Chapter Four
Kegan called out to Echo and pointed to the window looking out over the lake.
She followed the direction of his finger and in the next second, jumped from her chair. In two long strides, she stood in front of the thermal glass and yelled, “What are you doing, Samael? Put your body back on. Did you think that would frighten me? Honestly.” She placed her hands on her hips and shook her head.
“Let me in, Echo. Please. I can’t enter because of the holy water.”
“You’re joking, right?”
“No.”
“You really are as dim as a seven-watt bulb, aren’t you?”
“I’m in trouble, Echo. I need your help.”
She sighed. “What have you done this time, Samael?”
“Nothing.” Samael pouted.
Keegan watched the melodrama being played out. If Echo were smart – and he determined she was – she would barter with Samael. Keegan would. In fact, he'd done so on occasion to help a client or transfuse a case. As he thought about those times, he saddened. Practicing law defined him. No, he thought, his soul defined him. Law was merely a condiment complementing who he was. If his life came down to that, how would he survive without either?
Echo arched an eyebrow and tapped her foot on the floor.
“It’s not me, it’s Lucifer,” Samael said in a whiney voice. “He’s very hard to please. He asks for too much. I want to come back into the Almighty’s fold. Will you ask Him for me?”
“You should have thought about the consequences of your actions before you became a double agent.” She stared down at the floor. After a moment, she looked at him and sighed. “Give me the location of your portal, and I’ll see what I can do.”
“Really?” Samael’s head bobbed.
“Didn’t I just say I would? Beelzebub.” She growled.
Keegan arched his brows. Down, Echo. Getting pissed at your informant was not the way to gain confidence. Then, as though she’d read his thoughts, she said, “I’m sorry, Samael. This has been a trying day.”
She sounded sincere. Keegan hoped it was an act. Samael should remain Satan’s problem.
“What’s it going to be?” Echo asked, softly. “The location of your portal in exchange for a good word with the Boss?”
Samael’s beady eyes looked upward to the right, then downward to the left.
Keegan held his breath while he decided. Watching him ponder was painful. He wondered what the problem was. Only one answer could apply, and why Samael needed to consider the decision in the first place baffled him. He blew out the breath he held and prayed Samael would make up his mind soon.
His impatience caught him unaware. No one could ever accuse him of impetuosity, even when stressed. Something was happening to him, Keegan realized. He was changing, subtly and infinitesimally. If those alterations to his personality continued, he would morph into a man his own mother might not recognize.
Normally, Keegan wasn’t combative, either, unless, of course, he argued a case. He hated to think of the injustice that would ensue if he weren’t. All his life, he’d never had to think about right and wrong. The decisions had come naturally, without deliberation. He just knew the correct thing to do.
There had been occasions where he questioned the ethics of an issue and soul-searched for the right answer. He couldn’t do that now – not with his soul AWOL.
Samael crossed his eyes and stuck out his tongue. “I don’t trust you, Echo, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. If I found you, so will he.” He laughed, an eerie sound that chilled Keegan to the marrow.
“Get lost before I go out there and put your body where it’ll take you aeons to find.”
“They’re coming for him. They’re not letting this one go. He’s pulling out the big guns. For the right price, I’ll tell you why he wants him so badly.”
She wagged her finger in his face. “Honestly, Samael, you give me no credit. Do you really think I would believe that The Morning Star confided his plans in you?” She turned from Samael and with a dramatic eye roll, walked to the fireplace.
Keegan watched the demon’s head float into the mist. “He’s gone.”
“Good. I’m sick of that idiot showing up wherever I am. He’s too stupid to realize that pestering me is only going to make me ground my heels. Arghhh!” She threw her hands in the air. “Imbecile.”
“You two have a history?”
“Oh yeah.”
From her pressed lips, he could tell that whatever Samael had done still angered her.
She plopped onto a chair and blew a breath that bent the flame on a burning log. “What did you do that makes you so valuable to Satan?”
He shrugged. “I’m a lawyer,” he said, like that explained everything.
“Translated, that would mean…?”
“I’ve done some things and used some information and people for the good of a client.” He lifted his chin. “But nothing so sinful that Satan would fight to have me on his side. Unless he needs a good lawyer. What’s the story between you and Samael?”
“It happened a long time ago and is best forgotten.”
“But you haven’t. You can’t.” He needed to know whether whatever occurred between her and Samael would affect her judgment. He didn't want to end up a consequence. When he saw she had no intention of responding, he said, “I’ll keep asking until I get an answer.”
She shook her head. “It has no bearing on you and isn’t detrimental to your life.”
“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?”
She sighed and after a drawn out silence, said, “Samael played for both teams – good and evil. He succumbed to temptation and the promises of a traitor, Lucifer, the fallen angel, also known as The Morning Star. I learned of his duplicity and brought his deception before the board.”
“You tattled?” Keegan asked as he thought about something she'd said that he found even more intriguing. “Board?”
She stood and paced, her heels clicking on the pine flooring. “A panel of judges. Our Lord learned an invaluable lesson ages ago about defection and is understandably merciless in his punishment with anyone who crosses that line.” Obviously still angered by Samael, she glared at Keegan as if he was responsible for the fracas.
He cast that thought aside when something else occurred to him, probably because his life was governed by rules, laws, timetables and deadlines. “Are you on a countdown? Is there a time limit for you to reunite my soul and me?”
“Not specifically.”
When she averted her eyes, he became uneasy. There was something she didn’t want him to know, and her secrecy revolved around his soul. Determined to know, he asked, “What consequences will I suffer if I’m without my soul for too long?”
“We don’t know exactly.”
“But you’ve hypothesized?” He waited for her nod and asked, “What’s the verdict?”
She spread her hands at her sides. “There’s no delicate way to explain this, so I’ll say it straight out. Souls are the essence, the conscience of every human – an immortal sixth sense, if you will.”
Keegan considered that explanation and came to the only conclusion possible. “In that case, the longer I’m without my soul, the more I become something I’m not.” Mr. Hyde. He should just shoot himself now. Day to day life, the life he prized, the life he loved and would fight to keep would, ironically, do him in. Hell’s bells, what a mess he was in.
“Have faith, Keegan.”
Good advice, but difficult for him to abide, under the circumstances.
“Do you have anything to eat?” Echo asked. “I’m famished.”
“I eat out mostly,” he said absently. “But there should be something in the refrigerator.”
“Where might that be?”
He pointed to the hallway set off the living room. “To the right.”
Several minutes later, she returned with a bottle of Chardonnay, two wine glasses, a square of cheese, a package of crackers, and a dish of
olives.
“It was slim pickings, but there’s no mold on the cheddar and this is not a bad wine.”
“Do you always make the best of bad situations?”
She shrugged and bit into a cube of cheese.
He determined that Echo was a ‘my-glass-is-half-full’ woman, which led him to wonder if Samael would tattle their whereabouts to Satan. Then he grimaced at the absurdity of the question. Of course, he would. The man was demonic from his spriggly hair down to his pigeon toes.
“How long before the really bad guys get here?”
“I think we’re safe for the night. At least, that’s what I would do.”
“Create a false sense of security.” He stated the obvious.
“You know the game.”
“It’s not unlike lawyering. Make the witness comfortable, establish a rapport, be his friend, then go for the jugular.”
“Does that actually work?”
“Sometimes.”
“With the less intellectual types.”
“And the honest ones.” His eyelids were heavy with sleep. Despite the threats and violence that darkness might impose, his body required rest and his mind needed a time-out.
“I’m calling it a day," he said. "You can take my bed. The cleaning lady was in today so the sheets are clean. I’ll bunk on the sofa.”
“I’ll take the sofa,” she said. “I won’t be sleeping anyway.”
He stood and, though he was tired and wanted nothing more than to crash, something else occurred to him that he needed answered. “Tell me about you and Samael.”
“Huh?”
“Back in the alley. Samael reminded you about what happened in Dubai and Seven-Pack. When I asked you about it, you said, ‘Later’. Now’s as good a time as any.”
“It isn’t anything earth-shattering. Samael sucker-punched me and rode off with my camel, Seven-Pack, leaving me stranded in the desert without food and water and without any light to lead my way. I got lost. Really lost.” She chuckled.
Without forethought, he brushed his fingers over her cheeks. He was right – silky-smooth, just as he'd thought.
“Please, don’t,” Echo said, closing her eyes and leaning into his touch.
He cupped her cheek in his hand and looked into her eyes. “Do you really want me to stop?” When she didn’t answer, he kissed her. Her lips tasted of peaches and were as supple as her cheeks.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, hoping to everything holy she wouldn’t. He needed her like he'd never needed anything in his entire life.
Mewing, she wrapped her arms around his neck and kicked off her sandals.
He picked her up in his arms and was walking toward his bedroom when pounding sounded on the door.
“Oh God,” he said, when Smith smashed his face against the glass and peered inside.