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I put my hands to my throat, swallowing and breathing, and in general not dying. My throat was going to be so sore tomorrow. Not that I’d be alive. “I signed the rental agreement a few days ago.”
“Where did you move from? Why did you move? Did something threaten you?” A flicker of lightning filled his eyes before he tamped it down.
“What? No. Just you. And the skeletons.” I looked around the graveyard while I hugged myself.
“Then why did you come here?”
“It was really reasonable rent, and it’s still in…” No way I was mentioning my daughter who threw raw energy at people to this monster who killed everyone for fun. I swallowed hard. “A good location.”
“No reason other than the price of rent and a good location? Why don’t I believe you?”
“Because you’re suspicious bordering on paranoid?” I offered helpfully.
He grabbed my face, tilting it up towards him. “That must be it. You’re old to have no idea what you’re doing when you’re raising the dead.”
I glowered at him. “I’m not that old!”
“You’re old enough to know better than to play in a cemetery after midnight. Why are you here?”
I frowned at him. He was still holding my face, but his grip wasn’t painful. “I think it was the courage tea,” I finally said. “My whole life I’ve been fascinated by dead things, and I just wondered why. So I thought I’d explore the issue.”
“Your whole life you’ve been fascinated by dead things? Peculiar.”
“I’m not peculiar. Can you take your hand off my face and just kill me?”
He cocked his head, long pale hair settling over his shoulders, but his face was bare, jaw almost too strong, mouth firm yet supple, in other words, the kind of face that could represent a clothing brand if he hadn’t tattooed it. “Don’t you have anything to live for? Family? Husband?”
I pushed his hands off me and took a step back, running into a gravestone. “I have plenty to live for, but I’m not wasting my time begging you for mercy. Your reputation is very clear. You have no mercy.”
“You wound me. The Council’s Teeth a merciless monster? I’m injured to my soul. If only I had a soul.” That smile. So wicked. “I’ll make a deal with you. Since you’re so clearly clueless, and you didn’t try to fight me, other than hurling a skeleton’s head at me, but since that’s not a magical attack, I’ll give you a deal. I’ll spare your life and let you go free if you give me something in return.” He put a hand to his chin, humming. “What should it be? It could be the famous grimoire, but I already have a dozen grimoires, and I despise square-shaped ones.”
I stared at him, almost liking him for a second. “They are really annoying.”
“Never fitting properly on any bookshelves. Arrogant books, self-important.”
“And they’re all written in Latin. Why? What’s so great about Latin?”
“If you do spells in your native tongue, the will and the words blend sometimes, and accidents happen. I knew a fellow who accidentally summoned a demon while he was singing. It ruined the fishing trip.” He smiled again, and my skin crawled.
“What do you want?” I spat out. I was done with him playing with me.
“A kiss,” he answered just as bluntly. “Kiss me well, and I’ll pardon your life and give you a second chance.”
“A kiss? You’re joking.”
“You likely find it hard to believe since I look so jolly and good-natured, but I very rarely joke.”
This person of lighting and chiseled jaw wanted to kiss me? Was he going to suck out my soul with that kiss? Probably. That would suck. Har har. And now I was getting loopy. I pressed a hand to my chest, feeling my heart racing too fast. “How can I trust you?” I finally asked.
He shrugged. “You can’t. But maybe I’m feeling like not killing tonight. Getting blood in my hair is so irritating. It takes forever to get out.”
“I’d hate to irritate you with my blood. One kiss? Anywhere?”
“Mouth to mouth. Tonight. Or you won’t have a tomorrow.”
“Fine.” I grabbed his shirt and pulled him close—okay, I actually pulled myself against him because he was too large to move—and then I pressed our lips together. Before I could decide if the kiss was horrible or not, he slammed me against a tree. I didn’t even know there was a tree in the cemetery. At the very edge. How had he taken us to the edge of the cemetery without even a blink?
“Why is there dark sorcerer magic on your mouth? Did he force you?” His voice was low, almost too low to hear, with an edge of dissonance that clawed against my skin.
