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My entire being screamed at me to run.
    I fought down the urge while doing what I could to maintain my link to the ghost beside me, reminding myself that this was a test of control. If I lost my vision now …
    The ground beneath my feet began to shake and tremble as the things drew closer, but I planted my feet and simply willed myself to stay upright.
    Fifty yards.
    Twenty.
    Ten.
    I was sweating by this point, wondering if I had made the right decision, as those four humps churned toward me with remarkable speed, and I prayed that I wasn’t about to become lunch for some supernatural denizens of the deep that I hadn’t yet learned about. Denise would have warned me if I was in trouble, wouldn’t she?
    At the very last second, the creatures, if that’s what they were at all, dove deep beneath the surface, leaving the ground to shake for a moment beneath my feet. Then that too quieted down and grew still.
    I grinned; my link with the ghost beside me remained intact, and I used my borrowed sight to focus on Denise and wave to her good-naturedly.
    No sooner had my hand gone up than I was pummeled by a hurricane-like wind that seemingly sprang up out of nowhere. It knocked me to the ground and forced me to cover my eyes from the sting of the sand and grit that were carried along with it, but I recognized it for what it was, another test, and focused my concentration on maintaining my link to the ghost serving as my lab partner. The wind howled around me in a voice like a thousand banshees, but I refused to be distracted, and after a moment it died down as quickly as it had sprung up.
    Still able to see, I climbed to my feet and turned to look toward the dunes. I saw Denise standing high atop one of them, watching my performance.
    “Is that all you’ve got?” I shouted at her, grinning madly all the while.
    Bring it on, sister , I thought.
    Big mistake.
    Denise raised her arms slowly over her head, and as she did the sound of the surf behind me suddenly faded. Instead of the crash of the waves against the shore, there was nothing but silence. At the same time, a dark shadow fell across the beach, blotting out the sun.
    I turned to see a massive wave looming above me, a good fifteen feet in height. It hung there, trapped in that moment just before breaking, like a bull straining to break out of the rodeo gate.
    Fuck me.
    The wave broke.
    Knowing I was about to be pulverized by a half ton of water caused my concentration to slip. The connection allowing me to borrow the ghost’s sight shredded like a wet tissue, and I found myself surrounded by a fog of brilliant white. I had time to take two or three stumbling steps in the direction I thought the dunes lay, and then that massive wall of freezing water crashed down upon me. The force of the wave knocked me off my feet and carried me up the beach in a twisting, tumbling roll before depositing me at the foot of the dunes and receding back into the sea as if it had never existed.
    Spitting out seawater and gasping for air, never mind trying to remember which way was up after being tossed around like a rag doll, I pulled myself into a seated position, my head hanging between my legs, both literally and figuratively.
    A voice called down from the top of the dune above.
    “Looks like you lost your concentration, Hunt.”
    I spat up what felt like another lungful of seawater and answered with what was left of my dignity.
    “Nag, nag, nag. You just wait. I’ll get you for that.”
    Denise laughed, the first genuine laugh I’d heard from her in over a week. “Whatever you say, Grasshopper,” she said lightly. “I think that’s enough for today.”
    I waited until I heard her footsteps moving away from me before I muttered beneath my breath.
    “Watch it or I’ll sic a poltergeist on your ass.”
    Her honey-and-steel voice came floating back across the dunes.
    “I heard that…”
    I smiled. Maybe things were going to turn out okay after all , I thought.
    Unfortunately, the