Sudden fear knifed through Annabella. “My mother. The wolf will go after my mother.”
“Is that how he coerced you to go with him?”
Annabella nodded. “And he’ll follow through on his threat, especially now that I’ve run away from him. We have to get to her first.”
Custo caught her gaze with his. “I’ll send an extraction unit for your family, but we are going to the tower.”
“No. This is my mother we’re talking about.”
“Bella. Take another look at yourself in the mirror.”
Annabella kept her gaze on his face. She wasn’t budging.
He shook his head, no. “We have to find out what’s happening to you and if it’s reversible. My hunch is that the wolf will follow you, especially now that you are infected with Shadow, rather than make good on any threats to hurt your family. Remember what happened to Abigail?”
Annabella’s argument stuck in her throat. The memory of Abigail’s possession was vivid, horrifying, an invasion of body more complete than she could fathom. But she wanted her mom and brother safe and sound.
“Decision’s made, Annabella,” Custo said. His tone brooked no further disagreement. “We need to get you help before the wolf catches up with us. I don’t think we have much time.”
The army cart burst out of the concrete bunker. A helicopter was waiting, its propellers beating the air into a deafening hurricane of small debris that stung Annabella’s eyes. At Custo’s direction, the driver helped her inside, though she still didn’t need it. She looked like a freak, but she wasn’t helpless.
The helicopter lifted off before she was fully strapped in, nose angling toward the city. Annabella stared at the skin on her hands, while Custo yelled into a headset.
“Adam, repeat!” Custo’s forehead and eyes strained as he listened. He rubbed a hand over his face and told her, “I can’t get a clear signal.”
He asked the pilot, “What’s our ETA?”
“Seventeen minutes.”
Custo looked back at her. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine. The same.” Which wasn’t quite true. She was bitterly cold.
Annabella watched Custo’s arm heal as they flew, the flesh knitting together from the inside out as the minutes ticked by. The bone looked straighter, too. She tried to control her shivers while she listened to Custo make a series of calls. Her mom had been picked up, and though spitting mad, was fine and in transport by her city’s police to rendezvous with a Segue unit, which would really piss her off. Her brother had likewise been detained by campus security. Annabella could do nothing but wait and hope they were safe.
“Oh. Hell.” Custo was looking out his window to the city below.
Annabella leaned over to see for herself, but couldn’t immediately make sense of the chaos. A narrow building was in near rubble, its street-side wall collapsed, the interior floors and rooms exposed. Great white pieces of stone littered the sidewalk and crushed two unlucky cars. Other cars were abandoned helter-skelter in the middle of the road as in a disaster movie.
The helicopter lowered, and people became visible: a line of army soldiers crouched behind debris, protecting the remains of the building, firing upon an encroaching armed throng who obviously weren’t scared of guns.
The helicopter banked toward a rooftop landing, and from this new perspective, the street became more familiar. The destroyed white building below had to be The White Tower, occupying the space of the alley where it once had been concealed from human eyes. Now it was in full view. The soldiers protecting it and the fallen angels were led by Segue, holding off the invading wraiths.
“Adam was too late,” Custo said.
“Or just in time,” Annabella answered, unbuckling her belt. “We’ve got to hurry.”
Custo put a staying hand on her arm. “I’m not taking you down there.”
“Ha! I’m not asking permission.” She opened the helicopter door and pushed against the wind, her hair flying in all directions.
Custo climbed out after her, expression fierce. “Annabella—”
She cut him off, lifting her Shadow-veined palms for him to see. “There’s nothing down there scarier than what the wolf will do to me. He’s got to be close behind us—nothing can hold Shadow—and the next time he attacks we won’t have a flamethrower to stall him.” She pointed to the melee below. “The Order has answers and they need your help. I’m going whether you like it or not.”
Annabella took off across the roof toward a set of red metal doors, and Custo had no choice but to follow. Joining the fray was madness, suicidal, something for him, but definitely not for her. Besides, they were on the wrong side of the fight; they’d have to cross through the wraiths to get to Adam and his defense of the fallen tower. And though it was plenty cool that he could kill wraiths with his hands, as he and the other angels had the night of the gala, there were far too many of them for him to take on alone. But Annabella wouldn’t think of any of that.
As always, she seemed determined to be a pain in the ass.
The doors opened to a flight of utility stairs, which led to an upper floor of the building, housing what appeared to be a series of small, independent businesses, little gold plaques to the side of their doors. They took the main elevator to the lobby. Custo avoided the main entrance and barged through a very sketchy-looking staffing business to exit out the rear to a parking lot off the main street.
He hid her behind a Dumpster and assessed the thick army of stinking wraiths held back by Adam’s gunfire. Had to be upward of a hundred converging on the Segue men defending the broken tower.
No way to get through. The wolf could catch up at any moment, and then they’d be beset on all sides. They had to keep moving. Maybe if they circled around—
“Who’s that?” Annabella nudged him.
Custo’s attention focused on where she pointed, a blind spot some ten yards from their location at the juncture of a low concrete wall and a building.
“He was right there a second ago,” she said.
Against the age-whitened concrete, a lash of rippling, smoky darkness whipped into existence, and a wraith was propelled backward from the press of the throng. Midair, the wraith halted, and though partially obscured by Shadow, Custo saw his head suddenly torque, and then the sack of wasted flesh fell to the ground. The kill was over before Custo could blink.
Two nearby wraiths turned at the sudden motion, teeth thick in their mouths. With a bloom and jut of Shadow, the lower jaw was knocked off one, and the other crumpled, head lolling after a blur of movement.
Darkness crawled across the lot. A third wraith suddenly threw himself onto a rusty stake.
One by one, wraiths were picked from the back of the throng.
Had to be Shadowman, come to Adam’s aid. And he’d said he didn’t care.
Near a vertical cement post, the Shadows came to a roiling stop. Only Death’s stern face was visible in its depths, expression pitiless, eyes stirring with deep black. He looked over to the Dumpster and spoke, his words clear though he seemed to only mumble across the distance. “Don’t trouble yourself to help.”
Sarcastic son of a bitch. Custo had jumped Heaven’s Gate to help rid the world of wraiths; if he could have been wrenching the necks, he would have.
“I can’t. I’ve got a human woman here,” Custo replied. He couldn’t, wouldn’t leave Annabella alone for a second. “She’s been infected with…something.”
Shadowman tilted his head, forceful gaze intent across the debris and cars in the parking lot, assessing. Custo would have guessed from context that he was examining Annabella, but she was hidden by the gang-tagged Dumpster.
“She’s lost anyway,” Shadowman concluded, returning his attention to the throng of wraiths.