He slowed his pace. Something odd about the voice, its timbre, the way it echoed. It sounded far away, as if it were coming from the bottom of a well. A very deep well.

At the door, Lyle hesitated, then grabbed the k.n.o.b and yanked it open. The voice was loud now, almost as if the child were shouting. The words bounced off the walls, seeming to come from all directions. But where was the child?

Lyle stood in an empty room.

He stepped over to the couch and looked behind it, but found nothing but a couple of dust bunnies.

And now the sound was moving away... down the hall he'd just pa.s.sed through. Lyle moved back to the door but saw no one in the hall. And still the sound kept moving away. He followed it.

"Charlie!" he called as he pa.s.sed the stairs. He told himself he wanted a witness, but deeper down he knew he didn't want to be alone with this. "Charlie, get down here. Quick!"

But Charlie didn't respond-no voice asking, Whussup? No footsteps in the upper hallway. Probably holed up in his room with his head stuck in a pair of headphones listening to Gospel music while he read the Bible. How many times was he going to read that book?

Lyle followed the voice, still singing the same song, into the kitchen. But once he reached there, the voice seemed to be coming from the cellar.

Lyle paused at the top of the stairs, staring into the well of blackness below. He didn't want to go down there, not alone. Not even with someone else, if the truth be known. Not after last night.

He wondered if this delicate little voice was part of whatever had written on the bathroom mirror before smashing it. Or was the house haunted by multiple ent.i.ties?

"Charlie!"

But again, no response.

Lyle and Charlie had spent most of the morning talking about whether or not they were really haunted. In the warm light of day, with the shock and the fear of the night before dissipated, Lyle had found it hard to believe in such a possibility. But one look in the bathroom at the maniacally shattered mirror was enough to make him a convert.

The big question was, what could they do about it? They couldn't exactly call Ghostbusters. And even if such a group existed, think of the publicity: Psychic afraid of ghosts! Calls for help Psychic afraid of ghosts! Calls for help! A PR nightmare.

The voice was fading now. Where could it go from the bas.e.m.e.nt?

Lyle took a deep breath. He had to go down there. Curiosity, a need to know, pushed him for an answer. Because knowing was better than not knowing. At least he hoped so.

Flicking the light switch he took the stairs down in a rush-no sense dragging this out-and found himself in the familiar but empty bas.e.m.e.nt with its orange-painted floor, pecan paneling, and too-bright fluorescents. He could still hear the singing, though. Very faintly. Coming from the center of the room... from the crack that ran the width of the floor.

No... couldn't be.

Lyle edged closer and gingerly crouched near the opening. No question about it. The voice was echoing from down there, in the earthquake creva.s.se under his house.

He bent his head and rubbed his eyes. Why? This house was fifty-some years old. Why couldn't this have happened to the last owner?

Wait, the last owner was dead.

All right, the next owner, then. Why me? Why now?

The voice faded further. Lyle leaned closer. It was still singing "I Think We're Alone Now." Why that tune? Why a bubblegum song from the sixties?

And then the lights went out and the strange little voice boomed from an anemic whisper to a floor-rattling scream of rage that knocked Lyle onto his back. A noxious cloud plumed around him in the dark, the same graveyard odor as the night the crack first appeared, sending him scrambling across the floor and up the steps toward light and air.

Sweating, panting, he slammed the cellar door and backed away until his back hit the kitchen counter. This was getting way out of hand He needed help, and fast, but he hadn't the faintest idea where to turn.

Sure as h.e.l.l couldn't call on a psychic. He'd never met one who wasn't a lying son of a b.i.t.c.h.

He had to shake his head. Just like me.

Okay, there were some who really believed in all the c.r.a.p they fed their sitters, but they were deluded. And he'd found that people who lied to themselves were far more unreliable than those who simply lied to others. He'd take a con man over a fool any time.

Lyle stared at the door and calmed himself. Time to get a grip and face this situation head on. Because what he'd said this morning was true. He was not leaving his home.

He took a deep breath. So. Look at what he had: a.s.suming that some sort of spirit world was real-and he was being backed into accepting that now-it still had to follow some rules, didn't it? Every action had an effect. Every incident had a cause.

Maybe not. But that was the only way he knew how to approach this. If other rules applied, he'd have to learn them. But for now, he'd go with cause and effect.

That said, what had caused all this? What had awakened this demon or ghost or ent.i.ty, or attracted it to his home? Was it something he or Charlie had done? Or was someone else behind it?

Those were the first questions. Once he had those answers, the next step would be finding out what, if anything, he could do about them.

6.

"More kashi?" Gia said.

Jack held up his plate and said in his best Oliver Twist voice, "Please, ma'am, could I have some more?"

Gia had whipped up one of her vegetarian dinners. She was on a kashi kick these days, so tonight she'd fixed kashi and beans with sides of sauteed spinach and sliced Jersey beefsteaks with mozzarella. All delicious, all nutritious, all as good for a body as food could possibly be; and though he'd push away from the table with a full belly, these meals always left Jack feeling like he'd missed a course.

Jack watched Gia as she scooped more kashi from the pot. The old townhouse had a small kitchen with cabinets and hardwood floor all stained unfashionably dark. Jack remembered when he'd first seen the place last year. Vicky's two old spinster aunts had been living here with their maid, Nellie. The interior looked pretty much the same then, the furnishings hadn't changed, but the place had a real lived-in look now. A child will do that.

Jack let his eyes wander down Gia's trim frame, wondering when she'd start to show, to swell, marveling at the stresses women put their bodies through to bring a child into the world.

He shook his head. If men had to go through that the world would be d.a.m.n near unpopulated.

Still looking at Gia, he noticed an uncharacteristic tautness in her posture. Her uncertainty over the weekend as to whether or not she was pregnant would explain the mood swings he noticed, but he'd have thought finding out and telling him would have broken her tension. Something else was bothering her.

Jack got up and pulled another Killian's from the fridge.

"You don't mind that I'm drinking, do you?"

This was his third Killian's while Gia was still working on her first club soda. The bottle of wine he'd picked up on the way over sat unopened on the counter. Gia had told him that, as much as she loved her Chardonnay, she wouldn't be drinking for the next nine months.

"Not if it's beer. Wine might tempt me, but if the world suddenly forgot how to make beer, I'd never miss it."

"A world without beer... what an awful thought."

He wondered how hard it would be for him to give up beer for nine months. One of life's great pleasures was wrapping his hand around a cold one toward the end of the day. He could swear off, but he sure as h.e.l.l wouldn't like it.

He decided to float the idea past Gia, praying she'd shoot it down.

"If you're abstaining, maybe I should too."

She gave him half a smile. "What would that accomplish? My drinking could affect the baby; yours won't."

He raised his fist. "But how about solidarity, sharing the sacrifices of parenthood and all that?"

"If you intend to be a real parent to this child, you're going to have to make a lot more sacrifices than I will, so drink your beer."

That had an ominous ring. Jack took a grateful gulp of his Killian's. "I already am a real parent. One of them, at least."

"No, you're the father. That's the easy part. You haven't begun being a parent yet. That's a whole other matter."

Gia seemed edgy. What was she getting at? "I'm aware of the difference between fathering a child and raising a child."

"Are you?" She reached across the table and clasped his hand. "I know you could be a great parent, Jack, a wonderful father figure. But I wonder if you see what lies ahead for you if you make that commitment."

Now he knew where this was going.

"You're talking about the Repairman Jack thing. No problem. Look, I've already cut out certain kinds of fix-its, and I can make other changes. I can-"

She sat there shaking her head. "You're not seeing the big picture. Usually you're way ahead of me on things like this."

"What am I missing?"

She glanced away, then back at him. "I wish I didn't have to say this because it makes me feel like I'm forcing you into something you won't want to do, and maybe even can't do."

"Telling me something isn't forcing me. Just tell me: What am I missing?"

"Jack, if you're going to be a real parent, you'll have to really exist."

Jack's first reaction was to say that he did exist, but he knew what she meant.

"Become a citizen?"

She nodded. "Exactly."

A citizen. Christ, he'd spent his whole adult life avoiding that. He didn't want to change now. Join the ma.s.ses... he didn't know if he could.

"That sounds pretty radical. There must be some way..."

She was shaking her head. "Think about it. If this baby was born tomorrow, who could I put down as the father?"

"Me."

"And who are you? Where do you live? What's your Social Security number?"

"Numbers," he grumbled. "I don't think you need the father's numbers on a birth certificate."

"Maybe not. But don't you think the baby would prefer a father who doesn't change his last name every week? Who doesn't fade away when he sees a cop car?"

"Gia..."

"All right, I'm exaggerating, I know, but my point is, even though no one knows you exist, you live like a hunted man, Jack. Like a fugitive. That's fine when you're single and are responsible only for yourself, but it doesn't work for a parent."

"We've been over this before."

"Yes, we have. In the context of our future together. But it was all conjectural, with no set timetable." She patted her abdomen. "Now we've got a timetable. Nine months, and the clock is ticking."

"Nine months," Jack whispered. That seemed like no time at all.

"Maybe less. We'll have a more precise idea once I have a sonogram. But let's go past nine months. Let's jump ahead five years. And let's just say that you leave your situation the way it is. We don't get married but we're living together here-you, me, Vicky, and the baby. One big happy family."

"Sounds nice."

"But what if I get breast cancer, or fall off a subway platform in front of a train, or-?"

"Gia, come on." What a thought.

"Don't say it couldn't happen, because we both know it could. And right now, if something happens to me, Vicky goes to my parents."

Jack nodded. "I know."

It was logical, and probably the right thing. Her grandparents would be Vicky's only living blood relatives. But it would burn a hole in his life to watch that little girl be taken off to Iowa.

"But what if my folks aren't around when something happens to me? If they're dead, then it's not just Vicky who's at risk, but our baby as well. What happens to those two children?"

"I take them."

"No. You won't be able to. They'll be orphans and they'll become wards of the court."

"Like h.e.l.l."

"What are you going to do? Abduct them? Take off with them and hide out? Change their names and have them live like fugitives? Is that the kind of life you want for them?"

Jack leaned back and sipped from his beer. It tasted sour on his tongue. Because he was seeing it now, all of it, the knotty immensity of the problem. How could he have missed it? Maybe because the quotidian rituals of having no official existence, of pursuing an under-the-radar lifestyle had become to him as natural and reflexive as breathing.

Was he going to have to change the way he breathed?

He stared at Gia. "You've obviously given this a lot of thought."

She nodded. "It has consumed me for three days." Tears welled in her eyes. "I'm not pushing you, Jack. It's just that if anything happens to me I want to know my babies are safe."

Jack rose and moved around the table. He lifted Gia from her seat, slid beneath, then settled her onto his lap. She clung to him.

He put his arms around her and said, "Our babies. I couldn't love Vicky more if she were my own. And I don't feel pushed, okay? Fatherhood wasn't in my immediate plans, but that's okay. I'm flexible. I've learned to adjust quickly to unexpected situations in my work, and I can do it here. It's a responsibility and I'm not about to walk away from it." babies. I couldn't love Vicky more if she were my own. And I don't feel pushed, okay? Fatherhood wasn't in my immediate plans, but that's okay. I'm flexible. I've learned to adjust quickly to unexpected situations in my work, and I can do it here. It's a responsibility and I'm not about to walk away from it."