Read Playing With Fire for Free Online

by the neck and kiss the breath out of him. I fought the urge…oh, hell. Come to Momma. I tried to reach out, but my arms were too weak and remained at my sides.
    Maybe that was a good thing. He was the first man to enter my apartment in, well, too many months to think about (without crying), so I probably would have done a poor job of pouncing/licking/ consuming him.
    “Don’t be afraid. If you’ll answer some questions for me, I’ll leave you alone,” he said. “Sound good?”
    Okay, so he wanted to get away from me as soon as possible. I had to look like total crap. Before he escorted me through the gates of eternity, maybe he’d let me shower, brush my teeth, apply ten pounds of makeup, slip on a red teddy and mist myself with pheromone perfume. Not that I wanted to impress him or anything. Really. A girl just needed to make a good impression her first day in the afterlife.
    “You falling asleep on me again?” he asked.
    “No questions,” I said. I’d answered enough of those when Pretty Boy had interrogated me. As I struggled to sit up, the ache in my head roared to full life. I groaned and flopped against the pillow. “I hate to break it to you, but you totally suck at your job. Don’t just stand there looking sexy, take my soul already.”
    “Subject awake but not lucid,” he said to the walkie-talkie. For a second, only a second, I thought I heard the beat of his heart. Steady at first, then gaining in speed. Or maybe that was my heart.
    “If I’m asked to give an evaluation on the other side,” I said, “you’re going to score real low.”
    “You must be thirsty.”
    The moment he spoke, I realized just how dry my mouth was. “Yes,” I rasped.
    “Subject is thirsty,” he said, then hooked the walkie-talkie, or whatever the hell it was, to his waist. He disappeared. That was the only way to describe it. He moved so silently, so quickly out of my room, he was like a puff of smoke. There one moment, gone the next.
    He returned as quickly as he’d left and offered me a glass of water. I tried to sit up, but the feat proved impossible. Reaching out, he anchored his free hand under my neck and gently lifted my head to the glass. I drank deeply, the cool liquid soothing my throat, my stomach, moving through my overheated blood.
    Calluses covered his hand. My skin began to tingle. Umm, nice. So nice. My increasingly heavy eyelids fluttered open and closed as he eased me back onto the pillow and set the water aside. “Your evaluation scores just increased,” I said hoarsely. Sleep. I’d sleep a little longer.
    “We really do need to talk.” He gave my shoulder a soft shake.
    My brain wasn’t functioning at optimal levels, but common sense finally slipped past the thick labyrinth of stupidity blanketing my mind. I jolted into total wakefulness. Could a hallucination help me drink a glass of water? Would an apparition have calluses? Would a messenger of death be able to physically touch me? No, no and no.
    The stranger standing in front of me was very real.
    Panic washed through me. “Get out,” I demanded, my alarm making my voice scratchy. “Right now.” I wore nothing more than the flimsy bra-and-panty set I’d worn under the Utopia uniform I’d stripped out of, and though my comforter shielded me from view, it could be ripped away at any moment. In my weakened condition, I wouldn’t be able to fend him off if he decided to attack me.
    “Relax.” His voice was so soft and soothing, I barely heard him. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
    Liar! Why else would he be here? My panic doubled, and I groped the bedsheets for a weapon. Of course I found nothing more menacing than a few feathers from my pillow. Like those would stop a freaking dust mite.
    The man crouched beside me, putting us at eye level. I studied his eyes so I could give a description to the cops, not because they momentarily hypnotized me. His irises were a work of art. Dark blue branched from his pupils and blended with