The Mercenary and the Mortician (The Silent Hollow #1)

19. Ryan Fairview

Alexa, Play: Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked - Original Version - Cage The Elephant

M y mother took Caleb out with her shortly after Cal left. Iris spent a great deal of her time with a local group of women who were into all the same witchy things she was. They met weekly and often had what they called ‘circle’ on significant nights during the lunar cycle.

I had resented this as a child. The bullying I had endured from children who were convinced my mother was part of some sort of satanic church was pretty ruthless. However, now, as an adult, I was really just happy she had such a strong support system, especially after the death of my father.

Theo left the house as well. She was still clearly furious with me for dragging our family into whatever mess this was. I knew she was going to sign up for a fight, but as much as I hated it, there was no point trying to convince her to stay. Despite the fact that I could have used the help preparing for Ms. Thompson’s funeral the following day. Especially not when I was the reason she needed to blow off some steam.

Running an entire funeral home solo was not an easy task. Iris often helped with the paperwork (and there is a lot of paperwork), but as my sister tells me, I’m a bit of a control freak, so I tend to review everything she does anyway.

It was so much easier with my dad here. He would usually prepare the bodies and coordinate with the cemetery staff. He also acted as our unofficial grief counselor, something that I just was not nearly as good at.

Like I said, I’m an introvert, and it’s not that I don’t sympathize or feel for the family members of the deceased while they’re grieving. I just always feel like my platitudes come off as insincere and flat. This, coupled with the fact that their dead loved ones are usually sitting next to me, begging me to share their last words with grieving family members, makes the entire process unbearable for me.

My favorite part of the job is arranging the florals. I love it when families have the budget to send massive orders of bouquets to the house, and when they don’t, I quietly offer it as a complimentary service.

Iris has quite the green thumb, and she has an impressive garden out back filled with herbs and flowers that she allows me to take from in these instances.

Ms. Thompson’s family had a moderate budget for flowers, but after the insane chain of events I had just lived through, I found myself in my mother’s garden snipping up some lilies to make a bouquet. Floral arrangements just… soothed me.

The hot mid-afternoon sun was scorching the back of my neck as I bent over Iris’s plot, and I lost myself to the methodical snip, snip, snip of my sheers. Doing my best not to let my anxiety get the best of me, I avoided falling down the rabbit hole of overthinking what Cal had said earlier about me working for him.

I had already over-thought this too much as it was. Every time I spiraled, I ended up nearly calling the police. However, I had yet to follow through. I told myself it was because I was worried about what would happen to Caleb if I got the police involved, but for some reason, that felt like a lie.

Instead of focusing on the fact that I had been held at fucking gunpoint in my own home, I kept thinking about how that dangerous, smiling, black-haired man had been so kind to my mother.

What was with that?

I had grown up constantly needing to defend my mother and then consequently getting my ass beat for standing up for her. It got a little better after Theo made me take up boxing, but the lessons in self-defense didn’t do anything to protect me from the harsh sting of cruel words.

She had passed Cal a homemade talisman that I knew she had crafted to keep his harem of ghouls away from me, and he hadn’t ridiculed her or rolled his eyes. He had just agreed to keep it on his person and tucked it into his pocket.

Then, the next second, he had me slammed against the wall and was threatening my life…

I couldn’t figure that guy out. He was a walking dichotomy.

Abruptly, the peace of my afternoon was interrupted by the steady approach of deep bass and that strange robotic squeal that Cal had been blasting when he left that morning.

Despite the heat of the sun, my body went cold, and all the hair on my arms stood on end.

He was back.

I turned slowly to see a very large, expensive black SUV pull up. It looked like a mini tank and was clearly meant for offroading. It probably cost more than most people’s homes from the look of it, and my jaw dropped as my new stalker hopped out of the driver’s seat with that infuriating grin on his face.

He had his skull bandana tied around his neck, and he slid his black Ray-Bans down his nose to give me that look that made me feel like he could see right through my clothes.

“You look good on your knees, ginger snap,” he said, sucking in his lip ring suggestively.

My cheeks burned, and I leapt to my feet, brandishing my sheers at him. He glanced at the sharp object with an amused cock of his head.

“If you have a blood kink, just say so. I have more sanitary options in the wagon.” He winked at me. “Wouldn’t want you getting an infection. Nothing hot about intravenous antibiotics. I can tell you that for free.”

“What!? I don’t have a blood kink! ” I exclaimed, tossing the shears away from me as if they had burned me. How did he make literally everything sexual?

He just smirked and made his way to the back of his crazy murder mobile, popping the back open and gesturing for me to come closer.

“How do you know? You ever bleed someone during sex?”

“Of course not!”

“Ever let anyone bleed you?”

“No!”

“Then how do you know you don’t have a blood kink?”

My mouth opened and closed several times as I struggled to find the words to respond.

“While you figure it out, want to come give me a hand?” he asked, and before I knew what I was doing, I found myself coming around the SUV to peer inside.

If I had no words before, I certainly didn’t have any now.

This fucking psychopath had a body in the back of his car!

It was expertly wrapped in thick, opaque plastic, but even if I wasn’t a mortician, I wouldn’t have any trouble identifying the large morbid package for what it was.

I gaped at Cal, and my hands suddenly began to quiver.

“You… you really did it. You killed him!”

“Duh,” Cal said noncommittally before reaching forward and dragging the corpse closer to him. He moved the body so easily as if this grown-ass dead man weighed nothing. I stepped away reflexively as he hiked the corpse over his shoulder, the plastic crinkling as it moved.

“This is insane. You’re insane!” I rambled, and he shot me another easy grin over his shades.

“Again, I say, Duh.” He smirked before heading toward the back door of my house. I scrambled after him, feeling panicked.

Where was he taking that body!? Not into my fucking house!

But I couldn’t speak. I was pretty sure I was going into shock.

“Can you get the door, please?” he asked politely, and I considered refusing for a moment before I realized that the longer this man had this corpse slung over his shoulder in my fucking backyard, the more likely it was someone would see me with him and potentially call the cops.

I opened the door, and he strode into my kitchen, glancing back at me quizzically.

“Where do you want him?” he asked, and I sputtered.

Where did I want him? Literally anywhere but inside my damn house!

“Do you have one of those human toasters? I don’t know much about funeral homes. Do you just do the embalming, or do you handle the urn shit too?”

“You mean cremation?” I asked, feeling like I was fucking underwater.

His entire face lit up, and he snapped his fingers with the hand that wasn’t balancing a corpse over his shoulder.

“ That’s the word. Cremation. Thanks. That was going to bug the shit out of me.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose and did everything I could to focus on my breathing. Now was not the time to have a panic attack. This was madness, but… I didn’t know what I could do.

If I tried to call the police, I was sure he would fucking kill me. I should have called them before. Not calling them made me a fucking idiot; I knew that, but I couldn’t go back now.

He had already told me he would kill me if I didn’t help him with this. He clearly worked for a larger group of people that would put my family in danger, even if I managed to get him arrested.

I was royally screwed.

Beating back the panic, which was already triggering another boner, I resolved to focus on his question instead of worrying about how all of this was going to pan out. Staying in the present and focusing on what was happening right now was the only way I could make it through this without succumbing to a full-blown panic attack.

“We have a crematorium, yes,” I replied. “My dad had one installed a few years after I was born.” I remember him telling me how much of a pain in the ass it had been too. Crematoriums needed all kinds of permits, and the entire house needed to have proper ventilation added to it, but it had been worth it. Cremation was one of our most popular services, and the addition had more or less paid for itself.

“Great! In the basement, I’m assuming? What do I do… just toss him in and light a match? What’s the procedure?”

“No! Of course not. First, we need to make sure he doesn’t have any medical devices on him. The last thing you want to do is expose a battery to high temperatures like that. It could literally explode.”

Cal looked… fascinated, which isn’t a reaction I was used to when talking about my line of work. A strange, warm feeling stirred in my gut at the way his brown eyes were locked on mine. He ran his tongue over his lip and nodded in understanding.

“Cool. So, what, you want him on a table somewhere?”

“Ugh. Just… follow me,” I grumbled, finally giving in to whatever nightmare Cal had forcibly dragged me into.