“Can I help you?” A man’s voice broke the spell.
I turned, thankful. Memories of that day only led to thinking about the events that made it necessary. There’d been more than enough of that today. Coming down the aisle toward me was a tall, white-haired priest. “I, ah, was hoping I could talk to someone.”
The priest smiled and gestured toward the confessional at the back of the room. “Confession starts in an hour, but I have a few moments if you’d like to beat the rush.” He winked. “It gets crazy in here. Yesterday we had to pull apart two elderly women.”
Huh. A priest with a sense of humor. That would definitely help.
“No, nothing like that. I actually had some questions.”
He stepped back and slid into the nearest pew, sliding down to make room. “Oh?”
I followed suit and took a deep breath. “Demons.”
“Ah. We all have our demons. Drugs, violence, sex—”
“Um, no.” God, I felt like a moron. “I mean, like, real demons.”
His expression changed. “I see.”
I wanted to run from the building and never look back, but I needed answers. “Are they real? Demons, I mean.”
His right eye twitched, and it was plain to see he was trying to cover up a smile. “Do you believe yourself possessed?”
Okay. Now he was making fun of me. “Of course not.” I shifted in the seat. What I needed was an excuse. “I’m an intern over at the Harlow Journal,” I lied. “I’m helping with some research.”
His eyebrows rose. “On demons?”
“There’s this whole demon worship thing going around some of the college campuses along the Eastern Seaboard. I’m trying to get some basic information about lore and stuff.”
He thought about it for a moment, and just when I was sure he’d dismiss me as a liar, he frowned and said, “As sure as there is a God in heaven, there are demons. Yes. I believe them to be real.”
“And they’re all evil, right?”
He leaned back in the pew. “Evil is a relative term. Are people truly evil?”
“Um, is that a trick question?”
He smiled. “There’s no handbook. Much of these things go on faith. I don’t believe there is black or white, only shades of gray. Demons exist to tempt us into evil. Angels exist to tempt us into good. Who’s to say the right angel couldn’t tempt a demon? Or vice versa? I believe they’re the subtle whispers we hear in our daily battles with morality. ”
“So they’re not fanged, drooling monsters?”
He glanced over his shoulder, then turned back to me. “Not all of my brethren would agree with my beliefs, but no. I don’t think so. In fact, it’s my opinion that you wouldn’t even realize if you walked into one on the street.”
“So you think they’re here. Out there walking around?”
He hesitated, then sighed. “There are many stories, mythology if you will, depicting the path of demonkind after God cast them from heaven. Some believe they reigned in hell, while others insist they were cursed to walk the earth for all eternity.” The priest leaned back, a mischievous look in his eyes. “I met a man once who insisted he was one of the first cast aside, and sat in place of honor in hell, at Lucifer’s right hand. Whether it was true or not is a mystery, but he spun an intriguing tale.”
I bent closer. Now we were getting to the good stuff. “What did he say?”
“He told of a great, bloody war that raged over centuries, slowly tearing hell apart. Lucifer grew tired of his children misbehaving, and like God, cast them out. It is said that they were banished here, forced to live as mortals, stripped of their heritage and forced to sustain themselves on their rage.”
“What about a specific demon. The Son of Cain?”
The priest’s brow furrowed for a moment. “I don’t know of a demon by that name. Do you mean Cain and Abel?”
I shook my head. “I’m not sure? Is there some kind of myth connecting them to a demon?”
“Cain was the firstborn son of Adam and Eve. He grew jealous of his younger brother, Abel, and in a fit of rage, murdered him. The act brought true violence into the world. He was the first murder. There are rumors that Cain’s bloodline was marked by God as punishment for soiling his creation. Some being cursed to carry an unspeakable evil throughout the ages.”
“So then the descendants of Cain are demons?”
The priest smiled. “I think it’s a metaphor for the anger and jealousy in all humans rather than a literal meaning.”
Or, it could be the tall, dark guy I’d loved since childhood was an actual, honest-to-God demon, just like he said…
Chapter Fifteen
Jax
I watched Sam leave the church. Judging by the stiff set of her shoulders and the grim expression that weighed her mouth down at the corners, she didn’t get the answers she wanted.
I followed as she made her way down Topper Avenue, staying far enough behind so I wouldn’t be spotted. Coffee. A magazine. She even stopped to look in several of the storefronts. Things I knew she had no interest in. Barbet’s Baby Emporium. Fisher’s Pet Shop. She was stalling.
Sam stopped in front of Hellman’s Fine Jewelry. It was now or fucking never. I stepped from the shadows and came up behind her, and peered into the window. “Way too high-maintenance for you.” She was looking at a pair of white diamond earrings with a weird little squiggle thing on the bottom. “Plus, they’re so bland. Diamonds? You’re more of an emerald kind of girl.”
“Stalking is a crime, you know.” She turned from the window and started walking again. There was a chill in her voice that stung. I understood, but it still hurt.
Screw it. At least she was talking to me. That had to be a good sign. No rushing off screaming at the top of her lungs. “Depends. Demons stalk. It’s generally what we do.”
Sam didn’t stop, but her entire body tensed. Okay. Might be a good idea to ease up on the jokes.
“I know you’re probably—”
That time she froze. After pulling me off the street and into a side alley, she poked me hard in the chest. “You know? Somehow I doubt you know anything going on inside my head.”
I folded my arms and leaned back against the brick building. “Then tell me.”
She backed off, then collapsed against the brick wall beside me. “I—I’m not even sure what to say. I have so many questions. Questions that I don’t think I even want answers to.”
“Then don’t ask.” I shrugged, trying to keep it casual.
“What?”
“Don’t ask the questions. Think the worst of me and leave it at that—because I promise you, most of the horrible things going through your mind right now are true. But you have to trust me so we can beat this thing. Demons don’t stop, Sammy. We need to find out why this is happening and end it, or it’s going to end you.”
Her eyes went wide. “And how do we do that?”
“I don’t have it with me, but I am a card-carrying member of the evil-infested. Like I said, the cops are out of the question. They wouldn’t have the first clue how to deal with this. I do.” The lie tasted bitter. I had no clue what to do, but it worked. A thin line of pink rose through the gray and twirled around her shoulders. Hope.
Part of me was elated at the possibility that she’d be able to see past my darkness, while another part was terrified of what that could mean for her. What I was would only drag her down. “It’s okay you hate me for leaving…for what I am…but you have to know deep down inside that if I’d known you were in danger, I would never have left you.”
“How do I know I can trust you not to feed me to your demon buddies?”