Forged in Smoke (Red-Hot SEALs #3)(54)

A chill winnowed through her, and it had nothing to do with their current predicament—running for their lives, twenty feet beneath ground.

“Why are you shouting a dead man’s name?” The question tumbled out as her flashlight beam fluttered over his face.

It seemed to take a second for her query to register, and then his face went blank again. But she knew the answer.

“A ghost? You’re seeing ghosts?” It was the only thing that made sense. The only reason he’d be yelling a dead man’s name.

This was his problem? His hallucination? A ghost? He was seeing dead people? Every single comedic rip-off of The Sixth Sense reeled through her mind. Hysterical laughter bubbled up her throat and tried to escape out her mouth.

Except . . . there wasn’t an ounce of levity on his face. Instead, it looked frozen, almost fragile. Which was crazy when describing a six-foot-four hunk of muscle and strength. But yeah, he looked vulnerable, as though the wrong reaction from her could shatter him into a billion pieces and nothing would ever be right between them ever again.

The urge to laugh vanished.

“That’s what’s going on, isn’t it? You’re seeing ghosts.” She couldn’t quite bring herself to call them dead people—even though that was what they technically were. “Talk to me.”

Blue eyes scanned her face, lingered, and the intensity softened. “Ghost. Singular.”

She nodded, trying to maintain an open expression, even though every synapse in her brain had warped straight into denial. Ghosts? Seriously? “Pachico?”

It made sense that if he were suffering from a psychotic break, his delusions would center on the last person he’d tried to save, only to helplessly watch die.

“That would be the one.” He shot her a wry glance. “Relax. I don’t expect y’all to believe me.” He stared at the ground for a moment before running a tense hand through his hair. “Hell. I wouldn’t believe it myself if it wasn’t happenin’ to me.”

Okay, so her open expression must not be so open after all. “I’m sorry . . . it’s just . . . there’s no scientific evidence to support the existence of ghosts.”

His head pulled back. After a nanosecond, his eyebrows rose. “You don’t say. Well, I wasn’t touchin’ that rifle. So if it was pointin’ at you, as you claim, I reckon that’s about as scientific as it’ll get.” He stroked a palm down his lean face. “The bastar—” He caught himself with a grimace and shot her an apologetic glance. “Pachico has been manipulatin’ objects in the physical world, and he’s gettin’ better at it each time. We’re damn lucky he hasn’t pulled a trigger yet.”

“The physical world?”

A fleeting expression of annoyance touched his face, as though he’d said more than he’d intended.

“He’s incorporeal. A regular Casper. At first he just passed through everything. But now that he’s figured out how to manipulate physical objects—” He broke off with a shrug hard enough to lift the duffle bag up his back.

Manipulate physical objects . . .

His explanation echoed in her mind. Was he talking about the cookies? Or the cookie rack? Had he built a bunch of delusional scenarios around simple accidents? Or even unconscious actions on his own part?

The rifle had been pointing at her. She was certain of that. But his hand or elbow could have been manipulating it outside of her line of sight.

Another chill sliced through her. There were plenty of cases where people in the midst of a psychotic break experienced delusions, hallucinations, and memory lapses.

She jolted as he barked out an unamused laugh.

“And this is exactly why I haven’t told anyone. You’re afraid of me now.” Beneath the exasperation in his voice lurked that earlier vulnerability.

“I’m not afraid of you.” The reassurance came unbidden, but she realized it was true.

She wasn’t afraid of him. Looking back, he’d done everything possible to protect the camp from his perceived threat—even to the point of abandoning his comfy bed for the cold, damp forest.

Curiosity stirred as his actions started to make sense. “Was that why you left camp? Why you avoided everyone? To protect us from this ghost? How does that work? Why doesn’t it just harass us at will, whether you’re there or not?”

“Because it’s tethered to me somehow,” he snapped, a harried expression settling over his face. “And we need to move. If the time frame holds true, it’ll be gone ten, maybe fifteen minutes. Time enough to reach the hub.”

“It’s gone?” What fascinating, intricate scenarios had his mind built around this delusion? “It just periodically disappears? Why?”

He ignored the question in favor of turning and stalking off. Faith followed, watching the stiff line of his spine, or at least what she could see of it below the canvas bag. He obviously didn’t want to talk about his ghost. But maybe that’s exactly what he needed. A chance to examine the inconsistencies inherent in his delusion through an outside perspective.

“So when did he appear?” she asked.

Although he didn’t respond, from the catch in his stride, he’d obviously heard her.

“We might as well talk about it,” she offered after a few minutes of pregnant silence. “It will give us something to concentrate on while we’re making our way to the hub.”