“Or what?”
“Are you finished?” he asked, looking around at a few of the other tables. Apparently we were drawing an audience.
“Yeah,” I said, dropping my half-eaten donut in the sack and rolling down the top. I stood up and grabbed my coffee and the bag while he threw everything away except for his coffee, which now had its lid.
I followed him out of the shop and sank back into the leather of his Porsche. The seats were still warm.
He turned on the engine but didn’t put the care into drive. He just sat there staring out over the dashboard. “Make the date or I’ll kill you.”
“You will not.” I rolled my eyes.
He turned hard, cold green eyes on me and stared me down. I stared back, refusing to buckle under the pressure of his threat.
“All it would take,” he said softly, “is one little call to the Grim Reaper himself. All I would have to do is tell him that you were getting in my way and I wouldn’t have to kill you. I think you know once the Reaper makes a claim, there’s no going back.”
I thought about Piper. I thought about the price she would pay if he actually made good on his threat and sent the Reaper after me.
“I can’t do it until Saturday. I only get an hour for lunch during the week.”
“Good. Make it a weekday. Then you won’t have to stay the entire time.”
“Fine. Now take me to work. I can’t stand to be in your presence any longer.” I felt defeated, in over my head, and it was barely eight a.m. I didn’t even feel like hurling insults at him anymore; it was all just too much for the moment.
He didn’t say anything the rest of the drive and when he pulled up to my building, I climbed out of the car, not even caring I was early (usually, I liked to be there right at eight so I didn’t have to spend any extra time here).
He grabbed my arm, stopping me from getting out completely. “Make the call today, Frankie. I’ll be checking in to see that you did.”
I jerked my arm free and got out of the car, slamming the door behind me. I didn’t look back but went straight inside and to my spot behind the counters. It was only then I realized I left my coffee and the rest of my breakfast in his car.
I sighed.
“Haunted -
to come to the mind of continually; obsess.”
Charming
I dreamt about her last night. I heard her voice calling my name. I heard her laughter and then I heard her cry. I pushed the covers off before daybreak and the air was still frigid due to lack of the sun. I went to make coffee, thinking the brew would help chase away my thoughts (and yeah, maybe the brandy I was going to pour in), but I found myself staring at the coffee maker and wondering what she would have thought about all these modern day appliances.
I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t be alone. The minute I left Storm last night and climbed into my Porsche, I’d thought of little else other than her. I needed a distraction. A face to look at other than the one that haunted me.
I pulled up the address on my phone, got dressed, and drove to her apartment. I knew she would be pissed; I was actually looking forward to her hideous attitude and screechy voice. Anything to drown out my own memories.
Her apartment had been a little bit of a surprise. It wasn’t gaudy and over the top like I thought it would be. It was almost classy. And the posters of Marilyn Monroe reminded me of old Hollywood. She, however, had been over the top.
She pushed me so far with her attitude that I threatened her with G.R.’s wrath. That was the first time I ever threatened to sic him on someone. Usually I fought my own fights. She just knew how to push all my buttons and piss me off like no one else could.
Still, the way she climbed out of my car, without looking back, leaving her precious sugar behind, had made me feel… bad.
I told myself it was because of who I thought I’d seen last night. The reason I was feeling things. The reason I was so on edge.
So now instead of being haunted by one woman, I was being haunted by two.
I wasn’t good with idle time to fill. I was used to working… on pursuing a Target, a job, until it was complete. But this one was different. I couldn’t pursue the senator’s daughter like I would any other woman. I had to wait. I had to be patient. Building up trust wasn’t something I could do overnight.
I went to a gym in the bad part of town. Pulled my Porsche into the alley next to the entrance. There was a bum sitting near the dumpster, reading a tattered paper. He eyed my car and my clothes when I got out.
I fished a couple twenties from my pocket and extended them to him. “Watch my car. Don’t let anyone touch it. If you have problems, come get me. If it’s still here and undamaged when I come out, I’ll give you two hundred bucks.”
He eyed the cash in my hand.
“This now. Two hundred after. Got me?”
He nodded and took the cash.
I went toward the back door.
“You know there are better gyms on the other side of town. Gyms for your kind of folk,” he said.
“Yeah,” I replied and went through the door.
There were better gyms. But he was wrong about my kind of folk. I might look the part of a high-society man. I might have the money and the connections. But deep down beneath it all… I was a fighter.
The gym was one large square and smelled like no one had cleaned it since it was built. I walked past the free weights, the heavy bags hanging from the ceiling, and the many jump ropes hanging on the wall and into the tiny locker room where I kept a locker. I undid the lock and pulled out my gym clothes, stripping away the high-society man and putting on the one I was born as. When my wifebeater, shorts, and shoes were on, I went out to the ring.
There was a guy there, a little bigger than me, and I made eye contact with him. We both laced up some gloves and got in the ring.
I didn’t hold back. The mood I was in wouldn’t have allowed me to anyway. Even after all these years, after all the bodies I’d been through, I still remembered how to box. There wasn’t anything like it. Just two guys and their fists. Back in my days of boxing, I used to think that sheer will was what won fights. I still believed that. But I also learned that those who didn’t have enough will to win cheated.
I took a glove to the eye, felt the skin around it split and the warm trickle of blood down my face. The cut stung instantly because my salty sweat mixed in with the blood. The guy that hit me backed off, figuring I would get out of the ring.
I wasn’t getting out of the ring.
I sprang forward and delivered a series of rapid hits that had him shaking his head to clear his vision. I pounced again, dropping him to the mat but still punching, still delivering blows. It took two guys to pull me off. It wasn’t until they literally tossed me out of the ring that I snapped back to reality. I stood up, wiping at the blood on my face and peering into the ring.
The guy was unconscious. He had a split lip and it looked like a broken nose. The way he lay so still, I wondered if he was dead.
Is that what I looked like the night I died? Was I that still and pale with blood on my face?
I realized the room was entirely too quiet. I glanced around. People were staring. Everyone was staring. Except for the men who were bent over the man I pummeled.
I hadn’t been trying to kill him. I was just trying to forget.
And then I realized if he were dead, I would have broken yet another one of G.R.’s rules: kill no one but a Target.
I’d gotten away with it once… many years ago. Something else I really didn’t want to remember. Afterward I’d walked around in a state of panic thinking G.R. would find out and Recall me. But he never did.
I didn’t think I would get that lucky twice.
The man in the ring moaned and relief poured through me. He wasn’t dead. It wasn’t really that I valued his life so much—I had no value for life at all.
I just didn’t want to make this job any harder than it already was.
“Bandage -
a strip of material such as gauze used to protect, immobilize, compress, or support a wound or injured body part.”
Frankie
The best part about today? It was almost over. The lines at the DMV today had been longer and more hellacious than usual. Or maybe my mood was just more hellacious that usual. Starting my day with a demanding, self-important moron banging on my door at the crack of dawn just set me off on the wrong path.
On my way out the door, I rummaged through my endless bag of things I might need but never actually used, searching for my keys. When I couldn’t find them, a little tingle of panic shot through me, the kind of panic I always felt when I thought I lost something important.
Except I didn’t lose my keys.
I didn’t have them because I didn’t drive to work today.
“Ugh!” I burst out, stomping my foot on the pavement, and turned to go back into the building. A flash of red caught my eye. I did a double take over my shoulder and sure enough, my Jeep was sitting in the parking lot.
I had no idea how it got there, but I wasn’t about to complain. Now I didn’t have to call a cab. I hurried over to the driver’s side and opened the door; my keys were in the ignition.
Charming had to have done this. He’s the only one that knew I hadn’t driven to work. He’s also the only idiot I knew that would park my Jeep in the parking lot and leave the keys in the ignition.
“Well, I guess that’s better than him actually walking inside. Then I would’ve had to see him again,” I said out loud, disgust lacing my tone.
“Are you referring to me?” someone said from the back seat.
“Agh!” I practically fell out of the Jeep as I was climbing in.
“What are you
doing
?” I demanded, swinging my purse behind me to whack him on the leg.
He dodged the blow and sat up. “Well, I’ll tell you what I’m
not
doing and that’s being comfortable. The back seat in this thing is worse than a Porta Potty on a hot day.”
I snorted. “Like you ever use a Porta Potty.”
“I brought your Jeep here because I knew you didn’t have a way home. I was trying to be nice.”
“Please. You aren’t nice. What do you want?”
“Can we go now?” he asked, sitting up from his reclined position. “I left my car at your apartment.”
I turned around to glare at him, but my glare fell away. “What happened to your face?”
“Nothing.”
It wasn’t nothing. He had an angry red gash on his eye that was starting to blacken. “You need to put some ice on that.”
“I’ll do that. Just as soon as I get out of this torture chamber.”
I started up the Jeep and pulled out of the parking lot. “Let me guess, you treated someone else to your winning personality and they punched you in the face?”
He grunted but otherwise said nothing else.
At my apartment, I pulled up behind his Porsche and parked, moving the seat so he could climb out of the back. I started to walk away but then stopped. “Thanks for bringing my Jeep. The cabs around here take forever.”
“Did you make that phone call yet?”
Ahh, and there it was. The real reason he brought my Jeep. It was just an excuse to check up on me.
I sighed. “No.”
“I’m not leaving until you make the call.”
“Fine. Come upstairs. I’ll call her inside.”
At my door, I used my keys to unlock it and let us in, pausing once the door was open. “You left the door unlocked this morning when we left.”
“You locked it when you left, then?”
He nodded. “Leaving your doors unlocked isn’t safe.”
I almost made a quip about him not caring about whether or not I was safe, but I didn’t bother. I was tired.
He sat down in the nearby club chair and dabbed at his eye.
I went in the kitchen and grabbed an icepack and towel. “Here,” I said, jabbing it in front of his face. “That looks like it hurts.”
“I’ve had worse.”
I leaned in and looked at it. It was still oozing. “Did you even clean it?”
“I rinsed it out. You gonna make that call?” he asked, holding the ice up to his face. He didn’t even wince when the pack made contact with his wound.
I grabbed up my phone and dialed Rosalyn’s number. I was aware of Charming’s brooding stare as the phone rang. Rosalyn answered on the third ring.
“Hello?” Her voice was a little questioning, probably because my number was new.
“Hi, Rosalyn. This is Frankie. We met the other night…”
“Oh, yes! How are you?”
“I’m great. How are you?”
“Nothing wrong that a greasy slice of pizza can’t fix.”
I laughed. “I don’t think there is anything pizza can’t fix.”
“Hey, you wouldn’t want to grab some in a bit would you?”
“Oh. Well…” Charming appeared next to me and nodded. “I’m just getting off work—” Before I could finish my sentence, he snatched the phone out of my hand.
“Rosalyn,” he purred into the line. “This is Charming. We met the other night.” He grinned at whatever she was saying. “Yes, I’m here with Frankie. She was having some car trouble so I picked her up from work.”
I wondered if he would like a gash on his left eye to match the one on his right.
“Pizza?” he was saying. “Sure, we’d love to.” His eyes slid to mine and he smirked. I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a soda out of the fridge and sat down at the table. This day just kept on getting better.
A few minutes later he pulled out a chair across from me and sat down. “Hope you like pizza, sister dear, because we have plans.”
“Can’t you just tell her I’m sick?”
He shook his head. “Nope.”
“I don’t want to go.”
“Too bad. You’re the one who told her we were related. Then you told her I was gay. You’re going to come tonight and tell her I’m not. That you were just being an overprotective sister and didn’t want your only brother to get hurt.”
“And why would I do that?”
“Because once she knows I’m not gay, I can start dating her and then I won’t have to use my ‘sister’ as an excuse to see her.”
Well, at least then I wouldn’t have to see him every five minutes. Maybe once he wasn’t watching my every move, I could actually come up with a plan to get rid of him.
I got up and pulled out a small first-aid kit near the sink and returned to the table, pulling my chair directly in front of his. “At least let me clean up that eye. I don’t want to have to look at it while I’m eating.”
When he didn’t protest or make some nasty comment, I tore open a small cleansing wipe and reached up to dab at the corner of his eye. I expected him to wince or suck in a breath, but he didn’t do either. He just sat there staring at me without blinking as I worked.
“It really does look like someone punched you.”
He grunted.
“Was that a yes?”
“It was a ‘you should have seen the other guy.’”
I paused, wondering if he was being serious and deciding I really didn’t want to know, then finished dabbing at the cut and dropped the wipe on the table. “So, the other night… when I was in your apartment—”
“You mean the night you broke into my house?” he interrupted.
“Yeah, that one.” I said, opening up a butterfly bandage and reaching for the antibiotic cream. “You moved really fast. How’d you do that?”
I dabbed a little ointment around the edges of the cut. His shoulder’s tightened, but he made no other acknowledgement about my movements.
“It’s one of my abilities.”
“Moving fast?”
“Sort of. It’s called kinetic absorption. It’s the ability to absorb energy from other people and things around me. My body then can use the extra power by converting it to extra strength, super speed, or even sometimes using it to create power blasts.”
“Like from your hands?” I asked, forgetting I was cleaning his eye and just sitting there listening to him.
He nodded.
“Wow. I never heard of that before.” It might even be unbelievable if I hadn’t seen him do it. Or if I didn’t know the Grim Reaper existed.
“So is that all you can do?”
“I have super hearing too.”
“So that’s how you knew I was in the house.”
He shook his head. “The energy level in the house changed. You have lots of energy.”
I glared at him. “You used my energy that night?”
He shrugged.
“But I didn’t feel tired.”
“It doesn’t work that way. I take the
extra
energy; I don’t suck all of yours away.”
“Oh.” I picked up the bandage.
“Actually, that ability pretty much is the only one I have beyond the hearing. But it allows me to do a lot. It pretty much turns me into a super-powered human.”
“Human is debatable,” I muttered.
His shoulders began to shake with his laugh.
“Hold still,” I commanded and leaned closer to apply the bandage.
He smelled good. Like really expensive cologne. I knew it was expensive because all the cheap ones were overpowering; they smelled too strong. But this one wasn’t like that. It was light and clean with just a hint of spice.