by Ashlee Sinn
“Why are you fighting against me? Aren’t you a demon supporter?” My arm stung and I had a hard time feeling anything but the pain. Elijah must have cut me more than I initially thought.
“Sure, I support the demons. Just not you.”
“Why?”
Aldrich smiled, even though I knew he wasn’t happy. “Because look what you’ve done to my baby brother! He’s almost earth bound!”
“What?”
“His wings, you bitch. You’ve ruined him.” Aldrich stalked closer. “He was the only one of us that had a chance of becoming immortal. He was good. He was holy. And you took that all away from him!” Aldrich flung out his arm and tossed me backward to the ground. “You are the reason he’s fighting against us.”
“You’re wrong,” I choked out as his power wrapped around my neck. “He’s fighting against you because you’ve destroyed this world. Look around. You did this, not me.”
Aldrich squeezed tighter. “Demons are allowed to walk the surface and profit from humans. But angels can’t. We’re not allowed to use our power for gain. We’re not allowed to own homes or businesses or whatever it is you fucking do.”
“Sounds like a you problem to me,” I whispered. Spots danced across my vision. If I didn’t get air soon, I might end up like Griffin.
“I’m tired of your voice,” Aldrich groaned.
The pressure on my neck released, but from the look in his eyes, I knew he was about to deal a deadly blow. He lifted both arms, said something in a foreign language, and then…
A bright white light blasted him into the air, and before he landed on the ground, another angel with pure white wings carried him away. Across the street, I saw a different one do the same with Elijah. And then with Griffin. Jericho ran to my side and helped me off the ground. His face was covered in blood and bruises. He favored his left leg. And a chunk of his right wing was stripped bare of all feathers.
“Are you okay?” I asked him.
“Yeah, but we need to go. That was the only assistance we’re going to get.”
“Assistance?”
“From Raphael. Now come on. Can you run?”
I nodded and we took off toward the antique store. Jumping over debris and dodging flames, we ran as fast as we could through the destruction that was once called New York City. It took us longer than it should since every storefront and apartment building was burning or collapsing around us. But when we reached Otis’ store, we both sucked in a surprised breath.
“How?” I whispered. The store, in the middle of the devastation, stood untouched. As though a magical bubble protected his property, Otis’ livelihood had somehow managed survive.
“Divine intervention,” Jericho partially joked.
“No shit.”
He chuckled and grabbed my hand. Pulling me to the door, he hesitated only a moment before opening it. “Hmm, it’s not even hot.”
“That’s weird,” I mused as he yanked me inside. Once the front door closed, I was reminded about the scent of old things and the reason for my first visit here. This was where it all changed. Where I betrayed my kind. And where I met the angel I would end up falling in love with.
“I’m in the back if you need anything,” Otis called out.
“Does he even realize what’s going on outside?” I asked with a chuckle.
“Who knows.”
We made our way to the back of the store where Otis sat next to his broken clock. He looked up at us and grinned. “Ah, it must be time then.”
“You knew?” Jericho asked.
Otis laughed and slipped off his working glasses. “I’ve always known I had a purpose.”
“Which is why I couldn’t collect your soul,” I added.
“And why they told me to keep her away.”
Otis nodded. “It’s all a part of the plan.”
He said it so calmly, I wondered just how much he knew about the plan. “Otis,” I asked quietly, “do you know what’s going on outside?”
“The end of the world!” He threw up his hands and then immediately slammed them back down to his side. Letting out a series of coughs, I didn’t miss the way he held on to his ribs.
Neither did Jericho. “Otis, what happened?” The angel rushed around the counter and forced Otis to remove his hand from his side. It came away covered in blood. “Oh, no.”
“Who did this to you?” I asked, immediately searching my surroundings to look for something that could soak up the blood.
“The gray ones,” he coughed out.
“Son of a bitch!” The brothers. I hated them more each time we met. “I’m sorry, Jericho. But if we get out of this mess alive, I’m going to kill your brothers.”
“Get in line,” Jericho muttered. “Otis, I can’t stop the bleeding. Why?”
It was then I noticed the light coming out of Jericho’s palm. He didn’t need a rag, he had his healing magic.
“They cursed it,” he said. “It’s okay. It’s only my liver. I’ve still got time.”
“Otis, that’s a lot of blood,” I said.
“I’m fine.” He looked down at Jericho. “Really, I’m fine.”
Jericho and I exchanged a look. We might be able to make it out of here alive, but there was a good chance Otis wouldn’t. Surprised at the sudden pang of sadness etching into my skin, I shook my head and got down to business.
“Can you reset time?” I asked bluntly.
The old man smiled at me. “I thought you’d never ask.” He coughed again, and Jericho dropped to his knees to hold onto the wound. That is, until Otis beat him away with his hand. “Go. Go over to her,” he commanded.
Jericho complied and once we both stood next to each other across the counter, Otis lifted a black cloth off a small table clock. Not much bigger than a teapot, I thought the man might be pulling our legs. Which wouldn’t be cool…especially not now. “That’s it?” I asked in surprise.
“Sometimes the most powerful things are not the prettiest,” Otis said as though he’d dealt with numerous magical antiques before.
Jericho bent forward to take a closer look. “What do we have to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” I snapped.
“I mean, that when this was given to me, I was told to save it for a rainy day. Other than that,” he shrugged, “your guess is as good as mine.”
Glaring down at Jericho, I gave him a look that told him to deal with it. He stood and rubbed his hand over the unpolished gold of the clock. “Was it Raphael?”
“Excuse me?”
“The man who gave this to you. Was it the angel Raphael?”
Otis winked. “Maybe.”
“Okay, seriously. We need to reset time before it’s too late.” Turning back to Otis, I asked, “Do you have any idea?”
“Well, the angel told me only love could make it work.”
“Love? Like true love in fucking fairy tales?”
“Arabella,” Jericho warned.
“What? That’s such bullshit!”
“Is it?” Otis asked, eyes darting back and forth between the two of us. “Why do you think it was you two who showed up in my shop a few weeks ago? You couldn’t kill each other then. What’s happened since?”
Otis was an old man looking for a good story. So I ignored him. “Jericho, put your hand on the clock.”
“What?”
“Just do it!” He complied a moment before I also touched the gold metal. “Feel anything?”
“Nope.”
“Concentrate.”
“You concentrate,” he said with a smirk.
I closed my eyes and thought about…well, I tried to think about what I should think about to make an old clock reset time. “Nothing.”
We looked at Otis. “Try touching each other. Send your bond to the clock.”
It took all I had not to punch Otis in the face.
“Arabella, don’t,” Jericho said as though knowing exactly what I was thinki
ng.
I kissed him on the lips quick. “I won’t.”
“That’s it!” Otis shouted. “Do that again!”
“Do what?” Jericho asked for us.
“I don’t know, but when you kissed, the clock hands started to move.”
“Don’t they always move?”
Otis rolled his eyes and gave me a sour glare. “Of course they do, but not backward.”
“Oh.” Facing Jericho again, I teased, “Maybe we should think about that time in my apartment?”
“In the kitchen,” he grinned.
“Or in the bed…” My hand warmed as the clock started to do something.
Jericho stepped closer to me, and slid his hand along my bare thigh. “I can’t stop thinking about that. And when I thought I’d lost you forever…”
“Shh,” I cut him off. “Only happy thoughts.” I stood on my toes and kissed him. “Only happy thoughts will get us out of this mess.”
Jericho let his fingers brush closer to my sex and chuckled when I drew in a breath. “I can’t imagine a life without you in it, Arabella.”
Sucking on his neck, I closed my eyes and ignored the burning sensation in my palm as the clock did its thing. “I know,” I whispered. “It’s crazy, isn’t it?”
“Super crazy,” he said as he pulled my hips against his erection.
“I like crazy.”
“Me, too.”
“It’s working!” Otis yelled. “It’s working!”
Something was happening underneath our palms and also between us. Even in the midst of pure devastation, our love would find a way to make it all better. It sounded horribly corny and ridiculous, but for some reason, the connection between me and this angel would end up saving the world.
“Keep going—”
Otis’ voice was cut off when the clock exploded into a ball of blue and white flames. The fire licked around us, enclosing me and Jericho in a bubble and igniting my skin like a thousand fireflies. The power rushing through me and into Jericho and back into me again, had me selfishly wanting more. The warm wave of magic felt wonderful—like a massage mixed with the satisfaction of great sex and a successful soul collection. Everything felt good. Everything felt wonderful.
And when I looked into Jericho’s eyes, I knew he felt it too.
Our hair levitated in slow motion. The light darted between our hands. As I kissed him again, the power surged through both of us with a fiery rush. My lips parted in pleasure and Jericho squeezed my hand harder. The flames blocked us from seeing anything beyond the bubble, so it was impossible to know what was happening outside. Yet, something…something felt right. Like this resetting-of-time-thing was actually working.
So, when another explosion ripped us apart, and I flew through the air and into a glass shelf filled with old watches, I hoped my gut had been correct and we’d helped put the world back together again.
The ringing in my ears blocked out all other sound. For a moment, I was so disoriented, my stomach whirled with nausea. My back ached like the night I’d fought with the wraith on the bridge. My right arm was stiff where Elijah had sliced the skin and muscle. And my head throbbed like I had a concussion. Or three.
If time had been reset, why did I still have these injuries?
As disappoint filled my bones, Jericho’s face came into focus above me. “Arabella?”
“I’m here,” I whispered. “Did it work?”
“I don’t know.” He looked over his shoulder toward the counter where the clock had been. In its place sat a pile of ash. “I really don’t know.”
“Where’s Otis?” When Jericho shrugged, I reached out my hand to have him help me up. “We need to find him.” I stood slowly, relying on the strength of Jericho to help me gain my balance. “Whoa, I guess I hit my head harder than I realized.”
“Are you okay?”
Listening for the wrath of destruction outside, I had to ask, “Do you hear anything?”
“What?” Jericho tried to prop me up against the counter.
“The end of the world. Is it still happening?”
“I can’t hear a damn thing right now,” he grumbled, before spotting something on the floor. “Otis!” Jericho jumped over the counter and fell to his knees next to the old man. “Otis? Otis!”
“Is he alive?”
He took a few moments. Jericho looked up at me with tears in his eyes and shook his head. “He’s gone.”
“Dammit! If he’s dead, then that means—”
The bell on the front door of the antique shop dinged, catching our attention. “Arabella?” Echo shouted my name like he thought I might not be here.
“In the back!” I looked at Jericho and he shrugged.
Echo stumbled around the bookshelves which made the back of the shop look like a maze, out of breath and wearing a bright blue suit. “Oh, thank Satan, you’re alive.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” Jericho stood behind me and we both waited for the Under to explain.
“Because Mammon thought you’d both have to die in order to reset time.”
“Wait. What? You’re telling me we did it? We set everything back to the way it was?” Jericho’s hand squeeze my shoulder and I closed my eyes in relief. That little fact that Mammon was willing to sacrifice me getting a special space in the back of my mind. “But why is Otis dead?”
Echo shrugged and acted like I was wasting his time. “I don’t know, maybe he did what he had to do. Anyway,” he waved his hands at us, “we have to go. Now.”
“Go where?” Jericho asked.
Echo rolled his eyes and popped his hip. He pointed at Jericho and glared at me. “Is this really a thing between you two?”
Confused, I said, “Yes.”
“Fine. Whatever. Then you both can come.”
“Echo,” I said slowly, “Where. Are. We. Going?”
“To the meeting. We only have a few hours before all hell breaks loose again.” Echo huffed like we were being the stupid ones.
I looked over my shoulder at Jericho. “Do you have any idea what he’s talking about?”
“I’m guessing it’s a meeting to convince Lucifer not to move forward with the reveal.”
Echo clapped like a sea lion and flipped me off. “He’s smarter than you. I think I like him more.”
“I can still kill you,” I warned.
“Whatever. Let’s go.” Echo turned on his heel and walked toward the front door. He sashayed back and forth like we might care, and once he disappeared around the corner, Jericho jumped back over the counter.
“We’ll come back for Otis later. I have a feeling our time to convince everyone to change their mind is pretty slim.”
I kissed him on the cheek. “I love you.”
He smiled. “What was that for?”
“I just wanted you to know it.”
“Noted.”
With his hand on my lower back, he escorted me out of the store and toward the limousine Echo was just climbing into. But we both stopped the moment we stepped into the street. Like nothing had ever happened, time had been reset. Nothing was burning. No humans were screaming. The city was just like it had been the night Leviathan captured me. Complete, stinky, and my home. That memory triggered another question which I asked Echo once we climbed into the car.
“Do you remember what happened?”
He pressed his lips together. “Are you all right? You seem a little dumb.”
“Echo,” I groaned. “Answer the question.”
“Of course, I remember everything. And it’s a stupid question.”
Facing Jericho, I tried to put the pieces together. “Our injuries didn’t heal and Otis died. Echo remembers everything and so do we. Does that mean the humans would too?”
Just as Jericho opened his mouth, Echo signed in a very exaggerated way. “Seriously, you two were the ones chosen to save the world? What a crock of sh—”
“Echo!”
“What?”
“Will the humans remember?�
��
He shook his head and slouched into the seat facing us in the back of the limo. “No, they were wiped clean. So were most shifters and others.”
“But not demons?” I asked.
“Or angels?” Jericho added.
“It would appear not.”
Thinking that through, I stayed silent the rest of the car ride until we reached the ferry docks. Snuggling tightly against Jericho, I waited for Echo to huff and sigh several times before exiting the car. Nothing made me feel more normal than to give the Under a hard time.
“Ellis Island?” Jericho asked Echo.
“Neutral ground,” he groaned. “I thought you were the smart one?” Echo stomped away and climbed the ramp to the boat. We followed behind but also didn’t mind the privacy. The water slapped against the sides, as if encouraging us to keep moving. And once the ferry was underway, Jericho and I sat near the center, huddled together.
“We probably should have picked up some clothes,” Jericho said.
I glanced down at my bare legs and extremely dirty feet. “Why bother? If Lucifer won’t change his mind, none of it will matter anyway.”
Rubbing my legs to keep me warm, Jericho said nothing else. Even as we approached the island and we noticed the huge mass of demons and angels gathered together, we didn’t speak. It was almost as if our energy had been sucked out of us with the time reset. I could barely keep my eyes open, especially as the movement of the boat lulled me into a coma.
“We’re here,” Jericho whispered into my ear, making me realize I really did fall asleep.
“For fuck’s sake, Arabella. Pull yourself together.” Echo’s attitude was really starting to get on my nerves.
There was a crowd and they didn’t want to let us pass at first. But Echo pushed his way through one shoulder bump at a time, until we stood along the inner circle closest to the action. In the center, Mammon, Leviathan, Lucifer, and Raphael spoke quietly to each other. Lucifer looked bored. Leviathan smirked at me. And Mammon glared at all of them.
“What’s going on?” Jericho asked one of the angels standing near us.
“They’re negotiating a truce. Lucifer’s been hesitant, but the other two archdemons seem to be doing a good job of convincing him otherwise.”
“How much time to we have?”
“Before the reveal Part 2?” the angel asked. When Jericho nodded, he looked at his watch. “Less than five hours.”
