Jess groaned as she looked at her half finished toast struggling to finish more than one slice. Her head was pounding in time with her heartbeat and she would have liked nothing more than to disappear upstairs and sleep.

Now and then, she caught a whiff of Tabitha's "hangover cure" that stood in a mug at the edge of the table. Tabitha had said it had to be in an opaque glass or else she'd never drink it. Jess thought this was a waste of effort, as after one sniff, her stomach and head had both agreed that the concoction was entirely inedible.

Tabitha's had made her try a few sips before she left, and whilst Jess had been a good sport about it, she'd spat the mixture out as soon as Tabitha's back was turned. She'd never tasted something that could both make her cry and turn her lips numb. It was like taking vodka mixed with chilli, and considering neither of those had been included, she was reluctant to have any more.

The door slammed, and two sets of footsteps made their way towards her.

With every step, it felt as though they were tap dancing on her skull.

'How you feeling, Jesse?' Ash shouted before entering the kitchen.

Jess hissed and put her head against the table.

'Oh, so you're feeling better?' Ash chuckled when she saw her sister's hunched body. 'Didn't you drink Tabitha's cure?'

'That thing,' she said, pointing toward the mug, 'is poison.'

'It'll help,' coaxed Ash.

'When I want to have my vocal cords stripped-what the fuck happened to you?' Jess demanded when she finally lifted her head and saw the bruises on her sister's neck.

Ash ducked her head, whilst the Deputy wavered at the kitchen door, not liking the accusing look that Jess was giving him.

'My vision got out of hand,' Ash finally admitted.

'Out of hand! It looks like someone fucking strangled you.'

Ash winced and Jess' face lost all its colour.

'That's what you saw in your vision. You saw Darcy get murdered?'

'I did. I felt it. But I had no idea about this.' She waved at her neck.

'It was all normal...well as normal as you usually look having visions, but then your eyes opened and they were completely white. You just started gasping. I physically watched the bruises spread over your skin when no one was touching you,' the Deputy explained.

'Ash-'

'Look, the bruises are already fading. They were purple when we left Mrs Gonzola's house, and now they're just a sickly yellow,' she interrupted Jess. 'They'll probably fade in another hour.'

Jess pursed her lips, not convinced. She could tell by the look on her sister's face that she wasn't ready to talk about it. She had to admit that behind her calm facade, Ash seemed shaken, and that was not like her sister.

'Did you see her killer?' she asked instead.

Ash nodded. 'A white man. Average height, about 5ft 11in. Dark hair. Dark eyes. Reasonably handsome. But Mrs Gonzola had been right, his suit didn't fit. If I had to guess, I'd say it wasn't made for him. And he had a fake Rolex on.'

'How could you tell it was fake?' the Deputy asked.

'Please,' she rolled her eyes, 'our Nana taught us the difference when we were teenagers. She'd had enough people try to fob her off with their family's "real" heirlooms.'

'So a suit that wasn't his. A fake Rolex,' Jess pondered. 'Sounds like he was fishing.'

'A confidence man. Someone pretending to be the big man on campus, but he's not,' agreed the Deputy.

'He had access to the science building after hours. He had to have been faculty,' Ash summed up. 'How hard would it be to find out who was employed there at the time?'

'That's easy,' Jess said. She pulled out her laptop and used her university login to find the page she was looking for. When she'd first started, she'd used the page to familiarise herself with her lecturers and hadn't paid that much attention to the historical staff members. A part of her had wondered how useful the page was, but she was eating her words now.

'The uni created this directory for new and current students. It states all active lecturers, and retired lecturers, in each of the different departments.'

'Does it have staff photos?' The Deputy leaned forward as Jess spun the laptop around with a smug look.

'It does,' she announced proudly.

They both watched as Ash took a seat and flicked through the web page. She hesitated over a few, making Jess squirm, but then she moved on to the next one.

Jess glanced from her sister's face, tongue stuck out as she thought, to the Deputy who watched over her shoulder. He was doing a better job at hiding his disappointment as the list became smaller and smaller.

'None of these are him,' Ash admitted, finally looking up from Jess' laptop.

'What if we're looking at this wrong?' the Deputy said. 'We're assuming he's a lecturer, but all we really know is he had access to the building. What other people, not lecturers, would have keys to the building?'

'Cleaners,' Jess suggested.

'A cleaner would have access to the building, but also wouldn't be on a wage to afford a Rolex.'

'Or a fancy suit like most of these are wearing.' Ash pointed to the screen.

Jess' smile faded. 'But that's going to be harder to find out. The uni doesn't exactly push their cleaning staff to the front for everyone to see.'

But the Deputy wasn't phased. In fact, he looked euphoric.

'In a few days, the dental records will prove the bodies' identities. Once that happens, attention will turn naturally to those that worked there.'

'No one will think it's odd if you request the employee records then,' Ash said, her own smile growing.

'And when we do, I'll already know exactly where to start,' he said.

'But all of this doesn't help Charity,' Jess announced.

'But there's a link between these murders and Charity's, I'm sure of it. We're just missing something,' the Deputy said with frustration.

'I've been thinking about when Darcy possessed me. She wanted retribution, but she also wanted to stop it from happening again, which suggests that her killer could still be out there, that it could be the same person that killed Charity. She was leading me there, so what if we ask her where she was going?'

'Absolutely not,' raged Ash. 'You're not getting possessed again, Jesse. I won't let that happen.'

'I'm not talking about getting possessed,' Jess argued. 'I've been looking through the family book and there were two sisters with similar gifts to ours in the 1800s. The younger sister was psychic and the older one could see the dead. But they used each other to help strengthen their gifts.'

Jess pulled the book towards her and paged through it until she found what she was looking for. It was at the front of the book and was written in thin slanted handwriting with curling letters and exaggerated flourishes. It made a doctor's handwriting seem legible in comparison.

'You can read that?' Ash asked in astonishment, momentarily forgetting what they were talking about.

'History student, remember? Texts like this are what I live for.' Jess smirked. 'The older sister was able to resist getting possessed by using her sister's power as a shield.'

'And does it say how they achieved this?' Ash said, getting back to business. She peered at the writing with fresh eyes, even though it meant very little to her.

'They bound themselves to each other. But they said they could only do it when the ghost's body was close by. Apparently ghosts are calmer when their bodies are close.'

'Well, that's snuffered that then. How are we going to get close to the bodies? They're in the county morgue for pete's sake.'

'I may be able to help with that,' the Deputy offered.

'You can't be serious.' Ash stared at him.

'If I get you there, do you really think you'll be able to get answers from Darcy?'

Jess bit her lip. 'The book says the ghosts are more amicable when they're close to their bodies.'

'She wasn't so amicable when we were in the science building,' Ash muttered, but Jess ignored her.

'She should be more open to us, but it doesn't guarantee that she'll be helpful.'

'But we're trying to solve her murder?'

'You're thinking logically,' Ash pointed out. 'But to ghosts, logic doesn't mean anything. They don't think and feel like us. They have their own agendas, which usually only make sense to them. We may be trying to solve her murder, but she also may hate us prying into her life.'

'The two sisters were trying to contact their mother's ghost. Apparently, she'd hidden something valuable before her death and her daughters needed money. They took a map so she could point out where she'd buried it.'

'This is insane.' Ash hung her head.

'But what if she does know where her killer is? Charity's killer.'

'And what if they're not connected at all?' Ash exploded. 'We'd be taking a serious risk. If we're caught, then we'll get arrested for breaking and entering. Not to mention how shady it sounds that we broke into a morgue. We're walking a fine line as it is.'

'Ash, if Darcy's murder and Charity's are connected, then that means that a serial killer is walking around campus. They've already killed four girls that we know about. Anyone could be their next target. Me, you, Laura. We can't let them get away with this.'

'The police don't have any leads,' the Deputy reminded her. 'They're in the dark. They're still treating Charity as a missing person's case, and haven't made the connection between her and the three bodies.'

'But what about the rings?' Ash asked desperately.

'The Sheriff is refusing to believe that some cheap jewellery can be a connection. And it is flimsy. I spoke with a jeweller, and he said they used to sell rings like that a dime a dozen. It'll be impossible to trace who they were sold to. Without Charity's body, it'll be very hard to set a definitive link between the murders.'

Ash could feel a headache brewing behind her left eye, which was twitching rapidly. She stood and pulled a juice out of the fridge, draining the cartoon in a few mouthfuls.

'Ash, we need to try,' Jess urged her.

'Do the two sisters say how they bound themselves?' Ash said after slamming the fridge door a little too forcefully. She could hear the contents rattling together and only hoped she hadn't broken anything.

Jess scanned the entry again. 'It does.'

'Then you'd better write it out, word for word.'

Jess pulled her laptop forward and began translating the writing for her sister.

'So what's your plan to get us in?' Ash asked the Deputy.

'I have an idea. I just really wish I had a better one,' he admitted.

'I think that could be our new slogan,' she said, and neither of them argued with her.