Requiem (7 page)

“
That’s going to have to
go,” I said, collapsing into Jack's large, black leather
chair.

The stack of unopened envelopes was my first
order of business, and then I read my company emails. Bored as I
was, at least it kept my mind from Jared and the time. Just as the
sun began to set, my cell phone chirped.

“
Hey Bex,” I said through a
yawn, “almost done.”

“
Well that’s good news,
Sweetheart,” Jared said.

“
Hi!” I said, my voice far
too high to feign anything but elation. In reaction, I leaned over
to look out the window to the street. No black Escalade.

“
You’re not coming home
tonight, are you?” I said, deflated.

“
On the contrary. I will be
home at ten. Is that too late for dinner?”

The road noise should have given it away,
but I had expected to be disappointed. “Where are you?”

“
On the road,” he
said.

I sighed. “Do I need security clearance for
that answer?”

Jared laughed. “I’ll tell you all about it
when I get home. Bex tells me you had a good night’s sleep last
night. Is this true?”

“
It is. No bad
dreams.”

“
I look forward to watching
you sleep the whole night through, then.”

“
See you soon,” I
smiled.

My steps were light as I made my way out of
the building, and I couldn’t contain my smile when I sat in the
passenger seat of the BMW.

“
You talked to Jared,” Bex
said with a knowing smile.

“
He’s coming home,” I
smiled.

“
We better go move his
stuff around and hide his home gym,” Bex smiled, pulling away from
the curb. “He’ll hate that.”

I laughed. “You’re in charge of the home
gym. I’ll mix up the forks and spoons.”

“
I got it covered,” Bex
said with an mischievous grin. “You have dinner plans.”

“
Oh. Right,” I said,
sinking into the sink with a huff.

Bex sped to Cynthia’s faster and with more
precision than any television car chase I’d ever seen, much less
been a part of. He jerked the wheel, and let the Beemer slide,
counter-clockwise, into the loft’s parallel parking spot.

“
One of you will get pulled
over one of these days, and I’m going to laugh,” I said, trying to
steady myself once my feet hit the pavement.

“
Our boss has plenty of
money to bail us out,” he smiled.

“
I won’t bail you out. I’ll
laugh.”

“
Even if it was Jared?” Bex
said, escorting me up the iron steps.

“
Especially if it was
Jared.”

“
I don’t believe you. And
if Claire found out about it….”

“
You’re right. I’d bail you
out,” I nodded.

I changed clothes quickly, and then followed
Bex to the Beemer once again, letting him drive like a controlled
maniac to my parents' home.

Arriving within minutes, Bex jumped out of
the driver's side to open my door. We traded small talk as he
walked with me up the concrete steps, both of us hoping it would be
one of our shorter visits. Just as I reached for the handle,
Cynthia opened the door, startling me.

“
Mother….”

“
Agatha is ill today. I’ve
barely been able to tend to dinner. Of all days for her to get
sick….” Cynthia said, looking uncharacteristically disheveled. Her
eyes targeted Bex.

“
Good evening, Mrs. Grey,”
Bex said.

She nodded politely. “Will you be joining
us, Bex?”

“
No, Ma’am. Simply covering
a shift.”

Cynthia’s cold eyes narrowed at him as she
held out her arm to usher me into the house.

“
I'll wait here,” Bex
whispered.

“
Probably safer,” I
mouthed.

She wasted no time. “And where is
Jared?”

“
Er…resting,” I said,
cringing at my words. Surely I would be better at lying on the spot
by now.

“
Hmm….” she said, clearly
unconvinced. She didn’t press the issue, I assumed it was because
of the fact that I was safe. Beyond that she didn’t bother to
question.

The table had been set, but I helped bring
out the soup and salad, and entrée.

“
I’m sorry I always have to
ask,” I said, waiting for her infamous scowl.

“
You're predictable,” she
snapped. Her expression soon smoothed as she scanned the table. “I
thought I would try something different. Chicken Coconut Soup, and
wild mushroom fricassee over Polenta.”

“
Whatever that is,” I said,
overwhelmed.

“
Nina, really. You act as
though you were fed take-out your entire life. I have always
enjoyed cooking.”

“
And you never cease to
surprise me,” I said, smiling.

She didn’t ask about Jared’s whereabouts
again. We stumbled over the small talk, and politely discussed the
weather. Cynthia hadn’t mentioned my father since I returned home
from the hospital. I wondered if she ever would. The residual
circles under my eyes were a brief topic of conversation, and then
I helped her clean the dinner dishes before saying goodbye.

“
Dinner was uneventful?”
Bex asked, holding the passenger door of the Beemer
open.

My eyes narrowed at my former home. “She’s
up to something. You’re sure she hasn’t called or talked to
Jared?”

“
Haven’t heard a word,” Bex
shrugged.

At the loft, I found myself struggling to
stay awake to witness Jared’s homecoming. Reality television kept
my attention for a while, but I finally trudged up the stairs in
defeat.

“
Aw…but they’re going to
get in the hot tub in a second. The girls get in a cat fight, its
funny!”

“
Wake me when he gets
home,” I said.

“
Aye, aye, El Capitan,” he
responded.

“
You know you’re not
supposed to speak foreign languages to me,” I grumbled, falling
into the bed with my clothes on. My voice wasn’t loud enough to
travel to the first level, but Bex could hear,
regardless.

“
I wasn’t…never mind,” Bex
said, too involved in the hot tub disco party to argue.

Just as I closed my eyes, they popped open
again. The alarm clock on Jared’s side read nine-thirty.

“
You okay, Nina?” Bex
called up. “Bad dreams?”

“
No,” I whispered. Just
that minuscule bit of effort was all I could manage. I hadn’t
realized I was so tired, and it was so much easier to fall asleep
without the fear of screaming myself awake.

Ice was beneath me, and my bare toes wiggled
against the smooth, shiny whiteness below. That was the only way I
was aware it was dream—my feet were warm and comfortable. My
father’s office window came into view above me. I was standing
alone in the middle of Fleet Rink. Soon my naked feet were adorned
with a pair of new ice skates, and Jack stood in the window,
smiling down at me. A crowd of people, young and old, circled the
space where I stood. Sporting matching red noses, their misty
breath puffed out with each word or laugh.

I waved to him, and he waved back. Pushing
forward, I could hear the blade of my skate scratching the surface
of the ice. Looking up again, I noticed Jack was no longer smiling.
Instead he bobbed in and out of visibility, pacing back and forth
in his office, and then I saw Gabe.

They were arguing.

Oh no
, I thought, feeling the tugging feeling again.
No!

Back in the dusty, stale
office, I landed on all fours again. Anger surged through me. My
nights were just returning to normal. I wanted to sleep all night
in Jared’s arms. I wanted him to see that things were getting
better, that
I
was getting better.

“
I’m not doing this again!”
I yelled, storming Jack and Gabe.

They ignored me, repeating the same scripted
dialogue from before.

“
Stop!” I said. “I don’t
want to do this anymore!”

“
Are you sure you want to
do this, Jack?” Gabe asked.

My mouth formed around each of Jack’s words.
“Are you sure it’s her, Gabe?” He paused for Gabe’s answer, and
then continued, “Then you know the answer.” I shook my head from
side to side as I spoke along with him, copying him like a toddler,
angry and snide.

A ferocious rage overtook me, and I grabbed
the book from Jack’s hands.

Time stopped. Several times before, I had
attempted to physically interrupt, and failed. Jack, Gabe, and the
book were always very real, but when I tried to interfere, they
were the consistency of a hologram. This time the book was in my
hands.

Gabe’s head turned up in quick motion to
face me, his eyes a solid black. “Ars Notoria,” he whispered in a
voice not his own.

The change of events frightened me. I
stumbled back, away from my father and his friend. They were frozen
in time like everything else in the room. Even the moonlit dust
motes were hanging motionless in the air, but I could hear the
screeches of the demons as they approached.

The dimensions of the room stretched, and
the wood groaned and creaked. As I worked to keep my feet beneath
me, I gripped the book tighter in my hands. The possibility of
taking it back with me crossed my mind. It was the only reason I
would be able to take it from Gabe.

I looked to the large window and closed my
eyes. “It’s just a dream,” I said softly, confident the fall would
wake me up. Opening my eyes with the Naissance de Demoniac in my
hands wouldn’t be the most impossible thing that had ever happened
to me.

In a full sprint, I bound for the window,
bracing myself to leap through the glass and into the night, but
before I could, a searing pain spread throughout my hands. I
abruptly stopped and threw the book to the ground. Although the
leather no longer touched my skin, the parts of my fingers and
palms that had been in direct contact with the binding were charred
and smoldering. My hands shook violently as the burns traveled up
my arms, and I wailed at the intense heat spreading throughout my
body; it was as if I were on fire. The sensation was unlike
anything I had experienced before, but I couldn’t imagine anything
more excruciating.

The sound emanating from my throat didn’t
sound like my own as I protested the torture consuming me. Any
moment the demons would come, and I would beg them for death.

A hole opened up beneath me and I fell. In
that instant the pain was gone, and a soft, cool mattress was
beneath me. Jerking to a sitting position, I held my arms in front
of me. They were peach and unblemished.

Jared and Bex stood next to the bed with
terror in their eyes.

“
She was at least four feet
above the bed!” Bex said, his eyes wide. “Has that happened
before?”

“
No,” Jared said, his
expression exponentially more intense than the agonized look I had
been accustomed to waking up to. He was afraid.

“
Above
the bed?” I asked, confused.

Bex sat on the bed and watched me for a
moment, then took the sheet and wiped the sweat from my hairline.
“You were seriously hovering! It was something straight out of the
Exorcist!”

I hoped for one moment that Bex was being
Bex, trying to make light of the situation. Gauging the storms in
Jared’s eyes, it was true.

“
How is that even possible?
What does that mean?” I said, frightened.

Jared looked away.

Bex tugged lightly on my shirt. “Same
dream?”

“
No,” I said, shaking my
head. “I was angry…so angry that I took the book from them. It was
in my hands.”

“
You’ve tried that before
and your hands went right through it.” Jared said, his eyes on the
floor.

“
Not this time. I was so
damn mad that I screamed at them, and then grabbed the book. And
then Gabe…he looked at me.”

Jared knelt beside me, then. I touched his
face. He was desperate for guidance from his father. “It wasn’t
him,” I warned. “His eyes were solid black. Like Shax’s.”

Bex shook his head. “How
can that be? If it were d—
them
I would have known. The whole time you were
stretched out…suspended…there were none.

“
Bex,” Jared
warned.

“
Not a single one,” Bex
continued, lost in thought. “They crowd Mom’s house more than
that.”

“
None?” Jared asked. Bex
nodded and Jared stood up again, and then began to pace. Finally,
he spoke, “Something’s wrong.”

“
But you can feel them,
too,” I said to Jared. His question to Bex puzzled me.

“
I can. Bex is more
tuned-in to their presence—more so than any hybrid. His sensitivity
to them rivals Samuel’s.”

“
Sometimes I can tell when
they’re even
thinking
about coming around,” Bex added.

Bex’s frown instantly alarmed me. My mind
raced over every second of the dream, trying to think of something
that might help. I wasn’t sure why they were so disturbed, but for
Bex in particular, uncertainty was not something they handled
well.

“
Ars Notes something,” I
said.

Jared’s face transformed from worry to
anger. “What?”

I searched my memories again. “Gabe said
‘Ars Notary’ or ‘Ars Notes’…something like that.”