Chapter Nineteen

Seth

Getting back to New York wasn’t as hard as Seth had imagined it might be without Dante to guide him. There wasn’t much for him to do while he waited for it to get dark and for Cal to show up, so he flitted around the city, seeing sights he’d never bothered with when he’d been alive. It felt like a trivial exercise, but it helped to keep him occupied. The alternative was worrying about what Dante wanted to talk to Killian about, or what Cal might have been able to find out about Nelson.

Despite engaging in ghostly tourism, Seth still arrived at the meeting place long before Cal, which left him anxious and fretful. He’d hoped Dante would have joined him by now, which made him worry. Had something happened to stop Dante returning to him? He tried to push the thoughts aside, knowing Dante could handle himself, but his concern dogged him until the moment Cal arrived.

“Well?” he asked.

“And hello to you too,” Cal muttered gruffly. “So far as I can tell, Nelson’s as squeaky clean as they come. He even files his bloody taxes on time every year.”

Seth gaped at him. “But he’s not. He’s working for the Doctor.”

“You and I might know that, but unless I can prove he has mob links, I can’t get a search warrant. Without a search warrant, I can’t get that memory card.”

“And without the memory card, no one will ever know who the Doctor is.”

“Bingo.” Cal sighed. “Sorry I don’t have better news for you, kid. I’m guessing the Doctor is why you’re hanging around all poltergeist-like.”

Seth narrowed his eyes. “If I were a poltergeist, I’d be able to interact with things.” He swiped his hand through Cal to prove his point.

If he could interact with things, he’d be able to take the memory card and wouldn’t have needed to confide in Cal at all.

“But the Doctor is your unfinished business, right? With him still running around killing people, you can’t move on?”

“What makes you think ghosts move on?”

Seth wasn’t sure why he was so defensive of the truth. Maybe because he didn’t trust people? Or because Cal was nothing like the man he’d thought he was. He wanted the Cal he’d gotten to know back. The man who was forgetful and repetitive, who’d sat and told him the same story a dozen times or more and Seth had let him because he’d thought Cal’s brain was addled thanks to his experiences in the war. But none of it had been real. And now this version of Cal—smart and surly—was expecting him to reveal everything.

“I can see ghosts,” Cal said flatly. “And I think I’d have noticed if there were billions of ghosts floating around. Besides, it would be nice to believe there’s something pleasant waiting for us after we die. More than this.” He gestured to Seth. “I’d hate to be stuck like you are.”

Seth glared at Cal. “I’m not stuck.”

He could have moved on, but he’d chosen not to. What was it Dante had said? Everyone could determine their own destiny, or something like that. He couldn’t remember exactly, but he’d chosen to stay and stop the Doctor and, if he could, he’d choose to stay so he could be with Dante. He didn’t want to move on. Not now, not ever.

“You keep telling yourself that, kid,” Cal said in a sad tone.

“If I could interact with stuff and get you the memory card, would you be able to use it?”

Cal rubbed his stubbly chin. “Maybe. I could claim it came from an anonymous source. My boss probably wouldn’t be too happy about there being no evidence chain, but she’d find a way to make it fly in court. But you can’t get it, can you?”

“I’ll find a way.”

“Uh-huh.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Cal sighed. “Look, I can see you really want to stop the Doctor, but I’m honestly not sure what you can do. Like I told you yesterday, I’ve been undercover for months trying to find dirt on the mob. No one wants to talk. They’ve got people working for them in every walk of society and every level of government. It’s a sticky web that’s impossible to untangle and even harder to escape if you get trapped in it, as you apparently know all too well.”

He shoved his hands into his trench coat pockets. “If you really aren’t stuck here, do yourself a favor and let yourself rest. Because the task you’ve set yourself—bringing the Doctor down—I don’t think it’s possible.”

“It is,” Seth growled. “With those photos.”

Cal rolled his eyes. “Photos we have no way of getting.”

He turned to leave, which made anger course through Seth.

“I told you I’d get them.”

Cal swung back around, eyes blazing. “How? You said it yourself; you can’t interact with anything. I get that must be frustrating but—”

“You have no idea,” Seth hissed.

“No,” Cal said quietly, almost placatingly. “But I’ve been through my fair share of shit, and I know when to walk away.”

“But you haven’t,” Seth pointed out. “You’ve been at it for months, and you haven’t given up.”

“It’s my job.”

“And you couldn’t quit if you really wanted to?”

Cal bobbed his head from side to side. “Yeah, I could. And I probably will one day. But that day is not today.”

“And I’m not going to give up today, either. I’ll get you that memory card, and when I do, you’d better do something with it that brings the Doctor down.”

Seth didn’t think he’d be able to stand it if yet another person let him down. The trouble was, Cal had already let him down, but Seth felt like he had no choice other than to give the memory card to him. Cal was a cop. He’d know what to do with it. He’d be able to use it to stop the Doctor.

“If you get it to me, I give you my word I’ll do everything within my power to make sure it’s used as evidence against the Doctor.”

If. That single word resonated through Seth. Cal didn’t believe in him. Cal doubted him. Did anyone believe in him? Did anyone think he was capable of achieving anything? Except he hadn’t, had he? In twenty-five years he’d accomplished nothing. His life had been a giant waste of time. He’d failed at the one thing he could have done right: failed by keeping the memory card and then failed a second time by giving it to Nelson. He’d failed when he was alive, and was probably going to fail now he was dead.

“Any idea how you’re going to get it?” Cal asked.

“I’ll figure it out.”

“Want to talk your options through?”

“No.” Now he sounded like a sulky teenager.

“It might help,” Cal said, his voice suddenly soft.

“How could you help me figure out what I can and can’t do?” Seth demanded.

“I’ve seen a lot, Seth. Done a lot. You might be surprised.”

“You haven’t got a clue what being dead is like,” Seth yelled. “You don’t have a clue how frustrating it is not to have anyone able to see you, or hear you. To not be able to touch anything or anyone. To not be able to feel.”

If he could cry, he knew tears would be spilling down his cheeks. But he couldn’t, and that made his anger reach boiling point.

“You don’t know what it’s like to die. To feel so utterly helpless and alone. To be in so much pain, you struggle to breathe. To wish it would end, because dying isn’t the most terrifying thing anymore, living is.”

The words ripped out of him, each one like a dagger to his psyche. They were raw and unfiltered. All the anger and pain he’d been smothering breaking loose like a destructive tidal wave. Above him, the streetlight flickered and then burst, glass exploding around them. Cal ducked and covered his head with his arms.

“Jesus what was that?” he demanded, staring wide-eyed at Seth.

Seth stared back, his anger draining away.

“Did you do that?” Cal asked, curiosity playing over his face.

Seth started to shake his head. “I—”

“Could you do it again?”

Seth shrugged. He wasn’t sure he wanted to feel that angry and hopeless again.

Cal pointed down at the shattered glass that littered the ground around his feet. “Looks like you can go all poltergeist, kid.” He was grinning. “Imagine how much you could freak someone else out by pulling stunts like that?”

“Like... Nelson?” Seth wasn’t sure if he was scared of the prospect, or excited by it. He wasn’t sure getting swept along by Cal’s enthusiastic idea was a good idea, but it was the only one they had.

“Exactly like Nelson. You could go all ghost of Christmas Past on his ass and guilt him into handing the memory card over to the cops.” His expression suddenly became solemn. “If he knew it was you, maybe he’d roll on the Doctor and expose him as your murderer. I checked, by the way; no one matching your description has turned up at the city morgue.”

Seth wasn’t surprised, though it did add to his pain.

“Where’s your body?”

“Would you be able to do anything if I told you?”

Not that he knew where his body was—in an empty warehouse, somewhere in the city, which didn’t narrow it down a whole lot. Although, he felt that he could find his way back there. He wasn’t sure how he knew that, but he was confident it was true.

Cal sighed and shook his head. “Probably not. Not unless there was an evidence trail that led me there.”

“There won’t be.”

“Shame. Sorry, kid.” His face became animated again. “So... are you up for turning into a poltergeist? Think you can get angry again?”

“I don’t know.”

If there was a chance he could scare Nelson into giving up the memory card, he had to take it. He rolled his gaze upwards to the heavens, wishing Dante was with him to help him make the decision. He needed the angel’s advice. Heck, being held in Dante’s arms would have been amazing as he tried to sort out the mess of his thoughts.

But he was alone, and action needed to be taken. And as much as he didn’t want to have to leave Dante, he also wouldn’t be able to stand the guilt if the Doctor hurt anyone else, while he was wasting time on earth. Not that any moment he spent with Dante could be classed as ‘wasting time,’ but it was putting off what he needed to do, however much he hated to admit it. Christ, why had he wasted his life? The thought made anger churn within him, and he knew in that instant, that he could tap into and use it to ‘go all Ghost of Christmas Past.’

He stared directly into Cal’s eyes, determination burning within him. “I’ll try.”