Chapter 7

"Your cheeks are flushed," said the very stranger I had hoped to see from right outside my door. "Is everything all right?"

Oddly enough, from the parking lot, the spirits didn't have much to say about our clandestine meeting.

"Rough night." I dropped my hands into my lap. "What are you doing here?"

"I only just arrived when I saw you pull in." A smile flickered across his lips. "It's hard to miss your car."

"True." I felt a return smile growing. "She's a showstopper."

"You invited me to dinner last night, but I…" He crouched to put our heads at the same level. "I would like to make amends. Tonight, I brought you dinner."

"How did you know when to expect me?" A trickle of concern filtered in. "I didn't know to expect me."

I was supposed to be home, reassuring Josie, checking on Matty. Not here with him.

"You come every night and every morning five days a week." He shoved his hair out of his eyes. "I shouldn't have said that, should I?" He raked his teeth over his bottom lip as my stillness telegraphed my unease. "I told you I'm not good with?—"

"—the living," I finished for him, curious if this meant he lived nearby and saw me drive past both ways. As he said, it was hard to miss my wagon, and a soul devourer would need a steady supply of spirits. Did his insight into my comings and goings have to be more complicated than that? "Does that mean…? Are you…?" I cringed away from the question, but I still wanted the answer. I wanted to understand him. I wanted to understand how to protect the cemetery from him too. "Now I'm being rude."

That he knew my schedule flattered as much as it concerned me, but here I was in the cemetery at night with no witnesses. And there he crouched, about as menacing as a bunny rabbit and twice as cute.

"Give me your hand." He didn't reach in. He let me decide if I wanted to reach out. "I won't harm you."

As my palm slid against his, I laughed to find his skin warm. "Alive then."

"Yes," he agreed after a moment of consideration. "For the most part."

The contradiction should have confounded me, but with him, the answer somehow fit.

"That should be comforting, and yet…" I realized I was still holding on to him and let go. "So…dinner?"

In for a penny, in for a pound. I was here. I chose to come here. I might as well do recon while I was at it.

"Just there." He indicated a paper takeout bag near the front gate. "Does this mean you'll join me?"

"Sure." I started rolling up my window. "Let me tell my sister I'll be home late."

Once he retreated to the gate, I pulled out my phone and hoped I wasn't making a huge mistake.

gt;I'm at Bonaventure. I want to walk for a bit before I come home. Is that okay?

gt;gt;Sure thing, Mary. See me before you crash.

gt;I will.

Exiting the wagon, I chewed my lip, debating how to lead our conversation in a direction that got me answers and startled to find him already inside the cemetery, waiting on the other side of the gate.

"Having second thoughts?" He lifted the bag by its handles. "I would understand if you chose to leave."

"You underestimate me. I've moved on to third thoughts. Maybe even fourth." I climbed the fence with extra attention to avoid embarrassing myself. I jumped from the top, landed in a crouch, and dusted off my dirty hands. "Where to?"

"An appropriate venue for us."

Without a backward glance, he set out, allowing me to decide if I trusted him enough to follow him even deeper into the cemetery. I waited to see if any spirits would caution me against it, but they must have given me up as a lost cause. They didn't utter a single word of warning for me.

Or maybe they had realized he wasn't the trouble they originally thought him to be.

"I'm going to feel super awkward when my sister grills me if I have to admit I didn't catch your name."

"You may call me Kierce." He shortened his stride. "What should I call you?"

"Frankie."

"Frankie?"

"It's short for Mary Frances."

"Pleased to meet you, Frankie." He guided me into section H. "I hope you don't mind the setting."

Much to my macabre delight, he had chosen a table tomb, a Victorian-era relic. The carved marble table, its legs thick columns, boasted an inscription in the top. Two folding chairs he must have borrowed from the administrative building sat at either end.

"Victorians held a more charitable view on death," he—Kierce—said as he set the table with sandwiches and chips. He'd also brought icy cold bottles of water. "Mourning was de rigueur. The mortality rates were so high, it's understandable they romanticized the act or transformed their resting places into gardens."

As far as classic examples of Victorian cemeteries go, you couldn't find a lovelier one than Bonaventure. Grassy expanses meant for children to play or families to picnic, curving paths lined with flowers and the iconic live oaks. It was a garden, filled with gorgeous sculptures that just happened to mark graves.

Table tombs like this one, and there were a pair of them, were meant to give the family a place to gather for a meal to reminisce about their loved ones or spend quality time together. The tradition had been an oddity to most people who first learned about the tombs—or the notion of cemeteries as parks—on one of the myriad cemetery tours offered, but I thought it was a beautiful way to remember the dead.

"And were you around to share these charitable views?"

"In one manner or another, yes."

Familiar with the lifespans of vampires, necromancers, and fae, I wasn't shocked by his confession.

Pulling out my seat at the foot of the table, he waited for me to sit before pushing it in. The chair wasn't quite the right height, but I didn't let that stop my enjoyment. He sat at the head, attention on his portion of the spread as if he had never seen food in his life.

"Do you bring women here often?" I took a bite of my sandwich. "Or am I special?"

"You're more special than you know." He went through the motions of unwrapping his sandwich and opening his chips. "It's been a long while since anyone…" his forehead creased, "…made the effort to socialize worthwhile."

"I'm flattered." I watched him move his meal around without eating any. "This was a nice surprise."

"I'm glad you think so." He traced letters in the inscription below his hand. "Why do you come here?"

"For peace." I breathed easier in cemeteries. "For work." I bit into a chip. "I love it here."

"It's a beautiful place." He managed a faint smile as a bat whizzed past. "I prefer it in the dark."

"I do too." I made it almost halfway through my sandwich before noticing he hadn't taken a bite of his. "I'm not sure if it's my nature or my personal preference."

Kierce caught me watching him and abandoned the pretense, refolding his sandwich in its wrapper. "I ruined things, didn't I?"

"Hey, no." I could have kicked myself. "No one has ever gone through this much trouble for me."

"I find that difficult to believe." He cleaned his place and then mine, careful to return the leftovers and the trash to the bag. "You're easy to talk to, and you've been kind to me. Do you realize how rare that is? I'm too old to be anything but what I am, and the strangeness in me, the otherness, frightens most people."

Easy to talk to. Kind. All that was missing was him assuring me I had a great personality.

Cringe.

Just what every girl wants to hear.

"I'm sorry you've been treated that way."

Kindness was hard to come by in this world. He was right about that much. More so for the outliers like us. Plenty of people treated me like I had a disease after they learned about my death affinity. People feared those who were different, and Kierce was different even by my standards. I didn't have to be his girlfriend or whatever to be his friend. Whether this connection between us went anywhere or not, I could give him that. I could be that. A friend.

"It's for the best." He hesitated beside me. "Are you ready to go?"

Our interlude might have lasted thirty minutes, and here he was shuffling me toward the gate.

"Yeah." I rose before he touched my chair. "I should get home before my sister worries."

"Would you like me to walk you out?" He began folding the chairs. "I don't mind."

"I know the way." I felt like a dork when I lifted my hand. "See you around."

A text distracted me, and a familiar weight on my heart eased as I read it.

gt;gt;Matty's awake.

gt;I'm on my way.

gt;gt;We're about to eat. Should I save you a plate?

gt;Yes, please. I'm starving.

When I reached the wagon, a simple brown bag sat on the front seat. I must have forgotten to lock the doors in my eagerness to take Kierce up on his offer. I unrolled the top, glanced inside, and found a sandwich and bag of chips identical to the ones Kierce had served me. As if he had anticipated his awkwardness would ruin things and hadn't wanted me to go home hungry.

I couldn't decide if I was touched or sad or both. But his trick left me more intrigued than ever.

Josie metme in the yard with a golden apple fresh from the tree. I could tell by the faint sheen of vitality her magic left on everything she grew for a few minutes after she picked it. I accepted the new fruit with a critical eye, since she always wanted honest feedback, and sank my teeth into its crisp flesh. The tangy sweetness dribbled down my chin, and I shot her a thumbs-up.

"This is phenomenal." I finished chewing. "By far your best cross yet."

"I think so too," she gushed, stealing it back for a bite. "I can't wait to bake with it."

"I can't wait to eat what you bake with it." I nudged her toward the stairs. "How's Matty?"

A quick check of the bench outside the office confirmed that Mrs. Minchin hadn't returned yet. Likely an overnighter then. Who could blame her with so many visitors? I bet her grandkids got a pass on bedtime when she was home to stay up late and bake cookies.

"I got some food down him, but he was too tired to wait up for you."

"Sorry about that." The paper bag I had tucked behind me crinkled when I gripped the rail. "Tonight has been something else."

"What's that?" She lifted my arm, peering around me. "You stopped for food?"

"Not exactly." Heat prickled in my cheeks. "Let's get inside, and then I'll tell you everything."

Thirty minutes later, we were sitting at her table, and I decided everything had been too much for Josie.

"You've been hooking up with a stranger in the cemetery?"

"No." I choked on my water. "We just walk around and talk and then he vanishes into thin air."

"Are you insane?" She jabbed a finger at the bag of food she refused to let me eat. "This Kierce could be a psycho killer. He might have poisoned your food. He wouldn't even have to leave to dump your body. You were already in a cemetery."

"I hang around in cemeteries." I twirled my bottlecap on the table. "Does that make me a psycho killer?"

"You're a necromancer. You're supposed to be creepy and mysterious."

"Whatever he is, maybe he's supposed to be creepy and mysterious too."

The flat look she cut me made me shrink under her stare, so I circled back to Harrow and away from Kierce.

"It could be worse." I tried cheering her up, but I could already tell she wasn't buying what I was selling. "Harrow could be a sentinel and not an Unmentionable."

"This is a nightmare." She shoved back from the table. "I'm making a salad. Do you want a salad?"

Garlic bread and red sauce heavy with basil perfumed the air, but she had forgotten the spaghetti.

"Do you have to ask?" I sat back and watched her piece together her favorite comfort food. If only salad was my comfort food. Instead of carbs. Delicious carbs. Like those going to waste in the pot on the stove and the pan in the oven. "I reached out to Vi for guidance on Ormewood breaking her binding and the results of the summoning. I should hear back in a day or two."

"How is Vi?" She popped a cherry tomato into her mouth. "You haven't visited her in forever."

Years ago, after I recovered from Harrow's betrayal, I accepted things had to change. For my family's sake, and for mine.

To keep me off the Society's radar, I had to learn absolute control. I couldn't afford to make mistakes. Not with my gift or with my trust. To muddy the waters further, I trained for ten years with a mambo in New Orleans. The drive home on weekends had been brutal, twenty hours round trip, but I hadn't been willing to leave my siblings alone while I honed my craft.

Vi was a local institution, and she didn't leave the city. Ever. I wasn't sure the spirits who whispered in her ears allowed it. She and I weren't the same, but there was enough overlap she taught me the basics. And, living in New Orleans for a decade, she also taught me how to eat. Her cooking alone took me from a size six to a size ten. The rest of my curves I blamed on easy access to fresh-from-the-fryer beignets piled high with powdered sugar, pecan pralines, and bread pudding swimming in rich bourbon sauce.

And jambalaya. And shrimp and grits. And muffulettas. And crawfish étouffée.

I figured if I couldn't escape the old fears that one day our good luck would run out, that our food would run out, that we would return to scraping by on handouts, on charity, and on whatever Josie coaxed out of the ground for us, then I would rather eat those fears than let them gnaw on me until I splintered into the nothing I had come from.

"Good." I drummed my fingers on the table. "Busy."

We carved out time for a video chat every month to gossip and talk shop, but it was hard to catch her between them. Her services were highly sought after, and she had other business with the dead too.

With my powers fluctuating, I might have to spend a week with her for evaluation. A tune-up, if you will.

"Everyone thinks death means eternal slumber and an end to all their worries, but you're proof the dead have just as many problems as the living."

"Living or dead," I agreed, "people are people."

"You'll have to source another donor." She placed a bowl in front of me. "Do you have one lined up?"

"In three months." I stabbed a crisp bibb lettuce leaf and shoveled it in. "I can wait that long."

The timeline wasn't definite, but I had a list of potential donors who had sought me out for the bargain I alone could offer. A month to set their affairs in order after their death. To say their goodbyes. To do whatever they had left undone in life. Plus, a lump sum payment that went to their families or to a charity of their choice once their remains were in my possession. They also got to pick their nickname.

Mini Vasquez, the next donor in line, had chosen Camaro, after her first car. Her oldest brother had stolen her keys and wrecked it three months after she turned sixteen. The family hadn't had insurance, so the car was a total loss. This was a memorial to that first love, really.

"What happens to Blazer?" She slumped into her chair. "Will these 514 police people cremate her?"

Unclaimed bodies were either cremated and later scattered or buried in a pauper's grave by the county.

"No." I dragged my next leaf through a puddle of raspberry vinaigrette. "She comes to me."

Loaners were a mixed bag. Most families, blood or chosen, handled the last rites. But some left their final wishes with me. For those going to their family, I returned a magically preserved body after twenty-four months, the term of the lease, and they handled the rest. For those left in my care, the sky was the limit.

Stabbing a shredded carrot with more force than necessary, she twirled her fork. "Harrow agreed to it?"

"Yeah." Annoyed all over again at what he hadn't told me, I took her lead and stabbed a cube of cheese. "As soon as the coroner's done, they'll release her to me."

Which reminded me, I had to call Ormewood's daughter in the morning and check on the grandkids.

Filling in the details for her, when I had so few to share about her mother, ought to be loads of fun.

"You look ready to tip into your bowl." Josie poked my hand with her fork. "Go to bed."

"Let me help you clean up before I go." I gathered our dishes, scraped them clean over the compost bin, then loaded everything into the dishwasher. "I'm expecting a client tomorrow. A return. From Mrs. Minchin. I have a few things to do for Harrow too."

"I'm happy to cover for you in the office if you need me."

"Thanks." I slung my arms around her neck. "Love you, Mary."

"Love you too, Mary." She hugged me back twice as hard. "Sleep tight." As I closed the door behind me, I heard her mutter, "Don't let the psycho killers bite."

Chuckling, I made my way down the stairs to my apartment. I let myself in, grumbling over the necessity of a shower. Only the knowledge I had to wash off the morgue and the summoning convinced me to get naked, but that was all the conviction left in me tonight.

I fell asleep face-down with my hair soaking my pillow.