Chapter 8 #2
“Still, I want to try. Will you at least give me your name?” My voice deepened on the last words as cold numbness washed over me.
He will not answer you.
Wonderful. My demon side had decided to put in an appearance. Demon Betty was always a voice of reason in tense circumstances—not.
Her scoff echoed inside my skull. I am calm and helpful, even if we do not appreciate my help.
“Please back off,” I whispered. “And quit with the numbness. I need to feel things right now. Also, I need my own voice.”
Okay. She sounded pouty.
“Sir, will you please tell me your name?” I called to the hooded man.
Stop interrupting his chant unless we want to die.
“D.B., I’m begging you to not make things worse. We’re in real danger here.”
Yes, and I’m here to save us. Again. I could practically feel her rolling her eyes.
“Are you saying we’re not trapped?”
No, but neither are we free.
Shifting pronouns and pluralities and illogical logic were to be expected in any conversational adventures with my demon side. It broke my brain to think about it too hard, so I tended to just shoulder past anything weird.
“You’re being unhelpful.” I was still whispering but getting louder the more she/I annoyed me/us.
We needn’t fear this place, but we must protect our wolf. This is no place for his kind. Take his hands. Force him to stare into our eyes.
“Why?”
Do it before it’s too late.
“Fine, don’t tell me,” I muttered, but I did as she said. She was me, and we loved this wolf. We wouldn’t ever harm him. “Ronan? I need to talk to you.”
I grabbed his enormous paws, nicking my palm on one claw. Black blood oozed from the wound and ran down my forearm.
“Oh shit. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to— Betty?” He jerked back, his voice heavy with his wolf. “Uh, she’s here.”
“I know,” I said. “Look at my face, okay? I need you to stare into my eyes.”
“Why?” He sounded suspicious. “What are you doing, Demon Betty?”
“It’s still me, Regular Betty.” I’d have used normal instead of regular, but there was nothing normal about this or me. “Listen to my voice. I’m still me.”
“But your face has changed. Your hands have. Your blood is like ink—”
“You’ve trusted me this far. I just need a little more.”
Fur bristled from his face, chest, arms. “How am I supposed to trust you when you look like this here?”
“I don’t think you have a choice.” I softened the words with a stroke of my non-bleeding hand down the side of his face.
“Please. I love you with every cell in my body. If anything happened to you, I’d tear the world apart in retribution.
If you can’t trust a person who loves you like that, who can you trust? ”
“I love you, too.” Fur and claws retracted. He let out a long, shaky breath, and took my hands again. “You know I’d never doubt you. I just had to be sure that you’re you.”
“I’m me.”
Our gazes locked.
His pupils instantly dilated, lids open and unblinking, pasted in place. It was as if he’d been sprayed with water in subzero temperatures. I touched his chest—corpse cold.
Fear gripped me. “What did you do to him?”
Saved his life. Put your arms around him. NOW.
I did, and the chain the hooded man had been twirling broke free and flew through the air, wrapping around Ronan and me with a hollow clink. It squeezed like a snake, until my chest was so close to his our hearts beat in the same rhythm.
It ratcheted, tightening until my lungs compressed, until he and I breathed from a single chest. Until we were the same being. It was the closest we’d ever been. He was inside me, not sexually, but in a soul-deep way that was far more intimate.
The chanting grew louder, and I realized that the chain itself was now chanting, not the hooded man. I craned my neck to see if he was still there, but I couldn’t move.
Sing his song. Do it now.
Without hesitation, I took up the chant, focusing on the rhythm since I didn’t speak the language, didn’t know the words to the spell.
Intention mattered in magic far more than the exact right words, and I felt the objective of this spell in my bones.
It fell out of my mouth in a melody filled with magic, power, and purpose.
That purpose was: Home.
There was a flash, a sensation of movement, and then I was inside the truck with Ronan, a bag of scones, and an iced coffee. The ice was unmelted, the scones were fresh, and Ronan was smiling at Fennel, who was racing to the truck with Cecil on his back.
He loaded my partners into the back seat then started up the truck. The radio was playing “Must Have Got Lost” by The J. Geils Band.
“Hey, you went somewhere on me just now,” he said, “Everything okay?”
“Went somewhere?” I whispered.
“We were talking about the Mellizas, and you just sort of spaced out.”
I took my cell out of my pocket and looked at the time. 1:32 p.m. I checked the time stamp on the text I’d sent to Ida before the women approached us.
1:32 p.m.
“Betty?” Ronan turned in his seat to face me. “You’re so pale. Are you okay?”
Oh nothing, babe, we were just sent to Hell—or Purgatory—by a dangerous agency who wants to see me dead and then a hooded stranger and D.B. saved us from possible eternal damnation—or stagnation?—and now I’m sitting in the cab of your truck wondering if I’m going insane.
“I-I don’t know.” Tears welled in my eyes. One trickled down my cheek, and I lifted my hand to wipe it away.
“What’s wrong? What happened to your hand?
” Ronan unbuckled his seatbelt, opened his glove box, and withdrew a packet of tissues.
He wadded up the entire pack and pressed it to my palm.
“That cut’s deep. If you got it working at the bar, why hasn’t it coagulated?
” There was real panic in him when he looked at the wound.
“No, you didn’t have it then. When could this have happened? ”
I sat there, stunned into silence.
His head cocked to the left, to the floorboard. “Betty?”
“Y-Yeah?”
“Why is there a chain under your feet?”