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But if that Reaper reaches for her on my watch, he’s going to learn something this town already knows.

I’ve got a shovel with that bastard’s name on it.

Chapter Four

Sweet

I go back into the School of the Dead with my chin up, my apron folded over one arm, and the very clear understanding that I am not as fine as I’m pretending to be. That’s unfortunate because pretending to be fine is one of my best skills.

Miss Mercy walks beside me like a funeral queen with a clipboard, and Bitter Adams stays behind in the hall with Nevermore, being all dark eyes, broad shoulders, and bossy warnings. I don’t turn around to look at him. Not once, especially not when every nerve along my back swears he’s still watching.

The school doors swing shut behind me, cutting off the low rumble of male voices. For a second, I stand there in the colored light from the old stained-glass windows and try to remember how to breathe like a normal person. The workroom smells like disinfectant, hairspray, cold coffee, and the faint chemical bite that clings to Raven’s body now that he’s resting in his rider’s coffin instead of sitting proud on his Harley.

Dead men are quieter than living ones, and I’m beginning to appreciate that.

Petal looks up from a cart of folded towels. “You okay, honey?”

“Sure,” I say, with enough sunshine in my voice to grow tomatoes.

Lark leans around Petal, purple hair falling over one eye. “That means absolutely not.”

Junie, the one with the shaved side and gold hoops, nods while wiping down a tray. “Women only say sure like that when they’re either lying, hungry, or about to key a truck.”

“I am not keying anything.”

“Hungry, then,” Petal decides.

“I could eat.”

Miss Mercy points her clipboard at all three of them. “Nobody is feeding my new student gossip for lunch.”

Lark widens her eyes. “I was gonna offer crackers.”

“You were gonna offer crackers, gossip, and the kind of advice that gets women pregnant by men with neck tattoos.”

Junie glances down at Petal’s belly.

Petal points a sanitizing wipe at her. “Do not look at me. Mine has a job and health insurance.”

“In this building, that’s practically royalty,” Lark says.

A laugh slips out of me before I can stop it. It feels strange in my throat, like it has to crawl around the lump sitting there. My car is still outside with a Reaper mark scratched into the door. Razor knows where I am. Razor knows my new name. Bitter knows enough to start asking questions I don’t want to answer, and somehow, Petal’s baby daddy having health insurance is still funny.

Maybe that’s why people laugh at funerals. Grief and fear are rude. They show up without asking and sit in your chest. Sometimes the only way to make room around them is to laugh hard enough they scoot over.

Miss Mercy watches me for a moment, seeing too much the way older women do. Then she softens, but not enough to get mushy about it. “Apron on, Sweet. If you’re going to stay, you’re going to work.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Mercy.”

“Yes, Mercy.”

“Better.”

I slip the black apron over my head and tie it behind my waist. It feels official in a way my acceptance letter didn’t. The fabric is stiff and clean, with GRAVE PROWLERS SCHOOL OF THE DEAD stitched in silver over the chest. Under that, someone has embroidered a little skull with eyelashes.

I touch the stitching. “This skull has better mascara than me.”