Grim Reaper 01 - Embrace the Grim Reaper

rolling down his face.
    “So what are you doing in Clymer?” Todd asked, interrupting her thoughts. He wasn’t sweating now, and he looked so relaxed his eyelids drooped, as if he were about to fall asleep.
    Casey ran a finger down the side of her glass, drawing a path in the condensation. “Just traveling through.”
    “By yourself?”
    “It works.”
    He shook his head slowly, as if not sure what to think of her. “You on vacation? Took time off?”
    Casey looked away. “I don’t have a job right now.”
    “So how do you afford traveling? Family money?”
    Casey’s breath caught. Family money. She pressed her fingers to her mouth. He didn’t know how right he was.
    “Sorry,” he said. “I get nosy about money. Goes with the job.”
    Casey didn’t say anything, keeping her hand up, staring out of the window until her breath came back and she could talk without her voice shaking. “So,” she said. “Tell me about the play.”
    “ Twelfth Night ?” Todd’s eyes opened wider. “We just read through it last night.”
    “I don’t mean the play itself. I mean the people involved. Why you’re in it.”
    “Oh.” He shrugged. “What I told you last night. They needed a guy my age, so they called.”
    “It’s basically the same group each time?”
    He sniffed, flicking a hand over the tip of his nose. “I don’t know. It depends who’s in town, I guess. Before Eric and Thomas came back we were a little hard-pressed for good people, but we got by. Holly’s in everything—well, as long as there’s a role for someone she thinks is attractive enough—and Becca likes to be involved. Leila…well, if Eric’s in it, she’s somewhere close by.”
    “Aaron and Jack?”
    He grinned again, a slow smile. “They like the plays. Keeps them out of trouble.”
    Casey picked up her fork and twisted it in her fingers. “How about Ellen?”
    “Ellen?” His face went white, then red, before returning to its usual color. “She was good. She enjoyed the plays.”
    “I’m sorry,” Casey said. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”
    “No, no, it’s all right. She was—” He stopped and leaned back as Kristi arrived with the lunches.
    She set Casey’s hamburger platter down, then slapped an enormous salad in front of her dad, followed by a bottle of dressing. “There. Put on your own dressing if you’re going to complain.” With another narrowed-eye look at Casey, she stalked away.
    Todd winced.
    “Should I sit at another table?” Casey asked.
    “No.” He held up his hands. “No, if anybody moves, it should be me. But there’s no reason for it. It’s fine.”
    They looked over at the counter, where Kristi was scrubbing furiously with a dishrag, her eyes shooting darts toward their table.
    “You sure?” Casey wasn’t.
    “I’m sure.” He tipped the bottle to drip dressing onto his salad.
    Casey slid the pickles off of her hamburger and placed them on the side of her plate. She didn’t think she should ask him to resume where he’d left off talking, as it obviously disturbed him.
    “Tell me about Eric,” she said instead.
    A glob of salad dressing landed on his salad, and he tried to scoop it back up with a spoon. “I’m not sure what was going on with them.”
    “Who?”
    The tips of his ears went red. “Eric and Ellen. Isn’t that who we were talking about?”
    She blinked, then filled a few seconds putting ketchup on her plate. She dipped a fry and held it. “I guess so. But I was just wondering about Eric—why he left, and why he came back.”
    “Oh.” He let out a breath, a smile flickering across his mouth. “That’s easy. He left, going down to Louisville, to get away from his family. And he came back to deal with them.”
    Casey held the fry halfway to her mouth. “To deal with them? What do you mean?”
    “Well, his dad’s not exactly the most popular guy in town, so Eric had some major fences to mend.”
    “People don’t like his father? Why?”
    “Why do you think?” Todd gave a half-hearted laugh. “Because he’s getting ready to put this entire town out of work.”

Chapter Twenty-one
    Eric’s father was Karl Willems? The CEO of HomeMaker? The man who saw Becca’s pretty face and didn’t remember it?
    Casey sat astride her bike outside the diner, a bag of leftovers dangling from the handlebars. Once Todd had hit her with that bombshell, she’d lost her appetite again. He’d finished up his salad, his natural lethargy kicking in so they