Chapter 28
DAMIEN
Two Years Ago
She was going to die.
I was the Devil and she was going to die and there was nothing I could do about it.
I tossed my glasses down on my desk with a clatter.
Getting to my feet, I slammed the door to my study, the walls trembling behind me.
It was a blessing – or a curse, depending on who you asked – being able to see the deaths in the future.
At any given time, I could look into my ledger and see the date, time and cause of death for a specific person.
I didn’t do it often. It was enough to see it when I had to look forward to make decisions; why would I need to single out a human for any other reason other than necessity?
I didn’t know what made me look up Stella. I’d told myself I wouldn’t. All it would do was cause trouble for both of us. Besides, she was young. Healthy. Her parents had passed in a freak accident, so reasonably, her debt of death had been paid.
Or so I thought.
Here’s where it got tricky for me. I could see deaths in the future. I could change them. But once they happened, I couldn’t change the past. Ironic, really. All for the sake of the damned Balance. How I loathed that word.
I couldn’t stop my fingers from turning the pages, scanning until I found her name, laid out in black ink.
I expected a death from old age. Something far in the future, so she would be around to torture me for years, a constant reminder that I would not age with her. It almost felt like a failure on my part. But no, there it was, plain as day.
Stella Whittier. DOD 03/04/2024. Car Accident on Highway 80.
I stomped down the stairs, the wood creaking and protesting with every heavy step. Luna took one look at me and turned tail, running the other way. I couldn’t blame her. I would run, too.
‘Fuck!’ I screamed, pulling at my hair. ‘Fuck it all.’
Agatha’s gray head peeked out from the kitchen. ‘D?’
I closed my eyes, gathering every ounce of my restraint to not scream at her. This wasn’t her fault. Wrong place. Wrong time. All that bullshit. The Balance.
‘D, is everything okay?’
I opened my eyes, my sight blurry from anger, and some other emotion I didn’t want to acknowledge. ‘She’s going to die. Soon.’
Agatha chewed on her lip. ‘Isn’t that… a good thing?’
The growl slipped out before I could stop it, and I slammed my fist into the wallpaper. I still couldn’t be angry at Agatha. I knew what she meant. I knew she only meant good. But fuck, did it hurt to think about.
‘Yes. I suppose I’ve been a little distracted.’
Agatha snorted. I glared.
‘You’re lucky Clarissa hasn’t come down here and dragged you back to Hell herself.’
‘It hasn’t been that bad.’ I hesitated.
I’d fucked up on my quote a month ago. Let a soul slip through the month before that. None of this weighed even close to Stella in my mind. Not that I could tell Agatha that.
I hardened my face, tucking those thoughts safely away behind a wall. ‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘Yes, it would be for the best.’
But something must have shattered behind my carefully constructed veil, or Agatha had been with me for long enough she could see through it.
‘D,’ she murmured. ‘Oh, D. What have you gotten yourself into?’
‘Nothing I can fix now,’ I muttered.
Because that was the truth. I was so deeply ingrained into every fiber of Stella’s being that even the very concept of not being able to see her dark hair flowing in the wind, or check in to see what concoction she’d managed to scrounge together for her and Grace for dinner, felt like it would tear the fabric of my world apart.
Because the simple truth, the very heart of the matter was this: there was no realm I wanted to exist in if Stella wasn’t there.
She didn’t even know my name.
I pressed my fingers into my temples. ‘She’s in my book,’ I finally said.
Agatha’s quiet gasp told me she understood exactly what I meant. ‘When?’
This was the part I couldn’t process. The part that didn’t make sense, no matter how I tried to dissect it. ‘Next week.’
‘Shit.’
‘Yeah.’
She blinked. Once. Twice. Twisted her hands into her linen shirt. ‘So fix it.’
I froze. ‘Excuse me?’
When she met my eyes, there was no hesitation in her wise gaze. ‘You heard me.’
‘Oh, I fucking heard you. I’m just not convinced I’m not hallucinating. Haven’t you been trying to get me to forget her this whole time?’
‘I’ve been trying to protect you.’ Agatha tipped her head to the side, giving me a once-over. ‘I thought keeping you safe meant letting her go. I’m beginning to realize it’s the opposite.’
Could she see the threads too? The invisible ones that wove between us, the ones that felt like they kept me afloat of the darkness single-handedly some days?
‘Fix it…’ I repeated.
‘What good is it being evil if you don’t use your power selfishly every once in a while?’
But I was already walking away, hurrying toward my study. I could fix this. I hadn’t let myself consider it before, because Clarissa was nothing if not vengeful, and I wouldn’t ever want to put Stella in her path. But if Stella were dead, there would be no one to protect anyway.
I could fix this. I just had to find something reasonable to replace her with, something Clarissa wouldn’t think twice about.
I slid my glasses back on my nose, and started flipping through my ledgers, the dates appearing one by one.
Near miss of an airplane crash. Way too public.
Death in a pub fight. I sneered, remembering the first time I’d ever touched Stella.
Not big enough. Dates, near misses, names all bled into each other.
So many souls, so many lives, boiled down to nothing more than a few letters on paper.
Was this all life came down to as a human?
Hoping your death meant something large enough to take up space in a newspaper column, front page if you really meant something?
Disgusting. When you thought about it. All that living not to matter.
I wouldn’t let Stella be reduced to such a thing. She’d mean something. She’d matter.
Then I saw it. A break and enter. Supposed to leave no victims. I hesitated.
I’d done worse than this. Sacrificing a few people for the greater good wasn’t a strange concept to me.
Neither was being cold and callous toward death.
Hadn’t I gotten rid of her landlord without a second thought?
But this was different. This was sacrificing people who had no real connection to her other than wrong place, wrong time. This would change everything.
The worst part was I would never have anything to show for it. She’d live her life none the wiser to me interfering. Settle down with some dullard, probably with a high-paying job, who played golf on the weekends, and I’d be here. Watching.
Always watching. Waiting for him to slip up, when I could neatly outline his name and time of death in my book.
At least she’d have a chance, though. A chance at something better than this.
Decision made, with a steady hand, I carefully crossed out the details of the near miss, filling them in as appropriate.
Home invasion. Near miss. No casualties due to a misfired gun.
I’d still have to fix it in the human realm, but it was in the book now. Official.
And now for Stella. With the same steady head, I slowly crossed out the information there.
Stella Whittier. DOD 03/04/2024. Car Accident on Highway 80.
Satisfied, I sat back and admired my work. It’d been a while since I’d saved someone. Then again, it’d been a while since I had someone worth saving.
Now to fix everything in her realm. With a snap of my fingers, I found myself in the home of the would-be break and enterer.
His illegal gun sat on the counter. Idiots.
All of them. Listening before I moved, the house sat silent.
With a whistle, I strolled over to the gun, examining it carefully.
He hadn’t bothered to clean it in who knew how long, which was most likely the source of his troubles later. No matter. That was an easy fix.
Moments later, his gun sat cleaned and ready – not that he deserved it.
Fortunately for him, she did. I nudged the gun back into place, despite the fact he wouldn’t notice. With a sigh, I snapped my fingers once more.
Stella’s warm scent washed over me the moment I landed in her apartment. I didn’t need to listen out for her. I memorized enough of her schedule to know. Thursdays were clinic day for Grace, so they’d be at the hospital. Fuck. I really was a lost cause.
Making it so Stella wouldn’t get into a car accident was trickier than my work with the gun.
I needed to buy her enough time that she’d miss the accident and any fallout all together, but not enough to completely mess with the fabric of time.
The rules of Hell were complex, and rather tedious, but the result was the same.
Keep the Balance. I dragged my finger along her countertop, thinking.
A series of events would be best. A coffee machine that wouldn’t start.
Water that wouldn’t warm up. She never seemed to leave enough time to get ready in the mornings.
I sighed, clucking my tongue as I popped open the back of her coffee maker.
‘Oh, my sweet Stella. Whatever will I do with you?’ I snapped a wire inside the machine, then carefully put it back together.
Stuffing my hands into my pockets, I took my time, touching the walls where she’d put her hands before.
Thankfully, Stella’s apartment was older, and had a separate boiler. I cranked the temperature down, doing my best to not picture her in the shower, running her hands down her smooth body, and I—
Fuck.
It was too much being around her. All I wanted to do was run my hands through her hair, tug it, kiss her until she only remembered me. I was selfish enough to do it, too.
Two out of three accomplished, I eagerly started toward her room. If I hid her cell phone charger, she’d be reliant on her body clock to wake up on time, and we both knew how well that would go.
I was next to her bed, leaning over to detach the small white wire, when the front door flew open with a bang.
‘We go to the clinic every Thursday. Tell me how you forget your insurance card?’ Stella’s voice echoed through the small apartment.
I froze. I could snap my fingers and get out of here, but that would only leave two out of three of my steps complete, and that meant there was a risk it wouldn’t be enough.
No, I had to stay. It had nothing to do with the fact I got to be near Stella.
I threw myself to the floor on the other side of her bed. ‘Fucking hiding under the bed like a child. Do you see the things I do for you?’ Could I have blended in with the shadows? Sure. But something wicked stirred inside me, wanting her to know I was here.
Thankfully, Stella went into Grace’s room, tossing things around. Finally, she called out, ‘Got it!’ I heaved a sigh of relief, hearing her light footsteps trek back down the hall.
I started to haul myself off the floor when Stella’s door creaked open. ‘Hold on, Grace, I just want to change into a cooler shirt while I’m here!’
I tucked myself behind Stella’s bed the best I could, which was difficult considering I could hear her changing on the other side of the bed. As I listened, she paused. Sniffed. ‘Grace? Have you been sneaking cigarettes again?’
‘No?’ Grace called from the front door. ‘You told me they would kill me.’
Stella choked out a laugh. ‘I must be losing it. I thought I smelled smoke in here.’
I grinned, knowing it was me she smelled. Maybe if I was lucky, the smell would linger, haunting her.
Maybe I could… But just as I tried to turn around, a yellow sweater was flung over the bed, the sleeve draping over my face.
Stella’s scent was everywhere, overwhelmingly so.
All of my senses were so alive with this piece of her being so close, I barely noticed the door shutting, and a few moments later, the front door clicking into place.
I waited one minute. Two.
Then I jumped up, snatched the phone charger, and paused.
The yellow sweater sat there. Unassuming. Looking at me. Daring me. Haunting me.
‘I can’t,’ I whispered.
This was a piece of her, a sliver of something that caressed her skin in ways I could only dream. It comforted her in ways I would never have the chance to, while she laid awake at night, wondering if she, too, was deserving of a chance.
This was a small piece of her, but possibly the only part I’d ever be privy to, and yet would never be worthy of. If I wasn’t deserving of holding this flimsy scrap of yellow fabric in my filthy hands merely because it had once been hers, I was delusional to think I’d ever have her.
Not just a piece or a sliver. More than a crumb, left to linger too long on the tip of my tongue, but all of her for eternity. I couldn’t say no to that chance.
And so, charger in one hand, yellow sweater in the other, I snapped my fingers. I hoped it would be enough, for both our sakes.