by Tara West
He laughed. “I’ve had worse injuries than a little bump.” His smile faded. His gaze sharpened with an intensity that made me uncomfortable in my own skin. “How does your Grim like you working here?”
The way he sneered when he said “your Grim” made it sound as if the words were acid burning his tongue.
I squeezed my fists in my lap thinking I so didn’t want to get into a conversation about Aedan right now. I mean, the guy had just broken my heart. “I guess Aedan likes it. He’s on the squad now, too.”
Sarge’s eyes narrowed. “Is he why you been crying?”
I jumped off the bed, crossing the room with urgent strides. I ended up at an ornate dresser with a tall, oval mirror. I hated that dresser. It was this weird, pinkish-grey with the most hideous flowers carved into the sides. At the moment, though, I hated the reflection in the mirror even more, and not just because of the frizzy hair and smeared makeup. Though my afterlife was somehow supposed to be a new start, I’d allowed myself to tumble into the same old shit, falling in love with the wrong guy and giving him my utmost devotion while letting a great guy, maybe even a much better guy, slip away.
I clutched the side of the dresser, turning my gaze away from the mirror. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Sarge came up behind me, placing a gentle hand on my shoulder. “When you’re willing, I’ll be here for you. Okay?” There was sadness in his voice that tugged at my heartstrings and nearly brought fresh tears to my eyes.
I turned around and faced him, lacking the energy, or maybe the willpower, to fend him off when he snaked his arms around my waist and pulled me against his chest.
“Thanks,” I breathed against the starched cotton of his shirt.
His hands roamed from my waist to my hips, and then he settled them dangerously close to my ass. I thought of that time Sarge had smacked my butt so hard I saw stars. I remembered how the stinging slowly faded and was replaced by a new sensation: lust.
Even though I’d already had amazing orgasms today, I was horny again. What the hell was wrong with my libido? It wasn’t just stuck in overdrive, it was set to warp speed. There was no way I could fall for two guys. No way. I couldn’t even walk and chew gum at the same time. How could I manage two relationships? Besides, it wasn’t right.
Loathe though I was to pull out of his embrace, I backed up a step, and then another, wishing his heat didn’t linger, shrouding me like a fog.
“Ash, we need to talk.”
I gasped and my hand flew to my chest when Aedan stormed into my room unannounced. He came to a halt as if he’d slammed into a brick wall when he caught sight of Sarge.
Sarge didn’t bother turning around to acknowledge my boyfriend, but his flushed cheeks and hardened jaw told me he was less than pleased with the interruption. “I should get going,” he said, his tone cool and impassive.
I wrung my hands together as my emotions warred with each other. I wanted him to stay. I needed him to go. I was so damn confused. My bottom lip quivered as I struggled to keep it together. “You don’t have to go.”
As tempted as I was to look into those molten eyes of his, I felt the gravitational pull of Aedan’s heavy gaze, and I looked at him instead. The pain reflected in his blue eyes nearly took my breath away. My mouth fell open as an apology formed at the back of my throat. But then those jumbled emotions swirling around in my head slammed together and came to a full stop.
Why the hell did I feel the need to apologize? For allowing a friend to comfort me in the wake of Aedan’s heartbreak? So what if that friend also happened to make me horny. I hadn’t acted on it. I wouldn’t act on it, which was more than I could say for Aedan. Whatever had caused him and Marie to split, I wasn’t convinced he didn’t still love her. Besides, Aedan had left me alone all afternoon without so much as an apology or an explanation after calling another woman’s name in bed and then lying about it. If anyone had the right to feel betrayed, it was me.
The door to my patio swung open, slamming against the wall. I jumped back as Boner and Jack came racing inside like two mischievous children looking for trouble.
“I’m all out of cookies,” Boner said as he paused to catch his breath, completely oblivious to the tension as thick as fog radiating off Aedan and Sarge. “Mind if I take him back to Delta and get some more?”
“Good idea,” I said with forced perkiness as I ushered Boner and Jack toward the door. Sarge followed beside me, his stiff gait reminding me of a robot. A really pissed robot.
Jack didn’t even spare me a sloppy kiss or backward glance as he followed Boner out. Aedan, whose large frame filled most of the doorway, looked ready to block Sarge’s exit.
I shot Aedan a pleading glance before Sarge turned to me and, without warning, pulled me into a hug. “I meant what I said,” he whispered against my ear. “If you need me for anything, I’m here for you.”
Hot damn. Somehow when he’d emphasized the word “anything” I got the feeling he meant anything. I wasn’t ready to contemplate sex with another stud at the moment, as tempting as his offer was.
Sarge let me go with a wink, spun on his heel, and bumped Aedan’s shoulder hard before walking out, the clank of his metal leg echoing down the hall.
I held my breath as I waited for Aedan to go after Sarge, but thankfully, he stepped inside my room, slamming the door behind him. The look he shot me nearly made my knees weaken. This creepy sense of déjà vu swept over me, churning my gut as I looked into his thunderous expression. Dear God, the molten lava surging beneath his gaze reminded me so much of that dragon demon who’d almost taken me to hell last week. I swear, Aedan just needed to sprout a few scales, learn how to blow smoke out of his nose, and they could have been twins.
There was no mistaking Aedan was seriously pissed, which made me doubly pissed. What the hell gave him the right to be angry with me?
He crossed the room in a few long strides, his heavy boots thudding across the carpet loudly enough to wake the dead, otherwise known as the other Alpha House ghosters, whose quarters were a floor beneath us.
“So is this you getting back at me for Marie?” he bellowed, bearing down on me with a scowl.
“No.” I was tempted to take a step back, but I lifted my chin and held my ground. I refused to be bullied by a jealous ass. “This is me visiting with friends.”
He arched a brow, eyeing me coolly. “And I’m supposed to believe that?”
Of all the nerve!
I glared as I crossed my arms. “I’ve never given you a reason not to trust me,” I said with a pout, laying the guilt on thicker than warm, gooey hot fudge sauce over vanilla ice cream.
He cupped my face in his hand, a bold move for someone who was still on my neck-deep-in-shit list, but I didn’t pull away. That heartfelt look in his eyes put me in a trance. Damn. I sure hoped that look was for me. I mean, really for me, as in he’d forgotten all about Marie and was frightened at the possibility of losing me. And I thought I’d perfected the guilt trip. All he had to do was look at me, and my resolve was about as solid as melted butter.
“The soldier desires you.” His soft gaze sharpened. “I can see it in his eyes.”
I pulled away, missing the warmth of his touch but knowing I needed to keep my distance if I was going to have any chance of convincing Aedan he was wrong.
“I know he does.” No use lying. Sarge had desire practically stamped across his forehead when he’d left my room. Besides, I didn’t want to lie to my boyfriend. I actually had a conscience.
The smirk that tugged at the corner of his mouth looked more accusatory than friendly. “So you invite him into your room?”
I rolled my eyes. “Just because he has the hots for me doesn’t mean I’m going to act on it.” Then I leaned up and jabbed him in the chest. “I only date one asshole at a time.”
He flinched. “I’m sorry about what happened today.”
Such a typical guy. Apologize for something broad and sweeping like what had happened earlier i
nstead of admitting the specifics, namely his obsession with Mar.
I cocked a hand on my hip. “Oh, you mean calling me by another woman’s name after sex or lying about it?”
He colored, and damn him for managing to look masculine and boyish at the same time. “Both.”
Some part of me, the chicken-shit part, told me to drop it. He’d apologized. It was over. Now go back to pretending the relationship was perfect.
But the more dominant part of me, the bitch part, said no fucking way was I going to let this slide. And no, it wasn’t about being angry or enacting vengeance. I wasn’t PMSing yet, after all. This was about me not wanting to spend the rest of my eternity with a man who didn’t truly care for me, no matter how much I cared for him.
“And what about using me to fulfill some sick fantasy?” My tongue felt heavy as I spoke, the weight of my insecurity bearing down on my shoulders as I fell into a nearby chair and curled inward. I imagined myself a beetle, my arms and back a shell, protecting me from the pain as memories washed over me. I’d had a major crush on a boy when I was in eighth grade. James had been a ninth grader, tall and tanned with a deep voice that sometimes cracked, a wide mouth, and a smattering of freckles across his nose. I’d been struggling in algebra, and he was eager to volunteer when my math teacher asked him to tutor me. I’d thought it was because he liked me, but he’d only used me to get to my sister, a sophomore in high school.
We were latchkey kids, so my mom never made it home until after six p.m. Tutoring started at four. That was plenty of time for my sister to lock me out of the house and lose her virginity. For two long weeks, I imagined myself a beetle, curling into a ball on my front porch. I pretended their moans, which leaked through the thin windowpanes like steam rising from a boiling pot, didn’t affect me. But they had. Even though I’d never told my sister I had a crush on James, I still felt the sting of their betrayal. Nobody had asked me if I minded waiting on the porch steps while they had sex. Nobody asked me if my heart was breaking with each ear-piercing squeak of my sister’s box springs.
My mom had confronted me when I brought home another failing quiz, and I finally broke down and told her exactly what was happening during my tutoring sessions. My sister never forgave me, and I never forgave her for stealing my crush.
Aedan knelt in front of me, clasping my hands in his warm grip. “Ash, sweetheart, you okay?”
I looked at him through a curtain of tears, realizing I’d let myself get lost in my emotions. Guess that beetle thing didn’t work, because my shell had cracked, and I was nothing more than a rejected middle-school kid.
He handed me a tissue, and I used it to dab my eyes. I thought of Sarge, who’d used his thumb to wipe my tears, and I wondered why Aedan hadn’t done the same. It all went back to my insecurities over Mar. I couldn’t shake the feeling he loved a memory far more than me.
“You’re only with me because I look like her,” I said on a sob, biting down on my knuckles to keep more tears from falling.
He shook his head. “That’s not true.”
“Then why? Am I supposed to believe all the kissing and groping and credits were because you fell in love at first sight?”
Aedan’s shoulders slumped with his sigh. “I’ll admit, when I first saw you I was taken by your similarities to Marie, but that’s not why I’m here now.”
I leaned forward, eyeing him intently, wanting so badly to know the truth but fearing it as well. “Tell me why you’re here, Aedan.”
“I’m here because I couldn’t imagine spending eternity without you.”
My hand flew to my heart, trying to quell the heavy banging that ricocheted in my eardrums, drowning out all other sounds in the room. I wanted to believe his soft smile and heartfelt gaze were sincere, but there was something nagging the back of my conscience that I couldn’t let go.
“I don’t understand why you didn’t just ascend to Heaven with Mar. Didn’t you love her?”
Aedan tensed, the veins in his neck rising like raging torrents, threatening to burst through his tanned flesh. “Mar’s resented me for over a hundred years. Her sister Katherine went to hell, and Mar blames me for it.” The fatigue in his eyes reflected a century of sorrow. I knew then he’d pined for her, and maybe he still did.
The thudding in my heart subsided to a dull hammer pounding away at a rusty tin, not hard enough to break it but enough to dent it out of shape. “Why is that your fault?”
“I couldn’t save her on the night a hurricane claimed our lives.”
My hand flew to my throat. “You died in a hurricane?”
He sighed. “Drowned in the surge.”
Oh. That explained his hydrophobia. I thought how frightening his death would have been, caught up in the wind and waves, and for the first time appreciated my brief blow-dryer accident. But I still didn’t understand why it was his duty to look after Mar’s sister. “And Mar expected you to take care of Katherine?”
“Of course. She was my wife.”
“Oh,” I barely mouthed the words. Aedan couldn’t marry Mar, so he married her sister instead. What did that make me? Rebound victim number two? Or were there other Murphys in-between?
Aedan’s wife obviously wasn’t nice if she’d been sent to the fiery pit of doom. Disregard the fact that I’d been assigned to level two in Purgatory, which was just a few credits away from burning in eternal damnation.
“Why did she get sent to hell?” I asked on a shaky breath, almost afraid to know the answer. I still couldn’t wrap my head around Aedan’s wife being cast down to Hell.
His gaze flickered to me, and then he looked away, but in that fraction of a second I caught the intensity of a thousand hurricanes swirling in his eyes.
He rose with stiff legs, a dark shadow falling over his features as he looked down at me. “She was a lying whore.”
Without another word, he turned and walked out the door. Well, shit. I thought about following him, but I figured we’d torn through enough raw wounds for one evening, wounds that after a century still hadn’t healed and I feared never would.
I did not go down to dinner with the other Alphas that evening. Not that my snooty team members missed me. They were probably relieved they could enjoy their caviar and champagne without having to look upon the “Undeserving One,” as I’d heard a few of them whisper behind my back more than once. No, I much preferred sulking in the privacy of my bedroom than pretending to enjoy dinner while trying to figure out which fork to use for the salad.
After Aedan had completely ripped my heart out and crushed it to an unrecognizable blob, I didn’t have an appetite, anyway. Sure, he patched up my heart a little with his admission that he couldn’t imagine eternity without me, but it wasn’t enough to convince me he didn’t still love Mar. And then there was the whole weird thing with his wife. He seemed to have an obsession with MacLeod/Murphy women. I still hadn’t decided if that was a good or bad thing. I doubted I’d pay him a special visit tonight. Call me a coward, but I just couldn’t stand the thought of Aedan making love to me while thinking of another woman.
I sipped a diet Dr. Pepper and sank against my pillow as I watched Jackie Chan kick a villain’s ass. Usually, if anyone could brighten my mood, it was Jackie’s colorful antics and amazing, ball-busting skills. But not that day. Speaking of Jackie, Boner still hadn’t come back with my dog, and I sure could have used some cozy cuddles and sloppy kisses. I put Chan on pause as his foot was about to go into some guy’s chest, slipped on a pair of jeans, and trudged downstairs.
Our ghosting unit was on lockdown, on call in case of a ghosting emergency, which meant I couldn’t leave the house at all. Usually, being on call meant sitting around and dying a second death of boredom. I hadn’t gone on a ghosting assignment with my team yet, and I didn’t look forward to it.
I thought back to the time my friends from Delta House and I scared a group of punks at the cemetery. That night was awesome. That was the night Sarge told me I was beautiful. I briefly wondere
d if I reminded Sarge of a girl he’d left on Earth, or if he truly liked me for me. Then I wondered if I should have chosen Sarge instead of Aedan, but I quickly dispelled that thought. As much as I hated to admit it, my foolish heart yearned for Aedan. How many jerks would have to break it before I wised up?
I went downstairs to the common room, where fifteen ghosters and three Grims were expected to share one phone. Yeah, as nice as the digs were at Alpha House, technology was still at least twenty years behind, pretty much a recurring theme in Purgatory. As usual, Margo Styles was hogging the phone, twirling a lock of her long silver hair around her finger while she laughed into the receiver. I cringed and fled. Margo’s laugh made her sound like a cross between a dying cat and the Bride of Chucky, and my poor eardrums were the chalkboard to her ten-inch, stainless-steel nails.
Okay, so no calling Boner at Delta House. That left only one viable option. I’d have to go get my dog myself. There was just one problem. If I left, I’d be violating orders, which would have been just fine for my old self, but my new self was a good girl, and good girls followed the rules.
But I could literally run over to Delta House and run back in twenty minutes, thanks to Sarge, who had somehow miraculously managed to get me to enjoy running and help tighten the extra fluff on my thighs. Since most of the Alphas were generally unsocial and kept to themselves, nobody would miss me if I snuck out the back. I could see Delta House from my bedroom balcony, nestled at the bottom of a verdant hill right at the edge of a pine forest. It was about a third the size of Alpha House, with worn wooden shudders and this quaint façade that reminded me of a cross between a classic Victorian and a pre-modern hillbilly. If the house had been painted stark grey instead of bright greens and yellows, it could have passed for an Addams Family retreat. But despite the quirkiness of its exterior and the weirdness of its residents, I had felt so much more at home there than in my fancy luxury suite at Alpha House.
