A Dirty Job (Grim Reaper #1) (46 page)

“Sometimes, in times of crisis, that shit cannot be avoided. How are you doing besides that?”

“I feel wonderful.”

“Yeah, imagine the rest of us all bummed about the end of the world, not being cheerful.”

“Not the end of the world, just darkness over everything,” Charlie cheerfully said. “It gets dark—turn on a light.”

“Good for you, Charlie. Now ’scuse me, I got to go get my car out of impound before you start with the whole
‘if life gives you lemons you make lemonade’
speech and I have to beat you senseless.”

(It’s true, there is little more obnoxious than a Beta Male in love. So conditioned is he to the idea that he will never find love, that when he does, he feels as if the entire world has fallen into step with his desires—and thus deluded, he may act accordingly. It’s a time of great joy and danger for him.)

“Wait, we can share a cab. I have to go home and get my date book.”

“Me, too. I left mine on the front seat of the car. You know those two clients I missed—they’re here. Alive.”

“Audrey told me,” Charlie said. “There’s six of them altogether. She did that
p’howa of undying
thing on them. Obviously that’s what’s been causing the cosmic shit storm, but what can we do? We can’t kill them.”

“No, I think it’s what you said. The battle is going to happen here in San Francisco and it’s going to happen now. And since you’re the Luminatus, I guess this whole thing is riding on your shoulders. So I’d say we’re doomed.”

“Maybe not. I mean, every time they’ve almost gotten me, something or someone has intervened to pull out a victory. I think destiny is on our side. I feel very optimistic about this.”

“That’s just because you just shagged the monk,” said Minty.

“I’m not a monk,” said Audrey, bounding into the room with a sheaf of papers in hand.

“Oh, shit,” said the Death Merchants in unison.

“No, it’s okay,” Audrey said. “He did shag me, or, I think more appropriately—we shagged—but I’m not a monk anymore. Not because of the shagging, you know, it was a preshag decision.” She threw her papers on the table and climbed into Charlie’s lap. “Hey, good-looking, how’s your morning going?” She gave him a backbreaking kiss and entwined him like a starfish trying to open an oyster until Minty Fresh cleared his throat and she turned to him. “And good morning to you, Mr. Fresh.”

“Yes. Thank you.” Minty leaned to the side so he could see Charlie. “Whether they were here for you, or for our clients who didn’t die, they’ll be back, you know that?”

“The Morrigan?” said Audrey.

“Huh,” said the Death Merchants, again in chorus.

“You guys are so cute,” Audrey gushed. “They’re called the Morrigan. Raven women—personifications of death in the form of beautiful warrior women who can change into birds. There are three of them, all part of the same collective queen of the Underworld known as the Morrigan.”

Charlie leaned back from her so he could look her in the eye. “How do you know that?”

“I just looked it up on the Internet.” Audrey climbed out of Charlie’s lap, picked up the papers on the table, and began to read. “‘The Morrigan consists of three distinct entities: Macha, who haunts the battlefield, and takes heads of warriors as tribute in battle—she is said to be able to heal a warrior from mortal wounds in the field, if his men have offered enough heads to her. The Celtic warriors called the severed heads Macha’s acorns. She is considered the mother goddess of the three. Babd is rage, the passion of battle and killing—she was said to collect the seed of fallen warriors, and use its power to inspire a sexual frenzy for battle, a literal bloodlust. And Nemain, who is frenzy, was said to drive soldiers into battle with a howl so fierce that it could cause enemy soldiers to die of fright—her claws were venomous and the mere prick of one would kill a soldier, but she would fling the venom into the eyes of enemy soldiers to blind them.’”

“That’s them,” said Minty Fresh. “I saw venom come from the claws of the one on the BART.”

“Yeah,” Charlie said, “and I think I remember Babd—the bloodlust one. That’s them. I have to talk to Lily. I sent her to Berkeley to find out about them, but she came back with nothing. She must have not even looked.”

“Yeah, ask her if she’s seeing anybody,” Minty Fresh said. To Audrey: “Did it say how you kill them? What their weaknesses are?”

Audrey shook her head. “Just that warriors took dogs into battle to protect against the Morrigan.”

“Dogs,” Charlie echoed. “That explains why my daughter got the hellhounds to protect her. I’m telling you, Fresh, we’re going to be okay. Destiny is on our side.”

“Yeah, you said that. Call us a cab.”

“I wonder why of all the different gods and demons in the Underworld, the Celtic ones are here.”

“Maybe they’re all here,” Minty said. “I had a crazy Indian tell me once that I was the son of Anubis, the Egyptian jackal-headed god of the dead.”

“That’s great!” Charlie said. “A jackal—that’s a type of dog. You have natural abilities to battle the Morrigan, see.”

Minty looked at Audrey. “If you don’t do something to disappoint him and mellow his ass out, I’m going to shoot him.”

“Oh yeah,” Charlie said. “Can I still borrow one of your big guns?”

Minty unfolded to his feet. “I’m going outside to call a cab and wait, Charlie. If you’re coming, you better start saying good-bye now, because I’m leaving when it gets here.”

“Swell,” Charlie said, looking adoringly at Audrey. “I think we’re safe in the daylight anyway.”

“Monk shagger,” Minty growled as he ducked under the doorway.

A
untie Cassie let Charlie into their small home in the Marina district and Sophie called off the greeting hump of devil dogs almost as soon as it started.

“Daddy!”

Charlie swept Sophie up in his arms and squeezed her until she started to change color; then, when Jane came out of the kitchen, he grabbed her in his other arm and hugged her as well.

“Uh, let go,” Jane said, pushing him away. “You smell like incense.”

“Oh, Jane, I can’t believe it, she’s so wonderful.”

“He got laid,” Cassandra said.

“You got laid?” Jane said, kissing her brother on the cheek. “I’m so happy for you. Now let me go.”

“Daddy got laid,” Sophie said to the hellhounds, who seemed very happy at hearing the news.

“No, not laid,” Charlie said, and there was a collective sigh of disappointment.

“Well, yes, laid,” and there was a collective sigh of relief, “but that’s not the thing. The thing is she’s wonderful. She’s gorgeous, and kind, and sweet, and—”

“Charlie,” Jane interrupted, “you called us and told us that there was some great danger and we had to go get Sophie and protect her, and you were going on a date?”

“No, no, there was—is danger, at least in the dark, and I did need you to get Sophie, but I met someone.”

“Daddy got laid!” Sophie cheered again.

“Honey, we don’t say that, okay,” Charlie said. “Auntie Jane and Auntie Cassie shouldn’t say that either. It’s not nice.”

“Like ‘kitty’ and ‘not in the butt’?”

“Exactly, honey.”

“Okay, Daddy. So it wasn’t nice?”

“Daddy has to go to our house and get his date book, pumpkin, we’ll talk about this later. Give me a kiss.” Sophie gave him a huge hug and a kiss and Charlie thought that he might cry. For so long she had been his only future, his only joy, and now he had this other joy, and he wanted to share it with her. “I’ll come right back, okay?”

“Okay. Let me down.”

Charlie let her slide to the floor and she ran off to another part of the house.

“So it wasn’t nice?” Jane asked.

“I’m sorry, Jane. This is really crazy. I hate that I put you guys in the middle of it. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Jane thumped him in the arm. “So it
was
nice?”

“It was really nice,” Charlie said, breaking into a grin. “She’s really nice. She’s so nice I miss Mom.”

“Lost me,” Cassandra said.

“Because I’d like Mom to see that I’m doing okay. That I met someone who’s good for me. Who’s going to be good for Sophie.”

“Whoa, don’t jump the gun, there, tiger,” Jane said. “You just met this woman, you need to slow down—and remember, this comes from someone whose typical second date is moving a woman in.”

“Slut,” Cassie murmured.

“I mean it, Jane. She’s amazing.”

Cassie looked at Jane. “You were right, he really did need to get laid.”

“That’s not it!”

Charlie’s cell rang. “Excuse me, guys.” He flipped it open.

“Asher, what the hell have you done?” It was Lily. She was crying. “What the hell have you let loose?”

“What, Lily? What?”

“It was just here. The front window of the shop is gone. Gone! It just came in, ripped through the shop, and took all of your soul thingies. Loaded them into a bag and flew away. Fuck, Asher. I mean FUCK! This thing was huge, and fucking hideous.”

“Yeah, Lily, are you okay? Is Ray okay?”

“Yeah, I’m okay. Ray didn’t come in. I ran into the back when it came through the window. It wasn’t interested in anything but that shelf. Asher, it was as big as a bull and it fucking flew!”

She sounded like she was on the edge of hysteria. “Hold on, Lily. Stay there and I’ll come to you. Go in the back room and don’t open the door until you hear me, okay.”

“Asher, what the fuck was that thing?”

“I don’t know, Lily.”

T
he bullheaded Death flew into the culvert and immediately fell to all fours to move through the pipe, dragging the bag of souls behind him. Not for much longer—he would not crawl much longer. The time had come, Orcus could feel it. He could feel them converging on the City—the City where he had staked his territory so many years ago—his city. Still, they would come, and they would try to take what was rightfully his. All of the old gods of death: Yama and Anubis and Mors, Thanatos and Charon and Mahakala, Azrael and Emma-O and Ahkoh, Balor, Erebos, and Nyx—dozens of them, gods born of the energy of Man’s greatest fear, the fear of death—all of them coming to rise as the leader of darkness and the dead, as the Luminatus. But he had come here first, and with Morrigan, he would become the one. But first he had to marshal his forces, heal the Morrigan, and take down the wretched human soul stealers of the City.

The satchel of souls would go a long way toward healing his brides. He marched into the grotto where the great ship was moored and leapt into the air, the beat of his great leathery wings like a war drum, echoing off the grotto walls and sending bats to the wing, swirling around the ship’s masts in great clouds.

The Morrigan, torn and broken, were waiting for him on the deck.

“What did I tell you?” Babd said. “It’s really not that great Above, huh? I, for one, could do without cars altogether.”

J
ane drove while Charlie fired out phone calls on his cell, first to Rivera, then to Minty Fresh. Within a half an hour they were all standing in Charlie’s store, or the wreckage that had been Charlie’s store, and uniformed policemen had taped off the sidewalk until someone could get the glass swept up.

“The tourists have to love this,” Nick Cavuto said, gnawing an unlit cigar. “Right on the cable-car line. Perfect.”

Rivera was sitting in the back room interviewing Lily while Charlie, Jane, and Cassandra tried to sort through the mess and put things back on their shelves. Minty Fresh stood by the front door, wearing shades, looking entirely too cool for the destruction that lay strewn around him. Sophie was content to sit in the corner and feed shoes to Alvin and Mohammed.

“So,” Cavuto said to Charlie, “some kind of flying monster came through your window and you thought this would be a good place to bring your kid?”

Charlie turned to the big cop and leaned on the counter. “Tell me, Detective, in your professional opinion, what procedure should I use in dealing with robbery by a flying monster? What the fuck is the SFPD giant-fucking-flying-monster protocol, Detective?”

Cavuto stood staring at Charlie as if he’d had water thrown in his face, not really angry, just very surprised. Finally, he grinned around his cigar, and said, “Mr. Asher, I am going to go outside and smoke, call in to the dispatcher, and have her look that particular protocol up. You have stumped me. Would you tell my partner where I’ve gone?”

“I’ll do that,” Charlie said. He went into the office with Lily and Rivera and said, “Rivera, can I get some police protection here at my apartment—officers with shotguns?”

Rivera nodded, patting Lily on the hand as he looked away. “I can give you two, Charlie, but not for longer than twenty-four hours. You sure you don’t want to get out of town?”

“Upstairs we have the security bars and steel doors, we have the hellhounds and Minty Fresh’s weapons, and besides, they’ve already been here. I have a feeling they got what they came for, but the cops would make me feel better.”

Lily looked at Charlie. She was in total mascara meltdown and had smudged her lipstick halfway across her face. “I’m sorry, I thought I would handle it better than this. It was so scary. It wasn’t mysterious and cool, it was horrible. The eyes and the teeth—I peed, Asher. I’m sorry.”