But even with this new precaution and my dad’s much sturdier knot work, he wasn’t willing to let Alec sleep alone, just in case. So when I finally headed to bed at almost one in the morning, my father was settling onto the couch with his pillow and a throw blanket, determined to protect us all from the most recent Netherworld threat. Even in his sleep.
“HE KICKED HER OUT topless?” Emma shoved her spoon into the pint of Phish Food and dug out a chocolate fish, her brown eyes shining in the light pouring in through the kitchen window. After a long, mostly sleepless night, Saturday morning had dawned bright and clear, in blatant disrespect of my foul mood.
Fortunately, Emma had come bearing ice cream. Two reserve pints sat in the freezer.
I nodded, letting my bite melt in my mouth. Chocolate may not cure everything, but it goes down a lot better than any other medicine I’ve ever tasted.
The front door opened before I could respond, and Alec walked in, carrying a newspaper under one arm, nose dripping from the cold. He closed the door, then noticed us in the kitchen.
Before he could speak, I pointed the business end of my spoon at him and said, “Where were you? You weren’t on the schedule today.” He’d been gone when I woke up, both the ropes and bedding stowed somewhere out of sight.
Alec dropped the newspaper on the kitchen counter. “Apartment shopping.”
My eyes narrowed. “I thought you didn’t have the money yet.”
“I don’t. But I will soon, thanks to the new job.” And I had a feeling that after the big revelation, my father had suggested Alec move forward with his plans for financial and residential independence.
Still… I wasn’t taking any chances after meeting Avari at the theater. “Just humor me. What color was my first bicycle?”
“White, with red ribbons,” he replied, without hesitation.
“What’s with the twenty questions?” Em asked, scraping the inside edge of the carton with her spoon.
I shoved another bite in my mouth, buying time to think. But Alec was faster. “It’s this stupid trivia game.” He winked at me. “I’m winning.”
“Oh, I wanna play!” Em said, sitting straighter. “What was the name of my first bra?”
I nearly choked on my bite. “You named your first bra?”
She frowned. “You didn’t?” When I could only laugh, she turned to Alec. “You gonna guess?”
He hesitated, pretending to think. “I gotta go with Helga.”
She threw the ice cream lid at him. Alec laughed, then dropped it into the trash. “One carton of Ben & Jerry’s, two girls, two spoons. I’m guessing this is about Nash?”
Emma nodded, watching as Alec took off his jacket and draped it over the half wall between the kitchen and the entry. She’d made no secret of the fact that she thought he was hot, and I couldn’t exactly tell her he was nearly three times her age.
Alec raised one brow and grinned. “Isn’t the ice cream therapy thing kinda cliché?”
I shook my head. “It’s a classic for a reason.”
“And that reason is ’cause we’re underage,” Em insisted. “If I could’ve gotten my hands on anything stronger last night, we’d be recovering from strawberry daiquiri therapy this very moment.”
He laughed, heading for the silverware drawer. “So, is this girl-only ice cream, or can a sympathetic guy get a bite?”
Emma leaned over the table much farther than she had to for her next bite, to be sure he could see down her shirt. “What’s mine is yours.”
I kicked her under the table, as Alec dug in the fridge for a soda. He was older than her mother! And he was currently being used as the murder weapon for a Netherworld demon. Not that she knew any of that.
One more point in favor of full disclosure. I was probably going to have to tell Emma soon….
“What?” Em pouted, then licked ice cream from her spoon with it inverted over her tongue.
“That’s all you’re gonna share with him,” I whispered
She stuck her tongue out at me, then took another bite.
“What were you doing at Nash’s, anyway?” Alec asked, taking the chair on my other side. I think Emma scared him. Thank goodness.
“Makin’ up.”
Em grinned. “More like makin’ out.”
“Not that it matters now.”
“Why?” Alec dug in, his small spoon dwarfed by both of ours. Obviously an ice cream drama rookie. “If she kissed him, what’s the problem?”
I stared at him like he’d just volunteered for a lobotomy. “He kissed her back. I saw it. He didn’t push her away. He let her take her shirt off and stick her tongue down his throat.”
Alec licked his spoon, then set it on the table and popped his drink open. “Okay, I may be breaking some kind of girl-bonding rule or something, but can I offer you a guy’s perspective on this?”
I frowned, my spoon halfway to my mouth. “Is this gonna make me want to hit you?”
He shrugged. “Maybe. But it’s the truth. Here goes: kissing back is instinct. Unless the girl smells like a sewer or has tentacles feeling you up independently, a guy’s first instinct is to kiss back. That’s how it works. What’s important is how long that kissing back lasted. So…how long?”
“You can’t be serious.” I could feel my temper building like the first spark in what could soon be a roaring blaze. “You think it’s okay for him to kiss her back just because she isn’t hideous? Aesthetically speaking.” I was no suffragette, but I was pretty sure the he-can’t-control-himself defense was a big, stinky load of horseshit.
“No.” Alec held up one hand defensively. “But I also don’t think it’s okay for you to condemn him, if he was the innocent kissee, rather than the instigator of said kiss.”
I rolled my eyes. “Fine. He wasn’t the instigator.”
Alec nodded, obviously pleased with the progress. “Did she know you were there?”
“She parked right behind my car.”
“And he kicked her out, right?” Emma added, catching on.
“Yeah. And he told her not to come back.”
Alec turned to Emma, and she couldn’t resist another grin. “Are you hearing what I’m hearing?”
“Yup.” Alec met my gaze. “This was for your benefit, not his. She set you both up, and did everything she could to make you think he wanted it. And you…”
My frown deepened. “You think I’m overreacting?”
Alec shrugged again and dug in for another bite. “I wasn’t there. But it sounds to me like you at least owe him a chance to explain.”
I hesitated. Long enough for two more bites. “Maybe.” But I just wasn’t sure I had any more chances for Nash left in me.
I’M AT MY DESK with my laptop open, scouring the internet for a good price on a spray can of mara repellent, when the room suddenly feels wrong at my back. I don’t turn. I don’t even look up, because I know neither one will help. For several long seconds, we both pretend I don’t know he’s there. That the back of my neck isn’t prickling with fear.
Finally he says my name and I can’t ignore him. I slowly close my laptop and swivel in my rolling desk chair to confront the impossible.
“You can’t be here.” Yet me knowing that hasn’t prevented it from happening.
“Surprise,” Avari says, and he sounds truly thrilled. Somehow he’s managed to cross into the human world in his own body, and as far as I’m concerned, he brought hell with him.
The hellion looks different than I remember him, but that’s no surprise. Hellions can look like whatever they want, with one exception: they cannot replicate the exact form of any other living or deceased being. There will always be some small difference—finding that difference is the key.
At least, that used to be the rule. But if he can cross over now, do any of the other rules still apply?
Avari is now shorter than I remember him, with lighter hair. But he hasn’t bothered to change his voice, and his eyes are still the featureless ebony orbs I can’
t forget—spheres of chaos and infinity. Madness at a glance.
“Get out.” It’s all my overwhelmed brain can come up with while the rest of me fights the waves of fear and despair emanating from him like radiation from ground zero.
“Not until I have what I want.”
I don’t ask, because I know what he wants: me. But I don’t know why, and he’s never felt inclined to explain. Hellions can be bargained with—I’ve seen that firsthand—but they never give information for free, and I’m not willing to pay.
“So how does this work?”
He takes a step toward me, and I stand, my heart beating frantically. I want to retreat, but there’s nowhere to go. My desk is already cutting into my spine. “I grab you, then I drag you kicking and screaming into the Nether, where I’ll take good care of you—until the next new toy comes along.”
“And how are you planning to keep me there?” I’m impressed by my own nerve. I was stalling—for what? The cavalry? A brilliant idea?—but also digging for important information.
“Oh, after a couple of hours with me, you won’t have the strength to cross over. You won’t sleep and you won’t eat until I’ve broken your mind as well as your body, and after that… Well, it simply won’t matter what happens to you after that. You’ll never know the difference.”
“You won’t break me.” I sound much more sure than I really am. I have this strange calm now. It almost feels like acceptance. I can’t fight him, and I won’t scream for help and doom my would-be hero. And that means he’s won, before the fight even begins. So what’s the point in fighting?
Then he’s in front of me, and his hands have become wicked claws. He grabs my arm and his claws sink through my wrist, and suddenly I remember the point in fighting.
Pain, the moment he touches me, and not just where he rips through my flesh. I double over, struggling to breathe through an agony like electricity being run through me. He is the lightning and I am the rod, and the strike never ends.
Pain everywhere. I smell my skin cooking, hear my hair crackle as the follicles pop from the heat. In the mirror, I see no change, but I feel every single bit of it, like life is fire and I am the fuel, forever burning but never quite consumed. He can make me hurt in every cell of my body with a single touch. He will do this for eternity, if I go with him.
And he hasn’t even started on my mind yet.
NO! I’m screaming now, the magic word. They teach us in preschool. If something bad happens, shout NO! and parents will come running. If a stranger touches you, shout NO! and the police will take him away. You can always shout NO! and there will always be someone there to protect you.
But that’s a lie. No one comes. NO! is a lie, and safety is a lie, and the only truths are pain and forever, and pain is everywhere, and forever has already begun.
He pulls my arm, and the pain doubles, though that shouldn’t be possible, because how can you double infinity? I fall to the ground, because I can no longer stand. I can no longer think. I can only feel, and hurt, and scream, and know that it will never end. And that my grand delusions of resistance are like wielding a breath of air against a brick wall. There is nothing I can do. Giving in will not stop the pain. Begging will not stop the pain. In the end, even dying will not stop the pain.
And as my world fades beneath a swirl of gray fog, I know that I am lost, and that I will never, ever be found….
IT WAS STILL DARK when I opened my eyes, and the only sound I could hear was my own breathing, too hard and too fast. Still panicked from the nightmare. I stared up at the ceiling without seeing it, more afraid of the understanding now burrowing its way into my head than the dream I’d just escaped.
It wasn’t Sabine. My nightmare about Avari didn’t feel like her work—which I was definitely starting to recognize. It wasn’t personal enough. There was no angst and no self-doubt, the primary colors of her dream palette.
This dream felt like…Avari. Like the hellion was playing with my mind, messing with my very psyche. But that was impossible, right? Hellions couldn’t give people nightmares. Could they?
In the dark, as my breathing gradually slowed and my pulse calmed, I became aware of another sound, soft and even. Someone else was breathing. In my room.
I turned my head slowly, my heart thumping painfully, and could barely make out a familiar silhouette outlined by the creepy red glow from my alarm clock.
Alec sat in the corner chair. Silent. Watching me, like he’d been watching me for quite a while.
Why was he watching me? Why wasn’t he tied to the recliner in the living room, which is how he’d started the second night in a row? Where was my dad?
Uh-oh.
“Alec?” But I knew before he answered. I knew from the creepy smile Alec would never wear, and the way his eyes seemed to focus on something inside me.
“Bad dream?” he asked, leaning forward to study me closer in the dim light, and I froze at the sound of his voice. Because it wasn’t his voice. It was Avari’s.
No pretense this time; the hellion was all business. Just like in my dream.
“How did you…?” I started, clenching the top of my comforter.
“How did I get Alec free from those sad little ropes?” Avari finished, and I nodded. I didn’t bother ordering him to leave, because I didn’t have anything to threaten him with this time without involving—and endangering—my dad. Who’d probably already been both involved and endangered, considering that Avari had somehow gotten past both him and the restraints.
“Waking up bound was a bit of a surprise, I must concede,” the hellion said, leaning forward to peer at me through my friend’s eyes. “Regrettably, this body does not come with extraordinary strength. Fortunately, your father—or rather, his unconscious form—proved quite useful.”
“You possessed my dad?” My hands were damp, and I resisted the urge to wipe cold sweat on my covers. My father was eligible for hellion possession by virtue of having spent time in the Netherworld when Avari had him kidnapped the month before.
“Only long enough to free our dear Alec in his sleep. Your father is now unconscious, and both bound and gagged with his own restraints for my convenience. But he is otherwise unharmed, and I suggest you give me no reason to change that.”
My chest ached, and each breath felt like a knife to my heart. There was no one left to help me, and very few ways for me to help myself, without making things worse for both my dad and Alec. Even if I’d been willing to leave my dad, I couldn’t run, because if the hellion knew Alec’s physiology well enough to make his voice work, he could certainly catch me in the older, stronger body.
Why had he stayed to watch me sleep instead of going out for his usual murder-by-proxy? He couldn’t really drag me back to the Netherworld. Not using Alec’s body, anyway.
“You did that? My dream?” I asked, stalling for time to come up with a plan as my heart thudded in my ears. My only real hope was to knock Alec unconscious, which would expel the hellion from his body. But I’d never hit anyone that hard in my entire life. At least, not without a weapon to wield…
The hellion nodded magnanimously, an artist reluctantly taking credit for his masterpiece. “What did you think? Dreams are a new medium for me, and I may have used just a bit too much terror, when a little suspense would have sufficed.”
Fear and fury coiled within me, a startled snake about to strike, but I’d have to time my move perfectly to disable him with one unpracticed blow. “How?”
Avari shrugged nonchalantly, and it was almost as disturbing to see him in Alec as it had been to see him in Emma less than a month before. “There is a bit of a learning curve, but I’m sure I will get the recipe right next time.”
“How did you get into my head?” I snapped. “And there won’t be a next time.” There wasn’t supposed to be a this time. Depriving Avari of his proxy was supposed to keep him too weak to possess anyone. But not only did he clearly have the strength, he’d somehow picked up a new skill set!
“I’ve discovered several new talents since your last visit to the Nether, Ms. Cavanaugh. And there certainly will be a next time. Talents unpracticed are talents wasted, you know.”
“What do you want?” I asked, fully aware that this confrontation was now mirroring my bad dream. But that was the best I could do with the memory of the nightmare-hellion’s hands on me, his claws digging through my flesh, his power singeing my every nerve ending.
Avari cocked Alec’s head to one side, lending him a look of vacant curiosity. “You know, I’ve never had trouble answering that question in the past. And now it seems I want so many things that I can’t decide what to take first.”
I nodded, going for bravado. “Makes sense, considering you’re a demon of greed.”
“Lately, that’s not as much fun as it sounds like. What I really want to do is shove my hand down your throat and rip your heart out the long way. But I’m not sure if this body can accomplish such a physically demanding feat. And even if it can, if I give in to such immediate gratification, I’ll lose your precious, innocent little soul. And I think I might want that even more than I want your deliciously painful death.”
Don’t show him fear. Don’t shake and don’t sweat. Hold on to your anger, Kaylee. But that was all much easier said than done. “Lucky me.”
“Not in the slightest. Once I have your soul, I’ll be able to kill you over, and over, and over. It’s immensely entertaining—for me. Just ask Ms. Page.”
Addison. My chest ached just thinking about her and the very real torture she endured daily at Avari’s hands, er…claws. Because she’d sold him her soul, and we hadn’t been able to get it back for her.
“So, while I’m not quite ready to kill you yet, and I rather like having Alec on this side of the barrier now that I’ve had time to consider the benefits, I have no reason at all to leave your father breathing, if I cannot bring him into the Nether.”