Duck Duck Ghost (13 page)

Then from the mists, a moo belled, and the sound made Tristan laugh.

It was not just any moo, but a delicate, sweet undulating singing of bovine origin. It warbled and wove about, riding the breeze to the house’s wraparound porch.

Unfortunately, so did the particularly ripe smell of a bovine’s grass-fed expulsions.

“Ah, you gotta love the country.” Wolf rested his chin on Tris’s shoulder and snuggled closer. “So romantic. So… pastoral. So—”

“So stinky,” Tristan cut in. “I never guessed how stinky the country could be. ’Course all of those barnyard jokes should have been a clue.”

“Yeah, I loved coming here as a kid.” The man’s murmur was wistful, but Tristan wasn’t fooled. “I’m glad you got to see it.”

“Is this where you do Eddie Murphy’s old act and say ‘it’s a pity we can’t stay’?” He snorted when Wolf pulled back a little bit to object. Tristan turned around in the man’s embrace, rested his butt on the porch railing, then hooked his arms around Wolf’s shoulders. “I can hear you thinking, Doctor Kincaid. You’re busy flogging yourself for what happened to me and are trying to figure out a way to get me to go home.”

“I was thinking maybe a hotel nearby,” Wolf admitted softly. “I can’t abandon Sey, but I
did
want to spend time with you.”

“Yeah, not going anywhere. I’m not willing to go back into the tower and grow my hair so you can climb up on it whenever you want to show up.” He would have laughed at Wolf’s offended expression if he didn’t think the man’d been quite serious about trying to shield him from what happened. “You can’t protect me from myself, Wolf. Because what happened here isn’t because of you. It’s because of me.”

“If I hadn’t brought you—”

“Things like what happened today—well, whenever we’re counting it—have been going on around me since I was born.” Out of the fog, another low belling echoed, followed by an answering call. Wolf refused to meet his eyes. The man’s gaze drifted over Tristan’s shoulder, so he gripped Wolf’s chin to recapture the attention. “
You
didn’t do this to me.
I
did this to me. It’s been a long time since I’ve had an event, because the Grange is kind of set up to channel passing spirits or something, but before then, this kind of shit happened all the time. Hell, Wolf, do you think this was the first time I’ve been woken up by something wanting to get in my mind?”

“Not like this.” Wolf shook his head. “This was….”

“This was just like a few hundred other times. Why do you think I ran away to Uncle Mortimer’s?” He cocked his head to match Wolf’s confused tilt. “San Francisco is probably one of the most haunted places in the state, and there I go, being born right into it. Hell, one of my first memories was a ghost. Pretty sure it won’t be my last.”

“I don’t want that for you, babe.” Wolf sighed, wrapping his arms tighter around Tristan’s waist. “I want you to be happy and… I don’t know what else.”

“You want me to be normal,” Tristan corrected gently. “Hate to break it to you, Kincaid, but that’s
never
going to happen.”

“You
are
normal.
Your
normal.” Wolf’s lips left a butterfly kiss on the corner of Tristan’s mouth, and he couldn’t help but smile at the wistful tone in Wolf’s voice.

“Did I tell you I had an older brother?”

“No, you didn’t.” The cattle were moving closer, their soft rolling calls growing louder. “What happened?”

“I don’t know. He died way before I was born. I think he was maybe one or a little bit older when he passed.” Shrugging, Tristan tried to remember anything he’d heard about the child who’d come before him. “No one in the family talks about it. Something went wrong, I think. No one says
anything
, but see, I remember always hearing a baby crying. Like it was in pain. I’d tell my nannies I heard it, and they told me it had to be cats outside or something.”

“Nannies?” Wolf’s eyebrows soared up across his forehead.

“Yeah, I had a few. They kept leaving for saner kids,” he said with a chuckle. “The point is, that’s one of my first memories. Hearing a baby wailing in the middle of the night. When I was about four or five, I told my mother about hearing the crying, and I asked her if we could make him feel better. See, I knew he was my brother. Something inside of me
knew
who was crying even though no one’d told me about him—about Percival. I think it was the last time my mother was alone with me. She was…. I don’t know if she was angry or scared or maybe a little bit of both, but after that, she avoided me like I was a shambling leper with bells on.”

“You were her kid!” Wolf let loose a few curses under his breath. “Shit. Babe—”

“That’s what I love about your mom. She’ll never turn away from you. And yeah, she leaves hallucinogens around the house, but really, easily avoidable,” Tristan teased.

“I told you not to eat her cooking,” Wolf pointed out. “It’s something in the family, I swear. It’s like they all channel Sweeny Todd or something. But Tris, your mom probably loved you. She just hurt for your brother.”

“No, she didn’t love
me
enough. When she and my father died, suddenly Percival wasn’t the only one crying in our house. I’d lay in bed listening to her crying and calling for him.” He had to close his eyes, hoping to drive away the pain laden in his memories, but it stung anyway, an angry, vicious scorpion hidden among innocuous underbrush. “The rest of the family already thought I was crazy, so it wasn’t like I could go to anyone and say my mother was there in the house. But she would roam the halls and call for the baby. I never saw her, but she’d walk by my room, and I used to wonder why I hadn’t been enough for her. My mother couldn’t stand me. I was too weird—too different—too
me
.”

“Shit, Thursday—”

“See, I knew I was broken. From an early age. Because dead people visited me or walked through me. I was the only one who saw or spoke to them. I learned Chinese from murdered prostitutes, and really what I got isn’t useful for normal conversation, but I can certainly ask if you want a reverse jade dragon or a phoenix rising threesome.” Tristan slid his hands up to Wolf’s cheeks, rubbing at the scruff he found there. “And it was okay to be weird at the Grange because I couldn’t get hurt.”

“You’re not broken, Tris.” Wolf kissed his palms. “You’re
not
.”

“That’s not the point,” he said sadly. “I’ve been hiding in that tower, and whether I knew it or not, I grew my hair long enough for you to climb up it and visit me there, but Wolf, I don’t want to stay there. I want to be with you. Out here. And it’s time I kind of embraced the weird I’ve been given. Even if it scares the fucking hell out of me. I’ve got to start living. I can’t be my mother and spend my afterlife looking for something or someone I’ll never have again. I need to have this now—I need to have
you
now.”

“You have a life, babe. You do.” Wolf shook his head, and Tristan laughed. “Don’t mock your life. It’s a good one.”

“It’s a bookmark. Mara was right. It’s like I’m waiting for Death to come to me, and hell, it has. In little bits and drabbles, Death visits me. I live through the ghosts that come to me. I’ve got to
not
do that anymore, Wolf. And I’ll either do it with or without you, but I’d rather do it with you.”

“So what are you asking me?” His smile was nearly as wistful as the sound of the cattle mooing behind them. “What are you saying, Tris?”

“I guess I’m asking you to do a little bit of living with me. What do you say, Kincaid?” Tristan took a deep breath and plunged in. “Want to go ghost hunting with me?”

T
HE
CAMEL
made his appearance from over the rise a few moments after Tristan went in to get some sleep. Wolf was saluting the ungulate’s arrival with a jaunty wave of his hand when the screen door behind him squeaked open. A second later, Sey edged up next to him with a mug of steaming hot coffee, tiny dollops of cream dancing across its swirling surface as she set it down on the porch’s broad rail.

“Here you go, kiddo. Drink up.” Sey gave her pet camel her own salute, lifting her mug as he chewed a mouthful of grass.

“Anything boozy in this?” Wolf sniffed at the cup. “Because I could really get drunk right now.”

“It’s six in the morning,” Sey scoffed.

“Right, it’s got to be at least six thirty before we can get hammered. How could I forget?”

“How’s your boy doing?” Sey rubbed at Wolf’s shoulders, and he tried to shake off the tension building down his spine. “Tristan certainly can take a kick to the balls. Wouldn’t have thought that about him.”

“Tired as shit, but he’s passed out,” Wolf replied wearily. “Fucking hell, Sey. This is insane.”

It had to have been the last bit from the third pot they’d brewed, and it was as bitter and sour at the end as it was at the start of their long morning, but Wolf didn’t care. It was hot, and the acidic, oily sting would at least keep him awake for a few more minutes.

That’s all he needed. A few more minutes, then he could go collapse with Tristan in the bedroom next to Sey’s. One thing was for certain. Even if he’d been able to fix the door he’d broken, he wasn’t going to have Tris sleep in that room again. Not after what he’d gone through. With Gildy safely asleep and Crowley the cat once more laying claim to Sey’s windowsill, he’d needed some time to think before joining Tristan, watching the sun valiantly fight a losing battle through the morning fog.

He’d kind of grown up in the house. With Meegan’s nomadic lifestyle, it’d been a safe haven—someplace permanent he could always find in the same condition as when he left it. Visiting his paternal grandparents every once in a while hadn’t been the same. Their too prim and proper estate made being a kid uncomfortable, and Wolf was always very aware of how grubby the Kincaid brood was when compared to the fine china and sideboard set his grandparents ran with.

If Sey hadn’t moved into her mother’s house when the old lady took off for—knowing her—warmer climes, he would have offered to buy it. It was
home
of sorts—solid and dependable.

And now under siege by an entity Tristan described in horrifying detail.

“I shouldn’t have brought him here, and now he’s arguing with me that he
should
be here because he wants to live more.” He took another sip of coffee, taking penance in its taste. “Jesus fucking Christ, it’s like I’m
trying
to kill him, and he’s just skipping along like it’s a visit to grandma’s house with his picnic basket.”

“You didn’t know, kiddo.” Sey snuggled up next to him, leeching some of his warmth. “I asked you to come down because stuff kept moving around when no one was here. Who the hell expected some angsty evil ghost cosplaying Geordi La Forge? I sure as fuck didn’t.”

“Yeah, she was missing the banana comb. Shit, Sey, all I have is my fucking—” He needed to kick something, something with lights that maybe beeped when something changed on a spectrum no one but him gave a shit about. “I went to school for this kind of crap—”

“You went to school to become a scientist, honey.” Sey’s tone was gentle, but Wolf heard the thread of reproach woven through it. “You’re not a Hellsinger. You walked away from that, remember? No one expects you to know what to do with this kind of thing. Hell,
I
don’t know what to do with this kind of thing.”

“I
know
how these things work.” Suddenly the coffee in his stomach churned, curdling in his guts. “I’ve spent my entire—well, not life—but a pretty good chunk of it trying to parse out the
why
of ghosts, and I know jack shit about turning them. Fucking hell, I had to ask
Meegan
to help me get rid of a poltergeist my people brought to Tristan’s doorstep. And now this?”

“I’m going to say it again, Wolfgang. You are
not
a Hellsinger. Sure, you’ve picked up some stuff from the family. We all have. But this kind of crap is out of our league. We’re going to need to call in the big guns, but I don’t know who’ll come. Maybe one of the younger ones, but we definitely need help.” Sey stroked at his hair, soothing away the prickles of anger tightening his neck. “Can your ego handle that?”

“
My
ego? Probably not. I
am
a Kincaid,” he admitted. “But I know Tris. If he’s got his teeth into something, he’s not going to back down. And hell, I’m not sure I’d want him to. He’s strong, Sey. He can do things—see things—and he got the rug yanked out from under him because—”

“Of you.” Sey rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I got that part of it. Question is, what are we going to do about this shit? And are you
sure
we can’t ship him home? Maybe drugging him so he’s out of it when we pack him up. Oh I know, he can take Gildy with him too.”

“Yeah, good luck on that.” His laugh was nearly as bitter as his coffee. “He won’t go. Hell, he pretty much told me to pull up my big boy boxers and get ready to do battle. How do I deal with that? How do I keep him safe?”

“He’s not yours to keep safe, Wolf. He’s yours to love and maybe have fights with, but Tristan’s sure as hell not a pushover. You, little cousin, are going to have to learn how to compromise, but it was good to dream.” Sey drained her cup, then set it down on the rail. “Hell, the ranch guys will be here soon. I’m going to meet with them and then head to bed. I’m getting too old for this shit.”

“Sleep sounds fantastic. Let’s just hope we don’t get another visit from Blind Dog Betty. I don’t think my heart can take it.” Wolf watched the camel dip his head down for another mouthful of damp grass. There was one person he could call. Someone more dangerous than his mother, that was for sure, but all in all, he’d be safe from accidentally waking up next to a hookah-smoking caterpillar. Glancing at his watch, he sighed, “Shit, it’s way too fricking early.”

“Early? For what?” Sey covered her mouth, her jaw cracking in a yawn. “Not bed, that’s for sure. It was past bedtime about three hauntings ago.”