Winged Reaper

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

I pulled into the driveway of my flat and got out of the car. I was almost at the front door when a figure stepped into view, shrouded by shadows.

I dropped my bag, ready to run. No one with good intentions would be waiting on my doorstep after midnight on a Thursday.

Then…

‘What the hell?’ I took a step forward.

‘Hello, Tyler. My name is Emily, and I’m really sorry to just show up like this, with no warning, but I think I might be your cousin.’

I opened my mouth, too shocked to form words. She looked just like me. Same heart-shaped face, caramel skin and long black hair, though she had a blunt fringe. Even the curve of her mouth mirrored mine and her brown eyes, currently filled with hope, were eerily familiar. We could have been identical twins, let alone cousins.

I swallowed heavily. The uncanny resemblance meant she had to be a descendant of Malia, Almorthanos’s sister, like me. ‘Wow, yeah, from the looks of us, you could be right, Emily.’

Her face lit up and she bounced on the balls of her feet.

‘Oh my God, I am so excited to meet you. I have been waiting here for hours, wondering what I would say to you and what you would say to me and if you would believe me or not, and here you are, and you do, and this is the most exciting thing to ever happen to me.’ She clapped both hands to her cheeks.

I laughed. I couldn’t help myself. With the week I’d had, and the night I’d just endured, it was a change to be around someone who was genuinely pleased to see me.

‘How did you find me?’

‘I saw your picture on the news and it blew me away. I thought I was looking at a picture of myself, but the reporter said you were Tyler Morgan, from Easton, and that your half-brother was a serial killer who killed your best friend and tried to kill you too, and I was like, whoa, that is so scary.’

I stiffened and her face fell. ‘I’m so sorry, I’m such an i***t. You lived it, so you don’t need to hear some stranger talking about it, even though we are cousins and...’

I put up a hand and she thankfully stopped talking. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I would have to get used to the notoriety that came with being in the news. ‘Why don’t we go inside, and you can tell me why you think we’re cousins.’

She nodded and moved aside so I could unlock the door. I switched on the living room light as she scooped up a suitcase and followed me inside.

She set her suitcase by the door before taking a seat on the couch, crossing her legs at the ankles and holding her clasped hands between her knees. She looked like a chastened schoolgirl, even though I guessed she was close to my age.

I sat beside her. ‘So, Emily, where did you come from and how did you figure out we were cousins?’

‘Well, to be honest, at first I thought we were twins, because we look so much alike, but the reporter said you were twenty-five and I’m only twenty-three, so that ruled that out. But then I started to wonder if maybe one of us, or even both of us, had been adopted, and we were sisters at least. So I went to my parents, sure they had been lying to me all my life. And they had, but not the way I’d been thinking. It was my father who’d been adopted.’ She gulped in air.

‘Dad said Grandma and Grandad Wilson adopted him when he was five. Of course, I wanted to know why no one ever told me, though it explained why I didn’t look anything like my cousins on the Wilson side. Not that I look like the cousins on my mother’s side either. I’ve always been the odd one out, until now.’ She gave me a quick grin.

‘My mother was adopted,’ I said, voice quiet. It hurt to talk about her so soon after Chris’s revelation. ‘She died when I was a baby.’

‘Which is great. Not that she’s dead. I mean that she was adopted too, because it means you are most definitely probably my cousin because my dad said he had a baby sister who was adopted into a different family. But he didn’t know who took her, and never tried to find out. Which I thought was weird, I mean, if you were adopted and knew you had a biological sister somewhere, wouldn’t you want to find her? But he said the Wilsons were his family and he didn’t need another one.’

Emily grimaced. ‘From what Dad didn’t say, I think he has bad memories from before Grandma and Grandad adopted him, but I still think it’s weird he never tried to find his sister. And it’s really sad the adoption people let them get split up. You and I could have grown up together instead of only just finding out about each other.’

I let Emily’s words wash over me. It was surreal, looking at her, listening to her fill the silence that had enveloped the flat since Sarah’s death. She yawned, and I was helpless to stop myself from copying her as the late hour and little sleep hit me.

Emily giggled. ‘That was cool, that we did that, like in sequence.’

Eyes watering, I nodded. ‘Very cool, but I’m going to have to call it a night.’

Her eyes dropped. ‘Of course. I’ll get out of your way, and let you get some sleep.’ She stood and fished a mobile phone out of her jeans pocket. ‘I’ll just call a taxi and get them to take me to a motel.’ She hesitated; eyes hopeful. ‘Can I come back and see you tomorrow, I mean today, after you wake up?’

‘You don’t have to go, you can stay here if you want,’ I said, the words slipping out before I could stop them.

Her eyes lit up. ‘Really? You don’t mind?’

The sheer delight on her face made me feel better about my impromptu invitation. Maybe it would be good for me to not be alone on my first night back in the flat.

‘Can’t have my new cousin staying in a motel when I have an empty bed. Only… it was Sarah’s room.’ My bottom lip wobbled as I said her name and Emily scooted over and put her hand on my shoulder.

‘It must be so hard for you, to lose your best friend like that. I can go to a motel if that would be easier on you, or I can sleep on the couch, whatever suits you best.’

‘I don’t want you to leave, or sleep on the couch. It will be good to have someone else in the flat with me.’ I stood up and headed down the hallway, grabbing clean sheets out of the linen cupboard outside the bathroom, Emily at my heels. ‘All Sarah’s stuff is still in here,’ I said as I opened the door. ‘I haven’t had a chance to pack it up. I guess I’ll do it tomorrow, after her funeral.’

I let out a slow breath, not looking forward to saying goodbye to Sarah forever, taking little comfort from knowing I carried her soul around with me in my necklace. After Andrew had killed Sarah, Grimm had got to her, turning her against me, telling her it was my fault she was dead. He’d taught her how to become a wraith, reanimating her dead body, and sending her back to the flat to try to kill me. I’d had to reap her soul for the second time, ending her chance at rebirth, to stop him using her.

‘I’ll help you pack up her things, and I’d like to come to the funeral with you, too, if that’s okay.’

Grateful for the distraction from my depressing train of thought, I gave Emily a watery smile. ‘Thank you, but you don’t have to. You didn’t even know Sarah.’

‘But I know you, now. Besides, we’re family and that’s what family is for.’

I found it hard to reconcile her idea of family with the one I’d grown up with. My father looked down on me because I’d been born a girl, and my stepmother, Rhonda, blamed me for my elder half-brother turning out to be a serial killer. Not exactly the kind of family who stuck together. I had no idea if Denise, Andrew’s mother, blamed me for what he’d done, but I guess I’d be finding out soon enough. Andrew was being laid to rest on Monday.

At least, I hoped he was laid to rest. I wouldn’t put it past Grimm to turn Andrew into a wraith and send him after me, although he’d need a recently dead body to stomp about in.

Emily helped me change the sheets on Sarah’s bed, chatting to me the whole time, but I hardly heard a word she said. I was too busy picturing a stranger’s dead body chasing me, with Andrew’s soul doing the driving. The image followed me as I said goodnight and sought my own bed, sure sleep would be long in coming, despite how tired I was.

Nightmares were an occupational hazard since I became a reaper, and I had a horrible feeling matters were going to get even worse in the days to come.