But one sight of Dad and I remember I’m fighting battles on multiple fronts.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
He looks like death. He hasn’t shaved in ages, his face pale and frantic, his hair greasy and matted in thick patches.
“Making my lunch,” he says. “What’s it look like I’m doing?”
“Remodeling?”
“Can’t find my lunch box. You know where it is?”
I step closer, squinting at him through sleep-crusted eyes.
“Are you sober?” I ask.
“What kind of question is that?”
“A logical one.”
“Yes, smarty-pants, I am sober.” He leans against the fridge, both hands pressing into it. “I’m a little hungover, maybe, but I’m sober.”
I stare at him for a few more seconds, and pity gets the better of me.
“Go,” I say. “Shower. I’ll pack your lunch.”
“Thank you,” he says. He pushes off the fridge and looks at me.
Is he going to cry?
He’d better not. I’m not dealing with that this morning.
“It’s just a boxed lunch, Dad. You’re not off the hook.”
But it does feel kind of like a peace offering.
“No Pop-Tarts,” he says.
He starts toward the bathroom, and I grab the phone from the living room. I dial Helene, but her phone goes straight to voice mail. I leave a message telling her to call me back, telling her I’ve seen Damien. No use in cryptic codes. If Damien’s here, we’re past that.
I dig Dad’s lunch box—a small ice chest, really—out of the cupboard, and I jam in one of everything we have in the fridge. Except, of course, for the liquor. He’ll have to settle for Gatorade—and a blue one at that. He hates the blue. Says it reminds him of maxi pad commercials—and yes, he calls them maxi pads. But I drop in the blue Gatorade and a strawberry Pop-Tart for good measure.
Beggars can’t be choosers.
“Brielle.”
I scream. It’s impossible not to when Helene just appears in front of you.
She clamps a hand over my mouth, her voice hushed. “Your dad’s here, yes?”
I nod, and she releases me. “In the shower. What’s going on?”
“Damien.”
The name barrels into my chest like a bulldozer.
How close is he? Is he here at my house or just here in Stratus?
But the questions die on my tongue. Her head turns violently to the right, and she disappears. Instinct pulls my head up and around, looking, looking. Wishing I could command my eyes to see the world as it really is.
But I can’t.
The second hand on the clock twitches seventeen times before I make a decision. I run to the bathroom door and bang on it. I’ve got to get him out of here. The closer he is to me, the more danger he’s likely to be in. “Dad! You’re gonna be late. Hurry up!”
He hollers something back and turns off the water, but I’m already running through the house, looking for my phone.
Where is it?!
I lift the couch cushions and then shake out the blankets. I brush the curtains aside to check the window seat where I sat early this morning and watched Jake drive away. My phone’s not there, but I catch sight of something else beyond the window.
Kaylee.
You have got to be kidding me!
She’s pulling into my drive looking even more harried than normal. I dash back into the kitchen, colliding with Dad, who’s standing in the arched entryway wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist, brushing his teeth and staring at me like I’ve lost my mind.
“What are you looking for, kiddo?”
“My phone,” I say. “Kaylee just pulled up, Dad, and you’re naked! In the kitchen!”
“All right,” he huffs. “I’m going. What’s the herbivore doing here this early?”
I don’t answer, but I notice he sounds better. Definitely smells better. Still, I have got to get him out of here.
And Kaylee too.
“. . . don’t have time for you to answer the door. Brielle, did you hear a word I just said?”
Kaylee’s so close I can smell her cool mint toothpaste. She’s still in her jammies, her hair tucked into a baseball bat, Tasmanian Devil slippers on her feet, hot-pink mascara lining her lashes.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Have you seen Helene?” she asks.
I lick my lips. “Why?”
“Because she showed up at my door—at the butt crack of dawn, by the way—asking if I’d seen Olivia and telling me we had to go. And then I, like, blinked or something, and she was gone.”
“I don’t . . .”
“I tried to call you, Elle. Where’s your phone?”
I scrape my nails across my scalp. “That is a very good question.”
And then I can see. Into the Celestial.
A wing dips low through the roof. White. Shining.
I duck.
Kaylee makes a face. “Whatcha doin’?”
I look up and I see.
Not the entirety of the Celestial.
Just Helene.
Just Damien.
Just their swords!
I duck again.
“You gonna tell me what’s going on, homegirl, or would you rather I drive you to the sanitarium?”
Helene swings her blade again, spinning, spinning toward him. He’s so much bigger than she is, but she’s fast—wicked fast—her sword nothing but a blur against the morning sky.
I grab Kaylee’s hand and drag her toward the door, yelling over my shoulder.
“Daaaad!”
And that’s when my heart explodes.
Two white wings and a tiny body fall through the roof, and I shove Kaylee aside.
“Whoa, turbo!” she says, colliding with the counter.
But I can’t concentrate on Kaylee now. Helene connects with the linoleum, her wings useless, her limbs splayed like pickup sticks on the floor.
“Helene!” I scream.
A smoking wound of black ice cuts across the thick cords of shimmering white that wrap her torso. I drop to the ground, to my knees, and wrap my trembling hand around hers. Her white eyes find mine, and I hear her voice in my head.
“The Palatine are coming.”
Before I can ask what in Neverland she’s talking about, she vanishes, her fading eyes the last thing I see.
29
Brielle
The Palatine are coming.”
“You’ve said that no less than twenty times, and I still have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I’m kneeling on the floor, the linoleum squares swimming before me.
“The Palatine—”
“Are coming,” Kay says flippantly. “I got it. What exactly would you like me to do about it?”
“Who are they?” I whisper.
“I know you’re not talking to me.”
I’m not. I’m talking to Helene. My Shield. My beautiful, powerful, wounded Shield. How many times will that little angel be mangled in front of me?
“Kaylee?”
“Right here. On Planet Sanity, by the way. Whenever you’re ready for a return trip.”
“What happened?” I ask.
Kaylee’s slippers purr along the linoleum, and two Tasmanian Devils move into my line of sight. “Okay, that didn’t sound like a rhetorical question, but let’s just say I’m a little short on details myself.”
“Tell me anyway.”
Kaylee’s hands find my shoulders, and she pulls me to my feet. She doesn’t stumble, she doesn’t stutter. She looks at me with those gigantic brown eyes of hers and says, “I’ll tell you if you’ll tell me.”
Her eyes are a little too knowing, her lips a little too tight. And I understand that this is that moment. The one Canaan said would come. The mind can’t be forced.
But now she’s asking.
“Are you sure you want to know, Kay? ’Cause once you do, you can’t unkn
ow. It’s just . . . infuriating like that.”
“Infuriating like a halo that gives mysterious boys visions of you dying?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Just like that.”
“Then yeah. I think I can handle it.”
“This is my lunch?” Dad stands in the doorway of the kitchen, staring at the contents of his lunch littering the floor, but I’m still staring at Kaylee. Still considering her words. She did handle the halo far better than I expected.
“Okay,” I say.
“Okay?” Dad says. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Dad kneel to the floor and start scooping his lunch back into the ice chest. “It’s not okay.”
“Okay,” Kaylee says with a nod.
“I just, I’ve got to do something first.” But even as I say it, I have no idea what I’m going to do.
Damien’s out there.
And the Palatine.
Whatever the heck that is.
Maybe it’s good. Maybe I want the Palatine here.
Jake would know.
But he’s gone and I have no idea where I left my phone.
I stare through the entryway into the living room. I stare at the landline phone sitting next to Dad’s recliner and I try to conjure up Jake’s number, but all I come up with is speed dial 5.
Speed dial 5.
So not helpful.
All of this flies through my head in a matter of seconds, and then I see Damien.
Yes, Damien.
His talons appear first. They wrap around the entryway between the living room and the kitchen. He’s taken some damage during his fight with Helene and bears a series of festering sear marks across his arms and chest.
Still, he’s lethal. And I have no idea how long I’ll be able to see him.
My hands shake. And my legs.
My stomach roils, and I know I’m going to be sick.
God, are You there?
Please, please help me.
A bead of subzero sweat rolls down my spine, and it’s not God who answers. It’s Damien.
His voice snakes into my head, and it’s not melodic like Helene’s or soothing like Canaan’s. It’s gritty and toxic and cold.
“The Palatine are coming? Now?”
He’s asking me?
I don’t nod. I don’t answer.
Why is he asking me?
I try to look away, but his presence in my house is jarring. His chest is slick with fear. It blackens his talons further and pours liberally down my walls.
Is he frightened? Or does he just produce the stuff in vast quantities?
If the idea of the Palatine in Stratus frightens him, maybe they’re on my side. Maybe their presence will send him to the skies.
“Brielle, baby, are you okay?” It’s Dad, and I don’t know what to say. He stands and closes the ice chest. “Brielle?”
Kaylee takes my hand and tugs. Her breath flutters the hair at my ear as she hisses, “You’re doing it again.”
I break eye contact with the monster and look at my dad.
“I’m okay,” I tell him, trying to smile. “Just a little out of sorts, I guess.”
“Maybe you should head back to bed? It’s still early, kid.”
Damien slides down the wall and crouches in the entryway now. Massive shoulders, frayed wings, bulky arms with razor-sharp talons pressing into the linoleum flooring that Dad laid himself.
My father’s huge, but this beast dwarfs him.
It seems he’s willing to wait for a response, though, which baffles me. Will he hurt my father to get one? The thought makes my knees weak. Damien’s just feet from Dad now, and I try to warn him, try to say anything, but my throat just gurgles.
Dad’s brow knots.
Kaylee laughs, but it’s forced, and still I can’t take my eyes from the demon in my house.
“Your dad’s totally right, Elle. You’re a space cadet, and we have tons to do today. I’ll get her to bed, Mr. Matthews. You go. We’ll be fine.”
But leaving me in Kaylee’s “capable” hands does not calm Dad, and he walks toward me. He hefts the ice chest in one hand and takes my chin in the other.
“Tell me you’re all right, baby.”
I can’t avoid his gaze now. He’s there. Blocking everything else with his ruddy beard and his dripping hair. He looks cleaner, younger—the dad of my childhood almost—and for a moment I consider crawling into his arms, asking him to tell me there’s no monster. That it’s just my imagination. He would too. He’d tell me that. He’d do it just because I ask him to. Because I’m scared.
But it would be false.
Like the years of lies he told to protect me.
Like the one Jake told.
“I’m fine, Dad. Sorry. Kaylee’s right. You should go. I’m fine.”
I’m not fine, not by a long shot, but if Dad can lie to protect me, then I can return the favor.
He narrows his eyes at me, a bear scrutinizing his cub. At last he kisses my nose and pulls me in for a hug. “Sleep, okay? Let this little vegan—”
“Vegetarian.”
“—take care of you. You’ve got me all freaked out here.”
You’re not the only one.
The door closes behind him with a hollow rattle, and Kaylee yanks me toward her.
“You’ve lost the privilege of deferring till the second half, Elle. Talk. Now. What is going on?”
I’m out of ideas, and nothing but the truth makes sense. So I open my mouth and I tell her. “There’s a demon behind you,” I say. “In the archway between the living room and the kitchen.”
Her face goes white, her eyes shifting left and right.
“Demon, like that hot guy who used to be on Buffy but has that Bones show now? That kind of demon?”
“Nothing like that guy.”
“Fiddlesticks,” she breathes. She stands stick straight, the thin muscles in her neck taut. “What’s he doing?”
“He’s talking to me. Asking me about the Palatine.”
“Wh-What are you going to tell him?”
“I’m going to tell him the truth. That I don’t know anything about the Palatine. You hear me?” I yell toward Damien, “I don’t know anything.”
Kaylee flinches at my outburst.
Damien does not.
“But they’re coming now?” His voice is acidic, chewing away at my courage. “The Palatine are coming?”
“I don’t know,” I say, frustrated. “Are you not hearing me? I don’t know a thing.”
“Do not lie to me, human. I heard you say, ‘The Palatine are coming,’ and we still have days before that should happen. I still have days.”
He is frightened.
Dear Jesus, please let this be the right thing to say.
Please, please.
“I was repeating Helene,” I say. “That’s all. Maybe she was wrong.”
“Helene.” Damien’s face contorts at the word. I think he’s smiling. He turns his face to the sky, his fangs flashing, reflecting some unseen celestial light. And then he leaps through the roof and I lose sight of him.
Which terrifies me more than seeing him.
Still, I breathe deep. The air feels cleaner without him here. Kaylee’s grip is an anaconda on my wrist, her eyes glued to my face.
“Helene,” she whispers. “And the warehouse.” Tears clump in her hot-pink lashes.
I want to ask her what she remembers, what haunts her, but we’ll have to play catch-up later.
“Listen, Kay. Look at me. Good. I can’t see him now, but that doesn’t mean he’s gone.”
Her lip trembles. “Why? Why can’t you see him?”
“I’m not entirely sure.”
“Why could you see him before?”
“That’s another tough one to answer.”
She’s giving me that look. The same look I’m sure I gave Jake when he was struggling to explain. “Look, there are answers, Kay. Kind of. But we have to get hold of Jake. Now. Do you have your cell?”
Her mouth o
pens, and her eyes glaze over.
I grab her shoulders and shake. “Kay!”
“Yes. I’m sorry.” She pinches her eyes shut and shakes her head. “My phone is in the car.”
Outside. Ugh.
I look at the door like it’s a mutinous traitor. The reality is we’re not any safer here than we’d be outside. These walls, this roof over our heads—they offer nothing in the way of protection from invisible forces.
But I won’t get separated from Kaylee. That would be a mistake. Damien knows I care about her, knows I wouldn’t let her die. So to leave her without celestial eyes would be dangerous.
“Okay, then. Let’s go.” I step to the door and twist the handle. “You have your keys.”
Kaylee pats down her pockets and pulls a bedazzled key ring out of her pajama pants.
I take her hand in mine and we run down the stairs and to her car. The day is warm and bright, a glorious northwest summer day, but there’s a chill in my chest. I stay at Kaylee’s side while she jams the key in the lock and flings open the door. She reaches inside and pulls out her phone, shoving it into my hands.
I fumble with her phone, but it’s newer than mine, fancier, and I can’t find Jake’s number.
“Can you . . .”
She takes it from me and slides her finger along the screen. A few taps and the phone is ringing.
Ringing.
Ringing.
Pick up, pick up.
PICK. UP.
30
Jake
The neon sign in the window says Open, but it’s a lie. Two hours ago Jake climbed out of his car and shook the door handle. He succeeded only in dislodging the sign that declared the tattoo shop was open from eight to midnight daily. The clock hanging just inside the window says it’s half past eight now, and still Evil Deeds is nothing but shadows and glare.
On its left is a hair salon—very girlie, very bright. Above the red brick storefront, a swirly sign in red and orange guarantees you’ll love your locks when they’re through with them. Something about the place screams Kaylee.
To the right of the tattoo shop is an awning with vibrant swatches of material decorating it. The sign above this door says New Age Books, but not a single book is visible from where Jake is standing. Through the window he can see display cases of candles and perfumes. Baskets of rocks and crystals line the front counter. The doors are thrown open, welcoming, beckoning morning shoppers. The smell of incense irritates his nose, and he steps sideways to avoid it.
Broken Wings (An Angel Eyes Novel) Page 19
