***
The drive was quiet.
Akira was silent, gazing out the window without noticing the scenery, trying to remember every shade, every nuance, of the conversations that had brought her here. Zane hadn’t mentioned ghosts. Or lost children, for that matter. But he hadn’t tried to persuade her to come, either. No promises of fun and excitement, no words that turned on the charm.
But had he lied to her? Had he known that Lucas wouldn’t meet them? She didn’t think so, but she wasn’t sure.
She sighed.
Zane was texting, but he put his hand over hers, where it lay in her lap, for a quick squeeze, before bringing it back to his smart phone. “I’m sorry about this,” he said, not really turning his attention to her. “Lucas is saying that circumstances have changed, but he’s not giving me a lot of information. I’m still not sure what’s happened.”
Akira glanced at his phone. Surely it would be faster for him to just call and talk to Lucas? Was he texting so that she wouldn’t overhear what he said? She glanced at his face, his profile turned to her, trying to reconcile her paranoid thoughts with the man she thought she’d come to know.
She couldn’t.
She liked him, she really did, and seeing him as a liar and a manipulator just didn’t fit. Dillon’s warnings about his uncle had been about girlfriends, casual relationships, a lack of commitment coupled with a playful attitude toward life, not lies. She was ready to be stood up when a baseball game called, not to be deceived about ulterior motives. Zane just didn’t seem like an ulterior motive kind of guy.
His phone buzzed. “Oh, hell,” he muttered as he read his message. He glanced at her quickly, almost as if to check whether she was reading over his shoulder, and then grimaced when he saw that she was watching him. “You’re not going to like this.”
She raised her eyebrows in the question, but didn’t say anything. She could feel her shoulders tensing. Was he going to ask her about ghosts?
He looked worried, eyes tightening. “This was a custody case: the dad took his kid and disappeared. Happens all the time, and mostly the kids wind up home within a few days. But this dad is gone, gone. No one’s seen him, his car, anything. He hasn’t used any of his credit cards or taken money out of any banks. Best-case scenario would be that he spent a long time planning this.”
“And worst-case?” Akira asked the question even though she already knew the answer.
“That’s what the feds think it is, now.” Zane sighed.
“You brought me to the scene of a murder-suicide?” Akira couldn’t keep the accusation—and maybe the hurt—out of her voice. He had to know what that meant. They hadn’t talked much about the ghosts. Oh, sure, he’d asked her a few questions over the past several weeks, but mostly about Dillon. He seemed to respect her wish to not talk about what she could see. But even though Akira knew that a lot of the common stories about ghosts were wrong, Zane had to suspect that a murder-suicide was likely to leave ghost energy behind.
Zane’s eyes widened. “No,” he protested. “Definitely not! We’re going to the mom’s house, and there’s no way anyone died there.”
Damn. Maybe they should have had a few more conversations about ghosts. Ghosts weren’t always tied to the place they died. Some were, but not all of them.
“No,” Zane continued. “The problem is—the thing is—see, what’s happened is—”
The car had slowed dramatically and Akira, looking over Zane’s shoulder, could see the reason why. “The media found out?” she offered Zane. “And let me guess—the kid is cute?”
Following her glance, he saw what she was looking at. Cars. Lots of cars. And vans. The ones with satellite dishes on their roofs. Flashing lights from police cars, people milling around, reporters directing cameras, a crowd of neighbors, and behind it all, a driveway leading up to a posh, Palladian suburban house with a lopsided “For Sale” sign planted in the lush grass of the front yard.
“I’m so sorry,” Zane apologized. “If Lucas had told me, I wouldn’t have asked you to come.”
“I’ll wait in the car,” Akira said, looking past the crowd to the house. It was definitely haunted. She could see the shimmers of energy, almost like a color change in the air near the door of the house. It wasn’t just a ghost, it was a fresh ghost with a lot of power. Maybe a desperate ghost. That made it dangerous for her.
“I’m sorry, ma’am.” The driver, in the front seat, had been listening to the conversation. “I’m only supposed to drop you off. The other Mr. Latimer will be driving you back to the airport. I’ve got to get back to work.”
“Can you take her back to the airport first?” Zane interjected.
“No can-do, sorry.” The driver’s words were firm.
Zane looked at Akira. “Do you want to wait outside? I can find Lucas, and make him arrange for another car.”
Akira looked at the crowds of newspeople, already eagerly motioning toward their car. “Oh, that’s just a thrilling idea,” she said bitterly.
“I’m sorry,” Zane repeated, but a little less apologetically than he had the first time. “If I had known, I wouldn’t have brought you. But I didn’t. This should only take a few minutes.”
A few minutes. Depending on how perceptive the ghost was, that could be bad. But Akira looked at Zane’s face, his expression anxious but firm, and knew that he hadn’t lied to her. He didn’t understand the risks, but he hadn’t lied.
“I’ll come inside,” she said. They’d have a long talk after this. She’d tell him some of what she knew about ghosts. After that, if past experience held true, she probably wouldn’t be sleeping with him again.
Damn.
Today was turning into a day when she should have stayed in bed.