The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy (Hart and Mercy, #1)

by Megan Bannen

Twyla Banneker and Frank Ellis were Mercy’s favorite marshals. Middle aged and down to earth, they were partners in Tanria and next-door neighbors in Eternity, the sort of best friends who came as a matching set, as if they were attached by hyphens: Twyla-and-Frank.

Hart looked horrified, as if a cluster of drudges had attacked him rather than the Birdsall family.

The crow’s feet reappeared, and Mercy suspected that he was biting the inside of his cheek to stop himself from smiling, which was, if she was being perfectly honest with herself, endearing.

but she felt swoony as she watched him hang his hat on the coatrack and run a hand through his hair to neaten it.

Hart was the fragile one, while she was strong in all the ways that mattered.

“No hard feelings?” she said. “Oh, there are hard feelings. So many.”

Hart was late for work. Very, very late. He could not possibly care less.

All Hart could think about was Mercy, and how much he wanted to be in her bed, and how much he did not want to be stuck in Tanria, hiding his constant boner from Duckers.

Fuck it. Professionalism is for people who are not in love with Mercy Birdsall.

But since he was not above messing with Duckers, he crossed his arms and said, “That’s out of the way.”

“I’ll be good,” he promised. He could not wait to be good to Mercy.

He tried to keep his smile from splitting his face open as she wiped her lipstick off his mouth with her thumb. Her thumb. By his mouth. He grabbed hold of it with his teeth.

His hands traveled downward to her ass, pulling her into his hard need, and he moved with her gyrations, their rhythm heated and sinuous.

He hadn’t realized how tight his lungs were until Mercy gave him room to breathe.

He had so many stories he’d never told anyone.

he pushed aside the niggling worry that he was going to have to tell her about the letters at some point.

YEAH PLS DO IM NERVOUS

But since she knew that the prospect of immortality upset him—upset both of them, if she was being honest—

I’ve spent the night worshipping at the altar of your glorious, beautiful, intoxicating pussy.”

“That’s the idea.” By 7:57, Hart was saying “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” again as he struggled into his clothes, but this time, he was giggling like a sex-sated teenager, and Mercy

And then Hart walked past the front window, his long hand patting the top of his head as if he had realized at

“What the fuck did you think I was going to say?” “Dang, sir, I don’t know. I thought you were going to say that you like her, but you love her? Like, capital-L Love?”

Hart felt as if every organ in his body had dropped to the floor beneath the uncomfortable hospital bed. Because Marshal Rosie Fox was an immortal demigod. Definitely, conclusively immortal.

If Hart was going down in flames, he intended to look his best for Mercy when he did so.

I’m here to see your daughter to tell her that I’m her secret pen pal and I’m hoping against hope that she won’t hate me forever and might even want to have sex with me tonight?

If, by some miracle, he managed to keep Mercy in his life, he could be a part of this. He could have a family again.

terrible would it be if he never told Mercy that he was her secret friend? What good would it do to tell her about the letters now? None.

He had so much to lose if he confessed, and everything to gain if he simply kept his mouth shut. Surely, he could convince Duckers to see it his way.

Hart No

He held up both hands in surrender. They were shaking badly. He was going to lose her. He could already feel his joy slipping through his fingers like sand.

Mercy said nothing, and he wasn’t sure he would have heard her if she had. He was far away, standing in the field, watching Bill’s face contort in pain as Hart buried his rapier into his mentor’s appendix.

Because Hart had not been doing dandy on his own. That was how he’d wound up writing the words I’m lonely in a letter that found its way to the one person who could break him into a million pieces, the person who was breaking him into a million pieces right this minute as she trampled his memories of Bill.

His tears came like sick, heaving out of him uncontrollably. He sobbed the way a child weeps, coughing and wheezing for air. He didn’t know a grown man could cry like this.

And here he was, lying in bed when he was the one person in the world who might be able to solve the issue once and for all. He knew what needed to be done, and the more he thought about it, the more he knew he’d do it.

He wanted only love at his side now.

He blew out a breath, as if he could cast his roiling thoughts into the wind along with it.

As far as he was concerned, this was his home.

“We found him.” Alma’s bottom lip trembled. She took a shaky breath before she spoke again. “I’m sorry, Mercy. He’s sailed the Salt Sea.”

Mercy had told him that she didn’t want to see him again, and he had honored her wishes. Now, as she braced herself to see his remains, she’d

You’ve made me want to live my life, rather than spend my time worried about my mortality (or lack thereof). Maybe

Maybe then it will make its way to you somehow, my words too late as always and never worthy of you to begin with.

I’m not supposed to be here, he thought with an accompanying dismay.

The man chucked the clipboard onto the counter. He came closer, stopping a few feet in front of Hart. “I’m your dad.”

I’m the Warden—you know, the guy who ushers souls into the House of the Unknown God. They need help sometimes, the lost and lonely

ones. Hence, me.”

who, to Hart’s knowledge, had never fathered a child in all of recorded history—took a step toward him.

And pain. So much pain. He had opened the door and had gone home. They’d all gone home, all the lost souls, his own included.

It made me wonder, what’s so great about living that you wouldn’t want to die?

It wasn’t love at first sight, exactly—more like a knowing.

“You get two deaths to die, little demigod, one from me and one from your mother.”

Peanut. Hart had forgotten that his grandfather called him that.

Why did he think he was alone, when clearly, these two women loved him as much as—