Body & Soul

  I’d almost forgotten about her in the room behind me. “Misty, go downstairs,” I said over my shoulder as calmly as I could. “I’ll handle this.” How, exactly, I wasn’t quite sure, and for the first time I wished Will was here. Not that he could have done anything, but he definitely had more experience with being defenseless in the presence of ghosts and might have had some tips. But with or without Will, one thing was certain: I couldn’t have Misty up here listening to me as I tried to talk to this…faker.

  “But what if you need me?” she persisted. “What if she wants to talk to me? She was my friend.”

  “Oh, how sweet,” the ghost purred, oozing closer.

  My pulse spiked, and I backed up, giving the ghost room to exit the bathroom. I didn’t know who she was or what she wanted, which was bad enough. But if it turned out that my presence gave her physicality—you know, like the ability to hurt me—that would be much, much worse. I didn’t know for sure if I had that aspect of the ghost-talking “gift,” but now didn’t strike me as a particularly good time to find out.

  “If I need you, I’ll call you,” I said to Misty. “Just go, please.” I dared another glance back to make sure she was listening. Figuring out what was going on and who this was would be tough enough without worrying about blowing my cover.

  With an unhappy expression, Misty started for the hall but stopped to linger in the doorway.

  I gritted my teeth. “Seriously? I’m trying to do my job here.” Or at least pretend to, anyway. But I was rapidly losing patience with Misty and her softheartedness. True, she had no idea what was really going on, but even so, this ghost had been haunting her, terrifying her for who knew how long, and she wanted to hang around and have a chat?

  “I know,” Misty said. “But I just wanted to say…Alona, for what it’s worth, I am sorry.” With pleading in her eyes, she addressed a spot high on the wall above the bathroom door. How tall, exactly, did she think my ghost would be? “I shouldn’t have done that to you, no matter how Chris and I felt about each other. And I would have told you eventually. I was just afraid that you would be so angry.…” She trailed off and looked down at her hands, fidgeting with her thumbnail. “I didn’t want to lose you as my friend. I was selfish. I wanted you both. I never wanted to hurt you, and I’m even sorrier I didn’t get the chance to tell you that before. I hope you can forgive me.”

  I stared at her, stunned. There it was. The apology I’d been waiting months to hear but never expected to receive.

  Misty took a deep breath and nodded, more to herself than to me, and walked out, her steps lighter, as if having said the words had cleansed her in some way or lifted a weight from her.

  “Such devotion. It’s adorable,” the ghost drawled. “She’s been so upset lately.”

  I whipped around to face her, reinvigorated suddenly. She was not Alona Dare. I was, no matter who I looked like. She shouldn’t even be here, and that apology was not for her. “Shut up,” I snarled.

  “So much hostility,” she said with an amused gasp. But she still moved back slightly, proving she wasn’t as tough as she thought she was.

  “You’ve gone to a lot of trouble to get my attention. What do you want?” I folded my arms, though I supposed any effort to make Lily look fierce was probably wasted. She was too cute, scar and all.

  The ghost laughed. “What, Misty? That’s just business.”

  Which meant what, exactly? “What do you want?” I repeated. The more she dragged this out, the worse it was going to be. I could feel it hanging above my head, like the proverbial piano on a fraying rope.

  The blur edged closer, and I caught a glimpse of dark red hair and brown eyes before the particles reshifted into a messy, undefined swirl. Was my ghost vision finally improving? That would be nice…or not.

  “I’m here to make you an offer that is going to rock your world,” she said.

  “Please.” I rolled my eyes, angry at her for playing me and at myself for falling for it. I’d walked right into her trap, and now I was stuck. She knew who I was, and the only thing stopping her from blabbing it all over the undead world was her own greed. She wanted something. The only question was what.

  Actually, no, that wasn’t the only question. Would I be able to do what she wanted? That was a good one. I wasn’t Will. I was blind in this world and limited by a far less flexible situation at my current home. I couldn’t go traipsing off to strange places, alone, in the middle of the night.

  And here was the big question. What was she planning to do if I couldn’t give her what she wanted?

  My stomach ached at the thought. If word got out about me, I’d be flooded by ghosts, not only with final requests and messages but also with questions about how I’d done what I’d done with Lily—Body Wrangling 101. Like I had any satisfactory answers on that topic other than, “It just happened.”

  Regardless of my knowledge—or lack thereof—the results would be the same. Eventually, I wouldn’t be able to hide my “issues” from the Turners. And those rehab center brochures would lead to applications and being shipped off to Arizona or some other godforsaken place…if not worse. Will’s mom had once come very close to having him institutionalized. In a neat little twist of fate, I could end up facing the same situation.

  “Can we skip the buildup and cut to the part where you get to the point?” I snapped, fighting the urge to move farther away from her. I refused to give her the satisfaction.

  “I’m going to be your spirit guide,” she said in a rush. “And we are going to rule this in-between place.”

  I opened my mouth with an automatic “forget it” hanging on the tip of my tongue…and stopped. What? That was not the blackmail scheme I’d been expecting. It didn’t sound like a blackmail scheme at all, actually. It was…I didn’t know what it was.

  I shook my head, confused. “What did you say?” I had to have heard her wrong.

  “You’re a ghost-talker. You need a spirit guide. I’m it,” she said, her voice full of pride.

  Wait…what? I started to speak but stopped myself before trying again. “You think I’m a ghost-talker?” I asked in disbelief. No way. Did she actually think I was a regular—well, relatively speaking—ghost-talker?

  “We’re having this conversation, aren’t we?” she scoffed.

  I resisted the urge to laugh in giddy relief. Could I have really gotten it that wrong? She did seem to know me, though. How was that possible?

  I hesitated, and then finally asked, “How do you know me?” What did I have to lose? If she knew I was Alona Dare in another body, she’d have said so, probably in a scathing tone. If she didn’t, it would still be a reasonable question for me to ask as a run-of-the-mill ghost-talker.

  She rolled her eyes. “Figures that you weren’t paying attention yesterday.”

  “Yesterday?” I asked with a frown. She’d seen me yesterday? Where had I been that she would…

  Oooh! Malachi’s. It had to be. She was one of the angry ghosts in that faker’s office, that was all. She’d noticed my intense interest in Misty’s problems and bet on the fact that I’d follow up, giving her the chance to propose this spirit-guide idea. Smart.

  Now it all made sense. It was laughable, knowing what I knew, but I could see how she’d arrived here, both physically and with her logic.

  With that final piece of the puzzle in place, a huge weight of worry rolled off my chest. I let out a slow breath of relief. She honestly had no clue. I was just another ghost-talker to her, not a living dead girl, so to speak.

  “Look, I appreciate your offer, but I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said firmly. It was, in fact, a ridiculous idea. I was a spirit trapped inside a body, the last person in the world qualified to have a spirit guide. If she attempted to claim me as her ghost-talker, I was almost positive it wouldn’t work. But explaining that was kind of out of the question.

  “You think I can’t do it? You think I’m not worthy?” Her tone held a challenge, and I caught a glimpse of a s
tubbornly pointed chin in the swirling haze where her face would likely have been.

  I shook my head and put my hands out, palms up in a gesture of peace. “No, that’s not it at all.”

  “Because you don’t know me, you don’t know what I’m capable of. I get what I want. Always,” she said in a tone that brooked no argument.

  Whoa. That sounded very familiar, like something I would have said not so long ago. If she, whoever she was, had even half my stubbornness, let alone a similar temper…

  A faint warning bell sounded in the back of my head. “I can still help you,” I said quickly. Well, Will could, assuming we could get back on speaking terms. “You just need to need to stay calm and—”

  “Do not tell me to stay calm,” she said through clenched teeth. “This is not up to you.”

  Oh, not good. Spiraling out of control here. “Uh, okay, look, it’s totally not a reflection on you or anything,” I said in my best attempt at soothing. If she got angry enough, we might yet find out if she could shove me around or not.

  The blur straightened up, almost as if she were coming to attention. The first trickle of real fear climbed up my gut, along with the urge to run. I took a slow step back.

  “I claim you, ghost-talker,” she declared.

  I gaped at her. Seriously? Was there a spirit orientation class—Dealing with Ghost-talkers—that I’d somehow missed? How did she know what to say when I’d just sort of fallen into it? Clearly she’d done her research. This didn’t bode well.

  “Wait!” I said quickly. Just because I didn’t think it would work didn’t mean I was actually right. I’d been wrong more times recently than I cared to remember. “Don’t—”

  “You are mine and mine alone,” she finished in that same overly loud and formal tone.

  My eyes snapped shut out of instinct. Holding my breath, I found myself waiting with dread for the supernatural breeze that had marked my connection to Will.

  But the room around us remained silent and still except for the dull roar of the central air-conditioning kicking on outside.

  Huh.

  I opened my eyes slowly. No supernatural breeze, and I didn’t feel any different. Guess maybe I was right…this time.

  I laughed, more out of relief than triumph. Okay, maybe there was a little triumph in it. It felt good to score one in my column for a change instead of everyone else’s.

  “What the hell?” the ghost demanded.

  I grimaced. So much for relief. I might not be tied to this ghost as a ghost-talker, but she was still here, and she’d still have to be dealt with.

  I took a deep breath, steeling my patience. “Like I said, I don’t think it’s a good idea to—”

  “Two of you? How can it not work on either one of you? That makes no sense.” The ghost sounded distinctly put out.

  “—try to claim me,” I said, and then stopped, her words finally penetrating. “Two of us?” I asked, hearing the deadly chill in my voice. “You tried this on someone else?”

  “Of course.” She didn’t even hesitate in answering, too preoccupied and annoyed to notice my tone. “Like you were my first choice. I’d never even heard about you before yesterday.” The ghostly haze shrugged. “Other than rumors that the ghost-talker in the ’burbs had a missing spirit guide and was neglecting his duties, spending all his time with some new living chick, which must be you.”

  I didn’t miss the indictment and jealousy all jammed in that one word.

  “Did you try to claim Will?” I asked tightly.

  She ignored me. “But no one ever said that the living chick was a talker like he is.” I could hear the frown in her voice as she tried to match pieces of gossip with the facts as she knew them. “Of course, nobody said you’d look like this either. All weird and…glowy in the middle.” Her tone held equal parts distaste and fascination.

  Glowy? Did I look different to her, not like other living people? Whatever. I dismissed her words, though I recognized on some level that what she was saying was important somehow. But I wasn’t about to be distracted, not now.

  I closed the distance between us, getting in her face, or where I imagined it would be. “Did you try to claim Will?” I bit each word off. A dim part of my mind, probably the part assigned to reason and logic, pointed out that if she had claimed him, she wouldn’t be here. But the majority of me just didn’t care.

  She gave an exasperated sigh, which I felt against my cheek. “Yeah, but whatever. Like I said, it didn’t work.”

  If I’d thought about it, I would have realized that keeping my mouth shut was the better option, but I was beyond that. A horrible surge of fear and fury overtook me. It didn’t matter that her attempt had failed. It might have worked. And then she, this girl who I didn’t even know, would have been linked to Will, taking my place. God only knew whether she would have protected him or helped him or just left him to flounder. Frankly, she seemed more concerned with herself than with anyone else. He needed someone to look out for him, not take advantage. And what about me? Would he have just left me behind? I was already alone, stuck in this body and not able to help him like I could before. If it had worked, if she had claimed him, would he have even thought twice? I didn’t know what she looked like, but she didn’t sound stepsister ugly.

  And what if she tried again with him…and it worked? Then what? I would be replaced, and Will wouldn’t look to me for help anymore, wouldn’t look to me for anything. Wouldn’t smile at me, wouldn’t hold my hand. I’d be worse than useless to him; I might as well not exist.

  A yawning chasm opened inside me, and this primal sense of possessiveness welled up, spilling over until I could hear the blood rushing past my ears, pulsing with my racing heartbeat, something I’d never experienced before. Not with Chris, not with anyone.

  I reached into the haze, feeling my hand sink in and connect with what felt like a shoulder. Well, that was one question answered. Evidently, ghosts had physicality around me, just as they did around Will. I shoved the girl back a step. “Will is mine,” I said fiercely. “Got it? So leave him the hell alone.”

  And that’s when the cold breeze, the one I’d been half expecting only moments ago, swept through the room, blowing my hair back and freezing her in place, like oil trapped in ice. I’m not sure which of us was more shocked. Especially because I couldn’t see her expression.

  Holy shit. Somehow, I was still Will’s spirit guide. I didn’t show up at his side at my time of death anymore, but it seemed my other capabilities were present and accounted for.

  My first reaction was an internal leap of joy. I still had a purpose, and I didn’t have to be all self-sacrificing and try to convince Will to find a new spirit guide—not this chick—so he could be safe.

  But that emotion wore off quickly, because, as usual, without Will actually present, my spirit-guide defense capabilities were limited both in duration and strength.

  The blurry spot in front of me wavered and shimmered. Then she sucked in an audible breath. “You froze me!” She sounded horrified.

  Get out, Alona. Get out now. My overdeveloped sense of self-preservation, slightly rusty from not having been used much in the last month or so, kicked in with a vengeance.

  I started to back up toward the door, my heart pounding. I’d blown it. She had had no idea who I was, and I’d just handed it to her. If she put the pieces together, all the consequences I’d ducked would be landing solidly back on my head. And now she was pissed, on top of it.

  She followed me. “Will Killian’s spirit guide should be the only one with that power,” she said suspiciously, and I wished desperately that I could see her face. “But she’s gone. Unless she’s not.”

  The ghost lunged forward suddenly, her outstretched arms flashing in the mist, and I stumbled out of her way, but my left foot tangled in the corner of Misty’s quilt. I felt my balance shift, and I knew I was going down.

  My backside hit the ground with a teeth-jarring impact, and she was right there, standing ove
r me. Her hand locked on to my arm, and in that second, I could see her clearly. Long red hair hung over her shoulder, a pink bikini top showed through her cutoff Señor Frog’s T-shirt. A spring-break bunny. One who should have been wearing a tankini or one-piece. Much more flattering to her modest, at best, chest.

  Holy crap. This was Spring Break Girl. She was exactly as Will had described her.

  Her brown eyes widened, and I wondered if she could see me, too. Not Ally. Me, Alona.

  “You didn’t disappear,” she accused. “You just found a better deal.”

  I weighed my options. Continue lying, or fall back on the bravado that had served me plenty well in the past? She wanted something; that much was clear. And, as I knew all too well, people who wanted something, anything, were vulnerable to machinations that made them believe they might actually get it.

  So, easy choice. Time to change it up. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but…well, as much of the truth as would help me.

  I straightened up as best I could, ignoring the nervous fluttering of the heart in my borrowed body. Mind over matter. “Yeah, I did,” I said simply, calmly, as if this were no different than someone confronting me in the hall at school on something I’d reportedly said. Public, teary outbursts had been rare, but still something I’d grown to expect, on occasion. The person with the cooler head—me—always won. So that was it—I just had to stay calm.

  I pried at her fingers on my arm. “You mind?”

  She released me, ending my ability to see her clearly, and sank to the floor next to me, or at least, that’s what it looked like. The blurry space she occupied hovered above the floor in the vague shape of a person. “How did you do it?” she asked.

  I ignored her. “Who are you?”

  “Erin,” she said impatiently. “Did you kill someone?”

  My mouth fell open. “What?”

  “I thought about that. Like, maybe I could slip in as the other spirit was leaving, but since the only people we might actually be able to hurt would be ghost-talkers who would see us coming…” She heaved a disappointed sigh, as if she were talking about not being able to get concert tickets instead of, you know, murdering someone.