Chapter 30 Helena #2
In response, the tiniest of amused smiles tugged at one corner of his lips, but he banished it before glaring forward again.
An emotion I couldn’t quite name, some mix of gratitude and affection, whisked through me all the same, and I opened my mouth to thank him for, if nothing else, the food for thought. But then he spoke again.
“Look,” he said, “I need to ask you about something.”
“Something good?” I asked with a hopeful upward inflection.
Grim didn’t answer but twisted toward me, reaching into the rear seat in a way that exposed and brought his collar close to me—an action that had me actually licking my lips.
For the briefest of moments, I got a closer look at those black tattoos, too. Roughly silver dollar sized, they all took different shapes, each of which fit perfectly around the others, like stickers in a sticker book.
A raven like Pluto, a crescent moon, a grape leaf, a star…
I wanted to ask about them so badly—what they represented, because they had to signify something important. He was covered in them.
A short gasp escaped me, though, when, returning to his seat fully, he flashed a familiar book between us—the one about him.
That must have been what he’d tossed in the back seat.
“Saw this on your bedside table,” he said, “and found the note inside. I need to know where you got this—who you got it from.”
I took the book from him. “After our first encounter, I did what any librarian would do. Research.” Opening the back cover, I showed him the RFID tag pasted on the inside.
“This copy belongs to the main branch, and—sidenote—you’ll be pleased to know that the book correctly designates you as a psychopomp. ”
“A psycho what?” he growled.
“A psychopomp,” I repeated, my lids fluttering in surprise, because I couldn’t be the first one to mention this to him, could I? Then again, he was a tad… antisocial. “It comes from the Greek word ‘psychopompos.’ ”
“I am not a pompous psycho.”
I snort-laughed but quickly sobered when he failed to crack a smile. Then I cleared my throat.
“A psychopomp,” I said, “is an usher or guide to the dead, a supernatural being whose role is to escort the souls of the living to the afterlife. A nonjudgmental conductor instead of death itself. Like Hermes, Anubis, or Azrael. So, I was right about that—and so is the book. You’re a psychopomp.”
“If you say so,” he allowed. “What can you tell me about the note?”
“Nothing, unfortunately,” I replied. “I found the note inside. I don’t know anything about who put it there but… I know someone who does.”
I wasn’t sure I should drag one of my coworkers, especially Hunter, into any of this.
Even at eighteen, he was still a kid. And he’d just been doing his job of shelving returns when he’d had his run-in with whoever—or whatever—he’d encountered in the stacks before I’d arrived on the scene.
But I did trust Grim. And the note—I could see why he’d want to know more about its origins.
“The book wasn’t on the shelf even though the system showed it as being in,” I continued. “Someone had pulled it right before I got there—someone who must have known I would come looking for it and find the note inside.”
“Any idea what this person looked like?”
“You’re worried about this,” I said after a beat. “That’s why you came back.”
And that was the only reason he’d come back.
My heart sank while my throat tightened. Normally, embarrassment made me flush, but in this instance, my mortification had the blood draining from my face. The truth was he didn’t like me back. Not that way. How could he? If nothing else, he wasn’t allowed to.
And, oh yeah, I was supposed to bite the dust any day now anyway. Even if there had been some mutual attraction between us, which was still debatable, at least on his part, by default, we weren’t compatible.
“It could have been Cedric who left the note,” he said, that gaze remaining ever forward, his jaw tight. “But, as you know, I can’t exactly ask him right now.”
“My coworker friend said someone came in looking for the book just before me,” I explained.
“He said the guy was ‘weird,’ but… I didn’t get a descriptor other than that.
Now, though, it’s more obvious than ever that whoever planted that note knew what was going on with us and, for whatever reason, wanted me to find it. ”
And to know Grim was real.
“I need to talk to this coworker friend,” said Grim, a predictable response.
“He works tomorrow,” I said. “He’s there late afternoon. You could come in around four or so, and I could introduce you. Actually… he’s into heavy metal, too.”
Grim looked my way again. “I have more enemies than just Cedric,” he said, “and you already know Johann’s and Flora’s enemies are mine as much as they are theirs.”
“Package deal,” I said with a nod. “Families are like that.”
“So is the Mafia,” he grumped as he restarted the car.
I swallowed hard, my heart leaping into panic mode, thrumming with the fear of parting ways with him again.
“You have to go back to work,” I guessed, “is that it?”
“What?” he asked, which was becoming a common response from him. Perhaps a sign that I did, at least in some capacity, rattle him. “There’s always work, but no pull for any Fated Souls.”
“So you don’t have to go? And speaking of the Fated, do… you retrieve them often?”
“I don’t really pay that much attention,” he said, “but maybe a few times a year.”
“Wow.” I got quiet, because that was somewhat of a bombshell, wasn’t it?
Here I’d been thinking one in ten people must be a Fated Soul.
Apparently, they were much rarer than that.
No wonder there was so much hubbub around me.
I wanted to know more. I wanted to know everything.
Maybe there would be comfort in knowing.
“Listen,” I said, “if you’re not pressed for time, would you want to get something to eat? I mean… do you eat? Sorry, again, if that’s an offensive question.”
“Why would that be offensive?”
“I don’t know.” Again, I started talking with my hands, my own telltale sign of nervousness. “You never touched your coffee and, well, if you didn’t because you’re unable, then it’s kind of like asking someone who can’t swim if they want to go deep-sea diving.”
“It’s been a long time,” he said.
“Since you’ve deep-sea dived?” I asked. “I thought you went just the other d—”
“What do you want?” he half asked, half barked.
I shut my mouth and turned to stare forward. Now heat did crawl up my neck.
Of course I was wasting his time, and he could see straight through me, too. He was the Grim Reaper—ageless and important. He wanted me to tell him what I was after so he could ditch me and get on with his unlife while he waited for mine to expire.
On any given night, he saw—and handled—innumerable souls. Why wouldn’t mine be just another number to him?
“To eat, Helena,” he clarified, the words sending my startled gaze straight back to him—because he must have read the hurt in my expression. Did the softening in his tone mean he cared about that? “There’s a Chinese place right there.” He pointed to the strip mall. “Do you like egg rolls?”
I smirked—lopsidedly, my heart buoyed again.
“I do,” I allowed, “but… to be honest, I could go for something a bit more substantial than a snack.”
“Are you calling me a cheapskate?”
I blinked at him, taken aback, but I recovered quickly—and smoothly. “Well… you did take me to McDonald’s on our last date.”
“Hey,” he said, turning to hold up a finger between us, “that shit’s expensive now.”
A broad grin spread onto my face—impossible to suppress or subdue. “Did… you just make a joke?”
Another joke?
“I don’t joke,” he said, shifting the car into gear, and when he pulled out of the parking lot again, rejoining traffic, I didn’t bother asking him where we were going a second time.
So long as I was with him… I didn’t care.