Reaper Read Free Page B

my head.
    “Why are you out of breath?”
    “It, uh, was a hot shower,” I lied; I’m a horrible liar.
    “Oh, I bet it was a hot shower since you’re all out of breath. You miss me that much don’t you?” he joked.
    “Yep. You know me. Did you kill the demon yet? Can you come home?” I sank down on the couch only to feel vulnerable sitting down. I stood back up slowly walked toward the stairs.
    “Not yet,” he sighed. “There’s a ritual that forces it into corporeal form. We’re not having much success with it. I wish you were here; I know you’d get it done on the first try.”
    “Yeah, I might be able to. Hurry and come home,” I said quickly. “Because I really miss you,” I added in a voice I hoped was sexy to cover up my fear. The heater kicked on and I just about jumped out of my skin. I shivered, suddenly really cold. With the dagger still in hand, I went up to my room.
    “Are you naked?” Ethan asked.
    “No,” I said automatically. Shoot. I supposedly just got out of the shower. “I am wearing a towel, that’s it.” I turned on the light, my eyes darting all over for Romeo. He was sleeping in his hammock. I didn’t hear what Ethan was saying as I walked over to lock the ferret cage. I caught the tail end of Ethan asking me if I was still wet.
    “Yeah, I should go dry my hair,” I muttered, hoping to deflect him from trying to get me to have phone sex with him. That was just not gonna happen tonight. He pestered me some more about it and only stopped when I promised I’d send him a naughty picture. I didn’t want to get off the phone with Ethan but I felt guilty for keeping something from him. I changed the subject to my plans for fixing up the backyard and gardens, a topic boring enough to make Ethan end the conversation so I wouldn’t have to.
    I sent the picture before I’d forget and then pulled on one of Ethan’s hooded sweatshirts. I shut and locked my door, cradled the dagger, and stuck my legs under the thick, blue comforter on my bed. I felt like someone was watching me.
    I replayed everything in my head: the noises, the sink with the gross water, the TV, the Burning Man…it all seemed so real. It felt real; it was real. Wasn’t it? It was a ghost, I told myself. Sadly, that was comforting. If it was a ghost, I knew what to do. I could make it go away.
    “It was a ghost,” I told Romeo, nodding. “That’s all. A ghost and a dream. It’s not the first time a ghost took me into a weird dream world.” I got out of bed and rushed to my bookshelf, returning with a canister of salt and a bag of Devil’s Shoestring. I poured a circle of salt around the bed and stuck the dried roots under my pillow. “There, all better.”
    I didn’t feel better. For the first time since I’d lived here, I closed my blinds. There was absolutely nothing around the house except fields and cow pastures and since cars hardly drove along our road, I just didn’t see the need to draw the blinds. Or lock the turret door, for that matter.
    Next to the fireplace, there was a door that led up to a turret three stories above the ground. The only way to it was through this room. I turned the lock, wishing that there was a deadbolt on this door too. I got back in bed and turned the TV on, flipping through channels until I found something funny. I desperately missed Hunter right now.
    My connection with my Guardian had grown since I first learned who Hunter really was in October. Until then, I was under the impression he was a freakishly well behaved regular German Shepherd. We communicated telepathically, though not with full words or sentences. I couldn’t explain it to Ethan; he said it just didn’t make sense. Whatever I thought or felt, I could send to Hunter and vice versa. It was so much faster than talking. He could relay a whole message to me with just one flicker of an image through my brain.
    If I felt fear, he did too. If there was a ghost, he was the first to know. He literally would