Keeper vs. Reaper (Graveyard Guardians Book 1)

by Jennifer Malone Wright

  For a moment he considered just shooting the brother, but then decided that would give Lucy time to run. He wasn’t worried about the father. Souls didn’t have enough ability to fight back. Plus, a gunshot would alert anyone around that something was up.

  He raised his weapon and stepped out of his hiding place. “Don’t move,” he ordered, keeping his voice completely calm, while continuing to move toward them.

  All three looked up in surprise and took their fighting stances, even the old man. He flashed the three Keepers his best lethal smile. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I have a gun and I will fucking shoot you. So, don’t even think about trying anything.”

  The older brother, idiot that he was, moved in front of the sister. “Greg!” she cried out.

  By this time, Aiden was right in front of them and kicked out his weapon, then swung it hard. It connected with Greg’s skull and the brother fell to the ground with a thud. Unconscious for now, he turned on the sister.

  “If you’re going to kill me, fucking do it already. Just leave my family alone,” she cried out and fell to the ground beside her brother.

  “Lucy!” her father chastised her.

  Aiden wanted this whole situation to be over, he was getting tired of chasing Keepers. “Shut up, both of you,” he ordered then reached down with his free hand and grabbed Lucy by the hair. “You scream and I will shoot him, understand?”

  Lucy choked back a sob and nodded that she understood.

  “You too, old man,” he warned as he dragged Lucy up into a standing position. He reached down into her jeans pocket and pulled out her phone, then threw it to the ground beside her brother.

  “Don’t hurt her,” the father pleaded, “please.”

  “Yeah, not making any promises,” Aiden told him.

  “Let her go! There has to be something we can offer in exchange.”

  “I told you to shut your mouth.” Aiden dropped Lucy and turned to the old man. Only an inch away from the shimmering soul, he opened his mouth and felt the surge of energy take him as the soul of the old man began to float toward him.

  “Lucy,” the old man moaned, unable to stop what was happening to him.

  “Stop!” she cried out. “You can’t have him.” The next thing he knew, his feet were coming out from under him. She had grabbed one of his legs and pulled. The transfer of the soul halted and the old man’s semi-solid form stumbled backward a few steps.

  Aiden managed not to drop his gun, but Lucy was on top of him instantly. She pulled back her arm and then slammed her fist into his face. “You fucking bastard!

  His cheekbone erupted in a spike of pain and metaphorical fire. She reared back and hit him again, but he blocked the third one and then remembered that his gun was in the other hand. He lifted it and rested the barrel against her midsection. “Get the fuck off me,” he managed to say in a low voice.

  “You are a cheat,” she muttered, slowly sliding off of him.

  “Careful now,” he told her. “I don’t like this gun any more than you do, if it makes you feel any better. But, I can’t risk losing. Not this time.” He once again grabbed her by the hair, wrapping it in his fist. Once they were in a standing position, he gave her a little yank. “It’s time to go.”

  He glanced at the old man, whose expression was a cross between sadness and anger. Aiden actually felt bad for the guy for like five seconds. Poor guy was watching his daughter be kidnapped, and probably thought she was going to be killed, which she eventually would be if the Empress had anything to do with it.

  “Lucy.” The old man stretched his transparent hand out to his daughter.

  “Dad. I’ll be fine. Just tell the others what happened.” She had begun to cry and wiped some of her tears away.

  “Yeah,” Aiden agreed sarcastically. “Tell the others, it won’t do you any good though. It’s over now.”

  With that, Aiden slammed the grip of his gun into the back of Lucy’s head. Her weight slumped down in his hand, leaving her hanging from her hair where he had hold of it.

  “You will be sorry,” the old man hissed. “You are going to be so sorry that you have done this,” he repeated.

  Aiden turned and looked him straight in the eye. “It might surprise you, but I already am.”

  “Then why?”

  “Orders, my man. Not that I owe you an explanation.” He lifted the unconscious Lucy and threw her over his shoulder. “I hope to hell we never see each other again,” Aiden told the old man, and then strode off into the woods with Lucy hanging over him.

  “God dammit!” he heard the old man curse after he was out of sight. “Greg! Wake up!”

  Knowing that the son would be gaining consciousness pretty soon, he took off at a run. He needed to get out of there before they could give chase. The idea was to be on the road before the guy even woke up.

  His SUV was parked on some deserted side road he’d found on the other side of the woods from the Keepers property. Well, he hoped it was deserted. He opened the back door and pulled out a set of hand cuffs and some duct tape. He’d had to get the cuffs at a fucking sex store because he couldn’t bring his own shit with him. Thank God the store had some hardcore stuff there, he didn’t know what he’d have done if he had to restrain his kidnapping victim with handcuffs that had pink fur padding on them.

  She moaned as he plopped her down into the back seat where he handcuffed her wrists together and then wrapped her ankles with the tape. She was in a sitting position and kept flopping forward and he kept pushing her back.

  As soon as he finished taping her ankles together, her eyes popped wide open and she screamed so loud he wanted to cover his ears.

  “Shut the fuck up!" He grabbed his gun from the floor of the SUV and pressed the barrel against her forehead. With one hand, he held the roll of tape to his mouth, and with a loud tearing noise he ripped off a good sized piece. “Guess I’m going to have to use this on your mouth too.” He pressed the piece of tape onto her lips, and then removed the gun from its resting place on her forehead.

  “Now, be a good girl and sit still.” He slammed the door shut and rounded the vehicle to the driver seat.

  In no time, they were flying over the mountain to where the Empress had told him to meet her with the Chosen One.

  She could only breathe through her nose, which was causing claustrophobia to set in. It took a lot of focus but she managed to take long slow breaths in and out to avoid panic.

  She was sitting up in the back seat and could clearly see that they were going over the Saint Helena Mountain. What worried her most about this whole situation was that the Reaper who took her wasn’t worried about her being able to see where she was going, which meant that he didn’t expect her to be around to tell anyone about it.

  Oh shit, she was totally fucked.

  She eyeballed the Reaper who was driving. He had blond hair, she couldn’t see his eyes, but she remembered from the attack that they were green. While he was driving, he dug around in his pocket until he came up with a phone. He hit a number on what must have been his speed dial and lifted the phone to his ear.

  “Empress. Yes, I have her. Yes, she is alive. All right, okay. I look forward to the presence of your company.” A long pause. “No, I haven’t seen him. Yes, Empress. I look forward to your appearance.”

  Good God, he was taking her to the Empress of the Reapers. Yeah, totally fucked pretty much covered it.

  She couldn’t say anything with the tape over her mouth, and he didn’t offer any conversation, so they drove in silence to wherever it was he was taking her. It was an odd feeling that came over her, as much as she hoped to get away from this alive, she really hoped that none of her family tried to rescue her.

  It’s not like they would be able to find her anyway and she would probably be dead by the time they did.

  They had made it over the mountain and were entering the Napa Valley. She looked out across the expanse of vineyards. Wineries were set far back against the land and mos
t had large homes built beside them.

  Suddenly, she thought of how ironic it was that she had lived in the area her entire life and had not once gone wine tasting. There and then, she made a pact with herself. If I get out of this alive, I am going wine tasting, dammit.

  After driving a little while longer, she felt the car slow to almost a stop and then take a turn. A look out the window told her that they were heading down a long, paved driveway that was lined with oaks on both sides.

  They slowed again as the vehicle approached an iron gate. The Reaper stopped at the gate and rolled down the window so that he could enter a code into the little box with a keypad on it. Lucy watched everything as carefully as she could, just in case.

  Once the code was properly entered, the gate rolled aside, opening the way to what appeared to be more paved driveway. It wasn’t long, though, before they rolled into a circular driveway and were faced with a massive Victorian home. The lower half of the home was mostly gray stone from what she could see. Castle was the only word that Lucy felt could describe the second and third stories of the home.

  The Reaper circled the gargantuan fountain, which was placed in the center of the drive, and came to a stop near the front entrance.

  As he slid from the driver seat and came around the vehicle to get her out, the panic set in again. Shit, shit, shit! How in the hell was she going to get out of this?

  The back door opened and he stared at her for a second before reaching down to heft her out of the car. “Come on, Chosen One, let’s get this over with,” he muttered.

  Lucy couldn’t help it, she wanted to tell him to fuck off, but the only thing that came through the heavy tape was a pathetic moan that made her sound like she was whining.

  He threw her over his shoulder again and headed up the large set of stone stairs leading to the front doors. His shoulder dug into her stomach and both halves of her bounced off of his body.

  She heard the door open before he could knock on it or ring a bell. “Good evening, Sir Aiden,” a smooth voice greeted him.

  “Evening,” Aiden grunted under her weight.

  “You will find the Empress in the sitting room. She is expecting you.”

  Aiden trudged forward. “Thanks man, which way is it.”

  “Oh, of course, I will take you there.”

  And then they were walking down a hall with hardwood flooring, then through a set of glass doors into a large room with the same kind of floors. She couldn’t see much of the furniture from her view, but what she could see looked all antique.

  “Here you are Sir. Would you be requiring anything else?”

  Dang, guess it was no surprise to that guy to have people to show up at the door with a tied up girl draped over their shoulder.

  “Nope, I’m good.” Then he turned and managed to execute a small leaning bow. “Empress.”

  “Aiden. I’m so glad you’re finally here.”

  Then she was going over. Aiden flipped her and dumped her on a dark red velvet couch. Immediately, her eyes scanned the room until she found the woman who had been speaking.

  She knew her eyes had to be wide with fear, because she was scared shitless, but she sure as hell wasn’t going to show these fuckers just how scared.

  The Empress had short dark hair and wicked cold, dark brown eyes. Something about her was familiar, but she couldn’t quite place it. The woman was old, but she carried it well, and was most likely far older than she looked. She stood on the far end of the room by a set of glass doors that led out to a balcony.

  Standing beside her, was a young black girl who looked to be about the same age as Lucy. She wore a flowing burgundy skirt and a tight black tank top. The girl’s hair fell down her back in loose ringlets. Those were the kind of curls that never stayed for more than five minutes when Lucy curled her, straight as a board, hair.

  “May I ask who your friend is?” Aiden questioned, caution thick in his voice. Why wouldn’t it be, he just kidnapped someone. It’s not like he wanted that shit on the front page of the paper anytime soon.

  The Empress ripped her gaze away from Lucy and concentrated on Aiden. “This, is Emily, I will explain her presence shortly. You need not worry about her at the moment.”

  “With all due respect, Empress, I am worried when someone is involved in … matters which are to be kept under wraps.”

  The Empress waved her hand at Aiden in a dismissive manner. “Aiden, take the tape off the Keeper’s mouth.”

  Realizing that the Empress had no intention of continuing that part of the conversation, Aiden reached down and took the corner of the tape then yanked it off so fast Lucy knew she wouldn’t need to get her lip waxed for at least a year. “Mother fucker!” she cursed as soon as the tape was off. “Fuck!”

  “Mind your manners,” Aiden ordered.

  “You kidnapped me you asshole, I don’t have to mind shit!”

  She looked at the Empress. “If you’re going to kill me, just do it. Why the hell would you kidnap me instead of just offing me like he tried to do the first time.” At least if they just killed her then her family would be safe. She knew better than to think that they would do nothing about her being taken.

  The Empress sighed and strode across the room, her heels clicking prominently on the hard wood. “No one said we aren’t going to kill you. Be patient.”

  The whole time Lucy and the Empress were bantering, Emily’s face had gone from resting bitch face to really fucking worried. “Excuse me, but I didn’t realize that all this was part of your intentions. I cannot be involved in such things.”

  The Reaper Empress turned her head, her eyes boring down into Emily’s beautiful brown ones. “You have no choice, you are involved now and will not be allowed to leave the premises.”

  Emily didn’t seem to care. Lucy watched her carefully take a step to the side. She wasn’t the only one watching carefully though because Aiden side stepped as well. “Don’t even think about it,” he told her in one of the coldest voices she’d ever heard.

  “This is not what my gift is for.”

  Camille cracked a smug smile. “It is now, darling.”

  Emily’s face fell and she stepped back to where she had been, probably realizing that she would not be able to escape the grounds alive.

  Lucy struggled against her bindings. “What do you want?”

  The older woman sat down in a straight back chair across from Lucy and crossed her legs. “You are the Chosen One, correct?”

  “Apparently,” Lucy spat.

  “You see, the prophecy says that the Chosen One is descended from one of the seven original lines of Keepers. What exactly is so special about you that you would be the one deemed worthy enough to ‘bring forth an end to the Reapers?’

  “There is nothing special about me, and frankly I don’t give a fuck about this prophecy. All it has done is screw up my life.”

  The Empress closed her eyes and shook her head slightly. “First things first though.” She stood up. “We are going to need a few samples from you.”

  “Samples?” What the hell kind of ‘samples’ could they possibly want from her.

  The Empress went to a heavy wooden desk which was taking up space in one corner of the room. Lucy couldn’t see what was on the desk, but she saw what she held up and began to squirm again.

  “No fucking way!”

  The Empress came back her way, holding up a syringe complete with a huge needle. “I am afraid that you don’t have a choice, young Keeper.”

  “My name is Lucy, you bitch!”

  The Empress merely smiled a thin, cold smile. “Well, since we are on a first name basis now, my name is Camille, Camille Walker.”

  Walker. Now why did that name set off alarms in her head?

  “Now, we just need a little bit of blood. Aiden, hold her down.”

  No fucking way! Lucy tried to move off the couch. Maybe somehow she could roll to safety or something. What she ended up doing, though, was flopping around like a fish out o
f water.

  “Leave her alone,” Emily cried from the other side of the room.

  The Empress glanced her way. “If you move an inch I will have you killed this very night. Understand?”

  There was no answer, so Lucy assumed that Emily had nodded her response.

  Aiden reached down, grasped her by both arms and hauled her up. He sat on the couch and pulled her into his lap, where he wrapped his legs around hers and held down her arms at the same time.

  Lucy felt the tears on her cheeks and wished that she could wipe them away. She had failed so miserably with this whole Chosen One thing. “Why are you doing this?” She tilted her head up toward Aiden.

  He didn’t answer. He kept his face as emotionless as stone, just the way a henchman for his Empress should.

  “Hold still, Lucy,” Camille ordered as she approached, and then before Lucy could react, she felt the tightening of a tourniquet on her upper arm. “Please don’t,” Lucy pathetically tried again, but the Empress ignored her and a moment later, Lucy felt the slight prick of the needle sliding into one of her veins.

  She closed her eyes and turned her head away. God dammit, what a violation. Not that she would compare it to rape or anything, but it pretty much was. They were taking something from her body without her permission and it made her feel dirty and disgusting.

  “I hate you both,” Lucy murmured with her eyes closed.

  “You are mistaken if you think that I need or want you to like me.” Camille’s voice was icy cold. “There,” she released the tourniquet on Lucy’s arm, “that should do for now.”

  “Fuck off.”

  The Empress’s hand struck out so fast that Lucy’s head was forced far to the left. Lucy didn’t scream, but she let out a long breath and tried to keep calm. She was sure she came pretty close to pulling an Exorcist move there for a minute.

  “None of this is going to help you,” Lucy hissed.

  Aiden lifted her off of his lap set her aside and resumed his standing position like a good guard dog.

  Camille rolled her eyes slightly, as if Lucy was the most ignorant person on earth. “Don’t be so sure, Keeper. You have your prophecy, who is to say that we don’t have our own?”