Page 11 of Squad Ghouls

“BLOOD?” he screeched. “Why would it be blood? Who puts blood on their windows? Don’t be silly!”

He walked to the only other piece of furniture in the room other than the bed and the nightstands—a rickety desk under the window—and lifted one leg to perch on the edge of it.

It groaned under his weight and he slid off hurriedly, blushing and leaning his hip against it instead.

“I always forget I pack a bit…” And then he fucking grabbed his arse with both hands and gave it a little jiggle. “…more.”

My brain fucking fried.

All executive functions halted.

Dead.

Gone.

Fuck me.

FUCK HIM, my dick nearly screamed at me, struggling to bust out of the uniform.

“Shhh,” I told it.

“What?” Owain asked.

“Nothing!” I almost shouted it at him, realising too late that I’d said that out loud. Great. I was now having public conversations with my cock because my client was too fucking sexy for me to control myself.

“Right,” Owain said, still gripping the soft flesh of his arse. Clearly the agony wasn’t over yet because my eyes stayed glued to that spot and my brain went “imagine if YOU grabbed him there…go try.”

“My bag!” I said, desperate to get him to move, to do something to allow me to get my fucking head out of my arse. Well, his arse. His glorious, supple, juicy…

“Is right there,” Owain said, and my brain screeched to a halt.

“What?” I spun in place, eyes landing on my bag set neatly by the door. “Where did that come from?”

“Popty brought it,” Owain said with an exaggerated frown. “Like I said he would. Are you okay?”

“When did Popty walk in?” I walked to the door and peeked out, glancing up and down the hallway. Empty.

“You seemed distracted.” Owain smiled brightly. “The magic of the Last Resort does that. It transports you to a different place.” He put his hands together and held them under his chin like a damn princess as his lashes fluttered behind those thick frames.

“Yeah,” I said. “Hell.”

The dreamlike expression morphed into anger in a second.

“That was disrespectful and it hurt my feelings.” His bottom lip wobbled slightly and his eyes went huge and watery. He turned away from me and not even a direct view of his arse helped ease the shitty feeling nestling in the pit of my stomach.

He might have been batshit crazy, but I didn’t want to be a dick to him and make him sad.

“A suburb of hell?” I suggested weakly, trying to joke my way out of it because I fucking sucked at emoting at the best of times; apologies included.

“You’re rude,” he said sadly, crossing his arms over his chest and shaking his head. “But I guess I can’t be too surprised. You did come in here guns blazing, ready to just nuke my friends away from me.”

“I wasn’t gonna nuke them. And they’re not your friends. They’re ghosts.”

“And your agency isn’t a real agency,” Owain shot back. “It’s just three prejudiced arseholes in a trenchcoat.”

I had zero arguments there. Gerald was as shady as they came. I knew a snake-oil salesman when I saw one—it took one to know one after all. I liked to think before I got my comeuppance served to me as a pie in the face that I wasn’t as bad as him. I wasn’t exactly sending people to their deaths.

“Regardless of what you think about the company I work for, it doesn’t change the fact that ghosts are dangerous entities that you shouldn’t mess with.”