Page 35 of Grim Tidings

Silence stretches between the three of us. It’s awkward and heavy, but I sit in the middle of it, utterly content to disrupt whatever is happening over here. Casey looks to me, then Darcy, then back again.

“I’m sorry,” Casey says slowly, his frail mortal senses finally picking up on the tension. “Did I interrupt something?”

“No,” we answer in unison.

Darcy’s left eye twitches. My smirk tumbles into a grin. She wears every little thing she’s feeling, right there on her face. It won’t be difficult at all to know what she’s up to. I just need to keep her close.

And away from innocent bar dwellers.

“Cool,” he says, not meaning it at all. He shifts slightly so he’s angled away from me, curling over Darcy’s legs tucked beneath the bar. He’s trying to shut me out of the conversation and doing a shit job of it. He glances at Darcy again. “What were you saying about those Irish notebooks you found?”

Darcy’s whole face brightens in enthusiasm, like a match has been struck behind her eyes. The darkest parts of me can’t help but wonder if this is another mask. If this is all a ploy to get what she wants.

“I found these fishing ledgers,” she says. “From the early 1900s. I worked as a preservationist at a library for a while and it was the best job I ever had.”

The douche canoe in the plaid shirt looks enamored, like he’s never heard of anything as compelling as some waterlogged diary. “Is that where you work now? The library?”

Darcy’s expression fractures. I watch as she closes herself back up, bit by bit. “No. I do something different now.”

Yeah. She harvests the souls of innocent people with her massive blade and tosses them into the afterlife without a single care for the things they’ve left behind. She’s an apex predator, and this dumbass is trussing himself up like a Christmas turkey.

I reach across Darcy and grab her drink, holding it hostage. “I need to talk to you.”

She grabs it back, scowling. “Not right now. I’m talking to Casey.”

“I don’t care.” I grind my teeth so hard I’m surprised my jaw doesn’t snap. I shift so I’m behind her, my palm at the dip in her back. I urge her down from the stool with a not-so-gentle push. “We’re going,” I repeat. “Right now.”

She stumbles as she slips from the stool but recovers quick enough to manage a kick to the back of my knee. I grunt and cover it with a tight smile for Casey.

“Go back to your friends,” I encourage, letting a bit of my demand slip through. I’ve never been more grateful for my powers of compulsion. “You’ll forget about this in a minute.”

My magic works quick. He doesn’t so much as blink before he turns back to the crowded table in the corner.

“Was that necessary?” Darcy hisses.

“It wouldn’t have been, if you listened.”

“What did you do to him?”

“I made a suggestion, and he followed it. I did not cleave his soul from his body.” I tip my head toward the back hallway. I won’t talk about this here, with Frank watching us like a hawk from the other side of the room. “Come on.”

I start moving us through the bar, the skin of her wrist warm beneath my hand. She tries to pull herself away, but I grip her tighter, towing her into the narrow hall that leads to the back offices.

She rounds on me as soon as we’re out of earshot, her loose hair flying around her shoulders.

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Me?” I back her up until she’s pressed to the wall, my thumb at the hollow of her wrist where her pulse should be fluttering like hummingbird wings. But she doesn’t have a heart, and that’s never been more apparent than right now. “What were you doing talking to him like that?”

“Like what?”

“Close.”

“Am I not allowed to talk to people?”

“Not in my bar, you’re not. Not when I know what you’re—”

“Capable of,” Darcy finishes for me, rolling her eyes. “Yes, I know. I’m a proper menace, aren’t I? Sitting at your bar. Talking to men.” She turns her face to the side, looking back down the hall at the soft light that creeps in from the bar.