Brielle held one out to her. “Regular lights can create an electromagnetic field and give us a false positive on our EMF meters. Appliances can do it, too, so we’ll shut off the power before we start.”
Taking the flashlight from Brielle, she turned it on, frowning when she saw the meager light it put out. How the heck was she supposed to see anything with this?
Robert must have noticed the look on her face because he said, “It’s LED so it doesn’t put out a lot of light, but because it uses an extremely small watch battery, it’s as close as we can get to a zero electromagnetic field signature and still be able to see.”
Presley nodded even though she had no idea what he was talking about. She wanted to ask, but Logan was already barking orders.
“Robert, Brielle, you’ve got the first floor. Mav, you take the basement. I’ll cover the upstairs.”
Had he left her out on purpose? “What about me?”
Logan turned that impenetrable golden-brown gaze on her. “It was Robert’s idea to have you tag along with us, so you can go with him and Brielle. And try not to get in their way.”
He didn’t wait for an answer but turned and headed up the steps. Presley clenched her jaw as she watched him go. Brielle was right. He was a jerk.
“Don’t pay attention to him,” Brielle said. “Come on. Robert and I will show you the tools of the trade.”
Taking Brielle’s advice, Presley put the surly ghost hunter from her mind and instead turned her attention to Robert and the strange looking stuff he was pulling out of the duffel bag. If Logan didn’t want to play nice, that was fine with her. She’d go to Mav with any paranormal questions Brielle and Robert couldn’t answer. He seemed like the nicer of the two men.
“This is the EMF meter we were telling you about,” Robert said as he stood up. “There are several different varieties, but this one is called a Tri-Field Meter. They’re more expensive than the other kinds, but Logan and Mav like it because they think it gives more accurate readings. Brielle and I like it because it’s simple to use.” He held it out to Presley. “You can go ahead and take a closer look at it if you want.”
She took the EMF meter and shined her flashlight on it. The unit was rectangular in shape with a knob on the bottom that switched between magnetic, electric and radio fields. The top half was made up of a scale with a needle that measured the amount of energy coming from each of the fields. It looked pretty high-tech, but it could be a Geiger counter for all she knew.
“If the needle moves, does that mean there’s a ghost in the house?” she asked as she handed it back to Robert.
“Not necessarily,” he said. “It picks up electromagnetic fields, which can come from anything electrical. You need to be able to differentiate between those and the ones put off by ghosts. That’s where the real talent of the ghost hunter comes in, being able to tell a false positive from the real thing.”
“It’s also why we turn off the power and use other detectors, like thermal scanners,” Brielle put in.
“What are those?” Presley asked.
“They’re basically a regular digital thermometer, only they measure the temperature of the air.” Robert crouched down to rummage in the duffel bag. A moment later, he held out a thermometer that looked a lot like the one the nurses in the hospital had used to check her temperature. “Like this.”
She nodded. “Why is it important to take the air temperature?”
“It lets you know if there are any cold spots in the room.”
“Cold spots?”
“Air pockets that feel colder than the rest of the room,” Brielle explained. “Ghosts are nothing more than coherent energy fields. The energy they use to materialize is pulled right out of the environment. When you pull that energy out of a room with no electricity, you get cold spots. They’re literally sucking the heat out of the room to exist.”
Presley nodded again. She had no idea ghost hunting was so complicated, especially since it wasn’t as if it was an actual science. On the other hand, it made it obvious Brielle and Robert genuinely believed this stuff. Remembering she was supposed to be doing research, she handed the thermometer back to Robert. “Maybe I should be taking notes.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Brielle said. “We can go over everything again tomorrow at the office, if you want.”
Presley smiled. “That’d be great. Thanks.”
Even though she didn’t expect to see a ghost, Presley’s pulse quickened as she followed the two part-time ghost hunters from room to room. Now that her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, she could see fairly well with the little flashlight and she found herself looking around eagerly for signs of the paranormal. She kept waiting for their detectors to go off at any minute, but to her dismay neither the EMF meter nor the thermal scanner so much as even beeped.
When Mav met back up with them in the entryway ten minutes later to report he’d come up empty-handed as well, she had to fight to hide her disappointment. She’d already concluded she wasn’t going to see a real ghost or anything, but she’d been hoping the needle on the EMF meter would have at least tremored a little. Clearly, being a ghost hunter wasn’t as exciting as the television shows made it out to be.
“Did you get anything?” Mav asked when Logan came downstairs a few minutes later.
“I picked up some readings in the master bedroom.”
Of course he did. The big, bad ghost hunter didn’t want the new girl to think he wasn’t fully qualified hero material.
“Can you show me?” she asked.
His eyes narrowed. “Show you?”
“Yeah. That’s what I’m paying you for. Besides, I want to see the ghost for myself.” She lifted a brow. “Unless you’re making it up to impress me.”
Logan clenched his jaw, but whether it was in response to her words or the amused chuckle from Mav, she wasn’t sure.
“Fine,” he said. “Let’s go.”
Presley followed him up the steps, as did the rest of Paranormal Investigations Unlimited. She didn’t know why she kept butting heads with Logan, but she couldn’t help it. His attitude was so damn infuriating. He could at least try to act civil. She was paying him two-hundred-and-fifty dollars a day, after all, not to mention fixed his damn gas-guzzling Hummer.
Once they got to the bedroom, Logan pulled out his EMF meter and turned it on. Presley leaned closer to get a better look and was surprised when the needle barely moved a quarter of an inch.
“That’s it?” she asked. “That’s your big ghost. How scary.”
Logan slanted her a hard look. “Yeah, I know. You could always go wait in the Hummer if you’re too afraid.”
She gave him a sweet smile. “I think I can keep it together.”
“Suit yourself.”
Presley ignored his sarcastic tone and looked around the room. “If the EMF meter is picking up a ghost, where is it?”
Logan glanced at her as he put the meter back in the duffel bag he had slung over his shoulder. “I never said it was a ghost. I said I picked up some readings.”
“From what?”
He shrugged. “Residual energy, maybe. It’s a bedroom, so it isn’t surprising there might be some still hanging around.”