by Jessi Gage
A horn blared outside. A car door slammed. Muffled shouting doused Emmett’s desire like a bucket of ice water. He couldn’t make out the words, but he was pretty sure the voice belonged to Nick.
He bit back a curse and wiped his fingers on the sheets. Feeling suddenly ashamed, he met Jade’s eyes. He wasn’t sure if he’d expected her to look disappointed or embarrassed, but he definitely didn’t expect to see her face twisted in anger.
“Make him go away,” she growled. “Finish what you started.” She clawed at his jeans.
He caught her wrists. Something was very wrong. “Jade? What’s going on?”
He tried to roll her off of him, but she squeezed him between her thighs like she was riding the mechanical bull at Billy Bob’s. He couldn’t unseat her. Spiders skittered up his spine.
She didn’t answer. Her hands twisted in his grip until she’d managed to work his fly open. She wore a look of crazed determination that made him feel sick to his stomach.
“Baby, it’s over,” he said, scrabbling with her hands to keep her from reaching for his erection.
Nick’s shouting had stopped, and Emmett dared to hope it was because his buddy had decided to leave. No such luck. Downstairs, the kitchen door banged open. Footsteps clomped toward the stairs to his room, and he heard a muttered, “Son of a bitch,” then a hiss, as if his buddy were in pain.
“Don’t come up here, man,” he called, still struggling with Jade. Whatever had gotten into her, he didn’t want Nick to see her like this. He sure as hell didn’t want Nick to see him like this.
Nick’s footsteps stopped midway up the stairs. There were a few beats of silence. Then his buddy voice floated up from the stairwell. “Em, I need you to get away from Jade right now.”
“Please don’t come up. Jade’s not dressed.” Well, she wasn’t exactly naked, but she was close enough to it that he preferred for her to put something else on before Nick came up. That is, if he could get her to stop trying to grab his dick.
“It’s over, baby,” he said to her. “Hey, hey, it’s not going to happen tonight.”
Tears coursed down her cheeks. Her face fell to something between rage and despair.
Suddenly, she dove for the pillow and came away with the chef’s knife from his kitchen. “Tell him to go away,” she mouthed as she touched the blade to his throat.
He was clammy with sweat from the passion of a few minutes ago. At the sight of his girl pinning him to the mattress with a knife, the sweat turned to ice on his skin. He swallowed and a flare of pain over his Adam’s apple told him she’d just drawn blood.
“Um, Nick,” he said. “She says you’re supposed to go away.”
“Pray,” was his buddy’s quiet response.
He felt it then. Evil. He’d never realized evil had a sensation, but it did. It was cold. Not the kind of cold you fight by putting on a coat or turning on the heat, but the kind of cold that makes itself part of you. He felt cold to his core, like he had coolant pooling in his intestines.
His heart in his throat, he did what Nick told him, reciting the Lord’s Prayer as he had in Jade’s kitchen when that thing attacked them. “Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name—”
Jade screeched, “Stop! Draonius, help me!”
Her fingers convulsed and the knife fell to the mattress. She pressed both hands over her ears.
He kept reciting the Lord’s Prayer, torn between reaching for Jade and recoiling from her.
When she scrambled off of him with jerky, inhuman movements and huddled against the wall, a sob built in his throat. He didn’t let it out—he would fall apart if he did. Instead he kept reciting the Lord’s Prayer as he crawled off the bed. The words on his tongue tasted of warmth and hope.
Nick came up into the room, and the sight of him drew his gaze away from Jade. His buddy’s ever-present pageboy cap was missing. In its place were crisscrossing streams of blood matting his white-blond hair and streaking his face. It looked like something had tried to claw his head off.
Terror tightened his gut. His voice failed him. His prayer became a strained whisper. But when Nick joined in, he found his voice again.
They finished the prayer, and Nick said, “Your phone sent me a message a few minutes ago.” There was a tremor in his voice. He didn’t take his eyes from Jade. “It said, ‘She is possessed by a spirit named Mercy Abigail Birmingham, who serves the demon Draonius. You must stop him.’” He took a shaky breath. “I’m guessing you didn’t send me that as a joke.”
A shiver pebbled every inch of his skin. “I didn’t send it at all.”
Nick held up a hand. In his fist was one of the devices he’d used at Jade’s house the night before. The EMF detector. It hadn’t done anything then. Now, it was blinking yellow LED lights.
“And I suppose you didn’t leave this for me on the stairs, either,” Nick said.
“Nope.”
Holding the EMF detector out like a ward, Nick walked slowly to where Jade huddled against the wall. The lights blinked from yellow to orange. As he crouched and held the EMF detector right up against her, the lights blinked red, confirming what he already knew in his heart.
The evil was in Jade.
It hit him like a blow to the stomach. How had this happened? How had he not known? What was Jade feeling? Was she even in there?
“What’s happening?” he asked Nick. “What do we do?”
Nick didn’t look at him. “She’s possessed.” His buddy looked just as stunned as he felt.
“What do we do?” he repeated.
Nick blinked a few times as if getting hold of himself. “Get me a cross or a Bible,” he said. Then he began reciting something that sounded like Latin.
His leather-bound Bible lived on his desk across the room. He ran to grab it and pressed it into Nick’s hand.
Nick held it facing out to Jade, almost touching her.
She rocked on her haunches and keened a blood-curdling cry.
“You’re hurting her!” He grabbed at the Bible.
They had a mini tug of war while Nick said, “It’s not her. It’s not Jade.”
The words were a slap.
While Nick was distracted, Jade hissed at them, actually hissed like a rabid cat. Her legs coiled beneath her as if she meant to strike.
Nick pressed the Bible against her cheek, forcing her to cower into the wall again.
“Stop it.” Tears gathered in his eyes. Maybe Jade wasn’t in there right now, and he didn’t want to think about what that might mean, but maybe she was in there. Maybe some of the pain showing on her face was hers. He couldn’t stand to see her like this. “Please, stop.”
“I need you to keep it together,” Nick said. “Can you do that for me? Can you open the Bible and read scripture and keep her down like this while I call Chiboza?”
The tremor in Nick’s voice steadied him. His buddy was just as terrified as he was. He nodded, taking the Bible from Nick. It fell open to the Psalms, and he started reading.
He was vaguely aware of Nick behind him, talking on his phone in hushed, urgent tones. He thought he heard him saying, “This is out of my league. Way out.”
A few minutes later, his buddy said, “We need to tie her up. Do you have rope?”
“In the garage. There’s twine with the lawn care stuff.” His voice sounded far away. He was in shock. Damn it. Jade needed him to shake it off and help her.
“Do you have a cross?” Nick asked.
He had to think about it. His mom had given him one a few years ago—she’d brought it home as a souvenir from a trip to Israel. “Try the downstairs closet, look on the shelf above the coat rack.” Why hadn’t he ever hung the cross up somewhere? If he had, would that have protected Jade?
“Keep reading,” his buddy said with a pat on his shoulder. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Nick left, and Emmett read the Psalms as if his life depended on it. He wished it was his life that depended on it. He would have gladly traded p
laces with Jade to protect her from this.
“In you O Lord, do I take refuge. Let me never be put to shame. In your righteousness deliver me. Incline your ear to me. Rescue me speedily. Be a rock of refuge for me, a strong fortress to save me.”
While he read, he prayed silently. God, please help her. Protect her soul.
* * * *
Joshua nudged the limp essence in his arms. She wouldn’t respond.
Mercy had flung Jade out of her body, and the poor dear had been so depleted, her essence was the barest wisp, barely visible. He was still scolding himself for stepping away for a moment to unlock the rear door for Nick and kick up a wind to shove Draonius back so the man could get inside. If he’d returned to the bedroom a second later, he would have missed Jade. She’d been a hair’s breadth from dying.
He’d retreated to the abyss with her, where she was in no danger of disbursing. But without a demon to feed her, she stood no chance of recovering.
But wait. He was an angel. Surely he could do whatever a demon could. He was tasked with fighting them, after all.
Pressing her to his bosom, he willed his strength into her. Several minutes passed, but her constitution remained the same. Maybe she wasn’t meant to recover.
Maybe she simply couldn’t while her body was possessed.
He ached for his charge. She’d put up a valiant fight. He desperately wanted her to have her reward. Yet she stood to lose everything.
Hang on, my dear. We’ll sort you out.
He prayed he wasn’t making false promises.
Chapter 24
Emmett kept reading while Nick trudged up the stairs and turned on the bedside lamp.
“These candles are set at the points of a pentagram,” Nick said as he blew them out.
The Bible shook in his hands. He couldn’t focus on the words. All he could do was seethe at himself for being so oblivious.
Your girlfriend got possessed right under your nose, and you didn’t even notice? You missed the blazing pentagram around your freaking bed?
Talk about thinking with the wrong head. He’d let lust into the driver’s seat, and now Jade was paying the price.
“Don’t zone on me, man,” Nick said. “I need you. Help me tie her up.”
Nick recited more Latin while they worked together to tie Jade’s wrists, ankles, and knees. She seemed docile now, but Emmett insisted on using socks to cushion her skin from the bite of the twine in case she struggled. Once they had her on the bed, Nick told him to hammer the cross he’d found to the wall above her head. While he did that, Nick pulled a string of rosary beads from his ghost hunting kit and draped it over her head. The cross in the center rested on the thin, almost see-through cotton stretched across her breasts.
They stood shoulder to shoulder, looking down at her. Her skin was too tight over the bones of her face. Her eyes stared at the ceiling, the luster gone from her hazel irises. They were fish eyes, dead eyes. Her lips were moving. No sound came out.
He wanted to weep. Inside, he felt as dead as Jade’s eyes looked. He wished it were him.
“Why do you have rosary beads?” he asked Nick. “You’re not Catholic.”
“They’re a symbol of my faith in God’s power over this entity,” he answered without taking his eyes from Jade. “And they’ve been blessed by a priest. When you’re dealing with demons, objects like this serve as focal point for the exorcist. It’s not the symbol itself that fights the entity. It’s God, through the faith of His warriors. That’s you and me, Em. And Chiboza, when he gets here.”
Jade’s warrior. He could be that. If God would let him after what he’d just done. “Can we cover her up?”
Without a word, Nick went downstairs. He returned a minute later with the throw from the couch.
“I’m so sorry,” Emmett told Jade as he took the blanket and spread it over her. To Nick, he said, “How long until your mentor gets here?”
“By one for sure, maybe a little sooner.”
Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary was about a three hour-drive away in Massachusetts. Nick had already explained that Chiboza had to pack a few things before heading out. Waiting sucked.
He tore his gaze away from Jade to finally get a good look at Nick’s injuries. Blood caked his hair and one side of his face. Deep scratches crisscrossed his scalp. One particularly vicious-looking cut darted in front of his ear. That one might need stitches.
The fact that he was just now feeling worried for his buddy was yet another sign he was in shock. “What happened to you?”
“Damn crow attacked me.” Nick sketched a look at him then returned to watching Jade. “Like it wanted to keep me from coming in or something. And then this freak wind kicked up and, like, pushed it off me. Thank God you left the kitchen door unlocked. Thank God.”
“I didn’t. I locked all the doors when you left.”
A visible shiver rippled over Nick’s skin.
Like a yawn, it spread to Emmett. He swallowed and said, “You’ll probably need stitches.”
“Yeah,” he agreed, as if he got mauled by crows all the time.
“You should go to the hospital. Birds carry things. You might need antibiotics.”
“I’ll go once this is taken care of.” He said it with the conviction of a man determined to see a task through.
Emmett appreciated it, but he didn’t want Nick getting sick or ending up with horrible scars. Ali would never let him hear the end of it. “I’ve got some butterfly stitches in the garage. We keep a decent First Aid kit since Theo’s always bleeding on the job. Want me to go get it?”
Nick nodded. “Maybe that’s a good idea.”
Emmett stood rooted to the spot. He couldn’t bring himself to leave Jade.
Nick sighed, and the sound seemed to jar them both from their strange calm.
“She’ll be okay,” Nick said, patting his shoulder.
He wished his buddy sounded more certain. Tears pricked his eyes, and he blinked to clear the useless sensation.
How many times had they debated possession? It was a popular topic since Nick studied demonology as part of his seminary program. Christians were off limits to demons. They both agreed on that, though Nick claimed there might be an exception to the rule based on a couple studies he’d read. Emmett didn’t buy it. The Bible promised that God holds his children in the palm of his hand, and what God protects, no evil can harm. He couldn’t believe God would allow that promise to be broken.
But Jade wasn’t a child of God. There were no guarantees for her. She’d been taken over by something evil, and only God knew where she was now, or if she could be saved.
And he was powerless to help her. He had to rely on Nick and Chiboza. And God. Having faith had never been this hard before.
He went to get the First Aid kit. He couldn’t help Jade, but he could at least do something for Nick. The numbness began wearing off in stages. By the time he stepped into his shop, guilt hit him like a blow to the kidney. He couldn’t believe he’d let this happen.
Jade took his virginity vow seriously. She wouldn’t have lounged around in his bed in nothing but her underwear, not after their talk about rules. She wouldn’t have encouraged him when he got too physical. She would have told him to knock it off. Come to think of it, she wouldn’t have spent practically the entire evening in bed. She would have been with him, cuddling on the couch, helping in the kitchen, poking fun at his conspiracy theories, and challenging him and Nick with her wit and intelligence.
He should have known something was wrong.
He cursed himself as he dragged the First Aid kit from under the sink in the break area. When he headed back into the kitchen, the chime of his doorbell made him jump.
Oh, no. Lisa.
For all he knew the crow that had tried to scalp Nick was still outside. Dumping the kit on the counter, he sprinted to the front door.
* * * *
Draonius held his broken wing close to his body as he hid on the roof in the shadow of an
eave. His blackbird body was damaged beyond repair, but at least he knew now why the blessing had held despite Emmett’s lust. There was an angel helping the believers.
He’d known it the moment a holy wind buffeted him away from the fat one and slammed him into the trunk of a tree. The believers weren’t playing fair. Fine. Neither would he.
He summoned his prince just as another coach stopped near the house. A woman with fair hair and tan skin stepped out. She was a beauty. But he would not be distracted. His goal lay inside the house, behind that bedamned blessing.
A bit beyond your station, isn’t she? said a voice in his head.
He cocked his head to find his prince beside him resplendent in the form of a blood-eyed hawk.
I punished you once for overreaching. Apparently chaining you to that house has taught you nothing.
His prince hadn’t imprisoned him for “overreaching.” He’d imprisoned him for failing to tithe from the rush of power he’d gotten upon possessing Joshua’s body. He was only testing him by bringing up the past, determining whether he was worthy of help.
The only thing The Prince of Air respected more than ambition was pride, so he ruffled his feathers and drew himself up to his full height, despite his recently broken wing. Lord and Master, your punishment taught me patience. It taught me improvisation. I escaped, after all.
There is that.
He pounced on the moment of consideration. I do not desire the woman below. But there is one inside, behind the blessing—
Forget that one. She is gone.
Gone? Jade was gone? But her essence should be safe in the abyss. Did his prince know something he did not? Had something gone wrong?
And forget the man too, the believer. You have overreached again, Draonius. I curse you to—
No! Wait! Please my prince, let me have the full measure of this chance before you curse me again.
This chance is finished, his prince said, and then he was silent. He did not scold him for interrupting. He was either toying with him or curious how he planned to salvage this situation.
Whatever the reason, his prince was listening. He would not waste this audience. I would rather overreach and meet challenge than stagnate in complacency.
