The silence in the crypt is absolute. Maybe I’m just being paranoid. Maybe I actually won this one without any major cosmic consequences.
After debating my options for a few minutes, I shrug.
I can sit here for the rest of the night, waiting for something that might never happen, or I can finish my patrol, go home, take a couple of painkillers and stick an icepack on my head.
I choose the latter option.
If Miss Golden Glow decides to make a comeback, hole in face and all, I am sure I will be notified. In the meantime, sitting here in the cold and dark, with only old man Blackfen for company, doesn’t sound so great.
With one last sweep of the torch and finding nothing, I step out of the crypt and put all my weight behind closing the door. It bangs shut, and I turn from it, heading off quickly to patrol the corner near the main gate.
I look back over my shoulder, unable to help it. The prickle on the back of my neck is unmistakable, but the crypt remains closed and dark. Shaking my head, I force my feet through the wet grass, away from the crypt and towards the wrought iron gates. The feeling of being watched doesn’t fade. It intensifies, crawling over my skin like a dozen ghostly spiders. I blame the adrenaline crash. My body is aching, my head is throbbing, and my imagination is clearly working overtime. It was a clean kill. Messy, but clean. I’ve dealt with far worse, all things considered,than a megalomaniac creature who wants to take over the world.
Unfortunately, the theme tune to Pinky and the Brain enters my head and plays on repeat as I sidestep a tree root.
But, still. Every instinct I have screams that this is wrong. The air shifts, growing colder still, and the cloying scent of sandalwood returns, this time mixed with the sharp, clean smell of petrichor and something that reminds me of shadows.
“She always was one for dramatic entrances. And exits, it seems.”
The male voice with a soft Irish lilt halts me in my tracks.
I spin, my blade a blur of silver as it comes up to an offensive position. My heart leaps into my throat. Lounging against a massive Celtic cross, as if he’s waiting for a bus, is a man so hot, it should be illegal. He’s dressed in a dark, impeccably tailored suit that has no business being in a sodden graveyard. His hair is the colour of a raven’s wing, and his eyes, even in the gloom, glitter with an unnatural silver light.
He’s no mortal.
“Who are you?” I growl.
He pushes away from the stone, a slow, deliberate movement that is utterly without threat and yet menacing all the same. A faint, condescending smirk plays on his lips. “A word of advice, little slayer? Next time you stab a goddess in the face, make sure she stays down.”
Chapter 3
Nyssa
My mouth falls open. “Goddess?”
“Hmm,” he says, moving closer, twirling something between his fingers, almost obsessively.
“Whoa,” I say, lifting the knife higher. “Stay right there.”
Stay right there?What the fuck? Stay right there while I what? Converse with you and not kill you?
His smirk widens, crinkling the corners of his silver eyes. “I’m not here to hurt you.” He stops, a respectable distance away, but the space between us still crackles with an energy that makes my teeth ache. He flips the thing in his hand—a silver coin, ancient and worn—and catches it without looking. “Trying to kill me would be a mistake.”
My grip on the blade is so tight that my knuckles are white. I’m exhausted, bruised, and my brain feels like it’s been sloshed around in my skull. I am in no mood for cryptic warnings from a supernatural being dressed for a GQ photoshoot. “And letting you live isn’t? And I’d do more thantry, arsehole. I’d do it so hard, your head would spin.”
His gaze turns from amused to heated. “Do it so hard,” he murmurs.
My cheeks practically set on fire as I realise what I said, or more like how he took what I said and made it sexual. Typical guy. At least, typical of the guys I know.
Clearing my throat, I glare at him. “What do you know about that bitch? Talk and then I’ll kill you.”
He laughs. It’s a soft chuckle that has darkness seeped into every beat. “Still with the killing.”
“It’s what I do. I kill monsters.”
“Who says I’m a monster?”
“You look like one and lurk around in graveyards after the apocalypse has just been averted, making snappy comments. Screams evil to me.”
