Emily's Ghost by Antoinette Stockenberg

that. All she knew was that she had to be at her
husband's side. So she cancelled a concert appearance in Denver and
on her way to the airport, she was killed in a car accident." He
continued to stare out the caf é window. "She was so fiercely determined to come,"
he said softly.
    Emily had seen the facts
of his life on microfiche, but they had not torn her heart the way
he had just now. "I'm so sorry, Senator--"
    He turned to her and
smiled bleakly. "The story isn't finished. The man was lying in the
hospital, heavily sedated and unaware that half a country away his
wife had just slid off an icy highway into an embankment, when he
had a sudden sense of almost euphoric joy. The room seemed to fill
with a kind of whiteness ... a whitish light ... an awesome
brightness ... and he was filled with just ... so much joy. Later,
when he was clear of the sedation, he thought it must have been the
drug. That's when he learned that his wife had died, and
when."
    "Ah." It came out of Emily
in a whisper, and there was nothing of triumph in it. But suddenly
she understood the who, the what, the why, the where, the when. She
understood it all perfectly. And in fairness, she couldn't blame
the senator for trying to track down the source of that white light
ever since. It was an extraordinary coincidence. Of course it was
the sedative. But still.
    "So when you go to these
sittings, you're" -- she was almost afraid to ask it -- "hoping to
establish contact with your wife?"
    "Always, always hoping,"
he said with a sad shake of his head. "And always, always
disappointed."
    Emily had to admit that
wherever the voice that took over Kimberly had come from, it hadn't
come from a beautiful concert pianist. "There'll be other
sittings," she said softly, and amazed herself. So much for coming
down hard on him. So much for the downtrodden taxpayer.
    She could see, even as she
groped for the right thing to say, that he was forcing himself out
of his condition of pain. He turned to her with that dazzling smile
and those clear blue eyes, and ran his fingers through that shock
of thick brown hair.
    "This is the part where
you accuse me of having had a 'hypnagogic hallucination'," he
suggested with a boyish grin.
    How did he do it? It was
like turning on a charm spigot.
    "I didn't say that," she
hedged, though she was thinking it.
    "You're supposed to tell
me that ghosts are always spotted right after people go to bed or
when they wake up."
    "Apparently you already
know that," she said, still hedging.
    "Ah, what's the use?" he
said suddenly, signaling for the check. "I've gone only to the
best, and the best can't give me Nicole. I don't know why I
continue to try."
    Because you loved her with
a love that most women would kill for, thought Emily, and she was filled with a wistful envy for
this Nicole, this fiercely determined wife and concert pianist.
Emily had never loved that way, and she was absolutely certain
she'd never be loved that way. She cared too much about her job, and her job
demanded that she be clear-eyed and hard-edged. A clear-eyed woman
saw all too many flaws in a man, and a hard-edged one turned most
men off. If she wanted high romance in her life, she should've been
a concert pianist. And, of course, rich.
    The senator had stood up
to get Emily's chair for her. It was a charming -- or political --
bit of chivalry and it flustered her ever so slightly. She bobbed
up suddenly, and her face ended up very near his.
    "Huh. Freckles," he said,
focussing on the bridge of her nose. "For such dark eyes and hair,
you have very fair skin."
    "I guess." Were freckles
good or bad with these people? She suspected, bad.
    "--skin which I think is
having an allergic reaction to the chain on your necklace." He
traced a feather light but sizzling line across her collarbone,
alongside the heavy chain. "There's a bit of a rash
here."
    "Really?" she said,
reaching up automatically to the spot. If there was a rash, it was
impossible to separate it from the trail