Dark Passing (The Ella Reynolds Series) (14 page)

“I love you because you make me want to be a better person.”

Gabriel’s fingers wound through mine. We both held perfectly still, not saying anything for a couple seconds, wanting the moment to linger. “How many drinks have you had?” Gabriel broke the silence.

I laughed. “Just water.”

“Seriously, Ella.”

“Seriously. I’m not saying I didn’t want one, but I refrained.”

He raised his head. “This is quite the test you put yourself to.”

“Don’t I know it.”

“How many has Fagan had?”

I glanced at him, standing at the bar with a couple glasses already around him. “Looks like five or six shots and at least two vodka tonics.” I smiled up at Gabriel. “I’m easier to be around when he drinks. You should’ve seen how mad I made him.”

Gabriel chuckled. “He can’t drive.”

“He can come back to my house. I have plenty of rooms. Plus the ghost might like a new toy.”

Gabriel said good-bye to his friends, and I felt mildly guilty for ruining his night. I collected an intoxicated Fagan from the bar and we met Gabriel at the door.

“Where’s your coat?” Gabriel asked.

“Left it at the party.”

“Wait here. I’ll get the car.” He gave me his coat then went out into the blustery night.

I elbowed Fagan in the side. “See. That’s how you’re supposed to act.”

“Ow,” Fagan rubbed his side. “You have bony elbows.”

“All the better to jab you with.”

“You’re pretty, but you aren’t nice. I like my girls nice,” he slurred.

“And you can’t hold your liquor.” I could probably drink him under the table… if I did that sort of thing anymore, which I didn’t. Gabriel pulled up and I wrangled Fagan to the car.

My big old Victorian house seemed to watch us drive up the dark, slumbering street, and I smiled, a bit surprised. I’d missed the pile of bricks more than I ever thought I would. Gabriel hauled Fagan inside and deposited him in one of the guest bedrooms. I stayed downstairs, not ready for bed yet. I wandered around the first floor, looking at everything and letting myself acclimate to being back home. A hand brushed my arm, leaving a trail of goose bumps, but it didn’t startle me. I turned around with a smile for Gabriel, but he wasn’t there. I was alone.

“Grant?” I asked softly. The hair around my face fluttered back, and the air chilled. A form slowly took shape. After a few seconds, Grant stood in front of me as if he’d always been there.

“You aren’t scared of me anymore?”

I shook my head, unable to find words.

“You’re not thinking about leaving us are you, Ella?”

“No,” I said. “You’re stuck with me for a while.”

Grant smiled, but faded away as Gabriel walked in. “Were you talking to someone?” He glanced around the room. “I thought I heard voices.”

“Weird. I didn’t hear a thing.” I took his hand and we went upstairs, though my thoughts were on Grant and all the questions I needed to ask him.

“Grant! Where in the hell are you? I have questions. Come out, come out wherever you are.” I listened for a sign. “Here ghostie, ghostie.”

Nothing. The stupid, stubborn house remained peaceful and dull.
Crap.
What good was it to be haunted when the ghost wouldn’t talk to me?

 “I hate people,” I muttered as I walked toward the kitchen. “Dead or alive.”

“No, you don’t.”

The familiar voice made my head jerk. Grant was sitting at my kitchen counter, smiling like a man with a secret. I let out my breath slowly, trying to ease my heart. I was the one who called for him. Why was I panicking?
Because you’re talking to dead people.

“Until you showed up last night, I thought you’d forgotten about me,” he said. “I’m glad to talk to you again, Ella. It gets boring without you.”

I closed my mouth. This wasn’t my imagination. I sat down in a kitchen chair and stared. “You’re really a ghost.”

He gave me a sly, mischievous look. “What makes you think I am? Maybe I’ve only ever been in your head.”

“You’re in front of me.”

“How can you be certain? Maybe this is your imagination.”

I’d forgotten how annoying Grant could be. “What does that mean? Are you here all the time? Do you watch me?”

“I’m around. I keep an eye on things.”

“Grant!”

“Nothing to be uncomfortable about, I’m a doctor.” He laughed.
Jackass.
“There are lots of ghosts in this house and in your past. I’m by no means the only one.”

“Who else? Is Danny here? Why can I see you?”

“Is this why you called for me? To talk about Daniel?”

“No, but…”

“We have very little time, Ella. What’s your question?”

I ignored him, still trying to wrap my brain around the ghost business. It was one thing for me to adamantly declare to Gabriel that my house was haunted. It was another altogether to confront walking, talking proof—not just strange noises and bumps in the night. “Am I the only one who can see you?”

“You’re the only living person I’ve spoken with.”

“Can’t you just give me a straight answer?”

“I don’t deal in absolutes. Your time grows shorter.”

There were so many questions I wanted answered. How could any of this be real? “Is there another ghost trying to reach me in Jackson? And why can I see you people, things, whatever you are?”

Grant shook his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Okay, let’s try this, then. There
is
a ghost haunting me in Jackson. Can you go talk to her, see what she wants, and if it’s Mary Nelson, ask her who killed her?”

Grant chuckled. “Got yourself into another murder, did you?” I nodded. “Even if I wanted to help, I can’t. My domain’s here.”

“But you came to the bar and the hospital to see me.”

“You live here. I can stay with you if I choose.”

“If I sell the house someday, could you still stay with me?”

“Do you want me to? Or are you asking about Daniel again?”

I wasn’t entirely certain.

He shook his head. “Stop living among the dead, Ella. There’s a live man waiting for you right on the other side of that door.” He pointed to the front door, and my eyes flickered in that direction. When I looked back, he was gone, and Gabriel’s knock echoed through the house.

“Some help you are,” I mumbled as I walked to the door and opened it.

My eyes opened in my bedroom. A dream. It was just a dream. But it didn’t feel like a dream.

“Grant?” My voice shook, and I clenched the covers as I scanned the room. My closet door slowly opened, then closed just as gently.
Holy crap, it’s real.
I swallowed and pushed away the weirdness, ready to dive back into my questioning.

 “Morning.” Gabriel’s voice came from the doorway. I yelped.

He laughed. “A bit jumpy this morning?” He kissed my cheek; his whiskers scratched my skin. He was fully dressed and carrying coffee.

“Heh. Old ghosts.”

He handed me a cup and sat with his back to the headboard. “You have to let those go.”

Easy for him to say. He didn’t just have a conversation with one. “I had the craziest dream about Grant last night.”

“What did he have to say?” He spoke carefully—as he always did about Grant.

“That he couldn’t help me, and I had to stop living among the dead.”

Gabriel took a sip of his coffee. “What do you need help with?”

“The case.” My cell buzzed on my nightstand. “Hello.”

“Ella, this is Carter.”

“Are you calling me from my house?”

“No. Detective Troy drove me back to my car early this morning. Since last night didn’t go as planned, it should be chalked up as a trial run. There’s a gala next Friday at 8:00 p.m.”

“What a coincidence. I need to be picked up from Smithton on Monday.”

I drummed my fingers against my arm, waiting for his reply. “Fine. What time?”

“I don’t know. Maybe 1:00 p.m.”

“Fine, someone will be there. And you’ll come to the gala.”

“What do you expect me to do?”

“Just be your normal charming self.” He laughed at his own joke. “Make me look good.”

“You’re lucky I skipped breakfast today, or I’d puke.” Gabriel frowned, and I rolled my eyes for effect. “I’ll do my best.”

He laughed again. “Be ready by 7:30 p.m. sharp.”

“Whatever.”

I hung up, thinking that I needed to hunt down a suitable dress to pack, but more pressing matters quickly overshadowed that thought.

“Fagan?” Gabriel asked.

“Yeah. Thanks for driving him to his car.” If I could talk to Grant, perhaps I could talk to whatever was in Jackson, get it to help me. Maybe I’d ruled out an Ouija board too quickly.

“What’s going on in there?” Gabriel tapped my temple.

“Do you believe in mediums?”

Gabriel chuckled. “Not this weekend, I don’t. This weekend you’re all mine, and we’re going to have fun and not talk about ghosts, murders, or any other weird thing you can think of.”

“And start my driving lessons.” I smiled.

Gabriel hopped up. “Breakfast first.” He tugged me out of bed. We went to the kitchen and got out bowls for cereal. He kept giving me sly looks out of the corner of his eye.

“What?”

“So you love me?”

I laughed and wrapped my arms around him. “Sometimes.” He kissed the top of my head. “So I really can’t talk about the case at all this weekend? Hardly seems fair.”

“I told you you’d get obsessed.”

“Not
obsessed
, preoccupied.” I pushed myself up to sit on the counter next to where he stood. “Is it really so bad I value your opinion?” I looked at him with wide eyes and swung my feet.

He sighed. “You have until the end of that bowl of shredded wheat,”—he pointed to my dish—“then no more.”

Victory was mine. “Fagan doesn’t believe Lakota has anything to do with Mary.”

He stared straight ahead, then tilted his head to the side a fraction. “Why?”

“He says she’s a drug addict.”

“Hmmm.” He took a bite of his own cereal. “What does your gut tell you?”

“I think she was killed because she was going to talk to me.” My conviction was strong, though her apartment supported Fagan’s version more than my own.

“The timing is suspicious all right. Any other reasons you feel that way?”

I considered the question as I ate a couple bites. “She was jumpy when I met her. She came to me, but didn’t ask for anything, and she seemed scared. Something had her spooked. If Lakota knew something about the killer, maybe she’d been threatened, and my presence pushed the killer into dealing with her.” I didn’t like the idea, but it did make sense to me. “And Mary’s been dead for a while. I wonder when Lakota started using. Maybe it was how she coped with whatever she saw.”

“Possibly.”

“I should find someone who knows Lakota. Maybe it will lead me in the right direction.”

“Honestly, El. If she was killed because she was coming to see you, I don’t want you anywhere near this.” He held up a hand to stop the objection already on the tip of my tongue. “I know you aren’t going to stop investigating. Just promise you’ll be more careful. You almost went to meet Lakota alone. What if you’d gotten there on time and the killer did to you what he did to her? Please tell me where you’re going at all times, and take someone with you. Even if it’s Fagan.”

“I’m not sure I trust Fagan.”

“Really?” Gabriel sat his bowl in the sink and turned to me.

“He’s hiding something. I called him on it last night, and I think he almost told me what. Or maybe he didn’t. He knew about my meeting with Lakota, though—he came into the café right before she left.”

“What are you saying?”

“I don’t know.” And I didn’t. I couldn’t decide if I thought Fagan was a suspect or not. “I have the strongest feeling that he’s hiding something—that he knows more about Mary than he lets on.”

“How long have you felt like this?”

“A while.”

“So you went by yourself, without telling anyone,”—Gabriel smiled but it wasn’t an amused expression in the slightest—“to a dead woman’s apartment with someone you suspect of murder, or at the very least, of keeping something from you about a murder.”

I grimaced. “When you put it like that…”

“You’re determined to give me an ulcer. Always trust your instincts, Ella. And using a little common sense wouldn’t hurt either.”

“So what am I supposed to do? I have to work with him.”

Gabriel crossed his arms over his chest. “I don’t know. I don’t know him well enough to tell you my impression of him. If you truly think he’s a suspect, you should keep your distance.”

Gabriel’s advice didn’t help at all—sounded more like that of a worried boyfriend than of a detective trying to solve a case. I needed to get close to Fagan, so I could find out what he was hiding, not run away from him. I gave him my phone so he could watch Bryan’s interview I taped while I went upstairs to dress, still thinking. Surely police officers were vetted in some way. I mean someone would suspect if Fagan were murdering young girls, right? My eyes strayed to the purple marks on my arm. He was easy to make angry, really angry, but I didn’t see how I could cut him out and still investigate. I’d have to find a way to work with him.