Eleventh Grave in Moonlight

by Darynda Jones

  He sat holding his throat and glaring toward the bathroom.

  “Angel, what? Is it Beep?”

  Reyes was at the door in an instant, suddenly as curious as I was.

  When Angel didn’t answer as quickly as he’d have liked, he stalked toward him.

  I held up a hand and cast him a warning glare. “I think you’ve done enough, Mr. Farrow.”

  He stood back, every muscle in his body coiled, ready to spring into action should anything have happened.

  “It’s your uncle,” he said, his voice hoarse.

  Alarm rocketed through me. “What about him? Did he find Guerin?” Grant Guerin. The lowlife slated to kill Ubie. The whole reason we had eyes on the curmudgeonly man.

  Angel shook his head. Coughed again. “No, he’s at a hotel room. Some dive a few blocks from here. He’s been watching one particular room all evening. Some guys just pulled up in a rental, and now your uncle is gearing up like he’s preparing for World War III.”

  “What? Show me.”

  I rushed to throw on some clothes. Reyes did the same.

  “You’d better hurry. When I left, he was headed for the door. If Captain America hadn’t tried to kill me.”

  “If I’d have wanted you dead—”

  “Seriously, guys?” Then I glared at Reyes again for good measure.

  He lifted a shoulder. “He should learn to knock.”

  Before they could start arguing again, I took Angel’s hand. “Show me.” I dematerialized beside him. Reyes followed suit. Angel wanted to ask me about this spiffy new ability, but he remembered why he’d come, and he disappeared.

  Following Angel was a little more difficult than I’d expected. Reyes took my hand and led me, and we were there in a split second, standing in front of one of the sleazier hotels Albuquerque had to offer.

  “There.” Angel pointed. “Room 212.”

  “Thanks, hon.” Uncle Bob was already inside. The door was closed, so I did what any self-respecting PI would do. I dematerialized again and eavesdropped.

  “He doesn’t speak English,” a man said.

  I slipped into a tiny hotel room. Reyes appeared beside me. Angel on the other side of the room.

  Uncle Bob seemed to be holding the entire place hostage. A total of nine men. Nine. And they’d been in the middle of a meeting, by the looks of it.

  “Yes,” Uncle Bob said. “He does.” Then he aimed one of the two guns he had drawn at a man in his early fifties. Bad haircut. Hideous mustache. Like something out of a seventies discothèque. “And I know why you’re here.”

  “Dutch,” Reyes said, drawing my attention to a table.

  I stepped over and took a peek. There was a briefcase open with a stack of papers inside. And on top was a surveillance photo of yours truly.

  Oh, no. This couldn’t be the same people. I looked at Reyes. “This can’t be the same people.”

  “Robert killed them, but they could be from the same crew.”

  “He doesn’t know what you are talking about,” the speaker of the house said.

  “Sure he does.” Uncle Bob put his best grin forward. “Charlotte Davidson.”

  The man Ubie was most interested in let a smile slither across his face. “Is that her name?”

  “Doesn’t matter. You aren’t leaving here alive.”

  “I think we might, my friend.” The man started to stand.

  Ubie tightened his hold on his gun.

  The man raised his hands in surrender and sat back down. “I think you came here not expecting so much”—he spread his hands, indicating his cohorts—“company, no?”

  “I knew exactly what I was getting into, Valencia.”

  “I think maybe you are lying.”

  “I think maybe you are nervous.”

  I had never seen Uncle Bob so determined. So … furious. It radiated out of him. Hot waves of anger.

  “See, I’m the one who killed your little crew two years ago.”

  The man stilled, clearly not expecting that.

  “They knew about her. They were going to get her for you. I found out, and, well, this is my town. I don’t like it when Colombian drug barons try to steal women and eat them.”

  “My men knew about the witch?”

  Witch?

  “They did.”

  Witch?

  “Certain people in certain crowds know about how she has some kind of extrasensory perception.” Uncle Bob chuckled. “But trust me, they don’t know the half of it.”

  “How did you find out we were here?”

  “The State Department keeps tabs on people like you, El Tiburón. Of course we’d find out you came into the country.”

  “I did not come through the normal routes.”

  “You were smuggled in. I know. I have contacts.”

  “But maybe I am not here for this Charlotte.”

  Ubie didn’t even acknowledge that with a comment.

  The tension in the room ratcheted higher with each passing second. One man would ease toward a gun on a dresser, and Uncle Bob would shoot him a warning glare. Then another would lower one hand toward a gun in his holster. Same story. Different caliber.

  But they would get the best of him and soon. He couldn’t keep up the standoff for long. What the hell had he been thinking?

  “I’d like you to know, I’m actually doing you a favor,” he said. “Charley’s husband is the son of Satan. He would’ve done much worse.”

  The man remained impassive, but I felt his pulse skyrocket. In hunger. He wanted to eat Reyes, too. Fucker.

  I turned toward my husband and startled at the look of rage on his face. Pure, unadulterated rage. “Reyes, they couldn’t have killed you, anyway, right? It’s okay.”

  He all but gaped at me. “You think I’m worried about me?”

  No. Of course he wasn’t. “But they couldn’t have killed me, either.”

  “There are worse things than death.”

  Oh. Crap. That didn’t sound promising.

  In a sequence of events that was so fast it took me by surprise, guns from every corner of the room were drawn.

  I could barely get out the words Be still before several fired.

  Bullets slid through the air, two from the guns Ubie held, slowing to a complete stop. He was fast. I’d give him that.

  He stood frozen to the spot. Not because I’d stopped time, but because he was shocked and confused. I’d stopped time but kept him in the loop. Then Reyes and I materialized so he could see us.

  He noticed me out of the corner of his eye, dropped to his knees, and swung his gun around way faster than I’d thought him capable. A defensive maneuver that left me completely impressed. But he paused, his gaze fixating on me. His brows slid together in disbelief.

  I rushed forward. “Uncle Bob,” I said, patting him to make sure a bullet hadn’t hit its mark. “What the hell were you thinking?”

  “Charley?” He glanced from me to Reyes and back. Then he scanned the truly frozen occupants of the room. “What are you…? I don’t understand.”

  I knelt beside him. “What were you thinking, coming here?”

  “I … what are you doing here?”

  “I had Angel watching you.”

  “Why? You knew Valencia was in town?”

  Shaking my head, I said, “No. But we’ve had surveillance on you for a while for a completely different reason. You were supposed to be killed by a kid named Grant Guerin. We were tailing you. Trying to make sure he didn’t succeed.”

  “I don’t even know a Grant Gue—” He looked around at the statuesque figures, the blood draining from his face even more. “How did you…? What happened?”

  “I just slowed time. These men were going to kill you.” I flung my arms around his neck. He patted my head absently, the shock settling in and growing roots.

  Reyes went around collecting guns and tossing them into the briefcase.

  “You can … you can stop time.” It wasn’t a question. It was said more as a
matter-of-fact statement that he was trying to wrap his head around. I got that.

  “Not for very long. Uncle Bob, why did you come here alone like this?”

  “What?”

  I thought about slapping him like they did in the movies, and I might have if he weren’t holding not one but two guns. “Why did you come here alone?”

  “I got word. I … Valencia was smuggled into the country.” He nodded. “He saw that video Amber showed you.”

  “The puppies yawning?”

  “No.”

  “The puppies wrestling?”

  “No, the—”

  “Did it have kittens?” I watched a lot of kitten videos. “Or Ellen?” And Ellen clips. She rocked so hard.

  “The possessed one. The girl and the man with the machete and—”

  That didn’t really narrow it down much. Then it hit me. “Oh, right, the one of me exorcising a demon out of that little girl in Africa.” I cringed. “Bad lighting. And when my face bounced off the floor, the sound was all wrong. It was much more of a dull thud. I swear someone overdubbed it.”

  He blinked at me, the lights on but nobody home. “He wanted to—”

  “Eat me? Yeah, Reyes told me. He also told me what you did two years ago to those men who were going to abduct me and take me to El Jefe over there.”

  “El Tiburón,” he corrected.

  “The Shark? I like it.” I hugged him again, taking complete advantage of his mental state. “Uncle Bob, you are amazing, but you were slated for hell because of what you did for me.”

  He finally tore his gaze off the statuesque—and not in a Michelangelo sort of way—men and focused on me. He let go of one gun and put his hand on my face as though it were a precious jewel. “Pumpkin.” Or an autumn fruit. “I knew the consequences before I had walked through that door.”

  I gasped softly. “Uncle Bob. I don’t … I don’t know what to say.” And I didn’t, so I just hugged him. Again.

  “What do you think?” Reyes asked, still seething. “A tragic succession of broken necks? They’re all going to hell, anyway. I say we move up their arrival date.”

  I finally saw it. What he saw. The mark. I’d seen them before, but it was rather hit or miss. If I looked closely enough, I could see what they did, that one act that earned each of them such a fiery destiny. These were not nice boys.

  I shut my eyes to turn it off, for lack of a better phrase. They’d killed entire families just to set an example for others. They’d hung them from bridges. Decapitated them. Tortured wives while husbands and children watched. I stopped there, unable to see any more. The darker side of humanity. Like toxic waste.

  I focused on my husband and said, “Kill them all.”

  And I’d meant it. For a split second, I was ready to kill. To take human life. Like I had the right. Like I was one of them.

  Just as Reyes was about to break his first neck of the evening, I yelled, “Wait!”

  But it was too late. An angel appeared. An archangel, to be more precise. Michael. He materialized not three feet from me, his massive wings taking up half the already-crowded room.

  I jumped to my feet. Reyes stepped away from the goon and lowered his head, his muscles poised and ready as his billowing black robe materialized. It undulated in giant waves. Made him look even more menacing, not that he needed any help. I could just make out the glint of steel underneath it—the boy really wanted a fight—then it settled around him.

  And Uncle Bob, who I was surprised could see the archangel, scrambled to his feet, not sure what to do next. He couldn’t decide if he was more taken aback by the angel or by Reyes.

  Personally, I would have placed my bet on the prickly son of Satan, but I did marry the man. I was probably biased.

  “What?” I asked Michael in my rudest tone. We hadn’t always gotten along. Mostly because he tried to kill me. Or, well, hold me until Jehovah arrived to do the deed Himself.

  He’d warned me. Michael. He’d warned me not to stop what was already set in motion. “I suppose He’s coming for me now that I’ve changed human history. Now that I’ve saved my uncle’s life.”

  “Not at all,” he said, keeping his gaze trained on the biggest threat in the room which, sadly, was not me. “You arrived before he died. No laws have been broken.”

  “What?” I stepped forward, incensed and ready to throttle him. But I stopped short and took him in.

  Angels had the most incredible inhuman eyes. They shimmered with the lights of the universe. Their eyes were proof that Reyes was part angelic being. The way they glistened even in the lowest of light. The way they saw straight into one’s soul. The way they knew way more than they let on.

  Reyes had been created from the energy of a god and the fires of hell, but part of him was angel. True, that part was fallen angel, but angel nonetheless.

  And just like Reyes, they could be the most frustrating things this side of eternity.

  “I thought I couldn’t heal at all. Isn’t that what you said?”

  “You may heal on occasion. Many of the gifted in this world do.”

  I folded my arms, annoyed. “Yeah, I hear doctors do it all the time.”

  “There are laws, reaper. However, you did not break any this night.”

  “What laws? Remember, this whole gig came with a serious lack of instruction manuals.”

  He finally spared me a glance. “You are a conundrum. We’ve had only one reaper live as long as you have. And she was a hermit with no other abilities than what your reaper status entails. You, on the other hand, require special … mandates.”

  “So, I can heal people? Because I thought if I healed anyone or stopped Ubie’s untimely demise, I’d send heaven into an uproar.”

  He let his gaze wander over me as though trying to place my species.

  “Not that it would be the first time. Heaven seems insanely easy to uproar these days.”

  “You can heal,” he said at last, “only very occasionally and only—and mark these words, reaper—only if the soul has not already been freed. Only if it has not left the vessel and entered our Father’s kingdom. That is the most sacred law.”

  “So, that’s the biggie?”

  “Yes.”

  “And if I break it?”

  “You will be cast from this dimension for all eternity.”

  “Oh. Well, that doesn’t seem too difficult to follow. I can’t heal dead people, which, why would I? They’re dead.”

  He tilted his head to the side, but his attention snapped back to Reyes when the devil’s spawn—in the literal sense—took a miniscule step forward. He’d been itching to get to Michael for a while now. I could feel the desire tug at him. Urge him forward.

  I glared and shook my head. He ignored me.

  “And no curing cancer,” Michael continued.

  “I didn’t.”

  He tore his gaze off Reyes again and gave me a knowing grin. “You thought about it.”

  “Yeah? Well, I’ve thought about breaking your neck, too. Does that count?”

  “No,” he said, one corner of his mouth tilting heavenward.

  “Wait a minute. Is that why your henchmen have been tailing me?”

  His gaze grew curious. “Henchmen?”

  “Are they following me because I threatened to cure cancer?” Then something else hit me. I sat in a chair when I realized what Michael had said. What he’d really said. “You were going to cast me from this plane if I healed my uncle, but you didn’t. Because … because he wasn’t dead yet? Because we’d stopped them from killing him?”

  He nodded.

  “So, then, he was really going to die here. We stopped Grant Guerin from killing him, so this was … and I was going to—”

  “—find him too late,” he finished for me.

  I looked at Uncle Bob, my heart breaking at the mere thought of losing him, but he didn’t seem upset in the least. Then again, he was still in a state of awe. Angels did that.

  “You knew,” I said
to him. “You knew you wouldn’t make it out of here alive.”

  He finally focused on the conversation. Bit down. Lifted one shoulder in a helpless shrug. “I had a strong suspicion.”

  “Uncle Bob. How can you just…?” At a loss for words again, I took him in.

  He bore the mark. It was unfair, especially given the circumstances. His cause had been noble. The sentence unjust. I raised my hand and then raised my brows in question to Michael.

  He nodded and waited, so I waved my hand and unmarked my favorite uncle.

  Then I turned to Michael. “Why can I mark and unmark?”

  “You are reaper. It is your domain.”

  “So, I ask you again, why are your henchmen following me?”

  “They are not.”

  “Dude, they’re everywhere. Don’t even try to tell me they’re not following me, because … oh,” I said when I realized how amazingly arrogant I sounded. “They aren’t following me, are they?”

  “They are following the god Rey’azikeen.”

  Right. That actually made a lot of sense.

  Reyes stayed deathly still, but he let slip the barest hint of surprise on his perfect face, a reaction so minute that if I’d blinked I would have missed it.

  “Now that Reyes knows he’s a god,” I said, “he’s more of a threat? Is that it?”

  “Probably no more than you, but yes.”

  “Me?” I asked, appalled. “What did I do?”

  He deadpanned me. I didn’t even know angels could do that. “Did you or did you not threaten to unseat the Father?”

  Wow, did my fingernails need a good filing. I turned them this way and that when I answered. “Pfft, dude, I make threats all the time. Like I’d know how to unseat … wait.” I stood, astonished, and stepped closer. “Are you telling me that’s possible?”

  He didn’t answer. I couldn’t blame him. Who would want something like that getting out?

  “So,” I said, changing the subject lickety-split, “we’ve been holding back time for quite a while now.”

  “Time is of no consequence.”

  “Tell that to someone in a car accident, bleeding to death.”

  Michael started to touch me, but Reyes was there in a heartbeat, sword drawn, the tip piercing the angel’s throat.

  Uncle Bob stumbled back, still freaking a bit.

  Michael held up his hands. “I was just going to show her.” With the sword still at his throat, he turned a hand over and offered it to me.