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And for some reason, I find myself wanting to tell him what happened that night.

I haven’t wanted to do that with anyone. Even Liz hasn’t heard all the details from me, although I’m sure she’s read the case file.

But with Beau, it’s different. Maybe because I know he’ll get it in a way no one else has.

“Can I tell you?” I ask.

Beau’s expression softens. “Come on, let’s sit down for this.”

He leads me over to a bench along the path and we sit close to one another.

“If you want to share your story with me, then I’d love to hear it, but only if you’re comfortable. Please don’t divulge anything that might be triggering for you.” He takes hold of my hand and squeezes it in his.

And just like that, any last ounce of uncertainty I have about telling him my story vanishes.

“I’m not sure what it is about you,” I admit, “but I feel like I could tell you all my deepest, darkest secrets, and you’d keep them safe and not judge me for any of them.”

It sounds cheesy as hell to my own ears, but I can’t deny the truth in my words.

“You smooth talker, you,” he teases, but then turns serious. “But in all honesty, that’s one of the sweetest things anyone’s ever said to me. Thank you.”

I inhale deeply, bracing myself, and let it out slowly.

“Five years ago, Liz was out on maternity leave. She was due any day, and I was paired up with a temporary replacement. We’d been working together for about two weeks when we were out in the field. A suspect we’d gone to question bolted out of his flat and took off on foot. I gave chase and didn’t realize until it was too late that my partner wasn’t beside me.”

“Oh dear,” Beau murmurs.

“It was a stupid assumption on my part. I was so used to Liz and me being in sync in the field that I didn’t think before I acted. Even worse, I was a bloody eejit and didn’t call it in. Amped up on adrenaline, I was, and too focused on catching the guy. Liz would have read me the riot act if she’d been with me. Anyway, things went south when the suspect disappeared into a dilapidated old building. I never should have followed him. The place was a wreck, clearly condemned, but I was operating on pure adrenaline and instinct by that point. No one runs that recklessly if they’re innocent, at least not in my experience.” Hearing the rasp in my voice, I clear my throat. “The suspect went up to the second floor, and stupid adrenaline-fueled me followed. But then, just as I caught up with him, the floor gave way beneath our feet, and we both fell.”

Beau gasps.

“Two stories, straight to the ground. For better or worse, I ended up falling feet first. Landed the hardest on my leg and my back rather than my head.” I swallow thickly. “My suspect wasn’t so lucky. He went headfirst and died not long after impact. Severe head trauma. Some of the debris broke a bit of my fall, but the impact was so powerful that my heart stopped beating. I was told later it was a BCI, or blunt cardiac injury, from the force of hitting the ground.”

Beau starts stroking my back in comfort. It’s rather sweet, and I’m affected by it more than I would have expected.

Has it really been that long since someone’s touched me as if they fucking care?

“That must have been terrifying,” Beau whispers.

“Thankfully, I wasn’t conscious or aware once my heart stopped beating. From what I learned afterwards, my temporary partner arrived on scene shortly after my fall and performed CPR until the EMTs arrived. Instead of chasing after our suspect, he’d taken the time to call it in to get us backup, which is exactly what’s supposed to happen and is probably what saved my sorry ass in the end. Emergency personnel arrived relatively quickly, and after I was shocked back to life with a defibrillator, I became conscious again. Although only vaguely.” I swallow hard around the lump in my throat. “But I do vividly remember seeing the ghost of my suspect standing beside his dead body.”

Beau makes a pained noise. “Oh, darlin’, I’m so sorry. That must have been a whole new level of traumatizing for you.”

“You could say that again. Fortunately, I passed out pretty fast and don’t remember anything until I woke up again about eighteen hours later in hospital and after emergency surgery on my back and my leg.” I grimace. “And that was its own special kind of hell, and not just because of the physical pain I was in.”

Beau eyes me sympathetically. “Hospitals are not the best places for people like us.”

“Too bloody true. Ghosts everywhere. At least, it felt like that at first.”

“The type of death that happens in hospitals makes it quite common for the spirits to linger there a little while. Many times they’re confused about what’s happened to them. Most of them figure it out, of course, and move on. But at any given time, you’re likely to run into several in a major hospital, still working through it.”

“Yeah, well, it made being able to get any kind of rest damn near impossible for the first few days. They even put me under psychiatric watch when I started talking about seeing people who aren’t there. They thought I was hallucinating and off my fucking rocker.”

Beau covers his mouth with his hand. “Oh, Callum, I’m so sorry.”

“I learned pretty quickly to keep my mouth shut. Anyway, my leg was broken in several places, so they had to do a second surgery while I was there and now I’ve got a lot of pins holding it together. While it gives me some trouble with stiffness and pain, especially when it rains, it’s the nerve damage in my back that’s harder to deal with. All things considered, I’m really fucking lucky I didn’t die or end up paraplegic. But I still struggle with it all, especially when a flare-up takes me out of commission for days or weeks at a time.”

He reaches a hand up and strokes my cheek. His touch is warm and comforting, and I almost want to nuzzle into it the way Poirot does when I pet him.