Incorporeal (19 page)

“
I must have dropped it out of my purse when I was getting my phone. I tried to call someone for help when I got off the bus in Vallejo, but the battery was dead.” Sara opened her eyes and propped herself up on her elbows. “Who is he, detective? Who is he really?”

Detective Flannery patted her shoulder. She knew he was trying to comfort her. “Let’s get you checked out first and then we’ll talk.”

There’s your answer
. “What about Nathan? He doesn’t have any family.”

The detective sighed. “We’ll talk about that too. You need to go now.”

Two EMTs pushed her toward the back of an open ambulance. “Detective Flannery,” Sara called out. “I know one more thing about Nathan de Manua.”

The detective turned around. “What’s that?”

“
He’s Jewish. He, the body, he would want to be buried quickly.”
And he shouldn’t have an autopsy, but I guess since he’s been dead for over five hundred years, it doesn’t matter
.
I guess nothing matters.

“
Sara,” Dalton yelled, jogging toward her car. “I’m coming with you. I’ll follow the ambulance.”

Chapter Fourteen

Sara lay on a narrow bed in the Emergency Room of her local hospital. If someone said, stick out your arm, she stuck out her arm. If someone asked for her insurance number, she gave them the number. When Dalton asked her if she wanted anything to drink, Sara dutifully nodded her head. She had no idea what Dalton brought her. When she sipped, the beverage had no taste.

Maybe it’s incorporeal, like Nathan. No, never, not like Nathan. He was never incorporeal like that. He had substance from the moment he appeared in my shower.

“
Dalton, I want to go home.” Sara turned to look at her friend. “I want to go home. Tell them.”

Dalton has a funny expression on her face. She seems worried about something. Oh yeah, me and two dead guys and almost getting her throat slit
.
Guess that’s more than enough to worry her
.

“
You can’t go home, honey.” Dalton rubbed her arm. “It’s a, it’s a crime scene. The police won’t let you back in.”

“
I don’t care. I want to go home. I want to take a shower in my own shower. Where are my clothes?” Sara kicked the blanket off and sat on the edge of the bed.
There’s something stuck to my arm
. She raised her arm to get a better view.
It’s an IV. When did they start an IV?

“
Miss Wise, your friend is right. You can’t go home.” Detective Flannery stepped into the cubicle. “If you make a list, I’ll have one of my men get whatever you need.”

I need Nathan
. “I don’t need anything. I just want to go home.”

The detective rocked back and forth in squeaky shoes. “I know this is difficult for you. I wish there was some way to make it easier, but to be honest, there isn’t. It’ll only be for a few days.”

“
A few days?”

“
Yes, we should be finished with our work in a few days.” Sara saw him exchange glances with Dalton.

Dalton patted her knee. “Sara, I’m going to step out with the detective. I think he has more questions for me. Will you be okay?”

Sara nodded.

As the detective and Dalton exited the cubicle, the ER doctor slid past them. “Miss Wise? How are you feeling?”

“
Like I want to go home,” said Sara.

He gave her a nod of sympathy. “Sorry, can’t help you with that, but I do have the results of your tests. I know why you passed out, and it wasn’t just because of the, uh, because of your experience this morning.”

Sara scooted back a little on the narrow bed and ordered herself to pay attention. “Tests? You did tests?”

The doctor blinked a few times. He sat down at the foot of the bed. When he spoke, Sara heard sympathy in his voice, despite the strained look on his face. “Yes, don’t you remember? We started an IV and we drew some blood. You signed the consents when the EMTs brought you in.”

“
Oh.” Sara shook her head, trying to hold onto a clear thought.
What did he say? I passed out for a reason? Aside from the obvious, I mean?
“Oh,” she repeated. “Why did I faint?”

“
Well, I imagine stress had a great deal to do with it, but since the rest of your blood work is very normal, I’m assuming you felt lightheaded because you’re pregnant.”

Sara stared into his eyes, wondering if she’d heard him correctly. “You didn’t just say I’m pregnant, did you?”

“
Yes, Miss Wise, that’s exactly what I said. You are pregnant.”

“
Oh my god, that’s a riot.” Sara laughed. She couldn’t help it. The very idea was absurd. When she could speak again, she said, “I’m not. Doctor, what is your name? You’re as crazy as I am. I am not pregnant. It’s impossible. I can’t be pregnant.”

“
I’m Dr. Edwards, Miss Wise. Don’t you remember? We spoke extensively when you came in.”

Sara shook her head. “Well, Dr. Edwards, I can’t be pregnant.”

“
You seem like a very healthy young woman. I imagine you’ve used birth control, but there’s no perfect form of birth control, aside from sterilization, and this blood test is about as definitive a test as we have. Of course you’ll need to follow up with an obstetrician.”

Sara waved him off with a snort. “You don’t understand. You couldn’t possibly understand. I cannot be pregnant. It would go against everything you know about the laws of nature. Wait, no, the laws of physics; no quantum mechanics. No, I’m wrong, all the laws of science and religion.”

The doctor shot her a look she couldn’t mistake.
He’s wondering if he should sedate me
.

“
Are you telling me you can’t be pregnant because you haven’t had sexual intercourse?” he asked.

“
Hell no, Dr. Edwards, that man, that,” she sucked in a breath, “dead man lying on a slab in the coroner’s office, he’s been fucking my brains out. But, but…” Sara couldn’t finish her sentence. Burying her face in her hands, she said, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t hear anymore. I can’t see anymore. I can’t think anymore. Let me go home, please, that’s all I want to do.” She raised her head and her arm. “Take this out, please, take this IV out and discharge me, or I’ll take it out myself and walk home.”

The doctor rose to his feet. “I’ll get the nurse and we’ll arrange to discharge you, but the detective won’t let you go home. And I recommend you see an obstetrician as soon as possible. Miss Wise?”

“
Yes?”

“
I’m sorry about all of this.”

Sara tried her best to shape her mouth into a semblance of a smile. “Thank you.”
Me too
.

Chapter Fifteen

“
Do you want to talk about him, honey?”

Sara kept her face turned to the wall. The bed in Dalton’s guest room was bloody uncomfortable. The hard mattress hurt her hips. “No.”

“
You know, there’s going to come a time when you’ll need to talk about him and about what happened.”

“
No there won’t.”

“
Sara,” Dalton’s voice rose.
Good, she’s irritated. She’ll leave the room and I can nurse my wounds in private
. “Sara, you’re having his baby for god’s sake. You’re going to have to talk about him. At the very least, you’re going to have to tell his child about him. He saved your life. He saved my life. That’s not something you can skip over.”

Sara’s eyes filled with tears, again.
Christ, how can one human being make so damn many tears? Gee, Sara, I don’t know. How can one human being die more than once?
She mashed her face into the pillow, willing Dalton to go away.

“
Geri’s here. She wants to see how you’re doing.”

Sara mumbled into the pillow. “I don’t want to see her.”

“
She says she has some news that might cheer you up, news about your books.”

“
Fuck the books.”

“
For crying out loud.” The bed shifted as Dalton rose to her feet. “I didn’t want to do this, but you leave me no choice.” She grabbed Sara by the shoulder and flipped her over. “You have been lying in this bed for ten solid days. You’ve barely spoken, eaten next to nothing. You haven’t even showered. You’re acting like a selfish pig. I almost got killed too, you know.”

Sara stared up into Dalton’s stricken face. She saw tears fill her friend’s eyes. They spilled over her thick lashes.

“
Don’t you think I blame myself every single minute of every single day for the fact that the man you love, the father of your child, is dead?” Dalton swiped at her wet cheeks. “How do you think that feels? Could you get off your ass and give me a little support? I need a friend too, you know.”

“
Oh Dalton, come here.” Sara opened her arms and Dalton fell into them. The two cried together for a long time, buried beneath a twisted mass of wrinkled sheets and blankets.

When at last they both lay quiet, Sara pushed the tangled hair from her eyes. “I’m sorry.” Her voice was quiet, but even. “I have been a selfish pig. I know this hasn’t been easy for you. None of this is easy. It’s just that; oh Dalton, I don’t know how I can go on without him.”

“
You carry his child,” Dalton said, stroking Sara’s wet cheek. “You have no choice.”

“
But it doesn’t seem real,” Sara whispered, placing a hand over her belly.

Dalton smiled. “It will be real in six months or so, if the ultra-sound is accurate.”

Sara turned onto her back and stared at the ceiling. “Dalton, you know when we read a love story, we always want an HEA, a Happily Ever After?”

“
Yeah?”

She looked at her friend. “The publisher I met with that night, the night that started this all, well, she was right. There is no HEA when the hero’s a ghost.”

Dalton rose up on an elbow. She leaned over Sara, covering Sara’s hand with her own. “Oh no, Sara, this is far more than an HEA, this is a miracle. He’s given you a miracle. Don’t you see it? Nathan, your beloved five hundred year old ghost, will live on through this child. He gets to live again, but this time, no Inquisitors will come. Nobody is going to harm his child. Can’t you see that? Are you blind to the gift you’ve been given?”

Sara chewed on her lower lip. “Nathan always said I was the gift, but I thought he was. That’s what his name means, you know, God has given.” Sara smiled through her tears. “I should never have told you the truth. Now I won’t hear the end of it. I didn’t expect you to believe me.”

“
Are you kidding?” Dalton teased. “I always knew there was something weird about you. The fact that you can see and hear ghosts comes as no great shock. I have read your manuscripts, remember?”

“
Seeing and hearing ghosts are very different than falling in love with one.”

A dreamy expression came over Dalton’s face. “I don’t think Nathan was a ghost.”

Sara sat up, scooting back to rest against the headboard. “He had to be a ghost. What else could he have been?”

Dalton shrugged. “I don’t know. What did he think he was?”

“
He couldn’t explain his existence any better than you can.”

“
I think when you’re dealing with the numinous,” Dalton reached over to tuck a thick strand of hair behind Sara’s ear, “there are no hard and fast explanations. This baby is a miracle and you are this miracle baby’s mommy. Maybe it’s time you started to act like it.”

***

“
Thank you for coming.” Sara shook Detective Flannery’s hand. “I’m afraid there aren’t many of us.”

Sara, her friends Dalton and Geri, and Detective Flannery, stood in the rain, watching as Nathan’s simple pine casket was lowered into the muddy ground.

“
You’re welcome,” the detective said. “It’s good of you to do this for him.”

Sara looked up. The cold rain struck her full in the face, but she didn’t mind. The only reason she was here to feel the rain was because of Nathan. The dignity of a decent burial was the least she could do for him, rain or shine.

He hadn’t been given that before. He’d said he couldn’t remember his death, but Sara had spent many sleepless nights, imagining his ravaged body thrown into a pauper’s unmarked grave. She shuddered. Yes, this was the least she could do. In accordance with Jewish law, in a year she’d have a stone set and she could bring his child to visit the grave.
Not just his child, Sara, your child too. The two of you made this baby
.

Sara’s hand went to her belly. She found herself doing that a lot lately. After initially losing weight, she was beginning to show. Only last week, she’d heard the heartbeat. Dalton had accompanied her on that visit. The next visit she’d go on her own. She needed to be strong, to honor Nathan’s memory, strong for this child.

“
I’m sorry it took so long to release the body, but we had to be certain there were no next of kin.”

“
It’s all right, detective. His release was out of your control.”
As his death was out of mine. Nathan knew all along. He knew what would happen when he came to me.
“I guess I’m surprised that…” Her voice broke. Detective Flannery waited for her to finish. She couldn’t.
What do I say? I’m surprised he left the body behind?
“Sorry. I lost my train of thought. It happens a lot these days.”