Dangerous Lovers

by Becca Vincenza

  Her chest itched where she had strapped her breasts down, considering she was a hell of a lot more curvy than Charlotte. The boots pinched her toes and a blister was already forming on her left heel. She was miserable. Her physical discomfort was not helping her overall nerves about this whole thing.

  A few men nodded her way as she walked toward the elevator. She nodded back, not speaking. None of them seemed to mind or consider this abnormal, so she rolled with it. As soon as the elevator reached the fourth floor she was practically running down the hall. All she needed to do was get to her room so she could compose herself and prepare for tomorrow. She had to be here for a week and a half. That wasn’t too bad…okay, it was awful. That gave her plenty of opportunities to screw up. She just hoped that her sister wasn’t lying about being moody all the time around them, so no one would think it odd if she was quiet.

  The room was just up ahead. Almost there, she thought gratefully. She wanted out of this outfit so she could breathe normally.

  “Lottey,” a deep voice came from behind.

  Bridgette turned slowly, and froze. The room was just a few steps away. Her sanctuary. Her place of refuge. Just a few steps, and yet it seemed like miles as she faced the last person she wanted to see right now. This next week and a half was going to be the longest ten days of her life. That is, if she even made it that long. Because one of her biggest fears was walking toward her, a worried look on his face. Roman Adamson. God help her.

  WATCH OUT FOR BRIDGETTE AND ROMAN’S STORY

  FEBRUARY 25, 2014

  Readers, I hope you enjoyed Pete and Charlotte’s story! Thank you for purchasing the Dangerous Lovers Box Set and supporting all the authors I’m privileged enough to be in this set with If you want to contact me, my email is jmstalder@gmail.com, or you can find me on facebook and twitter, @jmstalder.

  Thank you again!

  xoxo

  Janelle

  CHARMED

  A Death Escorts Novel

  By Cambria Hebert

  Copyright © 2013 CAMBRIA HEBERT

  http://www.cambriahebert.com

  Cover design by MAE I DESIGN

  Edited by Cassie McCown

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-938857-22-5

  Other books by Cambria Hebert

  Heven and Hell Series

  Before

  Masquerade

  Between

  Charade

  Bewitched

  Tirade

  Beneath

  Renegade

  Heven & Hell Anthology

  Death Escorts

  Recalled

  Dedication

  To anyone who’s ever been charmed.

  “I’m selfish, impatient, and a little insecure. I make mistakes,

  I am out of control, and at times hard to handle,

  but if you can’t handle me at my worst,

  then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best.”

  —Marilyn Monroe

  Prologue

  “Boxing - the act, activity, or sport of fighting with the fists, especially according to rules requiring the use of boxing gloves and limiting legal blows to those striking above the waist and on the front or sides of the opponent.”

  Charming

  1920 New York

  The moment when the course of your life will be defined forever.

  I was in that moment.

  The pungent odor of sweat and adrenaline permeated the air around me. The crowd, sizeable and energized, bellowed. It was an all-encompassing sound, the many individual voices creating a singular roar that echoed through the warehouse we occupied.

  In just a few moments, my life was going to change forever. And damn, it was going to be sweet. Everyone here was going to know my name. After tonight they would say it with reverence, with awe. I would go down in the history books as the unknown scrapper who literally fought his way to the top and beat out the reigning champion.

  The managers I couldn’t get, the representatives who looked at me and sneered, were going to eat every last you’ll never make it they ever said. I felt a few gazes from across the room and I glanced their way. They were from the reigning champ’s camp. They looked at me with a mix of surprise and disbelief—like they still couldn’t figure out how I made it this far without anyone to help me.

  The answer was simple.

  Determination.

  I jerked my chin in acknowledgement of their stare, and their looks changed.

  To arrogance, to pity.

  I rolled my head on my shoulders, enjoying the sound of the cracks and pops in my muscles. The arrogance, that was to be expected, but the pity… that was something else entirely. It was fuel. Fuel to my fire, fuel to succeed. They thought I was going to get my ass beat in front of a sold-out crowd, in front of anyone who mattered in the boxing world.

  They were wrong.

  The announcer stepped into the ring, ducking between the ropes and straightening to his full height—which was still a full head shorter than me—and began to introduce the reigning king of boxing and then me, the unexpected, no name challenger.

  I didn’t bother to listen. Instead, I made sure the laces on my gloves were tight. I concentrated on the familiar rush of power into my limbs and I called up an image in my head, the reason I did any of this at all.

  The crowd roared as the champ took his place in the ring. As I walked to my place, I picked out a few voices in the onslaught of noise. They were betting against me. Wagering I wouldn’t make it past round one. Without thinking, I stopped my steady progress to the ring, halted where I stood and then pivoted back around. A hush fell over the crowd; they waited to see what I would do… if I was going to chicken out and leave without trying.

  I walked to where the men were betting against me. They looked up, one of them visibly swallowing.

  “Add me to that roster,” I told the man with the paper and pencil.

  “Excuse me?” he said.

  “I want to place a bet.” I said it extra slow like he was stupid.

  His face flushed red. “I… boxers don’t usually bet.”

  “My money isn’t good enough?” I lifted a single brow.

  “Of course,” he said, recovering. “What’s the bet?”

  “I’ll win in the third round. A complete knockout.”

  There were gasps all around me.

  “Are you sure you want to do that, kid?” the man with the pencil asked.

  I grinned. “Twenty dollars.”

  His eyes bulged. “That’s a lot of money…”

  “I’m a sure thing,” I replied and turned around to walk away.

  Someone behind me laughed. “That kid has balls.”

  The murmurs of “what’s his name again?” did not escape my ears.

  I climbed in the ring, my eyes going directly to my opponent’s corner. He sat there with his team around him and a white towel draped over his shoulder. I made it a point to meet his eyes. I did it every fight. I wanted whoever I fought that night to know that I wasn’t intimidated by their backers, their titles, and their name.

  I was here to take it all away.

  The clamor of a bell signaled the start of the match. We came out of our corners, circling each other a few times, sizing each other up, looking for weaknesses, for patterns, for anything that might give us the edge.

  He threw the first punch. I dodged it; spinning away and then coming right back. He threw another and I blocked it, hitting away his glove like it was a gnat and I was annoyed.

  The more blows I blocked, the more flustered he became. Halfway through the first round and I hadn’t even taken a shot. I hadn’t been hit either.

  He drew back to attempt another shot when I struck out, the uppercut snapping his head on his shoulders. The crowd went nuts as he stumbled back.

  His eyes locked on mine and like a freight train he came at me, knocking into me, back against the ropes, and I used their momentum to push him backward and hit him again.

  After that, t
he fight got real. Fast.

  I took several slams that made my vision go blurry, but I stayed on my feet and delivered a few vision robbers of my own. By the end of the second round, we were both breathing heavy, pouring sweat, and bleeding. I fumbled around with the water in my corner, trying to get it in my mouth. It was hard with gloves on and no one to help me.

  Someone appeared next to me, standing outside the ring. He grabbed the water and squirted it in my face. I opened my mouth automatically to get some of the cool liquid.

  “That’s some good fighting, kid,” the man said. “You just might win.”

  I glanced at my helper, not really seeing him because everything was blurry. All I knew was that he wasn’t that big and he had dark hair. “Thanks,” I said, opening my mouth for more water.

  “The other side looks pissed. Word is they got a lot riding on this fight. They thought it was going to be cake. You’re making it harder.”

  I grunted. “I’m going to win.”

  “My money’s on you.”

  The announcer called out and I turned back.

  “Keep an eye out, kid,” the man behind me whispered. “Some people like to win dirty.”

  I didn’t really hear his words because the bell rang and we moved out of our corners. My eyes went to my opponent’s. There was a glint in them that hadn’t been there before. A sort of clarity that could only come from confidence.

  I shot my fist out to wipe the look off his face. He dodged me.

  We locked arms, our upper bodies colliding as we tried to muscle the other toward the ground. “Give it up, kid,” the guy whispered. “I’m not giving up this title.”

  I shoved my fist into his ribs and the crowd roared.

  He collapsed a little farther against me, my body taking on more of his weight. “Give up now, or else.”

  I wanted to laugh, would have if I wasn’t busy punching him again.

  This time he fell over onto the floor. I bounced from foot to foot, waiting for him to pick himself up.

  He lifted onto his hands and knees, his back heaving with heavy breaths.

  Everything seemed to slow down then—like in a car accident when you know you’re about to die and every last second is painfully drawn out so you know exactly what is about to happen.

  My opponent glanced to his corner. His handler nodded once and then slid his cold eyes to me. The boxer got up and turned, looking at me with a hard expression. I saw his glove coming, but I didn’t move fast enough. It hit me square in the face and I fell back, down onto my butt.

  The guy was on me then, straddling my waist and hammering his glove into my face. My vision went dark. I’d taken thousands of hits like that before and not one of them ever took away my vision.

  His glove. It was weighted.

  He hit me again and warmth rushed from my nose. He must have put on a new glove, one with brass sewn inside. He was dirty.

  I tried to get up, to hit him again.

  “I told you I wasn’t going to lose,” the man rasped.

  I heard the ref calling out for him to get off me, that he was supposed to back off. I heard the hush that fell over the crowd.

  I looked up at him. He saw it in my eyes.

  I wasn’t giving up. This title, the money that came with it, was mine.

  He reared back one last time, the ref screaming for him to stop.

  He drove his glove into my face, up under my nose, driving the bones straight into my brain.

  I collapsed beneath him.

  As life faded from my limbs, a single flicker of emotion was felt.

  For her. She needed me and I failed. What would happen to her now?

  Death swallowed me then, taking what was left of my thoughts, my life. Turns out the moment in which my life was defined forever was not what I expected.

  In fact, it seemed that my life was now defined by death.

  * * *

  Red. It’s all I could see. It was all around me, everywhere. At this rate I wouldn’t have one drop of blood left in my body. How long did it take someone to bleed out? How long until their organs, their heart had nothing left to fuel them? A minute? Five?

  What I couldn’t understand is why I wasn’t in pain. Surely with this much blood pouring out of my skin I would feel some kind of raw pain. But there was nothing.

  Nothing but red.

  Why was it suddenly so quiet? I could hear nothing—not even the sound of my own breathing. Then I realized. The hush in the air was because everyone was watching me die. They were likely wondering the same thing I had been moments before: How long? I needed to get up, to prove to them that I wasn’t going down like this. I wasn’t going to die in a fight I should have won—a fight that was rightfully mine.

  I stopped thinking completely when I practically flew up off the ground. An overwhelming dizziness overcame me, so disorienting and unsettling that my insides buzzed with discomfort.

  I was upright, my body springing up so fast that I hadn’t even consciously tried to move it. Still, all I saw was red. How could someone bleed so much and move so fast?

  I looked down at myself, taking stock, mentally preparing for the sight of my blood-drenched body…

  Only I wasn’t bleeding.

  And my body… it wasn’t there.

  In the place of skin and bone was nothing but a fine red mist—a red cloud that was shaped like a man—like me.

  Tentatively, I reached out my arm (was it really still my arm?) and watched the red mist dissipate like smoke from a cigar.

  I must already be dead.

  This cloud—this red—was all that was left of me, left of my life?

  I looked up, beyond myself, and saw that I wasn’t in the ring anymore. I was in a room. An office. It was large, uncluttered and had a huge row of floor-to-ceiling closets lining the wall behind a massive desk.

  It was clear this wasn’t heaven. But it didn’t seem like hell either.

  I watched as the large leather chair behind the desk began to swivel around, slowly turning, and if I had a throat I would have swallowed thickly.

  There was something ominous about the way that chair turned, something final. I knew it down to my core.

  A boney man with a wide forehead and shrewd eyes appeared, steepling his fingers beneath his chin and regarding me in a way that did nothing to soothe my confusion.

  “You’re dead,” the man said simply. “But you don’t have to be for very long.”

  “I don’t?” I replied, surprised when my voice echoed through the room. How does one speak without a mouth?

  He smiled. It was the kind of smile that I’d seen before. The kind the boxer gave me right before he killed me in that dirty fight.

  “I have a proposition for you,” he began, pulling his hands down from under his chin and pushing out of the chair. “One that you won’t be able to refuse.”

  And so just minutes after I lived the moment that defined my life forever… I also lived the moment that would forever define my death.

  Chapter One

  “Death Escort - an assassin employed by the Grim Reaper. Will kill a target by any means necessary. Including charm.”

  Charming

  Present day

  You would think being a Death Escort—a killer by trade—would make a man above getting a lecture from his boss. Apparently when you work for the Grim Reaper, the ultimate death dealer, it doesn’t matter who you are, how many times you’ve killed, or how ruthless you might be because he is better.

  After over ninety years of working for him, it’s still annoying as hell.

  And so are his lectures.

  The fact is it gets old working for someone who is the be-all, end-all in life and death. So when I saw the chance to allow someone to get the best of him, I took it. I mean, it isn’t every day when someone manages to get around the iron-clad rules of the Grim Reaper himself.

  So yeah, I talked and wasted time. I “forgot” to mention that one of his new Escorts had figured out a way to
break the call of death that was placed on a Target. Turns out in the eyes of the Reaper (who strangely looked a lot like Mr. Burns from that cartoon The Simpsons), that made me an accessory.

  And now, after weeks of delaying the inevitable, I was getting my punishment.

  Goody gumdrops.

  Instead of listening to what a disappointment I was, how he should just Recall me right now and let me twist away in an eternity far worse than hell, blah, blah, blah, I turned my attention instead toward the floor-to-ceiling row of closets that lined the wall behind his massive desk.

  The closets where he kept his bodies.

  Some people collect coins, artifacts, or tools. G.R. collects bodies.

  The doors were open, making me think he was displaying his collection to me for a certain reason. Shock value maybe? Though he must know that seeing a bunch of bodies wasn’t something that would shock me. These bodies were all groomed and hanging in perfect rows. I was used to seeing bodies in… less than perfect condition.

  Maybe it was to make me think that the very body I inhabited at this moment might end up back with the others and I would be nothing but the red mist that makes up my soul.

  I scanned the bodies, my eyes looking for one that probably should have been familiar, but after so many years I wondered if it would be. I had done this occasionally through the years, but just like today, I didn’t see it. I wondered what had become of my original body, the one I was born in. The one I died in. I couldn’t imagine G.R. got rid of it; I mean, he was practically a body hoarder, yet in all my years of working as an escort, of rotating bodies, I hadn’t seen it.