Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
THANATOS
Of all the times to be human, this was the worst of them.
Those damn shackles made my body ache just from being this close to them.
Yet I couldn’t part from them. There wasn’t a person or place on Earth to hide these cursed things.
I had to figure out how to get them into the Underworld where no human could access them ever again.
I tightened my grip on Anastasia’s hand as we hurried down the stairs toward the emergency exit.
I pushed through the door and out into the night air. We were on the side of the hotel on a narrow walkway with the hotel at our back and a thick line of foliage on the other side. I turned and started walking, pulling Anastasia along with me.
“Where are we going?” Her voice was low, almost a whisper.
“We need to get to New York.” I hurried my steps.
“New York? But we’re in Florida. That’s gonna be a hell of a trip if we’re trying to stay hidden.”
“I don’t care. We have to go.” If I was a god, I would get there in the blink of an eye. Perhaps being human wasn’t what it was cracked up to be. This worry for Anastasia, for the shackles, for what might happen in the future was overwhelming. Was this what humans called anxiety?
“Thanatos, wait.” She tugged on my hand, and I let her pull me to a stop.
“What?” I spun around to face her.
“None of this makes sense to me.” Her eyes darted nervously, and she licked her lips. “Make it make sense for me.”
I sighed and shook my head. “I am Thanatos.”
“Yeah, I know your name.” She crossed her arms over her chest.
“No, I am telling you I am Thanatos.” I wanted to give us a chance to live a human life, but the fates seemed hell-bent on ruining it now. It was time to end Anastasia’s ignorance to what was happening.
“The fates cursed me into human form, and these shackles,” I shook the bag, rattling them, “are the only thing that could trap me when I was a god. Once, in the beginning, Sisyphus tricked me and I was bound by these. He literally stopped death . . . He stopped me . . . until one of the other gods freed me.”
“This is unbelievable.”
“I know it is.” I glanced over my shoulder toward the busy street.
She threw her arms up and let them hit her thighs with a smack. “Of course I wound up with a crazy person.”
“What?” I shook my head. “I am not crazy.”
“Have you listened to yourself?” She shook her head. “You think you’re a god. I’m pretty sure that earns you a seventy-two-hour hold and some kind of anti-psychotic. Or you really believe you’re a god, which would make you the world’s worst narcissist . . . possibly a psychopath.”
I placed my hands on her shoulders and caught her eye. “I am none of those things . . . and what is a seventy-two-hour hold? No, never mind that. Come on, deep down you know what I’m saying is true.”
“What you’re saying is not logical. It’s insane.”
“And yet you know me, Anastasia. You’ve dreamed about me. You’ve seen me at times when you’ve been close to death. You’ve missed me all your life.”
Her jaw dropped and she took a step back from me. “I’ve never told anyone that.”
“You didn’t have to. We’ve done this before. You’ve lived before. And in those lives, you have always missed me like I have missed you. In the past you told me this.”
“No.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “This is all too much.”
She spun on her heels and marched away from me, heading toward the back parking lot of the building. I followed behind her. “We have to stay together.”
“Stay together?” She whirled around and jabbed a finger in my chest. “You just knocked out my best friend and then claimed to be a god.”
“Was a god. I was a god. I’m human now.”
“Not. Helping.” She turned back around and hurried toward the parking lot.
I trailed behind her. “Look, if I were you, I might have the same reaction.”
“Might!” Her voice rose as she wound through the cars in the darkened parking lot.
“Anastasia, just slow down.”
“Stasie.”
“What?”
She stopped between a pick-up truck and red sedan. She turned back to me. “My name is Stasie.”
“Okay, Stasie.” My eyes darted around, and I could’ve sworn I saw the shadows move. “Can we just get out of here and then we will talk this all out?”
“What is there to talk about? You are crazy and I am the crazy person who just jumped in with you.”
“Everything okay over here?” A man strolled in our direction.
I glanced toward Anastasia and she sighed. “Yeah, we’re good.”
He moved in closer. “You guys look like you’re having a pretty heated fight.”
“I’m fine.” Anastasia held her hand out toward him, warding him off. “We’re good.”
The guy was larger, with stacked muscles. He wore a black T-shirt and black cargo pants. Hardly an outfit for someone just walking by. I held my hand out to Anastasia. “Come on. We have to leave.”
“She doesn’t look like she wants to go with you, buddy.” The man walked to stand beside Anastasia, then wrapped his hand around her upper arm. “Do you?”
She tried to jerk her arm away from him, but he held tight. He pulled up the corner of his shirt, showing us the pistol he had stuck into the waistband of his pants. “Let’s not make this more unpleasant than we have to, alright?”
Anastasia’s eyes widened when she looked up at me. I sucked in a deep breath. “We’re not here to make trouble. Why don’t you just tell us what you want.”
“We want the shackles, Anastasia. We know you have them.” His voice was deep and rough.
“We?” She narrowed her eyes up at him.
“You know who we is. Now hand over the shackles and we will let you both go on your way.”
I slid the bag from my shoulder, about to hold it out to him.
I wasn’t going to risk Anastasia’s safety.
Anastasia whirled to the side and slammed her fist into the guy’s throat.
His head snapped back, and he hunched over trying to suck in a breath.
Her knee came up and smashed into his face.
The guy smacked into the car behind him and fell to the floor holding his nose.
Blood poured between his fingers and down his face.
I gave her a nod of approval. “Nicely done.”
“There will be more coming.” She said breathlessly.
“Come on.” I pushed her in front of me so I could protect her back as we turned from him and started running across the parking lot toward the street.
Footsteps followed us as we ran. I glanced over my shoulder and saw a group of men all dressed in black hurrying after us.
Anastasia turned down another street and ran into a restaurant.
People froze and stared at us. She was nimble and quick, dodging waiters and ducking around tables.
I tried to keep up and crashed into a waiter carrying several plates.
Food flew up between us and the man crashed to the ground.
“Thanatos, move!” Anastasia called out to me as she wove through the tables and went straight through a swinging door at the back of the restaurant.
When I glanced up, those men were coming through the doors.
I turned, hurrying after her. The kitchen was chaos.
A line of white tickets hung across the shelf while a line of cooks hustled behind it.
Heat wafted from behind there and a group of waitresses stood on the other side of it waiting for them to slide their plates across the metal shelves.
Anastasia didn’t stop, not even when someone tried to step in front of her.
She just kept on running and I followed behind, keeping the bag firmly on my shoulder.
She turned to the left and ran down a long hallway off the kitchen into a prep area where people stood chopping vegetables. She ran toward the back door and threw her body at the push handle. The door flew wide open. Anastasia waited until I was through, then shoved the door shut.
I pushed a large metal garbage can in front of the door to block it. “Do you believe me now?”
“That you’re a god? No. But you didn’t just try to steal the shackles and hurt me.” She glanced down the alley, then in the other direction. “I’m picking the lesser of two evils right now.”
“I’m not evil.”
The door raddled behind us and she motioned for me to follow her. We darted down the alley and came out on a busy street. Anastasia slowed her pace and fell into step with me. “Look, I have no idea what’s going on or why they’re coming after me, or even who they is.”
“You know who they is. It’s Sisyphus and your boss.” I hiked the bag up. “We need to get to New York now. They are the only ones who can help us.”
“Who?”
The sound of gunfire exploded from behind us and people on the street screamed and ran for cover. We ducked behind a car and more shots fired over our heads. I threw my body over hers. Anastasia’s eyes went wide. “We’re gonna die here.”
“No, we’re not.” It wasn’t her time, not even close to her time.
One of the guys ran up to us. I jumped from behind the car and grabbed the gun in his hand.
I pulled him close to me and threw my fist across his face.
His elbow flew up and smacked into my jaw.
I shoved my knee into his stomach and the air whooshed from his lungs.
The gun clattered to the ground and Anastasia pounced on it.
The guy tried to get to her and my anger flared.
I wrapped my hands in his shirt and lifted him up, slamming him onto the hood of the car parked behind the one we tried to duck behind.
His head smacked into the hood and his eyes rolled into the back of his head.
Anastasia turned to face the other three men following us. She ducked out from behind the car and pulled the trigger, firing in their direction. “We need to go! Now!”
More shots came toward us and I pushed her down lower. When they paused, she popped out and fired back.
I motioned to the gun. “You’re gonna kill someone.”
“Not really. I’m just buying us time.” She pulled the trigger again.