Part 24 (1/2)

”No!” Margaret shook her head furiously, scooting backward into the mausoleum.

She has grown fond of me, you see. Children are sometimes so very foolish, the ghost murmured, like the moan of a dying mother.

Pete turned on it, careful not to meet the silver orbs distorted by the s.h.i.+eld hex. ”I swear to everything above and below that if you've hurt her I'll follow you all the way down to the underworld and find a way to kill you again.”

The ghost snarled and raised a smoke-hand tipped with black claws. Pete made a dive for Margaret. She felt the swipe, felt it grab the ends of her hair and the seams of her s.h.i.+rt, barely missing skin, the magic burning as if she'd touched supercooled metal.

She had the thought I should be dead I should be dead as she hit the ground, snagging Margaret's hand and pulling her close, balling up her body around the little girl and rolling away from the shrieking spirit. as she hit the ground, snagging Margaret's hand and pulling her close, balling up her body around the little girl and rolling away from the shrieking spirit.

When she opened her eyes Jack stood above her, both hands extended, the s.h.i.+eld hex glowing blue-hot around the edges as the ghost struck it again and again. Jack wobbled under each blow, and Pete saw a ribbon of blood begin to leak out of his nose.

”Not exactly exactly like you remember, is it, you wispy c.u.n.t,” he ground out. ”Pete, run,” he said. ”Run for your life.” like you remember, is it, you wispy c.u.n.t,” he ground out. ”Pete, run,” he said. ”Run for your life.”

The light of the s.h.i.+eld hex reflected off the ghost's teeth and Pete shook her head. ”Not leaving you. Can't.”

Margaret was sobbing, but in relief, not terror. Pete reached out her free hand and laid it on Jack's arm.

”Pete&” he started, but she gripped his hand before he could protest.

”I know what I'm doing,” she said. It was a complete lie, and it didn't seem to appease Jack, but by then it was too late.

Just as with Talshebeth, Pete felt the dial on her senses pushed to maximumthe shriek of magic and the burning of Jack's skin on hers, the same wind roaring through the well-kept trees and between the tombs. The storm discor-porated the ghost, all except a black skeleton that thrashed and howled as the gale of s.h.i.+eld magic pelted it.

Jack pulled both of them away, scooping Margaret up in one arm and dragging Pete with the other, although he told her later that he'd had to half carry her because as soon as the ghost's silver eyes winked out under the a.s.sault of Jack's talents, Pete blacked out and woke up on Jack's mattress, in his flat, alone.

Chapter Forty

”Inspector.” A hand gripped her shoulder, tentative and shaky. Not Jack. ”Inspector.”

Pete opened her eyes, though the light seemed very bright, and ached, forcing her to lower her lids and peer at whoever-it-was through a forest of eyelashes.

”Ollie.”

Ollie Heath sat back on his heels, the tight set of his jaw loosening when she spoke. ”Thank G.o.d. Thought you'd gone and punched your ticket.”

”No,” Pete said, soft and brief out of necessity. She felt as if she'd drunk up all the alcohol in London, and then vomited it back up and drunk some more. Her tongue was cottony and her skull pulsated steadily as if one of those cymbal-clas.h.i.+ng monkey dolls had her head in its grasp.

Pete saw milling figures in somber blue outside Jack's bedroom door, and two in green carrying a paramedic's case.

She bolted up. ”Margaret.”

”The girl's fine, just fine,” said Ollie. ”I called the bus for your friend, actually. He could barely stand upright, and he's got himself some nasty burns on his hand& scratched all to Hades too, all over his body. Strangest b.l.o.o.d.y thing I've ever seen.”

Ollie propped pillows against the wall, staying crouched next to Pete as she craned to see into the rest of the flat. ”Margaret is safe.”

”Safe and sound and gone home with her mum,” Ollie confirmed. ”Now, I know DCI Newell is waiting to hear you tell exactly what the b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l happened and where you've been for the last three days, and I have to say I wondered myself”

Pete clasped her hand around Ollie's wrist. ”I can't. You have to just trust me, Ollie, and not breathe a word to Newell.”

Ollie nodded slowly. ”I'll always want to know how you found that child in time, Pete.”

”You wouldn't believe it,” Pete a.s.sured him. Ollie stood.

”Likely not. I'll go let Mr. Winter know you're awake. He was troubled when he called. Claimed you pa.s.sed out.”

”I did,” Pete said. Everything after she took Jack's hand was an inkblot on the narrative, obscured by folds of pain and ghostly hisses. ”Wait,” she said as Ollie walked out, the belated truth breaking through her foggy mind. ”Jack called you?”

”Took your mobile and did it,” said Ollie. ”He was terribly concerned over you and the fate of the girl.”

”How about that that,” Pete mused; She could only imagine Jack's conversation with Ollie when he called to report the missing Margaret Smythe found.

”Seems an all-right bloke, if a bit on the s.h.i.+fty side,” Ollie observed. ”Want me to send him in?”

”Please,” Pete said, pulling her hair into a knot at the base of her neck and attempting to work the kinks out of her arms and shoulders. Everything hurt, as though she'd run for kilometers beyond measure and then gone a few rounds with a drunken Chelsea fan on game day.

Ollie disappeared and a moment later Jack replaced him, not hurrying or rus.h.i.+ng in but just there, as if Pete had willed him into being. She blinked and then narrowed her eyes. ”One day you're going to tell me how you do that.”

”Do what, luv?” He pulled the straight-backed chair up to the mattress and leaned down to put one finger under her chin. ”You look a bit worse for wear.” The corners of his mouth crinkled a little and his eyes darkened to a deep-sea color with what Pete would cla.s.sify as relief, if it were anyone but Jack.

Pete examined him in turn. Except for neatly wrapped bandages on his palms he was untouched, rumpled, and smelling of day-old tobacco. As usual, and Pete couldn't have been more grateful.

”If it wasn't for your hands I'd believe I dreamed the ghost, everything,” she said.

Jack's eyes rippled again, slate. ”You didn't.”

”I know,” Pete said quietly. ”What have you told the police?”

”Not a b.l.o.o.d.y thing,” said Jack. ”I've taken a pinch before, Pete. I can keep me mouth shut.”

Pete tilted her head back and shut her eyes, the solid and the real finally seeping back into her skin. ”Then it's over. I'll make up a story for Newell, and you'll corroborate it, and it will be over.”

A silence stretched, and Pete opened one eye. Jack was staring out the window, past the telephone wires and the chimney pots on the opposite block of flats, watching as slivers of mist collected and filtered the sun to a tarnished sheen that turned his hair molten and his skin paper.

”It's not,” he said finally. ”It's not finished.”

Pete swung her legs over the side of the mattress and sat up, even though dizziness rocked her like a s.h.i.+p in high wind. ”What do you mean, Jack?”

He stood up, knocking the chair over, and paced away. ”Come on, Pete!” he snarled. ”Don't play the sweet school-girl with me. You know know what that thing was in the graveyard! You saw it.” what that thing was in the graveyard! You saw it.”