Chapter Three
Ossy
My assignment was to grab Elliot’s pizza friend because he was a beloved.
Why me and not one of the other guys? Good question.
My guess was that Morgana didn’t want to look at me anymore.
Apparently, my face was expressive, and I showed how mad I was getting with each passing minute. She couldn’t handle me.
I huffed on my way out, grabbing a cloak from the hook by the door. I had my hand on the front doorknob when I thought better of leaving without at least some sort of emotional support.
I’d seen Tan with a bottle of whiskey yesterday.
I remembered it because I’d thought about how great it would be to stop feeling so hard for just a little while, but that was what Phin did to me.
He brought big emotions. Too big. Scary emotions I’d never felt for anyone else.
What was even scarier was not being able to see him ever again. There was a high probability of that.
The helplessness sat like lead in my stomach. I sat around doing nothing while Phin walked into danger every day. Leaving him in oblivion was the worst part, but Morgana was the boss. And she had a point. Phin just had to stay under the radar and play dumb until I could reach him.
I wouldn’t wait forever. Morgana had to know that.
Maybe that was another reason she sent me to get the pizza beloved.
She knew I was five seconds away from heading to headquarters to rescue Phin.
She needed to distract me long enough to come up with a plan so I wouldn’t end up in Tech Duinn.
All it would take was for Donn to think about sending me there, and I’d be there. So would Phin.
Worst-case scenarios aside, if I were going to rescue someone else’s beloved rather than my own, I needed a way to dull the guilt. Tan’s bottle of whiskey would do.
I searched the kitchen cabinets first, but didn’t find it. Then I remembered how he’d once put a bottle in the freezer during poker night. Sure enough, Tan’s predictability earned me a prize. Tan didn’t drink the cheap stuff either. I took a swig. The whiskey even tasted expensive.
I’d have to replace the bottle. Tan would bitch forever about me stealing it if I didn’t. Either way, I wasn’t putting it back now that I’d found it.
I took another swig. It didn’t burn as much the second time. It warmed my gut as gravity pulled it through my body, and some of my anxiety eased.
This was how a reaper solved problems. Pickle us in expensive alcohol. Tan didn’t have many good ideas, but that one was great. But it made me wonder what Tan was running from. Was his beloved stuck in the Bureau, too, or was it something more?
I couldn’t think about it too hard because I had a pizza guy to save. Well, sort of. He wasn’t in immediate danger, not like Phin.
Stop thinking about Phin.
I pulled my hood up. It couldn’t cover all my long hair, so some spilled out, framing my face.
I wasn’t sure where the pizza guy lived, but I knew he smoked pot regularly and lived near the pizza restaurant, so I started there.
The place smelled of tomato sauce and fatty meat.
It didn’t matter that the restaurant was closed for the night.
The smells were permanent, a testament to the restaurant’s longevity.
Even the air couldn’t shake it. The pizza must be great.
There were no cars in the lot so late at night. Just a bike propped against the building. The restaurant was put to bed for the night, quiet inside with the lights off.
The smell of weed hung in the air, drifting toward the parking lot where I stood, mixing with the scent of pizza. Elliot had mentioned getting high behind the restaurant, so I made my way toward the back.
The guy had long hair and a scraggly beard that didn’t quite fill in. He held a cigarette to his lips but dropped it when he saw me.
He tensed. “I don’t have any money, man. I swear.”
“I’m not here to rob you. I’m a friend of Elliot’s. He sent me to pick you up.” Not the truth. It was Morgana and Grym who had sent me, but Joel didn’t know who they were. Dropping Elliot’s name was a much better way to gain his trust.
“You’re with Elliot’s hot guy, aren’t you?” High or not, the guy was pretty observant to have reached that conclusion already.
“Grym. Yeah, I am.” I stepped closer, and when the guy patted the milk crate beside him, I sat. “I’m Ossy.”
“I’m Joel.” Joel reached down, picked up the joint, and held it out to me. When I shook my head and held up the bottle, he shrugged. “To each, his own.”
“I’m drowning my guilt.” I nodded to Joel’s hand. “What about you?”
We all had a reason. Even if it was just to relax at the end of a hard day, it still buried our troubles deep enough that we didn’t have to feel them anymore.
“Trying to forget that my mom isn’t here anymore. I’m good at it.” Joel held up the joint and smirked. “She always told me to keep at the shit I was good at.”
“Is it working?” The alcohol didn’t work for me.
Phin was still there, in the back of my mind.
He never left. Not even when I’d wanted him to.
Thoughts of what Donn could do to him plagued me.
Was Phin afraid of the dark? That was the question I’d landed on, and it wouldn’t go away.
I didn’t know the answer, and I should. After all the times we’d spent together, I still didn’t know him as well as I should have. The tragedy of that wasn’t lost on me.
“Nope. But it helps me remember the good things about her. There weren’t many of them.” Joel sucked in more smoke, held it for a moment, then let it out. When he spoke again, his voice was husky from the big puff. “Gotta focus on the good times. Am I right?”
“That’s right.” Maybe I should focus on the last time I saw Phin. He’d been in the supply closet, mad at me. But he’d let me smooth out the prickles.
“That’s a deep conversation for just meeting.” Joel gave me the side-eye.
“Kinda, yeah.” I really liked Joel. He was easy to be around.
Joel chuckled. The mood shifted back to serious just as quickly, though. “Elliot was on the schedule today. Do you know if he’s alright?”
“He’s great.” Getting fucked six ways to Sunday made him better than most. “Just preoccupied.”
“That means it’s working out with the hot dude.” Joel eyed my cloak. “What’s with the getup?”
I could have lied, but I thought better of it. I’d gained Joel’s trust from the start and didn’t want to lose it so quickly. “I’m a reaper.”
“Am I dead?” If he was bothered by the thought, he didn’t show it.
“No, but you are in danger. I’m going to need you to come with me.” I fully expected him not to believe me, but he just shrugged.
“Where are we going?” His eyes were half-lidded and grew more bloodshot the longer we sat there. Maybe the weed made him easygoing in that moment, but I got the impression he was that way most of the time. The circumstances might have changed that if not for the weed.
“To Elliot’s house. You can stay there. It’s safer.” I stood and held out my hand.
He took it. “K. But I need to tell my brother I’m having a sleepover at Elliot’s. He’ll worry.”
“I can take you home first.” That turned out to be the worst idea I’d ever had, because Miles, Joel’s brother, was a colossal pain in my ass.