Page 1 of On a Pale Horse
One
Cloris
She didn’t realize how far she would go for him.
Blood dripped down the knife in her hand, drops splattered with atick, tick, tickonto her Jimmy Choo’s, and yet, her rage hadn’t quenched. Each drip reminded her she did this for him…Alwaysfor him. In that bloody moment, she realized she loved him. Could Death love? Was it possible for the antithesis of life to develop such emotions? She hadn’t allowed herself to explore any type of tender feelings before.
Persephone was the closest she ever came. How could anyonenotlove the Goddess of Spring? She was life itself, and Persephone lured Cloris as surely as a bee would be to the sweet nectar of a flower.
An apt thought considering the dead body currently lying at Cloris’ feet.
Hades didn’t know Hel kept sending hounds and goons to find him, and she wouldn’t be the one to tell him. She liked the idea of him feeling safe and she cared for. Too many years spent as Hel’s plaything ruined something inside him which Cloris desperately wanted to restore. An innocence or maybe an acceptance. The closer she came to her goal, the more she yearned to see that look in his eyes. Even more so to be the one who put it there.
The hellhound laying on the cold concrete didn’t move.
She’d escort his rotting soul to the Underworld and destroy him under Hel’s nose if she could. That woman had long since passed being a nuisance and full-on deserved destruction. It wasn’t a matter of if, but when.
She could already see her knife point buried in the damn woman’s rib cage, and she’d savor every second. Her breathing had picked up so much, she could hear her own exhalation in the quiet alley. With a deep breath, she steadied herself and let some of her anger go with it.
She reached down and jerked the essence of life from the hound.
His human form took shape in her clutched fist. His spectral features drew up in fear. Now he understood the odds and the extent of his undertaking. She squeezed tight through his soul and extinguished it. Nothing left of him but a faint puff of smoke and a ruined bloody shell.
Leaving his body, she walked away, hoping when his partner returned, it would serve as a warning. If anyone went after Hades, they would deal with the Horseman of Death.
Her phone vibrated violently in her pocket and she stopped near the body’s feet before she reached into the small pocket of her black, crushed velvet dress to pull out the device. Speak of the devil. She smiled at her little pun and hit send.
“Hello.”
“Where are you?”
She closed her eyes but doing so provided little barrier against the liquid rich timbre of his voice. He sounded deep, sultry, sexy. Even more so when he physically sat in her presence, but she tried to ignore it. She knew how uncomfortable it made him to have such an involuntary effect on others.
“I had some business to take care of,” she gave the corpse’s leg a kick with her toes to wipe off some blood. She didn’t know if her shoes would be salvageable. A pity, really.
“I got Chinese.”
“Sounds perfect. I’ll be there in a moment.”
He didn’t say goodbye. As a habit, he tried not to speak much.
She tucked the phone back into her pocket, crouched to wipe the blood off the forgotten knife she’d been holding, and slipped it into the garter sheath against her thigh. With one last look at the body, she closed her eyes and melted into the other realm. Her ability to walk between worlds allowed her to travel any distance. She materialized beside her living room couch and tumbled across a misplaced ottoman.
“Who the fuck moved the furniture?” she grumbled, climbing to her feet and quickly removed her heels. A box of mistletoe lay on the floor. She’d knocked it off when she’d landed against the ottoman. She tossed it on the table to throw away later.
As Hades rounded the corner to the living room, clutching a tray laden with white and red Chinese food boxes, Cloris tucked her heels under the couch to hide the blood.
His chocolate brown ringlets were in disarray, as if he’d been running his fingers through them. She tried not to notice his bare feet poking out from the sweatpants he wore with an old seventies concert tee. One he probably attended in person. “Sorry, I think Baldir stopped by to do something. He was decorating, I guess? I’ll talk to him about moving things.”
In person, the effect of his voice was compounded, almost as if his rich timbre trailed seductive tendrils across her skin.
She trekked to the kitchen, tossed the mistletoe in the trash, returned, plopped on the offending ottoman, and allowed him to take the seat on the couch above it, placing the tray between them.
“Where’s Char?”
“I gave him the night off. He was here with Baldir decorating and plotting who knows what.”
Not that the ferryman of the dead had much work to do anymore. “Oh?”
