And that view of his life in the kaleidoscope had shifted just enough for him to admit other people might have “a little something extra.” Like Clare. Like Mrs. Flinton. Like his maternal grandmother.

Not him. Nope.

Her hazel eyes were wide. “I didn’t think I’d see you again.” She glanced away; her gaze went in the direction of the television, and she turned her head away to look him in the eyes. Shrugging and shaking her head, she said, “I was quite incoherent. A real mess.”

With a wry smile she added, “You might as well know I’ve finally gone around the bend. I’ve accepted that I’ve inherited the family talent of seeing ghosts.”

Zach waited a beat or two.

“You can leave if you want. I expect nothing from you.”

That irritated him. She was giving up on him. Not fighting for him and the real sexual desire that flamed between them. Subtly he leaned forward into her personal space, his grip tightening on his cane. He could smell her better. Yeah, for sure, he wanted her.

“I think I’ll stay, if it’s all the same to you.” His voice came out rougher than he thought, but he hoped she heard the sincerity.

She swallowed, and some of the shadows receded from her gaze. “Truly?” she whispered.

“Oh, yeah.”

Then her chin lifted, her expression hardened, and determination replaced vulnerability. She drew in an audible breath. “I guess I should lay it all out then, bottom-line it.”

“You accountants do like your spreadsheets and your bottom lines,” Zach joshed.

“Apparently my relatives have passed down a . . . gift. An intuitive gift, the ability to see”—she swallowed—“to see ghosts.”

“Uh-huh,” Zach said. He could do this. He could listen reasonably. He knew Clare was a reasonable person. He could trust her to find and explain whatever odd logic applied to this situation.

“I saw a cowboy ghost waving his hat in front of the EZ Loan. Did . . . did you?”

Zach sucked in a breath through his nose, caught her scent again. He could do this. “Maybe,” he mumbled. “When I was, ah, in contact with you.”

Her turn to say, “Uh-huh.”

Going over to the coffee table where research books were stacked, she chose a large picture book of historic Denver and flipped through the pages. She tapped the old photo of the street that now included the EZ Loan. “This is where we were.”

He walked over, stared down, wouldn’t admit to a tense gut. That was the white-gray, partly transparent building he’d seen. He recalled the sign LAND OFFICE.

A nervy smile twitched on and off her face. “I saw this building and a cowboy waving his hat, shouting that there was a robbery going on.”

Another slow inhalation, an even slower dip of his head, as he couldn’t deny her. “That’s right.”

She reached out, then curled her fingers before she touched him. He heard barking again, tensed. He’d heard a dog whenever he’d been with her, and he’d have to get used to that, hearing a ghost dog. Because the dog was attached somehow to Clare, not Zach; all about her, not him.

Clare glanced down; her fingers stroked an invisible head. She nodded and looked back up at Zach.

“You apprehended three dangerous thieves,” she said with admiration.

“Suspects,” he corrected. “Just doing my—” Zach stopped. Flinched. Felt like he’d been gut-stabbed as his past and present collided here and now with pretty Clare.

The jagged parts of his life hadn’t appeared earlier in the familiar setting of the police station. No, that place had soothed him consciously and subconsciously.

But the now very real contrast of civilian life versus cop life slammed through him. He wasn’t a deputy sheriff anymore, and like Clare and her damn ghosts, he remained in denial about that fact. Pretending that he’d accepted the issue when a huge anger raged inside him, at the unfairness of life, at destiny, at himself for being so goddamned stupid.

Easier to believe in seeing strange things than to know his old life was over. Like he’d told Mrs. Flinton that afternoon, he’d seen plenty of odd stuff in his career, damn near as unbelievable as Clare’s wavery buildings and specters and dogs. Not to mention he’d seen other people react to experiences Zach couldn’t sense. He knew of more than one cop, deputy, investigator whose hunches were solid gold. And that might include Rickman.

Yes, simpler to accept the inexplicable than to deal with his fury at his lost life.

Than to cope with the permanence of his nonfunctioning foot.

To have that out in the open between them. Here was Clare, looking as if she’d found her balance with whatever had plagued her, while he still teetered around between anger, despair, and unforgiveness. He couldn’t forgive himself or even Lauren, who’d died before her time. And wasn’t that a pisser of a thing—to hold a grudge against a dead woman?

But just telling himself to get over it didn’t do one bit of good. His heart wasn’t willing to let the ruin of his life go.

And he had to stop thinking that his life was ruined, too, another impossible matter. Nope, not open at all for much at all.

“Zach?” Clare asked softly.

Well, except maybe sex with a lovely woman.

“Yeah?”

“Are you hungry?”

Food he could appreciate, too, and talk about, too.

“Starving.”

“I have shish kebobs and potato skins on the grill.”

One side of his mouth kicked up even as his mouth watered. “Sounds great.”

“Come on through.”

“Smells good, too.” He wound with her through a pristine kitchen and out to the backyard, which had a long slab of concrete running the length of the house and an old wooden picnic table. Just beyond the door stood a simple grill that most of Zach’s male friends would sneer at. The odors were fabulous, easily making hunger his primary concern and emotion. Whew.

“Definitely done,” Clare said. She glanced at him. “Do you grill?”

He grunted. “Some. Not for a while, though. I lived in an apartment complex for the last few years; didn’t have one in the communal area and I lived on the second floor. Not much space on the balcony for a grill, and they didn’t like when you did it, either.”

“I would bet you anything that Mrs. Flinton has a grilling area,” Clare tossed over her shoulder as she went into the kitchen.

“No bet,” Zach said, though he hadn’t looked around the estate much. He’d only been there a full day—or would be once he returned. One of those points in his life when situations and events stretched out time, felt like he’d known Clare for months.

Had wanted to make love with her for months.

She gestured him to sit at the table and when he did, she set a plate with half of a huge potato and three skewers with large chunks of steak sandwiched with onions, peppers, and mushrooms in front of him. Taking the remaining two skewers and potato half, she put her dish opposite his and asked, “Lemonade? It’s good stuff.”

“Absolutely,” he replied.

A minute later she poured out two big glasses and also set out salads and joined him at the table.

They mostly concentrated on eating and talked about Mrs. Flinton and Mrs. Magee, and Clare became animated when she retrieved her tablet computer and showed him the photos she’d taken of the house she’d be looking at the next morning. She’d received a dozen pics from her real estate agent showing the interior.

Zach chewed his last bit of steak, a little too well done for him, then asked, “How much did you say this was?”

She puffed out a breath. “Two million, four hundred fifty-six thousand; two point five million rounding up.”

“That’s some rounding.”

Her shoulders sagged and she glanced around the extremely modest backyard with a chain-link fence between her and all her neighbors. “I shouldn’t buy . . .”

“You love the house,” Zach said.

Her gaze flicked to his. “Yes, I do.”

“It’s in the country club district; no question it’s an investment.”