That neighbor had to have been Reyes. And he knew what the boy had done. What would that guilt do to a person? How would it affect one’s psyche?
And the ogling didn’t stop there. I’d noticed departed hanging around more and more. But Reyes looked different to them than he did to humans. He was forever enshrouded in a dark mist, and underneath that mist was the soft glow of a fire. The angrier Reyes became, the brighter that fire. I’d seen it only once, after almost dying at the hands of a raving lunatic. And, as incredible as Reyes was in human form, he was startlingly beautiful when seen from another plane. I’d been told I could perceive things from that plane, and in that form, whenever I wanted to, but I had yet to master said talent. Because of this handicap, I wasn’t sure if the departed who followed Reyes around were like the humans – insanely attracted to him – or like some form of spiritual gawkers, unable to believe what they were seeing, curious about him, testing their own courage by how close they could get to him.
Right now, my guess would be the latter, as there was a departed woman totally in our space bubble. The blonde stood against my shoulder, staring up at Reyes in wonder. In her defense, the departed were unused to being watched back. Maybe she didn’t know we could see her. Reyes was still studying my mouth, completely ignoring her, so I turned and pinned her with an annoyed frown.
Stepping back as though coming to her senses, she cleared her throat. “Sorry,” she said a microsecond before disappearing. But not before one last longing glance at the prince of the underworld.
That answered that. At least in her case.
“Tell me what it’s like,” I said, gesturing toward the patrons with a nod. “What does it feel like to have them want you so badly? Is it, you know, because of your father?”
He dipped his head and didn’t answer for a long moment. When he did, it was a mere whisper on the air: “It feels… It feels like I’m drowning.”
I wrapped a hand behind his neck. Brought him even closer. “Reyes, I’m so sorry.”
The loose grip he’d had on my throat tightened minutely. “Your pity is hardly a step up.”
“Empathy,” I corrected, running my fingertips along the back of his neck soothingly. “And there’s little I can do about it.”
After another long moment of his probing gaze, he blinked to attention and released me. The coolness that rushed over me with his absence gave me goose bumps as he escorted me to the table. I sat down with Cookie, Uncle Bob, and my sister, Gemma, while Reyes strolled back to the kitchen to grab our lunches. Every head turned to watch him, conversations dying down as he passed, and I felt the weight of their emotions from where I sat. I felt the suffocating pressure. I felt him drowning, but he walked without betraying a hint of that distress.
The door swung back and he was already putting on the white apron he always wore. I sat there, marveling at how utterly stunning he was. Was there anything sexier than a hot guy in an apron, cooking? I could only hope he wouldn’t grow tired of me. Would we ever get tired of one another? Would our desire to be touched by the other, to be embraced, ever wane? I couldn’t imagine it, but I prayed not.
“So?” Gemma asked. Her brows arched in question as a lock of her blond hair pulled loose from a tidy chignon. She wore chignons and that particular navy blouse and skirt only when she was meeting someone important. Someone not me.
“Who’s the VIP?” I asked back as I dipped a blue corn tortilla chip into Reyes’s salsa, otherwise known as the devil’s dipping sauce. I absorbed the spice and heat with something akin to ecstasy. His salsa was becoming famous and he’d been asked to bottle it several times, but it was usually by women gazing at him with fire in their loins, and I was never sure if they were talking about bottling the salsa or Reyes himself.
I glanced over at him as he brought out our plates. Either way, I’d be the first in line to purchase at least a case.
“What VIP?” Gemma asked.
“Your duds. You never wear navy unless you’re meeting someone super important.
“Oh.” She looked down and shrugged. “It was all I had clean.”
“Ah,” I said, clearing a place for my plate. She was lying, but I’d let her. For now.
Reyes set down a plate for Cookie, Gemma, and Ubie, his long, sinuous arms flexing in a way that had me mesmerized. I tore my gaze away to see what was on the menu. Red chile enchiladas. Sweet. I glanced up at him askance, wondering where my plate was.
He waited as one of the new cooks brought up the last entrée. “I hope you like them,” he said, gesturing toward the plate.
“I love your enchiladas.” I gazed down at the flat enchiladas as he waited for us to sample them. A symphony of moans echoed around me as everyone took a bite, and while Reyes’s enchiladas were always to die for, their reactions were a mixture of ecstasy and surprise. I was a little worried Cookie was going to climax, her expression was so sensual.
More curious than ever, I buried my fork, cutting through the soft blue corn tortillas and scooping a bite into my mouth. He sank beside me, balancing on the balls of his feet as I ate – and just like Cookie, I almost climaxed. My taste buds were gifted with an explosion of unexpected flavors and textures, the spices warming my mouth.
I glanced at him. “You used chili. Oh, my god, this is amazing.”
A shy smile reshaped his features, and he bowed his head like a kid unable to take a compliment. The act was so charming, I reached out and put my hand on his cheek.
He kissed my palm quickly, then stood. “I’ll let you guys eat,” he said.
“Why don’t you join us?” Ubie asked, and I could tell the question surprised Reyes. It surprised me.
After a moment, he said, “I can’t, but thanks. I have to put out a few fires before this one —” He nodded toward me. “— runs headlong into a hot mess of trouble again.”
The appreciation in Uncle Bob’s expression was undeniable. “She’s a full-time job.”
I tried to be appalled, but when Reyes said, “She is indeed,” and bent to kiss me, my misgivings melted.
I watched him leave – his steely buttocks amazingly sexy, framed the way they were with the edges of the apron. I scooped up another bite before checking out the rest of the fare. He’d covered the papas with chili as well, topping them off with a ladle of warm red chile and cheese. It was like crack on a plate. And the scent helped mask the aroma of coffee lingering in the air. How would I ever get through the next eight months without the elixir of life?
“So, what exactly happened between you and Judge Quimby?” Ubie asked me.
I snapped out of my pity party to answer him, but changed my mind. There were some things he was better off not knowing. “I’d rather not talk about that,” I said, diving in for another bite.
“She seems to like you,” he said.
I lifted a shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. “She did seem way more understanding of the fact that I’m alive and kicking than she normally is. I wonder what changed her mind about me.”
A knowing smile flashed across his face, but he hid it quickly.
Not quickly enough, however. I gaped at him. “What?” I asked.
“What?” he asked back.
“You know something.”
He cut into an enchilada, stuffed a bite into his mouth, then said, “No, I don’t.”
I leaned close to him. “Yes, you do, so let me put it this way: You can tell me and spare yourself the embarrassment of me reminiscing about the time I caught you stumbling around in our backyard in the middle of the night screaming, ‘Stella!’ or you can sit there and squirm while I recount the entire story in great detail, including a description of your attire that fateful evening.”
He straightened. “You wouldn’t.”
“Do you know me at all? I suffered. Seeing you in that particular style of underwear? I was traumatized for hours. Maybe days.”
“That’s blackmail.”
“Duh. Do you really know something about the judge I don’t?”
/>
He caved. “I only know that you somehow helped her sister come to terms with her husband’s death.”
“Her sister?” I asked, thinking back.
“She’d been devastated and developed some kind of eating disorder.”
I gasped. “No way! That was her sister?”
“It was.”
That poor woman was so distraught over her husband’s death, she hadn’t eaten for weeks. I’d never seen anything like it. The husband had come to me and asked me to intervene. He knew she would take his passing hard, so he hadn’t crossed when he died. Together, we came up with a plan to help her cope. It basically involved me relaying his messages to her. The whole ordeal was heartbreaking, but with some professional therapy thrown in, she’d slowly come out of it. I had the most rewarding job ever.
“Who’s that?” Cookie asked, her voice sharp with concern.
I turned to see a woman speaking to Reyes near the entrance. She had thick black hair that fell like silk over her shoulders and startlingly blue eyes.
“Is that the newswoman from Channel 7?” Gemma asked.
“I don’t know,” Cookie said, and I felt her ire rise. “But she is getting just a little too friendly, don’t you think?”
Cook was right: The woman was leaning in to Reyes as she spoke to him. She placed a hand on his shoulder when he apparently said something funny. It was an intimate gesture that had me seeing a vivid, crystal scarlet. I was used to women fawning all over themselves to get closer to him, to touch him, but this was ridiculous.
“You have got to get a ring on that boy,” Gemma said. “Speaking of which, did you look at those links I sent you? Those are some prime venues, and you two need to decide on a date soon if you want to book any of them.”
“Oh,” Cookie said, combing through her bag, “and we need to decide on where to have the shower.”
“I showered this morning,” I said absently.
Gemma ignored me. “The shower, yes, but are we doing one shower for both the wedding and the baby, or one for each?”
“Heavens, that’s a good point. Charley, what do you think?”
“I like Reyes’s shower,” I said, not bothering to look at them. Instead, I watched as the newswoman, whom I now recognized from the six o’clock news, spoke softly to Reyes. She laughed at something he said, taking the opportunity to toss her hair over her shoulder flirtatiously.
Reyes glanced back, then realizing I was watching, angled himself between the newswoman and me. Completely affronted, I stiffened.
“Oh, I like that place, too,” Cookie said, responding to something Gemma had said. “It’s gorgeous in the summer.”
“True, but I think it will be too late to get it for this summer. It books fast.”
“Okay, well, what else do you have?”
As Cookie and Gemma planned my wedding, a job I did not envy in the least, I watched Reyes. I tried to single out his emotions, but there was so much blisteringly raw lust in the room, I couldn’t get past it all. Damn him and his sexual tractor beam.
A giggle floated toward me, and I saw the woman’s head tilt back again. Clearly, Reyes was slapping on the charm, but why? Was this about an interview? He’d been asked a dozen times for one and never gave any of the other reporters the time of day. Even 60 Minutes had wanted to do a story on him and got the door slammed in their face. But this woman came in, pinned him with a glittering smile, and he caved?
That was not like Reyes.
“I need a pretzel,” I said, ignoring my food.
Before any of them could say anything, I rose and walked to the bar, which put me a few precious feet closer to the happy couple. If he were ever to break up with me, I would so be that stalker ex-girlfriend who stole his underwear and hid in the hedges outside his bedroom window. But finally I had a clear path and could read Reyes’s emotions. Only I still couldn’t feel him.
He was blocking me!
He’d done that trick before, but it took a concentrated effort on his part. The sting stemming from the fact that he was doing so while a gorgeous woman flirted with him hit me hard and quick, and he visibly sucked in a lungful of air when it did. He’d felt my reaction to his reaction to my reaction at having a hussy put her hands on my man. But still he stood with his back to me, barring me from the conversation.
Fine. I grabbed a pretzel out of a bowl on the bar and turned my back to him as well. If he wanted to block his emotions from me, I would do the same to him.
Except I didn’t know how. Damn it, I needed The Idiot’s Guide to Grim Reaperism.
I took another quick peek from over my shoulder as I headed back to our table. The woman’s hand was resting on his arm again, her fingers curling over his biceps clearly visible in the outlines of his tee, and I nearly tripped.
Well, okay, I did trip, but I caught myself quickly, grabbed my plate and fork, and said, “I’m eating in my office. I have some work to do.”
“Charley,” Gemma said, her tone scolding, “we need to make some decisions.”
“I have complete faith in you,” I said before taking off for my hidey-hole.
As far as I was concerned, if he was going to flirt so openly with a skank who wore enough hair spray to thin the ozone a good two inches, then he could have at it. I had better things to do with my time than watch him. For example, I needed to put the song “Jolene” on repeat and listen to it about a thousand times. It was the song where Dolly Parton begs Jolene not to take her man. But I wouldn’t beg. I would never beg. It would be really bizarre if her name were Jolene, though.
I took the interior stairs back to my office, refusing to spare another glance his way. Just as I put my plate on my desk, I noticed a priest waiting in Cookie’s office. He was wearing a jacket and jeans, but the collar gave it away every time. We’d apparently forgotten to lock the door, but in all my years as a PI, a priest was new. I felt like I should do the sign of the cross as I walked forward, but I could never remember if it was up-down-left-right or up-down-right-left. I was so bad with directions.
“I’m sorry,” I said, going over and holding out my hand. It was shaking even more now than it had been that morning. Shaking from too much coffee was one thing, but shaking from none at all? Utter agony. Torturous. Inhumane. Of course, Reyes and his new gal pal could have had something to do with my trembling. “I didn’t mean to leave anyone waiting here,” I continued. “I’m Charley.”
He stood and took my hand into his. He looked like one of those jolly priests who preached about hellfire and damnation but then qualified his sermon with an assurance that if his parishioners strayed, they need only repent to be washed of their sin. I’d tried to be washed of my sin once, but I ran out of Dial. Tricky business, that.
“I’m Father Glenn,” he said, his voice and manner full of exuberance. He had sandy hair, thinning up top, and wire-framed glasses fitted over chubby cheeks. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your lunch.” He gestured toward the lunch he could see through the adjoining door. It sat on my desk, calling my name. Metaphorically.
My stomach growled on cue. I offered a sheepish grin, then said, “Oh, no, I’m saving it for later. I’m not the least bit hungry.”
“Gutsy,” he said as I sat in the chair next to the one he’d been sitting in.
“Gutsy?”
He followed suit, crossing his legs to get comfortable. “Fibbing to a priest,” he explained.
“Oh, that.” I laughed and waved it off. “I do that kind of crap all the time. Except to my clients,” I assured him. “I don’t lie to my clients.”
“Then I hope to become one.”
I liked him. “What can I help you with?”
“Well, I’d like to think we could help each other.”
“Works for me.”
He settled back into his seat and then looked at me pointedly. “What do you know about possession?”
Ah, a supernatural gig. Interesting. “More than I’d like, sadly.”
“Do you know wh
at the three kinds of possession are?”
“There are three? I just thought possession was, you know, possession. An entity takes over a body, and that body is then possessed.”
The scent of New Mexico–grown red chile infiltrated every air molecule around me. I had no choice but to inhale as my mouth flooded in response and my stomach growled again.
“You’re not entirely wrong,” he said, taking an envelope out from a pocket inside his jacket, “but that’s only one kind, and despite the fact that it’s the least common, thanks to Hollywood, it’s the most well known. I just thought with your… background, you’d know more.”
“My background?”
He took the envelope into both hands and held it while we spoke. “Yes. Your experience.”
I shifted in my chair. “And what do you know about my experience?” It wasn’t a defensive question at all. Just a curious one.
“Well, let’s just say when I discovered what I discovered —” He tapped the envelope. “I did some research on you.”
Wonderful. I suddenly felt the need to explain that night with the chess club. It was all a blur, but I was certain of one thing: Chad Ackerman’s tattoo of a female impersonator was not my fault. Not entirely. “So you went down to the local library?” I teased him.
“Actually, the Vatican has a rather extensive file on you.”
“Shut up,” I said, flattered and appalled at the same time.
“No, it’s true. You’re of great interest to them. I thought you should know.”