Love Beyond Loyalty

Even though he'd been relatively secure—the guy who ran his place didn't smack him around too much—and fed, he would always run when Alexa needed him to.

  The idea of leaving her alone on the streets was enough to make his stomach ache.

  He turned the corner down Canal Street and ducked left to avoid being spotted by a police officer. The NOPD might have their hands full with Mardi Gras happening but that didn't mean they wouldn't notice a boy, alone, running through the streets.

  Gabe knew he couldn't trust the police, not ever. Not after what had happened the one time he and Alexa had been caught. Lying down on his stomach in juvenile detention while two correction officers beat him with a stick had been the worst day of his life.

  Turning once more, he looked to where Alexa stood huddled next to a dumpster and some discarded trash.

  He stopped running and walked toward her. She looked up, her face broken and battered.

  Gabriel stopped. Standing very still, he listened to the noises of the cars on the street behind him and the drunken laughter echoing from a distance. The distinct smell of urine and vomit wafted through the air.

  Something was wrong. He closed his eyes. It was so unfair. Most of the kids his age were asleep in their beds, loved and cherished by their families. No one ever wanted him. Discipline problem, headstrong… he'd heard all the reasons more than once.

  No, he shook his head. This was wrong. He wasn't six years old anymore. Turning to look at Alexa, his eyes narrowed. Nothing had happened the way it was happening here. This wasn't his memory… it was something else.

  He'd saved Alexa. They'd run away. She'd never been beaten in real life. That was why they'd hidden in the alley for three weeks.

  "Enough," he shouted into the darkness.

  Silence met his ears. Gone were the street sounds that permeated the air. Even the disgusting scents that had at one time been a normal part of his existence ceased.

  A slow, maniacal laugh sounded to his right, and he turned toward it. Sebastian stepped out of the shadows, but not the Sebastian of now. No, it was the childlike Sebastian; the one who had lured Gabe and Alexa into his house with promise of family.

  The little boy who Gabriel now knew wasn't a little boy at all but a Demon who had always wanted them dead.

  "I've already won, you stupid human. I've got her."

  Angelic looking Sebastian pointed at Alexa.

  "You can't fulfill your damn prophecy without all of you together. You're here with me now because she targeted you for me. Who else could break through Marina's wards but another Outsider?"

  Gabriel gasped. In all his worst nightmares of this scenario, he had never really believed Alexa would betray him. She might not believe him. She might take some extra time to convince because of her deep-seated loyalty to Sebastian—a loyalty based on her never ending belief that Sebastian had rescued them from the same streets he now imagined he was back on—but she would never, ever seek out to hurt him.

  Would she?

  Snapped back into his body, Gabriel groaned and hit the floor face first.

  "Boy, were you being screwed with."

  He knew that voice. It was Kal. He didn't know the Outsider well, they'd only met face-to-face once but Gabriel had been involved in kidnapping Kal almost six months earlier. That experience marked the end of Gabe's belief in Sebastian.

  As he'd transported Kal through space to a basement where Sebastian had attempted to torture the Outsider, Gabe had finally voiced what he'd secretly wondered for a decade; Sebastian wasn't all he claimed to be.

  Kal had forgiven him, more than Gabe might do in the same situation.

  He picked up his head and rubbed his nose before rolling over. Loraine stood next to his supine body with what looked like a damp washcloth in her hands. Kal stood next to her, his hand on her arm as if he restrained her from touching him. Marina, positioned over his head, breathed hard with Charma next to her.

  He tried to sit up and Loraine shrugged off Kal's arm to squat down next to Gabriel.

  She placed the rag against his forehead before she spoke. "Are you okay?"

  Grabbing her arm to stop her from standing, he tried to smile. He definitely felt… cooler. As if the heat that infused his body and mind mere seconds earlier had dissipated, leaving him worn out but not angry.

  "Are you?"

  Her smile at his question made his heart leap. "I'm okay. Believe it or not, I have been yelled at before. I teach kids, remember?"

  "Maybe in the future I can do better than a small child."

  She nodded. "Maybe."

  Marina spoke. "It certainly didn't help that your mind was being systematically invaded by the demon."

  Gabriel needed answers. "How did you get it out?"

  Now that he felt more coherent, the fact that he lounged on the floor made him feel a little foolish. He tried to stand but Loraine nudged him back.

  She shook her head. "Not yet. If you could have felt the heat that just came out of your body you wouldn't be making any moves to get up."

  "I did feel it. Trust me, I did." He looked back at Marina. "How did you get it out?"

  "I didn't." He saw genuine remorse in her eyes. "You pushed him out. Charma and I were just getting ready to try when you expelled him." She sighed. "I'm not sure I can keep him out if he wants to come back in. It's like he has a direct access to you. Almost as if he knows you so well he can just plow inside of you anytime he wants."

  Gabriel thought about what the young version of the demon Sebastian had told him. Had Alexa done that? She was capable of targeting any Outsider, of finding them all. She hadn't yet managed to hone that skill. She could find Gabriel at will and had found Kal because Kal had been putting himself out there as a news reporter. So far, thanks to Marina, Alexa hadn't been able to break through.

  Had she just betrayed his loyalty to her so deeply it could never be repaired? Were they now standing on opposite sides of the war?

  He looked up into Loraine's violet eyes. He had two objectives now. It was to keep Loraine safe and end Sebastian's reign of terror on the Outsiders.

  It was time to come clean. Gabriel pulled Loraine down into his lap. She didn't resist his touch, and he was glad he hadn't managed to push her away when he'd been so angry.

  "If I can't stand up then you're all going to want to take a seat. Probably you're going to want to grab Leonardo—he won't want to miss this. I know how he likes to have all the information all of the time. Eden and Isabelle, too."

  He might as well get it all done all at once. It was like a pulling off a bandage. One, two, three—yank was the best way to go. Still, a sinking feeling of dread filled his stomach. Would they all hate him? What about Loraine?

  Gabriel knew with the story he was about to tell his newfound friends, no one, not even Loraine, would want him here very long.

  Chapter Eight

  "Here," Loraine handed Gabriel a glass of water. He drank it fast and smiled at her. Gone was the unrestrained anger in his gaze from earlier but it had been replaced with what looked like sadness. That didn't make her feel any better.

  "Thanks."

  He set the cup down on the floor and hauled himself onto his feet. Walking slowly, he made it to the chair before half-sitting, half-falling into it. Mixed emotions filled Loraine.

  On one hand, she still felt shaky from his unreasonable behavior moments earlier. But, now she had to acknowledge—even though it felt bizarre to even think the thought—he'd been under the influence of a demon pushing negative energy into his mind. She sighed. They were going to have to talk about it.

  Two strangers stormed through the door. The first one was a tall, dark-haired man with big, broad shoulders. His eyebrows pointed downward as he rubbed his forehead. Although she'd never met him, she had to guess this was the aforementioned Leonardo and that he either had a headache or he was angry about something. Maybe it was both. He looked up at her and nodded.

  Behind him, a small woman with black hair and dark eyes st
rode fast into the room. What had Gabriel called the other person they needed to send for? Oh, yes… this has to be Isabelle. Moving to Kal's side, she stuck herself next to him and wrapped one arm around his waist as she hugged him close.

  Soul mates. Before today she would never have imagined actually having one. Now, looking at the others she wished she and Gabriel could have the ease the others seemed to have. Maybe that would come with time?

  She sighed. Her life was never simple…

  "Where's Eden?" The man she identified as Leonardo spoke.

  Isabelle smiled. "She's coming with Jason."

  Leonardo rolled his eyes. "What's taking so long?"

  Kal laughed and looked at Gabriel and Leonardo. "One thing Leonardo hasn't learned because he hasn't had to, Gabriel, but you will get really fast, is that women make you wait for them. Patience is a virtue."

  Loraine raised an eyebrow at Kal's stupid remark. "I'm never late. In fact, I'm compulsively on time. Usually, early."

  "So I guess I won't have to learn that lesson." Amusement tinged Gabriel's voice before the sadness reappeared.

  The door opened once again, this time less dramatically than Leonardo had opened it. Jason held it open for a woman who Loraine assumed was Eden.

  Eden was tall. Loraine would guess about five-foot ten-inches, and curvy everywhere. As she walked, she kept her head down.

  Loraine had seen girls do this all the time during her teaching career. She wished she could tell them whatever had taken away their confidence wasn't worth it. No one, besides Futon, who she missed terribly even for the few hours she'd been away from him, had ever really liked her. She didn't go to prom, she didn't have boyfriends, but she'd never cared.

  Jason nodded to her. "Feeling better?"

  She smiled. "I am, thanks for helping me."

  "Glad to be of service."

  Leonardo cleared his throat. "Can we get on with the story here?"

  "As most of you know," Gabriel looked at Loraine and she realized she must be the only person in the room not to know whatever it was he was going to say. "I was raised in New Orleans. Up until a few months ago, I would have said I was born there, but it turns out I was born across the globe. Wish I had discovered that earlier; maybe we wouldn't be in this predicament now."

  Kal sat down across from Gabriel. Loraine felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. There was history between the two of them. She wasn't sure why she knew that. Her grandmother had always called it Loraine's 'other' sense. But to Loraine it had always been more akin to what animals did.

  She knew when to run, when to hide, and when a storm was going to come. Right now, Loraine's intuition told her there was tension between Gabriel and Kal.

  Unable to resist the urge, she stepped to Gabriel and put a hand on his shoulder. Whatever he was about to talk about made him feel all alone in the room. He wasn't. She was just as much an outsider in this group of Outsiders. If he left, she would go with him.

  "Anyway, the story one woman told, that I always thought was bullshit but now I wonder about, is that two babies just appeared one day in the nursery. We were completely unauthorized. No one knew where we came from. It was a big scandal."

  Leonardo tapped his foot. "This is fascinating, Gabriel. Every Outsider we encounter has their 'how they were found' story. Jason appeared on his parents table."

  Isabelle sat down on Kal's lap. "So did I."

  "Look… fuck, this is hard." He rubbed a hand on his forehead.

  Driven with a need to keep him from any more pain, Loraine spoke up. "Gabriel, you don't have to do this right now."

  He shook his head. "I do."

  "Hell, yes, he does." Leonardo stalked to the window. "He dragged the whole house in here. Let's hear what he has to say."

  "I think," Loraine interrupted Leonardo's rant, not liking his tone, "he just said there were two babies who appeared. Two? He and another Outsider."

  Clearly, the rest of the group didn't know about Alexa. If Loraine could make Gabriel's telling of this tale a little easier, she would. He glanced up, his eyes tired. He smiled at her.

  "That's right. Her name is Alexa. What happened to us over the years is neither here nor there at the moment. The ultimate point of this is that we were eventually both adopted by the same family. A rich, uptown New Orleans' family who had a son our age. His name is Sebastian. Only recently did I find out he's actually a demon."

  Kal stood up fast. "You lived with the demon? You and this Alexa person? Was she the other one who kidnapped me that day?"

  Gabriel nodded and realization dawned on Loraine like a bell being struck. Gabriel expected to be judged for having resided with the demon.

  "That's right. I never told any of you about her, and I never told her about any of you. The thing is, and this is hard for me to explain, I've always taken care of her." He looked up at Loraine. "Like you might a sister."

  Kal paced. "And the two of you together helped the demon take me?"

  "Alexa found you—she is capable of finding any of the Outsiders—and I moved you through space to where Sebastian waited for you."

  Leonardo shook his head. "I still don't understand how you thought that was a good idea. What exactly did he tell you he wanted to have happen?"

  Loraine didn't like his attitude. She opened her mouth to speak but Gabriel continued before she could. "He told us that you were evil. That anyone associated was in a cult performing dark magical acts threatening the world."

  Gabriel stood. Loraine was glad to see him stand up straight.

  "It's not like you knew differently. We're all guilty for believing what we're told." Loraine interjected. "I was raised thinking the woman I was with was my grandmother and evidently that wasn't true."

  Even saying that fact aloud caused Loraine pain. She shook her head. Hopefully, there would be plenty of time to deal with her own emotional burdens later. Right now it had to be about Gabriel.

  Gabriel walked to the window, turning his back to the room. "The thing is that while I came to doubt Sebastian, Alexa never has. She's absolutely convinced I've joined the cult Sebastian claimed you were all in. Clearly, she's helped him target me. It's the only way I can explain how he got around Marina's wards."

  Leonardo moved forward until he stood next to Gabriel. "So what you're saying is that Alexa—that's her name, right?—is so far gone she's not just believing the demon; she's helping him?"

  Loraine swallowed hard. She wondered if anyone else in the room had caught what she just caught. There was a certain gleam in Leonardo's eyes. A heated glance that was different from the indifference or sometimes hostile glances he'd held since entering the room. He was very interested in finding out more about that woman.

  Was Alexa Leonardo's soul mate?

  "That's right. Clearly, I made a mistake not involving the whole group. Maybe it was pride, maybe it was stupidity…"

  Loraine had to interrupt. "Maybe it was loyalty."

  Gabriel turned around from the window and grinned at her. "Maybe I was stupidly loyal. I thought I could bring her around. I believed, wrongly, it was better if I didn't involve anyone else." He spoke to the room, but his eyes never left Loraine's. "She's completely betrayed me. Even if she thought I was doing evil things, she didn't extend me the same respect I did to her. She joined forces with someone else to hurt me."

  Not able to stand it anymore, she walked fast to Gabriel's side. "Maybe she thinks she's helping you."

  He shook his head. "It was different the last time I saw her. When you dropped me off at the homeless shelter, her eyes, her whole demeanor toward me had changed. She's working with Sebastian against me now."

  Leonardo interrupted their exchange. "Look, I think we all need to head down to New Orleans and get her out of there."

  Kal laughed. "We're going to do some kind of Outsider intervention? If Gabriel says the chick is working with the demon and thinks we're all in a cult, then I doubt all of us arriving in the Big Easy and trying to reason wit
h her is going to work."

  Leonardo shook his head. "We have to do something. We can't leave one of our own to the tender mercies of a demon."

  Jason raised an eyebrow and walked forward. "Since when do you want to interfere in other people's destinies? What happened to leaving everyone alone to discover his or her own path? Aren't we supposed to let the prophecy happen as it happens?"

  "We can't fight him until we're all together. At least that is what I think the prophecy said." Leonardo pounded his hand on the wall. "If I could ever get my hands on Abraxas's journals, I'd know exactly what it said. It is, of course, possible that there are multiple ways to read the prophecy. I won't know that until I look at it myself."

  Confusion made Loraine's head feel muddled. "Who is Abraxas?"

  Gabriel reached up and pushed a strand of hair from her face. "He's the man who was responsible both for saving us from death as babies and for accidently splitting us up so only a few of us were actually raised knowing we weren't human."

  "I've been searching all over the world for his journals. Just recently, I got arrested in France for digging up a grave because I was sure they were there."

  Visions of all the horror movies she'd secretly watched as a child danced in brain. "You dug up a grave?"

  "I didn't expect to find a body in it, just leather bound books written by our former leader. Fortunately, there was no decomposed body in the ground but someone had gotten there before me and taken the books. When the authorities found me waist deep in the dirt they were none too pleased."

  From across the room, Eden, the woman who had made no eye contact with anyone when she entered, started to scream. Grabbing her head, she fell to her knees. Gasping, Marina ran to her, and before Loraine could even process what was happening she knelt by the screaming woman's side.

  She reached Eden at the same moment Isabelle and Charma did. Like statutes, the men seemed frozen. Loraine stared at Gabriel, his mouth hung slightly open as if the sight of Eden's pain confused him rather than disturbed him into action.

  "What's going on?" Loraine spoke to Marina. The other woman seemed to understand these things better than any of the other Outsiders.