Kiss & Hell (28 page)

Her mouth might have fallen open in astonishment if not for the fact that she had so much to say. “Have I mentioned what my life’s like, seeing dead people? Were you not present for the overall synopsis?”

Clyde’s head dipped. “I was there. I’m here now, and from my vantage point, I’m seeing someone who’s been rejected because of something she can’t control, and then decided it was much safer to stay at home with her dogs and Melinda Gordon than it was to take a risk.”

If only that was the entirety of her self-imposed isolation. It would be a much simpler explanation than the real reason. Sure, the medium thing was a difficult pill to try to make someone swallow, and that she’d given up on a relationship was just as well, because Satan’s threat to hurt anyone she came in contact with brought her more fear than telling someone she talked to the dead.

Delaney threw her hands up in the air in disbelief. “A risk? Risk? Did you smoke a bong when I wasn’t looking? Maybe hit my herbs and some paper towels for rolling? That’s not all this is, Clyde. This is about something much bigger than a risk.” A risk. Risk this, asshole. He had no idea what it was like to have to explain why and how lamps and dishes and a host of other objects had managed to become airborne without her moving a muscle. Or why she was in the coat closet, talking to fucking nothing. Risk
that
.

But Clyde wasn’t letting go. Yet he appeared neither angry nor even a little frustrated. His quiet urgency set the hairs on the back of her neck standing on end. “No, that’s exactly what it is. If you live the rest of your Friday nights at home on your bed with your dogs, watching
Ghost Whisperer
in that ratty bathrobe, it’s a much safer bet you won’t meet someone who thinks you’re a kook. It’s easier. But I’m here to tell you,
Ghost Whisperer
will be canceled someday. I know that offends your sensibilities, but even J-Love won’t be around forever. You can either replace it with some other show, or you can go out and get a life. Getting a life is a lot harder than finding something new to watch on TV. It’s work.”

She was aghast, but it didn’t keep her from defending her position. “When prospective dates think you’re crazy, when even the average female you meet at the gym finds out you think you see ghosts, shit changes. Save the speech.”

“Know what I did when you went to help that customer today while we were surfing the Net?” The smug look he gave her, right there in the middle of the sidewalk, said he’d found some fact about something he could throw at her like a fastball to back up his new life plan for her.

Delaney stuck her neck out while she shook her head. “No, Clyde, what did you do? Absorb a class in psychiatry at the speed of light so you could tell me what’s wrong with me?” She chose not to hide the sarcasm in her tone this time. In fact, she let it drip right off her words and into the space between them like puddles of melting hot chocolate on ice cream.

But he smiled wider. “Nope. I searched mediums, and forums for mediums. I’m laying bets there’s plenty of them out there. Mediums, that is. People who feel just like you do. People who have the same sorts of social problems you experience because ghosts show up at inopportune times. Don’t think you’re all that special, Delaney. You’re not the only woman with a burden to bear. Maybe you should get over yourself.”

Get over herself? Get. Over. Herself. Easy for him to say. Red flooded her cheeks and fire raced along her neck in a flush of color. “I never said I was special, demon. I said it was hard to meet people. And hey, Mr. Supernatural—why don’t you saunter up to someone and tell them you’re a real, live demon? See how well that goes down. And P.S., over ninety percent of those people you found online are all full of shit. I’ve seen some fruit loops in my time, and they don’t even see their own shadows, let alone the spirits.” She’d been to some of those forums and discovered the real shysters. She was accused of being one all the time, and yeah, it had put her off most of the human race. So the fuck what.

Clamping his hands on her shoulders, Clyde forced her to look him in the eye, and he wasn’t smiling anymore—he was intent. “Then that leaves ten percent who aren’t full of shit. Go figure. But you wouldn’t know that because you won’t even give it a chance. Why couldn’t one of those people be someone you spend some time with? Get to know. Have some goat cheese with? Get off your ass and try.”

“I hate goat cheese.” Which was a lovely defense and totally not true.

Clyde shook his head with a firm not-buying-it. “No, you hate
rejection
and the smallest hint of it. You don’t do it because it’s the looking for what you want that you don’t want to do. So let’s say you hook up with someone—or a hundred someones and they all call you a kook. You didn’t lose a limb—it won’t kill you. It’s just words, Delaney. You’re not afraid of words, are you? You call me enough of them. But what if there’s just one someone in that bunch who doesn’t think you’re a nut? Imagine that . . .

“This isn’t about me lying to you. This is about me giving you some hard truths from a perspective you have to admit is pretty damned accurate. It’s about indulging in the possibility you’ll end up alone, and not only letting it happen but wallowing in it. It’s so much safer, but look where alone got me. I can’t even find my cold, dead body, and I have no one who’s alive to do it for me. Some would say that’s pretty pathetic. Is that what you want?”

Her eyes rolled, and her mouth opened. “I want you to get off my ass and stop projecting your postmortem introspections about how insulated your life was on me. My life isn’t anything like yours.” She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from gearing up for a good smackdown. He was rubbing her raw, and it was pissing her the fuck off.

“Because my introspection’s too close to home?”

“Because it’s a retarded comparison.”

“Because it’s a comparison that’s relevant.”

She finally shrugged his hands off her shoulders with a shake. “Why do you care how I end up, Clyde? What goddamned difference does it make to you if I end up in a rocking chair at a state-run nursing home and die with the title Crazy Dog Lady?”

“Because I like you. When you like someone, you want good things for them. See? That was easy to say. Now you say it, too. I—like—you—Clyde.”

Poof, her anger was gone. Just like that, and the bubble of a giggle formed in her throat. “No.”

“Then at least admit it was hasty to call me a liar, and answer the question. Am I right when I say you’re afraid to be shot down?”

She giggled without thinking, her anger ebbing. “Look, this blank you’ve drawn—or
claim
you’ve drawn—is pretty suspicious. If you were me, what would you think?”

“That wasn’t the question. Don’t avoid the answer.”

The sigh she expelled was exaggerated and ragged. Cool air blew from her lips in a puff of irritation. “Fiiiine. I’m afraid I’ll get too attached to you because you understand me and my life and my stupid, traitorous dogs. But I’m also afraid to mistake those qualities for something more than what they are and what this is. It would be stupid of me to think that, just because you acknowledge I can see ghosts, you’re the missing half of me. So get the proverbial grip. We’re about as different as two people can be thus far. You shovel the most offensive crap into your body—dead or not. I’d rather die than drink a banana Slurpee. You’re passionate about percentages and the square root of five, and I’m passionate about herbal remedies and ghosts and dogs who have no homes and no one to love them.

“Okay? Yes, it’s damned hard to be rejected and called crazy. Yes, it’s hard to put yourself out there when you know most people think you’re a cracker. My shot at all the things Satan wants to see me trashed over lessens all the time. But my shot for those things isn’t any greater with you because you’re outta here in a couple of weeks. Yes, you get it—you get what goes on in the madness of my communication with the dead—but you don’t know me and I don’t really know you. Letting you in won’t make a difference one way or the other because a few weeks is hardly enough time to know someone.” Right?

“And you like me. Given the chance to spend some time with me, if you weren’t such a chicken, and we had more time, you’d do it.”

And? “But we don’t have more time.”

“Now who’s the logical one?”

When your heart’s at stake, logic can be your BFF. She’d had enough. Hurling the obvious in her face had become tired. “Aren’t we supposed to be eating?” She pushed off on her heel, turning to head down the sidewalk. Her fears were hers—kook that she was. Talking about them with Clyde would only mean she was allowing herself to be exposed. You didn’t do that with someone you’d never see again. There’d be no bonding over her supposed isolation.

He caught up to her, grabbing her hand once more. Against her will, her fingers curled into his. Clyde leaned down and chuckled in her ear. “Avoid, avoid, avoid. And if you’re taking me to one of those places that specialize in goat’s milk and seaweed, you’re dining alone. I’m up for a greasy cheeseburger or some pasta. How about you?”

There went the Souper Salad buffet. “Oh, definitely—color me all in. With a banana Slurpee on the side,” she scoffed, then mentally slapped herself. Clyde should be able to enjoy whatever the hell he wanted. She didn’t know if they had banana Slurpees where she hoped he was headed, or cheeseburgers or whatever, but if they didn’t, she had no right to deny him simple pleasures. “That was catty. Sorry. You should have whatever you want to have, as much of it as you want, before you . . .”

“Go.”

Jesus, he was all about the making his point tonight, wasn’t he? “Right. Go.”

“Something you don’t want me to do. Even if you did call me a liar.”

“I didn’t call you a liar.” Not out loud.

“Well, technically, no. You didn’t. But it’s what you were thinking. I’m still working on not being offended.”

“You do that. And while you’re at it, let’s go stuff your mouth and clog your arteries so you’ll have something to do besides psychoanalyze me and air my dirty laundry in a public forum—”

“Don Henley, 1982—”

She flicked a finger to his biceps. “If you don’t quit that, I’ll take you to my favorite organic restaurant and stuff some marinated burdock root down your throat, followed by some tofu hummus.”

His eyebrow raised in disdain. “Perish the thought.”

Delaney stopped outside of Ishmael’s all-night burger joint, the only one she knew of that was close by. “Aw, look. By-products and animal fat, Clyde. This must be the place.” She went to reach for the door, but Clyde’s big hand stopped her, swinging her around to face him. Her look of question turned to a hitch in her breath. His face was all hard planes, his eyes epitomized somber, and his vibe was once more urgent.

“Don’t grudge, Delaney. Don’t be angry because I’ve opened wounds you’d much rather slap Band-Aids on. Don’t. I get it now that I’m dead. I want you to get it before you are, too. I’m being very serious when I say that I like you. You have a razor-sharp tongue, and you’re too damned cute for your own good, but you’re also
alone
. Because I like you, and I can’t be here to do a proper job of it myself, I want you to have those things you want. I don’t want you to sit at home and hope it’ll find you.”

They had to lighten up or she’d be crying buckets of wasted tears. And what did “do a proper job of it himself” mean? “So are ya giving me permission to date other guys? Does this mean it’s over between us, Clyde? Are we”—she made quotation marks of her fingers—“seeing other people?”

Without warning, he pulled her into his embrace, jolting her senses. “Don’t make light. Just promise me you’ll give it a try when I’m gone.”

When he was gone.

That the words still stung after he’d said them for the hundredth time, that she was feeling even the slightest bit of dread for a lost soul who was by far going somewhere better than this, meant heartache would follow. Clyde belonged up yonder. Any suspicion she’d had earlier was gone. Ghosts had blank spots in their memories all the time. Demons probably could, too. Whatever was keeping Clyde from remembering who he’d done work for, she was ready to admit it had nothing to do with dishonesty.

That made him even more wildly appealing, and nothing scared her more. Clyde was right in his assessment of her life and the potential to become attached to something she just couldn’t have.

Scarier still.

“Sure, Clyde. I’ll give
www.mediumsaren’tbatshit.com
a shot just for you.” She turned to pull out of the arms that were feeling far too insistent, and way more secure than she was comfortable with.

Yet Clyde held fast. “Light.”

“Huh?”

“You’re making light. Stop. Just do it.”

Yeah, she’d do it, and while she was at it, she’d avoid any more sexual healing in the process.

Marvin Gaye, 1982 . . .

Oh, Hell’s bells.

She’d caught the disease known as Clyde.

The only cure was to get him out of here and off to higher ground.

Pronto.

fifteen

Mistake number one—putting something as undeniably romantic on her CD player as Michael Bublé while she packed.