I covered the mouthpiece again and sank onto the edge of the coffee table, my head spinning with anger, frustration, and exhaustion. “It could be anyone…” I moaned to Tod, staring up at him in desperation. “What are there now, six billion people on the planet?”
Tod shook his head. “He can’t just possess some random sleeping stranger, Kaylee. The host has to be someone with a connection to the Netherworld. Someone who’s left a psychic imprint there, either by crossing over or by tasting death in one form or another. Which is how he got Emma. She was technically dead for a couple of minutes back in September, right?”
I nodded, my thoughts as scattered as dandelion fuzz on the breeze. Em had died, and I’d crossed over. Those were our connections. Were we both now fair game for demon possession?
“It probably also has to be someone with a connection to you. Otherwise, how would he get your phone number? It’s unlisted right?”
“Kaylee?” Avari’s impatience reclaimed my attention, as Tod’s new information began to process in the back of my mind.
“It’s not about what I’m willing to risk!” I snapped into the phone, having hit the limit of my own tolerance. “It’s about what I stand to gain from that risk. Which is nothing, because we both know you’ll never let them go if I cross over.” After all, he was a hellion of greed.
“I might not,” the hellion agreed, and in my mind, I saw a featureless, borrowed head nodding sagely. “But you’ll have to take that chance if you ever want to see your father and boyfriend again.”
I covered the mouthpiece and met Tod’s eyes. “Someone who’s tasted death and has a connection to me. Like Emma…” Oh, no. No, no, no… “It’s Sophie.” My eyes closed in horror, but I knew I was right. “Avari’s in Sophie.”
Tod frowned, then he was gone again.
“Well?” Avari said into my ear. “Which do you value more—their lives, or your freedom?”
But I had no answer to that because it wasn’t a fair question—if I crossed over, I’d be giving up both options. “Give me a gesture of goodwill,” I demanded. “A sign that you intend to keep your word.”
Avari laughed so hard they probably heard him in the next dimension. “What did you have in mind?” he asked, amusement still ringing loud and clear in his voice. “A pinkie swear?”
I rolled my eyes. Where did he get his cultural references, Hannah Montana? “Send one of them back now,” I clarified. “And I’ll cross over, then you can release the other.” Of course, I had no intention of crossing over, because I didn’t believe for a second that he’d actually give back either my father or Nash. So his next question stunned me into speechlessness.
“Which one?”
“What?” I asked when his words finally sank in.
“Which one will you trade yourself for? Which one will you save?”
“Oh, right,” I snapped, digging deep to find the courage for a few more words—and desperately hoping my bravado didn’t get anyone killed. “Like you’re actually going to let one of them go.”
Avari chuckled softly, and the sound skittered up my spine like spiders crawling on long-dead bones. “I’m just intrigued enough by your proposition to actually send one of them back. But only because your agony over the decision promises to be a rare and extravagant treat.”
As if I would ever let him snack on my pain…
Still, it was a chance to get one of them out alive, immediately, which meant Tod and I would only have to escape the Netherworld with two passengers, instead of three.
“So, which one will it be? The father or the lover? Which do you love more?”
I don’t know. My father, who loved me, but abandoned me to his brother. Or my boyfriend, who loved me, but lied to me, Influenced me, and let a hellion wear my body.
There were no guarantees that I’d make it out of the Netherworld alive with whichever one I left in Avari’s…care. So the only one whose safety was guaranteed—assuming the hellion’s people couldn’t get to him again—was whichever one he sent over immediately.
And I couldn’t choose.
“This offer expires in two minutes, Kaylee…” Avari’s intimate whisper made me feel dirty, and promised much worse things to come when we met in his territory. Things that may have already happened to my father and Nash. And I couldn’t decide which of them to rescue….
Fortunately, before I could squeak out a desperate, impulsive answer, I heard a dull thud over the line, then the smack of something hitting the floor.
An instant later, Tod’s voice spoke to me over the line. “You were right. It was Sophie.”
“What did you do?” I demanded. My momentary relief was eclipsed by concern for my cousin, who hadn’t exactly volunteered her body for hostile occupation. Even if her own occupation of it was usually hostile.
Tod chuckled. “You can’t possess someone who doesn’t have control over his or her own body. That’s like stealing a horse without grabbing the reins—how are you supposed to control the animal?”
Had he just compared my pampered cousin to a beast of burden? I shouldn’t like the comparison, but I do….
Still… “So what did you do?” I repeated.
“I hit Sophie on the back of the head with a universal remote. This thing is huge. It’s like a cell phone from the ’90s.”
“You were supposed to get rid of Avari without hurting the host!”
“Yeah, I didn’t get that memo. Maybe next time you should be a little more specific when you boss me around while I’m saving your ass. Though, frankly, this whiny little shrew is lucky she only has one bump, ’cause she’s had this coming for a while.”
Well, I couldn’t argue with him there. “Is she still breathing?”
“It was a remote, not a sledgehammer. Anyway, it’s not her time. She’ll be fine.”
“She better be.” I sighed and sank onto the couch again, desperately hoping I hadn’t just signed my father’s death warrant. Or Nash’s. “But the real question is how can we keep it from happening again? What’s to stop Avari from taking over everyone I know?”
“Other than the qualifications for an intermediary? I mean, how many people do you know who have a connection to the Netherworld?”
Not many, fortunately. Not that I knew of, anyway. But there were a few—Emma, Sophie, Uncle Brendon, and Harmony—none of whom I wanted to see hurt. Especially because of me.
“Besides,” Tod continued, suddenly appearing in the middle of my living room floor, still holding Sophie’s home phone. “I think the key to keeping Avari out of your friends and family is right in front of us.”
“It is?” I dropped my phone back into its cradle as Tod nodded solemnly, ignoring the static bleeding from the receiver in his grip.
“Alec.”
“The proxy?” Finally wide-awake, I made my way toward the open kitchen window.
“Yeah.” The reaper’s gaze followed me, but in true Tod fashion, he made no move to help as I used most of my weight to force the first heavy pane of glass closed. “Possession takes an enormous amount of energy, and most hellions can only do it every now and then, and only for short periods of time. A few minutes, at the most. But Avari’s been possessing you regularly for a month now, right?”
I latched the kitchen window, then moved on to the two in the living room. “As near as I can tell.” I felt sick just thinking about it. How could Nash let Avari possess me? Had he even tried to evict the body snatcher? Even once I forgave Nash for lying about the Demon’s Breath—after all, he’d been exposed while helping me—I wasn’t sure I could forgive him for letting Avari inside me. And even if I could forgive, I could never forget….
“And he’s been able to do it twice in two days, since he got his hands on Nash and your dad,” Tod continued, dragging my thoughts back on topic. “Which suggests that he’s using them as additional energy supplements—logical for a hellion of greed, don’t you think?” The reaper raised one brow for emphasis.
“Yeah.” And that also supported my theory that Avari had no intention of returning them, no matter what I did. Especially now that I’d blown the “one now” deal.