“You got an online degree in counseling?”
He smiled widely and nodded. “Of course, I had to use my alias. It's not like I could matriculate as Death but I did all the work myself. Wow, some of that reading was quite lengthy too.”
“In addition to...” what would be a politically correct way for describing sucking the life out of someone? “Reaper activities?”
He nodded. “Ever since Fred moved in, he's been referring them to me.”
“Fred?”
“The human accountant downstairs. We golf together on Wednesdays.” He pointed to the corner near the door where a new club leaned against the wall. “Just bought it off EBay last week. Can't wait to try it out.”
“There's a human here? Does he know about all of this?”
“No. He doesn't. He didn't know what the building was and we had an open office. It was something of a paperwork slip up that no one's been able to figure out. He was such a nice guy that we all lobbied to let him stay.”
“And Fred gets you clients?”
“Well, he got me my first couple but I've taken to it like a fish to water so now those clients have been getting me referrals. Fred has been a wonderful human to have around.” He stood and took a framed photo off his bookshelf of three guys on the golf course. “That's Fred, Dennis and me. Dennis is the tooth fairy. He's even dabbling in dentistry now, because of Fred. Have you met him yet?”
“The tooth fairy?”
“Yes. He golfs with us a couple of times a month.”
There was a rap at the door, then a young man poked his head in. “Hey, Doc. Your two o'clock is here.”
“Thanks, Tim!”
I stood up and couldn't stop shaking my head. Where did the craziness of this place end?
“Thanks for talking to me.”
“Any time! Door’s always open!”
***
After the party gone wrong and the idea that he might be waiting at my condo, I needed a drink badly. I pulled up to a bar I'd known my whole life but had never frequented. It was one of those local joints that didn't get much of the tourism crowd. Being a public defender, I was always worried about running into one of my clients here. It was the perfect place for how I was feeling.
I walked into the mostly empty dim room. The Joker by Steve Miller played on a jukebox in the corner. A couple of guys shot pool, the balls clanking and cigarettes burning in the ashtray.
I grabbed a stool as far away as I could get from the few other patrons. A middle-aged bartender who would have looked at home in an old western approached me.
“What'll you have?” he asked, slapping down a peeling cardboard coaster.
“Something strong.”
He nodded and returned with a bottle that appeared to have red wax dripping down its side. The label read Maker's Mark. He poured a shot and then placed a coke beside it.
“You might need a chaser.”
The smell of it alone made my eyes burn and my stomach do a flip-flop, but I threw it back in one gulp anyway. Trying to keep it down, I'd never been so happy to chug a coke in my life.
I pushed the shot glass forward and nodded toward the bottle.
“Another coke, too?”
“Definitely.” I slid the empty coke glass forward.
“Want to talk about it?” he asked as he refilled both.
“Nope.” Not unless you want to die today.
“That bad, huh?”
“Yep.”
I was still none the better after three shots, a sugar high and a fuzzy feeling later.
“What's got such a pretty girl looking down in the dumps?”
I hadn't noticed him sit beside me until he spoke, probably due to the aforementioned fuzziness. I knew he was older by his voice but, when I turned toward him, I hadn't expected someone looking down a decade.
“I'd love to share but I'm not at liberty.” If he only knew how honest I was being.
“Then just listen.”
“Thank you for the offer, but trust me, you really can't help me with this.”
“You need to listen,” he chastised and even threw in a finger pointing for good measure.
I was wondering if I had a choice. He seemed intent on having discourse and I was pretty sure I couldn't drive. A taxi would take at least ten minutes to get here so I guess I was hearing him out whether I wanted to or not.
“I've witnessed war, death, disease and every other type of atrocity you can imagine, let alone the ones beyond your fathom.”
I'd been staring forward but now I looked back at him. He was old enough to have gotten around the block a few times and seen a few wars. But there was something about the way he said it that made me start to wonder who, exactly, this man really was.
“I knew you had good instincts.” He smiled as if he knew what I was thinking.
“Who are you?”
“I work for the company. You could call me a recruiter.” He took a sip of a draft beer he had in front of him.
“Do you work in the building?”
“We don't all work out of the building.” He leaned a little closer as to not be overheard. “Now listen to me, I know you plan on quitting at the end of the trial period. That's not a good idea.”
“Why not? I hate this job.”
“Doesn't matter. This is where you're supposed to be.”
“Fate doesn't think so and isn't that his department?”
He shrugged. “He doesn't understand, yet.”
“But you, as a recruiter, do?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want another refill?”
I turned to the bartender, and waved my hand over the glass shaking my head.
When I turned back, the old guy was gone.
Chapter Ten
When I woke up at one in the morning, my head was pounding, but that didn't seem to slow the visions. Image after image appeared, of a small woman being repeatedly struck in the face by this huge man. I watched him pushing her dead body off a cliff into the ravine below. I saw her falling, dark hair flying among flailing limbs.
They were in a dense forest with tall pines and maples all around. I'd never been there, but I somehow knew exactly where it was.
But how was I supposed to get to Pennsylvania by three A.M.?
I grabbed my phone and dialed Harold, who answered on the first ring. It made me wonder if he was a night owl or simply didn't sleep. I needed sleep; if he didn't, what was he? Hopefully I wouldn't be around long enough to figure it out. Put in my days, take out a killer or two in the process and get out before I was stuck.
I explained every detail to Harold and then repeated it all over again when he didn't respond.
“It hasn't happened yet and I have to get there. How?”
“Are you supposed to stop it?” he asked.
No. I wasn't. I'd seen the log he'd used for the final strike to her head. I saw it placed in his trunk. The traces of her blood I'd add to his clothes. I was supposed to make sure he got caught.
It was time to see how many details Harold had about the assignments.
“Yes.” There was no way in hell I'd sit there and watch him beat that woman to death without trying to stop him. If he didn't know exactly what the job was, I didn't feel it necessary to inform him.
There was a pause, a long one. Maybe he did know? Maybe he got a memo or something?
He finally spoke. “Tell Fate. He'll get you there.”
“I don't want to ask Fate,” I said but he'd already hung up. I knew he'd heard me but didn't want to answer. No, not Fate. Not again, especially not this time, when I was going to go off plan. If he knew this woman was meant to die, it could really mess me up.
So I did what any reasonable person would do. I called him again, and again. Then a few more times after that, for good measure. Fifteen minutes later, and after an unknown amount of ringing, I conceded defeat and accepted that he wasn't going to answer and awaited my dreaded Fate.
Ten minutes of aggravated
pacing in the bedroom later, I forced myself to go and ask Fate. He'd been on my couch, feigning sleep, when I'd gotten home, so I knew right where to find him.
I walked out of my room and saw him lying there. He looked handsome, the perpetual scowl he always had for me smoothed away by sleep.
I sighed and meandered across the room, stopping to rinse a glass and put it in the sink.
“How long is it going to take for you to tell me?” I swung around, startled by his voice. He was still lying there with his eyes closed. Did he know I'd just been staring at him?
“Why are you pretending to sleep?”
“Having your eyes closed isn't a pretense, it's called resting.”
“If you know, why do you need me to tell you?”
There was a quick upturn at the corner of his lip. A micro-expression, it’s called. A small snippet of someone's true feelings that slip out sometimes, before the person realizes. I used to look for them all the time as a lawyer. He was amused, even if he didn't want to admit it.
I couldn't understand what he'd find amusing about this, but he was an odd bird.
“Your walls are paper thin. I heard you tossing around in bed, too. Not sleeping so hot, huh?”
Why would he even mention that? What was the point? He knew I was unhappy, why the reminder that it was affecting my sleep?
And I knew out of everyone I'd met, he was the most likely to screw this up on me. But how was I going to get to Pennsylvania? Harold would just have to send someone else here to help me.
Fate sat up on the couch and then stood, stretching his arms out and hogging my living room. He walked over and leaned a hip against my table. He did that a lot. Leaned. As if he couldn't be bothered to exert the energy it would take to stand or something.
And he took up too much room; not physically, but he just seemed to eat up all the space around him. Why couldn't he be one of those people you forgot were there?
Then there was the other issue he had – he was too attractive and he knew it. Yes, he was good looking and well built, but so what? To put it nicely, he wasn't a nice person. He was the type of guy girls with issues would find attractive. I didn't have issues. I was a normal, healthy...
Shit. I kept forgetting I was dead. It didn't matter, I was still mentally healthy and that was all that mattered. No self-respecting girl would date him.
“I don't understand why it has to be you?”
I walked over and sat on my couch, trying to reclaim it. There was nothing left of my old life and I wasn't giving up anything else.
“Even if you weren't under my direction, most of the things you are going to deal with tie into a person's fate. If I go, I might not get the full details you do, but I'll be able to get a general sense of how things are supposed to play out. Murphy, Luck, even Crow, none of them overlap as much as we do.”
“I did the last one basically on my own anyway. Why do I need you to come? All I need is for someone to get me there.” And I don't want you to know what I'm going to do. If I'm going to be Karma, I'm making the most out the situation. If the universe thought it was fair she get beaten to death, it was obviously having slips in the system.
“Your last job was the equivalent of riding a bike with training wheels on it. It was almost full proof.”
I didn't budge. I didn't want to work with him and I couldn't have him there. I'd take the risk of doing it by myself.
“I have to show you how to get there anyway.”
“Harold can send someone else.”
“But he won't. Don't forget, active participation. You start missing jobs and you aren't active.”
He had a point. Thank goodness they didn't say anything about how I decided to participate.
I couldn't get there without someone's help and Harold wouldn't take my calls. I eyed up his “look at me lean on things, I'm so cool” face.
“Fine. But stop leaning on my stuff.”
I stood and grabbed my purse. He pushed off from the table and followed me toward the door.
“I'm sorry you have such an aversion to people leaning on your furniture.”
“Not people. Just you.” If I annoyed him, he didn't let on.
“I'll drive.”
“I want to.”
“Sorry, but I have an aversion to your driving.”
Yep, I annoyed him.
“You can't just dictate.”
“Can't I? You can't get there without me so I think I can.”
Just as I was trying to swallow the bitterness of that tasty bite, I noticed the car he was about to get into. Now, for the record, I'm actually becoming accustomed to my broken down Honda. She gets me where I have to go, even if a little slow.
But a Porsche 911? Are you kidding me? The jerk gets a Porsche? And I'm Karma. Shouldn't I be able to fix this, somehow? The fact that I didn't know how was making me feel very inadequate.
I stopped in the middle of the parking lot and looked up at the sky. “Seriously? I wasn't looking for you. You wanted me. Is this really fair treatment?”
Fate stopped and turned to watch me. “You know, you're a little odd.”
“Please, like you people have any room to talk.” I walked over to the car and got in the passenger side, not surprised in the least that he didn't try and get the door for me. He sped out of the lot before I got my seatbelt on and the way he whipped down the road made it hard to breathe.
“Would you mind slowing down?”
“Yes.”
“Why are you so horribly unpleasant?”
“You shouldn't be here.”
“You are such a jerk.”
“It's not just you, any transfer.”
“I agree completely. You should do something about it. Maybe talk to the people in charge?”
“Harold agrees, but he was being honest when he said he couldn't get rid of you until the thirty days.”
“What about the old man? Maybe he can do something?”
His gaze swung to me. “What old man?”
“The old guy that recruits?” The way he was staring at me didn't bode well.
“Harold recruits.”
“Only him?”
“Yes. Who are you taking about? Are you talking to humans? Did you tell a human about us?”
There was absolutely no way I was going to say anything else. He obviously didn't know the guy and the way he was looking at me, I didn't particularly feel like admitting to knowing about him, either. When in doubt, say nothing.
“I just figured there was someone above Harold.” He was so arrogant that I couldn't help but get a little joy out of him not knowing something I did.
“No, that isn't what you meant at all.”
“Don't tell me what I meant.”
“Then why would you assume Harold's boss was an old man?”
“I was being sexist.” The words tasted bad even as I said them. There wasn't a sexist bone in my body. My unlaughed giggles died a sad death in my chest, snuffed out by the false label of sexism. How short lived my glory had been.
“You are so full of shit.”
“Please, Fate, let's not pretend you're insulted over unshared confidences.”
He broke out into a deep laughter and something in my stomach fluttered. The scowl erased, a wide smile replacing it. How could such a jerk look so inviting just because he was smiling?
“Why are we at the office?” I asked looking to change the subject and get rid of the offending expression.
“It was closer than my place and I didn't want to leave my car in your lot.” He got out and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket.
“Don't we need a plane or something?” I looked around searching for a hidden Cessna.
“I'm calling for a door.” He held up a hand to me, gesturing for me to stop talking. “We're ready,” he said into the phone.
A door?
I spun around looking at the dark lot.
“Shouldn't we get going?” I said to him. We did need to get states away and pro
nto.
“There.”
Ten feet in front of us, a shimmering started until a set of doors appeared out of nowhere. They looked like they were made of platinum, but what was even crazier were the two guards in full armor that appeared next to them.
“I'm guessing that they would be the ones that stopped anyone trying to go through without permission?”
“Yes.” We approached the doors and they glided open. On the other side of them, a forest appeared.
“And we can just call these guys up? How did they know where to lead us?”
“Yes. The number is programmed into your work phone.”
“Why did I need you then?”
“They don't always like new people, even if they are supposed to be here. It's usually better if you travel with someone they know the first time.”
Fate stepped aside to let me go first. I hesitated right before I crossed the threshold and felt Fate's hand on the small of my back. If it was someone else, it might have been a reassuring presence. Him? It was probably to push me through if I tried to stop.
And then I took the plunge forward.
Chapter Eleven
I stood on the other side of the door as Fate came through after me and then it disappeared. Looking around, it wasn't so dissimilar to the forests of South Carolina, especially dark as it was. It was hard to believe we'd just crossed a distance that would have taken hours by plane in less than a minute.
“What time is it?” I asked as he looked down at his wrist.
“We've got about a half an hour to get to the locale.”
It felt so odd that I knew instinctively where to go. If someone asked how I knew we had to walk north to find the couple, I'd ask them how they knew to drink water when they were thirsty. That's how natural and impulsive the urge was.
I took off in search of my job and Fate silently followed behind me. As we traveled in the dark in the middle of a forest, I wondered how I wasn't falling on my ass, tripped by a wayward branch or a boulder. Somehow, my feet always stepped somewhere sound.
I didn't falter until I heard the screaming coming from our destination. I only paused for a second before I took off at a dead run, knowing what was coming.
Karma (Karma Series) Page 8