Lyn Benedict - Ghosts & Echoes

Blood was easy to come by. There was glass in the gutter. If Wright decided to go for it, to trust Odalys’s spell, he could pick up a piece of broken glass and carve Demalion out of his life and into hell.

“When I came back, it wasn’t tunnels and white lights; it wasn’t heaven or hell—”

“Weren’t dead long enough to be sorted,” Sylvie muttered, thinking of the gods divvying up mortal souls.

“But I knew I’d been dead, and now was alive. And I knew I was lucky. Billion-dollar-lottery lucky, only it feels like a nightmare, and sometimes I’m not even sure I ever woke up, and this is death. Dreams of a life I left behind, gone sour, mangled, and terrifying. And it’s going to be like this forever. . . .”

“Don’t worry,” Sylvie said. “This is life, and you’re mortal. Nothing in this world is forever.”

He laughed, brief puffs of air that were more surprise than amusement. He pinched at the bridge of his nose, transferring Miami dirt to his pale Midwestern skin. “Jamie’s scared of me, scared of the ‘wispy man’ who walks around in the night. Who doesn’t answer to Dad. I scare my son. ”

The silence stretched between them, expectant, and Sylvie groaned. She was fresh out of reassurance.

It didn’t matter. Her little dark voice was willing to pick up the slack.

“It’s your life, and it’s real. Fight for it, or give in. Indecision means you don’t want to admit you want to give in.”

The acid in her tone shook him, widened blue eyes tinting darker. He rose, dropped the pendant in the dirt, and said, “You’re quite right. There’s nothing so human as the fight for life.”

“Demalion,” she said.

“Yeah, and thanks for the pep talk,” he said. “But before you encourage him too much, let me point out that we both died. Unless you’re one hundred percent confident in that spell, who’s to say the revenant soul the stone drives off might not be his?”

Sylvie said, though it hurt her throat to do so, “It’s still his choice.”

Demalion stretched long and lean, all cat-slink and aggravation. If he’d had a tail, he’d have been lashing it. “I’m going to disagree. I have a say in this situation, and I will be heard, Sylvie. Make no mistake. I will fight for my life.”

Rather than be drawn into an ugly argument in a public place, Sylvie put her back to him, headed for her truck, and let him catch up when he would. A quick sidelong glance as he settled into her passenger’s seat let her know the argument was off the table for now. Demalion was gone; Wright was back.

THE SOUTH BEACH OFFICE WAS QUIET WHEN THEY REACHED IT, Alex’s head bent over the laptop she’d dragged over to the couch, and she was frowning furiously. Quiet wasn’t good. A happy Alex was a chatty Alex. It meant that even with the heads-up phone call, Alex hadn’t had any luck locating Tierney Wales.

“I can’t believe this guy!” Alex erupted into speech, without ever looking up. “He just vanished from the system in the past two years. No bank, no credit cards, no address, no DMV. Nothing. I mean, I got a few random Google hits, old mentions of a Web site that’s gone down. Other than that, he’s a ghost.” She licked her lips, and said, “Um, Syl? Promise you won’t be mad?”

“What’d you do?” Sylvie asked. “Are the cops going to break down the door, and did it work?”

“No cops. I hacked the ISI database with Demalion’s old codes.”

“Jesus,” Sylvie said. “That’s the last thing we need, them having a reason to dig back into my life.”

“I thought they were the good guys,” Wright said.

“The ISI and I don’t agree on which of us is the good guy. They staked out my office for years, gave up recently. I don’t want them back,” Sylvie said. She grinned mirthlessly. “Waste of taxpayers’ money.” Her temper itched at her. Sitting still made her crazy. Dead ends made her angry.

Sylvie leaned against the desk, and Alex looked up, belatedly puzzled. “The bell’s not going off.”

“Locked the briefcase in the truck box,” Sylvie said. “I’m sick of it. Sick of the whole damn thing, and those Hands aren’t healthy to keep close. Next you know, we’ll all be having bad dreams. Find Wales and let me shove those things down his throat.”

“I’m trying,” Alex said.

“Try harder. We don’t have the time to stake out the Grove in the vain hope of catching him selling bones to tourists.”

“What about the girl?” Wright asked. “Bella. Why don’t you ask her?”

Sylvie blinked a moment, then said, “I should have thought of that.” She should have. Normally, she would have—only thinking about Bella made her think about Zoe, and that made her dizzy with horrible possibilities.

Sylvie really missed the early days, when it was find the monster, kill the monster, and the biggest problem was getting rid of the body.

It will come to that, her little dark voice assured her, nearly purring. It always does.

“I’ll give Bella a call.”

She left Wright and Alex eyeing each other warily and went upstairs for the phone and some privacy. At her office door, she closed her eyes and leaned against the peeling green doorjamb. She had to be better than this, think faster than this, distance herself from all of this. It was no different from any other case. If she couldn’t stop thinking that it was Demalion’s soul on the line, or her sister’s life, she wouldn’t be doing her best work.

Sylvie picked up the phone, hesitated, then pulled Zoe’s cell out of the drawer. Given the miracle of caller ID, Bella’d be more likely to pick up if she thought it was Zoe.

The phone rang through to voice mail, three times running.

Unease rose. For a teenage girl, answering the cell phone was an avocation and not a chore.

She dialed the house number, and, when Eleanor answered, said, “I need to talk to Bella. It’s important.”

Eleanor’s response slipped in and out of English. Sylvie followed just enough of it to get cold to the bone. Alex greeted her return with, “Bella give you an answer?”

“Bella’s in the hospital. She’s not expected to make it.” Sylvie collapsed on the couch. “Total systemic failure. Like rapid-onset AIDS. Her entire body’s shutting down.” She stared at the ceiling, watching the sunlight shift along the plaster. “She wanted to bond with the Hand. She kept it beneath her pillow, slept with it, carted it about with her. Decorated it. She invited it into her soul.”

Wright shivered, a spasm of movement there and gone, unnoticeable except this was Miami, and even the air-conditioned office ran closer to sultry than shiver.

“Yeah,” she said. “You stay the hell away from those things. Don’t touch them; don’t look at them.”

“Not a problem,” he said. “You’re the one carries them sightseeing.”

Alex said, “What are you going to do? Can you save Bella?”

“I don’t know how the Hands work. I don’t know what kind of connection they have to Bella, to Zoe. Bella was trying to bond with it, and now she’s sick. . . . Finding a way to sever that connection has to be the first priority. Hopefully, destroying them will do it. Wales is our best bet.”

“He’s the seller!” Wright said.

“Then he’ll have the manual,” Sylvie said.

“We still have to find him,” Alex pointed out. “Just saying.”

“If he’s selling things on the street, the beat cops will know him,” Wright said. He rocked back on his heels, slid his hands into his jeans pockets, read their faces, and said, “What? It’s a good idea.”

“We don’t call the cops,” Alex said.