There was a jingle of keys in the door, and Callum entered, wearing a London Tube uniform.

“What’s going on?” he asked. “I got your message.”

“There’s been an accident,” Stephen said.

“What sort of accident?”

“Boo—”

“Boo got hit by a car,” I said. “The Ripper came after me. Boo tried to help, and he threw her in front of a car.”

For a moment, Callum couldn’t speak. He leaned against the counter and put his hand to his forehead.

“Is she—”

“She’s hurt,” Stephen said, “but she’s alive. I had to get Rory away from the scene.”

“Alive? Conscious alive? How alive?”

“She wasn’t conscious at the scene,” Stephen said.

Callum just stared at me.

“It’s not her fault,” Stephen said.

“I know that,” Callum replied, but he wasn’t acting like he knew that. “Please tell me she got him. Please tell me that. Please let that be the upshot of all this . . .”

“It sounds like she tried,” Stephen said. “But no.”

“It was a mistake to send her in alone,” Callum snapped. “I told you it was a mistake. I told you we should have just stayed at the school.”

“We needed to investigate—”

“Investigate what? What exactly have we come up with so far?”

“He spoke to Rory,” Stephen said, his voice rising. “We learned a few things. We learned he had the sight when he was alive. That’s probably why he’s been trailing Rory. That’s probably why he killed at Wexford. He found someone who could see him, who could hear him.”

“Oh, good,” Callum said. “Well, then. Sounds like we’ve solved it.”

“Callum!” Stephen’s voice went deep when he yelled. I could feel the sonic boom in my stomach. “You aren’t helping. So either stop it now or go outside and walk it off.”

For a moment, I thought they were going to have a fight—a real, physical one. Callum stood up, straightened, and stormed out of the room. I heard a door slam somewhere else in the apartment.

“Sorry,” Stephen said quietly. “He’ll calm down in a moment.”

I could hear things being thrown around in the other room. Then the door opened again and Callum joined us, rattling the table and spilling our tea with the force of sitting down.

“So what do we know?” he asked.

“Someone is clearing up the red tape. He’ll tell me when it’s all right for me to take Rory back to Wexford. Until then, we should stay here with her.”

“We should be out there, dealing with him.”

“I’d like that too,” Stephen said, “but we have no idea where he’s gone. But in the meantime, we can work with what he’s said this evening. He’s been communicating.”