The head moved to the left and the right again while his lips kept moving in the same pattern.
She bit a fingernail in concentration. “Damn. Okay, forget what kind of doctor you were. Is the reason you found me because of your profession? Like you want me to pass on a message to a patient, or their family?”
The spirit’s outline began to fade again, frustrating her.
Clyde let out a grunt, his arms and legs giving out.
The moment Clyde slumped was the moment the spirit slipped away, evaporating into the air like a sliver of smoke. “Damn.”
His look was apologetic. “I’m sorry. I’ll get right on those yoga classes the moment I’m free of a little thing like Hell.”
She pressed a finger to her temple. “Did you see him? Maybe if you’d watched his lips move, you might have caught something I didn’t.”
Clyde’s body did that shudder thing again. “Delaney, I’ll say this one more time. No. I didn’t see him because I didn’t want to see him. He has no head. I repeat. No head. I can’t stress that enough. That’s just too weird for me. Besides, I was too busy clenching every muscle in my body to focus on much else. I’m also not ashamed to admit I’m just a little squeamish about blood and detached body parts anywhere on my person. So what more do we know about him tonight than we did this afternoon? He’s a doctor?”
“Yep, I think so. At least he made his head nod yes when I asked him if he was. Or he did something in the medical profession. He definitely lost his head in some kind of accident that had to suck big fat weenies. He was decapitated, I’m guessing. Can’t think of another explanation for why he’d be carrying around his head.”
Clyde jammed his hands in his pockets. “And we have the word uma. Which isn’t really a word.”
“Yep. Maybe he’s foreign like the lady with the doily on her head.” Damn, she should have asked him that, but with Clyde being her conduit for all things spiritual, it was distracting.
“Well, shit. I have to give you patience. This would drive me out of my mind.”
Her shoulders lifted, then released. “It’s what I do and sometimes, that’s how the spirits roll. They aren’t always sure why they’re here either, or the message they’re trying to send. It’s all a part of my medium package. Sometimes I have to figure it out on my own with most of the pieces of the puzzle missing.”
“Decapitated . . . you know, ironically, I once knew a guy who was decapitated.”
“Ugh. Really?”
“And as a matter of fact, he was a doctor, too. Brutal car accident.”
Maybe the spirit wanted to talk to Clyde? He’d said he was sick as a child . . . “Was he a young guy? Really blond with brown eyes? Very fit?”
“He did have brown eyes, but he was balding and had a paunch. It was a shame, too. He was a nice guy.”
“And he was a doctor?”
“Yeah. Geriatric. My mother’s.”
Damn. “Well, your doc doesn’t match my ghost’s MO, anyway. So back to square one for the headless scalpel wielder. That’s two ghosts in the matter of days who’ve shown up and I couldn’t help them.”
“Does that happen often?”
“Nope. So far, the only ghost I don’t get is Darwin. I don’t know why he won’t hit the field of endless tennis balls and rawhide bones. But it’s early in the game. Some spirits require more investigation than others and longer periods of interaction. But it’s bothering me that they don’t come in as clearly.”
Clyde put a hand of sympathy on her shoulder, creating mayhem in her stomach. “And I realize that’s my fault. However, I know what’d make you feel better.”
Your rock-hard body up against mine? On mine? Under mine? In a boat, on a float? Or even in a moat . . . She mentally gasped. Enough. Delaney cleared her throat, moving away from Clyde. “What’d make me feel better?”
“My Slurpee. Bet if you had some of my banana Slurpee, you’d feel better.”
She grinned. “Bet I’d rather just hand over my left lung and a kidney.”
Clyde laughed. It rumbled from deep in his chest, making it strain against his borrowed polo shirt. “Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it.”
His laugh was sexy when it was unbidden. The word unbidden sounded a lot like forbidden—which Clyde was. As had been that kiss she’d thrown at him like she was whoring for dollars. She needed space to recover. Like big. “It’s on my list of things to do. And now, I have to finish my inventory. Go amuse yourself. In fact, why not teach the dogs how to eat with the proper fork and polish my toenails for me. You’re good at making them listen.”
“You sure you don’t need help?” His stance said, I’m just trying to be polite by offering, but his eyes said something different.