Dark Kiss Of The Reaper (21 page)

She winced. The first pointed fingers of a migraine jabbed into her skull.

He nibbled the curve of her neck. “Are you awake?”

“Almost,” she mumbled, rolling away from him to hide a grimace of pain. “I need coffee. I think I had too much champagne again.”

He massaged her back. She moaned as the pleasure of his touch warred with the pain blossoming in her head.

“Does that feel good?” he asked.

“Oh, yeah.” She didn’t want to interrupt him to get coffee, but her system screamed for the caffeine it knew was hot and waiting in the kitchen.

His gentle hands went lower, kneading her shoulder blades then down along her spine. She congratulated herself on marrying so well. Married. She smiled and sighed into her pillow.

He scooped her close against his warm, naked body. “Good morning, wife.” He kissed her temple. It began to throb. “Stay in bed. I’ll get you some coffee.”

“I love you,” she whispered. Anything louder would kill her.

The bed moved as he got up. She almost opened her eyes just to watch him walk away. A backside like that should be admired whenever possible. But the thought of letting daylight behind her lids made her nauseous.

She lay there, trying to find the strength to get up and get moving without letting Azrael know how much pain she was in. She didn’t want him to worry about something as silly as a headache.

“Here’s your coffee, sweetheart.” The mattress sunk down as he sat.

She inhaled the fresh brewed aroma and steeled herself. Now or never. She opened her eyes a slit, blinking to clear the haze.

Two Azraels holding two cups of coffee sat beside her. She blinked again but the double vision didn’t go away. She rubbed her eyes. It didn’t help.

She pushed herself up and a fresh blade of pain cut through her brain. “Oh...ow.” She clutched her head, unable to pretend any longer she was fine.

“Sara, what’s wrong?”

“Just a headache,” she mumbled, drawing her legs up and pressing her forehead into her knees. “I get these migraines every once in a while. It’ll pass. They always do.” Coffee. What she need was coffee.

She lifted her head, still holding a hand to her brow. “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.” With a forced smile, she reached for the cup he still held, fighting the double vision to find the real one. Her nose started to run. Great. Coming down with a cold was exactly what she needed.

Azrael’s eyes rounded. He set the coffee down before she could take it. “Something’s wrong.”

“It will be if you don’t let me have my coffee.” She swiped at her nose and made a mental note to buy tissues. “I get these all the time. I’m fine, I promise.”

“No, you’re not.” He grabbed her hand and held it up so she could see.

A streak of blood smeared her skin. She inhaled, tugged her hand away and wiped at her nose again. More blood. She struggled to stay upright, her ears ringing with a tinny buzz that shut out all other sound. “I don’t...”

Her vision narrowed down to pinpoints.

Then everything went black.

Chapter Nineteen

Azrael pounded on the emergency room desk. “What’s going on? What’s wrong with her? I want to know. I’m her husband.”

“Sir, please.” The nurse gave him a stern look that did nothing to intimidate him. “The doctors have to run some tests. We’ll let you know as soon as they find something out.”

“When will that be?” He’d waited hours already.

“I don’t know, sir. Could be any time now.” She pointed back into the waiting room. “Have a seat and I’ll call you as soon as the results come in.”

Have a seat. How was he supposed to wait patiently while Sara suffered? Why couldn’t he be with her? At least he could hold her hand and tell her everything would be all right. He closed his eyes for a moment, weary of being mortal and powerless. Maybe he should change into Reaper form and slip back there. See for himself what was going on.

A doctor pushed through the swinging doors leading into the patient area. He read some paperwork on a chart, flipping pages as he walked. He stopped at the desk, looked at the nurse. “Page Mr. Grimm.”

Azrael stepped forward. “I’m Mr. Grimm.”

“I’m Dr. Stein. Why don’t we take a walk down to one of the consultation areas and I’ll explain what’s going on with your wife.” The doctor’s face was emotionless, his eyes blank. Completely unreadable.

“Fine.” He followed the doctor a short way down the hall and into the private room.

Shutting the door, Dr. Stein pointed to one of the chairs. “Would you like to sit?”

“Just tell me what’s going on.” He fisted his hands at his sides to keep from pummeling the information out of the man. That would help nothing.

Dr. Stein flipped some more papers. “Based on the symptoms your wife was having, we did a series of tests, a chest x-ray, a head CT, an MRI, some blood work.” He sighed. “She’s got a non small cell carcinoma on her right lung.”

“Cancer?” Azrael shook his head. “But that doesn’t make sense. That wouldn’t give her headaches.”

Dr. Stein nodded. “You’re right.” He tucked the chart under his arm. “We also found a me
tastatic
brain tumor. That’s what caused the headaches, the double vision and the nose bleed.”

“What?” Sharp pain punctured Azrael's gut. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see, couldn’t think. A cold, fluid numbness leaked down his spine.

He fell into the closest chair. “You can treat this, right?”

The doctor took the chair across from him. “Non small cell carcinomas grow slowly and unlike other types of lung cancer, we can usually remove this with surgery.” He paused. “The brain tumor is another story. We’ll operate to remove what we can, but its position makes it difficult to get all of it. Radiation and chemo are her best hope.”

Azrael sat frozen, trying to find a way to comprehend everything the doctor was telling him. “Can I see her?”

“Not yet, we’ve still got some more tests to run. Need to make sure the cancer hasn’t spread elsewhere. I assure you, she’s in good hands and in very little pain right now. We’ve got her on
Mannitol
to reduce the brain swelling, which will alleviate some of the headaches.”

Azrael spoke around the lump in his throat. “What...what caused this?”

He shrugged. “We’re not sure. She’s in great physical shape, healthy, non-smoker, much younger than the typical patient who presents with this. Cancer is one of those things where you can’t always pinpoint a cause.” He sat back. “It’s like something flipped a switch in her system that turned the cancer on. Judging from the size of the tumors, it happened pretty recently too.”

Azrael buried his face in his hands. He had a good idea what that something was.

* * *

The first fat drops of hard rain hit the Fates’ balcony the second after Azrael materialized. The drops drove down, stinging his skin and melding into a solid sheet of water. If this was their way of getting rid of him, they were going to have to try harder.

Much harder.

“Atropos!” He called out with a voice fueled by the Darkness. “Klotho! Lachesis!”

Nothing. Not a curtain moved in the massive stone house. They were in there, he could feel them. Sense them, just as he could his brothers, although not quite as strongly.

“Come out now or I come in.”

The rain dribbled to a halt. A few rays of sun leaked through, sparkling off the puddles left behind. One of the balcony doors opened a fraction. Klotho peeked her head out.

“Please, Azrael, go home. We know she’s ill, but there’s nothing—”

“Don’t lie. It spoils your beauty.” He unfurled his wings to the sun, casting the Virgin in shadow. “I want an audience with Atropos. Now.”

“She doesn’t wish to speak to you.” Klotho blinked hard.

“And you think what Atropos wishes matters to me?” He opened himself further to the Darkness. Let them see the being he truly was. Let them understand he was done being their pawn. “Send her out.”

Klotho shook her head, sadness evident in her limpid blue eyes. “Go home, Azrael.”

She moved back to shut the door.

“I will not be dismissed.” He gave the Darkness full voice and shouted for Atropos again. Tiny cracks shot through the glass in the first floor windows. Klotho disappeared, quickly replaced by Lachesis.

The Mother waved her silver rod. “What’s done is done. Leave us be.”

“Send. Atropos. Out.” He thrust his wings forward, hurling a blast of wind against the house and shattering the cracked windows.

Lachesis opened her mouth to speak, but a wizened hand on her arm stopped her. Atropos, leaning heavily on her carved-bone cane, shuffled out of the house.

“What do you want, Reaper? I’m weary and need my rest.”

“I want answers.” The Darkness struggled against his control, but he stayed it for the moment.

“Your mortal is sick. It appears you are to blame. What other answers are there?”

With a gut-deep bellow, he cracked the glass the next story up. “Did I or did I not cause the cancer in her body?”

Atropos cocked her head, her rheumy eyes pinning him with a cold glare. “You fault your brothers for their brief liaisons, but none of their women have grown ill. You chose to spend time with her, to bring her to your home, to couple with her repeatedly...” She shook her gray head, the small hairs on her chin trembling. “One might do well to assume you are to blame.”

He howled in frustration.

She spat on the ground. “You are a Reaper. Or have you forgotten that? Death and mortals may mix on occasion, but to create a union with one...pah.”

“Blast you, old woman! You encouraged me to pursue her.”

“But not to make her part of your life.” She sighed. “You are the most foolish of your brothers.”

White-hot anger threatened to blind him and wrench away the last bit of control holding back the Darkness. For Sara’s sake, he found a sliver of calm and held on a little longer. “Tell me how to fix this.”

Atropos smirked. “You’re too weak.”

For Sara, he would endure anything. “I will do whatever it takes.”

“I doubt it.”

“Try me.”

She dug into the folds of her long robes, extracted a small vial of greenish liquid and tossed it to him.

He caught it and held it up to the light. Bands of black swirled within the mossy depths. “What is this?”

“Give it to her and it will remove all trace of you from her memory. You’ll have a few moments once she ingests it to remove yourself from her sight. Then you must never see her again.”

He squeezed the bottle in his fist. “How is that going to help?”

“Without the presence of Death in her life, she should be able to recover.”

“Should isn’t good enough.”

Atropos shrugged. “Then stay with her. Sit at her side. Hold her hand. But when she dies before her time and Kol reaps her soul, you will forever wonder if things could have gone differently. Or…” She shrugged.

“Or what?”

She shuffled closer. “Take her soul now, yourself, and spend the rest of your existence peering into the blank eyes of each passing Shade trying to find her.”

Disbelief numbed him into silence.

She turned to make her way back inside. “Just as I suspected. You’re too weak.”

A jagged tear opened across his heart. The pain gave him voice. “How long do I have to say good bye once she takes the potion?”

“A minute or two. Not long.”

“And what of her friends? Co-workers? She was registered in the hospital as married. There will be questions.” He held the vial up on the tips of his fingers as his insides went numb with sorrow. “I doubt this can solve all that.”

Atropos shook her head, leaning heavily on her cane. “A few strands respun, a thread added here or there. We will take care of the rest.”

“Then take care of her as well. Don’t make me do this.”

“You are too deeply threaded through her life.” Atropos shuffled toward the door with a long sigh. “Love tangles everything.”

* * *

In an empty hospital bathroom, Azrael assumed human form for the last time. There would be little need for it after tonight. He’d already been to Sara’s apartment to collect the diamonds he’d bought her and the pearls his brothers had given her. This was the last step. The last time he’d see her. Kiss her. Inhale her scent.

Closing his eyes, he bowed his head, breathing deeply to find a place inside him capable of seeing this wretched but necessary deed through to its end. He’d made her sick. It was his responsibility to give her a chance to get well.

He walked into the hospital’s florist shop. Despite the fact he was to leave nothing behind that might remind Sara of him, he refused to go to her bedside empty-handed.

“I’ll take those.” He pointed to the large bouquet of red roses in the display case.

“Those are awesome. Two dozen definitely says get well better than one.” Snapping her gum, the sales girl lifted the vase out and set it on the counter. “Would you like us to deliver them to the room? It’s totally free.”