She dreamed of Gideon and the beach, and of a dark-haired little girl who had a really great laugh. They were pleasant dreams, untouched by the stress of her job or any uncertainty about the future. There were no monsters here, not of the human variety, not of any variety.
Precious. Gideon thought she was precious. Whether he said so or not, that was love.
A door slammed, interrupting her pleasant dream of sand and laughter, and she heard Gideon calling her name. His voice was unnecessarily sharp, and it took her a moment to realize that what she heard wasn’t a part of her dream.
Hope opened her eyes as he rushed into the room. “Is it seven already?” she asked as she sat up and stretched her arms over her head.
“I think there’s a bomb downstairs,” he said crisply. “Let’s go.” He didn’t wait for her to respond but half lifted and half dragged her from the bed.
“I need my shoes,” she protested, still muddled from sleep.
“No time,” he responded, leading her toward the door that opened onto the stairway to the shop.
She was half-asleep, still fuzzy-brained and confused, and she wanted to collect her shoes and her purse and maybe an answer or two. “What do you mean, you think there’s a bomb?” That didn’t make any sense at all. There either was a bomb or there wasn’t.
“Echo had a dream.” Gideon’s jaw clenched, and a muscle twitched there.
“I wondered how you found out about the bomb so fast.”
They both spun to face the woman who stood by the kitchen door. She held a semiautomatic pistol in one hand, and with the other she removed a dark wig and shook out the long blond strands of her hair. Tabby was armed differently today, and she didn’t look at all inclined to run.
Gideon had one hand on the doorknob to the stairwell, the other gripping Hope’s arm. He smoothly placed his body in front of hers.
“Gideon Raintree,” Tabby said with a crooked smile. “This isn’t exactly what I’d planned, but I can’t say I’m disappointed. When I saw the bomb squad arrive I was disappointed, because I’d hoped to have a little time with your girlfriend before you showed up. Still, I suppose this will do.”
Gideon dropped Hope’s arm and pushed her aside as he smoothly drew his weapon. Her own weapon was in the other room, resting on the bedside table. She’d never thought she might need it here, and in an instant she understood the violation Sherry Bishop and Marcia Cordell and all the other victims had felt when Tabby had entered their homes.
Tabby’s aim never wavered. Her smile barely faded as she glanced at Gideon’s weapon. “Shoot me and you’ll never find out where the second bomb is, or when it’s scheduled to go boom.”
FIFTEEN
“What do you want?” Gideon tried to ease Hope toward the door, doing his best to place himself between the two women.
“First thing, I want you and your girlfriend away from that door.”
“She’s my partner, not my girlfriend,” Gideon said, knowing a close connection to him was a very bad idea at this particular moment.
“Liar,” Tabby said. “I can feel the connection rolling off both of you like the tide outside your window.”
Apparently the blonde had seen him and Hope together. She knew where he lived, too, which was more than a little disturbing. “You don’t need her,” Gideon said as he took a step toward Tabby.
“You don’t know what I need, Raintree,” Tabby snapped. “If your girl tries to leave before I say she can go, not only will I shoot her, I’ll make sure you don’t know where the second bomb is until it’s too late.”
He took another step toward the woman with the gun. “I’ll ask you one more time. What do you want?”
“I want both of you dead by the end of the day, and I want Echo. Where the hell is she?”
“You want Echo?” Gideon said calmly. “Is that all? Give me the location of the second bomb and we’ll talk.”
Tabby held the gun as if she were comfortable with it, as if she’d been in this very position many times before. “You’d give up your cousin so easily?”
He needed her to believe that he would trade his cousin’s life in order to save many others, so he remained calm as he answered, “Yes. For the bomb and Hope, you can have her.”
“You’re cold,” Tabby said. “Sensible and predictably noble, but cold. Stop right there, and very carefully put that gun on the floor.”
Lily Clark took shape beside Tabby and swiped vainly at the woman who had killed her. “There’s not another bomb. Don’t listen to her, Gideon! She’s trying to trick you. She tricked me, and she tricked other people, too. I know that now. Don’t let her trick you.”
Did Lily know something he didn’t, or was it a guess? Maybe there wasn’t another bomb, but he couldn’t be sure.
“None of this will make any difference if we don’t hurry up,” Gideon said as he dipped down to place his pistol on the floor. “How long before the bomb downstairs goes off?” He wanted to know how much time he had to get Hope out of here, if the bomb squad didn’t get the device neutralized. They were in the building working on the bomb at this very moment; he heard male voices and the hum of motorized equipment downstairs.
“We have a few minutes,” Tabby said, flipping her hair in a caricature of girlishness. “Long enough for us to finish our business. Much as I would love to spend a little time with you and your girl, I need to hurry. I have a party to go to tonight, and I want to make myself extra special pretty.”
Gideon knew there was a rarely used back stairway that was kept locked, except when Rainbow took the trash to the Dumpster in the alleyway. Obviously Tabby had entered the building that way. She could have shot them both in the back when she’d come out of the kitchen. They wouldn’t have known she was there until it was too late. Why hadn’t she? Why was she so intent on dragging out the confrontation?
And where the hell was the team he’d hired to keep an eye on this place? Dammit, someone should know Tabby was here. They should have been watching all the entrances to the building, locked or not.
The fact remained: if Tabby simply wanted him dead, he would already be dead.
“Let’s finish our business, then.” He could take Tabby down with one motion; he just needed her to move the weapon aside so Hope wouldn’t take a bullet if the automatic weapon the blonde was holding went off when she went down.
The psycho reached into the roomy pocket of her dress and drew out the knife she’d used to kill Sherry Bishop and Lily Clark and so many others. So that was the way of it. She wanted him dead, but not quickly and not from a distance. He could use that to get himself closer, to make sure Hope wasn’t harmed in any way.
“Tell me why,” Gideon said as he took a step forward. Since he was unarmed and she had two weapons, Tabby didn’t feel threatened, and she didn’t tell him to step back or stop moving forward.
“Who cares why?” Lily Clark said frantically, jumping up and down. “Just kill her! Don’t let her get away with this.”
Gideon turned his gaze to the ghost. Lily was strong. She had the power to affect this reality if she tried hard enough. If she wanted it badly enough. “I need you to move that weapon aside.”
“I’m not moving anything,” Tabby said, not yet realizing that Gideon wasn’t speaking to her. Lily didn’t realize it yet, either.
“I need you to shift the barrel of that gun away from me and Hope.”
Clark’s eyes went wide, and her figure shimmered. “Me?”
“Yes, you.”
Tabby finally put two and two together. “You’re not talking to me, are you? Well, good luck. I’ve killed a lot of people. I’ve even felt like maybe their ghosts were watching me. But none of them ever laid a hand on me. You know why? They can’t. They’re dead. All that’s left when I’m done is a pitiful spit of energy that can’t do anything but moan and cry to you. They’re pathetic.”
Lily’s misty hand reached for Tabby’s gun and wafted through it without creating so much as a wobble.
<
br /> “I don’t feel anyone trying to move my gun,” Tabby said, brandishing the weapon almost wildly. “See? I’m in control here. No ghost is going to touch me or my weapon.” She quit jiggling the pistol and took aim at Hope. “I want to feel you die in my hands, Raintree. I don’t care about her. She can die right here and now.”
Gideon threw himself between Hope and the gun just as Lily finally made contact. The ghost’s misty hand grabbed the barrel and shoved upward. A surprised Tabby lost control of the weapon. It swung wildly up and then to the side, and a bullet slammed harmlessly and loudly into the ceiling before Lily managed to knock the weapon from Tabby’s hand.
The pistol hit the floor and skittered away, coming to rest half beneath the sofa. Hope ran toward the weapon to retrieve it, while Gideon lifted his hand and directed a bolt of electricity at Tabby before she could reach for the pistol she’d lost. He could fry her heart from this distance, but he didn’t want her dead. Not yet.
Was there a second bomb or not? He had to know. The bolt he let loose knocked Tabby backward and to the floor, where she landed hard. But she didn’t lose her grip on the knife.
“What the hell was that?” she asked breathlessly as she looked up at Gideon. “They didn’t tell me you could do that.”
“Who’s they, Tabby?” If she wasn’t working alone, then this wasn’t over by a long shot.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Gideon dragged the blonde to her feet and wrested the knife out of her hand, tossing it away. She tried to fight but was weakened by the electricity he’d called upon to stop her. Hope held on to Tabby’s weapon and fetched her own pistol. She stood more beside than behind him, her own pistol pointed unwaveringly at Tabby.
“Where’s the other bomb?” he asked.
Tabby just smiled, and he gave her a small jolt to remind her of what he could do. “I can stop your heart with one jolt,” he said quietly. “I can pop you with more electricity than your brain can handle. Don’t think I won’t.”
“Go ahead. I have worse waiting for me if I walk out of here and leave you alive. Besides, we’re going up in a big boom any minute now. Tick-tock. Tick-tock.” She grinned at him. “Afraid?” She closed her eyes and took a long, deep breath, inhaling deeply and holding it.
“Hope, check on the bomb squad,” Gideon said without turning to look at her. “If they don’t have the device neutralized, get out of the building.”
She edged to the door. “I’ll get a status report, but I’m not walking out of here without you.”
“Don’t be stupid.”
Hope left the room without responding, leaving Gideon alone with Tabby. “How touching,” she whispered, opening her eyes once again. “What are you planning to do, Raintree? Get married and make little freaks? Settle down and pretend you’re just any old cop? Good luck. Even if…well, let’s just say it’s never gonna happen, and we both know it.”
He ignored her attempt to distract him. “Where’s the other bomb?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“It’s in your best interest to cooperate, Tabby. Is that your real name?” he asked almost casually. “Tabby?”
The woman didn’t answer. She worked her mouth oddly, and before Gideon realized what she was up to, she bit into something she’d had hidden in her mouth. Instantly her body bucked and her eyes rolled back in her head. A few seconds later, she went slack.
Gideon muttered every foul word he knew as he dragged Tabby from the room. Hope met him on the stairs. “The bomb was a simple mechanism, and it’s already been disabled. What happened?”
“Tabby had some kind of poison hidden in her mouth, and when she realized she wasn’t going to get away, she bit into it. Dammit!” Considering the almost paralyzing dust she’d thrown into his face, he should have seen this coming. He needed to know about the other bomb. He also wanted to know what she’d meant when she talked about “them.” Were there others out there who knew what he could do? For all he knew, there was someone around the corner waiting to take her place.
“Is she dead?”
“Not yet.” If she was dead, her spirit would be here, hounding him still.
“Did she tell you where the second bomb was?”
“No. I don’t know when or where, or even if the bomb is real.”
An ambulance was already on the scene, and the paramedics rushed forward as the three of them hurried from the building. Gideon didn’t know what Tabby had taken, so he couldn’t be much help. He did warn the EMTs to keep her restrained, in case she did come to. Anyone in her path was likely to end up dead if she woke up.
Gideon spotted one of the private security guards he’d hired to watch The Silver Chalice and the apartment above. He made his way roughly through the crowd of cops and onlookers, and grabbed the man by the collar, slamming him against the wall. “Where the hell were you?”
The kid didn’t put up a fight. “While everyone was rushing out of the store, a woman’s purse got snatched. She screamed, and people were running and talking about a bomb. It was a mess, and I was distracted. I’m sorry.”
“Where’s the other guard?” Gideon asked. “I specifically asked for two people to be on duty at all times.”
The kid—and he really was just a kid—paled. “Joe went to the hospital in the first ambulance. He was checking the perimeter of the building, and a woman out back stabbed him in the gut. He was hurting, but he was able to tell the officers what happened before the ambulance left. The paramedics said he’ll be all right.”
Gideon released the boy and shook off his anger, running agitated fingers through his hair and turning away. Hope was talking to her mother, maybe making explanations or offering daughterly, calming words. When their eyes met, she placed a hand on her mother’s arm, patted it gently and then walked away, heading for Gideon.
He wrapped his arms around her and held on as they met, not caring who was watching or what they thought.
“I love you,” he whispered.
“Love you, too,” she said comfortably, as if she’d already accepted everything. Their love, Emma, who and what he was, who and what she would become. Amazing, for a woman who just a few days ago had admitted without reservation that she didn’t believe in anything she couldn’t see or touch.
“Let’s go home,” she said as she smoothed a wayward strand of hair from his cheek. “We can leave word for the hospital to call us if Tabby wakes up. Or if she doesn’t. I just want to go home.”
There was such longing in her voice as she said the word. Home. His house. Their house. “Yeah. I just have one thing to do first.”
He released Hope and turned to face what was left of Lily Clark’s ghost. She was fading at last. “Thanks.”
The spirit smiled at him, almost shyly. “I did help, didn’t I?”
“I couldn’t have done it without you.”
The justice she’d demanded had been done, but Lily wasn’t quite ready to go. Her smile faded. “If she dies, will she be there? Where I’m going? Will I have to face her all over again?”
Gideon didn’t have to ask who she was. “No. Tabby’s going to another place.” He didn’t know where or how, and didn’t want to, but he knew for sure that Lily wouldn’t be seeing her killer again.
Lily glanced up as she began to fade away. “They’re so proud of you,” she said, her voice growing distant.
“Who?”
“Your mom and dad. They’re so…” Lily Clark didn’t fade. She simply disappeared with a small and distinct pop that only Gideon heard.
How odd, that this house was home. Not her mother’s apartment, not the house she’d grown up in, not her Raleigh apartment where she’d lived for years. Here.
The hospital had called not five minutes after they’d walked into the house. Tabby was dead. They knew from the remains of the capsule in her mouth and the way she’d died that it was a poison of some kind that had killed her, but they hadn’t yet identified the toxin. It could be days before they
knew exactly what it was.
Hope planned to call the lab on Monday morning and harass them about the dust Tabby had thrown into Gideon’s face. Maybe the two drugs were related somehow.
Gideon was distracted. He’d undressed her slowly and made love to her without saying a word. Tonight he didn’t cheat. He didn’t arouse her with caresses colored with lightning or make her come with a touch of his hand. He just pushed inside her body and stroked until she climaxed hard, and then he found his own release in her. He did still glow in the dark a little, though, her own personal flashlight.
Eventually the warm glow faded, and he pulled her body against his and held on tight. If not for his breathing and the way one hand occasionally caressed her, she would have thought he had fallen asleep. But he hadn’t. He was nowhere near sleep. She felt it; she knew it because she knew him.
“You can tell me anything, Gideon,” she whispered. “What are you thinking about right now?”
At first she thought he was going to ignore her, and then he answered, “I never saw my parents.”
“What do you…?”
“After they died. I never saw their ghosts. Everywhere I turned, there were spirits, but not theirs. Never theirs. I was so mad at them for not coming back. For a while I was mad at everybody.”
She stroked his face with her fingertips.
“I started to get into trouble not long after they were murdered.” He lifted his hands, studying them as if they weren’t his at all but those of a stranger, hands he didn’t know or understand. “Think about it. No security system or lock is going to stop me from getting to what I want. No jail is going to hold me. With enough lightning I can pop any lock. I would make a fine thief, and for a while I was so furious with the world that I almost went there.”
He might not know that such a thing never would have happened, but she did. Gideon was one of the good guys. Heart and soul. “What stopped you?”
“My brother. My sister. Knowing that maybe, just maybe, even though I couldn’t see my parents, they could still see me.”
“You made that choice a long time ago, Gideon. Why are you thinking about it now?”
Raintree: Haunted Page 19
