With a quick wave and a smile I did not feel, I headed to the highway and a date with Death.
Chapter 5
THE CASINO was impossible to miss. Nestled in a valley and built over what used to be a roadside fruit stand with a wheat field behind it, the local native tribe had installed an inviting collection of buildings. The casino was nicely faced, with deep orange and white brickwork, and each of the connecting buildings spread like a small city just east of twisty Highway 18, which was the main road between the capital city of Oregon and the coast.
Used to be tourists only came in from the Willamette Valley to get to the beach and ocean. Now more people stopped here at the casino than made it over to the coastal towns.
Dad had grouched about it, and didn’t much like it when the casino became the meeting place for the gods. But I liked it. I liked the noise and lights, the excitement of people making those big and little wins.
Everyone deserved a few lucky breaks in their life. Why not here?
The fact that it had also attracted the attention of the gods was fine with me. It was nicer to deal with beings of universal power here, than in the old gas station and bait shop we used to meet up in.
I parked on the far side of the lot and left my jacket and badge in the Jeep. I didn’t like bringing attention to my profession when I was meeting with deities.
Since I’d rolled straight out of bed and hit the ground running, I hadn’t had time to pull together my casual professional look.
What was I wearing anyway?
I glanced down: jeans, boots, and Dad’s Grateful Dead T-shirt.
Great. Of all the T-shirts to be wearing when meeting Death for the first time, it had to be this one.
“Hopefully Death has a sense of humor,” I muttered. “Or an appreciation for classic rock.”
I dragged the rubber band out of my hair and combed fingers through it, trying to smooth a few tangles.
“You got this, Delaney,” I said as I slicked back my hair and tucked the rubber band in my front pocket. “Reed family hasn’t met a deity we can’t handle.” Although we’d never, apparently, met Death.
The casino was cool and well lit, little pockets of shadow strategically placed to let the lights from the machines shine out invitingly like stars twinkling in a dusky sky.
I made my way past the main game room, a gift shop, and to the coffee shop at the far end of the building.
Since it was still early, there were only three people in the café. A gray-haired woman in a bright pink sweater and a younger woman wearing a yellow pantsuit chatted at a table in the front.
There, at the back of the place, sat a man in black.
Death, I presumed.
He stared out the window at the forested hills that drew off into ever-rising blues of the distance, his face in profile to me.
If I didn’t know what he was, if I couldn’t sense the power he carried, I would immediately know he wasn’t from around here.
He was very thin, very pale, and sat very stiffly. Only the fingertips of his long hands rested on the edge of the table, like a piano player paused mid-song. His hair was black and meticulously trimmed. There wasn’t a wrinkle on a face that seemed to be so much older than it appeared.
When he turned his eyes to me, they were gravestone black and devoid of humanity.
It was like staring into an empty gallon bucket of ice cream: both sad and disconcerting.
His gaze lowered to my shirt, and one eyebrow twitched ever so slightly.
I crossed the room toward him.
“Reed Daughter.” He spoke in a cultured accent. I swore the temperature in the room dipped by five degrees. “Join me.”
I did so, settling down into the chair opposite him. Most gods didn’t like idle chitchat, so I got right down to brass tacks. “Thanatos. I am here because you have requested to vacation in Ordinary, Oregon.”
It was formality, but words were a binding thing among deities, so words needed to be said.
