Page 5

Indy

We ordered breakfast in.

Lunch, too. I picked at the food, unwilling to test my stomach with more than a few bites.

Sully chattered about her spell work, notably not asking about the waterfall of memories spilling into my brain.

It was better she didn’t; I wasn’t sure I could put words to the things I was thinking.

By the early evening, I was sober but mired in memory.

I was good for little more than fetching Sully supplies and nodding along to her explanation of what to expect.

She gestured this way and that while her words became a nonsensical drone.

I may have been physically standing a few feet from her, but I was mentally lost somewhere in the 1970s, begging Loren to take me to Studio 54 where I might run into Andy Warhol.

It was one of a thousand moments—a million—all clattering together until they stopped me in my tracks.

Emotions rolled in on top of them, so potent and raw that I found myself on the floor, sobbing while holding a box of chalk.

My collapse brought Sully in a flurry.

I tried to shoo her away but ended up folding into myself instead.

The chalk tumbled aside while I balled up, trapped in the endless loop of my equally endless life.

At first, the recollections of Loren had been intoxicating.

He was my comfort; the one thing that remained constant decade after decade, death after death.

But then I saw how things had changed over time.

Steady, steadfast Loren wasn’t quite the rock he used to be.

He had eroded and was crumbling, retreating from me, and I knew why.

“I ruined his life,” I sniffled while Sully rubbed my back.

“He could’ve moved on if not for me. Could’ve had someone who wasn’t so…” My jaw clenched as I gritted out, “Temporary.”

Sully made a soothing sound.

“Honey, you’re not temporary?—”

My head snapped up, and I pinned her with a glare.

“Are you kidding? I’m practically disposable. Single use.” My fists clenched because I remembered dying, too.

Trying and failing to cling on while some higher authority restarted me over and over like a damn videogame character.

“Ten years at a time?” My voice trembled.

“What kind of bullshit is that?”

I stared at Sully, hoping for an answer.

She knew so much about phoenixes, maybe she could tell me why my existence suddenly felt like a cosmic joke.

A curse on me and everyone around me.

Rather than answer, she sighed.

“Indy…”

“I’m fine. I’m fucking fine.” I flapped both hands in a fevered dismissal.

“Let’s just get this done.”

Scrambling to my feet, I grabbed the chalk and led the charge toward the space we’d cleared in the middle of the living room.

Pillar candles were arranged in a circle around the thick line of rock salt like the kind they spread on Brooklyn’s icy streets every winter.

As Sully approached, the candles lit simultaneously, adding a yellow tone to the hues of dawn beaming in the windows.

She came up behind me and wrapped her arm around my shoulders to give me a side hug.

“Loren adores you, you know,” she said.

“And when we get him back here, I’m sure that will be the first thing he says.”

I snorted, suddenly teary again.

“He’s not gonna say anything, Sully. I’ll be lucky to get a nod and a grunt.”

Sully’s mouth tipped in a gentle smile.

“But you’ll know.”

“Yeah.”

I knew.

Scooping a book from a nearby stack, Sully opened to a marked page.

It was the summoning spell she’d mentioned last night, complete with an incantation and a pentagram to scribble on the floor.

With the rug rolled aside, we had ample space to begin the sketch.

I took out a piece of chalk and knelt inside the salt circle, drawing sharp, straight lines punctuated with arcane symbols.

It looked a bit like.

Binary code for demons.

Every tick and dot meant something, but not to me.

Sully directed me to one side, then the other.

It became an elaborate game of Twister not to smear the powdery white lines by dragging my knees or bare toes through them.

My head throbbed dully as memories continued to filter in, making it increasingly hard to focus.

When I finished, I hauled myself to standing and tucked the stick of chalk behind my ear.

My hair was greasy from sweat, and I desperately needed a shower, but hygiene could wait.

I had a date with a demon.

Sully donned her glasses and was skimming the text as I crept up beside her.

I watched while she mouthed the words, silently rehearsing for what looked to be a hell of a monologue.

I waited for a long moment while picking at the chipped paint on my nails.

When it seemed that she’d reached a stopping point, I cleared my throat and asked, “How does this work, exactly?”

She dragged up a small table with a pillar candle on it.

“This is a timer; that is a cage.” Her finger pointed first at the candle, then at the sigil circle I’d drawn on the floor.

“When the demoness appears, she will be confined inside that space until the candle burns out. We have that much time to make our request and plead our case.”

Leaning around her, I scrutinized the candle.

Squatty and thick, it had enough wax to burn for a couple of hours, I imagined, but had to ask, “How much time?”

Sully tipped her head from side to side in a noncommittal shake.

“It varies.”

I quirked a brow.

“It’s her power versus mine,” Sully explained.

“Like a battle of wills. I try to keep the candle lit, she tries to put it out, and we hope we’ve convinced her before she does.”

Probably not hours, then.

I stood, nibbling my lip until Sully patted my shoulder.

“You ready?” she asked.

“As I’ll ever be.”

After adjusting her spectacles, Sully consulted the spellbook again.

Then, it began.

She spoke in a deep intonation, reading from the page while my attention alternated between her and the sigils on the floor.

They matched up with the illustration as best I could tell, though we hadn’t discussed what would happen if they didn’t.

I was beginning to fear the worst, the nothing, when the ground began to rumble.

It shuddered underfoot, toppling candles and spilling wax in streams and puddles.

The flames died one by one, and Sully kept reading.

Her expression grew stern, or maybe strained, like the words were hard to force out.

Smoke kicked up in a tornadic swirl.

It was faint at first, then grew heavier as the incantation continued.

More than the sight was the stink of rotten eggs that made my stomach lurch.

I waved my hand to fan away the stench while squinting through the cloud that gradually coalesced into the form of a woman in a burgundy dress.

Inky black hair spilled to her waist, and her dark brows and eyes looked almost ghoulish as she aimed them at me.

Sully muffled a gasp as the spellbook hit the floor with a thump.

The fat pillar candle beside her flickered to life.

Its flame wavered in the dead air.

The demoness smiled, flashing a pair of fanged teeth like a vampire.

Her gaze flicked from me to Sully and back again, seemingly deciding who to address.

After another moment’s debate, she targeted Sully, who had removed her glasses and hung them over the collar of her pajama top.

“You rang?” The demoness indicated the grimoire lying open on the ground.

She didn’t budge from inside the sigil circle, didn’t move at all besides smoothing her hands over her hips and causing the fabric to shimmer.

Rather than wait for Sully’s reply, I cleared my throat and stepped forward.

“You’re Moira, right?”

Her crimson eyes glittered.

“I am.”

Memories clawed at me, thoughts of phone calls that made Loren shrivel and shrink.

Visions of him returning from Hell only to lock himself in our bathroom and shower until I thought he’d scrubbed his skin off.

That’s what he’d been doing in the trailer park bathhouse the day I walked in on him.

I knew it now. I recognized the look on his face.

Shellshock and shame.

It was her fault.

I set my jaw and glowered at the demoness.

“You know Loren?” I asked.

She blinked once, twice, and then her slim brows drew together.

“Lorenzo?”

He didn’t like that name.

“Loren,” I repeated, and I hoped she felt the chill in my voice.

Her head cocked, and she swept her ebony tresses over one shoulder.

“What interest do you have in my pet?”

I stiffened, curling my fingers and even my toes in a battle-ready stance.

“He’s not your pet,” I seethed.

Sully touched my arm.

“Indy…”

Her interruption stopped me from launching into a full-blown tirade because my god I knew, I knew, I knew.

This woman, this demon, put a chain around Loren’s neck that was as heavy as an anchor.

She violated him. Abused him.

Tried to ruin him and believed it was her right to do so.

And now she was keeping him from me.

I wouldn’t allow it.

Sully turned toward Moira.

“We want to make a deal with you. A trade.”

The demoness’ lips pursed in a sneer.

“What could you possibly have that I need?”

“Phoenix tears,” I said.

“Fresh from the tap.”

She perked and, for the first time, I saw something deeper than disdain in her porcelain features.

She scanned me again—barefoot, oily, mildly hungover me.

I was rarely an intimidating sight, but now I wasn’t even an appealing one.

I’d seen myself in Sully’s bathroom mirror.

I looked like gutter trash.

Mascara traced the tear streaks on my cheeks, and sweaty curls were plastered to my scalp.

Eggplant. Not indigo.

None of that stalled Moira’s inspection or kept her from extending her hand in a beckoning wave.

“Come closer, dear,” she crooned.

“Let me have a look at you.”

Into the sigil circle.

Into the cage.

I glanced at the pillar candle burning down fast. Wax spilled over its sides and pooled beneath it.

We had no time to spare.

None to waste.

I already stood at the edge of the salt circle and had barely taken a step forward when Sully shouted, “Indy, don’t!”

But that step was enough for Moira to catch me by one suspender and drag me close.

She grabbed the other and held me nearly against her, eye to eye while she bent into the curve of my neck and inhaled a deep breath.

A few weeks ago, I’d joked about having superpowers, but it was truer than I knew.

I used to have wings and fire that could incinerate anything on Earth.

Or in Hell. With the demon clinging to me, sniffing at my skin, I searched inside myself for a spark.

A match to strike. An ember I could coax into a flame.

I cringed and squirmed and struggled to make my body obey the command to burn.

Nothing happened.

I twisted my hands helplessly around Moira’s forearm while she held me, then snaked her forked tongue up the side of my face.

The wet, hot trail it left behind stretched from my jaw to my temple.

Moira hummed a savoring sound that made me want to gag, and I kicked at her.

I connected with something—her shin, maybe?

—and she released me with a shove.

I tumbled onto the floor, dangerously close to smearing a few chalk lines as I crab-walked out of the sigil circle.

Scrambling to my feet, I rubbed the side of my face, determined to remove the spit residue that I imagined to be there.

Sully crowded in, checking me over while the demon smirked.

She rolled her tongue around in her mouth, then across her lips before swallowing at last. “It’s you,” she said.

“The phoenix.”

“I would’ve told you,” I grumbled while I smoothed the wrinkles out of my shirt and tightened my suspenders.

“You didn’t have to fucking sample me.”

Moira’s mouth curved in a sharp-toothed smile.

“Pretty bird,” she trilled.

Next, she’d be asking if Polly wanted a cracker.

My fists clenched again, and I stomped my foot.

“Do you want my tears or not?”

“Do I ?” she asked, then answered, “Not particularly.”

“Then why are you hunting me?” I asked.

“Why’d you take Loren?”

The demoness crossed her arms and rolled her eyes aside with exaggerated annoyance.

“ Lorenzo stepped out of line. He’s been doing quite a lot of that lately, and he needed to be reminded of his place.”

Did she know that I’d seen?

Hundreds of times, I’d stood by and watched her berate him.

Before the phone calls, it was telegrams. A few times, letters came in the mail.

He couldn’t escape her— we couldn’t.

Did she realize that I’d been there for all of it?

Fury swelled inside me, so hot I could have sworn I was steaming.

I leaned in, bent over the salt barrier because I wanted to be in her face.

I wanted to burn her.

Slowly reduce her to cinders while she groveled and begged the way she’d made Loren do so many times.

“Tell me his place,” I hissed.

“I fucking dare you.”

Moira leaned forward, too, and glared directly at me as she replied, “On his knees awaiting my command.”

“Bitch!” The curse exploded out of me, and I would have launched myself at her.

Would have dove into that sigil circle and tackled her to the ground.

But Sully caught me by the wrist, her grip viselike and her expression taut.

“Indy, maybe I should handle this,” she said.

I didn’t miss the warning behind her words.

She could kick me out.

I was already here on shaky terms. I was supposed to go to meetings, stay clean, and tidy up the gallery at night.

Instead, I’d used meetings as an excuse to rendezvous with my dealer, sobriety was a distant dream, and the only part of the gallery I’d tidied was the wine closet.

Sully would be within her rights to decide she could do this demon deal and everything else better without me.

I let my head drop in a nod and backed away from the sigil circle.

The pillar candle was over half melted.

Wax dripped onto the wooden tabletop like water breaking through a dam.

“How much is Loren worth to you?” Sully asked the demoness.

“Don’t say it like that,” I muttered.

“That’s what matters,” she retorted, then addressed Moira once more.

“We want to trade. What would it take?”

Moira’s forehead creased.

“Why?”

“Why what?” Sully asked.

“Why do you want my dog?” Moira replied.

The gravel in her voice at the last word galled me.

It was condescending, demeaning, and untrue.

“He’s not a dog,” I snapped, rounding on her.

“And he’s not yours. He’s my partner. My mate. Mine .” I was simmering again, prickly hot and rippling with tension from my toes to my teeth as they ground together.

“And you can either make a deal with us and get something out of this, or I will follow you to Hell and bring him back here my damn self. Watch me.”

Bowed up like a much larger man, I wasn’t menacing, but I used to be.

I could be. Somewhere, my power was buried.

I just had to dig it out.

When I did, I would give this demon bitch every bit of her due.

Until then, all I had was a decent bluff.

Decent enough judging by the way the smug look slowly left her face.

“Phoenix tears, you say?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. “That’s what I say.”

Her gaze raked over me, and I wished for some sunglasses like the poker hotshots wore.

Something to shield my eyes so she couldn’t see through my false bravado.

At last, she relaxed with her arms crossed and shoulders set.

“One vial of tears in exchange for the hound?”

“Loren,” I corrected.

Demons were devious, and I wouldn’t be tricked with vague phrasing.

I didn’t want any hellhound.

I wanted mine .

“I’ll consider it,” Moira said.

The candle wavered, and it drummed up panic in me.

I started what I meant to be a threat, but it came out as a frantic sputter, “Y-you’ll do more than that?—”

“No.” She cut me off.

“I won’t. Because our time is up and, if you had a way into Hell, I imagine you would have employed rather than wasting time worrying about what torment was being visited upon… your mate .”

Maybe I shouldn’t have claimed Loren so boldly.

She thought he was hers, and now I was competition.

To negotiate, we needed to work together, but I had established myself as a challenger.

As gratifying as it was to finally make her as aware of me as I had long been of her, it might have had the opposite of the desired effect.

“Twenty-four hours,” Sully blurted.

The pillar candle flickered, its wick almost drowned in wax, and Moira’s form wavered in tandem.

“We’ll summon you here then,” Sully continued, “and we’ll have the tears.”

She glanced at me to confirm, and I nodded.

I couldn’t burn a bitch, but I could cry.

In fact, I was welling up now, frustrated and frightened and fucking overwhelmed.

Moira smiled. “You do that.”

When the candle died, the room felt dark despite daylight beaming through the windows.

I looked at where Moira had stood, but she had disappeared with barely a wisp of smoke to herald her exit.

Sully and I lingered in silence.

I touched the sweater yarn tied snugly around my wrist.

Moira said she would consider our offer.

While she did, we would wait.

Loren would wait another agonizing day, increasingly assured no one was coming for him.

Afraid he’d been forgotten because I excelled at forgetting.

But now, he was the only thing I could remember.