Praise for the novels of

ERICA ORLOFF

MAFIA CHIC

“The author of Diary of a Blues Goddess and Divas Don’t Fake It scores again with a charming heroine and a winsome tale.”

—Booklist

SPANISH DISCO

“Cassie is refreshingly free of the self-doubt that afflicts most of her peers.”

—Publishers Weekly

“This fast-paced and funny novel has a great premise and some interesting twists.”

—Romantic Times BOOKreviews

DIARY OF A BLUES GODDESS

“With a luscious atmosphere and a lively, playful tone, Orloff’s novel is a perfect read for a hot summer night.”

—Booklist

THE ROOFER

“Orloff’s characters are wonderful, most particularly Ava, who is resilient enough to take a chance on love.”

—Romantic Times BOOKreviews

“The Roofer is a fantastic novel…fans of urban noir romances will appreciate the contrast between glitter and grim and hopelessness and love in a deep, offbeat tale.”

—Harriet Klausner

Also available from

ERICA ORLOFF

Spanish Disco

Diary of a Blues Goddess

Divas Don’t Fake It

Mafia Chic

Do They Wear High Heels in Heaven?

The Roofer

Double Down

Invisible Girl

Urban Legend

Knockout

Trace of Innocence

Trace of Doubt

The Golden Girl

Blood Son

Freudian Slip

ERICA ORLOFF

To the memory of two people in heaven

I think of most often, Robert and Irene Cunningham

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

As always, a thank-you to my agent, Jay Poynor, for his unflagging support.

Thanks to Margaret Marbury, the ultimate editor—brains and a sense of humor and an uncanny understanding of publishing all rolled into one.

Thanks to Doris E., an old and true friend. ABBA…what can I say? It was an inspiration during the writing.

I’d like to thank, as always, my family, Maryanne and Walter Orloff, Stacey Groome and Jessica Stasinos, J.D., Alexa, Nicholas, Isabella and Jack. To Ariana, who read the manuscript and said she laughed. To Charlie, for some really insightful reading. And to my faithful writing pals Pam, Jon and Melody. Without you, I’d be lost in the thicket of plot.

The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a

heaven of Hell, a hell of Heaven.

—John Milton

Paradise Lost

Hell is empty and all the devils are here.

—William Shakespeare

The Tempest

Certain thoughts are prayers. There are moments

when, whatever be the attitude of the body,

the soul is on its knees.

—Victor Hugo

Les Misérables

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THIRTY

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

CHAPTER FORTY

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

BOOK GROUP QUESTIONS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

CHAPTER ONE

KATE DARBY WILTED IN the August heat and decided she couldn’t handle the subway tonight. Too steamy, too grimy, too many commuters even at seven o’clock at night. She lifted an arm to hail a cab and smiled when one pulled over to the curb right away.

“Must be my lucky day,” she murmured. She opened the door and slid across the backseat, adjusting her skirt beneath her. “Ninetieth, between First and York.”

The cabbie, black beard flecked with gray, with warm brown skin and a regal nose, nodded his turban-covered head, clicked the meter and pulled into traffic.

Kate leaned back, enjoying the blast of air-conditioning on her damp skin. She lifted her hair, twisting it into a loose chignon, and let the coolness caress the nape of her neck. Her eyes roamed the cabbie’s unique domain. A picture of the Dalai Lama in saffron robes was paper-clipped to the right visor, the holy man’s serene visage beaming at her. A jade-colored Buddha bobblehead perched on the dashboard, happily nodding with each careening motion of the yellow cab. Amethyst rosary beads dangled from the rearview mirror, a silver Jesus, arms outstretched on the cross, swung gently from side to side. A picture of Pope John Paul II was taped to the glove compartment, one hand lifted as if to make a sign of the cross over the faithful. And if Kate was correct, she was pretty sure the turban meant the cabbie was a Sikh. Only in New York.

She leaned forward slightly. “Your cab reminds me of the United Nations.”

He looked at her in the rearview mirror and laughed heartily. “My wife is good Catholic woman. My son is a Buddhist. And I think…God loves us all.”

“You’re probably right.” She edged forward in the seat, resting her head on her forearm as she peered into the front of the cab. She could hear the world’s most infamous shock jock inflaming his listeners over the radio. “God loves everybody. Even him.” She nodded her head toward the radio.

A woman was having an orgasm—real or faked, Kate had no idea—on air.

“Oh, he’s a crazy man,” the cabbie said, in Indian-accented English. “Craaa-zzy.”

Julian Shaw’s raspy voice filled the cab. “You heard it here. Live. Lana Luscious, the world’s hottest lesbian porn star just gave oral sex to Jenna Jones. In my studio. Right here. On my couch. For those of you listening, let me tell you that, if you don’t know Lana, she’s a gorgeous, smokin’ hot brunette with 42-double-Ds, and Jenna is the platinum sex goddess of your wildest imagination. That was so hot. So friggin’ hot. If this couch could talk, baby. So Jenna…did you fake it or was that the real deal?”

“How can you listen to him?” Kate asked the cabbie. She only half listened to the radio now as Julian Shaw sped on to his next favorite point of conversation—mocking gays.

“I always wonder what he’s going to do next.”

“But as a spiritual man…” She gestured with her hand toward the religious items. “I mean…he’s really, really raunchy.”

“I think God has a sense of humor. And maybe…maybe this crazy man is the best and worst of America all in one being. I listen because I want to understand America.”

“America?” Kate tilted her head. “This guy helps you understand America?”

“Yes, yes, yes.” The cabbie nodded his head vigorously. “He is America. He is an insane demigod presiding over chaos.”

Kate smiled. “Now this theory I have to hear.”

The cab stopped at a light, and the cabbie turned his head slightly. “He is America. He is what your country is fascinated with. He is both sides. Yin and yang.”

Kate crinkled her nose. “Um…not seeing the logic yet. Both sides? Lesbians and porn stars? Lesbians and gay men? I don’t understand.”

“No. America loves its sex.” He gestured out the window toward a shop on Fifth Avenue, its mannequins futuristically haunting and sexualized, empty-faced yet erotic. The clothing adorning them accentuating every pointed body part. Yet the overall effect was strangely androgynous.

Kate gazed out, the cab speeding by the window. “Yes, America does.” The next window was Gucci, then a short time later Abercrombie and Fitch. Designers flaunted their wares behind plate glass, with beautiful models, their lips slightly parted with promise. A big poster for a new designer perfume showed a tousled-haired blonde looking as if she was in the throes of passion.

“But then,” the cabbie intoned, “America is very repressed. It pushes sex, sex, sex, but then it’s not happy with sex. It gets offended by sex. Very strange. Very strange.”

“That it is. But still, that show.” She looked at the radio dial. “That show is out of control. I never listen. There was even an argument in the office about him one day. One of the assistants had him on the radio at his desk. He almost got fired for it. The woman in the next cubicle complained that he was creating a hostile work environment.”

“Where do you work?”

“At a publishing house. I’m a book editor.”

“A very honorable profession. I love to read. My son, also. Always his nose in a book. He got a scholarship to university.”

Kate smiled at his pride.

“He wants to be a writer.”

“My boyfriend is a writer. He wrote The Jackal’s Feast.”

“I know that book!” the cabbie said excitedly. “I read it! It was a wonderful book. Very excellent.”

“I was the editor.”

“You are famous!”

“No. Not famous. My boyfriend’s not even famous. The book was well-reviewed though. I think his next one could be huge. If he ever finishes it.”

“I can say I know you,” the cabbie said.

“Sure.”

She leaned back as the DJ continued. Periodically, his words were bleeped. She shook her head. How could anyone stand that guy?

“Pull up over there.” Kate gestured toward the building where David lived. “I’m surprising him with a fresh-off-the-press interview he did with Gotham magazine. The magazine writer clearly adored him.”

“You are a very nice girlfriend then, miss. Surprises are very good. I always like to surprise my wife. One time, I brought home three dozen roses—three dozen. I made her cry happy tears.”

Kate’s eyes watered. She didn’t know why, but the little love stories of people’s lives always touched her.

The cabbie clicked the meter, which chattered and chinged as it spat out a receipt. She handed him a twenty-dollar bill. “Keep the change.”

“Thank you. You have a very nice night. God bless you.”

“Thanks. You, too.” She smiled at the bobblehead jiggling on the dash as she clambered out of the cab and walked to David’s building. The doorman let her in. “Evening.” He nodded at her.

“Hi, Henry. How’s your wife feeling?”

“Better, thanks. The doctor says the treatment is working.”

“Oh, that’s very good news.” Kate prided herself on remembering the names of doormen and bodega owners, the bagel guy, the little old man who walked his terrier each day near her apartment. Her father had always taught her that you could go through the world knowing no one, or go through it knowing everyone. She liked knowing everyone’s name, their little love stories and big love stories. It made Manhattan seem a little smaller.

She pressed the button for the elevator and took it to the seventh floor. David was the perfect guy. Smart, funny, unbelievably handsome. He was going to be famous someday. And she was positive this next book was it.

They hadn’t gotten involved until the first book went to press. But the attraction had been there all through the editing process. Everyone in the office felt it. Leslie, her best friend and fellow editor, told her she was the luckiest book editor in Manhattan getting to work with someone who looked like a Brooks Brothers model—with a brain. The chemistry culminated in a celebratory dinner after his first reviews came out—all positive. They’d been together ever since.

The elevator doors opened, and Kate walked to 7B. She put her key into the lock and entered his apartment. His style was, she teased him, “elegant bachelor,” all dark, sleek wood and clubby brown leather, accented with black-and-white photography on the walls in silver frames. The place was dimly lit and she wondered if he was even home. She was about to call out his name when she spotted it. An opened bottle of Kristal champagne. Two crystal flutes, nearly empty, the last champagne bubbles drifting lazily in the remnants. One glass emblazoned with lipstick on the rim. Red. Not her shade.

Feeling like her knees might buckle, she told herself there were a million possible explanations. His childhood best friend, Judy, could have come into the city for dinner. He could be entertaining his sister. But what blared through her head was what she had told him that morning as she left his place. I can’t see you tonight. I have to work late and then meet with an agent for cocktails.

But then she ran into the editor of Gotham, who handed her a crisp copy of the issue. After drinks with the agent, on the spur of the moment she decided to cab it up to his place.

Shaking, feeling like a fool, she stumbled, almost blindly to the bedroom. And there he was, naked, half-erect and hurriedly putting on his boxers. And there she was, frantically shoving her black-lace bra into her purse.

Leslie.

She turned, bile rising in her throat, and ran.

“Kate…Kate…wait!” He chased after her, grabbing her arm. “It’s not what you—”

She shrieked, not even recognizing the voice that came out of her own mouth. “Not what I think? Don’t patronize me! You bastard!”

“I thought—”

“I was working late? Had drinks scheduled. Couldn’t see you?” She felt tears streaming down her face, and she thought she was going to vomit. She wrenched her arm free and reached into her oversize purse to pull out the magazine. She flung it, as hard as she could, at his face, where, thanks to her high school softball career, it landed perfectly, smacking him on his perfect nose. “I ran into the editor of Gotham and wanted to surprise you.”

The magazine landed on the floor cover-side up. One of the heads read, “America’s Best New Writer.”

“Kate.” His face was pale, and he shook his head. “I was drinking. I…”

With all the fury and hatred she could muster, Kate glared at Leslie who stood, teary, in the doorway of his bedroom. Kate swallowed hard. “You two deserve each other.”

She opened the apartment door and fled down the hall. Over and over, in her mind, as if she were unable to control her own brain, the image of Leslie, topless, in his bedroom, came back to her. In slow motion. In fast motion. In frozen images.

She whispered a prayer, “Please let the elevator come right away.” Thankfully, it did. She stepped in and punched the button for the lobby, jabbing it three, four, five times, willing the elevator doors to close faster and deliver her even quicker to the ground floor and away from him. From them. Running out of the lobby, past Henry’s concerned gaze, she stepped into the hot night. She tried to gulp in fresh air, but it felt like breathing in a sauna.

She just wanted to go home and shower off the ugliness she just saw. She wanted to be alone. She turned to hail a cab and saw the cab she had taken not ten minutes before, with his “off-duty” signal, sitting parked on the street.

Wiping at her tears, she walked to the cab and bent over to peer in the window. Sure enough, it was the same bobblehead dashboard. Her turban-wearing cabbie. He waved and rolled down the passenger-side window.

“What is the matter, my someday-famous friend?”

“Surprising him was not a good idea.”

An expression of immediate comprehension crossed his face. “Let me drive you home.”

Grateful for his kindness, she again climbed into the backseat of his cab.

“Thank you,” she whispered, looking more closely at the name on his license, clipped to the viser, trying to discern the pronunciation—it had six syllables.

“You may call me Mo. That is what my American friends call me.”

“Thank you, Mo. I’m Kate.”

He turned to look at her. “I am very sorry. You tell me where to take you.”

She gave him her address and leaned back, shutting her eyes. A tiny sob escaped. Maybe she wanted conversation. Something to drown out that image seared on her brain.

“Why were you still here?” she asked. “I thought I was going to have stand out there and try to find a cab, and there you were.”

“Something very, very strange. I had to listen.” He pointed at the radio.

“To the sex-crazed DJ?”

“Yes, yes. He was shot.”

Kate opened her eyes wide. “Shot?”

“Yes. He is a crazy man, my new friend Kate, but someone else was even crazier. Someone tried to kill him.”

“That’s New York.”

“No, that too, is America,” he said sadly.

As he pulled onto York, Kate watched the bobblehead. The Buddha seemed less merry now, like he was mocking her.

With each nod of his head, the Buddha told her, “You should have known. You should have known. You should have known.”

CHAPTER TWO

JULIAN SHAW EXPECTED a long tunnel. Then a white light. Or at least his dearly departed Grandma Hannah.

Instead, he got Gus.

“Listen, old boy, try not to panic” was Gus’s advice, delivered in a clipped British accent.

“I’m too confused to panic,” said Julian, but then he spied his body in the hospital bed, and panic struck him like the shock of a defibrillator.

“Remember not to panic,” Gus urged, but it was far too late for that. Julian let out a Friday the 13th shriek, and frankly, Julian didn’t even care that his scream sounded like a girl’s—like the time he dropped a toad down his cousin Tori’s shirt the year she got a training bra.

“What the hell is going on?” Julian looked down at his body, which had a frightening assortment of tubes protruding from just about every orifice. Bags of dark blood and assorted other fluids hung from IV poles surrounding his bed like silent sentinels. Machines whooshed and whirred and beeped. Their eerie sounds echoed in the otherwise sterile quiet of the room, as if the body were just another machine being driven by devices and not life itself. A nurse appeared to be taking his vital signs, which, if her frown were any indication, didn’t seem to be too vital.

Julian approached her and asked, “What’s wrong with me?” but she looked through him as she walked away, pushed through the door, and back to the nurse’s station on the other side of the glass.

“Hey!” Julian shouted. He followed her, but she never acknowledged him, and when he touched her arm, she didn’t react at all. He turned to another nurse, and then a doctor, waving his arms wildly, “Hey! Someone tell me what’s going on!”

But they all continued working, talking with each other, looking at computer screens, ignoring him.

Because Gus had spoken to him, seemed to see him, Julian now faced the short, thin old man in the blue pinstripe suit, with the elegant little silver mustache and one of those old-fashioned monocles perched on one eye. “What’s going on? Do you know?”

“You don’t remember anything, young man?” Gus asked, clasping his hands together expectantly.

“No. I mean…how did I get to be here, and my body there? Am I…you know…dead?” He said dead in a whisper, because he really didn’t want to know the answer.

“No. Not dead. In a coma.”

“A coma?” Julian again looked at his body—long black hair, thick and curly. High cheekbones. Tattoo of an angel on one forearm, another of a hypodermic needle near his elbow, with the words Rock Or Die on the biceps above it. Yep. It was him. He was a good-looking SOB, he thought, even though his face was nearly as pale as the bedsheet.

“Yes, my dear chap. Seems you are in a coma or I wouldn’t be here.” Gus smoothed his burgundy tie, fussed with his diamond tie-tack, and then clasped his hands behind his back, rocking slightly on the heels of his highly polished black shoes.

“Where is here? And, for that matter, who the hell are you?”

“Well, no need for hostility, young man. We’re Neither Here Nor There. And I’m Gus, your Guide.”

“Come again?”

“Neither Here Nor There. As in, neither in Heaven nor in Hell. We’re in between. Or, rather, you are. And I’m to show you the ropes, so to speak.”

“Why aren’t I over there? With my body?”

“Good question, which begs a thorough explanation. As thorough as I can give you when we have a rather pressing agenda. How familiar are you with quantum physics?”

“You’ve gotta be friggin’ kiddin’ me, little man. Not at all. I’m a DJ, the shock jock at WNRQ, not a…physicist. Jesus, I must be dreaming. I gave up heroin a long time ago, but is this a flashback or something?”

“No. I am not a figment of your imagination. Trust me, you are not that creative. All right.” He sighed. “As best as I can explain it, the universe is always moving. Even a table, a chair, a rock, they have moving parts, tiny atoms and particles and, if the string theorists are to be believed—and they’re right, you know—there are parts even smaller than that, like tiny strings in a realm we can’t even begin to understand, it’s so microscopic. Mind-boggling, actually. And the universe—from the cosmos to tiny particles—is in a state of constant motion, ever expanding and accelerating, with the idea that one day, it may actually collapse back into itself, though I am not entirely privy to all the secrets the universe has up its sleeve.” He chuckled slightly.

“Speak English, pal.”

“I’m trying, young man. Again, I can’t be positive of what the future holds for the universe. However, I do know that the universe is not, ever, at any time, in a state of inertia. In terms of astrophysics, cosmic inflation describes the exponential expansion driven by a negative-pressure vacuum energy density.”

“Look, buddy…can we get past all this science stuff, which I can promise you I am not ever going to understand, and get to the part about how it is my body is lying there with tubes up my friggin’ nose?”

“Getting to that. You see the way God made the universe, She created Heaven and Hell, and then the place in between.”

“She?”

“Of course. You mean to tell me you never noticed how women are the nurturers, the creators?”

“Well, maybe but…you know, the whole Bible and…”

“Written, I’m afraid, with a bias. By men. The original Old Boy Network.”

“So you’re saying a chick made the universe. Including Neither Here Nor There.”

“I know. It’s an unwieldy name. I wish She had thought of something…I don’t know, catchier. But nonetheless, just because you happen to be in a coma, you do not, my new friend, have a free pass as far as the universe is concerned. You must be doing something. Consequently, you are Neither Here Nor There, and you have work to do while you are in the in-between realm. We have an agenda, which, I might add, we must get to. Soon.”

“And you?”

“Me? I’m a Guide.”

“Got any identification?”

“Afraid not. I would have presumed the very fact that your body is there and we’re here would be identification enough. It usually is.”

“What’s with the British accent?”

“I was British on earth, and apparently it’s quite difficult to lose the accent, even after centuries in the Afterlife. I’ve retained a love of stout, too. And scones.”

“Afterlife. I thought you said we weren’t dead. Afterlife sounds suspiciously like ‘after you’ve bought the farm.’”

“We aren’t dead. I am dead. Was dead, actually. Now I’m a Guide. Well, technically, I am still dead, but my spirit…Well, I suppose it’s all about whether you view the glass as half-full or half-empty. You, on the other hand, are not dead. You are…well, in this rather in-between state.”

“So what happened to me?” Though his body—the one in the bed—looked painfully uncomfortable, he didn’t feel any pain at all in his newly acquired spirit body. In fact, he felt surprisingly terrific, if he thought about it. Except for the sheer terror stuff.

“You really have no memory of it? Think back.”

“Well…” Julian tried. “You know it’s a little hard to think when I’m staring at my comatose self.” Again, he felt waves of panic sweep over him. He tried harder to remember. “I was on the air. Lesbians. I was talking about lesbians. They’ve made me the number-one late-afternoon and evening drive-time show in radio. Syndicated. I’m on every hour of every day somewhere in the country. Rebroadcasts. Cable. Chicks getting it on with other chicks? The audience loves it. And…” He tried to think. “Oh…yeah. I pushed the envelope big-time. Holy crap, but it was an awesome show. Live sex. On air. The switchboard went wild! Two women were having oral sex right there on my couch. That couch is like a shrine to sex. Then I wrapped up the show. I met with my producer. Then…I went outside. Was waiting for my limo to circle the block and pick me up. And that’s the last thing I remember.”

“Think back. Someone said something to you. On the sidewalk. Someone approached you.”

Julian fell silent, and then a flood of memory and more panic threatened to drown him. “Oh my God…I was shot.” He rushed over to his comatose self. “Oh Christ…in the stomach.” Julian could see bandages peeking over the top of the blanket. “By a guy who was pissed off about my show. Religious fanatic. He’s called in before. I recognized his voice.”

“Yes,” Gus said quietly.

Julian’s terror intensified. “Jesus.” He began pacing. “Oh my God. Holy shit…Am I going to make it?”

“I don’t know,” Gus said. “I’m not privy to that information. It’s not in your dossier.”

“I don’t get it. I don’t get any of this.”

“That’s understandable. Give yourself time. You’ll adapt. In the meantime, you have a job to do. Get your mind off the situation, so to speak.”

“What kind of job? What? Do spirits need a call-in radio show?”

“Hardly. No, this is far more important than any earthly job. Particularly an earthly job involving prattling on about lesbians.”

“You got something against lesbians?”

“No.”

“Does God?”

“No. She’s of the opinion it’s not who you love but that you love.”

“She.”

“Yes. I told you that already. Keep up, young man. Take notes if you must.”

“I’m trying. Give me a break. I’m still working to fathom that. A woman. God is a woman. Damn. All right, I’ll bite. Do I get to meet her?”

“You don’t want to. If you meet her that means…” Gus looked over at the comatose Julian and then moved his hand across his own neck in a cutting motion of death.

“Gotcha. No meeting God. Okay, so you gonna tell me about my job?”

“Yes. You see, we’re not angels. And we most certainly don’t work for the Other Team.” Gus shuddered. “We don’t have the power of either extreme. We talk and eventually, those on earth start to hear us—maybe. And if they listen, then we have some influence.”

“So what? We talk to schizophrenics? People who hear voices?”

“Oh, no. Those unfortunate souls hear voices from chemical imbalances in the brain. Occasionally, I suppose, they may intercept voices from one of us. No, in our case, the people we speak to hear a voice urging them to do something.”

“Like a conscience?”

“Yes. Or maybe, sometimes, if we have a very strong connection to our assigned case, they may actually blurt out what we say to them. You’ve heard of a Freudian slip?”

“Sure.”

“Freud himself had a strong connection to his case worker.”

“So does everyone have one of these voices? One of us?”

“No. There aren’t enough of us to go around, I’m afraid. Those few in-betweeners like yourself are assigned a case, usually based on need.”

“Need?”

“Yes. The person prays for guidance. Or sometimes those around the person pray. A relative will plead their case. And what he or she gets is us. Or, in this case, you. You have one person, one case, you’ll be seeking to influence and help.”

“That’s it? I talk? Like I do on the air. For an audience of one? That’s it?”

“That’s it? My God, man, have you not been listening? You must not be fully comprehending the gravity of this. Perhaps it’s the shock. We take this job quite seriously. This isn’t a ‘that’s it’ sort of matter. Someone’s life—their very well-being, their sense of hope—is placed in your very hands for help.”

“Well, if they’re looking for help from me…they must really be desperate.”

Gus smiled. “She knows what She’s doing. So no time to waste. Come along and meet your assignment. According to the Boss, your case is fairly desperate. She has had a terrible day of unseemly proportions. Simply ghastly.”

Gus took Julian by the elbow and led him out of the intensive care unit. As they walked past other comatose patients, machines whirring like whispering sentinels, Julian saw other Guides, and even a dog—a big old chocolate Lab—lying by the bed of what he presumed was its master. Deducing that no hospital allowed dogs in the ICU, he guessed the dog was a spirit, too.

As he walked through the lobby, Julian struggled to discern who was real—as in alive—and who were spirits. He quickly understood that anyone dressed anachronistically—like Gus with his monocle—was a spirit. And the ones who walked through things—well, they had to be spirits, too. He had a million questions as they left the hospital. So many questions that Julian felt dazed.

The two of them wandered Manhattan’s streets, unseen. Julian kept looking at people, stepping in front of them at times, but no one acknowledged him. Finally, he and Gus arrived at an apartment building in Greenwich Village, which they entered as a resident left, slipping through an open door, and then ascended a flight of stairs to an apartment door.

“Come along,” Gus said.

“What? Do we ring the doorbell?”

“No, we walk through. Just don’t hesitate—that can get messy.”

Gus took him more firmly by the hand and half pulled him through the door. The two of them were now invisible visitors in a small one-bedroom apartment near Washington Square Park. Two policemen in uniform stood in the middle of the messy living room.

“There she is,” Gus gestured toward a brunette with hair to the middle of her back, neither thin nor plump, with rosy apple cheeks and a smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose. She clutched a tissue and looked around her apartment as if in shock.

“Can you see anything immediately missing?” the female officer asked, a notebook open, pen poised.

The brunette shook her head. “The TV. But other than that…it’s just the mess. My jewelry box is gone, but my good jewelry I kept in the freezer—I saw it on a TV show once and always have done that. I just checked. It’s still there. They didn’t take much. My dog must have scared them.” Then she started crying. “And now she’s gone.”

“Your dog?” The second officer looked down at the ground. “I’m sorry. That’s difficult.”

“When they left, they must have…let her out. Will you guys look for her?”

“Realistically…this is New York City. We have hundreds of break-ins. Thousands. What kind of dog?”

“A little Yorkie. Just the kind of dog someone would scoop up and keep.” The woman sat down and started sobbing. The two officers shifted on their feet, looking uncomfortable.

Julian stared at Gus. “You’re telling me I have to solve a dognapping? Give me a break. This isn’t a crisis. You know how many people get robbed a day?”

Gus shook his head. “You need to pay attention. This is just the end of a very, very horrible day.”

Julian and his Guide watched as the officers handed the woman a form and a card with a number to call to follow up on her case. The cops let themselves out. Julian watched as the woman wandered into her bedroom and tried to fix her mattress, which had been tossed on the floor. She started crying harder, the sounds changing from sniffles to guttural sobs. She unbuttoned the back of her skirt to change out of her work clothes. While she was undressing, Gus tugged on Julian’s arm. “Give her some privacy.”

Disappointed at missing a free peep show, Julian followed Gus to the living room. The woman emerged from the bedroom a few minutes later, in a black sports bra and gym shorts. She straightened up a bit, returning knocked-over lamps and a spilled basket of magazines to their rightful positions, then opened a bottle of white wine with a shaking hand. Soon, she was lying on the floor of her apartment, a box of tissues and a now half-empty bottle of white wine next to her.

“She’s beautiful,” Julian said, moving closer to her. “But she’s a mess. What’s wrong with her? Why is she crying? Besides the break-in? What happened to her today? This can’t all be over a Yorkie and a television set. So what is it?”

“That’s for you to find out, my boy. And solve. Julian Shaw, meet Kate Darby.”

CHAPTER THREE

KATE DARBY LISTENED to Stevie Nicks’s plaintive wailing on “Beautiful Child” for the hundredth time. This had to be the worst night of her life. Only, she knew it wasn’t. There had been worse nights. Worse weeks. Worse years. But this ranked up there with one of the most colossal bad days ever.

“Okay, God…what do you have against me?” she said aloud. “It wasn’t bad enough to walk in on them in bed together? Lose the love of my life. And my best friend. In one day.” She rolled over on her belly and flopped her face against her forearm and started crying all over again. “Apartment robbed. Place trashed. But the dog, God? My little Honey? Christ…this is the worst night of my life.” Then Stevie finished her ode, and Kate pressed the button on her remote control, starting the song all over again. A hundred and one and counting.

You’ll meet someone better.

“Ha!” she said to herself, shaking her head at the voice she heard in her mind. “Meet someone better.” She looked at her coffee table, staring at a picture of her and David on the ski trip they took to Aspen over New Year’s. He was like that, the king of grand gestures. He’d put plane tickets in her Christmas stocking. He gave her a pair of diamond earrings for her twenty-seventh birthday in May, in a blue box from Tiffany’s, which he’d presented her while they took a horse-and-carriage ride through Central Park. For God’s sake, they’d talked about getting engaged for Christmas this year. Just like the cabbie telling her his love story, his surprise of roses, Kate thought she and David were writing their own love story.

Kate sat up and blew her nose—loudly—in a tissue, which she then crumpled and threw on the floor next to the twenty or so other tissues. Next to the spilled contents of a box of old photos the robbers had upended.

“It just hurts,” she whispered aloud. The whisper turned to a prayer. “God…it just hurts, and I don’t know if I can take any more. My father died—well, you know that, God. I miss him so badly sometimes it’s an actual pain in my heart. And now this. Not to mention my mother remarrying to that investment guy with the comb-over. God…this just sucks. It sucks. And I can’t take it anymore.”

She stood up and walked to the maple bookshelves next to the tall windows that opened onto the fire escape. She picked up a photo of her and Leslie in a silver frame.

Kate had never felt beautiful her entire life, except maybe when she was with her father. But who believes their father? Aren’t all fathers supposed to say their daughters are beautiful? In a size-two world, she was built just a little large, and in a city of little-black-dress sophistication, she was always just ordinary. At least, that was what she told herself. She wasn’t beautiful, she was pretty. She was girl-next-door. Sweet faced, more than sexy. Until she met David, who swept her off her feet. He finally made her feel as if she belonged on the pedestal he placed her on, as if she were stunning. Not just girl-next-door but drop-dead gorgeous.

Leslie, on the other hand, had always been the eye-catching one. Sure, she’d told Kate she was “gangly” and had braces in seventh grade, but come off it. Leslie had been perfect her whole life. Tall, thin, high cheekbones, Southern drawl, long blond hair and she didn’t even need to exercise to maintain her perfect figure. It was positively sickening. Those perfect breasts and rock-hard abs—that she’d seen only too clearly tonight in David’s bedroom.

“So you had to have the one man I loved,” Kate said to the picture. “You could have had your pick of any man in Manhattan. Heck, in the whole tristate area, but you set your sights on David.”

At the thought, Kate felt like she was going to throw up again. She took the picture and frame and tossed them in the trash. Then she sat down on her couch. The apartment was decorated in shades of green—her favorite color—with touches of Boho and eclectic flea-market finds she and her father used to hunt down.

“Well, damn it—now what? My life is ruined.” Like she could show up at her job and work side by side with Leslie. Their offices were next door to each other at Washington Square Publishers. Kate picked up the bottle of wine and took a huge swig.

Maybe you should consider becoming a lesbian.

Kate shook her head at the voice. “I must be cracking up. Like that would ever be an option.” And then—despite the fact that she’d found her boyfriend with her best friend, that her dog had disappeared, her apartment was broken into—despite it all, Kate laughed to herself.

I’m not kidding. Lesbians have more fun.

CHAPTER FOUR

“SHE’S CUTE WHEN SHE smiles,” Julian said to Gus. He leaned closer, as if inspecting a specimen under glass. “She has dimples.”

“Hmm?” Gus was looking at a file that had materialized out of nowhere. They were still standing in her messy apartment, though they had moved to the small galley kitchen—typical by Manhattan standards with an Easy-Bake-size oven and a refrigerator shorter than Julian’s shoulder.

“I said she’s cute. What are you looking at?”

“This?” Gus waved the file folder, and it disappeared. “Nothing. Case files.”

“Shouldn’t I look them over or something, if I’m going to be some sort of celestial social worker?”

“Afraid not. The Boss believes in intuition. In the power of connection.”

“What kind of New Age bullshit is that?”

“She’s afraid of self-fulfilling prophesies. They’re the worst prophecies of all, you know.”

“Slow down, Gus. You may be used to this Neither Here Nor There lingo, but it’s all new to me. I’m still getting used to being…away from my body.”

“Well, the Boss has been frequently misquoted by prophets. A lot of them, I have to tell you, were cuckoo.” Gus twirled a finger round and round by his temple.

“And of all the crazy prophets,” Gus continued, “self-fulfilling ones drive Her the craziest. If you read Kate’s case…Let’s suppose it said she was depressed.”

“I’d get her to pop a Prozac.”

“Precisely. Then you would assume it to be so—that she was depressed. And let’s say it said she was destined to live the rest of her life alone and lonely. Well, you’d hardly work to get her a new trustworthy boyfriend, would you now? No, you’d see the case file, assume it was her fate, and it would be a self-fulfilling prophecy for poor Kate. You’d tell her it was useless to look for love again. But if instead you knew nothing about her story and had to intuit it and learn it fresh, then, frankly, anything could happen—and in this world it often does.”

“So in other words, your Boss doesn’t believe in predestination.”

Gus’s eyes opened wide. “Who knew you were aware of such a word? Your SAT scores give no indication of that sort of vocabulary.”

“I was stoned when I took them. All right, Gus, so what do I do?” Julian looked at Kate crying and inexplicably wanted to give her a hug, which he knew was futile since she couldn’t see or feel him. Not to mention he wasn’t the hugging type.

“Don’t know, my boy. Up to you to figure it out. Well…I’m off.”

“Hold it!” Julian grabbed Gus’s arm. “You’re off? You’re God damn off?”

“You wouldn’t damn Her if you knew what’s good for you.”

“But you can’t leave me here. You can’t possibly leave me here, Gus!” Julian heard the panic in his own voice.

“But I have other cases.”

“Well, before you traipse off to the next friggin’ coma, what if I need you? I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. I don’t know the rules. I don’t know anything, but that this chick has had a really bad day.”

“I’ll check in from time to time.”

“But—”

“Julian, the Boss wouldn’t have entrusted Kate to you if She thought you couldn’t handle it. She is all-knowing. You’ll be fine.”

“No, I won’t be fine. You tell this Boss of yours I am not happy.”

Gus laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“Well, that attitude may get you a hot table and a complimentary bottle of vodka at the latest restaurant in the Hamptons, and it may even get you a shag with a porn star, but that ‘famous DJ’ attitude of yours doesn’t do anything for the Boss. She really hates star trips. If you only knew what awaited a certain Hollywood starlet unless she shapes up.”

“Star trips? You call not wanting to be left alone as a disembodied voice in some strange girl’s apartment, having no idea what the hell to do a star trip?”

“Julian, my dear young man, you may not like this, but it’s your job, and for now, it is simply what you have to do.”

“And what if I don’t? What if I just leave and go wander around the city? Go hang out with some other…spirits? Go get drunk? I don’t know. What if I just don’t?”

Gus removed his monocle. He sighed. He took out the neat little polka-dotted pocket square that he had tucked into his suit and unfolded it, cleaned his monocle, put it back on, refolded his pocket square precisely and returned it to his pocket.

“Well?” Julian asked impatiently.

Gus clasped his hands together. “I didn’t want to have to get…tough with you. But I’m afraid you just aren’t getting it. There are two outcomes if you die. Go up. Go down. That’s it, my young man. Your score sheet with the Boss doesn’t have very much on the Good Side. However, there is much on the bad side. An endless array of crimes and misdemeanors, so to speak.”

“What do you mean? A score sheet?”

“Heavenly Accounting. It’s a huge department. More employees there than almost anywhere. A lot of CPAs end up working there. All the anal-retentives do also. The Heavenly Accounting department does very meticulous work. You have a file, just as Kate does. Just as I do. The filing system alone is one of the most magnificent works of organizational genius ever invented, thanks to Luca Pacioli.”

“Who?”

“A friend of da Vinci. The father of modern-day double-entry accounting. Your file, Julian, has very, very, very few entries on the good side. I even had Pacioli himself double-check it. If you look at it as an accounting system, your good side is in arrears. In the red. Your bad side…one of the thickest on record.”

“Gimme a break. What about someone like Hitler?”

“Was there any doubt as to which direction he would go?”

“No. I suppose not.”

“Julian, if you accomplish this, if you do what you are asked, and do it well, it will erase a tremendous amount on your bad side. It won’t balance your books, so to speak, but…if you don’t, I’m afraid it will reflect badly with the Boss. Now, I can’t force you to do anything. That’s what free will is. You have free will, even in Neither Here Nor There. But as your Guide, I am urging you to consider what I am saying very carefully.”

Julian stared at Gus. He had never, until today, thought about death. That wasn’t entirely true. He had thought about it a couple of times after he drove while drunk and woke up the next day unsure of how he got home. He had a couple of times when he knew he had shot up too much heroin. When he mixed too many drugs. He had thought about it and brushed the thought away. Death was far away. Far away. Beyond that, he hadn’t thought of going anywhere when he died. Not Heaven. Not Hell. He didn’t believe in either. He thought when you died, you became worm meat. Nothing more. Nothing less. But now, faced with actually going to Hell?

“All right. So that’s it? I just hang out here. With her. The crying chick.”

“Yes, and try to discern what she needs to do.”

“Do I get to see her naked?”

Gus stared at him. “I don’t think I’ve ever been asked that question before.”

“Well, do I? I mean, if I’m here, can I watch her take a shower? Can I watch her get dressed in the morning?”

“I suppose so,” Gus said, annoyance in his voice. “But that really shouldn’t be your goal.”

“Well, if you’re leaving me here, then I’m lookin’ at her naked.”

“Fine,” said Gus. “I’ll inform the Boss.” He shook his head.

“Fine. You do that.”

“I will.”

With that, Gus disappeared.

Julian was irritated. Who the hell did this Boss think She was? Just depositing him here like this? Screw it. He didn’t want to go to Hell. He didn’t want to go to Heaven, either. And what? Play a harp? What he wanted was to be back in his body. But for the moment, that looked like it was out of the question. However, that didn’t mean he knew what to do in the meantime. He looked at Kate. “Now what?”

He began to closely examine her apartment. It was a very small one-bedroom, though it had floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room, with crown molding and hardwood floors. A nonworking white-brick fireplace flanked one wall. At least Julian assumed it was nonworking as there wasn’t a speck of soot anywhere on its hearth. On the fireplace mantle were a half dozen pictures in frames, all of an older man and a little girl. Julian walked closer to the pictures. In every snapshot, the little girl was smiling, her hair in pigtails or braids, her dimples showing.

“This is you,” he said to Kate. “And this must be your dad.” She didn’t react. Julian looked at the pictures again. Her father was tall, with dark hair, a little bit of gray at the temples. He had brown eyes and a big smile, just the slightest hint of a smirk, like he knew an inside joke he just had to tell you. Over to the left was a picture of her father in a fireman’s dress uniform. Ladder 10.

“Is this how he died?” Julian asked, remembering her whispered prayer. She told God that her father was dead. “Did he die in a fire?”

Julian walked over to the couch, near where Kate lay on the floor, sniffling.

“My father used to beat the crap out of me,” he said. He stood over her, looking down, trying to fathom what was in her mind. He was hoping that being in Neither Here Nor There would gain him some sort of psychic power. Then he could figure out all her problems, go back to his body, and hopefully go home. To the living. But he found he had no idea what she was thinking. He had no special powers. “My dad was a prick. Nothing like your dad, I suppose. He looks like a good guy in the pictures. You’re lucky. I mean, he may be dead, but while he was here, he loved you. Right?” He was just guessing, filling in the blanks. But she had so many pictures of him. She missed him. He had no pictures of his father anywhere. So her dad must have loved her.

Julian sat down and leaned back on the velour rollback couch. He scanned the ceiling, hoping for a cue from someone celestial—a guardian angel or something. “Now what? Now what? What the hell does ‘discern what she needs to do’ mean? Christ, I miss my life. I even miss my obnoxious sidekick, Frank. I wonder how he’s doing. I wonder if my mother and father even bothered to come to the hospital.”

Kate rolled over and stood up. She had the remote for the CD player in her hand.

“Shit. Don’t play that song again, Kate. Put on something cool…something upbeat. Something that will make you smile just a little bit.”

Julian stood and followed Kate over to the stereo system and said, over and over again, “Something happy. Play something happy.”

He repeated it ten times, twenty, thirty.

“Play something happy. Play something happy.”

He kept at it, and then he watched in amazement as she stopped, her finger poised on the “Repeat” button for that hopelessly depressing Stevie Nicks’s song. Kate looked conflicted, and she bit her lip. Then she started running her fingers over her CD collection, her lips moving silently as she read the spines of her CDs, looking for something.

“That’s it,” Julian urged. “Pick something else. This is so cool. Like you can hear me.”

He was inches away from her face. He reached out his hand to touch her, but she didn’t flinch. He could feel her skin, could tell he was touching her, but it didn’t translate to his senses in the way things had before he got to Neither Here Nor There. Julian took his hand away and looked at his own fingertips. He didn’t feel warmth or coolness, but instead a vague numbness, like he had been shot with Novocain through his whole body.

He leaned still closer to Kate, close to her ear, and whispered again, “Choose something happy.”

He watched as her face crinkled into a smile. Her eyes grew shiny for a split second.

“Here it is,” she said aloud. She took a CD from the shelf, opened it, and pressed a few buttons until the CD player came to a stop on the ninth song.

A bass being plucked. A little jazzy sound.

“What the hell is this?” Julian asked. “Christ, girl, have you ever heard of The Sex Pistols, The Clash or The Who? What is this shit?”

Then a voice, unmistakable, began singing the tune, “Fly Me to the Moon.”

“Sinatra? Frank Sinatra?” Julian looked at Kate. “I asked for a happy tune, but Sinatra?”

He studied her face as she smiled and then hummed, and then even sang a line or two. She swayed.

“This makes you happy?” Julian asked her, knowing no response was forthcoming. He decided being her caseworker was like being a detective. He looked up toward the ceiling, assuming he was speaking to the Boss, wherever She was. “You know, it would be a lot easier if you would just let me talk to her. Let her have a vision or something. Let me ask her stuff.”

He received no reply. What did he expect, lightning bolts? A voice from on high? A chorus of angels?

Kate wandered over to the mantle, to the picture of the fireman in his dress blues. She ran her index finger along the top of the frame.

“That’s it,” Julian said. “Sinatra reminds you of your dad.” He was pleased with himself for figuring that out.

Kate stroked the picture. “Aw, Daddy,” she whispered. “I wish you were here.”

Then she moved over to the bookshelves and took down a photograph in a simple brass frame. Julian hurried to follow her, to try to see what this picture was.

But the photograph wasn’t of a human being. It wasn’t her father at all. Or the loser who’d cheated on her. Or even her missing dog. Julian looked over Kate’s shoulder. She was staring at a photograph of the New York skyline. Before September 11, when two towers rose high to the heavens soaring above the rest of the buildings.

“Is that how he died?” Julian asked her. “Is that how your dad died?”

Then he watched as Kate put the picture back. The smile disappeared, and soon she was crying all over again.

“Shit!” said Julian. “This is harder than it looks.”

Kate looked in the direction of a clock. “One a.m.” She sighed and walked over to her telephone. She punched in a number and said, “Hi, Helen. This is Kate Darby. I’m just leaving you a message that I won’t be in…today. It’s one in the morning. My apartment was broken into. I’m exhausted. I don’t have anything that can’t wait until Friday. I’m fine. I’m not fine, but don’t worry. I’ll see you Friday. Thanks.”

She hung up and then walked over to her couch. She turned off the lamp and the room fell into grayness, illuminated outside by streetlights. She lay down and curled into a fetal position. She sighed. Julian watched as her eyes grew heavy, and then shut, and her breathing fell into a rhythm of sleep. He sat down next to her. He shut his eyes. But then he realized—and he wasn’t sure how—but he realized he wouldn’t fall asleep. That he couldn’t. That he didn’t need to. Being a spirit was a 24/7 job. Spirits didn’t sleep.

“Damn! What the hell am I supposed to do?” He tried to visualize a beer. It didn’t materialize. He snapped his fingers and said, “Beer, please!” Nothing happened.

He stood up and walked around the apartment looking for more clues to her life. The sooner he solved her problems, the sooner he’d rack up some points in the Good column and hopefully get back to his life.

Her refrigerator was covered with pictures of herself and friends, including one chick with a punky haircut who was in most of them. He tried to open a drawer but found he couldn’t. He thought about it and guessed that if spirits could open and close things at will, the world would seem like one giant haunted house.

He went to the door and decided to practice walking through. Don’t hesitate was what Gus told him. Gus was an odd little fellow, but at least Gus could see him. Talk to him. Have a conversation. When Gus was with him, they had sailed right through the door.

“Here goes nothing,” he said aloud. His first attempt, he smacked into the door. He didn’t feel any pain though. The second time, he made a running start and burst right through.

“Yeah!” he cheered when he found himself standing in the empty apartment hallway. He faced the door of the apartment across the hall from Kate’s and decided to go be a voyeur in someone else’s place. Maybe he’d get lucky and see someone having sex. Live porn. Girl-on-girl would be even better. He looked up and down the hallway, thinking of the possibilities of sex behind every door. Life—if that’s what you called it—in Neither Here Nor There was starting to get interesting.

Walking through the door across the hall, he emerged in a small living room, the mirror image of Kate’s. A “man couch”—black leather—faced a flat-screen television. Two people, their backs to him, were watching a Law & Order rerun. An old woman sat close to a guy around his age, maybe late-twenties, early thirties. The Law & Order rerun was one with Lenny Briscoe—his favorite TV cop. The old woman looked up—stared right at him, in fact, and asked, “Who are you?”

“You can see me?”

“Of course I can.”

He walked over to the couch. “Can he see me?”

“No.”

“He’s the guy who lives here?”

She nodded. “He’s my grandson.”

“Are you a Guide?”

“No.”

“An angel?”

“Yes.”

“Where are your wings?”

“They’re a pain in the ass. Always getting in the way.” She stood, and he could see wings, all folded up, on her back.

“How come you’re here and not in Heaven?”

“Zack needs some help. His wife died over a year ago. Almost two years now. Tragic. Lovely girl. She was in a car accident. And it’s all this time later and still…he won’t go out. Won’t see his old friends. One by one, they’ve given up on him. Except one—Tony. They grew up together. Tony hadn’t been to church since I used to drag the two of them on Sundays when they were little. In Queens. That Tony…good boy. Now he works on Wall Street. Tony, he went to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Prayed for help for Zack. My supervisor decided I was the best angel for the job. I know Zack. So, I’m working on it.”

Julian got a brilliant idea. “Well, now Grandma, I think we might be able to help each other.”

“Oh?” She arched an eyebrow. He looked closely at her now. Her skin was luminous. But her hair was all white. He could tell she was old. Her voice was a little tremulous. She was wearing a baggy housecoat like the one his own grandmother used to wear. But her skin…it glowed.

“Look, I’m from Neither Here Nor There. I have no experience in this. I have absolutely no idea what the heck I’m doing. I literally started this job today.”

She winced slightly. “Tough job, young man. Usually you Neither Here Nor There fellows are short-timers. You either come out of the coma, or your situation, and go back to your bodies…or you go…you know, up or down. It’s not enough time to get a lot done. Me? I have eternity.”

“Yeah. Tough gig is right. So listen, I need to earn some points with the Boss. I’m looking for some solutions here. I don’t have time to sit around and watch TV, no offense.”

“Who’s your assignment?”

“The chick across the hall.”

“Kate?”

“You know her?”

“Oh, yes. She baked Zack some Christmas cookies last Christmas. Left them in front of his door in a basket. She sent flowers when Meg died. Lovely girl, Kate.”

“Yeah. So…come on, Granny. Let’s get the two of them together, and it will solve both our problems.”

“She has a boyfriend.”

“Past tense. Had a boyfriend. The creep cheated on her. With her best friend, no less. She’s a mess.”

“Poor thing.”

“And her apartment was broken into.”

“I know. A junkie looking for drugs or stuff to sell for drugs.”

“Why didn’t you stop him?”

“We can’t intervene like that. We have to intervene in subtle ways—by comforting and giving strength, not by stopping a crime. I’m not the angel version of Kojak, young man.”

“Well, maybe you can just get Zack to…I don’t know…‘accidentally’ go to the laundry room at the precise time she does? Check his mail at the same time.”

“You’re talking Heavenly Coincidences.”

“Yeah.”

Zack’s grandmother looked over at her grandson. He sighed, shoulders slumped.

“It’s worth a try.”

“Thanks, Grandma. I’m Julian, by the way.”

“Okay, Julian. We’ll see what we can do.”

“I’d sure appreciate it…. Oh, and did you happen to see where her dog went?”

“The little Yorkie?”

“Yeah.”

“No.”

“Well…if Zack just so happened to find her little dog, I think it would go a long way with her, you know. See what you can do. Check with some other angels. Somebody’s got to know where the dog went.”

He turned and walked through the door. It got easier each time he did it. He considered going to look for a couple having sex. But he thought better of it. What if Kate woke up? If she did something that could offer him more clues? He decided to sit next to her while she slept.

He walked through the door into her apartment. She was snoring slightly, nestled under her blanket. He thought the sound she made was kind of cute; not quite a snore, but a little sighing noise. He wasn’t sure why, but in Neither Here Nor There, when he was away from her, he worried. Like he had to be sure she was all right. He decided it was because he was still extremely freaked out by his nearly dead coma body, by being shot, by everything that had happened to him.

Tonight, he’d sit by her. Tomorrow night? Hunt for lesbians.

Night passed slowly. He had nothing to do but pace in her apartment and sit next to her and wonder what she was dreaming about. Occasionally, he’d drift to the window and stare out at the street—at life going on without him. He was unseen. Unheard.

Julian sighed. He never thought he would miss sleep. Hell, he had snorted cocaine to avoid sleep in his life. He couldn’t even turn on the television and considered going over to hang out with Grandma. But he felt strangely responsible for Kate. When the sun rose, and then she stirred near nine, he was excited. Even if she didn’t talk back to him, he could talk to her, and that was sort of like company.

“Good morning, Kate,” he said as she climbed out of bed. He watched her brush her teeth in the small bathroom off of the bedroom. He sat on the edge of the tub while she brushed her hair and pulled it into a ponytail.

“What are we doing today?” he asked, knowing she wouldn’t answer.

He followed her as she spent the morning and part of the early afternoon cleaning up after the break-in. She righted a knocked-over lamp, and put papers that had been strewn on the floor into a desk drawer. While she was at it, she dusted the furniture and organized her shelves. At lunch, she walked into the kitchen and ate a blueberry yogurt. He peered into her fridge. Yogurt, bottled water, wilted celery. He guessed she didn’t cook much. Then he realized he wasn’t hungry. So aside from not sleeping, that meant he didn’t eat in Neither Here Nor There. Come to think of it, he hadn’t had anything to drink since he got there, either.

The phone rang.

“Hi, Mallory,” Kate said when she picked up the receiver, after glancing at Caller ID.

From what he could figure out from only one side of the conversation, Mallory had apparently tried reaching Kate at the office. Kate blurted out about her now-ex-boyfriend, and Mallory then got a blow-by-blow of the entire sordid affair. The break-in. The missing dog. Kate curled her legs under her as she sat in a club chair next to the telephone. Julian flopped on the couch and waited. Women sure could talk on the phone for a long time.

After Kate hung up, the super for the building came and changed the locks. He said he was letting the other tenants know about the break-in, too.

Locks changed, place straightened up, next she made fliers of her missing dog. She printed them out on her computer. While she was in the photo files on her computer, he got a mini-slideshow of her life. She poised her finger on the mouse, considering deleting all the David ones. She didn’t. Then there were the Leslie JPEGs. Leslie and Kate at a bar, looking like they were having a blast. Leslie and Kate at some book signing. Leslie and Kate lying on a beach somewhere. Bikini shots. He liked those.

“She’s a bitch, Kate.”

Still Kate stared at the screen.

So he began talking incessantly. “Delete her. Exorcize her from your life.”

He watched as Kate’s index finger trembled slightly on the mouse. He leaned closer to her face. “Delete the bitch.”

Her face turned resolute. She clicked…and Leslie was gone. Poof. Off Kate’s computer.

“Holy shit, I can do it,” he said. “You can hear me. I know you can.”

Kate stood and walked to the window. The day had meandered toward early evening. Julian looked at her profile as she gazed down on the street. He tried to follow her line of sight, and realized she was staring at couples strolling near the park, hand in hand under the lampposts. A drag queen strutted by in a halter top and tight jeans, a piercing in her belly button. She wasn’t, Julian mused, an attractive drag queen. Her hands were manly and her face was, well…like a guy with a bad wig. Suddenly, she waved at someone coming in the opposite direction. She flew at a guy in jeans, flip-flops and a T-shirt, and next thing Julian knew, the two of them were making out on the corner.

Kate sighed. “Even the trannies have love.”

“Worse, even the ugly trannies have love. Time to get you out of this apartment.”

CHAPTER FIVE

TIME TO GET YOU OUT of this apartment, Kate thought to herself. Sitting here crying isn’t helping matters. She walked to her bedroom and opened her closet doors.

Her closet was just a few inches short of a walk-in—a rarity in Manhattan. The rest of the apartment was small, just shy of 550 square feet. Still, she was beyond lucky to have it. Her father had always been so cautious and insured himself through the New York Fire Department. Plus the settlement she and her mother received after his death. And then the money her grandfather on her mother’s side left her. She knew it was astounding that she had this place at all at her age, in this city. That she owned it—albeit with a hefty mortgage was even more astounding. She would have bought it for this closet alone—let alone the proximity to the park.

She began pushing aside shirts. No, no, no, they’re all wrong.

She frowned. What, exactly, was wrong with her clothes? She had never particularly cared. A jeans and T-shirt gal, she had been a tomboy growing up. Softball, soccer, field hockey. Her dad came to as many games as he could. Now, working in Manhattan, she wore pantsuits in black. Black. Black. Grey. Adventurous was the camel-colored one.

None of this stuff is sexy. You’ve got a great body, you need to show it off a little. Get playful.

She rolled her eyes and searched deeper into her closet, passing by white blouses. While she used to believe you couldn’t go wrong with a fitted white blouse, nothing dangling from the multitude of hangers seemed right. Then, way near the back, a low V-neck, fitted T-shirt with a funky Asian graphic on it. She never thought the shirt was “her,” but it had been a gift when her cousin Mallory went to Hong Kong on business. Mal was always the wild cousin, sneaking off at family gatherings to smoke cigarettes when they were fifteen, running off to Paris for six months after college to drink wine, eat cheese and make love with sexy European men—including an Italian soccer star.

Kate pulled the shirt out of the closet and held it up. With a pair of black jeans, it might be what she was looking for. Not that she knew what it was she was going to do beyond getting out into the fresh night air, away from her apartment. It was unsettling to her that someone had broken in. The super had come to change the lock already, but still, she was creeped out.

She pulled on the top and dug out a pair of True Religion jeans that fit her pretty well. She padded, barefoot, to the bathroom door, on which hung a full-length mirror.

There you go, Kate. Own it. You’re fuckable.

“Jesus!” she said aloud. “Where the hell did that come from? Too much wine yesterday.”

She brushed her teeth and, uncharacteristically, dabbed some lip gloss on her lips. She stared into the mirror. Her eyes were still puffy, so she shrugged and added concealer and then two coats of mascara.

“That’s better,” she said and smiled.

Walking through her apartment, she grabbed her keys, and tucked them and three twenties into her pocket, grabbed some fliers and some tape, and headed out the door.

Even on the way down the stairs, she had no real idea of where she was going, an aimless feeling completely unfamiliar to her. She taped some fliers in the laundry room and next to the mailboxes, and then by the stairwell. Then she burst through the building’s front door like a second-grader on the first day of summer, and a warm breeze stroked her face. It almost felt like a man’s fingers gently touching her. Feeling unexpectedly buoyed, she set off toward her favorite pizzeria to grab a slice and a Diet Coke.

At the corner, she headed east to Gino’s, passing countless NYU students in T-shirts and shorts. Even in summer, the university had plenty of students filling the sidewalks and pizza places and bars of Greenwich Village. Gino’s was a favorite haunt, and the place stayed open nearly twenty-four hours, taking advantage of late-night student munchies. She walked in, the bell on the glass door tinkling slightly. The scent of fresh dough and tomato sauce caused her stomach to remind her that all she’d consumed in the last twenty-fours was yogurt and wine.

“Hey, Carlos,” she said to the owner. He had long ago explained to her he bought the place from Gino and kept the name. “Two slices. Burn ’em. And a Diet Coke.” She sat down at the long bar.

Carlos, of the smoldering dark looks, black eyes and rock-star bald head and earring, stared at her.

“What’d you do, Kate-Baby?”

“Hmm?” she asked.

“What’d you do? To your face? New haircut? Something.” He leaned back and folded his arms across his muscular chest. His tattoo of Jesus on a cross flexed along with his biceps.

“No,” she said, puzzled.

It’s the shirt. Told you. Nice rack.

“What is it?” Carlos asked again.

“Hmm?” She shook her head to quiet this suddenly obnoxious inner voice. What the hell was in that wine last night? They were breasts, or even boobs. But never a rack. What was wrong with her?

“Maybe it’s my breasts…um…shirt.”

Carlos nodded appreciatively. “You should wear it more often, angel.” He propped his elbows on the bar and leaned forward.

Kate felt herself flush. Carlos was one of those guys that it would never, in a million years, cross her mind to date. He oozed sex. Right down to the ever-present bulge in his Levis. She had never been one for meaningless sex, no “friends with benefits.” That was Mal’s thing.

“Okay,” she heard herself say.

The slices came out of the oven, burned the way she liked them. She bit into the gooey cheese and promptly burned the top of her mouth, causing tears to spring to her eyes. She quickly took a sip of ice-cold soda.

“Burn your lips, angel? I could kiss them for you.” Carlos winked at her.

Oh, for God’s sake. Is that the best this grease-ball can do? Finish up and head out the door.

Kate blew on her piece of pizza, and ate it, savoring the perfect combination of cheese, crust and tomato sauce. Carlos continued to flirt with her, and Kate made a mental note to drag out the shirt from Hong Kong more often. She didn’t want Carlos so much, but the attention was rather nice. After last night with David, she had wondered if she was pathetically unlovable.

She finished her pizza, paid her bill with a twenty and waved goodbye to Carlos, who was, typically, onto his next flirtation.

Kate strolled home, starting to feel a bit better. She stopped in Washington Square Park to watch the speed chess players. Sometimes she played a game or two, but this evening, as dusk settled over the sky, she was content to watch. On one end of the park stood one of NYU’s buildings, its deep purple flag flapping in the summer breeze.

She was an NYU alumna. She remembered wistfully looking at the university and knowing there was no way her family could afford it. But her father worked his off days as a carpenter for his uncle’s construction company, and saved every dime. Between that, grants and student loans, she’d been able to attend her dream college.

Three in-line skaters went past. A guy strummed a guitar, playing, she listened carefully, a Radio-head song done as a slow acoustic number. She saw a few skateboarders, more students and a few people in professional clothes, eating take-out dinners. She loved the park.

She walked the rest of the way home and entered her building and then climbed the staircase to her apartment.

As she started down toward her door, she saw the guy from across the hall holding Honey.

“Oh my God.” She felt a sob escape and raced toward her dog.

“Found her just sitting on my doorstep about fifteen minutes ago when I went to do the laundry. Just sitting there, looking up at me. Patiently waiting.”

He placed the now wriggling little dog in her arms, and she could feel Honey trembling—what she always did when she was excited. Her little tail was wagging, and she “yipped” once.

Tears in her eyes, she spontaneously hugged her neighbor. “Thank you, Zack. Thank you so much.”

“I didn’t do anything,” he said modestly.

That’s right he didn’t.

“Oh, but you have no idea. I was just lost without her.” She kissed her dog on the nose.

Dog germs.

Kate furrowed her brow.

“What?” Zack asked her.

“Nothing. I…I just have been out of sorts. Don’t know if you heard—my apartment was broken into.”

“I did. I’m really sorry. You know, if you ever need anything, or you’re just…scared to go into an empty apartment, knock on my door and I’ll check around the place for you, or whatever. Anything you need.”

He looked down awkwardly, but she touched his arm. “I will. Thank you. I mean it.” She squeezed his arm slightly. He was so handsome, she thought, and it was such a shame about his wife.

Holding her dog, she turned to enter her apartment. Once she shut the door, she set down Honey, who proceeded to run from one end of the room to the other, yipping and barking.

Shut up.

Honey barked insistently, almost like she was trying to tell Kate something.

“Why are you barking? That’s not like you, Honey. I bet you were so worried and scared when you saw the robber. It’s a good thing you were just lost and he didn’t hurt you.”

Honey moved toward Kate, but seemed to look past her, focusing upon one spot and yipping incessantly.

Go away. Tell the dog to be quiet. Tell it.

“Hush, Honey. What are you barking at? Was the robber there? Can you smell him?”

The dog wouldn’t budge from the one spot. Kate reached down to reassure her little dog. Honey quieted, but still stared, fixated on a spot on the ceiling.

Kate went to the kitchen and set down a bowl of food and one of water. “Come on, Honey,” she coaxed. “Don’t you want to eat?”

Honey still wouldn’t move. Puzzled, Kate walked over to her dog, scooped her up and carried her to her dog dish. Finally, Honey picked at the kibbles and drank some water, then she went over to her green plaid dog bed, turned around three times and settled in for a nap.

Kate walked toward the stereo.

Nothing depressing, Kate. How about the Clash? Or better yet, what about a shower?

Shrugging, she changed her mind about the music. She stood and shed her T-shirt, walking toward the bathroom.

Now this is more like it.

“I swear I need Prozac or something. Shut up!” she said to herself.

Not a chance. We’ve got things to do, Katie Girl. We’ve got things to do.

CHAPTER SIX

“WAKE UP, KATE. WAKE UP, wake up, wake up, WAKE UP!”

On night two, even after peeking into other apartments—and not finding any sex, lesbian or otherwise—Julian found himself next to Katie’s bed, longing for her company. Night seemed interminable again. His old life schedule was a collision of work and partying with odd hours here and there for sleep, as long as it didn’t interfere with his Patron consumption. He liked the 1800 Silver 80 Proof version, perfect for drinking neat. If there was a woman around to do a belly shot off of, even better. He loved licking a sexy belly button. He liked a woman’s stomach, that area below the belly button. He also, for some reason, was fascinated by a woman’s clavicle. Liked to lick along the bone, so delicate. Liked the hollow of a woman’s neck.

Face it, he thought, he loved a woman’s body, period. It was all the emotional shit he couldn’t handle. He stared at the hollow of Kate’s throat, wondering what it would be like to lick it. To kiss her.

Then he wondered what his own body was doing. His assassination attempt had to be big news. He wondered if Kate got the paper in the morning.

“Wake up, little Katie, wake up!” He started singing it, plugging in her name for “Susie” in the old song by Simon and Garfunkel.

He knelt down close to her and sang it in her ear. He watched as the flickers of a dream crossed her face like a shooting star. He had never been this close to a woman before—not in this way. Sex was different. Sex he’d had so close it was claustrophobic, like in the cramped bathroom on a flight from New York to London with a Swedish model. Or that time he had two women in the stall of the bathroom in CBGB’s before it shut down. He would also never forget the time he did it with the wife of his former station manager in the front seat of her Porsche Carrera. The stick shift kept ramming into his butt as she straddled him on top.

But close like this? Never. He didn’t cuddle after sex. He didn’t even like to kiss during sex. He liked it raw and fast with no talking—except for dirty words and moaning. The dirtier the better, frankly.

Kate rolled over, facing the middle of the bed, so Julian walked around to the other side and lay down next to her. He liked listening to her breathing because he felt so lost in Neither Here Nor There. It was contact with a human being. He had no idea how long he’d be stuck in God’s stupidly named in-between world. And he also knew he could find himself ending up there. In Hell, if he died. Or Heaven. One or the other. But he preferred to go back to living in the real world. Where there was Patron tequila. And people who could see him.

“Wake up, little Katie, wake up!” He started singing again. Louder and louder. And finally she stirred. He leaned up on one elbow, thrilled for the company.

She stretched, yawned and punched her pillow. Then she sat up and stared at the clock and groaned.

“God,” she exhaled. “Four in the morning and I wake up with a song stuck in my head. Shut up!”

She punched the pillow again and then flopped backward.

“Don’t go to sleep, Katie Girl. Sit up. Talk to me. Come on. Talk about anything.”

She stared up at the ceiling in the half-darkness—the illumination from the clock radio and city lights outside kept her tiny bedroom a deep gray. She had managed to get the mattress back on her bed that morning. Julian had watched her struggle, unable to lend some muscle.

“Aren’t you happy Zack found your dog? And you can get a new TV. Now we just have to get you over this boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend. Kate, you should have deleted his picture. Don’t agonize over this guy, this jackass who screwed you over. He’s not worth it.”

He’d had so many one-night stands, he’d lost count. But he wasn’t misleading. He didn’t need to lie to get women, and he had no problem with saying it was for sex and nothing more—not looking for a relationship, I don’t need your number, let’s not do lunch, there’s the door. But he didn’t lie.

He watched her, finding the entire voyeur experience strangely erotic. At the same time, she was his only companion, unless you counted Grandma across the hall, and right now, he needed Kate.

Her eyes remained fixed on the ceiling.

“What are you thinking?” he asked her.

She was silent for a few minutes as he studied her. And then she whispered aloud.

“God? It’s me. I…know you aren’t Santa Claus. I can’t just make a wish and have it all get better. But it’s been a really hard few years. First Daddy. And then Mom marrying that money guy. I’ve tried to like him, God. I honestly have, but he’s…not my dad. Maybe that’s what’s so hard. He’s nothing like my dad. Not heroic. Not handsome. Not funny. Not anything. He’s like striped wallpaper. You barely notice him.”

Julian saw she had clasped her hands together on top of the blanket like a small child saying bedtime prayers. Not that he knew anything about that. He hadn’t ever prayed in his life, he didn’t think, which made his recruitment for this job all the more ridiculous. He wasn’t even agnostic. The very word implied someone who had given some thought to the question of whether or not there was a God. He hadn’t. Not ever. He was nothing. Not an atheist. Not an agnostic. Just apathetic. When would the Boss understand that and let him get back into his body and wake up?

Kate whispered again, “And David. I…feel like my guts have been literally ripped out from me. When I saw them together, I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t even think past the pain. I don’t think I want much, God. I am truly, truly thankful for the material things I have, the roof over my head, my health, a profession I adore, all of it. But to find someone who loves me. Deeply and totally and all of me. Is it impossible? Is a soul mate impossible?”

“You know, Kate,” Julian said, “if you had told me last week that I would believe in soul mates, I would have said you were fucking nuts, but…this whole cosmic thing going on? Maybe God does exist and does know what He…She’s…doing. Maybe there’s someone out there for you.” He filled in his half of the conversation in the pauses.

“I can’t sleep, God. It’s like I hear this constant chatter in my head. It’s driving me nuts. I know it’s the stress of it all. At least I think it’s stress. I don’t want to go to work next to Leslie. It makes me want to throw up. On the good-news front, I have lost six pounds since this whole thing started—even after eating pizza. The stress diet.”

Kate pulled the covers up. “Please let me fall to sleep, God. Otherwise I’ll be so tired and will look horrible and Leslie can have the last laugh knowing David picked her and I’ve become a hag.”

Leslie, Julian decided, needed to be put in her place. And there was no way Kate was going to do that tired and stressed. “It’s okay, Kate. I was just…bored and lonely. I’m sorry I woke you. Go to sleep.”

He touched her cheek and watched as her breathing grew more shallow. Finally, she drifted off.

Now what?

He climbed from her bed and wandered into the living room. There were no phones in Neither Here Nor There, so what was he supposed to do if he had a question?

“Gus?” He said it loudly. “Gus!”

Nothing.

“Fuck me,” he said. Pissed at Gus, and at God for that matter, he sat down on the couch and waited for dawn. He wanted answers. Like when or if he was going back to his body.

He looked down at his arm. It looked like his arm—the same arm he always had—but when he touched it, he barely felt it. The tattoo of a heroin needle mocked him. He used to love heroin. Love and hate it. He’d be the first to admit he had abused his body, but now he wanted it back. If he could talk to God, wherever She was, he’d tell Her that he’d take better care of himself. A little less Patron, a little more broccoli.

He leaned his head back on Kate’s couch. What did he miss about his body? He’d discovered that the longing for heroin never goes away completely, no matter how long you’ve been clean. He craved, constantly, the euphoric sense of well-being, or floating. That place where everything was like a slow-moving bubble of warmth. Coming down from it, every muscle, every inch of him, hurt. Even his eyelashes hurt. If Gus was right and the universe was made up of strings, in a quantum sense, his particles hurt. Every neuron, proton, every cell.

He hadn’t gone to rehab. Instead, after an on-the-air rant in which he’d said some things that even for his show were pretty outrageous—and after the FCC scandal of it, the fines, the firestorm of criticism, he’d been taken off the air for thirty days. And in those thirty days, he and his producer had holed up in a hotel in Costa Rica, near the rain forest. He’d never gone through such pain in his life. Every day, an ancient native woman visited and brought him an herbal concoction to drink that their guide swore by. Julian sweated and cursed. At one point his producer, Frank, had literally tied him to the bed.

He emerged from that jungle hotel a couple of weeks later, clean but not sober. He drank more heavily, partied harder, screwed more women, chasing the demon of heroin.

Julian sighed. Then, with startling clarity, he realized that he didn’t want heroin. Or Patron. He had lost his earthly cravings. It was as if this lion he wrestled with every day for the last several years had suddenly turned into a kitten. The desire for heroin was completely gone.

“Okay, Boss.” He looked up at the ceiling. “Nicely done. If I could be this way and be back in my body, though, that would be the key. I miss sex. I miss touch.”

Suddenly, from Kate’s bedroom, her clock radio blared an old Britney Spears song.

“Crap, Kate,” he yelled. “Don’t tell me you listen to pop radio garbage. The Ramones, baby. You need to listen to the Ramones. Or Pete Townsend. Or…well, we’ll work on song selection.”

He rose and walked into her bedroom. She was hiding under the covers.

“Come on!” he yelled at her, standing at the foot of the bed. “I’m sick of these four walls. Time to get out of here. Let’s see where you work. Where you go for happy hour.”

Eventually, after one more smack down of the snooze button, she rose and headed to the bathroom. As she undressed, Julian admired her naked form.

“Nice tits. Great ass, by the way. You must do squats at the gym. You know, you need to stop covering up.”

She turned on the shower until the tiny bathroom steamed up. She stepped into the stall and soaped up her body. He watched the way the water formed rivulets through the bubbles on her skin. Even without a scrap of makeup, her skin was perfectly clear.

He watched her and decided shower time might be his favorite part of the day in Neither Here Nor There. Oddly enough, he found himself erect.

“Okay…so, let me get this straight, I can still get a hard-on in Neither Here Nor There? But what am I supposed to do with it?”

Annoyed, he had to be content with watching her rinse her body and wash her hair. She emerged from the shower, cheeks rosy from the hot water, and proceeded to brush her teeth and towel-dry her hair.

“Now the clothes,” he said, following her to the closet.

As she slid hangers across the bar, he spoke, loudly and firmly, “No, no, not a chance, big fat no, what were you thinking? No, no, and no again.”

She put a hand on her hip and sighed. “What is it with me? I hate all of my clothes all of a sudden. Hate them!”

She reached way back in the closet for a skirt and flirty top. She held them up to her body in front of the full-length mirror.

“We can work with that,” Julian told her.

“Maybe since I’ve lost weight, this will fit better.” She scrunched up her mouth and wrinkled her nose. Julian thought she looked like a bunny.

“Put it on,” he commanded her, though he did like looking at her naked.

She padded to her dresser and pulled out a pair of panties.

“No!” he screamed. “No! No! No! Cotton briefs? No, Kate girl, no. Boy shorts, a thong, silk. Not that.”

He leaned over her shoulder and stared into her underwear drawer. Though he had seen lots of women’s underwear, he had never been privy to the mysteries of a woman’s underwear drawer before. He’d taken them off with his teeth, ripped off thongs and judged panty contests on his show. But a woman’s apartment—the way she actually kept her things—that he wasn’t familiar with. His underwear drawer was a laundry basket of clean—or semi-clean—clothes in his closet. Kate’s drawer was, he decided, without enough silk. There seemed to be a shortage of sexy. That would have to be remedied.

She sighed aloud. “Maybe these.”

She pulled out a cotton pair—but at least they were bikinis. Then a bra.

“We’re going shopping today,” Julian said. “I hope you have a high limit on your credit card.”

Kate dressed, fixed her hair, dabbed on makeup, grabbed a soft-sided briefcase and headed out the door with Julian close behind. He wondered if she took the subway. He loathed the subway. But, to his pleasant surprise, she walked to work.

Once in her office building, she made a beeline for the newsstand and coffee bar in one corner of the lobby. He said, “Buy a paper, buy a paper, buy a paper, buy a paper, buy a paper.”

Thankfully, she did. And as Julian soon discovered, he was front-page news: “Shock Jock Clings to Life.”

Well, he mused, at least he was alive. He hadn’t been shuttled down to Hell, or sent up to Heaven.

As Kate walked, Julian noticed more than one appreciative stare. So, apparently, did she. He saw her blush a little. The black skirt she wore fit her perfectly, about two inches above the knee, and she had on black heels with a strap around her ankle. Fuck-me pumps, he decided. The blouse was hot. It was colorful, sort of tropical, like a watercolor on silk. And she had her hair pulled up, but with some loose pieces around her face. He was ready for Leslie. And he hoped she was, too.

They rode the elevator up to the eighth floor. “You work for a publishing house,” he said to her. “Hmm. Maybe I should write my memoirs when this is all over.”

They got off the elevator, and she waved to the receptionist, a guy.

“Hi, Todd.”

“Girlfriend, you look sexy today.” He smiled at her. He lowered his voice. “You go march past the office of that whore and knock her dead.” Then he winked.

She stopped in her tracks. “Who told you?”

“She did.”

“She did?”

“Well, not exactly. She went into Tammy’s office. As soon as she got in. Told her everything. I don’t think they realized I was in yet—nobody else was. I heard everything. She’s a bitch, and you just nail her ass.”

Julian smiled. This was going to be good.

Kate walked briskly into the hallway, but she stopped about halfway down. He could hear her hyperventilating.

“Kate,” he whispered in her ear. “No, don’t do this to yourself. She’s a bitch. Don’t let her ruin your job. Come on…walk past her. You look fucking hot. Fucking hot. Work it. Come on. It’s in you.”

She pulled her head up, lifted her chin and walked past an office. On the open door was a simple brass plate that read, “Leslie Winters.”

A woman called out, “Kate!”

Kate halted for just a minute.

“Ice-princess mode, Kate,” Julian told her. “Frosty, bitchy, don’t give her the time of day.”

Kate turned her head a fraction of an inch. Her eyes were cool, though up close, Julian could see she was trembling ever so slightly. He put his hands on her to steady her, hoping that she could somehow feel him.

“Kate…please. Can we talk for a minute? I made the hugest mistake of my life, and I am so sorry, and I would do anything to undo this,” Leslie pleaded.

Julian sized up the bitch. Kate was all wrong, he decided. Leslie wasn’t anything. Yeah, she was blonde and tall, and she was attractive—he’d seen that in the photos. But now he saw it was all…fake. Kate had a natural sexiness that was just starting to come out. He was bringing it out—and damn proud of himself for it.

“Undo what?” Kate asked.

“Good one!” Julian said.

“This. Us. David. I was an idiot. You’re my best friend and I really, really screwed up. It was a stupid, awful lapse in judgment.”

Julian leaned in closer to Kate, “Tell her to fuck off.”

Kate’s lip trembled.

“Don’t you dare, Kate!” he screamed at her like a drill sergeant. That seemed to make her lip tremble more. So he softened. “Don’t. Don’t, don’t, don’t. Please don’t.” He put his mouth close to her ear, whispering.

“How…” Kate’s voice was so quiet, Julian saw Leslie lean forward to hear her. “Do you propose undoing screwing my boyfriend, Leslie? Are you going to unfuck him?”

And with that, Kate turned and marched down the hall, leaving Leslie openmouthed. Julian jumped up and down. He high-fived himself and danced a spontaneous jig.

“Kate.” He leaned in and kissed her. “Kate…you did it.”

In her own office, cluttered but homey, she shut the door and sat down at her desk. A picture of her dad was on the shelf nearest to her, and every inch of shelf, desk and empty chair was covered with books and manuscripts and papers.

With the door shut, the tears came. She reached for a tissue and blotted at them.

Julian hated tears. A lot. He felt helpless. What the hell was he supposed to do? He stroked her hair, and just whispered to her, “You did good. And in a few days, that bitch won’t be more than a blip on your radar. I promise.”

She calmed down eventually, and Julian looked at her. He never had a sister. Never had anyone he looked after like this. He kind of hated it. And he kind of liked it. Which, he guessed, was appropriate since he was stuck in Neither Here Nor There.

CHAPTER SEVEN

GUS WAS ENJOYING a small pot of Earl Grey tea and warm scones with a dollop of raspberry preserves when he got a call from his immediate supervisor, Albert, to come to his office.

This was never a good sign.

The Home Office of Neither Here Nor There was a labyrinth of offices and cubicles. When Gus first arrived, it had taken him what seemed like half a century to really learn every office, not to mention the entire 48-volume Celestial Resources Manual. His last supervisor had been transferred to New Souls—the department that handled pregnant women—and Gus was assigned to Albert. In general, Albert allowed him a great deal of autonomy. So being called to the office usually meant trouble, and if Gus was going to take a wild guess, honed from many years in Neither Here Nor There, his guess was that trouble had a name: Julian Shaw.

Gus turned up outside Albert’s door and knocked softly, half hoping he’d gone to lunch, which would not be unusual for absentminded Albert.

“Come in,” Albert called out.

Gus sighed and opened the door. His supervisor was sitting behind his enormous desk, case files spread all over it, trademark hair standing straight up—usually a sign he was having a rough day. Albert Einstein was a tough supervisor—one of the toughest in the district because his expectations were so high, but he was revered for his work in quantum physics and in understanding why some people were attracted to others. According to Albert, it had to do with recycled particles that recognized each other. Of course, his explanation was a lot more complex and involved formulas that no one but the Boss understood. Gus just took it at face value.

“’ello, Albert,” Gus managed to squeak. Albert made Gus nervous. It was bad enough having a demanding supervisor let alone the smartest man in the history of the universe.

“Have a seat.” Albert smiled at him. Then he stood up, pulled the shades on the windows, which overlooked the lunchroom, and locked his door. “We need to talk,” he whispered, putting a finger to his lips, which were nearly covered by his bushy mustache.

Gus felt an anxiety attack coming on. He was going to be fired. He didn’t know why, but he was going to be fired, he was sure of it!

Albert walked over to the stereo on his shelf. The way it worked in Neither Here Nor There, Gus knew, was you simply thought of the music you wanted to hear and it emerged from your speakers. Gus was partial to Beethoven’s Ninth, though over time, he learned to appreciate Etta James and Ella Fitzgerald. Albert, however, stood before his stereo, and the next thing Gus knew, ABBA was blaring.

This was very bad.

For whatever reason, over the years, the workers in Neither Here Nor There had discovered that ABBA was almost like a cosmic scrambler. If you wanted to discuss something and not have the Boss hear you, ABBA did the trick. No one knew whether it was because ABBA’s harmonies were so distracting, their tunes so saccharine, or the Boss simply hated them, but, regardless, ABBA it was.

If Albert was playing ABBA, then something very serious was afoot.

“Now,” Albert said, sitting down. “We need to discuss Case File #1,997,024.”

Gus gulped. “Kate Darby?” If he had been able to sweat in Neither Here Nor There, he would have been soaked, drenched.

“Yes, and that Julian fellow assigned to her.”

Gus nodded. It was coming. He was about to be fired.

“I need to ask your opinion.” Albert lowered his voice. “Is it possible the Boss has made some kind of mistake? A celestial error?”

Gus’s eyes opened wide. “That’s practically unheard of. Not since She didn’t foresee Roger Staubach’s Hail Mary pass.”

Albert nodded. Staubach, a devout Catholic and Dallas Cowboys quarterback, had thrown the original “Hail Mary” pass in the 1975 game against the Minnesota Vikings. The Boss had bet against Dallas to lose—a friendly wager between her and Gabriel. Unfortunately, no one told Mary—the Mary—and when Staubach said a prayer to the mother of the Son, the pass was completed. “I know,” Albert muttered. “It doesn’t happen often. But this Julian Shaw? He’s an utter disaster as a caseworker.”

Gus winced. “I was afraid of that.”

“Ask me what he’s doing right now.”

“I’m afraid to.”

“Don’t be scared, Gus,” Albert said, pulling on his hair in a nervous habit. “Ask me.”

“Certainly, Dr. Einstein. What is he doing right now?” Gus asked, but he really didn’t want to know.

“He’s somehow managed to cajole our poor Kate into a lingerie store on her lunch hour.” Albert turned to his laptop and fired it up on the Cosmic Superhighway. “According to this latest report from one of our Operative Angels in the Village, Kate Darby’s spent $483.72 on thongs.”

Gus cleared his throat. “Um, excuse me, sir?” he stammered. “I don’t understand. Thongs?”

“Yes. Do you wish to tell me how they could spend that much on underpants with only a string up the fanny? Gus…I think we have a problem.”

ABBA was now singing “Dancing Queen.”

“You know, Albert…he never struck me as caseworker material. But I—I—” He stammered. “I was following orders.”

“I have done a thousand calculations on him, and each time, the result is pure disaster. Well, now what? The Boss has assigned him to us, and you’ve got to get him in line. Helping Kate is the number-one priority. Thongs are not. Gus, if we’re not careful, we can both kiss our retirement package goodbye.”

Gus nodded.

“You do understand me, Gus?”

He nodded again. “I’ll speak to him, Albert.”

“Good.” Albert stared at his stereo and changed the music to a classical station. He favored, as everyone knew, the violin. Compositions by Mozart, Brahms, Bach and Prokofiev.

Albert leaned back in his chair and shut his eyes. “Ahh, Gustav, this is Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G Major.”

Gus listened politely, but he really needed to be going. He cleared his throat. “Sir…is that all for today?”

“Yes, yes. That’s all. Thank you, Gus. Other than this one, you’re doing a fine job. Excellent. If you can swing this case in our favor, I will put you in for a promotion.”

“Thank you, Dr. Einstein, sir. Thank you.”

As Gus rose and left Albert listening to Bach in his office, he felt as if an ominous cloud was following him. He knew it. Julian Shaw was without a doubt a disastrous caseworker. And he had the potential to put a big black mark in Gus’s career file. Forever.

At this rate, he’d be kicked out of the union.

CHAPTER EIGHT

BALAM WAS RECLINING on a red-velvet-covered couch enjoying the striptease of two NYU coeds gone wild in a small apartment near 14th Street.

“Come here,” he urged the blonde—he thought her name was Cyndi. His favorite song blasted through the room—AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell.” If only mortals knew the Highway was, indeed, paved with good intentions.

Cyndi giggled, drank a belly shot out of her best friend’s naval, and approached him, topless. “You’re such a little devil.”

“You have no idea,” he growled. She bent over and he licked along her nipple. Then he heard his cell phone.

“Damn,” he murmured. It was the hotline. From his boss, Lou.

He looked up at her. “Hold that thought. And the next one. And the next one.”

He sat up. “Balam here.”

“Listen, I hate to bother what, knowing you, is surely a decadent evening, but I need you in the office. Pronto.”

“See you in a few.”

Cursing under his breath, Balam stood and pulled on his pants.

“Ladies, we’ll have to continue this some other time. Business beckons.”

“Ohhh…” The brunette pouted…what was her name? Angie? “You have to go?”

“Afraid so.”

She stumbled toward him, eyes glazed with tequila shots. “Come on,” she begged. “Don’t you want to stay and play with us?”

“My guess, darling, is that you two are perfectly capable of playing without me. Perhaps I’ll see you some other time. In fact—” he sized her up and down “—I have a feeling I will. You, in particular, are very, very naughty indeed.” He looked at the blonde. “You, on the other hand…” He sighed. “I suppose you’ll go back to your home in Ohio after you graduate and forget all about the debauchery you enjoyed in the big city. Pity.”

He buttoned his shirt and surveyed himself in the full-length mirror that leaned against the wall—they had set it up so they could enjoy watching their escapades from all angles.

He loved his human appearance this go ’round. Drop-dead handsome—black hair, dark eyes, abs…killer abs. He was going to get laid a lot this journey.

Fully dressed, he left the girls grinding to AC/DC and stepped out into the hallway. As he walked, his devilish hearing picked up bits of conversation—the better to combat the Enemy. He knew, by the end of the hall, which resident was fighting with his wife, which one was cheating on her husband with the building super, and which one was trying to get laid by whispering empty promises into the ear of a drunken woman he’d picked up in the corner bar. That was what made the world go round for most twentysomethings, heck most thirtysomethings and fortysomethings and fiftysomethings, wasn’t it? When the Bitch created humans and gave them the ability to procreate, She had no idea what She was doing. How it would consume them, their every waking thought—particularly for men.

He hailed a cab and took it to 666 East 66th Street. He took the elevator to the thirteenth floor—which conveniently did not even have a button in the elevator—the strange superstitions of humans. They were afraid of the number thirteen, black cats and breaking mirrors, when they ignored the homeless and the hungry and everything God preached throughout time. Made his job easier.

Stepping off, he was in the pinnacle of luxury. The floors were gleaming marble, imported, he knew, tile by tile, from Italy. Two huge ivory tusks from an elephant faced the boss’s door. On the wall hung looted art from Nazi Germany. He spied a “missing” Manet—apparently newly acquired by his boss since the last time he saw Lou. Balam smoothed his hair and greeted the receptionist, “Hello, Dorothy.”

The elegant woman smiled. Her perfectly coifed silver bob grazed her shoulders. “Hello, Balam. He’ll see you now.”

He nodded at her as he walked past—but he didn’t actually turn his back to her. Anyone who could murder three husbands in a Black Widow scheme for insurance money…Well, he didn’t trust her. That was one of the tricky things about working in Hell. It was almost as vicious as corporate America. Then again, so many of those greedy bastards would end up working here. He knew they planned a nice corner office for Bernard Madoff.

He opened the door and stepped into the even more luxurious offices of Lucifer.

“Hello, Lou.”

“Balam.” Lou smiled at him. He’d chosen a body as handsome as Balam’s own. “Care for a scotch? It’s a single malt. Perfectly aged.”

“Sure.”

Lou waved a hand and the scotch materialized in a Waterford crystal tumbler with crystal-clear ice. Another minor annoyance of Hell. Nothing ever tasted quite cold enough. Ice was in constant demand. And Lou liked his pure ice from a glacier.

“Thanks, Lou,” Balam said and took a sip. “Smooth.”

“Nothing but the best for my top producer.”

“Thank you,” Balam said warily. When Lou complimented him, it usually meant a tough assignment. Some complication he hadn’t foreseen.

“Balam, I’ll be honest. We have a tiny little problem.”

“And that is?”

“Hold on.” Lou snapped his fingers, and ABBA piped through the sound system. Balam inwardly cringed. He hated “Dancing Queen.”

“All right, listen…you know Julian Shaw?”

“Yeah. He was a lock for a spot in our organization. I had big plans for him. I thought we could revamp the organization’s radio station. Update it a little. Take over one of Sirius’s satellites.”

“I would have thought so. But…he’s working for Gus and Al over at Neither Here Nor There.”

Balam groaned. “What? Are you sure?”

“Yes.” Lou took a remote control and pointed it toward an immense plasma-screen television that hung on the far wall next to a painting by Marc Chagall. He pressed a button, and suddenly Balam was looking at the inside of a lingerie store.

Lou pressed another button, then another, so a picture-in-picture popped up—and there, though he wasn’t visible in the ordinary screen, stood Julian Shaw, talking to an attractive brunette who was, apparently, buying an assortment of silk and lace panties.

“What the hell is he up to?” Balam asked.

“He is trying to fix her life.”

“And he thinks underwear is going to do it?”

“He’s trying to get her over a messy split.”

“Thongs seem like something…I don’t know…that our side would advocate. I don’t know that we have anything to worry about.”

“Oh, no. Look at this.” Lou fast-forwarded. He pulled up a picture-in-picture.

Julian Shaw, the world’s most infamous lesbian-porn-loving shock jock, was staring at the brunette while she slept.

“What?” Balam squinted. “One minute it’s thongs. Next he’s…I think I might be sick. You’re saying he cares about what happens to her? Who is she? What are her weaknesses?”

“Well, this is her best friend…” Lou pulled up another picture of an attractive blonde screwing a good-looking guy. “Frankly, after this little escapade, she may be headed here. That’s the brunette’s boyfriend. The brunette, by the way, her name is Kate Darby.”

“And the blonde, what’s her story? She screwed her best friend’s boyfriend?”

“Alcohol was involved. Classic. Trying to tell herself it was all the booze when you and I both know that…free will reigns. She wouldn’t have done it if she didn’t really want to.”

“All right, so…what are we looking at here?”

“We need Shaw. We’ve been working on him for years—listen, once he tried heroin, we had him. Even once he got clean, he was already so far over to our side. I don’t want to lose this one. It’s exactly the kind of case She likes to win. Like those deathbed conversions. We’re ready to snatch the soul to Hell, winning one for the team, and then…then, after a lifetime of total evil and debauchery, they say they’re sorry, welcome Her into their hearts, and She’s willing to forgive it all. Let them through the Pearly Gates.”

“Are they really pearly?” Balam asked. Lou had been there…he never had.

Lou nodded. “Quite glorious. I’d never admit it to Her.” Lou shook his head. “Dancing Queen” began again. Lou had a loop for discussions like this one.

“So the objective,” Balam said, sipping his scotch, which, despite the ice, tasted lukewarm, “is to get Shaw back on the team.”

“Yes. But…here’s the thing. If you could do it and also bring the blonde, the boyfriend and Kate Darby, that would be great. She’s bitter. Ripe for the picking. That would be a coup. But whatever happens, don’t lose Shaw. I know how that Bitch works. She’s letting him rack up some points for the Good Side. Well, you just ensure he racks up some bad points while he’s at it. Got me? We need this one. It’s a matter of pride.”

Balam nodded. “Sure thing, Lou.” He had this urge that he sometimes had when he was around Lou, to ask him…To ask him the Big Question. What was She like? Lou had not only met Her, he had been Her favored angel. Until they had some sort of massive falling out.

But he didn’t ask.

And the reason he didn’t was he knew he couldn’t admit to curiosity about Her. Religion had it all wrong. It wasn’t lakes of fire and unbearable thirst. It was a sense, always there, like something was missing. Balam likened it to feeling like you were trying to retrieve a memory…something on the tip of your tongue that should be part of you. Trying to remember something you did while you were drunk beyond belief. It was there, this calling, this…longing (not that he’d tell Lou that). But you were separated from Her for eternity. And…

He didn’t want to think about it.

“You can count on me, Lou.”

“You’re my top closer. Seal the deal with Julian.”

“Sure thing.” He set down his scotch and stood. How hard could this be? Julian Shaw was obsessed with sex, drugs and rock and roll. And lesbians.

More than that, he was a narcissist.

He was destined to be one of them.

CHAPTER NINE

KATE’S COUSIN MALLORY called her at two o’clock, just as Kate was heading into a cover design meeting.

“Kate? How’s it going, sweetie? Up for cocktail therapy after work?”

Kate paused. She had felt rattled but strangely thrilled all day by her interaction with Leslie. Then her budget-busting shopping spree at lunch. Cocktails were definitely in order.

“Sure. Where do you want to meet?”

“My treat. I’m taking you to that new sushi place in Tribeca. Sake and sushi will purge that asshole from your mind.”

“Actually—” Kate smiled, liking the feel of her new silk boy shorts against her skin “—I think I’ve already started to exorcise him. But I’ll tell you all about it over dinner.”

She hung up and went into her meeting, where the new Isabella Lopez cover was unveiled. The concept was all wrong. A pink tutu?

“What do you think?” Tammy from marketing asked.

“Too, too much,” Kate said, uncharacteristically honest. She usually couched everything with, “I like it, but maybe we could tweak…”

Everyone laughed, but then all eyes were on Tammy, who hated to be crossed.

“You have something better?” Tammy arched an expertly plucked eyebrow. “This I’d like to hear.”

Emboldened, Kate said, “Actually, if you’d read the book or my notes, you’d know the centerpiece is the heroine’s journey to her grandmother’s hometown in Mexico. It’s about embracing her roots. Not pink. Not trendy. Why not embrace some of its cultural aspects?”

“I thought the tutu was a metaphor for her as a little girl. Maybe it’s just a little above your level. You don’t get the vision we have, the metaphor.”

“Really?” Kate asked. “The metaphor for not trying anything new or daring up there in design?” Kate blinked hard. Where was all this bravado coming from?

She was just about to apologize, when Helen, her publisher cut in. “I have to go with Kate. Maybe an old-style cantina. Something. I don’t think Isabella will go for the tutu anyway. She’ll hate it.”

That shut Tammy up, and Kate, trembling slightly from the confrontation, felt vindicated. Her author would hate it.

After the meeting, a glare from Tammy, and a late afternoon checking back-cover copy for three upcoming releases, her publisher called her into her office.

“Yes, Helen?” Kate sat down on one of the club chairs facing the polished cherrywood desk. Helen was a legend in the book business, one of the last of a dying breed that passionately courted new talent and nurtured them. She was about fifty-five, never married, no children. Books were her children, she liked to say.

“Bad news travels fast,” Helen began.

Flushing slightly, Kate nodded. “I’m trying to be professional about it.”

“David’s called me. He still, for now, wants you to edit his next book. He says you’re his muse. He can’t finish this book without your help.” Helen rolled her eyes. “My question for you is…can you? Can you do it, Kate?”

This type of thing is what separates the men from the boys, Kate. Say yes, and she’ll think you’re a pro. Say no, and she’ll lose respect for you. This is a career-defining moment.

That voice again. Every bit of her wanted to say no. Wanted to scream no and run from the room. But she couldn’t. Books were her children, too. She would never forget getting David’s manuscript from his agent. The Jackal’s Feast was an intelligent thriller, and though it benefited from her editing—particularly a subplot that went nowhere that she’d had him excise—it had given her goose bumps. She just knew in her gut that he was gifted. Her instincts were as good as anyone’s.

“Of course I can. I know that book inside and out. I know it and it’s good and it will make the company money, Helen. I know it could be a bestseller.” She heard the words leave her mouth, and she wondered, who was this woman standing on her own two feet?

Good job, Kate. Show the bastard you can do it.

“Kate, you remind me of me when I was starting out. Passionate about what you do. Keen instincts. My door is open if you need me.”

“Thanks, Helen.” Kate stood and exited Helen’s office. In the hallway she exhaled. And smiled.

Leaving uncharacteristically on time—she usually stayed until well past five—Kate headed home. In her apartment, she flicked on all the lights. She was grateful, in a sense, that the place was small. Knowing she’d been burglarized made her uneasy, but with the lights on, she was reassured no one was in her apartment. She was safe.

Again, Honey barked as if fixated on something. Kate chalked it up to trauma, put the leash on the dog and took her for a walk. Coming back into the building, she scooped Honey into her arms, and then spied Zack.

“Thanks again,” she said to him as he stood at his mailbox, pulling out the day’s mail.

He smiled at her. “I’m just glad the little guy found my doorstep.” He patted Honey on her head.

It’s a girl, you jerk.

“She’s a girl. Her name is Honey.”

“I like dogs. Sometimes I think I should get one—for some company, you know?”

“You should. Then Honey would have a friend.” She smiled at him and walked into the building.

Maybe rushing into dating is the wrong thing. Don’t get any ideas.

She changed into one of her new outfits. Besides the outrageously expensive thongs, and the one doubly outrageous splurge—a La Perla lace demi-bra—she’d gone and bought two dresses and a couple of shirts. She stepped out of her skirt from work, pulled her shirt over her head, and pulled on skinny jeans and a new V-neck kimono tunic that plunged low up front, with dramatic sleeves. She took the bobby pins out of her hair and ran her fingers through it. From being pinned up, it had curled perfectly.

She was just about to walk out the door when her cell phone rang. Assuming it was Mallory, she answered without looking at Caller ID.

“Don’t hang up,” the voice on the other end pleaded.

Kate grabbed at the sideboard next to the door to steady herself. “Hello, David,” she whispered.

“Five minutes. Five minutes is all I’m asking. I’ve been a total jackass, a heel, a scumbag, the most awful boyfriend ever…but I love you and I want to have a chance to prove that.”

Kate felt her insides lurch, and she ran to the bathroom, feeling as if she might actually vomit. She flicked on the lights, and no longer saw herself looking sexy and beautiful, the way she had felt all day. She saw herself pale and pathetic. She turned off the light and stood there, breathing in and out, trying not to get sick.

“Kate? Five minutes. Five minutes…that’s all I’m asking.”

What is it, Kate? It’s him, isn’t it? The bastard.

She exhaled. “What is there to say, David? You fucked my best friend—former best friend. We have nothing left to say.”

“We do. Five minutes. And then you can tell me to get out of your life forever, and I will never bother you again.”

“No. I don’t owe you anything, David. Not even five minutes.” She felt as if she were clawing her way out of a bog, trying to get back on firm ground, back to the place where she felt good. The place where she was this afternoon—which now seemed a lifetime away.

His voice was soothing. “No, no, baby. You don’t owe me anything. Not one thing. I owe you so much. So much better than I’ve done by you. But if you could find it in your heart to give me five minutes, to meet me for coffee. I just don’t want to end like this.”

Closure. Was it psychobabble? Could there be any more closure than seeing his firm naked ass, then seeing Leslie half-naked by his unmade bed where he and Kate had made love just that morning? There could be no more closure than that.

“No.” She heard herself as if from far away.

“We still have to work together.”

“We can do it all by e-mail. There’s nothing to say, David.” Then she closed her cell phone.

She still felt like throwing up. She turned on the bathroom light and stared at herself in the mirror over the sink.

You owe him nothing.

Put on your best fuck-me pumps and a smile and go meet Mallory.

She flicked off the light and considered canceling the whole thing. She stared at her bed, where her purchases lay strewn across her comforter. Buyer’s remorse hit her in her gut. About the same place where David’s voice hit her.

She shook her head. “No,” she said out loud. “Today I was…” She searched for the word.

Fabulous.

Say it out loud.

“Fabulous.” She said it resolutely. She slipped into a pair of sandals with a sexy sling-back heel and walked over to the bed to pick up one of her new dresses. “I’m worth every penny.”

Damn straight.

“NO OFFENSE, KATE, but if this is what breaking up does to you, you should break up with guys more often.” Mallory picked up a piece of tuna with her chopsticks.

“What?” Kate shot her cousin a look.

“The outfit is awesome. And totally not what you usually wear. It’s funkier. And I love the hair. The makeup.”

“I bought some new Stila products today. The makeup counter woman had me do this whole smoky-eye thing. I feel like one of those makeup ads—definitely not me.”

“Well, maybe you should make it you, because there isn’t a guy in here who’s not staring at you.”

Kate rolled her eyes. Mallory was petite and dressed like a rock star in tight black pants and even tighter tops that showed off her graceful collarbone and neck and well-toned arms. Thin without being gaunt, she had enormous brown eyes that had a slightly feline appearance, and black hair she wore in a near buzzcut, with tips of platinum on the ends. Her mother was Korean. Her father was Kate’s dad’s brother. The resulting genetic mix—Irish-Korean—made Mallory intriguing and exotic with a hint of punk thrown in for good measure. Her eyebrow was pierced and she had five small stud earrings in each ear.

“Mal, I think you’re getting plenty of looks.”

“I get the ‘that girl is probably wild in bed’ looks. I get the ‘I bet that girl would do a threesome’ looks. You’re getting ‘that girl is totally hot but maybe out of my league’ looks.”

Kate sipped her sake, ignoring her cousin. “He called me.”

“The bastard?”

She tells it like it is, Katie Girl.

“Yes, the bastard.”

He’s worse than that. He’s a prick.

“And?”

“And he wants to meet for coffee.”

“Why?”

“I suppose to grovel for forgiveness.”

“He wants you back?”

“Something along those lines. He says he still loves me.” Kate swallowed hard at the last three words. She told herself she would not cry. That voice told her she would not cry.

“Look, Kate, I’ll be the first to admit that infidelity sometimes happens. You know, a business trip, a lonely night, a drunken mistake. Doesn’t make it right, but it happens. When I was with James last year, I cheated on him once while I was in Hong Kong. It was a total spur-of-the-moment thing with a hot guy I met in my hotel bar. The guy was from London, an economist, brilliant, funny, sexy. It was one night. But here’s the thing, Kate…cheating with someone’s best friend, where you are really destroying any chance for trust again, destroying a friendship and your relationship? That’s a whole different kind of cheat. He lacks a moral compass, Kate.”

“But what if it was just a mistake? A stupid mistake?”

“No. People don’t make those kinds of mistakes. That’s like detonating a nuclear bomb in your life. You don’t detonate the bomb by accident.”

Listen to her. Listen to her. Listen to me, Katie Girl. Listen to me.

“Well, I told him no.”

“Good. I’ll drink to that.” Mallory lifted her saketini. Kate held up her sake cup and clinked Mal’s glass.

“But Helen asked me if I would still work with him. On the book.”

“She didn’t.”

“She did.”

“Did you tell her you can’t?”

“No. I’d be really hurting my career.”

“I don’t know, Kate…”

“I have to at least try.” Kate shrugged. “Can I tell you something, Mal?”

“Anything, you know that.”

Kate nodded. Mal’s support was a constant in her life. Through 9/11, through everything, Mal had been there, never wavering. They were more sisters than cousins. “Ever since the whole David fiasco, I feel like I’m cracking up a little. I spent almost five hundred dollars on underwear today.”

“That’s awesome. Did you buy La Perla?”

“Yes.”

“And aren’t their bras totally worth it?”

“Yes.” Kate laughed. “But still…Mal, this is me we’re talking about. And I keep wanting to blurt out the most inappropriate comments. It’s like my id has suddenly decided to take over.”

“You know, Kate, it’s been a rough couple of years. I mean, frankly, every time I see that guy your mom married, I want to blurt out the most inappropriate—but true—comments. Like, pal…lose the comb-over. And I want to ask her why she got married so fast. So maybe the stress of the whole break-up, your dad’s death—I know it’s been a while, but the anniversary is coming up, the robbery, the shock of all of it, has…I don’t know…shut off your internal censor.”

“Maybe.”

“That’s all it is,” Mallory assured her. “And maybe it’s a good thing. Now, if you want to say something inappropriate, why don’t you walk over to that guy over there and try to pick him up?”

“Mal…” Kate shook her head, flushing.

“What? You don’t think he’s a perfect specimen?” Mallory gestured toward a guy in an expensive suit with what looked like an even more expensive haircut.

“Well, of course I think he’s hot,” Kate said. “He’s tall, dark and drop-dead gorgeous.”

Mal stood up, much to Kate’s mortification. But that was Mal. She strutted in her five-inch heels—at five feet one, she was never without heels—over to the man in question and his friend.

“Excuse me,” Mal said, “but my cousin and I are thinking of ordering fugu and taking our lives into our hands. Deadly blowfish. But before we do…we want to know if we’ll even like it. Have you ever had it?”

Kate’s eyes opened wide. What the hell was Mal talking about? Granted Mal made big bucks. Streaked hair tips and rocker fashion sensibility aside, she had an MBA from Wharton and a killer job. But fugu costs $150. And regardless of the price, Kate wasn’t eating it, no matter what these guys said.

The tall, dark and handsome one and his slightly shorter friend strolled with Mal over to their high-top table in the bar area. “The fugu is awesome here. And do you know wasabi is a natural aphrodisiac?”

Oh, please. First of all, fugu tastes like congealed leftover oyster juice.

Kate wrinkled her brow. Mal saw her puzzled expression and asked, “What’s wrong, Kate?”

“Nothing…just a weird déjà vu moment. Fugu tastes like…oyster juice.”

“When have you had it?” Mal asked. “You hardly ever go for sushi.”

“That’s the funny thing. I don’t know.”

“Well, then I’d avoid the oyster juice,” the tall well-suited man said. “I’m Mike. This is my friend Ted.”

“Hi,” Mal said. She leaned a little closer to Ted. Kate smiled a hello.

“But I wouldn’t avoid the wasabi,” Mike said.

Kate looked desperately at Mal. “I’ve got to go, Mal.”

“You sure?” Mal ever-so-slightly raised an eyebrow.

“I’m sure,” Kate said. “I don’t feel well.”

“Let me call you a cab,” Mike offered.

“That’s all right.” Kate stood and opened her purse.

“Coz, it’s on me. Call me tomorrow, okay?” Mal said.

Kate nodded, feeling as if the room was spinning. “I’ll see you. Nice to have met you guys.”

As she left, she glanced over her shoulder. Mike had hopped into her seat, and Ted had a hand on the small of Mal’s back. The three of them were laughing.

Kate stepped out of the restaurant and onto the sidewalk. Cabs flew down the street, and clusters of people walked from bar to bar.

“I am so not ready to be back in the dating pool,” she muttered to herself.

She lifted her arm to hail a cab, muttering to herself. “And what the hell was that whole fugu thing? Oyster juice? Congealed oyster juice?” She felt like gagging.

A cab pulled up. She opened the rear door and slid across the seat. She was, she decided, definitely cracking up.

CHAPTER TEN

JULIAN WAS FOLLOWING Kate out of the Japanese joint when a well-dressed man in a suit approached him.

“Julian…Kate can see herself home. Why don’t you and I take a stroll?”

Julian watched as Kate left. She gave one backward glance at her cousin and the two guys trying to pick them up, and left.

He turned to the man in the suit. “You can see me?”

“Of course.”

“All right, Guide. I’ve got the drill now. We can take a walk. Where’s Gus?”

They stepped outside as Kate was getting into her cab. Julian strolled down the street the other way, his new Guide beside him. The man was well-dressed, with a crisp white shirt and what looked like an expensive tie. He smelled of Armani cologne—Julian knew because he’d received a bottle as a gift once, and it was the one cologne he sometimes wore.

“Gus works for a different boss than I do.”

“Well, you know, I’m really starting to wonder about this whole thing. Gus fucked up, I think. I mean, he literally drops me into some strange girl’s apartment and wants me to figure out how to fix her life. Like I have any idea—and no porn star, either. No bisexual sex fiend. Just a girl with a plain old broken heart. Wouldn’t it be simpler for an angel to wave a magic wand, earn its wings, whatever…and just fix it?”

“Well,” this new Guide said, “we tend to think so.”

“Now we’re talking, my man.”

“Indeed, we are. My name is Balam, by the way.”

“Hey, Balam.” Julian was relieved to find someone in Neither Here Nor There who got the difficulty he found himself in. Still, he also felt just the slightest bit anxious that he had let Kate out of his sight.

“You see, we think if God was truly the God of good, of benevolence, then why would mankind have to suffer? Why not make things perfect? Why not create an Eden in the here and now? Or as the adage goes, why do bad things have to happen to good people?”

“Precisely. I mean, I hadn’t thought of that before I got to Neither Here Nor There, but yeah, that’s it. I mean, Kate’s a nice girl. Why not make her feel better? Why not fix it? Look, she is a good person—unlike me, I have to admit. Do you know she bakes Christmas cookies for everyone in her building? And she knows the name of the guy in the bodega where she gets her coffee, of this old guy with a little dog who sometimes walks his dog at the same time she walks hers? She’s just nice. Which, as far as I’m concerned, is a little freaky. Especially in this city. But still.”

“So glad you see things our way. That’s why we unionized.”

Julian glanced over at his companion as they strolled. He still wasn’t quite used to being unseen by all. Passersby were oblivious to the two men, and Julian appreciated someone who actually talked back to him. This Guide had to be head of a department or something. Diamond tie-tack, Rolex. Gucci friggin’ loafers.

“A union?”

“Oh, yeah. We’d love for you to join. You know, Julian, I am completely authorized to offer you a substantial signing bonus.”

“A signing bonus? Oh, this is priceless. Gus is a piece of work. You know it figures I would end up with a Guide who neglected to tell me all the perks.” Jesus, he was pissed off. “Gus said nothing about the union, and sure as hell said nothing about the signing bonus. What a slacker. Or maybe he intended to pocket it himself.”

“Absolutely. We’re not very pleased with Gus. But we can remedy that. We can remedy a lot of things. First of all, you sign with us and you’re not saddled with Kate.”

“I get a new case?”

“No. You won’t have any cases. Kate won’t be your problem anymore. Call it benign neglect.”

Julian stopped walking. Something about this guy was all wrong. He hadn’t been a jerk all his life not to know a fellow jerk when he met one. “Where’s Gus?”

“He doesn’t really check in with me.”

Julian, despite his lack of solid human form, felt a chill pass over him, like a shadow. “Okay, pal…who, exactly, do you work for?”

“The boss.”

Julian narrowed his eyes. “The same boss as my boss?”

“Depends on how you define boss.”

Julian stood outside a bar. Gorgeous women were two deep at the bar, and he felt a hard-on making an appearance. He just didn’t have a physical body to do anything with it. He didn’t long for heroin or Patron anymore, but he did long for his body. To be able to go into the bar, sit on a stool, and order a drink and be seen instead of trying to figure out just whose side he was on. Not to mention sex. He would like some sex. He also wished Gus were there to explain this Balam guy to him. The scent of Armani was wafting over him in waves, making him feel confused.

“You want a drink?” Balam asked.

“Very funny.”

“You sign with me, and you can eat and drink and enjoy all the things you used to. Your tequila shots. Belly shots from the hottest woman in the room. Your heroin if you want to—with no withdrawals, either, none of the consequences. Imagine it, Julian. The high without the fall.”

Julian could imagine it. The longing for heroin was never far from him. He used to dream of it when he got clean. He’d wake up in the middle of the night, sure he was high. Heroin, he always used to think, was as close to heaven as you could get—until you came down.

Balam continued, his voice lugubriously smooth. “This signing bonus comes—if you should end up back in your mortal body—with wealth. Unimaginable wealth. And just for you—” He snapped his fingers and a thick contract on many pages of legal-sized paper appeared out of nowhere. “Clause 17H.”

Julian examined the contract, running his finger down all the fine print until he got to 17H. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope. Clause 17H. I’ll toss in a ménage à trois with twins.”

“Identical twins?”

“Absolutely.”

“Playboy-quality twins?”

“You insult me, my friend. Would I deliver anything less? Impeccably perfect Playboy-quality twins. Blondes.” Balam snapped his fingers. “One better. Natural blondes. Brazilian wax of course.”

“Look,” Julian said. “Tempting as all this is, how come you’re not burning in a sea of fire? You’re not what I expected.”

“Of a demon?”

“Yeah. No pitchfork. No horns. No red skin.” Julian reached out and patted Balam’s suit. “Expensive Italian suit. Expertly tailored.”

“I use a guy from Hong Kong over near the Waldorf Astoria.”

“And he can see you?”

“Sure.”

“But we’re invisible right now.”

“Yes. One of the advantages of not being mortal, my friend. We can be seen—or not—at will. People can see angels, too. Most just don’t realize it. Or, as is the case right now, I can elect to be invisible to mortals.”

Julian felt uneasy. “You haven’t answered my question.”

“The sea-of-fire thing.”

“Right. I mean, it seems like you have a good gig.”

“Exactly. She wants the world to believe in a miserable, fiery Hell. But the lake of fire doesn’t exist. It’s a figment of human imagination. And I have to say, humans are not a very imaginative lot.”

“Well, then if there’s no lake of fire, and there’s clause 17H, why would anyone fear Hell?”

“Precisely, Julian. No one would. Hell is simply a realm in which there is benign neglect of humans. Why should we care about them? I have no use for the petty problems of others. And frankly, judging from the radio show you had, you had no use for their problems, either. We’re quite alike in that regard. When, tell me when, did you ever think of your fellow man? They were…something to exploit. The dumber, drunker, sluttier and more pathetic, the better.”

Julian liked to think of himself as having a finely honed bullshit detector. “All right, I’ll give you that. I was a jackass. But…if you don’t care about people, if you…want to believe in benign neglect, then why try to sign me up to your side? If you really don’t care, then why not let the other team do what it does and…who gives a fuck? Let them help Kate.”

“Because…” Balam’s voice was instantly less smooth and calm. It seethed, and Julian thought the temperature around them shot up a few degrees. “Because we’ve been cast for eternity away from Her. And She sends all kinds of angels and guides to help them. Miserable mortals, who are rarely, I assure you, grateful.”

“People are grateful. People pray all the time. They go to church. They go to temples. They…believe in Her. Even if they call Her a Him.”

“No, they’re not grateful. They’re pathetic. Do you know how many pitiful souls get down on their knees, on their knees until they’re raw, and literally beg for a miracle—save my child, save my marriage, help me get over my broken heart, keep my child out of jail.” He pleaded with a sing-song falsetto, mocking and cruel. “They say to Her, ‘Do this and I will never ask for anything again. I will go to church dutifully every Sunday. I will be good. I will give up smoking, just let it not be cancer.’ And then you know what?”

Julian nodded. “Yeah, pal, I know what.” His heart, had it been his regular beating heart in his regular old body, would have felt a thud.

“Exactly. They swear they will live each day as if it is their last.” Balam hissed the word. “And in six months, it’s all forgotten. And She lets them. It’s sickening. All we do—meaning me and my fellow card-carrying union members—is let them make their foolish choices—the choices they were going to make anyway. Sign with us and you’re on easy street, my friend.”

Julian felt a hot breeze, even though he didn’t really have his full senses in Neither Here Nor There. He just knew he was being sold a bill of goods. “You know, Balam, as tempting as your offer is, I think I’ll stay in Neither Here Nor There for now.”

“Suit yourself.” Balam stared coldly at him, with a gaze that cut through Julian. Staring deep into Balam’s eyes, Julian saw they were reptilian, dark and flat and black.

“Just so you know, though,” Balam said, “if She decides to send you to Hell, if you don’t make it…if that assassin’s bullet in your gut kills you, and She decides you don’t have enough checkmarks in the good column…She won’t have pity on you. She will cast you out like She did all of us.” Balam looked over his shoulder. Julian followed his gaze and saw what seemed like hundreds of well-dressed demons that he hadn’t noticed before.

“Fine. If I get cast out, then I’ll get my suit tailored and drink my Patron. But until then, I don’t think I’m signing up. Much as Clause 17H is enticing.”

“See you in Hell, then, Julian.”

Julian turned from Balam. Then he thought of Kate. “Balam!” He called out after the demon, who was already turning to go into a bar.

“Yeah.”

“What about Kate? I never should have left her.” He didn’t know why he felt this way, but he did. “You tricked me, didn’t you?”

“Hmm, that’s the Boss’s fault for entrusting one of Her babies to a fuckup like you. She’s back with the prick who jilted her.”

“What? But she was just fine. Just a little bit ago. I was with her. She was okay.”

“Amazing what the power of the dark side can do, Julian. You have no idea what you’re up against. You really should have signed up when you had the chance.”

“What about benign neglect? Why would you purposely help that guy ruin her life?”

Balam shrugged. “For the fun of it. I live for these little games. Like a cat toying with a mouse. I love it. It amuses me.”

“Shit!” Julian screamed and started running for Kate’s apartment. He prayed Balam was lying. Really prayed.

Looking Heavenward, he implored the Boss, “Don’t let her do it, okay? Don’t let her make a mistake because I was ignoring my job. I didn’t mean to leave her side. I swear it.”

He ran through Tribeca, though amazingly, he never tired. Eventually, he ran through Greenwich Village and then Washington Square Park and up the steps of Kate’s apartment. He stopped when he got to her hallway. For there, strewn down the hall were rose petals. Hundreds of them.

“Son of a bitch!” Julian screamed. And then he caught it—the unmistakable scent of Armani cologne. Balam had been there.

“Benign neglect, my ass,” Julian muttered, and entered Kate’s apartment to see just what he was up against.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“IT’S BEAUTIFUL,” KATE murmured. She was staring at a diamond engagement ring. The one she had always dreamed of, with sparkling baguettes on the side and a two-carat pear-shaped diamond. Platinum. From Tiffany’s. In an Easter-egg-blue box. It was the most beautiful ring she had ever seen, and it danced with the light.

“Try it on,” David whispered. “Please?”

While she was out, he had strewn dark pink rose petals down the hall. He had been standing outside her door with the biggest bouquet of wildflowers she had ever seen, grinning sheepishly because his key no longer worked. When she opened the door, he made her close her eyes while he lit dozens of candles.

Now he was asking her to try on the ring.

“I don’t want to, David,” she said softly, eyes shining. “Because if I put it on, I won’t want to take it off, and I’m not ready to forgive you.”

“I’ll wait.” He took the box from her, and walked over to the fireplace mantle. “I’ll wait as long as I have to. I’m going to put this ring right here.” He placed the blue Tiffany’s box next to the photo of her father. “And when I prove myself to you, and you put this on, that will be the happiest day of my life.”

Kate leaned back against the couch and sighed. Three weeks ago, she would have thought this the most perfect night of her life. The proposal was grand and romantic. But try as she might, every time she looked at David—handsome, with those hazel eyes and lashes that made her stomach turn cartwheels—she pictured him screwing Leslie. It was burned in her mind forever. Even if they married, Kate imagined that on her tenth wedding anniversary, as they toasted each other with Moet & Chandon, that there would always be a pause. Her heart would always feel a pang that not only had he been unfaithful, he had betrayed her with her best friend in a way that was irreparable.

“David…I just don’t think you can fix this.” He was so used to having his way. Whether as a writer or on the racquetball court. He was used to winning. He always got what he wanted. And he had wanted Leslie, she told herself.

He walked over to her and knelt down in front of her. “Kate, I know I can fix it.” He took her hands and kissed the inside of each of her wrists. “Let me try.”

Tell this jackass to get lost, Katie Girl. Think of who you were today. You were fabulous and confident. You faced down Leslie and won, baby.

Kate heard that internal voice of hers again. The new voice, the confident voice. She just wished she could internalize it. Really feel it. The voice was separate from her, almost like a…coach, talking to her, but not part of her. David leaned up and kissed her cheek, his lips brushing her face. She felt his tongue flick across her lips as he then moved down and kissed the nape of her neck. A shiver pulsed through her. They were always so good in bed together.

“David…” She moaned slightly.

“Don’t you miss me? Don’t you miss this?”

“Ye-es.”

“Think about making love, Kate. How we fit together.”

Fuck off.

“If we fit so well—” she suddenly pushed him away “—why wasn’t it enough?”

He fell back a little. “Okay.” He stood up and paced back and forth a couple of times. “Fair question. Honest question.”

“Because I am honest—and you’re not.”

“But I am. All right…you want to know? You want to know why I did it?”

Kate winced and felt a stabbing inside. Did she really not want to know? What was worse—having the details or always wondering? She decided the wondering. “Fine. Why?”

“Because—” David’s voice was pleading “—that ring was burning a hole in my pocket. I wanted to propose, and I was freaking out. The more I freaked, the more the idea that we wouldn’t be with anyone else for the rest of our lives just kept repeating in my head. I was going out of my mind with wanting this for us and being terrified at the same time.”

“So you thought fucking my best friend was the solution to your dilemma?” She crossed her arms.

“My God, Kate…that doesn’t even sound like you. No. Of course not. I ran into her in Barney’s. I was picking up a gift for my mother’s birthday, and Leslie was shoe shopping or something. We shared a cab, and I told her about the ring. She got all excited and asked to see it, so I invited her to my place. I showed it to her. She said it was gorgeous…and I opened a bottle of champagne. Then a second bottle. It all seemed surreal. I was going to ask you to marry me. Marriage. Then all of a sudden, she started flirting with me. Giving me a hard time about how I wouldn’t ever get to go to bed with her now that I was getting married.”

Kate felt her cheeks flush, as if she’d been slapped in the face. She clutched her sides.

That Leslie is a conniving bitch. If you believe him.

“I was drunk. I was stupid. I was…caught up in the whole idea that maybe I wasn’t ready. But as soon as it was over I knew not only was it a mistake, I wanted to be with no one else but you. Forever. Never again. I swear it.”

Kate shook her head. “David, I don’t know what to say.”

“Say you’ll at least think about it. That you won’t shut the door forever—just think about it.”

She bit her lip. “Fine. But you have to go now.”

Ask for your key back. Even if it doesn’t open the door anymore. It’s a symbolic gesture.

“And,” she said as she stood and walked toward the door with him, “I need my key back. Please.”

David nodded. He pulled his key chain out of his pocket and took a brass key off. He pressed it into her palm. “I know one day you’ll give me this back.”

She smiled at him. He was trying hard, she’d give him that. But it all felt too raw. She opened the door to the hallway.

“I’ll call you,” he said.

“Fine.”

He leaned in and gently kissed her cheek, his lips lingering for a few seconds. “I love you,” he whispered, then turned and walked down the hall.

Kate watched him leave.

You don’t believe this jackass, do you?

She shut the door and looked at the rose petals strewn across the floor. He was the king of grand gestures. The flower arrangement was enormous, and the entire apartment smelled like a florist’s. She started blowing out the flickering candles. Then she saw it—the box on the mantle. She had been so overwhelmed she hadn’t even looked at it closely.

She stepped over to the fireplace and stared at the ring box. Did the ring fit?

I’m warning you, Kate…don’t try it on. I mean it!

Kate’s hand hovered over the Tiffany’s box. And then, suddenly, the box flew from the mantle and landed on the floor four feet away, as if the strongest gust of wind had blown through her apartment.

“Oh my God!” Her heart pounded. “That was weird.”

And then, distinctly, she heard that voice in her head. Only this time it was clearer. Male. Smooth.

Don’t, Kate. He’ll only break your heart.

Kate walked over to the box and bent over to touch it. She knew no breeze had blown. No mild earthquake had flung the box from the mantle. She was almost afraid to touch it, picturing some strange scene out of Poltergeist. She stood up and said aloud. “Are you a ghost?”

And the voice, very clearly, replied, Sort of.

CHAPTER TWELVE

“GUS, WE HAVE A CRISIS on our hands.” Albert was playing with his hair, twisting it ’round his fingers as he stared at the ceiling. ABBA was playing—“Waterloo.”

“Yes, sir,” Gus agreed.

Albert stopped playing with his hair and leaned forward at his desk. He pulled up a complex chart on his laptop, smiling. “You know, I still can’t get over computers—delightful little machines.”

“Yes, sir.”

Albert clicked a few keys, hunt-and-peck style. “I never learned to type properly,” he said to Gus. “One moment.” Then he turned the laptop slightly so Gus could see the screen. “Okay, as you can see here, there is a delicate balance between Earth, Heaven, Hell and Neither Here Nor There.”

Gus stared at the swirling chart, which looked rather like a fragment of DNA twirling and spiraling. He didn’t understand it. But then, he never understood Albert’s charts. He wondered, not for the first time, why they hadn’t assigned Albert someone smart. Like Isaac Newton. Or Galileo. In his human life, he had been a tailor. Respected, but not aristocratic. And certainly not as smart as Albert.

Albert continued, “This is the fabric of the cosmos. This delicate balance is maintained by certain understandings, certain checks and balances. Now, we’re all aware Satan and his minions are going to try to interfere in the workings of mankind. It’s a given.” Albert clicked and a photo popped up of Balam and Julian walking through Tribeca.

“But in general, they use the workings of free will—mankind tends to botch things up on their own. Now the Angels, they intercede in times of great crisis without calling too much attention to themselves. We read about these cases all the time—miraculous recoveries from cancer, babies rescued from wells, things of that nature.”

“Oh…like that tornado in Kansas—blew the whole building away, left the baby in his crib.”

“Precisely.”

“But here—” Albert pulled up his diagram of the cosmos again and pointed to a nebulous area, which looked as if it was made of stardust “—is Neither Here Nor There—NHNT for short. And never are the citizens of NHNT to reveal their existence in any sort of physical way. We fly under the radar so to speak. The Demons know we’re here, but because they battle the Angels, we enjoy détente. And tonight, we have this.” Albert pressed a key, and a video played of a ring box flying off a fireplace mantle. Albert pressed two more keys and it played again in slow motion.

Gus winced. “Oh, dear. That’s not good.”

“Precisely, Gus. I realize you’ve got a heavy caseload, but I’m transferring your cases to other Guides for the moment, and you are to concentrate entirely on reining in this Julian fellow. I curse the day he was assigned.”

“Yes, Albert. I’ll tend to that right now.”

“I knew I could count on you, Gus.”

Gus nodded. “Of course, sir.”

“Care to play a game of chess before you go on your way?”

Gus had played chess with Albert before and Albert usually had Gus in check within seven moves.

“I should really go attend to the situation.”

“Certainly.” Albert switched the music from “Dancing Queen” to Bach. “Ahh, that’s better.”

“I’ll report back as soon as I have any information, Albert.”

Gus left Albert’s office. Were he mortal, he knew he would have a massive headache. Were he mortal, he would have been fired already. Jack Welch of GE would have canned him in five minutes. Donald Trump (possibly headed to Hell depending on who was laying odds in the office pool) would have said, “You’re fired!” But he wasn’t mortal. He was here for eternity and this was his latest and biggest headache.

“Well, Julian, my boy…time to see just what you are up to.”

GUS WALKED THE STREETS of Greenwich Village, enjoying its energy, as always. He imagined it was rather like the streets of London in his day—minus the chamber pots being tossed out of upper windows.

New York City really never slept. Because he didn’t either, he liked to wander, unseen, studying human beings, sometimes with envy, sometimes with disappointment, but always with compassion. NYU students milled about full of promise. Bar patrons spilled out on the sidewalk. Each bar had its own personality—from pubs to “beautiful people” hot spots. Cabs sped by him. He liked embassy row, where old townhomes with rich history stood on tree-lined streets, ivy climbing their sides.

When he reached Kate’s apartment building, he entered, and then walked through her door to her bedroom. She was sleeping soundly beneath a moss-green comforter, moonlight streaming in. Gus thought she looked quite beautiful. Julian was lying next to her in bed, watching her intently.

“Gus?” Julian lifted his head off the pillow. “Man, am I glad to see you.”

“I’m slightly less glad to see you, Julian. We need to talk.”

Julian sat up and climbed from bed with another glance at the resting Kate. He approached Gus. “Sure, now you’re willing to talk to me. At first you just dumped me here with no friggin’ clue what to do!” Kate stirred. Julian continued, whispering, “You didn’t even bother to tell me the devil might show up and offer me a signing bonus. What if I had signed my soul away? Huh? What then? And, what? You guys don’t offer any kind of compensation?”

Gus sighed. He turned and walked into Kate’s living room. He observed the robin’s-egg-blue box back on the mantle. “All right.” He turned to Julian, who had followed him. “Perhaps we need a better training program. We’ve had discussions in Celestial Resources about that. Saint Matthew was supposed to be working on something.”

“Saint Matthew? Didn’t he write one of the chapters in the Bible?”

Gus rolled his eyes. “Yes, he was a close personal friend of Jesus. He’s also the Patron Saint of Accountants. A stickler for details. Supposedly, he was working up a manual, a Powerpoint presentation, a short training session. But it’s too late for that now. Perhaps I could have explained things better.”

“Perhaps?”

“But that’s no excuse for tossing her engagement ring across the room, Julian, my boy.”

“First of all—” Julian poked Gus in the chest “—I didn’t even know I could do that. I walk through doors, so how I was supposed to know if I slammed that ring box it would move instead of my hand just going through it?”

“Well, technically, it shouldn’t have.” Gus sat down on the couch. What was the Boss thinking? This was getting far too complicated.

“What do you mean, ‘technically it shouldn’t have’? It did!”

“Well, Julian, try to understand me…. It is not our role to be so emotional. So involved.”

“I’m stuck with this girl 24/7! You told me to figure out what she needed.”

“Yes. But your job was to discern what Kate should do, not become so enraged that you hurled a ring box. You should think of yourself as a monk, or as a Buddhist. You wish her happiness, you have compassion…but you are not involved. It’s that emotional involvement that allowed you to move that box.”

“I’m not emotionally involved.”

“Then what happened after you threw the box?”

Julian didn’t say anything.

“Young man, I can find out through cosmic surveillance tapes or you can tell me.”

“What are you, Big Brother?”

“Matthew 10, verse 29.”

“What? You and Saint Matthew are best buddies all of a sudden? I’ve never read the Bible, Gus.”

“Well, then I’ll tell you. The verse says, ‘Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father.’”

“For God’s sake, Gus, speak English.”

“She knows all. She knows every sparrow, every blade of grass on Her good earth—which is all the more reason you mortals need to go green and recycle. For heaven’s sake, She sends Al Gore out there to try to get mortals to understand how precious Her planet is. She knows all, Julian. All about the heroin. All about your dark secrets. That stash of porn DVDs under your bed.”

“She knows about that?”

“Yes. Even the really, really naughty ones.”

“I hardly ever watch those.”

“She knows about the time you crashed your Porsche into the minivan at the mall and drove away without leaving a note—that minivan was owned by a single mother with four children and unbelievably awful automobile insurance.”

Julian’s mouth dropped open slightly. “Wh-at?”

“Yes. She knows all, from the sparrows to you, my boy.”

“Then why does the Bible verse say Father, not Mother.”

“Pronouns. Gender. Immaterial. We are all one in the fabric of the cosmos. So you might as well fess up. That’s what you humans don’t understand. You hide and nurture your darkest secrets. You tell no one. The evil that men do is kept in the most hidden parts of themselves. But She already knows. So why not bring them into the light, where She can heal you?”

Julian shrugged.

“Come along then. What happened after you knocked the box to the ground?”

Julian shook his head. “All right. Being as you already know, Gus. Kate asked if I was a ghost.”

“And your reply?”

“I said ‘sort of.’”

“Sort of.” Gus snorted.

“Well, I kind of am. I’m Neither Here Nor There. And I wasn’t about to explain that to her.”

“You aren’t to explain anything to her. Julian, your existence is not ever supposed to be revealed.”

“Well, you never told me that. When I answered her, she heard me, Gus. She heard me. And she talked back. We can talk to each other.”

“I have heard of this theoretically being possible. My direct supervisor…he has theorized it’s possible. But I personally have never known of such a thing happening. The connection is obviously very strong, but you must not encourage these conversations.”

“Fine.”

“You must remember that your time in Neither Here Nor There is brief. You will either recover or move on. You can’t remain with Kate here. And conversing with her will only confuse her once you’ve gone…. Julian?”

“Yeah,” he replied, a sullen edge to his voice.

“Let’s go pay a visit to your body. Kate is sleeping. She’ll be all right if we leave for a short spell. Come on.”

Gus led the way. Desperate times called for desperate measures. Visiting mortal bodies was not generally recommended—in fact, Albert was positive these types of visits were counter-productive. But in this case, Gus felt an exception was necessary.

About ten minutes later, they stood outside St. Vincent’s hospital.

“My body’s in there, huh?” Julian asked.

“Indeed. Let’s pay a visit, shall we?”

“Maybe I’ll see some hot nurses.”

Gus smiled. Perhaps Julian hadn’t changed as much as Gus thought.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

BALAM STOOD IN LESLIE’S apartment, trying to determine how she could be useful. She should have been fast asleep, but she was sitting with a picture of her and Kate Darby, an opened and nearly finished bottle of expensive Napa Valley wine, and a box of tissues.

Balam wandered her apartment searching for clues and found the first sitting on a bookshelf. A yearbook. From Dalton—an elementary-through-high-school Upper East Side institution of impeccable reputation. He pulled out what looked very much like an iPhone, but was instead connected to the Cosmic Superhighway. In an instant, he knew the Dalton School had yearly tuition in the $30,000 range.

“Rich girl,” he murmured. That explained something.

In Balam’s experience, two of the greatest corruptors of human beings were great poverty and great wealth. The poor sometimes made reckless decisions born of desperation. They could end up in Hell, but She quite often understood their temptations. Hunger. Pain. Lack.

The rich made callous decisions born of a life led without care or burden. Without care and burden, humans created their own dramas. They divorced and remarried, and they dragged their children through the detritus of their affairs and misbehaviors. They cared less about their fellow man as greed consumed them. They were, quite often, his easiest acquisitions.

He walked into Leslie’s bedroom. It was decorated with expensive furniture. He touched the comforter, peeled it back. The thread count on her sheets was incredible! She had rich tastes befitting a Dalton grad.

But what else? He spied a picture on her nightstand. Of David and Kate. But Kate was nearly out of the picture, in profile.

She had a crush on David all along.

Another thing about mortals. They believed all was fair in love and war.

Nothing could have been further from the truth. He had invented the expression—to confuse them. In fact, She was the universe’s ultimate pacifist. She despised war, and there was nothing fair about it. No matter how much the military hid civilian casualty figures, declaring them inflated by the opposition and so on, every civilian casualty was a loss She felt keenly.

As for love…humans could make more abhorrent decisions for the sake of a thirty-second orgasm than for nearly any other reason. Long-term marriages tossed away. Lust was so fleeting. But they—mortals—talked themselves into believing it was real, and that it justified all sorts of behavior.

So Leslie had fallen for her best friend’s guy. That explained a little more.

But there was one more piece. He was sure of it. He logged on to the Cosmic Superhighway again. Punching a few keys on his phone he smiled.

A side-by-side comparison. SAT scores. Report cards. Kate was much, much smarter than Leslie. And then, their confidential reviews at work. Kate’s were stellar. Leslie’s were less so.

Add professional jealousy and Leslie was a perfect Hellbound Trifecta.

This was going to be easy.

He walked back into the living room and sat down next to Leslie. He began speaking to her. Only, what he had to say were the very things she spoke to herself. The things she wouldn’t admit to Her, to Kate, to anyone. Leslie’s deep, dark ugly side. Her insecurities.

Play on a human’s insecurities, and the chess match with the angels was practically won. He had contacts at another publisher. And a plan was formulated.

“Hello, Leslie,” he intoned. “You know…if Kate and David were meant for each other, he never would have slept with you. Surely, you felt the attraction between you two. But better yet…are you really appreciated at that small publishing house? Wouldn’t a giant house really give you the room to spread your wings, away from Kate and her small, little dreams. And wouldn’t it be a feather in your cap to not only jump ship, but to take David with you? To bring him to the big leagues?”

He watched as Leslie dried her eyes, then leaned back and furrowed her brow. She was thinking.

“And really? He is that talented. Kate has got great instincts. But if she really cared about him, she would have encouraged him to leave. To go someplace bigger with a big, fat advance. You’d be doing him a favor if you left and then courted him to your new house. In fact…why not meet with a headhunter? I know just the one, too.”

Balam watched as the corners of her mouth turned up ever so slightly. Soon, a full-blown devious grin spread across her face.

“There you go, Leslie. A girl after my own heart.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

THE EMERGENCY ROOM, which Gus and Julian first passed through, was full of the cacophony and chaos of a typical urban hospital. Gunshot wounds, overdoses, car accidents and the usual assortment of illnesses and complaints, people speaking with anger and emotion and heartbreak in ten different languages.

Julian followed Gus past the gun-metal-gray waiting room chairs. They walked through the linoleum and cinder block hallways, took an elevator to the intensive care unit, and found Julian’s body. Sitting next to Julian’s body was his producer, Frank, looking ashen, with circles underneath his eyes, and reeking, slightly, of Jameson’s whiskey.

Julian looked at his body, which seemed pretty much the same as when he’d left it—driven by machines, pale and lifeless. Occasionally his eyes darted beneath their lids, or he twitched, but otherwise, he looked like a corpse.

“Frank looks broken up over this. I didn’t know he cared so much,” Julian said. “I’ve been a prick to him, you know.”

Gus nodded. “I do know, Julian.”

Julian stood over his producer’s shoulder. Frank was whispering to the comatose Julian.

“You were always a bastard to me, Jules. Bitching and moaning about anything that flew into your mind. The temperature in the studio was too hot. The temperature in the studio was too cold. Your chair wasn’t comfortable enough. You wanted more lesbians books on the show. You wanted a macrobiotic breakfast—but you washed it down with tequila. No one could make you happy. I know I sure couldn’t.”

Julian listened to Frank, wanting to protest, but feeling, for the first time, ashamed.

“It’s that inability to censor yourself that makes you impossible to turn off the radio, Jules. You have no filter. What you think comes out of your mouth. Like one giant id. Impossible to turn off the dial, and impossible to live with.”

Frank shook his head and rubbed at his eyes. “Even women. You banged beautiful women—could have any one in the room. You screwed porn stars and movie stars. But you took particular delight in trying to bang the girlfriends of the interns, or of James. I mean why do that, except to humiliate these guys you worked with? Piss off the world. Rant all you want. But at the end of the day, Julian, be a decent human being.”

“Gus…aren’t all women fair game?” Julian looked to his Guide for assurance.

“Apparently Frank doesn’t think so. And now that you know more about the Boss, do you really think She feels that way?”

“All’s fair in love and war. Isn’t that what they say?”

“First, the Other Team says that. Second, shagging the girlfriend of an intern isn’t love. It’s…shagging. And nothing more.”

Frank sank his head into his hands. “And worst of all, Jules, is even though I know you banged Maureen that one time you were drunk, and you said it was because you were plastered, I think it’s because you don’t know how to be anything but a fucking bastard.” Frank looked up, tears in his eyes. “Yet after all we’ve been through—detoxing you off of heroin, the highs and lows of creating the greatest damn show in radio history, and all the rest of your insane, dysfunctional life—you’re still my best friend and I can’t stand to see you like this. They don’t know if you’re going to make it.”

Frank sobbed, and Julian leaned over and tried to comfort him. “I…know I was that prick. I know I was. But if I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t be. I swear it.”

Julian looked at Gus. “I’m going to go to Hell, aren’t I?” Had he really been that awful? Hearing Frank’s sobs, he started to think the answer was yes.

Gus shrugged his shoulders. “Julian…I told you…I’m not privy to that information.”

“Frank—” Julian put his hand on his producer’s shoulder “—I swear to you, as the Boss is my witness, if I ever get back to my body, if I ever get out of Neither Here Nor There, I won’t be such an asshole.”

Frank didn’t respond. A nurse entered the room. “Visiting time is up. We shouldn’t even have let you in here. It’s the middle of the night. But given he’s touch-and-go right now…”

Frank nodded. “I appreciate you bending the rules a bit.” He stood and looked down at Julian’s body. “I’ll see you tomorrow, pal. Hang in there.”

“You’re a good friend,” the nurse said. “He’s world famous and not a single other person has been to see him.”

“I know. His parents don’t even want to have anything to do with him. Which is just as well, really. They weren’t great parents. The suits at the station, they’re just worried about covering their investment. About ratings. Right now they’re running ‘Best of Julian’ segments.”

The nurse looked down at Julian’s body. “You’d think his parents would come. You work in ICU long enough and you see the best and worst of people and their families. Most especially families. They should come together, but crises like these tend to rip them apart more.”

“Do you think he can hear me?”

The nurse, about fifty, plump, with tight ash-blonde curls cut close to her scalp, smiled. “We think so. Keep talking, Frank.” She patted Frank’s arm. “You keep talking and don’t give up.”

Frank nodded and left the room, shoulders slumped.

Julian walked over to Gus and observed the nurse turning him, checking his vitals, looking at the levels of fluids on the various IVs surrounding him.

“Come on, Gus. A hypothetical. If a man dies, and his life amounted to being a prick, does he automatically go to Hell?”

“Depends on his remorse. His intentions. Her arms are always opened wide, Julian. The Boss loves all Her children.”

“I’ve never felt so bad in my whole life. Frank was always so loyal to me. He and Maureen broke up ’cause of me, you know.”

“Why did you do it?” Gus asked.

“Because I could. Because no one ever said ‘no’ to me. And now look at me—” Julian gestured to his body. “I may not get a second chance. Can’t you tell me, Gus? Can’t you tell me if I make it or not?”

“No. That’s all classified.”

Julian stood and watched his body, chest rising and falling with the timing of the whoosh of the machines, all night. Gus stood with him. When day came, the nurses changed shifts. Julian thought of Kate. “Come on, Gus, I need to get back to her apartment.”

With a backward glance at his body, ventilator filling his lungs, Julian followed his Guide. He realized, with a cold starkness, that all his life he’d been a useless prick. And now, with Kate, he had a chance to fix that. Gus was dead wrong, Julian decided. He didn’t need to be less involved. He needed to be more involved.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

KATE SAT ON THE COUCH in Mallory’s ultra-modern studio. A bottle of wine, a wheel of brie and crackers sat on the glass coffee table. Al Green drifted through the speakers.

“Do you believe in ghosts?” Kate asked, hoping Mal didn’t think she’d finally lost it. She was avoiding her apartment. Avoiding the voice.

“Once, after Charlie died,” Mal said quietly, referring to her best friend who had died of AIDS years before, “I thought I saw him standing at the foot of my bed. I woke up, and there he was. He didn’t look sick. He was smiling and looked so peaceful, but then I decided I was dreaming.” Mal frowned and looked over at Charlie’s picture on the sleek chrome-and-glass shelves against the wall.

Kate stared down at the glass of pinot noir she was nursing. She swirled the glass. “I don’t know…I keep getting this weird feeling like my apartment is haunted. Maybe someone died in it. It’s a really old building.”

“Oh, I love things like that. We should go see a psychic. Have a séance. Get an exorcist.”

“Sure, Mal.” Kate laughed. “If I start spewing pea soup and my head twists around, you call Father Damian.” She looked at Mal on the couch beside her. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m just crazy. But it feels haunted. Nuts, huh?”

“No. You’re human. You’ve been on a roller coaster. You walk in on David and the bitch. And then, just as you’re starting to take baby steps toward moving on, he shows up with a rock.”

“A Tiffany’s rock,” Kate said, shaking her head. “The perfect rock. Rose petals, candles. The perfect proposal. Could you forgive him, Mal?”

“Me? No. I’ll love you no matter what you decide, but I couldn’t.”

“Do you think I’m an idiot for even talking to him?”

“No. I think you’re a woman who loved a man very much. You can’t just shut that off. I think you’ve been through a lot.”

Kate sighed. “I’d better go. Thanks for listening. I’ll muddle through it all.” She stood and leaned over and kissed Mal’s cheek. “Thanks. Maybe it’s just the anniversary of September 11. It’s still hard. I know it’s years later. But I still think of him every day.” She swallowed hard. “I wish he was here, because he would know what I should do.”

“You know, I was born in this city and have always adored it. And the day the towers went down broke my heart. But I didn’t lose my daddy. It was bad enough as his niece, as your cousin, but…he was your daddy.”

Kate nodded. “It was the most surreal, numbing, awful experience to watch the towers on television and realize my father was going up into them to do his job as people desperately poured out of them. Then the towers were gone. Gone. I watched it—this cloud of ash where the tallest building in Manhattan stood. Gone. Maybe that’s what this all is. I want so desperately to believe there is a heaven that I made up a ghost in my apartment.”

“You know I don’t buy into the family party line about heaven. Call me a firm maybe gal.”

“Agnostic?”

Mal nodded. “Do you know, I remember the day I walked up the center aisle of church to make First Holy Communion, but before that communion wafer hit my tongue, I was already wondering if there was a God. I just don’t believe in Heaven, Kate. But if it exists, your dad is there.”

“I know.” Kate picked up her purse. “I’m going to go home. It was a long day today at the office. David sent me five flower arrangements. Five! Red roses, white roses, orchids, one arrangement that was made up of tiger lilies and a huge bouquet of wildflowers. A new arrangement came nearly every hour. Each time, the flowers were, of course, marched right by Leslie’s office. I know she really wanted to ask me about them.”

“Did she?”

“No, but she looked pale and upset all day.”

“Good.”

“I know, but I still find the whole thing awkward. I don’t want the drama. Anyway, let me get going.”

Mal suddenly stood. “Hold on.” She crossed the room to a drafting table that doubled as a desk and rifled through papers. “It’s here somewhere.”

“What is?”

“Hold on.”

Kate smiled. Organization was not Mal’s strong suit.

“Wait!” Mal held up a finger.

“What am I waiting for?”

“Ah-ha!” She plucked a business card out of a pile of papers and envelopes. “Here.” She walked to Kate and handed her a card.

“Dr. Raphael Tobit,” she read out loud. “Psychiatrist.”

“I met him—totally cute guy, by the way, but I think he’s gay because I came on to him pretty strong and…nothing.”

“And you think I need a shrink?”

“No. Not exactly. When I asked him what he did, he pulled out the card. He said he specializes in grief work. Particularly people who have unresolved grief. Weird, I met him six months or so ago, but I can hear the conversation like it was yesterday. I took his card. Maybe some of this is…grief. And then with the stress of David and the whole thing, it’s all bubbling to the surface, all this unresolved stuff.”

“You think?” Kate fingered the thick linen card stock. “I’m sure the guy is booked months in advance if he’s any good. A Manhattan shrink? I mean, come on.”

“Well, why don’t you call him?”

“All right. Maybe I will. Tomorrow morning.”

She turned and left Mal’s apartment and walked the fifteen blocks to her place. The night was breezy, and the scent of a street cart of Greek gyros and onions permeated the air. She loved that about New York. Any food, any culture, was here. The city never slept, as the saying went. Even after 9/11, the city went on. A little more tentatively, the people more fragile, but the city emerged from its tragedy.

The entire walk, she kept touching the card, like a talisman, as it sat in her pocket. She reached her building, went in, then climbed the stairs to her floor. When she reached her door, she turned her key in the lock and stepped into her apartment. She had always lived alone. Yet, now it felt strangely like she was sharing it.

Hello, Kate.

“All right.” Kate swallowed. “Ghost…I know you’re here.” That was it, she was definitely cracking up.

I’ve been waiting for you to come home. You look beautiful.

Kate darted her head around the apartment feeling terrified but fascinated. She whispered, “Where are you?”

By the couch.

She looked over at Honey, and sure enough, her dog was staring right at the couch.

“Great. I’ll likely sit on you.”

Kate moved toward the couch and passed through a pocket of cold air. She shivered and sat down opposite the couch in a chair.

“That cold spot. Is that you?”

I don’t really know.

“You’ve been in my head, haven’t you?”

Yes.

“You’re the voice. The voice telling me I could get through this. I’ve heard you. I’ve really heard you.”

I know.

I’m not crazy.”

No. Not crazy. Not the slightest bit crazy.

“Can I see you?”

Haven’t quite figured out how to do that yet. I’m new here.

“A new ghost.”

Sort of. It’s complicated.

“No. Complicated is a woman sitting in the dark in her apartment talking to a poltergeist.”

I’m not a poltergeist…. Go into the light, Carol Anne.

Kate grinned. “A ghost with a sense of humor.”

Always, beautiful.

Kate slipped off her shoes and drew her knees up to her chest. She rocked back and forth slightly. “I can’t believe I’m…This is nuts.”

No. Nuts is talking to yourself. You’re talking to me, Katie Girl.

She smiled and shook her head. “My dad used to call me Katie Girl. Who are you? What’s your name? I can’t come in here calling out, ‘Hello, Mr. Ghost,’ all the time.”

Jules. Call me Jules.

“Okay, Jules….” Kate looked up at the mantle where her father’s photo peered back in the dress blues that always made her feel so proud. She thought of her conversation with Mallory. “So tell me…does Heaven exist?”

Haven’t been there. They tell me it’s lovely this time of year.

“What, like escaping to the Riviera?”

Something like that.

“This is insane. It’s insane.” She thought about the card for the shrink. She was definitely going to call him in the morning.

No, insane is tossing away a beautiful girl like you for someone like Leslie.

“But how do I know that…you’re a ghost and not someone I made up in my head?”

Do I sound like any thought you’ve ever had in your entire life before?

“No.”

Wait a minute.

“Hello?” Kate called out, but the voice didn’t respond.

A minute or two later, she heard it again. All right. Your refrigerator. What is the expiration date on the container of blueberry yogurt?

“How should I know?”

Precisely. How would you know? I can tell you, it’s two days ago. Throw it out. Now, you can go and look.

Feeling a tingle at the nape of her neck, Kate rose and went to her refrigerator. She opened the door.

“You’re wrong. There is no blueberry yogurt. Only cherry.”

Behind the pickle jar.

She moved the pickle jar, and there it was. A container of blueberry. She lifted it and looked at the date. It had expired two days before.

She dropped the container and slammed the fridge door shut. “This can’t be happening.”

It is.

In a daze, she wandered back to the living room and sank into the couch. “It can’t be.”

I wouldn’t have thought it possible, either. Put it this way, circumstances have made me a believer.

Kate shook her head, then yawned.

Tired, angel?

“Yeah. I’m going to go to…bed. Wait a minute, what do you do when I’m in bed?”

Watch you. It’s been the single most beautiful thing I’ve seen since I got here. I can tell when you’re dreaming. I whisper to you. I’m with you all the time, you know.

“I’ve felt you, at the office. That day I confronted Leslie. You told me I could do it. And that shopping spree. The new clothes. The new underwear.” Kate blushed and stood up. “Wait a minute…Does that mean you’ve seen me naked?”

Yes. And also with boxes of tissues and mucus coming out of your nose. He broke your heart, Kate. Don’t marry him.

“Hold on. I’m still getting past the you’ve-seen-me-naked thing.” She looked over toward the mantle. “You made the box fly across the room. You did that. I know I’m not crazy. I didn’t imagine that. The box moved.”

You can’t marry him. Please. Not him.

“Why do you care?”

I do. I still feel. When you sleep, I want you awake. I want you to talk to me.

Kate walked toward her bedroom. “I’ve felt you at night.”

When she entered her bedroom, she said, “Turn around. You may have seen me naked, but…not tonight.”

But I’ve seen it all already.

“Turn around!”

How will you even know if I do or not?

“I just will. Besides, you’re an angel or something. You can’t lie, can you?”

I can. It’s just here I don’t want to anymore. Funny…really. Here I am the man I should have always been.

“Are you turned around?”

Yes, Kate.

She hurriedly undressed, and, not really trusting him, she pulled her nightshirt over her regular shirt and slid her bra and shirt down her body and stepped out of them. She pulled back the covers. “You can turn around again, Jules.”

He didn’t answer.

“Jules?”

I’m here. I’m just looking at you.

“You were the one who made me buy that outrageously expensive bra.”

An excellent purchase, don’t you think?

“How can an angel—or whatever you are—be so into thongs and bras and seeing me naked?”

I don’t know. I would dearly love to get laid but seeing as I don’t have a body, I have to be satisfied with looking at you.

Kate slid beneath the covers. “Where are you?”

Lying next to you.

She rolled on her side and stared. “What do you look like?”

Devastatingly handsome. Tall. Dark. Sexy. Well-hung.

Kate rolled her eyes. “Sure. But you can’t use it. All talk, no action.”

Touché, Katie Girl.

“So Mr. Tall, Dark, Devastatingly Handsome and Well-Hung Ghost, why me?”

I was assigned to you.

“Assigned? Like a job?”

Precisely. Like a case. I know…Trust me, when I found out, I wasn’t happy. I didn’t want this responsibility. But now, I like it. I like being around you.

“You have a beautiful voice, Jules. It’s…gravelly without being hoarse. It’s sexy. A woman could fall in love with a voice like that.”

A ghost could fall in love with a girl like you. No pretense. Just real. You’re refreshingly decent, Katie Girl, in a world lacking decency.

“That’s very sweet, Jules. Can I ask you something?”

Anything.

“Can you touch me? If you touch me, can I feel it?”

I think so. When I touched you once, you woke up. I’m touching you now. To me, it feels like I have pins and needles. I’m touching your face and it tingles.

Kate crinkled up her nose. “I don’t feel anything. But I know you’re there. I’ve sensed you.”

Go to sleep, Katie Girl. Go to sleep. I’ll watch over you.

She yawned. “All right. Will you be here when I wake up?”

Yes. I won’t leave you, Katie Girl. I’d be happy to stay here watching you forever.

“Promise me. Promise you won’t leave.”

I promise. Just so long as you don’t marry the creep.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE NEXT DAY, by some miracle, Dr. Raphael Tobit had, he said, a last-minute cancellation. He could see her at four if she left work a little early.

Kate sat in her office and whispered, “Jules?”

Yes?

“Go home. I…I want to go see this guy alone.”

You don’t need a shrink.

“Look…it’s personal. I’m hearing voices.”

Not voices. One voice. Mine.

“Even so…some privacy please?”

Fine. Go alone.

“Thank you.”

I don’t like it.

“I know. But really, this isn’t normal.”

At three-forty-five, she shoved two manuscripts into her oversize bag and slung it across her shoulder. Occupational hazard. Most editors had very tight shoulders.

Dr. Tobit’s office was—in another wonderful little miracle—just a few blocks from the office. When she arrived at the stately brownstone, she stared up. Charming gargoyles carved in stoned lined the rooftop. A polished brass sign outside the door read DR. RAPHAEL TOBIT. She pressed the bell. It had a majestic gong sound.

The door opened, and Kate caught her breath. Mal was right. Actually, Mal hadn’t done Dr. Tobit justice. He was incredibly handsome. No, that wasn’t the word. He was beautiful, with a head of dark curls, and cheekbones and a jawline as chiseled as the stone gargoyles.

“You must be Kate.” He smiled at her. “Come in.”

Kate stepped inside. “How lovely,” she murmured. Mal was right again. No straight man would own a home like this one.

Marble floors swirled in a very faint pinkish hue. The floor-to-ceiling windows were covered with the sheerest of white sheers. They fluttered as some of the windows were open. Enormous statues carved from marble, and polished until they shone, lined the walls on stone pedestals. There were angels with magnificent wingspans, and right outside his office door stood a bust of Sigmund Freud.

“You collect some beautiful art. Even Freud here.” She thought the bust looked terribly realistic, each hair on his beard perfectly sculpted and almost lifelike. The marble was alabaster, pure and clean, shining.

“Thank you.” He opened the door to his office and swept his hand aside.

Stepping into his inner sanctuary, a fountain topped by an angel gurgled pleasantly. Lush plants and orchids grew in gleaming pots on every surface. A Victorian rollback couch covered in dark purple velvet sat atop the plushest carpet she had ever seen. Facing that was another velvet couch, and between them a polished mahogany coffee table.

“Have a seat, Kate.” Dr. Tobit gestured to the couch. His voice was almost as soothing as Jules’s.

Kate sank into the couch, finding it very comfortable.

He sat opposite her and folded his hands. “What brings you to my office today, Kate?”

“Well…” She sighed. He had such an open face, so compassionate-looking. “Well…where to start?”

“I usually find the beginning is best,” he joked.

She looked over at him. His face was so trustworthy, without judgment. It was as if his face compelled her to talk.

“Yes. Well…” Why was she here? “All right. I might as well start not at the beginning so much but at the—” She exhaled. “I’ll cut to the chase. I’m hearing voices.”

“I see.” He nodded his head. “For how long?”

“Not that long. Recently.”

“And have you ever heard voices before?”

“No.”

“I see. And what do the voices tell you?”

“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”

“No. Well, though, I suppose that might depend on what the voices tell you.” He winked at her.

“It’s one voice, actually.”

“Just one?”

“Yeah. Same one. All the time.”

“Do you recognize the voice?”

“No. Well, vaguely. But, no. And it has a name—Jules. A man’s voice.”

“And what does this Jules tell you?”

“Well, that’s the funny thing. He tells me I’m fabulous. He gives me courage. He…makes me believe anything is possible.”

“I see.”

She stared at him. His eyes were the palest blue she had ever seen, like the ice of a glacier.

“I suppose I should also tell you that the reason my cousin gave me your card is my father died in 9/11. And I walked in on my boyfriend and my best friend in bed together.”

“Recently?”

She nodded. “And that same night my apartment was robbed and my dog was lost. Though now I have her back again.”

“I’m sorry. And…did you ever hear the voice before all this happened?”

She shook her head. “No. Am I nuts?”

“Not nuts. I would say seriously stressed.”

“So, I’m imagining the voice.”

“I would…well, let me rephrase that. What do you think?”

“It doesn’t sound like me. The voice. Not at all. It’s a man’s voice, for one thing. And it’s so separate from me.”

“And is this voice here right now?”

“No.”

“You’re sure.”

“No. Not here.”

“How come?”

“Because I told him to go home.”

“Told him to go home?”

“Yes. He kind of lives with me. You see…I’ve been telling myself it’s a ghost. A ghost in my apartment.”

“A ghost. Do you believe in ghosts?”

“I didn’t before.”

“Before all these awful recent events—the affair, the apartment break-in, and so on.”

“Yes. But now I’m not so sure.”

“And you’re sure your ghost isn’t here right now.” Dr. Tobit stared next to her—not at her, but at the spot on the couch next to her.

Damn. He can see me.

Kate whipped her head at Jules. Or at least where she thought Jules was.

“He cannot,” she hissed.

Then why did he look right at me?

“I don’t know!”

She faced Dr. Tobit. “I told him to stay home, but apparently he’s here.”

She expected the psychiatrist to lock her up. Call Bellevue. Fit her for a strait jacket.

“Why don’t you ask him why he came?”

She faced Jules. “Why are you here, Jules, when I specifically asked you to go home?”

I didn’t know what you were going to say to him. I was worried he’d…I don’t know, drug you or something.

“He’s worried you’ll drug me.”

“Is he now?” Tobit’s eyes seemed to twinkle slightly, and she noticed he had a dimple in the middle of his right cheek.

If he makes you take something, then maybe you won’t be able to hear me anymore. And besides, I know you’re not crazy. I know I’m real.

“You’re going to prescribe me something, aren’t you?”

“No, I’m not.”

She glared in Jules’s direction. “See?”

“Actually, though…I’ll rephrase that. I am going to prescribe something.”

See?

“But first, tell me about your father. Losing him.”

“It was the worst day of my life.”

“You were close?”

She nodded. “I…I’ve never met anyone quite like him. He just believed in me. And he was brave. And he never lost his temper. Ever. He listened to me.”

“Does this voice listen to you?”

“Yes.”

“And your mother?”

“She remarried. Very quickly after my father died, and it was difficult. I barely had time to adjust to his being gone, and suddenly she had moved on. Sold my childhood home. Boxed up any sign that my father existed. It was like he…never lived.”

“Friends?”

“My boss is a mentor to me. I adore her. And Mal is my best friend—my cousin. The one you gave the card to. I usually rent a place on Fire Island with her, another cousin, and five or six friends each summer, but this year, we were all so busy, we didn’t think we’d even be able to get out there. But, yeah. I have friends. I had Leslie. Until…”

“The affair.”

Until she banged the jerk. For God’s sake stop being all…nice about it. She screwed him.

“Shut up, Jules.”

“All right. Here’s my prescription.”

I knew it!

“You have two assignments. One…I would like you to do something fun. Separate from the voice. Go on a date. Out somewhere. Tell the voice to stay home. Do something on your own. Two, I would like you to…maybe do a little bit of grief work surrounding your father. You could try writing a letter to him, and then simply not mail it. Or you could go visit your mother, maybe talk about your father…maybe make some special plans to observe the anniversary of 9/11 this year. I have a feeling that the more you can deal with that and cut down on some stress, the less you’ll hear the voice. And I’d like to see you back again after you’ve completed your assignments.”

“Okay, Dr. Tobit. Thank you.”

That’s his prescription? What’s he going to charge you for that brilliant bit of advice? Two hundred dollars an hour?

The doctor stood and shook her hand. “Sometimes, Kate, all of us hear little voices in our heads when we need a little extra help in our lives.”

“I hope you’re right.”

She left his office after giving him a check, and then stepped out onto the sidewalk.

I don’t like that guy. What’s with all the creepy angel statues?

“Jules…look…I…I don’t know if I’m cracking up, or you’re the stress in my life. I don’t know. But…right now, you’re confusing me.”

I’m just trying to help you.

“I know. But can we walk home in silence? Just for right now?”

Fine.

Kate sighed and walked in the August heat, the bag over her shoulder digging into her. What Dr. Tobit said made perfect sense. She felt herself connecting the dots.

Can I talk now?

“No.”

How about now?

“No!”

I’m real. I’m separate from you, Kate. And I’ll prove it to you again. What, the yogurt wasn’t enough?

“It was yogurt, Jules.”

I’ll prove it again.

“How?”

What’s Mallory’s work address?

She gave it to him.

Meet you at home.

Rolling her eyes, she walked the rest of the way back to her building. Once in her apartment, she dropped her bag, grateful to have it off her shoulder. Then she took Honey for a walk, then came home, changed into shorts and a T-shirt and waited.

“Tobit’s a genius. One session and no more voice.”

She leafed through a magazine. Was it that simple? One session and the voice was gone? It had all been stress.

An hour later, she felt lonely. She wondered if she should, to be safe, do that grief work. She took out a piece of paper and tried to decide what she would write her father if she were able.

All right, Kate, if I’m just in your head, then how can I do this?

“Do what?”

Write this down. Take dictation.

“I’m not your secretary.”

Take it down.

“Fine!”

Pen poised, she waited.

Mallory is at Nobu. She is wearing a black T-shirt with a screen print of Debbie Harry on it. She has an amethyst ring on her right hand. And she got a tattoo tonight. A new one. It’s a Chinese symbol for “breathe” on the inside of her left wrist. She ordered something different tonight. A spider roll. And a mango saketini. Call her cell phone now.

Heart pounding, Kate took her phone and dialed. “Please let this not be true,” she whispered, looking down at the words on the page.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Mal. It’s me.”

“Hey…what’s up? Did you call that Tobit guy?”

“Yes. As gorgeous as you said. As gay as you said.”

Mal laughed.

“Mal? I was wondering…where are you right now?”

“Nobu. I just ordered. I’m here with Teddy Weinberg. That guy from the architecture firm. Why don’t you join us? We just ordered.”

Throat dry, barely able to speak, Kate stared down at the paper as the words swirled in front of her eyes.

“What’d you order?”

“The waiter talked me into fresh yellowtail. And Teddy has ordered us a round of mango saketinis. I’m actually on saketini number two right now, so they better bring our food soon or I’ll be drunk.”

“Um…I don’t know if I can make it. What are you wearing?”

“Not dressed. I have my Debbie Harry T-shirt on. Nothing special—though you know I love Blondie.”

“I know,” Kate managed to squeak.

“Come out with us. Please? It’ll be good for you. Oh! And I can show you my new tattoo. I made Ted come with me. He chickened out. Said his parents would still kill him.” Mal laughed.

“You know, Mal? Maybe another time, okay?”

“Okay. Talk to you tomorrow, all right?”

“Sure thing.”

“You okay, honey?”

“Yeah. I’m okay. Love ya.”

Kate hung up.

I told you I was real. That doctor is a quack. I’m real, Kate.

She touched the paper, half-expecting the words to evaporate like disappearing ink. She folded the paper. Then she stood and put it in the freezer next to her good jewelry. Like some prized possession.

She was faced with two equally scary thoughts. One, that she was absolutely, positively insane.

Two, that she wasn’t.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

JULIAN HAD THE URGE to push Kate’s stepfather’s comb-over until it flipped over the other way, almost like a convertible top. It was a hideous orangish color. Comb-over aside, the man was dressed impeccably. How a man could spend two thousand dollars for a suit and ignore that head of hair, Julian had no idea. But then, he thought, look at Donald Trump.

Julian sat next to Kate on the couch, his arm around her. He had whispered in her ear that he was there, hoping to impart her with strength. Kate fidgeted as her mother carried out a tray of finger sandwiches and wineglasses. Julian heard her murmur something about watercress. He hadn’t even known there really was such a thing as a watercress sandwich, and for the first time since arriving in Neither Here Nor There, he was grateful that he couldn’t eat.

A bottle of seventy-dollar chardonnay—Julian had checked out the label—was chilling in a stainless ice bucket on the table. Human Comb-over was nursing a martini.

Julian surveyed the Long Island mansion Kate’s mother now called home. It had a view of the water from the living room where they sat. Floor-to-ceiling windows dominated the room, and the lawn beyond the glass was impeccably landscaped. The furniture was uncomfortable. Louis the XIV kind of chairs and desks on gilded spindly legs. Heavy oriental carpets adorned the cream-colored marble floors, and art in heavy frames lined the walls. Ugly art, Julian decided, of people in Elizabethan clothes. And ducks. There were several mallards. The former Mrs. Darby had hit the jackpot. On the way over, Kate had told him that only a small portion of her newfound wealth was 9/11 settlement money. The rest belonged to her new husband. He was insanely rich. Hedge-fund rich. By attrition that made Mom rich. And Kate hated him, her, the house and anything to do with the whole charade.

“Well, I’m sorry to hear about David,” her mom said. “He was a catch.” She looked over at New Hubby and whispered indiscreetly, “He’s very well-off, a Riverdale graduate. Then Yale. Successful book.”

Comb-over nodded.

“First of all, that book was a success because I took a chance on a first-time author. I saw the potential. Yes, he’s a wonderful writer, but…I had a part in that, too.”

“Touché! Kate…I am impressed,” Julian whispered to her. “Well played.”

“I’m not saying anything about you, Kate. It’s just a shame, that’s all. He’s really…you know, destined for great things, I think. You two had the potential to be a real New York literati power couple.”

“Well, I’m sorry, Mother,” Kate snapped. “But he couldn’t keep his hands off my best friend, so…that’s how it goes.”

Julian looked at Kate’s profile and saw she carried herself a little taller, more confidently. Her voice was surer. Gus was completely wrong. It was better now that she knew he was there. Much better. She had an angel on her side—okay, technically not an angel, but something that gave her courage. If only every person could have a personal spiritual cheering section, he mused, perhaps the world would be a better place.

“So now what? Dating? You won’t ever find someone as successful as David,” her mother said. The woman sat down on the couch opposite him and Kate, next to her husband. The Human Comb-over put a hand on Mrs. Darby’s thigh and absentmindedly moved his index finger back and forth. If Julian had a body, he would have puked.

Kate’s mom was very attractive for an old broad. She wore her hair in a soft honey-blonde bob, and was dressed in crisp white linen pants and a pale lavender blouse. The rock this guy gave her was blinding. Julian resisted the urge to get up and go take a closer look. Besides, even from his vantage point, it was a friggin’ hunk of flawless stone. A small boulder. Emerald cut. On her wrist was an equally blinding bracelet encrusted with red stones. Rubies?

Kate folded her arms. “Sorry, Mom. I don’t aspire to all this success.” She uncrossed her arms and waved her hand to indicate the mansion.

“You tell her, Katie, Girl,” Julian said, pleased.

“I just want you to be happy, sweetheart.”

“Well, I wasn’t raised to need wealth to be happy. I was raised by a fireman, Mom.”

Julian, staring at Kate closely, saw the slightest of trembles in her chin.

“This is so hard, Katie Girl, isn’t it? So hard.” He leaned in and kissed her cheek, watching as her lips slid into a small grin.

“Can you feel that?” he asked her. “Just give me a nod if you can feel it. Just a little nod of your head.”

Miraculously, she nodded.

He kissed her again. And again. Whatever bond they had that Gus said was special or unusual, it was getting stronger. She felt him.

“Kate,” Human Comb-over said, “your mother has only your best interests at heart. She worries about you. We both do.”

Kate smiled wanly. “I don’t need you to worry about me. Let’s move on. Let’s talk about something else.”

“Fine.” Her mother patted Comb-over’s knee. “We want to know if you would like to go to Europe with us this Christmas. Our treat. We’re going to fly in to London, and then spend some time in Paris. If we can, we’d like to squeeze in a short time in Lake Como, Italy. Martin has a client there, and we can use his villa.”

Kate stared at her mother. “No.”

“But you always wanted to go to Europe. Your whole life since you were a little girl.”

“I know. I wanted to go with you and Daddy. But I don’t want to spend my Christmas holiday in Europe. I want to be here.”

“I’ll take you to Europe, Katie Girl. We’ll go together.” Julian had been to London several times. He hated the beer. Didn’t like driving on the other side of the road. Didn’t particularly like British chicks. But if Kate wanted to go to Europe, he’d suck it up.

Kate’s mother shook her head. “This was Martin’s idea. I told him how your father and I could never afford the trip, and he thought this might be a nice way for us all to spend time together.”

“Thanks, but I don’t think so.”

Kate’s mom stood and poured herself a full glass of wine. She drank half of it standing there by the wine bucket, and then refilled it to the top again.

“What are you doing for the anniversary, Mom?” Kate asked.

Julian whispered, “Katie Girl, don’t break your heart anymore. Don’t ask.”

But it was too late. Her mother glared at Kate. “What anniversary?”

“Nine-eleven, Mom. What do you mean? It’s less than two weeks away.”

“I’m not going to do anything. Kate, I could have died on that day of a broken heart, but I chose to move on. I’m not going to memorialize it forever. I have a right to a life.”

“And you sure have one.” Kate stood up. So did Julian.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, Mom. Look, can Martin’s chauffeur take us…um, me…to the train station?”

“He’s off today,” Martin said. “I’ll drive you myself.”

Julian groaned. That was going to be a fun trip. But with no other option to get the train back to Manhattan, Kate nodded. She approached her mother. “I’m going to go, Mom. Talk to you soon.”

She leaned in to kiss her mother, who received the kiss stiffly, like she was the Queen Mother or something, Julian thought. He couldn’t wait to get out of the house. It was like a mausoleum. A mausoleum for Louis the XIV.

Human Comb-over stood. “I’ll get my keys.” He walked over to a delicate desk, opened a draw and held up the set. “Here we go.”

Kate followed him through the dining room, into the cavernous kitchen—all Subzero appliances and built-ins—and out to the garage. Julian whistled low. “Man!”

Kate nodded. The garage held six cars, one more fantastic than the next—a Jaguar, a Maserati, a Porche.

“Who knew Martin here liked sexy cars,” Julian said, running his hand along the shiny surface of a Cadillac. He looked down but couldn’t see his reflection in the sheen. He looked at Kate. He wanted her to be able to see him.

Kate’s stepfather led them to the Jag. Julian remembered Gus’s advice about walking through doors, and found car doors were no different from apartment doors. Don’t hesitate. Walk through.

Kate climbed in the front seat. She turned her head to peer in the back, and Julian whispered, “I’m here, Kate. Always here.”

She smiled and settled into her leather passenger seat. Her stepfather climbed behind the wheel, pressed a button to open the garage door, and pulled down the drive, out through an elaborate stone and wrought-iron gate, and off the mansion’s property. Kate looked out the window. Julian put a hand on her shoulder.

“Kate, I’m very sorry this visit didn’t turn out quite how your mother hoped. How I’m sure you hoped,” Comb-over offered.

“It’s all right.” Kate waved her hand.

“No, it’s not.” Human Comb-over glanced over at Kate. “I wanted to drive you to the train station. That’s why my chauffeur has the day off. I wanted to say something to you.”

Kate stiffened.

“I don’t have any false pretenses. Your father was the love of your mother’s life.”

“She has a weird way of showing that.”

“Maybe not so strange. I think she wanted to go on living again, somehow, after he died. But I don’t think she wanted to ever, ever lose someone she loved that much again. She loves me, but it’s in a different way. You get to be in your sixties, and it’s love, but it’s a different quality of love. Like fine wine that’s aged somehow.”

Kate glanced over at him.

“I know the anniversary is coming up. And so does she. And when she thinks about the horrible day, it’s all she can do to hold it together, so she reacts the way she did today.”

Kate’s mouth dropped open slightly. “This is the most you’ve ever said to me.”

“I’m a man of few words,” he joked. “I’m all action.”

Kate smiled. “I can’t just forget my dad. I can’t live in some fancy place with no sign he ever existed. All the things they owned. Our whole house. It’s like it blew up in the ash that day, too.”

“Maybe it did, Kate. But sometimes, to survive, people do that. Blow up their old lives and try to stumble through the fire toward a new one.”

“Maybe.” Kate looked out the window as the train station came into view.

“And for the record, Kate, don’t marry David, no matter what your mother says. Marry the man who’s worth risking it all for. Marry that one, whenever he comes along.”

“Amen, Brother,” Julian said.

Martin pulled the car to a stop and put it in Park. “Have a safe trip back to the city, Kate.”

“Don’t worry, we will,” Julian said.

“Thanks, Martin.”

Kate hesitated, then kissed Comb-over on the cheek and exited the car. Julian jumped through his door and fell in step beside her.

“Where are you?” she whispered.

“To your right.”

“So how horrific was that?”

“Horrific. Scale of one to ten, it was an eleven.”

“Exactly.”

“But the house was horrific. That spindly furniture. However, Martin was surprisingly human on the drive. And…well, what he said made a lot of sense, don’t you think?”

She nodded. “My life feels pretty blown up lately. I honestly understand why she…has done what she’s done. I just wish she had said all that to me, not him. She and I have never been close. She’s not awful. She’s just…never been the mother I wanted, I guess. And Martin? I barely know him.”

“Yes, but even the Human Comb-over thinks you should hold out for someone perfect for you, Katie Girl.”

“Like you?” She glanced in his direction.

Julian felt trapped for a moment, but then felt as if the bars of a cage had been opened. “Yes. Someone like me. Someone who will never tire of watching you when you sleep.” He almost couldn’t believe the words himself. Julian Shaw. Hooked on a girl.

“Jules?”

“Yes, Katie Girl?”

“Hold my hand.”

Julian took her hand in his, caressing the top of her hand with his thumb. “Can you feel me?”

“No, but just knowing it makes me feel better.”

“Me, too.”

A few of the people scattered along the concrete platform were watching Kate.

“They think you’re talking to yourself.”

“Maybe I am.”

“But you know you’re not. I’m here. You felt me kiss you.”

“It felt like an itch.” She giggled. “I swear. It made me laugh.” She looked his way again. “Tell me more about who you are. That way I’ll listen and won’t have to talk and have people think I’m crazy.”

Julian was mindful that the Boss wouldn’t want him revealing precisely who he was. The Boss didn’t want any of this. Not the talking. Not the hand-holding. “I used to be a person. Like you. I wasn’t terribly nice, though, Kate. I was a giant out-of-control id. A narcissist. Everything was all about me. And then I ended up here and realized it’s not about me at all. Not one bit. It’s about…you.”

The sign lit up, announcing the train would be pulling in to the station.

“I don’t have any info on the grand scheme of the universe, though, Kate. Nothing like that. I have a little universe I am in charge of fixing and tending. Like the Little Prince—ever read that when you were young? And his rose. You’re my rose. And I suppose that makes me the prince. God, I’d thought I’d forgotten that book. This is what happens when you stop shooting up smack. You remember things.”

The train pulled in, and the doors opened automatically. Julian followed Kate on, and they found a seat near the back of the car with no one else around. Kate sat on the aisle, so that no one would be tempted to take Julian’s seat.

“Can you be reborn?” she asked him.

“Hmm. Well…it’s all rather complicated. And I guess I don’t really know. I’ll have to ask my Guide.

Kate settled in for the train ride as it pulled away and the trees of Long Island zipped past the window.

“Thanks, Jules.”

“For what?”

“Being there today. When you’re with me, I somehow believe everything will be okay.”

“It will.”

“It will.” Her voice was serene.

“Sure it will. Just keep wearing that La Perla bra.”

He looked over at her, and she laughed openmouthed and loud.

He decided he liked seeing her laugh like that. And he would do whatever it took to make sure she didn’t cry anymore.

“Jules?”

“Yes?”

“Can we make a stop?”

“Anything.”

He rode next to her, holding her hand. Two stops later, she stood.

“Where are we?” he asked her.

“You’ll see.”

She exited the train car and he followed. Once they stood on the platform, she walked toward the depot and out front, where several cabs waited. She caught the eye of one cabbie and climbed into his car—a gray Toyota Camry.

“New Hope Cemetery, please,” she said.

The cabbie nodded, clicked the meter and pulled out of the station and onto a leafy and quiet suburban Long Island road. Small store fronts dotted the street. Antique shops, a bagel shop, a druggist.

“I know you can’t talk to me. The cabbie will think you’re crazy. So we’ll just hold hands. I think I know where you’re taking me,” Julian said. “I know you so well. I know you as well as I know myself. Maybe even better.”

Sure enough, they pulled into the cemetery, and she directed the cabbie to the top of a picturesque hill. “Will you give us…I mean me…about fifteen minutes? On the meter.”

The cabbie nodded. “No problem, miss.”

Kate climbed out of the cab, and Julian followed her. She walked gingerly past grave after grave, until they came to a headstone with the name SEAN DARBY carved into the marble. The date of death was September 11, 2001.

Kate sat down on the grass, and pushed away some fallen leaves, pulling up a dandelion or two. “Hi, Daddy.”

Julian sat down beside her. He waited respectfully as she appeared to gather her thoughts. “The anniversary is coming up. And since you’ve been gone, I honestly feel like…life used to make sense and now it kind of doesn’t. I don’t understand how Mom can move on—I mean, I don’t want her to be mourning and depressed, but…Martin isn’t anything like you, Dad.”

Julian watched how the sunlight filtered through a nearby oak tree and danced on her face, dappled and alive.

“And now…well, here’s the thing…David turned out to be a jerk. Leslie…worse. And I’m talking to a ghost. He’s here. Next to me. And it makes me believe in heaven. Believe in something else. For sure. So where are you? Can you hear me?”

Julian looked around the graveyard. He was rather surprised. When he walked through Manhattan now, he saw them—demons, angels, Guides, and spirits. But here, in the graveyard, where he might expect to see hundreds of spirits, he saw none.

But he kind of got it now. The dead didn’t go off somewhere in the clouds, playing harps. They didn’t go to Hell in lakes of fire. They were involved. Like Balam, like Gus, like himself…They weren’t in some cemetery. They were amongst the living, part of their lives, and yet not.

“Is he here, Jules?” Kate looked in his direction. A breeze fluttered through the leaves, and a few strands of her hair framed her face.

The old Julian would have said yes. He would have told her what she wanted to hear. Or, if it was his radio show, he would have said something cruel, something disparaging.

Instead, he told the truth. Or at least, the truth as he knew it.

“No,” he said softly.

“I didn’t think so.” She looked down at the grass, and let her hand glide along the blades. “I never feel him, Jules. Not like I feel you.”

“It doesn’t mean he’s not here. It’s just…he’s not here.”

She looked around the graveyard. “Are any of them here?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I’m not really sure. But…if I were going to take a guess, I would say that they miss you. They miss their loved ones. They don’t want to be out here, with only other dead people to talk to. They want to be around life. They want to be near you.”

He thought about Zack’s Grandma. “I’ve met an angel, you know.”

“You have?”

“Yes. And she spends her time…around someone she loves. Loved. When she was alive. The way I see it, Kate, is we have it all wrong.”

“How so?”

“Human beings look at life as having a beginning. We’re born. Doctor smacks us on the ass, we cry, we enter the world. We have a middle. Everything from that point until we’re almost decrepit.

And we have an end.”

“And that’s not right?”

“No. It’s more like…we have an existence before we’re even born. And then we live this life, almost like sleepwalking. We’re only partially aware of anything going on. Only aware of our hand right in front of our face. And we think it ends when we stop breathing. But it doesn’t. It’s one long continuum, without an end. At least no end that I can see.”

She nodded. “So,” she whispered. “If he’s not here, do you think he…is somewhere? That he knows what’s going on in my life?”

“I’m sure of it.”

“Have you met him?”

Julian was silent.

“Have you met him, Jules?”

“No.”

She turned her head away from him and dabbed at the corner of her eyes. “I wish I could feel him.”

“I wish you could too. I wish all people who love someone could feel them. I have to tell you, Kate, if I was running the place, things would be different. I don’t pretend to understand.” He looked Heavenward toward the Boss. People used to talk about God having a plan. He had to wonder.

She leaned forward and ran her fingers along the marble of her father’s headstone.

“But if you don’t even understand, how can we? How can ordinary people hope to understand?”

Julian thought about it. “I suppose they can’t. But they have a name for that.”

“What?”

“Faith.”

“You’re very deep today, Jules.” She looked in his direction and winked.

He thought about his life before Neither Here Nor There. Before Kate.

“I suppose I am. Maybe I’m just figuring some of this out myself…. Come on, let’s go home.”

He took her hand as she stood up. She leaned over and kissed the top of the headstone.

“Even if he’s not here, Jules…I miss him anyway and want him to know that somehow.”

She walked past other headstones and markers. “Promise me you won’t leave me, Jules.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

Even as he said it, he knew he was lying. But he also knew he’d have to figure out some way to make sure he kept his promise.

Hell, he’d strike a deal with the devil if he had to.

He wanted to stay with Kate.

Leaving the graveyard, he took one more look at its emptiness.

Where were they all? Where did all the dead people go?

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

“HE’S GOT TO BE KIDDING ME .” When Kate got to her office Monday, it was filled from end to end with roses.

This is getting out of control.

“You’re not kidding. It’s like a florist’s in here.” After shutting her office door, she moved a large lead crystal vase with long-stemmed red roses just beginning to open, and plopped down in her desk chair. She could no longer even see the door. Reaching into one bouquet, she found the card.

Take me back.

—D

Well, I adore you, too. And I won’t bang your best friend.

She smiled. “Jules…I would miss you if you weren’t here.”

In a world of unreliable lovers and betrayals, bad dates and stilted conversations, Jules had become her constant companion, her defense against loneliness. A ghost who thought she was beautiful and watched over her while she slept.

Katie Girl, my whole life I was a fuckup. I’m finally gettin’ the hang of this. I’m a good angel, aren’t I?

“Yes, Jules, you’re a good angel.” She smiled in the general direction of where she thought he was. “Kiss me, Jules.”

She felt a tickle on her cheek, and then a feeling like a feather touching her lips.

“That was divine,” she whispered.

She turned on her computer. “I’ll lay odds it crashes today.” She rolled her eyes. “This old thing is a beast, but we don’t have the budget for any new equipment. Can you wave some magic wand and stop it from crashing?”

Sorry, angel. I don’t have control over computer systems. Out of my area of expertise.

She smiled and checked her e-mail. Two from David begging her to meet him for lunch or dinner.

Fr: David Williams

To: Kate Darby

Subject: I can’t live without you

Kate,

I screwed up, but that will be the last mistake I ever make. I swear to you. Meet me for lunch. Let’s keep talking. Please.

David

P.S. Try on the ring.

A few minutes later, someone knocked on her door.

“Yes?”

Todd, the receptionist, poked his head in. “He’s here.”

“Who?” Kate looked down at her desk calendar. She didn’t have any author meetings scheduled.

“Who? Him! The cad!”

Kate felt her stomach lurch. She looked at her watch. “It’s nine-thirty in the morning. Is he out of his mind?”

“I’d give that a yes. Sleep with the blonde bitch instead of our beautiful, wonderful, sweet Kate? But he’s here. What do you want me to do?”

“Shit.” She looked in Jules’s direction, hoping for guidance. But he didn’t say anything. “Damn…all right. Send him back. I’ll try to get rid of him fast. Is Leslie in?”

“Oh yeah. You know what? I’ll escort him back and let you know what she does when he walks past her office.”

“Todd…” Kate scolded.

“I’m doing it,” he shot back.

“Fine.” She smiled at him. “Go ahead, Gossip Queen.”

Todd turned to go. Then he stopped. “Girlfriend…I don’t want you taking him back.”

“I won’t.”

“But I’m warning you, brace yourself.”

“Why?”

“Because he looks beyond hot today. I mean, smokin’ hot.”

“Great,” she said unenthusiastically. “Shut the door, will you?”

He nodded and left.

“Jules? Jules? I need you.”

No response.

“Crap!” Kate stood and straightened her skirt, then sat back down again and pulled a small mirror out from her desk to check her teeth. No lipstick on them. She ran her fingers through her hair and looked down at her cleavage. This was a Jules shirt. They had gone shopping again. She fingered the fabric. Jules made her feel so…fuckable, to use his word.

A minute or two later, Todd knocked on her door again.

“Come in,” she said, fluffed her hair once more, and leaned back in her chair.

Todd opened the door and held it wide. David strode in. And promptly tripped, knocking over a vase, which spilled water all over her desk.

“Jesus, I’m sorry, Kate,” David apologized. He turned to Todd. “Can you grab us some paper towels?”

“For her? Yeah.” Todd turned and dashed down the hall.

“I’m so sorry, Kate,” David said as he helped her move flower vases and manuscripts out of the way of encroaching water.

“It’s all right. Maybe if I didn’t have so many flowers in here,” she joked. Inwardly, she prayed for Jules to come.

“I swear I must have tripped on something. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear Todd pushed me.”

Todd reappeared with paper towels. “I didn’t push you.”

“I know.” David smiled at him. “I just can’t believe I was such a klutz.”

I can.

Kate smiled. Her Jules. She blotted up the water on the desk, while Todd left and shut the door. When her desk was dry again, she stood up and looked directly at David. “Why are you here?”

“Because I love you.”

“David…”

“All I’m asking for is a chance. That’s it.”

He was so handsome. Kate bit her lip. “Can you step outside my office for one minute? I have to make a phone call.”

“Sure. I’ll be waiting right outside.”

When David shut the door, Kate whispered, “Jules?”

Yes, Katie Girl.

“I’m insane, aren’t I? I keep picturing you as my perfect partner, but you’re not flesh and blood. I picture you as always watching me sleep, as being with me all the time. But you can’t make love to me. You can’t really hold my hand. I can’t even look in your eyes.”

But I can look in yours and see the whole universe, Kate.

“Where are you?”

Right in front of you. Lean forward and I’ll whisper in your ear.

Kate leaned and felt a chill pass by her ear.

Kate…you have beautiful eyes.

She smiled. “Come in, David,” she called out.

He walked back in, tripped slightly and landed in a chair.

“What do you see when you look in my eyes, David?”

“I see the woman I’m going to marry.”

Kate looked at David. “Give me time. I used to look in your eyes and see that, but I don’t anymore. And I don’t think I can again. No more flowers. No more showing up at my office. None of it. Give me time.”

He stood. “Fine. Time. I know what I feel for you won’t go away.” He leaned over her desk and kissed her lips, lingering. She didn’t kiss back.

After he left, she said, “Jules?”

Yes?

“Can you make love?”

I don’t know.

“Want to try?”

Yes.

“What did you think when he kissed me?”

That I don’t ever want to see that again.

Not ever.

It should be me.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

KATE LAY ON HER BED, naked, listening to Jules’s voice. She had never felt so beautiful. Not ever.

You’re perfect, Katie Girl. Can you feel me touching you? I could spend an hour on your thigh, right here, just worshipping you. This spot is heaven.

“I feel cool where you touch me,” she breathed. All around her candles flickered, casting the room in a soft, warm glow. The night was warm, and she felt deliciously sexy.

Lie still. Lie perfectly still. That way you’ll feel the slightest touch. Okay?

Kate shut her eyes. She did feel him, like butterfly kisses, on her thighs, then her belly, then her nipples. She moaned. She so wanted to be able to feel him harder, skin to skin, but the sensations were delicate and erotic.

We’ll have to be creative.

She smiled. “Creative?”

Shhh, just lay still, angel.

Kate breathed deeply, feeling little shivers all over her body. It was erotic, but she longed to hold Jules. To see him. She felt his breath at her ear.

Touch yourself, Kate.

She blushed, a flush of red ascending from her neck to her cheeks.

“Jules,” she whispered. “I don’t know if I can do that in front of you.”

I’m touching myself. I swear to you. I’m touching myself at the same time. I want to see you come, Kate. I have to be with you when you do. Touch yourself. Please? Trust me.

Kate slid her hand down her belly. Then she took a deep breath and touched herself.

Jules whispered to her. You’re my soul mate, Kate. I adore you. Now, feel me on top of you, pressing against you?

She did, and felt her body rising toward an orgasm.

“Jules,” she said, breathless, body tense.

Yes, Katie Girl, I’m here. Let go, let go with me, Kate.

When she came, she heard Jules moan, and his guttural sound sent additional tremors through her body.

She breathed heavily for a minute or two.

You look beautiful when you come, angel. You look so pure and perfect and…I could watch you forever.

Kate smiled, opened her eyes, and rolled onto her side, facing the middle of the bed. “Jules?”

Yes?

“That was beautiful. It wasn’t…I can’t describe how much I long to hold you and feel you and see you. But that was intimate, and I did feel close to you.”

Don’t ever leave me, Kate. Don’t ever send me away.

“Never,” she breathed. “Talk me to sleep, like you do, Jules.”

I adore you. And I love you, Katie Girl.

Kate heard him whispering over and over again, and knew she wanted that voice, her Jules, there every night. Forever.

CHAPTER TWENTY

“GUS!” JULIAN SHAW stood in the middle of Kate’s living room while she slept in the next room. Julian shouted at the ceiling. “Gus, God damn you. And yes, I said God damn you. Materialize! Come here! Wherever you are, get your ass down here.”

A short time later, Gus appeared, a pint of Guinness in his hand.

“Where the hell have you been?” Julian demanded.

“I was in the middle of a game of darts when I got an urgent call from my boss, actually.”

“The Boss called you?”

“No. My boss. My immediate supervisor. Seems you have been misbehaving with Kate. Like one of your kinky porn DVDs.”

Julian lunged at Gus. “Shut the fuck up!” He swung at him and missed, sending the Guinness careening to the floor.

“All right. Perhaps it wasn’t kinky shagging. But Caseworkers are not—most definitely not—supposed to be having relations with their cases. This is against every rule in the universe. How are you helping Kate? How? You were instructed to discern what she needed and then help her. Not shag her like one of your two-bit tarts.”

Julian pushed Gus. “Don’t make me hurt you, old man. ’Cause I will.”

“Julian, you have never sustained a relationship in your entire life, from the moment you lost your virginity at thirteen to your babysitter.”

“I forgot you guys know all about me. All right, so at thirteen, I was too old for a babysitter.”

“Your parents were going to be gone for an entire weekend.”

“Well…that was apparently a little too much time for Missy Conrad. She was a hot college student with a thing for virgins.”

“Listen to yourself, Julian. Fine, from Missy Conrad on…you tried to get in the pants of every girl in high school—you even kept a secret list under your mattress.”

“Can I help it if I liked to keep score?”

“Shall we move on…College. You were uniformly reviled by women. Love ’em and leave ’em. Your radio show was a slightly tamer version of your current one. The administration was constantly after you. And then…the show.”

“My show is entertainment. That’s all.”

“But Julian, you’ve used the show to funnel sex into your own life from porn stars to impromptu orgies. And now…now you’ve been forced—and I’ll admit it…you don’t have too much choice here, free will aside, the Boss wanted you on the case, but forced, coerced, whatever you want to call it to spend time with Kate.”

“My Kate.”

“But Julian, have you thought perhaps it isn’t so much Kate but the fact that you’ve for once slowed down and spent 24/7 with another human being? With a woman? Stopped seeing a woman as an object? Gotten to know her as a vulnerable person? Watched her sleep? All the while unable to indulge in some of your usual peccadilloes?”

“No. Kate is special.”

“I know that. My boss knows that. The Boss knows that. But I don’t know if you know that, Julian. Not really. If you believed that, you would want the best for her, not want to be selfish and use her for a shag.”

“She’s not a shag. Kate isn’t like that. She’s not like that at all.”

Gus backed up. “Julian…you can’t believe that you are what she needs. You simply cannot.”

“I am!” Julian shouted.

“Stop being selfish for once in your life. This isn’t about Julian Shaw. This is about Kate.”

“I’m what she needs. I love her.”

“Julian, you can’t have her. She’s mortal. And you are…”

“I’m what? I don’t even know what I am. A disembodied soul. I’m still me—Julian. She needs me.”

“Julian, she needs to move on with someone she can have a life with. A real life.” Gus’s eyes were soft and pale, pitying. Which made Julian hate him more.

“She can have a life with me.”

“She can’t. She would never be able to have children, to create life. She would shut herself in this apartment with you and be lost to the world of the living. You can’t want that for her, Julian. These walls and no more. You don’t want her to give up on the world, Julian.”

Julian hesitated. “It wouldn’t be like that.” Already, in his mind, he imagined them having a child—using a sperm bank. Raising the child together. Creating a world away from the nastiness outside. The nastiness he had been part of. They would be different.

Gus stared at him. “You’ve fallen for her.”

Julian refused to answer. “You know who I am. I’m a shock jock. I don’t fall in love.”

“This is preposterously and completely unacceptable.”

“Yeah, well, fuck your unacceptable. You dumped me here with no real instructions. How was I supposed to know anything? I’ve done the best I could. And she is so much better off now. She smiles. She laughs. She falls asleep without crying. She listens to me, and I listen to her.”

“She makes love with a soul. You are not flesh and blood, Julian.”

“So what? I’d think the Boss would approve of soul mates.”

“Julian…”

Gus’s face was stricken, and Julian felt panic.

“Gus, you have got to go to bat for me. Let me stay in Neither Here Nor There. I’m good here. I’m fine with her. Let me stay here.”

“Julian, you don’t get to decide that. The Boss does.”

“Well, fuck the Boss.”

“You don’t mean that,” Gus said.

“I do. I mean it with every bit of my soul. You don’t screw with people like that, Gus. You don’t throw two souls together and then when they have actual feelings, when they find something between them, something they’ve never known before, rip them apart from one another.”

“You don’t understand how it works.”

“Don’t I? Look at poor Kate. Look at 9/11. Where was the Boss in all that? Where was She when the towers went down?”

Julian felt a furor pulsing through him that he had not felt since arriving in Neither Here Nor There. That he had never felt. His rants on the radio were about things he read in the papers or ideas he had, but not anything that was important to him. Not in the way Kate was.

“It’s the Plan.”

“What fucking Plan?”

“A Plan too grand, too huge for us to understand.”

Julian stormed toward Gus, backing him up farther. “You know what, Gus? You know what? That just sounds like a load of fucking crap you feed us to keep us from questioning the Boss. Well, I for one don’t think She knows what the hell She’s doing. And if She does, then She’s messing with people’s hearts. It’s bullshit.”

Gus held his hands up. “Please, Julian, calm down.”

“No! You go to the Boss. You tell Her I’m not leaving. I can stay in that God damn coma forever. Twenty years. People do that, don’t they? They do that all the time. I have no one who would fight to pull me off life support. I can lay there forever, for all I care. I’m not leaving her.”

“You don’t get to make those decisions, Julian.”

“Tell her!” Julian screamed. “Tell the Boss. Then get out of here. I’m going back to lie down with Kate. She needs me.”

Gus shook his head sadly. “Julian…try to think this through.”

But Julian didn’t want to hear anything Gus said. “Stupid Brit,” he muttered, and wandered back to Kate’s bedroom. She was sound asleep, a serene look and a half smile on her face.

He lay down next to her. “Katie Girl, I won’t let them take me away. We’re good together. We are. Fuck ’em all if they can’t see that. Fuck ’em all.”

He leaned in so close that he could see her pale freckles, even in the darkness of the room. He kissed her lips. This was what he was meant to do.

“Dream, Kate. Dream of me.”

And he kept watching her, knowing Gus was wrong, but worrying just what the Boss would do when She found out just how deeply he had fallen.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

BALAM WAS ESCORTED to The City Bistro’s private room. The City Bistro sat on Madison Avenue in midtown, not too far a walk from St. Patrick’s Cathedral—a haven for the Other Team. The dining room windows rose two stories tall, with the kind of hushed feeling a “power lunch” place possessed. Thick tablecloths and equally thick napkins sat on tables covered with the finest china and heavy silverware. He walked through the dining room, absorbing all the stares.

He always got the private room, and always as he walked through the crowded, leather and brass restaurant, diners scrutinized him. You had to be A-list to get the private room. A Bruce Springsteen, a Julia Roberts, a Justin Timberlake. Not even Paris Hilton and her ilk could get the private room. Too banal. Too low-class.

What the diners didn’t know, of course, was that the maitre d’, Tony, was on Balam’s payroll. Tony had a drinking problem, and when he’d hit and killed a pedestrian—and left the scene and never reported it—Balam was waiting with an iron-clad contract. No clause 17H for him. In exchange for his soul, Tony was cured of his thirst for alcohol—and never got caught for the hit-and-run murder.

There was no better person to funnel information to Hell than the maitre d’ for The City Bistro. Graft, corruption, backroom power deals and underhanded business moves, powerful men wining and dining women other than their wives, powerful women backstabbing colleagues, affairs and clandestine drug use, it all happened at these tables. And Balam knew about all of it. The City Bistro was his favorite place to eat. It was utterly delicious and that wasn’t even counting the food.

After seating Balam in the private room, Tony escorted a gorgeous redhead to Balam’s table. Balam ordered a bottle of Italian wine—$300. Carpaccio—$47. Foie gras (screw PETA)—$80. Followed by a rare filet mignon smothered in truffles at $165. The baked potato with extra butter—$15. The demon’s eye view of the dining room. Priceless.

In between the second appetizer and the main course, the redhead was on her knees under the table, servicing him. Tony poked his head in.

“Sorry to bother you, sir.” He handed Balam a slip of paper.

Balam just nodded. When Tony left, he opened the paper. And smiled.

Word in the Underworld was Julian Shaw had fallen hard.

And Balam knew one thing was positive about humans. If lust and greed made them stupid and reckless, love—real love—made them dangerous. He’d struck many a deal with those who loved the most deeply.

He’d have to tread carefully. Real love, which was difficult at times to delineate from lust, was a favorite cause of Hers. The expression “moved heaven and earth” was invented by Lucifer. It referred to the way the angels would do whatever it took for the cause of love.

He chuckled. One shock jock DJ. One broken-hearted woman. It was shaping up to be a real battle between his side and Her side. He put down the paper and rubbed his hands together. He had been finding it so easy to collect souls of late. The Internet (all those illicit Internet affairs and Webcams), E-Harmony (all those married souls pretending to be single), the media (he just adored the paparazzi)…it was just so utterly easy. A little battle might put a bit of fun into his work again. A little lift to his stride. A challenge.

“That’s it, honey,” he murmured to the woman under the table.

When she was finished—or rather he was—after he’d eaten his steak, he dismissed her and waited. He was patient. And finally, about the time he was finishing his second piece of cheesecake, he was rewarded.

Leslie, David and the vice president of a rival publishing house—one of the biggies—sat down to lunch. David had a manuscript in a soft-sided Italian leather briefcase. How utterly ironic that Kate had been the one to give it to him for Christmas. Leslie was smiling and patting David’s hand on occasion.

He couldn’t hear the conversation, but he could imagine it. They had ordered a round of martinis. Then another. Oh, he could imagine it all right.

He had a very good imagination.

All demons did.

He thought it was entirely possible to win the Hellbound Trifecta.

Julian. Leslie. David.

Three for the price of one.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

THE NEXT MORNING, as Julian and Kate walked to work, laughing together, Julian saw Balam waiting at the street corner, looking at his pocket watch.

“Kate, Love, I have a…friend to meet. From my world. You go into work. Probably get a lot more done without me chattering in your ear all morning.”

She looked at him and smiled. “See you later then, Jules. Don’t be long. I’ll miss you.”

“Never too long. See you soon…. Wait, hold still.” He kissed her nose, and she crinkled it and laughed and strolled on to her office building. He could see a light bounce in her step.

“Julian, my friend,” Balam greeted him. He wore the same crisp suit Julian remembered, and diamond cuff links gleamed in the sunlight. His white shirt was blinding. Julian would never have thought that a demon would have the best dry-cleaner in Manhattan.

“Balam.” Julian nodded.

“You know, the universe is a pretty small place.” Balam smiled. He also appeared to have the best dentist in the five boroughs.

“How so?”

“Well—” Balam spread his hands out “—it doesn’t take long for news to travel. I get around, my friend. I hear you have a bit of a dilemma.”

Julian looked around them. Now that he was in the company of a demon, he could again see the demons strolling the streets, all of them, legions, part of the fabric of the world he once thought he knew.

“It’s not a dilemma. It’s a difference of opinion with the Boss.”

Balam laughed derisively. “You’re a fool, Julian Andrew Shaw, son of Rachel and Vincent Shaw, boy who believed in Santa Claus until you were nine. Child who dreamed of escaping an alcoholic household.”

“Look, I get it. You all know everything about me. The other side does, too, so you’re not impressing me. This shit is getting old.”

“I thought I knew you, Julian. But where’s that hard edge? Where’s the Julian Shaw who ran the airwaves around this city? Who was courted with a hundred-million-dollar contract? Who doesn’t even need a lawyer or agent for negotiations—oh, sure, you have them, but you’re more shrewd than they are. You pull their strings like a ventriloquist. How can you be so pathetically fucking stupid?” Balam’s face twisted into a cruel—but still dazzling—smile.

“You know, stop jerking my chain and get to the point.”

“Julian, there is no difference of opinion.”

“Of course there is.”

“No, because Her opinion is the only one. The only one that matters, man. Did they feed you that nonsense about it all being part of a grand plan and you are too insignificant to understand it?”

“Yes.” Julian longed for Kate. He didn’t like being two feet away from a demon—no matter how well-dressed and dentally cared for.

“Well, it’s a load of garbage, Julian.”

“Look, I don’t see why you care about Kate and me.”

“But I do. I hate seeing lovers ripped apart.”

“Now who’s full of crap?”

“Look, it’s the Freewill Paradigm. I didn’t create it, but She places a lot of stock in it and then what happens? When free will doesn’t work out like She wants, She rips you two apart or sends a tsunami or something. Her and the weather.” Balam shuddered and looked up at the clear sky.

“So what about this Freewill Paradigm?”

“Well, look…as far as I’m concerned, this type of thing never works out. A mortal with an entity? Did you not see the movie model for that. The Entity—bad eighties flick, but definitely a working video for just how wrong these things can go.”

“Gimme a break.”

“Fine. Ghost. Did Patrick Swayze get to stay with Demi Moore, humping her, courtesy of Whoopi Goldberg, or did he eventually have to go into the light? How do you think these things get green-lighted? Trust me, Hollywood is full of demons, pal. They never end well.”

“But I don’t want to harm her. Gus has it all wrong. She wouldn’t be better off without me. I just want to be with her.”

“Precisely. But these relationships never work out. Trust me on this one. I’ve got centuries of experience with this sort of thing. Look at Joan Of Arc.”

“Joan of Arc.”

“She heard voices. You know the story. Put two and two together. It wasn’t about God. It was Neither Here Nor There. A disaster. She fell in love with her caseworker. They were too close. But fine—” Balam shrugged “—you want to be with the girl of your dreams and she’s willing to give up earthly love for what passes as sex between you two, who am I to try to intervene? Not my style. Hence the Freewill Paradigm. I personally think you two should be able to make your own decision regarding this. You’re both semi-reasonable adults.”

“Now there we go,” Julian said. “Someone who makes sense.” That’s all he wanted. A chance.

“See, I am a very sensible fellow.”

“You’re also a demon.”

“True enough. But I am sensible. I am the Dr. Phil of the Underworld.”

“Well, it’s great you’re so sensible, but the fact remains, Gus wasn’t too receptive to my problem.”

Balam came around to Julian’s side and draped an arm across his shoulders. “Exactly, which is why you have me.”

Julian looked at his new “friend.” Balam’s eyes were black and flat, like coal. Completely dead. And scary.

“I happen to have a new and improved contract here,” Balam said, snapping his fingers and producing a new set of papers. “I guarantee that you can remain as you are, forever.”

“What happens to my body?”

“Doesn’t much matter. You land back in there, we’ll kill you and you just get to go right back to how you are now. Preferably, you’ll just linger in a coma until the end of the world as we know it. Which, according to my bookie is going to be sooner rather than later.”

“And I get to stay with Kate?”

“Yup. Never have to leave her side. And, I would most especially check out Clause 22J.”

Julian took the thick sheath of papers and scanned through to 22J. His mouth dropped open. “You’re serious about this?”

“Yup. Serious as a heart attack, my friend. You get a proper penis for these sessions of yours. She will get to feel you, same as if you were a man. You’ll remain invisible, but with a punch, if you know what I mean.”

Julian looked at Balam. “Can I think about this?”

“Sure. But don’t take too long. No telling what She will have in mind. You could get zapped back to that pitiful coma body at any time. You probably don’t have as long to think about it as you think.”

“All right, then, Balam. I’ll definitely consider your offer.”

“Excellent.”

“How do I get in touch with you?”

“Just call for me. Like I said, the universe is a very small place.”

Balam started off down fourteenth. Julian watched and saw his suited companions fall in line behind him. He stared at the contract in his hand and tucked it in his back pocket. He walked toward Kate’s office, feeling more positive than he had since he arrived in Neither Here Nor There. The Freewill Paradigm. He knew what was best for Kate. He did. And screw the Boss if she didn’t know that, too.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

KATE ENTERED THE reception area of her office to find the organization in utter panic.

“Helen needs to see you,” Todd said. His face looked pale. She could see editorial assistants scurrying in and out of offices.

“What is it?”

“Leslie quit.”

“What?”

“And she’s taking her fucking Rolodex. Her authors. She’s been maneuvering this behind the scenes. It’s 9:00 a.m., and I think Helen already needs a stiff gin and tonic.”

“Shit.”

Kate walked down the hallway to her office. Leslie’s office door was wide open. Her desk was cleared out. Her personal effects gone.

Kate opened the door to her own office and dropped her briefcase on the floor. The flowers David had been sending were wilted. The roses dropped, their petals turned brown and shriveled. Feeling a surge of anger, she wanted them gone.

She buzzed Todd.

“Yeah, sweetie?”

“Would you do me a big favor? Will you come into my office with one of the big, green trashcans and just get rid of all the flowers and vases?”

“Even the pretty crystal one?”

“Yes. Even the pretty crystal one. Unless you want it.”

“Sure, I’ll take it.”

“Great. And any other vases you want. I even think there’s a porcelain jewelry box in here that had some flowers in it. You could give it as a gift to someone.”

“I love free stuff. It’s like a swag suite. Be right down.”

“Thanks, Todd.”

She hung up the phone. Then, taking a deep breath, she walked down the hall to Helen’s office. Her boss was facing the tall window, looking out on the street below. Kate rapped slightly on the ajar door.

“Helen?”

“Oh, good. Come in. Sit down. Shut the door, will you?”

Kate did. Helen sat down at her desk.

“Want coffee?” Helen had her own coffeemaker in her office—one of those pod machines that makes a single cup at a time.

“No thanks, Helen.”

“How about a stiff drink?”

Kate smiled wanly. “That I might take you up on. But we’ll be all right. She’s just one editor.”

“Yes. But you two are my best. You had the healthiest lists. But there’s more.”

Kate braced herself.

“I have it on good authority that David’s going to jump ship with her. She’s going to a house that can literally give him anything and everything he wants. Huge advance. Promo. Co-op. A dedicated publicist. They can give him the world.”

Kate exhaled like the air being let out of an overfilled balloon. “But we still get to publish the sequel to Jackal’s Feast. He has a contract. I’ve edited the sequel. Most of it. He hasn’t turned in the ending to me yet.”

“I know. But once we publish it, he’ll turn around and hightail it with Leslie. We’re screwed. You edit the masterpiece. He goes.”

“I…” Kate looked down at her hands and noticed they were shaking. “I can’t believe he would do that to me.”

“He’s quite the devil.”

“So much for me being his muse.”

Helen swiveled in her high-backed leather chair and slid it over to the bookshelf behind her. Like most editors, she lined up every book she had ever edited. Running her manicured index finger along the spines, she went alphabetically until she found what she was looking for.

She pulled the hardback book from the shelf and slid it across the desk to Kate.

“Time Thief,” Kate read aloud. “I loved this book. This is a Kent Washington book. Sci-fi. We didn’t publish it.”

She nodded. “That’s right, we didn’t. But I edited it.”

“You did? I don’t understand. This book is legendary. But you never worked for them.”

Helen nodded her head ruefully. “Legendary. Yes, it is. Kent was my author and my friend. Let me back up. He was my friend first. Then…we dated. Off and on. He had writer’s block. Agonizing writer’s block that kept him up all night, pacing and fretting that he’d never write another word. I helped him through it.”

Kate could totally picture Helen nursing Kent Washington through his block. Leslie used to joke that she and Helen could coax a book out of a monk who had taken a vow of silence.

Helen continued. “He was crippled by insecurity about his writing. He would bewail that he was a hack. That he didn’t have it in him to finish the book.”

“Sounds familiar.”

“And I helped him through it. We were a team after a while, and I just assumed that when his book was done, he would be placing it with me. It was our baby. A labor of love. Of patience. Total mutual devotion to the creation of a masterpiece.”

“It is a masterpiece.”

“And I assumed I would shepherd it to publication. That when the first copy fell off the printing press, I would hold it in my hands, like an OB-GYN catching a baby as it’s born. That Kent and I would be there together.”

“And that never happened, I take it.”

“No. He turned around and took it to them. On the one hand, I didn’t blame him. They offered him a lot of money, and they are a sci-fi house. The line was perfect for him. But on the other hand…it was a cruel blow.”

“You sound pretty pragmatic about the whole thing. I would be devastated.”

“It was such a breach of trust, Kate, I thought I’d never recover.”

“So why do you keep the book on your shelf? A reminder to never trust anyone ever again?”

Helen smiled and pursed her lips together. “Au contraire. I keep it there because they didn’t change a word of it. No matter whose jacket is wrapped around the cover, it is still the book I’m proudest of. I know how much a part of it I was. And so—no matter what he tells himself so he can sleep at night—does Kent.”

“He never wrote another book like that one. I hear he’s an alcoholic.”

“Poetic justice.”

“Okay, Helen, so how do we do damage control?”

“We’ll have a meeting later. I’ve got to wait for Joe to come in,” she said, referring to the publishing house’s president.

“All right. Thanks, Helen. Words of wisdom very much appreciated.”

“You’re welcome. We’ll get through this. Though if I see that skinny little blond bitch, I just might slap her.”

Laughing slightly, Kate rose and left Helen’s office.

She thought once she had Jules watching out for her, all would be…well, perfect.

But even with an angel—or whatever he was—in her corner, the world wasn’t perfect.

She wanted a hug. With someone’s real arms. Deflated, she trudged down the hall to her office, and dialed Dr. Raphael Tobit.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“DR. TOBIT?” KATE reclined on his couch, legs draped over the arm, staring at the ceiling.

“Yes, Kate?”

“I’m nuts, aren’t I?”

“No, Kate.”

“Well, then you’re the only one who thinks that.”

“Why? Have you told other people about the voice?”

“Are you kidding? They’d have me committed.”

“Do you think you’re crazy?”

“Not crazy so much…as losing it. Don’t get me wrong, I prayed for help. I just didn’t expect my help would be…something supernatural. Something I can’t explain.”

“All right, let’s assume for the moment that…well, that this voice of yours is real.”

“So you believe me?”

“Doesn’t matter. Let’s talk through this. Let’s assume this voice is real. You have a dilemma, don’t you?”

“Yes.” She looked up at Tobit’s bookshelves, and a smaller bust of Sigmund Freud stared down at her. Mocking her. She shut her eyes and listened to Dr. Tobit’s fountain. She wanted to go to her “happy place”—but lately her “happy place” was also an insane place.

“And that is?”

“I told you…. Today…I wanted someone to hold me. For real. I wanted a hug with real arms. Arms I can feel. I wanted to make love with—no offense, Dr. Tobit—a real penis.”

“No offense taken. Don’t worry. You can say anything here. Dr. Freud won’t tell.”

“That statue up there?”

“No. The goldfish on my desk. Dr. Freud. He keeps secrets. He and I have heard it all.”

“Well, I am pretty sure you haven’t heard this precise story before. And neither has your gold fish.” She turned her head to see the fish swimming lazily in an elaborate glass vase with clear blue stones at the bottom and live plants.

“You’d be correct there.”

“But it does make me feel better. I have a ghost companion. You have a goldfish one.”

“Yes, but I have to tell you, Kate…I don’t sleep with my goldfish.”

She smiled, despite how depressed she felt. “So…stay with Jules and have an almost-perfect relationship? Or…send him away, and risk that I may never find something like that with a real person? What if what he and I have is so extraordinary that I don’t ever find it here on earth?”

“I suppose that’s what we all fear.”

“Really?”

“Let me tell you something, Kate. When people come to a psychiatrist or an analyst or a therapist, they’re coming to them, looking, much of the time, for someone to listen to them without judgment. For someone to ‘get’ them and their particular neuroses. They want to figure out the difficult journey we call life.”

“And do they?”

“Sometimes. Sometimes all they get is confirmation that the journey is hard, and growth is even harder. But beyond that, Kate…modern man is so utterly lonely. We’re looking to condense the search for a soul mate into a short paragraph we can run with a photo on E-Harmony. We speed date. We want to cut out the courtship and just find what it is we’re looking for. Instantaneously. A soul mate in a nanosecond.”

“I know what I feel for Jules is special. But it doesn’t seem right that my soul mate should be a soul without a body.”

“No. It doesn’t seem right. And maybe that’s part of the process you’re working through.”

She felt tears stinging her eyes and she rolled onto her side.

“And what if I accept that this is my soul mate and I just have an unusual relationship?”

“You wouldn’t be the first to strike a compromise.”

“I don’t think other people compromise by being with a ghost. More like they accept that their husband isn’t a morning person, or their wife is a bad cook.”

Tobit laughed. “All right. An exceptional compromise.”

“You still think this is all in my head?”

“I think you’re still under a great deal of stress.”

“I was lonely today. For the first time since my voice came, I was lonely.”

“Did you do my assignments?”

“I did some grief work. I went out to my father’s grave.”

“With him?”

“Yes. And he was wonderful. Supportive. But…as for the other half of your prescription, my sense of fun is a little warped right now. It consists of staying home and making love to a man I can’t see, but can only hear.”

“I can’t give you the answers, Kate. But it’s pretty clear-cut. This voice only lives in one realm. Your choice isn’t between two men who have a list of attributes. Your choice is between one of this world. And one of…”

“My imagination?”

“I didn’t say that. Like I said, let’s suppose there’s more to this world we live in than meets the eye. It’s still a very clear choice. Of this world. Or that one.”

Kate sat up and looked for his box of tissues. “I just feel so torn.”

“It’s not an easy decision you’re facing. I think you’re saying goodbye to many things all at once. David. Leslie. Unresolved grief for your father. Even the illusion that your apartment is totally safe—never underestimate the effect of being a victim of a crime. But you’re strong, Kate. I have faith you will figure this all out.”

“Thanks, Dr. Tobit.”

Clutching a tissue, she wiped her eyes. And as she left his office, walking past all his statues of angels, she felt more alone than ever before.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

“I LOVE YOU, JULES.”

“I love you, too, Katie Girl.”

“Make love to me. Make love to me the way you do. I don’t ever want to leave our world here together.”

“Feel me, Kate. Feel me touching you.”

Gus watched the video on Albert’s computer screen feeling increasingly queasy. He pulled out his pocket handkerchief and dabbed at his brow. He didn’t sweat in Neither Here Nor There, but he felt the sensation of sweating just the same, a cloying dampness on the back of his neck. Albert tugged at his hair, which was wilder than usual.

“Turn if off,” Gus pleaded. “Take a Chance on Me” was playing in the background. He wondered if Benny Anderson and ABBA were secretly in league with Satan. Their tunes were so damn subversive.

Albert shook his head. “Not before this video clip. It’s worse than the first.” Albert pressed a button and Balam appeared on the screen. “Look here.” Albert zoomed in on the legal contract.

“Please tell me the poor lovesick boy doesn’t take it.” Gus felt uneasy at even the thought of demons. Nearly every time a suicide occurred on earth, a demon had convinced some utterly bereft soul that God’s arms weren’t waiting. Hope was lost. Gus held his breath.

“Oh, he does.” Albert fast-forwarded to the part where Julian stuck the contract in his back pocket.

Gus materialized a shot of whiskey and drank it fast and neat. “What are we to do, Albert?” He made the shot glass disappear and wrung his hands together, nervously knotting and unknotting his silk handkerchief.

“Give me one of those whiskeys, will you?”

Gus materialized another one and handed it to his supervisor, who sipped it while poring over formulas. Gus was lucky he had ever mastered long division. Albert’s equations were like a foreign language.

“I have gone over these equations a thousand times. I can only assume Julian and Kate—on some quantum level—knew each other in a past life. Particles reacting to one another.” He turned a notebook around. Squiggles and notations were scrawled across the page in a handwriting Gus could barely decipher with formulas he most definitely couldn’t decipher.

“A quantum level?”

“Yes. You see, Gus, the atoms that make up the universe have been here for billions of years. And it’s my theory that when two souls meet each other and feel an unnatural pull toward one another—an immovable force, if you will—it’s because their particles recognize each other. It may not be a previous life in the way the Dalai Lama has been reincarnated but a previous life in that their particles are drawn to each other.”

“Fine. Suppose their particles did know each other. It still doesn’t solve anything. What if he actually signs that contract, Albert? Julian has been a real trial and tribulation to me, as you well know, but his heart is in the right place. He is changing. Has changed. I don’t want him to end up in Hell, Albert. The thought terrifies me. We have him this close to Her arms again, he signs that and…” He shuddered. He really couldn’t bear to think of it. Gus knew no lakes of fire burned in Hell but the idea of being separated from Her unceasing love for all eternity made him feel actual pain—the only real pain he could feel in Neither Here Nor There.

“We have to hope the Boss sends him back to his body before then.”

“What is the latest medical report?”

Albert pressed a button on his laptop, and all of Julian’s charts appeared. The two of them went over each chart, one by one. Vital statistics, body temperature, medications, oxygen levels.

“Nothing extraordinary. I don’t see any signs of real recovery,” Albert said. “But She performs miracles all the time. The world just doesn’t pay attention. Julian could wake up tomorrow. We’ll just have to wait for word, Gus. In the meantime, keep him from signing that contract!”

“I’ll stick to him like glue, Albert. You can count on me.”

“I know I can, Gus.” Albert finished his whiskey and sighed.

“What is it?”

“Look at this picture.”

The final screen shot on Albert’s computer was of Kate, her face illuminated as she was kissed on the sidewalk by Julian.

“She looks so beautiful.”

“Yes,” Albert replied. “She looks the happiest I’ve ever seen her.” He clicked through a photographic file. Kate appeared as a tiny little bundle in a pink blanket in a hospital bassinette. Kate taking her first step in little white baby shoes. Kate as a little girl holding her father’s hand on the first day of kindergarten, wearing a tartan plaid skirt and a white blouse from Catholic school. Her first kiss on the playground in third grade. As a teenager with braces. On prom night in a beautiful black gown with tiny little roses embroidered in its tulle overlay. On 9/11, face pressed against her TV, Mallory next to her, the two of them sobbing. At her father’s funeral. With David in Central Park in a hansom cab. And finally…with Julian.

“She glows.” Albert sighed.

“You think the Boss really knows what she’s doing?”

“Yes, but you’ve heard of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle?”

“No.”

“It…examines the uncertainties of hypothetical, infinitely precise measurements.”

“Oh, of course,” Gus said, feeling, as he often did with Albert, completely lost.

“Basically,” Albert said, “there is the most minute uncertainty in the quantum mechanics of the universe.”

“What does that have to do with Kate and Julian?”

“It means even the Boss can have a degree of uncertainty.”

“That’s never good.” Gus didn’t like to think that the Boss, even in the most tiny, most minute little chance, didn’t know precisely what she was doing. He liked to cling to the verse from Matthew. The one about the sparrows. Surely Julian and Kate were as important to her as sparrows.

Now he had the uncertainty principle to deal with. He hoped quantum mechanics could help him keep Julian from the clutches of Balam. But now, Gus was filled with uncertainty of his own.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

DON’T SEND ME AWAY, KATE.

She sat in bed, clutching her fifteenth tissue. “It’s not that I want to, Jules…but…I don’t know if this is enough. I thought once you were involved in my life, everything would be perfect. But it’s not. The real world still sucks sometimes. Only I don’t have a real man here to help me. I mean, Jules…it’s not like I can take you as my date to a wedding. We can’t go on vacation together like real couples.”

We can vacation together.

“With me hiding in my hotel room so people don’t see me talking to you. And what if one day I want to have a baby? We can’t marry, can’t have a baby.”

So we choose a sperm donor. You have the baby. I raise the baby with you.

“Listen to you, Jules. What are you saying to me? This isn’t right. I can just picture it. On Father’s Day, I’ll have our little girl making cards for a ghost father.”

And then, at those words, she began sobbing. “I can’t do that to my child. Because on Father’s Day that’s all I’ll have, Jules.”

Don’t cry, Katie Girl. Don’t. You don’t understand. All I have is eternity stretching out in front of me. And I would spend every minute of every day until the end of time being here for you. Trying to make sure you never cry. Loving you. It’s all I want. I get you, Kate. I get all your quirks, your eccentricities, your sweetness. I understand you. I know what you’re thinking before you think it. I don’t know how. I don’t know why. But we’re connected. And I love you. And…treasure you.

She sniffled. “You know, Dr. Tobit said that’s all anyone wants. Someone to be there for them.”

Tobit’s a quack. I told you that. I don’t trust him.

Kate dried her eyes and blew her nose. “I must look a fright.”

You look beautiful. You know, when I first arrived, I thought I needed to make you a little sexier. Now, don’t get me wrong, I think you in a thong is the sexiest woman I’ve ever laid eyes on. But when I love you most? When I love you most is when you first wake up, no makeup, sleepy-eyed, bed head. All natural. My Katie Girl. And you know why I love that best?”

“No, why?”

Because I know I’m the only soul who gets to see you that way. It’s me you share your life with. I am privy to you blowing your nose, to your sleepy eyes, to the way the sunlight comes across your face at dawn. I get to see that. No one else. And that makes you and me…special.

“Oddly enough, Jules…maybe I have it all wrong.”

What do you mean?

“I think I want a pair of arms. I think I want a real-world lover. But what I really want…is what we have. At the end of the day, total acceptance. My soul mate.”

That’s all I want, too.

“Kiss me, Jules.”

She felt the brush of his cold air against her now hot cheeks, wet with tears.

You won’t send me away?

“No. I won’t.”

She lay down on her bed. “Spoon around me, Jules. Let me hear you near my ear.”

How’s that?

Though she couldn’t feel him, his voice was whispering and seductive in her ear. It gave her chills.

The telephone rang and startled her. She grabbed the receiver and looked at the caller ID.

“Hi, Mal.”

“Are you crying?”

“No.” Kate sniffled. “Allergies. I’m fine.”

“Since when do you have allergies?”

“Hayfever.”

“I don’t believe you. Come out with me.”

“Sorry, Mal,” Kate said, holding the telephone receiver on her shoulder, featherlike caresses tingling up and down her neck as Julian kissed her. “I can’t go tonight.”

“Why?”

“I have a pile of work to do. I brought home a stack of manuscripts. Mmmmm.”

“Mmm, what?”

“Huh? Oh…nothing. I’m just tired. Distracted.”

“I’m coming over tonight.”

“No. Don’t.”

“I’m worried about you. You haven’t taken David back, have you?”

“Haven’t even thought about it,” Kate said honestly.

“Is there someone new?”

“Not exactly.”

“Wait,” Mal said. “The ghost. You still think your place is haunted?”

“I don’t know if haunted is the correct term.”

“Look, it’s almost the anniversary. I just want to know you are okay. I love you, sweetie.”

“I’m okay. I’m better than okay. I am deliriously wonderful. Swear it.”

“Aren’t you doing anything for Labor Day? Maybe get out of the city? Jack Davis invited me—and you—to go out on his boat. It’s docked over in Piermont. We could sail the Hudson.”

“Nope. Staying put. I’m fine, Mal. Swear to you. Cross my heart.”

“You sound fine, except for the sniffles, but…Hey, how was Dr. Tobit?”

“He actually helped me figure it all out, Mal.”

“You sound stronger.”

“I am.” Kate smiled and looked over her shoulder in Jules’s direction, at least where she thought he was. “Let me run.”

“All right. Have a good long weekend.”

“You, too.” She said goodbye and hung up the phone.

“Well, Jules…it’s you and me tonight, darling.”

My favorite kind of evening.

“Mine, too.”

Kate stood up. “I’m going to get a glass of wine.”

Right behind you. And what a fucking hot behind you have.

Kate laughed. “Jules, there is definitely still a lot of naughty boy in you.”

You bring it out in me.

Labor Day Weekend. Three days of Jules 24/7 and no work, no phone, no TV—she had never replaced the one that got robbed. Just them.

She padded to the kitchen, poured herself a glass of white wine, and then ran back to her bedroom and put it on the nightstand and flopped back on the bed and laughed. She had made her choice.

I never tire of that smile.

“You put it there.”

And I intend to keep it there.

“What’s to become of us, Jules?”

I imagine we’ll grow old together in this apartment.

She frowned. “Can you grow old?”

I don’t know. I need to ask you something, Katie Girl.

“What?”

Do you believe in Hell?

“Fire and the devil and all that?”

Yes. Well, no. Apparently that lake-of-fire thing is a myth. A rumor to keep humans in line.

“Why? Are you about to tell me you’re a demon?”

No. Just asking. Do you believe in Hell?

“Am I going there?”

You are paranoid today, Kate. No. Just answer the question.

“Well, no. I don’t. I guess I picture God—when I picture God when I say my prayers—as a loving God. And so I don’t picture burning in Hell and all that. I picture God as wanting us to do good. To love one another as ourselves, that sort of thing.”

What if I told you that demons exist, but they’re really…No pitchforks. And Hell was just not going to Heaven.

“I don’t know, Jules. I guess I would say that eternity is a long time to be without God.”

Eternity is the minutes I’m not with you.

“You’re so sweet, Jules.” She furrowed her brow. “You have me a little worried. No Hell for you, okay?”

Sure.

“Why don’t I believe you, Jules? I can hear it in your voice. Something’s on your mind.”

No. I have choices to make. About eternity.

“I guess we both do, right? Now—” she sat up and pulled off her top “—make love to me, Jules.”

You’re a sight as beautiful as Heaven. I’m sure of it.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

ON SUNDAY, KATE slept in while Julian stared at her. There was a time when five minutes was as long as he could bear postcoitus with a woman. No snuggling. No spooning. Just fuck and get me out of there.

Now he could—blind and from memory—recount every freckle on her body. The adorable little scar on her ankle. What shampoo she used. Her habit of crossing herself when she finished saying her nightly prayers. He knew she always put three ice cubes, not four, not two, in her soda. He didn’t even know if she knew as much about herself as he knew about her.

He laid his head on her shoulder. He had memorized her body. But beyond that, the little things. She was in her mid-twenties but still bought Lucky Charms and picked all the marshmallows out to eat as candy. She heaped ketchup on scrambled eggs. She hid her eyes during the scary parts of movies. If she walked by a water fountain, she always dug a penny out of her purse and made a wish.

He thought about eternity. He could spend a hundred lifetimes memorizing these things about her, and it still wouldn’t be enough. He’d want to know more. He had never realized, until he got to Neither Here Nor There, that inside one woman was a vastness as big as the cosmos, there for the knowing.

Kate’s eyelids fluttered.

“Good morning, beautiful.”

“Good morning, Jules. What’s it like outside?”

“Sunny. Want to take a walk through Washington Square Park?” he asked, knowing the answer already.

“Yes! Best part is I can talk to you and people will just think I’m an eccentric from the park. No one will care.”

“That is a great thing about being in New York City.” He had always loved New York’s nut jobs before. They called in to his radio program, he mocked them, he got great ratings. But seeing the looks Kate got from talking to him, he began to wonder if the crazies tapped into something the rest of the world just didn’t understand.

Julian watched as she climbed from bed and went into the bathroom. She shut the door, and he could hear the sink running and the toilet flush. They had a deal. He got to watch her showers. Anything else in there was private. She emerged, hair in a ponytail, naked.

“You walk around like that, and we won’t ever get to the park,” he growled.

“No. We’re going for a walk. Like all lovers. Remember that day I saw the trannie with a boyfriend? Well, now I have a boyfriend, too.”

“Technically, yes. But no one else can see me.”

“Doesn’t matter. I know.” She touched her breast where her heart would be. “In here. I know.”

She opened her top dresser drawer and pulled out a thong. Then she donned a pair of gym shorts, her La Perla bra and a T-shirt, pulled on socks and a pair of Nikes, and walked toward him. “Come on, Jules. Let’s go! It’s our wonderful weekend.”

The two of them left her apartment, and she took the stairs two at a time, her ponytail swinging. He had never been more in love. When he was with her, the joy on her face—was infectious. Joy—if anyone had told him he, Julian Shaw, would even use such a saccharine word, he would have told them they were snorting heroin.

Out on the sidewalk, Kate raised her face to the sun and sighed. He kissed her cheek, and they ambled toward the park. They passed a newsstand on the way. He stopped for a moment and saw one of New York City’s tabloids with big block letters proclaiming “Shock Jock Defying Doctors.”

Julian ran to the paper. He scanned the story. His body was responding to stimuli, according to the lead sentence. There was hope he would emerge from the coma. He felt the earth spin. The papers in his back pocket seemed warm, like a small fire lit on his ass. He patted his pocket. No fire. But he was running out of time, like Balam said.

He returned to Kate’s side and held her hand. “I love you, you know. No matter what happens, know I love you. Okay?”

“Okay, sweetness. I know. Love you, too.”

“No. Say it. Like you believe it. Say you know that I love you.”

“Jules? You’re acting funny. Of course I know you love me.”

They reached Washington Square Park, its huge arch greeting them, pigeons pecking at scattered popcorn in the gutter. Inline skaters darted by them. Lovers strolled. And then Julian saw Gus.

“Angel—” He grabbed Kate. “Angel, my Guide is here. I need to talk with him. Meet me on that bench over there, okay?”

“Sure, Jules. You sound worried.”

The papers in his back pocket were burning hotter now.

“No. Not worried. I love you. I love you for eternity. Go now, okay?” He grabbed her face in his hands and kissed her on the mouth.

Her pupils widened. “Wow! I really felt that one.”

“Just the passion of the moment, Katie Girl. My Katie Girl. My angel. I love you.”

She smiled and started strolling toward the bench. He watched her ponytail and her glorious ass as she walked away. With every bit of his soul, he wanted to run after her, but he knew he had to speak with Gus.

“Hello, Julian,” his Guide said.

“Hello, old man.”

“Julian…it’s time. The Boss wants you back in your body.”

“You can’t do this to me now, Gus. I swear to you, I’m changed. I swear it. I get it now. I get the whole fucking reason for our earthly existence.”

“And what’s that?”

“To love. Gus…see that girl on the bench there?”

Gus smiled at Kate’s direction. “Of course I do. Our Kate Darby.”

“She’s my girl, Gus. She’s my reason. She’s what I was meant to…She’s my girl, Gus. I am begging you, don’t take me from her.”

“But the Boss…She has different plans. And you have to accept that, Julian.”

Julian pulled Balam’s contract from his pocket. “No, I don’t. Balam!” He screamed it at the sky. “Balam!”

In an instant, Balam appeared, in his usual perfectly tailored suit, white shirt and expensive Italian shoes.

“Gus.” Balam nodded. “Nice to see you down here among the riff-raff.”

“Balam, leave this boy alone.”

“He’s not a boy. He’s a foul-mouthed shock jock with a major case of the lovesick blues. He can sign that contract and be with his girl forever if that’s what he wants. Who am I to deny him that? Worse, who is She to deny him?”

“That’s not for us to question, Balam.”

“Why not? That’s the difference between you and me. Between Lou and Her.”

“What’s that?” Gus asked.

“She wants unquestioning faith and acceptance but She’s unwilling to provide any answers. No questions, just toe the line. We happen to believe if She granted mortals intelligence, then why shouldn’t they question?”

“That’s not true,” Gus said. He put a hand on Julian’s shoulder. “Don’t listen to him, Julian. He’s a forked-tongue beast. Faith is about acceptance but Her love is unceasing. We must not doubt that.”

Julian looked from one to the other, then held the contract in his hands. The faintest of flames flickered at the edges of the paper, dancing in orange hues with blue-and-red tongues, yet not burning the edges. He was mesmerized.

“I’m going to sign it. Gus…I can’t leave her. I can’t leave her, man.”

“A minute ago, you said you knew the purpose of your existence. It’s love, Julian. Balam doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”

“Is it love, Gus,” Balam said, squinting his cold, dead eyes, “that caused Her to allow all those people to go down in the towers? Is it? Sign the papers, Julian. They’re feeding you the party line, and it rots and smells like dead fish.”

“Don’t do it, Julian,” Gus urged. “You’ll belong to him. Forever.”

“But he doesn’t care what I do. I can stay in that apartment with Kate forever.” Julian felt as if his heart—which he knew was actually beating in a hospital bed, powered by machines—was going to explode. He looked desperately from Gus to Balam.

“Julian, sign the contract. You don’t have much time. She can seize you at any minute,” Balam commanded. “And then Kate will be lost to you. Forever.”

Gus walked over to him and placed a hand on Julian’s shoulder. “What will you do when she grows old, Julian? When she is old and frail and you are forced to watch her take her dying breath, and then you have all of eternity, until the very universe ends, to pine for her until you become bitter and enraged and you will then do Balam’s bidding. He knows that. The devil is patient, Julian.”

Julian clutched at his throat. “I can’t breathe. I…Gus, I can’t leave her.” The physical agony he felt was unlike any pain he had ever experienced in life. Worse than heroin withdrawal. By a thousandfold. It wasn’t physical—he didn’t have a real body. But it felt physical. It was an aching in his soul, an anguish that hurt so badly, he wanted to die.

“Julian, don’t condemn yourself to Hell. Don’t condemn your Katie Girl to a half-life with you. She needs to be of this world. Not of Neither Here Nor There.”

Julian stared at the papers in his hands. The flames burned higher. Then, with a guttural scream, he sank to his knees.

“Send me, Gus. Send me before I lose my courage.”

And in an instant, the world went black.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

KATE WAITED. MINUTES grew to a half-hour. “Jules?” she called out. “Jules?”

She stood up and scanned the park. She didn’t know exactly what she should be looking for. Jules was more of a feeling. So she strode to the arch, where he had last kissed her and held her hand. She waited expectantly, spinning slowly, as if Jules might come up behind her and kiss her. Might surprise her.

“Jules?” she called out. “Jules!”

But he didn’t respond.

An uneasy feeling overcame her. She looked at her hands, which trembled so much they visibly shook. Her teeth chattered. She turned and ran, as hard and fast as she could, down the sidewalk, leaving the park. She raced, darting across the street, then dodged passersby, back to her building, up the staircase, tripping once and landing on her knee, feeling it grow wet with blood, then scrambling up and charging up the stairs and down the hall faster.

She burst through her door. “Jules!” she screamed. “Jules! Jules!”

She ran from room to room in her apartment. “Jules!” Her cry became a shriek. It was a shriek she recognized—her voice at the horror of that day. The anniversary day. Grief and panic and shock. “Jules! Don’t tease me. Come out, Jules!”

But she got no response, and then she remembered the way he told her to believe he loved her. He was coming back. He was gone temporarily. He had to be coming back. His Guide needed him for a bit. She told herself that. She told herself, just like she told herself they would find pockets of survivors in the ash and rubble.

Kate sank to her bed and curled her legs up in a fetal position.

“I know you love me, Jules. I know you love me.” She repeated the mantra over and over again until she couldn’t speak from the sobs choking her. Then she gave in to the hysteria.

“Jules…Jules…” she called out to him. But she didn’t feel his presence. She didn’t feel his kiss. And she didn’t feel, most of all, as if life were worth living without him.

WHEN KATE WOKE UP, the first word on her lips was “Jules.” The apartment was dark, and she pressed her fingers to her eyes, feeling how swollen they were.

“God,” she whispered. “I don’t know how you brought me Jules, but I need him to come back to me. Please. I will promise anything. That I will be celibate for the rest of my life except for the way he and I make love. I swear it. I just need to have him here.”

She didn’t know how long she lay there, bargaining with God until she finally whispered, “If only to say goodbye, please. So I can say a proper goodbye.”

Dawn arrived. Then noon of Labor Day. Out on the street, she could hear the sounds of laughter drifting up through her window. She stared at the ceiling and didn’t move.

The day shifted. Shadows danced on her wall as sunlight hit the prism that hung from her curtain rod. A spectacle of rainbows and colors danced. And she stared at them.

She walked Honey, wearing dark sunglasses, avoiding the gaze of anyone on the street, then hurried back to her apartment.

Night fell. She wasn’t hungry. She wasn’t thirsty. She was numb—and yet in so much pain, it was physical. When she caught David and Leslie together, it had been a slap, a stinging slap across the face. This was different. It was so intense, she felt as if her heart was literally breaking.

FOR A FULL WEEK, she did little more than call in sick to the office and wait.

“Todd?”

“Still sick? My God, but you have the flu bad. Take care of yourself. Anything I can do?”

“No. Thanks, though.” She hung up and shuffled into the kitchen, feeling like she might faint. She forced herself to eat something and poured herself some Lucky Charms, ate a small bowlful—and promptly retched in the kitchen sink.

Later, she forced down some Campbell’s chicken noodle soup she cooked in the microwave and ginger ale, then crawled back into bed to wait for him.

Mal called.

“Kate? What’s up? I phoned the office and Todd said you were really sick with some kind of hellacious flu. Said you sounded like death. You haven’t called in sick in four years—except for the day after the robbery, and even then you weren’t really sick, just exhausted and looking for Honey. What is wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“It has to be something. You sounded so excellent the other day. So happy, Kate. What is it? Tell me. We’ve shared secrets forever. Who did you tell when you lost your virginity? Me. Come on.”

“I can’t, Mal.” Kate heard the choked-off sound in her own voice.

“I’m coming over.”

“No!” Kate pleaded, but the line went dead.

Staring into the darkness, she realized now he wasn’t coming back. He wasn’t ever coming back. She tried to replay his voice—that precise intersection between a growl and a moan and bad-boy sandpaper-sounding whisper that she craved. But the longer it was since she heard it last, the harder it was to recall the exact intonation and inflection.

She heard Mal knocking on her door some time later, then a key twisting in the lock.

“Kate?” Mal called out.

Kate heard her footsteps through the apartment until Mal stood at the foot of Kate’s bed. She was, uncharacteristically for Mal, wearing no makeup and dressed in baggy, shapeless flannel PJ bottoms and a tank top. Mal climbed into bed with Kate and spooned around her, gently stroking her hair.

“Whatever it is, Kate, I’m here.”

And then, though she had thought she was done crying, the waterworks started all over again, wracking her gut until she felt like she couldn’t breathe.

Kate allowed Mal to comfort her for over an hour. Finally, she thought she could talk.

“Mal?”

“Yeah, sweetie?”

“I loved him.”

“David? Is this about him switching publishers? It made page six, you know.”

“No. My ghost. And he had to go away.”

“Okay, honey.”

“You don’t believe me.”

“I don’t not believe you. I’ve known you for so long, and I know you are the most honest, sweet, wonderful person. If you say there was a ghost here, then there was a ghost. No question.”

“And now he’s gone.” Kate hiccupped.

“Why?”

“I don’t know. But I know he didn’t have a choice. He loved me, Mal. He loved me.”

Kate stared at the wall, her back to Mal, and stroked the side of the bed where Jules usually lay, whispering to her until she fell asleep.

“Ghost or not, Kate, you have to get out of this bed.”

“Do I?”

“Yes. Do you want me to call Dr. Tobit?”

“Why?”

“Because, Kate,” Mal said gently and plainly, “you may have loved your ghost, but you belong to the land of the living. You have to come back to us.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

JULIAN SHAW SAW a white light. Then he heard an unfamiliar voice.

“His pupils are reacting to light. I think he’s coming out of it.”

Out of what?

“Julian, I’m Dr. Marc Levinson. If you can hear me, move your index finger.”

Move my index finger? Julian struggled to open his eyelids. Drugs. He was definitely on drugs. It reminded him of his heroin days when the smack would make him think he was carrying on entire conversations, only to finally open his eyes and realize he wasn’t even speaking aloud, let alone speaking to a person.

Julian moved his finger ever so slightly, caressing the sheet and wondering what the hell happened to him. He tried to remember, but all he could recall was blackness. Nothing.

“Okay, Julian. Now you’re breathing with a ventilator. You were hurt, but you’re going to be okay. All right? Just try not to panic.”

Why did those words sound familiar to him? And even as he hard them, panic was spreading through him. Julian opened his eyes wide, and the first thing he felt was a tube in his throat. It hurt. His throat. He wanted the damn thing out.

“Relax, Julian, okay? Don’t fight the ventilator. We’ll get you off it as soon as possible, okay?”

Julian turned his head slightly, taking in the room, the doctor, two nurses. The machines. The fucking machines. He wasn’t breathing. They were. The machines. Christ, what the fuck happened to him?

He looked up at the doctor questioningly.

“Someone shot you, Julian. You lost a lot of blood, and you’ve been in a coma. But you’re going to be all right. Can you feel this? If you can feel me poking your toes, blink.”

Julian blinked. He felt that. But he didn’t understand. Shot? He fought to reclaim his memory, but nothing. Blank. How long had he been here like this?

Julian tried to relax, and a nurse came to his bedside with an injection, which she put right into the IV line. He felt himself sinking back into the haze.

TWO DAYS LATER, Julian’s ventilator was completely out. He still had a catheter in. Still didn’t understand what had happened to him, despite the doctor explaining it. Twice. Three times.

He stared at the ceiling. A crack squiggled along like a river with splintering tributaries. He wanted to kill himself. He couldn’t even muster up a desire for tequila. He was getting all the fucking morphine a former heroin addict could want—and he didn’t care. They came with his “happy” shot, and he felt a spike of languid calm, only to sink lower.

They told him depression was normal. But this was worse.

It wasn’t the pain. It wasn’t that he couldn’t walk or had a tube up his dick. It was something bigger than that. Something was missing. Something more than nerve endings connecting to whatever he needed to move his legs. Something, some piece of him was gone.

And for the life of him, he had no idea what it was.

CHAPTER THIRTY

KATE WOKE UP and stared at the ceiling, dreading the day. Finally, she rose, washed up and brushed her teeth. She didn’t turn on the TODAY show. She couldn’t bear it. The day.

She dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, stuck a handful of twenties in her pocket and put on her sneakers. Then she left her apartment and started walking downtown.

She loved New York. For as long as she could remember, it was part of her. Like her father was part of every memory of her childhood, so was the city. She and her dad spent father-daughter days taking the subway, going to Yankees games, or seeing the Knicks at the Garden. They went to the circus every year it came to town—even when she was nineteen and twenty and twenty-one. But as much as she loved events with him, as she grew older, she realized it was something more. She liked being with him in this town. This unique corner of the world.

The city had an energy. Standing at a street corner, watching yellow cabs fly by like magic carpets on speed, she felt an elation she couldn’t quite describe. She liked the bustle, the shops on Fifth Avenue and the trannies on Christopher Street.

Restaurants, bodegas, guys selling knock-off designer purses on the sidewalk, everything about New York’s vibe lifted her. At least usually it did. She walked past strangers, all shapes, sizes, colors, all a little sadder today.

She walked toward the place, the World Trade Center site, where he last was hero. Eternally was a hero. But first, she made her way to St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

She was, like Mal, a lapsed Catholic. When her parents didn’t force her to attend Mass each Sunday, holy day and Wednesdays during Lent, she simply stopped going. But she supposed the church was a part of her, and lapsed though she was, she still thought of herself as a Catholic. Not being so would be like trying to stop being a woman. St. Pat’s was still a place where she sought solace.

She climbed the marble stairs, and entered through the immense, heavy wooden doors into the church. Instantly, though New York was just outside the doors, the world reduced to a hush. She paused at the font of holy water, dabbed it in the sign of the cross on her forehead, and genuflected in the main aisle. She sat down in a hard wooden pew near the rear of the church and silently spoke to her father. When she was finished telling him she loved him, she stood and started to leave. Then she thought better of it.

Along the perimeter of the church were alcoves with candles—She could still light real candles in St. Patrick’s. At each alcove was a marble statue of either Mary or St. Anthony or other saints, some of whom she knew. A couple she didn’t. Wanting to be alone, she strolled along, looking for a kneeler that was empty.

Finally, she knelt down in front of a statue of Mary. She took a twenty from her pocket and tucked it into the black iron box. Then she pulled a long matchstick from the sand beneath the candles, put it into a candle flame in a red votive, and then lit another candle before extinguishing the matchstick in the sand.

“Jules?” she whispered. “I miss you. Especially today. Wherever you are, I love you.”

An old woman came and knelt down beside Kate. “She can hear you, you know?” the woman said as she wrapped her gnarled hands around the marble railing.

“Mary?” Kate looked up at the statue. The face was so serene, she could almost imagine the statue listening to her.

“No. God. She’s always listening. She knows.”

She? Kate smiled politely and rose to leave.

“Never give up on love,” the woman pointed a crooked finger at her. “Never.” Then the woman bowed her head.

Kate turned away but glanced back at the strange old woman several times as she left the cathedral, passing beneath the immense stained-glass window.

After St. Patrick’s, she walked by the New York Public Library and she continued her long trek until she finally reached the tip of Manhattan. Her legs ached, but this was her pilgrimage. The place where the skyline was permanently changed.

Other mourners and curiosity seekers milled around the sidewalk. Kate looked up at the empty sky. She exhaled at its loneliness. Sky was all around, but this patch of blue sky was desolate. They could build a new skyscraper, but the empty space would always be there. Just as she knew the empty space left by Jules would never be filled.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

GUS SAT IN A BAR around the corner from Julian’s hospital. Had anyone bothered to notice, they would have seen that no one ever entered the bar. No one exited. Yet it seemed perpetually full. Gideon, the angel-owner, installed an invisible fence around the place to keep out the riff-raff. If a mortal tried to enter, a foul stench detectable only to humans would cause him or her to think better of it. Gideon kept sliding Gus scotch, neat. Unfortunately, Gus thought, he wasn’t getting drunk. He had never mastered cosmic intoxication.

“You can’t take it so hard, Gus,” Gideon offered, resting one hand on the bar. He stretched his wings—their span was as long as the bar itself—then folded them up again.

Gus shrugged. “You got any ABBA in the jukebox? I need to talk to a friend, Gideon. I could use your advice.”

“A17.”

Gus stood and walked to the old-time jukebox, waved his hand, and the song that was playing ended, and a rare live version of “Fernando” started.

“Hello, Gus.”

Balam leaned up on the jukebox glass. He looked, Gus thought with envy, perfect, whereas Gus knew he himself was disheveled, and his hair was starting to resemble Albert’s from where he tugged at it with worry.

“Hello, Balam,” he managed to whisper. He glanced around the bar. It was pretty evenly divided between angels and demons, with a handful of Neither Here Nor There denizens tossed in the mix.

“Nice move in the park. Sending him back before he could change his mind.”

“Well, you know, we like to keep the good ones on our side.”

“That’s the thing that puzzles me.” Balam held a hand out and appeared to admire his diamond signet ring and perfectly buffed manicured nails. A diamond-encrusted Rolex wrapped around his wrist.

“What’s that?”

“All our data, all our reports, suggested he was not one of the good ones. He was destined for the long, slow slide to Hell. Actually, he was on a fast slide to Hell. Had any of us taken action from our bookies on him…we’d be even richer than we already are. Now suddenly, he’s good? I don’t think so. Humans don’t work like that.”

“You win some, you lose some, Balam.” Gus felt the heat radiating off the demon, which, coupled with “Fernando” and the heavy waft of Armani cologne, was distracting.

“I don’t.”

“You don’t what?”

“I don’t lose some. I don’t lose any, Gus. I don’t think it’s as simple as all that.”

“But he’s back. He’s back in his body. He didn’t stay with her. He didn’t sign the contract.”

Balam smiled, though his eyes were as dead as a corpse’s.

“What?” Gus asked suspiciously.

“See you around the hospital, Gus. ’Cause you know, if ever there was a time when a man might give up on God, it’s when the doctors tell him he has to go to rehab to learn how to walk again. And that his dick might not get hard anymore. That last one is a hell of a blow for Julian. I’m not even sure the little blue pill can give him a hard-on. And that’s gonna hurt. Because he may have fallen in love with Kate in Neither Here Nor There, but now he’s back in that same whore-and tequila-loving body of his. And he’s getting high on morphine every day.”

“No!” Gus said. He glanced over to the bar, where Gideon shook his head, warning him against getting emotional when talking with a demon.

“Yeah. Morphine haze can cause some pretty unbelievable hallucinations. A man might even see a demon.”

“You wouldn’t,” Gus warned.

“I might. Just for kicks. Adios, Gus.”

Balam turned and left the bar. “Fernando” finished playing, and Gus walked over to his bar stool. “Did you hear him, Gideon?”

“Yeah.”

“What do I do? This is very bad. I’ve got to report to Albert.”

Gideon shook his head. “Balam doesn’t like to lose.” He handed Gus another scotch. “You made yourself a dangerous enemy, there, Gus.”

“I just have to hope Julian’s soul remembers her. He loved her, Gideon.”

“For real?”

“Yes. For real. I saw them together. He can remember her, can’t he? She could be his redemption.”

Gideon poured himself a scotch. “It’s rare, Gus. Very rare that they remember.”

“I have to try.” Gus stood. “I’ve got to go find Albert.”

Gus left the bar—an official no-man’s land, truce zone for angels, demons, and in-betweener’s—and headed out on the streets of New York City. He walked, shaking his head, worry washing over him. He spotted an angel on the other side of the street and waved. But, looking left and right, he saw demons. Lots of them.

He needed backup.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

KATE READ THE SAME sentence in her author’s manuscript ten times. Without Jules’s company, work seemed to last forever. The day dragged on and on and on, just like the book she was trying to edit.

She no longer cared about Leslie and David or the piles of slush that came through her door from wannabe authors. She suddenly had an abundance of cynical books—love stories that all ended in death or destruction. It was as if someone were purposely sending her manuscripts that would push her over the edge. She had lost more weight—she just didn’t care about eating. Food tasted like cardboard. Not to mention that now she had no one to wear her La Perla for. She shopped for new clothes to accommodate her new figure, and she tried on sexy blouses and stilettos, but Jules wasn’t there to tell her how deliciously fuckable she was.

She sighed, gave up on the manuscript, and decided to go home.

“Night, Todd,” she said when she got to the reception area.

“Night, Kate.” He was pulling his iPod out for the subway ride home. He looked up at her. “Mind if I ask you something?”

“Ask away.”

“This isn’t about David, is it?”

“What isn’t?”

“Your smile never reaches your eyes anymore. I know a lovesick girl when I see one—Hell, I am a lovesick girl half the time. Marco and I are over again. Two weeks from now, we’ll be on. You know our pattern.”

“I’m sorry, Todd.”

He waved his hand. “I’m fine. It’s you I’m worried about. You’ve lost your sparkle.”

“Only a gay man would notice a woman’s sparkle.” Actually, that wasn’t true. Jules would notice her sparkle. And he wasn’t gay. Not by a long shot.

“Well, the sparkle isn’t there anymore. But I don’t think it’s David.”

“Very astute of you, Todd.”

“Want to talk about him? Whoever this mystery man is?”

She shook her head. She started to leave, then paused and turned around. No one else was left in the office. “Have you ever had a soul mate, Todd?”

“Me? I thought Marco was mine, but we’ve lost that lovin’ feeling, you know? I always thought soul mates…that it was forever.”

She smiled at him. “Me, too. My soul mate, he…well, it just turned out we were from two completely different worlds.”

“Tell me about it. Me? I’m a WASP. Marco? Italian American. I felt like I was visiting Mars when I went to his family’s house for Christmas last year.”

“Well, my world and my…soul mate’s world? Even farther apart than that.”

“Well, then you haven’t had some Italian grandma try to serve you scungilli on Jesus’ birthday, honey.”

She laughed halfheartedly. “You’re very sweet, Todd. You deserve a soul mate. From your world.”

“You, too. Have a good night.”

“Thanks.” She left the office and walked home. She no longer ever stopped to see the inline skaters or the speed chess players. The park just reminded her of the last place she spoke to Jules, and every time she even thought about that day, her ribs hurt and she felt like she couldn’t breathe.

In her apartment, she mindlessly flipped on her stereo. She found she had to listen to classical because the words to every love song reminded her of Jules.

Her cell phone rang, and she answered it, expecting Mal to check in on her.

“I’ve been giving you time.”

“David?”

“How about dinner? Have you eaten yet?”

“No.”

“How about dinner in Paris? I could steal you away for the weekend.”

She smiled despite herself. “Paris, David?”

“I’m serious. We could go. Just fly there for dinner. Though I suppose if we left now, we’d really be talking breakfast tomorrow or lunch or something. I’d have to configure the time difference. Do you have your passport handy?”

“David…” She softened and chided him play fully.

“If you don’t like Paris, there’s always San Francisco—you love it there. Or what about a drive up to Connecticut? Remember that inn in Mystic Seaport? Remember how fabulous that was? The pastries for breakfast. We said we’d move there someday.”

“I remember. We said we’d have one boy and one girl and name them Andrew and Zara.”

“A to Z.”

She shook her head. The last time she thought about children, she was discussing sperm donors with Jules.

“Did I hear you laugh at something I said? Did I?”

“Yes. Very, very slightly.”

“We’re good together, Kate. I want to spend the rest of my life taking care of you, loving you, being your best friend. I want to have babies with you, Kate.”

“No talk of babies. David…I know Leslie’s taking you to her new publishing house. Your book will be out in three months and then…off you go. I’m sure you two will be very happy together.”

“We’re not together, if that’s what you think.”

“It doesn’t matter to me, David. You’re free to be with whomever you want.”

“But…what I want is you. Come on, you have to be hungry. Dinner? For old time’s sake. If I promise that I won’t bother you about getting back together. If we just go out to eat and discuss our favorite books. And our favorite movies. Let me buy you dinner. Please? Just dinner. Nothing more.”

Her stomach was growling so loudly, she could hear it. “One dinner. We’ll see how it goes.” She shook her head.

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Less.”

She closed her cell phone and sighed. She wandered toward the fireplace and then got the strongest scent of…men’s cologne. It was overpowering. She wasn’t sure why she even knew it was…Armani…an old boyfriend maybe? Feeling mesmerized, almost trancelike, she felt drawn to the fireplace. She wondered if it was hunger that was making her feel so…foggy.

“That’s odd,” she said aloud. And then she saw it. The ring box. She hadn’t even looked at the diamond since David put it on the mantle.

Hand shaking, she opened the blue box and pulled out the black velvet one within it. She lifted the lid. The diamond was breathtaking, and it shimmered brilliantly.

She gently tugged the ring out of its resting place and held it out. And then, as if hypnotized, she slid it over her left ring finger. It fit.

Perfectly.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

ALBERT MADE A RARE trip out of his office in Neither Here Nor There to meet Gus in New York City. They met at the arch of Washington Square Park, reminiscent of the Arc de Triomphe, rising up above them. Just standing there felt incredibly poignant to Gus. It was where Julian had returned to his body. He remembered Julian’s anguish. Though Gus was no longer mortal and therefore far less emotional than he had been in his life, Gus remembered the absolute pain that Julian had experienced. Worse, Gus had then stood watching as Kate sensed Jules had gone. It was his worst assignment ever in Neither Here Nor There, and he would do anything to fix it.

“This way,” Gus led Albert.

“So many people. So much energy,” Albert said. “I wonder if that could be quantified.”

Gus marveled at Albert’s incredible capacity for trying to explain and understand the universe. They traveled invisible to mortals, and Albert’s curiosity meant he walked slowly, watching everyone intently. They crossed the street and eventually stood on the sidewalk across from a French café complete with a big picture window framed by red velvet curtains.

Gus pointed at the window. “There they are. Eating dinner. Front table. Escargot.”

Gus couldn’t believe how fast things were going to Hell. It was almost as if he could smell the work of the demons. But he had learned over the years that was how Balam and the rest of Lucifer’s minions worked. They struck quickly, when you were weakest. And they never relented.

“Oh my,” Albert clucked.

Gus and Albert crossed the street. “And look—” Gus pointed again, his face pressed up against the glass. “Left finger. Sparkler.”

“I sense demon footprints all over this.”

“Me, too.”

“I need to look at my data. Let’s go see Gideon.”

The two of them made their way to their favorite bartender, finding two empty seats at the bar. Albert was a bit of a celebrity, and he greeted angel and demon alike. Gus knew Albert was uncomfortable around demons—but the truce and peace of the bar meant he had to have a sense of courtesy.

Gideon nodded at the two of them and poured them each a whiskey. Albert pulled out his laptop and fired it up. “Go press A17, will you, Gus?”

“Good memory, Albert.”

Gus walked to the jukebox and started up the super special live version of “Fernando” again, giving him an almost instantaneous headache at the memory of Balam. He returned to the bar stool next to Albert.

“Look at this.” Albert swung his laptop’s screen so that Gus could see it.

“What is it?”

“These graphs? These are levels of hope in Julian and Kate. Very low.” He lowered his voice and looked over his shoulder for demon spies. “They are both extremely vulnerable right now.”

Gus felt himself tearing up. He couldn’t cry in Neither Here Nor There. Albert called such reactions emotional memories—stored in Gus’s very particles from the time he was human.

“What?” Albert asked and patted Gus’s hand. “Don’t fret so much, my friend. Balam may not like to lose…but Albert Einstein doesn’t, either. And he may be devious, but I am a genius.”

“Well, Albert, I would never be so presumptuous as to think the Boss made an error,” Gus said, thankful “Fernando” was playing at eardrum-shattering levels, sending most of the patrons for the door. “But I really believe they’re meant to be together, that it would be a horrific mistake to keep them apart forever. And…worse, if Balam gets his devilish manicured fingers on them, they could be lost forever. Either of them could go to the other side.”

Albert looked at Gus. “Think of Galileo.”

“Galileo?” Gus always found it so much work keeping up with where Albert’s mind drew correlations.

“Yes, yes. My stars, but he infuriated the church with his daring proposition that the earth was not the center of the universe. How daring!” Albert slapped the bar top. “Give me another drink, Gideon! We’ll toast to Galileo.”

Gideon obliged and the three of them clinked glasses.

“To Galileo!” Albert said.

After downing his whiskey, Gus stared at Albert expectantly.

“Yes?” Albert asked.

“What does Galileo have to do with Kate and Julian?”

“Ah, yes. Galileo was daring, they imprisoned him. Then when I developed my theory of relativity, I was a maverick. It was an exciting time. All through the theoretical physics community, whispers rose. ‘What is that Einstein fellow working on?’ Now there are the wild men of string theory. Let’s drink to them, barkeep!”

Gideon once again filled their whiskey glasses. Once again, the three of them toasted. “To string theory!” Albert shouted.

“To string theory,” Gus said, just as confused as ever.

“The string theorists, my trusted and trusty assistant, are searching for the theory of everything—that explains the entire universe is both its vastness and its minuteness. Gus, all this brings me to my point.”

Finally, Gus thought.

“Sometimes, in order to do something extraordinary, you have to break a few rules.” Albert’s voice was gleeful.

“Are you suggesting?”

Albert nodded and tapped his temple. “Balam isn’t the only one who can interfere. I am suggesting—” he lowered his voice to a whisper even with “Fernando” playing “—we disobey the Boss. Just this once. That we help these two souls find each other again.”

Gus smiled. Perhaps with the smartest man who possibly ever lived, they stood a chance against the forces of evil.

They just had to be certain the Boss never found out.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

JULIAN HATED THE GYM. His whole life, his idea of exercise had been sex and lifting a shot glass to his lips. If you counted using the remote to fast-forward to the good parts in his porn DVDs, that was his entire exercise regime. And now, in rehab out in Jersey, he had never worked so hard in his life.

“Come on, Julian,” his physical therapist urged. “Don’t be a wimpy boy. Push on those muscles.”

“Fuck you, Carla,” he snarled. Sweat poured from his forehead into his eyes, stinging them with salt.

“Wouldn’t you love to?” Carla teased him. “Come on, big boy.” Carla, in her mid-fifties, was a squat, stocky woman with graying black hair she pulled into a ponytail with a scrunchie, and a gap between her two front teeth that Julian found endearing despite the fact that she was killing him. Right now, she was helping him navigate the parallel bars.

Julian grimaced. Every muscle ached, and his shirt was soaked through. “I never worked so fucking hard in my life,” he growled.

“Wait until tomorrow. And the next day. And the next…And the next. I’m gonna get you running a marathon someday.”

“I’ll settle for losing the wheelchair. And my dick working right.”

“We’ll definitely lose the wheelchair, honey-bun. As for your dick—” she winked at him “—how do I even know it worked right before?”

He laughed despite the pain. “Oh, it worked just fine.”

When his physical therapy session was done, his arms were trembling so much from exertion that he couldn’t even wheel himself back to his room.

“I’m due to take a break now, anyway. I’ll take you,” Carla offered. “You can thank me later.”

“Yeah, remind me.”

She stood behind the wheelchair and started pushing him down the long, gray-linoleum-tiled hallway. The walls were a gray cinderblock, and though they tried to dress up the walls with colorful children’s drawings, and a few mobiles dangling from the ceiling, it was depressing as hell.

“I fucking hate this place,” Julian groused.

“Anyone ever tell you that you have a foul mouth?”

“All the time.”

They passed by several amputees and a stroke victim, all in wheelchairs. Most dozed. The place was overcrowded. The war had sent back so many amputees.

“Listen, Julian,” Carla said, leaning down conspiratorially. “I got some advice for you, Baby Boy.”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t give in to self-pity. Don’t nap your days away. Look at them all. Don’t give in to it and you’ll get home a lot faster.”

“Easy for you to say. I had a sex dream last night and woke up and it was limp as spaghetti.” He looked up at her and smirked.

“You strike me as the type that…Well, you wouldn’t let that stop you.”

Julian laughed. She pushed on his door and wheeled him through. Frank was waiting.

“Hey, Frank. This is Mistress Carla, my dominatrix. Uh…physical therapist.”

Frank smiled at her and reached out and shook her hand. “You probably deserve some kind of medal for putting up with this guy.”

“I do. A medal and a big, fat raise.” She clamped a strong hand on Julian’s shoulder and leaned down once more. “You don’t forget what Mistress Carla told you, okay?”

“I won’t. See you, Carla.”

“See you. And nice to meet you, Frank. From the stories he’s told me, you deserved a medal long before I did, honey.”

After Carla left, Frank pulled up an orange plastic chair near Julian’s wheelchair. “How you doing today?”

Julian shrugged. “I’m still in this thing.” He tapped the arms to his wheelchair. “But okay.” He looked out the room’s window. “I have to tell you something, Frank.”

“Sure. What’s up?”

Julian kept staring out the window. He didn’t want to look Frank in the eyes. “I’ve been a prick, Frank. Sitting in this chair, day in and day out, you do some thinking. A lot of thinking. And I’m thinking I’ve been a bastard.” He looked over at Frank, briefly. Frank’s hair had turned more gray since the shooting. “We’ve been through a lot, pal. And the nurses told me you came every damn day to the ICU. I can tell you, if the situation had been reversed, I wouldn’t have been man enough to do that. I would have run for the fucking hills and drowned in some tequila—I would have lifted my glass and silently toasted you, friend. But I would have been drunk off my ass. Hospitals give me the creeps.”

Frank cleared his throat. “Hey…that’s what friends are for.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t want you thinking I’ve become a pussy. But I wasn’t a good friend, and I want you to know that I appreciate that you have been. I’ve changed.” He looked Frank squarely in the eyes. “I’m not that guy anymore, Frank. I just need you to know that.” He felt his own eyes get a little misty. “All right. No more chick talk.”

Frank laughed. “You’ll never totally change, Jules.”

“What did you call me?” Julian felt a buzz in his brain. Like a bee zipping by his ear.

“Jules.”

“You never called me that before.”

“Hmm. I don’t know. Just shortened your name. I don’t know. Sorry.”

“It’s all right. I just…I don’t know. Weird. Someone used to call me that.” His head hurt, and the buzz was louder. “I know someone did. Can’t remember who, though.”

“Anyway, you’ll never totally change.”

“I guess you’re right. How are things at the station?”

“Shareholders are panicking. I mean, you’re the bedrock of that company—your ratings drive all the advertising dollars. But they’re saying the show is getting killer numbers because everyone’s tuning in for all the updates, the ‘best of’ shows, the celebrities dropping by to talk and wish you well. Have you been listening?”

Julian shook his head.

“More porn stars than a friggin’ gangbang shoot have stopped by. The audience is loving it. And quite a few A-list celebs.”

Julian stared off out the window again.

“Hey…what’s wrong? I mean besides the obvious. You know if you want to talk about anything, you can. You need anything? I can bring stuff from your apartment, or I can buy whatever you need, Julian.”

Julian shook his head. “I can’t explain it. It’s not the wheelchair or the rehab or even that some maniac shot me. It’s that somehow, I guess, when I was in that coma, something happened. I left the old me on the other side of that darkness. It’s like the coma was a wall or something. And on the other side is the old Julian. And this side is the new one. And I’m missing something from the other side of the wall. I just don’t know what it is.”

Frank nodded. “The doctors said you’d have amnesia around that day. The shooting. And maybe other things. You’ve been through a trauma, Julian.”

“It’s not that. I wish I could explain it better.”

Frank was silent, and then, so softly Julian had to strain to hear him, he said, “Maybe you just don’t want to be pissed off at the world anymore. Getting shot is an astounding awakening to hatred.”

“Maybe,” Julian said, unconvinced.

He and Frank talked for a while, then Frank said he had to go back to the station.

“The suits want to pay you a visit when you get out of this place.”

“Great,” Julian said unenthusiastically.

“Don’t even think about it until you’re ready. Screw ’em, okay? You getting better is the most important thing, not when you get back on the radio. All right, man?”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“No problem.”

When Frank left, Julian slowly got out of his chair and made it into his bed—a bed he hated. No matter what buttons he pressed—feet up, head up, feet down, head down—he felt like a piece of meat between two slices of bread. He pressed the button for his pain meds.

There was a time, he mused, when he would have been ringing for the drugs every half hour. But now, though he welcomed the haze, he didn’t long for it.

“Hey, Joanie,” he said when his afternoon nurse came in.

“Ready to visit happy land?”

“Yeah. I’m a hurtin’ pup.”

“Here you go, Julian. Get some rest.” Joanie injected the medication directly into the IV port on his forearm. She walked to the door. “Want me to turn off the overhead light?”

“Yeah.”

Julian shut his eyes and let the drugs wash over him. He felt as if he were floating. And then he had the curious sensation of an olfactory hallucination. He smelled cologne. Armani.

Julian opened his eyes and saw a well-dressed man—good-looking in the extreme, not that Julian thought of guys that way—standing there. Julian’s eyes fluttered with the pain medication, and he opened his mouth but no sound came out.

“Julian, remember me?”

Julian shook his head back and forth against the pillow. He wanted to speak, but words wouldn’t come. He tried to focus. The man leaned closer, and Julian felt a chill. The stranger’s eyes were dark, flat, black. Cold.

“We were friends once. In a manner of speaking. Now listen to me, Julian. Listen carefully…I have certain connections. Stick with me, and your dick will be in fine working order soon.”

A urologist? In a suit?

“Okay.”

“You know the song ‘Sympathy for the Devil’?”

“Stones?”

“Yes. And when you have your proverbial moment of doubt and pain. When this rehab thing pushes you so hard that you’re retching from the exertion—and trust me, those days are coming—when you still can’t get a hard-on, and Viagra, at your age, is the best you can hope for…erection in a pill…You call me.”

“Okay,” Julian mouthed, though how the hell was he supposed to remember this urologist.

“It’s simple. You just whisper my name.”

Julian nodded, but he didn’t know the guy’s name.

“You just whisper Balam. And I’ll turn up. Now, you go off to la-la land and think about that. Dream about that. Absorb it into your subconscious.”

Julian nodded, feeling the drugs in waves now, sinking, as if falling into a warm pool.

Then he heard another voice. He was too far gone to open his eyes, but this one had an English accent.

“Find her.”

Find who? Julian wondered. As blackness came, he wondered if he would, in his dreams, travel to the other side of the wall—the coma wall—and find what it was he was missing.

Find her.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

HELEN AND KATE SAT in a restaurant in Tudor City, close to Helen’s apartment, sipping champagne. Kate picked at her appetizer—rare tuna on a bed of mustard greens. Helen was eating a shrimp cocktail.

“I have to tell you, Kate,” Helen said, lifting her flute of bubbly. “I’m a sucker for a happy ending. Especially when it involves my publishing house.”

Kate smiled and lifted her glass to Helen. “We did it.”

“The Jackal’s Famine sets the stage perfectly for the third book. It’s in its third printing. We topped the New York Times list. And…the pièce de résistance?”

“What’s that?”

“Leslie was fired for falsifying her academic credentials. I don’t know how she slipped by our HR department.”

“I honestly thought she graduated.”

“Well…I would never wish misfortune on anyone, but I have to say, it sounds like karma to me.”

“Maybe.”

“And then there’s the matter of your engagement. I know he hurt you, Kate, but David, at least as far as I can see, is doing everything and anything he can to prove he’s worthy of your trust again. He turned down the other offer in order to re-sign with us. He doesn’t even have writer’s block anymore, thanks to his muse.”

Kate stared into her champagne as the bubbles danced to the surface. “Yes. The third book will be great, Helen.”

“So if we’re here to celebrate our mutual good fortune, to your astounding success as an editor, to our big fat bonuses, to your engagement to a man who, thanks to your being his muse, will make you a very wealthy and powerful New York literary couple, tell me something—as your friend.”

“What’s that, Helen?”

“Why do you seem so unhappy? You lack a certain…sparkle.”

“Have you been talking to Todd?”

Helen blushed slightly. “Well, if a woman needs to know the best inside scoop, there’s no better source in that company than Todd. And he genuinely cares about you, Kate.”

“I know.” Kate looked across the restaurant. Each table was surrounded by a light muslinlike cloth that floated down from the eighteen-foot ceilings and cocooned each set of diners, affording them privacy. Through the soft-white filmy drapes, she saw a couple eating together and staring into each other’s eyes. Even from four tables away, Kate sensed a powerful connection between them.

“So what is it?” Helen asked.

Kate sighed. “I have no idea.”

“None? I know you, Kate. You’re the most honest, self-aware woman I know. For a twenty-something, you have the wisdom of a…well, fiftysomething.”

Kate smiled. “And for a fiftysomething, you look like an early-fortysomething.”

Helen leaned in close. “A little Botox, hon.”

Kate sipped her champagne. Todd had guessed about the Botox months before.

“So you still didn’t answer the question.”

“I wish I knew. Honest. I…guess I’m longing for something that I’m not sure ever really existed.”

“Does this have to do with David…Leslie?”

“No.” Kate shook her head. “It has to do with someone I once knew, or thought I did, anyway. The love of my life. And for complicated reasons, it didn’t work out. And I guess I feel like I am going to spend the rest of my life comparing every person, every event, every moment to what I had with him—and nothing measures up.”

“Let me tell you something, Kate…Have you ever wondered why I never married?”

“It’s crossed my mind. But I know how important your career is to you. As you always say, books are your babies.”

“Well, that’s not entirely true. I’ve had offers. But not the right offer.”

Their waiter came and cleared their appetizers. He poured them each more champagne. After he left, Helen continued. “When I was twenty-three, I fell madly in love with an artist. He was tremendously talented. Tremendously tortured.”

“I know the type.”

“But he was…I know it sounds so silly, but he was my soul mate. When I was around him, I could literally swoon. Literally get weak-kneed. Not just an expression, Kate. I couldn’t stand. My legs would turn to jelly. I would hear his voice and get almost ill with desire for him.”

“That’s love…. So what happened?”

“He rode a Harley. Died in a motorcycle crash. He was hit head-on by a drunk driver.”

Kate gasped. “I am so sorry, Helen. I had no idea.”

“No one does. I don’t speak of him.”

“And so…?”

“So, every man who has ever come after Leo hasn’t measured up. They’re not as smart or as talented or as good in bed or as funny. But most of all, they don’t seem to fit with me. It’s like, I’m a whole person, and I’m a key, and I fit in someone’s lock. I haven’t found another lock that matches the way he did. And I’m not going to settle. And I’m not—and this is the most important part, Kate—I’m not going to file down my edges so I fit with someone else. I’m just not.”

Kate lifted her flute and took a big sip. “But Helen, what if there is no lock for me?”

“Then that’s okay, too. It’s all right—it’s enough—to know you once had one. At least that’s how I feel.”

Kate looked at her mentor with even more respect. “You know, Helen…you are the smartest woman I’ve ever met.”

“Well, don’t sell yourself short. In any area of your life.”

The two of them continued their meal. Then Kate walked to the subway. At the street corner, she gave Helen a hug.

“Thanks. I’ll figure it all out. I will.”

“I know.”

Kate waved goodbye and entered the bowels of New York City. Usually the smell of the subway made her feel claustrophobic, the air so hot. With a whoosh, the train arrived and whisked her down to Greenwich Village. She entered her building and checked her mail in the vestibule. Zack strode through the doorway.

“Hi, Kate.”

“Hi, Zack.” Her eyes widened slightly. “Good to see you out.”

“Yeah.” He grinned sheepishly. “I keep having these weird dreams. My grandmother, who’s been dead for ten years now, telling me to go play chess over in the park. I used to all the time.”

“You should.”

“I know. It’s time for me to get out again, Kate.”

She smiled at him. “I’m glad.”

He nodded. “For some reason, last night it was like she wouldn’t shut up. So I figure if I’m going to get any sleep at all, I better go and play. Then maybe she won’t come to me in my dreams. I mean, I loved my grandmother, but…I need my sleep.”

“Well, good luck.”

“I’m rusty.”

“It’s like riding a bicycle. You won’t forget.”

Kate entered the building and climbed the stairs to her apartment door.

“Not again!” Her apartment was trashed. Furniture upended.

“Honey!” She called for her dog, who trotted out.

Kate righted the furniture again. She looked at the stereo—still there. The TV she had finally bought. There.

She picked up a bat she kept in an umbrella stand and walked to her bedroom door. Nothing in there was disturbed at all.

Suddenly, she smelled the strong scent of Armani. She turned around, but no one was there.

“The freezer!” she screamed.

She ran into the kitchen, dropping the bat and opening the freezer door. She pushed aside several Lean Cuisine dinners and some frozen vegetables. The coffee can was still there.

Relaxing slightly, she pulled it out and pulled off the lid. The velvet jewelry bag was still there. She pushed it aside.

“Where’s the paper?” she screamed. She kept it in an envelope, inside a baggie. She put the can down and emptied every single item in the freezer, then her fridge, even though she knew it wasn’t there.

Jules’s dictation. That night. It was gone.

A sob escaped from somewhere deep inside her. She slid down to the floor, clutching her sides. It made no sense. Her apartment was broken into again and all the thief took was her most prized possession. The one piece of proof she had that she wasn’t crazy.

That Jules had existed.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

JULIAN WALKED—albeit with muscle-straining effort, two Percocets for breakfast, a cane and leaning on Frank—into the conference room high above Manhattan. The radio station’s corporate digs overlooked Rockefeller Center. Prime New York real estate.

When he had entered the station, he’d gotten a standing ovation. Two of the interns he had once screwed in an amazing drunken threesome gave him a bouquet of roses and promises of massages. Naked massages. His boss had real Cuban cigars and Patron waiting for him.

Once in the conference room, after some applause, Julian sat down at the long cherrywood table. Thirty or so suits and skirts looked at him. The VP of the company had prepared a speech, which he managed to make sound off-the-cuff, a schmoozy technique Julian would have admired at one point.

“It’s been a long road, ladies and gentlemen. And it’s taken tremendous courage on the part of Julian Shaw to reach this conference room table today. Tremendous courage.” He paused for more applause.

“When an assassin tried to strike down Julian, it frankly didn’t look like radio’s number-one DJ was going to make it. This is a man who revolutionized radio. He has made radio history.”

The suits around the conference room table applauded.

The VP continued, “I know there wasn’t a person in our radio family who wasn’t praying for Julian’s recovery. And we have had our prayers answered. The raunchiest man on the air is back! He may need a cane for right now, but his mind is the same sharp, acid-tinged, biting work of genius it always was. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Julian Shaw.”

Julian stared around the table, nodding occasionally and acknowledging the applause. After a moment or two, everyone quieted.

“Well, thanks for the enthusiastic welcome home. I appreciate it. I really do. Getting shot, my recovery, it’s been a humbling experience.”

He struggled to find the right words. But there weren’t any. How could he explain to a room full of people what rehab had been like. It was as if he were a newborn, learning to do everything all over again.

“I have given this a lot of thought. My show. My listeners. My producer, Frank. The people who count on me for ratings. The company. But that little speech you just heard wasn’t quite correct. I’m not the same evil genius.” He laughed a little to lighten the mood.

He glanced up. Everyone was staring at him intently. Expectantly. He exhaled. “You see, ever since I came out of the coma, I feel like something’s missing. For the first time in my life, porn and tequila isn’t enough.”

He saw some eyes widen.

“Yup. Two lesbians having sex on air just doesn’t cut it for me anymore.”

Julian glanced at Frank who was giving him a thumbs-up. The guy was truly a friend. How had he spent a decade oblivious to that?

“I think life is some kind of strange, twisted journey. Being a radio shock jock was my Act I, and I can’t do that for my second act. I wish I could explain it. But I can’t. I can’t tell you why, except it all feels rather empty.”

Julian stood up and faced the stunned silence. He turned to Frank. “I’m done here. Let’s go get drunk.”

Leaning on Frank, he exited the room painfully slowly. Every step was still agony. He wondered how long he’d have that reminder from the shooting.

Several suits—including the company’s lawyers—followed him. They surrounded him as he walked and were a veritable Greek chorus of “think about it.” Finally, the gauntlet was thrown.

“You have a contract, Julian. You just can’t walk out on it.”

Julian decided he’d had enough.

“No? Find me a jury on the planet that will force a cripple back to work. I still can’t pee without dribbling on my pants and down my leg. I can’t sleep without painkillers. I have a disability—and an out. So fuck off. And for the record, not one of you suits ever came to the hospital, your flower arrangements wilted and you can all kiss my ass. Frank?”

Frank held out his arm for Julian to lean on, and they hobbled along to the elevator. When the doors opened and they were alone as the doors shut again, Frank looked at Julian.

“Very dramatic, pal.”

“I thought so.”

“Tossing in the pee dribbling was great. Brilliant, really. Who’s gonna argue with a man who can’t urinate properly?”

“Precisely.”

“So what’s the second act?”

“Couldn’t tell you.”

“No idea?”

“None.”

“Whatever it is, Julian, I’m in. Act II. I want to be part of it.”

“Christ, you know we gotta stop all this sentimental talk, Frank. I’m starting to feel like a homo.”

“I have nothing to worry about. You can’t get it up without medicinal help.”

The two of them laughed, and they rode down to the lobby. Frank helped Julian slowly make his way across the marble floors. His limo was waiting outside, long, sleek and black. Frank helped him climb in, and then joined him in the back. The chauffeur, reeking of friggin’ Aramis, asked Julian, “Where to?”

“We want to get good and drunk,” Julian said. “Find us a bar.”

“With tequila,” Frank added.

“Sure thing,” the chauffeur said. “How about the new strip club downtown? They have a couple of porn stars that dance there. Primo women, if you know what I mean. And the lap dances, my friends…mm-mmm.”

Frank looked at Julian. “You know, we’re just looking to drink tequila and reminisce about old times.”

“Suit yourself. I’ve got just the place,” the driver said.

Julian looked out the window as the building faded from view.

Maybe he was crazy.

Maybe there was no such thing as a second act.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

GUS AND ALBERT SAT eating sushi at a trendy Japanese restaurant in Soho, disguised as soft porn starlets. They were fully clothed, but with that unmistakable porn star makeup and look. Gus wondered if they taught soft-porn makeup, specifically, at cosmetology school.

“I feel like such a tart,” Gus said, ruffling his fingers through his long, flat-ironed locks—he could tell they were a weave. They fell to his ass. ABBA’s greatest hits album was on rotation on the sound system, much to the consternation of the head sushi chef.

“It was the only way, Gustav. The Boss won’t think it’s us, and we were able to keep a close eye on Julian.”

Gus shook his head. “I have never seen Balam so utterly determined to win.” He held up his hand as he counted off Balam’s tricks. “He’s embodied a chauffeur, a college coed with a twin sister, a massage therapist who was prepared to offer a happy ending.”

“I never even heard the term before yesterday. I was thinking fairy tale, Gustav, and she was thinking, well, you know.” Albert shook his head.

“And the pièce de résistance, an unbelievably gorgeous, nymphomaniac heiress to a liquor fortune.”

“That was clever, I’ll give the evil and despicable demon that.”

“And not just any liquor fortune. A tequila manufacturer. It was a stroke of pure genius.” Gus looked at Albert to see if he was offended by the use of the term for Balam.

“But our boy hasn’t bitten yet. He didn’t fall for any of it. I thought the heiress would get him, but no. There’s a melancholy to him, though. I worry about him, Gus.”

“Me, too.” Gus had not been able to concentrate on his usual duties since that horrible day when Julian begged to be sent back to his body in total anguish.

“And what do our spies report on Kate?”

“Worse.”

Albert bit into his sushi. “Raw eel. Who would have thought of this as a food craze?” He dunked it in his soy sauce dish. “Give me the bad news.”

“According to the angel we planted to work at the bagel place she frequents, her cousin Mallory is leery of the marriage but has agreed to be maid of honor. Worse, David is in such a rush to seal the deal that he paid a reported five-thousand-dollar bonus to a restaurant on the Upper East Side to make arrangements for the reception quickly. Tomorrow, she goes for a dress fitting.”

“What does she really feel, though, Gustav? In here.” Albert tapped his chest.

“She still cries for Julian. She still calls out to him in her apartment, hoping against hope that perhaps he’ll return. Mal—against the marriage but not the idea of her ending up with a human being, for heaven’s sake—has encouraged her to let go of Julian. But Kate hasn’t. Not truly. Not in her heart.”

“Any ideas how to stop a wedding?”

“We’re going to have to get creative, Albert. I saved the worst news for last.”

“All right. Tell me.”

“Remember when Julian dictated that ‘proof’ to Kate. We were beside ourselves.”

“Yes, yes.” Albert nodded. “Imagine the audacity of that young man. Proving he was real so he could be with her.”

“Well…Kate treasured that piece of paper. She would look at it at least once a day. Carefully unfold it. Like a ritual, almost.”

“And?”

“And yesterday, Balam stole it. He burned it in a Hell fire, so there’s no chance of our stealing it back, Albert. We’re going to have to get very creative. Look at what we’re up against.”

“Embodying this disguise? You don’t think this is creative?”

“No, it is. But Balam has his hot little fingers all over Kate’s wedding, too. He made a cancellation happen at the restaurant just as David was calling the place. He had her try on the perfect wedding dress first. The perfect one. It fit her like it was expertly tailored for her body—which of course Balam made sure that it was so. He has that tailor from Hong Kong. He whipped it up and had it waiting on the rack in the bridal salon. Balam even had the catering manager at the restaurant—the very day that Kate and David showed up—add this delightful little chocolate cream puff to the dessert menu. They’re getting a pastry table for the wedding, and what is Kate’s favorite dessert?”

“The cream puff,” muttered Albert. “Curses!”

“Precisely.”

“Well, then,” Albert said, “we just have to get trickier.”

“Trickier than our current appearance?”

“Trickier, Gus, than even that.”

Gus lifted up a piece of tuna. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror behind the sushi bar. He looked like a hip-hop slut. And his boss. Albert Einstein in drag? If he didn’t know any better, Gus would swear the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse were going to ride in at any moment.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

JULIAN SAT ON A PIER overlooking the black, swirling Hudson River, down by the meat-packing district. He stared at the water as the sun set, an array of oranges and pale purples streaking across the cloudless sky. He had taken a cab to the dock—for some reason, every driver his limo service sent annoyed him.

An autumn wind whipped up, and the water occasionally was dotted with white caps. Sea gulls called out, dipping down to strike the water and then soar again. Julian felt an overwhelming urge to just jump in the water and drown. He knew he’d never do it, but the longing inside of him wasn’t going away.

He had never felt this way before. In his life, his most familiar feelings were those of being hung-over, angry, bitter, cynical and horny—yes, all of those. But his anger had made him feel alive. It had driven him to the pinnacle of the ratings. Now what? Who would listen to a depressed cripple talk every day? He thought of even going to see a God damn therapist—not that he thought he could ever talk to a shrink. But he needed something. Because for the life of him, he couldn’t shake this feeling. Every time he went somewhere, everything he did, every meal he ate, something was missing.

His doctor told him depression following a coma was common. But his anguish was more than that. He tried to explain it. “Doc,” he had said two days before. “Ever have a word on the tip of your tongue? Or you’re trying to remember the name of a song? And it drives you insane? You know it. You know it’s right there. But you can’t pull it out of you. That’s what the feeling is.”

His doctor wanted to put him on an antidepressant. And Julian didn’t want one. He didn’t think a pill could fix what ailed him. It was something in his soul. Even more, he wasn’t sure he wanted to take an antidepressant because if he did, he was afraid he’d never find what it was that was missing. Numbing it wasn’t going to help.

Julian sat by the water as the sky grew darker. Across the river, lights flickered on the Jersey side of the Hudson, and way up to his right the George Washington Bridge glowed as it crossed from one side to the other. He saw the lights of cars zooming along like lightning bugs. A Circle Line boat chugged past, people pointing at the sights. People who were alive with excitement. Tourists who came to New York for its energy.

An energy he no longer felt.

Julian heard someone come up behind him. He whipped his head around, expecting a mugger, and raised his cane. But instead, it was a homeless man with a shopping cart of belongings, one wheel on the cart hopelessly bent.

“Oh…sorry,” Julian apologized. “You startled me.”

The old man smiled at him beatifically and bowed like a Kung Fu master. Then he sat down next to Julian, and dangled his dirt-encrusted, sandal-clad feet over the water, too.

“Nice night,” Julian murmured, not really meaning it.

The man nodded. “Glad it’s not too cold. I’ll be sleeping on the pier tonight.”

Julian looked at the homeless man’s face. It was unlined, even happy. Meanwhile, he himself had circles under his eyes that never seemed to go away.

“You look like you lost your best friend,” the man offered.

“Maybe I did.” Julian thought it was ironic. He lived in the Trump Towers, had millions in the bank—more than he could ever spend—and a guy who carted everything he owned in a metal basket on shaky wheels was offering him solace. “Thing is, I don’t know what I lost.”

“You’re doing the right thing then.”

“What?”

“Sitting here in the quiet, communing with God.”

“Whoa…” Julian held up his hands. “I didn’t say anything about God. He and I aren’t on a first-name basis.” He hoped this guy wasn’t some religious fanatic. That was the last thing he needed.

“Maybe you should be.”

“No thanks, buddy.”

“First book of Kings. And after the fire a still small voice.”

“I take it that’s a Bible quote?”

“Yes. After the fire—the trials and tribulations—the still, small voice is what remains. That longing you feel, it’s God calling you. You listen to that still, small voice, Julian, and eventually, you will find what you’re looking for. Trust the still, small voice.”

“You called me Julian. How do you know my name?”

“Recognized you. Think I saw your picture on the side of a bus.”

“Oh…” Julian stiffly climbed to his feet, using his cane. “Thanks, man.” He pulled out his wallet, peeled off two hundreds and handed them to the homeless man. “For the free advice and the Bible lesson.”

“Thanks, Jules.” The man took the two hundreds, but he stared Julian right in the eyes.

Jules.

He got that buzzing sound in his head again. For the life of him, he couldn’t remember who called him that. But he liked it. Maybe in Act II, he would use that name to signify a new chapter.

Only trouble was he still had no idea what Act II was going to be.

Julian walked toward the street to catch a cab. As he walked, he looked up at the dark sky and muttered, “Okay, still, small voice. Show me the way.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

VERA WANG. WHENEVER Kate flipped through bridal magazines, she always stopped in awe at the designer’s creations. She would turn pages, each glossy display more beautiful than the next. And she had always told herself when she got married she would wear a Vera Wang gown.

She stood on an elevated wooden platform that was covered in soft mauve carpeting and slipped the dress over her head. The gown was white silk satin, with a crystal beaded bodice and a full chapel train. And amazingly, though she was scheduled for a fitting, the gown would need nothing. Not so much as a seam taken in or let out. It fit her body like haute couture, as if it had been hanging on a rack waiting for her. Like some magical princess.

Kate stared at herself in the three-way mirror. She turned to the left. She turned to the right. She pulled her hair up in a ponytail that she secured with a hair band from her purse. She pulled down some tendrils, as if her hair had been done in an updo on her day. Her wedding day.

She twirled completely around. It reminded her of when she was a little girl and got a tiny jewelry box from her father for her birthday. When she lifted the lid, a ballerina inside twirled around in time to a music box tune, in front of a small round mirror.

The seamstress knocked softly on the dressing room door.

“You can come in,” Kate called out.

“Oh, you look simply lovely, dear.” The older woman spoke with a British accent. Her hair was wrapped in a chignon, and she had a seamstress’s red tufted pincushion strapped to her wrist. An assortment of colorful pins protruded at all angles.

“Where’s Gabriella?” Kate asked. “I was working with her.”

“Oh, Gabby got a telephone call from her husband. He miraculously got two front-row seats—won a radio contest—for a rock concert at the Garden tonight. I told her I would happily cover for her.”

“Oh…well, good for Gabby.” Kate smiled and twirled around again. She had truly never seen such a beautiful dress in all her life.

“You’re going to make a radiant bride.” The seamstress came closer to Kate. “My goodness, but this dress fits you like a glove. I honestly don’t think I have to do anything to it. How extraordinary!”

“I know.” Kate smoothed the skirt of the dress and stared at the mirror.

“It’s a simply stunning gown. Wait until your fiancé sees you walk down that aisle. A vision! I suppose no man—no one—has ever made you feel more beautiful than…what’s your fiancé’s name?”

“David.” Kate said it softly.

“I bet he makes you feel like a royal princess.”

The seamstress’s words sliced through Kate. Tears stung her eyes. She suddenly couldn’t stand facing her reflection.

“Oh, dear, my child. I didn’t mean to make you cry. Come, come, you sit over here.”

The seamstress pulled a plush velvet chair over for Kate to sit down. “Come over here, darling. It’s just nerves. I don’t know a single bride who doesn’t cry like this at some point.”

Kate sniffled and plopped down in the chair, her dress billowing around her. She felt like Little Miss Muffet on her tuffet—and the spider of doubt had just spun down. “It’s just…” She looked down at her Tiffany’s engagement ring. She would have accepted a gumball machine ring that made her finger turn green if it had been from Jules.

“What? Tell Gussie.”

“I once felt more beautiful than even this.”

“A special day with David?”

“No…someone else.”

Gussie sat down on the platform where Kate had stood a minute before and leaned in close to Kate, their knees practically touching. “A soul mate?”

Kate looked into Gussie’s eyes. They were the most understanding, kind, serene eyes she had ever seen.

“Yes. How did you know?”

“Oh, child, you do this long enough, and you learn about soul mates. You hear all sorts of tales of the twists and turns of love. No wonder you’re crying. What happened?”

Kate exhaled. “We were from two different worlds. Like really two different worlds.” She half laughed to herself, shaking her head. “And he had to go. It’s complicated. I really don’t know what happened to him. I didn’t get to say goodbye. Not properly. Maybe I just need closure, I don’t know. I just know I miss him.”

“Let me tell you something.”

“Hmm?” Kate tucked a stray tendril behind her ear.

“A soul mate…that feeling won’t ever go away. It isn’t possible. I know this for a fact. He could be a million miles away, and trust me, he is feeling a deep, deep, deep longing in his soul for you, too. Whatever it is that is keeping you apart doesn’t diminish the feelings. A soul mate is different from earthly love that can be changed by circumstance, time, age. It’s very different.”

“Really?”

“Yes.” Gussie pulled a tissue box out of nowhere and handed Kate a Kleenex. “When two souls are joined like that, they can spend several lifetimes searching for each other. Plato wrote in the Symposium that ever since Zeus cut humans in half, man has been doomed to search for his soul mate.”

“But…” Kate dabbed at her eyes. “What if you spend your whole life waiting and searching, and…it just never happens? What if he never returns to me?”

“To my way of thinking, I’d rather wait forever with just the memory than to settle for less. He’s always here.”

Gussie reached out and touched Kate near her heart. When she did, an electrical flash jolted Kate and in an instant, she could feel Jules. It reawakened something, a faded memory she had started to believe wasn’t so.

He was real. He was real and what they had wasn’t gone. It had just changed to something rooted in memory until Jules could come home to her.

But he was real. She felt it. Even if the piece of paper was stolen…he was real.

She stared at Gussie. “I have to go now.”

“Okay, Kate. I understand.”

Kate stood up. “I mean now. Please help me out of this damn dress.”

Gussie’s hands were a flurry as she hurriedly unbuttoned what seems like a thousand tiny pearl buttons that traced up Kate’s spine.

“Hurry, Gussie. I feel like I can’t breathe in this thing.”

Finally, she was free. She pulled on her jeans and sweater, grabbed her purse and cell phone and bolted from the dressing room calling out behind her, “Thank you, Gussie!” Out on the street, a cab was parked—as if it were waiting—by the front door.

“My friend!”

Kate broke into a huge smile. “Mo?”

“Yes, yes, yes!” He clapped his hands together. She exhaled as she slid across the seat.

“It’s good to see an old friend, Mo.” She watched as the Buddha bobblehead nodded his approval. It was a sign. She was doing the right thing.

“Where to?”

“Home…” She started to give him the address.

He held up his hand. “I remember. A terrible day. Now, you look…happy, my friend.”

She nodded. “I am, Mo. I am.”

She leaned over the seat. “Thousands of cabbies in New York City, and I run into you.”

“Funny thing. A very old man hailed my cab. Wild white hair all standing on end like he had put his finger in an electric socket. He climbed in and asked me to take him to this bridal shop. He paid me a twenty-dollar tip! Then he said to just wait for a few moments. He walked off down the street and never returned. And then you come out, looking for a cab.”

“What a strange coincidence.”

“I think so, too. What kind of old man needs to go to a bridal shop? No? He had me take him there, and then he didn’t even go inside. He just looked in the window.”

Kate looked around Mo’s religious sanctuary of a front seat. The Dali Lama’s picture was still there, but he had added a Hindu picture—at least she thought it was a Hindu god.

“Who’s that?” She pointed.

“Ganesh.”

“And what is Ganesh?”

“The god of overcoming obstacles.”

Kate smiled. “I like him.”

“Me, too,” Mo said and slapped the wheel.

“Can I ask you something, Mo?”

“Yes. Anything, my friend.”

“Do you believe in soul mates?”

“Of course! Two people can wander through several lifetimes searching, always unhappiness…until—” he pointed at Ganesh “—the gods…the gods clear away the obstacles holding them apart.”

“I hope you’re right,” she whispered.

“Wait a minute!” Mo exclaimed.

“Yes?”

“You…you came out of the bridal shop. Are you getting married?”

She shook her head. “Not anymore, Mo. Not anymore.”

“I am sorry. You are unlucky in love?”

“No.” She smiled. “I was lucky once. And I’m willing to wait until I am lucky again.”

“Wise. If not for my wife, I think I would never have married. Never. Never.”

“Was it an arranged marriage?”

He shook his head. “No. I come to America alone. I meet, my very first day here, an English teacher.” He held up one finger and pointed to the roof of his cab. “We were very blessed. God, in his infinite wisdom, made my English teacher the most beautiful teacher in all of the island of Manhattan.”

“How lovely,” Kate said.

A short time later, they reached her apartment. “No charge, my friend. Not today.”

Kate dug into her purse. “No. Take this.” She thrust two twenties in his hand. “I hope I see you soon.”

She let herself into her building and ran up the flights of stairs to her apartment. She unlocked the front door, and for the first time since Jules left, she felt Jules.

It wasn’t him, but his presence. And not his presence the way she knew it, but the comfort that he had been there. At one time, her soul mate had been there and filled her life and her heart and soul in a glorious, extraordinary, full way.

“Jules?” she called out. “I know you probably can’t hear me. But wherever you are, you can feel me. I know it.”

Then Kate walked into her bedroom. She lay down on her bed, and for the first time since she could remember, she slept peacefully, sure that Jules, wherever he was, remained her soul mate, even if they were from two separate worlds.

CHAPTER FORTY

JULIAN SHAW BROKE OUT in a sweat.

He also had the very distinct feeling he might puke at any moment. His hands shook like he had the DTs. And if anyone knew what those were like, it was him.

It was five minutes to air time, and he stared at his microphone like this giant monster. Never, not even the first time he did a college internship, had he feared the microphone like some beast, feared the airwaves. His whole career was based on being fearless, saying anything that came into his head.

He had never had an internal edit button. No three-second delay. Whatever came into his brain, he said. Loudly. When he was a kid with drunken parents raging at home, he took out his anger and fear at school. He said whatever popped into his mind—out loud, no raising his hand—and spent whole weeks in the principal’s office. He came close to dropping out several times—until he found radio.

The microphone, of all things, was his salvation. He spoke the things other people were too scared to say—about race, sexuality, gender, politics, bodily functions and most of all porn. And lesbians. At least, for years that’s what he told himself.

But now that he wasn’t so angry anymore, he realized that perhaps he wasn’t speaking for everyone. He had been speaking for himself. What he thought was a voice for the masses had actually been the voice of one. One mess.

He’d been exorcising his demons.

But now?

Frank looked over at him. “You okay, man?”

“I’m fucking terrified.”

“Look, just talk like you always did.”

“But I don’t have porn to back me up.”

Frank winked at him. “Jules, it’s still talk radio. You’re just talking about issues now. Politics. Poverty. Race in America. Health care. The stuff ordinary Americans care about. You’re just going to put that focus you always had on things you now think people should hear. Whether they want to or not. The things that are important for them to hear. And not porn.”

“Think anybody out there still cares about what I have to say?”

“Jules, I don’t want to freak you out anymore than you already are, but this is the most anticipated show in the history of radio. If I know you, people will care what you have to say. You have a way of cutting through the bullshit.”

Julian nodded. He bowed his head and whispered to himself, “Okay still, small voice, let me say the right things. Give me guidance.”

With two minutes to go, everyone around him was settling in. One minute and he felt his heart pounding.

Intro music played. Pete Townsend singing “Rough Boys”—because Lord knows that was him. A rough boy. A rough boy trying to change.

He shifted in his seat. The pain in his legs, back and gut still bothered him every day. And he still had the pain of a deep soul ache, but he hoped the new show would somehow cure him. He had thrown himself into the preparations with a vengeance. He did it because he had to do something. But on those nights when he didn’t fall asleep exhausted, the soul ache was still there.

Frank gave him the cue.

Taking a deep breath, he spoke into the mic. “Good afternoon, New York, this is Jules Shaw and welcome to five hours of whatever the hell pops into my infantile mind. But here’s the thing, ever since that jackass shot me, what pops into my mind is different. I know some of you want porn, lesbians and discussions of oral sex on the air. But not this show. Today, we’re going to discuss life after death.

“Now, I know that topic is sure to bring all the nut jobs out of the woodwork. I have to tell you, I apparently died for a minute in the ambulance, but they were able to save my pathetic life. I didn’t see a white light. For those of you who think that’s because I was bound for Hell, that may be. But no white light. No Grandma waiting for me. No cherubim or seraphim. No dreamy floating sensation or rushing down a long tunnel. None of it. In fact, I don’t remember being dead. But I do remember…there was no white light.

“At the same time, I am not the man I was before my brush with death. It changed me.”

Julian talked for about ten minutes. He took a commercial break, and then his first guest, a noted expert on near-death phenomena, sat down in the studio. The switchboards lit up with phone calls. They didn’t light up the way they used to when he needed a dozen interns to just handle it all. But they were really busy.

When the show was over, he and Frank cracked the seal on a bottle of Patron. They each had a shot, and then Frank asked him if he wanted to go grab something to eat.

“No. I think I’ll just head home. I’ve got the senator on tomorrow. I have to be prepared. She’s no dummy.”

“Okay, Jules. You were brilliant. Edgy but not sophomoric.”

“That’s what I was aiming for. A little less id. Still the same bad boy, only polished up a little.”

Jules left the studio and exited out onto the street. The station was so grateful he returned in any format, they redid the studio. He now broadcast from the ground floor, with glass, so people could watch him as he did his show.

He pulled up the collar of his jacket, and limped down the street. It was a good show. He was proud of it in a way he had never felt about the old show.

Still, he hadn’t cured his ennui. It clung to him like a fog. He felt lost, like he couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. The confusion, the lost feeling, was as thick as the fog got on the Hudson sometimes.

But the still, small voice told him he was on the right path.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

“SO LET ME GET THIS straight,” Mal said, sipping straight vodka on ice with a little Rose’s lime cordial. Her hair was now peroxided white blond and, Kate decided, totally hot. Totally Mal.

“You canceled your wedding. You are not going to get to wear your nonreturnable Vera Wang. You returned your big friggin’ rock of a diamond. For a ghost?”

Kate, feeling freer than she had her whole life, nodded. “Maybe not for the ghost, but for the idea of the ghost.”

“I don’t get it.”

Kate looked down at her bare left ring finger. “Well, I’m not sure I get it, either. But I guess my ghost was my soul mate. And I would rather have just the memory of that than something less than that with David. He wasn’t the one, Mal. And not because he slept with Leslie. He just wasn’t the one. And maybe there is someone out there that I will feel the same way I did about my ghost. And maybe not. But I’m willing to hold out for a soul mate.”

“Well, now I don’t have to wear a hideous bridesmaid dress. I really wasn’t at all sure you should go through with it, Kate. But I also…I don’t know, I’ve been worried about you. How did David take it?”

“He thinks he’ll change my mind. But I told him even if he had never banged Leslie, we were missing something. I just didn’t know it. And maybe, you know…I sort of look at it as maybe God had a plan for me. I thought walking in on them was the worst thing in the world, but when I step back now, look at the big picture? It’s kind of okay. I feel like it was part of the plan.”

“God had a plan involving your boyfriend banging your best friend?”

“Yes. I couldn’t see it at the time, but yes. Exactly.”

“Okay, this has nothing to do with the ghost. This is why you’ve totally lost it, Kate.”

“No, listen. I’ve thought about it. If he never had banged Leslie, then I probably would never have questioned any of this. I would have gone with the plan. Not God’s plan or fate’s plan, but David’s plan. My plan. The whole this-is-what-we-should-do-next thing. I wouldn’t have yearned for more until maybe years went by and I realized David was not my soul mate.”

Mal furrowed her brow. “All right.” She nodded. “Okay. I get where you’re coming from.”

“Maybe God’s plan is just too big and complex for us to comprehend it all at once. Things happen for a reason. My ghost came to me for a reason, Mal.”

“What did your mother say?”

“Oh, she was, you know—Mom. Worried I’m going to end up alone. But Martin? He told me I did the right thing. He’s growing on me, that Martin.”

“He’s not your dad.”

“No. But who could be? I’m okay with them now.”

“You know, not just your mom…you know, you getting along better with her. But you are different. You have an inner peace, Kate. You were always an amazing person, but you have something glowing inside. I don’t know how a woman goes through a break-up, a robbery, a haunted apartment, another—albeit weird—robbery, a marriage proposal, wedding planning and a cancellation of said wedding…and comes out looking happier than I’ve seen her in years.”

“Thanks, Mal.”

“You know, can you put on your radio?”

“Sure. You want me to play my iPod? I have a jazz playlist I love.”

“I hate jazz.”

“I’ve also been listening to the Clash.” She decided not to tell Mal it was because Jules love the Clash.

“No. You’re going to think I’m crazy, but I started listening to talk radio in the afternoon. Julian Shaw, that DJ who was shot and then in a coma? He’s back on the air.”

“The creepy one into all that porn? The lesbian guy?”

“Yeah. But he’s different now. His show is very political. He’s really, really good. You’d like him.”

“I doubt it.”

Kate stood and walked to her stereo and turned on the radio. “What station?”

“WVHR. Down at the low end, near 92.3, I think. Same station he was on before. Just now it’s lesbian-free and political instead.”

Kate fiddled with the dial. “Since when do you, the woman who loves Ani DeFranco and the Clash and old Joan Jett, like talk radio?”

“I don’t know. I went to turn on my radio one day, and my usual station had moved. I mean, the preset button was wrong. And I started listening. He’s good. And that voice.”

The station was on a commercial break. When it came back, the DJ said, “Hello, this is Jules Shaw, and we’re taking your calls about health care and uninsured Americans right now. These stories are heartbreaking. I defy any listener out there not to be moved by what we’re discussing here today.”

Kate collapsed to the floor and put her ear to the speaker. “That voice…it…I thought his name was Julian. The DJ who was shot.”

“He uses Jules now. He was interviewed, and he said that after his coma, he wanted a new name to signify a new chapter to his life. He calls it Act II.”

“That voice…Mal.” Kate didn’t think she could stand. She remembered Helen telling her about her knees buckling. That was it exactly.

“You’re hyperventilating. Kate, what’s wrong?”

“I can’t explain it right now. Where is this show broadcast out of?”

“Over by Rockefeller Center. He has a new studio. On the ground floor. You can watch him. People stand outside with signs and stuff. Pretty wild scene.”

“I have to go.”

“Can you tell me why?”

Kate scrambled to her feet. “Honestly, no. I have to go. Let yourself out. I promise you I’ll explain later.”

Kate threw on a jacket and ran out the door and down the hall to the staircase. She had no idea what she was going to do.

Or say.

But she knew that voice.

He was her Jules.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

SHE STOOD ON THE sidewalk with the crowd. Around her, people waved homemade poster-board signs declaring their political positions. The crowd was from both sides of the political aisle. Though his politics were decidedly to the left, he was patient with the right. He was intelligent—and the crowd loved him.

So did she. Watching him, she felt her gut twist and churn with longing. She wanted him. He was beautiful and handsome and he had that voice she knew so well, coming out of speakers. The voice she knew as well as her own. But how could she explain it to him?

“Excuse me.” She tapped someone on the shoulder who looked like a rabid fan, judging by the Jules Shaw T-shirt he was wearing.

“Yeah?”

“I really am a new listener. Does he ever talk about getting shot?”

“Yeah. Sometimes. He’s still in a lot of pain.”

She winced. “What about his time in the coma? Does he remember anything?”

“Nope. He even joked about it his first time back on the air. He expected a white light. His grandma. Nothing.”

“Thanks.”

She pulled up the collar of her coat. What she was thinking wasn’t possible. But at the same time, she was so completely sure he was her soul mate.

She ran though a dozen scenarios in her mind.

You don’t know me, but…

And each scenario ended with him calling the cops and her being declared insane. She hoped Mallory had enough money to bail her out. He would think she was a stalker.

As the sun set, the crowd dwindled. Until eventually, it was her and some guy holding a sign predicting the end of the world, another guy in a crisp suit and two older men, one of whom had really eccentric hair.

Kate pressed herself up to the barricade. In her head, she repeated the mantra, Look at me, Jules. Look at me. Look at me. I’m here. Look at me.

But he continued to talk to his guest. He was fired up, passionate. He was her Jules. She loved listening to him, not just for that voice of his, but how quick he was, how witty and sharp and brilliant. She smiled to herself remembering some of the things he used to say to her. Back when he was…

He was what?

How on earth would she ever explain this to him?

Then, just as he was getting ready to do his sign-off, he looked up—right at her, actually.

And he fumbled.

Dead space. On talk radio.

For a full minute. Kate saw his producer leap up and wave his arms, even write something down on a pad.

Then, finally, he spoke again. “This is Jules Shaw, signing off. And the woman out there in the black coat—don’t move. Please. Don’t move.”

Kate stayed frozen. She didn’t dare move, or breathe. She just stood there, shivering slightly in the cold. And waited.

Ten minutes later, Jules Shaw emerged from the building and limped toward her. She would have walked toward him, but she thought her knees would buckle.

“Hello, Jules,” she said when he reached her.

He didn’t say anything. He looked at her, and then reached out and gently touched her hair. At his touch, his real touch, she started shaking, and had to grab onto the barricade for support.

“I know you,” he finally whispered. She saw him swallow hard. She watched as his pupils registered this shock—the same shock she felt when she heard his voice.

“I don’t know how,” he said. “But…I know you. This is so…”

She nodded and inched closer to him. Then he took her face in his hands. She could feel his hands. And she wanted them on her in other places. Naked. Touching her. She wanted him as she had never craved another man in her life.

“Do you know me?” he asked.

She nodded, eyes shining.

“What was missing. I…this makes no sense, but I’ve been missing something. Ever since the coma. I’ve been missing something. And I know you’re going to think I’m crazy.”

“I don’t,” she said. Her eyes welled up.

“I know you somehow. And…”

“I’m Kate.”

“That’s it.” He broke into a grin as if he finally recognized her. “Kate. I know you. You called me Jules, didn’t you?”

She nodded.

“You’re the one. You are.” He suddenly pulled her to him. “I’m going to kiss you, Kate.”

And when he put his lips to hers, she felt, finally, like Gussie said—Zeus had split her soul in half. And now it was whole.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

JULES SHAW STOOD AT the front of the church, his best man beside him, a gold ring in his pocket. Candles flickered and the scent of hundreds of white roses filled the air.

“Nervous?” Frank whispered.

Jules shook his head. “Not even a little. Not even a little.”

He looked over at Kate’s maid of honor, her cousin Mal, who stood beaming on the other side of the altar, and winked. Mal knew. And she didn’t even think they were crazy.

Then the violinists completed Vivaldi and started Pachebel’s Canon. The oak doors at the back of the church opened and Kate stood there, with her stepfather, in the most amazing dress he had ever seen, with a beaded bodice. She looked like a princess.

Slowly, she walked up the aisle, tears glistening on her cheeks. And Julian had never in his life felt anything like this. He couldn’t explain it. Not to Frank, not to anyone. And neither could Kate. So they stopped trying. Maybe one day they would tell their kids a fantastical story of two souls split apart.

That night after they found each other again, they had gone back to her apartment. He knew he had been there before. He knew where everything was. He knew it as well as he knew his own place. As if his soul had memorized it. And he had led her to the bedroom and taken off her clothes and the two of them had made love.

Before the coma, he had sex with people. He had had a list under his mattress in high school. But this was different. That night, the sex was so good, it hurt him. It literally felt like his heart broke in half and poured into her before coming back into him. And though they had made love many times since then, it never got old, it never got boring, it was always that intense.

She was almost to him. He couldn’t wait for her as she walked up the aisle.

And there she was, next to him. Kate reached the altar and took his arm. At her slightest touch, he always wanted her. She stood next to him and mouthed, “I love you,” and he leaned in and nuzzled her neck for a second. To hell with a hundred people looking at him. He had to kiss her.

Jules wrapped a hand around her waist. On his arm, beneath the fancy tux, he knew he had a tattoo of a hypodermic needle from his lost years. The angry years. Rock or die.

And on the other arm, the angel tattoo.

Now that he thought about it, he had never intended to get an angel on his forearm. It was from long ago, and he had been drunk. But the tattoo artist, a burly biker, had shown it to him and said he thought it was right for Julian. It would protect him from evil spirits. So Julian had agreed to it.

Maybe that was it, an angel. Because someone, somehow, had watched out for him. Had brought him through heroin and a broken life, near-death and a coma, to this moment. This one moment in time.

And life, he decided, was too complex to ever understand all the pieces, all the ways in which the journey twisted and turned to bring you to the moment.

The perfect moment.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

BALAM STOOD OUTSIDE the church, completely disgusted by the turn of events. At one time, he thought, you could count on the Other Side to fight fair. Which was, of course, excellent for him. He never fought fair. What was the Netherworld coming to?

Just when he thought he had won, when the restaurant was booked, the cream puffs sampled, the flowers ordered, the damn Vera Wang dress perfected, those In-Betweeners had pulled out all the stops, every dirty trick in the book, for what? To save one soul? Julian Shaw? Ex-heroin addict. Foul-mouthed prick. He wasn’t worth saving. Balam had no idea why they couldn’t see that.

They might even have saved two souls. No, Kate would never have done anything truly awful. But she would have shriveled, like an untended rose that dries up and the petals fall. Her soul would have been his by attrition, by years of loneliness.

No, they hadn’t fought fair.

Balam paced on the sidewalk, seething. He hated to lose. Julian Shaw should have been his. And what really pissed him off…the weather. The one thing She could control that Lucifer and his side had no influence on. She couldn’t have given them rain? Thunderstorms? It had to be this gorgeous day. It was enough to make him burst into flames.

The church doors opened. The guests poured out, awaiting the couple with little bottles of bubbles. People started blowing through the wands and iridescent soap bubbles floated through the air, dancing on the gentle breeze.

He looked down and could see steam rising off his Gucci loafers.

Careful to not actually step foot on church property, he stood at a wrought-iron fence and eavesdropped.

So in love.

The perfect wedding.

Soul mates.

There it was. Soul mates were his undoing many a time. Of course, he had won Joan of Arc and her visionary lover. But, in general, the battles to claim soul mates were always fiercest, the most treacherous. You never knew what one soul might do for its true mate.

It reminded him of a murderer he accompanied to Hell. The murderer drowned his victims. He had bragged about it. Had told Balam that his victims always struggled, fought to get to the surface. Soul mates were like that. Struggling, as if gasping for the very air, until the bitter end.

Worse. If they were reincarnated, the battle just resumed the next life. Then the next. The next. This constant battle between his side and Her side, with the Neither Here Nor There crowd caught in the middle.

Why did God make humans that way? he wondered. Why did She build into their souls this primal longing for another soul? It seemed a useless aberration. An error of design.

He stared through the wrought-iron gate as Julian and Kate emerged. It was sickening just how in love they looked. It was as if they would consume each other, breathe each other. As if they were two halves of one whole.

Then Julian looked right at him. The groom paused, for a fraction of a second. He locked eyes with him. And then, in the ultimate insult, Julian grabbed his bride in a fierce embrace and kissed her in a way that made two women in front of Balam swoon.

He was going to be sick. And he needed a drink.

He turned and headed toward his favorite watering hole. She may have won this one, but there would be others. There were always others.

From the dawn of humanity until the Horsemen came riding through, the battle would go on.

He looked over his shoulder. “You coming?” he growled and snapped his fingers. A flame shot out of his fingers. “Let’s go to Hell’s Kitchen,” he said. Though with gentrification, even that no longer felt like home.

“Now!” he snarled.

And a thousand dark-suited demons fell in line behind him.

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

GUS TOOK OUT A CRISP white hankie and blew his nose.

He thought he was crying real tears. His cheeks were wet.

“Was that not the most beautiful wedding ever?” he asked Albert.

“Truly lovely,” Albert concurred. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a prettier bride. But it was the love. You could feel it. Don’t you think?” he asked their other companion.

Kate’s father smiled. “She’ll be fine now. I don’t think there’s anything that could pull those two apart.”

“Not even the threat of Hell,” Gus said.

“Thank you for your help,” her dad said. “I know there are so many who need help, but she’s my little girl. Always will be. I couldn’t rest until I knew she was taken care of.”

Albert nodded. “I’m a father, too. I understand.”

“Let me ask you something, Albert,” Gus said. “Do you really think the Boss doesn’t know? That we got involved the way we did?”

Albert waved at the limousine as the newlyweds were driven toward the hotel where the reception was being held.

“Well now, Gus,” Albert said. “Funny you should ask that. I have looked at all the calculations.”

“And?”

“And I never switched Mallory’s radio station.”

“I didn’t, either,” Gus said.

Kate’s dad said, “Don’t look at me.”

“So, I have to think perhaps…” Albert said. “How else to explain it?”

“That She, Herself, got involved in two little people’s lives? Amongst her billions of souls?”

“The plight of two soul mates. Two sparrows.”

“Shall we go visit Gideon?” Kate’s dad asked. “I’d like to buy my two friends here a celebratory whiskey.”

“Indeed,” said Albert.

Kate’s father, with a backward glance at the church where his daughter had been united to her true love, slung his arms across the shoulders of Gus and Albert.

“Gentlemen,” he joked. “This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

And then, his angel’s wings unfurling like sails behind him, he walked Albert and Gus down the street.

BOOK GROUP QUESTIONS

1. Do you believe in soul mates? Have you ever had a connection to someone that you couldn’t explain in any rational way?

2. Do you believe angels—or demons—get involved in the matters of mere mortals?

3. Could you give up a sexual relationship, like Kate did, for the hope of a soul mate connection, even if it could not involve physical passion?

4. Albert is always trying to quantify the universe in terms of quantum mechanics. Do you think there are some elements to love that have to do with things we don’t yet understand? What is that elusive “chemistry”?

5. Do you think there is a bigger plan than what the eye can see? Have you ever had a terrible experience, but later realized it was actually for the better?

6. Are coincidences accidental, or do you think sometimes the universe is trying to tell us something?

7. Do you believe in Heaven? Hell? Neither Here Nor There?

8. Have you ever “settled” for a pleasant relationship—but not a soul mate? Are you with a true soul mate now?

About the Author

Erica Orloff is a multipublished author across several genres. Erica lives in Virginia with her family and menagerie of pets. In her free time, she enjoys hunting for Buddha statues for her collection, eating at her favorite sushi joint and playing poker. She has, in an effort to curb stress, taken up knitting lopsided scarves and sweaters that her four children are too embarrassed to wear. She may be reached at her Web site at www.ericaorloff.com.

ISBN: 978-1-4603-0305-4

FREUDIAN SLIP

Copyright © 2009 by Erica Orloff

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario M3B 3K9, Canada.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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Table of Contents

Cover

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THIRTY

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

CHAPTER FORTY

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

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