G.H.O.S.T. Teams: Book 1 - Magic Read Online Free Page A

they made their way up the hill. I glanced out over the water, noting the small police boat and it’s two uniformed occupants. They were talking to a scuba diver, whose head was bobbing up and down in the water. I assumed they were searching for murder weapons or clues to the crime. Their attention seemed to be fully involved in whatever they were doing, so I looked over at Freddy.
    “I think that’s about as much privacy as we’re going to get,” I said.
    Freddy glanced around the area, nodding his head as if he agreed with my assessment. Then he turned towards the team, gave them a broad smile, and started dishing out orders.
    “All right, this is what we trained for people, let’s hop to it,” Freddy stated enthusiastically, before dropping his voice to a whisper, “Kara, if you would check the local manna levels. We shall need to know if there was anything else magical in the vicinity. Erika, sweep the area, and see if you can find any unusual tracks or other signs of recent paranormal passage. Timothy, log into the local networks, figure out if there are any cameras looking in this direction, and what, if anything, they observed in this vicinity. Also, secure this area from any external surveillance while we are working here. Danny, if he was killed in this locale, then there is a chance that a psychic residue was left behind. Let me know if you pick up anything. Bruce…”Freddy hesitated a moment.
    I’ll admit that I was in shock. Freddy had been so weak and timid when dealing with Shaw, that to see him now, with all of this confidence, was a pleasant surprise. Perhaps that was his gift, the ability to delegate responsibilities. Then again, this was our first mission. Maybe he had been planning that speech for months. I was about to ask him about it, when he continued his instructions towards me.
    “Bruce… good job with Shaw,” he said before patting me awkwardly on the shoulder and turning to watch Kara’s progress.
    Freddy kept a straight face when he thanked me, which actually made the situation even more comical. But to my credit, I managed to contain my own laughter. I debated on whether or not I should be insulted that he didn’t have anything for me to do. But in the grand scheme of things, I guess it was to be expected. After all, I was the team muscle. My position on the team, referred to as the Knight, has the simple task of neutralizing threats. Their job was to locate the threat and mine was to deal with it. On the plus side, it meant that I hardly ever had to do paperwork.
    Having nothing else to do, I figured that this was as good a time as any to observe my teammates while they worked. I was hoping that it would give me a better idea of their talents and abilities. Unfortunately, it quickly turned into me staring at Erika as she walked away. I forced myself to stop thinking about her form fitting jeans and focus on what exactly she was up to.
    Erika started by the river, walking slowly along the bank, her eyes scanning the ground. She was very methodical in her search, almost as if she had mentally sectioned the area off in grids and was working her way through each one. As she moved, I noticed two other very interesting things about her. The first was in the way she walked. The weight of each foot was perfectly balanced, leaving hardly any track upon the ground and making almost no sound. I wondered if that was part of tracker training, walking without leaving a trace. When I was a kid, we were forced to walk on rice paper to achieve a similar effect. Maybe the two of us could have quiet walking contests.
    The second thing I discovered about Erika was the fact that she utilized her other senses a great deal. She would stop, stoop down and sniff the ground, or pick up a lump of dirt to test its texture between her fingers. And I am very sorry to say that several times she even brought the sense of taste into play. No matter how beautiful Erika was, watching her lick dirt definitely made