Chapter 16
“I’m not the one who’s gonna die, honey. I’m the one who’s gonna live.”
—LOUISE, THELMA & LOUISE
R eaver wouldn’t let me leave until he was done with his shift. He told me I could wait until he drove me home, or he would make me work every one of his shifts for the next month. So naturally, I waited for him. Shem left a few hours before closing with a yawn.
“I have to open tomorrow. It’s going to be boring without you two around to spice things up. Later, Thelma.” He saluted me as he left, and I shook my head, not sure if I was hating the serial killer jokes or if I thought they were morbidly hilarious.
Sara finished her shift and sat down with me for the last few hours before closing. She smiled at me and thanked me for helping her out the night before.
“Have you heard from him since?” I asked, genuinely wondering. It wasn’t like my demon to slack this hard on killing the people around me. She shook her head, and my heart rate increased.
“I thought for sure he would be waiting for me when I got home,” she said with a frown. “I even called one of my friends to meet me there just in case he showed up, but he didn’t. He hasn’t texted or called either. It’s super weird.”
I felt the corner of my mouth twitch up but didn’t ask any more about it. Maybe my Reaper hadn’t been as quiet as it had appeared. I was suddenly sure John was dead in a ditch somewhere. They just hadn’t found the body yet.
Reaver appeared after finishing his cash out in the office with Rafael and yanked me away from Sara, shooting her a glare. She frowned, confused at his sudden hostile behavior. I laughed.
“See, I told you he was a douchebag,” I muttered, not caring that Reaver was next to me and could clearly hear me.
He grabbed my arm and dragged me away, putting his mouth close to my ear. “Careful, deathtrap,” he purred. I shivered, but I allowed him to strong-arm me out of the restaurant and to his car.
He opened the passenger-side door for me, and I sighed, getting in. I jumped as he leaned over and literally buckled my seatbelt for me.
“Reaver, what the fuck? I’m not five years old. I can do up my own seatbelt,” I snapped as he clicked it into place. He paused with one hand on the buckle and the other on the back of my seat. He was so close I was swimming in his signature funeral home scent. Slowly, he turned his head to face me. The tip of his nose brushed against mine and I inhaled the spearmint on his breath.
My heart was suddenly in my throat, and I couldn’t breathe. His eyes met mine, and I watched as his gaze dropped to my mouth before flicking back up.
“What part of you’re mine, do you not understand?” he whispered, his lips were so close they were nearly touching mine. “If I want to buckle your seatbelt, I fucking will. If I want to spoon-feed you all your fucking meals, I will. You belong to me. I own you.” He growled, and I shivered under the intensity of his words.
“I’m a person, Reaver, not some plaything. You can’t hold this job over my head forever. When the quarterly review is over, you won’t have anything on me anymore.”
He chuckled and hovered half an inch closer. We shared a breath before he smirked and pulled away.
“We’ll see about that, deathtrap.”
Then he slammed the door shut.
Reaver drummed his fingers on the steering wheel as he drove. I was feeling unnerved by the weirdly possessive shit he had just said to me and also oddly turned on. I squeezed my thighs together in an attempt to quell the burning that had pooled in my core and his eyes flicked to my lap before returning to the road.
There was no way he could tell… could he ?
I nervously picked at one of the leather cuffs I always wore to cover up my scars. His eyes flickered toward that movement, too. I saw the question before it left his lips.
“Why?” he asked, glancing intentionally down at where the cuffs poked out from under my jacket. I narrowed my eyes on him.
“Why what?” If he was going to be a nosey fucker, I was going to make him say it.
“Why did you try to kill yourself?” It was a question, but his delivery was flat as he checked his blind spot before changing lanes to get off at my exit.
“Reaver, we are not nearly close enough for you to ask me a question like that,” I said quietly. “I don’t even think I like you, and I know you don’t like me. So let’s not pretend you give a shit why I tried to kill myself.”
He glanced over at me as he eased the car off the busy main roads that ran like arteries through Gravestone. We bled smoothly into my more residential area, and he pulled in front of my little apartment.
I moved to get out, but his hand shot out and grabbed me.
“I didn’t say you could get out yet,” he growled, though his tone was not as angry as it normally was. I let out an exasperated sigh and turned to face him.
“What now?” I asked but froze when I found him looking at me in a way I hadn’t seen before. He was studying me, and he looked almost confused. Conflicted even.
After a long pause, he finally seemed to find the words to speak. “I never said I didn’t like you, Lilith.” His voice was quiet, almost a whisper.
“You didn’t need to say it, Reaver. It’s clear in the way you treat me.” I glanced down at my hands and rubbed the leather cuffs on my wrists awkwardly. “No one’s ever tried to be my friend before, you know. I’ve accepted that friends just aren’t in the cards for me, but no one has ever been as mean to me as you are either. Not even…” I trailed off. I obviously couldn’t tell him how Death had been stalking me. I eyed my apartment anxiously. I had a feeling my demon would be paying me a visit tonight. I had broken a lot of his rules lately.
“Not even who?” he asked quietly.
“Nevermind. Anyway, the point is, you don’t have to pretend you like me. I’m used to being alone.”
“Again. I never said I didn’t like you. I said we could never be friends.”
I shot him a look. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
His gorgeous hazel eyes were swimming in the golden light of the streetlamps that lined the quiet road. Reaching out and gripping my chin, he ran his thumb over my lower lip and pulled it down gently, exposing my bottom teeth to him.
He licked his lips, and his gaze dropped down to my mouth again before flicking back up to my eyes.
“No, Lilith. It’s not the same thing.”
We stayed like that for a moment before I realized he was still touching me. If Death hadn’t killed him over everything that had happened yesterday, he would probably kill him now. I tugged my chin away from his fingers.
“You shouldn’t touch me,” I said, even though a part of me wished that he could touch me for just a little longer. He was a fucking asshole, yes, but I was so deprived of human contact even small touches felt precious.
“And why is that?” he asked, looking intrigued.
For a moment, I thought about lying to him, then decided fuck it . Who cares if he knew? He probably wouldn’t believe me anyway.
“Because everyone who touches me dies.”
A wicked smile curled across his lips, and his eyes gleamed sadistically in the moonlight.
“I’m not afraid of death, Lilith.” I frowned at him and shook my head. He didn’t get it. “Now be a good girl and go to bed. I’ll see you tomorrow.”