“Do you think they’re destroying it?”
“No. Dean would never waste food.”
“Surely you don’t think he’s eating it.”
“No, but he does do all the cooking…” After final good-byes, Claire ducked under the counter and headed for the back of the building. Rounding the corner into the kitchen, she stopped short. “What are you doing?”
Dropping a handful of pumpkin innards into a colander, Dean looked up and smiled. “We forgot to get one on Saturday so I went to the market this morning.”
“You’re carving a jack-o’-lantern? Have you forgotten what’s in the basement?”
“No, but…”
“Do you really think that, under the circumstances, it’s a good idea to attract children to the door?”
His face fell. His shoulders slumped. “I guess not. But what’ll we do with all the candy?”
“What candy?”
“All those bags of little chocolate bars and stuff we bought on Saturday.”
“There’s two bags less than there were,” Austin pointed out from his sunny spot on the dining room table.
“Two bags?” Dean stared aghast at Claire who glared at the cat.
“Tattletale.” Assuming there’d be no little visitors to the door, she’d also assumed the candy was for home consumption and acted accordingly. All right; perhaps a bit more than accordingly.
Sighing deeply, Dean stroked his hands down the sides of the pumpkin, fingers lingering over the dark orange curves. “I suppose I could do some baking. If I want to see the kids’ costumes, I guess I can go to Karen’s place tonight.”
It was honest disappointment in his voice. He wasn’t trying to manipulate her—regardless of how she might be responding. Claire couldn’t decide if that was part of his charm or really, really irritating. “All right I guess one jack-o’-lantern and a few candies can’t hurt.”
“Depends on how they’re inserted,” Austin observed.
“So you’re what they call a Keeper these days.” Her mother’s image in the mirror folded her arms over her chest. “Put the boy in danger just because you can’t bear to say no to him.” Red eyes narrowed. “I certainly hope you’re not feeling guilty for continually saying no to him on other fronts.”
Claire finished brushing her teeth and spit “What other fronts?”
“Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed his raging desires? His burning passion that only you can quench.”
“Did you just acquire another romance writer?”
“Go ahead, scoff. It’s no skin off my nose…” Skin disappeared off the entire face. “…if you break his heart.”
“Oh, give it up, I am not breaking his heart.” Dropping her toothbrush on the counter, Claire stomped from the bathroom.
The image lingered. “A mother knows,” it said with a lipless smile.
“Is it that you want me to be gone?” Jacques demanded, his edges flickering in and out of focus. “I thought you were happy to have me here, with you.”
Claire hadn’t intended to hurt the ghost’s feelings, but since feelings were pretty much all he was, she supposed it was inevitable. “All I said was that if you want to cross over, tonight would be a good night to go. The barriers between the physical world and the spiritual will be thin and…Austin!”
He looked up and drew his front leg back out of the rubber plant’s green plastic pot. “What?”
“You know what.”
“You’d think,” he muttered, stalking from the sitting room, his tail a defiant flag flicking back and forth, “that after seventeen years she’d trust me. Use a flowerpot just once and you’re branded for all nine lives.”
When the cat’s monologue of ill-usage faded, Claire turned her attention back to Jacques. “You’re stalled here,” she reminded him, “halfway between two worlds and, someday, you’ll have to move on.”
“Someday,” he repeated, his fingers tracing the curve of her cheek. “If I, as you say, move on, will you miss me, cherie?”
“You know I will.”
“Pour quoi?”
“Because I enjoy your company.”
“Not as you could.”
“What you seem to need is Jacques possessing Dean’s body.”
She shook the memory out of her head before Hell could comment but Jacques seemed to see something in her face that made him smile.
“Perhaps you desire me to leave because you are afraid of the feeling I make in you. Of the feeling I have for you.”
“Jacques, you’re dead. Only a Keeper can give you flesh, and I’m the only Keeper in your…” About to say, life, she paused and reconsidered. “…in your existence.”
“Then it is fate.”
“What is?”
“You and I.”
“Look, I just wanted to ask you if you wanted to move on; since you don’t I have things to do.” Pulling enough power to brush him out of the way if he didn’t move, she headed for the door.
He drifted aside to let her pass.
Fingers wrapped around the doorknob, she paused, expecting Jacques to put in one final plea for flesh. When he didn’t, she left the room feeling vaguely cheated.
“What’re you doing. Boss?”
Claire set the silver marking pen on the desk and worked the cramp out of her right hand. “I’m justifying tonight’s potential danger. Trying to be a Keeper in spite of the situation.” She nodded toward the huge wooden salad bowl half full of miniature chocolate bars, eyeball gum, and spider suckers. “Every piece of that candy has a rune written on the wrapper that’ll nullify anything bad the kids might pick up.”
“Like fruit and nuts instead of candy? Kidding,” he added hastily as Claire’s brows drew in. “I mean, I know there’s sickos out there and I think it’s great you’re doing something about it.”
“Thank you. Every time one of those sickos slips a doctored treat past street-proofing and parents, there’s another hole ripped in the fabric of the universe and, given the metaphysical baggage carried by this time of the year, anything could slip through. Early November is a busy season for the lineage.”
The chocolate bar he picked up looked ludicrously tiny as he tossed it from hand to hand. “Can I ask you something? Why don’t you stop them before the kids get hurt?”
“You mean why don’t we make everybody behave themselves instead of just cleaning up the mess once it’s over? My sister used to ask that all the time.” She’d stopped, but Claire suspected Diana still believed the world would be a better place if she were in charge. So did most teenagers; trouble was, Diana had power enough to take a shot at it “It’s that whole free-will thing; we’re no more allowed to make choices for people than you are. We’re just here to deal with the metaphysical consequences.”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“You can stand in the doorway and hand this stuff out.”
“I meant…”
“I know.” There were times, Claire reflected, when a facetious comment just wasn’t enough. “You’re good people, Dean. That helps strengthen the universe all by itself.”
“Kind of like moral Scotchgarding,” Austin told him, unfolding on one of the upper bookshelves. “Now could one of you, preferably the taller one, help me down.”
After the cat had settled on the monitor and Dean had returned to the kitchen to fetch the pumpkin, Claire tossed another chocolate bar into the bowl and said, “Thanks.”
“No problem. You were having an honest in-depth conversation, so I figured you’d soon run out of things to say.”
“You know…” She poked him with a sucker stick. “…you can be really irritating.”
“Only because I’m right.”
The candy hit the bowl with more force than necessary.
“I’m right again, aren’t I?”
“Shut up.”
Dusk settled over the city, the streetlights came on, and clumps of children, many with bored adults in tow, began moving from door to door.