“I can’t.”
There was silence and then a strained, “I hate this part.”
I came to a full stop, inviting his headlamp to ram my backside again. It did.
“Is there something I should know about?”
“I don’t like enclosed spaces,” he quietly confessed.
Hold the phone. The Eidolon is claustrophobic?
He palmed my buttocks. “Go, before I flip out.”
I feared heights. Brent feared enclosed spaces. We should have disclosed our list of phobias before we crawled into a three-by-three tunnel to hell. But after several more minutes of knee and elbow scurrying, I spotted slivers of pale light through a ventilation grill.
I flattened onto my belly and used my elbows to drag myself to the grill. A whiff of that familiar aroma of death—sickly-sweet with a hint of musk—crept through metal slats.
Below us there was a hallway like any hotel hallway. Damask wallpaper and carpet scrolled with green and rose tulips adorned the walls and floor respectively. This was Lethe?
A black shape popped into view and ruined any thoughts of taking a vacation here. I recoiled and collided with Brent. My buttocks crashed into his triumvirate of man bits. What a lovely way to introduce our privates.
Someway the Eidolon had maneuvered himself above me without me feeling him and gazed down through the grate. I wasn’t sure what intrigued me more—Brent’s skills or the spirit below, wandering aimlessly through a hallway inside the underground portal to the Afterlife. At least Brent was alive.
“Is it a human soul?” I said, not bothering to ask why Brent covered me like a Reaper-blanket. Later. Later I would ask…if I remembered.
“Yeah, human,” he whispered into my ear. “They spend time in Lethe, forgetting their lives, until they’re fully crossed over.”
The ghost stopped in its directionless route and looked toward us. Brent yanked me back. Our limbs entangled into an erogenous jumble. Had I let him put me over the back of the couch and dishonor me however he wanted, would it have been anything like this?
I waited until the ghost carried on then asked, with Brent’s better bits pressed to mine, “How long do they stay here?”
He gave a shift of his hips, a gratuitous but very nice gesture, and he said, “For as long as it takes for them to forget. Be quiet. The Vaults are two more vents ahead.”
I thought to ask what the next vent would reveal. I saved my words, and I climbed out from our leg-and-arm pretzel to stealthily scuttle toward the next grate. After several minutes I came to our second destination. I paused, took a breath, and looked.
I wished I hadn’t.
The lost soul looking to erase his or her memory was as sweet as running into Mickey Mouse in a haunted house. The creature I now stared down on was far less cuddly-cute. It gave a resonant growl that vibrated the air duct.
Grasping his collar, I put my lips against Brent’s ear, not caring how he interpreted it. “W-What the hell is it?”
“A sentinel. Don’t stop.” He nudged me forward. “They smell fear.”
The sentinel had an elongated face with fangs protruding from its jaws. But the body was a skeleton of an overgrown dog. Ribbons of fur clung to its bones. The monster glowed with an unknown light source, and I didn’t plan to hang around to it figure out. It released another growl. I shuffled onward, ignoring how my knees protested. Brent was closer to my backside than before.
Our escape took far too long, as I imagined that sentinel climbing into the air duct after us. Then a whiff of stale paper wafted through the third vent—our destination. The Registry Vault was beneath us. I looked through, praying to Hades I wouldn’t spy a hairy dog skeleton there.
Droplets of water trickled from the grate. The view didn’t indicate the room’s size, but I saw walls packed full of wooden cases with words on the front of each drawer. And no monster.
I put my hands on the opposite side of the grill and crawled over it, careful not to touch the metal or make a sound.
“It looks like a giant card catalogue,” I said.
Lines of soft light washed over what I could see of Brent’s face. “Sort of is.”
The Head Reaper and his closest confidants didn’t bother converting their paper files to electronic ones.
“This place looks exactly as it did in 1910,” he said.
“Reapers don’t tend to redecorate.”
“Guess not. The cases were falling apart when I was here. Such a pain to—”
“What now?” I wasn’t interested in listening to Old Man Hume reminisce.
“See those wood cabinets?” He pointed to several lined up along a wall. They looked as rotted and timeworn as Greek antiquities. “Gotta find Eve’s name in the catalog. Then we cross-reference it with the Reaper’s list to be sure we got the right one.”
That sounded peachy. But I had no intention of moving.
He curled his fingers around the grill, pulled it free, and handed it to me. Like an upside-down gopher in black goggles, he lowered his head, checked the scene, then snapped back. “You first.”
I handed the grill back. “When hell freezes over. You first.”
Grumbling, he dumped it and proceeded to unfurl inside the tunnel, which for a six-foot-five giant was no small feat. He wasn’t elegant, especially not after getting his right knee wedged on the lip of the ventilation hole. This was why he didn’t like small spaces.
I stifled laughter as he slipped headfirst through the hole and did some kind of acrobatic twist. He hit the flagstone floor with both feet, crouched like the ninja he resembled. That performance quieted my amusement with admiration.
He might have been apprehensive above in the cramped tunnel, but now he was on the alert as he scanned the room he’d once known. With a wriggle of his finger, he said it was my turn to do a nimble twirl from the ceiling.
I lowered my feet until I felt something squishy. A glimpse down. My boot squashed his cheek.
Good, he had me.
I pulled my torso out of the vent as best I could as his hands caught my calves. They slid up my thighs, stopping short of my hips. He was helping, but somehow his touch felt sensuous when it should have been all business. I lowered tentatively into his grasp until I was stretched out with my hands on the rim of the ventilation hole.
“Let go,” he whispered.
Boy, I wanted to, until I looked down another four feet. I was about to give a protest, maybe a slur of dirty words, when he gave a tug. I was going down whether I wanted to or not. My hands slipped as his arms coiled around my waist. Brent had proven he had some slick moves, so it wasn’t any shock when his arms slackened, and I found myself feeling every muscle and bulge as I rode down the length of his body.
The fact he had half-deathed me through a secret entrance and we were in the middle of the underground vaults of the hostile Head Reaper home base had no effect on the fact that every time we touched, there was more to it than breaking and entering. Too bad I wouldn’t remember any of it.
When my feet planted on the floor, my knees buckled. He caught me before I crumpled.
Lit by oil lamps tacked on the walls, the domed room was lined with carvings of skulls in the polished stone. Skulls were fitting. We were in a library crammed with stacks upon stacks of Deathlists.
However, why the room wasn’t packed with Watchmen was beyond me. I didn’t pause to ask. All we needed was Eve’s Reaper and to make our way to that damn free fall of an exit.
Brent put his mouth to my ear, his breath hot against my flesh. “Remember the plan. Stand guard.”
Right. Standing guard I could do while rubbing the Eidolon-induced goose bumps from my arms. I looked back and forth, then turned to him and nodded. There wasn’t much I could do if a Watchman or those ghost-white sentinels came to have a chat.
Ten of the longest minutes of my life crept by. The raised hairs on my arms tingled. Every possible danger raced through my mind. Would we get caught? Would I trip and knock down the enti
re Vault of Reaper lists? Was there a ladies’ room nearby?
Someone tapped my shoulder. I jumped a foot in the air and then breathed in relief when I saw the tall man in black with my boot print on his cheek.
“Eve’s guy is in section B.” Above the card catalogues, twice as tall as Brent, hung wood signs with letters burned into them. Section B was halfway across the room, underneath a skull chandelier. How swanky.
His hand gripped mine as he dragged me toward a wall of cases. We passed through one row, then another. Brent’s headlamp flashed across the square drawers marked with surnames. Bainbridge. Baines. He slowed. Bains. Bainter. He dove for a low drawer. Baird. The index cards clicked when he yanked the drawer open. Dust attacked my nose. I scratched it to keep from sneezing. I would not get caught because of an allergy.
Brent’s fingers danced over the cards with lightning speed, so I did another sweep of our surroundings. Something about the stillness didn’t feel right. I looked down as he ripped out a certificate, scribbled two words on our notecard, stuffed the paper inside the Ziploc bag, and slipped it underneath his shirt.
“Who is her Reaper?” I asked.
“Nicholas Baird.”
He replaced the certificate. The drawer slammed shut with a kick of his foot. He straightened, returning to his towering height. I whirled toward the ventilation hole but he cupped my wrist. Every hard muscle of his pressed against my backside when he pulled me close.
“Not that way.”
We made a hard left at the end of the cases and down two more rows, further into the middle of the room. I looked up to the wooden sign above us. Section H. Lovely. I should’ve assumed Brent would want to peek at his list, too.
Had I slightly more guts, I might have asked him to find my Reaper.
When we reached the drawer for Hume, he zipped through the cards, plucked his Deathlist, slipped the whole certificate into the Ziploc baggie, and tucked it back under his shirt with well-rehearsed precision.
“You said not to take the whole List,” I said. “Jot the names down.”
“No time.”
“They’ll come after you if—”
He put a finger to my lips. I stilled. There were determined footsteps off in the distance. The red dots of his eyes behind his goggles broadened. We had no need to verbally exchange words. Brent bolted upright. We took off through the labyrinth of bookcases.
“Over there,” shouted a foreboding voice that surely belonged to a five-by-five brick house of a Watchman.
My heart was between my throat and eyes. Just as I was about to break from Brent’s grip and head back to the ventilation exit, we came upon another grating in the floor. The faint sound of rushing water beckoned. This was our way out?
Brent grabbed the lattice and yanked. “Shit.”
“What?”
“It’s welded shut. Used to be loose.” His brow creased from his straining.
“Then half-death us through it.” I was okay with the idea. No problem. I’d even let him see my panties. Hell, he could sniff them if he got us out of here.
“Can only do it to get into Lethe. Getting out is different.” He bared his teeth and pulled again.
“You’re not trying hard enough.”
He glared up from under his rumpled brow. “I could lift a backhoe with this grip.”
“They’re by the drain,” shouted a Watchman.
Now was not the time to panic, but I never lived by anybody’s schedule. I shoved Brent aside and dove for the grate. Maybe all it needed was a fresh set of hands to haul the steel blockade free. I put in my best effort.
Brent sat back on his heels. “Told you.”
“Don’t sit there. Help.”
The advancing footsteps grew louder.
“You and your polka dot g-string seem to have it handled.”
“You motherfucker. You looked?” But at least they were my cute panties.
“I’d be an idiot not to,” he snickered.
“I’m going to—” Smoke called my attention to my hands, melting the obstruction. A breath later, the barrier was gone, dripping glutinous metal down into another void.
“I’ve got them,” shouted a Watchman at the end of the aisle.
“Go. Go.” Brent practically threw me down the hole.
Astonished because I hadn’t considered using my heat to my own advantage, and aggravated I didn’t have time to delight in the discovery because the brick house was practically on top of us, I dropped into the darkness, not knowing where I was going or if this was the free fall or if it was still to come.
At the bottom, I found myself inside another tunnel with two feet of moving water tugging at my legs. A deafening roar gave away a waterfall. Dread superseded the urge to get away. I looked, intent on climbing back up the ladder, when Brent cleared the last rung. Flashlight beams swung over us.
As my fingers found their way around the ladder’s rungs, Brent pulled on me. I collapsed into blubbery defeat, screaming and going limp in his arms to foil his effort to get me into the water. He pulled me close so I couldn’t fill my lungs for another shriek before we were no longer standing in the waters flowing through Lethe, but plummeting with them over the precipice of an underground waterfall.
Chapter Nine
“The hypothalamus is one of the most important parts of the brain, involved in many kinds of motivation, among other functions. The hypothalamus controls the “Four F’s”: fighting, fleeing, feeding, and mating.”
—Marvin Dunnette
Not a single word passed between us, from the moment we smacked through the water’s surface on the Saint Lawrence River, to when we stumbled, dripping wet, into my apartment. There was nothing to discuss because, as Brent had promised, we could not remember anything after reaching the bottom of the manhole beneath the Château. Besides, stopping to debate whatever we thought had happened, soaked as we were, was not possible. Québec. Winter. Enough said.
However, we must’ve gone through Lethe. The last I remembered was fixing to scoot through a tunnel before Brent turned into his wraithlike self. Nothing, not the pounding of our feet on the pavement from the sprint to my apartment had loosened the remainder of the experience. Nothing but an abyss remained. How eerie that I had gone through the portal to the Afterlife and couldn’t recall anything about it.
After cranking the heat in my apartment and flicking on the lights, and most certainly after I gave Dudley a warm greeting, I looked at my co-conspirator. His mask and goggles were gone, he was shivering, and, for some reason, he had a size-seven muddy boot print on his cheek.
“What ha-happened?” I asked through chattering teeth.
“Not sure, but it was a ride.”
We convened around a piping hot radiator in my living room. The temptation to sit on it and warm my buns was there, but I resisted. What was impossible to resist was standing side by side with Brent without touching. And the more we sought warmth, the closer we became. Too soon we were all but hugging in effort to regain our body heat.
Had he suggested removing our clothes, I would not have partaken. I would have liked to know what the rebel Brent Hume was like in the bedroom, but not right before Lethe, in Lethe, or after Lethe, and certainly not standing over a radiator, shivering ourselves silly.
My clicking teeth slowed as the radiator, and Brent’s body heat, melted a layer of ice on my clothing. “Did you…you get the Reaper’s name?”
He pulled down the collar of his shirt to expose a white notecard inside a plastic bag. A name was scribbled on it, but from what I could see the writing had bled. Brent noticed a second after me.
“Mother fucker,” he groused. “The ink got wet.”
“Of course it did.” It was too much energy to roll my eyes. For now, I needed heat. Lots and lots of heat.
He held the baggie up to the overhead light. “I see a name. Baird.”
“Is that a last name or first? Is it a male or female? Who is it?” My shivering worsened my panic, which in tu
rn worsened my shivering. “We did this all for nothing, didn’t we? Didn’t we?”
“Good Hades, calm down, Scrivener.” He turned from me when I tried to get a peek at the name through the soggy baggie. Not one to take such an obvious cue to give him space, I went for it, using my own shivering to launch into the air. Quick as he was, he underestimated my determination. The baggie was in my hands before my feet touched the floor. Being short and swift was a fine offense against tall and slow.
“Hey!” he barked.
“It says Baird. It’s a last name.” I ducked when he reached around my shoulders, thwarting his effort to retrieve the baggie. “But I can’t read the first name. No knowing if it is a guy or gal.”
“Give it back.” Brent refused to continue reaching for the prize, as if little ol’ Olivia outplaying him was an affront to his ego.
“I don’t know a Baird,” I said.
“Neither do I. This means I can’t just look the Reaper up and distract him or her like I had planned.”
“So I was right?” I dropped my arms to my sides as we faced each other, Brent looking as bewildered and broken as I felt.
“Seems so.”
I sighed to keep from breaking into tears. My shoulders and head felt heavy. The couch seemed a great place to throw myself down and let my emotions pour out. I would’ve found out, if Brent didn’t rush at me and grab the baggie. There was only a small glimpse of his wicked smile before we found ourselves entangled, both vying for the prize. A moment after, I found out what it would be like to collapse onto the couch, only with the Eidolon, too, falling over top of me. The springs of the beast cringed from our weight.
Thoughts of Eve and the name Baird flitted away in exchange for one very real thing hovering above me.
I grew tense but hopeful when his eyes turned to my lips. I knew what that meant. Every woman did. However selfish and grossly out of place it was, I was okay with one kiss, more curious than frightened to discover what it was like to kiss an Eidolon who could drain my life. Perhaps my motivation was to ridicule Fate by kissing the lips of Death himself. Or maybe I was cold, tired, and downright horny.
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