Grave Dance (23 page)

The rest? I didn’t see how it would help.

I fel asleep on the ride home and woke to Falin lifting me from the car.

“M-mm. Put me down; you’re hurt,” I mumbled, the words coming out slightly garbled in my half-awake state.

“I’m not
that
hurt.”

Right.

But he did put me down, and I stumbled up my stairs on my own. I let him use my keys to unlock the door, as I’d have just fumbled the job in my trembling, half-blind condition. I’d spent way too much time peering into other planes of existence. What I real y wanted now was a hot shower and a good night’s sleep, though not necessarily in shower and a good night’s sleep, though not necessarily in that order.

PC danced around us, his little gray body burning my legs where he brushed against my pants. Crap, I hadn’t even raised a shade and I was chil ed to my core. I glanced longingly at my bed, but I’d made a promise to myself to stop sleeping with Falin—in any sense of the word—until I figured out how I real y felt about him. And I’d made that decision before he’d gone and disappeared on me. Now?

Yeah, I was sticking to my resolve.

“So,” I said, turning toward Falin.

“So?” He slid his jacket off and hung it on the back of my solitary chair. His holster fol owed.

“Do you want the bed or the floor?” The good-host thing to do would be to offer him the bed, but he’d invited himself, so I’d let him be gal ant and take the floor.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No,” I said, and I meant it, but even to my own ears, the single-syl able word sounded feeble. Maybe that was because I was staring at the smooth skin being revealed as Falin unbuttoned his oxford.

“Real y?” He pul ed the shirt free of his pants so he could get to the last button, but he didn’t take the shirt off. It gapped as he stepped forward, exposing smal glimpses of pale skin and hard abs.

He lifted a hand, brushing a strand of hair back from my face. He’d stripped off his gloves at some point, so his fingers were bare and warm against my cheek.

“I—” I started, but he leaned down. His lips brushed mine, the kiss tentative, a question with just a touch of breath and heat.

Whatever I’d planned to say vanished.

I lifted on my toes, inviting more, and he didn’t disappoint.

His lips closed over mine, firm and soft al at once as he deepened the kiss. One of his hands slid into my hair, the other around my waist as he pul ed me closer, surrounding me with his heat, his scent, his touch.

me with his heat, his scent, his touch.

Someone cleared their throat behind me. “Please tel me I get a veto in this.”

I jumped, breaking contact with Falin in midkiss.

Death leaned against the counter, his thumbs hooked in his pockets and his dark hair spil ing into his face. I couldn’t do anything more than stand there staring at him as my heart thundered in my chest, though I couldn’t have said if I was more breathless from the kiss or from the fact that it was Death who had caught me at it.

“I’m not interrupting, am I?” he asked. Death may have looked casual and sounded bored, but his eyes were fixed on Falin with dark intensity.

Yes. Very much.
Not that I shouldn’t have been thankful

—I
had
made a promise to myself, after al —but I couldn’t quite summon up that particular emotion as Falin’s hands slid over my shoulders.

“Alexis,” he whispered, his lips pressing against my hair, his breath tracing my ear.

A shiver that had nothing to do with the chil fil ing me and everything to do with the sensations his touch woke in my body rang through me. Aside from the awkward, teasing dance that Death and I had been stumbling through recently, I hadn’t been touched,
really touched
—in a month.

The feel of his skin on mine sent a thril through me as if it had been a lot longer than that. But I couldn’t do this.

Especial y not with Death watching every change in my features from beneath his heavily hooded eyes.

I shrugged away from Falin’s hands. “I’l just take the floor,” I said, no longer caring who got stuck with the floor so long as his hands, and lips, and eyes stopped lighting a fire in my skin. I turned to Death. “What are you doing here?”

He lifted his shoulders in a slight shrug. “At the moment?

Chaperoning.”

Right.
Of course.
I groaned silently and realized I could almost hear the ringing absence of movement as Falin went stil behind me.

went stil behind me.

“Who’s here?” he asked.

As answer, I reached out my hand toward Death. I wasn’t sure he’d accept it. Roy enjoyed becoming visible, but Mr.

Super Secretive Soul Col ector? Him I wasn’t sure about.

Hel , for al I knew, he might vanish just because I’d let on that he was present. But if he was going to stand around making commentary, I wasn’t going to be the only victim listening.

Death looked at my outstretched hand for a moment, and then smiled, flashing a row of perfect teeth before placing his palm against mine. I dropped my shields and Falin let out a curse.

“What’s he doing here?” he asked, the question directed at me and not the col ector, though I knew he damn wel was now visible. Falin crossed muscular arms over his chest and glared from Death to me.

I frowned at him.
The point of dropping my shields was
so they didn’t talk
through
me in the first place.

Death lifted my hand to his lips, drawing me several steps forward in the process, but he didn’t so much kiss my knuckles as smile into my skin. His eyes watched me as he did this; then, as if we were dancing, he spun me so my back was to him. Dropping my hand, he wrapped one arm around my shoulders. He was tal enough that he could prop his chin on the top of my head.

“I heard Alex was having a slumber party and decided to crash,” Death said, and though I couldn’t see it, I could hear the smirk in his voice.

I’m tal —I have been ever since I turned twelve and in a single year shot up from a respectable twelve-year-old height of four-eleven to a gangly height of five-ten. I’d slumped for the rest of the year, until I’d left the academy for summer break and my father had threatened to make me spend my entire vacation in a social polishing camp if I didn’t stand up straight. I’d soon stopped caring that I towered over my female peers and learned to enjoy the fact towered over my female peers and learned to enjoy the fact that I could look most guys in the eye. It was some time after that when I decided kickass boots that added an extra three inches to my height were the only way to go. Al that said, I wasn’t used to feeling short. But with Falin towering in front of me looking like some sort of pissed-off Greek god carved out of marble, and Death pul ing me back against his wide chest, I felt downright petite.

I also felt like I was suddenly caught in a situation that was about to spiral wildly out of control.

“You shouldn’t be wasting energy. We need to get your body temperature back up, not invite in the chil .” Falin stepped forward and, apparently deciding the best thing to do was ignore Death completely, rubbed his hands over my arms—which was more annoying than helpful.

Death’s arm wrapped tighter around my shoulders. “I have body heat.”

“Stop it, both of you.” I shrugged away from Falin’s hands, which earned me a frown from the fae, until I ducked out from under Death’s arm. Then I garnered frowns from both men.

But I couldn’t escape Death’s touch. He and I had to be in contact for him to be visible unless I wanted to start channeling major amounts of energy, which I didn’t, maybe even couldn’t at this point. So I stood there for an awkward moment, my hand clasped in his, but my arm outstretched to add space between our bodies.
How do I get myself into
these things?
Wel , there was always one safe topic: business.

“There was a col ector at the crime scene earlier. Or at least I think he was a col ector. But he col ected the souls before death.” Wel , with the female skimmer he did, though I could have sworn the male was going to make it before the col ector showed and snagged the man’s soul. “Can you guys do that? Get impatient and col ect a soul early?”

I’d been focusing on studying the layer of dirt coating my boots from my recent misadventures in the great outdoors, boots from my recent misadventures in the great outdoors, but as the silence stretched I looked up and found Death staring at me. Not the dark but intense I’m-imaginingyou-with-a-lot-less-clothing stare he’d been prone to giving me lately but a you’ve-stumbled-into-something-over-yourhead stare.

“What did he look like?” he asked.

“Male. Average height. Late twenties to early thirties.

Dark hair. Long dark trench coat. What are you thinking?”

Death frowned, his gaze moving past me.

“Could he be involved?” Falin had snapped into cop mode while I wasn’t paying attention. “He was at a murder scene that had a rift into the Aetheric. Could a . . .

col ector”—the way he said the word made it clear it wasn’t a title he was accustomed to using—“have ripped through to the Aetheric?”

Death shook his head, but I wasn’t sure if he was disagreeing or simply dismissing his own thoughts. Then his eyes focused on me again. “You’re trembling.”

“I’m fine.” I should have saved my breath.

“She needs sleep,” Falin said, his gaze going icy again.

“With you, I suppose?” Death asked.

Falin crossed his arms. “It’s an option.”

“I’m fine,” I repeated. Not that either of them noticed—

they were too busy attempting to stare holes into each other.
Perfect. Just what I need.
I was cold to the core, magical y drained, and far beyond the point of exhaustion.

“You know what, guys, maybe you’re right. Have fun with the pissing contest. I’m going to bed.” I dropped Death’s hand, closed my shields, and marched over to col apse ful y dressed on my bed. I was asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pil ow.

Chapter 21

I
woke trapped under a warm arm. A quick status check showed I was stil in my own bed and ful y dressed, though my boots had vanished at some point in the night. I was sure the warm body curled around me belonged to Falin only because Death was staring at me from where he leaned against the wal across from my bed.

“Did you stay al night?” I kept my voice low, trying not to wake the man behind me.

Death lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “Wasn’t much night left. More morning and early afternoon.”

“You know, that is kind of creepy stalker–esque.”

“I’m not the one who crawled into bed with you after you were asleep.”

Point.
The men in my life were . . . complicated.
And so
much for my resolve.
I craned my neck to glance back at Falin. His face was relaxed, peaceful with sleep. Good.

Now to get out of this bed without waking him.

Easier said than done.

I tried to slide out from under his arm, but the more I wriggled, the more his muscles flexed, tightening around me. He dragged me back against his chest without waking, like it was a reflex.

Crap.

I grabbed his wrist, hauling his arm off me. Then he did wake. The bed shifted as he moved, and he lifted his wrist from my hands, wrapping his arm around me once again.

His breath tickled along my jaw as he placed a kiss on the sensitive skin under my ear. “Good morning,” he the sensitive skin under my ear. “Good morning,” he whispered, his voice stil rough with sleep.

My mouth went dry, my body waking to answer his in ways I real y wished it wouldn’t—especial y with Death stil standing three feet away, watching me.

“I, uh—I have to pee.” I broke free of Falin’s arm and rol ed to the edge of the bed.

As I crossed the foot of the bed, Falin flopped over onto his back. Staring at the ceiling, he bunched both his hands in his hair. “How many hours should I wait to start breakfast?”

“What? I—” Okay, so I
had
hid out in the bathroom the last time I woke with Falin in my bed, but this was different.

“I’l be right back.”

Death trailed me. I ignored him until I reached the bathroom—I had no intention of making him visible and encouraging a repeat of last night’s posturing. Once I closed the door, I rounded on him.

“Out. This is alone time.”

“You’re cute when you’re flustered.”

I frowned at him. “I’m being serious.”

“Then you should seriously make
him
leave.” He jerked his chin toward the inner wal and the one-room apartment beyond.

“He’s not here in the bathroom.”

Death gave me a look that said I knew what he meant, and I sighed.

“He’s helping me, okay?”

Death just continued to frown, and I turned my back on him. His reflection in the mirror watched as I tried to drag a brush through the snarls that my curls had turned into after they’d been slept on, and before that, hours of being tossed around in the wind while crossing over from the land of the dead.

“How do omelets sound for breakfast?” Falin’s voice cal ed from somewhere in the kitchen, and Death’s reflection shook its head.

reflection shook its head.

He muttered the word “omelets” under his breath and then focused on me again. “He has his own agenda.”

I shrugged and turned on the water. “Most people do.” I shoved the brush under the faucet, and then dragged the wet bristles through my hair to calm the frizz.

“Alex.” He stepped closer, his hands molding around my hips. “What do you real y know about him?”

I twisted in his grasp, not to get away but to face him. The position was close, intimate. If I had lifted onto my toes, I could have kissed him. As it was, I was close enough to see the kaleidoscope of colors hidden in his dark hazel eyes.

“What do I know about you?” I asked, and the skin around his eyes tightened in a smal flinch, as if my question could wound. I lowered my gaze.

When I was a teenager, I’d had a major crush on Death.

Yeah, imagine that, a teenager with a crush on Death—it took emo to a whole new level. He’d visited me less often then, stopping by apparently at random for reasons unknown. I think, back then, my company was an amusement or maybe an interesting novelty—a mortal who could see him, interact with him. For me, he was that dreamy, dark and mysterious older guy. I guess he was stil al of those things, but I’d thought I’d outgrown that teenage crush. Clearly it had just grown up with me.

I took a deep breath, relishing the thril of his hands on me, of his touch. Of the fact that we
could
touch. A month ago it would have been uncomfortable, him too cold and me too hot. But now things had changed.

Looking up again, I studied his face, recognizing every line of his jaw, the curve of his eyebrows. In some ways, he was my closest friend. In others he was a complete stranger. But even with our relationship in this strange, awkward, morphing mess of, wel , whatever it was, I stil felt like I could talk to him. Could tel him anything, everything, even if he couldn’t do the same. After al , no one kept even if he couldn’t do the same. After al , no one kept secrets like Death.

“You’ve always told me not to push,” I said, moving my arms to his, my hands at his elbows, my forearms on top of his. We were too close for me not to touch him without making things more awkward. “Not to push for answers you can’t give me, for secrets you can’t reveal. Wel , now it’s my turn. Don’t push me for commitments I can’t make.”

He closed his eyes and then leaned forward, propping his chin on the top of my head. The movement brought me in contact with his chest, and I leaned into him as wel , feeling the softness of his T-shirt against my cheek—a T-shirt that I was pretty sure didn’t exist, at least not in the terms with which I was familiar. I felt the sigh that escaped him as he wrapped his arms around me.

“Okay.” His fingers trailed over the sliver of skin exposed between my halter top and my hip-huggers. “Okay, I’l stop pushing. But I expect you to tel
him
the same thing.”

“Trust me, I intend to.” Now, if Falin would listen? That would be a miracle.

As if he could hear my thoughts, Death laughed, one hard bark of air. “He’s stubborn. You know he continued to talk
at
me—at empty air, for al he knew—for an hour after you fel asleep.”

I hid my smile against Death’s shoulder. “Yeah, he’s stubborn.”

“You could kick him out.”

I groaned and pushed away from Death. “I told you, he’s helping me with my investigation.” I hadn’t intended to rub Death’s nose in the fact that he
wasn’t
the one helping me, but it was there, in his eyes. He looked away, as if he knew I could see it.

“What marks the end of life?” Death asked, hooking his thumbs in his pockets.

“What?”
Where did that question come from?
Death didn’t answer, or repeat himself; he just looked at me, his eyes intense, as if the words he
wasn’t
saying were trying to eyes intense, as if the words he
wasn’t
saying were trying to burn through his gaze.

“Philosophical y, scientifical y, or . . . ?” I let the question trail off and lifted my hands, palms up, as I shrugged.

Stil he didn’t answer.

“Okay.” I frowned and leaned back against the sink’s counter. “Science would say life ends after the last breath leaves the body and the heart ceases to beat, or perhaps when brain activity stops. But . . .”

Death inclined his head, as if encouraging me to continue. He was a col ector and I talked to the dead, so a scientific explanation probably wasn’t what he was looking for. I’d seen bodies continue to have scientific signs of life for up to a minute or two after their souls had been col ected, but I knew from experience that if I raised the shade of one of them, his memory would last only until the soul left the body. I’d also seen, though thankful y not often, bodies that had lost al signs of life but retained souls—their shades remembered being dead. “Mortal life ends when the soul leaves the body.”

Death smiled, but it wasn’t exactly a happy smile. “So what is the fuel of life, and where else have you seen it?” he asked. Then he vanished.

I stared at the space where he’d been.
Souls
. Souls as fuel. And I knew exactly where I’d seen souls recently—the constructs.

When I left the bathroom, I found Falin poking around my fridge, wearing only a pair of jeans.

“You need to go shopping,” he said without looking up.

“Typical y.”

I grabbed PC’s bag of kibble and flicked the coffeemaker on as I passed it. The coffee had only just begun brewing by the time the smal dog was chomping away at his meal. I pul ed a mug out of the cabinet, then away at his meal. I pul ed a mug out of the cabinet, then jerked the pot out of the coffeemaker and held my mug directly under the steaming liquid. When I looked up I found Falin grinning at me.

“Impatient?”

“In a hurry.”

“You always need that stuff to wake you?”

No, having two of the best-looking guys I knew in my
bedroom had pretty much taken care of getting my pulse
moving.
Not that I was going to tel either of them that. I shoved the pot back under the stream of coffee and cupped my half-ful mug in my hands.

“You never answered me about the omelets,” he said, stil grinning at me over the door of the fridge.

“What’s with you and cooking?”

He shrugged. “I live alone and I don’t like eating junk.”

Well, at least he didn’t say he serves the Winter Queen
breakfast in bed every morning.
I also lived alone—when Falin wasn’t randomly inviting himself into my house—but I’d never gotten into the cooking thing. Of course, eating junk tended to be cheaper, and that was a factor too. The only reason I had eggs in the house was because I’d had a craving for brownies last weekend and the supermarket didn’t sel just two eggs.

“So yes or no on breakfast?”

I glanced at the afternoon light streaming into the room.

Not exactly breakfast time anymore.
But I wasn’t going to pass up real food.

“Breakfast,” I agreed.

I walked PC and showered while Falin cooked. Then, after our afternoon breakfast, I paid a visit downstairs.

Caleb was unhappy that Falin was stil in the house, but he told me Hol y had been released from the hospital—and then promptly reported to work. He swore he hadn’t felt any effects of the spel , but I stil sensed the crystal-armored dormant spel where the ravens had scratched him. By the time Falin got out of the shower I’d brewed a second pot of time Falin got out of the shower I’d brewed a second pot of coffee and was pacing around my apartment as I mul ed over the case.

“I know that look,” he said as he towel-dried his hair.

“You feel like you’ve got a dozen pieces of the puzzle but not only do they not seem to fit together, they don’t even seem to reflect parts of the same picture.”

“Yeah, that sums it up.” I set my mug down on the counter.

My mind kept circling back to what Death had said, or real y, what he’d not said. I was sure he meant the constructs when he mentioned where else I’d seen souls, but he’d made me go through al that bit about the end of life first. Or, put another way, the cause of death. I grabbed my purse off the counter. “I’m going to head to the morgue a little early. I want to test a theory.”

Falin returned the towel to the bathroom. “Okay, I’l be ready in five.”

I stopped halfway to the door. “I don’t think you should go with me.” After al , John hadn’t had the greatest reaction to my showing up with Falin at the crime scene.

“What if the constructs attack again?”

“If they get inside Central Precinct, past the wards, the guards, al the cops, and down to the morgue, I’m pretty sure I’m screwed. Even if you were there, I think it’s a safe bet we’d al die.”

Falin dropped me off at Central Precinct. I wasn’t thriled about his driving around in my car, but he hadn’t replaced his after it was totaled a month ago, and he needed wheels to work the case. Besides, I wouldn’t be able to drive after I raised the shade—if Rianna and I managed to do it—so it made sense for him to take the car.

After I passed through security and signed in with the attendant in her fishbowl office, I clipped on my visitor badge and headed down to the morgue in the subterranean levels of Central Precinct. Halogen bulbs lit the unadorned levels of Central Precinct. Halogen bulbs lit the unadorned corridors, making the underground hal s bright, if not cheery. I hadn’t asked which medical examiners were working this afternoon. Considering that Tamara had been at the crime scene most of the night, I assumed it wouldn’t be her, so I was surprised when I ran into her outside the coroner’s office.

“I was already on the schedule,” she said, covering a yawn with the back of her hand. “So what’s happening? It best not be another emergency because I get off at seven and I swear if I don’t make it home to my bed and sleep through the entire night there wil be hel to pay.”

“No emergency this time. Remember when we were at lunch the other day and you mentioned that you had several bodies in the freezer that you couldn’t find a cause of death for? Did you ever find one?”

She blew air through her teeth and pushed open the door to the autopsy room with al its stainless-steel gurneys and scary-looking medical equipment. “No, and now I have more of them. Why? You think you know?”

I had a theory.

“This is them,” Tamara said, roling a second gurney to the center of the morgue.

I nodded. Tamara and I had discussed it and she’d picked the two most inexplicable deaths for me to question.

She hadn’t given me any specifics about the victims, but even ful y shielded I could feel that the bodies belonged to a male and a female. Young, too—my age or a little younger. I couldn’t tel more than that through my shields, but the grave essence in them clawed at the edge of my mind.

“I’m at my wits’ end,” she said, watching as I dragged the tube of waxy chalk I used to draw indoor circles on the linoleum morgue floor. “In the last two weeks, I’ve had over a dozen suspicious deaths of undetermined cause cross my table. These two came in together. They’re young, in my table. These two came in together. They’re young, in good health, with no signs of foul play or disease. And yet they’re dead.” She shook her head, as if the movement could clear away the mystery. “I feel like the universe suddenly changed the rules and no one told me.”