A Gift of Ghosts

  ***

  “Hey, do you want to come to North Carolina with me?”

  He was a morning person. She could hear it in his voice, all cheerful and wide-awake despite how little sleep they’d had. Damn. Morning people, blah. She opened a reluctant eye, and peered at the clock. 7:47.

  “Why are you awake?” she muttered, finishing with a yawn that she buried in her pillow.

  “Because it’s morning?” he offered in response, before tugging lightly on a lock of her dark hair. “Come on, come to North Carolina with me.”

  She rolled over, onto her back, and stretched, arms above her head, back arching, and then wiggled down in the bed, a little deeper under the light sheet that covered her. Hmm. Even half-awake, she could see his reaction to her movement in the way his eyes darkened, the lids half dropping. “Or you could come back to bed,” she suggested, voice husky with sleep.

  “The body is so, so willing,” he said, sliding his hand across her stomach and leaning down to kiss her. “But the brain is stuck with responsibility,” he added as he sat back up, mouth twisting.

  “In North Carolina?” Akira asked, reluctantly sitting up, sheet clutched high.

  “Yeah, Lucas . . .” Zane shook his head, apparently not wanting to get into details, but looking grim. “He took a job for me.”

  “A job?” Akira was surprised. Zane might play a lot of foosball at work, but she’d gathered that he was the one who coordinated assignments for the people whose work involved . . . quirks. Didn’t he usually give Lucas jobs? “Isn’t that backwards?”

  Zane sighed. “Yeah, but the only reason Lucas works for me instead of the other way around is that he doesn’t do so well staying home. He’s not an office type.”

  Akira bit back her smile, but Zane obviously saw it, because he grinned at her and trailed a finger down her cheek, before saying, “He doesn’t know what he’s missing.”

  “I was just thinking that your office isn’t very—um, formal,” she defended herself. She hadn’t been thinking about what they’d done in his office, just that Zane didn’t seem to draw the lines between work and play that most people did.

  “Yeah, well, Lucas likes the road. But a lot of the work we do comes from his connections. Whoever asked him to do this job probably knew I’d say no. Someone’s calling in a favor.” Zane stood with a sigh. He was already showered and half-dressed, Akira realized.

  That sounded so dubious, she thought. Favors? Were they the Mafia? “You don’t know who you’re working for?” she asked. She was feeling an unwieldy mix of doubt and curiosity, a combination of uncertainty about who Zane was and what he did and a desire to know more.

  “That sounds a lot more exciting than it really is.” Zane was looking around for his t-shirt. “It’ll be someone in the FBI.”

  “The FBI?” That was better than the mob, but not necessarily less exciting.

  “Yeah.” Zane pulled on his shirt. “So, you want to come?”

  “Is anyone going to be shooting at you?” Akira asked, not sure what she’d do if the answer was yes. Briefly, she remembered what Grace had said the day before about today being a rough day.

  “I wish,” Zane answered, almost as if to himself. “It’d be more fun.”

  Her eyebrows arched up. Had Grace been understating? What was wrong with this job Zane was doing? What exactly was he going to do? She didn’t say anything but he looked back at her, and must have seen the questions as he tried to smile. “No, it’s just a straightforward job. I’m going to fly up there in the company plane, meet Lucas at the airport, hold someone’s hand for five minutes, tell her I can’t find what she’s looking for, and then fly home. No big deal, really.”

  He sat down on the edge of the bed again. She was sitting, the sheet tucked around her body, one hand under her chin, and he brushed her hair back, off her shoulder. “So, no go?”

  “Are you kidding?” Akira smiled at him. She didn’t understand what was going on. She was definitely missing something. But she wanted to find out what it was, and there was an easy way to do so. “A chance to spend the day above the clouds in a little tin can that bounces around like a carnival ride?” She leaned forward and brushed a kiss across his lips. “Do I have time to shower?”