Page 155 of The Ghost and the Graveyard (Knight Games 1)
"-this month's JAMA research seems to indicate..." Dr. Wellington droned on and on, motioning for me to follow him as he walked.
I complied, hoping to steer him away from the gurney and Logan. I knew better than to try to stop him. Dr. Wellington would not take a breath until his entire thought was aired in a verbal string of logic and statistics. I followed along until we stopped in front of the emergency room doors.
"So what do you think?" he asked me. I had no idea what he'd said.
"I think you are absolutely right about that. Insightful as ever, Doctor."
"Good. Then you'll help me chair a cross-disciplinary committee to make the change?"
"Um, sure," I said. Surely there was a spell in the Book of Light that would erase this conversation from Dr. Wellington's memory. I hoped.
He gave a little nod and disappeared into the emergency department. I raced back to where I had left Logan, but Michelle was gone, as was the gurney. As fast as I could walk without drawing attention to myself, I moved out the doors into the back lot and toward the ambulance. I hoped Michelle had made it without me, but the vehicle was dark and quiet. I looked in the window and saw the keys were in it.
"Psst," Michelle's voice came from the back. "Get in. You need to drive so I can stay back here with Logan."
I climbed behind the wheel and took off for home.
I've always loved sunsets, especially the orangey-pink ones that happen low in the sky on a cool fall night. But as I raced for home, I cursed the setting star that would without a doubt reach the horizon before we reached Logan. I sent up a silent prayer that Logan would wait to decide his fate, that he would resist Rick's spell.
Then I yelled to Logan in the back, just in case some part of his subconscious got through to his soul. "Logan, if you can hear me, don't choose. Please don't choose."
By the time I reached home, the sun was completely behind the horizon. I tore through the front door. Logan's ghost hovered over a bowl of blood in the foyer. Rick, in some kind of a trance, chanted in front of the circle of bones.
I did what any woman would have done. I slid, screaming, across the wood, crashing into the skulls and pushing the bowl out from under Logan. To be honest, I had no idea what the consequences of my actions would be. I could have forced him on right then.
But whether by magic or fate, I got lucky.
For The Best
"Grateful, what is going on?" Logan's molecules separated and rejoined. "This A-hole says you agreed to this."
"We did agree. Explain yourself, mi cielo." Rick pointed at the spilled blood on the floor.
"You stay out of this, dirt jockey." Logan turned, pointing a finger in Rick's direction. "Do you know what this bastard almost did to me? I might have never seen you again!"
"It was for the best." Rick spread his hands.
"Logan, I..." My eyes drifted from his.
"You knew, Grateful? How could you agree to this?" Logan's voice blasted at me, shaking the walls and making the hanging pots in the kitchen clink together.
"I didn't want you to spend eternity forgetting yourself in my attic," I yelled. "I thought it was for the best."
"Why did you stop me?" Rick asked. "Have you changed your mind?"
"Of course she's changed her mind! Grateful and I have something. She wouldn't do this to me." Logan's orb form floated closer to my face.
"Actually, Logan, it would have been for the best if I hadn't found what I did."
"What did you find?" Logan and Rick asked in unison.
I walked to the door and opened it for Michelle, helping the gurney's wheels over the threshold. Logan floated over to his body, and Rick stepped closer. After a moment of awestruck silence, Rick jerked.
Logan took longer. He hovered over his body until I wondered if I'd caused some type of metaphysical shock. Eventually, he reformed in front of me, looking like a younger, healthier Logan than the body on the gurney. With a glance toward Rick, he nodded in my direction and said, "Can you put me back in?"
"I hope so. I don't know yet. I need to check the book."
"Can I suggest we move Logan's body to the attic and get cookin'?" Michelle said. "I mean, we do need to sneak Logan back into the hospital tonight if this works. He's already been gone a long time for a CT scan."
