Raising an eyebrow, she gave him a bored look. “Well, that’s easy. I was swayed by the dark side. You know—money, fame, fabulous boobs for all eternity. The norm. It paid off, don’t you agree?” She wiggled her body beneath him to express just how well it had paid off.
“Nice. Now the truth,” he demanded with a hint of the old hard-edged tone he’d always reserved just for her.
“That is the truth, ignoramus. You know what it comes down to when you die. You make a choice. I made mine.”
“How did you die?”
“Neiman Marcus fire sale. I was trampled in the rush to get to the half-off designer shoe rack. A pity, too. I would have rocked those heels. I have great legs.” To emphasize her point, she ran a calf along the length of his leg, wrapping it enticingly around his waist.
Kellen lowered his head, grazing his lips against her ear. “Did Neiman Marcus have fire sales in the dinosaur age?”
Jerking her head away from the hot, sweet feel of his breath against her ear, she spat out of the side of her mouth, “They were woolly mammoth-skin wedges with these cute little strappy things that went up over your calves. All the rage way back when, in the days of yore.”
“And in the days of yore, what was your life like? How old were you when you made this choice you seem so determined to prove you made?”
She bit her tongue—hard—and it wasn’t only because she didn’t want to dredge up the kind of pain her past wrought, but because this brick shithouse of a man was putting the kind of hurt on her that set her skin on fire and her toes curling. Not to mention her girlie bits. They, too, heard the sweet strains of violins playing.
“I’ve got all night, Marcella,” he crooned against the column of her neck.
“Yeah? Well, I’ve got all of eternity,” she shot back with dry sarcasm.
“Then we’d better get comfortable,” he offered, settling on top of her with a grunt. “Because you’re not going anywhere until I have some answers.” Plopping his head on her shoulder, he inhaled deeply.
Fury tickled her spine, and other things tickled her ovaries. “Why the fuck do you care how I became a demon or what my life was like before I was dead? What difference does it make now?”
Kellen’s head popped up again, his hazel eyes playful. “You know, when you swear, it’s a little hot. Add in that accent you try so hard to hide, and you’re officially smokin’. I’m just throwin’ that out there. Now, there’s a reason you’ve kept your death and afterlife a secret. I have every intention of finding out what it is.”
“For what purpose?”
“Call me curious.”
“I’m much more at ease with fucktard.”
His lips whispered over her shoulder, making her jump. “The way you roll your r’s is hot, too.”
“The way I roll you won’t be hot at all if you don’t get off me!” She lifted her hips with a hard shove, only to encounter the rigid line of his shaft, hard and pulsing. A groan slipped off her tongue before she had the chance to beat it into submission.
Kellen heard the hiss of it and acknowledged her yearning by rolling his hips into hers.
The awareness between them became thick, as though it had a life of its own, swirling in the air they inhaled with shuddering breaths. Lifetimes passed in the still of that moment. Her heart thrashing inside her chest, her eyes clung to his, knowing he felt the spark, too.
She watched Kellen war with his lust, turn it over in his mind, measure the consequences, just before he lowered his lips, so full and delicious, to hers.
That was his first mistake. The second was the notion she was going to let him plant those decadently fine lips on hers and get away with it. She’d never survive that memory. Marcella let her body go slack as if acquiescence was something she could no longer fight. When he sank into her, relaxing his body, she shoved him with a jolt of her palms against his shoulders. The slap of her hands against his flesh was enough of a shock for him to move just enough for her to wiggle out from under him and rise to the ceiling. “I don’t owe you explanations, Kellen, and you have no right to ask for them,” she seethed. “You never bothered to ask before, don’t bother now!”
Rising up, he sat at the edge of the bed in nothing but his boxer briefs. She had to avert her eyes to avoid the memory of all that luscious man just waiting for the taking. “Would you have told me if I’d asked?”
No. She probably wouldn’t have. Score one for the living. “That point is moot after all this time. And quit with the counselor-type questions. What happened to me, my choices, they’re no one’s business but mine. Now go to sleep and stop thinking me up in your perverted little fantasies about naughty demons gone wild. I can’t get away to try to find anything out if you keep dragging me back here. We have to figure out how to protect Carlos.”
There was no shame in his gaze, no hint that he was embarrassed. In fact, he smiled a wide grin, infuriatingly so. “Teachers.”
“What?”
“My fantasies have nothing to do with demons.”
“I believe I’ve pointed out the scholarly ones are always the kinkiest.”
He chuckled before sliding back between the sheets, Vern and Shirley curling up against the shelter of his side. “’Night, Marcella.”
“Good night,” she whispered, disappearing into the bedroom wall and out into the storefront before she threw herself at his mercy and sang like a canary.
Melancholy struck her when she passed Delaney’s herb catalog, lying open by the cash register. She missed her friend. These conflicting emotions about Carlos and Kellen were worthy of a good BFF powwow.
She lingered but a moment before clearing the front door and whisking her way to the park. Her favorite place to sit and think and wait in the hope that Darwin would reappear.
The wind was brisk when she slunk down onto what she’d dubbed her thinking chair. It whipped her hair around her face, whistling through the deep plum-colored night.
Maybe if she made the rounds of some of her old haunts, she could get someone to squeal like the wee little piggies they were. But that was a dangerous proposition without any demonic power to back her up. She didn’t know a whole lot about ghosts, but risking being banished somewhere that wouldn’t allow her to get back here would be foolish.
“Yo, yo, yo, babyyy,” a voice cackled from behind her left shoulder.
Marcella froze.
“Wha’s good, mama? Hey, you got any cash you could spare?”
Turning around, her gaze leveled at a young boy. Maybe no more than twenty. His gold-capped teeth flashed in the streetlamp when he gave her a malicious grin. The fist he’d propped on the top of the bench held a shiny knife. His eyes were wide, scanning the park wildly, and his pupils were dilated.
She sighed. “Darwin?”
“Tha’s right, my sistah. In somebody else’s flesh.”
“Where the hell have you been?”
His jittery, evasive response made her wince. “Around, and I ain’t been nowhere near that Rodriguez dude, copper. And tha’s all I’m sayin’. I ain’t no narc.”
The guilty response and paranoid sweep of his eyes made her roll hers. With two fingers, she opened his right eye wide and gazed into it. “Are you high?”
“As a fuckin’ kite, chiquita. I don’t mind sayin’, i’s aaa’ight, too. Crack’s underrated. E’rebody should do it. Just e’rebody. World would be boot-i-ful. No doubt.”
Flicking him in the side of the head, she pursed her lips at him. “Pull your pants up right now, you heathen, and come sit down. I need your help. And put that knife away before you hurt someone.”
Hopping over the back of the bench, he took his place beside her, using the knife to dig dirt from beneath his greasy fingernails. “So wha’s up, pretty lady?”
“Why do you keep possessing only chemically dependent bodies? It’s disgusting, and stop leering at my hooters. Isn’t there a nice little old lady’s body you can find?”
“Not at this time of night. Only
druggies and drunks hang out here this late.” He flung an arm around her shoulder with an awkward, jarring thunk, pulling her flush to his side.
“If you don’t take your arm off me, I’ll gnaw it off with my teeth. Now try to get past your crack-induced delusions to pay attention. I need your help. A little boy needs your help.”
He made a smacking noise from between his chapped lips. “Yeah. I know dat, fo sho.”
“What were you going to tell me before you passed out yesterday? I need to know what you meant when you said they want Carlos.”
A metaphoric light went off over his stained do-rag-covered head. “Oh, snap—yeah. Tha’s some badass crap gonna go down.”
Fear shot through her veins. “With Carlos?”
He sat up ramrod straight, rocking back and forth as he slapped his fingers on his thighs to a rhythm only he could hear in his head. “Dude, yeah. I don’t know the particulars. Just know what I told ya. I heard rumblings from some demons, and they say the little boy’s important to someone. I heard the kid’s name, but I got the hell outta there before they saw me. I don’t need no demon shit breathing down my back.”
Important? Because he could see dead people? “I don’t get it, Darwin. There are plenty of legit mediums, and demons aren’t beating down their doors to stop them from doing anything.”
He threw his hands up, palms forward. “Heyyy, quit puttin’ the heat on me, sistah. I told ya what I know. Now, about that cash . . .” His eyes lowered to the front of her dress again.
“Darwin?”
“Yeah?”
She wrapped her index finger and thumb around his nose and lifted his head, forcing him to look into her eyes. Eyes that held a plea she hoped would penetrate his hyperawareness. “Stop looking down my dress and get out of this body. Go back to that hell-hole plane and get me some answers. Do it discreetly, and do it now. Meet me back here tomorrow night when no one’s around, and for the love of Christ, try to find a nice, clean, sober hooker to possess. I need you to do this for me, Darwin. Please. I’ll never ask you to do another thing again, but we need your help. Kellen needs your help.”
Darwin popped up from the bench as though he were going to make his exit, but he whipped back around. “Sheee-it! There was something else I heard, too.”
“What? What else did you hear?”
Bending at the waist, he cupped his head in his skinny hands—hands that trembled. “Hold on. Lemme think. Fuck if this shit doesn’t make your brain move at warp speed.”
Marcella sprang to her feet, placing a comforting hand on Darwin’s back, reflecting on how touching things on this plane had become easier and easier. “Tell me how I can help.”
“There’s a box. A box, a box, a box!” he yelled triumphantly, frenetically.
“A box? A box that has to do with Carlos?”
“Yep, that’s it. A box with something bad in it. Tha’s what I heard. Tha’s all I heard, lady. Don’t try to squeeze me for nuthin’ else. You can’t make me talk, copper!” He began to back away, slinking into the dark night thick with the smells of the city. The sound of police sirens off in the distance left her with nothing but the echo of his sneakered feet, beating a frantic path away from the park.
What could he possibly mean? A box. A box with something bad in it. It made no sense to her. Where was this box?
Maybe the crack was confusing him.
But then a glimmer of a memory from long, long ago whooshed through her brain like a freight train out of control.
A box.
There was once a box. A box with something bad in it.
Oh, holy mother of all things unholy.
No.
Jesus, please.
No.
seven
Marcella flew through the doors of the store the moment day broke, surprised to find Kellen awake and pacing in front of a man who was vaguely familiar. She’d battled the remainder of the night over whether she should tell Kellen what Darwin had shared last night. She couldn’t even be positive what he’d shared was accurate due to his drug-induced state. But that message about the box had scared the ghostly shit out of her. How it related to Carlos had her baffled, but she intended to find out if it meant anything at all.
She peered around Kellen’s shoulder, fighting the impulse to inhale his freshly washed hair curling over the back of his neck. His hooded sweatshirt and low-slung jeans, comfortable and worn, gave bow-chick-a-wow-wow a whole new meaning. That lingering sharp jab her heart experienced each time she saw him as of late returned full throttle. “Fashion consultant?”
When he turned to face her, he smiled. It had a welcoming glow attached to it that left her breathless. “Hey, how was your night?”
Marcella scowled in return. “You care why?”
“Because it’s nice to inquire after someone when you’re maintaining a healthy relationship.” As the words left his mouth, Marcella saw the tic in his jaw jump. Just a little, but jump it did. He could still be egged on if she just kept pushing.
Good times.
She’d decided last night she wasn’t going to make her stay here on this plane easy for him. They weren’t going to be friends. They weren’t going to smile fondly over old times as they forged new ones. The further she pushed him away, the less likely he’d be interested in dragging her past out of her. “How sunshiny. My nights are all the same, thanks to you, you suck-ass. That translates to, I have no nights, and no days either. I don’t sleep. I don’t eat. I just drift. So thanks. Buttloads. If you hadn’t thought me up, I’d be off spreading my cheer and goodwill to a bunch of lame undecideds.”
“And unable to help Carlos.”
“I wouldn’t know Carlos existed if you hadn’t sucked me into this mess.”
“Then accept my deepest, most heartfelt apologies.”
Cocking an eyebrow, she tilted her chin up and gave him a haughty glare. “No.”
His wide shoulders shrugged affably. “Suit yourself. Right now I have bigger problems.” Pointing to the agitated ghost in the corner, Kellen ran a hand of frustration through his hair. “He’s been here for over an hour, dancing around, repeating something I can’t make head or tail of. I don’t even know who he is. The only thing I can pinpoint is he definitely has that John Travolta move down to a science.”
“That’s because you’re a child.” Marcella eyed the man and his outfit, a metallic copper shirt, open to his waist, tucked into tight, white pants.
“Compared to you, Methuselah, I suppose some might see it that way.”
She almost grinned—because this was familiar, welcome even. A warmth spread through her, but she managed to contain her smile of fond familiarity. “You really don’t know who that is?”
“Not a clue.”
“You know why that is, Kellen?”
“Why is that, Marcella?”
“Because you spend too much time watching the Golf Channel.”
“That’s not one hundred percent true. Sometimes I get cagey and watch entire marathons on the Food Network.”
“It’s Maurice Gibb. You know, the Bee Gees?”
“The who?”
Her sigh was put-upon. “The Bee Gees. ‘Stayin’ Alive’? You know, the aforementioned John Travolta?”
His handsome face was blank. Still beautiful, but blank.
“Forget it. Did you ever do anything fun, or did you spend all of your teenage years dissecting poor frogs and studying the Earth’s crust?”
The spot on the right side of his jaw began to pulse, meaning he’d begun to simmer. “Excuse me. I’m an assload of fun.”
“Do they tell you that at the senior citizens’ center?”
The twitch of his jaw came as fast as it went. His hard face relaxed again, and he slapped a placid mask on. “Every Wednesday at eight when I give my dissertation on global warming. You don’t know what you’re missing. Standing ovations as far as the eye can see.”
The giggle that fled her lips burst out before she could stop it. “Wha
tever. The Bee Gees were huge in the seventies. I’ll chalk up your not knowing that to your youth and the fact that you come from another dimension, where music and dancing are considered frivolous and the work of the devil. So let me see if I can figure out what he wants.”
“You go, Dancing Queen,” Kellen quipped, sweeping a hand in front of him to signify Maurice was all hers.
From a distance, she could see Maurice’s lips move fervently, but she couldn’t make out what he was saying while he jabbed a finger up in the air, then plunged it down to his waist to the music in his head. His copper shirt, unbuttoned to the waist, and his tight, white pants made Marcella grin. “Maybe he’d be able to communicate better if his pants weren’t so tight. It’s got to make it hard to think.” She sighed wistfully. She’d done her share of the Hustle in clubs all over New York back in the day. “I so miss platforms and picking out my hair.” She tugged a tendril, letting it curl around her finger.
Sauntering toward him, Marcella watched his lips move more closely. She gave him a saucy wink as he twirled. “So, Maurice. What brings you to our corner of this plane?”
When she caught his attention, Marcella couldn’t help but wonder at the look of relief on his face at seeing her. Maurice looked as though he’d been waiting on her forever by the way he threw his hands up in the air in a gesture that said “it’s about damned time.”
He gave her a sad gaze, filled with pity, and pointed a finger at her chest. “How can you mend a broken heart?”
Marcella clapped, pulling her hands to her chest with a smile. “That was a good one, but by far my favorite from that soundtrack has to be ‘More Than a Woman.’ In fact, I’d venture to say it could’ve been my theme song. I was quite the viper until just recently.”
Maurice shook his head in exasperation that bordered on angry. Once more, he pointed a finger that smacked of accusation. “Jive talkin’,” he spat out.
She experienced a jolt of defensiveness when he threw the song title out with such a bitterly harsh ring to it. “Hey! Don’t get all huffy with me, crooner. I’m just trying to help. You know, I was a big fan of the Bee Gees, and I had an übercrush on Andy. Don’t be so cranky.”
My Way to Hell Page 11
