One Handsome Devil (36 page)

"This is your final warning.” The helicopter had quieted but the police bullhorn sounded like it was directly outside the door.

"Look behind the Reverend Bob's portrait,” Mona suggested.

Sara looked confused, so Katra followed her sister's suggestion. Mona had gotten into trouble more times than Katra could count and had managed to survive. Right now, that sounded like a pretty good record to Katra.

Rev. Bob had a painted portrait of himself, dressed in scarlet robes and walking with a bunch of sheep hanging over his desk. If Katra had ever seen it, she would have banished Reverend Bob from her list of acquaintances long before.

She yanked the portrait from the wall and exposed a crate sunk into a recess. “What's in here?” she asked.

"Let's get them out.” Mona was practically gloating. “We'll teach those guys not to mess with us."

Mona gave Katra a hand tugging the heavy box from the wall. They flung it open and exposed a small arsenal of rifles and one grenade launcher.

"You are definitely going to get us killed,” Sara said. “Put those away before the police see them."

"Looks like Rev. Bob is getting ready for the millennium,” Mona observed.

Katra yanked out one of the rifles, made sure the clip was in place, then fired a round through the ceiling.

Outside, shouting reached a sudden climax, followed by a dead silence.

The phone rang.

Katra picked it up. “Reverend Bob's militia. How may I direct your call?"

"Wha—"

"Who is this?” A different voice filled the phone.

"We think we've been set up. We'd like you to send in Minnie O'Hara to negotiate with us and assure our safety if we surrender."

"That's ridiculous. We could never expose a civilian to this kind of risk."

Katra fired another shot, this time through the Reverend Bob's portrait. “We will release Derrick Benton, also known as Derrick the Dongless, once Minnie O'Hara has been delivered to us."

She pointed the gun at Derrick's crotch. “Does that sound fair, scumbag?"

"Do it. Please do it,” Derrick screamed loudly enough to be heard without the phone. “We can shoot them later."

"Call me when you have Mrs. O'Hara waiting.” Katra hung up the phone.

"I can't believe you're bringing mom into this,” Mona breathed. “She'll kill you."

"We needed another sixty pounds,” Katra said. “Lord knows she can spare them."

Chapter 22

Jack burst through the wall between the worlds, landing on a crouch on the floor. A fusillade of bullets followed from outside.

Seconds later, an electronic voice pierced the bullet-ridden building. “We have lost patience. We're coming in."

The spirit winds tore at him but Jack grasped the tenuous lifeline that connected him with Sara and held on.

Her strength added to his, surprising him with its power.

"I think he's here."

I am.

He lacked the substance even to speak.

"Tell him what you want him to take.” Sara sounded confident, in control. “Don't hurt anyone, Jack."

Anyone but a demon or an angel would have found it impossible to listen to the female babble that followed. Katra went into meticulous detail on how she would prefer her body to be reshaped, Mona described general areas, and Minnie simply declared that she could stand to lose seventy pounds, the quicker the better.

Jack clasped his wisps of wings around Sara for support, holding on against the gales threatening to blow him straight back to Hell, then reached into each of the women, accepting what they were willing to give, absorbing their matter into himself, and transforming it to muscle, bone, tissue. Since he had been inside of both Katra and Sara, he had a far better idea of how the human body works and saw plenty of room for improvement on his earlier design. The basic exterior, he left completely alone, except thinner and tighter.

"Oh, my gosh. Look at me.” Mona stood and yanked up her suddenly sagging dress. “I could be one of those sexy chick singers who prance around with their belly buttons showing."

Jack launched himself at her, his new wings grasping at the air. “Get down."

"I don't go for the three-way stuff,” Mona lectured him as he drove her to the ground.

One of the bullets in the salvo that followed tore through Jack's newly created chest. He healed it absently.
That
bullet hadn't been part of Reverend Bob's arsenal.

For twenty seconds, the smashing sound of bullets hammering through glass and into masonry blocks made conversation impossible. He reached out and touched Sara's mind and wished he hadn't. She feared him almost as much as she feared the gunmen outside.

"This is our final warning,” the electronically enhanced voice announced.

"Some warning,” Katra griped.

"So what are we going to do?” Sara asked practically.

She looked pale and thin. No wonder the other women had refused to let her give him any of her matter. She was wasting away. Because of him. He would put these problems to rest, then leave her life forever before he did even more damage to her than he already had.

"We walk out,” he said.

"We'll get killed for sure.” Minnie's high-pitched shriek would have set every dog in the neighborhood barking if they hadn't already been doing that in response to the police sirens.

"I'll distract them,” Mona offered. She started to unzip her shirt.

He held out a hand. “Please, we don't have very long."

"Can you make us invisible?” Sara asked.

He shook his head. “Not completely. But I can help us blend in."

He led the women into the interior of Reverend Bob's compound, his booted feet crunching down on shards of glass and fragments of brick and concrete.

"Maybe later you can give me some of my weight back, right in my boobs,” Mona suggested just as they reached an exterior door.

"Shhh,” Sara hissed.

He nodded. “Walk like you're supposed to be here."

Minnie grinned. “Like we're the cleaning crew."

"We'd be better if we were the police,” Katra suggested.

"Perfect.” He adjusted his illusion and waited.

Moments later, the gunfire ripped through Bob's office again. “Now.” He opened the door.

As he'd suspected, everyone outside was looking to see the effect of their shooting. He and the women were able to get quite close to the police line before a Sergeant stepped out.

"What the Hell are you doing out here?"

Jack adjusted the illusion slightly and tried to remember the words to that movie Katra had made him watch. “These aren't the ‘droids you're looking for. Move along."

"Get the Hell back in your line. Do you want to get shot?"

"Right.” He kept walking, using his senses to ensure that the women were following. Mona was checking out the cops and it took a little mental prodding to keep her moving forward, but he managed that task. It would be another mark against him in Sara's score pad, however. More proof that demons could not help using their powers to control others.

Sara collapsed in her sofa and turned on the television. All normal programming had been interrupted to tell the terrible story about several homeless people who had invaded the sanctuary of the Rev. Bob's mission, taken one of his congregation hostage, and then died in the police shootout. Their names didn't appear on the news at all.

"That isn't what happened. They can't just forget about us. Derrick will have told them exactly who we are. And two of those cops drove all the way out to Minnie's house to pick her up."

"They don't want to believe that anyone could just walk away from there."

"But—"

"Derrick is insisting that the three of you were summoning a demon and planning to sacrifice him. Would you listen to that? Besides, they've pulled up Derrick's record and a known criminal like him has little credibility. Nobody else saw anything."

"They saw me.” Minnie poured herself a glass of iced tea and looked longingly at the box of cookies on Sara's shelf. “Uh, can you do that weight loss thing again if I need you to?"

Jack's lips turned up but it wasn't much of a smile. “I don't think I'll be around long."

"Oh.” Her hands snapped down to her sides. “I guess I can go without."

Sorrow rolled over Sara at Jack's statement. What would she do without him? Still, it had to be the only choice.

"When are you leaving?"

He sat beside her, close enough for her to feel the heat radiating from him but too far to touch. “There are still a few things I need to clean up."

"Where will you go?"

Any hint of his smile vanished. “I have a spot between the worlds. I think I can go back there. It's better than Hell."

Would he stay if she asked? She wished she could, but it wasn't that easy. She would never forget her horror at seeing Katra writhing on the ground in her terrible battle against possession.

"It sounds nice."

"It is um, peaceful.” Jack was a master at lying while telling the truth. Peaceful didn't mean nice.

The television flashed to a shot of firemen carrying out the victims of the shootout at Rev. Bob's commune. All of their heads were covered but blood had soaked through some of the coverings.

"Who were they?” she demanded. “Did you kill a bunch of homeless people to distract attention from us?"

He shook his head but said nothing.

Panic settled on her like a suffocating pillow. “Who. Who died so that we could just walk away and not have the police knocking on our door?"

"It was them or us,” Mona argued. “Come on, Sara. Jack saved us. Try to cut him a little slack."

"That's insane. You can't just go around killing people."

"Nobody died,” Jack said.

"Liar. I see them."

"The police will never be able to identify them."

"That doesn't mean they weren't people."

"They're props. Sculptures if you will. I reshaped some of the chairs and cushions in Rev. Bob's office."

"Oh.” She deflated like a punctured balloon. Then her doubts returned. “Are you telling the truth?"

"I always tell the truth.” His demon eyes glared at her, shifting from sapphire blue to glowing red. “If I was willing to lie, I could come up with something better. Is that what you want? Do you want me to lie just to make your world a little easier to understand?"

She reeled back against his attack. “No. I don't want—"

His gaze deepened, looking through her rather than at her. “I know what you don't want.” He stood. “I just wish I knew what you
do
want."

"You saved all of our lives,” Sara said. “I'm very grateful that you came when you did."

"Don't call me again.” He stalked to the door and vanished.

Sara put down her head and sobbed.

Katra jogged down Jefferson, picking up a couple of cups of coffee and a biscotti at the local Starbucks, then continued to Sara's house.

"What?” Sara's voice sounded as rumpled as she had been in the week since Jack had walked out of all of their lives.

"It's Katra."

"I'm not in the mood to talk."

"I didn't ask."

Katra leaned against the door frame waiting.

"I mean it, Katra. I need to be alone."

"You don't need to be alone. What you need is to get laid, but that isn't happening so I brought you coffee instead."

"I appreciate it but—"

"I'm not going away, Sara."

The door opened and Sara peered out. “This isn't a good day for me."

"Had any of those lately?"

"That wasn't very nice."

She pushed past Sara, turned off the T.V. and pulled the coffees and biscotti out of the bag. “French Vanilla coffee."

"Ohmygod, I mean, wow."

"You can use the ‘G’ word now. You got rid of Jack but good"

Sara broke into tears.

Katra took a sip of her coffee, then walked around the living room yanking up Sara's Venetian blinds and letting the sunlight shine into her darkened apartment.

Dust bunnies scooted across the floor as Katra walked so she went into the kitchen, found a minivac, and swept them up.

"So, what are you going to do?” she demanded when she'd done what she could to make the place a little more like a home and a little less like a morgue.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'm talking about Jack."

"He's gone."

"Well, duh. It's been three weeks."

"So there's nothing to do."

"Let me get this straight. You are willing to risk your soul going through your mother's old spell book to find a boyfriend you don't even know exists, but you won't do anything to bring him back after you fall in love with him? Am I the only one having a hard time making sense of this?"

"I'm not in love with him. He's a demon who sucks up souls."

"Maybe if you stopped lying to yourself, this would be easier."

Sara nodded. “All right. I am in love with him. Are you happy now?"

Katra took another sip of her coffee and thrust the biscotti at Sara. “Eat. You look like you're about to collapse. Then we'll figure out how to get him back."

Sara waved her hand toward her bookcase.

Katra followed Sara's gesture and saw a whole new shelf of books all having to do with loving the wrong man, some still wrapped in cellophane.

"He's even worse than the men those women had problems with. First of all, he's a demon. Second, he doesn't have any morals. Third, he doesn't know how to respect boundaries. I mean, it's bad enough that he would mess with my car without asking me, but messing with my brain and my best friend, and—."

Katra wasn't able to hold her outburst in. “He wasn't messing with me. He was helping me. And I asked him to."

"Well, I didn't.” Sara folded her arms across her overly slender chest.

"Eat your damned biscotti before I cram it down your throat."

Sara nodded, dipped the dry cookie into her coffee, and took a bite.

"Thanks for the food."

"Some food. When was the last time you ate?"

Sara shrugged. “I haven't been hungry."

"Starving yourself is a real sensible approach to sadness."