“Well,” she pushes her red-rimmed sunglasses up her slender nose, “there’s a first time for everything.”
“Apparently.”
“Hey!” Kai yells, materializing in between Candy and McKenna in the backseat. They gasp and I swerve the car, crossing over my lane before quickly straightening it back out.
“Shit,” I grumble.
“What the…?” McKenna jerks away from Kai, hitting her head on the side of the car. She nurses it, rubbing the tender spot.
“You okay?” I ask McKenna, giving Kai a pointed look. McKenna nods, grumbling under her breath. “Dude,” I say. “You scared the shit out of us. You can’t just appear out of nowhere like that, especially when I’m driving.”
Kai puts his hands up in surrender. “Sorry, sorry. I didn’t want to wait to talk to you.”
“You could have called.” Candy laughs, poking at her sister’s head with her finger. McKenna slaps her away.
I force my tired eyes to remain on the road. We’re just outside of Leighton, Arizona, and we’ve already been on the road for a good eleven hours today. Had he called, I probably would have just ignored it, anyway.
The tall, green pine trees pass in a blur outside the windows, the tendrils blowing mercilessly in the wind. The crosswinds howl against the car, whipping us back and forth.
Kai sighs in the back. “So, there’s word from Maker.”
Candy inhales and McKenna shoots a nervous look to me, her bruised head no longer a concern. I grip the steering wheel tighter.
“It’s not good and I guess—it’s not bad either. The order is to keep you safe at all costs. We’re supposed to cover you in protection.”
“What the hell does that mean?” I spew, angry of the possibility of more monsters coming around.
“It means we aren’t the only ones looking for her now.”
“What?” McKenna screeches, grasping at her shirt. “Why me? Why would you think there’s more?”
“Hey,” I say, looking to her in the rearview mirror. “We’re going to protect you. You don’t have to worry.”
“Right,” Wood agrees. “You aren’t alone.”
McKenna takes a deep breath and nods. “I just don’t understand why they’re targeting me.”
“Me either,” Kai says regretfully. “But we’re on the knowing side of this. And let’s not forget, you’re not completely incapable of taking care of yourself, either,” Kai reminds her. “You’re powerful. We might have to just bring it out more.”
I pull off the freeway, and make my way to a row of hotels, parking in the first one I come to. I’m exhausted and if I don’t get a couple hours of sleep, I’m not going to be much use to anyone. Wood quickly runs into the office and gets us two rooms, running back out with two key cards.
“All set.” He throws Candy a card.
“What do you mean we might have to bring out my power?” McKenna asks as we all pile into one of the hotel rooms. Kai takes a seat on the bed, lying against the pillow with a hand behind his head. Wood sits at the table next to the enormous window and Candy plops down next to him. I grab McKenna’s hand and guide her to the second bed, sitting down on the edge.
She turns to Kai.
“It’s all about using your power in the right context,” Kai says, crossing his legs at the ankles. “I want you to learn how to throw the rule book out the window and use your magic for you.”
A pensive expression crosses McKenna’s face. “I don’t know if I can do that.”
“You’re going to have to.”
“I read about a certain type of magic called Manifestation,” Wood jumps in, pulling out his laptop, tapping on the keys the moment he opens it. “It’s all about expressing yourself through your magic. It’s supposed to be the most commanding in the world.”
Kai gives a half-hearted shrug. “It’s been said.”
“Do you know anything about Manifestation?” McKenna asks Kai.
“I do. It’s pretty much the same thing we’re taught as by Maker. We just magnified it.”
“And you’ll teach me?”
“Of course. Candy, too, if she wants.”
“I’m in,” Candy says quickly, perking up. “If there’s a fight coming, I don’t want to be on the sidelines.”
McKenna smiles proudly, looking a little more confident and she sits up straighter. “Where do we start?”
“Wood and I have a case here. We can’t forget,” I interject, yawning.
“Oh, right. Is there anything we can help with?”
A knowing grin settles on my lips. Since we’ve been together, she’s been so helpful with doing research and finding more humane ways of taking care of monsters. It’s incredible to have her on the team. “You can always help, but I think we’ve got it today. Go with Kai. If we need you, I’ll call you.”
Candy stands and McKenna squeezes my thigh. “Okay. We’ll get unpacked and head out. What’s the case, again?”
I stand and place a soft kiss on her forehead. “Just a small haunting. Should be easy.”
McKenna laughs and pulls back, looking earnestly into my eyes. “A small haunting? Our lives are so weird.”
“Right?” Candy says, laughing as she walks out the door. Kai follows behind her and they disappear outside.
“You’ll be safe?” McKenna makes sure, her eyes full of care. And I have to admit it, I kind of like that look in her eyes.
“As much as I possibly can.”
“Ugh,” Wood groans. “You two are disgusting.”
McKenna looks down at her feet, her shoulders bouncing in laugher and I throw my keys at him. “Shut up.”
“Just kiss her so we can go, already.”
“Leave now? I really need some shut eye, Wood.”
Wood shakes his head. “Sorry, bro. We have to get going. The job doesn’t sleep.”
I grind my teeth. “And apparently neither do I.” I swallow and McKenna places her hand on my arm and lightly rubs it, letting me know there’s no reason to be angry with my apathetic brother. This is just part of the job.
Calm, my hands find her side, and I skim my fingers under her shirt, reveling in the softness of her skin. It’s so weird to me how I find pleasure in things like that now. My insides immediately wake up, sizzling with energy. She sighs and stands on her tiptoes, touching her lips to mine lightly. My hands constrict and she wraps her arms around my shoulders, squeezing my leather jacket in her hands. Her mouth opens and my tongue finds hers.
When we pull away, her cheeks are flushed and my mouth is wide in a smile.
Who needs sleep when I have her?
I smile to myself as I think back on my internal conflict I had before. I was so torn. I guess, I still am sometimes. But she’s pretty great. Even being her friend would be enough.
I tell myself that, but now that I’ve seen her deeper side, seen the depths of her struggles, I can’t imagine going back to being just friends.
“I’ll see you later.”
“Okay.” She walks backward. “You be safe, too, Wood.” She gives him a stern look, pointing her finger.
“Yes ma’am.” He salutes, a smile tugging on one side of his mouth.
She winks and grabs the door handle, leaving us alone.
“You told her this would be an easy case. Doesn’t seem like it to me.” Wood says with a weary expression.
A heavy feeling settles in the pit of my stomach. “I didn’t want her to worry.”
“She’s going to worry about you no matter what you tell her.”
“Exactly, so why make it worse?”
Wood shakes his head and picks up the keys I threw at him earlier. “Let’s go.”
I groan, making my way to The Sting.
Hopping on the freeway, Wood and I drive to a home just inside a quaint community. Typical cookie-cutter houses, all essentially the same, line the streets. One by one, we pass house after house, each without an inclination of a problem.
Finally, a yellow home with white shutters and a black door comes into view.
“That’s an odd color for a door,” Wood says grimly.
The dreary door is so unlike all of the other houses, each one bright and colorful.
My mouth pulls to the side and I swing into the driveway. Shutting The Sting off, we saunter to the door and knock. Wood stands next to me, fidgeting as he waits for an answer. When the door swings open, a woman in her forties with sunken blue eyes and sad, droopy brown hair greets us.
“Finally you’re here. It’s gotten worse.”
She gestures for us to follow her inside and we take a seat on the couch. It’s the middle of the day, but you wouldn’t know it. All of the blinds are shut and it looks like night.
“What’s been going on, Mrs. Carlson?” Wood asks in a kind voice.
She sniffles. “It started out as normal teenager problems. Talking back. Staying out late. That sort of thing. But, it’s gotten progressively worse as the weeks go on. I don’t know what to do. He’s become belligerent.”
“And he wasn’t like this before?” I ask.
“No. Never. Clayton was a good kid. Got good grades. Always checked in if he was going out. Now, he’s gone for days at a time. I go out of my mind worrying about him.” She begins to softly cry into her hands.
I sigh, not really seeing how we tie into this. “I don’t mean to be frank, but this doesn’t sound like our kind of thing. He seems to just be a troubled teen.”
Mrs. Carlson clutches the hankie in her hand. “You were called because it started after the church attempted an exorcism.”
“Your son was possessed?” Wood clarifies, writing the information down in his worn, brown notebook.
“Or he had an attachment. I don’t know. At the time, we weren’t educated in the matter. We sought out help from our local church, but all it seemed to do was make whatever was inside Clayton angrier.”
“Which is why he’s acting out,” I say, now understanding his odd behavior.
“I think so. It—the exorcism, I mean—must not have worked. For about three days after, he seemed better, back to his normal self, but something’s changed again.”
Wood huffs, knowing all too well what that could mean. “When someone is open to possession like that, sometimes the demon leaves the body, but that door is never closed.” He shakes his head. “It’s a possibility there’s someone—or something—new inside him.”
Mrs. Carlson gasps, tears trickling down her face.
“Ma’am,” I caution with a soft tone. “We can help. Where is he now?”
Her bottom lip quivers. “He hasn’t been back in almost five days.”
I stand and Wood does the same. “Do you mind if we look around the house?”
She looks up at us with red-rimmed eyes. “Oh. Of course. Feel free.”
Wood takes Mrs. Carlson’s hand and squeezes it, his eyes sincere. His love for people—or victims—relentlessly abundant. He’s always so good in these situations. In his normal life, with friends or even girls, he’s sort of closed off and doesn’t let his emotions show. But when he’s with clients, he seems to open up more. Let’s his guard down. He’s empathetic and sincere. This job suits him.
He leaves Mrs. Carlson with a genuine smile and walks up the stairs with me, looking for Clayton’s room.
We pass two rooms, neither of them having much of a personality. I give him a level look, signaling to follow behind me to the master. With floral wallpapered walls and a green bed, nothing seems out of the ordinary inside the room. I move to the closet and open the door, sifting through the clothes. I pull back a couple pairs of shoes on the rack and find nothing.
The ruffling sounds of Wood going through one of the dressers fills the quiet space, so I head back out.
“Nothing?” I ask.
“Nope.”
My eyebrows furrow. “Let’s find Clayton’s room.”
We pass another mundane room.
Damn, how many rooms does this house have?
Clear at the other end of the house, we find what seems to be Clayton’s space. Though, it doesn’t look like a room a normal, good-mannered kid would have. Like the front door, the walls are black, the windows are blocked out and the bed is the color of coal.
“Christ,” Wood exasperates.
My hand moves to the wall to turn the light on, but the switch doesn’t work. “Weird. Maybe the bulb is out.”
Wood’s mouth turns down and he shrugs, stepping inside the room.
I use my hand to search my jacket for my flashlight and turn it on. I squint as the light shines on the dark room. Little flecks of dust pass through the light and I stop on an engraving on the wall.
Wood shines his flashlight on the wall as well, and I move to it, examining the etching.
“Someone carved this with what looks like a knife,” I say, inspecting it more closely.
Wood moves in closer. “EXHAULTOUS.”
I frown, moving my hand from the wall to the back of my neck.
“I think I might have heard that word before,” Wood says, turning away to gather his thoughts.
I read the word over and over again. I snap my fingers. “What about an ancient language? Is it Latin?”
Wood shakes his head. “No. I think it was a lost language. Used by people pre-God.”
My nostrils flair. “Pre-God? What’s that? Dinosaurs?”
Wood’s mouth thins, clearly not in the mood for my jokes. “No. Dad came across this book when we were in high school and gave it to me to read for fun. It turned out it was about a group of people that were made not by God, but by Lucifer. I thought it was a bunch of crap and didn’t really think much about it.” He shakes his head. “Maybe I should have.”