by Julie Hall
“Logan, it is what it is,” Shannon’s voice drew my attention—which had subconsciously drifted to the damsel still sitting on the ground between us—once again, “You’ve been chosen as her mentor. You need to train her as you would anyone else.”
Did that last comment come with a pointed look, or was I just reading too much into it? And then a thought occurred to me.
“Is this because of what happened?” My tone darkened.
“No, Logan, this isn’t some sort of punishment. You know things don’t work like that here.” Shannon paused for a moment. Her features softened and that was almost worse.
I didn’t want her pity.
“What do you think they said about Romona when she first joined?”
I looked down at the girl, who in truth wasn’t that much smaller than Romona—one of our best fighters—and let out a heavy sigh.
What else could I say?
Shannon knew me well enough to recognize my defeated sigh.
“Thank you, Logan. I’ll leave her with you now. You know what to do.”
I almost laughed at her words. I had no idea what to do with her.
“Wh-what?” The little sprite had been listening to our conversation with rapt attention, and it appeared that she had just now realized her fate had been sealed—and she wasn’t going down without a fight.
I watched silently and with raised eyebrows as she clumsily tried to regain her footing to chase after Shannon. When the door banged shut behind the angel, she stopped and stared. Most likely frozen in disbelief.
I could relate.
Hmm, what’s the wisp going to do now?
I was surprised by my own mild interest in this tiny creature. She remained turned toward the door, which gave me a nice view of her—
With a huff, she spun on her heel.
I schooled my features. I had a master poker face. No need for her to know the path my thoughts had taken a moment before.
“Okay,” she plopped her hands on her hips and let out a breath. That absolutely wasn’t cute, I chanted over and over in my head. Maybe if I said it enough it would become true. “So, will you at least tell me what exactly it is that we do?”
I stared straight into her eyes. How could they not have explained her job to her, at least in part? Man, talk about throwing someone right in the deep end. Time to rip off the Band-Aid and see if Half Pint knew how to swim. This chick was in for the shock of her afterlife.
“We kill demons.”
She blinked twice. I thought she was going to say something, but instead her eyes rolled back and she dropped to the ground like an anchor hitting the ocean floor.
She was out cold.
Author Commentary: Chapter 1
JulieHallAuthor.com/logan-1
Chapter 2
Two and a Half Years Earlier
The drink in my hand was tepid and soured in my stomach. To an onlooker, I probably looked wasted. But the glazed expression emanating from my eyes was less from the warm beer I was drinking and more from the thoughts rolling around in my head.
Despite the noise from the beach party around me, the splashing and receding of the surf washing up on shore wouldn’t be silenced. Salty waves beat against the beach again and again only to be sucked back into the vast ocean. The sand would either be covered in water during high tide, or dried out by the sun’s rays at low tide.
Underwater or dried out. That’s exactly how I felt these days.
This party was like any other I’d gone to during high school. Booze, drugs, music, and filled with over-exaggerated everything. Loud laughing, sloppy dancing, and poor decisions we all blamed on the booze, drugs or music the next day and just moved on.
Everything was the same, except this time the only difference was me.
But no one seemed to care and I couldn’t drum up the emotion to care that they didn’t care.
An ocean breeze blew my shaggy hair around my head and with it the smell of brine and warm beer. I hadn’t drunk that much, but there was a chance I was still going to be sick.
What am I still doing here?
Just as I was about to get out of the lounge chair I’d taken possession of for the last half hour—the one I’d pointed at the water rather than the festivities—a body plopped into my lap, sloshing the warm drink on both of us.
I let out an annoyed growl as I dumped the remainder of my cheap beer into the sand before it could do anymore damage. My mind more on thoughts of how it was going to stink up my car than the drunken girl trying to straddle my lap.
In her quest, she elbowed me in the gut and my annoyance turned to her.
“Oops, sorry Logan,” she said before dissolving into a fit of giggles that brought her stale breath and unfocused gaze closer to my chest. I restrained myself from standing up and dumping her on her butt into the sand. I knew Rachel. We went to the same school and under normal circumstances she wasn’t nearly this . . . annoying. I told myself she was just having a good time and I shouldn’t bring her down. But I was done with this party tonight. Maybe done for a while.
“Hey, what’s up with you? Whatcha doin’ sitting over here all by yourself?” she asked after she regained some semblance of composure.
She wasn’t wrong. This wasn’t my usual M.O. for these parties. I was often one of the loudest and most annoying of them all. But something just wasn’t sitting right with me these days and it couldn’t be ignored anymore.
“Just feeling more like chilling tonight, I guess,” I answered, trying hard not to stare at the ample amount of cleavage on display, exactly at eye-level.
“I could be up for chillin’.” Rachel’s attempt at casual seduction was anything but. There was nothing subtle about her literally throwing her body at me. Her eyes weren’t half closed with desire, but rather due to whatever drinks or pills she’d consumed that night.
That was not hot.
I fought against another wave of irritation that called for me to shove her body harshly off of mine.
What was wrong with me?
In the past, this would have been the type of scenario I would have been down for. Rachel was cute; I’d never cared how much someone else was under the influence before going for it. Heck, I was usually just as plastered as they were and sometimes didn’t remember much the next day, but right now, I was just disgusted. Not at Rachel, but at myself.
Is this really how I want to go through my life?
I gently, but firmly, removed her hands from my shoulders and then lifted her off my lap as I stood up. She teetered on her feet and giggled some more as she used my body to keep her own upright. I gritted my teeth and waited for her to regain at least some of her balance before removing her hands from me once again.
“I’m gonna head out.” I jerked my chin towards the parking area up the way to indicate that I meant I was going to leave the party, not just leave her. I was never one to needlessly hurt people’s feelings, but if this chick didn’t get the hint soon, it might come to that.
Something was roiling inside my gut, screaming at me to run from this place. Itching to get out of there, I was little more than a ticking time-bomb, unsure of when the countdown would reach zero. When I exploded I wanted to be far away from this place.
“Aw, come on, Logan. Don’t be like that. It’s not even late. You can’t leave yet.” She jutted her lip out into an exaggerated pout. Did girls think that was attractive?
Rachel made a move to latch on to me again but I quickly side-stepped and took off. I think she landed on the lounge chair because of the racket behind me, but I refused to turn around to check. I was so done.
Long strides took me closer to my car. And each step away from the party lifted some of the pressure in my chest, making me feel lighter somehow.
“Hey, handsome, where are you headed off to?” The clear and crisp nature of her words and familiarity of her voice tempered my need to flee. Kaitlin was just getting out of her lime-green VW Bug Convertible when I reached the rows of parked cars. My black Mustan
g was a few cars down from hers, but the itch to reach it lessened for a moment.
“Just not feeling it tonight, I guess,” I answered. Kaitlin’s quintessential California girl look with her blonde hair pulled up into a high ponytail, tanned skin, and athletic build was probably an exact match for my laid-back surfer persona. I’m sure lots of people assumed we were a thing at one time or another. But it had never been that way between the two of us.
I’d known Kaitlin for practically my whole life. In a weird way, she was the closest thing I had to a sibling. We’d bonded over who-knows-what sometime along the way and now we watched out for each other.
Her eyes narrowed and her brow pinched. I braced myself for a round of twenty questions, silently cursing the wind as I shoved the hair from my face, and waited for her to come up with the first one. Clearly, we knew each other a little too well.
Kaitlin was probably the only girl here I wouldn’t blow off if pushed too far. Maybe that was wrong, but it was the truth.
Her slow nod spoke of understanding and I almost dropped my jaw at her next comment.
“Yeah, I get where you’re coming from.” She looked out over the beach where the bonfire blazed. From up here under the lights, you couldn’t see much down past the circumference of the fire’s light. “These things don’t seem as exciting as they used to, do they?”
I opened my mouth to respond but no sound came out.
Kaitlin didn’t wait for me to speak. “I’m just gonna pop in myself and say hi to a few people before heading out too,” her gaze jerked back to me, “You haven’t been drinking have you? You’re okay to drive?”
I ignored her first question and answered the second. “Yeah, I’m good to drive. You have fun. I’ll see you later.”
She nodded her approval—probably assuming I was confirming the not-drinking-anything question—and I waved a quick goodbye.
I was fine to drive, so she didn’t need to know I’d had a few drinks of beer in me. Really only one because the second barely counted. I wore more of it than I had actually drank. Thank you very much, Rachel.
I reached my car a moment later and breathed a sigh of relief. Something was seriously wrong with me.
I started the muscle car and enjoyed the rumble of the engine before carefully reversing and pulling out onto PCH—Pacific Coast Highway ran north and south along most of the pacific coast of California—leaving the festivities behind.
Both literally and figuratively.
I carefully maneuvered my car around the bends and turns in the road because although I felt like I was one hundred percent okay to drive, I still didn’t want to be caught by a cop. Being underage at eighteen, any number that popped up on a breathalyzer would be too high. So, regardless of how fast I might push it during the day, my hands remained firmly at the ten-and-two position as I carefully made my way home.
But that restless mind of mine just wouldn’t shut up and I found myself pulling off at one of the scenic overlooks along the road. It was a favorite late-night spot of mine because it was far enough away from the city to see the stars, and hidden enough that it was hard to find. The singular deterrent was the occasional car that did stumble across my hidden oasis to use it for a different sort of privacy. Tonight it was blessedly empty when I pulled off the road. I got out of the car and hopped up on the hood so I could lean back and gaze upon the heavens.
It was a cloudless night, so the cosmos was out, its full glory on display. I could even see the edge of the Milky Way, like a dusting of freckles set upon the darkened sky.
I inhaled a deep breath of salty air and was warmed by the metal beneath me as a cool breeze washed over my body. Even though most of my clothes had dried since their earlier beer bath, the faint smell still infused the air around me when the wind died down. It was washed away with every new gust of air off the Pacific, only to return between breaks.
I was going to have to be extra careful to get these clothes in the wash before my parents woke up in the morning. I’m sure they already suspected what I was doing when I went out with my friends, but no point in giving them any reason to get on my case when I hadn’t even done anything this time.
Thoughts of the party slowly leaked from my brain as I continued to stare at the expanse above. For the last few years, my life had consisted of three main things: surfing, parties, and girls. But lately, deep life questions had begun to haunt me, making me feel much older than I truly was.
What was I doing with my life? Where was I going? Was I making a difference in the world? Did I even care if I did?
My mind was a cluttered mess. I beat down the uncertainty and let all thoughts fly from my head on a loud exhale. A perfect moment of silence followed as I watched a star streak across the sky. I gulped in the ocean breeze and a question bigger than myself trickled into my subconscious.
Could all of this beauty in the world really have been put here by accident? What if there was something bigger at work?
“My will, not yours.”
Those words echoed in my brain in an unnatural way.
I jack-knifed into a sitting position and turned my head from side to side making sure I was truly alone.
Had I actually heard those words . . . or was I hallucinating now? Had someone slipped something into the one drink I’d had?
My gaze was prowling the surrounding area for the person who had spoken when I was momentarily blinded by a set of headlights.
Great, my reprieve was over. Might as well head home, I guess.
I slid off the hood of my car and was about to open the driver’s side door when the short whoop of a police siren froze me in my tracks.
I yanked my guilty hand from the door handle as if it had been burned. I couldn’t get in trouble if they hadn’t actually caught me driving, could I?
As I turned, the police cruiser came to a stop in the spot next to my own.
I groaned silently as a door opened, then slammed shut.
This was just great. I should have just stayed home tonight.
I turned my body and leaned up against the side of the car, crossing my arms over my chest. Might as well find out what the cop wanted. I’d been here too long for him to have followed me under suspicion of drinking and driving, but the second I got behind that wheel he could slap me with a DUI and underage drinking charge.
No thank you.
An older man with salt-and-pepper streaked hair came around the front of his standard issued police cruiser. He reminded me of my dad for some reason. Maybe it was the man’s athletic build—despite being past his prime—or perhaps it was just the air of authority cops gave off in general.
Whatever the reason, I shook it off and forced a neutral expression on my face.
“Everything okay out here, son?” the officer asked.
My knee jerk reaction was to tell him I wasn’t his son, but that wasn’t going to land me anywhere I wanted to be.
“Yeah, I’m good.” Short and to the point. Why offer any more information than was necessary?
His eyes, although not hostile, remained locked on my face. I returned his stare hoping it sent him the I’ve-got-nothing-to-hide vibe.
“Well, that’s good to hear. I happened to see a car parked here on my way back to the station and just wanted to check to make sure everything was okay. Glad to see no one has any car trouble.”
I almost snorted. Yeah, he was probably checking to make sure no one was getting it on, was more like it.
“Nope. The car is fine, sir, just doing some star gazing to clear my head.”
This guy wasn’t a fool, but it didn’t appear like he was looking for trouble either.
He nodded at me and cracked a small smile. The gesture seemed friendly, but what did I know? I didn’t have much experience with cops.
He could check my car if he wanted. He wasn’t going to find anything incriminating in there.
“Well, then,” he began, “seeing that everything is alright here, I’ll just be on my way.”
The officer stopped in his tracks and turned back toward me. His gaze wasn’t as friendly as it had been a moment before.
Not moving a muscle, I remained casually leaning against my driver’s side door with my arms folded across my chest. My face held the same look that I was sure gave nothing away. But I did hold my breath and sent up a silent prayer to whomever was out there that this guy would just turn back around and drive off.
My prayer went unanswered.
“Did you drive this car out here tonight, son?”
I was not this guy’s son. And what could I say to that? There wasn’t anyone else around, so a lie wouldn’t have been convincing.
“Yes, sir.”
“And have you been drinking tonight?” He didn’t beat around the bush.
Lie or truth? Which one would get me in less trouble? Because right now this cop was like a dog with a bone.
“Someone spilled their drink on me. That’s what you smell, officer. That’s why it’s so strong.” Half-truth and evasion, it was.
This guy wasn’t an idiot, so I knew he would be able to tell right away that I wasn’t drunk. But I also didn’t look twenty-one, and I smelled like a brewery.
My only hope was that he’d take my word for it or let me off with a slap on my wrist. I got underage drinking was illegal, but come on, didn’t everyone do it? And he had to actually catch me driving to slap me with a DUI, right? But I’d just admitted to having driven the car here myself.
Shoot.
Author Commentary: Chapter 2
JulieHallAuthor.com/logan-2
Chapter 3
“You know getting off with only community service for the rest of the year is actually pretty lucky.”
I cracked my neck and shot Kaitlin an irritated look. She wasn’t wrong, but the whole ordeal was a mess and I would never hear the end of it from my parents. They’d had to pick me up at the police station. The lectures hadn’t stopped since, and they’d revoked my ‘car privileges’ for the next month.
