by Mina Carter
He nodded and turned to the uniform he was talking to. Troy headed the opposite direction, locking gazes with Laney to let her know he could see her. Only an idiot wouldn’t pick up that he wanted to talk to her, and Laney was no idiot. She nodded slightly and turned, walking through the crowd to a big black monster of a motorcycle. Troy’s breath caught in his throat at the sight. He’d had too many friends killed on the back of those things to be entirely comfortable with her riding one. His jaw clenched.
Either way, it was another part of the conversation they were going to have.
Chapter Two
I mingled with the crowd against the cordon and watched Troy and his partner get out of the car. My breathing caught in the back of my throat as butterflies decided my stomach was ground zero for a head-banging concert. The man looked just as good, better in fact, in the daylight. How the fuck did he do that?
He walked beside his partner, looking all sexy and not disheveled, but a little… mussed and tired. The dark shadow on his jaw made my fingers itch to stroke it, and the rest of him. I bit my lower lip as memories from last night rolled through my mind. Damn right he should look tired, the stamina the man had was awe inspiring. So much so, I had to check his timeline several times to ensure he was just human.
Yup. Just human.
Coffee mug in hand, he barely looked at the scene. Instead he was scanning the crowd. When his eyes met mine, my heart leapt. Stupid thing. Despite the Grimm’s current silence, I knew things between us couldn’t go anywhere. Reapers were always on the job, day and night, and how the hell was I going to explain that to a normal? Worse, to a cop.
Hey, sweets, I kill people for a living. We cool? Yeah, that would fly like a lead balloon.
Then it hit me. He could see me. Again. He didn’t break eye contact as he headed to his car. No words, but I got the message. Nodding, I turned and headed to my bike. We needed to talk and it wasn’t the kind of talk we could have with an audience.
I set off up the road, making sure to keep him in my mirrors as I went. The little devil on my shoulder urged me to take off, break the speed limit. Anything that could get me arrested. A hot shiver whispered through my body. Cuffs and Troy, now there’s an explosive situation waiting to happen. I couldn’t wait.
A quick twist on the throttle sent the bike roaring away, and I caught sight of his surprised face for a moment in the mirror before distance rendered him indistinct. I could almost hear the frustration as he put his foot down, chasing me but there was no way he’d catch me when I was on these two wheels. Let’s just say, you won’t find a model like mine from any dealer or manufacturer anywhere in the world. Hell, even I wasn’t sure what its top speed was.
I sat on a picnic table off the road a little way ahead when he skidded to a stop. He got out of the car and slammed the door shut behind him to stalk over to me, anger rolling off him in waves.
“Just what the fuck was that?”
Concerned-Troy from last night had been cute. Sweet-Troy patching up my injuries…sexy. Angry Troy glaring down at me like that? I’m a twisted bunny because that was as hot as all the hells. Yeah, I said hells. Plural. Way plural. Oh, you thought there was just one? That’s cute.
“What?” I looked at the road with a look as innocent as I could manage.
“You know exactly what I mean!” he growled and slammed his hands down on either side of my hips. I swear I felt the wood crack but kept my eyes level to his. He was strong for a human. Most wouldn’t have moved the wood at all.
“That little ride?” I couldn’t help it, the snark always managed to escape. If I tried to hold it in, I’d explode or something. “You might want to get your car checked out. It’s a bit on the slow side.”
He snarled a curse dirty enough to make a marine blush. “You could have been killed. Doesn’t that bother you? Because it sure as hell bothers me!”
I already had my mouth open to throw something back when his last words registered. I shut my mouth with a click and looked at him. He cared. He actually cared. About me. The emotion wrapped around him like a cape as he glared back.
Fuck. Me.
There is a moment in every reaper’s life when we have to make that decision. A crunch moment. The moment we have to come clean and tell someone not in the life what we are and what we do. My grandpop told me about his crunch moment. The conversation when he’d told my nanna, before they were married, what he was and what he did for a living. Her reply has been family lore for decades. “Well, Jack, there’s death and taxes and I’m sure as damnation not marrying a taxman.”
This was my moment. I knew it as sure as eggs were eggs and grass was grass. It was a soul-deep knowledge that clanged with finality. I knew if I made some snarky comment and walked away, I would never tell a non-reaper what I was. Who I was on the inside. I couldn’t do that. It would be tantamount to shutting myself away and never reaching out again.
“Laney? Are you listening to me?” His demand brought me back to the present, to face the frustration, anger, and fear etched onto his face. Whoa, I was responsible for dragging all that depth of feeling from him?
“No.” I shook my head, realizing I’d answered his questions out of order. “Sorry, I mean, yes. I’m listening. But no, I’m not worried about being killed.”
He started to speak, then stopped with his mouth half open. A frown drew little furrows in his forehead. “You’re not? Why the hell not? What do you think you are, immortal or something?”
I choked back a laugh. He was serious, and I shouldn’t find his concern so amusing but I couldn’t help it. It was sweet.
“Not immortal, no. I can die. I just can’t be killed.”
He looked at me as though I was one nugget short of a happy meal. To be fair, in his shoes, I’d be calling the men in white coats to bring out the latest model of hug-me jackets.
“What do you mean, you can die but not be killed? That makes no sense at all.”
Birds tweeted in the trees behind us, sounding way too happy with life as I debated how to answer. No doubt the more scholarly amongst the Reaper families would have found an eloquent way to explain it, but I’m a blunt kind of girl. I kill things for a living, so my social niceties aren’t the best developed.
“Can’t kill something that’s death.”
“Dead?” Anger flirted with Troy’s expression, his lips drawing tight. “Do you think I’m stupid? I know you’re not human, but you’re not dead, you’re breat—”
I put my fingers over his mouth. They were soft and instantly my memory provided sensory recollection of what they’d felt like against mine, and other places.
My voice was soft when I spoke. “I didn’t say dead, Troy. I said death. I am Death. A collector of souls. That’s why I was at the accident… I was there to send their souls to the afterlife.”
Her words stopped Troy dead. The anger rolling through his body drained as he tried to process what she was telling him. He’d been so worried—No, that was the wrong word. He’d been scared out of his damn mind—when she’d taken off on that monster bike of hers. Lean, low and deadly-looking, it was some kind of superbike, but not one he recognized. Like her, it slipped in and out of focus if he tried to look directly at it.
But all that slid away in the face of…this.
Death. Collecting souls.
Somehow that didn’t mesh with the image she presented to the world. Sexy, pixie biker chick. Her hair was pulled up into a messy pleat his fingers itched to drive into, and pull free. The memory of her silken hair running through his hands the night before hit him hard, precipitating a very typical reaction down below. From her tousled hair, to the bee stung pout of her lips and curvy little body, she looked about as dangerous as a wet kitten.
Appearances were deceptive though. Last night had taught him that. She’d taken on the werewolf in his kitchen with nothing more than those blades of hers, the ones that even now hid in the back of her belt, and dangerous didn’t cut it. Lethal was nearer the mark.
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“What… Like the Grim Reaper?” he joked, trying for a smile from her pretty lips. “Aren’t you—”
“A little fat?” She cut him off with a smile, but not the one he’d hoped for. It didn’t reach her eyes. Shit. She was serious. She thought she was fat. Realizing that he’d strayed into one of those female danger areas and his response could hit hard and deep, he paused and looked at her directly.
“Breathing. You’re breathing, babe.” Stepping closer, he nudged her thighs wider apart so he could ease between them. She let him, interest and growing heat stark in her eyes. Open. Honest. Not hiding anything. He loved that about her. There was no pretense or coyness. No games. He couldn’t stand games. His bitch of an ex had been all about them. Right before she’d been murdered by the first wave of vamps to hit the town. “And I don’t want to hear you say you’re fat again. You’re not.”
A gentle finger hooked under her chin made her meet his eyes and he bent his head to brush his lips against hers.
“I love your curves. And I loved feeling them pressed against me last night as I fucked you.”
He wasn’t usually crude like that. Unlike a lot of guys, Troy believed in respecting a woman. Treating her like a princess. But that didn’t mean it was all rainbows and unicorns. Sometimes he wanted to wrap a woman’s hair around his fist to hold her still while he drove into her hard and fast.
“And I fully intend to enjoy them again.”
Her breathing caught, the little hitch accompanied by a sudden darkness in her eyes that made him want to push her back onto the picnic table and work through every one of the fantasies plaguing him since he’d woken that morning.
With a groan, he gave up resisting temptation and covered her mouth with his. Her lips were just as soft and perfect as they had been the night before. Sweet and pliable as he parted them with a sweep of his tongue and drove inside to sample her mouth again. She whimpered, a sexy little sound he felt more than heard, and one that kicked his already rampant arousal into high gear.
Breathing heavily, he broke away before things could get out of hand. As much as he wanted them to, a picnic table at the side of the road wasn’t the right place. The last thing he needed was to get arrested for public indecency, especially in the company of a…what?
Resting his forehead against hers, he cupped the side of her neck in one hand. His thumb stroked her cheek gently. “So. Death, huh?”
She gave a tiny little nod, but didn’t pull away from the caress. Instead she closed her eyes, leaning into it. Troy’s inner caveman roared and beat his chest. She was his for the taking. He knew it as sure as he breathed air.
“I’m a Reaper.” Her voice was soft and he got the feeling she’d never said that to anyone…normal? Someone like him who didn’t know what she was on sight. “Not the Grim Reaper. More a descendant, shall we say?”
Troy couldn’t help it, a snort of amusement escaped. The idea of the Grim Reaper getting his sexy on was too weird, even for Liberty. “So ol’ Boney got the chance to knock boots, huh?”
The soft, musical sound of her laugh wrapped around his heart. “Yeah, no… That didn’t happen. Few bits missing for that I think.”
She pulled back to look at him. God, she was so tiny it made his heart ache. How could someone who looked so alive be Death incarnate?
“It’s more we carry a piece of him.” She tapped her temple. “In here. That’s what gets passed down.”
“We?” He couldn’t keep the curiosity out of his voice. “There are more of you?”
“Hell yeah.” She smiled, indulgently. Like he was a toddler who’d learnt something new. It was cute so he didn’t take offense. “Whole families, all over the world. I inherited it from my grandpop.”
Families. Grandpop. The ground might as well have rocked beneath his feet as the world tilted and grew. Shit, and he’d thought the boggarts were bad. Finding out there were whole families of Reapers blew his mind.
“So, that’s what brought you to Liberty?” He slid his hand down to the back of her hips, spreading his hand out to pull her up snuggly against the erection trapped in his pants. It was so not professional, but he didn’t care. He needed her to know how badly she affected him.
She nodded and tilted her head at the slight pressure of his fingers. He didn’t pass up the offer, as manipulated as it was, and slid his mouth along her neck to the soft spot behind her ear that made her shiver.
“Yeah. If there’s a reap to be done nearby, I can see it. Like a line in the corner of my eye.” Her hands swept up his arms and over his shoulders to clutch at his collar, as though she needed something to hold onto. She paused, her body stiffening. “Lines. Lots of them.”
“It gets that bad? How do you see?”
He nuzzled her neck again, but she pushed him away, her expression concerned. “Shit. New lines. There are souls to be reaped. Silver…I mean human ones.”
Decoding her words took an extra half second, then a chill ran down his spine. Reaped meant someone was about to die. More than one someone. He took a step back, the cop training forcing its way to the forefront.
“Where? How many?” More important questions to ask at the moment than who. Identity came later, after they’d stopped whatever was going to happen. If she knew someone was about to die, then surely they could stop whatever caused the death.
“It doesn’t work like that. I don’t get details. But I’m violent deaths.” She slid off the table and strode toward her bike. Stones crunched underfoot. “So if it’s calling me, it means an accident, or murder.”
The chill emanating from the bike matched the one that wrapped Troy in its coils. Like it watched him, judged him, and found him wanting. Very much wanting. If it had lips, it would have curled them and bared its teeth. His steps slowed. He didn’t want to get near the thing, but she strode on.
“Stop that,” she snapped, slapping the tank as though the bike were alive. Troy was very much afraid it was. “I like him, so if you scare him off, there’s gonna be a scrapyard in your immediate future. And a crusher. See how you get out of that.”
She swung her leg over the saddle and for a moment he thought he saw a swirl of something, like black robes, out of the corner of his eye. He shook his head. There was no way she’d grown by a couple of feet and acquired a scythe. She’d said herself she was just a reaper, not the big guy himself.
She kicked the bike into life. It roared, the sound far deeper and more animalistic than he’d expected. Hell, he didn’t know what to expect. Not from her. She grabbed the handlebars, turning the front wheel then paused to look at him.
“Unless you like riding pillion, I suggest you keep up,” she said with a jerk of her head toward his car. “And you might want to call for backup. Three at the same time is bad.”
Kicking the bike into gear, she twisted her wrist and roared away. He turned and raced for his car, yanking the door open and sliding into the driver’s seat in the same movement. The door was still open as he hit the gas, only slamming shut when he skittered sideways onto the road.
Spotting Laney up ahead, he gunned the engine to keep up. He still didn’t know how this all worked, but his mind was already a few steps ahead. If she knew when people were about to die… that was one hell of an early warning system. Used right, they could get there and stop the death. He didn’t buy into the whole ‘our lives are pre-destined.’ If they could stop whatever it was killing these people, then they could save lives. Surely?
One hand on the wheel, he speed-dialed the station as he drove, taking note of the direction they were heading. “Yeah, hello? This is Regan. I got possible homicides on the west side of town. Turning onto Fourth, now onto Weston Avenue. Get me some units down here. Not sure what we’re going to find, so call an ambulance as well.”
He clicked the cell off and concentrated on following the speeding bike. Whatever else she was, she was a hell of a rider. He’d never seen anyone throw a bike around like that before, her turns so low her knee almost ki
ssed the ground. But each time he thought she was about to come off, she pulled it back and sped off, proof that neither bike nor rider were anything close to ordinary.
Lights ahead brought a smile to his face. Several cars with all their lights blazing pulled around a house. He slowed to a stop behind Laney.
“They’re quick,” he commented as he got out the car. “We might have a chance here.”
More cars pulled up. John and the captain were already out of their vehicles, guns in hand. Troy frowned. That was unusual. Reilly normally didn’t head out on scene, but didn’t live too far from here so perhaps he’d been on his way home.
John looked up at the sound of Troy’s steps, surprise on his face. “You psychic or something now? We just got the call. Neighbors reported screams.”
Troy’s weapon was in his hand before he could think about it. “No shit? I just called in myself.” He jerked his head back toward Laney, who had paused in front of the building with her cell phone in her hands, thumbs tapping away.
“Got a tip off. Paranormal. A good one though,” he added, as two pairs of eyes cut to her with suspicion. Last thing he wanted was any of them taking a shot at her. Mostly because he wasn’t sure what the hell would happen.
Reilly nodded, his eyes way too speculative for Troy’s liking, but then his attention turned back to the building. “Screams to the rear. Family house. Registered to a Mr. and Mrs. Kaufman. I’ll take the front, you two take the back?”
They headed for the front gate, but before they could get through Laney shouted, “Stop!”
All three wheeled around, the captain with a less than impressed expression on his face. Laney walked toward them, tucking her cell into her back pocket. “No one goes in there but me.”
Reilly looked at Troy, his sidelong glance full of wtf?
“Captain, this is Laney. My…” What was she? He didn’t want to say ‘hookup last night.’ The guys didn’t need to know they’d been up close and personal. “My paranormal insider. Got me here before it went out on general dispatch. Laney, this is my boss, Captain Reilly, and my partner Detective Johnson.”
