Living with the Dead Part 32

They exchanged business cards, Nast writing Irving's cell number on the back of his before handing it to Finn.

"Maybe you'll have more luck. I'm persona non grata with Irving today, after dragging him away from his family. Which reminds me, he mentioned he was taking them up the coast this afternoon. Visiting the in-laws, I think. So you might have trouble getting together. But he's usually in by eight-thirty. If you'd like an introduction tomorrow, have the desk buzz me."

Damon was waiting outside the front doors. "I circled the whole building. There was one spot, around the back, where I made it two feet through the wall before hitting the invisible one. Weird."

Finn nodded, not really listening.

"Was Irving in?" Damon asked.

Finn shook his head.

"Can you take out your cell phone and actually talk talk to me?" to me?"

He gave Damon a play-by-play. "When Nast left that room, something happened. One minute he was Mr. Helpful, the next he couldn't get me out fast enough. I think when I was talking to Madoz, Nast had second thoughts about making the call to Irving in front of me. He did it from the other room and whatever his cousin said made Nast decide he shouldn't be so eager to help."

"So what happened when you tried the number yourself?"

"I haven't."

"Because you know it's fake."

"I'm sure it isn't." Finn rounded the corner.

"So Hey " Damon grabbed for Finn's arm, letting out a hiss of frustration when his fingers pa.s.sed through. "One of these days, I'm going to stop doing that. I was saying, the car is that way."

"I'm not going to the car." Finn backed against the wall. "Hold on while I try the number."

It rang through to voice mail, as he'd thought it would. Sean Nast wouldn't risk giving him a fake. He'd just warn Irving not to answer. Finn left a message and made a note in his pad.

"Are you going to tell me where we're going?" Damon asked as Finn pocketed the notebook.

"I'm backtracking to the front door, now that the guard has seen me leave. You'll cover the rear. If Nast comes out your way, follow "He stopped, remembering his partner was the Invisible Man. "You cover the front; I'll get the back. You see him? Whistle." cover the front; I'll get the back. You see him? Whistle."

ROBYN.

Robyn peeled one hand, gummy with sweat, from the gun, flexed it and readjusted her grip.

"You're doing fine," Hope whispered as they edged along the building.

Fine? Robyn didn't even know what what she was doing. She knew the plan, but she felt like a computer processing ones and zeros with no concept of what it meant, how it fit together in a larger context. she was doing. She knew the plan, but she felt like a computer processing ones and zeros with no concept of what it meant, how it fit together in a larger context.

Shot by a psychotic paparazzo? No sweat. Kidnapped by a werewolf? Okay. Best friend turns out to be a demon? Sure. She'd even played bait to catch a killer, and still kept her cool. But when that boy leaped to his death her emotional core had shut down altogether.

She still saw his face, floating before her wherever she looked, his expression frozen at the moment when he'd realized he was falling.

And now she was going to see his body.

Robyn wanted to slap the gun back into Hope's hand and say, "You deal, because I can't."

Hope tugged the back of Robyn's s.h.i.+rt. "I'll do this."

"I'm fine," rose to Robyn's lips. Then she realized Hope must have read her thoughts. "I'll be okay. If you were up to it, Karl wouldn't have given me the gun."

"It's just that When we get close, I'll see... it. The boy's jump. I black out. I only see that."

A replay of his death?

"I'll be okay," Robyn said again, and meant it.

As they neared the corner, Hope took out her phone. Robyn kept her gaze forward, waiting while Hope called Karl to say they were in position.

When she didn't, Robyn glanced back. Hope stood there, phone still in her pocket, her face a copper mask, immobile and gleaming, amber irises stuttering, like Damon's when he'd fall asleep watching TV, eyelids not quite closing. Dreaming. Or seeing a vision.

Robyn reached for her friend's arm, then stopped. You weren't supposed to wake sleepwalkers would the same logic apply?

"It's her Adele," Hope said. "Grief. Guilt. G.o.d, she feels so guilty. She " Hope's chin jerked up, ricocheting from the vision. "Sorry, I was..." She reached toward the wall, as if to steady herself, then noticed the phone clutched in her hand and stared at it, confused.

"You need to call " Robyn began.

"Right." She hit the speed-dial b.u.t.ton, didn't raise it to her ear. Just let it ring twice, then hung up and said, "I'm going to take a look. If I freeze up, don't worry unless you hear anything. Then just yank me back."

Hope eased past Robyn. She was still a foot from the edge when she went rigid. Then she backed up.

"It's not Adele," Hope said.

"What? You didn't see "

Hope held up a finger as her phone buzzed, the vibration as loud as a ring. Robyn circled past her, to peek around the corner.

Beside the boy's body crouched the man from the bookstore. The one who'd brought that display carousel cras.h.i.+ng down.

They were in the rental car, heading... Robyn wasn't sure where exactly, and she supposed it wasn't important.

"So you said you recognized his scent?" Hope was saying to Karl in the front seat. "He was the guy following us earlier, right?"

"At the diner and the bookstore, yes. And earlier than that. Remember Friday night, when you were getting takeout... ?"

"You thought a guy was watching us and followed him around the back. That's where you knew the scent from. It was him. So he's involved. He clearly knew the boy. The grief and guilt was so "

Hope's head jerked up.

"Do you sense something?" Robyn leaned farther over the seat.

"No, I hear something."

The bzz-bzz bzz-bzz of Hope's cell phone vibrating. As Hope struggled to get it from her back pocket, Karl reached over and deftly plucked it out. of Hope's cell phone vibrating. As Hope struggled to get it from her back pocket, Karl reached over and deftly plucked it out.

"Thanks. I'm sure it's just that detective again. He keeps calling from other numbers, hoping I'll answer if I don't recognize " She glanced at the display. "Whoops. This one I do recognize."

She answered. "Hey, Lucas. Do you have more on clairvoyants for me?"

Hope's smile dropped. "Who?"

She glanced at Karl. He'd stopped at a light, and was frowning at Hope as if he could hear, which Robyn supposed maybe he could.

"Are you sure?" Hope paused. "No, I understand." Another pause. "Sure, how about..." She glanced at her watch. "Tell him half an hour."

Hope hung up. "We need to make a pit stop."

ADELE.

Adele watched through the car windows as a stretcher carried Colm's body away.

Colm was dead. Thank the G.o.ds.

She put the car into drive and continued past the ambulance and the cruisers lining the road. Two officers glanced at her car as she drove by, then returned to their watch. As long as she didn't stop to gawk, they weren't interested in her.

Driving past hadn't been a step she'd wanted to take. Added risk. But she'd had to know. Adele had been remote-viewing Robyn when she'd run onto the roof and Adele had seen Colm jump.

If he wasn't dead, she prayed that he'd still be there, and she'd get to him first so she could put him out of his misery. Suffocation, she decided it could be attributed to the fall. She couldn't take him, injured, back to the k.u.mpania or she'd have to explain how he got that way.

On the drive, she'd cursed Colm. She'd trusted him and he'd betrayed her with his incompetence. After all she'd done for him.

But now, seeing that he was dead, she granted his memory a smidgen of grudging respect. He might have screwed up, but he'd realized his mistake and made the right choice, protecting her.

Still, she'd have to explain his death to the k.u.mpania. As she drove, she crafted a few stories, rejecting each as casting too many droplets of blame her way. Before she pa.s.sed the city limits, she realized the solution the man at the bookstore.

It didn't matter that it had been thirteen years since she last saw him. His face was imprinted on her brain, invoking a wave of comforting warmth, a flare of icy rage and then, as if in afterthought, a tingle along her spine, the feeling of seeing not a man, but a phantom.

"You're certain it was him?" Niko asked, forefinger rubbing his chair arm.

They were in the meeting room, usually reserved for the phuri a wood-paneled library with bookshelves, a bar and leather chairs, the Victorian atmosphere ruined by the hum of computers.

"Yes, I'm certain."

Neala leapt up, her shredded tissue fluttering to the floor. "I won't sit and listen to this. She killed my "

"Neala..." Niko's voice was thick with reproach.

"I didn't kill Colm," Adele said. "He was like a brother to me. More than a brother. My husband-to-be, my future, my "

"Oh, stuff it," Neala snapped. "Don't play the grieving lover if you can't even squeeze out a few tears, Adele."

"Can't you see I'm in shock? I almost died."

"Colm did did die. But it's all about you. Nothing else penetrates that nasty little mind " die. But it's all about you. Nothing else penetrates that nasty little mind "

"Neala!" Niko said. "That's enough. Adele didn't kill "

"She was responsible for his death even if she didn't push him off that roof, which I'm still not convinced she didn't "

"Neala..."

"And she now compounds it with this... this outrageous lie."

"Neala, I don't think Adele means "

"She means to torment me, and in tormenting me to serve herself by deflecting attention from what she's done. And she's succeeding, isn't she?"

Niko turned to Adele. "You say you're certain it was him?"

"Is anyone even listening to me?" Neala said. "We know it wasn't him. You know for a fact that it could not have been him. He's dead. dead. " "

"Neala?" Niko said. "I think you should leave now."

Adele watched her carefully. Naturally, hearing he was still alive would come as a shock, but Neala seemed to be overdoing her outrage.

Neala stormed out muttering about fools and phantasms. Not like Neala to abandon a fight... Yet she couldn't seem to get away fast enough.

Niko waited until her footfalls faded, then turned to Adele.

"Yes," she said before he could ask again. "It was him."

"And he saw Colm? Recognized him?"

"I believe so."

"Did he see what happened to Colm?"

Adele considered lying and saying yes, but it wasn't just Neala scrutinizing her every twitch and inflection now. Niko didn't want to believe what she was saying the k.u.mpania had a vested interest in not believing it. Her answers here were more important than those regarding Colm's death.

"I don't know," she admitted.

Niko settled back in his chair, fingers templed. "We have to presume he did. And if he did, he'll be on his way here. We must be ready for him."

HOPE.