Good Will Ghost Hunting: Demon Seed [Good Will Ghost Hunting 1] (Siren Publishing Classic) (30 page)

Kal had to hide her laughter behind a coughing fit. They had
no
idea how accurate that statement truly was.

Her mother still had some gumption left in her. “He’s a TV show host. Frankly, from what I’ve seen of his show, he does more debunking than anything. I might be a little upset if she was involved with that other guy, what’s his name, Aidan. He’s handsome, but he looks like a flake.”

Kal faked another sudden coughing fit. Again, they had no idea.

Her father’s turn to be shocked. “You watch it? How can you dare watch that…that…filth! I forbid it!”

“Because our daughter is the producer, that’s why. You won’t forbid me to do anything, Kenneth Martin. I know which foot you put in your pants first every morning, and let me tell you something else”—she stepped forward, forcing her husband back a step—“you will quit harassing Kal about Jeff and coming home. She doesn’t want to come home, and she doesn’t want Jeff. Drop it.”

Nope, definitely “jaw on the floor” time. Both Kal and her father were shocked into silence. Her father recovered first. He turned on her and glared as he rubbed his forehead.

“Well, I hope you’re happy, young lady. You’ve managed to turn my own wife against me and set her feet on the Devil’s path! You’re getting a real kick out of defying us, aren’t you? I swear, you’d think you hate us to defy us like this.”

With the focus back on her, Kal couldn’t take it. “I’m sorry, Daddy. I’d love to stay and listen to this, but I can’t. I’ve got to go to work, we’re shooting tonight. Closed set, sorry, you can’t come.” God would
definitely
forgive her that lie, for sure. It was lie or commit murder, no matter how justifiable. She grabbed her purse, keys, and cell phone before he could argue. “I’ll see you in the morning, maybe before noon, but no promises.” She stormed out the door and to her car, driving away before he could run after her.

Her cell rang almost immediately, her father’s number appearing on the display. She shut it off.

Around the corner from her apartment complex, a large shopping center lay deserted at that time of night. Kal pulled in and, with her head resting on the steering wheel, she sobbed.

She couldn’t call out to Will. Not after she’d made such an ass of herself.

And she couldn’t bear the thought of spending the night working alone at the office. It was tempting to call out to Ryan, but for some reason that didn’t feel quite right either. Not as upset as she felt.

She closed her eyes. “Aidan, please,
appareo,
” she whispered.

He instantly appeared in the passenger seat. He wore a concerned look. When he saw she’d been crying, he opened his arms. “Aw, sweetie. Come here.”

She fell against him and sobbed. He stroked her back and let her get it out of her system. After fifteen minutes of bawling like a baby, she sat up and wiped her eyes. “Thanks, Aidan. I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”

He squeezed her hand. “No, sweet cheeks. I was just watching
Stargate
reruns.” At least this time he was dressed in more than his boxers. “Want to tell me what happened?”

With her breath still hitching in her throat, Kal managed to sob out the story to him, crying again at the end. He opened his door, got out, and walked around to the driver side.

“C’mon—out. Switch. You’re in no shape to drive, sweetie. I’ll take us back to my place and we’ll drown our sorrows in a couple of pints of Cherry Garcia ice cream.”

No urging for her to call out to Will, no comments about her parents. Just comfort.

“I wish you weren’t gay sometimes.”

He laughed as he adjusted the seat so his knees weren’t jammed against the steering wheel. “Why’s that, babe? If I wasn’t gay, we couldn’t critique guys together at lunch now, could we?” He looked at her. “You certainly wouldn’t be comfortable curling up on the couch with me and crying on my shoulder.”

“Maybe we’d be hooked up.”

He laughed, shaking his head. “Naw, you’d be trying to toss out all my shirts, honey. I love you to death, but I couldn’t have you doing that now, could I?”

She laughed again even though she still sniffled. They rode to his house in comfortable silence. As promised, they curled on the couch together under a blanket with pints of ice cream and two spoons in front of the TV.

Aidan made sure Kal didn’t see him grab his cell phone when he excused himself to the bathroom.

He took a deep breath, turned on the sink so the sound would help mask his voice, and called Ryan.

“And to what do I owe this unexpected call?”

“Cut the crap,” Aidan whispered. “I need a favor.”

Ryan hesitated. “What? What’s wrong? Why are you whispering?”

“Shut up. Call Will, tell him Kal’s safe at my place, and to not show up.”

“Why are you phoning me?”

“Because I don’t know if Kal can hear my thoughts if I do it the other way and try to tell Will myself mentally,” he whispered, hoping she couldn’t hear his voice from the bathroom.

“Why don’t you call him yourself?”

“Because if I call him, he’ll show up here. If he shows up in my house, even if he doesn’t talk to her, she’ll feel him appear and it’ll really piss her off. She had a fight with her parents and a fight with Will tonight and she’s pretty upset. She needs some time to chill. I just don’t want him worried about her. We’re wiping out my ice cream reserves and watching TV.”

Ryan sighed. “Fine. I won’t tell him where she is though, because trust me, if he feels she’s that upset, he will show up. You should know that.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

When Aidan hung up, he touched his amulet and muttered a spell, hopefully locking them in. Will was so much stronger than him. He didn’t know if it would keep his cousin out any more than a “do not disturb” sign on a hotel door could keep out housekeeping.

Aidan shut off the sink and rejoined Kal on the couch. They’d polished off the Cherry Garcia and were working on his last pint of Chunky Monkey. He’d have to make another ice cream run at this rate.

“You okay, sweet cheeks?”

She didn’t look okay, but she nodded. “I’ll be all right.”

“Not to sound like an asshole, but why not let Will handle your parents?”

She shook her head. “I can’t let him fight this battle for me. It’s not fair to him.”

“Unfair would be making him do something he didn’t want to do. Believe me, a chance to stand up for you, he’d jump at it.”

“If I can’t stand up to my father, how am I supposed to survive against whatever gets tossed at us?”

“Sweetie, you won’t ever be put in the line of fire, trust me. You don’t have to stand up to anyone you don’t want to. You’ve got all of us ready to fight for you. Even the shit weasel.”

Kal smiled. Despite everything, she’d decided she liked Ryan. He was a lot deeper than he let on. While she didn’t agree with his methods, she could agree with his rationale that he had a job to do and had to protect those he was responsible for. And she respected him for it. She wouldn’t ever admit it to Aidan or the others, though.

And if it wasn’t for Ryan, she wouldn’t have Will.

* * * *

Will felt the call. At first he fought it, then gave in and appeared in Ryan’s Atlanta living room. Ryan looked like he’d been sleeping, his hair mussed, wearing pajama pants and nothing else.

“What do you want?” Will growled. He was in a foul mood from his fight with Kal, and now he wasn’t even sure where she’d disappeared to. She’d been home. Then when he checked later she was gone. Not just from home, but totally off his radar. He could sense she was safe, but not where she was. He didn’t know if it meant he was having some sort of power fluctuation or something else that he didn’t want to contemplate. It would take him a few more weeks at least to completely return to his previous strength, and it worried him that he couldn’t pinpoint her location. As pissed as she was, he didn’t dare show up at her apartment. She wasn’t answering her cell phone either. His only comfort was he knew she wasn’t in trouble. That much he could sense. Wherever she was, she was safe.

“Calm down, Will. I’ve been asked to pass a message.”

“From who?”

“Whom. None of your business. Kal’s fine. She’s safe.”

Will fought the urge to choke the information out of Ryan. “Where is she? Who’s she with?”

“If I tell you that, you’ll go charging in there and make matters worse, trust me. She needs time to decompress. Apparently she had a rather large row with her parents, and then on top of whatever lovers’ squabble the two of you had, she didn’t feel she could call you.”

Guilt overwhelmed him.
She couldn’t call me?
“Who’d she call?”

* * * *

“Doesn’t matter,” Ryan said. “No, it wasn’t me, I’m simply the messenger. She’s safe, and she’ll stay safe until the two of you settle this one way or another. Not that I imagine there will be more than one way to settle it, but whatever it is, it’ll work out. The party in question asked me to let you know she’s safe and secure.”

“Is she with Aidan?”

He shook his head. “I’m not saying where she’s at.”

“Swear to me she’s safe.”

Ryan nodded, suddenly wide awake. “I swear to you she’s safe, and I swear to you she’ll stay safe. You have my word.”

Will slumped on Ryan’s couch. “Okay. Thank you.”

“Go home. Try calling her in the morning. Apologize for whatever happened and kiss and make up.” He witnessed Will’s sorrow and choked back his own emotions. When Ryan next spoke, he kept his voice low and soft to mask his feelings. “I’ll make sure she’s taken care of, Will. I promise. Let her have this time to de-stress a little. She’s overwhelmed. Frankly, I’m surprised she’s gone this long without some sort of breakdown. Go home.”

Will nodded and disappeared.

Ryan sighed and rubbed a hand through his hair. Obviously he wasn’t getting any sleep tonight. He changed into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, then made a quick stop at the local grocery store. He sensed Aidan’s barrier, and while he knew he could bypass it, that would be rude.

He appeared at Aidan’s front door and knocked.

A startled Aidan opened the door. Ryan walked in and held up the plastic grocery bag. “Is this where the pity party’s being held? I brought chocolate chip cookie dough, pistachio, and butter pecan. Where are the spoons?”

They’d been Abby’s three favorite flavors. If Aidan remembered, he didn’t let on.

Kal’s startled look transformed to a broad beaming smile. Ryan stilled the lurch his heart took. That look had been for
him
and no one else.

He would cherish the image of her smile forever.

Okay, maybe it had been for the ice cream more than anything, but still…

Will, you’re a truly blessed bastard and you have no idea,
Ryan thought.
You’re lucky I’m a dedicated company man.

“Thanks, Ryan,” Kal said as she gave him a one-armed hug so she wouldn’t drop her spoon. She scooted over to give Ryan room to sit on her other side.

Ryan settled next to Kal on the couch while Aidan brought another spoon. The three watched TV until she fell into an ice cream-stupor-induced sleep after midnight, snuggled against Ryan, with her feet in Aidan’s lap.

Aidan carefully extricated himself and put what little was left of the ice cream in the freezer, then returned to the couch.

Aidan didn’t want to wake Kal and assumed she couldn’t hear their thoughts while she was sleeping.
“Why are you here, Ryan? Did you talk to Will?”

“I did. And no, I didn’t tell him she’s with you. I swore to him she’d stay safe.”

“You don’t trust me to take care of her?”

“Of course I do, but you have to sleep sometime. If anything happened to her, he’d kill you and me both, you know that.”
They watched Kal sleeping between them.
“What happened, Aidan?”
Aidan related as much of the story as he knew. Ryan sighed.
“Well, she’s right that she has to learn to stand on her own feet in some matters. The stronger she can be in that way, the more it will help her in life.”

She rolled over in their laps, onto her side, her face snuggled against Ryan’s stomach.

* * * *

Aidan felt a wall go up in Ryan’s mind. He looked at the man. Ryan’s hand hovered inches over her head, not touching, as if he wanted to stroke her hair yet didn’t dare to.

Aidan’s mind flashed back to a night when Chloe was alive and he’d once watched this almost identical tableau play out, then slammed the door on his memory. No. Not now. He couldn’t think of her now. It was too painful.

Ryan’s eyes bored into his.
“Never tell her, Aidan. She must never know she was Abby.”

Aidan nodded, understanding. He’d quit trying to figure Ryan out centuries ago. He knew from their long history together that there was more to the asshole than met the eye, even if Aidan usually thought he
was
an asshole.

I’ll never understand what Chloe saw in him,
Aidan thought, then pushed that memory back in its closet, too. It did no good going there, especially now. Then again, from the way Ryan had tried gently coaxing Kal out of her funk, maybe that was one of the things Chloe had seen in him.

Kal started to dream and softly moaned, murmuring.

Ryan studied her face.
“Aidan, remove the barrier.”

“What?”

“Do it! Now!”

He did. Just then in her sleep, Kal cried out, “Will,
appareo!
”

Will immediately appeared in the living room and both men frantically waved at him, warning him to stay silent.

He glared at Ryan. When Will realized Kal was asleep, his face softened. The other two men witnessed his obvious anguish.