The hairs along my arms stand on end.
He really is hunting me.
I grab a brown leather satchel I see hanging off a nearby chair. Dumping out the bag’s contents, I drop the knives inside, then sling it over my shoulder.
“Come out, kismet!” Thanatos calls. “I know you’re in this city!”
Quickly, I leave the restaurant. My eyes scan the street, looking for the horseman.
“Lazarus!” Death’s voice seems to carry on the wind. I have no idea which direction it’s coming from.
I’m still looking for him when movement in the distance catches my eye. Far away, I catch sight of a skyscraper—something no one’s had a use for in quite some time. Only as I watch, floor after floor crumple like an accordion, the building falling into itself.
I can’t do anything but stare.
It hits the ground with an echoing groan. In its wake, a plume of ash and debris rise up.
“Come out, kismet. I don’t wish to bury you alive.”
My stomach flips.
This devil.
“Here I am, Thanatos!” I shout, refusing to hide like a mouse.
My voice reverberates around me, but I have no idea whether Death can hear it. It’s impossible to tell where exactly he is.
Out of the corner of my eye, I swear I see movement, but when I spin, there’s nothing there besides a few bodies and a stretch of open road. Off in the distance, another building begins to topple, drawing my attention back to San Antonio’s skyline.
“Lazarus.” Death’s voice echoes, slipping over my skin like the brush of fingertips.
I don’t have to wait long before I hear the thunderous thump of Death’s wings. He lands in front of me, his silver armor gleaming and his wings spread wide.
Behind him, another building collapses.
“Kismet.” He says the endearment like he’s savoring chocolate on his tongue. “Your time is up. Lay down your weapons,” he says.
“No,” I say.
“I don’t want to be your enemy.”
“So long as you’re killing everyone, we will be enemies,” I say.
Death strides up to me, and for once, I don’t immediately reach for my weapons.
I hadn’t wanted to hurt this man before our last encounter. Now that he saved me and healed me … I am especially reluctant about using the knives in my bag. I know that’s ridiculous, but there it is.
The horseman stops in front of me. “Grab your blades then, kismet,” he dares. He must see how at odds I am with myself.
When I don’t, he steps in close. Taking my hand, he guides it to the sheathed dagger at my side. Closing my fingers over it, he pulls the weapon out. The entire time there’s a daring, defiant gleam in his eyes. “If we are to be enemies, then hurt me.”
It’s only when he brings the blade up to the side of his throat that I begin to resist.
“Do it,” he commands. “My artery is right there beneath the skin. All it would take is a knick. I would bleed out in minutes and it would buy you a day.”
“Stop it,” I whisper.
Death releases his hold on my hand, and my dagger slips through my fingers, clattering to the ground.
“I don’t know what to do,” I admit, the words spilling out of me. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I cannot seem to stop you any other way.”
Death’s hand rises to my cheek. His fingers stroke it, and fool that I am, I let him touch me. It feels so much better than I remember.
“Before I healed you,” he says softly, “I assumed using my power to heal was wrong. I can see now that it was me who was wrong.” His gaze dips to my mouth. “I find myself longing for another reason to hold you close.” This last confession just seems to slip out with the rest.
My breath hitches as his eyes move back to mine. All those forbidden thoughts of him I’ve had over the months—thoughts that would creep in during my long lonely nights on the road—they resurface. Until recently, I assumed they were one-sided. Now knowing that they’re not, that Death wants this more than I even do …
A completely inappropriate ache pounds deep within me.
Thanatos’s attention moves to my stolen bag. He opens it up, staring at all the knives.
“I’m guessing these are meant for me.” He says it so conversationally, so unafraid. It should dissipate the strange sexual tension between us.
It doesn’t.
“I’m not going to let you take me,” I say vehemently.
“I’m not going to give you a choice,” Thanatos says, gaze rising to mine.
And yet, he hasn’t grabbed me. He keeps not grabbing me, as if he’s waiting for me to fall into his arms. If that’s the case, then he can wait until Kingdom Come.
Death cups my jaw then, and his nostrils flare. “Tell me you don’t feel this … this consuming need.”
My stomach somersaults at the intensity in his eyes.
“I don’t feel it,” I say, only my voice comes out all breathy and wrong.
Thanatos narrows his gaze. Slowly, he smiles.
“I will count to a thousand,” he says. “That’s as generous as I’m going to be. You can do whatever you’d like in those thousand seconds. I won’t fight back, I won’t come after you, but once time’s up, we’ll no longer be playing your game. We’ll be playing mine.”
We were never playing any sort of game. Ever.
My stomach drops. “I’m not going to—”
“One … two … three …” he begins, a savage look on his face.
I look breathlessly at him, then around us before jumping into action.
I slide my satchel off my shoulder, letting it drop to the ground. Kneeling down next to it, I pull out a knife and begin sawing away at the strap of the bag. Once I cut the strap free, I glance at the horseman.
He raises his eyebrows. “Sixty-seven … sixty-eight …”
“Turn around,” I command, half-expecting him to ignore my demands. Much to my shock, however, he turns, exposing his massive wings to me.
My breath hitches at the sight of all those coal-black feathers. I step up to his back, my skin pebbling as those very feathers brush against my skin. I swear I hear Thanatos’s sharp inhale, and maybe I’m not the only one affected by the contact.
I grab one of his forearms, pulling it behind his back, then the other, pressing his wrists together. I bind his hands together with the satchel’s leather strap, making sure to tie the knots extra tight. His body sways.
“I like this, kismet,” he says, “This makes me think very strange, very … human thoughts about you.”
My core clenches at his words.
It’s only as I finish my work that I remember his absurd strength. He’ll get through the bindings in seconds.
Damnit.
I release his bound wrists. “Why don’t you focus on counting—wouldn’t want to give me any extra time,” I say, stepping away.
Death laughs darkly, the sound making the hair at the nape of my neck stand on end. “You’re not going anywhere,” he vows.
My stomach dips at the certainty in his voice.
“Turn around,” I command.
Again, I don’t expect him to follow my words, but he does. The horseman faces me once more, his eyes full of dark anticipation.
He smirks. “What about my wings?” he asks. “Shall you bind them too? I’m rather enjoying being tied up for you.”
I pull out one of the blades from my bag and use it to cut off the bottom of my shirt. This, too, he’ll be able to rip away in seconds, but if he’s willing to play my game for the next ten odd minutes, it’ll subdue him for at least a little while.
Gripping the fabric, I step up to him.
“Kneel.”
Thanatos stares down at me for a long time, that same look in his eyes. Never glancing away, he moves down on one knee, then both.
I bring the cloth up to his eyes, blindfolding him with it.
“Killing me would be easier,” he says.
It would be. I have to hide my swallow. The awful truth is that I’ve come to care about this horseman’s pain. Enough to stay my hand.
So instead I tie the knot extra tight behind his head, ignoring Death’s beautiful features and the silky soft texture of his hair. I can’t help, however, the strange sensations his scent conjures.
Him holding me fast to his chest, his fingers caressing my face …
“Come with me,” Death says softly, as though he, too, is thinking similar thoughts. His voice is gentle, a plea; it’s so unlike him. “Untie these bindings and come to me of your own free will.”
“You said you wouldn’t ask me that again,” I remind him.
“I was wrong,” he says. “Come with me, Lazarus. Let me know what it is like to hold you instead of fighting you.”
To hold me? What exactly does he have in mind once he captures me?
Doesn’t matter, Lazarus, that fate is not for you.
I lean in close to his ear. “No.”
A slow, malevolent smile spreads across Death’s face, and even blindfolded, I find him chilling.
“Then you better run, kismet.”
I do run.
I run as fast as my legs will carry me, clutching two knives in my fists, two more blades crammed into the sheath at my side.
I don’t know what use they’ll be. I have lost the will to hurt the horseman.
You could simply go with him. The thought nearly stops me in my tracks.
I’ve been so used to opposing him, I’ve never actually thought through this option. If I was with Thanatos—well, there are many ways I could prevent him from moving from city to city.
Now I do come to a halt, my chest heaving, my breath leaving me in ragged gasps.
I could go with him.
But then I couldn’t forewarn towns. I’d have to figure out a new strategy. All the while, Death’s dark, penetrating eyes would keep flashing that fight-me-then-fuck-me look. How long would I be able to resist him? A week? Two? I’m probably being generous here. Already his beauty is distracting, but to be alone with him at length? When he’s made it clear he wants to at the very least hold me? I would give in. It probably wouldn’t even take that long. Not when I know he’s already given in to this terrible pull between us.
I begin to move again.
No, fleeing him is still my best option.
I barely make it a block more when the earth begins to tremble. I stop once more, looking up at the buildings towering around me. There’s a parking lot that’s been converted into horse stalls next to a high rise apartment building with broken windows and clothing lines crisscrossing the street. Across the way is another multi-storied structure that’s decorated with brightly colored street art.
It’s all somehow both bleak and strangely lively.
And I’m pretty sure it’s all about to literally come crashing down on me. My fear ratchets up at the thought of being buried alive.
I needn’t have worried.
The buildings don’t come down. It’s much, much worse.
For all around me the dead rise.
Chapter 20
San Antonio, Texas
January, Year 27 of the Horsemen
The corpses that lay strewn on the street are picking themselves up as though they were never dead to begin with. There are four, five, six of them. I spin and count several more. More still are exiting the buildings around me.
Thanatos can raise the dead.
I’m trying not to panic, but Thanatos can raise the dead.
One by one the revenants turn their unseeing eyes on me, and unease pools low in my stomach.
I grip my knives tighter. What are they doing?
Suddenly, all of them begin to walk towards me, the group of them moving almost as a single unit.
My own fear closes up my throat.
Fuck, what is this?
More importantly, how am I supposed to get myself out of this situation?
Overhead, I hear Death’s massive wings. At first, the sound is quiet, but as he gets closer, his wingbeats grow louder and louder.
TWUMP—THWUMP—THWUMP.
I catch a glimpse of him in the air above me, and I watch him circle, then descend down to the street. Thanatos lands no more than twenty feet from me. His wings close at his back, looking like a massive cape.
The corpses halt where they stand, their dead eyes still fixed on me, their faces slack. I shiver at the unnatural sight.
Death walks towards me, his wings swaying behind him. The few revenants between us part for him to pass by.
“How are you doing this?” I ask.
“I have always been able to do this, kismet,” he says. “Up until now I simply chose not to.”
He could’ve been doing this the entire time? My mind races over all those instances I fought him. How many cities had the two of us encountered one another, all while being surrounded by corpses?
Many.
So, so many.
Never once had he raised the dead.
Death has been toying with me this entire time. The realization steals my breath away. For the first time in a long time, I truly fear him.
“Why?” I demand, backing up. “Why do this now?”
“Because you were designed to be mine. And it’s time I claimed you.”
Chapter 21
San Antonio, Texas
January, Year 27 of the Horsemen
I turn from Thanatos. There are dozens of revenants around me, revenants who have gone still while Death approached me.
“Fighting is useless,” he says, coming closer.
Ignoring his warning, I turn on my heel and begin jogging away from him.
All at once, the zombies come alive, only they don’t walk towards me, they charge. They descend on me painfully fast.
My mind won’t let me believe that they’ll actually touch me. They’re corpses, after all, their whole point is to lie still and rot.
So when the first revenant gets to me—a young woman who can’t be more than a few years older than me—I lose a second simply accepting that this is actually happening.
The woman’s cold hand grabs my forearm, and my stomach tumbles at how frigid her fingers feel even through the fabric of the shirt I’m wearing.
I slash out at her—and the other corpses that follow—grimacing as their blood glugs out from the wounds. A dead man grabs the blade of one of my knives, ripping it from me with a jerk. Another rips my two knives from my sheath while I fight off a third revenant.
A dead child steps up to me and wraps a clammy hand around mine. I yelp at the touch and his sightless eyes. He pries my last weapon free.
“Enough.” Death’s voice echoes in the air.
The revenants fall to the ground, my weapons clattering from a few of their hands. They are all lifeless once more.
I turn just as Thanatos steps over the scattered corpses. He comes to me, and I don’t even have time to protest before he pulls me into his arms.
At first I think he means to fly off with me, and maybe he does, but he hesitates. After a moment, Thanatos whistles, all while holding me in his unyielding grip.
I hear the echo of hooves against asphalt, and then the horseman’s steed charges down the city streets, expertly maneuvering around the strewn bodies. He’s already saddled and ready.
Death gazes down at me with those obsidian eyes, his expression filled with wicked intent. His dapple gray horse slows to a stop next to us, and in one fluid motion, the horseman lifts me onto his mount.
A split second later, Thanatos is hoisting himself up behind me. And then his powerful thighs are hugging mine and his armor-clad chest is digging into my back, the metal unforgiving.
Death wraps a muscled arm around me, pinning me in. He clicks his tongue, and his steed takes off once more, galloping down the road.
We tear through the streets of San Antonio, the buildings and the dead blurring by us.
“You are finally mine,” he says, hi
s words exalted.
They send a strange mixture of dread and excitement through me. How I long to stop this monster. How I have to keep fighting my ridiculous attraction to him.
“I have imagined this moment countless times,” he admits.
He squeezes me close, and oh, I’m definitely getting some hate-fuck energy from Death.
I try not to dwell on Thanatos’s words, but how can I not? He’s clearly been fantasizing about capturing me, and now I’m at his mercy. And I have no idea what he really intends to do with me now, though it probably has something to do with hate-fucking. Pretty sure that one’s on the menu.
After a long, drawn-out silence, I force myself to ask the question that has been plaguing me lately. “What do you feel for me?”
His lips fall to my ear. “Many, many things, Lazarus.”
Definitely wants to hate-fuck me.
My breath hitches at the thought of lying beneath Death, his body driving into mine.
Apparently I’m not completely against the idea either.
Jesus.
We leave San Antonio to the muted sounds of buildings crashing behind us. Then even those sounds drift into silence, and I’m forced to truly face my predicament.
I glance down at the hand holding me fast. On one of his fingers he wears a silver ring, an ancient coin bearing the face of Medusa fixed to it. I just manage to stop myself from touching the strange piece of jewelry.
I’m going to be staring at that hand and that ring in this saddle for a long time if Death has it his way. No more tracking. No more fighting. Just lots and lots of personal time with the horseman.
The thought is enough for me to give escape one last, valiant attempt.
I throw myself violently to the side. Death’s hold on me slips, and for a second, I’m sliding off his steed.
I have no plan and no weapons, but by God, I’m going to be the least cooperative captive there ever was.
Thanatos’s wing sweeps out, battering against me, slowing my fall long enough for the horseman to snatch me by the shirt and drag me back onto his steed, his heavy arm wrapping itself around my waist once more.
He laughs low, the sound drawing out my gooseflesh. “A good, but futile attempt, kismet,” he says. His brings his lips to my ear, his tone turning menacing. “Fight me again, and I will abandon my steed for the skies, and then you will have no choice but to cooperate.”
Death (The Four Horsemen Book 4) Page 10