Unlike Robin MacKenzie, Suzanne Simmons didn’t just drop into our plane. It took at least ten minutes for her to fully materialize. When she did, there was no question of asking for ID. I’d seen her full-on in the vision the Fates gave me, and I’d never forget that face. She was still wearing prison hospital garb. The beehive hairdo from the vision was gone, and her dirty-blond hair hung about her shoulders, lanky and unwashed, as if no one bothered with that nicety while she’d lingered on her deathbed. Her feet were bare. That was the first thing she noticed—her feet. She stared down at them, lifting one, then the other, toes scrunching as if gripping the grass. Then she smiled. Eyes closed, she lifted her head and took a long, deep breath.

Jaime turned, mouth opening to speak, but I cut her short and motioned for her to wait. Wait and watch.

Simmons opened her eyes and looked around. Her gaze crossed the tombstone. A blink. She tilted her head to read the text. A tiny nod, as if the confirmation of her death was neither unexpected nor terribly alarming.

As she turned, I sidestepped, staying out of her field of vision. Her gaze passed right over Jaime, and she surveyed the cemetery grounds, gaze flickering from person to person, a slight frown as she looked out on a world that was familiar…and yet not familiar.

Two teens whooshed along the path on Rollerblades, lips and brows a patchwork of metal studs that glinted in the sunlight. The girl yapped into a cell phone while the young man skated beside her, eyes half-closed, immersed in the thumps from his headphones. As they approached, Simmons reached out. The girl on the cell phone passed right through her fingers. Simmons nodded, as if this, too, was not unexpected.

“Welcome home, Suzanne,” I said.

She turned, hands going up as if to ward off a blow. I leaned back against a neighboring tombstone, my hands shoved in my pockets.

“Are you a ghost?” she asked.

I reached down into the bouquet of flowers at the grave’s base and plucked the one I’d conjured there earlier. I held it up.

“Does it look like it?” I asked.

“Then how—?”

“Necromancy,” I said. “Ever heard of it?”

A pause, then a slow shake of her head. “No.”

“Well, necromancers can contact the dead.”

“And that’s what you are?”

“Nah.” I waved at Jaime. “That’s what she is. I’m just the client.”

Simmons looked Jaime up and down, then stepped toward her. Jaime struggled to hide her distaste, but it seeped out. Simmons cocked her head, gaze boring into Jaime’s, then took another slow step toward her, and watched the necromancer inch back.

Simmons smiled, a tiny little Mona Lisa smile. “Your friend doesn’t like me.”