Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet (16 page)

Cookie came over then and tried to peek over my shoulder. “What’s going on?” she asked
me.

“I’m not sure.” Had we hurt Amber’s feelings before when we turned to look at her?
I wasn’t really getting hurt, but whatever she was feeling was overpowering anything
else. Twelve-year-old hormones were a tricky thing. She’d seemed fine thirty seconds
earlier. Because I didn’t know what else to do, I asked, “Would you come meet Reyes?”

She looked up at me then, and I could see tears pooling in her blue eyes. She ducked
back down, embarrassed, and let me lead her forward.

“This is the one they call Amber of the Kowalski clan,” I said, trying to lighten
the mood. “But she’s a heartbreaker, so guard yours well.” I winked at Reyes.

She strolled forward, her eyes locked on the ground, her shoulders concave, insecure.

He studied her, tilting his head for a better look. She was tall for a girl and really
tall for a twelve-year-old girl, but her height gave her a grace that other girls
her age lacked. Like a gazelle.

“Amber, can you say hi?” Cookie asked.

With her gaze still averted, she shook her head.

Cookie seemed mortified. She pushed a long lock of hair over Amber’s ear. “I’m so
sorry,” she said to Reyes, shaking her own head in helplessness. “She’s usually so
vocal.”

“You save her?” Amber finally said, talking to her feet. “You watch over her?”

Before any of us could question her, Reyes said, “Only on really special occasions.”

What were they talking about? Amber didn’t know about Reyes. How could she know he
had saved my life? On several occasions, in fact.

She looked up at him then, her lashes holding a shimmering tear at bay. “I know what
you do. I know what you are. They think I don’t, but I do. And I know you were here
that night.”

“Amber,” Cookie said, a nervous smile twitching the corners of her mouth, “how could
you know that?” Cookie suddenly grew afraid, and I knew where her thoughts were headed.
What would Reyes do to her if he knew Amber was aware of his existence? “She doesn’t
know what she’s talking about.”

“See? They don’t know, and they don’t trust you like I do.” She took a step forward.
“You’ve watched over Charley her whole life. Kept her safe. And that night, if you
hadn’t come—” Her breath hitched, and before any of us knew what she was doing, she
ran forward.

Reyes stepped back as though uncertain as she flung herself at him.

She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Thank you.” She turned in to him. “Thank you
so much. You saved our lives.”

After an awkward moment where Reyes resigned himself to being accosted by a twelve-year-old,
he let his arms fall loosely around her. She squeezed tighter.

I stepped forward and rubbed her back, my heart swelling with adoration. I didn’t
realize she knew Reyes had shown up the night Earl Walker attacked me. I didn’t realize
she knew anything about what had happened.

She looked over at me, then whispered into his ear. “I know what
she
is, too, but I would never tell anyone.”

Reyes offered her the most charming grin I’d ever seen. A soft giggle of delight bubbled
out of her before she backed out of his arms. She sidled close to me, her eyes taking
on that dreamlike luster I knew so well.

“You coming in?” I asked.

He winked at Amber, then turned to me. “Not tonight. I have business.”

“Of course. But I really want to talk to you about—” I thought about how to say
demon possessions
without saying
demon possessions.
“—the occupancy issues we’ve been having.”

One corner of his mouth tilted into an almost grin. “About that, I really need you
to stay in your apartment for the next few days.”

“Can’t, but thanks for asking.”

He glanced around, then said with a menacing tone, “Don’t make me insist.”

“Seriously?” Did he honestly think that would work?

He dragged in a deep gulp of air, then seemed to give up. After a moment of thought,
he touched the bottom of my shirt again. “I’m glad you came to see me.”

I rubbed my fingertips along the back of his hand. “I’m glad you’re free.”

A breathy scoff escaped him like I’d said something funny.

“What?” I asked.

He stepped closer, even with Amber there, even with Uncle Bob behind me, rubbed a
thumb over my bottom lip, and said, “There is a fine line between freedom and slavery.”

9

Two drinks away from girl-on-girl action.

—T-SHIRT

“You okay?” Uncle Bob had asked after I closed my front door. As always, the air crackled
with electricity in Reyes’s wake. But I thought it was sweet that Ubie would be concerned
about me. He was the one quaking in his discount loafers. He was beginning to understand
what Reyes was capable of, and quaking in his loafers was a very appropriate response.
Especially since he was the one who put him behind bars.

“I’m fine, thanks. How are you?”

“Late,” he said. “I have a date.”

I tried not to look too surprised. “With a person?”

He frowned. “No, a soda machine. Of course a person.”

Amber giggled, recovering from Reyes’s presence faster than her mother or Gemma did.
I gave them a few minutes to absorb everything while I teased Ubie, who only had to
recover from his near near-death experience. I was so glad Reyes hadn’t ripped him
to shreds. I liked him much better un-shredded. Unlike, say, my preference for lettuce
or heavy metal guitar solos.

Getting the feeling I was going to have company for a while, I headed toward my shower.
“Well, you better get home,” I said to Ubie. “You can only keep a date tied up in
the basement for so long before they become resentful.”

Just as I entered the bathroom, I heard him say, “Talk to your dad.”

Not likely. The shower felt wonderful, even with a furry beast knocking me to and
fro. I hadn’t seen this much action in one day for over two months. My body didn’t
know what to do. How to act. It wanted my sofa—which might or might not go by the
name of Sharon—and cheese puffs, but I realized I was going to have to wean off both.
Slowly at first. Maybe I’d downgrade to a recliner and cheese crackers, ease off gradually,
then try something healthy like cleaning house and eating an apple.

I shuddered at the thought. Cheese puffs were so comforting. And they were orange.
No, I probably shouldn’t rush into anything. I came up with a plan B. Clean house
while eating cheese puffs. Comforting and productive.

After Artemis dived into the earth below me, I stepped out of the shower and dressed
in a pair of plaid lime green pajama bottoms that had no smart-ass saying whatsoever.
But I made up for it with a top proclaiming
SARC
- was my second favorite -
ASM
word. Ready to face the masses again, I went back out into the living area.

Cookie and Gemma were in the kitchen, trying out all my cool new gadgets. Hopefully,
I’d get a meal out of their efforts. Amber gathered her books when I came out and
she stepped over to me. “You’re really loud in the shower,” she said.

I could only imagine what Artemis knocking me into the wall repeatedly sounded like
from out here. “Yeah, I tripped.”

“Seven times?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, okay. Well, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry, Charley. I didn’t mean to do
that. With Reyes. I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”

“Embarrass me?” I gathered her into my arms. “Amber, you could never embarrass me.”

“Never?” she asked.

“Never.”

“One time, I yelled across the store to Mom and asked her if she wanted the regular
or the super-absorbent tampons. I added that, according to the box, the super-absorbent
were for those heavy days. Then I asked her to rate her heaviness on a scale of one
to ten.”

“Okay, you could.”

“Then while we were standing in line, I asked her why she was buying three boxes of
Summer’s Eve in the middle of winter.”

I set her at arm’s length. “Wow.”

“I know, right? I had no idea a person could turn so red.”

“So, we’ve established that, yes, you could indeed embarrass me. But you didn’t. I’m
sorry that you know so much of things no twelve-year-old girl should know about.

“I won’t tell anyone. I promise.”

I looked over to see what the chefs were doing. When I saw that they were busy, I
leaned in to her. “What exactly do you know?”

She smiled. “I know you’re the grim reaper.”

That realization knocked the wind out of my sails.

“And I know Reyes is the son of Satan.”

“H-how do you know all of this?”

“I have really good hearing. And I can listen to all kinds of conversations even while
I’m doing my homework.”

“Really?”

She snorted. “I swear, you guys act like I go deaf every time I open a book.” With
an evil cackle, she headed toward the door. “I can hear other things, too. Before
you came around, I had no idea a man could make a girl scream like that. Reyes seems
very talented.”

Certain my eyes resembled tea saucers, I took a quick peek at Cookie to make sure
she wasn’t paying attention to us. While I’d never had relations with Reyes other
than in my dreams and once while he was incorporeal, those relations were … very satisfying.
And apparently Amber knew it.

“Don’t worry. Mom doesn’t know.”

“That Reyes is very talented?”

“Oh, no, she’s extremely aware of that part. She just doesn’t know that I know that
Reyes is very talented.” She giggled again, a sound that conjured images of a mad
scientist in the making, and just before she closed the door behind her, she said,
“But don’t stop on my account.”

Oh. My. God. Cookie was going to kill me.

“So what were you two talking about?” she asked.

I jumped, then smoothed my pajama bottoms. “Nothing. Why? What do you think we were
talking about?”

She frowned at me. “Do you think she’s okay?”

“Oh, I think she’s just fine.” The little smarty-pants.

She went back to whisking some kind of batter as Gemma dumped in a powdery substance.
I could only hope they were baking brownies. Brownies were like spare batteries. One
could never have too many in the house.

“I’m going to sleep with you,” Gemma said as she eyed the concoction and rationed
in a little more powder.

“You’re not really my type, but okay. How kinky are we talking?”

“Do you think it needs more?” she asked Cookie, inspecting the bowl.

“One can never have too much powdered sugar,” Cookie said. Then she pointed a whisk
at me. “I think you should bottle Reyes and sell him on the black market. We’d be
rich.”

I stepped closer. “Dude, what are you whisking?”

“Having recently been in the same room with the hottest man on the planet, I’m probably
whisking my virtue.” She chuckled. “Get it? Whisking my virtue?”

Gemma laughed as she measured in more powdered sugar. I took a gander at Cookie’s
bowl and scooped out a dollop of white heaven. “So, icing?”

“Yes, we’re trying out your new cake pans.”

“I bought cake pans?” That was so unlike me.

She wriggled her brows. “And you bought a margarita mixer.”

Uh-oh.

*   *   *

I soon found out Gemma had ulterior motives in hanging with me and drinking like a
fish on dry land. I could read it in her body language, in the shifting light in her
eyes, but mostly when she said, “I have ulterior motives.”

She was determined to help me sleep if she had to get me plastered to do it. So she
and Cookie were trying out a frozen margarita mixer I’d ordered during a low point
in my downfall. For one week, all I could think about was drinking margaritas—well,
that and running my tongue along Reyes’s teeth—but I didn’t have salt—or Reyes’s teeth.
I’d also lacked the energy to leave my apartment to get some—or the desire to stoop
low enough to beg Reyes to let me lick his teeth after what he did—so I could only
wish for a margarita. And dream of Reyes’s teeth.

I’d secretly hoped a margarita would magically appear in my hand, but that would mean
I would have to put down the remote, and God knew that was not going to happen.

It was a vicious circle.

But Gemma rarely drank. Maybe a glass of wine with dinner. And I drank only on special
occasions. Like Fridays and Saturdays. Cookie on the other hand …

“Wooooooohooooooo!” Cookie raised her arms in triumph. No idea why. “I haven’t had
thith much fun thince … thince…” She seemed at a loss for coherent words, but she
recovered quickly and pointed toward the door. “Thince Reyeth Farlow walked through
that door!” She turned back to me, her expression full of awe. “And, my god, doeth
that boy know how to walk.”

Cookie stood on the other side of the breakfast bar, trying to bake brownies in my
new electric pressure cooker. While the apartment smelled really good, I didn’t have
high hopes for a chocolate fix anytime soon. The cooker beeped and she turned to check
it right before she disappeared. It was weird. She was there one minute and gone the
next. And her disappearance was quickly followed by a solid thud, the sound echoing
off the kitchen floor. I thought about hurrying to her rescue, but didn’t trust my
own legs at that point. Gemma was draped over the arm of my sofa—which might or might
not go by the name of Melvin—and Aunt Lillian, who swore those were the best margaritas
she’d had since that beauty pageant she entered in Juárez, was facedown on my floor.
No idea why.

“You’re missing out, Mr. Wong. I don’t know what Cookie put in these, but they’re
pretty amazing.” I saluted the boxes that surrounded him, downed the last sip of margarita—or
Cookie-a-rita, as they’d been recently dubbed—and decided to get a jump on my letter
writing Gemma insisted upon as a form of therapy. Usually therapists stuck to journaling,
so letter writing was an interesting twist.

I figured I’d write a letter to Santa. Christmas had come and gone, but I’d missed
it, as I was not talking to anyone except for the salespeople for the Buy From Home
Channel at the time, and they didn’t seem to want to spend Christmas with me.