The Sweetest Burn

  Zach glanced at Adrian, and when they exchanged a meaningful look, my hackles rose. “If either of you even think of hiding something from me again—” I began furiously.

  “We’re not,” Adrian interrupted, his gaze piercing as it landed on me. “I told you, Ivy, no secrets and no holding back this time. Moses’s staff controls nature, which is why we need it to repair the realm walls and the demons also want it so they can use it to send those same walls crashing down. So, our best bet is to start with places that have natural anomalies. Even while dormant, the staff will affect what’s around it.”

  That made sense, but, “I doubt it’ll be as simple as googling places that are known for large congregations of locusts, frogs, lightning bolts or partings of seas,” I said tartly. “If so, demons would’ve found it centuries ago.”

  Adrian raised a brow. “They’ve spent a lot of time scouring places with unusual natural phenomena, but they can’t sense hallowed objects. Only you can. That’s why we’re going to find the staff and they’re not.”

  He sounded completely confident. Then again, he was overlooking the most dangerous part of this mission. It wasn’t whether or not we could find the staff. It’s what could very likely happen if I tried to use it.

  “I’m going with you, too,” Jasmine said, her words distracting me from a topic I didn’t want to dwell on.

  I turned to my sister. “You’ve been through enough. We’ll find you another place to stay at on hallowed ground, so you’ll be safe—”

  “You think I’ll ever feel safe again?” Her voice filled with more pain than any eighteen-year-old should ever have. “I’m barely holding it together with you and Costa around me 24/7. If you leave me by myself, I’ll lose it for sure. And I spent months trapped in a demon realm, so I know what we’re up against.”

  “Jasmine,” I tried again.

  “I’m going.” She cut me off with a flash of her old stubbornness. “Either help me pack or get out of my way, Ives.”

  She hadn’t called me her pet name from our childhood since we’d rescued her. That, plus the glimpse of her former spunk, melted my resistance away. Who was I to lecture her? She was right. In some ways, she’d been through a lot more than me.

  “Fine, then you can help me pack,” I said, trying not to think about how I was going to find the staff while not getting myself killed, my sister hurt or my heart broken again.

  “I’ll pull our ride around,” Adrian stated.

  I gave him a doubtful look. “You think we can fit four adults and a winged gargoyle into your vintage metal baby?”

  His smile was threatening and promising, like a lion licking its prey while deciding whether to eat it now or later. “We’re bringing my Challenger, but we’re not riding in it.”

  Huh? “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  His smile widened into a grin. “Get packed and you’ll find out.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I DROPPED MY suitcases when I saw the bus. It was so long that it extended well past the driveway, and it had to be at least three feet taller than Brutus at his full height. Now I knew what Adrian meant about bringing his Challenger but not riding in it. The muscle car was hitched to the back of the bus, and though it wasn’t small, it was dwarfed by the black-and-gray behemoth that had the words Soul Smashers emblazoned across both sides of it.

  Adrian jumped down from the side door, ignoring the steps that led to the bus. “Like it?” he asked, grinning at my expression. “It’s not much for speed, but when it comes to space and comfort, this thing has it all.”

  “You don’t say,” I managed. “Where did you get this?”

  He glanced at it. “This was the tour bus for a band that was trying to be the next Smashing Pumpkins. The Soul Smashers never made it past being a one-hit wonder, which is why they went broke and sold their tour bus to me a few months ago.”

  I didn’t comment on the irony of the last Judian and the last Davidian traveling around in a bus labeled Soul Smashers while trying to prevent a demon apocalypse. Instead, I climbed the steps and peeked inside. Then I blinked, convinced that I’d been glamoured because this couldn’t be real.

  Plush, black leather couches and a matching leather recliner chair made up what looked like an upscale living room. Mounted wall speakers surrounded a state-of-the-art entertainment area with a large flat-screen TV, and unless I was crazy, across from that was a minibar.

  Beyond that, there was a kitchen with the works: granite countertops, a double-door refrigerator, stove, microwave, sink and dishwasher. A dinette area was across from that, with a half bathroom tucked into the corner. And on the opposite wall, right before a door that I assumed led to a bedroom, was a full bar complete with a lower cooler filled with wine bottles.

  No wonders these rockers went broke, I thought. They’d been too busy drinking and riding around in style to perform.

  When I slid open the pocket door in the back, it revealed a large, king-size bed, and I spied another bathroom in the corner, this one with a shower. The exterior of the tour bus might look at little beat up, but on the inside, everything was brand-new and top-of-the-line. Hell, it was nicer than the house we’d just left, not that I’d ever say such a thing to Costa.

  “Better than my Challenger?” Adrian teased.

  I turned around to find him standing behind me. He had both my suitcases, but really what caught my attention was his smile. It was almost impish, and the silver rings encircling his irises seemed to gleam brighter from mischief. I couldn’t remember seeing Adrian look so...carefree. Under the power of that infectious smile, I smiled back.

  “You could fit several of my former dorms in this thing.”

  He shrugged. “As you said, Brutus is too big to fit in any regular vehicle, plus in addition to the four of us, we also have lots of luggage and weapons.” Then Adrian cast an almost casual glance at the bedroom. When his gaze met mine, his smile had a decidedly wicked slant. “This will suit all our needs.”

  Wow, he wasn’t even trying to be subtle! Did he really think he’d just walk back into my life and I’d greet him with open legs? Okay, so I’d come close to giving it up before, but I knew better now. We had destinies to fulfill—or in his case, to overcome—so any attraction I might still feel for him was irrelevant. Saving people was my top priority. Not getting sweaty with the one person in the world who was fated to betray me.

  “We could also have just taken different cars,” I said, my chilly look telling him, It’s not happening.

  The single arch of his brow said, We’ll see.

  Jasmine and Costa climbed into the trailer, interrupting our wordless conversation. “Nice, bro,” Costa commented, looking around with appreciation, but no surprise. Maybe Costa was used to Adrian living large, even if that was a side of him I was just beginning to see.

  “Is all this necessary?” was what Jasmine said. I frowned. I agreed, but she sounded snippy, which wasn’t like her.

  “Our first stop is California,” Adrian replied, his new, neutral tone not fooling me a bit. He hadn’t done this just because we had a long way to go. “Since it will take days to get there, we all may as well be comfortable.”

  Comfortable, my ass. His glance at the bedroom certainly hadn’t been accidental.

  Jasmine shot a look between us, then she tugged on my arm. “Come on, Ivy. If the bedroom’s ours, let’s get settled in.”

  I grabbed my bags and led the way. “The closet’s yours, and there are more drawers under the bed,” Adrian called out.

  “Thanks—”

  Jasmine shut the pocket door before I could finish speaking. When she turned around, her arms were crossed in a way that reminded me of our mother when she’d been upset.

  “Is something wrong?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she replied shortly. “You and Adrian ar
e what’s wrong.”

  I was so shocked, it took me a second to find my tongue. “Lower your voice, he can hear us,” I hissed.

  Her blue eyes seemed to turn to ice. “I don’t care. He’s destiny-bound to betray you and everyone knows it. If it were up to me, he wouldn’t be anywhere near you, but Zach insisted.”

  I didn’t know what surprised me more, the harshness in her voice, or this latest revelation. “Zach? When did you talk to him about Adrian coming with us? When I was packing?”

  She gave an impatient swipe. “After you left to look for Brutus. Zach showed up and said that you’d be back with Adrian. I begged him not to lift his restriction on Adrian, but you can’t tell an Archon to do anything he doesn’t want to—”

  “You knew about Zach supernaturally preventing Adrian from contacting me?” I cut her off. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  Jasmine’s expression hardened. “Who do you think asked Zach to do it in the first place? Zach agreed that you needed time by yourself. I was hoping you’d get over Adrian if he was forced to leave you alone, but ever since he showed up, it’s obvious that you haven’t.”

  I stared at her in disbelief. The blond-haired girl across from me looked like my sister, but the Jasmine I knew was sunny, playful and impulsive. Not manipulative, hateful and hard.

  “Jaz,” I said softly. “What’s going on?”

  She let out a sound that was half scoff, half sob. “You mean, why do I hate him? Maybe it was seeing my boyfriend tortured to death in front of me in Adrian’s former realm, or seeing how demons treat people worse than cattle, or being their caged trophy for weeks. Maybe it was finding out that minions murdered our parents while I was away, or maybe it’s the fact that both demons and Archons believe that Adrian absolutely will fulfill his destiny by betraying you! You’re all I have left, Ivy.” Her voice broke. “I can’t stand to lose you, too.”

  I felt so ashamed. Here I’d thought that Jasmine had been doing better over the past several weeks. She’d seemed like she’d been coping after her ordeal, but she hadn’t, and I’d been blind to it. Seeing Adrian again must’ve felt like salt in her wounds, and she had already suffered so much.

  “You don’t have to worry,” I told her, my voice rough from holding back tears. “If Zach hadn’t made him come, Adrian wouldn’t be here. Anything I felt for him before...it was just our supernatural tie because we’re the last of our lines. Adrian even warned me about that when we first met. It might have felt like real emotions, but it wasn’t, and I’m over that now.”

  I managed not to choke on the lie. Oh, if only what I still felt for Adrian was the same emotions that had drawn Davidians and Judians together for over two thousand years! Those had been compassion, empathy and the need to save. What I felt was different—stronger and deeper—and as much as I might want to, I couldn’t blame any of it on my lineage.

  “You don’t have to be afraid of Adrian betraying me again,” I went on. I won’t let him, I silently added, but Jasmine needed more reassurance than that. “The day I wiped out the Bennington demon realm, Zach told me that Adrian had a chance to beat his fate. So, the demons might believe that Adrian is their weapon, but when you take someone’s best weapon away from them, it just makes them easier to kill.”

  I was paraphrasing Adrian’s words from this morning, not that Jasmine needed to know that. She just needed to believe it, and despite all my issues with Adrian, I still did believe that he could overcome his fate. I just wasn’t willing to bet my life on it anymore, let alone my heart.

  I went over to Jasmine and took her hands. She couldn’t know that I still had doubts. She was too fragile. “I’m going to get Moses’s staff, use it to repair the realm walls and then laugh as the demons choke on their unmet expectations of Adrian,” I told her in a strong voice that belied my inner fears. “If you don’t trust that he has truly changed, at least trust that Adrian hates demons even more than you do.”

  Tears welled in her eyes until one of them rolled down her cheek. “Then why do all the demons still believe in him?”

  I kept my hands on hers, but my grip loosened. “They need to,” I said at last. “Aside from getting lucky and managing to kill me first, Adrian’s betrayal is their only hope.”

  She smiled with more pain than anyone eighteen years old should ever have. “And your only hope is that they’re wrong. Someone’s going to lose this bet, and whoever does will die.”

  The truth of that was like razors across my heart. I couldn’t show that, so I turned away, starting to unload the contents of our suitcases into the room’s drawers and cabinets.

  “I know this is winner-take-all,” I said at last. “But only people who bet everything stand a chance to win it all. We’re going to win, Jasmine. I promise you that.”

  We have to, I didn’t add. If not, and the realm walls eroded enough to fall, or Adrian did betray me to demons as his destiny predicted, then all the horrible things Jasmine had experienced would become everyday life for the rest of humanity.

  I couldn’t let that happen. I wouldn’t.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ADRIAN TOOK THE first shift driving. He’d been tight-lipped ever since I came out of the bedroom, and it didn’t take my new, improved senses to figure out why. He’d overheard my conversation with Jasmine. Whether he was more upset at her low opinion of him or my assurance that I’d never felt anything real for him, I didn’t know and I wasn’t about to ask.

  Costa seemed unusually subdued, too. Of course, that could be because of Brutus’s close proximity. Even though we’d shared a house, I’d kept the gargoyle away from Costa as much as I could these past two months. Costa might only see a seagull when he looked at Brutus because of the Archon glamour Zach used to disguise him, but Costa never forgot what Brutus was. Neither did Jasmine, although she seemed to have gotten past her initial trepidation over him. Maybe Costa had seen too much of what Brutus had done when the gargoyle had been the demons’ flying version of a guard dog to ever feel comfortable around him.

  Because of Brutus’s fear of sunlight, we had him in the back bedroom with the windows and door shut. I only hoped he didn’t break the bed under his weight or get slime on the pillows; man, that gargoyle could drool when he slept! Costa, Jasmine and I were on the couch watching TV, although I don’t think any of us were paying attention to what was on the screen. We all appeared to be lost in our own thoughts.

  “So, California, here we come,” I said, trying to break the new, pensive atmosphere. “Which part are we going to? The beaches, the mountains, Hollywood?”

  The look Costa gave me said he knew what I was doing, and it wouldn’t work. “Death Valley. Shine that turd, Ivy.”

  Okay, so I had my work cut out for me. Was it riding with Brutus that had Costa so grumpy, or was it knowing that our brief, demon-free interlude was over? “Sun and sand, what’s not to love?” I said, accepting his challenge. “Beats the hell out of a freezing, pitch-black demon realm.”

  A smile ghosted across Costa’s lips. “You’re right—I would take scorpions, dehydration and heat stroke over the realms, but that doesn’t mean I like where we’re going.”

  I remembered that Costa hadn’t volunteered to come with us. Zach had just stated that Costa was going without bothering to ask his opinion on the matter.

  “Do you not want to be here? If so, we can drop you off somewhere, or...do something else?”

  Costa’s pointed look stopped my awkward attempt at letting him off the hook. “I’ve come this far, Ivy. I’m seeing it through to the end or I’ll die trying.”

  I flinched. Costa had been through enough to know that death was a real possibility. As he continued to stare at me, his real age seemed to creep into his dark brown gaze. Costa was a good-looking Greek guy who appeared to be in his late twenties, but time moved differently in the realms. In the one Costa had b
een trapped in, it had slowed to a near standstill. He’d be seventy-five on his next birthday, and every moment of those years filled his stare as he spoke again.

  “I’m okay with that, Ivy.” His voice was very soft. “The question is, are you ready to see this through, no matter what?”

  I hoped so. I attempted a confident version of a smile. “Of course. It’s my destiny, right?”

  He leaned back, flicking away wavy black hair that, along with his olive-toned skin and deep brown eyes, highlighted his Mediterranean heritage. “Destiny is only foreknowledge of choices you have yet to make.”

  “You’ve been spending too much time with Zach,” I muttered, wishing I’d kept watching the movie instead of trying to lighten the mood. Boy, had that backfired.

  “No,” Costa said, a harsh smile twisting his mouth. “I just know you want to get through this without hurting anyone except demons or minions, and that’s impossible. You’ve busted your ass training to fight them, but you haven’t accepted the fact that you might have to sacrifice everyone on this bus to win this war, and until you’re ready to do that, you’re not ready.”

  I looked away, my jaw clenching. “I’m doing this for everyone on this bus. I already lost my parents, my friends and any hope at a normal life, so if I lost all of you, too...it’d probably be easy for the demons to kill me, because I would have lost everything I’d been fighting for.”

  Costa’s smile was wiped away. “Then you need to find something else to fight for, because there’s a good chance that some or all of us will die before this is over. So find that something else, Ivy, because one day, you’re going to need it.”

  As if I needed any more pressure. If this was Costa’s version of a pep talk, he sucked at it. I looked at him, Jasmine, and then snuck a glance at Adrian, who drove without the aid of any mirrors because he’d smashed all the ones the bus came with. Breaking the mirrors negated a demon’s power to use them as mini-gateways or as spying tools, but they must make driving the bus a little more challenging. If so, Adrian didn’t show it. He stared fixedly at the road, but I knew he’d been listening.