Page 72 of Mortis

“Anyway,” Arlo continued. “I’m trying to tell you about the guy who’s casing the joint.”

He jabbed a finger towards the front window, apparently unconcerned that the man he suspected might look up and catch him pointing.

I raised an eyebrow. “‘Casing the joint’? He’s not a film noir villain, Lo.”

Arlo growled and stomped his foot, the heel of his boot clacking against the tiled floor.

“You’re not taking me seriously!”

I rose from my chair and placed a hand on Arlo’s shoulder.

“He’s an old man.” I ignored the pang of hurt when he shrugged me off. “He’s probably trying to decide whether to come in and choose a coffin.”

Arlo pushed past me and rounded the desk, stopping beneath the open archway that led to the display of urns and caskets.

“I know shady people when I see them, Teddy,” he said quietly.

My stomach twisted, and a lump formed in my throat, just like it did whenever Arlo alluded to his past. A time I knew he’d rather forget altogether, if such a thing were possible. He’d admitted as much one Christmas, only after we’d gotten plastered on mulled wine once Grandad had left.

“If you won’t believe me, then I’ll tell Moz we need better security,” he continued. “For all we know, the weirdo outside could’ve been behind that awful break-in.”

Then he disappeared from sight.

I dragged a hand down my face with a sigh. Part of me wanted to go after my best friend. To finally tell him that Kael had been the one to break in. That he didn’t need to be so paranoid.

But then I’d have to explain why Kael had broken in, which meant revealing he wasn’t human. That he was a demon who answered to a Prince of Hell, and I was feeding him pieces of the dead so his inner Beast didn’t go on a murder spree around town.

Yeah.

Better to let him be a little paranoid.

He’d get over it once the stranger eventually moved on from whatever he was doing outside.

“Teddy, is everything alright?”

Kael stood beneath the archway, dressed in jeans and a dark fleece with the Adler & Sons logo embroidered over his heart. His hair was tied back in a low bun at the nape of his neck, and when a loose strand fell into his face, my fingers itched to brush it behind his ear.

He’d gone with my grandad to collect a body from a hospital near Oxford, so they must’ve only just got back. I stepped out from behind the desk and walked straight into him. His maroon eyes widened when I wrapped my arms around his trim waist, and for a heartbeat, he froze in surprise before relaxing beneath my touch. My fingers flexed against the solid muscles of his back, and I felt the tension leave him in a slow exhale.

He was so warm. Like a sometimes human, sometimes demon-shaped radiator. The heat bled through both our clothes, and I sighed contentedly. The scent of woodsmoke clung to his skin, reminding me of Bonfire Night. Standing close enough to the flames that your cheeks burned while your back stayed freezing. Thick jumpers and shared blankets. Smoke lingering in your hair and your clothes long after you’d gone home.

Touching him like this felt strangely natural.

I usually kept people at arm’s length. Even with Arlo and Grandad, there was always an invisible divide between us. Thin, yes. But still present. Because the two of them belonged out front with the living, while I hid away with the dead.

With Kael, I didn’t feel that.

We were similar, I suppose. Two people who’d never quite known where they fit, somehow colliding over a half-eaten corpse. And somewhere along the way we’d gone from reluctant babysitter and confused cryptid to tentative friends to . . . whatever this was. It had happened so gradually that I hadn’t even noticed. Now I couldn’t imagine not reaching for him.

Kael had apparently discovered he was a tactile person after leaving the woods. And unfortunately for me, it seemed he’d rubbed off on me.

Quite literally.

Resting my chin against his chest, I smiled up at him, and his own smile widened in answer. One arm circled my waist, holding me close, while the other drifted through my hair. Arlo had spent the morning absent-mindedly playing with it while avoiding actual work, leaving the strands slightly knotted. But Kael’s unusually blunt nails carefully worked through them, gently scratching my scalp until I had to fight the urge to melt into him.

“Are you alright?”

I nodded.