Alec knocked on the door as I set the bowl on the coffee table, and four different people yelled for him to come in. To my house.

“Hey, Kaylee,” he said, pulling me into a hug as Luca closed the door behind him. “How’s Death treating you?”

“No better than life did.” I hugged him back, treasuring one of the few uncomplicated relationships I had. Alec was my friend, and that line was blessedly unblurred by attraction, jealousy, or any feelings of neglect or betrayal. Alec was a drama-free safe zone.

He laughed. “I meant Tod. You know, death with a capital D?”

“Ah. More death humor. Never gets old.” I let him go and grabbed a handful of popcorn. “Tod’s great.” I wanted to say more, but Nash was listening, and I didn’t want him to think I was rubbing anything in his face.

“Who’re they?” Alec whispered, less-than-subtly tossing his head toward Madeline and Luca.

I reached up and turned him by his shoulders to face them both, then cleared my throat to catch everyone’s attention. “Madeline is my boss at the reclamation department. She helped me cover up my own murder and clear Nash’s name. And Luca is her great-great-nephew. He’s a necromancer, which means he sees dead people.”

Alec frowned. “Like that kid in the movie?”

“Not really. But close enough,” Luca said, crossing the room to shake Alec’s hand. “No ghosts, but I see the undead, even when no one else does, and I can sense corpses until they’re preserved or start to rot.”

Alec shook his hand. “No offense, man, but that’s creepy.”

I rolled my eyes. “This, coming from a psychic parasite.”

“Half,” Alec insisted. “Half-psychic parasite. My mother was human.”

“Okay, so everyone knows everyone else now, right?” I said, and heads all over the room nodded.

“Don’t you wanna call in Tod before we get started?” Alec said.

“He’s filling in for a missing reaper at the hospital, but he’ll be here when he can. He already knows all this, anyway.”

“Missing reaper? Is that what this is about?” Alec sank onto the couch and I sat between him and Emma.

“No,” Madeline said, just as I said, “Yeah, in part.”

“Maybe start from the beginning?” Alec suggested. “For those of us just joining the party?”

“Okay.” I took a deep breath and did a mental search for the beginning of the story. “For those who may not know this, Madeline recruited me specifically to help hunt and take out a serial soul thief—”

“I call him Cap’n Crunch,” Luca interrupted, and was rewarded with a roomful of frowns. “You know. Because he’s a cereal thief?”

“Wouldn’tthat make him more like the Cookie Crook?” Alec said, then shrugged at all the blank stares. “Am I the only one who remembers breakfast food from the eighties?”

“You’re the only one who remembers anything from the eighties,” Nash said, and Madeline frowned.

“That’s the wrong kind of ‘serial’ entirely, and we do not have time for anecdotal tangents. Kaylee, please continue.”

Sabine muttered something bitter and profane beneath her breath, and Nash laughed.

“Anyway…” I said. “The serial soul thief turned out to be Avari. Also, he is now officially a serial killer, which is how he comes by the souls ready to be stolen.”

“So, how’s he getting them into the Netherworld?” Alec asked. “Sounds like you’re actually looking for whoever’s working for him.”

“Nope. You know how they say old dogs can’t learn new tricks? Well, they’re wrong. Avari’s figured out how to cross over.”

13

“THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE,” ALEC said. “He doesn’t have a soul. He can’t cross over.”

“Yeah.” Emma tucked her feet beneath her, like she did during scary movies, so nothing evil could grab her ankles from beneath the couch. “The only reason I get any sleep at all anymore is because you told me he couldn’t cross over. No way, no how. That’s the rule. How is he breaking it now?”

“Kaylee,” Madeline said, before I could even try to answer Em. “I’ve been dead for more than half a century, and my superiors have been here even longer, and in all that time, I’ve never heard of a hellion crossing through the fog. It can’t be done. If it could, they would have taken over the human realm centuries ago.”

“The realm? The whole realm?” Em was close to panic.

“Stop saying the word realm,” Sabine said. “I’m having sci-fi convention flashbacks.”

“When were you at a sci-fi convention?” Alec asked, and the mara shrugged.

“Nerds give good nightmare. They’re afraid of everything.”

“Could we focus, please!” I snapped. Then I turned to Alec. “If a soul is all that’s keeping hellions from crossing over, why has it taken them this long to make the trip? I can think of half a dozen souls Avari’s stolen this school year alone.”

“It’s not that easy,” Alec explained. “Devouring a soul isn’t the same as having one of your own. He’s been trying to make that work for centuries, but once he eats the soul, it’s gone, and he can’t make it past the fog. To cross over, he’d have to be able to sort of…install a soul in his own body. And that’s impossible.”