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After the better part of two days spent driving down e out of truck-stop diners, all four of us smelled like road trip--that funky mix of stale corn chips, sweat, dirty hair, and ass that seems to show up any time you drive more than a couple hundred miles in one stretch We had two rooms, which meant two of us could shower at once, after all four of us had cleared the blood test required to get inside
Soh one room was supposed to be for thethe first showers It was like a ic trick I asked "Does anybody want a shower?" and they were gone, disappearance punctuated only by the steady hiss of the water
Mahir and I settle in the rooain, just in case We were too close to her horound for us to want her left alone The motel security could be worked around, and I didn’t trust her to shoot her way out of a paper bag if soe of one of the two queen-sized beds, rubbing my face with one hand like I could wipe the exhaustion away It never worked "So the Doc says et to work around nine The janitorial staff arrives at seven That gives us two hours to evade one of the best security syste any blood tests that would announce our presence, and make our way to Dr Wynne’s lab"
"Correct," said Mahir Paradoxically, he looked less tired than he did when he first arrived in Weed The bastard I hadn’t been able to get any real sleep in the van--too uard down in the field--but he’d been out like a light every ti The rest had been good for hi to need it
"Is it justi of the security sweeps since Dr Connolly’s death, it’s going to be bloody difficult, but no, I wouldn’t call it ‘fucking i impossible requires rather more in the way of, I don’t know, ninjas" Mahir s, half-buried in stubble and his own natural restraint, but it was there "I’ ninjas"
"Saet the sub to the sound of running water for a moment before I asked, "Does this shit ever end, Mahir? I h’ and let things go back to nor "Your sister trained me, and she never stood for liars No, Shaun, I don’t think this ever ends, not for us, not until we’re dead Maybe not even then You’re a haunted house pretending to be a ia ae Her tone was grimmer than I’d ever heard it
Mahir looked at et distant when you’re listening to her Either you’re truly haunted, or you’re the most reasonable madman I’ve ever known, and it doesn’t much oing to be resting in peace anytime soon"
"What if we all die here?"
"What makes you think on’t find people of our own to haunt?" Mahir dug into his pocket, producing a slim nylon wallet He flipped it open and passed it to me "My wife, Nandini Nan You never once asked to see a picture of her You realize that? You called at all hours of the night, you drove herabout her"
I took the wallet, too abashed to knohat else to do It was open to a picture of a sliularly, to keep the bleach fro a cowl-necked sweater the color of cherry cola, and frowning at the camera
The rese was too i But so about the expression in her eyes…
"She looks like George"
"Yes" Mahir leaned over and plucked the wallet froe, but she wasn’t the first bride they offered me, or even the fifteenth She was just the first one I fancied enough to have a go with Traditional enough to suitwith I’m not sure whose parents were ave the picture a fond look, snapped the wallet shut, and slid it back into his pocket "I told her to divorce ht --still, I’ve no doubt she listened this ti else"
"I didn’t mean to… I mean, I didn’t know…"
"What, that I loved your sister? Of course you didn’t, just like you had no idea Rebecca fancied you You never had to go searching like the rest of us She was haunting you a long tio, you’d be haunting her the same way" Mahir stood as the water turned off "We’re all hauntings waiting to happen, Shaun The sooner you realize that, the sooner you’ll get past wondering when our norain"