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one in the morning, I sat in the hospital cafeteria, clutching a lukewarm mug of tea in my hands and being grilled by my ex-husband. Braden was still in surgery, his family hovering anxiously in the waiting room, and Rachel’s dad had fetched her an hour ago, promising she could return to the hospital in the morning. My ex, Officer Hank Parker of the St. Elizabeth Police Department, had shown up just as I was debating calling my mom for a ride home or lurking in the waiting room until someone looked like they were headed back to St. Elizabeth. Hank and his new partner, Officer Ally Qualls, a short, dark-haired woman, arrived before I could make up my mind. While Officer Qualls talked to Braden’s family, Hank steered me to the elevator and down to the cafeteria, where he bought me a fresh cup of tea.
    “Thanks,” I said with real gratitude, slumping into an uncomfortable plastic chair. The cafeteria smelled like burned toast and was deserted except for a man and a woman in lab coats arguing at a table by the window, and a short-order cook dressed as a mummy yawning over the grill.
    “What in blazes were you doing at a high school get-together, Grace?” Hank asked. He leaned back in his chair and stretched his long legs out toward me. He’d thickened a bitthrough the neck and middle since high school, and his brown hair had thinned a bit, but he still looked sharp in his uniform. He’d applied to the Atlanta Police Department more interested in cop groupies and carrying a gun than protecting the public, but it seemed to me recently that he’d gotten a bit more serious about policing. He’d told Mom he was planning to take the sergeant’s exam before long. “You don’t have the hots for that teacher, that Spaz guy, do you?” His eyes narrowed with suspicion.
    Hank’s jealousy, despite our divorce, which happened largely due to his infidelities, got on my nerves. I was sure he’d deliberately mispronounced Glen’s name. “It was a field trip,” I said. “Surely Mr. Spaa
tz
”—I emphasized the pronunciation—“told you that.”
    “Yeah. But it still sounds like a stupid-ass idea to me,” he said, shaking his head. “Ghost hunting? What’s the point of that? I can’t see where it matters if there’s ghosts or not. What were they going to do if one showed up? Put it in a zoo?”
    Maybe it was because I was sleep-deprived and worried, but what Hank said made a certain amount of sense. Scary. “I don’t know,” I said. “It was for science.” I propped my elbows on the table and let my head fall into my hands.
    Hank snorted. “So, what were you doing there?”
    “Chaperoning.”
    “Damn fine chaperone you are.”
    His words scraped my raw emotions. I’d already been beating myself up for agreeing to chaperone in the first place and for failing so miserably at it. It was at least partially my fault that Braden McCullers was in the hospital. “Thanks a lot,” I muttered.
    “Not that it sounds like you could have prevented the accident,” he added graciously. “The fireworks, now . . . We’re goingto have to ticket the kid who set those off when we catch up with him. All the other kids say it was”—he checked his notebook—“an Alonso Farber.”
    I was concerned that Lonnie still hadn’t turned up, but it was Hank’s first words that caught my attention. “Accident? You’re sure it was an accident?”
    Hank worked his lips in and out. “Of course. What else would it be? You certainly don’t believe that ghost—Cyrus or whatever—”
    “Cyril.”
    “—shoved him off the landing?” He guffawed. “You need more than caffeine, Grace—you need some shut eye. Let me take you home.”
    Riding home with Hank was not high on my list of things I wanted to do, but neither was sleeping in the hospital waiting room. “Okay, thanks. Just let me see if there’s any news on Braden,” I said.
    When we got back to the ICU, a tall woman in surgical scrubs was talking to Braden’s