Valeria Brinstrone had hissed 'shuddup' to the wounded reaper, Ari, who is seated in the backseat of her car, while on a call with her mother-in-law. Of course, the mother-in-law, Erin Brinstrone, had thought Valeria was telling her to shut up.
"WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME???" Erin Brinstrone had screamed in response.
Valeria scrambled to make amends.
"No, no, sorry Erin, I wasn't talking to you," she tried to explain but Erin will not have it. She will not have her daughter-in-law talk so rudely to her.
"You think I don't know what you just said? I heard it loud and clear! How dare you tell me to shut up, just wait till Mark gets home, I will tell him what an insolent wife he has," Erin warned.
The woman then hang up without saying another word.
Great. Now the monster-in-law wants to drag Mark into the whole hullabaloo. As if their marriage aren't already in trouble. Sure, why not add in another item into the long list of "why Valeria makes a lousy wife to the great Mark Brinstrone", she thought.
Ari sniggered in the back seat and she glared at him through the rearview mirror.
"Just you wait, you demon reaper, just wait," she muttered under her breath.
Ari was not in the least intimidated. Instead, he smirked at her which pisses her off even more.
Valeria spied a 24-hour convenience store and made a sudden sharp turn, tires squealing, after making sure there were no cars coming in the other direction. This caused Ari to slide across the newspaper-covered seat and almost fall off. He held on to the the handle above with one hand and clutched his wound with another.
"If you are an Uber driver, I will give you zero rating," he mumbled, disgruntled.
"If reapers have a rating system, I will give you negative 100 for failing to do your job and not only that, you let your subject stab you with your own reaping instrument," she retorted.
Ari gave her a murderous scowl and she smirked back at him.
"You wait here while I go in and grab those blasted magazines," she told him.
"Ya ya, go on, I have no desire to follow you everywhere," he replied and leaned back to close his eyes.
She made a mad dash inside, grabbed all the magazines she can find, pay and dashed right out. All within 5 minutes. Then she started the engine and pealed out of there, speeding all the way back home. She has to get home before Mark gets home.
She glanced at the clock. It is already 1am. So typical. Mark doesn't gets home till it is 3am nowadays. Sometimes, he doesn't even come home at all. She hoped tonight is the night he doesn't come home.
When she pulled into the Brinstrone mansion's driveway, a thought occurred to her. How will she hide Ari? Where can she set him up? They have plenty of guest rooms but how do you smuggle a visibly injured man into your house without the in-laws noticing?
"Humans can't see me if I don't let them see me," Ari told her drily. "You already know that, I don't know why it's such a quandary for you all of a sudden,"
"Right," she said.
She forgot. In the rush home, she had forgotten all things to do with reapers and reaping souls. There was also a sort of an invisible beeping or blinking or notification of sorts in her mind. Something nagging at her behind her mind that she had ignored while rushing back. Now, she focused on it and it became clear.
A list of names. Souls she has to reap tomorrow. Since she is in a hurry, she tucked it to the back of her mind again. She will go through the names and locations tomorrow morning.
She has to resolve her monster-in-law problem first. She grabbed the stacks of magazines and went inside the mansion without waiting for Ari.
Screw the reaper. Let him take his own sweet time limping, shuffling, whatever that he does in that weird slow gait of his, all the way inside.
"I do not limp!" Ari protested behind her but she ignored him. She didn't even leave the door open since he could appear wherever he wanted.
Erin Brinstrone was sitting in the large luxurious gold trimmed living room waiting for her with her two sisters-in-law, Nesquai and Neshi. There were no signs of Mark and for that she is relieved. She can handle the women alone.
"And so the cheating housewife returns," Erin said. She stood up, snatched the magazines from Valeria's hands, threw it on the floor and slapped her so hard, her head whipped to the right and she almost fell over. Her face sting from the slap but Valeria suppressed her scream.
"My Mark gave you everything you wanted, a luxurious life, designer brands, and this is how you repay him? You go around committing adultery???" Erin accused.
"Mark should get rid of her," Nesquai said
"Damn right, such an ugly bitch too, time to kick her large ass out," Neshi chipped in.
"I wasn't, I didn't," Valeria tried to defend herself but Erin will not have it.
Erin slapped Valeria's other cheek hard. Valeria's head whipped to the other side and she stopped herself from touching her stinging cheeks. Her head is now ringing from the slaps. She knows Erin doesn't like her to raise her hand to touch her own cheeks whenever Erin slapped her so she kept her hands firmly by her sides.
She bit her lips, stifling her sobs and any other sound that could set Erin off again.
"Don't you dare speak before I allow you to speak you useless gold digger!" Erin screamed. "The least you could have done was to give my Mark a child, an heir, and even such a simple thing as that you can't do!" she spat. "And now, you go gallivanting around the city with some man and kissing some man!"
Then she shoved Valeria so hard that she fell back on the floor, landing hard on her butt. She quickly curled into a ball, knowing what was to come. Erin started kicking at her, her foot making contact with whichever body part she could find. Her foot land on Valeria's back, on her butt, on her legs, her thighs, even her head, repeatedly.
She is only glad that Erin is not wearing stilettos today. Sometimes she would even grind the stiletto into her body.
"Useless bitch! Mark should divorce you!" Erin said as she kicked.
Nesquai and Neshi giggled on the sofa, making no attempts to stop their mother's violent assault against their sister-in-law. This is a normal occurrence in that household and they seem to enjoy watching Erin torture Valeria. After a few more moments of venting her anger on Valeria, Erin stopped, panting from her exertions.
"You better be up early tomorrow morning to make sure the house is spic and span and breakfast is ready by 7am," she ordered. Then she turned to her twin daughters.
"Come on girls, it is late, we should not waste time with this stupid ugly thing, Mark will most probably not be back tonight, I will call him tomorrow to tell him to divorce his cheating wife," she said.
The women didn't even glance at Valeria, who was curled up in pain, on the floor as they make their way up the grand staircase to their respective rooms. Nesquai and Neshi even sniggered as they walked pass her.
Once they are gone, Valeria slowly sat up and massaged the parts Erin had hit her, which was literally her whole body. Tears swelled in her eyes but she refused to let them fall.
What is the point of crying anymore? No one will come to rescue her. Not the least Mark, her husband. The man who had promised to love, protect and care for her for the rest of her life but has not done that in years.
She slowly stood up and noticed the nagging in the back of her mind again. The list of souls to reap. Right. She is not in the mood. She headed to the staircase before stopping short. Didn't Ari come in?
She looked around. There was no sign of him. Sighing, she went to the front door to look out. He was standing outside the door waiting.
"Why are you standing here? Do I have to open doors for you now? What is this, treat Valeria as a servant day?" she said.
"I am injured, my powers are greatly impeded, it was already a struggle for me to remain invisible to humans," Ari told her.
She rolled her eyes and stood aside for him to enter. Then she locked the door. If Ari mention even a word about what Erin did to her jokingly, so help her she will….
"I may be a reaper but I am not cruel," Ari interrupted her thoughts. "Besides, I think someone saw me kissing you in your car and told her, I was not invisible at that time, and that could have been what set her off," he told her.
"You heard everything?" she asked, keeping her voice low.
"I can hear all the thoughts by humans remembers?" he said.
Right. Why didn't she get this power too? Then at least she will know what her in-laws are thinking and she can avoid doing anything to anger them.
"Sorry, no can do, we can't give humans that kinda power," Ari replied.
"Whatever, let me set you up in a room first," she whispered.
She made her way upstairs. She will have to set Ari in the furthest guest room from the in-laws and yet to be near enough to her so that she can go in and give him his daily drop of blood. It was a good thing she is in the east wing and the in-laws are in the west wing.
When she and Mark first got married, Erin had said that they should have the whole east wing to themselves since they are newlyweds. It was to give them more privacy. The first few years were bliss. The honeymoon years with Mark. Now, she is just glad that she sleeps far away from the in-laws. At least they won't murder her in her sleep.
They have a few guest rooms in the east wing. Mark always sleeps in the one next to the master room so she will give Ari the one that is at the far end of the wing. It is secluded and off the way.
Perfect to hide a wounded reaper.