He burrowed his head in her hand and her heart clenched. They’d been together a long time—almost as long as she and Darwin before he’d left this plane.
Setting down their food bowls, Delaney rinsed their water cooler out and threw the Tupperware filled with leftover Hamburger Helper in the microwave. Checking the time, she encouraged them to chow down. She’d already missed almost ten minutes of Ghost Whisperer. “Dogs! Hurry up, would ya? Melinda and her über hawt hubby await.”
Running a tired hand over her scalp, she massaged the back of her neck, heading back to her bedroom, situated just off the kitchen. The only saving grace for today was the anticipation that filled her at the thought of climbing into her king-sized bed. Her one and only luxury—a luxury she’d splurged on at a high-end thrift store so her puppies could sleep with her. Which some might call obsessive, but whatevs.
She was in her tiny adjoining bathroom, pulling on her nightgown, when she heard the sound of voices, familiar as old friends, drift to her ears.
“You know, I’ve been watching this Ghost Whisperer, and I have to tell you, you’re nothing like Melinda Gordon. You’re kinda cranky. She seems much less irritable than you.”
How lovely. He was baaaaack.
Very Poltergeist.
“Yeah?” she called out, digging in her hamper for her bathrobe. “Well, that’s because her paycheck’s a whole lot bigger than mine. Not to mention, she has cuter clothes.”
“I’d definitely have to agree that what she puts in those clothes is very cute.”
How quaint—even from the grave, men lusted for Jennifer Love Hewitt. She continued rooting in her hamper, hoping against hope he’d go the frig away. Where the hell was her bathrobe? How could she watch Ghost Whisperer without her crappy, moth-eaten, comfortable bathrobe? It was what Friday nights were all about at Chez Markham. Her pink bathrobe, a bowl of leftover Thursday night Hamburger Helper, her puppies sprawled out on her bed, and Ghost Whisperer. In that particular order, damn it.
Delaney poked a head around the corner of her bathroom to find the voice in her head had become a big man, lying casually in the middle of her bed in a pink-bathrobe-clad lump.
Her pink bathrobe.
Which was now semicovered in puppies.
Light and breezy. That was the goal here. Try not to overreact to his materialization. Or react at all, if it could be helped. Ghosts had uncanny senses, and if their intent was malevolent because of the chaos they were experiencing over being in limbo, you couldn’t let ’em see you sweat. It also took a good deal of patience to figure out what they wanted you to do, because most times, they were as confused as you were by their presence. But he’d tried her patience. So if he wanted her help, it was going to be on her terms, and her terms included waiting until she was good and goddamned ready to help him do whatever it was he needed her to do for him. Which was as yet to be determined. He didn’t seem terribly needy in the way most spirits were, though. “Pink is so not you,” she remarked dryly.
He lifted the collar of her robe with tapered fingers and smiled. “You don’t think?”
She shook her head, sticking her hand out. “I don’t think. Now give it to me. My Friday night’s fucked enough—don’t screw with my chi by taking the only thing I have left.”
He eyed her warily with indigo blue eyes shielded by square dark-rimmed glasses. “But I’m naked.”
“So I’m guessing you died while you were boffing, then?” Most ghosts who showed up in the buff were wonking someone when they kicked the bucket. Definitely a nice way to leave this plane, but not so much if you had unfinished business and had to return.
“What is boffing?”
For real? Her eyebrows shot upward in surprise. “You know . . . uh, having sex.”
His full lower lip curled upward. “No. I wasn’t having sex when I died.”
“Then why are you naked?”
“Had I an explanation, don’t you think I’d give you one?”
“The only thing you’ve given me so far is agita.” Delaney crossed her arms over her chest to hide the filmy nightgown she wore.
He grinned again, playfully, as if being stuck between two planes was no big thang. He wasn’t even a little frantic, she noted. Absently, he reached out to stroke a random dog’s head. “Again, this is me apologizing to you.”
“Forget the apologies. How about you explain how you picked up my bathrobe? Learning to pick up physical matter once you’ve passed is like a long-term gig. It can take a good while to accomplish.”
He shook his head. His neatly groomed, shortly trimmed head of hair, as dark as the night had become, and thick like his stubborn skull, bobbed. “I don’t know what you mean. I realized I was naked, and I found something to cover up with—a logical thing to do, seeing as this is our first meeting. Though I have to say, it’s a little small.” He unsuccessfully tried to tug the two sides of the bathrobe together over his thighs.