~*~
Maggie’s gaze was fixed to the paper in her hands as Ghost walked into her central office at Dartmoor. It was a crisp day, and the breeze came in through the propped-open door, stirring the invoices and tidy stacks on the desk. Maggie didn’t seem to notice any of it, or even him, as he braced a hip against the corner of the desk and folded his arms, waiting.
Her eyes lifted, bright with alarm, face tweaked with it. “Harry stopped to get the mail on his way in, and dropped it off to me.”
“Right.” She was building to something and he knew it, didn’t push her.
“This” – she shook the paper – “didn’t have a stamp or an address on it, so whoever sent it must have put it in the mailbox himself. It was made out to ‘Mr. and Mrs. Teague,’ so I opened it, thinking it was an invitation or something.”
“Invitation? Everyone we know works here.”
“I know,” she said grimly, turning the paper to face him. “Which makes this creepy as shit.”
He took the note from her and read it, quickly:
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Teague,
I know we’ve never met, but I’m a good friend of your son’s, from back in school. I’m real sorry about what he’s going through, and I want to let you know I’m here if you need me.
It was unsigned, and the handwriting was slanted and hurried.
“Friend from back in school?” Ghost asked, glancing at his wife. “He never had any friends save Kev. And all of us.” He plucked at his cut for emphasis.
“Certainly no one he would have told about Tonya,” she said.
Ghost turned the note over in his hands several times, looking for clues. There were none.
“Someone’s trying to screw with us,” Maggie said.
“On several fronts,” he muttered, handing the paper back. “Hold onto that. God knows that it means, but I don’t believe in coincidences anymore.”
“Hmm.”
“Where is he, by the way? Aidan?”
“Clocking hours at the shop. He’s been here all morning.”
He frowned. The little delinquent – he was late more often than not these days, off running errands and keeping to himself. Fatherhood – yeah, that’s what he needed. The kid would be better off going to someone else. Someone who didn’t have his head stuck up his ass.
“Don’t look like that,” Maggie said.
“Like what?”
“Like you hate your own son. I won’t tolerate it.”
“He’s my son,” Ghost said, hotly. “I’ll think whatever I want about him.”
“No you won’t,” she countered. “You’ll stew, and fuss, and eventually realize he’s no different from you, and you’ll get over yourself, so you might as well cut to the chase.”
“Did I ask for your opinion?”
“No,” she sighed. “That would have been thesmartthing to do.”
Nine
“What are you gonna do about–” Tango glanced over his shoulder to ensure that Mercy and Carter were occupied all the way on the other side of the garage. He turned back and dropped his voice a notch. “Greg?” he whispered.
They worked on either side of a particularly banged-up Night Train, and Aidan frowned at the greasy guts of the machine. “Well, since going back in time and pulling the damn trigger isn’t an option,” he whispered back, “I’ve got no fucking clue.”
