Keeper vs. Reaper (Graveyard Guardians Book 1) (17 page)

Ethan nodded. “Just about, let me go get my sweat
-
shirt.”

“Hurry up, dude.”

“Good night.” Lucy waved as she strode through the kitchen door and headed for the stairs. A chorus of ‘goodnight’ and ‘get some rest’ followed her.

Once she was in her room she closed the door behind her and leaned against it. Oh, the sweet, sweet silence. She loved her family, but being around them was exhausting.

She looked at the clock and figured most everyone would be going home soon except Greg, James and Ethan. James and Ethan were going out on patrol pretty soon and Greg would probably sit downstairs and read for most of the night.

A shower was severely needed after working in the garden, so she decided to do that first.

The steaming water filled the bathroom quickly. She let the water just roll over her for a while, soothing her sore muscles and opening her pores.

Lucy tried to tell herself that she was just going to question this Jack the Reaper, but at the same time she felt an excitement buzzing within her. She wanted to see him … more than she should ever want to see a Reaper.

Why in the hell was she so excited to see this guy? Seriously was there a reason that she was shaving her legs? Was there a logical reason as to why she sprayed her favorite perfume onto her skin? What about wearing her favorite jeans ... the ones that she knew damn well made her ass look good? Or topping off her outfit with a tight fitting tank that showed off a little bit of cleavage? Did any of that sound like a girl who is just dropping by to thank a guy and ask him a few questions?

No ...
it sounded like what a girl did when she was getting ready for a date.

Mother of
God, she was going crazy. This Chosen One bullshit, and the attack, was getting to her head. Did they have special shrinks for Keepers? Maybe she should find out just in case she needed one.

It wasn’t long before she heard cars
starting up and pulling out of the driveway. She went to the window seat and watched, letting out a relieved breath when they were all gone.

Changing direction, she moved her gaze over to the graveyard. There, among the trees and gravestones, she saw two forms of shimmering silver mist milling about. James and Ethan were already out and about in the graveyard.

Time to get ready.

She hadn’t done this since she was a teenager and felt terribly juvenile for doing it. Opening the closet door, she extracted a few extra blankets she stored there for when it got chilly. She peeled back the blankets on her bed and rolled the extra ones until they looked like a human form underneath the covers.

Then, she went back to the closet and dug way in the back until she found the awful doll that her grandmother had given her when she was three. This doll stood about two feet tall and looked just like the Estmond children. Meaning, it had the red hair she needed to pull off her little stunt.

She set the doll underneath the blankets, covering the face and then spread the hair out over the pillows.

There. That should do it. Most likely anyone checking on her would just crack the door open a little bit, see the body in the bed and then close the door again. Well, hopefully that’s what would happen.

Back at the closet, she pulled out one last thing, a long, black, soft leather
coat with a very large hood. She had worn it a couple of times over the years, mostly during her dark stage when she was sixteen.

She donned the coat and pulled the hood up over her head then headed for the window.

Looking down, she cursed. Getting down there with this giant coat on was going to be extremely difficult. But, she needed the coat to hide her aura or James and Ethan might see her.

With careful precision, she threw her leg out the window and found the ledge. Then, she grabbed onto the top ledge with her fingertips and slowly pulled her other leg out.

The overhanging tree branches weren’t very big, but should hold her weight. Reaching out, she grabbed the branch and then held her breath as she jumped, swinging herself out and grasping the branch with her other hand.

It was about four feet from window to tree. With
her coat fanning out behind her and the hood blocking most of her vision, she used all her upper body strength to move across the branch. The process was excruciatingly slow.

Please, please, please don’t let the branch break. Please, please, please, don’t let me fall …
she chanted over and over again in her head until she made it to the trunk of the tree. Still hanging on to the branch for dear life, she tested around with her feet until she found another branch and let most of her weight settle onto it.

From there, it was easy peasy
. She scoured down the branches quickly, just like she did when she was a teenager. The only issue was the fucking coat kept catching on the branches as she went down. The last branch was five feet up from the ground. Not a problem. She dropped down and landed on her feet without even losing the hood.

Quickly, she pulled the hood down farther, covering her face more. Not wanting to chance a look over at the graveyard, she took off toward the trees on the other side of the house, wanting to get out of sight before anyone saw her.

Once she got through the trees, which was a total bitch in the dark, she popped out on the road that led up to her house, but was far enough away that no one at the house could see her.

She jogged down the side of the road
, and then took a shortcut onto another side road, which led over the little bridge and then straight into town.

Summer Hollow was a town where everyone knew everyone, but there was one place she knew she could get the information she needed. The place where everyone talks to everyone.

When she arrived at the door to the bar, she dropped the hood down before she stepped inside.

The place was pretty busy, as it always was. Not much to do in this little town for socialization, so drinking at the bar was one of the obvious solutions.

Reese was behind the bar, uncapping a beer for a customer. Not wasting any time, Lucy headed straight for her. “Reese.”

“Hey, Lucy. How’s it going?”

“I’m … Can I talk to you in private for a minute.”

Reese lifted her eyebrows and shot her a curious look, then jerked her head to the side. “Down here, best I can do. I can’t leave the bar.”

Lucy nodded and followed Reese down to the end of the bar where there weren’t any customers.

“What’s up?” Reese folded her stained
, white bar towel.

“I need help finding someone.”

Again with the eyebrow lift. “I’ll do what I can. Who is it?”

“His name is Jack, he’s new around here…”

Before she could finish her description Reese had her hands up. “Whoa, Lucy, are you serious?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Jack is not a guy I would recommend any of my friends getting involved with.”

Lucy’s turn for an eyebrow lift. “Why, what did he do?”

Reese looked out over the patrons of the bar to make sure everyone was behaving themselves. “Don’t get me wrong, I like Jack. He seems like an all right guy, but he’s kinda slutty.”

“U
mmm … oh.” There wasn’t one reason that this information should bother her, but suddenly she felt angry and … hurt. The only other describable feeling Lucy could come up with was betrayal. “I … um … I still need to find him. It’s important.”

Reese shook her head. “All right, but don’t say I didn’t warn you when he breaks your heart.”

Oh my God, what had this guy been up to when he wasn’t reaping souls or saving Keepers.

“He’s been staying out at Mr. Landry’s old rental house.”

“Thank you!” Lucy turned to go.

“Just be careful. Jack is a bad boy who needs a whole lotta fixin
’.”

Lucy smiled. “Gotcha. Thank you, Reese.”

She pushed open the door and headed out into the night, lifting her hood as she strode quickly in the direction she needed to go. She had about a mile to walk before she got to the rental house that old man Landry owned. Luckily, she knew exactly where it was.

The walk wasn’t too bad, sort of calming really. Allowing her to gather her nerves and plan out what she wanted to say.

Finally, the mile was up and she turned off onto the side road. Even in the dark, she could see the little white house sitting among the little forest of trees. She stopped at the start of the gravel driveway and looked at the house.

A big black truck was parked outside and lights shone through several windows, so she knew he was in there.

The feeling of climbing the four stairs up to the front door was extremely anticlimactic. She was here. Yay! Now what.

She raised her hand and knocked on the door. When no one answered, she knocked again, only harder.

It took over a minute, but she heard the knob turning and then the door was yanked open and suddenly the barrel of a gun was in her face.

“Oh my
God, don’t shoot me!” The words were out of her mouth before she could rethink something better to say.

Jack, who had answered the door and to Lucy’s delight, wasn’t wearing a shirt, quickly dropped the gun to his side. “Lucy!” His gaze tried to get a better look at her face.

She lowered the hood down. “Yes, it’s me.”

For a moment, his dark eyes seemed to devour every inch of her. Then, his gaze moved beyond her, looking out into the trees and scouring his yard for any other Keepers.

“I’m alone,” she told him. “You don’t need to worry.”

His eyes darkened and he suddenly looked angry. “Well, what the hell are you doing here at all?”

When he pulled open the door and saw the hooded figure on his porch, he’d figured that his mother had simply given up on giving them any
more time and sent the Reaper Council after him. It wouldn’t have surprised him at all.

What
did
fucking surprise him was that underneath that hood was the object of all his craziness lately. As she pulled the hood down, his red headed Keeper stood there, bathed in a shimmering silver mist.

What the fuck was she thinking, running around out in the dark by herself without any protection. Was she
trying
to get herself killed?

“Excuse me?”
she responded to his rude ass question.

“I asked, what the hell you think you are doing here
?”

He watched Lucy recoil a bit and felt like an ass. But, in his defense, she was the one putting herself in danger. Aiden could be out there looking for her right now and here she was making herself the perfect victim.

She looked away from him and seemed to consider turning around and leaving. “I, uh… I just … needed to see you. I’m sorry.” She backed up and turned to descend the porch steps.

Oh hell no
.
He was pissed off enough that she was running around out in the dark by herself in the first place, he sure as hell wasn’t going to let her walk all the way back home again. That is, assuming she walked, which he was pretty sure she did. Without thinking about it, he reached out and grabbed her arm.

“What the fuck, let go!”
she screamed.

Oh great, now he was scaring her. “Shut up, I’m not going to hurt you.” He pulled on her arm and yanked her inside the house, slamming the door behind him.

“Are you fucking crazy?” he demanded, letting go of her arm just as she pulled herself away from him and stumbled back a few feet.

“You’re the crazy one! Do you always treat people like this, or is that just a Reaper trait? Liv told me you weren’t that bad, but I’m wondering what the hell made her think that.”

“Your sister doesn’t know a damn thing about me.”

He watched her gaze bounce around, inspecting the inside of his little house and then settle back onto him. “She knows enough to tell me she came here. She knows enough to think that you wouldn’t hurt me.”

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Even as he was cursing Liv for talking to Lucy at all, he was fighting the urge to touch Lucy’s skin, to feel that she was indeed here in his house.

He took a step closer to her. “Like I said, she doesn’t know me. Neither do you. I could hurt you if I wanted to. Don’t forget, I’m a Reaper and you have a soul.”

She lifted her chin defiantly
, and mimicking his actions, took a step toward him as well. “I’m not scared of you.”

By now they were less than six inches apart. “You should be scared.”

What was wrong with her? She just waltzes in here without thinking of her own safety. But, God fucking damn, her lips …

Their eyes were locked on each other, both of them unwilling to turn away. “Why should I be scared of you?”
she demanded. “Why would you save me from the other Reaper if you wanted to hurt me?”

With strength he didn’t know he had, he tore his eyes away from hers and spun around, grabbing his truck keys off the table. “I’m taking you home. You should have never left.”

“I need to talk to you. That’s why I came here.” With both hands she unbuttoned the long coat she was wearing and slid it down her arms.

Oh holy hell.
So much skin.

She turned to set her coat on the back of one of the dining chairs and
he was rewarded with an amazing view of her perfect ass. Again, oh holy hell. He let out a long breath and tried to send a brain signal to Mr. ‘gets excited over everything’, down there, to tell him to behave himself.

“I don’t know what I can do to help you that I haven’t already told your sister.”

“You didn’t tell her everything.” Lucy wandered around the room. He could see her taking in the details of his temporary home. Normally that kind of shit bothered him, but not this time. Nope.

“How would you know?”
he demanded.

She peeked into the bedroom and then glanced back at him. “Because I didn’t tell her everything either.”

Well fuck, he leaned on the doorframe by the kitchen and watched her poke around the house. “So, are you ready to go now? We can talk in the truck.”

“Why are you trying to get rid of me?”

“Because you’re a Keeper. I don’t associate with the likes of you.”

“Well, under normal circumstances I’d feel the same way about you. But, I think you know as well as I do that we don’t have normal circumstances.”

“And you are putting yourself in danger by coming here, walking around in the fucking dark, what the hell is wrong with you, there is someone out there trying to kill you!” As soon as the words were out of his mouth his eyes went to her neck and he saw red.

Son of a bitch.

Mother fucker.

The faint scabbed line from where Aiden’s knife had dragged across her throat stood out against her pale white skin. He wanted to choke the shit out of Aiden for marking her.

Her hands fluttered up and touched the wound. “I can take care of myself.”

Without thinking, he closed the gap of space between them and dropped his keys on the floor. Reaching out and clutching her arms, he yanked her toward him. “You think you can take care of yourself, huh?” She let out a tiny gasp as he crushed their bodies together. “Those Reapers you fight on a regular basis do not want to kill you. They want souls. The Reaper after you now, he wants you
dead
.” He shook her a bit. “Do you fucking hear me?”

“Yes! Now get away.” She was demanding that he let her go, but she didn’t fight or struggle against him. It almost felt like she was relaxing against him. “

“If I wanted to hurt you, I could, and there is nothing that you could do about it.”

What the hell, was he
trying
to piss her off? She was here, she was safe.

She lifted her chin, looking up into his eyes. “That’s not true. You have no idea what I am capable of.”

His eyes zeroed in on her lips, slightly parted and shiny with some kind of gloss that smelled like strawberries. His gaze continued down her neck, beyond the knife wound, to her chest which was heaving gently, lifting her exposed cleavage up with every breath.

Fucking hell.

He raised his eyes and locked them with hers again. “Is that so?” he barked. “Fight me then, show me how fucking tough you are. Show me how you can protect yourself.” With that, all control was lost. He pushed himself against her and crushed his mouth to hers.

As soon as their lips met, his body erupted with electric tingles that could be felt over every single nerve in his body. Her lips parted, making way for his tongue to graze hers. He moved forward
, walking her back until she was pressed against the wall. Her hands were clutched in his, and he raised them up pinning her against the hard surface.

“Fucking fight me, Lucy.” He pulled away only enough that he could mumble against her lips. “Show me.”

With her lips against his and the connection made, he realized how hungry for souls he was. It had been a while since he had any soul other than the little bits he’d taken from those girls he’d been with.

She moaned, and then abruptly turned her head to the side, forcing their lips apart. “I just came here to talk
. I don’t need to prove anything to you.”

With a push, Jack forced himself to move away from her. “Well, like I said, let’s talk in the truck.”

Lucy shook her head, smoothing down her top and getting her nerves back in order. “Why … um …” She paused and shook her head, as if trying to clear the sexual thoughts out of her head and make way for the actual questions she’d come to him with. “There isn’t any burn when we touch, why is that?”

“I don’t have a clue.”

“Has this ever happened to you before, with another Keeper?” She began moving around the house again.

“Nope, never.” He went into his bedroom and found his jeans. “I’m going to get dressed now.” Without even bothering to shut the door, he slid out of his pajama bottoms. Before he reached for the jeans, he glanced up, wondering if she had been curious enough to look in at him while he was changing. But, no, she wasn’t anywhere near the doorway.

“Do you know what would cause the contact between you and me to be different than it is with every other Keeper and Reaper?”

He pulled on his jeans and a black tee shirt
and headed back into the living area. “No, I don’t know what the hell it is. Supposedly, the burning sensation is caused by something that’s in our DNA that goes against the nature of each species. It’s some kind of a reaction. Maybe we just don’t have whatever that is. It’s some kinda super scientific shit that I wouldn’t know anything about.”

Lucy looked him over, eyes scanning from his feet, up his legs and torso, finally meeting his eyes once again. “So, Liv told me some stuff … stuff about how you’ve been feeling since we first met.”

He gave her a nod and sat on the couch with his boots. “Yeah, I don’t know what the hell it is. I don’t know what started it. I don’t know if it will last, but I wish it would go away because, frankly, it’s a real pain in the ass.”

“I know.”

His head snapped up. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, that I know … because I’ve been experiencing a weird attraction to you.”

What the fuck? He could only stare at her with his mouth hanging open.

“Maybe not as severely as you are, but it’s there, nonetheless.”

This whole situation just got a hell of a lot more dangerous than Aiden being after her. If she had even half the attraction for him that he had for her, then they were both staring trouble right in the face. On the other hand, he had spent the last few days thinking he was just going crazy, and now it turned out that he wasn’t alone in his craziness. The fact that she was going through the same shit he was could be an upside or a serious downside.

He finished lacing up his boots and pulled the strings tight. “Yeah, let’s get you home.”

She stepped away from him a couple of feet. “But, we need to talk about this. It’s important.”

“Well, I’m going. You can either come with me and talk in the truck or walk home and not talk to me.” He pulled open the front door, hoping to
God that she would follow him.

She did.

He stalked out the door and she hurried after him, grabbing up her coat on the way. Once they were out at the truck, he watched her hesitate by the door and then reach out and yank the handle.

Why couldn’t she have just stayed home? This whole situation was going to shit as it was
, and he didn’t need even more Keepers up his ass because she couldn’t sit at home where she was safe.

He slid behind the wheel, fired up the engine and backed out of the driveway. Once they were on the main road she started up again. “Do you think that when you leave here, that the attraction will fade?”

He shrugged “I don’t know.” He paused. “I hope so.” Well, he kind of hoped it did.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her turn toward him in the darkness of the truck. “Look, I know that this situation isn’t exactly normal and we aren’t supposed to get along, but I don’t understand why the hell you’re treating me like this if you are supposedly feeling so protective of me.”

Good God, why didn’t she get it. He was careful not to look at her and kept his eyes on the road. “Because, it’s exactly the reason that you said. We aren’t supposed to get along. We are enemies, Lucy.”

He heard her flop back in her seat in a huff. “I don’t feel like we’re enemies. Maybe that’s what this Chosen One bullshit is all about. Maybe you’re a part of it too.”

Yeah right.

“I highly doubt that is the case. The Chosen One is supposed to bring forth and end to the Reapers, remember. I don’t think that a Reaper can be part of bringing himself to an end.”