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“What?” he asked. He stepped to Sophie, my sofa, and fell back to land softly on her soft cushions. “I can’t say hey to my favorite grim reaper?”
Oh, wow. Something was definitely up. I strolled over to him, turned around, and plopped down on his stomach to incapacitate him. Then I proceeded to tickle him until he begged for mercy.
“Okay, okay,” he said, laughing like a schoolkid. It was nice. “I give up.”
“What’s up with the nice act?” When he hesitated, I went back in for the ribs.
“No! Okay, I’ll tell you. I’m just happy. My mom’s doing really well.”
“Yeah, thanks to the raise I gave you. So, she fell for the ‘dead uncle left her money’ thing?”
He wiped his eyes as I let him up. “Seems like it. She’s just happier now. Something has changed.”
“Angel, maybe she’s happy because she’s figured out you’re still around.”
His disposition went from light to dark in a flash. “No, she’s not. I told you, I don’t want her to know.”
“I know. Geez. I didn’t tell her anything. But she suspects. You know that, right?”
He sat back down and rubbed the peach fuzz on his chin. “I know. As long as she doesn’t know for certain, she’ll be fine.”
“Well, either way,” I said, going to warm up my coffee, “I’m glad she’s doing well.”
“Yeah, me, too.”
“I have two jobs for you.”
“Okay, but I’ve decided I need weekends and holidays off.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. It just sounds good. And I need benefits.”
I gave him my best deadpan expression. “Isn’t it a little late for medical?”
“No, I need other benefits. Like seeing you naked. But only sometimes. I’m not greedy.”
“You are not seeing me naked. Now, do you want to know the jobs or not?”
“Sure. Why not? I’m only dead. It’s not like I can argue.”
I curled up beside him, and he put an arm around my shoulders. “Can we make out?”
“No. Can you draw?”
He shrugged. “I used to be pretty good. Haven’t tried it in about thirty years.”
“But you can manipulate objects sometimes. I’ve seen you.”
“Yeah. Do you need a nude portrait done?”
“Yes, actually, I do.”
He rose slightly. “Really?”
“Yes. Of Mr. Wong’s back.”
Disappointment lined his handsome face. “That old guy? I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. He’s …
escalofriante
.”
“Angel Garza,” I said, leaning away from him. “Mr. Wong is not creepy. Why would he give you the chills?”
“He just does.”
“That’s not nice.”
“Whatever you say,
’jita
.”
“And you can’t call me
’jita
. It’s wrong. I’m older than you are.”
He still had his arm on my shoulders when his full mouth tilted playfully. “You are not older than me. If you’ll let me see you naked, I’ll prove it to you.”
The way Angel talked, the departed could have sex. But really? Could they? I wasn’t about to find out with a thirteen-year-old. “You are not seeing me naked. I need you to draw the tattoos on his back.”
“I can try, but I don’t think he’ll like it. What if he’s ticklish?”
I pursed my lips in reprimand. “I don’t know what else to do, unless you can talk to him and find out who he is.”
“I’ve already told you: I’m not a ghost whisperer. And if you could see what I see, you wouldn’t even want to know who he is.”
I bolted upright. “Why? What do you see?” Then I remembered something. When I was hurt and almost burned alive, I’d seen Reyes’s darkness, the flames that forever engulfed him, the scars from his past. Reyes said I was looking at him from another plane. Now I just had to remember how I did that.
I looked back at Mr. Wong and concentrated. Then I squinted. Then I squinted harder until he became a blurry patch of gray.
“Is it working?” Angel asked, a soft laugh escaping him.
I gave up with a hopeless sigh. “No.”
“You’re the grim freaking reaper. You can do anything. You just haven’t figured that out yet.”
“Dude, how do you know more than I do? Are my abilities, like, common departed knowledge?”
“No,” he said with a shrug. “You kind of learn things as you go. It’s like on-the-job training.”
“That’s exactly how I feel. So, like what? What can I do that I don’t know about?”
“I just told you. Pretty much anything.”
“That’s so helpful. Thanks,” I said, giving up. Again. “What do you see?”
He looked at him, studied him a long while, then said, “Power.”
My eyes rounded. “Power? What do you mean? What kind of power?”
“That’s it. Just power. You’d have to see it to understand.
Me da mala espina
.”
Well, that was a huge help. “Something ominous is coming, huh? When isn’t it? I want you to try to draw the tattoos on his back onto this paper when you can.” I pointed to my sketchpad.
“Okay. Most likely the pencil will slip through my fingers, but I can try right now if you want.”
“Nope—right now, you have another job.”
“Okay. I get paid time and a half for overtime, right?”
“No. I need you to go check out a demon posing as a man.”
“I don’t like demons.”
“I don’t either.”
“That’s fu
“Reyes is not a demon.”
“Keep telling yourself that,
mijita
. He is the most notorious demon of them all.”
“Are you going to go check this guy out or what?”
“Sure, but when the prince of hell turns on you and decides to engulf the world in a blazing inferno, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“Deal,” I said, plastering a smile on my face.
5
I’m only here to establish an alibi.
—T-SHIRT
I told Angel where he could find the Dealer, with instructions to just get a feel for him. For his power. “But don’t get too close, else he’ll sup on your soul,” I’d added, after which he’d rolled his eyes. He could be such a drama queen.
I looked back at Mr. Wong and studied him. Power. I just didn’t see it. Duff!
I bolted up again. When Duff, a departed man who’d followed me home from a bar one night—long story—first saw Mr. Wong, he seemed … surprised. Like he knew him. Or recognized him.
Mission for the moment: Find Duff.
I went to the last apartment he’d lived in. He moved around a lot, but the last time we’d talked, he told me he was back in with Mrs. Allen down the hall. She had a vicious poodle named PP. To PP’s credit, however, he did try to fight off a pack of demons for me. I had a soft spot for him now. Super soft. Like Twinkie guts, only not so marshmallowy delicious.
I knocked on Mrs. Allen’s door, waited a bit, then knocked again. PP was yapping up a storm from behind it, but it took Mrs. Allen a bit to travel that distance, even though her apartment was smaller than mine.
She cracked open the door, the chain still on, until she saw me and took the chain down to let me in.
“Hey, Charley,” she said, and I realized immediately she didn’t have her teeth in.
“Hey, Mrs. Allen.” One thing I didn’t think to come up with was an excuse for being there. “Um, I was just wondering how your … heating system was working. Mine is on the fritz.”
“My heating system.” She practically shoved me inside. “It’s awful. Never works right, and poor PP feels the cold. Breaks my heart.”
She hobbled to her thermostat. “See, it’s on seventy-five, and I know it’s not a degree over seventy-three in here.”
“Okay,” I said, searching for Duff. According to the talk on the streets, I could summon any departed, as I had with Angel, but I didn’t know Duff that well. I didn’t want to just drag him away from whatever it was he was doing. Come to think of it, what did the departed do all day?