by Jenn Stark
“There was a man they kept there in the crypt—an insane man known only by the name Bartholomew,” he said. “A man who’d been kept alive for hundreds of years.”
The tension in the room deepened. Finn didn’t move a muscle, but his focus on the priest was all-consuming, as if he could will the words out of the old man. Franks turned away from him, his voice trembling and low.
“He’d come to the gates of the church in rags, the story went, in late May of 1527.”
Dana’s mind seized, stumbled. She’d heard that wrong, she thought, and her brain reordered the numbers, restated them into a date that could be real, could be possible. Not one that was nearly five hundred years ago.
“The man’s body was strong, his voice pure, but his mind had been fractured. His eyes burned pure gold, and he was filled with rage and fire. That first day, it had taken a dozen men to subdue him, and he screamed at them in languages they could not decipher until he passed out from apparent exhaustion. They brought him to the cathedral, and he seemed crushed. Defeated. Until he saw the clock.”
Finn frowned. “The clock?”
“The astronomical clock of Lyon.” Franks sighed. “He made them understand, eventually. That he knew the clock and all its inner workings. He convinced them he’d made one similar to it, and they were overjoyed. The astronomical clock of Lyon had a complexity that had been lost in the many years since its creation. He would tend it, make improvements, and remain within the church walls, even though—” He paused, shooting a glance at Finn. “Even though he could not fully reclaim his mind.”
“He arrived in 1527.” Finn spoke as if to a ghost. “After the sack of Rome.”
“He told me that, yes, but I soon learned that part of the story had not been shared with the current generation of priests at the church. To them, Bartholomew wasn’t a refugee from one of the greatest crimes against the Holy See and its defenders, he was simply…a miracle, a gift from God who’d been possessed of a demon. Their challenge was to release the demon while sparing the angel.” He shook his head. “They’d been trying ever since.”
Finn’s scowl grew ominous as Father Franks continued. “I’d been brought in to drive the demon out of the poor man once and for all. I was locked in the room with him for three days, watched through a slit in the door.” His lips twisted bitterly. “It was my test as an exorcist.”
“And did you pass?”
“Well enough. I did not—could not—drive the demon from him. He laughed when I made the attempt. But he gave me words to share with my superiors, to convince them I had, somehow, reached the spirit behind the devil that caused him such agony. But he told me more, words that I was not to share. What he’d seen in Rome. His name. The mark on his wrist and its purpose. That he was no demon…but also no human. That he was a Fallen angel, beloved of the Lord. He also told me how…” Franks swallowed. “How much power he still possessed.”
“Why you?” Finn asked.
The priest shrugged. “My arrogance must have caught his attention too. But when I said I would return to help him again, he said no.”
“No?” Dana asked, and this time, Franks did look at her, and she took a step back, struck by the misery in his eyes.
“He believed he deserved the pain he was in, that he had failed in his mission and should be punished. That he could never trust himself.” Franks’s mouth trembled, and Finn winced, knowing that sorrow, that belief. “The Church thought him an angel, and at the time, he had decided that an angel was the only thing he could be, or everything else they believed would be held suspect. But he was very different from any angel I would ever expect. He was…deeply damaged.” His gaze swung back to Finn. “I heard nothing more of him, and after the years passed, I let myself forget about Bartholomew. But I have felt his presence strongly these past few weeks. He is here. And now, so are you. Bearing the same mark. But you are not mad.”
“Not yet, anyway.” Finn grimaced.
Finn’s words galvanized Dana, and she forced her hands down to her sides, her mouth to work again. “So what exactly is going on, Finn? Who are you?” she asked in a low voice. “And why do you want to see Lester?”
That shook Franks out of his own troubled thoughts. “Lester?” he asked. “Tell me he hasn’t endangered Dana yet again.”
But Finn was looking at Dana, not the priest. “I’m not what this Bartholomew guy was, or whatever he’s become. Because clearly…something broke inside him.” Broke, and is a serious problem.
“And it hasn’t broken in you. Yet.”
He quirked a smile. “Not that I know of.”
“How about some honest answers here?” Dana snapped, anger finally breaking through her sense of dread. “Let’s recap. Father Franks is an exorcist. Years ago, he was called to exorcise a demon out of a church prisoner named Bartholomew, only he couldn’t. He did, however, see Bartholomew’s cool ink, listened to his story of being an angel on Earth, and got the impression that the dude had lived a really, really long time. Fast forward to tonight. You show up, also tripping Father’s demon Spidey sense, and you’ve got the same ink. You want to tell me you’re also several centuries past your expiration date? And that you’ve got feathers?”
She didn’t know how she was asking these questions in her normal-person voice, but when Finn stared back at her, refusing to answer, another synapse snapped. “Jesus Christ,” she muttered. “What the hell are you?”
“He’s a Fallen,” Franks said simply, his voice low, defeated. “No more or less than that.”
Dana curled her lip, trying not to snarl at the priest to pull it together. “A Fallen angel. Great. And you’ve floated down to Cleveland on Christmas Eve—why, exactly?”
“I need to speak to Lester,” Finn said implacably.
“So you keep saying,” Dana said, watching Franks’s shifting emotions with interest. Franks wasn’t denying Finn’s words anymore. He’d accepted Finn, which was its own circle of crazy, but there was too much she needed to know. Starting with: “Why do you need to see Lester, again? And why tonight?”
“Because he’s expecting me,” Finn said smoothly. He smiled, and every sense in Dana’s body went on high alert. She hated it when he smiled. “He has something to give me. I honestly don’t know anything more about it. If I did, I’d tell you.”
Dana blew out a long breath. Lester had a penchant for collecting the odd and the crazy, and he was, admittedly, a little bit of a nut for religious antiquities. So if Finn was part of some group of people who could convince even straight-up priests that they were, ah, angels or demons or whatever, she could see such a group appealing to her uncle. Secret societies and ancient artifacts and arcane lore were the old man’s catnip.
So okay, but…there was still Father Franks’s reaction to contend with. And her own apparently healed leg.
Which once more raised the question: who was this guy?
Dana’s attention fractured as her phone buzzed, and she turned away from the two men. Max would be texting her. About time.
She flipped to her texts.
Got the name, running the search. Also, L called me. I told him about Dr. Doom. Turns out he’s expecting him—and he’s massively geeked. Wants to send his goon squad to get you both. Good?
Dana sighed, resigned. That solved at least one mystery, then. Lester might be one fruitcake short of a full bakery, but he was both her client and her uncle. And Finn—so far—hadn’t proved dangerous so much as protective. “Good news. He wants to see you,” she said to Finn. “He’ll send a car.”
Finn nodded. “Excellent. The sooner I can finish this, the better. Those men out there aren’t the last of your problems. There will be more, and until I have what I need, they’ll also be looking for Lester. If they can’t find him…they will find you.”
The half-forgotten nightmare assaulted Dana again, distorted faces, misshapen bodies. “What were they?”
“Demons, some of them. Others were Possessed, which is almost as bad—and
worse, in some ways,” Finn said. Father Franks shifted beside them, his face closing down, the secrets of the Church locked within it. “But the important part is, they’ll only get stronger. They’ll strike again before midnight tonight. You can count on it.”
“Uh-huh. What do they want from Lester?” she asked. Demons. He said the word like it was God’s own truth, and Franks wasn’t contradicting him. Great.
“The same document I’ve been sent for, I told you,” Finn said, eyeing her as if he was trying to see if his words meant anything. They didn’t. “Once I have it in hand, the attention of these things that were following you will turn away from you and your uncle, and fix on me.”
She narrowed her eyes. “That’s it? They’ll leave us alone after you get this document? How do you know Lester hasn’t made a dozen copies of it?”
Finn’s gaze arrowed through her. “I don’t. But if he gives it to me, whatever it is, he’ll be safe.” She sensed herself being almost physically pushed back by the force of his gaze, surrounded by it. “You’ll both be safe. I swear it.”
The moment felt heavy, ominous, a fire stinging along Dana’s nerves that hadn’t been there before, Finn’s dark eyes blazing with heat and intensity. “All right,” she said, keying another message to Max to unleash her uncle’s hounds. “I’ll take you to Lester. But I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
The smile on Finn’s face flickered dangerously. “I also get that all the time.”
Dana rolled her eyes. The phone buzzed again in her hand, and she glanced down at it. Goons en route. Be there in five.
Chapter Ten
Public Square District
Cleveland, Ohio
3:45 a.m., Dec. 24
Finn watched Dana as she slid into her uncle’s limo beside him, taking note of every twitch of her muscles, every nuance of her tone as she gave her orders to the driver. He could practically hear her questions as they formed themselves in her head, but to her credit, she didn’t speak right away. They set off down the street, the expensive vehicle purring into the night. Dana watched the streetlamps pass by for one block, then two.
Then she turned to him.
“Seriously? You’re…” She slid a glance to the driver. “What Father Franks said you were?”
Finn weighed his options, wondering how to play this conversation. Dana was still trying to convince herself there were no demons in the world, or angels either. But at least by his count, she’d already been attacked three times by representatives of the demon horde. Ignorance was no longer bliss, it was sheer stupidity.
“I’m what he said I am, and that means I can kill what attacked us tonight. I can. You can’t. Because of what they are.”
“What they are,” she repeated, her eyes hardening.
“I know you don’t want to believe it. I don’t blame you. But that doesn’t make it untrue. And right now, Lester’s in danger. So are you.”
“And this Bartholomew? What’s his relevance?”
Finn shrugged, not wanting to scare her more than she already was. “I have no idea. Father Franks recalled him because he shares the same tattoo that I do. That’s it.”
“But you said—”
“You’ll find I say a lot of things when I need to. At the moment, I need to get to your uncle, and to do that, I had to get the priest on my side. I’m obviously not the only one interested in reaching Lester Morrow, but as to whether the guy behind tonight’s attack is the Bartholomew that the priest encountered or someone else, I don’t know.”
“Bullshit,” Dana retorted, catching him up short. “You’re both the same kind of whatever, and you’re both here. And so far tonight, you’ve shown up at a charity event, ingratiated yourself with a complete stranger, spent fifteen thousand dollars to make a statement, and foiled an attack by some seriously disturbed souls on the streets of Cleveland at three in the morning, then played hot potato with a gold crucifix and damn near made a priest cry. And you mean to tell me that a holy man who may or may not be possessed—but who is definitely deeply broken—and is also a known associate of both you and Father Franks doesn’t have anything to do with it?”
“Bartholomew is no known associate of mine,” Finn said, but even as he spoke the words, he hesitated. He didn’t at all recall the sin that had brought him to his demonic status. He didn’t remember anything at all about being Fallen. Had he known this Bartholomew? Did the rogue Fallen know something about what had caused Finn’s disgrace?
“What is it?” Dana demanded, and Finn blinked, surprised to see her staring at him. Humans weren’t supposed to be able to see anything a demon didn’t want them to see, including their changing expressions, and Finn was currently a Fallen. He should have more protection against the curiosity of mortals, not less.
“Nothing,” he said. When she made a face, he felt compelled to continue. “Okay, something. I don’t know anyone by the name of Bartholomew, I don’t know this man or what he’s done, or if he’s interested in your uncle’s document. But yes, I will grant you, it’s as reasonable a theory as any that he might be involved. And if that’s the case, you must be even more careful. Because if he is the agent behind these attacks you’ve experienced—”
“Attacks?” she asked sharply. “There’s only been one. Tonight’s.”
Now it was his turn to watch her with skeptical eyes, and Dana scowled at him. “You have no way of knowing about anything else. Unless you were behind them.”
“I wasn’t behind them,” he said. “But I know that you were attacked two months ago, I know that you were attacked three nights ago as well. I’m almost certain that the first attack was connected, and I can tell you for sure that the second one definitely was.”
“What do you know about what happened in Canada?” Dana winced as she spoke, lifting a hand to her brow. “Damn, that hurts,” she muttered.
Finn hesitated, then lifted a hand as well. It might help, he reasoned, if she knew a little more. She might count him more as a friend.
Never mind that he suddenly wanted her to count him as a friend. It wasn’t his place. This fierce, lost, driven woman had a life and a purpose in this world, while he would be gone in less than twenty hours. But for this barest moment in time, he didn’t so much care.
With one gesture, a haze dropped between the seats, separating them from their driver. To the man in the front seat, they would appear to be staring out the window, no longer talking. It was the easiest of illusions, and it was one he knew Dana would instinctually appreciate—if she could have noticed it.
Which, insanely, she did.
“Oh, so now you drop the cloaking device?” Her eyes were bright, alert, and she reached out, touching the air. Nothing was there, of course. Nothing visible to ordinary humans, anyway. “Couldn’t we have started this conversation that way? All of Lester’s goons have recording devices.”
“It’s not just a soundproof barrier. It’s visual as well.”
Her brows shot up. “Really? How?”
Despite himself, Finn smiled. “Really. And how doesn’t matter. You’re safe, Dana,” Finn said. “No one can see you, so let me do this. Let me help.”
Without waiting for her to respond, he reached out both hands to brush Dana’s hair with his fingers, pressing lightly against her temples. She froze beneath his touch as he took the pain away from her, her eyes wide as she stared at him. In that glance, there was fear, worry, even a little anger. But there was also…hope. And it was the hope that tore at Finn, made his own breath ragged in his throat. Hope was an emotion he had never understood.
What was it that Dana truly believed he could give her? Whatever it was, she was bound to be disappointed. But not…not yet, he decided. Not yet.
“It was me,” Finn said quietly, holding her gaze as her dark eyes flared. “I was there three nights ago, when you were attacked by the wolves. I fought them off, got them to scatter. Stayed until I knew they were gone.”
“But—how?” she managed. “You were fo
llowing me?”
“I was following you,” Finn said. Or the archangel was, more to the point. Which meant that Michael knew a lot more than he was letting on. Did he also know what this list was? He certainly wanted it badly enough. But why the cloak and dagger? Finn and the Syx were bound to the archangel’s service. It wasn’t as if there was any reason for subterfuge.
He shook off his uneasiness. Dana was staring at him, waiting for him to continue. “At that point, my goal was merely to keep you safe, not to approach you.”
“What changed?” she asked, and he looked into her eyes, for a moment forgetting anything but how close she was to him, how real, how vital.
“You did.” The words were out before Finn could stop himself, and he flushed, the unexpected surge of emotion warming him in a way that even Sara Wilde’s healing energy hadn’t been able to. He could see Dana’s lips part, sense her instinctive twitch away from him, but he pushed on. He had only this second, this moment. Life was so fragile and fast moving, in a blink, Dana’s life would end, her soul would pass, and he’d have missed his chance. To say…to say…
“I don’t understand,” Dana whispered, but her eyes were on his, dark and intense—and a little desperate. “Help me understand, Finn.”
The car stopped abruptly at a light, a chirping from the front shattering the moment. “Your uncle, Ms. Griffin,” the driver said, his polite voice splitting the veil Finn had raised, their temporary isolation already gone. “He wants you to know everything is ready for your guest.”
Dana flushed and straightened. “Of course,” she said, once more all business. “Why wouldn’t it be?”
Shoving away a gnawing ache that he could neither define nor fully admit to himself, Finn turned and stared at the bright lights of the frozen city.
Chapter Eleven
Post Office Plaza
Cleveland, Ohio
4:00 a.m., Dec. 24
Dana tracked the iridescent green numbers on the Audi Q7’s radio console as they flipped to 4:00 a.m. At that precise moment, the limo turned into the narrow street between the Ritz Carlton Hotel and the Post Office Plaza building. She’d been awake almost twenty-four hours, and the adrenaline jacking her system had left her alternately strung out and exhausted. Her bones jolted over every grain of salt on the bleak white streets, her skin shivered at every breath Finn took in the seat beside her.
