Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
SAMARA
Ilanded in the bathroom with one foot in a toilet.
My heart was beating so uncontrollably that I couldn’t breathe. I hadn’t wanted to go, but Amari had mouthed for me to run and shook his head when I moved from behind the tree.
Had they taken his arm?
I pulled my foot out of the water and shook it off, thankful for waterproof boots. Still, it was gross, and as soon as things settled down, they were getting a good wash. Or the fire.
Tucking the feather I’d used into the inner pocket of my jacket, I went to the sink and took several deep breaths. I didn’t know how long I needed to stay before it was safe to return.
If I went back too soon, they’d capture me too.
I turned on the faucet and stared at the water running out of it. I’d seen nothing like it before. I scooped some into my hands and then let it go.
It was clear, but it smelled like an apothecary had dumped his strongest, worst elixirs into it. Inferna’s water might have been red, but it didn’t smell.
My hands were wet, and I looked around for a stack of drying cloths. The only thing I could find was a small bit of paper hanging out of the bottom of a box. I pulled on it, and it made a sound like a possessed demon, spitting out more paper.
“Ah!” I jumped back, nearly running into the toilet. “That was completely unnecessary!”
I grabbed the paper and tore it free with perhaps more force than necessary because the box let out another shriek and vomited out more paper in retaliation.
“Seriously?” I hissed at it, shaking my head. “You couldn’t let me dry my hands in peace? No need to scream at me.”
The thing offered no apology, apparently content with terrorizing anyone who dared need a cloth.
I dried my hands, keeping my eye on the box. “You’re lucky I didn’t stab you.”
The bathroom door opened, and a man poked his head in. “Oh, I’m sorry.” He was about to shut the door again when he stopped and cocked his head.
Instead of leaving, he walked in and shut the door behind him, locking it.
I reached for my waistband and pulled out my knife, holding it in front of me. He raised an eyebrow and then put up his hands.
“I’m not going to hurt you.” His voice was melodic and made me shiver, and not from fear. “I can sense you.”
I backed up, and my ass hit the sink. Water seeped through my pants. Great. I had gross water on me.
“What do you mean, you can sense me?” I narrowed my eyes, assessing him.
He was about four inches taller than me, which meant he was about six feet. It was nice not having to look up for once—Nico, Val, and Amari all topped six feet by a few inches.
Unfortunately, the man wasn’t bad on the eyes either. He had blond hair that was tousled as if he had just rolled out of bed and had three days’ worth of scruff on his face. If he hadn’t intruded on my safe space and locked the door, I would have considered him hot.
And if he hadn’t opened his mouth.
“Who are you?”
I tightened my grip on my knife. “You’re asking me who I am? You’re the asshole who locked himself in the bathroom with me!”
“You didn’t lock the door.” He crossed his arms over his chest, the gesture making him look like he owned the place. Owning a bathroom suited him.
My jaw tightened so hard the muscle in my cheek twitched. The comment grated on my nerves. As if that were the problem here and the locked door was what I should worry about.
My grip on the knife didn’t waver, but there was a slight tremor in my forearm from holding tension too long. The light above us buzzed like a bug, casting harsh shadows across his face, making him look even more smug.
No, I hadn’t locked the door. I’d been too busy dealing with a shrieking paper demon and worrying about Amari, who had been about to be mutilated, and Val, who would probably get himself killed.
The idea of locking the bathroom door had been so far down my list of priorities that it hadn’t registered.
“And you didn’t knock. Are there people on the other side of the door?”
An amused expression crossed his face. “How’d you get in the bathroom? You had to have walked through the coffee shop.”
“I had to pee so bad that I wasn’t paying attention.”
If I screamed, would anyone hear me? The door he had come through appeared to be thick wood.
“Are you on something?” His eyes narrowed again as he took a step toward me.
I was going to have to stab this guy. “Get out, or I’ll scream.”
He laughed but backed up a step. “How about this… tell me your name and why you’re registering as an angel.”
He looked me up and down, and his eyes stopped on my breasts.
“Seriously?” I pulled my jacket closed.
He nodded at my breasts. “What are you carrying?”
Apparently, he hadn’t been looking at my breasts. “My bag.”
“What’s in it?” He stepped forward, and before I could scream or stab him, he had my wrists pinned to the wall and a hand over my mouth. “Now why would a sweet woman like you be carrying angel feathers around?”
My eyes widened, and I screamed, but it came out muffled. I tried to bite him, but I could barely graze my teeth on his palm.
He pressed me to the wall so I couldn’t move, and the knife dropped to the floor. My attempts at kneeing him were futile. Whoever he was, he was well trained in the art of stopping a kick to the balls.
“I’m going to take my hand off your mouth, and you’re going to tell me why you have Oliver’s feathers in your possession. Do you understand?” His friendly voice was gone and had been replaced by something low and dangerous.
Who the fuck was Oliver, and how did this guy know I had angel feathers? I nodded, and he removed his hand.
“You fucker!” I spat on him because it was currently my only line of defense.
He lifted a shoulder to wipe his cheek, never losing his grip on me. “Answer the question.” His face was red, and a vein appeared on his forehead.
“I found them.”
“Where?” A muscle beneath his eye jumped.
“On the ground?” If he was expecting me to tell him on the floor of a cell in the castle’s dungeon in Inferna, well, he wasn’t getting that.
“Fuck this.” He kicked the knife across the bathroom and let me go.
He backed up, his eyes never leaving me as he pulled something rectangular out of his pocket, pressed something, and then held it to his ear. There was a faint sound coming from it before he spoke.
“It’s Raphael. Where did Oliver lose his feathers?… I have some chick here who has a bag full of them.”
I stayed pressed against the wall. I wouldn’t be quick enough to get into my jacket pocket for the one I’d stashed there.
“Inferna? And none of you idiots thought to mention that he left them behind?... There’s blood on the feathers!… No, I will not calm the fuck down… Reve, do you have any fucking clue—”
“Reve? Reve’s my brother!” My heart was nearly in my throat. Was my brother inside the rectangle? Did this man, Raphael, shrink my brother and lock him in the tiny box?
Raphael held the rectangle away from his ear, and muffled words came from it. When the words stopped, he put it to his ear again.
“Would you like to talk to her now that you have that out of your system?… I’ll put her on speakerphone. I don’t trust that you aren’t planning on taking over Earth.” He held the rectangle. “Talk.”
“Sammy?”
I had to press myself against the wall to keep from collapsing at the sound of Reve’s voice. “Reve?” I looked at the rectangle and then at Raphael. He was watching me closely. “What is this? Who is this guy? Did he trap you in there?”
Raphael laughed, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “His ego is so big I’d need something bigger, sweetheart.”
“Fuck you, Raph. Sammy, we’re on a communication device called a cell phone. It’s not an actual cell… although many people use them so much they might as well be.”
I did not understand a word he was saying. “Where are you? Who is this asshole?”
“The asshole is an archangel.” Reve let out a long sigh. He sounded exhausted. “What are you doing on Earth? How did you get here?”
Raphael looked at the ceiling in frustration. “I told you. Ollie’s feathers.”
“But the only place he would have lost them…” Reve sucked in a sharp breath. “Samara, what were you doing in the dungeon?”
I bit my lip.
Don’t cry. Don’t cry.
Tears spilled onto my cheeks despite my efforts to stop them. “Everything is fucked up. A whole demon village is missing, a council member is missing, vacants are acting crazy, and the entire council minus Val voted to make me pay for you deserting the crown.”
“Fuck.” I could picture him running a hand down his face. “I’ll come back there with you.”
“And you’ll retake the throne?” I couldn’t keep the hope out of my voice. If he did, then all of this would be over.
“No.” Reve’s refusal landed hard, and something in me went cold.
“You can’t be serious. You have to fix this.” I wanted to scream at him and tell him Inferna was in this mess because of him, but that wasn’t fair. If he’d been strong enough on his own to overthrow Lilith, he would have.
“Sammy, I renounced the crown. There’s no coming back from that. It changes the alpha magic.” Reve’s sigh crackled through the little box. “And besides that, I’ve been on Earth for too long, and my magic is weak by Inferna standards now. I’m not... I’m not the alpha anymore.”
I opened my mouth to ask what the hell that meant—because that phrase made absolutely zero sense to me—but Raphael cut in.
“I’ll go to Inferna with her.”
I turned to stare at the archangel. “You’ll what?”
Raphael’s jaw was set, and determination flickered across his face. “I’ll protect you from having your head put on a spike.”
“Raph—” Reve started.
“Don’t ‘Raph’ me.” Raphael pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re not exactly in a position to stop me, demon.”
My hand drifted to the feather tucked in my pocket. “I don’t need your protection. I have plenty of it already.”
“Oh, and where is this protection you speak of?” He glanced at the knife on the floor. “If it comes down to it, I can get you to Earth faster than your stash of feathers can.”