In Your Dreams (16 page)

         
“Sean! I want Sean!”

         
Isabelle’s cries thundered inside his cranium, and he turned to Xavia, allowing
the latest orb ball to whizz by, unhindered. “Did you hear that?”

         
Xavia stood up straight, head cocked, listening. “Hear what?”

         
“Isabelle. She’s calling me. Screaming for me, actually.”

         
Xavia’s expression transformed from bland to concerned, and her posture
stiffened. “Why? What’s wrong with her?”
          “I don’t know.”

         
She stalked toward him and punched a balled fist into his shoulder. “Well, find
out. Where’s your clipboard?”

         
He jerked his head at the corner of the floor near the door, where both their
boards sat, cold and empty. Since Isabelle was obviously awake, no messages
came from the communication device. The new rules instituted by the Board and
the Elders were in full force.
Only in her dreams...

         
“Get Sean! Tell him to let me out of this box!” Isabelle’s terrified pleas
echoed in his ears.

What
felt like his heart—if he’d still had one—beat rapidly against his chest. He
couldn’t seem to catch his breath. He gasped for air, and the cells that made
up his Afterlife existence careened inside him, erratic marbles on a slick
surface. Dull pressure clamped his head, and he set his hands on either side to
ease the sensory overload. Panic overwhelmed him, forced him to seek some kind
of escape, but he felt the power of others pushing him back, pinning him in
place.

“Sean?”
Xavia’s voice came from some invisible tunnel, all shadow with no substance.
“What’s wrong?”

At
first, he had no clue, but as Isabelle’s struggles intersected within him, he
came up with an answer. “I think I’m experiencing an empathetic reaction to
whatever Isabelle’s going through.”

         
Xavia didn’t question the statement. Instead, she gripped his shoulders and
focused concerned eyes on his face. “What’s happening to her?”
          “I’m not sure. She’s
boxed in or something, held down. And she’s terrified.”

         
“Talk to her,” Xavia urged.

         
“I can’t. The Elders—”

         
“Yes, you can.” She left him where he stood, retrieved his clipboard, and
returned to shove the device into his hands. “To hell with the Elders. I told
you, Isabelle’s your one priority. Not me, not the Elders. Make sure she’s
okay.”

         
“But—”

         
“No buts. I’m your boss, dammit. For once, don’t question authority, stow your
pissy attitude, and do what I tell you. Talk to Isabelle. Now!”

         
Despite the hysteria surging inside him, he pictured her in his head and placed
his fingers on the cold, sterile surface. Resistance met his first attempt at
contact, so he doubled his efforts, envisioning himself beside her, holding her
hand. Through all his concentration, her cries still pierced the chilly fog
inside him.

         
He had to get to her. Had to reach her. Something, however, some force field,
held him here. Blocked him.

         
“Come on, Sean,” Xavia muttered. “Go. Don’t just stand around. Help her.”

         
“I can’t.”

         
“Yes, you can.”

         
He pushed again, came up against the same solid barrier. “No. Something’s
stopping me. Like a brick wall I can’t break through and can’t climb over. It’s
gotta be the damned Elders. They’ve blocked me in.”

         
“Keep trying!” erupted from Xavia while Isabelle continued to call, “I want
Sean. Please. Get Sean.”

         
“I’m working on it,” he shouted at both of them.

         
“Work harder. And faster,” Xavia ordered.

         
Too bad he’d never had the chance to figure out how exactly he made the trip
from here to there when Isabelle needed him. In the past, he’d barely
registered any change in himself before he wound up on the other side. So now,
when he needed to get to her, he couldn’t manifest the right combination. He
shook his head. “It’s no use. I can’t reach her. Whatever the Elders have
conjured up is too thick.”

         
“Bullshit. If you can hear her, there’s gotta be a way to get to her.”

         
“I’m doing everything I can. Nothing’s working,” he insisted.

“What
if you did that meld thing?” Xavia suggested. “Do you think that would give you
enough power to break through?”

         
“I don’t know.” He considered the idea. Melds allowed bounty hunters to
transport heavy burdens, souls with centuries of heartache and grief weighing
them down. Would a meld with Xavia give him enough power to obliterate the
barriers tossed up by the Elders? “Maybe.”

         
“How do we do it?”

         
He opened his eyes, noticed the frantic urgency on her face. Christ, she really
wanted him to do this—to disobey the Elders, regardless of the consequences to
her. “You are one ballsy woman,” he told her.

“Forget
the compliments. Get the hell out of here. Save Isabelle.”

Thrusting
out his hand, he slapped his palm over Xavia’s chest where, in life, her heart
would reside. Energy pulsed, radiated, blossomed from that simple contact,
forcing him up, up and out. For an instant, he rocketed through time and space,
past blackest night and brightest days, and when at last he landed, his hand
held Isabelle’s. They were in a cavernous white room, a vast steel tunnel
towering above them. Behind a large window, four men and a woman, all garbed in
white, stood at a console filled with blinking buttons and levers.

         
Isabelle lay on a long, cushioned table in front of the tunnel’s mouth like a
sacrificial offering to some metallic god, a strange geometric contraption
connected to her head. As if she’d sensed the moment of his arrival, her cries
and outrage silenced.

         
“Hey, Belle,” he greeted her with a smile. “Did you miss me?”

         
“Sean.” Relief flooded through her, and he felt her muscles go slack. “You
came.”

         
“Sorry I didn’t get here sooner. What’s going on?”

         
“It’s some kind of gamma knife thingy they want to do to me. They’re going to
shoot radiation into my brain. They think it might slow the progression of the
tumor.” She pierced him with a razor-sharp look. “Will it?”

         
“I have no idea. What did the doctors tell you?”

         
“That I had a ghost of a chance.” Her lips turned up in tremulous appreciation
at her own jest.

         
“What’s with the birdcage hat?”

         
She raised a hand to touch the metal frame. “Part of the procedure. Supposedly,
it keeps my head from moving during the radiation so they don’t miss and hit my
brain instead of the tumor.”

         
“Looks uncomfortable.”

         
“Yeah, well, it’s sometimes painful to be stylish. You should’ve seen my Easter
bonnet last year.”

         
“I bet.” He paused, gauging her tear-stained cheeks, her red-rimmed eyes.
Amazing how she could still joke with him, despite her terror. “Are you okay?”

         
“I am now. Where’ve you been?”

         
“Not allowed to see you,” he admitted. “Technically, I’m still not.”

         
“Are you going to get in trouble for being here?”
          “Probably. But don’t
worry about me. How are you?”

         
She offered him a bitter laugh. “You mean, besides scared out of my wits and
feeling like my head’s stuck in a vise?”

         
“Yeah, besides that.”

         
“I’m glad you came. Even if it does get you in trouble. Does that make me a bad
person?”

         
“No. It makes you human. And it makes me glad that I can put you at ease just
by being with you. Relax, Belle. I’m here. I’ll stay right beside you ‘til you
don’t need me anymore.”

         
From outside the invisible bubble they’d created for themselves, another voice
erupted. “Okay, Ms. Fichetti, we’re going to start the procedure now. Just
relax, okay?”

         
“Promise you’ll stay with me?” she asked Sean.

         
“That’s what I came for.” He squeezed her fingers in his palm. She squeezed
back. “What’ll happen now?”

         
“They’re going to slide me into that machine.”

         
“Okay, then. I guess we’re going for a ride.”
          “Will we both fit?”

         
“Of course we will. I don’t take up space. I’m not a physical being anymore.”

         
She inhaled long and soft. “I’m ready,” she told the doctors behind the window.
“Let’s do this.”

         
While Sean continued to hold her hand, the table glided forward and stopped
when her head and neck hit the center of the tunnel. A low hum filled the air,
sparks flew, and a sudden magnetic force field pulled at Sean’s core. His
energy cells went into hyper-drive, pulling him deeper toward where Isabelle
lay.

         
“Sean!” she croaked, her throat tight with dread.

         
“I’m here. I’m right beside you. Don’t be afraid.”

         
Those were the last words he spoke. The hum intensified, a searing white light
burst inside him, and he hurtled headlong into free fall. Isabelle’s arms
wrapped his neck, and her hot flesh—naked and welcoming—pressed against him.
His lips came down on hers, tasting a woman’s breath and soul for the first
time since his death. She was pure life, sweet and heady, and he drank from her
pool until he grew dizzy. Her fingers dug into his scalp, pulling him closer.

         
Arching her back, she offered her breasts to his hunger. He clamped his wet
mouth to her nipple, took all that she offered and more, his need for her
insatiable.

         
“Sean,” she moaned. “Yes.”

         
Within this nuclear cave, he became flesh: hard and hot and eager to slide inside
this lush woman who called him forward, pulled him deeper. He kissed her
eyelids, the delicate flesh quivering beneath his lips, and her lashes tickled
when she fluttered. His fingers danced across her scalp, reveling in her silken
hair, in the way it curled around his knuckles. Her warm flesh wrapped him in a
velvet embrace. A thousand reactions flooded his body, waking his senses to the
pure pleasure of lovemaking. What heaven had he lost the day he shoved the gun
barrel in his mouth and pulled the trigger? Christ, how long had he existed in
his numb cocoon in the Afterlife? According to Belle, at least thirty earth
years.

         
Too long. Too long without touch, without the sweet sound of a woman’s sigh in
his ears, without the taste of her...

         
He licked the vulnerable skin behind her earlobe, savored the sweetened salt of
her desire and anticipation. Her audible delight whispered through his body.
She opened herself to him, and he thrust into her, afire with need.

         
“Yessss!” she whispered and moved against him, taking him inside, into the very
core of her womanhood. “God, Sean, yes.”

         
He rode her with abandon, her cries driving him faster, harder, deeper. Her
nails raked his back, and her knees drew up against his naked hips. She rocked
back and forth, teasing him by tightening her hold and withdrawing herself to
the very tip before soaring into him to the hilt. Pressure built, steam and
power swirling around them both. Perspiration—real moisture—dripped from him
onto her golden flesh. And still, he dove, holding her within his embrace,
every cell connecting to hers in a glorious ocean of touch.

         
He came in a blinding flash, a shower of stars that burst and fell to the
cushion beneath them in thousands of twinkling lights.

         
“Sean!” A familiar voice, filled with concern, broke the sensual spell. “Come
on, Sean, snap out of it.”

         
He opened his eyes to find Xavia, hands on his shoulders, shaking him like a
used dustcloth. “Jeez, Sean. Wake up. Come on.”

         
“I’m awake,” he mumbled. “I’m here.”

         
“What the hell happened?”

         
“I don’t know.” He blinked several times and struggled to bring himself fully
into focus. “What’d it look like on your end?”

         
“Like some weird-ass electrical fire in a blender. One minute, you were you,
standing here staring off into space—though almost transparent—and the next,
you were this…galaxy of stars spinning out of control. No form, no substance. I
couldn’t even grab hold of you. It was like…you exploded or something. What the
fuck?”

         
“I’m not really sure,” he replied, his mind still struggling to catch up. “Would
you believe me if I said I think Isabelle and I just made love?”

~~~~

         
Isabelle opened her eyes and found herself alone in the gamma knife machine.
“Sean?”