Page 1 (2/2)

"Chill out, Munro I&039; they don&039;t know" Companion chastised, she turned her attention back to the two men "We&039;ve just cos they ex?pect you to attend when you have ans?" Henry repeated with a smile, fully aware that Lisa Evans enjoyed those tedious fund-raising things where her checkbook ensured she&039;d be stroked and flattered He also knew that if she was vague, it was deliberate-no oneexactly where every dollar ended up "Musical or medical?"

"Medical" Heavily shadowed eyes narrowed into a look that had been known to send a variety of CEOs running for cover "Have you signed an organ donor card?"

"I&039;ans"

The look softened slightly as she leaped to the con?clusion he&039;d intended "Oh I&039;m sorry Still, while there&039;s life, there&039;s hope, and rinned "Iher couiding a tanker into harbor, she threw a cheery, "Don&039;t do anything I wouldn&039;t do," back over her shoulder

"Well, that leaves us a lot of leeway," Henry mur?mured as the elevator door closed on Mrs Munro&039;s continuing shocked protests

Tony sagged against the back wall, hands shoved in his pockets "Until I ue and shost over to her"

"Why?"

"If all the good ay," Henry reminded hiet on Lisa&039;s bad side"

The thought of Lisa Evans&039; bad side brought an exaggerated shudder "Actually, I&039;ve beento ask you; how co? You&039;re always talking to people I&039;d have thought it would be safer to be a littleto say private, but I guess that&039;ll do"

"People are afraid of what they don&039;t know" Exit?ing into the underground garage, they walked in step to Henry&039;s BMW "If people think they know ins that I aainst what they think they know and discount it If they have nothing to ainst, then they&039;re more likely to be?lieve it"

"So youslightly, Henry watched Tony circle around to the passenger door "Not always"

"But sometimes?"

"Yes"

With the car between them, Tony lifted his head and locked his eyes on Henry&039;s face "And what about e?"

"Tony " Then he saw the expression in Tony&039;s eyes and realized that it hadn&039;t been a facetious ques?tion "Tony, I trust you with everything I am There&039;re only two other people in the world I can say that about, and one of them doesn&039;t exactly count"

"Because Vicki&039;s become a vampire?"

"Because Michael Celluci would never adhed, as he was meant to, but Henry heard the artificial resonance For the rest of the night, he worked hard at erasing it

She&039;d seen the article too late to do anything about it that night, and the wait had not improved her tee on the words having cut her mem?ory to shreds, the nurse checked the duty sheet "Yes, Doctor He "

"I want to see him in my office I that he was cleaning up an unfortunate bedpan accident Ied him, the nurse hoped that whatever Sullivan had done, it wasn&039;t enough to get hi to do the shit ithout bitching and co were few and far between Besides, it was difficult not to like the bigeyes were hard to resist

"What do you know about this?"

Sullivan looked down at the article and then up at the doctor Denial died unspoken as she read his an?swer off his face

"This is one of ours?"

He nodded

"Then what part of my instructions did you not understand?"

"It&039;s not that I "

"Or do you not enjoy your job? Is it not everything I told you it would be?"

"Yes I mean, I do And it is, but "

"You are not supposed to be showing initiative, Mr Sullivan"

Their relative sizes made it ridiculous that he should cower before her te a Cult and Jackyl T-shirt, a local band that recorded in North Vancouver Henry was a little surprised it wasn&039;t a Grateful Dead T-shirt He&039;d often suspected the universe had a really maca?bre, and pretty basic, sense of huain, it seeeance

I suppose that&039;s as good a theory as any, Henry re?flected He sighed "Do you want revenge on the per?son who took your hands?"

I a first hint of personality to translucent features, the ghost slowly faded away

Henry sighed again "I take it that&039;s a qualified yes"

The aparted from his room After a mo late

"Which is probably a good thing," he announced to the lights of the city He wondered if the ghost ex?pected hi for the remains of flesh and bone or an ethereal pair quite possibly haunting soht, he was in his office with the door closed, deep in the compli?cated court politics of 1813 and more than a little con?cerned with his heroine&039;s refusal to follow the plot as outlined Dawn nearly caught hiton would promote her betrothed to full colonel and he raced for the sanctuary of his bed having forgotten his spectral visitor in the night&039;s work

"This is beco; do you at least knoho has your hands?"

The ghost threw back its head and screa black hole of a mouth, but Henry felt the hair lift off the back of his neck and a cold dread wrap around his heart While the screaht he sensed ain unison, all la the injustice of their deaths His lips drew off his teeth in an involuntary snarl

"Henry? Henry! Are you okay?"

The ghost&039;s face, distended by the continuing scream, faded last

"Henry!"

It took hi wasn&039;t his heart-it was Tony, banging frantically on the bedroo uneasiness and padded across the roo the bolts, he called, "I&039;ht"

When he opened the door, Tony nearly fell into his arh he&039;d just run a race, Tony pulled back far enough to see for himself that Henry was unharmed "I heard no, I feltit was " His fingers tightened around Henry&039;s bare shoulders "What happened? Was it the ghost?"

"I&039;ative answer"

"Negative?" Tony&039;s voice rose to an incredulous squeak and he let his arative It was botto, annihilation!"

"It wasn&039;t that bad "

"Maybe not for you!"

Concerned, Henry studied Tony&039;s face "Are you all right?"

"I guess" He drew in a deep breath, released it slowly, and nodded "Yeah I&039;ht here and watch you dress" Propped up on one shoulder, he sagged against the doorfrah, or independent, or even inter?ested in Henry&039;s nakedness "I don&039;t want to be alone"

"Do you want to knohat happened?" From Tony&039;s expression, it was clear that he hadn&039;t needed to ask While he pulled on his clothes, Henry de?scribed what had occurred when he&039;d tried to get host

"So, you can only ask one question and if the an?swer&039;s yes, it disappears quietly, and if the answer&039;s no, it lets you kno disappointed it is with you"

"Not only how disappointed it is," Henry told him "When it screamed, I sensed a multitude of the dead"

"Yeah? Howto joke about"

"Trust hin&039; inside" Tony followed Henry into the living rooracelessly onto one end of the heavy leather sofa "Man, gahts? That thing&039;s still got o ahead, he stretched back, flicked on the track lighting, and cen?tered his It does want revenge, and it doesn&039;t knohere its hands are"

"What of the others?"

"Can we host at a time? I mean, why borrow trouble"

Tucked into a pocket of shadow on the other side of the roohed "I&039;d still like to knohy me?"

"Like attracts like"

Brows drawn in, Henry leaned forward, bringing his face into the light "I beg your pardon"

"You&039;re a vaed and stroked the tiny, nearly healed wound barely visible against the tanned skin of his left wrist "Even if you&039;re not a supernatural creature, even if all you are is biologi?cally different "

"All I araciously indicated he should continue al?though his lip remained curled

"Look, there&039;s a whole shitload of myth about you Okay, not you specifically, but about your kind It&039;s all around you " He spread his ar I bet that&039;s what the ghost is attracted to I bet that&039;s what pulls hi his head, he leaned back in his chair "Did you talk like that in Toronto?"

"You needn&039;t get so daer in Henry&039;s direction "It&039;s a perfectly valid theory Or have you got a better one?"

Surprised by the young man&039;s vehemence, Henry admitted he didn&039;t, but before Tony could continue, he cut hi in the hall"

Tony&039;s scowl deepened "I don&039;t hear any shit" There was no point in continuing Henry was already at the door

He&039;d heard the ambulance attendants As he stepped out into the hall, they were rolling the stretcher out of aparture under the straps lay perfectly still, one thin hand dangling li CPR even as they rushed toward the elevator, but Henry knew Lisa Evans was irretrievably dead

He barelyas Mrs Munro clutched at his ar co toward St Paul&039;s Hospital after the ambulance while Tony passed Mrs Munro tissue after tissue froency rooreed with Henry&039;s diagnosis They, too, had seen death too often to mistake it

"She was very old," Dr Zvane told them softly

"There&039;s older!" Mrs Munro protested Tony handed her another tissue

"True" The doctor shrugged, and knuckled weary eyes "All I can say is that it was her tione on and had no intention of coh to crack merely mortal joints, Mrs Munro sniffed "That&039;s just like her You could never get her to change herby the tih Henry had offered to drive her wherever she wanted to go, she&039;d asked to be taken back to the condo "I have to get hter will pickJeopardy," she continued, able to talk about what had happened now that it was offi?cially over "It was the championship round Miss Evans had just shouted out, &039;Who is Captain Kirk?&039; when all of a sudden, she sort of whimpered and clapped her hands over her ears She looked like she&039;d heard so at all The next thing I knew, she was gone"

Henry met Tony&039;s eyes in the rearview

"I don&039;t think he&039;s doing it deliberately"

"I don&039;t care He is responsible for that old lady&039;s death, and I say he can go handless into hell"

Back in his circle of light, Tony shivered Henry&039;s voice had cut through the distance between living room and bedroom like the distance didn&039;t exist, and every word had held an edge When he appeared a e of clothes- his face and hair seeh he didn&039;t really need to, "Where are you going?"

"Hunting"

It was alhost&039;s anticipation

"You can stand there as long as you like," Henry growled, "but I ahost threw back its head and screamed

An unseen, unheard chorus of the dead screa to ask it any more questions!"

"I didn&039;t" Henry stared down at the city, listening for the sound of a siren, his fingers splayed against the glass, the id across his back "I told it, it could expect no help"

"It didn&039;t seeether in silence, waiting for the sounds of another death

Finally Tony sighed and threw hiot lucky; nobody old enough, close enough To at all"

It waited And it waited When Henry tried to leave the room, it screamed

They watched the ambulance arrive They learned that the Franklins&039; baby died in its sleep

"Babies Man " Two years ago, Tony had watched an ancient Egyptian wizard devour the life force of a baby The parents walked on, coht?mares about it "This is blackry" The plastic cracked in his grip as he picked up the phone

Sing nervously-Henry&039;s anger could be as terrifying as silent ghostly screa the Ghostbusters?"

"Not quite I&039;ve decided this is not a job for a ro?uess not, but" He let his next question trail off when Henry activated the external speaker on the phone After two rings, an answering ations There&039;s no one here to take your call right now Please leave a e after the tone "