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The chocolate donut calls my name and I dig in.
My date, however, reaches for his hood and draws it down.
I can’t help but gawk as light coming in from the window plays across his face. He’s beautiful! He has a strong jaw and full lips, high cheekbones, and the most perfect, almost translucent skin I’ve ever seen on a man. And those eyes. I swear they see right through me.
Reaching across the table, I grab his hand as if I’m claiming him before someone else can.
“Hey, after this, want to go on a real date?”
His eyes almost look like they are about to blink, and he pulls his hand away from mine. “Morgan Nichols, I am not here to date you.”
Well, shit. He probably has a girlfriend. “You’re not?”
“No. I’m here to reap your soul.”
Chapter Two
Grimm
The human drops the stiny brown donut with the rainbow sprinkles and cream cheese icing and gawks at me with round blinking eyes, her mouth open. “E-excuse me? Repeat that.”
“I am not here to date you. I am here to reap you.”
“Reap?!” Her blinking intensifies as she tries to muffle her startled gasp. “What do you mean,reap?”
All but one human turn their heads in our direction. Morgan shrivels in her seat and pulls the top of her turtleneck up to cover the lower half of her face. What is she doing? Attempting to hide? I scoff. As if doing that will hide her.
“Reap. Collect. Harvest. They all mean the same thing,” I tell her, tapping my fingers on the table with feigned patience. At least she has not yet tried to run, which is what my harvests usually do. First they run, and then they bargain. Always with the bargaining.
Morgan can hide anywhere she likes, but I will always be able to find her. Her soul is a beacon that calls to my scythe. Even if she traveled the seven seas, or bargained her life for all the wealth in the world, the outcome would still be the same.
Her soul. Harvested.
She gives me a look of disbelief.
“Why did I have to kiss the crazy hot one?” she mumbles.
Slowly, as those around us resume their meals, Morgan awkwardly reaches for her donut and brings it back to her mouth. I can’t help but watch as she nibbles away at her meal because a million crumbs fall around her chin, smearing sticky, sugary sweetness on her face. Disturbed by the way humans consume their food and how messy the entire process is, I decide it’s time to end this once and for all. It’s bad enough that I have already missed my deadline and my harvest is all too clueless as to why I am here. I am not dealing with unrefined carbs that will no doubt stick to my robes until the end of time as well.
Heaving a sigh, I stare at her from across the table she dragged me to. In all my years as a Grim Reaper, I have seen many, many things, but I have never seen a human so oblivious to the signs of a death reaping. Not only did I approach her in full ceremonial attire, but I had forgotten to change my appearance to appear less frightening and yet she still… she…
My hand lowers to that part of my face that is so foreign to me.
Skin. Flesh.Lips.
She kissed me. She pressed those very warm lips of hers against mine. Does she not realize what a cardinal sin that is? To touch me,Death?
“You are lucky that I am only here to collect you and not punish you. Do you know it is a sin to insult your Reaper?” I ask.
It is more of a sin for me to lie to a harvest than for her to spew insults, but we are where we are. Things need to speed up. At this rate, Morgan will never be harvested.
“Please stop talking.” Her face turns red, and she sinks lower in her seat, further hiding in embarrassment.
“I would if you stopped hindering my schedule,” I tell her. “Yours is not the only soul I have come to collect and bring to the afterworld—”
Another startling gasp rips through the air, and out of nowhere she clamps my lips shut with her hands so that I cannot finish explaining her rather dire situation.
“SHH! People will hear you!” she whisper-shouts, her fingers now glued to my face with the same sticky crap she was consuming not ten seconds earlier.
