The Tessa Randolph Collection, Books 1-3 Paula Lester (year 7 reading list .txt) 📖

there, but she couldn’t spot tall, thin Timothy. When she turned to the right, a burgundy blur pushed through a doorway midway down the hall.

Tessa ran to catch up, thanking herself for not wearing heels that day. She leaned against the wall for a few minutes and counted slowly to forty before entering the room herself.

Timothy sat next to April in the front row. Tessa took a seat at the very back of the room.

The presenter, a reaper Tessa didn’t know, had a sunny attitude and, if Tessa hadn’t been focusing on Timothy so much, would have been fun to listen to. She was talking about how to get the most out of your day as a reaper—planning and scheduling your day so you could be given more assignments.

Tessa kept her eyes on Timothy. About fifteen minutes into the presentation, he looked at his watch, grabbed the notebook he’d been jotting in, and slipped out of the chair.

Tessa leaned over her own notebook, letting long hair fall forward to thwart Timothy’s recognition. Had he noticed her? She counted slowly to twenty, grabbed her stuff, and darted after him.

He was nowhere to be seen. The hallway that was bustling earlier was now empty, as everyone was in their morning session.

Where is he? Had he gone back toward the hotel lobby? That made the most sense. The majority of the conference rooms where in that direction. Or maybe he’d wanted to go to two talks that were scheduled at the same time and decided to go halfsies.

She started in that direction but then hesitated and glanced the other way. The only thing there was a set of double doors that said Exit. One of them wasn’t closed completely, as though someone had slipped out of it and not delivered enough momentum for the thing to swing back shut all the way.

Her brow furrowed. Why would Timothy leave the building? Did he need a smoke break or something? Tessa had never seen him with a cigarette, but she hadn’t exactly been following him around everywhere before either. The guy, with his accountant-like aura, mostly blended in with the scenery.

Tessa opened the door cautiously and stuck her head outside. The sun was so bright she couldn’t see anything for a minute. She blinked several times and held a hand to her forehead to shield her vision. Timothy was walking down a sidewalk that bordered the back of the hotel.

She eased out, holding the door until it closed so it wouldn’t make noise. She dug in her purse for the sunglasses she’d bought with Silas, glad she had them with her even though she hadn’t been planning to go outside that morning. Once they were on, her eyes were much more comfortable. She started after Timothy, making sure to stay far enough behind that it hopefully wouldn’t trigger his sixth sense and let him know he was being followed.

At the end of the building, Timothy veered off across the perfectly manicured lawn, past a little courtyard with stone benches.

Where is he going?

Tessa tried to remember what Bubba had said during his talk about staying in the shadows. The main thing was to act normal. As much as possible, even forget yourself that you were following the person. That way, you wouldn’t be putting out energy that may draw their attention.

She tried to think about something other than following Timothy across the lawn. First, her thoughts landed on Abi and Pepper. A smile lifted her lips as she remembered the need to pick up some gifts for Abi to make up for her cat’s bad behavior. She should get Pepper a little something too. Poor kitty was probably just as irritated with Abi as the other way around.

The loud chirp of a bird startled her back to the moment. Her heart thudded faster as she remembered the mission. She scanned the landscape ahead for Timothy. He’d put more distance between them. The courtyard had given way to shorter, perfectly clipped grass.

In the distance, Tessa could see a few scattered golf carts.

Really? A golf course?

She couldn’t believe it. Since becoming a reaper, Tessa had found herself on a golf course roughly triple the number of times she’d ever set foot on one during the whole rest of her life combined.

Was this some kind of curse? Were golf courses to reaper Tessa what graveyards were to most ordinary folk?

She rolled her eyes at her own thoughts and focused on Timothy. He’d stopped walking and stood, arms crossed, watching a group of golfers.

Tessa wanted to get as close as possible without being spotted by Timothy. There was a little creek to her left. She darted that direction and crouched in a patch of cattails, praying there were no alligators lurking there.

Then she stopped and blinked with the realization she wasn’t the only reaper around. Lydia was there too. That was even more odd.

Lydia was approaching from a slightly different direction as Tessa and Timothy. The golfers waved her over and one of them requested a bag of chips and a soda, as though Lydia worked for the golf course. Tessa couldn’t hear everything, but the scene was familiar. Her own first reap had been strikingly similar.

A moment later, one of the golfers stiffened and fell over. Tessa watched Lydia, in her grim reaper form, greet the man’s spirit and herd him toward a bright light that only the two reapers could see.

But Timothy’s gaze was right on them, above the other golfers. Could he see Lydia and the golfer’s spirit too?

A shout went up from one of the other golfers, stopping the spirit momentarily, who looked down on his own prone body in the grass.

“I think he had a stroke or something! He’s not breathing!”

The spirit looked sad. Lydia touched his arm, smiled, and drew his attention away from the ground and toward the sky.

Timothy nodded once, turned, and headed back across the course toward the hotel.

Tessa frowned. Why had Timothy taken it upon himself to watch Lydia