Spooks abound around town

The floors creaked under his feet as they ventured into the abandoned building. There were remnants of tile and large holes in the floor. The walls were gone. All that was left were the wooden beams that kept the structure together.

Nick Carcione came out of the old building to report to his friends.

"I swear I heard something," he said. "I swear I heard people in there."

As Halloween approaches, emotions and fears of the urban legends and haunted, abandoned buildings are intensified in people's minds and the curiosity of spirits is heightened.

Carcione and his friends had that odd inquisitiveness on a cold Wednesday night, just a week before the holiday. After wandering around an old building they continued to test theories, taunting the ghosts to come out.

One theory they tested was calling out the bride. Marie Odom, an electronic voice phenomena specialist, said the story goes years ago, a bride was running late to her wedding. On her way to the ceremony, she was killed in a hit-and-run accident in the canyon above the Capitol. Now the story is if people go up there at night and flash their brights three times she will come and tap on the car window and ask for a ride.

Carcione and his fellow ghost hunters tempted the bride by flashing the car lights. She didn't appear — to their disappointment.

Odom and her colleague Tifany Jorgensen have yet to see a ghost manifest itself to them. But Odom said if the bride ever tapped on her window she'd say, "Come on in."

Jorgensen felt a bit differently.

"I'd faint," she said.

Odom said her EVP team will go to teenagers for stories because they know where the haunts are.

"The stories are mostly over exaggerated, but you'll find some truth in them," Odom said.

Odom said Salt Lake City is full of haunted areas because of the history.

"Most of the buildings are pretty haunted, but people don't want to see it," she said.

One of these spots is the the City-County Building.

A little over a hundred years ago, the story goes that two children died during the construction of the building. The story varies from person to person, but what doesn't seem to waver is the employees' undeniable feeling of a presence in the building.