Eighth Grave After Dark

by Darynda Jones

  He snickered. “We decided that months ago.”

  Garrett walked in then. “Got him,” he said, carrying a tablet. “Duff Newman, executed for killing a woman and her daughter in 1987.”

  Osh tsked. “Duff. That’s not very nice.”

  Focusing on Duff again, I said, “Once more with feeling. Who do you report to?”

  “If I tell you, he’ll send me back.”

  “To hell?” I asked. “You’re going back there anyway, sport. It’s hot. You might want to plan for that. Take an ointment.”

  Osh spoke up again. “Why let him live at all? I could use dessert.”

  “You sure?”

  “Positive.” That wolfish grin was back, and Duff tried to jerk out of my grip, suddenly terrified.

  “Wait,” I said; then I turned to Angel. “No really, why not just tell me?”

  He lowered his head. “You’re too reckless.”

  “What?” I asked, completely offended.

  “You’re too careless,” he said, unable to meet my gaze. “You risk too much for people you barely know. We couldn’t—”

  When he didn’t continue, I finished for him. “Trust me. You couldn’t trust me.”

  He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.

  “Well, that little decision almost cost me my life, thank you very much.”

  “Sorry.”

  Fury overrode every other emotion as I marked Duff. One thought was all it took, and the symbol appeared instantly. “He’s all yours,” I said to Osh.

  The Daeva walked up to Duff, who decided right then to fight. He managed to slip from my grasp, but Osh had him around the throat in the blink of an eye. He pushed Duff against the wall, the exact same way he had with Sheila.

  Osh squeezed Duff’s jaw, doing some Vulcan mind meld thing to get him to be still. He froze as though he could no longer move.

  “It’s better than being burned alive,” he told Duff.

  Apparently, Duff didn’t agree. He shook his head, fear consuming him. “Not this,” he pleaded, and I couldn’t help but wonder why. I’d been to hell. Why was this worse?

  “I wonder if those people you killed said that.”

  Before Duff could answer, Osh braced a hand above the wall over Duff’s head, pressed against him like a lover, then covered Duff’s mouth with his own. And while the soul-sucking thing with Sheila had been hot, this was even more so. I felt a warm rush wash over me. It pooled in my abdomen as Osh kept a hand locked around Duff’s throat, his mouth on his. Then he pulled back, just a little, just like before, and the light, a light blue glow, shone between them. Duff splayed his fingers and stared at the ceiling as Osh took everything he had to offer. Slowly, Duff dissipated, cracking and drifting away until there was nothing left.

  Osh pressed his forehead against the wall, his chest heaving, his muscles weak, while I stood in a convent, in a house of God, with the most impure thoughts I’d had in a while. Boy-on-boy action.

  “I need a shower,” I said, suddenly warm.

  Osh glanced over his shoulder at me. “You know what goes well with shish-kebabed Duff?”

  “I don’t want to know,” I said as I started for the door.

  “Cherry pie,” he called out after me, laughing softly. “Tart cherry pie.”

  “Asshole.” He knew how sexy that was. He was freaking doing it on purpose.

  After about five seconds in the shower, I started groaning. Out loud. I really did need one, if for no other reason than to work the kinks out of my muscles. I couldn’t help but wonder where Reyes had gone off to. Maybe he was talking to that older couple again. Angel couldn’t have meant the Loehrs. They weren’t that old. Angel made the couple Reyes was talking to sound ancient. And he couldn’t possibly know about the Loehrs. I’d only just found out about them myself, and he’d told me months ago he didn’t want to contact them.

  I turned off the water and wrapped a towel around me. Then I did the all-important phone check. No calls. No texts. Probably a good thing.

  Hoping Reyes was okay and wondering if he would suck a guy’s soul like Osh so I could watch—because, day-um—I wiped steam off the mirror and was just about to blow-dry my “in bad need of a trim” locks when my phone chimed.

  The fact that it could have been Reyes made me a little too enthusiastic. I knocked the phone off the counter and watched as it headed right toward the toilet.

  Without blinking, I slowed time, fetched it, then let time bounce back into place.

  Being a god definitely had its perks.

  Swiping a finger across the screen, I brought up the text and my world fell apart at the seams.

  Do not move.

  The first line of the text read like it’d been sent by some harmless creep playing a joke. That wasn’t the part that slid the world out from under me.

  Do not say anything.

  The sender was unknown, a blocked number.

  Do not alert your friends to this message.

  Dread crept up my spine to settle at the nape of my neck.

  Control your emotions or Ms. Kowalski and her daughter die.

  Whoever was sending the texts knew enough about me and my friends to know that any spike in emotion could summon the cavalry. Not many people knew that.

  But the next text contained an image, and the dread scratching at my neck exploded, awakening every nerve ending in my body as a sharp tingling sensation washed over me. My knees gave beneath me, and I sank onto the side of the bathtub.

  They—whoever they were—had Cook and Amber. The picture showed them sitting beside each other in a dark room, a harsh light brightening only their features, their hands tied behind their backs, their mouths gagged, their faces dirty. There was a newspaper in their laps. I didn’t bother trying to make out the date. No one would go to that much trouble without actually having the day’s newspaper.

  I couldn’t take my eyes off them. They sat leaning in to each other. While Amber stared blankly into the camera, clearly in shock, Cookie looked up at her abductor, her brows scrunched in fear for her daughter’s life. Her shoulder was in front of Amber as though she were trying to protect her. And then I saw why. The assailant, at least one of them, had a gun. I could barely see it in the upper right corner of the image. And it was pointed straight at Amber’s head.

  I covered my mouth with a hand to suppress an astonished sob as another text slipped underneath the picture.

  I’m sure we have your attention. Calmly walk out the door, get in your car, and go to the abandoned gas station at the bottom of the mountain, just before the turn off in San Ysidro. If anyone follows you, if you alert anyone to the situation, they are dead. You have ten minutes.

  I dragged on my dirty clothes and burst through the door. Speed-walking as normally as possible, I pressed my mouth together hard and forced a smile when I saw Garrett come out of the kitchen.

  He slowly made his way to the stairs, pausing to ask, “You okay?”

  My keys to Misery, my cherry red Jeep Wrangler, were hanging on a hook by the front door. I hadn’t driven her in eight months, but Garrett made a point to take her to work about twice a month to keep things running smooth. Swallowing hard, I nodded and walked back to the kitchen, waiting for him to ascend the stairs. The minute he was out of sight, I rushed forward, grabbed the keys off the hook, and flew out the front door.

  The sun hung low on the horizon as I ran for Misery. I hopped in and started her on one try. Backing out of the drive while trying to seem nonchalant was excruciating, but I didn’t want to alarm anyone, so I took my time. Hopefully, if anyone looked out, they’d think I was just moving my car to a different location. Dying inside. The fear coursing through me was so powerful, I thought I would be sick. Clearly, I was not suppressing my emotions, and yet Reyes was nowhere to be found. He must have been angrier with me than I thought, but even at his angriest, he would never leave me hanging. I couldn’t imagine why he wasn’t materializing beside me, but I was both relieved and concerned.
/>   I raced down the mountain, taking the 25 mph curves at 75.

  A motorcycle appeared out of nowhere, the driver waving me to pull over. I ignored him and pressed the gas pedal until it would go no farther.

  He pulled ahead of me, missing an oncoming car by inches, and waved again. I stared straight ahead. Was he one of the abductors? Two more motorcycles appeared in my rearview, speeding up behind me. I considered slamming on my brakes to take them out, but I didn’t want to lose the time. It took more than ten minutes to get down the mountain from where we were. I didn’t have a second to spare.

  Just as the last curve came into view, the gas station only minutes from there, the motorcycle swerved in front of me. My reflexes took over. I jerked Misery to the right and didn’t have enough space to fix the overcorrection. I went headfirst into a shallow ravine, bouncing over the bumpy drop until crashing to a stop at the bottom. I flew forward, my seat belt biting into my shoulder as my head hit the steering wheel.

  Then someone was knocking on the window, jerking on the door handle. I tried to restart Misery, to no avail.

  “Charley, damn it!”

  I finally turned and saw Donovan. Biker Donovan. My Donovan. It didn’t make sense. Why would he be here? I looked back at the other two, and sure enough, his sidekicks, Eric and Michael, were also with him. They had lived beside the abandoned asylum Rocket grew up in. Artemis, my guardian Rottweiler, had originally been Donovan’s. He’d led a rough life—most bikers did—but he had a heart of gold. If not for that whole bank-robbing gig, he would still have been in my life in one form or another.

  “Move!” he shouted through my window a split second before he drove a leather-clad elbow through it. He reached in, unlocked the door, and dragged me out of Misery kicking and screaming. Eric, the one I’d always referred to as the Greek prince, was right there, helping him.

  “What are you doing?” I yelled, pushing them off me once I’d gained my footing. “I have to go! They have Cookie and Amber!”

  Donovan held his palms toward me, gesturing for me to calm down. “Who has them?”

  My phone rang before I could come back with a biting reply. I pulled it out of my pocket, my hands shaking uncontrollably. It was from Cookie’s number.

  “Cookie!” I screamed, pressing a palm against Misery for support. “What happened? What do they want?”

  “Charley, what are you talking about? What’s wrong? Is Beep okay? Oh my God, did something happen to Beep?”

  “No, what? Where are you? You’ve been abducted. You and Amber.”

  “What?” Cookie screeched. She dropped the phone, and I heard footsteps, a frantic voice, then more footsteps. “Charley, damn it,” she said when she picked up the phone again, panting. “If this is a joke—”

  “Cook, you haven’t been abducted? You’re— You’re okay?”

  “Of course we’re okay.”

  “Amber’s okay?”

  “She’s right here. We were just about to head out there. I was calling to see if you needed anything before we left Albuquerque.”

  I fell to my knees in relief. “Why did you pose for that picture?” I screamed at her. “What kind of sadist are you?”

  “Charley, you’re scaring me.”

  “Join the club. That was a horrible picture. And you had red eye in it.”

  “Honey, what picture are you talking about?”

  Donovan was right beside me. He lowered himself onto one knee and kept a hand on my back.

  “What’s going on?” she asked, but I looked up at Donovan.

  Donovan!

  Donovan?

  I blinked, knowing in the back of my mind that my mouth sat agape. Which couldn’t be flattering. “What are you doing here?” I brought the trio surrounding me into focus.

  Eric stood beside us, his lean frame at the ready.

  Michael stood back as usual, coolness wafting off him as he rested against his Harley, arms crossed over his chest, an amused smirk on his face. “Still causing hell, I see.”

  I scrambled to my feet, then threw my arms around Donovan’s neck. He lifted me off the ground and hugged me tight.

  “What are all of you doing here?” I asked when he set me back down. “You’re wanted men. You can’t be here.”

  Eric nodded. “That’s what we tried to tell that guy. Nobody listens to us.”

  I shook my head, trying to absorb a thousand layers of information at once. “What guy?”

  Donovan grinned. “That man of yours, sugar. We’ve been holed up across the road from you, keeping watch.”

  “Reyes? Reyes asked you to come? Why? And keeping watch for what?”

  “This,” Michael said, smirk firmly in place. “Said you have a habit of running off when you shouldn’t. Seems he was right.”

  I was so flabbergasted, I didn’t even know how to respond. Why would Reyes bring these guys here? He knew I had a weak spot in my heart for them. A really weak spot. As in, Donovan-was-an-incredible-kisser weak spot.

  Then something a tad more important hit me. Cookie and Amber hadn’t been taken. Someone wanted me off the grounds, the sacred grounds. They wanted me dead. I whirled around, watching the road from where I’d just come, waiting for the sounds of paws tearing through the forest. For the sound of snarls and teeth gnashing as they drove closer and closer to the kill. Because I finally remembered why I was not to leave the convent. But the only sound I heard was the breeze whispering through the trees. A bird calling out overhead.

  Slowly, realization dawned. There was a reason the Twelve didn’t follow me. They were going after Beep. My hand flew over my mouth, and a paralyzing fear gripped me.

  “Sweetheart,” Donovan said, trying to coax me back to him.

  “I have to go back. Now!” I started for Misery, but Donovan tucked an arm around my waist and hauled me toward his bike. “I’ll take you. We’ll come back for your Jeep later.”

  “Yes. Yes, good idea.” I hopped on the back of Donovan’s Harley and wrapped my arms around him. “Please, drive fast,” I said before he brought Odin, his Harley, to life with a roar.

  “My favorite way to drive!” he yelled back to me. Only after we started back did I realize I’d left Cookie hanging on the phone, probably frantic. And my phone lay somewhere between here and there.

  15

  LIKE THE SUICIDAL RACCOON,

  I, TOO, WILL FUCK UP YOUR ALIGNMENT IF YOU RUN ME OVER.

  —T-SHIRT

  The second we pulled to a stop, I tore off the bike and ran for the front door despite Donovan’s insisting otherwise. When I got inside, I was met with exactly the scene I’d been expecting. The first things I noticed were the bloodied bodies of Osh, Garrett, and Reyes. Denise sat in a corner, her fear so great, she was probably crippled by it. And the hounds, the ones who couldn’t come onto sacred ground, stood encircling Beep’s bassinet.

  My lungs seized when I saw their silvery black hides shimmer, then disappear, their massive heads more shadow than substance, and their razor-sharp teeth glinting off the low light. A terror of nightmarish proportions ripped through me so fast, I could hardly focus. With legs shaking, I lowered myself onto one knee.

  I had so few options. With Osh, Reyes, and Garrett down, what could I do?

  I could slow time, but they would only match it before I could reach Beep. I could let the energy inside me explode, the light like acid on their hides, but they’d recover too quickly for me to get to her. I could offer my life, but could hellhounds be bargained with? And Lucifer wanted Beep, all because of a few verses some guy wrote centuries ago. He wouldn’t settle for me when he had the very being prophesied to destroy him at his fingertips. Or his hellhounds’ claws.

  Artemis took up position beside me, her hackles raised, a low growl reverberating from her chest.

  Garrett was out cold, but Osh got slowly to his feet, a smile on his face as he dusted himself off. “I live for this shit,” he said, but he wasn’t looking at the hellhounds. In fact, the hellhounds seemed
quite at ease. He was looking at Reyes as he followed suit and stood. He cracked his neck and rolled his shoulders before testing his jaw.

  I blinked in confusion. Was Osh betraying us after all? Reyes hadn’t wanted to trust him, but I thought we could. I really thought he was on our side.

  I rose to my feet to try to reason with him. Osh, I could reason with. The Twelve, not so much.

  “Charley, no!” Denise said. She started to get up, but I held up a hand to stop her.

  Still, her cry was enough to get the attention of the others in the room.

  “’Bout time,” Osh said, doubling over and panting as the bikers came in behind me.

  Reyes watched Osh for a moment, turned his attention to the bikers, then focused on me. And I suddenly understood. The man before me, while in Reyes’s body, was not my husband.

  He stared at me a long moment, and what I saw was like something from a dream. Black fog drifted off his shoulders and down around him like a great cape. It pooled at his feet. His lips parted and he ran his tongue over his bottom lip. Or, Reyes’s bottom lip.

  Enough with the gawking. “Lucifer, I presume.”

  “You are more beautiful in your true form, but this isn’t bad either. You’ll taste good, I’m sure.”

  “What did you do with my husband?”

  “You mean my son? The son I created to carry out a mission, and he couldn’t even do that.”

  “And yet you don’t seem disappointed.”

  Osh was easing closer to me. Lucifer offered him a disinterested glance, then asked me, “Why would I be disappointed when my son did exactly as I knew he would? He always defied my orders. Why should my order to kill you be any different?”

  “So, you knew he would disobey you?”

  “It’s in his nature. He was never one to follow the rules. And I knew he would want to be with you, the Val-Eeth, the last of her kind, the most beautiful and the only pure ghost god ever to exist. He always was attracted to power.”

  “You know nothing about me.”

  “I know that you are the first god of pure light, the first pure ghost god born of two ghost gods ever to exist. I know you are the thirteenth. I know you have inherited all the power from all the gods ever to exist in your realm, and yet here you are, playing games with me. I am honored and appalled that you would think so much of these humans to risk your life for them. You must realize you have left your realm vulnerable. No telling what you’ll go back to.”