Chapter 7

7

ATTICUS

A tticus paced.

He directed his attention to carefully rolling through each of his toes with every step that he took, noting the soft tickle of the rug against his bare feet.

It was futile, really, a worthless attempt at distraction, when, in reality, he was the eye of the storm. Everywhere he looked was a harsh truth that needed confronting, swirling around him, taunting him, holding a mirror up to his cowardice.

Sharing a lover with William was nothing new. Sharing a woman, even, was routine for them. But every past exchange had very clearly been transactional. Everyone benefited from the encounter, everyone was given orgasms that left their legs shaking, and then they were gone. It was an unspoken understanding that had worked seamlessly for the past century.

But this woman. Tatiana. Her name rolled off of the tongue like mead, a heady sweetness that warmed his body from the inside out. And fuck, she had been sweet. She walked into their dynamic with open eyes and participated without hesitation. Every time he had looked in her eyes he'd seen desire and trust — a heady combination for a man like him.

But it was not his response to her that had him pacing like a caged animal.

No, it was William's.

His William, his pup, his everything . Atticus tore a hand through his rumpled hair, the flash of pain as he tugged at the roots serving to ground him for a brief, blissful second.

That morning, in their austere and lifeless kitchen, watching Tatiana make them pie , of all things, William had looked deeply, blissfully, at peace. Atticus saw the way that he watched the woman, the way that his eyes lingered on her bosom, the way that his smile softened when she spoke. He had looked content in a way that Atticus was not sure he'd ever seen.

He shook his head. All that he wanted was William's happiness, and yet… And yet. Seeing another person elicit that response from his lover had unsettled something. It wasn't jealousy – no, one didn't make it hundreds of years into companionship plagued by something so basic – but it was still a feeling that stung. It shed light on the fears that he'd harbored, that he might not be enough for William. That, once it was just the two of them, with the work and obligations stripped away, he would come up short.

The air before him rippled, and Atticus didn't have time to brace himself before William appeared, his face wild and twisted with rage, and shoved him in the chest.

Atticus stumbled back, quickly righting himself and lifting his hands to defend himself. He might be taller, but William was stronger, his muscles flexing as he advanced toward him.

"William," Atticus growled, a clear warning in his tone.

William shook his head. "What in the fuck is wrong with you?" His voice was an unrestrained rumble, more canine than man, and his eyes flashed yellow.

Atticus tried a different approach. Extending a hand, he softened his voice. "Love," he began.

"No, Atticus." William's whole body shook with anger. "She wanted this. She wanted us , and you sent her away."

Fuck , he wished it was that simple. "You heard her, love! She has a dream that she can realize here. A chance to do what she could not while alive."

Some of the anger faded, and Atticus could see the full weight of William's devastation in the red rimming his eyes and his downturned mouth. "Do you know what she asked me? At headquarters?"

Atticus shook his head, knowing full well that whatever it was was going to wreck him. He knew it in his soul.

William wiped a hand over his mouth. "She asked me where we lived. What region we were in."

A pained sound rumbled in his chest. "No," Atticus rasped, shaking his head.

"She did," William hissed, a bit of anger bleeding back into his voice. "Now look me in the eye again and tell me that you are certain she did not want us."

"We have a job to do, William. Responsibilities that don't allow for lasting entanglements."

William barked out a harsh laugh. "You are so full of shit, Atti. That job we have? With all of those pesky responsibilities you like to talk about? We sit at desks. We review memos. We check boxes on fucking performance reviews . It is a job we can walk away from whenever we please. You know that and I know that. We have overstayed the typical tenure of Grim Reaper by decades, Atti. Marjorie and Jeremiah are both fully trained and waiting in the wings. Waiting for you to decide that you can give up your precious job and settle into an eternity of anonymity."

Atticus felt his upper lip curl, a familiar, ruthless need to defend himself rising in his chest. "That is not what this is about," he snarled.

"Then tell me!" William's shout echoed off of the obscenely high ceilings, the sound waves getting lost in the millions of nooks and crannies, the rooms they never used, the spaces that remained cold and empty. "Tell me why you refuse to give this up. I know that you hate this fucking house. I know that you are not particularly invested in the work of managing this infinite and eternal place. So tell me, Atti. What is it?"

Icy cold fingers constricted around his throat. How was Atticus supposed to explain that without the work, without being the Reaper to William's Grim, there would be nothing but the two of them? Nothing but Atticus with all of his shortcomings and William with his seemingly endless light and spirit. How was he supposed to tell him that he was terrified at the thought of snuffing out that light with his own darkness and melancholy? How was he, Atticus, supposed to make William happy?

William backed away from him, and Atticus wanted to reach for him, to tug him into his embrace and plant reassuring kisses on every bit of bare skin he could find.

"Coward," William said, golden eyes boring into Atticus' own. "You are a coward, Atticus."

Atticus could do nothing but watch him walk away, damned by his own silence.

A tticus' brogues clicked on the marble floors as he walked into the Central Office.

Immediately people jumped into action, rising from their desks and asking how they could assist him.

"Most recent files," he commanded, and within seconds a stack of folders was placed in his hand.

He flipped through them quickly. His mind was sharp, focused, his purpose distilled and refined in the wake of his discussion with William.

When he found what he was looking for, he handed the rest of the stack to the closest employee, and disappeared on the spot.

Rather than bother with walking, Atticus opted to transport directly into the middle of Abimbola's office. Just like the rest of the Afterworld consultant's offices, it had a small seating area, a low table displaying materials for each of the Regions, and a desk tucked into a corner.

The man who sat at the desk looked up, blinked his bright eyes once, and then returned to his paperwork. "Boss," he said. "What can I do for you?"

Atticus slapped the open file down on the desk. "I need to know where you sent the woman."

Abimbola leaned forward, and then glanced up, flashing his broad, white smile at him. "Tatiana. A very nice girl. Very nice."

Atticus narrowed his eyes.

"You know I can't tell you that, boss," Abimbola said carefully, his brown fingers tapping on the edge of the desk.

"I know that."

"So why are you here?"

Atticus frowned. "I have made an error and I need to fix it."

"She did seem sad, boss." Atticus glanced up and caught Abimbola's small smile. "As though maybe she did not want to go anywhere after all."

Atticus felt his heart plummet, seeming to land somewhere below his stomach. With a nod to Abimbola, he disappeared again.

T he Afterworld Department of Resource Allocation was a low-ceilinged, wide room that was divided up into a maze of cubicles and walls of filing cabinets. Employees scurried about like ants, constantly in motion.

Atticus walked right up to the machine from which a near constant stream of applications emerged, printed in fine black print on thick, white paper. He grabbed one, skimmed the applicant, and tossed it aside. As he was scanning the next one, he saw, out of the corner of his eye, an employee come and retrieve the discarded application. Good , he thought. Their work would carry on in spite of his presence.

Time blurred as he scanned document after document. At some point an employee had placed a chair behind him, and he collapsed, his hands never ceasing their motions — grab, scan, discard, repeat.

What if there was a version of their eternity where it wasn't simply Atticus and William? What if he wasn't alone in loving his beautiful pup, in luring his happiness to the surface? What if Atticus could open his heart to another?

After a life on Earth that had been riddled by insufficiency, by solitude, he knew that he clung to his love for William like it might be his salvation. Born to a poor mother who served as a custodian at a university in Osaka and a British scholar of a father who had no qualms with forcing himself on the local help, Atticus had known only a brief taste of his home country before he'd been ripped away by his father, who insisted on bringing him back to England so that he could oversee his education. Atticus would never forget the final glimpse he'd had of his mother standing on the dock, her face blank, but her eyes so clearly conveying the extent of her desperation.

He had never seen her again.

His life had then consisted of days shut away in a room where an array of private tutors instructed him on Latin and Greek and the early European iterations of alchemical studies and botany. He was smart, curious, and powerless, but it was all that he had known.

He was twenty when his French tutor grabbed his cock through his tweed trousers. Later that week he had sucked the handsome young man's cock, receiving very detailed instructions (in French) about how to best go about pleasuring a man.

The physical explorations escalated for the next month, culminating in the day when his father, hearing the rhythmic banging of the settee against the wall, barged through the door to investigate.

What followed was undoubtedly an accident. His father, while cold and reserved, was not a violent man. However, the sight of his son getting fucked by Jean Alain must have been enough to ignite his temper, because one misplaced shove had flung Atticus sideways, where his head met the stone of the hearth, killing him instantly.

Such a silly way to die, he thought, his mind immediately conjuring Tatiana's reaction to hearing that she'd been hit by a vehicle.

Could he? Could Atticus stomach the unknown for the sake of an eternity that could possibly be more than he had ever allowed himself to imagine?

He had been a coward, and it had cost him the happiness of the man he cared about more than anyone else in the universe and the possibility, the maybe, of someone else he could care for too.

Now, it was up to him to fix it.