by Grae Lily
Gabriel sat waiting in Lucius’ chair. Lucius raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. Gabriel grinned at him before turning to Jasper, “I hope Lucius hasn’t already told you this, but I’m here to offer you a job.”
Jasper’s reaction seemed to be comparable to the one Gabriel said he’d gotten from Evangeline. After several impatient seconds, Lucius pinched Jasper’s arm. “Say something.”
“Words?”
“Yes, words. Words would be useful. Remember, you can speak.?”
“I like to talk.”
“Has the offer scrambled your brains, Jasper?”
Jasper nodded. “I’ll get to be with Evie.”
“For at least a hundred years more, you will.” Gabriel smiled. “We extended her contracts a couple of weeks ago and ever since Lucius has been…”
“Don’t spoil it. I didn’t tell Jasper about your surprise, so you won’t tell him about mine.”
“Okay.” Gabriel laughed, putting a piece of paper on the desk in front of Jasper. “Signing this might be easier, Jasper. This is a hundred year contract. You'll be one of my guardians, so you’ll be reporting to me, and for the first year, you’ll be trained by Evangeline.”
“Why Evie?”
“I get the feeling you’ll make some of the same choices as her. She always chooses people who are taking the same path she did and if you do the same thing, then, it will be helpful if you’re trained by someone who understands that urge to try to help people who often don’t want to be helped.”
Evangeline, after dealing with the mess on the highway, stepped into Lucius’ office. “No survivors.” She blinked away tears as she saw each of the bodies again, but all of the spirits had been guided to the world of the dead. “We weren’t expecting there to be, but it would have been nice.”
“Yes, it would.” Jasper crossed the room to give her a hug. “When did they tell you?”
“Gabriel told me a couple of weeks ago. Keeping it from you has been the hardest part. Well, that’s over now, so we can go on with living our… well, this isn’t life, but I’ve done more living during my death than I did during my life, so I guess, this is more my life than that had been.”
“Well, I have one last surprise for you.” Lucius smiled at them. “If you’d both follow me.”
Confused, Evangeline took hold of Jasper’s hand, knowing he had no idea how to follow Lucius, and took him through the gap Lucius left for them. “That's weird.”
“After a while, you do get used to it. It’s just a case of working on where the gap’s been left if you’re following someone. Gabriel told me that should be one of the first things that I teach you.”
“Okay…”
“I promise you, it will make more sense once you’ve tried it a couple of times. Lucius wasn’t a patient teacher, so I got thrown into the deep end more than once.”
“You found your way back.”
“One time it took me three days, Lucius, because your office kept moving.” Evangeline glared at his back. “I know you were doing it on purpose and I hated you for it.”
“This will make up for it.” There stood a cottage in the middle of the woods on the back of Lucius’ property. Evangeline looked between it and Lucius, trying to figure out where this came from all of a sudden because he couldn’t mean what she thought he meant. “It’s yours for as long as the two of you are working as guardians.”
“Why?”
Jasper squeezed Evangeline's hand. “Thank you, Lucius, we appreciate the gift.”
Lucius laughed. “It’s yours because I care about both of you and I want you to have a place that you can call your own. Evangeline, we both know it isn’t the sort of thing I’d normally do, but you two are special to me, in more ways than I could ever have imagined when you first became my reaper, so this is my gift to you for helping me more than I ever thought possible.”
“Do you want anything in return?”
“You’re already going to be working for me for another hundred years, so no, there’s nothing I want in return. Not any gifts, Evangeline.” Lucius shook his head. “Now go inside, have a look around, and let me know if there’s anything you want me to change. It can be done any time within the next couple of weeks, there’s no rush. Take your time.”
Moments later Jasper was at the front door, but Evangeline was still looking at Lucius, trying to work out why he’d done that for them. She knew he cared about her. She knew he cared about Jasper. Yet Lucius had created a cottage for the two of them, which was something he would never have done for anyone else, so she had questions, which really shouldn’t surprise him. Their eyes met.
“The time may come…”
“Of course.” Evangeline stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Lucius. “If it does, then, we’ll talk. There’s no chance of me walking away and we both know I’m capable of taking over, if that’s what you need me to do.”
“Sorry.”
“For being tired?” She shook her head. “You’ve been doing this job a long time and you’re allowed to be. Let me have a couple of days with Jasper. Then, we’ll start working out what our next steps should be, Lucius, but make sure you talk to Gabriel first. He should be able to help you find her, if she’s still in the world of the dead, and that’s what you want to do.”
Lucius watched the girl who'd just been his reaper walk to the cottage she'd share with her lover. Of course, she understood the reasoning behind the gift. They’d talked before about what might happen in the future because he'd grown tired and he wanted to find the woman that he’d had to walk away from to see if they could have a happy ending in the same way that Jasper and Evangeline would.
From the doorway of her cottage, Evangeline watched Lucius walk away and Jasper wrapped his arms around her. “You think he’s going to move on?”
“I do, Jasper. He’s been guiding spirits to the world of the dead forever. He deserves to live his own life, and if that’s what he wants, I’ll take his place.”
“That will change things, won’t it?”
Evangeline nodded. “It'll be the first time someone like me will have been in control of the reapers and I’ve been talking to Gabriel as well.” She sighed. “He might not seem like it, but he’s tired too.”
“When the time comes we’ll deal with it the same way we have before, Evie - one step at a time. Now come inside, because it’s been a long time since I've been young enough to do the things I really want to be doing to you right now.” He kissed her neck. “I love you.”
Evangeline turned in his arms. “I love you, too.” She stood on her tiptoes and gave him a kiss. “Hurry up. Let's start on the bed this time.”
~~~
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