Falling Light (Game of Shadows #2)(26)

“He’s very present and remarkably lucid for a ghost, isn’t he?” She chewed on a thumbnail as she thought.

“Yes, he is.” Michael accelerated into a gap of traffic. “Some ghosts are fragments of personality, or traumatized by what happened to them, and most don’t stay long after their death. Nicholas is different. He is whole and present, at least for now. Maybe after he loses his sense of mission or responsibility, he will pass on too.”

“But what if he doesn’t pass on?” There, she said it.

He frowned. “What do you mean?”

She took a deep breath. “If the Deceiver can take over another person’s body, why can’t someone else do it too?”

He stared at her. “What are you talking about? None of us have done that, ever.”

She rushed on, the words tumbling over one another. “Of course, I’m not talking about taking over a person who is alive and aware. That would be murder. I’m talking about people who are already dead—the drones. Their bodies are functional, but the spirit is gone. This morning when I examined those two men, I got to thinking, if the Deceiver can take over a drone, why can’t someone else do it too? It would be like—like organ harvesting. Sort of. Wouldn’t it?”

After his initial reaction, he looked quite alert and fascinated, without any sign of the revulsion she had feared. “You’re thinking of trying something like that for Nicholas.”

She lifted a shoulder. “I haven’t had a chance to think any of this through, and there’s a lot to consider. Many of those drones must have some kind of family. Either they are pretending to live their normal lives, or they’ve left their families behind. Or maybe they have criminal records. After all, they’re doing things at the Deceiver’s bidding. And who knows how Nicholas would feel about any of this? Even if he agreed, I think he would have to live in hiding for the rest of his life . . . or for the rest of the life span of the drone he inhabited.”

He gave her a keen glance. “But you still want to offer him the chance.”

“Yes.”

“And you could help him enter the body and take it over?”

She blew out a breath. “I don’t know, but I think I would like to try, if he would let me.”

“If you could resurrect him, then Nicholas would really be back in the game.”

“Or not,” she said strongly. “He’s sacrificed enough. If I could do it, he might want to retire, and he deserves that chance.”

“You don’t know Nicholas. He wouldn’t be able to stay uninvolved. For one thing, his murderer hasn’t been caught.” Michael grinned. “It’s never dull, is it?”

“No, it never is,” she said. She made a wry face. “Even if we manage to destroy the Deceiver, we’ll never live any kind of normal life. Or at least what other people consider normal.”

“We’ll have to achieve our own kind of normal.” His big hand covered hers. She turned her hand over and clasped his.

“That’s a deal,” she told him. “In the meantime, honey, would you mind picking up a drone for me whenever you can?”

He laughed softly. “Just as soon as an opportunity presents itself.”

Chapter Nine

MICHAEL TURNED OFF the main highway and drove through Petoskey’s side streets. Mary looked out her window. She didn’t know much about the city other than it was small, attractive and full of large Victorian houses. Petoskey’s old downtown Gaslight District, an area of about six blocks, had been restored and was populated with cafés, pubs, galleries, antique shops and boutiques.

She had once driven through Petoskey. She had stopped to have a late lunch in a small restaurant and had fallen into a conversation with her waitress, who was a student at North Central Michigan College.

Apparently, her waitress had told her, Ernest Hemingway had referred to many local landmarks in his novel The Torrents of Spring. Mary had resolved to read the novel and had gone so far as to buy a copy, but she disliked Hemingway’s writing, so she had never followed through with her original intention.

She tried to think back. What had happened to that book? Had she ever unpacked it, or was it still in the boxes in the garage?

Then she remembered. The book no longer existed. It had been destroyed along with the rest of her house.

Following hard on the heels of that realization, in a one-two knockout punch, an image surfaced of Justin’s face surrounded by the sparkling black corona of the Deceiver’s aura. Dread shot adrenaline through her veins and left her feeling sick. The Deceiver’s smile had been an alien unwholesome travesty on Justin’s clever face.

Her life and her sense of identity had transformed almost beyond recognition, but her feelings for the people she knew and loved were still the same.

Justin’s partner, Tony, had to be so worried, not just about Justin but about her as well. He needed to hear that Justin had died. He deserved the right to mourn instead of enduring an endless agony of not knowing. When would she find time to call him? Was it safe to contact him? Was she reaching a point when she never would?

Her mouth tightened. She wouldn’t accept that. If they managed to live through this hellish mess, she would figure out how to live with both halves of herself. She would call Tony as soon as she knew that it wouldn’t put him in danger. She would tell him about Justin and tell him something about herself that didn’t sound too crazy. She had to call him, if for no other reason than to give him closure and to say good-bye.