Page 28 of TBR: Dead But Well Read

Well, everyone but the female ghost who’d clung to him with the stubbornness of a crocodile who refused to release their meal. She’d haunted my thoughts since that day I’d first laid eyes on her in the library.

Decade after decade, I’d watched as humans chose a mate and then became possessive over that person. I understood the grief that came from losing a family member.

What I didn’t understand was how humans could become so enamored with another person that their happiness in life was contingent on whether they could possess the one they wanted.

They didn’t call it possessing on the marriage forms. But if you took away the flowery language, it was simple. In exchange for the right to claim their chosen mate as belonging to them, humans were willing to sacrifice the freedom to make decisions on their own, giving partial ownership of the things they’d sacrificed hours of their lives working to acquire.

All for what? The chance to have sex? I’d been called to reap countless souls who’d died during their orgasms. Nothing about the process seemed appealing or worth the effort. I’d even wondered if humans were faking their dramatic reactions.

Loyalty and friendship, I understood, but love and desire were things that never made sense.

Until her.

From the moment I’d laid eyes on her, I felt as if my soul was being called to her. I’d been called to reap millions of souls, but this was different.

It took seeing her in danger for me to grasp what my body had been trying to tell me. I wanted to protect her anddestroy everyone who dared hurt her… because my body already considered her ours.

When I’d yanked Zacharias away from her in the tunnel, it hadn’t mattered that he was as close as a brother to me. My loyalty to her was already stronger, and I’d barely resisted the urge to rip his heart from his chest.

She was changing me, and we’d never even spoken to each other.

My jaw clenched at the memory of the energy Zacharias had blasted at the small group, causing my stomach to spasm and my heart to bang against my ribcage.

I’d teleported right into the path of the blast, standing between it and the beautiful ghost who was weeping over the dying Rhodes. Quickly tossing the other two Baudelaire men out of the blast’s path, I’d braced for the impact.

The amount of power he’d put into the attack would’ve destroyed much of the tunnel system and killed anyone trapped inside. I’d wanted her to survive, so my only choice was to absorb the energy.

It was over in a matter of seconds and I’d grabbed Zacharias and teleported us away before he could do any more harm to them, or to my opinion of him.

My body shook with rage and the desire to make him pay for the pain he’d caused her. Not trusting that I could resist the urge, I’d left him on our estate halfway around the world from Amberwood.

Then I’d teleported back to the tunnels, staying in the reaper realm to prevent them from seeing me.

I’d watched with awe as she’d tried to heal the collector’s wounds. Ghosts couldn’t heal, but that didn’t stop her from trying.

Pride swelled in my chest as she slowly and carefully manipulated the energy inside her and began sealing his wounds shut. She was a natural.

But one look at Rhodes told me he was beyond her abilities to heal. His soul was already pulling free of its dying vessel.

Remembering the way she had seemed to stare right at me in the library while I was in the reaper plane, I moved to stand directly behind her. When she buried her face in her hands and began to sob, I knew that was my chance to help without being seen.

Rhodes’ soul opened his mouth and began the ancient call for death. While many people considered reapers to be harbingers of doom and gloom, we were closer to agents of mercy. Our presence eased the pain, confusion and fear the person was experiencing.

But not this time.

“Oh, no you don’t,” I’d snarled, covering his mouth with my hand to silence the call. “She wants you alive, so you’re going to stay alive if you know what’s good for you.”

I’d none-too-gently crammed Rhodes’ soul back into his body. Then, not trusting him to behave, I kept my hand pressed against his chest.

It was a lot like what would happen if you shoved a ticked off cat into a cardboard box, and then attempted to keep the lid closed with one hand, while trying to tear off a strip of tape to seal the box closed with the other.

Instead of tape, I was trying to use energy to repair the damaged artery that was causing him to bleed out. Just as I’d stopped the bleeding, she’d shifted positions to lie down beside him.

Their lips met, and she opened herself to him, and I watched in a jealous rage as she let him devour her. He sucked up her energy at an alarming rate, leaving me confused about howa ghost could have stored away so much and how she could maintain a stable energy level. Ghosts faded a fraction with each passing hour after their death until they were simply gone. It was the natural order of things.

She was an anomaly that didn’t make sense. But I knew with certainty that I didn’t want her to exhaust herself. Not before I had a chance to figure her out.

The ghost’s heart was tender, and she glowed with the purest of energies. There was no doubt she’d give her all if it would save a life, and it had my teeth grinding together in agitation. We needed to work on that.

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