Gregson didn’t think he’d ever heard anything funnier, but the robed man—God—didn’t appear to be the least bit amused.
Gregson tried to control himself, but the laughter of madness would not be contained. Stumbling back in a fit of giggling, he bumped against something, turning around to look up into the horrible, blood-covered face of the monster that had consumed his friends.
And Gregson kept laughing.
Even as the thing of nightmare reached for him, pulled him up into its many arms.
And into its mouth.
Malachi brought a hand close to the gate, feeling the energy radiating from the black metal, an energy that could destroy even him.
The gate had been closed by an edict from God. It could be opened again by neither the divine nor man.
Not unless one possessed the key.
The Lord God had given them the ability to see the error of their disobedient acts, and to someday return to the Garden from which they were banished. But there had to be penance; they would have to be truly sorry.
Then, and only then, would they be allowed to pass through these sealed gates.
The elder turned to look at the two pieces of the divine key that he had endured so much to obtain. The old woman had draped her body across the naked form of Adam, protecting him from the elements, her own fragile body shivering in the cold.
Again he questioned the Creator’s fascination with imperfection, wondering if he would understand once he himself assumed the role of Lord of Lords.
His eyes shifted as he watched his own creation finish its meal, blood glistening upon its face and muscular body. It saw that its master was watching, and came to attention, eager to please.
“Bring them to the gate,” Malachi commanded.
And the Shaitan obeyed.
Just as it should have.
Eliza tried to protect Adam from the harshness of the elements. It was in her blood, and at first she did not understand.
But now, in this cold, frozen place, with the warmth of the Garden before her—calling to her—Eliza Swan understood.
They had always said she was special, that there was something inside her that made her different from all the other Daughters. This was the reason they were so upset when she left them.
And yet, she had never realized how special she really was.
So special, in fact, that there would be folks in Heaven who would try to kill her.
The monster was before them again, pulling them up from the snow with its snaky arms, and hauling them closer.
Closer to the Garden.
She remembered now that she used to have dreams as a child: vivid dreams of this very place. And she used to tell her grandma, and her mother, and all the other Daughters, and they would look at her in that knowing way and smile.
The monster tossed them roughly onto the warm, green grass before the heavy metal gate.
“Keep treatin’ us like that and you’ll kill us,” Eliza said, her body aching in so many places she was surprised she could still move.
“Not yet,” Malachi said, staring hard through the thick metal bars at the Garden beyond.
Eliza felt the pull of the place, like a piece of metal being drawn to a magnet. She couldn’t fight it if she wanted to. Adam lay silently beside her, but now his eyes were open.
Malachi was watching her, his monster—all covered in blood—standing obediently beside him. She was reminded of the big man Leo, and his dog, Cleo, at the Pelican Club, only she had liked them.
“Do it,” Malachi said, eyes still locked on the lush green beyond the gate.
Eliza lay on the ground, pretending she hadn’t heard him, picking blades of grass from Adam’s pale, naked flesh.
“Did you hear me, monkey?” Malachi asked, his voice deceptively calm and pretty.
“I heard you,” she replied. “But I haven’t a clue as to what you’re going on about.” Even though deep in her heart, she did.
He looked at her then, his cold, icy stare so intense she could practically feel his eyes inside her. “You lie.”
“Guess you know me best,” she said, realizing that she was staring at the metal obstructions that barred their entry. Something stirred inside her, fighting to get out. It was the Garden pulling her, calling to her from the other side.
“Far better than you know yourself,” Malachi purred. He knelt down beside her, that horrible knife of fire appearing in his hand.
She gasped, remembering the feeling as he’d used it on her, cutting loose the pieces of her forgotten life. Cutting loose the location of Eden.
Malachi brought the blade down toward Adam. “He has so little life left. I would hate to see it wasted . . . out here . . . so close to home.”
Eliza shielded the man with her own body, the instinct to protect him strong. Almost as strong as the instinct that pulled at her from beyond the gates.
“You leave him alone,” she cried. “The poor man’s been through enough.”
“And now it’s time for him to rest,” Malachi said with a nod.
“Yes,” Eliza agreed.
“Then do as you’re told. Open the gates.”
Holding Adam in her arms, Eliza felt suddenly whole, complete. The feeling in her chest had grown to bursting, and she wondered if her old heart was about to give out.
“Open the gates,” Malachi said again, his attack dog looming behind him.
She looked down at the ancient man in her arms and saw that he was looking at her. Malachi had been so right: he didn’t have much life left, and it was only a matter of time before it would all run out.
She saw the corners of his mouth twitch first, and she was surprised by the movement on his sunken features; then she realized he was trying to open his mouth.
“What is it?” she asked, pulling him closer. “What are you trying to . . . ?”
But she knew the answer, the feeling in her own chest bubbling up, threatening to explode from her.
They were both feeling it. Together.
Adam’s ancient mouth slowly opened, releasing a soft, whispery sound.
And Eliza could not help herself. She found herself doing something she hadn’t done in so very long—not done since Pearly Gates had used his magick to take away her memories.
She was doing what she loved to do.
What she had been born to do.
Eliza Swan let it out, the sound of her voice joining with the weak sound from Adam to form the most beautiful of songs.
Eliza and Adam were singing a song of absolution.
And the gates swung wide to welcome them home.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Remy did not feel the bite of the severe cold, only the heat of Zophiel’s sword, and the pull of Eden upon it.
He opened his wings to the sight before him: a jungle, enshrouded in a roiling tropical fog, growing up from the bleak surroundings of ice and snow.
The blade flashed with an angry fire, and he felt it pull him toward the gates, which were yawning open.
Remy remembered the last time he and the Garden were together—it had been his duty to close those gates, severing its connection to Heaven.
The Garden called to him now, and Remy answered, trudging across the frozen landscape, burning sword clutched firmly in his hand. The Seraphim was with him; Remy could feel him inside, burning in his muscles, joined with his being, no longer struggling for supremacy.
For now.
The angel nature must have understood; he must have realized that for them to survive there must be unity.
At least, that was what Remy hoped.
“A little help here,” said a voice, barely audible over the polar winds.
At first it startled him; he had almost forgotten he hadn’t come here alone. He turned to see Jon supporting Izzy, who was bent over and vomiting onto the snow.
Remy returned to his friends, a sudden, burning spark of annoyance that he needed to do this confirming that the Seraphim was indeed with him in more t
han spirit.
“Feels like you turned me inside out,” Izzy slurred, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
“If it means anything, the more you do it, the less awful it feels,” Jon offered.
They were shivering with the cold, and Remy held out his burning blade, letting the heat of the sword warm them slightly.
“We might want to get moving,” he said, his attention drifting back to the open gates. “Before the cold finishes you two off.”
He started to walk, and they followed, eager to stay close to the warmth of the blade.
“Do you think they’re here?” Jon asked through chattering teeth.
Remy noticed patches of blood on the snow, and what appeared to be a crumpled tent off in the distance. The scent of violence, though fading in the wind, still wafted heavily on the frigid air.
“They’re here,” he said, stopping at the gates. “The last time I saw this place I locked the gates behind me.”
“Looks like they found a key,” Izzy said, carefully stepping from the ice onto the thick green grass.
“That’s exactly what they did,” Remy answered, staring into the Garden. The Seraphim was ready for anything. . . . Remy was ready for anything.
“So, what’s the plan?” Jon asked. The man had already begun to sweat profusely in the stifling heat radiating from the jungle.
Remy considered the question.
“We go in and we kill the bad guys,” he answered, and then started through the opening, into the Garden of Eden.
“That’s it?” Izzy asked, following Jon, who followed behind Remy. “Sure am glad you guys worked this out so carefully,” she griped. “For a while there I’d almost convinced myself this whole business was suicide.”
Her face was numb.
Linda led Marlowe into the lobby of her apartment building, letting the door slam closed on the cold behind them.
“There,” she said to the dog, relieved to be out of the icy January cold. “Happy now?”
Marlowe’s thick black tail wagged as he looked at her with his deep brown eyes. She had never owned a dog before, but the last few days with Marlowe had been special.
“C’mon,” she said, holding on to his leash and leading him toward the stairs. “Let’s get back to the apartment and get you an apple. . . . You like apples, right?”
Marlowe barked, as if telling her yes, and galloped up the stairs, pulling her eagerly behind him.
Once inside the warm apartment, Linda kicked off her boots and settled on the couch, feet curled under her. She sipped a cup of chamomile tea, watching the black Lab happily eating his apple, and thought of his master.
Remy had been gone for more than three days, longer than he had expected, and had called only once, leaving a message apologizing for the inconvenience, and telling her that the job was proving more complicated than he’d thought.
Marlowe finished the apple, getting up from the floor and approaching the couch.
“Hey, there,” she said, smiling as his tail wagged.
He rested his chin on the sofa cushion beside her, gazing up at her with soulful eyes.
“You miss him, don’t you?” she asked. “You miss Remy.”
The dog let out a low moan, tail twitching ever so slightly.
And Linda had to admit that she missed him too. In all her years she’d never met a man like him, and she’d known quite a few.
There was something about this Remy Chandler.
“Want to come . . .,” she began, but never got a chance to finish as Marlowe leapt up onto the sofa, plopping heavily beside her, his butt pressed firmly against her hip.
“There you go,” she said with a laugh, leaning on him, hugging and scratching behind his ears. “How’s that?”
Marlowe sighed, closing his eyes to begin another nap.
She continued to think about Marlowe’s master, and what it was that attracted her so. She had noticed it the first time they’d met, out in front of the brownstone on Newbury. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but he seemed to give off a strange kind of vibe, as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.
A weight that she would be perfectly willing to share, if he’d let her.
“Oh, my God,” she muttered aloud, horrified that she had thought of such a thing.
Marlowe lifted his head wearily and looked at her, wanting to be sure that she was all right.
“Can you believe it?” she asked the black dog, reaching out to pet his square head. She loved the feel of his fur, his velvety soft ears. “I’ve got a crush on your master, and we’ve only been on two dates. Can you say ‘mucho desperate’?”
She bent down and gave him a loud smooch on the top of his head as she got up from the couch. “Promise me you won’t tell him?”
Marlowe’s tail thumped on the cushion.
“It’ll be our little secret, okay?”
He barked softly as if to say, Your secret’s safe with me, and Linda laughed.
She loved it when Marlowe answered her.
It was almost as if he understood exactly what she was saying.
Steven Mulvehill was in a half-awake, half-asleep limbo in the emergency room of Brockton Hospital, waiting for the doctor to either discharge him or admit him.
Machines beeped and chimed on the outskirts of his consciousness, along with the chattering of voices and the tormented moans of the injured.
He was hurting, but the physical pain was nothing compared to the agony inside his head.
Mulvehill had gotten a glimpse behind the curtain—a peek inside Pandora’s box, so to speak—and knew that no matter how hard he tried, life would never be the same again.
Drifting down deeper into sleep, he saw his friend waiting for him, ready to tell him that everything would be just fine. And wanting to believe, Mulvehill let his guard drop.
Remy tore the flesh from his own face, revealing something pale and tattooed, with teeth like needles. Something horrible, and hungry to eat the world.
Mulvehill screamed, thrashing upon the hospital bed. The machines beeped loudly, and he guessed a nurse would soon be in to check on him.
Good, he thought as his heart raced painfully in his chest. And after she had checked him out and hooked him back up, he would ask her to turn on some more lights.
It was too damn dark in the room.
Marlowe waited outside the bathroom door as Linda showered.
He could have stayed on the sofa, but decided to accompany the female instead, preferring not to be alone.
He lay on his side on the rug in the hallway, closing his eyes, and in a matter of minutes he was dreaming.
He traveled to the place where his master was, a place of many trees and grass, surrounded by ice and snow.
A place filled with danger. Even in his dream, Marlowe could smell it, heavy in the air, drifting up from the ground, and from the leaves on the trees.
He began to bark, warning his master of the impending danger, but Remy did not hear, so Marlowe barked some more.
And would continue to bark until Remy heard him.
CHAPTER TWENTY
For Jon, it was like stepping into a fairy tale.
Like climbing the beanstalk and finding the old woman who lived in a shoe, and all her kids were being babysat by Cinderella.
It was that weird.
He’d been raised to believe in this place, that someday he and all his cousins would be allowed to return to Paradise.
To Eden.
Now, standing just beyond the gate, he tried to take it all in. It was an odd place, a foreign place. Jon had been to many a jungle in his lifetime as the Sons moved from place to place, but he’d never seen a jungle like this.
“Something’s wrong here,” Izzy said.
Jon noticed the trees, their branches twisted and malformed, the vegetation covered in dark, malignant spots. A smell hung heavy in the humid air; it was the smell of sickness, of rot.
Izzy bent down to the ground, and Jon
watched as she extended her long fingers and stuck them into the moist earth.
The woman gasped.
“Oh . . .,” she said, eyes growing wide, her body rigid.
Thin, snaking vines began to emerge from the ground, entwining around her fingers and moving up her hands, wrapping around her wrists.
Her breath was coming in quick gasps, her eyes blinking rapidly as they glazed over.
“Oh, my God. Oh, my dear God . . .”
Jon reached for her, but Remy grabbed his wrist, stopping him.
“Wait,” he ordered.
“The Garden,” Izzy said between troubled breaths. “The Garden . . . the Garden is in my head. . . . Oh, God . . . she’s sick. . . . Something . . . something is growing inside of her. . . . Something is going to kill her if . . . if she can’t fight it.”
A strange moaning sound filled the air. Jon looked around for the source, but realized it was coming from all around them. The tree branches were moving, creaking in protest as they bent in their direction. Even the grass beneath their feet had begun to squirm.
“This isn’t good,” Izzy screamed, trying to pull her hands from the ground, but the vines held her fast. “She’s crazy from the pain . . . from the sickness.”
Tree limbs lashed out with whiplike speed.
Remy grabbed Jon, driving them both to the ground as a branch swiped at them, passing dangerously close to their heads.
“She . . . she’s trying to fight back,” Izzy said, now sitting upon the ground, still connected to the Garden. “She doesn’t know that we’re here to help.”
Thorny vines dropped from some of the higher trees, wrapping themselves around Remy like tentacles, and pulling him up into the air.
Jon watched in horror as the squirming tendrils yanked Remy higher into the thick foliage, the angel practically disappearing into the growth.
“She’s trying to save herself,” Izzy yelled.
Jon scrambled to his feet, standing beneath the struggling form of Remy Chandler, who was now completely enshrouded in sharp, spiny vines. He looked toward Izzy; she had the power to help but was held in the grip of the Garden. She had started to struggle, her body becoming covered in thin, slithering roots.
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