Vengeance (Vitali's Legacy)

Bobby opened an eye and looked at him. "What?"

"Mark and Tilly have relocated and are safe."

"Yeah? Cool."

Bobby had never been expressive, but now he was essentially monosyllabic. Angelo had brought more to tempt him, though, a sandwich prepared by Buttles. He put it down on the coffee table. Bobby looked at it and shrugged, as if to ask what he was supposed to do with it.

"You need to eat, boy."

"Don't feel like it."

"You're going to eat, or I'm going to make you eat." The threat was emptier than it should have been, and so it did not work.

Bobby sighed and rolled over to face the back of the couch.

Angelo left the food on the coffee table, knowing it wouldn't be touched. Bobby was in a spiral. The problem with being a soulless, loveless husk of a human was that it was always so much worse when someone broke through the barrier.

The brief raw emotion of the funeral had given way to a void, an emotional sinkhole that had always been at the core of him. Now Angelo felt it every moment he was around Bobby. It was a chasm he was almost half-afraid he would fall into.

He left Bobby to rest because the alternative was rousing him into some activity that would only cause chaos. They had to be careful now, with so much on the line. The news was still running stories about the death of Sir Digby and Lady Willow Spencer, though they omitted the part where they had it coming.

"ARGH! FUCKING GHOST FUCK!"

Angelo heard Bobby's scream, a tortured sound that emerged from him in a wild wail. He turned on his toes and raced back toward Bobby at high speed, knowing something was very wrong. Bobby did not scream. Not unless he was being whipped, and even then it took a great deal to make him break. Angelo had never heard Bobby's voice at that particularly terrified pitch before. His first thought was that the forces hunting them had caught up and were torturing Bobby.

He slammed through the door, gun drawn, ready to fire on anybody who might have broken in.

But there was nobody else in the room besides Bobby, who was on his feet in a rare display of animation, staring and pointing out the window.

"What is it?"

Bobby didn't even look at Angelo. His gaze was locked on the lawn, his skin paler than Angelo had seen it. He looked like a ghost himself. "I saw Gemma."

"Boy…" Angelo drew in a breath. The last thing he needed was Bobby going completely psychotic.

"No. I mean it. I saw her. She was just out there…."

"Gemma is gone, boy."

"She's not. I saw her!"

Bobby was now doing his best to climb out the window with a wide-eyed, sallow cheeked desperation which made Angelo almost certain the boy had lost his mind. Hauling Bobby back in was not easy. Bobby was strong, and he had that crazy man strength.

"Gemma!" Bobby called her name again as Angelo pulled him back to the couch.

Angelo looked over in the direction Bobby was pointing. A chill went through his flesh as he realized Bobby was right. Gemma was standing outside the window, waving.

FLUMP!

That was the sound of Bobby fainting on the couch. Angelo checked his pulse, then turned his attention to the more obvious problem on the lawn. It was undoubtedly Gemma. She looked incredibly happy and well for someone who was recently deceased.

Angelo stepped through the open window, expecting her to run or perhaps disappear like the apparition Bobby had supposed her to be. She didn't run. She didn't fade into the wind. She stood there wearing a pink sweatshirt and blue jeans with dark sneakers, nothing like the attire she had been buried in. The expression on her face might have best been described as sheepish.

“What the…”

"Hi. Sorry. This probably isn't the way to do this, but there isn't really a way to do this. So. Anyway…" she spread her arms in a shrug. "Not dead."

"Evidently not," Angelo growled.

"Can I come inside?"

"I insist you come inside," he said. "Have you been followed? Is there an armed team behind you?"

"I really hope not," she said. "I'd be in so much trouble if that were the case."

"You're in so much trouble as it is," he said, ushering her back in the window.

It was an eerie feeling to have mourned her loss and to find her back in his presence once more. Obviously, she had been involved in some scheme even greater than he imagined, and that made him furious. But she was alive, and that, he was half-surprised, made him very happy.

He helped her inside the window, noting how she winced and had to go carefully. He ended up taking her by the elbow and guiding her in to sit on the edge of the couch where Bobby had passed out.