by Box Set
"She doesn't want to talk to you, Alec." Konstanz narrowed her eyes until they were slits of anger.
Well, that wasn't exactly true, but I wasn't going to argue. It wasn't about what I wanted. It was about keeping him at arm’s length for the rest of forever. I couldn't get over him if he kept up this permanent residence in my head.
"I don't care, Konstanz. This isn't about Navi. Or you." He looked up at me again, his eyes scanning my face with an intense desperation that made my skin flush and my heart pound.
"It's okay, Konstanz." I smiled reassuringly. She glared at him once more for good measure and then backed out of the way, letting him in. He edged around Elizabeth and shut the door behind him.
Wait.
He edged around Elizabeth.
"You can see her," I whispered in shock.
"Yeah. It's been quite a night. I need your help." I wanted to memorize every feature, every tight muscle against his t-shirt. I wanted to throw myself into his arms and sob because I'd missed him so much.
But that would only hurt worse. I had to hate him. I had to not let him hurt me. Because I couldn't survive this again.
"What happened to your shoulder?"
I twisted my head to see it. Yeah, it looked pretty awful. "Work. What do you want?"
Elizabeth gave me a pointed look. "Perhaps you should dress yourself, Navi. I feel this may not be a conversation to be had in a towel."
"They talk to you." His face was absolutely white. He shook like a small dog in a hurricane. My big, tough Alec was scared out of his mind. Which meant only one thing—he could see. Someone had opened his eyes and he could see my ghosts. And if he could see my ghosts, the demons would hunt him.
I swore. Several times. "Stay here. I'll be right back. Do. Not. Move."
I raced into the bedroom and threw on one of Bryson's sweatshirts he always left at my house. He had a bigger clothing budget than I did, and his clothes were softer than mine. Soft on my wounded shoulder would be fabulous. "Wait, at least let me wrap it. You'll get Bryson's clothes all bloody and you know how he hates that." Konstanz already had her kit in her hands, biting her lip as she watched me try to settle the fabric over the wound.
"I haven't, technically, gotten his clothes bloody before. Just dirty." The look she gave me said she was less than impressed. "Okay, just... let me get dressed. I can't—Alec is out there—they might—" I swore again under my breath. There was too much she didn't know. Too much I couldn't say or I'd open her eyes and she'd be in just as much trouble as Alec. And the sun, the blasted sun, had still not risen.
I pulled on shorts, pulled off the sweatshirt, and put on a sports bra, then hurried back out to the living room, Konstanz on my heels with her first aid kit. "One sec. Sit." I pointed to the seat across from me where I could keep an eye on him. Everything I'd gone through, everything I'd done for the last ten years, was all for nothing. He was a target now. It was my worst nightmare come true.
He sat, his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. "Can you tell them to let him in?" he mumbled through his fingers.
"What? What do you mean?"
"Bryson. Your friends won't let him in."
Konstanz's fingers stilled in her poking and prodding of my wound. "Have you lost your mind by any chance? Of course we'll let Bryson in. He's always here."
"Not you." He looked pointedly at me and then at Elizabeth.
"Alec." My throat was attempting to close in horror. "What do you mean they won't let Bryson in?"
He threw up his hands and now looked at Konstanz. This had to be the most frustrating conversation I'd ever had. "Bryson was in an accident down by Devil's Gate. He's in a coma with unexplainable injuries."
"What?" Konstanz asked, horror making her voice harsh.
But she wasn't as horrified as me. Because I suddenly realized exactly what Alec was saying. Somehow, the asuwangs had gotten Bryson—but not his soul. Not if he was here.
I looked at Elizabeth. She was watching me silently, her eyes wide and worried. Without a word, she turned and disappeared through the door.
Konstanz finished wrapping and I slid Bryson's sweatshirt over my head. "I'll call in sick to work. I’ll be at the hospital," she said quietly. Now she was shaking as hard as Alec. This was a disaster. The first guy Konstanz had seriously dated in ages, and this happens.
But that didn’t matter. Right now, I had to protect Alec and keep Konstanz’s eyes closed to the demons in the world.
Please, for the love of all that is holy, go, Konstanz. " If... if Bryson is-isn't okay, call me."
She nodded and practically sprinted out the door, still in her pajamas. The second she was gone, I turned on Alec. "Tell me what happened."
Elizabeth appeared through the wall. Bryson followed close behind. And he was a ghost. My hands shook and my stomach roiled dangerously as splotches appeared before my eyes. "Bryson! What happened?" Whirling on Alec, I cried, "I thought you said he was in a coma!"
"Is she going to be okay?" Bryson’s eyes followed Konstanz’s disappearing form.
I could only blink at him like he'd lost his mind. Adrenalin had kicked in, forcing my sluggish brain to function, but it didn't seem to be catching up with the conversation. "You are a ghost, Bryson. And you're worried about Konstanz?"
"I love her, Navi. You know that."
Alec’s head jerked his elbows slid off his knees, nearly plummeting him to the floor. "What?"
"Konstanz and I sorta… sorta fell for each other while I was trying to woo Navi. But Navi doesn’t mind," he finished in a rush.
"Not at all." And then I shook my head because really, this is what we were choosing to talk about right now?
"What happened, Bryson?"
"I followed you."
"You what? Why would you do that?" I screeched. Like a harpy eagle. Not my most beautiful moment.
"You lied to me! After everything we’ve been through!"
"Navi, your shoulder is bleeding," Alec murmured.
"Bryson, this is insane. Will you please just calm down and focus on the problem at hand?"
"Navi, you need to ice your shoulder." Alec nodded toward my wound, which I could feel swelling as the moon set and the sun rose and my magic faded.
Bryson ignored him. "You told us you're a probation officer."
"I am." I twisted my fingers. "Bryson, you're dead. My job is not what we need to be focused on. Tell me what happened." I think, I think this was the third time I'd asked him, and I still hadn't gotten any answers. Have you ever tried to mourn a loss when the person you're mourning is standing in front of you, accusing you of lying? It's difficult. Little bit.
"We were just trying to protect you. And you lied to us the entire time." Bryson shook his ghostly head and paced.
"Can I grieve, at least? Or do I not get to do that, either?" I snapped, because he was dead and in my living room and I wanted to cry and not have this conversation right now.
"He's not dead." Alec got up and went into the kitchen to dig through my freezer.
"You're not dead? Then how are you here?" I asked Bryson, relief sweeping through my blood like ice thrown on panicked fire.
"Why don't you tell me why you lied, first?" He crossed his arms and tried to look tough. Throwing up the hand that wasn't attached to my wounded shoulder, I turned my back on him to focus on Alec, who seemed terrified and more than a little shaken up, but he was rational, at least. He handed me an ice pack and pushed me down onto the couch. That brief contact sent heat flaring through my recently cooled blood, so fast and so fierce that my knees gave out and I sank obediently into the soft suede.
"Alec." My voice shook and I cleared my throat, trying to steady it. "Do you know what happened?"
Alec sat across from me again, close enough that our knees almost touched, staring at the floor. "They thought you were into some sort of trouble. They didn’t believe the work story you were feeding them—"
"I thought you were with some bad guys—"
"Bad guys? Are y
ou serious? I know what Alec thinks I am, but you...?" I glared at Bryson, forgetting for just a second that he was dead. Or not, as the case may be.
"Well you're gone all the time and you were moody and you had absolutely no interest in —"
"Navi, I don't think that, and can we please focus here? Bryson is in a coma." Alec sounded exhausted, and there was zero emotion in his voice as he stared at the carpet. Bryson, too, refused to look at me. "He followed you last night to the beach. Now that we're past the part where you look as idiotic as I did, would you like to tell the story, Bryson?"
My heart pounded. Alec thought what he'd done was idiotic. Bryson was dead but not dead. I couldn't process any of this information.
"I followed you to the beach. To Devil's Gate. And then you just... just disappeared, and I was trying to find you... and then this sea monster came out of the water and attacked me." I could hear genuine fear in his voice as his eyes widened and his entire countenance shook. I got up and crossed the room to him, standing so close that part of his hand swirled and disappeared in mine.
"Hey. It's okay. It's over and we'll fix this. But I have to know what happened."
He nodded, swallowing hard, although technically he didn't need to swallow at all.
"Then suddenly you were there again and you followed it. The monster. You followed it and it ran and you ran after it and then there were more of them, and there were ghosts everywhere and they wanted to kill me—"
"We did no such thing," Elizabeth interrupted. I’d almost forgotten she was there, but now she stood next to Bryson. "We thought he was in limbo. We forced him to leave." Elizabeth shook her head. "We didn't recognize him in this form."
I'd heard that ghosts looked different to each other than they did to us, so that made sense, although it didn't make things any easier on Bryson.
"I could see you talking to the ghosts, telling them what to do. I knew you'd be able to help me so I followed you home. But they wouldn't let me in."
Of course not. Because ghosts in limbo were dangerous. They possessed things and threw things and attacked things. "They were protecting me," I said softly.
He ran a trembling hand through his ghostly hair. "I couldn't get to you so I went and got Alec. He found my... my body and called 911."
"He's stable, but in a coma." Alec spoke for the first time in several minutes. I glanced at him over my shoulder, but he still stared at the floor.
"Did you try going back in? If you touch your body, it should just absorb your soul."
"This is the most surreal conversation I've ever heard," Alec mumbled. "Like you're giving him computer advice, except for bodies."
This had to be hard on him, too. I’d assumed he’d be with his new girlfriend this weekend. Probably not the way he’d planned to spend his Monday morning.
And he was talking. I shook my head, trying to focus. "Yeah, I did. But nothing happened."
I looked to Elizabeth. She was a ghost. Maybe she had answers. She shook her head, as lost as I was. "Okay. I have to talk to Death. He'll know what's going on."
Alec and Bryson both choked. "Death?" Alec gasped.
"Yeah. He's my boss." I ran a hand through my tangled, wet hair and moved away from Bryson. "You both have to know—I didn't tell you because I was trying to keep you safe. If I'd told you what I was, it would have opened your—like your soul's eyes, and you would be able to see the demons and the ghosts."
"Would that be so bad?" Bryson asked, his voice shaking as much as the rest of him.
Alec stared at me, dark blue eyes so intense and confused that it sent chills up and down my spine. How on earth he could have this effect on me in such an awful situation was just ridiculous. It was taking everything I had not to bury my head against his chest and beg him to understand. But I couldn't. I couldn't survive this pain again. I couldn't survive him again. "What do you mean you were protecting us?"
"If you'd opened my soul eyes or whatever, I would have seen the monster before it got right on top of me and I could have run away." It was the angriest at me I’d ever seen Bryson. Usually, he let me get away with everything—all my whining, crying, pouting, snapping, exhaustion, insanity. It was new territory we were in, and I wasn’t sure how to proceed.
"You can't run from them. And you saw it because you became a target. If I'd opened your eyes, they would have sent hunters after you. Like, immediately. Humans do not survive well when they can see."
"All this time?" Alec's voice was barely above a whisper as he met my eyes. I was shocked at the pain there. Bryson might be the one fighting for his life, but Alec was definitely the most hurt.
I left Bryson's side to kneel in front of Alec. He swallowed hard, his hands twitching where they rested on his knees. "Yes, Alec. All this time. I was protecting you. I... I couldn't put you in danger. Please, please don't be hurt. I loved you so much I would have done anything to keep you safe."
His pain-filled eyes widened and I realized what I'd said. But it wasn't exactly a surprise, was it? It was pretty obvious to everyone and their ghost how head over heels I was for him.
He cleared his throat. "But I can see them now."
I nodded. "Bryson opened your eyes when he came to you. Living in close proximity, in Bryson's home, it made it very easy. But now you're in a lot of danger, Alec. They'll hunt you, and you can't fight them."
"Will they come for me, too?" Bryson’s eyes were big, dark pits of terror against his translucent white face. "What about Konstanz? We have to keep her safe."
I rose, away from Alec, away from his pain. My body protested. It wanted to be near him, despite everything. Despite every painful thing he'd done for the last two months.
"I'll talk to Death, but I can't until the moon rises. We'll have to wait until then. Bryson, Elizabeth can show you the ropes, if you'd like. She’s been doing the ghost thing for quite a while." I offered my best encouraging smile.
"I'm not leaving you. You're the only one who can save me."
"Navi is the only one who can save any of us," Elizabeth said. "We don't have to be in her constant presence for her to do it."
"Please, Navi, don’t make me go. I... I don’t feel safe without you." I wanted to point out that just two minutes ago he’d been mad that I’d lied to him. But he was scared and confused. His mood swings were understandable.
"It's okay," I said when Elizabeth moved toward him. "It's fine. Of course you can stay with me. I just thought it might give you something to distract yourself. Why don't we go up to the hospital and see what's going on. Maybe I can figure something out from there."
Alec dug his keys out of his pocket. "I'm going home if you don't need me anymore."
Panic, sharp and overwhelming, shot through me. "No!"
He froze at the door. Elizabeth appeared in front of him, blocking the way. He could have walked right through her, but he wouldn't. I'd seen the way he'd edged around her before. "You don't still need me here, Navi. You can take care of Bryson. I have stuff to do."
I left Bryson to go to Alec, starting to feel like a ping pong ball between them. "You can't go anywhere without me, Alec. If they attack—"
"I'll run." He shrugged. "Or I'll keep my gun loaded all the time. It's fine, Navi."
I closed my eyes, grasping his wrist in case he tried to escape while I prayed for strength.
"You don't understand. You can't fight the demons. Only Navi or those in her employ can." Elizabeth peered around him as I opened my eyes. "But the asuwangs cannot come out in the day. He should be safe until the moon rises."
"Yeah, but we had three get away from us last night. I only caught one. That means the other two have shifted to a human form and they'll come after him as soon as they catch his scent." I turned to Alec. "You have to stay with me."
He looked, if anything, more tortured. "I'd rather take my chances with them."
Wow. Was I really that awful? A part of me wanted to stomp my foot and pout and tell him to go, to lash out because he'd hurt me. But
this was my job, my destiny. I protected people from the monsters. And Alec, more than anyone, I would not fail. "Alec." I forced myself to meet his gaze, no matter how beautiful it was, no matter how much it seared my soul. "Please?"
I could see the indecision warring across his face. "Navi, I'm like a foot taller than you and I outweigh you by a hundred pounds. I'll be fine."
"You can't kill them. Soul blades are the only thing that can kill them, and only an Agent and her army can wield them." If Elizabeth's face was any indication, she was completely annoyed at his argument.
It was part of the reason I adored her.
Alec's eyebrows raised—they didn't shoot up, like he was too exhausted to show adequate surprise. I moved in for the kill. "Please, Alec? Please stay with me." It was a risky little move, pulling that line. If he refused, it would cause me a lot of pain I wasn't sure I could handle. He had a girlfriend, he'd forgotten all about me, but hopefully that would bring back at least one good memory that would keep him here.
Where I could protect him and watch the pieces of my shattered heart slowly crumble away.
His face paled and he sucked in a breath, those gorgeous eyes searching my face for an answer I couldn't give him unless he asked. And then he nodded. "Okay. Fine, I'll stay. Thank you."
"We need a plan. Something proactive," Bryson mumbled and paced my small living room, walking right through the coffee table. "I’m dead. I don’t know how to be dead."
"You aren't dead, Bryson. And we'll fix you." I tipped my head to the side, considering him. "Actually, of all of us, you're the safest. Death can't take you while you're in limbo, although your body could die if we don't take care of it." His mouth dropped open and I rushed to continue, my hand out and placating. "But we are! So it's okay. And the asuwangs won't hunt you like they will Alec. They'll only attack if you get in their way." I gave him my very brightest smile, which was difficult given the tenseness of the situation. "See? You're all set."
"Navi," he growled. Bryson rarely growled. In the two months that I had seen him every single day in every free moment Konstanz had, he'd only been angry once. It was when I’d missed Konstanz’s birthday party because of a war on the beach. They’d invited guys from his work that I might be interested in. In my defense, it was better that I hadn’t gone because even now, all this time later, I had no desire to touch anyone or kiss anyone or be involved with anyone at all.
