Текст книги "Ghost Seer"

Автор книги: Robin D. Owens

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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 21 страниц)

THIRTY-SIX

“NOPE. YOU NEED to nap.”

The human specter solidified. You will be there? The hope in Jack Slade’s voice, a man’s voice again, made Clare blink fast. “Yes.”

Zach heard another bark, then watched as the dog—whom he hadn’t seen, only heard—became visible and went over to lean against the phantom of Jack Slade. The guy was nearly concrete now. Zach could only see vague lines of one of the bureaus behind him.

After rubbing Enzo, the gunman inclined his head at Clare, stuck out his chin at Zach, and faded away. Clare sighed. If Zach let her go, he figured that she would pace restlessly. He hadn’t noted the habit much at her former house, but this house was big enough for her to get a long run going.

You need to nap. The big dog leapt onto the end of the bed.

Zach took her fingers from his thigh, squeezed, and trailed his own up her bare arm. “Yeah, let’s nap.”

You need to nap, too. Enzo stared at Zach.

Clare bit her lip. When her voice came, it quivered. “I know I need to nap.” She put a hand over her stomach. “This is going to be it, the big deal.”

The big deal, Enzo barked.

Dropping a kiss on her head, Zach said, “You can do it.”

She leaned against him, then drew away a bit, eyes fixed on something he couldn’t see—visualizing the future? The apparition of Jack Slade again? Some other demanding specter?

“I will do it.” Her hands fisted. Finally she shuddered and let out a deep breath, and sank back on the thick layered pillows she liked. Her gaze met his. “I’m even more wound up than I was.” She reached out and stroked his chest, dragging her nail gently over his nipples, spiking his arousal. “I think a good release would help us sleep.”

He totally agreed. Zach had had enough of lying in bed alone. He thought he heard caws outside the window and his shoulders tensed. No. This was happening far too often . . . since Montana. Maybe since before then. Since his mistake. Nothing he would analyze now, especially not when Clare came closer and said, “We really need to break in my new bedroom more.” She whirled her hand. “Fill it full of good energy.”

He noted the strain in her eyes. She was a woman completely unused to violence and had been swept into a violent plot. He dealt with violence every day, lived within its confines, and so had the police who’d questioned her, and the counselor who’d stood by her.

She needed this time, this sex, with him more than he realized.

He’d wanted to make love to her tenderly, but nerves fizzed in him, too. He took her chin in one hand and locked gazes with her, while his other hand stroked down her body, found a hard nipple on her plump breast, felt the curve of her hip. He shifted until she was on her back and he on his side. His fingers feathered to the apex of her thighs and she opened for him . . . was damp and his cock thickened, his blood pulsed heavily.

Then she touched his erection, rolling a condom over him that he hadn’t even known she’d had. She curled her fingers around him and he brushed away her hand. “I don’t have much control.” Keeping his breath steady was impossible. He moved over her, slid into her. Perfect.

Her hips arched and his breath caught as he slipped deeper inside her. Need threatened. Soon. Soon. Soon he’d let the reins go.

“Fast and hard would do me,” she said.

Lust simply blew his mind away. He plunged inside her, keeping his eyes open and staring at hers, linked together.

Dimly he heard her cry out and she tightened around him, and he let himself go.

 • • •

Two hours later he opened his eyes, saw that the alarm would sound in a couple of minutes. He’d thrown the incredibly soft sheet off himself, the air-conditioning turned up just enough to make the house a good temp. Gazing down at Clare, who had the sheet up to her neck, Zach thought that she might always have a problem with cold.

She should move to a warmer climate. And that notion made his heart twinge and his dick twitch. But her great-aunt Sandra had lived in Chicago, so Clare should be able to manage Denver.

Besides, she loved this house. Zach was just beginning to let liking for this house sneak under his guard. He’d lived a lot of places when he was growing up, tended to stay no longer than five years at one job since he’d started working as a cop. Had never had a home.

Clare had moved around, too, but he figured this place was definitely home for her.

She woke slowly, blinked up at him, and smiled. Then she sat up and stretched and kissed him. As she glanced out the window, he saw when knowledge and dread came to her eyes at what it was finally time for her to do.

Then she looked over at him and Zach understood with a sickening jolt that his bad knee, the hideous red scars, his foot a little floppy and unable to flex, were bare to her sight. He froze. She shifted toward him. The view of her naked breasts swaying distracted him, fuzzed his mind until she sat cross-legged, another fine view, and stroked his scars with her fingertips.

“Oh, Zach, how much pain this caused you.”

He just couldn’t move away; he was immobile under those light touches.

“And how it hurt you,” she crooned.

“It destroyed my life.”

Sighing, she continued to caress, meeting his eyes with a sad smile. “What a pair we are.” She tapped her temple. “My ‘gift’ wounded me, ruined my life. It just happened on the inside and doesn’t show as much on the outside.”

“You’re stronger for it,” he said. “Wiser.”

Even in the dim light he saw her roll her eyes.

He went on, “This . . . gift . . . you received didn’t ruin you. It enriched you. . . .” He let more truth out into the world, words he needed to say aloud. “And my injury didn’t wreck my life, just my career. I was stupid and I paid.”

Clare angled her chin, but her lips still curved in that half smile. “And I spent my life ignoring what Great-Aunt Sandra might have taught me, rebelling against the craziness of my parents and her ‘weirdness.’ I could have accepted earlier, could have learned, could have been prepared.”

“We are a pair,” he said.

Her gaze was straight as she continued to pet him. “This finished your career, but it’s made you stronger, Zach.” A breath that lifted her full breasts. “I’m glad I met you now.”

“Yes.”

Enzo barked, breaking the moment. Time to go.

Clare leapt off the bed. “I need a brief shower. I’ll be ready in under fifteen minutes.” She gestured to a curvy love seat where Zach now saw she’d laid out her clothes: new jeans, a silk blouse and light leather jacket, buffed hiking boots. Incredible.

“I can’t go face that situation without looking my best!” She hurried to the master bath.

“I’ll get the ears,” Zach said, and grinned at her expected squeal.

But when he swung his legs from the bed to the floor, he saw that the scars weren’t as red as before, and his left foot dropping and brushing the plush oriental carpet as he walked felt sensual, almost acceptable.

Clare made good on her word, and she and Zach and Enzo were out of the house in under fifteen minutes, along with the cooler full of snacks, drinks, and chicken strips, and her overnight bag containing her tablet and some clothes.

When Zach put her bag in the compartment behind the truck seats, Clare noticed he had the duffel he usually carried there, the one that had come and gone at her place. The one she’d insisted he take with him that morning—so very long ago! And so very much change happening to her so very fast. She wasn’t the same woman as she’d been even that morning.

But they’d cleared the air, for now, between them.

She’d offered to share driving time with Zach, but he turned her down and gripped the wheel a little harder. Since she had a brother who insisted on driving instead of letting her help, she settled back in her seat, only a little disgruntled. That was a minor battle for another day, though she noticed Zach drove a consistent seven miles over the speed limit.

Enzo curled up near her, but she didn’t pet him. From what she understood her role would be, she’d be interacting deeply with Jack Slade, freezing and in color. Why hadn’t she realized that the shawls Great-Aunt Sandra draped herself in weren’t only for show?

Before they’d left the Denver suburbs behind, Enzo had dissipated into nothingness. She was sad to see the dog go but dreaded discussions with the Other.

Talk with Zach was infrequent and casual. She sensed that he’d dropped into that long-distance driver’s concentration that didn’t allow for much of anything else, and she knew if she opened her mouth she might simply babble her fears for the entire trip. So she stiffened her spine and kept him stocked on drink and food.

They paused only once at a rest stop to stretch. Since the stop was relatively close to Torrington and Cold Springs, she did stretch and limber up, anticipating the hike off the road to the area of the defunct station.

Just south of Torrington a grayish oblong patch coalesced out of the darkness, slowly becoming defined as the ghost who’d haunted her since she’d returned to Denver.

He floated several yards ahead of the car. Clare tensed.

“Jack Slade?” Zach asked.

“Yes.”

He picked up her hand and put it on his thigh. “Better if I can see him through you.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly, spreading her fingers, feeling the taut denim over muscle. She wouldn’t push Zach on whatever psychic powers he might have. From the conversation she remembered between him and Mrs. Flinton, the older lady, so much more experienced than Clare, believed that Zach had some sort of gift.

They continued driving, following the specter, and then it zoomed away, and back.

We’re close! the ghost said, hovering in front of the truck in a manner that made Clare’s stomach lurch.

“Can you hear me, Jack?” Zach asked.

The phantom’s face solidified more, and Clare swallowed. Tell the driver I can hear him.

“Yes, he can hear you,” she relayed. Her nerves began to twang in anticipation of what she’d have to do.

“Stick to the roads,” Zach said. From the sound of it, he spoke between clenched teeth. “And don’t make us go through any damned barbed wire.”

The ghost frowned, appearing more raggedy: no feet, his legs ending in filmy white streamers. Clare sensed that he had a pinpoint focus: to get through this night, one way or another. She gulped.

I will lead you to the best place, he finally said in her mind. I will trace the modern roads. He vanished.

Clare’s doom came closer.

THIRTY-SEVEN

THEY WOUND THROUGH the narrow streets of a shabby trailer park. Now and again off to the left or right were short gravel drives that went nowhere, where there’d once been access to fields that now only showed thrusting grass in faint dirt ruts.

Zach cursed mildly but continually as he wove through the lanes that were more country than town.

There is a sharp turn, here, follow me! Jack Slade said, indicating the bend, then flickering out. Due to his excitement or some other paranormal phenomenon that she didn’t know about?

“I saw him,” Zach said, and Clare realized she’d left her fingers on his leg, but they’d traveled up more toward the crease in his thigh. He didn’t seem to mind, though she was sure he noticed. A trickle of easy contentment mixed with the excitement churning through her blood. She was so, so lucky to have him with her.

No matter what happened in her life, she needed to remember and cherish this moment. No matter what happened with her and Zach . . . and she hoped they were only on the beginning of their journey together . . . she had to remember what he was doing for her tonight. Not leaving her alone to face her first major ghost laying . . . transitioning . . . passing on into the light . . . heading through the door to the next world or whatever came after death. She’d had little religion or personal spiritual philosophy but figured she’d be developing one soon. Her mouth twisted; she’d have to, it would be a necessity, wouldn’t it?

A bump jolted her from the thoughts she’d wrapped around her like an insulating blanket.

“Damn washboard road.”

They proceeded slowly, but it wasn’t more than five minutes before the ghost appeared again.

“There! There he is, and more distinct than I’ve ever seen him!” Clare said.

“Yeah, yeah. I see him pretty damn good, too.” A slight pause. “Well, crap.”

“What?”

“Look ahead and a little up.”

She sucked in a breath. “A ridge. Full of houses. Some of them with porch lights on.”

“Damn it! All of the huge state of Wyoming with farms and ranches of thousands of acres and the damn site is near a damn suburb of Torrington.”

“The trailer park isn’t that far behind us, either,” Clare said.

“I know it.” Zach turned into dirt ruts that his headlights illuminated. They also caught the shine of white letters on a sign: POSTED. NO TRESPASSING. KEEP OUT.

“Well, darn,” Clare said. She was breathing fast. “At least there’s a draw . . . a tangle of bushes and cottonwoods, and it looks like we’ll be below another ridge, maybe hidden a little?” She kept her voice quiet but couldn’t stop the anxious rise in tone.

“Not good enough,” Zach said grimly, killing the lights. He jutted his chin. “Did you see the irrigated field? I betcha anything the damn station will be in the middle of that wheat.”

“Oh, dear.”

He opened the door and she did the same and hopped out, landing on dry grass that crackled under her feet. A mass of crickets went quiet.

“Let’s head on along the bottom of the ridge,” Zach murmured. He rubbed the back of his neck. “At least there’s no moon. It’s a new moon tonight. And let’s do this fast. Ted’s around. I just feel it.”

Clare smiled at him and his heart squeezed. He’d do a lot for that smile. “I know I can trust you.”

She will not be aware of the normal world, Enzo said in a fussy tone.

All Zach’s muscles tensed; he had to pry his teeth open to say, “What?”

Patting him on the arm, Clare turned on a small flashlight she must have pulled from her pocket. She outlined the continuing dirt rut between the ridge and the wheat field, heading toward a glowing blur a couple of yards away. The thing winked out when she raised her hand from his arm. “I trust you.” She stopped a moment, her face pale but her big eyes wide. “Time to confab with the notorious Jack Slade and send him to his . . . on.”

“To his just reward?” Zach asked dryly.

Clare shivered a little and he wondered if she felt the cold of ghosts. Zach himself felt warm, though the sky began to rapidly cloud over, blocking even the starlight on this night of the dark of the moon.

“I hope there is a great deal of mercy,” Clare murmured.

Zach would second that. “I’ll follow close.” He clicked on his Maglite.

She nodded, said nothing about him being crippled, as usual. She trusted him as backup and he trusted her. She’d do her job to the very best of her ability. And she’d be a good partner, take charge of the situation and spare him what she could.

Some partner he was. He should have asked one of the special forces guys to help them . . . help Clare. He wanted her safe, and he couldn’t protect her the way he could have a few months ago.

The going was rough. He had to watch every step, and each step hurt. He should’ve gotten a goddamned brace. Clare was at least three yards ahead of him.

“Hey, Jack,” she said softly.

From one step to the next, as if she crossed some invisible boundary, the night sliced in two. Instead of the subtle tones of night, the blasting uber-rich color of a hot August day hit her eyes. Instead of fragrant scents of grass and crops and land drifting to her nostrils, horrible odors assaulted her nose—horse poop, blood, and death.

The man slumping on the post before her had voided himself. A pool of dark red liquid surrounded by buzzing flies marked the packed dirt at his feet; two holes on the opposite sides of his head were red, horrific.

She screamed but heard nothing . . . except Jack Slade as he stepped before her, still in his shades of black and white, worry lines dug into his face. He wasn’t the only man there, but the two other cowboys, both vivid in life as Jules Beni was in death, stood with disgruntled expressions, waving at the body and seeming to yell at Jack. Clare couldn’t hear them.

Jack angled to follow her gaze. “They aren’t really present, just part of my torment, the continuing loop. I just told them that they wouldn’t be getting the larger reward for Jules Beni, since he wasn’t alive.” Jack sounded as if he spoke, words forming in air, not mind-to-mind.

The apparition turned fully around to survey the scene with her. His hands rose and dropped in a futile motion. “You know I went to Fort Laramie and told the commanding officer I’d be hunting Beni. He gave me his blessing, such as it was. I’d boasted I’d cut Jules’s damn ears off and wear them, and I had to do it.”

A deeper timbre entered his voice along with an edge. Jack rubbed his chest over a couple of the bullets left in him. “I’d been avoiding Jules as long as I could.” Jack’s lips curled. “Scared then of getting shot and more hurt, like I’m scared now I won’t pass on.” He didn’t look at Clare. “I had to cut off his ears, to keep my reputation, and once I saw him dead, I wanted to. So I did.” He shook his head, sighed, glanced sideways at her. “All right, maybe I was a little wrong about the first part. I didn’t have to cut off his ears.” Jack rubbed his own. “I knew no matter what happened that day, people would say I was the one who killed Beni; my rep woulda been fine without the ears.”

Clare nodded. “They said you tied him to a pole and shot bits of him for hours.” Instinctively, she looked at the dead man again. He’d lived to be significantly older than Jack Slade, and she couldn’t tell how many times he’d been shot because his shirt was so stained she couldn’t separate the fresh blood from anything else . . . but she didn’t think he’d had a six-shooter emptied into him like Jack had.

“I didn’t torture him or kill him,” Jack Slade said simply.

Enzo appeared. Why are you still here, Clare? The cold is killing you and you haven’t even merged with Jack yet? The ghost dog asked telepathically.

“I had to tell her my story,” Jack said.

Enzo snorted, glaring at Clare. You don’t have to listen to their stories. You can’t afford to.

She moved cold lips, answering aloud. “I think I do. To understand my . . . my place in this . . .” So hard to lift a hand and gesture, her fingers a tiny flick instead of a wide movement. Alarm flared in her mind and sent a spurt of warmth through her.

Jack sighed and it was more hollow and otherworldly than his words had been.

“Do you have the ears?”

They were in her jeans pocket. She nodded. Her lips turned down. Time to get on with the whole weird business.

Take my hand. Slade’s voice was back to ghostly thought echoing in her mind.

She knew what that meant; when she initiated contact with the ghosts, the cold was so much worse. Freezing enough to stop a heart. She stared and stared at his hand. For once Enzo didn’t prod. Zach wasn’t near, but he wouldn’t attempt to stop her from doing her job. He understood. She wished she did.

 • • •

“Just what are you all doing on my land at two in the morning, messing around with my crop?” snapped a weathered older man in a cowboy hat, holding a shotgun.

Zach didn’t answer, more focused on a blurry movement in the brush to his right, the crack of the breaking of dry branches. If he pulled his gun, the farmer might shoot him.

“Well?” the guy demanded.

The tiniest glint on a gun barrel in the draw. Zach leapt forward into the big farmer, knocked him aside, fell himself.

Ted rushed from deep shadows. The bastard had another gun. “You can’t make Jack Slade move on before he tells me about the gold.” He shot but missed Zach since he was already rolling away.

“What the hell!” shouted the farmer.

“I’ll get her, slow her down.” Mather panted, pivoted, and aimed at Clare.

Zach reached for his gun, shot.

So did the farmer.

 • • •

Take. My. Hand, Jack Slade said.

She was too tense, too wired, all her muscles tight, her nerves quivering through her body, but Clare reached out, grasped the ghostly hand. And it seemed he moved into her, slowing her motions, stopping her heart in truth for one terrible second before she, they, took up a stance before the ever-running, looping scene. He settled in her, not as a man, but as a hard ball of ice in her torso.

And she was blazing color, too, seeing the events take place, feeling what Jack did, his continual agony of the bullets and buckshot still inside him, his fury at Jules Beni.

She strode up to the corpse and a knife was in her hand, and then she watched as she deftly cut the ears off with a couple of slices. “He’s dead right enough,” Jack said, the only words she’d actually heard, though the cowboys had come and their mouths had moved and arms waved in a heated discussion with Jack. He poked a hole in one of the ears and threaded his pocket watch chain through it, the ear now a bloody fob. Then he stuck the other in a pocket. Her gorge rose and she stumbled a couple of yards back.

Got the ears? the phantom asked. It’s time.

It’s time, Clare! Enzo chimed in.

She wanted to rub her arms, but her hands were bloody and one held a knife and the cold numbed her fingers. She could feel her energy draining as she swayed.

THE EARS! both Jack Slade and Enzo shouted.

The gunfighter’s image rose in her mind, his determined expression let her know he wouldn’t let her give up. He’d haunt her for sure, as a mad specter, if she didn’t do this for him, she just knew it. His face began to fade to a skull, then gained substance again . . . repeated the cycle.

Reaching into her jeans pocket, she fumbled to find the opening. She should be able to see her breath, she was so cold . . . dangerously cold.

Clare, Clare, hurry, hurry, hurry. You have to do this fast! Enzo whined and jumped around her. When he lit on her feet, she could swear she could feel his weight.

Better get it done, Slade said. Or we’ll both die . . . or go mad.

Her focus narrowed to one thought, too late to think the whole thing was weird and crazy and unreal. She managed to thrust her fingers into her pocket and touched the earlobes. They felt warm and plump and throbbing.