Scythe Does Matter (13 page)

“Too bad,” Sergeant Schotz said. “ ’Fraid you can’t get your old life back now.” He nudged my shoulder with his foot, causing my arm to flop once.

Shannon squealed. What had it looked like to her? Zombie Kirsty rising from the walking dead?

The sergeant lowered his head. When he raised it again, Professor Schotz looked at me, face crumpled with commiseration. “But at least you’ve cleared your name. Both of you. And you, Kirsty, have a good job and a good afterlife waiting for you back home.”

Home. Yes, sir. That was where I was going. But I had one more thing to take care of first.

The
whoosh-bam
sounded once more, judge and professor transporting away.

Dante nodded to me gravely. He raised his scythe handle to shoulder height, ready to activate it. “Conrad Iver. You sold your soul, and I have come to collect.” He coughed. “I hath come to collecteth thine soul, I mean.”

He activated his scythe. The two purple lights shot out, up and down from the handle, the top one arcing out to form the blade. You have to admit, it’s pretty impressive. I couldn’t wait to try my own.

“I can still make it worth your while. I can get you other souls. Not just one or two. I can get you as many as you need. What’s your weekly quota?” Conrad weaseled and wheedled, turning my stomach with every whiny word. “I’ve got some homeless folk lined up who think they’re giving blood.”

And then he laughed. Not the evil-villain “
Bwahahaha!”
that I expected. No, this was a little friendly chuckle, like an in-joke shared between old friends.

That was it. The last straw. My blood simultaneously ran cold and boiled. Above Dante’s head, the clock ticked. Only seconds remained in the anniversary hour. My old body had been weak and useless, but my Hell body was in great shape. I leapt across the room—charging right through the hospital bed—and snatched the scythe right out of Dante’s hand.

Before Dante even had a chance to scream, “Don’t touch my scythe,” I’d whipped around and sliced it through Conrad’s body.

“I’ll see you in Hell, you skeg-hole!”

Conrad’s eyes flew wide and his red face grew redder. Staggering backward, he crashed into equipment, falling to the floor, clutching his chest. Shannon dropped the stapler and rushed out the door, screaming for help.

In seconds, the room was a hive of medical personnel shouting things like “stat!” and “clear.”

“Oops,” I said, retracting the scythe and handing it back to Dante. “I think this is yours.”

“Dammelo!”
He snatched it from my hand angrily. I noticed the absence of blue smoke. I really was back on the Coil. “Don’t you know by now you’re never supposed to touch anyone else’s scythe?”

“That’s just an old wives’ tale. I researched it and there’s no evidence. Besides”—I sidled up to him, feeling confident and powerful—“this is the third time I’ve touched your scythe.” I traced a finger down his chest. “And nothing’s happened . . .” I gave him my sexiest smile. “. . . Yet.”

Behind us the doctor called Conrad’s time of death, citing heart attack. And mine, citing blunt trauma. Strangely, it didn’t seem to matter anymore. I’d spent a year trying to get my life back and now all I wanted was my afterlife.

The medical staff began to pack up their gear. Hospital security took possession of the stapler, dropping it in a clear plastic bag. They led Shannon away, sobbing. I hoped a few of those tears were for me.

Dante and I were alone now, except for the dead bodies, but that was okay. Some of my best friends are dead people.

“So . . .” I moved another inch closer. “Is there anything of mine you’d like to touch to make us even?”

Dante looked exasperated, pursing his lips and furrowing his forehead. A tiny muscle in his cheek jumped. He gripped my shoulders. Was he about to shove me away? I guess I deserved it.

Apparently not. Slowly, he lowered his face until his lips were just a breath away from mine.

“So you think you’ve won, don’t you, you little bitch?”

Not exactly the romantic words I longed to hear.

But wait, Dante’s lips hadn’t moved. I’d know if they had because they were barely a millimeter from my own. We looked at each other, eyes crossing with the proximity, and then at Conrad’s body, which was still lying on the floor where he’d died, awaiting the coroner.

Above his corpse, Conrad’s spirit rose. Most people’s souls look like healthy, younger versions of their favorite incarnation, but in Conrad’s case, instead of a handsome, young man, he retained his toad-like, smarmy bastard look. That must have been how he truly saw himself.

“You’ll never take me alive!” he shouted.

“But you’re not ali—” Dante began.

Conrad turned to flee, but Dante was an old hand. In one smooth motion, he activated his scythe and hooked the blade around Conrad’s feet, sending him crashing to the ground. In a ninja-esque move that struck me as very sexy, Dante leapt across the room and pinned the escaping spirit to the floor.

“Cuffs!” Dante called.

I pawed through the pockets of his robe and produced a pair of rusty iron manacles linked together with a length of clanking chain. Dante was so old-school.

I slapped them on Conrad just like we had in Reaper practice sessions.

I helped Dante haul Conrad to his feet. The newly dead shade fought and struggled, but with both hands secured behind his back, he was no match for two trained Reapers.

Without meeting my eyes, Dante said, “You sacrificed your remaining life for her. That was very noble.”

“Do you think I shouldn’t have?”

“Absolutely not, you little—” Dante clapped a hand over Conrad’s mouth.

“No, I have to say I’m glad you did.”

“And you, Dante.” I pulled him in close. “You were willing to give up everything for me. To go dirt-side again, even though you don’t want to.”

“For you,
cara,
I would give my all.”

Conrad made muffled noises and rolled his eyes.

I laughed. “Let’s get this skegger home where I can tell you I love you, too. And show you. In private.”

We tried the teleportation method, but apparently it doesn’t work when there are three on one scythe and we weren’t willing to separate now that we were finally together. So we had to walk to Hell. Again.

We hurried through the wall and the void. We had a brief battle with the gee-gnomes. I was tempted to let them sting Conrad but I was a professional now. I did my duty, getting a defiant soul home. We skated across the Good Intentions and slid down the slippery slope. Finally we crossed the Soul Train tracks and met Char as he was just about to push off with another load of the recent dead.

Char had updated his drag inspiration by a few decades since I’d seen him last. Today he was wearing a knock-off of Lady Gaga’s meat dress, much to Cerberus’s slobbery delight. If it hadn’t been a miniskirt at the beginning of the day, it was now. Cerby licked his chops, looking very satisfied.

“Hey, guys. Good to see you again. Girlfriend, I love your new look! You just can’t go wrong with leather pants. But what’s with the stupid matching grins?”

Chapter 15

Abstinence Makes the Heart Grow Fondler

WE DROPPED CONRAD,
still protesting and fighting his bonds, at Hell’s Cells. We filled out the paperwork as fast as our veins could provide ink, but the processing took ages. Midnight chimed all across the city when we finally left Hell’s Cells and headed for home. Our home. Where we lived, together.

My lips were frozen in a blissful smile. Every time I looked at Dante, he blushed. I knew exactly what he was thinking, because I was thinking it, too. I couldn’t wait to get home and demonstrate exactly how I felt.

The trip across town seemed to take forever, but at last we arrived back at our apartment complex. I was tempted to race up the three dangerous flights of stairs but I wanted to appear casual, so I reined in my desires and started to saunter across the dusty courtyard.

Only a step or two in, Dante grabbed my hand, drew me close, and kissed me.

Whoa! It was a real kiss this time—no tricks. No distractions. No interruptions, either. None until the long-dry fountain burst into a shower of crystal-clear water, spraying us. And the cat that always sat there.

Dante brushed my damp, white hair from my shoulders and chased me, laughing, up the stairs. Upon reaching our apartment, he fumbled with his key, opening the door on the third try. We tumbled in, nearly tripping over little Jenni in the foyer.

“Shhh!” Dante whispered.

I giggled some more. “Why? We’ve never cared if the neighbors heard us before.”

“That’s why I was late getting to you,
cara.
Before I could round up the judge and Colin, I first had to settle your aunt and Leslie in our guest room.”

Oh, of course. I felt ashamed of myself for not thinking about them. I was still the selfish kid who hadn’t appreciated them. And now I had a second chance to tell them I loved them. And I would. First thing tomorrow. It would be inconsiderate to wake them, wouldn’t it? This was going to be a do-over for me. I hadn’t done anything like this as a teen, but now I was sneaking a boy into my bedroom. Trying to be quiet and not get caught only added to the mood.

I grabbed Dante’s hand and dragged him into our sexy
Arabian Nights
bedroom, where I threw myself on the bed and pulled him down after me. I laughed, I moaned, I might even have screamed a little if we weren’t trying to be quiet. And also? Dante put his hand over my mouth. When he wasn’t busy either kissing me—and man, was kissing great when you didn’t need to breathe—or telling me
“Ti amo,”
over and over.

“I love you, too,” I answered, so, so glad I’d chosen to stay. There’s no place like Hell. There’s no place like Hell. There’s no place like . . . oh, yeah, right there!

I would have clicked my heels together but I wasn’t wearing any shoes.

Chapter 16

Inter-Lewd

SOME THINGS ARE
worth waiting for. And one of them is pillow talk.

“Dante,” I said. “Can I ask you a question?”

“
Hmmm?
” He nuzzled my shoulder.

“Why don’t you want to go back to the Coil?”

“I thought I explained. Nobody gets me up there.”

I waited. He’d either elaborate or begin the next round. I was okay with either option.

He rolled on his back and scratched his chest. “It is like this. Back in my day, when we visited someone, we stayed for many days. Sometimes weeks. And while there, your host threw lengthy parties. They would invite their friends and neighbors and serve much wine. On one occasion, a group of writers and philosophers were drinking and a challenge was issued. There may have been a bet involved. It was so long ago, I don’t remember. I do remember locking myself in my room with more than one bottle of wine and emerging three days later with my ‘epic’ poem about Hell. It was the ultimate ‘Mary Sue.’ ”

“Mary Sue?” I’d never heard the term before. Assuming it was a term and not an ex-girlfriend. One time, in the heat of passion, he called me Beatrice. I didn’t speak to him for days.

“Oh.” He shrugged. “Mary Sue, or in my case, Marty Stu, is a writing term for when an author places themselves in their story as the best and brightest character. In my case, I wrote about myself being the only person on Earth so admirable and so worthy that Lucy invited me for a tour d’Hell. And when I got there I found all my enemies being sorely punished. I regret to say, Kirsty, that it went on and on and on.”

I yawned hugely. I hadn’t realized
discussing
poetry could be even more boring and obscure than the poems themselves.

“So,” he continued, somehow mistaking my yawning for interest, “my poem is circulated among our group, much like those emails of today in which you are directed to forward it to five friends or dire events will befall you. All my close friends found it hilarious. But as scribes made more and more copies and it traveled outside my immediate circle, people began to take it seriously. They thought I was
that
arrogant. That full of myself.”

“And in conclusion . . . ?” I yawned again, making the words sound weird. Hopefully that would hurry him up so we could get back to the cuddling.

“And in conclusion . . .” He laughed, leaning over to kiss my forehead. “In conclusion, now students today are forced to study it, scholars analyze it and academics deconstruct it. And no one realizes it was supposed to be funny. It’s like telling a joke and having it fall flat—flatter than the Coil.”

“Uh, Dante. You do know the world isn’t flat, right?”

“But of course I do. Galileo drops by regularly.”

“Oh.” I yawned again. “I guess you guys were contemporaries, eh?”

“I suppose you would consider us so. What’s a few centuries between scholars?”

I chose not to answer that. My eyelids grew heavy and I figured we might as well nap while we recovered enough for round two.

Just before I drifted off, Dante mumbled, “I love you.”

“I love you, too. You can scythe me anytime.”

Chapter 17

Look Before You Reap

“C’MON, BABY.”

I don’t know how many times my hellphone played the Reaper Corps theme song as I struggled up from the deepest, darkest depths of REM sleep.

“Baby, take my ha—”

I’d been sleeping the sleep of the dead, of course. How else would I sleep? Finally I surfaced into consciousness.

“ ’Lo?” I answered, silencing Blue
Ö
yster Cult mid-lyric.

“Kirsty? You’d better get down here right away.” Kali’s voice crackled from the tiny speaker, sounding as distressed as I’d ever heard her. I half sat up, rubbing crusty dried gunk from my eyes, the corner of my mouth and . . . never mind. Despite having no psychic abilities at all, I clearly foresaw a shower in my future.

“Down where?”

“To Hell’s Cells.”

I thumped the heel of my hand against my forehead, trying to dispel some of the got-some brain fog. I had a memory once, I just forgot where I put it.

A recent memory floated within reach. I grasped for it, almost had it . . .
Ahhh.
Now I remembered. Dante’s friend Monroe had told us the holding facility where he worked needed an extra pair of hands. And Kali was nothing if not handy. She had six of ’em, after all.

Obviously, she’d landed the job. Only Reapers need apply.

“So what’s up?” I asked. Dante rolled over and opened his eyes. I held a finger to his lips to keep him from speaking. He kissed my finger softly and my insides melted. No, not literally.

“What? I missed that, Kali. Say again, please.”

“I said, something weird went down with that soul you brought in. That Conrad guy. You didn’t use another Reaper’s scythe on him, did you? Because if you did, I think we’ve finally figured out what happens when you do.”

As Kali described the scene in the cells, all the blood drained from my face. My stomach flip-flopped and my heart clenched.

“Oh, skeg!”

To be continued in Book 3 of The Reluctant Reaper series,
Esprit de Corpse: Hell Is Where the Heart Is.