Free Soldier of Love by Gabrielle Holly

international basic cable. However , you’re ‘not comfortable’ with me setting up a thermal imaging camera in your bedroom to record you while you sleep. Which, can I just say, is evidently the only time you’re not going to make some psychotic claim about your close, personal relationship with a one-hundred-and-fifty-year-old ghost. Does that about sum it up, Miss Bianchi?”
    Toni took a step back as if Thomas’ words had dealt her a physical blow. A sudden, terrible realisation dawned on her. He doesn’t believe it. Not any of it. He doesn’t believe in what he’s been selling the public for the past four seasons. Her stomach knotted. Her eyes and nose stung with the cresting tears as she realised the worst of it. And, he doesn’t believe me.
    “Fine! Set up your damned cameras!” she said, then turned and stormed down the hallway.
    She wondered how he’d feel when he reviewed the tapes and found out that what she’d been experiencing was real. She also wondered how she would feel if it weren’t.
    Thomas followed her into the master suite where he set up the cameras to the left of the bathroom door on the wall opposite the bed. While he made adjustments to the setup, Toni went into the bathroom to get ready for bed. She slipped into her standard bedtime ensemble—an oversized T-shirt—washed her face, brushed her teeth and looked at herself in the mirror. Free from the confines of a bra, her breasts seemed freakishly large. She yanked her robe from a hook on the back of the heavy oak bathroom door, pulled it on and tied the belt tight. She drew in a deep breath. I’ll get through this. She’d brought the entire thing on herself. If she’d just thought things through and hadn’t been such a reactionary hothead, she’d still be back in the city with a lux condo and a fat bank account…and a raging case of stress-induced acid reflux, a ninety-hour work week, and a bum of a boyfriend whose only talent was spending her money.
    Toni looked at her reflection in the mirror. You chose this path, now you’ve got to make it work.
    When she stepped out into the bedroom she saw Thomas looking through the viewfinder of one of the two cameras. He heard her and straightened. He seemed to be concentrating on keeping his voice even.
    “Okay, so this is a thermal imager camera and that one is just standard night vision. I’m running them both directly into ginormous hard drives, so they can go all night without having any storage issues.”
    Toni crossed her arms under her breasts and glanced at the tripods standing sentry across the room from the foot of her bed. The cameras were pointing to where she would try to sleep.
    She kicked out one hip and raised her eyebrows. “Anything else?”
    “Nope, that should do it,” Thomas answered.
    She glared at him until he finally asked, “Problem?”
    “I don’t have a problem,” Toni replied.
    “Are you insinuating that I have a problem?” Thomas shot back.
    “Well, if the insinuation fits.”
    “Lady, you don’t even know me!”
    “I know that you’re a phony. You prey on people who believe in the supernatural and you just pretend to believe in all this stuff so you can collect a pay cheque!”
    “Yeah, a big, fat pay cheque. And those naïve idiots are going to believe in this stuff anyway. I used to. I wanted it to be true more than anyone. But I’ve been at this for years now. I’ve travelled all over the world, investigating the most credible reports with the most advanced equipment available. And you know what we found? Nothing! Nothing that couldn’t be explained away by a gust of wind or uneven floorboards or mice in the walls or lonely people with overactive imaginations!”
    Toni shook her head as if she’d been slapped. “‘Overactive imaginations?’ Was that directed at me? Is that some kind of euphemism for ‘nuts’?”
    Thomas held out his hands. “If the euphemism fits.”
    Toni balled up her fists. Her eyes stung with tears of