Authors: Wendy Higgins
“We go where we are sent,” answered the angel in the center.
“Yes, yes, of course you do,” Rahab spit. “No minds of your own. What do you want?”
“You will not kill the daughter of Belial.” The room went ghostly quiet. My heart soared.
“The Nephilim have never been your concern. They are
ours
!”
“Nothing on earth is yours, dark one.”
Rahab turned beet red, droplets of foam forming at the corners of his mouth. “Your kind is not supposed to interfere in our work! We’ve been granted the right to test humanity and deal with our own ranks.”
“It is not her time.” The angel regarded me. “She will serve as a test to many souls.”
There was a dense pause. And then Rahab smiled.
“Fine. It is not her time now.” He waved the gun at me. “But it is
hers
.” Before anyone could stop him, he pointed the gun at Gerlinda’s forehead and fired. I screamed at the sickening crack and spray of blood. She fell back, hitting the wall and sliding down, dead. Her spirit wrenched itself from the body and was captured by two Legionnaire spirits who swept her from our sight.
The gun I held clattered to the floor and I crouched down. I was so certain Rahab would go against the angel’s orders and try to kill me, too, that I felt for the hilt at my ankle. My hand found the leather cover and fumbled to open it.
The ranks of angels moved toward the stage in unison, filled with righteous anger. None of the Dukes dared move. Rahab stumbled back as several angels surrounded me in a circle of protection.
A long-haired angel noticed what I was doing and swooped down, shielded from view by his brethren.
“You are not to reveal the Sword of Righteousness this night, child,”
the angel whispered to me.
Its voice was a balm to my soul, and I uncurled my fingers from the hilt, no longer burdened with the fearful instinct to protect myself. I stood, shaken but strangely at peace.
Every one of the angels stared at Rahab, stricken and offended by the loss of life they’d just witnessed. The leader in the center seemed to fight a battle within, wanting nothing more than to disobey orders so he could take care of Rahab then and there.
“Someday,” the angel promised him. He and Rahab glared at each other as the angels moved backward toward the light, one by one disappearing into it. When the last angel entered the light, darkness descended on the room once again.
A palpable tension filled the room in their absence.
“Someday we will take back what is ours,” Rahab whispered, seething. He turned on my father. “You will punish her within an inch of her death! Now get your filthy offspring out of our sight. All of you! Go!”
There was pandemonium as I jumped off the stage and ran to grab my coat. Nephilim were scrambling, falling over chairs and one another to grab their things and get out of there. My friends stared at me in disbelief. Their faces showed that they’d been through hell that night just as surely as I had. Even Ginger looked worn. But it was Kaidan’s glassy, blank stare that killed me.
During those split seconds I watched him until his sight focused. Seeing me up there had broken something inside him.
Someone grabbed me by the elbow: my father.
“Get out,” he growled, shoving me toward the exodus of Nephilim. Ginger grabbed Marna’s hand and they ran, with Blake close behind. My father pushed me forward and we crushed into the crowd.
I turned, looking for Kaidan. I had to say good-bye. My dad shook his head. In the madness I made eye contact with Kopano, whose worried eyes tore at me.
My father continued to shove me from behind, up the narrow stairs and down the darkened hall, shoulder-to-shoulder with other Neph. I kept turning, trying to peer around my dad’s solid body, frantic for a glimpse of Kai.
And there he was, also attempting to push through the people. I reached my arm back, feeling my dad’s hands firm around my waist. Kaidan’s warm fingers locked around mine, and our gazes held. In those blue eyes was a shattered look that made my soul ache.
“Enough!” my father scolded gruffly, pulling me and breaking my connection to Kai. I screamed out. We burst into the frozen night, where my father hailed a waiting cab, opening the door and flinging me inside. He gave directions to the cabdriver.
“Straight to the hotel,” my dad said to me, throwing cash on my lap. “I’ll deal with you later.”
He slammed the door shut.
“What’s going on at that club?” the cabbie asked as he laid on the gas pedal. “There a fire in there or something?”
I couldn’t answer. I spun around in the seat, staring at Kaidan on the edge of the sidewalk, hands on his head, air condensing like smoke from his lips, watching me leave.
G
oing back to school after that weekend was surreal. I tried to focus on Jay and Roni, who were both hurting. They weren’t talking at the moment, despite Jay’s efforts to apologize. The depth of their sadness only gave me more hope for their possible future. It was clear how much they cared for each other.
I kept thinking about how the angel said I would be a test for many souls. Maybe he was bluffing Rahab. Could angels bluff? No matter what he said, there was no way I’d do the work of my father. I would rather die.
Marna had come to me bearing bad news the day after the summit. Kaidan was moving to L.A. right away, and the band would soon follow. I’d been given instructions not to call. He’d left without saying good-bye. Knowing he lived so close had been my security blanket, and now he was gone.
Marna revealed another piece of information about the night of the summit. Kaidan had hidden a knife in the sole of his boot, which would explain the one he held when he’d stood, ready to fight for me. Fortunately nobody had noticed, because the light had been the room’s focus.
It was better this way, I told myself. Safer. I repeated it to myself like a mantra.
I checked the mail and took it up to the apartment when I got home from school. Patti wasn’t home from work yet.
I almost threw the small postcard away with the rest of the junk mail, but the Arizona postmark caught my attention.
It was hard to say how long I stared at that postcard, overwhelmed, before I grabbed my keys. I ran out of the apartment, in a hurry to drive and get my bearings. It didn’t matter where. I just needed to be on the open road.
Halfway to Atlanta I ended up at the top of Lookout Point. Since it was the middle of the day, I was the only one up there. I felt the rush of being somewhere otherwise forbidden, and staring out at the great expanse, I understood why I’d been drawn to that particular place.
I cut the car off and sat there looking at the postcard in my lap. On the front was a picture of the Grand Canyon. Though it was a beautiful scene, I knew the picture could not do it justice. I flipped the postcard over and read the tiny, boxy scratch of male handwriting next to my name and address.
I’m sorry.
That was all it said. But those two words spoke many things to me. Sorrow and regret. Heartache and lost opportunity. And ultimately, sacrifice.
I tried to imagine Kaidan driving a moving van with all his stuff, making a detour and standing at the edge of the enormous abyss. How small he must have felt. Did he realize, as I did now, that it was all so much bigger than us?
I climbed out of the car, clutching the postcard in my hand and bracing myself against the chilly wind of the higher altitude. Walking to the roped edge, I looked out at the vastness of the divide. Our own canyon, though not so grand. The valley before me dipped low, and every inch of plant life was covered in a leafy vine, like a rain forest jungle. Kudzu: the vine that ate the South. I’d always thought it was beautiful, in a wild sort of way, but not today. Today I felt bad for the trees that suffocated underneath.
I pulled out my cell phone, scrolled down, and dialed before I had time to change my mind. I didn’t know what I’d say or what I wanted to hear him say. I didn’t even care if we said nothing, and simply shared silent airtime. Maybe I could bask in the sound of his voice mail one last time....
“The number you dialed has been disconnected....”
Or not. I hung up, shoving the phone in my pocket and letting my head fall back as the wind picked up.
It was over. Truly over. My eyes fluttered closed and I heard the patter of rain moments before I felt it against my skin. The fresh drops from heaven were soft on my face. In that moment I was embraced by the elements, comforted just as if Patti held me in her arms. In the safety of that feeling, I let the pain tumble out of my heart with cries I’d held in. I grieved with my face in my hands until there was nothing left to cry. I lifted my face to the sky once again, letting the rain wash away the salty tears.
Now I understood what Kai tried to get me to see: There was nothing healthy about desperately wanting something you couldn’t have. I would never have a husband and children. He would never have the freedom to let himself be loved. And each time we saw each other was a painful reminder of those facts.
Patti told me that to truly love someone, you must hold them in an open hand. That was how I needed to love Kai. It was necessary to uncurl my fingers and let him go.
As if pleased with my revelation, the rain stopped and another wind blew through. Clouds shifted until a ray of winter sun poured across the valley and onto the peak of Lookout Point, warming my face, encouraging me. I nodded and took a deep breath, managing a small smile. I might have inherited a legacy of sin from my father, but I was also given a heritage of hope from my mother, and that was the one I needed to embrace.
I didn’t know if I would ever see Kaidan again, or when, but I knew I would love him all my life. We would always have our memories: the sound of each other’s laughter and the feel of each other’s lips. I’d always know he’d been willing to die for me. Nobody could take those things away.
Like humans, I had no idea what was in store for me or how my life might be used in the scheme of things. But I didn’t doubt I would, indeed, be used. If life was a game, like everyone said, then I wanted to win. I held up my hands to the heavens.
Deal me in.
Duke Name: Job Description: Their Children
(Neph who appear in
Sweet Evil
)
Alocer
(Al-
ō
-sehr):
Wrath
: spurning love, opting for destruction; quick to anger; unforgiving: Kopano (K
ō
-pah-n
ō
)
Astaroth
(As-t
ə
-roth):
Adultery
: breaking marriage vows; cheating on one’s spouse: Ginger and Marna
Belial
(Beh-leel):
Substance abuse
: physical addictions; primarily drugs and alcohol: Anna
Jezebet
(Je-z
ə
-bet):
Lies
: being dishonest or deceptive
Kobal
(K
ō
-bal):
Gluttony
: consumption of more than one’s body needs or requires: also
Sloth
: avoidance of physical or spiritual work; laziness; apathy: Gerlinda
Mammon
(Ma-mun):
Greed
: desire for earthly material gain; avarice; selfish ambition: Flynn
Melchom
(Mel-kom):
Envy
: desire for others’ traits, status, abilities, or situations; jealousy; coveting: Blake
Pharzuph
(Far-zuf):
Lust
: craving for carnal pleasures of the body; sexual desire outside of marriage: Kaidan (Ky-den)
Rahab
(R
ā
-hab):
Pride
: excessive belief in one’s own abilities; vanity; sin from which other sins arise
Shax
(Shaks):
Theft
: stealing
Sonellion
(S
ō
-nee-lee-un):
Hatred
: promotes prejudices; ill will toward others; hostility
Thamuz
(Th
ā
-muz):
Murder
: taking the life of another person
I
’d like to thank my agent, Neil Salkind; my editor, Alyson Day; and the staff of HarperCollins for taking a chance on this little ole Inkpopper.
Much appreciation goes out to my first reader and gorgeous friend Courtney Fetchko. Thank you for falling in love with Kaidan during those
horrid
early drafts. Your enthusiasm fueled me more than you’ll ever know. And to my other three cheerleaders and earth angels, Ann Kulakowski, Janelle Harris, and Joanne Hazlett, thanks for always reminding me who’s in control. Oh, and thanks to Janelle’s husband, Jimmy, for the drummer jokes.
I must thank a few others who read along the way: Meredith Crowley and three of my Dugout Girls: Holly Andrzejewski, Hilary Mahalchick, and especially the keen-eyed Carol Moore. LYLAS!
My heart is filled with gratitude for more than five hundred people on Inkpop.com who gave feedback and support to this story when it was
Angel Prophecy
, especially the handful who critiqued the entire rewrite. I wish I could name everyone, but I have to give credit to Kelley Vitollo, Carolee Noury, Bobbi Doyle, Lia Sunny, Evelyn Burdette (Evie J—smile! You’re on
Candid Camera
), Morgan Shamy, Leigh Fallon (my big sis in publishing), and her real-life little sis, Jen Conroy, for dialect help. It’s amazing the friendships that can be formed via the Internet.
I don’t know how anyone can write a book and go through the process of publication without a supportive family. To my precious Autumn and Cayden, *muah, muah*—Mommy owes you lots of snuggles. To my wonderful parents, my siblings (Frank, Dan, Jeff, and Lucy), and my in-laws—you guys rock. Thank you.
Lastly, I’m blessed with a husband who doesn’t make me feel like too much of a freak for all of my writing quirks, the burned dinners, and my insane bouts of impatience with the entire process. Nathan, thank you for believing I could achieve this dream even when I didn’t believe it myself.