Authors: Rachel Vincent
“Oh, I think we will. I think you and your older, fairer,
deader brother will do just about anything to provide for the care and comfort
of your lovely mother....”
Nash reached for the phone, but before he could pick it up, the
screen flashed black, then the words “call ended” appeared. “Bastard!” Nash
shouted, and I grabbed his phone before he could reach it because I could see
his intent in his eyes. “He has our mom!” Nash turned on Tod. “How can you just
sit there, knowing he has our mother?”
“He doesn’t have her.” Tod’s voice sounded calm, but I could
see tension in every line of his body. In the way he sat perfectly still, as if
he might lose control of his temper—just like Nash—if he moved at all. “If Avari
really had her, he’d come right out and say it, so there could be no doubt. But
he didn’t say it. He only implied it, because that’s as close to lying as a
hellion can get. He hasn’t found her yet, Nash.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” I said, and Tod nodded. “That’s probably why he hung up
so fast—so we couldn’t start asking about her.”
“So, she’s okay?” Nash needed us to say yes. I could see that
in the anxious twists of green ringing the edges of his irises. He wouldn’t
sleep if we said no. In fact, he’d probably stay up all night plotting her
rescue from scratch, not that I could blame him. But we owed him the truth.
“Maybe,” I finally said. “She’s more okay than she’d be if
Avari had her, anyway.”
“Well, I guess that’s probably true.” My mattress creaked when
he stood. “I’m going to look for her again. Will you guys come with me?”
Tod hesitated, but I nodded, trying to hide the dangerous idea
and the grim certainty growing clearer in my mind with every passing second.
“Yeah. Of course. But we should give it a little while. Avari’s going to be on
alert for at least the next few hours, in case I actually lose my mind and
decide to turn myself in.”
“That’s fine. I’m going out with Sabine anyway,” Nash said, his
hand on the doorknob. Tod shot him a questioning look, which I suspect my
expression echoed. “Not
out,
out. Just out to eat.
She feeds at night, remember? And I don’t want her going alone after what
happened last night.”
Sabine wasn’t going to feed in the Netherworld, which meant she
should be safe on her own, but I saw no reason to point that out. Nash feeling
protective of his recently poisoned girlfriend was good news for them both.
I was happy for them.
“Don’t forget your key,” Tod said.
“And this.” I held out his phone, and Nash took it, then shoved
it in his back pocket. “Be careful.”
“We will.”
“Hey, baby brother, stay out of trouble,” Tod said before Nash
could pull open the door.
Nash lifted both brows and grinned. “I’m a year and a half
older than you now. I think that makes
you
the baby
brother.”
“I may be physically younger, but—much like a sweet, golden
apricot—I was plucked from life at the peak of perfection.” Tod’s smile grew and
mischief swirled in his irises. “Someday decades from now, when you and Sabine
are hobbling around in your old-people pants and orthopedic shoes, yelling at
grandchildren and reminiscing about the days when you could still see your feet,
unimpeded by the view of your gut, I will still be basking in the glow of
eternal youth, forever young, forever golden, forever—”
“In love with the face in the mirror and the sound of your own
voice,” I finished for him, and Nash laughed.
“I can’t take credit for my genetic blessings, but I can’t deny
them, either.” Tod pulled me onto his lap again and his hand settled on my hip,
and for a moment my whole world went still beneath the unexpected weight of his
intense focus. “But the face and voice I most love to see and hear both belong
to you. And they always will, Kaylee.”
My heart beat so hard my entire body trembled. I kissed him,
and my fingers slid into his hair, and Tod’s hands splayed across my back,
touching as much of me as possible.
Nash cleared his throat. “I’m going to refrain from
acknowledging the awkwardness of this moment, as I quietly retreat....” His
shoes whispered against the carpet.
I pulled away from Tod reluctantly and turned to his brother.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to make things—”
“Don’t be.” Nash’s smile was small and more than a little
melancholy, but he met my gaze and held it a second. Then he gave Tod a small,
firm nod, like he’d come to some private decision. “Don’t be sorry. Either of
you. This is the way it’s supposed to be. I’ve understood that for a few weeks,
but I didn’t tell you because...well, because I was really mad at you both. But
this is...right.” He made a gesture encompassing us both. “This is
good.
I hope you both get to stay golden for a long,
long time.”
Tod was silent for a moment, and I felt his heart go as still
as his eyes, which usually meant he was feeling something he didn’t know how to
express. Then, finally, he grinned. “And I hope you get all those grandkids and
that old-man gut.”
Nash laughed, and I frowned at Tod.
“What?” He gave me a wide-eyed, innocent look. “I just
basically wished him a lifetime of good food and sex. It doesn’t get much better
than that.”
I glanced from one brother to the other, confused. “Food and
sex? How do you figure?”
Nash crossed his arms over his chest, still chuckling. “Where
do you think the kids and the gut come from?”
On the bright side, the fraternal communication gap had
obviously been bridged.
But on that other side...it turned out that nonsense was the
official language of testosterone, and I was not a native speaker.
“But we’re talking
extreme
future
tense, here. Like, hover cars and space colonies.” Nash lifted his shirt,
showing off one of few physical traits he and his brother actually had in
common. “These abs are gonna be around for a long, long time.” He disappeared
into the hall, still chuckling, and Tod looked at me in astonishment.
“Did that really just happen?”
“I think it did.” I exhaled, long and slow, more relieved than
I could ever have explained by this breakthrough in their relationship. In the
landscape of betrayal and resentment they’d been mired in for months, that
relaxed banter was like climbing the Mount Everest of emotions. Together.
When Nash and Sabine had left so she could hunt, Sophie, Luca,
and Emma curled up on the couch to try to distract themselves with another
movie. Though I could tell during the opening credits just how futile an effort
that would be.
When I turned to relinquish the living room to those still
actually living, I found Tod watching me from the hall. His eyes swirled with
conflicting emotions, in complementing shades of blue, and I watched as rage at
Avari and worry for his mother competed with desire for...me.
He smiled when he saw me looking, and I wanted to kiss each of
his dimples. I wanted to kiss him until he forgot about everything else. Until
all of the fear and anger and horror we’d been living with for so long had faded
into the background and—for a few minutes, anyway—there was nothing but us and
the comfort we found in each other.
I needed some time alone with Tod, and it had to be soon,
because Avari’s clock was ticking and what I’d learned from our phone call with
the hellion—what I’d finally been forced to admit to myself—was that I was the
only one who could stop his macabre countdown.
But first...
I slipped into the hall and tried on a smile of my own. “Hey.”
I looked up at Tod, and he stared into my eyes like he could see right through
me. Into me.
“Hey.” His smile faded a little, infused with a more intense,
more intimate emotion that couldn’t be described with any one word in my
vocabulary. “Your irises are spinning like crazy. Whatever could be on your
mind,
bean sidhe?
”
I stepped closer and put my hands on his chest for balance
while I went up on my toes and whispered, though no one else could hear me
anyway. “Well, reaper, I was thinking that we should get out of here for a
little while.”
The blue spirals in his own eyes tightened in response, and
anticipation tingled up my spine. “And where should we go?”
“You know the place.”
“Do you think that’s safe?” He glanced over my shoulder into
the living room. “Leaving them here?”
“Nothing is safe. But we’ll be just an autodial away, thanks to
the miracle of cell phone technology.”
“I’m convinced.” But then his gaze narrowed on me, studying me.
“You sure you’re okay?”
“Considering the circumstances? I’m as okay as I’m ever going
to be.” I dropped onto the balls of my feet so he couldn’t see how very true
that was. “Let me tell them we’re going, then I’ll pick up a snack and meet you
there in twenty minutes.”
“I can get food. What do you want?”
I shook my head. “My treat this time. I insist.”
His brows rose, but he didn’t argue. “Okay. I’ll see you in a
few...” Then he disappeared.
I ducked into the living room and told the three couch potatoes
that I’d be at Tod’s for a while, and that they should text one of us if
anything...happened. Sophie pretended to gag. Luca shut her up with a kiss. And
Emma gave me such a wistful look that I almost changed my mind, so I could keep
her company. I owed her that.
But I had to talk to Tod in private. And time was running
out.
Chapter Twenty-One
The fact that I hadn’t actually lied to Tod didn’t ease
my guilt as I blinked into his mother’s home. The house felt strange and too
quiet without Nash and Harmony there. I missed the hum of the dishwasher, the
scent of baking chocolate, and the video game sounds usually emanating from
Nash’s room at the end of the hall.
My shoes squeaked on the linoleum while I searched the kitchen,
and I bruised my knees climbing onto the countertop so I could check the upper
cabinets, but I didn’t find what I was looking for there, or in the bathroom, or
the living room.
Walking into Harmony’s room while she was suffering in the
Netherworld felt like violating a shrine. Her closet was open and her bed was
unmade, like she’d just gotten up, but the truth was that she hadn’t been home
in more than a day, and she wouldn’t come home at all if I didn’t get what I’d
come for, then do what had to be done.
Avari’s clock ticked in my head as I searched her drawers and
her bedside table, and a countdown of my own added to the pressure when I
glanced at her alarm clock and saw that twelve minutes had already slipped away
from me. Tod would expect me in eight more. If I was too late, he’d text. Then
he’d come looking for me.
I finally found what I needed in a shoe box at the back of
Harmony’s closet. Eleven vials, neatly labeled in her all-caps print, along with
a handful of disposable plastic droppers sealed in cellophane and a small
notebook full of notes to herself. Most of the sentences were incomplete, but
the dosages were clear.
I wondered how she’d been testing them. Then I decided I didn’t
really want to know.
I slid the vial I needed into my pocket, along with one of the
droppers. Then I took another dropper, just in case. After I’d closed the box,
pushed it back into place, and double-checked to make sure I hadn’t left
anything else out or open, I blinked out of Harmony’s house and into Levi’s
office.
“Kaylee.” Tod’s boss blinked at me in surprise then hopped down
from his rolling chair. His chest barely cleared the surface of his desk. He
couldn’t have been more than eight years old when he’d died, and I found little
else in either world creepier than an undead child. “I’m in the middle of a
meeting.” He waved one small, freckled hand at something behind me, and I turned
to see two reapers I didn’t recognize sitting in chairs at my back. I’d appeared
out of nowhere between them and Levi’s desk.
“I need a favor.”
Don’t look at his letter
opener. Don’t look at his letter opener....
If he’d noticed the
missing incubus soul, I couldn’t tell, and I wasn’t about to alert him to the
loss.
“If memory serves, you’re already in my debt in that regard.”
He’d restored Tod’s afterlife after I’d died. “And did I mention that you don’t
have an appointment?”
“She’s not even a reaper,” one of the men at my back said.
Levi crossed tiny arms over his little-boy chest, half covering
the Gap Kids logo. “I’m aware, David.”
“What
is
she?” the other reaper
asked.
“Out of line. That’s what she is.” Levi planted both palms on
his desk and glared up at me. It was like being scolded by a kindergartner. A
kindergartner with an old soul and a corpse’s eyes. “Kaylee, see my assistant
and make an appointment. I think I have an opening around noon tomorrow.”
“This can’t wait.
Please,
Levi. I
need help.” I clutched the vial in my pocket and held his gaze, letting
desperation show in mine, even though he probably couldn’t see the motion in my
irises. “Five minutes, max. I swear.” That’s more than I could afford to spend
there anyway.
Finally he exhaled and looked past me to the other reapers.
“Wait in the hall.”
When they filed out the door without arguing, I realized that
Tod was probably the least compliant employee Levi had—much like me in
Madeline’s service.
The door clicked closed at my back. Levi gestured to one of the
chairs in front of his desk, and I sat. “Is this about Tod?”
“No. Not directly, anyway.” My feet bounced on the floor, and I
couldn’t make them stop.
“Good, because he’s used all the favors he’s going to get—most
of them on your behalf—and he’s been dead less than three years.”
I swallowed a lump of guilt over that. But if this went well,
he wouldn’t have to worry about me getting Tod in trouble anymore.
“So, what can I do for you, Kaylee?”
I took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. “I need you to tell
a lie.”
Levi frowned with pouty child’s lips, and his freckled forehead
wrinkled below a mop of bright red hair. “Maybe you better start from the
beginning.”
It took almost five minutes for me to explain what I needed and
why, and another two minutes to persuade him that my lie was necessary, and that
he had to be the one to tell it. I then spent one more precious minute
convincing him that I hadn’t lost my mind and that I would actually go through
with my part of the plan.
By the time I shook Levi’s hand, unsettled more by the grim
respect in his gaze than I was by the reality of what I was planning, I was
seven minutes late to meet Tod, and he’d texted twice.
And I still had to pick up the drinks.
While I waited for our cherry limeades, I texted Tod to tell
him I was on my way. Then I practiced controlling my pulse and slowing my
heartbeat. Letting my true fear show in my eyes while hiding my guilt over what
I was about to do.
This is about the war, not the battle,
Kaylee.
Sacrifices had to be made.
When I blinked into his room, Tod was squatting in front of the
minifridge that served as his nightstand. When he saw me, he stood with the
small carton of ice cream we’d opened the day before.
“No, thanks.” I set the limeades on top of the fridge and held
his gaze. “I’m not here for the ice cream.”
His eyes widened. “I may not be the sharpest scythe in the
shed, but even I can read those signals.” He kissed me, and I nearly forgot my
own name.
“Mmm...” I said, when his mouth trailed over my chin and down
my neck.
“Why do you taste so good?” he mumbled against my skin.
“Cherry limeade.” I reached back to hand him his. I’d gotten us
each a small, because I needed him to drink as much of his as possible.
Tod took a long drink, then set his cup down. “I love
those.”
“I know.” I slid my hands beneath his shirt, running my fingers
over his stomach, then higher.
“I love you more.”
“More than processed sugar and fresh-squeezed citrus? You
flatter me....”
I leaned into him until he had to take a step back, and then I
leaned a little more. He lost his balance and had to sit on the edge of the bed,
staring up at me in surprise. I climbed into his lap, then I kissed Tod like I
might never see him again. Like the promise of eternity was a cruel joke and the
truth was that we might not live to see dawn.
When that kiss finally ended, Tod leaned back a little so he
could focus on my face. “Not that I’m complaining—and let me emphasize that I’m
truly
not complaining—but is something wrong,
Kaylee? I mean, other than the missing parents/demonic evil thing?” He reached
for his cup again, and relief and guilt churned within me, one fading into the
other until they were indistinguishable.
“Does something have to be wrong for me to want to spend time
alone with my boyfriend?”
His eyes narrowed as he sipped from his straw. “A smarter
reaper than I might notice that you’re playing the same implication game Avari
plays when he doesn’t want to admit something.”
“I don’t want a smarter reaper. I want
you.
”
“Ha ha.” He took another drink, then set the cup down again.
“Kay...?” He knew me too well to fall for my avoidance game, and he loved me too
much not to push for the truth when something was obviously wrong.
“I’m just...scared. I’m scared, Tod.” I slumped beneath the
weight of that admission, and his hands slid up my back, over my shirt. “I’m
more scared now than I’ve ever been in my life. Or my afterlife.” That was true.
In fact, that was the truest thing I could possibly have told him.
“You’re a murder victim. How can you be more scared now than
you were the night you died?”
“I don’t know. There was no time to be scared then. All I could
do was react. Fight. But now there’s nothing to do but think about what Avari’s
doing to my dad and what he’ll do to your mom and Brendon when he gets them. Or
about how we can’t stop it. We’ve been in and out of the Netherworld a dozen
times in the past twenty-four hours, and we haven’t seen a single sign of your
mom and my uncle since we found those bandages, and what scares me even worse is
that Avari hasn’t found them yet, either. How is that possible? I mean, if they
were still alive, wouldn’t he have found them, even if we can’t?”
“Maybe not.” Tod’s eyes went still beneath the burden of a fear
I understood very well. As did Sophie and Nash. “They’re alive, Kay. And so’s
your father. We’re going to get them back.”
“I know. I’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen. But...”
I sat straighter in his lap and looked right into his eyes. “You know we can’t
do that without sacrificing something else, right? We can’t get them back
without casualties.”
He shook his head. “No. No one else is going to—”
“Tod. We’re both as grown-up as we’re going to get, and we have
to stop telling each other faerie tales. This isn’t a happy-ending kind of world
we live in. Nothing comes without a price, and someone has to be willing to
pay.”
“The bad guys are going to pay. It’s their
turn
to pay.”
“What part of our recent interaction with the Netherworld leads
you to believe that’s even possible? If Ira had wanted Sabine dead, she’d be
dead, and who knows how many more of us would have died trying in vain to save
her. Or even find her. Sometimes I think we’re only alive because they haven’t
decided to kill us yet.”
“We’re not alive,” Tod said, but for once, his grin failed to
lighten the mood—because it wasn’t a real grin. He was as scared and angry as I
was, and there was no way to truly forget that, while those we loved were
suffering beyond our reach.
“You know what I mean.” I took a sip from my cup and handed him
his, careful not to get them confused. Fortunately, I’d depressed the “diet”
bubble on the lid of my own, even though there was no such thing as a diet
cherry limeade. Thank goodness.
“I also know you’re wrong.” He took a drink, then set his cup
down again. “We’re not alive because they haven’t decided to kill us yet. We’re
alive
in spite
of them wanting us dead. Because they
have
tried, and we’ve come through it okay every
single time. Because of you, Kaylee.”
“It was a team effort. Besides, not all of us came through it,
and that part
was
because of me.”
“Don’t.” Tod took my face in his hands and kissed me before I
could argue. Then he pulled me close again and spoke into my ear so softly I
wasn’t sure if I was hearing words from his mouth or from his heart. “You don’t
get credit for killing Alec because you would never have hurt him. Never. You’ve
lost everything protecting the people you love. Em and Sophie. Nash. Your dad.
And me. I’m here because of you. I’m as close to human as I can be—as I’ll
ever
be again—because you’re here with me. Every
night, I count down the minutes until I can see you. I hate school because it
takes you away from me. I wish I could sleep for more than a few minutes at a
time, so I could dream about you. My mom and Nash are very important to me. I
would do anything for them. But you’re the reason I’m still here. You’re the
reason I’m still me—the reason I still see people instead of potential names on
a future list.”
He held me tighter, and tears rolled down my cheeks before I
even knew they were there. “We’re going to get through this. I promise you,
Kaylee.” He pulled away so he could see my eyes, and I saw sincerity in his.
Earnestness. I saw how very much he believed what he was saying. “We’re going to
get them back. And we’re going to be together forever. There’s nothing in either
world strong or evil enough to come between us.”
But he was wrong.
I blinked before he could see the truth in my eyes.
“You want to cross over again?” he asked, and I opened my eyes.
“We can go now. I don’t have to be at work until midnight, and I won’t have a
reaping until—”
“No. I mean yes, I do, but not yet. In a couple of hours. For
now, I just want...you. Us. This.” I kissed him again and ran my hands through
his curls, thinking about how soft his hair was. How good his skin felt beneath
my hands, smooth and firm, and so very warm.
How this might be the last time...
“Mmm...” he moaned against my skin. He worked his way down my
neck while I worked my way up from his stomach, dragging his tee up with my
hands, trying to touch all of him at once. When my fingers crawled over his
collarbones, he leaned back and lifted his arms so I could pull his shirt
off.
I have no idea where it landed.
Tod lifted me and turned, and suddenly I was looking up at him,
propped up on my elbows. His eyes churned with an intense blend of pain, and
fear, and need, and anger, but at the center, just outside of his pupils, there
was a deep spiral of something more powerful than all the others. Something
stronger, like it could swallow everything else he was feeling, and with a
sudden, startling leap of intuition, I realized that that spiral was
me.
That deep, bright blue that grew and twisted
throughout the other colors—that was how he felt about me.
I got lost in his eyes. I got lost in the colors and the
emotions, and I stayed lost there as long as I could, because those things he
was showing me...those were real. His eyes were truly the windows to his soul,
and those colors...they
were
Tod. Seeing them meant
knowing him, and I knew that no one else had ever had free access to his soul.
Not even Levi, who’d reaped it not once, but twice.