Conah grabbed my hand, and the world splintered.
We materialized outside, a good distance away from the club, but close enough to still see the queue snaking out from the doors.
Conah didn’t stop to look back, though. He gripped my hand and tugged me away down the street.
I trotted to keep up with him. “What was that about?”
“That was Grayson Loch being a domineering wanker.”
It was the first time I’d heard him swear like this. “Who is he?”
“Alpha of the Regency Pack. Fucking loup-garou royalty in the shifter circles.”
“What does he want with me?”
He stopped and stared at me as if trying to put together a puzzle. “Fee, have you looked in a mirror lately?”
Mal’s hot gaze on my naked body came to mind.
“You’re an attractive woman,” he said. “And Grayson is a very hot-blooded loup.”
“But I thought you said demons smell bad to a loup.”
“They do. But you’re not pure demon. You have demon blood, which is different. We don’t know how that changes things. We don’t know how that will affect your connection with the scythe.”
“Conah, I heard you and Mal talking earlier, you were arguing about me …”
He ran a hand over his face in agitation. “It was nothing. You shouldn’t worry about it.”
Annoyance flared in my chest. “Don’t you think I have a right to know?”
He made a sound of exasperation. “Yes, of course, you do. But I need to be sure. I need to know for sure that what I tell you is fact, and I need to have solutions.”
“To my being broken?”
His eyes widened, and he grabbed my shoulders, hauling me close, so he could look down at me. “You are not fucking broken, okay. You’re amazing, and strong and, fuck, Fee, you have no idea how enticing you are with your confidence and your compassion and that pouty fucking mouth of yours.”
Oh …
He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and exhaled through his nose. “I’ll be damned if I’ll put a dent in that with misinformation.”
His lips were so close, too close. His eyes darkened, focused on my mouth. My pouty fucking mouth. Kiss me.
He released me and turned his face away. “I can’t.”
Fuck had I said that out loud?
His shoulders rose and fell as he took a deep breath. “I promise you, once I have answers, I’ll let you know.”
Anger pricked at my throat. “I have a right to be involved, Conah. I’m not a fucking child. I can help figure shit out.”
“I’m trying to protect you.”
“I don’t need you to protect me. I’ve been protecting myself all my life. I don’t need anyone.”
He reached for me, and his fingers brushed my cheek. “We all need someone, Fee. And we all need protecting sometimes.”
He walked off again, expecting me to follow, and my ire rose. I was a grown woman. A woman who’d taken care of herself all her life. How dare he treat me like a damsel who had no clue.
“Fuck you, Conah. I’m going home.” I crossed the street and headed toward the nearest train station.
Forget the dagger, forget Peiter, forget reaper land. This was a mistake. This wasn’t my world. I needed to get home to Cyril and Cora. I needed my things, my room. I needed a moment to think.
“Fee, wait!”
I broke into a jog to get away from him. Unlikely that would work, but still. I took a left at the intersection onto a quiet cul-de-sac, and then a right down a side street. I knew this area well. Five minutes, and I’d be at an underground station. I exited the side street and crossed the road to the station. The moon, full and proud, looked down on me as if to say, you go, girl, you got this. But it didn’t feel good.
This felt like running away.
Fuck me and my anger.
Guilt gripped me. I glanced back. No sign of Conah. Had he given up following me? No … He wouldn’t have … What was I doing, storming off like this? Fucking childish move. I’d go back and smooth shit over. I turned and started walking back the way I’d come. Warning bells went off in my head a moment before a male bellow cut through the silent night.
Conah.
I broke into a run, boots hammering the ground, and then skidded to a halt at the entrance to the side street. I peered around the wall, into the dark. Déjà vu assaulted my senses as I found Conah on his knees, shoulders heaving, while several figures surrounded him. No. This could not be happening again. Fucking alleys. I caught a glimpse of the nearest one’s face. There were dark pits where the eyes should be. These were the guys from the club, the ones who’d been watching Conah. Not hooded figures but something else.
Monsters.
They circled Conah like vultures.
Fuck. I had to do something. But I had no weapon. Why hadn’t I insisted on bringing my dagger? The dagger I had no idea how to use, but how hard was it to fucking stab someone? Urgh. Impotence was a band around my chest. I’d failed to save Peiter. I couldn’t fail Conah too. I had to do something.
The scythe. I had my scythe. It would have to do. Problem was, we hadn’t covered how to make it appear in training yet. What else did I have? A clutch with a stick of lip gloss and some money in it. Fucking great.
A figure materialized out of the darkness, tall, slender, too pale, and most definitely female. Crimson eyes looked down on Conah from a lofty height. Long crimson hair kissed high cheekbones, and strange ridges skated across the bridge of her nose. But even with the ridges, she was too beautiful to be a monster. What the fuck was she?
“Hello, son of Adam,” she said. “We’ve been waiting for you.”
Fucking hell, even her voice was beautiful, like sunshine and honey.
Conah raised his head. “No hooded figures to do your dirty work tonight, Evelyn?”
Her brow furrowed. “Hooded figures?”
Conah coughed and clutched his torso. “Never mind.”
He was testing her, and he’d just confirmed she had nothing to do with Peiter’s death.
“I heard about your brother,” Evelyn said. “Tell me … How did he die?”
“Fuck you.”
She moved so fast she was a blur, and then she had Conah by the hair, head yanked back.
“You will answer me, reaper.”
“No,” Conah bit out. “No, I won’t.”
Evelyn leaned in. “Always so difficult. Always so proud.”
“Not always,” Conah said softly. “Not with you.”
Something crossed Evelyn’s face, sorrow, regret, it was hard to make out, and it was gone too soon to hold onto.
“Last chance,” Evelyn said. “Just tell me what I need to know.”
“Like I said before, fuck you.”
“Oh, but you already did that,” she drawled, and then her mouth opened, her jaw unhinged, and her maw elongated even more.
Conah began to glow as if activated by her open mouth.
Oh, fuck. Oh, God. A Dread. She was a fucking Dread, and she was about to feed off Conah.
I shook my right hand and then opened and closed my fist. Come on, scythe, where the fuck are you?
Please.
Please, come on.
Nothing happened except Evelyn’s head whipping toward Conah’s face.
Terror short-circuited my brain and galvanized my body into action. With a battle cry, I barreled into the street, swinging my clutch like a lethal weapon. The pit-eyed guys ran at me as one. Fuck!
I smacked one in the face with my bag, putting all my force into the swing, and then dropped it and went in for a jab with my fist. It connected with a satisfying crunch. The guy went down, but another took his place, hissing in my face, showcasing elongated canines.
Vampire.
Frozen shit!
I punched him in the mouth, grazing my knuckles on his teeth. Fuck, that hurt. Talons swung at my face. I ducked and jabbed, connecting with a crotch and eliciting a pained grunt.
The vampire went down, clutching his jewels, but the one I’d punched in the face was back up. He approached slowly, and two of his comrades joined him. They circled me.
Shitting hell. Okay, I had this. I could do this. But my legs trembled, and my stomach was alive with crawly things that made me want to puke. Then the street lit up as the moon peeked out from behind a cloud. Heat coursed through my veins, my vision sharpened, and the crawly things in my stomach morphed into something dark with claws. It swelled until it filled my body, and then I was pushed into the back seat as my body took over, moving of its own accord.
Get to Conah. I had to get to Conah.
The vampires attacked, or maybe I attacked them. It didn’t matter. They had to die. I had to tear them up. I felt a blow here, a punch there, but it was as if the pain was at a distance. Adrenaline was my fuel and the clawed monster that had taken me over needed nothing else.
All that mattered was saving Conah.
Keep hitting, keep moving. But then my forward motion was halted by a hand at my throat. My feet left the ground, and the world tilted. Pain blossomed across the back of my head. Ooh, pretty stars.
I was down. Vision compromised. Fuck! I lashed out, raking and shoving at the weight on top of me, at the hand pinning me. And then my face was shoved to the side to expose my throat.
Hell, no.
Argh. Pain ripped through me. He was feeding on me. On my blood. I was going to die. My hand tingled and heated, and then a weight settled into it.
The scythe. Hope was a fresh wave of adrenaline.
I brought the scythe up and buried the blade in my attacker’s body. The vampire tore its fangs from my throat with a gurgle and fell off me, turning to dust as he hit the ground. I rolled and stood, swinging the scythe to keep the other vampires at bay. Light filled the street, spilling from my blade in an arc of power.
The vampires fell back.
“Conah!”
The Dread lifted her maw and released Conah. He toppled onto his side with his back to me.
I stared at the Dread, at her soulless eyes and her grotesque mouth, and then down at Conah’s lifeless form.
Not again. Fuck, please, not again.
Chapter Nineteen
Conah wasn’t moving. He wasn’t breathing.
A scream of rage surged up my throat and smashed into the air. My boots beat the ground as I hurtled toward her, scythe ready to take off her head.
Her hands shot up, and power slugged me in the chest, throwing me backward. I hit the ground on my ass, and the world dimmed for a moment.
No. Losing consciousness wasn’t an option. I rolled onto my front and braced myself on the ground.
“Get away from him. Get away …” Shit, I needed to catch my breath.
The world was too silent.
The air still.
They were gone.
Conah? I staggered toward him, fighting the darkness at the edge of my vision. My knees hit the ground beside him.
“Conah.”
I rolled him onto his back and pressed my fingers to his pulse. Oh, God. Thank God. His pulse was weak, but it was present, and that was all that mattered. Alive. He was … The world tried to tilt, and my neck throbbed. My hand came away sticky with blood. Losing blood. Shit. Why wasn’t I healing this time? The scythe was here. It should heal me …
I had to stay conscious. If I passed out, then Conah could die before anyone found us. Why the fuck couldn’t I teleport? My phone? Where was it? I spotted my clutch not too far away and crawled toward it. Cora … I’d call Cora. Cora would get help. Cora would come and …
The world went dark.
“Fee? Oh, God. Fee!”
Pressure on my neck.
Cora? Why wasn’t my mouth working? My pouty fucking mouth. I needed to open my eyes.
“Fee, oh, fuck. What do I do? The cops. No. That Grigori dude. Shit, what was his name?”
“Uri …” My voice was a croak.
Cora let out a laugh that was part sob. “Oh, babe, you’re alive. Okay, Uri. I need to find … Hey! You. Come here. Spread the word. We’re looking for a Uri, Grigori. It’s reaper-related and urgent. You get him now!” The pressure on my neck increased. “Babe. Babe, you’re bleeding out. Oh, fuck. I can’t.”
I wanted to hug her. To tell her it would be okay. “Conah?”
“Breathing, last I checked. Just hold on, babe.”
“What is this?”
That voice. I knew that voice.
“Are you Uri?” Cora asked.
Darkness took me once more.
* * *
“Fee? Babe? Can you hear me?”
The world claimed me back in increments. I opened my eyes to low lighting and a beloved face.
Cora smiled, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. “Hey, sleepyhead.”
Her voice was thick with emotion. Why? Why was she—oh, shit. It all came rushing back—the attack, Conah, my neck. My hand flew to my throat. Healed and smooth.
I struggled to sit up. “Conah …”
“Is fine.” Cora pushed me back down to the pillows. The poufy pillows from my underworld room.
Wait … “You’re here.”
She frowned. “Yes, babe. I’m here.”
“And so am I,” Cyril’s sibilant voice said from my right.
I looked down to see him lying across my bed, his head by my elbow.
He nodded with his perpetual snake smile. “You gave us quite a scare.”
“How are you both here?”
Cora pursed her lips. “Like hell was I letting you out of my sight. I made that Grigori bring me with you. I told him, in no uncertain terms, that if he left me behind, I’d have every ghost in Necro haunt the fuck out of him.”
“And then she sent him to fetch me,” Cyril said. “We were in the middle of watching a movie when you called.”
I called … I remembered reaching for my clutch, but had I made a call? Urgh, my head hurt too much.
“You need us,” Cora said. “And we’re staying with you. End of. Your imp, Iza, has made up a room for us, and the snarky reaper Mal agreed to it.”
“And Conah is fine?”
“He’s healing,” Cora said. “Just like you should.”
My eyelids were already heavy again. “You’re really here.”
A cool hand touched my brow. “Yes, babe. We are.”
I allowed sleep to claim me.
* * *
This time I woke to sunshine streaming across my bed and a silhouette at my window.
Iza polished the glass, humming softly to herself as she worked.
I sat up, mouth dry, body sluggish. “Iza?”
“Fee!” She dropped the cloth and hurried over. “You’re awake. Oh, thank goodness. I was worried. Two masters dead in a month does not look good for an imp.”
She was worried about her reputation. “At least you’re honest about your concern.”
She blinked slowly up at me. “And, of course, I was worried about you also. Decent masters who don’t expect me to massage their asses are hard to come by.”
Had she just made a joke?
She grinned, and I couldn’t help but smile.
“Water.” She held a glass to my lips.
Oh, fuck. That felt good. Cool and refreshing.
“How long have I been out?”
“Three days,” Iza said. “And Master Conah is still in a healing sleep.”
Three days … Cora and Cyril … they’d been here? Or had that been a dream? “Um … did I have any visitors?”
Iza rolled her eyes. “Your bossy friend and rude reptile pop in twice a day.”
They were really here. “Where are they now?”
“Visiting the town. Polyindra took them to the market with her.” She sniffed. “Trying to muscle in on my charges. I tell you, that imp has no respect. She should be at her master’s bedside, watching over him while he sleeps.”
“Polyindra is Conah’s imp?”
I
za rolled her eyes. “And she doesn’t let anyone forget it. The last son of Adam, she says, like it matters anymore.”
Son of Adam … that’s what Evelyn had called him. But what did Iza mean, the last son of Adam?
I pushed back the covers and swung my legs out of bed. “Iza, I need a shower and some clothes, and then I need you to take me to see Conah.”
Iza looked uncomfortable. “I’m not sure that would be such a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“Master Conah is not alone.”
“I thought you said his imp was out?”
“Oh, yes, but Mistress Kiara is with him.”
Kiara? “I’m sorry, who is that?”
Iza searched my face. “Mistress Kiara is Master Conah’s soulmate. Did he not mention her?”
No. No, he hadn’t. Why hadn’t he? It was no big deal. So, he had a soulmate like Nera.
“He may have mentioned it, I don’t recall,” I lied.
“Mistress Kiara hasn’t left his side since she arrived yesterday. With the wedding mere months away, it’s come as a terrible shock.”
“Wedding?”
“Oh, yes.” The imp nodded eagerly. “It will be the fanciest affair in the whole of the realm.” She clasped her hands together. “Soulmates and lovers. It’s like a fairytale.”
But the blood was pounding in my ears, and no one heard the splinter of my heart.
* * *
Stupid. Falling for a guy without knowing the facts. Four days. Come on, Fee. Four days? Keep your vag in your pants, woman! It was fine. An infatuation. Infatuations faded.
Stupid.
Stupid heart getting ahead of my head. Making connections without my permission. Conah was taken. He was about to be married to his soulmate, so why had he looked at me the way he did? Said the things that he did?
I wasn’t crazy. I hadn’t imagined it … had I? No. He’d said things, romance novel things, and he’d looked at me like he wanted to kiss me. I was not imagining that.
This wasn’t just me. Wanker. Forget him, he had Kiara, but Peiter deserved justice. And the dagger needed to be found, and I needed a fucking distraction.
I made my way toward Mal’s quarters. Did he know about Evelyn? Could I get him to tell me what the fuck he and Conah had been arguing about before we left for the club a few days ago? I also needed to bawl him out for not being there for Conah. If he’d agreed to help find the damned dagger…
Reaper Unexpected: Deadside Reapers book 1 Page 14
