Death raiser, p.3
Death Raiser, page 3
I mean, not that I wanted to sleep with Kang.
Not really.
Okay, maybe.
Oh hell, I totally wanted to. I wanted to badly.
Apparently, I had a kink for grumpy detectives. Who knew?
Kang pulled into my parking spot and shoved it into park before turning to me. “I’ve known I wanted you for a long time, Lark.”
I frowned. “Now I’m confused.”
He sighed and popped off his seatbelt. “Dating is not a casual thing for me.”
“That’s funny. From what Jacobs says, I thought all you ever did was casual.”
“Let me rephrase. Dating you will not be casual.” His gaze flashed. “If you’re not ready for something serious, you should tell me now.”
I narrowed my eyes. What made me so special? Why did I get that distinction when other women didn’t? And if he felt that way about me, why would he hesitate to ask me out? While I’d been dating since we met, I hadn’t been in any serious relationships except with Ricky, and that ended disastrously. But the lack of a committed relationship wasn’t from a lack of trying. I wanted a long term, loving connection with someone. Something like what Logan and Brandon had. I wanted that true love for me, too.
Not only was I ready for something serious, I’d actively searched for it for years. “Tell you now? Do you honestly think I wanted to flitter around from one awkward first date to another?”
“No.”
“Then what the hell, Kang?”
If he knew I wanted something serious, and he wanted that with me, too, why did he wait years to ask me out?
He flinched. “That was a dick question. Every time I thought to ask you out, you ended up dating someone else.”
“You should’ve said something, Kang.”
“I wasn’t sure you reciprocated my feelings, but more importantly, I don’t believe in holding life-altering secrets from someone I’m in a relationship with,” he said. “You only figured out I was a glamy last week.”
Ah. There it was. One piece to the hot mess of Figuring-Out-Kang puzzle. “Would you have told me if I hadn’t discovered the truth?”
“Maybe.” He looked away. “If it was only my secret, yes.”
More pieces fell into place. From our conversations over the years, I knew he had a sister nearby, and his parents lived in the city as well. That meant whatever Kang was, it had to be hereditary. If he got outed, his whole family would be, too. He had to keep the secret for them just as much as he did for himself, yet he didn’t want to keep the truth from me, either.
Now, he didn’t have to make that hard choice. I’d figured it out all on my own. Well…most of it.
“You haven’t asked me what I am,” he said.
I hadn’t. That was considered a rude question within the glamy community. I didn’t want to put him on the spot. He obviously hid his true nature for very good reasons. “I figured you’d either tell me when you were ready or you’re hoping I’d figure it out with my superior intellect.”
He chuckled and shook his head. “I guess it’s a bit of both.”
I popped off my seatbelt and turned to him expectantly.
He didn’t elaborate.
“Thank you for the ride home.” I held my hand out for the keys, he placed them in my palm and opened the door. I mirrored his actions, getting out of the car.
“Would you like to come upstairs while you wait for your ride?” I bit my lip to refrain from saying something more scandalous.
Kang paused, his lips quirking up at the corners. Something wicked flashed in his gaze and he leaned forward over the roof of my car to inhale deeply. He smiled, a slow, knowing smile that told me he knew exactly where my mind had wandered.
Instead of vaulting over the vehicle, though, he stayed safely on his side. “Thank you, but I don’t trust myself to come upstairs.”
“Why not?”
“You mentioned the possibility of tying you up and now my mind is going wild with possibilities. I won’t respect your boundaries.”
“That sounds…terrible.” I lied. Now I was tempted to insist he escort me upstairs.
“Lark, I’ll lock you up and start investigating the whole mysterious rose thing, and you’ll never forgive me.”
He was right, but not for the reasons he thought. “I wouldn’t forgive you for choosing to spend my time tied up trying to solve a mystery,” I said.
“Careful.”
I ignored his warning. “I’m surprised you didn’t accept my offer to do exactly that.”
“I’m trying to be good.”
“How’s that working for you?”
“Not well.”
“Are you mentally running through ways to sneak into my building to set up surveillance?”
He pursed his lips. “Maybe.”
“Kang.”
“Morgan.”
“The flower thing is handled.”
He grumbled and his dark gaze flashed with promise across the roof of the car.
“How will you get home?”
He blinked at me and pulled out his phone to check his messages. “I’ll take a cab. Jacobs drove and he’s still finishing up the scene.”
I nodded and shifted my weight from foot to foot.
“You haven’t answered my question,” he said.
“I wasn’t aware you asked one.” I refrained from whistling or batting my eyelashes innocently. He hadn’t asked me out, he only mentioned he wanted to.
Kang reached into the back of the car and picked up a thick file he’d placed there at the beginning of our trip. He walked around my car and closed the distance between us. Tucking the folder under his arm, he reached out to gently cup the side of my face. He stroked my cheek with his thumb and leaned in. “Will you let me take you out on a date?”
I’d probably let him do a hell of a lot more than that right now if he asked.
He didn’t.
Instead, he studied my face again as if mesmerized by the tiny spattering of freckles across my nose and cheekbones. His gaze snagged on my healing bruises again and sucked in a quick breath.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“I look forward to it.” Kang leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to my cheek. Taking a step back, he pulled the folder from under his arm and held it out toward me.
I used the key fob to lock the car doors before shoving the keys in my purse. I pointed at the thick folder. “What’s this?”
“It’s a copy of your father’s missing persons case.”
I stared down at the folder, not trusting my hands to touch it yet. My heart rate picked up and my scalp prickled. Dad went missing fifteen years ago and while I’d resigned myself to never learning his fate, I still clung to hope. “Why do you have it?”
“I’ve been working on the case for years, but I’m sorry to say I’m no closer to discovering what happened to him than I was six years ago.”
Six years ago.
He’d been working on this case, on the side, since he met me.
I swallowed, my mouth dry, my heart beating madly.
He’d looked into my father’s disappearance after he’d saved my life. Kang didn’t hate me at all. He…cared…for me. And now I knew he also liked me and my entire understanding of the world around me was crashing down.
“I should’ve given you a copy sooner,” he said.
I reached out and took the folder from him and hugged it to my chest. My eyes stung and I blinked rapidly to hold the tears back. “Thank you.”
“I need you to know I would’ve given you the folder regardless of whether you agreed to go on a date with me.”
I scoffed and shook my head. “I never doubted your honour, Kang.”
He reached forward and trailed his finger along my neck and down my collar bone before hooking it around the gold chain of my necklace. With a gentle tug, he lifted the pendant. “You’ve worn this every time I’ve seen you since our first case together. Is it your father’s?”
“In a way,” I said. “He had one made for me and Logan to match the one he has. Had. My brother refuses to wear his, but he keeps it in a box on his dresser.”
“But you wear yours.”
I plucked the dangling pendant and tilted it so the nearby light glinted off the surface. Someone had meticulously engraved a griffin clutching and chomping down on a skull in the center of the circular pendant. The symbol for descendants of the Morcant bloodline.
“I’ll never give up hope,” I said.
Kang dropped his hand to his side. “Neither will I.”
Chapter
Three
I mumbled the incantation to bring forth the spirit to the living realm. Johnny Wheeler’s spirit had a light blue shine and a wispy appearance. He hovered over his remains and shook his head. His living wife stood a few feet behind me, waiting for her deceased husband to arrive. She had no idea he was already here. Drabs couldn’t see spirits. Hell, most glamies couldn’t, either.
The moon cast an eerie glow over the cemetery, creating long shadows over the hallowed ground and illuminating the gravestones that stood in the tidy rows.
“Get in your corpse, Johnny.” I shoved more magic at him, but he kept his position and continued to shake his head.
Standing beside Johnny’s wife, Peter Schmidt waited patiently. I worked with this lawyer regularly, though Peter usually covered estate law, not spousal closure requests.
Monica, the wife, shifted her feet. “He’s…he’s here?”
“Yes, but he’s being a little ornery. Sometimes spirits don't wish to reanimate their corpses.”
“Why not?”
“I had a soul describe it like getting into dirty, wet clothes.” They needed extra motivation.
“Last chance,” I warned Johnny.
He swayed back and forth over his coffin as if to mock me.
Fine.
I knelt down, touched one of the exposed bones from his decaying body and pushed my magic in.
Johnny squealed. My magic yanked his spirit into his body.
“There we go,” I whispered. “Home sweet home.”
Johnny flailed his arms.
Monica gasped.
I muttered another incantation to get him to obey my commands and keep control of him. The last thing anyone in Victoria needed was a zombie running loose. Their bites weren’t infectious, they were just a nuisance.
Usually.
“Feel your body, Johnny. Reconnect with it and stand up,” I ordered.
He scrambled to his feet and swayed, waiting for his next command. A wind rustled through the nearby trees, unusually cold for this time of year.
I turned to allow Monica an unobstructed view of her deceased husband. She held her hand to her mouth as if it would somehow block the smell of decay or take away the intrusion of the resting spirit.
“Babe?” Monica dropped her hand and stepped forward “Is that you?”
“Monica?” His voice came out raspy. The larynx had already started to break down. “Why did you do this? You know how much I hated the idea of this.”
If he hated it so much, he should’ve had the additional restrictions added to his will.
Monica hesitated and glanced at me. “Is he feeling pain?”
“Not at this moment, no. Reanimating is often disorienting, though.”
“But he can?” she asked.
“Can what?”
“Feel pain?”
I shrugged. “To an extent.”
Monica didn’t wait for an explanation. She stepped forward, drew her arm back and punched Johnny in the face. His head snapped back and a bone cracked. Instead of sitting properly on his neck, his head now listed to one side.
I rocked back on my heels and exchanged a look with Peter. He grimaced and shrugged. The laws were a little gray when it came to violence against a reanimated corpse. Some people had tried to go after clients in the past for desecration of remains, but the courts had thrown out every case so far.
“Fuck, Monica. What was that for?” Johnny wailed.
“What was that for?” Monica screeched the question back, hitting the corpse over and over again. “No. You meant to ask who that was for.”
I bit my lip.
“And so far, there’s Beatrice, Becky, Sarah, Michelle and Tara.”
Oh dear.
“Are there more?”
Johnny dropped his mouth open but didn’t reply.
“How many?” Monica demanded. “How. Fucking. Many?”
“A few.” He winced.
“Who?”
“I…I didn’t know their names. At least not all of them. Their names didn’t matter. It was always you. I loved you. I have always loved you more.”
Did he seriously say that? What a backward compliment. If Monica wasn’t already beating him to a pulp, I would’ve been tempted to take a stab at him.
“Why didn’t you just leave me?” she asked. “If you wanted other women so badly, why not free yourself? Why not free me, if you loved me so much?”
“Because I love you and I love our son. I love our family.”
“Did you think about your family while you were plowing through the entire catalogue of available, and not-so-available women of Victoria?” Monica asked.
Johnny flinched.
Monica took a deep breath and curled her hands into fists. “Are there any children I should know about? Is your estate going to be sued for child support?”
I frowned. Could the court even do that? A glance at Peter and his responding nod told me yes. Huh.
At least I knew why Peter was here. The possibility of additional heirs would make settling the estate trickier.
“No…no children.”
“You’re sure?”
“I had a vasectomy three years ago.”
“You what?” Monica started to breathe heavily. Pain streaked across her expression.
Without asking, I knew, just knew, Johnny hadn’t told his wife about the vasectomy. I’d just met Johnny, but so far, he seemed like a complete piece of shit.
“Did you need anything else from him?” I asked, Johnny might be stubborn, but he wasn’t particularly strong. I could hold him for longer. If Monica needed closure, though, hopefully, this was enough. Spending even one more second with this piece of work was a waste of our time.
“No,” Monica whispered. “I got what I needed.”
I glanced at Peter again and he nodded. They had the confirmation they needed. With a deep breath, I withdrew my power. Normally, spirits were ready to race away to the veil.
Not Johnny.
After I detached his spirit from his body and his corpse crumpled back into the open coffin with a thud, Johnny’s spirit remained.
The blue spectre hovered over the open grave, bobbing a couple of feet away from my face, eerily silent. I gathered my magic to banish him to the veil when he sped forward.
“What the—”
“He wants a word.” Johnny latched onto me and used my magic to send us both hurtling to the land of the dead.
Chapter
Four
I slammed into the cold ground and death magic swirled around me so fast it threatened to steal the air from my lungs. I released Johnny’s spirit and clambered to my feet. A breeze whipped my hair in every direction. There was always a constant wind in this place. Death magic flowed around me, and curious spirits whirled by, swirling like little tornadoes of energy trying to vie for my attention. An ethereal mist rolled over the barren, uneven ground.
Pain stabbed at my fingers as my nails grew into long, dark talons. I watched as they elongated. Would I ever find out why my body reacted to the veil this way?
“We meet again.” A deep voice made me jump and spin around.
The Lord of the Veil stood a few feet away, his castle looming close behind him. The structure rose from rocky terrain with a long winding path leading to the wrought iron gate at its main entrance. Outside the gate, a row of skeletons hanging on spikes acted as a better deterrent than any alarm system or guard dog. The gothic castle screamed danger and death and yet my curiosity begged me to get inside and have a look.
Logan would love this place.
Instead of running away, I faced the owner of the castle. With dark hair, dark eyes, flawless bone structure, perfectly symmetrical features and a body worthy of any romance book cover, Leviathan had a too-perfect, granite statue kind of beauty that made him both hard to look at and hard to look away from. He wore a flowy white shirt, metal plated leather pants and a wide smile that showed his long, glistening white fangs. I might’ve drooled over him if he didn’t scare the ever-loving shit out of me.
“Hello, Leviathan,” I said.
“I thought I told you to call me Levi.”
I scrunched up my face. We were not friends.
“Please.”
I didn’t want to. If I started calling him cute nicknames, I ran the risk of forgetting just how powerful and dangerous he could be. No one knew exactly what kind of glamy Leviathan was or where he came from. Some sites on the internet hypothesized he was part beast and controlled the barghests who roamed the veil. Others claimed he was the first original necromancer and became lost in the veil because he didn’t have an anchor to bring him back. He survived by using the souls of the dead and other lost necromancers to sustain him and over time he transformed into something else.
Some raunchy fanfiction claimed he was a naughty fae capable of devious bedroom acts, and other sources claimed he was a god, banished for past transgressions, forever held apart from his brethren.
At the end of the day, who or what Leviathan was or wasn’t didn’t matter. Not if I was dead. There was no point in pursuing that information either. At least not yet. Especially not right now. I needed to focus on getting away first.
“Did you seriously send a spirit after me?” I asked.
Leviathan cocked his head. “How could you even think that? If I recall correctly, you’re the one who called him.”
But Johnny had been prepped. Leviathan had given the cheating bastard orders before I called him to the living realm. That meant Leviathan either held some sort of control over all the souls in the veil or he detected my call in advance and somehow reached Johnny before I drew him to the living realm.
