Eleventh Grave in Moonlight

Michael held up his hands. “I was just going to show her.” With the sword still at his throat, he turned a hand over and offered it to me.

  I reached out and brushed my fingertips along his upturned palm, and the images that flooded my cerebral cortex defied logic. The creation of Earth. The depth of the ever-expanding universe. Living creatures in the farthest reaches of space. And the gods. So many more than I ever imagined possible. Almost every dimension, and there were thousands, had at least one. Some more. A few none.

  When he’d finished, I stepped back and lowered my head. Absorbed what he’d shown me. And why. It wasn’t a documentary on the mysteries of our amazing universe. It was to let me know just that: thousands of dimensions. Thousands of options. And I could be cast into any one of them.

  I glanced at him and nodded my acknowledgment. My understanding. We came to an accord of a sort.

  Almost.

  I leveled a hard stare on him and said, “These men are mine.”

  “Those slated for Lucifer’s domain are not my concern.” He offered a congenial nod and vanished.

  Time slammed back into place, the sound deafening for a split second, then the men glanced around, looking for their guns.

  “You know,” I said to Reyes over my shoulder, “we should let Osh in on this.”

  He scowled but shrugged, leaving it up to me.

  “Uncle Bob, you are about to see something that might be a little disorienting.”

  Ubie’s expression went from stunned to comical in under six. He was really good at the deadpan thing, too.

  “Osh,” I said, summoning the slave demon to us.

  He stepped from a shadowy corner as though he’d been there the whole time.

  “Take your pick.”

  A grin far too wicked for the grim situation flashed across his handsome face. By that point, El Jefe had figured out he’d made a grave mistake.

  I didn’t understand men like him. So loyal and loving with his own family and yet a monster, an absolute monster to others.

  Valencia gave Osh a once-over and smirked. I wanted to tell him Osh only looked like a kid, but he’d find that out soon enough. Osh was on him so fast, he was impossible to see. He pinned him against a wall, then lowered his mouth onto the older man’s and breathed in his essence. Absorbed his soul. Fed on his aura.

  It was like watching gay porn without the nudity, the whole exchange one of the sexiest things I’d ever seen.

  Valencia’s men scrambled to help their boss, but Reyes had been chomping at the bit long enough. He let loose. Got into a couple of fistfights for the fun of it before snapping necks one by one. They didn’t know what hit them. Then again, their deaths were merciful compared to what they did to their victims. Their eternal damnations following death, however, would be another story.

  I escorted Uncle Bob out under the guise of plausible deniability. Also, he didn’t need to see it all. Reyes and Osh were demons. Sometimes they enjoyed the kill a little too much.

  “We have to go to hell in less than three hours,” Uncle Bob said to me, as though we were walking out of a meeting or had just come from dinner.

  “What? Oh, right, the mall.” I suppressed a giggle. “You know, I’ve been. They really are very similar.”

  “Why am I not surprised?”

  “Uncle Bob, I still can’t believe what you were about to do for me. You could have died.”

  “Charley, I know how special you are. Or, well, I thought I knew.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I guess I had no clue. Not really.”

  I wrapped an arm in his. “That’s okay. I don’t always get it, either.”

  “Was that … was that an angel?”

  “Oh, him? Yeah, that was Michael the Churlish Cherub.” I bent at the waist, giggling.

  Uncle Bob just stared all aghastlike. Not everyone got my humor.

  “Does … how much does Cookie know?”

  “Not as much as you. Not anymore.”

  He nodded as Reyes stepped out.

  “Feel better?” I asked him.

  “You know, I think I do.”

  I studied the run-down hotel. “I essentially killed those men. Am I slated for hell?”

  He stepped to me. Put his fingers underneath my chin. Raised it until our gazes locked. “You’re a god, Dutch. And the reaper. You don’t get slated. You are the slate.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m not sure Michael the Churlish Cherub would agree.” I snorted again at my own joke. “I’m so calling him that next time I see him.”

  “I want to be there.”

  “I’ll get you a ringside seat.”

  “No, I want to be there the next time you try to start World War III.”

  His statement wasn’t actually the light suggestion he’d made it out to be. It was a warning. He’d paired his warning with a gentle glare. It would have been even better had he paired it with a nice chianti and a cheese ball.

  I stepped into his arms and offered my own warning glare. “Push me off a building again, and you’ll see Michael sooner than you’d hoped.”

  He pulled a lock of my hair, then tucked it behind my ear. “Unless he’s visiting Lucifer, I doubt that would happen.”

  I eased back, surprised. “Do you really think you’d go to hell?”

  “No. As a god, I’d go to a prison dimension, I suppose.”

  “I think you’ve seen the inside of enough prisons to last you a few million years. And besides, why would you go there? You’ve done nothing wrong, Reyes.”

  He offered me a sad smile and looked away.

  17

  My entire life can be summed up in one sentence: “Well, that didn’t go as planned.”

  —T-SHIRT

  The next morning, I waited on the sidelines in Amber’s room while Uncle Bob and a tech guy named Jimmy equipped Amber with a wire. We’d be able to hear everything. Reyes stood in the doorway with a cup of coffee. Sadly, it was not mine.

  “Thanks for being here, Swopes,” I said to Garrett Swopes, one of my best friends on planet earth. Or he could have been if he’d drop the macho guy routine and offer to make me tacos. He’d been explaining to Amber how the wire would work when he stood and walked over.

  “Not at all.” He gestured toward Amber. “How’s the smidgen holding up?”

  “She’s nervous. I want her to be able to see either you, me, or Reyes at all times.”

  Garrett was the only person in our circle who I could be fairly confident Joe Stalker didn’t know about. He could be there without worry that Joe would have seen them together. And while Amber and I hadn’t been seen together in public for months, I had a workaround, just in case. A reason for my being at the mall. It was ingenious. I’d pretend to be a shopper. Gawd, my plans rocked.

  I walked over to Amber just as the tech guy was finishing up. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  She nodded, but I could feel the elevated pulse. The tightening of her throat. The nausea churning in her stomach. Poor kid. Stress did so much more damage than people realized.

  I sat beside her and took her hand.

  We’d sent texts throughout the day before, so if Joe Stalker did clone her phone, he would know exactly where she’d be. I had a hard time believing he just followed her around. The texts were the only thing that made sense. Either that or he was following her on GPS. Both acts relied on her phone.

  “Brandy will be there, too, right?” Amber had texted her friend Brandy as well after Uncle Bob discussed the whole thing with Brandy’s parents. They’d agreed, albeit very reluctantly, to let their daughter go. I could hardly blame their hesitation. Who would purposely set up their daughter in a sting trying to catch a stalker? Yeah, I bet that wasn’t an easy sell for Ubie. But he got the job done.

  “According to her parents, yes. She’ll show.”

  She nodded, relieved.

  “I heard he didn’t text you yesterday.”

  Ubie said everything went well with Osh being there, but I was worried it may have sc
ared Joe off. Now was not the time to go into hiding, but if it happened, it happened. We would simply try again until we caught him.

  She shook her head. “He’ll do that, though. Go for a few days without texting me, then I get like ten in one day from a totally new number.”

  “Okay.” I could only hope he wasn’t someone who traveled for work and was out of town. This whole thing could be for naught.

  Cookie’s hands shook as she handed Amber a hairband. “I don’t see why I can’t go in. I’m her mom. I would be at the mall with her, anyway.”

  “We can’t risk it, Cook. We don’t want to do anything that will scare him off.”

  She agreed with a soft nod, but she wasn’t happy about any of it.

  “You’ll be able to hear the whole thing from the van.”

  We’d set up a special surveillance van and, as per regulation, had an ambulance waiting in the wings.

  Ubie knelt in front of her. “How does that feel?” he asked, gesturing toward the wire. Jimmy had had to reach inside her camisole to clip it to her bra. Humiliation had surged through her, poor kid. But I got the feeling that had been the worst of it.

  “Fine.”

  He cupped her chin and waited for her gaze to meet his. “We will be right there, smidgeon. I would never let anything happen to you.”

  She nodded, dipped her head, then lunged forward and wrapped her arms around him. Cookie pressed a hand to her chest. Now that she knew what had been eating at Ubie—namely, a drug baron wanting to make a creole sauce with my brains and enjoy it over a nice frittata—she felt a small amount of relief. I only prayed that after today this whole ordeal would be done and over with. For Cookie’s sake.

  Amber sat back down, her hands still shaking so badly she had to clasp them together.

  I looked at the crew, letting my gaze linger for a moment longer than necessary on the ball and chain as he leaned against the doorjamb and sipped from a black mug. Then I focused on Cookie. “Do you mind if I talk to her alone?”

  “Oh,” she said, a little surprised. “Not at all.”

  She stood and shooed everyone out, including Tall, Dark, and Sensual. He had to tease her, of course. He stood his ground until she started to step across the threshold, then he blocked her path, an evil grin widening his mouth.

  She stopped and questioned him with her gaze; then, realizing he was teasing her, she physically turned him and pushed him from the room. He raised his arms in surrender.

  God bless him. He was trying to help Cookie deal and it was working.

  Amber relaxed, just barely, after they left. It was a lot to put on a thirteen-year-old’s shoulders. This entire sting was not only for her benefit, but hinged on how well she could pull it off.

  I sat on the bed opposite the desk where Amber sat. She stared at her shoes for a solid minute before glancing up at me.

  “I will be right there, Amber. I’ll hear everything you say. If you feel like something is wrong or you get scared, you just give the signal.”

  The signal was a phrase: Don’t tell your mom about the jelly. Of course, running and screaming worked, too.

  She let out a nervous laugh, the sound soft and shaky. “I don’t know why I’m so scared.”

  I lifted a brow. “Want me to tell you?” After she nodded, I said, “Because this guy knows a lot about you. He stalked you for a while before initiating contact. He threatened your stepdad. You wish Quentin were here. And this is a big operation with a lot of people and a lot at stake, and you don’t think you’re worth it.”

  She glanced up, surprised.

  “You don’t think we should have gone to all this trouble, and I’m going to tell you right now, you are wrong, Amber.” I took her hands into mine. “You couldn’t be more wrong. Odds are this guy is just some nut who would eventually leave you alone, but we cannot take that chance, hon.”

  She withdrew inside herself, her shoulders going concave. “It’s just a lot of fuss for what might turn out to be nothing.”

  “Amber, you are the most confident thirteen-year-old I’ve ever met.” I rethought that. “Okay, the second-most confident.” Angel exuded confidence by the bucketsful. “Don’t let this guy knock you off your game. That makes him the winner. Even if he never touches a hair on your head, he’s still won, and that is not okay in my book. Because there is nothing on earth more important than you.”

  She nodded, completely unconvinced.

  “Can I tell you a secret?”

  A spark of interest lit her blue eyes.

  “You are on her team.”

  Intrigue straightened her shoulders. “Whose?”

  I smiled and thought about everything this amazing kid had left to do. And she’d need all of the tenacity she could get. I’d be damned before I’d stand idly by and let this asswipe drain even an ounce of that spunk and spitfire from her lovely, graceful bones.

  I squeezed her hands and said, “Beep’s.”

  Her lids rounded in awe.

  “I’ve seen it. You’re a prophet.” Warmth filled me just thinking about it. “You’re the prophet.”

  The look of amazement and wonder that overtook her face was my reward for confiding in her. “I’m … me? I’m the prophet? The one who sees into the future?”

  “You already see into it better than I’ll ever be able to. I think we should talk to your mom about honing those skills. You’re going to need them to help Beep in the coming years, don’t you think?”

  She nodded, excitement and enthusiasm overpowering her fear. Her uncertainty. “I would like that.”

  “And I shouldn’t be telling you this, because nothing is ever set in stone—things could change—but Quentin is on her team, too.”

  Her expression went from ecstatic to dreamy. The girl had it bad. “That would be the coolest thing ever.”

  “I agree.” The fact that Quentin was about to turn seventeen and Amber didn’t turn fourteen for a couple of months had me a little on edge. It was one thing when the kid was sixteen. There was just something about his inevitable seventeen-dom that brought out the mother bear in me.

  Then again, Beep was barely two months old and I’d already peddled her off to a four-hundred-year-old demon.

  Maybe seventeen wasn’t so bad. And I’d had nothing to do with their inevitable hookup. That little nugget came to me the same day Amber’s destiny did. The day they’d taken Beep away. The day I’d forgotten how to breathe.

  “I miss him,” Amber said.

  “Osh?”

  She giggled. “No. Quentin.”

  I pulled her onto the bed beside me and leaned in to her secretively. “Okay, for reals. How did Osh handle high school?”

  She snorted then doubled over in a fit of the giggles. It was fun to watch.

  After laughing so hard her face turned red, she told me all the gory details. Girls fell over backwards, literally, to get a look at him. And one glance was not enough for most. Since Osh hung with her all day under the guise of being her cousin, every girl in school wanted to get to know her better.

  “He is cute,” she said.

  “What?” I shook my head. “No, he’s not. He’s … he’s…”

  “It’s okay, Aunt Charley. I don’t think of him in that way.”

  “Right,” I said, relief washing over me. “You only have eyes for a tall blond boy who eats his spaghetti with a straw.”

  She burst out laughing again. “We only did that once. As an experiment. It doesn’t work as well as you might think.”

  “Yeah, I’ll take your word for it.”

  By the time we emerged from Amber’s room, her entire demeanor had changed. She was still nervous, but the situation didn’t bother her as much. Her future looked far too bright to let it.

  As Uncle Bob went over some last-minute instructions with her, Cookie wrapped an arm in mine and took me aside. “How do you do it?”

  “What?”

  “I’m her mom and—”

  “Cook, that’s it. You’re
her mom. I’m the cool aunt.” I breathed on my fingernails and polished them on my shirt.

  “I suppose you’re right. I’m just glad that cool aunt vibrator thing works.”

  “You know about Han Solo?” When she questioned me with her usual comic obliviousness, I said, “I think you mean vibe. And it does work. Clearly. Also, I have superpowers.”

  She gaped at me. “I have superpowers, too.”

  “Hon, blinding people with your fashion sense doesn’t count.”

  “Oh, okay. Never mind, then.” She hugged me to her, thanking me for the thousandth time since the whole thing began.

  I had Swopes text Amber to make sure we’d get it, too. Something totally nonsensical. Because we would also get all of Amber’s texts, we would know the minute Joe made contact.

  When a text came through that read, Do you think Justin is cute? Amber giggled.

  I punched Garrett on the arm.

  “What?” he said, rubbing his biceps as though he actually felt my paltry effort. “I have nieces. I know how they think. And every school on the planet has at least one Justin. It’s a statistical fact.”

  He had me there.

  As per the instructions, Cookie dropped Amber off at Coronado Center, a.k.a. the mall, then drove to the back entrance of a convenience store three blocks away and got in the waiting surveillance van. We couldn’t risk Joe seeing her slip into the van and grow suspicious.

  Once Cookie was inside, an officer drove the van over and parked behind the mall.

  The team consisted of me, Reyes, three officers posing as shoppers, Uncle Bob, who was stationed in the mall security booth, Garrett, who was hanging back, and Osh, who was meeting us on-site.

  Reyes had been a little moody after finding out the angels who’d been stalking me were actually stalking him, so I stationed him at a kiosk that sold cologne. The salesman there was about to have his best day ever. Women flocked around the kiosk as Reyes pretended to try this cologne and that. They would spray perfume on their wrists, wave it in front of him, and ask his opinion. Subtly was none of their strong suits.

  I went about my business window-shopping. Not that I needed new windows.

  Amber met her friend Brandy at the entrance. We would hear every word they said over the mic. If Joe texted, she was to go to the food court, where we had the rest of the team waiting.