Page 26 of Waysider
Holy shit, Cal thought. This girl could hear him. She was the real deal—a voyant.
His entire being felt like a live wire. Cal circled the table and knelt beside Laura, his eyes glued to her face. What if this thing had a time limit? What if what she’d said to the dead guy’s wife wasn’t total bullshit, and there was a weak connection between them? “I need your help,” he said urgently.
The voyant didn’t answer. Her spine was straight and stiff, and her gaze was fixed on the wall across from them. “Joseph wants your forgiveness,” she told Mrs. Leary.
“Joseph isn’t here, and his wife needs to move on, anyway,” Cal said.
Laura’s nostrils flared. “Stop it,” she muttered.
“Stop what? What is he doing?” Mrs. Leary demanded.
“My name is Cal Ryan,” Cal said, but Laura just turned to the woman next to her and said something soothing. She was ignoring him, damn it. Cal’s jaw clenched, and he scanned the room, helplessly looking for something—anything—he could use to make this medium acknowledge him. But of course there weren’t any magical, ghost-friendly items in sight.
In a burst of anger, Cal swiped at the candle in the center of the table. The stand toppled over, and the candle went flying from the force of his palm. It hit the floor with a thin sound, and the flame sputtered out.
Cal was frozen in shock, staring at the table, but Mrs. Leary’s shriek pierced the stillness. She scrabbled at her enormous purse as if her dead husband was about to snatch it out of her hands, and in her attempt to recoil, she tipped her chair back. Cal swore and reached for her, but his hands passed through. Laura cursed, too, as she launched from her chair.
The widow hit the floor with a thunderous crash.
“Mrs. Leary!” Laura cried, rushing to help the woman. Mrs. Leary jerked her arm away as if Laura were the devil himself, and scrambled to her feet. She flew over to the door and wrenched it open, still holding her purse in front of her like a shield.
“I’m burning your baseball collection too, you bastard!” she bellowed, then whirled and fled, closing the door behind her with a stark, wall-shaking slam.
The second Mrs. Leary was gone, Laura spun around. Her hands were clenched into fists.
“Damn it!” she hissed, glaring at the empty apartment. “That was my only client today. Thanks a lot.”
“I’m sorry,” Cal said, sounding anything but. “This is important.”
But this time, Laura didn’t seem to hear him. She stood there for another second or two, visibly stewing, then seemed to deflate. Sighing, she walked over to the small living area and started turning more lights on. Within seconds, the apartment was far more inviting. “Fucking spirits,” Cal heard her mutter.
“Then help me, and I won’t come here again,” he said.
No reaction again. Cal wondered if communicating with ghosts was like a radio—some of the stations fuzzy, the voices and music coming and going. Laura took off her robes and hung them on a coat rack near the door, revealing ragged clothes that looked like she’d been sleeping in before Mrs. Leary came, and she planned to go right back to bed now that the woman was gone. But Cal was just getting started. He’d found someone who could hear him, and he wasn’t leaving. Not until they actually got somewhere.
“I need to protect my family,” he pressed, following Laura to the kitchen. “They might be in danger, and I can’t just sit around and let something bad happen to them.”
The voyant paused with her fingers wrapped around the refrigerator door. Something about her expression made Cal’s pulse quicken again. She’d heard him, he knew she had. A second later, Laura confirmed it.
“Protection,” she murmured, still wearing that concentrated frown. “You’re seeking protection?”
“I’m seeking a person,” Cal said urgently. But Laura stood silently, her head tilted, as if she were still listening. Cal started to look for something to write with, then remembered for the millionth time that he was fucking dead. He couldn’t even pick up a pen. Frustration and desperation sliced through him. He was so close!
Fuck it, Cal thought.
Steeling himself, he squared his shoulders and walked right through Laura.
And as their bodies overlapped, he pictured the stranger who ruined his family’s lives.
Cal didn’t know his name, but he knew his features. He’d committed them to memory on the bridge, and he would never forget the exact moment—the boy reaching out, shoving Cass’s shoulders, and then his sister tipping back, back, back.
It had all happened in a split second. That night, Cal moved faster than he ever had in his life. When he’d jumped in after Cass, there hadn’t been any time to think about the people he loved or the things he would never get to do. He just saw their faces like the flashes of a camera. Mom. Dad. Cass. Gavin. Teresa.
And his. The asshole who did all this.
A soft gasp brought Cal back to the present. As he finished passing through Laura Stag, he realized he was seeing things in her mind, too. He had to be—these memories certainly didn’t belong to him. Cal had only meant to share the images in his own head, but he was still new at this. Fuck, Cal thought, grimacing as he invaded Laura Stag’s innermost thoughts.
He saw a woman’s body on a dirty kitchen floor, a needle sticking out of her arm.
