Reap & Redeem (21 page)

It was the story of his life.

Sliding his arms into the harness of the scabbard, he took comfort in the feeling of the scythe against his back. He’d been reckless to take it off in the first place, let alone leave it completely beyond his reach. It wouldn’t happen again.

He strapped the sheaths to his legs, over his pants this time since he wasn’t concerned about scaring innocent bystanders this late at night, and tucked the dagger against the small of his back.

Better.

Now, all he had to do was get Olivia to safety. When he finally turned to look at her, he watched her disappear into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.

* * *

Olivia pressed her hands flat against the cool surface of the bathroom vanity, splaying her fingers to keep herself steady. Her head, too heavy to hold up, hung down and she closed her eyes to avoid her reflection. She considered pressing her face against the marble as well. Anything to give her some relief from her tangled emotions.

She wasn’t sure which was more mortifying—the inhibitions she’d abandoned in making love to Kylen or his reaction in the aftermath. Both were causing her face to flush with fire.

He. Was. Amazing.

She couldn’t imagine that sex could be any better than what they’d shared tonight.

But what
had
she expected afterward? Proclamations of love? Promises of a future together? They both knew that was impossible. They were adults. It shouldn’t be this difficult. Obviously, it wasn’t for Kylen. He was already retreating back inside the cold shell he’d constructed around himself. So this was her problem, wasn’t it? She didn’t have a shell. All of her soft parts were exposed.

She didn’t want him to see her emotionally weak and undone. He had already seen her physically weak, so she couldn’t help that. But she would die with dignity and strength, not pining away over a one-night stand. She’d accomplished everything on her list. All but the last one, anyway, and it didn’t look as though that one could be achieved. It certainly wasn’t from lack of trying. She’d have to live with that. Or, in this case, die with it.

Cracking the door open, she peeked into the bedroom. Her clothes were all in a closet on the other side of the bedroom. She wrapped a towel around her body and scurried over there to change.

* * *

Kylen paced in front of the living room window. No matter how many times he glanced into the alleyway, the scene remained the same. The dozens of imps had swelled to at least a hundred as he kept watch. They crouched there, fiery eyes fixed on the third-story window, blinking like malicious fireflies in the darkness. The sheer number of them made his skin crawl.

Sending his senses out into the night, he tapped into the network of darkness. He could feel the demons gathering beneath the earthly realm. They were nearby, waiting for the portal to open. A growing sense of dread filled him. He couldn’t take the chance of walking Olivia the six blocks to the cemetery, not when the portal might open anywhere. He wondered if Deacon, Ruth and Nate were back from the hospital yet. Deacon needed to get Ruth to safety, too. They were running out of time.

Then he felt the surge of power through his tether.

The ground was ripped and rent under Camael’s command. In his mind’s eye he saw that the new portal was opening in a cemetery. Not Maple Park but another place, outside of town. Using cemeteries and church portals as staging grounds for his demons was Camael’s bird flip to the big guy. There was nothing the fallen angel liked better than to desecrate holy places. The demons streamed out by the hundreds descending upon Meridian, but Camael couldn’t hold such a big seam open for long. The portal was closed after a few minutes, cutting off the flow, which enraged Camael further. He’d only accomplished part of his plan, thank God. As it was, it would be nearly impossible for the reapers to destroy all these new adversaries.

Kylen snapped back to awareness as the tether snapped. When he heard Olivia’s footsteps behind him, he forced himself to turn to face her, an act which felt much more dangerous than facing the imps that awaited below.

She was radiant.

Her pale skin glowed with life, and her white hair cascaded down her back and across one shoulder. It was all he could do to stop himself from rushing over to her and burying his face against her neck. His pulse beat in his ears like a train chugging down a track, and his attempts at coherent thought were worthless.

“I’m ready.” Olivia shouldered a backpack and stuffed her hands into her jeans’ pockets, looking everywhere but in Kylen’s eyes.

Paralyzed, Kylen knew he should respond to her—acknowledge her comment, tell her about the danger—but all he could see when he looked at her was her body spread across the bed, him buried to the hilt inside her. His cock hardened against his will.

Her eyes finally settled on his, and her face flushed a sweet shade of pink. Was she thinking the same thing? Of course not. God, he was going soft. Only not in the right places. He shifted and headed in exactly the direction he didn’t want to go—away from her, toward the door.

“Do you have a car?”

“Yes. We’re driving now?”

“Only to the cemetery. We have company outside. It’s not safe to walk.”

She headed to the window and looked down. Frowning, she turned to look at him, “There are at least a hundred cats down there. Are you the Pied Piper of cats or something?”

“Those are imps. Trust me, if you could see them in their true form you wouldn’t want to play with them.”

She walked to the door, took her purse from the coat hook and fumbled inside until she extracted a ring of keys.

“The car’s outside in the garage.”

“Good.”

* * *

Kylen led the way down the three flights of stairs to the building’s back entrance. He hesitated at the door and drew his scythe.

“You really think that’s necessary?” Olivia asked, backing away from him.

“Yes.”

He cracked open the door, taking a cautious assessment of the distance to the garage—it was open, thank God—before wedging himself through it, scythe first. Reaching back for Olivia, he took her hand and drew her up against him as they made their way to the car.

“Open the locks.”

She clicked the remote, and he heard the beep as the doors unlocked. They sprinted the fifty feet to the carport, and he opened the passenger door of the Focus, pushing her inside. He folded himself behind the wheel of the tiny vehicle, and breathed out a sigh. As he backed out of the carport, the headlights illuminated the herd of imps, which had pulled in close, their glowing yellow eyes like a carpet of stars lining the driveway.

As he pulled forward, the imps closed ranks around the car, hemming it in. Rage built inside him as he stared at the beasts.

“Part,” he commanded.

When they didn’t yield, he hesitated in confusion for only a moment. The imps had been responding to his commands for more than a century. They’d obeyed him just days ago. Surprised, he smashed the accelerator to the floor and ran right over them. The car crunched over a handful of imps, and others careened away and were sent bouncing off the hood of the car.

Olivia screamed.

He knew it must look like he was running over and killing defenseless animals, but that was absolutely not the case. If he couldn’t command them, he couldn’t keep her safe, either. He had to get her to consecrated ground without delay. The imps wouldn’t be able to cross the boundaries of the cemetery unless Camael had desecrated it. Imps could only use the portals leading directly to and from Hell, not the consecrated subway used by reapers. If he got her back to Ruth’s, she’d be safe.

Once he got them through the hoard, he drove straight to the cemetery. He didn’t stop the car until they were in the center of the small grounds. He leaned his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes, letting his heart break a little as Olivia snuffled softly beside him, her breath hitching. She was crying. For imps.

Holy shit, the world really is going to Hell.

“I’m sorry,” she said, wiping her hands down her face.

“They’re not cats, I promise you.”

He left the car and walked around to her side. Opening the door for her, he reached for her hand, and when she gave it to him, he pulled her toward a headstone near where they’d entered the cemetery several hours earlier. Imps were lining the perimeter of the cemetery, all the way around the acreage, so the consecration must be secure. This night was completely FUBAR. He couldn’t imagine how it could get any worse.

Holding his scythe in one hand, he drew a sobbing Olivia to him with his other arm and concentrated until he felt the familiar swirl and tug that would bring them home.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Ruth’s living room was bedlam. The place was wall-to-wall reapers, just like the bar in Purgatory. Huge, badass reapers, all of them talking over one another. Deacon and Ruth were standing just inside the open doorway of their bedroom, having what appeared to be quite an animated conversation. Kylen counted six new reapers, plus a woman who had to be Deacon’s replacement reaper, Maeve. Nate stood next to her, a strange expression on his face. The room reeked of testosterone and anticipation.

Deacon spotted him from their bedroom doorway and nodded, making his way over to him. “I am glad you two are back. We have problems.”

Olivia stared wide-eyed at the new additions. Kylen wanted to put his arm around her waist and pull her close, but he couldn’t summon the courage to do it in front of Deacon, let alone this roomful of strangers. He looked at Ruth, who was still standing in the doorway, and she took pity on him, motioning for Olivia to join her.

Olivia gave him a tense smile. “I’ll be back.”

“Sure,” he said, watching her wind her way through the crowd.

“What was that all about?” Deacon asked. “Is she okay?”

“She’s great.”

“All righty then. Are
you
okay? You kind of look like hell. And we both know that’s saying something.”

“It’s been a long night.”

“It’s about to get longer.”

Kylen nodded. “I know. A huge portal just opened. And it won’t be the last. They’re building up to something big.”

“How do you know?”

“I had a dream—sort of—then I…felt it open.”

“You’re still connected? I mean, I knew you had your mojo on for the demon tracking, but has there been more?”

“Nothing specific. Until now. Deacon, I think Camael’s trying to open a permanent portal for Lucifer. These small ones have been tremors. He’s working up to the big quake.”

“I don’t know how much bigger we can take. Grim is pissed. We got this one sealed within minutes, but our best guess is that a few hundred demons may have escaped.”

“Is that why the Mickey Mouse Club is here?” Kylen asked, nodding towards the crowd.

“Yeah. Grim handpicked them. We have an edict.”

“Sounds very official.”

“You’re about to become a part of it, too. This is big, Kylen.” Deacon grabbed Kylen’s shoulder, making eye contact with him. “Are you good? Can you handle this? Are
we
good?”

Kylen studied his friend’s face. The friend he’d grown up with since childhood. The friend who’d once sworn to kill him before allowing him to be possessed…and then reneged. The friend who’d finally helped save his miserable life. Deacon had risked a lot for him, and if the circumstances had been reversed? Kylen didn’t know if the man he had once been would have been able to kill a possessed Deacon, either.

“Yeah. I am. We are.” Kylen’s bitterness melted from his heart, and for the first time in…forever, he experienced forgiveness. “Do
not
hug me.”

“No problem.” Deacon slapped his shoulder. “I’m going to need your backup here. You’re the only one of us with true inside information. Ready?”

“Best get started.”

Deacon smiled, and then turned to address the gathered reapers.

He whistled loudly and the room instantly quieted. “You have each been pulled from your previous positions, which are now being filled by other reapers. You have been handpicked by Grim to join this reactivated order.” Deacon walked toward the center of the room, and the reapers parted, making way for him.

“As you know, I am the new Powers, and Grim has ascended to Seraph. For more than four thousand years, there hasn’t been a need for the order you are about to join. Demons have stayed in Hell where they belong. But a war has begun once again, and you will be on the front lines. It’s the same old story. Good versus evil. But there can no longer be only one Gatekeeper. You’ve been recruited because of your skills, your strength and your record of success. Your task will be to guard the Earth from evil and eradicate it everywhere you find it.”

“We will hunt down and destroy every last demon Camael released today, and we will continue to patrol the borders of Heaven and Hell to protect mankind until our dying day. If you have doubts or misgivings, now is the time to declare them. If you accept this appointment, you will become Authorities in the Order of the Powers, and for your service, you will ascend to The Sixth Choir as an angel upon your death. And I can guarantee no one has seen angels the likes of this motley crew.”

Several of the reapers laughed, and Deacon continued. “You are warriors and protectors. This will be your chance to prove yourself. You’ll be paired according to your special skills and sent forth to track and dispose of the demons. There are a lot of them. Hundreds. Maybe more. It’s not going to be an easy task. You can live here. The accommodations will be uncomfortable for the moment, but we will improve them together. We will be an army and a family, and we
will
succeed.”

“If you accept your role, you’ll be allowed to return to Purgatory with me, and Grim will install you as members of this elite Reaper Authority Force. It will not be without its perks… For one, you will no longer need to carry a soul to travel to and from Purgatory. You’ll be able to travel at will. The downside is that it’s a lifelong commitment, and you have to make your choice
now.
” Deacon took his measure of each reaper, and then turned his gaze on Nate.