Beautiful Death Read Online Free PDF Page B

forehead earlier and made him loose his dinner was still there, but had dried into this disgusting, stinking, dark paste of death. His thick, shoulder length black hair looked like a squirrel had its way with it and there was something pasty in the tips that made it stick out in all directions. Looked like vomit. Speaking of vomit, there was some on his shirt. And his jeans from his knees down.
    Jesus Christ, what a fucking mess. No wonder Haruka wouldn’t look at him.
    He frowned at his dirty reflection. “You disappoint them every day you do stupid shit like this...” He sighed and pulled off the soiled shirt. He washed his face as thoroughly as he could, trying to get the disgusting dried corpse off. When he was satisfied that his face couldn’t be any cleaner and burned just a little from scrubbing too hard, he returned to the bedroom.
    “Haruka?” She looked up at hearing her name but didn’t say anything, eyes gazing off past him. Maybe she was just tired too. “It was Haruka, right?” Still nothing. He let out a defeated sigh and held up his shirt. “Uh, yeah, you mind tossing this in the wash? I don’t have any other clothes and this one’s dirty...”
    She walked up to him, took the soiled shirt without touching him and pointed down at his pants, dark eyes fixed on his bare chest. He almost smiled, but his exhaustion was too heavy to care much at the moment about her checking him out.
    “Pants too, huh? I guess they are kinda dirty. Um, a robe maybe?” He usually didn’t mind stripping down for a pretty girl, but he was so not in the mood right then—an oddity if any. He’d be lucky to get any sleep after the night he just had. Then again, he knew where the house bar was…
    Haruka nodded and pointed a single finger behind him. In the bathroom, he stripped down to his boxers and stopped, debating on whether or not to let her have them too. He was only sleeping and his clothes should be clean by the time he woke, that’s if Haruka was up for the day. He shrugged, got naked and found a clean kimono type robe folded on a linen shelf. It wasn’t his style, but it was something. The thought to just walk back out there naked had occurred to him. In the end he decided to cover up—not that he thought Haruka would really notice. She hardly even looked at him. He handed over the rest of his clothing, hoping to see them again, especially his boxers. Nothing like being in a strange place with stranger people, without your own drawers.
    “Thanks,” he said, running his eyes over her, taking her all in. In the better light, he could really see her. She was older than he originally thought, older than him, not that that effected his decision in women. But, seriously, she was just a little too strange. Even for him.
    Haruka must have felt his gaze on her because her dark eyes flicked up, finally meeting his. He smiled that smile all pretty women got and she gave a small gasp, quickly looked away. Clutching Tristan’s dirty, stinking clothes to her chest, she gave a deep bow and left without another word.
    “Wow, what did I get myself into?” Tristan shook his head and climbed into bed. Remembering their strange conversation outside of Ash’s bedroom, he picked up the necklace from the nightstand. He turned it over a few times, looking at it up close. It was simple, like a miniature pillow, sealed on all four sides. One side had a purple star embroidered into the red silk. There was something sweet smelling inside that crinkled like dry leaves when he squeezed it. He knew it was stupid, thinking a silly pouch of leaves would keep him nightmare free, but he put it on anyway. And there was plenty of naked flesh for it to touch now that his clothes were gone.
    He gave a deep sigh, his body instantly relaxing and his eyes weighted down. Despite all the crazy shit of the night, sleep demanded reign. And he was happy to give in to it, happy to finally have an end to the shitty ass day. Though, these days— most