Page 12

We Confessed Everything

Tears bubbled up at the bottom of Scarlet’s young eyes. “Oh God, Helena,” she whispered. “I am so sorry.”

Before anyone could say anything more, Helena’s arms flew around Scarlet, pulling her into a tight, desperate embrace. Scarlet’s arms returned the hug, and the two women held each other in a shared grief. For the first time since waking up in her kitchen, Rafferty felt like he was finally seeing Helena’s true pain shared with someone who actually understood exactly how she felt.

“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” Scarlet kept trying to repeat as a sob wr acked her.

“No, no, it’s not…” Helena tried to admonish her, but it didn’t do any good.

Finally, becoming conscious of the impropriety of this show of raw emotion in the hotel hallway, Helena pulled her boss into the room and shut the door.

The change of location seemed to give Scarlet a degree of control for her emotions, and she straightened, the poise Rafferty expected from an aristocratic lady like herself reassertin g control.

“You must be the chef.” Scarlet’s damp gaze landed on him, then she stretched out her hand to shake.

“How did you find us?” he asked, the only question he needed answered. Vassago couldn’t have told her, he thought, but he didn’t have another answer for it and that s cared him.

Scarlet didn’t seem flummoxed or disconcerted by the question. “I have a private detective on retainer. He’s very good and very fast.” She licked her lips, squaring up with him. “I am so sorry for what I have put you through.”

The formal words sounded wrong, but Rafferty took her offered hand, tipping her knuckles up so that he could bow over them. It may have been deeply old-fashioned and old country, but he didn’t care. It reflected how deep his own guilt went. Scarlet took it in stride, not at all surprised by th e gesture.

“This is not your fault, lady,” he said when he str aightened.

She shook her head, firmly, the tears threatening her eyes again. “No, sir,” she stated. “I won’t accept that this was only Yosef’s choice and only he is to blame.”

“Rafferty,” Helena said, meeting his eyes, using them to give him a warning about saying too much.

Scarlet looked between the two of them, the once-older woman seeing more then they wanted to reveal. “So, you two are a couple, then?” She turned again, speaking to Helena even as she continued to hold Rafferty’s hand. “I wondered how you found him for the Winter Rose Ball so fast.”

Squeezing his fingers once, Scarlet let them go. “I just wish that all your effort hadn’t gone to absolute waste.” She moved to the table, setting down her purse so she could remove h er gloves.

“What happened? The other night after…” Helena’s question died on her lips as her voice thickened. He could see the memory of the terrible events playing in her eyes, the ease and joy they had struggled so hard to gain back that morning wa shed away.

Scarlet continued. “The other night…” She cleared her throat. “This is partly why I came, even against the advice of my lawyer. I wasn’t even sure you would see me. As you can imagine, Scarlet Promotions is utterly destroyed. Despite everything we did over the last year, there is no point in trying to save what remains. Half of the staff have already jumped ship, and I told the other half that they could continue to draw salaries while they looked for another job. I am even calling in every favor I have left to try to get them placed in new situations so the fallout from my disgrace doesn’t taint their résumés.”

“Your disgrace?” Helena repeated, taken aback. “But this wasn’t your fault. You didn’t do anythi ng wrong.”

“Whatever the facts are at this point are irrelevant—at least in terms of business. The news outlets and social media are feeding conspiracy theories back and forth, claiming that I…” More tears beaded her eyes. “That I sacrificed my own assistant in order to gain youth and beauty. You have to admit it’s a very compelling, classical n arrative.”

The weight of everything forced Scarlet to pull out one of the chairs from the table and sit down with an unladylike heaviness, as she lost herself to te ars again.

Urgently, Helena retrieved the box of tissues from the side table near the bed and offered them to her mentor, her movements jerky as if she itched to do something, anything.

“Scarlet?” she ask ed softly.

The other woman blinked as if coming back awake, then grabbed Helena’s hand instead of the tissues to give it a little squeeze. “And you most of all, my darling girl. I had thought to leave you with a legacy, and now I’ve brought you down with me!”

“It’s my fault,” Rafferty interrupted, his back ramrod straight, his arms at his side, like a soldier at attention. “I summoned demons to the kitchen that night. I am the reason your lover is dead.”

Stunne d silence.

Rafferty knew the risk he was taking. He had not used Vassago’s name. He had in fact summoned many demons to the kitchen that night to help him. The spirit of the bargain would remain preserved. Probably. He understood the dangers of making deals with demons; this sort of thing was very hard not to do, but it was too late to regr et it now.

“What?” Scarlet asked, swiveling her head toward Helena. “What are you saying…?”

“No, it’s not that simple. It’s my fault,” Helena insisted.

Rafferty’s heart skipped a beat. What if he couldn’t trust her after all? In her hurry to defend him, would she condemn him by r evealing …

“I brought Rafferty in and asked an impossible task of him…”

The surprise and relief he would have felt evaporated instantly. He shook his head, growling, “You asked for help from your boyfriend. I’m the one who took it too far—”

“It’s not your fault! I shouldn’t have put you in that position to… Or I should have e xplained—”

“I should have believe d in you—”

“I sho uld have—”

“Stop it!” Scarlet barked, silencing the fight before it could grow. The now-young woman fidgeted violently with her gloves like they were a squirming animal, as she struggled with what Rafferty could only imagine were turbulent emotions.

She then indicated Helena. “You. G o. Speak.”

Helena took a deep breath in. “A few months ago, I… accidentally summoned a demon. It was the night of my dinner party in fact, the night you came—”

Scarlet nodded and waved. “Yes, yes, I remember.” She gestured for her to get o n with it.

“It was a complete accident. I still am not entirely sure how I did it, but once I had summoned Rafferty”—she gestured to him where he still stood straight as an arrow—“he… he did me a favor, and I was able to send him back safely, but then I felt…” She struggled for a moment, her eyes flashing him apologies. “ Sorry for him. I summoned him back again, not to get anything from him. I just wanted to give him a break from Hell, you know. I know this sounds insane, but we… we became friends a nd then…”

“I seduced her,” he interjected. “I wanted to stay here, and it was a means—”

“Rafferty!” Helena barked. “You don’t need to do that. You don’t need to lie to protect me.” She turned back to Scarlet, her hands out, urgently pleading with their chosen judge. “He went back on his own to save me from paying the price of him staying.”

Scarlet didn’t look at her. Her gaze remained fixed on Rafferty, an intense haunted depth in her eyes.

Desperate, Helena continued. “We… we fell in love. Truly. He’s not a monster. He’s not like what other demons are. He would never hurt anyone if not f orced to—”

Rafferty closed his eyes, wincing at her words. To her, they weren’t lies, she truly believed everything she said, but to him… he knew better. “Helena—”

“You’re not!” she insisted. “You’re a good person who made some terrible mistakes. Why can’t you see that?”

“Helena, leave him be,” Scarlet commanded, fully in control of herself once more. She gestured at Helena. “ Continue.”

Helena’s whole body shook, but she obeyed. “And… and then the night of the Winter Rose Ball came, and when the chef didn’t show up… I didn’t know what else to do so I… I summoned him for help.”

Falling silent, Helena hugged her arms around herself, having reached the end of her c onfession.

Instead, Rafferty took over. “I summoned many demons to that kitchen to make a feast fit f or kings.”

“And you let them free once they had?” Scarlet asked. Her gaze returned to him, and Rafferty felt as he had all those centuries ago when he had been face-to-face with the King of France. Though, to him it felt like only a couple of years ago.

He would tell her the truth, though he also was sure she wouldn’t be lieve him.

“I ordered them back and they all went. I had bound them to my word.”

Helena’s eyebrow s creased.

“So Yosef summoned him back,” Scarlet finished for him. “He called the demon from the circle himself.”

“But how do you know that?” Hel ena asked.

“I was there when he did it,” Scarlet said, her long gaze haunted and heavy.

Rafferty licked his lips and continued. “What most likely happened is he spoke with a demon while it was under my thrall. That would be enough. The demon would have told him how to summon him back and offered him something he wanted more than anything.” All things any demon could and would have done. “I was too preoccupied to have noticed, but that is not an excuse. I took a huge risk, and he paid the price.” He shook his head.

“Therefore, we would have gotten away with a demon summoning that night if he had not done what he did,” Scarlet said as if she were perfectly okay with that. Like it was something she would have done herself in those circumstances. Maybe she had. He didn’t know much about Scarlet, but her lack of appalled reaction made him think this had not been her first encounter with the demonic before. “And he bargained… for this.”

Scarlet held up her hands, the wrinkled skin now tight over her bones, the flesh restored to supple strength. Gently, those hands probed at her angelic face. “He traded his youth… his life… to rest ore mine.”

“If I were to guess, yes, as the… deal was completed, all the essence that was Yosef transferred to you. You are now the same age in body as he had been,” Rafferty confirmed.

A coughing laugh escaped Scarlet. “God. To be twenty-six again.” She closed her eyes once more, sorrowfully. “I wanted it more than anything, but never at th is price.”

Abruptly, she stood up, zeroing in on Rafferty. He didn’t move away as she approached, but he did flinch as she raised her hands to his cheeks. He waited, expecting her to slap him, to punish him for what he had done to her lover.

But when it didn’t fall, he opened his eyes. Her face was fixed into an expression he hadn’t expect ed to see.

C ompassion.

Her hands gently cupped his face, holding him and his gaze locked with hers. “You are a demon?” she asked softly. He wanted to recoil from the question but didn’t have the will to pull away from her grip.

“I… I’m not sure anymore,” he breathed.

“I saw you both drop through the summoning circle,” Scarlet continued, as if she were afraid to voice her fears aloud. “I thought you both had to be dead. But if you were a demon, then you chose to protect her instead of dragging her there? You guided her through hell and o ut again?”

“Sh- she saved me,” he said, Scarlet’s eyes compelling him. Her eyebrows pinched, and then she set a hand against his chest. Those same eyebrows popped up with re alization.

“You are alive,” she whispered. Her gaze drifted down to her hand, and he knew what she felt. His thumping, beating heart, pounding fast against his ribs.

“He’s human again, yes,” Helena confirmed.

“Demons do not have a heartbeat. They don’t have real bodies,” Scarlet continued, as if she hadn’t heard. Then she broke her own spell, taking a step back. “I will help you.”

She retrieved her purse and opened it to pull out a silver cellphone.

“Scarlet, what are you doing?” Hel ena asked.

“I know someone who can help us. We can get him a new identity and a back history. Birth certificate, credit history, the whole works. Though we can’t do it here. We will have to go to the office. You are free to leave, correct?”

Helena hesitated. “Uh, it’s been strongly implied that we should stay here, but I don’t think we’re being f orced to.”

Scarlet nodded as she brought the mobile phone to her ear. “Lord, it’s been ages since I’ve had to do this for someone. I hope he will still answer thi s number.”

“But I don’t understand,” Helena said, completely flummoxed by her boss’ s actions.

“Why are you doing this?” Raffe rty asked.

Scarlet turned to look him full in the face, a confidence returning to her expression. A strength only inspired by purpose. “Redemption is a rare thing. It must be protected at a ll costs.”