“Am I that different?” the man asked as he stood and smiled at her. “Has so much changed?”

It was him, she thought, too stunned to do much more than gasp. “H-how is this possible? Why aren’t you dead? I saw you die. Dead people don’t have conversations.”

“It is a long story. Perhaps one I could tell you over breakfast.”

That voice. She would know it anywhere. It had haunted her dreams for the past five years.

Dead people also don’t eat. “Get back,” she said, feeling both shocked and angry. When in doubt, get pissed off. It was a philosophy she’d learned worked for her. “I don’t know what this game is, but I’m not playing it.”

“Mia, it is I. You must recognize me.”

“Must I?”

Right now she didn’t have to do anything but keep from having a heart attack from the shock, and wish she kept a weapon in her room. Something big and scary.

The bedroom door flew open and her two grandmothers burst inside. Grandma Tessa had a fire poker in one hand, and Grammy M threatened Diego with a rolling pin.

“Call Joe,” Tessa ordered Mia. “He’ll take care of this scumbag.”

Scumbag? Someone had been watching just a little too many police dramas.

“I’m not sure he’s a scumbag,” Mia said, still finding it difficult to believe her own eyes. “I might know this guy.”

“You do know me,” he said, his voice washing over her like a familiar and welcome memory. “Mia, it is I.”

Diego? Was it possible? Conflicting emotions raced through her. She wanted to run into his arms and have him hold her forever. At the same time she wanted to grab the poker and beat him over the head with it.

“You’re supposed to be dead,” she said, still confused and angry, and maybe just a little scared. Because if this guy really was Diego, she was going to have a lot of explaining to do.

“So you keep saying,” he told her, sounding more amused than anything else. “Would you be more happy if I were?”