Chapter 21
21
The whereabouts of the Church of God’s Children was no secret. Its address was plastered all over the many flyers I’d ripped down from storefronts and telephone poles. It was near Adams Morgan, which I’d always thought was a strange location for the church since that neighborhood was pretty lively and known for its nightlife. It was becoming more and more of an entertainment district, so the building used as a church truly did stick out like a sore thumb.
But we didn’t rush off to Adams Morgan.
The three of us remained in the empty club after the witches left, taking Bambi with them. Roth was the embodiment of barely leashed anger as he stood in the center of the dance floor, his hand opening and closing repeatedly at his side.
He was the first one to speak. “I think we need to be smart about this instead of bum rushing the Church. If the Lilin really is there, I doubt it’s sitting and singing hymns with those people.”
I glanced at Cayman, who still looked stricken by what had just happened, and then I refocused. Why in the world would the Lilin be with them? And vice versa?
“As much as I hate to suggest this, we need to call the Wardens,” Roth continued as he walked to where the witches had sat, picked up one of the chairs and carefully, meticulously, placed it under the table. “Yeah, their perfect pearly souls would be at risk, but they could act as backup.”
“Roth…” I stepped forward.
He ignored me, fixing the other chair. “We have the necessary weapons to take out the Lilin. So do the Wardens. Let’s do this.”
“Roth,” I repeated, this time stronger and louder. His dilated eyes locked onto mine. The glint in them was downright murderous. “Let’s stop for a second.”
“How about we not?” he replied calmly—too calmly.
The ache in my chest tripled. “What just happened…we have to acknowledge that.”
His lips were pressed into a thin, formidable line. “Do we? Because dwelling on it seems pretty pointless. What does it change?”
“It doesn’t change anything,” I said, as Cayman turned sideways, thrusting his hand through his fair hair. “But we can’t pretend it didn’t happen. Bambi—”
“I think it’s best that I pretend exactly that.” Shadows had begun to form under his skin as his features sharpened, forming harsh angles. “Because I am this close to ripping that coven apart, and if I do that, it’s going back on the deal Cayman made.”
Cayman hung his head as he placed his hands on his lean hips. “I had hoped that they would not come to collect.”
Roth didn’t respond to that, and I didn’t know what to say to make this better. He had lost a loved one. It didn’t matter that the loved one was a familiar who mostly took the form of a giant snake. Those two were bonded on a level that even I couldn’t fully comprehend, and I had bonded with Bambi. I placed my hand over my side, where Robin rested. I was already bonding with the fox.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
His shoulders tensed. “Why are you apologizing? You didn’t take her.”
“If anyone should apologize, it is me. I brokered the deal,” Cayman interjected morosely. “I knew—”
“You were doing your job,” Roth snapped, his anger surfacing. “I told you I’d give anything, therefore you made the deal. There is nothing you should be sorry for.”
I closed my eyes, forcing myself not to say what I wanted to. Guilt beat at me, but I knew he didn’t need to hear that from me right now. As much as I wanted to rage about losing Bambi, this wasn’t about me, and whatever I felt was nothing compared to what Roth had to be feeling.
Tucking my hair back behind my ears, I pulled my tattered emotions together, shoved them down and focused. “Okay. I can reach out to Zayne.”
Roth nodded and we headed back to his loft so I could grab my phone. Cayman didn’t follow, and I felt just as bad for him as I did for Roth. Walking into his room and knowing I would never see Bambi slither her way over to the piano again kicked the breath out of my chest as I walked to my bag, by his desk.
“She’ll be okay,” Roth said quietly as I drew my phone out. I turned around and found him staring at the piano. “I know she will be. Bambi won’t allow herself to be mistreated.”
I bit down on my lip. The back of my throat burned.
Sighing, he looked up at me and the anger was still there, brimming just below the surface, but so was the shattered disappointment. “I really hope those witches were right, because I have a lot of pent-up aggression I need to get out of my system.”
“I…” I trailed off helplessly, clutching the phone.
His thick lashes lowered. “It’ll be okay.”
Walking over to him, I placed my free hand on his shoulder, and then stretched up, kissing his cheek. He stiffened for a moment, and then he folded his arms around me, burying his face in the crook of my neck for only the briefest of moments before he pulled away, rubbing his palm along his chest. “Text Zayne.”
And that’s what I did.
* * *
Roth and I waited for the Wardens on the rooftop of a bank near the Adams Morgan area after the sun had set.
Nervous energy made it hard to stand still, and Robin was picking up on it, racing across my stomach like it was his own personal drag strip. Luckily, only about ten minutes passed before movement in the sky drew our attention.
From a distance, they looked like birds of prey at first, as if they’d swoop down and snatch people from the group. But as they drew closer, there was no mistaking what they were. Even those down on the streets below would be able to pick out the differences.
I could also tell that a whole crap ton of Wardens were coming.
“Damn,” I muttered, stiffening.
Roth was beside me in under a second. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Obviously what was about to go down was a big deal, and I’d known that eventually I was going to have to face more than just Zayne, Dez and Nicolai.
But a part of me wasn’t ready.
Nope.
“This is going to be awkward,” I said, brushing my hair back out of my face.
“No.” Roth placed his hand on my lower back. “But it may be bloody.”
I shot him a look. “Behave.”
“I cannot promise that whatsoever.”
“These are not the ones you need to take out your aggression on.”
He smirked. “Let me be the judge of that.”
This was so not going to go well, but it was too late to change our plans. The pearly white glows faded and Zayne landed first. In his true form, he was massive. His skin a dark gray, his horns curved back, parting his blond hair. Not ugly or frightening, to me at least, but his gaze was an arctic blast as it drifted over us, a painful reminder of how much had changed.
I wanted to hide from that gaze and everything it dredged up, but I found my lady balls and held them close. I’d put myself in this situation with him and I had to deal with the consequences.
Dez and Nicolai were next, followed by two more clan members, but it was the final arrival that caused dread to explode like buckshot in my stomach and punched a harsh curse out of Roth.
Abbot was here.
The roof shook when he landed behind the clansmen and straightened, a good half a foot taller than the rest. With his hair as golden as his son’s, brushing broad shoulders, he’d always reminded me of a great lion.
In a way, Abbot was king.
For years, I’d trembled at the mere sight of him in his human and Warden forms, as he had been the greatest authority I’d known. And for years, I’d struggled to obtain the smallest sliver of pride from him. I’d basically operated on the theory that any attention was good attention, like a puppy. Now? Unfettered rage was what shook me and I sure as Hell didn’t care if he was proud of that or not.
Abbot had believed the worst of me with little or no evidence backing it up. It was no wonder why I’d had such loser self-esteem and had also thought the worst. While he hadn’t been the one who shoved a freaking dagger into my stomach, he had me caged like an animal, and then chained like one.
That was kind of hard to let go of.
“What is he doing here?” Roth queried, and although the question sounded like he was asking about the weather, I knew he wasn’t nearly that calm.
Abbot walked to the front, his clan—even his son—-sticking close to his side. His gaze drifted over Roth, and he barely managed to keep the contempt off his face, but then he was looking at me, and all the hard lines of his granite face softened. “Layla, I—”
“Don’t.” The one word that burst out surprised me. “Don’t apologize. A handful of words don’t make up for what you did.”
He drew himself up to his full height. “I know nothing I say will ever erase any of what happened, but I… I regret the role I played in it all.”
The role he played? To me, he’d been the freaking captain leading the Kill Layla parade down Main Street.
Abbot wasn’t done. “You were mine to raise and protect. I failed you.”
“Yes, you did,” Roth replied. “I won’t, but here’s the thing, and this message goes out to everyone. She doesn’t need protection. Not anymore.”
I got all warm and fuzzy upon hearing that, but the smug feeling quickly evaporated when my gaze caught Zayne’s and he looked away without so much as a glimmer of any emotion.
“I’ve heard from my son that you are…something else.” Abbot spoke directly to me. “That you do not look like us anymore.”
“I’m not like you.” My hands curled into fists and Robin started to get antsy. “Turns out, I was never a demon.” That got Zayne’s attention and an emotion out of him. Surprise. “Yeah, I have some demonic abilities, but… Well, does any of that matter?”
“No,” Zayne answered, shocking me. “It never mattered before. Not to any of us. It doesn’t matter now.”
There was a tugging sensation in the general vicinity of my heart.
“You said that you have a lead on the Lilin.” Nicolai spoke up, always the peacekeeper of the bunch. “That it may be holed up with the Church of God’s Children?”
Roth was eyeing Abbot like he wanted to rip the Warden’s head off, and he would’ve, back on the night I had been captured, if I hadn’t stopped him. “Yes. Layla and I are going to check it out and if the Lilin is there, we’re going to need backup.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Dez responded. “You tell us what you want us to do. This is your show.”
Abbot’s shoulders hunched, and it was obvious that he wasn’t happy with that decision. Roth looked smug as he said, “We need you all to stay close by. If things get hairy, you’ll know.”
“How is that?” Nicolai asked.
One side of Roth’s lips curved up. “Nitro. Off.”
My gaze shot to him as the tiny black cloud appeared before him. It dropped to the rooftop, and then rapidly pieced together, forming a tiny kitten.
Zayne shook his head. “What is it with you and runts of the litter?”
“Patience, Stony, patience.”
Before Roth finished those words, the little ankle biter increased before our eyes. Frail shoulders expanding into powerful hunches. The back lengthened into thick muscles covered by sleek white fur. What started off as a soft growl turned into a menacing, reverberating snarl that raised the hair along the back of my neck.
Nitro looked like a panther, if panthers were white.
Goodness.
“Nitro will let you know if things get out of control,” Roth explained. “It will be obvious.”
I couldn’t stop staring at the cat. It plopped its butt down, its pink tongue moving over its teeth. It looked hungry, and the Wardens looked very, very unhappy, especially when it coughed out what sounded suspiciously like a laugh.
Roth turned to me. “Ready?”
“Yep.” The blade was tucked into my boot, just like Roth had his. We walked to the ledge overlooking the alley below. The fastest way down was to jump. Roth shifted quickly, tucking his wings back so he didn’t knock me off the edge with them.
Knowing that all eyes were on us, I allowed my own shift to take place. My skin buzzed with the change, and it was like finally waking up after being asleep for days when it happened. My wings unfurled, arcing high above me, the feathers tickled by the wind.
Someone murmured an expletive behind us, and it sounded a lot like Abbot. I glanced at Roth and grinned.
“Meet you down there,” he said, and jumped.
“Show-off,” I muttered.
Instead of jumping, I sort of walked off the ledge and empty space immediately reached up to grab me. Gravity was a beast. The alley raced toward me, and I let my wings spread out, slowing the descent.
I landed in a crouch, propping up to find myself at eye level with an old man with a dirty, unshaven face.
“Holy mother,” he gasped, stumbling back against the wall and then sliding down it, clutching his brown bag to his chest.
I winced as my wings folded in, disappearing. “Whoops?”
Roth chuckled, back to his human form, as he reached down, taking my hand. I sent the poor man an apologetic look, and then we hurried around the side of the building to the main street. My heart was thumping as we joined the thin crowd on the sidewalks.
“I hope that doesn’t count as exposure,” I said as we crossed the street.
He squeezed my hand. “I really think the Alphas have bigger problems to deal with right now.” Then he shrugged. “And seriously, you should’ve seen the look on the man’s face when he saw me . That was kind of funny.”
I shook my head, but a little grin peeked through. Roth was in a far better mood than he had been immediately after the witches had left with Bambi. Distracting himself with what lay ahead was working for him and it was a strange thing to be grateful for, but I was.
“There it is,” I said, two buildings down from the building housing the Church.
He arched a dark brow as he studied the four-story structure. “Have the windows always been like that?”
I nodded as a door to the building we stood in front of opened. A blast of music and laughter followed the young man out. His aura was a sea-moss green, swirling smoothly as he hunkered down in his jacket, heading in the opposite direction. “Yeah,” I answered. “They’ve always had the windows covered from the inside so you couldn’t see anything. It just adds to the shadiness, doesn’t it?”
He snorted. “Remember the guy who threw holy water on you?”
I rolled my eyes. “Not something I’d forget.”
“I really hope he’s in there.”
“Oh dear,” I murmured.
“You know what I just thought of?”
I looked at him. “What?”
Some of the mischievous sparkle was back in his amber gaze. “I didn’t get to deflower you in my Porsche.”
“Oh my God.” I gaped at him. “What in the world made you think of that right now?”
“It’s called multitasking.” He winked. “And I still plan on breaking that baby in, just so you know.”
“You’re ridiculous.” Slipping my hand free, I started toward the building and the grin I was rocking faded like an old memory as soon as we neared the door. “Do you feel that?”
“Feels like home.”
I ignored that, because I’d been to Hell, and Hell didn’t even feel like this—like a gallon of oil had been dumped over our heads. Walking was like pushing through slime. It was thick in the air, a heavy evil that had to be what the witches had been talking about, and never in my life had I felt anything like this.
Roth edged around me, reaching the handle of the door. “Locked.” He twisted sharply, like he’d done in the basement of the school when we’d been hunting down the source of a very rotten, demonic smell, snapping the lock while hitting it with a dose of not so heavenly heat. “And unlocked.”
The moment he opened the door, the smell about knocked us back a good three feet.
“Oh my God.” I smacked my hand over my mouth, clamping down on my gag reflex as I glanced around the dimly lit lobby.
“Jesus,” muttered Roth, his lips peeling back in a grimace.
The scent was that of meat left out too long mixed with something I couldn’t quite place. Worse than sulfur or a dirty back alley in the city. Carefully, I lowered my hand, trying to not breathe through my nose. If the smell was any indication, things were really, really bad here.
Behind the vacant receptionist desk, there was a huge banner hanging. Crudely drawn Wardens, who looked more like overgrown bats than gargoyles, were on either side of the words THE END IS NIGH.
“So cliché.” Roth started around the desk, toward double, windowless doors. “You’d think they’d come up with something new.”
I followed, disappointed that the smell was getting worse. “But the end is nigh .”
“You—” he glanced over his shoulder at me as he reached the double doors “—are adorable.”
I would’ve smiled at that, but the doors had opened, and all I could do was press my lips together to keep from hurling all over Roth’s back.
Candles were everywhere, casting a flickering, soft light throughout a large atrium-style room that had been converted into a place where sermons would be held, complete with pews and the chancel, a raised platform.
The pews weren’t empty.
They were also the source of the wretched smell.
They were full of bodies.