Thirty-Six

THIRTY-SIX

The bugs are gone. Maybe that's the last thing I should be thinking, but it's all my brain can process as I sit in the front yard, police cars in the driveway, ambulance out front. In everything that is happening—one person injured, three horribly murdered, the alleged killer ranting about ghosts and séances—I have been forgotten, and that is exactly what I want. A few moments to sit and stare at half-dead midges crawling on my jeans.

Keith is with Jin. I insisted on that. My injuries are minor, and Jin's are not, though the paramedics say he's stable.

I sit there, watching the midges die, and my mind is empty. Blessedly empty, my body equally empty, drained of adrenaline, only retaining enough energy to keep me upright.

I will need that energy. From experience, I know what happens next. The police will remember me—the only lucid survivor—and I will spend hours in questioning, praying it doesn't end in a jail cell. But I can't bring myself to care about that right now.

I'm safe. Jin is alive. Everyone else…

"Nic."

When the whisper comes, it might be the only thing that could pierce my shock and exhaustion. I follow it to see the faintest outline of Anton. Even without the bugs blocking him, he's barely there, pulsating as if he's already fading back to the other side.

"I'm sorry," he says.

"I think that should be my line."

He crouches in front of me. "I can't stay."

My eyes fill. "I know. I shouldn't have called you—"

One finger rises to my lips. "Shhh."

I nod, tears spilling out.

"I didn't get a chance to finish," he whispers, his voice barely there now. "At the roadside. When I said I'd be waiting."

I look up. I can just make him out.

"What I was trying to say is…" He comes closer. "I'll be waiting. But don't be in any rush to join me." He looks into my eyes. "I'm not going anywhere."

I choke out a sobbing laugh, and I swear I feel his lips against my forehead. And then he is gone.

I'm in the hospital for observation. I don't need it, but sometimes people—even doctors—can get overcautious when they hear you have CF. I've just suffered a trauma and… who knows? Better safe than sorry.

I'll argue tomorrow. Argue with the doctors. Argue with Keith. Convince my poor beleaguered brother that I can go home. Or, if he insists, I'll go home with him for a day or two.

The police have their story. A version of the truth, where we'd been conducting a séance to contact Anton, and Shania swapped out the ashes, hoping to contact her sister instead. She thought we had, and she believed she was possessed by the spirit of her sister, a madness that led her to murder.

When I'd explained, I could feel their gazes on me, the weight of them throwing me back twenty-two years to the detective who'd said, in all seriousness, that this was what came of messing with dark forces. But he hadn't been entirely wrong, had he? He just didn't have the whole story, where the "dark forces" were a very specific sort, shadow tendrils that ensnared a family.

They'll still need to investigate, of course. But the evidence will support my story, which Jin can corroborate as much as possible.

As for what happened to Jin, he'd set out that morning only to have my car die a few hundred feet from the house. When he couldn't get it going again, he'd fought his way back to the house through that fog of bugs, and been attacked by something in it.

Did my car coincidentally die before Jin could escape? I doubt it. Same as I doubt that was just an unusually dense swarm of midges. Whatever "dark forces" had been present, they'd tried to make damn sure we couldn't flee.

I've pieced together the rest as best I can. It seems Shania saw the story of Anton's death. She'd already been living and working in Toronto, and that article launched a plan of revenge. She inserted herself into my grief-counseling group where—after a few sessions—she'd requested me as a mentor. Had she always hoped to use the séances to contact her sister and unleash her on me? Had she been working up to that? I won't ever know all the answers, but when I invited her to join our week at the lake house, she saw her chance, though I don't think she ever imagined anything like what actually happened.

Shania is undergoing assessment now. I know what will happen. The same thing that happened to her sister and aunt. She will spend her life in a mental hospital, and the horror of that will never leave me.

Patrice blamed me for putting her in an institution. I can argue that Shania put herself there when she sentenced me to death at Patrice's hands, but that's not entirely fair. I chose to let Shania live, and that was no mercy. No mercy at all.

When my hospital room opens, I expect to see Keith. Instead, Jin slides in.

"Hey," I say, rising to sit. "Up and around?"

"I heard you found the speakers," he says.

I go still, and then I nod.

His face falls and his head drops. "I'm so sorry, Nic. I only wanted to give you closure and reassurance. But it was a patronizing thing to do, especially to a friend."

"Yep."

He looks up with a wan half smile. "Not going to tell me that my heart was in the right place?"

"Oh, I know it was, but it was still patronizing, and I would be furious if I didn't feel guilty being angry at a guy who was beaten with a paving stone."

"By a vengeful ghost. Don't forget that part."

I reach out and squeeze his hand.

He pulls a chair up to my bed and sits. "I'm sorry for all of it, Nic. For Shania and Brodie and Mrs. Kilmer and Dr. Cirillo. For what you had to go through, both twenty-two years ago and what you went through now. But I'm also sorry for what you didn't get. I really did hope we'd contact Anton."

I could tell him the truth. Maybe I should. But it feels too private, too personal. Like the moment at the roadside that should have been just between Anton and me, only it wasn't. This can be.

"I know he's there," I say. "I know he's waiting. And I know, if he could make contact, he'd kick my ass and tell me to start living again."

Jin's gaze meets mine. "He really would, Nic."

I turn away as I nod. "His life was cut short, and I will never stop raging at the universe for that. We had plans, and he's gone, but those plans don't need to die with him. They just need to change a little."

I look over at Jin. "Lucy has always wanted to see the northern lights. What would you say to a family cruise to Iceland? You, me, Keith, Libby, Hayden, Lucy…"

His brows rise. "A cruise with all of us? Are you sure?"

"Absolutely. A celebration. No expense spared." I smile. "My treat."