Touch If You Dare

by Stephanie Rowe

  “Stop it!” She shoved at him. “Stop talking about yourself like that. You guard hate. That doesn’t mean you are hate. Give Rocco a jump start, and you’ll see that there are times when a little negative emotion is a good thing, even if it’s not where you ultimately want to end up. You said yourself that hate can be transmuted into love, but apathy and depression can’t get translated into anything!”

  He wanted her words to be true. To believe he was some great balance in the universe, that this shit inside him wasn’t wrecking him. That an explosion that would decimate the emotional well-being of the world wasn’t ticking away inside him.

  But that would be denial, and there was no time for that. Denial didn’t change the truth.

  Only action would.

  Rocco coughed, and he looked over at the boy. At his pale features, at the hopelessness on his face. The kid looked like shit.

  “He’s dying because of love,” Reina said softly. “Give him some hate and a reason to live.”

  “It’s not a reason.” He shoved his sword into his scabbard, pissed as hell that he couldn’t help this kid. He hated leaving Rocco like that, but he wasn’t going to inflict himself on anyone, despite Reina’s delusion that he simply wasn’t that bad. “Let’s go find Augustus. Part One finished. Part Two, and we’ll have this festival in line.”

  “No!” She folded her arms over her chest. “I will not leave him here to die when you can save him. For God’s sake, Jarvis! I’d have given anything to have the ability to save those I love from death, and you could do it right now. How dare you walk away from that? How dare you reject that gift?”

  “Gift? You think it’s a fucking gift? Fine. You want a gift. I’ll give you a gift.” He stalked across the room, grabbed Rocco, and swung the kid over his shoulder. “I’ll have Nigel bring him to the festival on Friday night. Once I find my brother and knock some damn sense into his brainwashed head, I’ll have him infuse Rocco with some warm and snuggly feelings so he can feel better. Happy now?” Hell, that was actually a brilliant idea. So much better than leaving this poor love-struck sod to disintegrate into the mattress.

  Reina made a sound of exasperation. “He needs you, not your ego-maniac brother who suffers from such delusions of grandeur that he thinks he can save the world by killing it.”

  He yanked the door open. “Don’t malign my brother.”

  “He’s the one who should be maligned, not you.”

  Jarvis whirled around and stalked back to Reina. She lifted her chin as he neared. “Don’t diss him.” If love wasn’t worth admiring, then what the hell was he?

  “Protecting your brother is not what gives you value,” she snapped. “And quite frankly, I’m getting a little tired of you being so melodramatic about what a bad guy you are.”

  “Are you deluded, woman? I’m Hate.”

  She rolled her eyes. “For God’s sake, I can’t reach you, you bullheaded cretin.” She snatched her car keys out of his hand and stalked out the door.

  He scowled as he shifted Rocco and headed after her. It was time she stopped arguing and accepted what he was, and what he wasn’t. He might not like it, but at least he accepted it.

  He stepped out into the hall and saw the roomful of vampires salivating at the sight of Reina stomping her way through their midst, muttering about obstinate and asinine warriors.

  “Dude,” a younger vampire muttered. “If I was going to break my vows, that chick is the one I’d do it for—”

  Jarvis whipped out his sword and had the tip of the turbulent, purple blade at the kid’s throat before the youth could finish his thought.

  The boy’s eyes widened, and his friend grabbed his arm. “Dude,” he whispered. “That’s the Guardian of Hate. He’ll blow your vows for good—”

  The kid’s eyes flared red, and Jarvis swore as the room filled with the sound of popping corn. He turned to see fangs popping free left and right. Eyes turning red, and they were all fixated on Reina. “Yeah, welcome to my world, Reina. I’m like sunshine every time I walk in the door.”

  She looked around, and he saw the sudden tension in her shoulders. She slowed her walk, easing slowly toward the door, clearly trying not to make any quick moves.

  Jarvis had no such qualms. He broke into a run and sprinted for her. Caught her around the waist a split second before a roomful of vamps pounced like kitties on a catnip mouse. He swept her out of the way, put his sword into action, and headed for the door.

  Reina held on tightly as he fought to get them out.

  “Nice effect I have them, eh?” He couldn’t keep the smugness out of his voice. “Still think I’m a gift?”

  But when he saw her sadness, he didn’t feel quite as smug anymore.

  Which just pissed him off even more.

  Which was good, because being a little insanely violent helped him take down another five vamps.

  Which was bad, because as God was his witness, he was damn tired of feeling pissed off and insane.

  Maybe he’d offer himself up as Cam’s first victim. As long as he was going to go, wouldn’t it be better to experience a moment, just one freaking moment, of love before he died, instead of going out in an explosion of all the blackest parts of his soul?

  He dismissed the notion before he’d even finished the thought. What kind of crap was that? He’d fought off death for a hundred and fifty years. He sure as hell wasn’t going to offer himself up to it now. He was hanging on for as long as he could.

  He sprinted to the car, threw his cargo inside, and gunned the engine, hitting the road as the gang of vamps spewed out into the dusk. He glanced in the backseat and saw Reina holding Rocco’s head in her lap, her face full of love and concern. Hellfire and damnation, what he’d give for one moment in that light.

  “We can’t go after Augustus yet,” Reina said.

  He peeled around the corner toward his place. He should have known she wouldn’t be able to pull through. “Hey, babe, I know you don’t want to—”

  “No. My sickle was destroyed.” She patted Rocco’s head and then climbed back through the seats. In an automatic move, almost unconscious, she plucked his hand off the gearshift and held it between her palms.

  His tension eased. Just a bit. He wanted to haul her onto his lap and breathe her in, but there was no time. He’d never craved anything the way he craved Reina’s touch. It felt good, but at the same time, it was unfathomable torture to have her that close and not be able to take her. “So, we get another sickle from your boss.” Excellent. It would give him a chance to check out the property for his brother.

  “No.” Reina traced the lines on his palm. “He won’t give me another one. He put me on leave, remember? I need to get one from someone else.”

  “Where else are you going to get a sickle designed for harvesting souls? Death’s got corner on that market—” Then he realized what she was saying. “You want to hit up the original Grim Reaper?”

  “He must have spare ones lying around that will work for me.” She massaged his palm with her knuckles, as if she could dig out the hell that stalked him. “Death has to send him pictures and a snail mail letter on the first of every month to show he is adhering to the terms of their agreement.” She held up her phone, showing a contact page for the Grim Reaper. “I write the letters, so I have his address. He doesn’t live far from here.”

  Jarvis whistled under his breath. “I’ve heard he’s a crazy bastard. He’d kill you in a minute.”

  “I know.” She turned off her phone and put it away. “It’s the only way.”

  “I’m going with you.” No way was he letting her face the Reap unprotected.

  She smiled at him, relief evident in the way she squeezed his hand. “Thanks.”

  Thanks. Thanks? That word made him want to be the man he’d never be. A man who actually deserved a smile and a nod of appreciation. Not the man who was going to rain all over the parade of every living being in existence. “Then let’s do it.”

  Chapter 18
>
  “I don’t want to wait until Friday.” The Guardian of Love sashayed into Death’s office, clasping his new twenty-four-carat bow under his arm, and wearing nothing but a quiver of arrows. Cameron’s body was pale, as if he hadn’t been exposed to sunlight in a couple centuries, he had a sizeable paunch, and his endowment needed a serious infusion of testosterone.

  He’d also had his hair highlighted a brassy gold and invested in extensions, so his tresses floated down his back. The kid had clearly not used Death’s high-class in-house services for his makeover. He was perverted, cheesy, road trash all the way.

  This wasn’t the man who people would want to be their last experience in this physical world, let alone invest vast sums of money in. “Where are your clothes, for God’s sake?” Death demanded.

  Cameron leapt up onto a red velvet chair, set his foot on Death’s desk, and tossed his head so the bleached out straw masquerading as hair cascaded down his back. He fished an arrow out of the quiver, fixed it into the bow, and then took aim at the smoke detector in the corner of Death’s office. He didn’t fire; he just held the pose. “How do I look? Dead ringer for all the ancient paintings of me, aren’t I?”

  “Those paintings are of a cute little cherub. Once you hit age six, the naked thing can get you arrested.” With Cam’s foot up on the desk, it put his dangly bits way too close to front and center. “For God’s sake, boy, cover yourself up.”

  Death shoved his chair back and tossed one of the dishtowels from his espresso corner at the Guardian. It landed right on its target, but Cameron wasn’t perky enough, and after a moment, it dropped uselessly to the desk, right on top of the monogrammed pen set Angelica had given Death on his first day of business. He treasured those pens so much he’d never even used them. And now…

  Sigh.

  Cameron laughed, a loud bellow of mocking humor. “You need me, old man, so you must let me do as I wish.” He sank down in the velvet chair, his naked ass wedged into the cushions that Death had had specially imported from a secluded gnome monastery in upper Mongolia. Shit. He really loved those cushions.

  Cameron tucked one foot under him, pulled his left knee up, and rested his chin on it. He was wearing the most idyllic expression of peace Death had ever seen. “It’s been so long since I’ve felt like this,” Cameron sighed dreamily. “I’d lost my meaning in life. But you’ve brought me back.”

  Death saw the lack of turbulence in his blue eyes. And better yet, there was a spark of energy, of fire. “I’m glad to hear it, my boy. You had me worried.”

  “I know.” Cameron began to twirl his bow like a baton. “I haven’t wanted to be naked in almost a hundred years. It feels great to feel the wind over my skin.”

  “Yeah, well, you might want to consider a thong.”

  “Why?” Cameron tossed his hair again. “People think of me in my naked glamour, armed only with a bow and arrow. Why deprive them of such beauty and the fulfillment of all their dreams?”

  Death rubbed his jaw. “Well, you do have a point. Half the job is people’s expectations.” He gestured at the rolls of fat nearly covering Cam’s manly regions. “But if you’re going to go naked, you need to get into shape, man. If you’re going to represent love, then women have to want you, and men have to want to be you.”

  “You really think that’s why they all like me? Because of my washboard abs?” Cameron raised an eyebrow, revealing a surprising sharpness to his wit. Naked glee wasn’t the only thing returning to life with the Guardian of Love.

  “People are superficial,” Death said. “They respond to beauty, money, and power. Women especially. It’s what they want.”

  “No, it’s not.” Cameron plucked another arrow out of his quiver. It had a gold tip with a double heart logo that looked suspiciously familiar.

  “Is that one of my cuff links?”

  “Yep. I had one of your welders turn it into a razor sharp point. It’s my new signature—”

  “No.” Death plucked the arrow out of his minion’s hands. “That’s mine, and if you ever, ever, go through my private things again, I will cut out your entrails and feed them to the hell’s hounds skulking around my backyard. Got it?”

  Cameron’s eyes widened. “Wow. You’ve got issues, don’t you?” He leaned forward and propped his elbow on the desk. “So, tell me, Prentiss, why does a man who makes a living ending lives have hearts all over his walls, a pink bedspread, and a twenty-foot mural of Cupid both on your bedroom ceiling and in your office? And was it just me, or does every single piece of your man-jewelry have that double heart logo engraved somewhere on it?”

  Death’s hand went to the scythe under his desk and his fingers closed around it. “Be very, very careful, young man. You are not so important to me.”

  Cameron grinned. “Did you not get enough of your mama’s love when you were a kid, Prentiss? Because I cover all types of love, you know. Romantic love, motherly love, and brotherly love, and everything in between.” He pulled out another quill, this one unabashedly sporting the ring Death had plucked off his dead father’s hand just after Gramps had inadvertently knocked him off. “Allow me?”

  Death began to slide the scythe out of its brackets. “That was my father’s.”

  “Well, by all means, take it back.” Cameron extended it helpfully toward him, and Death reached to snatch it—

  Cameron twisted it suddenly and jammed it into Death’s palm.

  Death swore and jerked his hand back. “Don’t you dare—”

  An overwhelming sense of peace and calm settled over Death. His chest felt warm and full, and he had a sudden urge to stretch out on his floor and start singing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” His palm was glowing a rose pink, almost the same shade as his bathrobe. Twin, intertwined hearts pulsed in neon pink, as if they had been tattooed in his skin.

  Death raised his palm and pressed his lips to his hand. “My sweet baby—”

  Cam started giggling.

  The feeling of oh-so-sweet-love vanished instantly, replaced by sheer humiliation and the rawest sense of loss he’d ever experienced. That amazing sensation had been a fraud! He jerked the scythe free and had it at Cam’s throat instantly. “You toyed with me—”

  Cameron tapped the blade cheerfully, his eyes sparkling. “Not at all. I simply gave you a small taste of what I offer. Imagine if I gave you the full dosage? I just pricked you.”

  Death frowned. “This is what you do?”

  “This is what I do.” Cameron leaned forward. “You see, my good man, I don’t need to be handsome or rich or even funny. I simply need to be me, and I fulfill everyone’s dreams exactly as I am.” He bowed with a flourish. “Love at your service. Nothing else is needed.”

  “You just touch people and they love you?” What kind of racket was that? Death sat back down. “But you’re out of shape, arrogant, and naked with a small penis.” For hell’s sake, Cameron didn’t have a castle, wasn’t the richest man in creation, didn’t wield the ultimate power, and he still got every being on the planet to love him just by poking them? Hell. Death had taken over the wrong damn business, hadn’t he?

  Cameron grinned. “And to think I was so self- absorbed in my misery that I forgot about all this for so long.” He held out his hand. “I owe you thanks, big guy, for bringing me back. You’ve got my loyalty, and we’re going to make a killing.”

  Death slid the scythe back under the desk. “I didn’t fully grasp the extent of your powers.” He’d just wanted to keep the sorry bastard from depriving the world of love. But in the process of the only altruistic duty he’d undertaken in his life, he’d stumbled onto a gold mine.

  Cameron grinned and mimed shooting his arrow into the painting of the original Grim Reaper that was part of the landscape behind Death (another condition of the sale). “So, yeah, I don’t want to wait until Friday night. Let’s make this happen now.”

  Death shook his head. “We need to be strategic. I don’t want to rush.”

  Cameron leapt up and began t
o pace the room. “Well, I gotta get going on it. I’m on a high, and I don’t want to lose it. Gotta ride this wave.” He breathed on his bow, then defogged it with a lock of his hair. He spun it around, and Death could see his own reflection in the gold.

  Shit. Since when had he started to look so pale and worn out? Compared to the energy cascading off Cameron, Death looked like one of the souls he’d just harvested.

  “See, man, this is the deal.” Cameron vaulted over the chairs and frog-landed right in the middle of Death’s desk, knees up, feet flat, hands on the desk—which was just not an attractive pose for a naked man. “I haven’t felt this alive in so long. I thought I was broken. I thought I was useless. But when I got to Symphony Hall, and all hell broke loose around me, it triggered something. Seeing my brother with his hate—”

  Death jerked upright. “Your brother? Jarvis?”

  “Yeah, the dude’s like this major downer right now.” Cameron side-hopped and stretched out on his side across the mahogany desk. He propped his head up on his hand, cocked a knee, and grinned. “This is a seductive beach pose, is it not? Imagine a beautiful maiden stretched out beside me.” He began stroking the air in front of Death’s face. “I would touch her like this, grazing my hand over her breasts and—”

  “Hey.” Death caught his hand. “What was your brother doing?”

  “Trying to pry me out of your grasp, of course.”

  He should have killed the Guardian of Hate after all. Who knew he’d be so persistent? “And were you tempted?”

  “Only by the hellaciously attractive Reaper who distracted Jarvis long enough for me to shoot arrows at every cop and reporter, except the one with the biggest TV camera, of course.” Cupid winked. “Let’s just say that public fornication reached new heights outside the Elton John gala tonight. Check out channel seven. They’ll have some excellent footage.”

  “The Reaper who was with Jarvis?” It must have been Reina. “What was she doing?” If that woman had gone against his wishes, she was fired on the spot, no matter how much love she had oozing from her pores.