Page 39 of Reaper and Ruin

X grabbed his hand. “I’ll supply my own costume.” He glanced over at me. “You can sew, right? I’m thinking a black snake. With giant fangs. And sequins!”

I rolled my eyes, but X didn’t notice. He’d already turned his attention back to the coach. “I’ll be the best damn mascot this team has ever seen.”

“You’d be the only mascot this team has ever seen,” the coach countered dryly.

“What do you have to lose?” I asked. “You aren’t paying him. He’ll supply everything. And I think you’ve already seen, he can be quite entertaining.”

“What’s funnier than a hockey mascot who can’t skate?” Levi backed up my argument.

The coach blinked fast, glancing between me, Levi, and X, and then shook his head and threw his hands up, clearly bamboozled. “Okay, okay. If I say yes, will you get off my ice so I can actually start the tryouts?”

I clapped the coach on the back. “You got it. Just pretend we were never here.”

“I don’t think that’s possible.” He wiped sweat off his brow.

X was already shakily skating away. “MacIntosh! Guess what! I made the team! But I’m all out of best friend spots.” He glanced over at me and Levi. “I’ve already got a couple of those.”

12

VIOLET

Sequins littered my living room floor. They were down the cracks of couches, sprinkled across the countertop, and I’d even found a couple floating in my bath. I stared at the sparkly black blob as it floated along between the bubbles, and flicked it out, kinda hoping to never see a sequin again in my life.

We’d taken a crash course in sewing, aided by Queenie who’d heard about our plight to make X the biggest and best costume we possibly could. And thank God, because without her, the thing would still be in pieces. She’d whipped the four of us into a production line and somehow turned huge bits of foam and fabric and mesh into a giant snake’s head that X had been wearing proudly for the past two days, claiming he was a method actor who needed to be in character at all times.

I’d drawn the line at him wearing it, and nothing else, to bed. If I’d ever even thought of having some sort of snake kink, it had been well and truly satisfied.

But it had all been a good distraction from psychopaths who lingered out of sight, watching us in the darkness, and it had kept me from counting down the days and hours to Toby’sfuneral. I’d had a stilted phone call from his cousin, a woman I’d never even heard him speak of, telling me the date and time and place.

It hurt me his parents hadn’t called me themselves, but they were mourning, and I understood.

I smoothed out my long black dress, flicking off another damn sequin that seemed intent on hitchhiking. When X knocked on the door to pick me up, I half expected he would still be wearing his mascot headpiece, but he wasn’t. He just stood there, all six feet something of him in a suit that was slightly too short.

“Did you wear your brother’s suit again?”

He tugged at the sleeves that didn’t cover his wrists. “He really needs to grow.”

“Or you need to buy your own.”

He grinned at me. “I have one. It’s snake shaped.”

I shook my head and tucked my arm into his. Levi and Whip both waited downstairs, leaning on the side of Whip’s car. I sucked in a breath at the sight of them. Whip in a suit wasn’t anything I hadn’t seen before, but I’d barely seen Levi in anything other than ratty jeans and his club jacket.

“Wipe your drool, Omelet.”

I elbowed X but let him go so I could greet Whip and Levi. Whip put his hand to the small of my back to draw me in for a kiss that was so featherlight across my lips it did nothing but leave me wanting more.

Levi brought the more. He waited until Whip had his turn and then grasped the side of my face. He tilted it up so he could bring his lips down over mine. “You look beautiful, Vi.”

He kissed me before I could respond, stealing any words that might have been lingering on my tongue, and then opened the back door for me. He helped me in, and I slid over so he could get in behind me.

Whip and X took the front seats. We drove silently to the only church in Saint View. I couldn’t remember ever going there before, but I’d seen it in passing, from the back seat of the bus I took into Providence when a job had me out that way. It was surrounded by neatly cared for green grass, the graves of the deceased stretching far behind the little church and its surrounding buildings and parking lot.

Whip found a spot to leave the car, and the four of us got out, the men flanking me as we walked toward the doors.

Nyah and Dax waited just to the left of them, in dark-colored clothes that matched ours. She stepped forward and squeezed my hand.

I smiled at her gratefully. “You didn’t need to come. You didn’t know him.”