“Kay? It’s twelve-thirty in the morning,” Emma mumbled. It sounded like she had her face buried in the phone. “What’s wrong?”
“Sorry, Em, but it’s kind of an emergency. Can Nash and I get a ride to school tomorrow?”
“’Course.” She sounded a little more alert, and springs squealed as she sat up in bed. “What happened to your car?”
“My dad took my keys and my phone for a week.”
“Ouch. I’ll be there at seven-thirty.” Which meant seven-forty-five, in Emma-land. We’d be late to school, but that was better than riding the bus with the freshmen.
“Thanks. You’re awesome.”
“I know,” she slurred, already half asleep again. “Bye.” The phone clicked in my ear and Emma was gone. I spared a moment to hope she remembered us in the morning. Then I sank onto my bed, suddenly very sleepy, now that the immediate problem was resolved.
“Tell Nash to be here at seven-thirty if he wants a ride.” I’d driven him to school most mornings since we started going out. I glanced at the textbook on my desk, briefly considering my homework. But I was too tired to mess with that. I’d do it at lunch. “So what’s the plan for tomorrow?”
“We go downtown and find the disposal facility, then start asking questions until we hear what we need to know,” Tod said, slouching in my chair again.
“Simple. I like it.” I sat on my pillow and slid my legs beneath my covers. “When?”
“After school?”
“Nope. My dad’ll call, and if I’m not here to answer, he’ll…I don’t know. Call the cops or something.”
Tod scowled, an odd look on his cherubic features. “You’re not looking at the big picture, Kaylee. Addy’s soul is at stake. I’ve traded two hospital shifts in a row and will probably have to do it again tomorrow. The least you can do is drop off your dad’s radar for a couple of hours after school.”
“Okay, first of all, we’re not out of time just yet. Tomorrow’s Wednesday, and Addy’s not supposed to die until Thursday. And we can’t do this until I learn how to turn myself into a Netherworld ferry.” Which meant I’d have to convince my father to let me go for my how-to-be-a-
bean-sidhe
lesson after school, in spite of the grounding.
Then I’d have to talk Harmony into teaching me what I needed to know, without telling her why I needed to know it.
“Besides, we need a car. You can blink into Dallas whenever you want, but Nash and I can’t. And I’m not taking the bus in the middle of the night.”
“Middle of the night?” He leaned forward in my chair, brows dipped low in concern. “Isn’t that cutting it kind of close?”
“We don’t really have any choice, Tod.” I scooted down on the bed until the covers gathered at my waist. “The only time my dad won’t check up on me is when he’s asleep, which means we can’t leave until tomorrow night. That gives you almost a day to explain everything to Addy and Regan, and to find us a car.” Because his mom worked the night shift at the hospital and would need hers. “Do
not
steal one. The last thing we need is to get arrested on the way to the Netherworld.”
I could already see the headline: Mentally Fragile Teen Arrested in Stolen Car; Says She Was Looking for a Demon.
Sophie wouldn’t have to work hard to convince everyone I was nuts after that.
“That’s not enough time, Kaylee.” Tod looked as grim as I’d ever seen him.
“It’ll have to be.” I wasn’t sure how best to comfort a reaper. “By Thursday morning, Addy will be in full possession of her soul.”
It wasn’t much of a promise, but since I couldn’t guarantee her life, her soul was all I could offer him.
“Now, could you please put my phone back where you found it? And turn the light off on your way out.” With that, I lay back and pulled the covers over my shoulder. I needed sleep.
Tomorrow promised to be the weirdest Wednesday in history.
“I
REALLY SHOULD JUST LEAVE
you here. You deserve to ride the bus, for keeping so many secrets.” Emma slammed her locker closed as the last bell rang, but her bright brown eyes gave her away. She wasn’t really mad. She was fishing for hints about the super-secret
bean sidhe
mission she imagined we were on.
I settled my backpack higher on my shoulder and tugged my snug tee down over the waistband of my jeans. “Trust me, you’re not missing anything.” If she knew the truth, her curiosity would no doubt give way to terror. Which was why I couldn’t tell her.
But Emma would give us another ride, anyway, to make up for making us all nearly half an hour late to first period. I should have known she wouldn’t remember a middle-of-the-night, sleep-foggy promise. She’d actually made it all the way to the school parking lot five minutes ahead of the tardy bell before remembering me and Nash. I would have texted her, but my dad left for work with my phone, and I didn’t have her number memorized. Nor did Nash have it programmed.
We all three got unexcused tardies, which made a matched set with my unexcused absence from history the day before.
Add to that the half-finished chemistry homework I’d spilled nacho-cheese sauce on during lunch, and I was starting to think I couldn’t handle both school and
bean sidhe
business. Not to mention work.
“Hey, Emma,” a male voice called from down the hall. We looked up to see Doug Fuller strutting with a huddle of football players in matching school jackets, Nash among them. “You got plans tonight?”
The cluster closed around us in a tall wall of broad green-and-white-clad shoulders, blocking most of the hall from view and effectively trapping us, though Emma didn’t seem to notice the sudden suffocating lack of personal space. I stepped back and my bag hit the lockers. There was nowhere else to go unless I was willing to break through the offensive line and expose my confinement issues. Which would be like waving a red flag in front of a whole herd of bulls.
Nash must have seen the swirl of panic in my eyes, because he was suddenly at my side. I let my backpack slide to the floor, and he wrapped both arms around me from behind. His breath brushed my ear in a private, whispered greeting, and I relaxed into him as if the other ass-letes weren’t even there.
They’d accepted me into their company easily enough—though I’d only hovered on the fringes before, thanks to Emma’s various adventures in dating—because Nash and I were practically attached at the hip.
Or at the crotch, as the other guys no doubt assumed. After all, why else would he hang out with Emma’s curve-less, penniless best friend, even if I did have a not-hideous face?
A very good question…
Nash had no more money than I did. Maybe even less. But
he was wealthy in another currency: athleticism. He’d helped lead the football team to the regional play-offs—they were the heavy favorites for Friday night’s game—and would do it again when baseball season arrived in the spring. That prowess, along with a face and body—not to mention a voice—few girls could say no to, kept him firmly anchored in the bright, shining kingdom of Social Acceptance, a world surely stranger and more frightening than anything I could stumble across in the Netherworld.
Emma had a free pass into that world, issued solely upon the basis of her flawless face and generous curves. She flitted among the chosen ones at will, lingering whenever a strong chin or bulging arm caught her eye. But it never lasted long. She bored easily—especially of guys with wandering hands—and would soon come back bearing tales of bumbling inadequacy unenhanced by enthusiasm.
Outside of school, it was easy to forget that Nash belonged to that world, too, and that he had a lot in common with his friends, minus the bumbling inadequacy part. But I’d rather walk the Netherworld alone, with my soul safety-pinned to my sleeve, than spend a few hours alone with any one of his teammates. Somehow, that seemed safer.
“Yeah, I have plans.” Emma stood on her toes and pressed herself into Doug’s chest so that her breasts flattened against his letter jacket, her nose inches from his chin. His hand slithered around her waist to spread at the base of her spine, fingers inching lower. “I have very interesting plans….”
His friends snickered and Emma stretched higher, letting her lips brush his jaw near his ear as his hand slid lower, gripping the upper curve of her backside. “Too bad they don’t include you.”
With that, she dropped onto her heels again and smiled up at him, one hand propped on the dramatic flair of her hip.
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Emma’s game was a bit like taunting an angry gorilla through a flimsy window screen, but what can I say? She was fun to watch.
“You’ll change your mind.” Doug grinned and winked, walking backward away from us to keep Emma in his sight. He was a much better sport than I’d given him credit for.
“Not likely.” Emma turned to her locker and threaded the padlock through the holes in the latch, then snapped it shut as Nash waved off several summonses from his friends, so he could hang out with me. And his mother. “Come on, pedestrians, where am I dropping you? Your place or his?”
“His,” I answered so quickly Emma’s brows shot up in amusement.
“Trouble at home?” She shrugged her backpack onto one shoulder as I grabbed mine from the floor, and we followed her down the hall in the opposite direction of the offensive line.
“No more than usual, but I have a lesson this afternoon.” I left it vague because she knew what I was talking about.
Nash climbed into the back of Emma’s metallic blue Sunfire and I took shotgun. Her car was far from new—it was a hand-me-down from one of her older sisters—yet it made mine look like an antique in comparison. However, the major advantage to Emma’s vehicle over mine was that she was actually in possession of her keys.
I buckled as she pulled out of the lot onto a side street, barely glancing in her rearview mirror before changing lanes right in front of the first stoplight. “Give me a hint.” Em glanced sideways at me, when she really should have had her
eyes on the road. “Just a little one. Is someone else going to die? Is it another cheerleader?”
I laughed at her lighthearted inquisition.
“Maybe you should tell her,” Tod’s voice said out of nowhere, and I jumped so hard the seat belt cut into my neck.
“Stop doing that!” Nash shouted, and I turned to see Tod on the bench seat next to him, one finger pressed to his lips in an exaggerated “shh” signal, while his other hand pointed at Emma.
“Sorry!” she snapped, assuming Nash was talking to her. She swerved into the right-hand lane without bothering to flick on her turn signal, and the driver of the car behind us honked, gesturing angrily. “It’s not like I’m actually wishing for more dead cheerleaders. I’m just saying, if
someone
has to go…”
Tod snorted. “I like her!”
Nash elbowed him in the side, and Emma raised both brows at him in the rearview mirror. She’d seen the gesture, but couldn’t see the reaper now holding his ribs, nor did she hear his
oof
of pain. “Sorry.” Nash finally met her gaze. “I wasn’t talking to you.”
Her mouth opened, but I cut off a question I was sure we wouldn’t be able to answer. “Em, go.” I pointed out the windshield, where the cars in front of us had already driven through the intersection when the light turned green. The man behind us honked again, and Emma stomped on the gas. We lurched forward, and she forgot about Nash’s odd behavior. At least for the moment.
“Does this have anything to do with Eden dropping dead onstage?”
I couldn’t think of an answer fast enough, and Em’s lighthearted smile died when she realized she’d actually hit the bull’s-eye.
“Kaylee…” Tod said from the backseat.
“What’s wrong?” I twisted so I could see all three of the other occupants.
“I just didn’t see the light change.” Emma slammed on the brake when the school bus in front of us slowed to a rumbling stop, the pop-out stop sign swinging away from its side.
Of course, I wasn’t talking to her. I was talking to the uninvited, invisible reaper in her backseat.
“I can’t get Addy and Regan alone long enough to explain the plan to them. They’re constantly surrounded by this whole entourage. Assistants, and publicists, and Security, and their mother, who, by the way—” he turned to Nash “—hasn’t changed one bit, except for a whole web of new wrinkles. She still has her nose in everything Addy does.”
“Is there a point to this?” I looked from one brother to the other.
“A point to what?” Emma glanced in the rearview mirror again to see what she was missing. “What is wrong with you guys today?”
“Sorry, Em.” I turned to face her more directly. “It’s—”
“
Bean sidhe
business. I know. And I’m getting pretty damn sick of the whole thing.” She smacked the steering wheel with the heel of one palm, then swerved into a right-hand turn without even touching the brake.
I grabbed the door grip, but she only stomped on the gas again before the wheel even straightened out. “I lied to your
dad last night, and I got stuck in the ticket booth with Glen ‘the human sprinkler’ Frank for
four hours
yesterday. And I’ve driven you around today like your own personal chauffeur. The least you could do is explain why you two are acting so weird.”
Sighing, I glanced at Nash, then pointedly at Tod, raising my brows in question.
Should we tell her?
He shrugged, leaving the decision up to me. She was my best friend.
I shifted to face Emma, exhaling slowly. “I don’t want you mixed up in all this. It’s dangerous.”
She rolled her eyes, and when she turned to look at me, she accidently turned the wheel, too, and the front right tire scraped the curb. Emma didn’t seem to notice. “I’m not asking to go with you on some kind of scary field trip. I just hate being in the dark all the time.”
I knew exactly how she felt, but before I could say anything, Tod shrugged at me, blue eyes shining in mischief. “Sounds like she wants to help. Ask if we can borrow her car. Preferably before she drives it into the side of a building…”
“No!” Nash and I snapped in unison. Then, before Emma could get even angrier, I glared at Tod. “Show her.”
“You sure?” He frowned, no doubt thinking of my standing order for him to stay as far from Emma as possible, and never to let her see him. I didn’t want death getting a crush on my best friend.
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
“Wha—” Emma started. Then she squealed, and her eyes went huge as she stared into the rearview mirror in total shock. I grabbed the wheel when her hands fell away from it,
trying to keep us on the right side of the road while her foot got heavier and heavier on the gas.
“
Told
you this was a bad idea,” Tod said from the backseat, as Nash growled wordlessly at him in frustration.
“Em!” I yelled. “Hit the brake!” We were racing toward a four-way stop, where a group of tweens waited to cross the road on bicycles.
“Who…? How…?” She blinked, then actually twisted to look into the backseat, and the car lurched forward even faster when she braced herself against the gas pedal instead of the floorboard.
“Emma, stop!” I shouted, and she whirled around and stomped on the brake, bringing us to a screeching halt two feet from the crosswalk.
“Okay, we probably shouldn’t have done that while she was actually driving.” Nash studied her profile in concern.
“You call that driving?” Tod crossed his arms casually over his chest as if we hadn’t nearly flattened three kids and totaled Emma’s car.
The tweens rode their bikes across the street, glaring at us through the windshield. The last one flipped us off, then tossed long, purple-striped hair over his shoulder and rode off, standing on his pedals.
In the driver’s seat, Emma sat frozen, staring wide-eyed into the rearview mirror. Her chest rose and fell heavily with each breath, and her hands shook on the wheel.
“Want me to drive?” I offered, laying one hand on her arm.
She shook her head without taking her gaze from Tod. “I want you to tell me what the hell just happened. Who is he, and how did he get in my car?”
“Okay, but we can’t sit here forever.” Another car had stopped behind us at the four-way, already honking. “Pull into the lot up there and we’ll explain.”
Part of it, anyway
.
Emma forced her attention from the rearview mirror with obvious effort. “This is part of your
bean sidhe
business? Who
is
that?” She glanced quickly at Tod again, as she drove slowly through the intersection.
Nash braced his arm on the back of my seat, steeling himself for something he obviously didn’t want to say. “Emma, this is my brother. Tod.” Calm flowed with his words, and I could tell the moment it hit Emma, because her shoulders relaxed, and her grip on the wheel loosened just a bit.
“You have a…Wait.” She turned the car smoothly into a small lot in front of a park full of preschoolers and their parents, then pulled into the first empty spot, facing the road. Emma cut the engine and twisted onto her knees to peer over the back of her seat. “You have a brother?” she said to Nash, after a quick glance at me for confirmation. No one from Eastlake High knew about Nash’s dead brother, because he and Harmony had moved—and changed schools—after the funeral two years earlier. “And he can…what? Teleport into strange cars? Is that a
bean sidhe
ability?”
“No…” I started, trying to decide how much to tell her. But then the reaper took that decision right out of my hands, in classic Tod-style.
“Okay, we’re kind of on a tight schedule here, so let’s get this over with….”
“Tod—” Nash snapped, but his brother held up one hand and rushed on before either of us could stop him.
“I’m a
bean sidhe
, just like Nash and Kaylee. Except that
I’m dead. Teleportation—never really heard it called that—isn’t a
bean sidhe
ability. It’s a reaper ability. I’m a grim reaper. I can appear wherever I want, whenever I want, and I can choose who sees and hears me.” He hesitated, and I wondered if my face could possibly be as red as Nash’s. Or my eyes as wide as Emma’s.