Reignite (Extinguish #2) (16 page)

He
didn't further taint her soul.

"Is
it because she's mortal now?" Michael asked quietly. "Is that why she
responds to him so?"

In
all the time they'd been together, Michael had never seen Serah so unguarded,
so passionate. He'd never heard such cries of pleasure.

"Partly,"
He responded. "It's the combination of them together, son. Lucifer is
sulfuric acid, sometimes dangerous but still valuable. Serah, on the other
hand, is water, peaceful and pure. Mixed together, those two are fine, as long
as you introduce the acid slowly. The other way around, you're headed for
destruction. Dump water straight into the acid and something may very well
explode."

Made
sense, on the surface, but Michael had difficulties accepting it.

Why
them? Why not him?

Why? Why? Why?

"You
know why," He said, easily tapping into Michael's thoughts. "It was
destined."

"For
how long?"

Was
it always supposed to be this way? The entire time he'd been with Serah, had He
known it would happen? Had He planned this?

"It
was written in the stars the day Lucifer fell," He said. "She was
destined to save him from himself."

"Has
she?" Michael asked. "Has he been saved?"

His
Father cocked his head to the side, staring at the projection of Lucifer. He
stood just outside Serah's house again as she slept soundly in bed. "I'm
not sure."

The
hesitance in his Father's voice bewildered Michael. That was the second time He
had wavered, the second time He seemed to not know. "How can you not be
sure? You know all. You see all."

"I
do."

"Then
you must see his future."

"I
do," He said. "But Lucifer possesses something unpredictable."

"What?"

"Free
will."

Michael
was stunned.
Free will
?

"He's one of a kind," He said. "He
walks free, controlling his own destiny, but he doesn't yet know himself. His
mind isn't made up. It changes every few seconds, altering the future in vastly
different ways."

Michael
turned from his Father. "Why can't I see it?" He strained, trying to
sense the future like he did with mortals, but there was nothing. He shifted,
trying to sense Serah's, but hers, too, was blank. "I can't see her,
either."

"I've
kept them from you," He said.

Why
? Michael wondered, but his
Father didn't answer his question. Not this time. They watched the image of
Satan for a moment longer before the fallen angel zapped away. His Father waved
his hand, the picture dissolving.

"If
she doesn't save him?" Michael asked. "What if he makes the wrong
decision?"

"Then
everyone will lose," He responded. "Especially them."

It was the middle of the afternoon on a
Tuesday. Samantha Lauer sat at her kitchen table, feet propped up in the chair
beside her, barefoot and wearing a pair of raggedy pajamas. Her ankles were
swollen, her back was aching, and she'd give her left tit for the heartburn to
go away.

Serah knew all of this
because she sat right across from her new friend, listening as she vented. The
end of summer was upon them. They'd spent the past few weeks getting to know one
another, hanging out in the afternoon before Serah headed off to work the night
shift at the motel.

The windows were wide
open, a warm breeze wafting through the room. Sweat accumulated on Serah's
brow, beading along her nape and running down her back.

"Ugh, this
boy," Samantha groaned, clutching her stomach as she stood up. "You'd
think I was giving birth to Charlie Watts with the way he drums on my bladder
all day long."

Serah laughed, finishing
off the rest of her glass of lemonade as Samantha wandered down the hall to the
bathroom for the fifth time in an hour. Serah stood up, taking her empty cup to
the sink, when the front door of the house opened. She glanced over as
Samantha's husband, Nicholas, stepped inside. He started to speak but silenced
when he glanced over and saw it wasn't his wife standing there.

"Oh, hey," he
said, nodding politely.

Serah smiled.
"Hello."

She didn't have much
contact with Nicholas, meeting him a few times in passing when he was home, but
he seemed like a good man.

"Where's Sam?"
he asked, raising an eyebrow, a twinge of worry in his voice. "Is
she—?"

"Relax,"
Samantha called out, making her way back to the kitchen. "I'm right here.
What are you doing home?"

"Thought I'd check
on you," he said, "so I came home for lunch."

Samantha kissed her
husband before shuffling to the fridge. "I'm fine. Now sit down and I'll
make you something."

Serah took that as her
cue to leave, ignoring their declarations that she should stay and at least
have a sandwich. She made her way through the tall grass to her home and headed
into the bathroom, stripping out of her clothes to take a cold shower.

Climbing under the
spray, she stood there, letting the water rain down on her, cooling her clammy
skin. Her eyes drifted closed but flashed back open within seconds when a
banging echoed through the house.

Somebody was knocking on
the door.

Sighing, Serah turned
off the water, cutting her shower short as the banging echoed through the house
once more. Stepping out, she grabbed a towel and wrapped it around herself,
opening the bathroom door. The moment she did, she nearly ran right into
someone. Gasping, grabbing her chest, she nearly lost the towel as she
recoiled.

Luce
.

He was inside her house,
standing in the hallway right outside the bathroom door. "Jesus!"

"No, it's me,"
he said. "Jesus isn't around."

Serah rolled her eyes,
clutching the towel closed. "Was that you?"

"Was what
me
?"

"The banging."

He needn't answer, as
the sound rang out once more. Serah's eyes darted past Luce, settling on the
door, her brow furrowing. Clearly it hadn't been him. She had half a dozen
questions, like where'd he come from, where had he been, and how in the world
had he ended up in her house, but the frantic knocking distracted her.

"No," Luce
said, casting a glance at the door. "Not me."

Serah pushed past him,
heading for the door, and carefully tugged it open. Nicholas stood on the other
side, eyes panicked.

"Nicholas? What's
wrong?"

"I hate to do
this... I hate to ask you this. I know we hardly know each other, but my wife
really likes you, and my daughter does, too. So I'm just wondering if you could
do me a favor, if there's any way you can watch Nicki this afternoon for
us?"

"Uh, sure,"
Serah said. "No problem."

"She's at day camp.
The bus will drop her off in about an hour. If you could just watch her for a
bit, we'd be eternally grateful."

"Absolutely."

"We can pay
you," he continued.

"Nonsense,"
she said. "It'll be my pleasure."

"Thank you."
Relief tinged his voice. "Truly, thank you."

"Of course."

Nicholas started to rush
away when Serah called out to him.

"Wait," she
said. "Is something happening?"

He glanced back at her,
his expression lighting up, swallowing back the fear. "Sam's water just
broke. We're having a baby!"

A smile graced Serah's
lips as she watched Nicholas sprint next door. She stood in the doorway, just
staring out at the street, until the voice behind her startled her from her
daze. "It's a little indecent, don't you think?"

She turned, eyeing Luce
from a few feet away. "What?"

"You," he
said. "Wearing that, right here, right now."

Glancing down, Serah
felt her cheeks flushing as she quickly closed the front door. "Where did
you even come from?"

"Loaded
question."

"How did you get
here?"

"I'm not certain
you want to know."

She eyed him hesitantly
as he evaded answering her questions. "I don't recall inviting you
inside."

"Oh, but you
did," he said. "Weeks ago."

"That doesn't
count."

"Why not?"

"Because that was
then and this is now."

Luce just stared at her.
Serah could feel her blush deepening further at his intense gaze and fidgeted a
bit, clutching hold of the towel around her to keep herself concealed. She
feigned annoyance at his company, pretending to be put off by his presence, but
truthfully she felt at ease about him being in her home. She'd just been
surprised, not at all disturbed.

She should've been,
though.

It should've bothered
her. Frightened her.

There was nothing normal
about the situation, nothing safe about these circumstances, but she couldn't
seem to force herself to be troubled.

It felt natural, like
he'd been there all along.

"Do you want me to
go?" Luce asked as she strolled toward him.

"No," she whispered,
stepping around him. "I don't."

Lucifer stared hard at the tattered cards in
his hand. The edges of them were singed and the white was tinted a grimy shade
of gray. They'd seen a lot of play over time, and he was definitely due for a
new deck, but he had an attachment to these.

They were the ones Serah played with him down in
the pit.

The deck had been
through thousands of games of War, had seen hundreds of rounds of Solitaire,
but none had been as strenuous as the battle it saw now.

"Does you have
sixes?"

Lucifer's eyes stayed
fixed to his hand. "
Does
I have
sixes," he repeated, muttering the grammatically fucked up words under his
breath.

"Yes." Her
voice was serious… so, so serious. "Does you?"

Luce stared at the two
sixes in his hand for a second before his gaze shifted overtop his cards,
meeting a pair of wide, brown eyes. Nicki Barlow. The little girl stared him
down, waiting about as patiently as a nine-year-old could wait.

Go fish
.
Those words were on the tip of his tongue. Anyone else, and he would've said
them. Anyone else, and he would've lied. But she looked at him with the same
sort of reverence that Lucifer once felt toward his Father. She trusted him
implicitly to tell the truth.

Grudgingly, Luce pulled
out the two sixes and handed them over. Squealing excitedly, Nicki formed a
book, putting all of the sixes in front of her. She was winning now, two to
one.

"Does you have any
queens?" she asked, going again.

Luce didn't have to look
at his hand. "Go fish."

Nicki drew a card from
the pile.

"Give me your
kings," Luce said.

Nicki didn't even think before saying, "Go
fish."