Ghost Town Page 0,101

weapons. "We'll get ready ours." She started to leave him to it, and got only a couple of steps away before Frank said, without looking up from the stakes in his hand, "How is he?"

"Who?"

"Your father."

Of all the things Claire had expected, that wasn't it, and it took her a minute of honest puzzlement to try to work out why someone like Frank Collins would even care. She finally said, "He's doing okay. I talked to my mom yesterday; the doctors think they can fix his heart problem. He's feeling a lot better."

Frank nodded. "Good. Family's important," he said. "Maybe too important, sometimes. I know how much I screwed it up with Shane. Can't blame the kid for hating me now." It was almost a . . . question? And if it was a question, what could Claire say? Yeah, he hates your guts. That probably wasn't what Frank was hoping to hear.

"Just take care of him," she said. "That's what you're supposed to do. Stop using him, and start protecting him. I know he thinks he doesn't need it, but sometimes he does. Sometimes we all do."

Now Frank did look up, and Claire felt a blush building in her face as he stared at her like he was actually seeing her for a change. "He did okay," Shane's dad finally said. "Picking you."

She wasn't sure how to feel about earning the worst dad in the world's approval, so she just smiled weakly, and headed for another room--any other room.

The bikers finally drained the beer and got themselves loaded up in other ways, and they were just finishing with the preparations when the front door rattled.

Claire hushed everybody, and went to look out the window. There were two people on the doorstep. One of them was wearing a big, floppy black hat and coat, and the other one was completely shrouded in a blanket.

"What do you think--should we let them in?" Shane asked. He'd come up behind her, as close as if he actually remembered who she was. That felt . . . weirdly good, that he wasn't trying to stay out of her space. That he trusted her that much.

"I think that they probably have a key anyway," Claire said, as she heard the lock turn. "Let me take care of this."

She got to the hall just as the door swung open, and the figure in the blanket came over the threshold. Behind it, the one in the hat came in and shut the door and locked it.

"I'm telling you," Eve was saying, "something is totally wrong around here. My mother is completely mental. More mental than she was before, and that is at least ten trailer trucks of crazy." She stopped when she saw Claire standing there, and pulled off the hat. Her look of surprise turned to calculation, and then an outright glare. "Okay, who's this? Michael? You have a girl in your house? You could have told me!"

"Who's what? What girl? Get this off of me!"

Eve grabbed one end of the blanket and unwrapped, and Michael stumbled out of it, looking lightly broiled but nowhere near as bad as the last time Claire had seen him. She smiled in delight and moved toward them, then realized it wasn't a good idea, because they both looked immediately on guard.

Crap. They didn't know her. Once again, it hurt.

"Hi, Michael, Eve," Claire said, and tried for a reassuring smile. "You're right. There's something really wrong in Morganville, no doubt about it. Eve, I'm Claire. I talked to you on the phone, remember?"

Eve let that process for a second, then turned to Michael. "Is this your girlfriend?"

"What? No! No, I never saw her before!" Michael said. "I told you, I don't have a girlfriend! Ah, right now, I mean. Not that I never have. Or will."

"He's kind of between girls," Shane said, stepping up behind Claire. "Hey, Mikey. Eve."

Eve squealed. "Shane? Thank God, somebody sane. Well, sane-ish." She didn't give him a chance to answer, just threw herself at him and hugged him. "I looked for you at school. Figures you'd be skipping."

"Don't get all handsy, Gothica; I was busy." Eve backed off, smiling, and Shane exchanged a manly fist-bump with Michael. "Hey, man. You've looked . . . better."

"I know. I'm . . . I'm sick, that's all," Michael said. "What are you doing here? Wait . . ." He looked past them to the living room, where the bikers were crushing beer cans and checking weapons. "Okay, I