the underground garage beneath the Errington Security building. Jaz’s family company headquarters was also the location of their top-floor apartment in the city. Not for the first time, he wondered if they should move soon to a place in the suburbs with a real backyard for Jo to run and play in.

He mulled it over as he walked toward the elevator past the guard in the glass booth. The guard waved, and Dean lifted a hand in a half-wave back. The elevator doors slid open as soon as he pressed the button, and he stepped inside. He turned around and realized the shadowy figures were gone, as was the crooning.

He pressed the button for the top floor and rode up, contemplating the disappearance of the phantoms that had plagued him back at the station. Maybe it really had just been exhaustion.

The phantoms were gone. No crooning. Just home.

Feeling a little more confident in himself, he walked off the elevator and down the hallway to their apartment door.

Jaz waited just inside and threw her arms around him, pulling him close in a tight hug. A pair of tinier arms wrapped around his knees at the same time.

Surprised at the reception, he set the soup container down on the small table by the entrance and hugged Jaz back. Then he crouched to return the hug of his daughter, Joanna.

“Daddy needs a hug?” she said in his ear as he pulled her close.

Dean glanced up at Jaz, standing beside them. “Let me guess, Brynne called you?”

“Leah, actually. She said you’d had a hard day. I asked for details, but she said it was your story to tell.”

Dean released Jo from the hug and stood. “It’s not really something I feel like talking about right now. I think it was all just me being bone tired. That’s all.”

Jaz cocked her head to the side and studied him for a second. “If you say so. The gods above know I’ve seen my share of scary stuff out there. You know you can talk to me if you need to. It’s important that we’re there for each other.

“I just need some time to collect my thoughts.”

Jaz pointed at the container on the table. “What is that? Did Freddy make crab soup again?”

Dean nodded and grinned.

“Perfect, I picked up some crusty rolls from the store today. You shower and sleep for a bit. I’ll have dinner ready for us after I put Jo down to sleep. It’ll be nice to have some time alone while we grownups eat.”

“I could use a break. Thanks.” Dean meant it. He didn’t want to talk about anything right now, but he wasn’t angry with Leah. If their positions had been reversed, he’d have done the same thing for her. Partners looked out for each other. He just hated bringing his work home with him. It was hard enough with Jaz working downstairs. She also tried not to bring up too much about her day other than the odd office gossip, which they both enjoyed chatting about.

Dean went back into the master suite and stripped off his uniform. He left his clothes in a pile on the floor. The thought of a nice hot shower beckoned to him.

Fifteen minutes later, he tucked himself into bed in clean boxers and a t-shirt. His eyes closed in a sound sleep within seconds, his exhaustion dispelling all the ghosts for now.

————————

Jaz could always tell when Dean was carrying more than just his gear home from a shift. She’d read the weariness in her husband’s eyes the minute he’d walked into the room. There was something else there, too. It might be sorrow, or maybe something else.

She knew some things stuck with him from his shifts on the job with the Elk City Fire Department. He’d talk with her about it when he felt the time was right. She trusted him and gave him the space he needed to work through things from work. After all, he did the same for her stressful and dangerous job.

She put the soup in the fridge for the time being and focused on getting Joanna ready for bed. Together, they sang their tidying song and cleaned up the toys strewn across the family room floor. Then Jaz took her daughter back to give her a bath. To give Dean some extra time in bed, she let Joanna play a little longer in the tub than usual. When she finally got out of the water, her little fingers were wrinkly as prunes.

Jaz turned down the covers on the bed while the little girl picked out her jammies for the night. She chose her favorite superheroine outfit and started trying to dress herself, with only a little help from Mommy. A few storybooks later, Jaz turned off the lights and blew her daughter a kiss goodnight. She pulled the door closed and checked her phone to make sure the baby monitor app was working.

Leaving the video monitor up on her phone, Jaz returned to the kitchen and started pulling together a special dinner for Dean and herself. While most wouldn’t think of her as a homey type since she was usually seen in her tactical black hunter garb, Jaz enjoyed the time preparing a meal. It showed off her knife skills in a way that wasn’t deadly.

She set her phone down on the counter so she could glance at it occasionally and ensure her daughter was still tucked into bed. Then she started chopping up some raw veggies for a salad to go with the soup Freddy had sent home. There was some plain elbow macaroni left over from Joanna’s lunch with the nanny, and Jaz folded that into the salad along with a homemade vinaigrette she whipped up in the blender.

It was when she turned off the appliance that she first heard the strange man’s voice. It took her a few seconds to locate the source. Her blood ran from icy cold to red hot hunter mama rage when she heard Joanna answer the man inside her bedroom.

Jaz bolted for the back of the apartment, holding her eight-inch chef’s knife in a tight-fisted battle grip. She stopped outside Joanna’s door, cursing. Her phone and the monitor app were in the kitchen. Damn it.

She slowed her breathing in an exercise that came from long hours of combat drills and practice in the field. Then, Jaz pressed her ear to the door and listened carefully to the voices on the other side. She’d only have one shot at this. She waited.

Jaz pushed down her terror and got a handle on the tactical situation as she listened to the conversation on the other side.

“I know your daddy. He’s a good man. He was only doing his best.” The man’s voice almost sounded kind, though that was impossible since he’d broken into a little girl’s bedroom.

Jaz’s only thought was how fast she’d kill him once she got inside. First, she had to find out how he’d penetrated the substantial mundane and magical protections on this building and, specifically, this apartment.

“Daddy saves people. Did he save you, too?”

“Oh, yes. Many times, in fact. I’m sorry he failed in his quest to do so this last time.”

Wait, Jaz thought. Did that mean this voice was already dead? That changed the picture and the potential threat he posed. He could be an undead Unusual, like a vampire. Or he might be a specter or ghoul. No way a random ghost wandered through their wards. This wasn’t by chance.

Having heard enough, Jaz reached for the knob and slowly turned it so the latch disengaged silently. She took a deep breath and pushed inside, racing to the side of the bed as she scanned the room for the intruder.

A glowing blue apparition floated in the room’s corner next to their master suite. It had no detailed form, though the outline was vaguely humanoid.

Jaz stood with the bed at her back and leveled the cold-forged steel blade between herself and the apparition. “Who are you? Why are you here?”

“I don’t know.” The apparition spoke in a sad tone, almost sounding lost. Soft, crooning music wafted up behind its voice. “I closed my eyes and opened them here. That’s all.”

“That’s not good enough. You barge into a little girl’s room, sliding past all the protections in this house, and expect me to believe you came here by accident?”

“I am no monster. I saw Dean in the other room and drifted through the wall to see what else was here. That’s when your little girl spoke to me. I didn’t want to alarm her, so I answered.”

“It’s okay, Mommy. He knows Daddy.”

Yes\! Dean was the key to this. Somehow he’d caused this to happen. That meant he could stop it, too. “JoJo, honey, I want you to come over here and run into Mommy and Daddy’s room. Climb onto the bed and wake Daddy up. Tell him Mommy said he has to come here right now.”

Joanna yawned and climbed out of her bed. She gave a little wave to the glowing blue figure and padded calmly out the door and down the hallway.

“You stay right where you are. Don’t you dare move.” Jaz prepared one of the few offensive spells she knew. She wasn’t much of a spell caster. She typically relied on her weapons and martial training to deal with problems, but the pitiful knife in her hand was likely useless against this creature. Her magical katana blade probably wouldn’t do much harm to it either, even if she had it. She had to make do with the weapons she had with her.

The apparition in the corner remained where it was, bobbing gently. Jaz waited for Dean to return. His tired voice echoed down the hallway as he talked with Joanna in the master bedroom.

She lost her patience after waiting for almost a full minute for him to come to her. “Dean Flynn, get in here right now. There’s a thing from your work in your daughter’s bedroom.”

“What?” That got him moving. His feet thumped as he ran from the bedroom and down the hall. He stopped in the doorway and stared at her as she stood with her knife extended in front of her.

Jaz glared at him and jerked her head at the floating apparition in the corner.

Dean took a step inside the room to see what she was nodding at. He froze as soon as he laid eyes on the thing that floated there.

“What’s that?”

“I was hoping you could tell me. It seems to know you. Did you bring this home from work and forget to tell me?” Jaz bit back some of the bile in her tone. She tried to reason with herself that whatever had happened, Dean hadn’t done this on purpose.

He moved closer to her so he could fully face the floating figure. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”

“I don’t know what I’m doing here, Dean. I just appeared and found myself here.”

“Bob? Is that you?” Dean stared at the glowing outline.

Jaz glared at her husband. “You know this thing?”

“Yes, he’s a regular patient, or was one. He died today on the last call. I promise, though, I don’t know how he came to be here.”

“Have you seen him before like this?” Jaz pointed with the knife to emphasize the word *this*.

“I saw something like it right after we loaded him onto the stretcher at his home. Some kind of energy zapped me, and I started hearing sing-song crooning in the background and saw ghostly blue figures around the room. They sort of looked like he does.”

“Oh, my gods. I think you’re cursed. That type of energy flow is rare, but it sounds like this guy cursed you before he died.” Jaz swiveled back to the apparition. “You remove that curse from my husband right now. He tried to save you. You had no right to curse him.”

“I swear I didn’t curse him. I promise. I wouldn’t even know how to do that.”

In the doorway, Joanna let out an enormous yawn again.

“Listen,” Jaz said to the apparition, “can you move yourself out of this room?”

“I think so. I floated in here from the room where Dean was sleeping earlier.”

“Good, then you follow Dean into the family room outside. I need to get this little girl to bed. Then we’re all going to have a long talk about this.”

She waited for Dean and the ghost to get the hint and leave.

“Uh, yeah,” Dean said. “Bob, come with me. We’ll figure this out. JoJo, go over by your mother.”

Joanna moved over to Jaz’s side and waited while Dean and Bob left the room.

Jaz set the knife on the tall dresser by the bed and then lifted her daughter back up onto her mattress and pulled the covers up over her.

“Don’t be angry, Mommy. The man isn’t bad. He’s just scared and doesn’t know where to go.”

“How do you know that?”

“He told me.” Joanna left it at that and pulled her dolly over to hug while she snuggled into her pillow.

Jaz laid a hand on Joanna’s head. She was already falling asleep. Jaz picked up the knife before leaving. The visitor might be harmless, but she wasn’t. She expected answers as to why and how this intruder had come into her home, one of the best protected places in the city. Dean and Bob had better be able to give her an explanation.

📖 Loved Chapter 3? Keep going — get The Paramedic’s Siren on Jamie Davis’s site:

jamiedavisbooks.com/books/the-paramedics-siren/