Black Heart

Page 50

"For the last time," he said tightly, opening his eyes, "she wasn't screaming at me."
"I could hear her all the way down here, lad. She sounded pretty pissed if ye ask me."
"She wasn't screaming at me, you ass**le! She was screaming my name!" Tristan snapped.
"Yes," Shayne agreed slowly as if he were speaking with a small, confused child, "as she yelled at ye, lad. I'm thinking that after a month of her screaming at ye like that, that ye'd finally get the hint and move on. Ye really should take the hint, lad. It's kind of pathetic at this point."
"For the last time," he ground out, "my wife wasn't screaming at me because she was mad at me, you jackass! She was screaming my name while I was making love to her!"
Shayne frowned up at him. "And ye actually stopped just to come down here and tell me that?"
"No, what I came down here to tell you was that another one slipped by you," Tristan said tightly as he jerked a thumb in the direction of the dumb dead bastard who actually had the balls to ask if he could take over Tristan's body so that he could "Get some of that."
Up until that point, Tristan had been able to ignore the bastard's presence, but the moment the man had laid his hands on him to try and take over, which wasn't possible, he lost it. The ice-cold pain and anguish that seeped into his skin made it difficult to focus on anything other than getting the bastard out of the room and away from Marty. When she managed to ask him why he'd stopped, he was forced to tell her that he heard something downstairs, again.
If it wasn't for their family's tendency to let themselves in and make themselves at home, she'd probably think that he was crazy every time he abruptly left the room when they were sleeping, making love, talking, or taking a shower. He really needed to have another talk with them, but right now he was more concerned by the fact that over the past month spirits had been getting by Shayne left and right and bugging the shit out of him.
When he saw the spirit throw a look of longing towards the stairs, he shook his head, once. That's all it took to keep the man from going to play peeping tom on Marty. If he so much as looked in the direction of the stairs, Tristan was going to bring the bastard down to his knees, again.
While he normally didn't bother with spirits and left the handling and sorting to Shayne that didn't mean that he couldn't do his own damage. There was a reason after all that he could see, touch and communicate with them. Whatever Shayne was, he was, but the human version. He couldn't do as much as Shayne for that reason, but he could do enough to keep them in line when he needed to control them. The problem with trying to control them was that it meant that he had to touch them and he f**king hated touching them.
"I'm not sure how they keep getting past me," Shayne said with a put out sigh as he got to his feet.
"Maybe because you're too busy pouting to do your job," Tristan snapped, tired of this bullshit.
"No, that's not the reason," Shayne said, sounding thoughtful as he looked the spirit over. "I'm more than capable of pouting and doing my job. I'm talented like that," he said, earning a few muttered curses from Tristan as he stepped up to the ghost who looked like he'd been hit by a car. The tire tracks across his back only went to confirm that suspicion.
"Ye shouldn't have gotten near me lad here without me knowing," he said as he curiously watched the nervous man.
"I don't know what you're talking about," the man said, shifting anxiously. "The only thing that I know was that one minute I was taking my after dinner walk and the next I was getting pulled into a bedroom while this incredibly hot woman got on her knees and-"
"Well," Shayne said, quickly cutting the man off when Tristan took a threatening step towards him, "I can see that yer not going to be helpful, so this is where we say goodbye," Shayne quickly explained as he laid his hands on the dead man's chest. A beautiful white light spread over his chest, sending warmth and feelings of love through the room seconds before the man simply disappeared.
"What the hell is going on, Shayne?" Tristan asked as he rammed his fingers through his hair out of frustration.
Whatever was going on was seriously f**king with his life. He'd always attracted spirits, but this past month was f**king ridiculous. Normally he could still lead a semi-normal, productive life, only having to deal with spirits when Shayne was otherwise occupied, but something had changed over the past month. He couldn't remember the last time that he got a full night of sleep, never mind took a piss without an audience.
Everywhere he went, they followed. It was even worse when he was with Marty, which was often. He felt like such an ass**le. Thanks to him, she wasn't getting much sleep either. Every time spirts woke him up, he managed to startle her awake. He'd apologize for waking her up and she'd shrug it off like it was no big deal, but he knew that the multiple wakeups a night were taking their toll on her.
She was exhausted.
Granted, she was also putting in a lot of hours at work plus a few hours each night trying to figure out where all the missing women had disappeared. Mostly she was exhausted because of this damn spirit invasion that didn't look like it was going to stop anytime soon. Every night when she fell into an exhausted sleep in his arms, he prayed that they'd give him a damn break, at least for one night, but they never did.
Every night for the past month he woke up to find himself being attacked or screamed at and, each and every time that happened, he ended up waking Marty. It hadn’t mattered if he was holding her in his arms or managed to put some space between them before he fell asleep, he couldn't manage to handle the nighttime visits without scaring the hell out of her. He tried everything he could to help her fall back asleep, but once she was awake, that was it.
He considered sleeping on the couch, but that would only send the wrong message to his wife. They'd only been married for a month and opting to sleep on the couch instead of with her in their bed would cause a lot of bullshit problems that he'd rather avoid. He was in love with his wife and he didn't want her to ever have a reason to question that. So, instead of leaving her to sleep, he tried other ways to help make things better for her.
Sometimes he held her, drew a bath for her or they'd grab the files of the missing women and look through them, hoping to find something that they'd missed. So far they hadn't found any leads. They were still investigating restaurants and restaurant supply stores, but they were going nowhere.
The only time that she seemed to get any sleep was when he was driving. It only took a matter of seconds for Marty to doze off and once she was out she slept so damn peacefully that most mornings he drove around instead of going straight to the office. As long as he drove, she slept so he made damn sure that he drove as long as he could. Thankfully his position allowed him that luxury, but it couldn't keep him on the road indefinitely.
He usually reported back to the office by nine after he drove around, patrolling the town and making calls. By the time he shut the engine down, her eyes would be open and she'd be throwing him a grateful smile as she grabbed her bag and opened her door. For the next eight or so hours she'd struggle to stay awake while she worked, but the second that he turned on the car to take her home, she was fast asleep. He usually managed to drive for an hour or two before he took her home.