Nodding, I remove my hand and he opens the door for us.
I’m not sure what I was expecting, to be honest, but this definitely isn’t it.
I’d classify it as bizarre, maybe even unsettling. It’s as though time stands still. The walls are a dull, sickly green, flickering under a buzz of old fluorescent lights that cast an unnatural glow. The room is filled, allthe seats taken bythe dead, each of them bearing the peculiar signs of their death—ghostly, pale skin, others with limbs twisted, even a man with half his body burnt.
The furniture is worn and mismatched, a threadbare chair and sagging couch that squeaks as a woman with a missing leg and arm shifts.
“I swear I’ve seen a movie like this before…” I whisper. The atmosphere feels thick with tension, as if the room itself is holding its breath, waiting for me to make a move.
Alaric takes hold of my elbow and gently pulls me toward the opposite wall of where we entered. “Everything fictional derives from reality, Xeraphine.”
He stops us in front of what I assume is the receptionist’s window. I’m unable to see anything as there is a thick cloud of smoke, and the pungent smell of nicotine seeping through a crack that I can tell was made by a fist slamming into it.
Just as I’m reaching out to knock, Alaric puts his hand up, ceasing me. “Take a ticket.” He points then to a red box with a yellow ticket sticking out of it.
“You’ve got to be fucking with me.”
He groans, “Belial is?—”
“Full of himself?” I snarl. “I’m not waiting in fucking line. He calledmehere.”
“You ain’t that important!” a man with a heavy drawl to his tone yells from behind me. “Take a numba, just like the rest of us.”
“Shut up, man, don’t you see what she is?” another male says in a hushed tone.
As my nose twitches, I shift my gaze around the room. No one had given me a second glance when we walked in, but now, all dozen or so set of eyes are on me.
“Ya in the wrong room anyway, bitch,” the woman with the missing leg says with a slithering lisp. “Proserpina is down the hall.”
I tear away my arm from Alaric and hiss, “So loud for being thedead. What’s your hurry?” I drag my eyes from one side to the other, and snarl. “Can’t die of boredom…” The slow grin is met with distasteful frowns. “Time is meaningless to the dead, so shut the fuck up and mind your own business.”
Turning away from them, I pound against the glass. “Hey, let me see Belial,” I shout, but don’t see any movement behind the cloud of smoke. “I’m not fucking waiting when I was summoned here! Gods?—”
“You won’t find those here.” A thick voice filters into my ears, and it’s familiar. So much so, my breath gets caught in my throat. Shifting slowly as he continues, my eyes round into complete circles. “You were always so impatient, and a bitch, but would I havewanted you any other way?”
When his bright hazel eyes plastered on dark skin grace my vision, I struggle to breathe.
No way…
“Not really,” he continues. “It’s what made you, you.”
His bright white smile hidden behind his ebony lips, tells me he isn’t meant to be here. Everyone in this room shows evidence of their death, he looks as though he just walked out of the shower, dressed and ready for a date.
“It’s good to see you.” He steps closer, and I move back right into Alaric’s chest.
“Tyson? What in the Beyond are you doing here?”
Chapter 42
Xeraphine
Iknow my shock is justified. There was never a delusional part of me that believed Tyson would ascend to the Vayl—not with his past. But truthfully, I had hoped. I wanted him to be with his family, to have his happiness, because I do believe he deserved it.
Not this. Not the Beyond. Not alone.
“Tyson…” I repeat again, searching his eyes that are staring at me as though he has no care in the world.
We don’t hug, and I can’t even say I want one now, but as he inches to me to put his arms around my head I don’t shrug away. Although I don’t reciprocate it, he lingers, and the smell of his cologne that is familiar swirls into my nose.
