Geraldine took the hand of the man who’d been hovering a few feet back. His eyes were as sad as hers. If Bobby didn’t believe me about Geraldine, he wasn’t going to believe me about that guy either. The two of them would be stuck haunting him until he did. No wonder they appeared so sad.
Geraldine and the mystery man strolled west, walking right through one of the gawkers—Mrs. Knudson, who must have either closed her yarn shop or just walked away and left it open. She wrapped her arms around herself as if a winter wind had blown past, then Geraldine and her friend disappeared.
“Ask her—” Bobby began.
“She’s gone.”
“Convenient.”
I tightened my lips so I wouldn’t say fuck you.
“How did you know about those bones, Raye?”
“I told you. I see ghosts.”
“If the kid’s been a thorn in your side for years, why didn’t you…” He waved his hand. “Exorcise him before now?”
“I didn’t know where he’d been buried. And he was having too much fun to tell me. He didn’t want to leave.”
“Then why did he?”
“My—” I bit my lip. Telling him my father was a centuries-old, time-traveling witch-ghost, who’d heard it from Bobby’s dead child, was probably not the way to go. “One of the other spirits shared what Stafford had told her.”
“Why would a ghost do that? Don’t they have some kind of code?”
He was never going to believe me. Of course the alternative was letting him think I’d killed a five-year-old and buried him under a tree. Was it better to have the man I loved believe I was a murderer or a kook? I voted for kook.
My eyes burned. I wasn’t sure if I was crying for Stafford, Bobby, myself, or all of us.
“Don’t,” he snapped.
I didn’t bother to bite back another burst of: “Fuck you.”
“You have.”
My fingers curled inward. The spike of my nails only fueled my desire to punch him.
“You’re going to have to come up with a better explanation than one ghost told another ghost who told you—the ghost whisperer.”
Ghost whisperer. Wasn’t he clever?
“I don’t have one.”
“Well, at least tell me who the rat-fink ghost is.” His hand wrapped around my arm. I could tell he wanted to shake me, just a little, but he didn’t. “Don’t stop to think. I don’t want a made-up ghost. I want the real thing. What’s her name?”
“Genevieve,” I snapped.
Then I wished that I hadn’t.
Chapter 24
“I—” Bobby managed through the screeching in his ears.
“You—” he tried again between great gulps of air.
“We—she—” His heart thundered so loudly he was dizzy, and his stomach rolled.
Raye went as pale as he felt. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“I never told you about her.” He couldn’t remember once saying his daughter’s name since he’d found her, still and cold, on the floor next to a passed-out Audrey.
“You didn’t,” Raye agreed.
“Then how—” He pursed his lips before the stupid question could escape. If she could look up his cases, she could certainly discover the name of his dead child.
“Why?” he whispered, horrified when his voice broke. He swallowed the tears—once, twice, again.
“She’s—”
“No!” He leaped to his feet. Several of the bystanders frowned in his direction. He lowered his voice. “You will not tell me she’s here.”
A memory of himself at her father’s place surfaced. He’d caught the scent of his daughter—sunshine, cinnamon, and rain. Had she been there too?
He shook his head—hard. What was wrong with him? His daughter wasn’t here. She hadn’t been there. She was gone. Forever.
Because of him.
He didn’t remember moving, but the next thing he knew he was climbing into his rental car and driving off very fast. He didn’t plan to stop until he reached the airport. Except …
Someone was trying to kill Raye. Was it because she’d done the same thing to them that she’d done to him? Had she said she could see departed loved ones, talk with them, impart a message from beyond? He supposed it wasn’t easy to live on a teacher’s salary, even here. Though …
If she’d been taking money for ghost whispering, wouldn’t he have heard about it by now? That was the kind of thing small towns talked about.
Bobby smacked himself in the forehead. It didn’t help. He still wanted to believe anything but what he’d heard.
However, Raye’s claim might explain the question he hadn’t before been able to figure out an answer to. Why did the Venatores Mali want Raye dead? Perhaps someone thought that seeing ghosts was a little witchy. He certainly did.
Just that morning Bobby had decided he loved her. He’d been thinking about staying here—with her, for her—just so he wouldn’t have to leave and never see her again.
Now all he wanted was to leave and never see her again.
Bobby pulled to the side of the road. He couldn’t go. Raye might be bad, sad, evil, crazy—even all four—but he’d promised to protect her, and if he didn’t what did that make him?
At least three out of that same four.
He had to make sure someone was watching over her if he wasn’t. No matter what she’d said, done, he didn’t want her dead. He dialed Chief Johnson.