Good times.
She’d decided last night she wasn’t going to make her stay here on this plane easy for him. They weren’t going to be friends. They weren’t going to smile fondly over old times as they forged new ones. The further she pushed him away, the less likely he’d be interested in dragging her past out of her. “How sunshiny. My nights are all the same, thanks to you, you suck-ass. That translates to, I have no nights, and no days either. I don’t sleep. I don’t eat. I just drift. So thanks. Buttloads. If you hadn’t thought me up, I’d be off spreading my cheer and goodwill to a bunch of lame undecideds.”
“And unable to help Carlos.”
“I wouldn’t know Carlos existed if you hadn’t sucked me into this mess.”
“Then accept my deepest, most heartfelt apologies.”
Cocking an eyebrow, she tilted her chin up and gave him a haughty glare. “No.”
His wide shoulders shrugged affably. “Suit yourself. Right now I have bigger problems.” Pointing to the agitated ghost in the corner, Kellen ran a hand of frustration through his hair. “He’s been here for over an hour, dancing around, repeating something I can’t make head or tail of. I don’t even know who he is. The only thing I can pinpoint is he definitely has that John Travolta move down to a science.”
“That’s because you’re a child.” Marcella eyed the man and his outfit, a metallic copper shirt, open to his waist, tucked into tight, white pants.
“Compared to you, Methuselah, I suppose some might see it that way.”
She almost grinned—because this was familiar, welcome even. A warmth spread through her, but she managed to contain her smile of fond familiarity. “You really don’t know who that is?”
“Not a clue.”
“You know why that is, Kellen?”
“Why is that, Marcella?”
“Because you spend too much time watching the Golf Channel.”
“That’s not one hundred percent true. Sometimes I get cagey and watch entire marathons on the Food Network.”
“It’s Maurice Gibb. You know, the Bee Gees?”
“The who?”
Her sigh was put-upon. “The Bee Gees. ‘Stayin’ Alive’? You know, the aforementioned John Travolta?”
His handsome face was blank. Still beautiful, but blank.
“Forget it. Did you ever do anything fun, or did you spend all of your teenage years dissecting poor frogs and studying the Earth’s crust?”
The spot on the right side of his jaw began to pulse, meaning he’d begun to simmer. “Excuse me. I’m an assload of fun.”
“Do they tell you that at the senior citizens’ center?”
The twitch of his jaw came as fast as it went. His hard face relaxed again, and he slapped a placid mask on. “Every Wednesday at eight when I give my dissertation on global warming. You don’t know what you’re missing. Standing ovations as far as the eye can see.”
The giggle that fled her lips burst out before she could stop it. “Whatever. The Bee Gees were huge in the seventies. I’ll chalk up your not knowing that to your youth and the fact that you come from another dimension, where music and dancing are considered frivolous and the work of the devil. So let me see if I can figure out what he wants.”
“You go, Dancing Queen,” Kellen quipped, sweeping a hand in front of him to signify Maurice was all hers.
From a distance, she could see Maurice’s lips move fervently, but she couldn’t make out what he was saying while he jabbed a finger up in the air, then plunged it down to his waist to the music in his head. His copper shirt, unbuttoned to the waist, and his tight, white pants made Marcella grin. “Maybe he’d be able to communicate better if his pants weren’t so tight. It’s got to make it hard to think.” She sighed wistfully. She’d done her share of the Hustle in clubs all over New York back in the day. “I so miss platforms and picking out my hair.” She tugged a tendril, letting it curl around her finger.
Sauntering toward him, Marcella watched his lips move more closely. She gave him a saucy wink as he twirled. “So, Maurice. What brings you to our corner of this plane?”
When she caught his attention, Marcella couldn’t help but wonder at the look of relief on his face at seeing her. Maurice looked as though he’d been waiting on her forever by the way he threw his hands up in the air in a gesture that said “it’s about damned time.”
He gave her a sad gaze, filled with pity, and pointed a finger at her chest. “How can you mend a broken heart?”
Marcella clapped, pulling her hands to her chest with a smile. “That was a good one, but by far my favorite from that soundtrack has to be ‘More Than a Woman.’ In fact, I’d venture to say it could’ve been my theme song. I was quite the viper until just recently.”
Maurice shook his head in exasperation that bordered on angry. Once more, he pointed a finger that smacked of accusation. “Jive talkin’,” he spat out.
She experienced a jolt of defensiveness when he threw the song title out with such a bitterly harsh ring to it. “Hey! Don’t get all huffy with me, crooner. I’m just trying to help. You know, I was a big fan of the Bee Gees, and I had an übercrush on Andy. Don’t be so cranky.”
Kellen hovered near her ear, his lips but a fraction from touching the outer shell of it. “Well, Miss Sensitive and Nurturing, do you see what I’m up against? You don’t have the patience for this any more than I do.”
But then a thought hit her. She held up a finger to Kellen’s lips. “Wait. Maybe what he’s trying to tell us has nothing to do with him, and everything to do with what’s going on right now. I remember D telling me that while the whole thing with Clyde was going down, ghosts kept showing up and giving her clues that they didn’t realize pertained to Clyde’s predicament until later. So maybe what Joe was spewing—the monkey business thing—and whatever Maurice wants have to do with Carlos.”
Maurice began to jump up and down with a frantic gesture that made his comb-over flap.
“‘Tragedy’!”
The syllables echoed around the room, ominous, anxious, coming in stuttering waves.
Marcella blanched, barely able to find the words to speak. “There’s going to be a tragedy?” she squeaked. “With Carlos?”
His head bobbed up and down with furious jabs.
Fear clutched her heart. “I need more than that, Maurice. I need you to tell me what’s going to happen to Carlos. Who’s jive talkin’? For that matter, whose broken heart needs to mend?”
While Kellen grabbed a pen from the counter and scribbled the titles on a piece of stray paper, shoving it into the pocket of his jeans, Maurice’s image began to flutter.
“No, wait!” Marcella shouted, chasing after Maurice’s disappearing form. “Come back! God damn it, I’ll never watch
Saturday Night Fever
again if you don’t get your ass back here!” She stomped her foot when he slipped away completely. Kellen came to stand behind her, placing his warm hands on her shoulders with a reassuring touch. She so wanted to curl against him and sob in the shelter of his broad shoulder.
“We’ll figure it out, I promise,” he said, though he didn’t sound like he believed it. Pulling the paper back out of his pocket, Kellen ran his fingers over his wrinkled brow as he stared down at the song titles. They sprawled across the paper, menacing and ugly. Tragedy. What did it mean?
“Fuck. I don’t like the sound of this. I’m worried about Carlos.”
Marcella let go of a shuddering breath, wrapping her arms around her waist. “Me, too.”
Brushing a chunk of her hair over her shoulder, he asked, “Who’d have thought, Marcella Acosta?”
She didn’t like the sentimental tone to his voice or the way her heart went soft like room-temperature butter at his touch. “Thought what?”
“That you’d get so wrapped up in a frightened little boy.”
Certainly not her . . . She bristled. “Please. I’m not wrapped up. I’m involved by proxy and because you couldn’t help but be a pansy-ass where your sister’s concerned. I have nothing better to do with my time. God knows I can’t shop, so I may as well try to help Carlos.”
His pessimistic glance made her harden her eyes. “Right. I saw how indifferent you were to his snotty charms while you cooed at him over my shoulder all sweet and maternal. And that brings me to a question. How did you end up meeting Carlos? In the chaos, we never got around to establishing that.”
She shrugged her shoulders in what she hoped appeared as indifference, brushing his heated hands away as she did. “When you were kissing Delaney’s ass at her house and I disappeared—I ended up in Carlos’s bedroom. I have no idea how it happened. It seems I have no control when I’m sucked from one place to another. If only someone would suck me into the nearest designer boutique.”
“This means something, Marcella. So far you’ve only been summoned by someone with the gift of sight who’s been thinking about you.”
“I’d venture to guess Carlos wasn’t thinking about me in cheap lingerie,” she said dryly.
He gave her a shameless, lascivious smile. “Touché.”
She rolled her eyes. He was back to not biting again. “Then explain why a kid, one I don’t even know and never saw before a couple of days ago, is thinking me up.”
“I don’t know, but somehow you’re involved in this.”
“That brings me to why I’m here at the butt crack of dawn. Last night I hooked up with my contact again—”
“Who is this contact, Marcella?”
“If I told you, even with all the ghosts and demons that run amok in your life, you’d never believe it. Anyway, he said there’s some kind of box involved in this thing with Carlos and it’s bad.” Stopping there, she watched him assimilate the information. She couldn’t—
wouldn’t
—let herself speculate on this box until she had solid proof of its existence.
Kellen frowned. Leaning against the counter, he steepled his hands over his lips. “A box? Do you know what that means?”
The ringing of the phone saved her from answering his probing question. No one needed to panic until it was absolutely necessary.
After a brief conversation, he clicked the off button on the phone with a grimace. “That was Mrs. Ramirez.”
Instantly, fear clutched at her gut. “Is Carlos all right?” She knew her tone only verified his earlier statement, but she didn’t care. This strange pull, this odd connection to Carlos left her with no room to hide her emotions.
“He’s fine, but his mother’s in some serious shit.”
Marcella had never given thought to his mother. “His mother?”
“Mrs. Ramirez says she’s in jail. She asked if I’d watch Carlos for her so she can go bail her out.”
Jail? How could a sweet woman like Mrs. Ramirez have a daughter capable of landing in jail? “That poor kid,” she muttered. It wasn’t bad enough that the boogeyman was hot on his heels, but now his mother was locked up. “Did she say why his mother’s in jail?”
His face was grim with concern. “Solicitation of an undercover cop, and according to her, this is totally out of character. Mrs. Ramirez rambled on and on about what a good girl her Solana is—was.”
Good girls didn’t offer to wonk for cash. “Jesus. Is she bringing Carlos here?”
“Yeah. You wanna stick around?”
She couldn’t look at him for fear her eyes would give her away. Instead she let her eyes drift to the world globe Kellen had set out on the table in the story time area. “Are we baking cookies and finger painting? There’s nothing I love more than ruining a good manicure as I add ten unwanted pounds to my thighs while I amuse a child who surely has some icky diseases.” How’s that for maternal? In reality, there was nothing she wanted more than to hang around and just be near Carlos. See that he was safe. Protect him.
Gak.
“I was thinking maybe we’d do something fun like play Xbox 360 games. Maybe Guitar Hero or Rock Band. But what do I know about fun—me being such a snooze and all?” he teased.
“An assload of snooze,” she reminded him with a smirk.
Kellen chuckled over his shoulder, heading to the back of the store while Marcella fretted. Spending any more time with Carlos and Kellen than was necessary was treading on dangerous territory. Already this peculiar affinity for Carlos was burning a hole in her heart, and it frightened her far more than going back to Plane Dismal for eternity. What alarmed her even more was the possibility that she’d end up sucked back there and not be able to stay here and help. For all the good she was doing at this point.
The jingle of the bell on the door, and the sound of a harried Mrs. Ramirez rushing in with Carlos in tow, interrupted her worry.
Carlos, running behind his grandmother, backpack in tow, caught sight of her and gave her a shy smile.
And then her heart sang.
Jesus Christ on the crapper.
She gave him a little wiggle of her fingers and slipped behind the pair to listen to what Mrs. Ramirez said to Kellen. Kellen sent Carlos into the living room, where he’d set up the video game and told him to wait for him so they could rock out together.
When he turned to Mrs. Ramirez, he placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder and listened to her frantic explanation. Her dark hair, smattered with gray, usually so neat and tidy, flew in stray strands about her head. She clutched her large, multicolored purse to her chest like it was her lifeline. Her words shot from her mouth in chunks filled with anxiety. “I am so sorry, Meester Kellen. I don’t know what to do. My baby, she is a mess! This is
not
like my Solana. She
is
a good girl. But since Carlos’s father die, she never been de same.”
Kellen looked over her shoulder to catch Marcella’s gaze momentarily. Their questioning glance synchronized. “I had no idea Carlos’s father was dead. How long ago did it happen?”
Tears filled her large, almond-shaped eyes. “A year ago. He die in car accident. Ohhh,” she moaned, “it was so bad. So, so bad. My Solana, she cry and cry. Me and my husband tell her to come home from California. We help with Carlos while she work, but she no work. She always with the going out at night. She gone all the time. Poor Carlos, he so sad, and now, bad things happening with him, too. You see yesterday. You know, Meester Kellen, Carlos, he like you and Meess Delaney.”