by Nour Zikra
I sprinted across the hospital parking lot to my car. From a few yards away, I could see Adriel’s head reclined against the window, his eyes closed. I skidded to a stop and knocked on the glass. His head shot up. As if the boogeyman had emerged, his pupils transformed into big, dark marbles. He unlocked the door and got out.
“What’s wrong?” His hands went into my hair, pulling me closer. “What happened?”
I gestured in the direction of the hospital. My mouth hung open. I wanted to explain what I’d seen, but when I spoke, it all came out as an incoherent jumble of words.
“Addy, breathe.” He lifted my chin up, forcing me to meet his gaze. “What happened?”
I stared at him for a second while my mind raced. All those years. How had I never noticed that tattoo? My mother had never shied away from dressing in revealing clothes, and yet I’d somehow missed it.
With concern in his eyes, Adriel waited.
I placed my trembling hands against his chest, swallowed, and said, “There’s a tattoo of Lucifer’s initial on my mother’s ass.”
Adriel’s eyes danced back and forth in front of mine. His expression twisted into rage. If eyes were truly the window to one’s soul, I swore I saw Adriel’s soul running through a maze and tripping over invisible barriers.
“Say something.”
He shook his head.
“Why not?” I removed my hands from his chest and pulled away. “I need you to tell me what you’re thinking. I’m freaking out too!”
He rubbed his forehead. “So, you’re telling me that your mom sold her soul to the devil, and the devil happens to be your dad.”
His eyebrows drew together and he gritted his teeth, making his jaw tense. Revulsion was written all over his face.
Under his angry glare, I started defending myself. “Look, just a few days ago, I had no idea angels and demons were real. You think I want this to be happening? You think I want both my parents to be the shittiest parents on Earth?”
“I just . . .” His chest kept rising and falling.
“You just what?”
Closing his eyes, he let out a harsh breath. “I just don’t know whether you’re one of them sometimes.”
I froze in my spot. “What?”
“Your mother’s house . . .”
“What about it?”
“It was shouting.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Her house was shouting?”
“No, the fire. The fire kept making a . . . noise.”
“Adriel, you’re scaring me. What the hell are you talking about?”
“It kept saying, ‘Ade will corrupt all,’ and I was the only one hearing it.”
His words took a second to sink in.
“As in me corrupting people?” My stomach churned, and I felt this morning’s breakfast rise. “I think I’m going to be sick.” Adriel became a blur in front of me. I planted my hands against the car and bent over, my head hanging low.
“Hey.” Adriel stood beside me, rubbing my back.
The demonic fire that my soulless, deplorable mother had just survived claimed that I would corrupt all. I breathed slowly through my mouth while my head spun.
“But I wouldn’t,” I said. “I wouldn’t, right? I mean, not anymore. I got Reed back.”
“Come on.” Adriel set his hand over mine. “Let’s get out of here.”
“No, no. What if that’s my destiny?”
“Addy, you don’t know that. Just because I heard it doesn’t make it true. Now, come on.”
He held me as we walked toward the driver’s side. Once I sat down, he marched around to the passenger side and hopped in.
My legs trembled, but I wasn’t cold. Adriel rested his hand on my knee, an act that sent my stomach fluttering even in my current state.
Concern pinched his brows. “Can you drive?”
“No.” I’d never been like this, weak and pathetic. Weakness did not suit me.
Adriel stroked his other hand over the dark stubble on his face. “Want to stay here until you feel better?”
“I don’t want that, either. I want to leave this disgusting hospital and get away from Erica.”
The engine whirred under my seat. Slowly, I drove toward the motel.
H
Drive-throughs were convenient in our chaotic, homeless state. Being on the run didn’t allow for proper meals. So, stomachs growling, we stopped at the nearest fast-food restaurant and ordered six cheeseburgers, two large sodas, and four bottles of water to take back with us.
At the motel, I signed paperwork and proved I was of age while Adriel waited in the car. Once everything was settled, Adriel and I found ourselves in a cozy room with one queen-size bed, a nightstand, and a bathroom. The beige floral wallpaper on the walls peeled at the corners. Only one large window with a view of the parking lot came with the room, covered by a thick, brown, and dusty curtain. I left the curtain as is so no one could spy on us.
“What if the demons find us here? They could literally just pop in.” I collapsed onto the bed and buried my head in one of the yellow-stained pillows, hoping I wouldn’t get some weird disease.
“Michael said he would protect us.”
Beside me, the mattress sunk under Adriel’s weight.
Lifting my head, I met his dark stare. “The archangel?”
“Yes.”
In my pocket, my phone buzzed. I had a feeling Lizzy was the one texting before I checked, and I was right.
“Hey, where are you now?” she wrote from Nate’s phone.
It was twelve thirty in the afternoon. The last time we spoke had been a few hours ago. I sent her a text back saying, “At a motel in Latrobe,” before setting my phone down on the wooden nightstand with the uneven legs beside Adriel.
As I retreated, Adriel seized my hand and held it for a moment.
“How are you feeling?” He ran his thumb over the back of my hand, his eyes scanning my face. He lingered at my lips before glancing back up.
“Stressed.”
The light sensation of his thumb on my skin sent shivers up my spine. I dropped my head against the pillow but kept looking at him.
“It’ll be okay, I promise.” Letting go of my hand and getting up, he said, “I think we both need to rest.”
He opened the duffle bag we shared, dug inside, grabbed Nate’s pajama pants and the bag of underwear I bought him that morning, and went inside the bathroom to change. Although it was much too early for sleep, I followed suit, grabbing a white tank top and pajama shorts.
It was cold outside, but I felt warm. Too warm.
With my back to the bathroom, I removed the white T-shirt I wore and dropped it to the floor. Next came the jeans. When I unclasped my bra from the back, the bathroom door creaked open. I stiffened, sensing Adriel’s eyes on me.
“I . . . I’m sorry,” he said, turning around.
Over my shoulder, I saw he was shirtless again. The ridges of his spine protruded with each movement. I couldn’t help but stare at the lightly tanned skin of his back, where the scars were barely visible.
Feeling my face turn a hot red, I slipped my clothes on in two swift moves and coughed, letting him know the coast was clear. I slipped under the covers before he could turn around and lay on my side, my back to him.
After flipping the light switch off, he ambled to bed. “Sorry again.”
“It’s fine,” I mumbled into the dimness.
When he got in, the mattress sagged. His body brushed against my back, cold and refreshing. Thoughts of this morning came back to me, the way he’d pulled me in, his fierce tongue taking control of my mouth. I shut my eyes. Suddenly, the bed felt too small for the two of us.
“Everything all right?” His warm breath caressed my neck.
“Uh huh.”
I didn’t want to think about him. I knew he didn’t approve of me. He worried I was like my parents. He worried I was as wicked as them. The word godfors
aken came to mind, and in that moment, I understood its true meaning. It wasn’t that I was on my own without any parents; it was that I was on my own in the land of evil. Completely in the dark.
How had I gone from crying over my cheating ex-boyfriend to pining over a former angel in less than a week? How did my life become like this?
Pushing Adriel, Devin, and my parents out of my thoughts, I let exhaustion take over. Not caring how many people had previously slept on these same bedsheets without them being washed, I surrendered to the lumpiness of the mattress.
Not long after, I woke up again. The image of Erica’s tattoo had been ingrained in my mind. Peeling the blanket off me, I took a deep breath. Sweat covered my skin and my stomach hurt, a sensation that left me nauseous. With my back to the bed, I stared at the ceiling. Too close. Was the wall inching down, ready to crush me?
I burst out of bed. In the bathroom, I banged the door shut in a rush and leaned against the sink as water dripped from the faucet one drop at a time, ticking against the porcelain surface. My breathing was heavy. If Lizzy were here, she would have prepared a cup of peppermint tea for me to drink. She was probably having fun with Nate right now. Maybe they had gone out to lunch, like normal people.
A knock on the door made me flinch.
“Addy, are you okay?”
I moved to sit on the floor with my back against the sink and closed my eyes. “Go back to sleep,” I muttered.
“Why did you run out of bed?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Addy?”
Lucifer’s words came back to me. Do you think I did not make certain a long time ago to create a weapon so powerful that no one would know what it is or how to use it against me? What could his weapon possibly be? A magical sword that could kill anything but Lucifer? A powerful demon? Perhaps it was all the people whose souls I’d sold to him. Could they be the powerful weapon? And what of my mother? Her soul was long gone.
“Addy?”
My hands trembled. “Go back to bed.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I just want to stay here.”
The doorknob turned halfway.
“I’m coming in,” he said.
I didn’t have time to protest. In a second, he was standing inside with nothing but pajama pants on, looking down at me.
He raked his fingers through his hair. “You are not okay.”
Blinking at him, I said, “You shouldn’t have come in. What if I was using the toilet?”
“Well, you’re not.” Crouching down beside me, he leaned in and dug his hand into the spirals of my hair, cupping the nape of my neck as he did. “What’s going on?”
I shrugged. “I don’t want to talk.”
“Can I try to guess, then? It shouldn’t be hard, considering.” He smirked, his eyes gleaming. “Is it the demons taking over Earth?”
I stared at him without responding.
“Is it your mother?”
No words.
“Is it all of the above?”
It was, but I didn’t feel like saying it. He already knew the answer, though he would never understand exactly what I felt.
“Come on, Addy. I told you, we’ll figure it out together. We both should rest now.”
He grabbed my hands as he stood and helped me to my feet. The minute we reached the bed, my phone vibrated on the nightstand. Reed’s image greeted me on the screen. I let go of Adriel’s hand and leaped for the phone.
Picking up, I said, “Reed?”
Loud noises came from the other end of the line. A person breathed heavily into the phone but didn’t say a word.
I looked at Adriel, my heart beating fast. “Reed, what’s going on?”
Adriel came to stand by me, his eyebrows pulled together. He leaned his head close to my ear to listen in.
“Reed? Reed, can you hear me?”
“Addy,” Reed finally said. His voice was hushed, and he sounded jittery. “Addy, I’m fine, but others aren’t. Someone is shooting at us.”
“What do you mean? Where are you?”
Gunshots rattled in the background, shrill and incessant. I screamed Reed’s name.
“In the library,” Reed whispered. “Please help.”
The last gunshot sound exploded through my ear.
“Reed? Reed?”
We’d been disconnected.
I shot Adriel a glance and dashed for my duffle bag. I threw one of Nate’s shirts at him, told him to put it on, and grabbed the jeans I was wearing earlier.
With his arms through the shirt, Adriel said, “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know. He says someone’s shooting.”
Not caring what Adriel saw, I tossed my pajama shorts on the floor and put on the pants. In a few seconds, I had my keys and phone in hand. Just to be extra safe, I took the Swiss Army knife and hid it in my pocket.
“Come on!” I ran past Adriel toward the door.
“Wait.” He took hold of the duffle bag and dug inside. Taking out one of the knives I brought from my apartment, he smiled. “You’re not the only one who can carry weapons. Now we can go.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
ADRIEL
A dozen police cars tore past us, their sirens blaring and reverberating even after they were out of sight. One after the other, they raced toward the college.
Addy tried to keep up, but every time she stomped on the gas pedal, another police car came ripping through the street. Every few minutes, she had to pull over to the far right of the road and slow down to let the police cars pass.
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Her hands gripped the wheel as yet another car came hurrying by. “I should be driving ahead of them.”
“They don’t know that. Besides, we don’t know who is behind this shooting.”
She shot me a glare. “You seriously think this is a coincidence? I thought you were smarter than that.”
I shrugged. “I’m just saying, we don’t know all the facts yet.”
Under her breath, I thought I heard her mutter, “Fucking angels.”
Saint Vincent Basilica appeared in front of us, tall and imposing. This was the second time I’d seen the church while with Addy.
Addy turned around the corner. “They better not have the entrance blocked.”
Three police cars were parked in a line, blockading the driveway. Addy cussed. She pulled the car to the side and stopped the engine.
“We have to go on foot.” She grabbed her things and sprang out of the car. She flipped her Swiss Army knife out, exposing the actual blade, and held it tight.
I stumbled out of the car into the cold wind and shivered. Unlike Addy, the freezing temperature that seemed to be constantly dropping didn’t suit me. Not when the only source of warmth I had was a thin cotton shirt.
Addy started toward the cops in her equally thin tank top. I followed behind her. In my hand, I had my own knife at the ready.
My eyes skimmed the area. There was one entrance to the school, as far as I could tell, and we couldn’t go through there. I wasn’t sure what Addy’s plans were, but I hoped they were of sound judgment.
“Addy, how are we going to get past the police? There’s no way to dodge them.”
From where we stood, the school looked busy with cops. There were cops ahead of us, cops near the forest to our left and right, and cops marching in protective gear toward the school.
Addy eyed the cops blocking the road. “I was thinking I would compel them.”
“Addy, no.” I grabbed her wrist to stop her from going about her plan. Unlike me, her skin felt warm. I wished we could huddle together for warmth, sharing body heat. I shook the idea away. “You can’t do that anymore. Besides, you’d be putting yourself at risk too.”
“Fine. We’ll go ’round back.” She drew her hand to her side and ran off the road into the forest. Before I had time to tail her, she was zigzagging between the trees.
She was quick on her feet; sneaky, even. While the ground crunched underneath my feet whenever I stepped on twigs, she was absolutely silent. At some points, she disappeared from my sight, hidden behind the hundreds of trees transforming from orange to brown. I paused to scan the distance.
“Addy?”
She darted out from seven trees to the east of where I stood and gestured for me to hurry up. I chased after her.
The sun burned above us, its rays gliding through the tree branches. Although the wind whistled, the bright forest kept the weather balanced. I was thankful for that. I definitely did not want to freeze.
Once I caught up with Addy, she started moving again. Without looking at me, she said, “Took you long enough.”
“You disappeared.”
“Just keep up.”
Two gray squirrels were circling a tree trunk strewn with dead leaves when Addy stormed past them, scaring them to death. They went leaping up the tree, scurrying into the branches.
I was breathless, but I still managed to think straight. “So, what’s the plan?”
“Find the shooter and stop him.”
“But we don’t know anything about the situation. Addy, I don’t think this is a good idea. We need to think this through, at least.”
She groaned. “There’s no time.”
Other than the shuffling of the pine leaves, the school seemed calm. Even the cops had disappeared. I wondered if they’d already gone inside and captured the shooter, or shooters.
“I don’t hear anything. Do you?” I said.
“No. I don’t really know what’s happening.”
“What if we called Reed back?”
“I’m worried he’s hiding; I don’t want to blow his cover.”
The last of the trees faced us. Behind them, Saint Vincent College looked like a forgotten, lonely land. Addy left the forest and headed in the direction of a small parking lot. Across from us was the basilica. I could see the statue of a man with his hand outstretched in welcome in front of the cathedral’s doors, but I couldn’t tell if it was Vincent or someone else.
