Chapter 18

Chapter

Eighteen

DASH

“Fuck, Dash!”

Keir’s dick was in my mouth, and I was sucking that beautiful meat like a straw in a milkshake. He was everything to me, and I’d missed everything about him.

“Please, Dash. Inside me now.”

He was greedy for my dick, but I wanted his cum in my mouth, so I pushed his legs wider and began prepping him, not backing off his cock. I’d fuck him for a good long time, and he’d come again.

It wasn’t easy for me to hold back my own orgasm. My cock was pulsing with every slurp of him, but I wanted to fill Keir with my cum and push that butt plug inside him so he’d carry me with him all damn day. My need to mark him was primal at that point.

I reached for the drawer on the nightstand and opened it, pulling out the red silk cord to wrap around his cock and balls so he didn’t bust his nut until I was ready. His scent. His taste. Everything about the man drove me out of my mind.

“Dash, baby, I need to come.”

I laughed. “Oh, we both need to come, but not until I’m ready. You’ve been away from me, and I wanna draw it out and remind you what you’ve been missing so you never forget how much you love me.”

“I love you so much. You need to find me, Dash. I need your help.”

I jerked awake in our bed. I’d taken back the bedroom I shared with Keir and had moved Doppelgänger into the spare room. Before I’d gone to bed, I’d stripped the sheets and put on fresh ones. I desperately wanted to feel Keir next to me, and I damn well would. I just had to deal with a certain warlock.

My cock was in my hand, but I wasn’t about to let go like that when I had the perfect guy waiting for me somewhere. When I had him back, we’d make up for lost time.

The last moments of my dream echoed through my mind. Was Keir reaching out to me? If he needed my help, I was damn well going to give it to him. I just had to find him.

I got out of bed and went to the bathroom to take care of my morning business. After my ice-cold shower, I dressed in the scrubs Keir had ordered for me and went to the kitchen. I missed seeing Keir at the counter reading the news on his phone as he sipped his morning coffee.

Fuck!I nearly jumped out of my skin because Jonas was sitting at the counter instead. I took a moment to be calm enough to speak. “Welcome into our home uninvited.”

Yeah, I was in a shitty mood. Why wouldn’t I be? I was lonely and craving the touch of the man I loved.

“I found a holy man. It took me all night, and Vale isn’t thrilled with me, but I found one. His name is Carl.”

I nearly spit my coffee on the kitchen counter. I turned to Jonas and stared at him. “You found a holy man named Carl? I can’t wait to hear where.”

Jonas smirked. “He runs a soup kitchen and health clinic on Stockton near the river. His clientele is mostly the unhoused and sex workers who frequent down there. He turns no one away, and he doesn’t ask them a lot of questions. He provides a hot meal and a listening ear. He’s also a medical doctor, so he treats folks who are sick without requiring they pay a dime in return.”

Impressive. Finding someone so selfless in the current day and age wasn’t easy. He sounded like a good person, but was he really a holy man?

“Tell me more about Dr. Carl.”

“Dr. Carlos Lopez. He’s a descendant of the Incan god, Sarapana, the healer. He’s also a lycanthrope. He’ll be here at one this afternoon, so don’t be a dick. When’s your warlock coming?”

Jonas’s mood was a little salty. I had no idea what had crawled up his ass, but I still had questions, so he could get over it.

“What’s a lycan-what?”

There were two knocks on the door from the funeral home to the apartment before it opened. Adonis. “It’s lycanthrope, which means he can transform into a wolf at will. No full moon required. I’ve heard they can be volatile. They hate vampires, by the way. So, you found a holy wolf, did you?”

My mouth was hanging open. “A what?”

Jonas chuckled. “There are many variations of otherworldly beings you haven’t encountered yet. Not all of them are easily detected, even by us.”

“Damn! This just keeps getting better and better.” Of course neither of them appreciated my smartass comment.

“Jonas, can you come back after the funeral? You have a job too, I know. I’ve already asked a lot of you.” He had been great in Keir’s absence. No need to bite the hand that feeds you.

“Sure. I’ll be here. Joachim is taking off around noon to go to New Mexico to spend Thanksgiving with his family, so I’ll be here before Carl gets here.”

“Thanks.” I gave Jonas a back-slapping hug and walked him out.

I turned to Adonis. “Lake was here last night and did a good job on Sergeant Green. Can you help me get his body in the casket Keir uses for military funerals. Amelie said the Army chaplain from Camp Parks should be here in a couple of hours. We need to finish getting things set up, I guess.”

Adonis nodded, and I hurried to the chapel to bring down the catafalque and the casket delivered the previous day. I pushed both onto the freight elevator to take them downstairs.

When I stepped off, I saw Adonis wheeling Sergeant Green’s body out of the walk-in with the man’s spirit following behind. “Where the hell have you been?” My eyes were trained on Horace, and my voice was sharper than I intended, but I was frustrated as hell that the spirit had disappeared.

“I went to talk to Sandy, but he’s dead.”

Sandy? “Who’s Sandy?”

“He was a young guy in my unit during DS. He was such a great kid. I was redeployed after Naomi… He helped her. He got his father to give Naomi a job when she moved to get away from⁠—”

Green stopped talking and turned his head. “Who is that? Who’s calling my name?”

I glanced at Adonis and shrugged. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Me either.” Adonis opened the door of the walk-in, but we still heard nothing.

“I’ve gotta go. Where am I?”

“Dearly & Son Funeral Home. Reardon, California.”

Just like that, he was gone.

“Where the hell did he go?”

I opened the casket lid and moved things around so Adonis could place Sergeant Green inside, and then we adjusted the blanket and pillow to make it appear neater. It seemed like something Keir would do.

I hadn’t called the bank to see which location we could find Horace’s safe-deposit box. Keir would have easily handled it all, but I was less organized. I felt like a fucking slug.

“Hey! You down here?”

Michael and Doppelgänger came into the mortuary, both looking well-rested. Michael had insisted on sleeping in the room with Doppelgänger. I hadn’t asked where.

“We’re getting ready to take Sergeant Green upstairs for the viewing. The Army chaplain will be here in a little while, so you might want to make yourselves scarce.” I gently closed the lid on Horace’s husk and started to push the catafalque toward the elevator.

“I know where Keir is.” I turned to look at Michael as I waited for him to finish speaking, but he simply stared.

“Well? Don’t keep me in suspense.” I wasn’t shouting, but I was demanding.

“After the funeral. After we get the demon out of this one because we need to take him with us. Beelz will meet us there. I have an inkling we’ll need his scary ass.”

I nodded. The day was shaping up to be quite a doozy.

For the service,I wore my charcoal suit that Keir loved. Adonis wore a navy suit, and we stationed ourselves on either side of the chapel’s main entrance. It was as I’d seen my Dearly do many times before.

I was impressed by the pageantry the honor guard provided. Everyone was respectful, and I knew in my heart Keir would have done the event the justice it deserved. I just tried to mimic what I believed he’d do.

The Army chaplain, Captain Aaron Marks, arrived on time, and with his help, Amelie and I put together Horace’s eulogy. The chaplain was well-versed in the proper wording, and I was grateful. Regardless of what Horace had done after he fought for his country, he deserved a proper sendoff.

We would keep Horace at the funeral home until Thursday when Jonas had agreed to drive him to Sacramento Valley County National Cemetery. There would be no formal ceremony before his interment since there was no family. I thought it was sad, but there was nothing that could be done by me.

In attendance were members of VFW Post 67, who, like Horace, had all fought in foreign wars. They were kind enough to make a few adjustments to the setup at the front of the chapel, ensuring everything was up to Army standards.

After a special invocation, the chaplain looked at me, obviously waiting for something. Amelie slid behind me. “Get up there and thank everyone for coming.” She was whisper-shouting, and it freaked me out because she’d never done that before.

When she pinched my ass—which was unnecessary—I walked up the step and stood at the front of the chapel next to the chaplain. I tried my damnedest to remember how Keir addressed those in attendance, and I swallowed my nerves.

“Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our service for today. Thank you for coming to show your respects to Sergeant Horace Green. If you’d like to say a final goodbye, please form a line down the center aisle. There are refreshments in the hospitality suite to the right of the chapel. Thank you, again.”

I was shaking, but I thought I’d said what Keir would have offered to the mourners, though not nearly as graciously. I glanced through the crowd with my ghost-hunter eye, glad to see no dark auras or dangerous spirits in the room.

I did, however, see a few soldiers in the back row who were no longer fighting the battle on earth. I wanted to rush back to find out if they knew Sergeant Green when they were alive. Hopefully, they’d stick around, and I could talk to them later.

Once the chapel emptied, I closed the doors. I returned to the front and stared down at Sergeant Green. “Thank you for your service. You have my total respect.”

I tucked in the blanket to close the lid and return it to the mortuary after everyone had left. Then it would be time to deal with Paxton De Vil. I couldn’t wait to see that little fucker. I had several ways to deal with him. All of them ran through my mind like a movie.