Infestation (Days of Iron and Clay #2)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER

ONE

PHOENIX

The night was calm and quiet. There was no more screaming. Or demons. Or danger. And yet, I couldn’t get my body to relax.

Samantha was fine—a sleeping-like-the-dead kind of fine. I’d checked on her thirty minutes ago, and she was definitely okay. Her room? That was a mess. Destroyed by an invisible monster—also known as her father. I wasn’t sure how it was possible a demon was her father, but I wanted the chance to find out her whole story.

And I would get that chance. Because if Sam was okay, then I should be okay, too. But I wasn’t.

I wasn’t fucking okay at all .

My heart was still pounding in my chest, and it felt as if my ears were still ringing from the scramble to save Sam.

I was sitting on Sam and Ana’s porch in Sam’s bright red Adirondack chair. It was late—so late that it was almost morning. But my mind just kept spinning. I’d had one insane experience with Sam six years ago, and only reconnected with her yesterday. Today had been…

I didn’t have words for it.

What the hell just happened?

A cold breeze brushed against my face, and I zipped up my hoodie, popping the hood over my head. The Adirondack chair was stiff against my back, and the winter night had a bit of a chill to it, but I wasn’t ready to go inside. Not yet. I needed room to breathe, and I had a feeling Ana—Sam’s mom—needed the same. She was moving around in the kitchen. I could hear pans rattling and soft noises as she made something, but I couldn’t make myself get up to ask if she needed any help. I needed this more. I needed to sit here in the dark for a second listening to the cicadas’ song—with an occasional wolf howl—while sipping on my café con leche .

I wasn’t sure how everything today had shifted so fast from having lunch to crisis mode to severely scary shit. Between demon-dead spirits, Samantha leaving her body to go on a suicidal rescue mission in Hell, and a monster terrorizing her and destroying her room, somehow, I’d ended up saving Sam. I had no idea how any of what happened last night was possible, and that terrified me. I was so out of my depth on this.

And then it hit me. I knew why my thoughts were spiraling so much.

I’d done something that I couldn’t take back—that I didn’t want to take back—but once Sam knew about it, she might wish we’d found another way to save her.

Anxiety knotted in my stomach, and I set my mug down, raking my fingers down my face.

Shit. Yeah. That was why I couldn’t settle.

Eli—Sam’s guardian angel—had been so convincing in the moment. He really made me think that she’d want this bond—for me to anchor her to this world—but man…she’d been unconscious. If anyone did that to one of my sisters without their permission, I would fucking end them.

Had I taken advantage of her somehow?

I rubbed my eyes. What the hell was I going to do now?

I wasn’t taking it back. I couldn’t, even if I wanted to. Which no, it just wasn’t going to happen.

What if I ruined my chance with her, and she hated me? And now, she’d be what? Stuck with me? Or worse, what if she was too polite to tell me to get lost?

Oh shit. I might’ve just fucked up my shot with her entirely.

The knot in my stomach twisted, and the milky coffee suddenly wasn’t sitting well.

I got up from the chair and rested my arms on the porch railing so I could stare up at the moon.

Sam’s friends had left a couple hours ago, and so had all the wolves that had come by to watch me sitting on the porch. I knew other supernaturals lived in the neighborhood, but only the wolves had come to visit. At least as far as I could tell. Around thirty or so had stopped by in wolf form, sometimes alone, sometimes in small groups or pairs, but some of those could’ve been repeats. Telling them apart was tricky, so there was no way to be sure. But it seemed like the whole neighborhood had stopped by to check me out. They’d watched me, howled, and I swore some of them were smiling.

Did werewolves smile?

I huffed at the thought. It was absurd. Maybe they could, but my whole train of thought was nuts. She didn’t have a werewolf boyfriend, so why would they all come check me out? But that was what it seemed like to me. And they honestly should be checking me out. I had tied myself to Samantha…without her permission.

My phone buzzed, and I looked down at it. My agent was calling me. Again.

I sent her to voicemail. She was the last person I wanted to talk to right now, and from the way she kept calling, she knew I’d been lying to her.

I’d been lying to everyone. Her, my coach and teammates, my family.

I kept telling them my knee needed more time, but it was mostly fine. I could go back to playing soccer, but a voice inside my head kept telling me not to go.

I thought back to what Eli had said earlier—the three voices in your head—God’s, mine, and the Enemy’s. Man, I’d never heard anyone say that before, but God had laid out some crazy dominoes in my life with so many twists and turns that all led me right here, right now. When I looked back at it, it blew my mind.

That had to be a sign that this anchor bond thing would be okay. That she’d be okay with it—with me . If I was wrong, I wasn’t sure anything in my life would make sense again because this felt exactly, perfectly right.

I had no idea how long I’d been out on that porch—minutes, hours, I wasn’t sure—but eventually, the sound of a car on the dirt road rose above the other quiet sounds of the night. I could see the shine of headlights entering the small rural neighborhood. The car turned, the brights flicked off, and it eventually slowed down to park next to my car.

The front door creaked, and Ana stepped onto the porch. She looked so much like Samantha. Either Ana had Sam when she was a baby, or the Lopez genes were excellent. Ana looked like she was in her early thirties with no wrinkles in sight, but Sam was twenty-three. So, there was no way that was possible.

Ana wore an oversized, flowing shirt with the front tucked into wide-legged jeans. Her hair was up in a messy bun, and she wiped her hands on the dishtowel that hung over her shoulder as she came to stand by my chair.

“It’s past midnight. Who is that—” Ana broke off, and I figured she must’ve recognized the car.

A second later, I realized who it was. Frank.

“Did you call him?” Ana asked.

“No.” The thought never even crossed my mind.

Samantha said Frank was her mentor, but I wasn’t sure that was true. From how they interacted yesterday, they were more than coworkers or friends. They treated each other like family.

“I didn’t call him either.” She blew out a breath. “And I really should’ve. He’s going to be so pissed.”

I didn’t know Frank well enough to guess, but I knew I would’ve been pissed if no one had called me, even though I had no right, no stake, no claim on her life.

Except, I did now. That was something I’d need to get used to.

“Yep.” Ana wrung the towel in her hands as she stared at him through his windshield. “Really pissed.”

Everything had happened so fast, I wasn’t sure how anyone would’ve been able to think of calling Frank. One second, we’d been eating. The next, Gabe—Sam’s demon-dead friend—was back. Everyone scrambled to get that other fey guy back from Hell. No one stopped long enough to think it through or talk about what might happen. At least not in any way that I understood.

Frank got out of the car. His priest collar was unbuttoned and hanging open. His short, dark hair had small flecks of gray peeking through, as did his beard, but he hadn’t seemed old to me when I met him yesterday. Tonight, he did. From the way his shoulders hunched and how he moved slowly toward the porch steps, Frank must’ve had a bad night, too.

“What are you doing here?” Ana said. “You know the deer on the road get bad after dark and?—”

“Stop. Ana. Please . Everything has gone wrong tonight.” Frank held a prayer rope in his hand, his fingers moving over the knots as he spoke. “It’s been a long night…and I’m exhausted. I got in the car, driving on autopilot, and I was already halfway here when I realized where I was going. I swear I meant to drive home, but God had other plans for me tonight.” Suddenly, everything shifted in his demeanor. His shoulders straightened, and some of the exhaustion faded away before my eyes. “Why are you still here?” he asked me. “And where’s Samantha?” His voice was calm, clear, and had just a hint of an edge to it.

“Sleeping.” Ana looked about as exhausted as I felt. “She’s fine now.”

“But she wasn’t fine?” His voice rose—in fear, panic, anger, or maybe all three.

The front door opened, and Eli stepped out. “Don’t wake her, priest.” The angel looked more California bro than anything I considered angelic. His wavy blond hair brushed his shoulders, and he wore faded, torn jeans, a white button-down, and his feet were bare. But I’d seen his other form—the one with the wings, glowing armor, and a sword made of fire. That version was as far from a California bro as someone could get.

I didn’t ever want to get on Eli’s bad side.

Eli turned to me. “That’s for the best.”

And he could read my mind. Why did I keep forgetting that?

“I don’t know. You’d think it would be memorable.”

“Agreed.” I shook my head. “But it’s been a long couple of days.”

Eli grunted and sat in one of the Adirondak chairs. Ana met Frank on the porch steps and quietly filled him in on our day that had bled into the night. About how Sam had left her body to go to Hell. How she’d saved Van, a fey warrior, but then got trapped there. How I had somehow pulled her back to her body, linking myself to her forever.

“Potentially forever,” Eli said.

I should’ve been afraid, but I didn’t think he’d kill me.

I hoped he wouldn’t.

Actually, I should be clear with him. “I’d rather you not kill me.” He’d said that anchoring her to me—some kind of supernatural bond that I sealed with a kiss—was permanent. But then he said he’d find a way to break it if she didn’t want it or if I changed my mind. He wasn’t lying when he said it was permanent, but both couldn’t be true.

Eli’s grin sent chills down my spine. “See,” he said. “You’re not just a pretty face.”

I huffed a soft laugh. He said that as if killing me wasn’t a big deal to him, and maybe it wouldn’t be. “So, am I right?”

“I’ve spent a long time bending rules, and I’ve found that there are many ways around things, even ones that seem a hard and fast law. I wouldn’t punish you for the choice you made—so, no. I won’t kill you. But if you choose to go back on your word, I’d question my judgement for a while.” Eli shrugged. “It will work out.”

That was why I wasn’t afraid of Eli. Even if he did test me, deep down, I knew he was on my side.

And yet, he sounded completely sure that everything would work out while I’d been sitting out here stewing. “How do you know?”

He looked at me if he could see right through me. With his eyes bright blue and a hint of a glowing aura around him, it was as if he really could see me, my past, my future, and all the time in between.

“Not exactly, but close,” Eli said. “It helps when you can see a person’s soul and glance inside their head. I’ve also lived long enough enough to make accurate predictions. I don’t have any form of precognition, but I guess you could call it divine intuition.”

“Alright.” I was glad he was so sure. Not because I was rethinking things—I wasn’t going back on my decision—but because I wasn’t sure how Sam would feel.

I wanted Sam. I wanted to be there for her, to fight with and for her, and nothing was going to change my mind. But Sam might need some convincing.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I pulled it out. My agent was calling. Again . If I kept sending her to voicemail, she’d just keep calling.

I opened up our text chain. I’ll get back to you when I can, but something’s come up. I’ll be a little MIA for the next few days.

The three dots telling me that she was typing back popped up almost instantly, but I didn’t have it in me to text with her right now. I was money for her, which meant she could be aggressive and pushy. In her mind, you could never make enough money. But at this point, my money was making money. I would have to try really hard to spend it all. So, I didn’t need to do anything else in terms of work. Years of endless workouts and practices and games had given me what I always wanted. Freedom .

Frank and Ana came up the porch stairs. “I hear a thank you is in order,” Frank said to me.

“It’s not.” I didn’t want a thank you. Helping Sam was something that I’d wanted to do. “But I want a chance to tell her what happened. Everyone agreed not to tell her about it until I talk to her. Which I will do soon. I just…” I let out a breath to think through what I was going to say. “So, if you could keep it to yourself…”

For years, I’d daydreamed about what I’d do if I ever ran into Sam again, but I never planned on moving this fast with her. I hadn’t even gotten to take her out on a date, and I had a feeling she was dye for a good version of one of those. It sounded like she’d had enough bad ones to last a lifetime.

Maybe if I took her out on a good first date. Get her in a good mood. Something to help ease the potential sting of?—

“Potential sting? If you’re thinking that way, then she’s definitely going to freak out,” Eli said.

Not having my thoughts to myself was extremely unpleasant.

“Well, then, I guess I won’t help you.”

“I didn’t ask for help,” I muttered.

Frank studied me for a second. “I won’t say anything, but I won’t keep anything from her either. I won’t lie to cover anything up.”

“I’m not asking for that. She just needs some rest, and then I’ll tell her.”

Frank pressed his lips together as he studied me. I had a moment of panic that he was going to go straight to Sam and spill everything, but then, he nodded. “Alright. I’ll warn you not to take too long. Honesty is?—”

A scream broke through the night, and suddenly, Eli was gone.

“Sam,” I whispered before I took off running.

I raced into the house, up the stairs, and found her writhing in her bed, tangled in the sheets, screaming as fire encircled her body.

Holy shit.

Eli was beside her, wings out and glowing, watching but not touching her. “Don’t worry. She’s okay. It’s not hurting her. The screaming is from the nightmare, not physical pain,” he said to me without looking away from her. “The fire won’t hurt you, either. It’s part of her subconscious defense—a supernatural fire that she keeps contained. She never lets it out, even when in a fight. She sees it as too much of a link to her father and thinks that if she were to use the fire inside her, it would be a slippery slope to becoming like him.”

“Is that true?” I didn’t see how it could be. Samantha was good . She wouldn’t turn into the thing that ripped apart her room.

Eli shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. It would be up to her.”

That was one hell of a non-answer. “But I can see the fire?” That didn’t make sense, unless there was something I was missing.

“Everyone can when she presents it this way, but she only does this when she’s really and truly exhausted.” The angel actually looked sad as he watched Sam. “It’s the lingering nightmares that really do her in.” His voice was soft and filled with pain, as if watching her suffer like this broke his heart. From his tone and what he’d said, this wasn’t his first time seeing her like this.

Once was enough for me. I’d do anything I could to keep her from nightmares that consumed her like this.

Frank and Ana came through the door looking worried but not panicked. They stayed back. Even her mom, which surprised me, but I was grateful for it. I was feeling territorial, which was new. I wasn’t usually a jealous person, and being jealous of Sam’s mom or Frank was excessive, but I was. I was even jealous of Eli, which yeah, okay, that made more sense. He was powerful and knew everything about Sam and the world she fought in, and I was new. So new. But I wanted to be the one to help her. It was a deep-seated need in my soul that I couldn’t explain and didn’t have the bandwidth to figure out right now.

I forced myself to stay calm and study her. She was still screaming and writhing in the fire that engulfed her, yet somehow Eli was right. It wasn’t hurting her. Her skin and clothes were fine, as was the bed.

“Samantha. Wake up.” Ana’s voice was firm, loud, but Sam didn’t rouse. I wasn’t even sure Sam could hear anything other than the screams and whatever nightmare she was living in.

Eli stood guard over Sam, watching her while Frank and Ana discussed what had worked in the past and how to safely wake her so she didn’t attack whoever woke her.

Sam kept screaming, her body thrashing under the sheets, and I knew I had to do something. My hands itched to shake her awake, but I wasn’t sure if that was a good idea. I had no clue what to do. She needed help. That much I could see for myself.

“Exactly. She needs to wake up.” Eli looked at me then. His blue eyes had flames in them. “So, wake her up.”

He’d said it so plainly that I knew it had to be a trick. I hadn’t been around the angel very much, but I knew enough to figure that out. “How do you mean?” For a normal person, I would just go shake her awake. But from the emphasis Eli had put on his words, I had a feeling he meant something entirely different. “I can’t wake her up by shaking her, can I?”

“No. She won’t wake like a normal mortal would right now. She’s in too deep, but in this case, it’ll be helpful for you.”

“This is helpful?” How could he say that? She was suffering.

“Because it gives you a chance to practice being her anchor. Call her to you.”

Call her to me? Great. Easy. No problem. “How the hell do I do that?” Fire covered every inch of her body. I knew it wasn’t real and wouldn’t burn me because it wasn’t burning the bed. But two feet away from the edge of the bed, it was hot .

“Call her. Use the anchor bond. Do it. Do it right now .” From the way he said it, I knew this was a prove-it moment.

Okay. Fine. I’d figure it out.

I stepped toward the bed and prayed I was doing the right thing.