Free By Grace Alone (The Death Dealer Book 2) by Katie Roman

murderers like Harris Atkins into the grave. If the Death Dealer who resided in Glenbard was the same as the hero of the north, then perhaps Nathaniel could convince him where his loyalties should lie. It was only a matter of tracking the Death Dealer down.
     

Eight
    Grace woke with a start when a hand pressed over her mouth. “Don’t scream,” was the instruction that came out of the dark. Screaming was the second thing Grace wanted to do. The first was to stab the intruder, but this one had wisely moved her dagger outside of her reach. She could see the blade on the floor.
    “Jack?” was her muffled response, though it sounded more like a confused grunt.
    Jack removed his hand from her mouth and Grace worked to adjust her eyes to the darkness. She sat up in bed and a darkened figure crossed the room to sit at her desk. She rubbed her eyes and glared into the darkness. Jack appeared as a darkened lump in the corner of her room.
    “What are you doing here?” If she screamed she’d wake up Mistress Fisher, and Mistress Fisher would call for the guard. The scandal of Jack Anders in her room would be all over Glenbard in an hour. Jack had picked his time to harass her well. She had no way to fight and scream with him now. “How did you get in?”
    “Have you forgotten that I helped you and Marcus test the secret doors?” She had forgotten. More appropriately, she had forced herself to forget. It wasn’t a comforting thought to know he could come in at any time to see her. “I know what you were doing lurking in the shadows at the Emerald last night.”
    “How do you know what I was doing?”
    “Only the blind, deaf, and dumb don’t know what’s happening with the Guild and the Guard.” Even though it was dark, Grace could tell Jack was making himself far too comfortable in her lodgings. She heard him rustling and shifting as he sat, and the thud of boots on wood meant he’d put his feet up. She narrowed her eyes but the effect was lost in the darkness.
    “What business is it of yours, anyway?”
    “I’m not interested in you getting hurt because of Marcus.”
    “I imagine you think it’s only all right for you to hurt me.”
    Grace couldn’t see his face, but she heard him shift uncomfortably on the other side of the room. He was often like a rock, so to hear him uncomfortable was enough to bring a grim smile to her face.
    “I’m trying to tell you to stay clear of the situation,” he said after a considerable pause.
    “You’ve no place to tell me what I can and cannot do! You don’t know what’s best for me, you scoundrel and—”
    “Shut up, Grace.” He kept his voice down to avoid drawing anyone to the door, but he was mad. And he wasn’t the kind of man who talked around subjects when the blunt truth worked. “I know you’re smarter than this, and you’ve always placed yourself above these sorts of things. You gave up the hood. What are you thinking ?”
    Being the Death Dealer was the one thing Grace had after Jack left. Being the Death Dealer was a way to combat her grief after her father’s death. It was a way to keep her grounded and away from despair. Without it, she almost became a living ghost. Occupying her mind and body with chasing petty criminals and being Marcus’s watchdog was how she managed each day after Jack’s departure. She wouldn’t admit that to Jack, though she couldn’t say if she held her tongue because the truth would hurt him, or because it wouldn’t hurt him enough.
    “Harris deserves a better fate than the two before him,” Grace replied softly.
    “Better than a swift, merciful death or the certainty of torture? I’d say he’s in better hands with Marcus and the like.”
    “I mean he deserves the King’s justice. A trial. A fair hearing. No one cared much for the constable he killed, so why beat up on a fool like Harris?”
    Jack laughed softly from his seat and Grace frowned into the darkness at the sound. “Gods, Grace…a King’s justice?