…for your own protection, Mom’s letter had read.
I squeezed my eyes shut to the whispers and laughter and tried to get comfortable on the lumpy, urine-soaked mattress.
What the Hell was going on back home?
5
I’d just fallen asleep when someone began shaking me awake. With a grunt, I rolled over onto my back. “Go away, Mauve.”
“Mauve?” an unfamiliar voice said. “Girl, get your ass up.”
I froze, hoping that yesterday had been a nightmare. Taking in a deep breath, I opened my eyes. A pretty, smooth, dark face filled my vision. She had large lips that were painted deep purple, and her hair swept across her forehead and knotted at the back of her neck in a stylish do.
I frowned. “Are you a new handmaiden?”
She blinked, and then scowled. “You best not fail your drug test. Now get up!” She snatched the thin sheet from over me.
Slowly, I sat up, blinking and surveying the room. I was still here. Wherever here was. Wonderful.
“Drug test?” I asked, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.
“Yes, Miss Molly says you were acting strange last night.”
Ah, that must’ve been Femstache.
The woman shoved a small plastic cup into my hands. “Let’s get this over with.” She grabbed a pile of clothing and toiletries that were piled in a yellow plastic chair at my bedside, then started across the room.
When I made no move to follow, she turned and gave me a come-hither-or-else look with her dark eyes. “Now.”
Sighing, I stood and made my way over to her. “Can I at least have your name?”
Her eyebrows furrowed. “Girl.” She reached out and placed a hand on my forehead. “Please tell me you ain’t on that shit.” She shifted her arm away from my clothes to reveal a clipboard clutched to her chest. Across the back, Nadine was sketched in thick, black writing.
I tilted my head to the side. “No, I… Of course I’m not. Not on that shit.”
She eyed me up and down. “Good, then stop playing and come on.”
Nadine was a shorter woman, but she took rapid steps, so it was hard to keep up with her. She also had unusually good posture. Like Mauve. I winced as a sense of homesickness pulled at my throat.
“I’ll definitely stop playing, Nadine,” I choked out.
She stopped before the double doors and lifted an eyebrow.
“Mrs. Nadine?” I asked, toying with the plastic cup.
She pursed her lips. “Mrs. Crenshaw. Same as it’s always been.” She pushed open the door. “Let’s go. I don’t have time to babysit you all morning.”
I nodded. “Of course.”
Fluorescent lights flickered above my head in the hallway. I trailed Mrs. Crenshaw left and to a door with Women stamped on the front. Inside, little checked tiles in lime green and neon pink decorated the walls. A line of bathroom stalls with bright pink doors sat opposite a line of shower stalls with bright green curtains.
“Whoa.” I frowned. “It’s like... It’s…”
Mrs. Crenshaw actually chuckled as she dumped my pile of clothes on a bench halving the room. “It’s loud is what it is. If you ask me, getting that middle school group to decorate in here… Not Miss Molly’s best move.”
“It’s an eyeball assault,” I agreed.
She went to the end of the bathroom stalls and opened the handicap one, nodding me inside.
I squeezed the bottom of the plastic cup and then went inside with a gulp. Mrs. Crenshaw followed me in and shut the door behind her.
Was this some new human tradition no one told me about? Group peeing? That wasn’t a tradition I didn’t think I could get behind.
“Uh…what are you doing?” I asked.
She raised her gaze from whatever she was writing on her clipboard. “Waiting too long for you to drop that pee. Everyone has to go when they wake up.” She pointed at the cup.
She couldn’t possibly mean… “You want me to…go in this cup? With you?” I waved the cup in the air. “In here?”
She sighed and closed her eyes. “Girl, what is wrong with you? How many times have we done this? You have to get ready for kitchen duty.”
“I’ve never… I mean I can’t go with you watching.”
“You got fake pee on you?” She squatted in front of me and ran her hands up and down my pant legs.
“What? No?” I tried to shake her off, but she was as strong as she looked.
She pushed to her feet and put her nose right in my face. “Tell me you’re not using.”
I threw my hands up. “I’m not using!” The hard look she gave me made me feel guilty anyway.
She smoothed back her hair. “Look, I don’t like it any more than you do. But you know the rules. You know I have to supervise.”
I blew out a breath. “Okay, but can you at least turn around?”
She eyed me up and down again before huffing and turning to face the door.
“Thanks.”
“Mm-hm.” She glanced at her watch.
I stood there for several seconds, hopping from foot to foot. I really did have to go. Finally, when I couldn’t hold it anymore, I unscrewed the white cap on the cup and placed it on the lid of the silver trashcan mounted to the wall. Then I pulled down my…khaki cargoes…and squatted over the toilet. Closing my eyes, I placed the cup underneath me. At first, nothing happened, but then my relief tinkled against the plastic.
My face heated. I couldn’t remember ever feeling this humiliated. It made my skin crawl.
When I was finished, I screwed the top back on my cup of urine, flushed, and stood up. Mrs. Crenshaw reached into her pocket, snapped on a pair of blue latex gloves, and took the cup from me, her face a mask of no nonsense.
“Don’t be late for kitchen duty.” With that, she hurried from the stall.
Breathing deeply, I took a few moments to gather myself, grabbed my pile of clothes from the bench, and turned on the hot water in one of the showers. If I wasn’t depressed about the whole going in a cup thing, I was definitely depressed after browsing through my clothes. More khaki cargoes and some tacky T-shirt with bug-eyed kittens on it with their tails shaped into hearts. Not to mention a pair of plastic shower shoes with duct tape wrapped around them. I would’ve rather suffered flesh-eating foot fungus than clomp around in those.
After a quick shower, I put my hair into a wet bun while still in the stall. The bathroom door opened and shut, and footsteps slapped against the tiles. A few voices muttered things I couldn’t hear. Showers turned on. Toilets flushed.
I dashed out of my stall, ducked my head, and rushed out of the bathroom before anyone could say anything to me. And almost ran smack into Mrs. Crenshaw.
She narrowed her dark eyes and held out a stained, black apron and a stretched-out hairnet. “I decided to escort you to the kitchen to make sure you don’t bail since that’s your habit.”
I held the garments between two fingers and wrinkled my nose. “Thanks?”
She shook her head. “Since when are you such a princess?”
“Oh, for about sixteen years up until yesterday.”
“Good one.” She started back down the hall with a snort.
Sunlight streamed in through the box windows, illuminating the cartoonish art on the walls and the numerous affirmation posters, like Who’s Awesome? You’re Awesome! and Carpe Throat! Chuckling, I skidded to a stop in front of that one. Someone had made friends with a magic marker, it seemed.
Mrs. Crenshaw stopped outside yet another set of double doors.
“Well?”
“Well… Oh!” I rushed to tie the apron around my waist and fumbled to strap the net around my hair.
With her mouth thinned into a flat line, she opened one of the doors. Heat and unpleasant smells rushed at me, making my eyes water. Bodies dashed all across the industrial style kitchen. Everything was silver shelves and polished surfaces.
A petite woman with big brown eyes and ringlets approached.
“You know Cecilia
,” Mrs. Crenshaw said.
Nope. I forced a smile. “Sure do.”
“Hello, Kasey,” Cecilia said. “You want to come with me?”
As I followed her to a row of ovens, Mrs. Crenshaw called, “And no skipping class today!”
I turned and gave her an overly enthusiastic thumbs-up. Classes too? This place was a thousand times worse than Hell. My school work back home consisted of inhaling history and demonology books, possibly a few Hollywood gossip magazines, and the occasional physical training with Mauve, no actual school required.
I spent the rest of the morning making biscuits. By the time I was done, my hands ached and my whole body felt....moist. Not my favorite word. Not my favorite feeling. Then I had to stand in line with the other ladies, serving the residents of Miss Molly’s School for Troubled Teens. Maybe the last stop before jail for some of them.
Way to keep me safe, Mom.
I wound up eating outside by a dumpster with a view of a cracked basketball court just to avoid being around the other girls. As I lifted my milk carton to my mouth, a shadow blocked the persistent glare of the sun.
“Is that you, Kiera Morningstar?” a smooth voice asked from the front of the dumpster.
I peered up at the sound of my real name and almost spilled my milk all over the pavement. A set of massive, white-feathered wings spread out behind a tall figure. My pulse crashed into a rioting beat as the Chancellor of Heaven himself gazed down upon me with cosmic blue eyes.
I blinked. “M—Metatron?”
6
Metatron smiled and it was the first actual smile I’d seen in...well, pretty much forever. Up until that point, everyone had been doing it wrong. Sure, I’d met angels before, but it had been a while since I’d been this near one who worked so closely with my grandparents.
“How are you doing, Kiera?”
His eyebrows were impossibly dark, and his inky, long hair was pulled into a ponytail behind his head. He wore a tailored suit and looked so out of place it kind of hurt to keep staring at him. So instead, I gazed down at my duct-taped boots, feeling rather unworthy.
“Kiera?”
A swarm of nerves struck my stomach. I shook myself and met his gaze. “Yes… Um, yes, I’m great. Dandy, really. You?”
He strolled closer, his feathery wings grazing the side of the dumpster, his perfect mouth tilted in a frown. “What are you doing here, so far from home?”
I pursed my lips. He had to be messing with me. “You haven’t heard?”
His frown deepened. “I’ve heard a lot of things lately. I’m afraid you’ll have to narrow it down.”
I sank into the brick wall behind me. “I’ve been banished for not collecting a soul…”
He quirked a dark eyebrow. “You don’t sound so sure.”
“It’s because I’m pretty sure there’s more to it than that.”
He inched toward me, his shiny black shoes silent on the concrete, shaking his head. “It is baffling.”
“What is?”
“That you would be punished for doing something good. That girl you saved? She’s thriving. And no one had to lose a soul. I don’t see what’s so wrong about that.”
“Well, in your eyes, of course it’s good.” In mine, too. It was good to hear the little girl was doing well. I gazed at him for a long moment for no other reason than angels were sure nice to look at. “Why are you here? And speaking of here, where is here?”
He smiled. Even his blue eyes smiled. I sighed up at him, realizing I was totally girling out on him and not caring one bit. He was probably at least in his early twenties, and way on the other side of the so-called tracks.
“Tennessee,” he said. “Small little hole in the world called Jonesborough. And I might be here for the same reason you are.”
“Yeah, sure.” I snorted. “Since when do angels get themselves banished?” Oh, right. Since the very beginning. I’d followed that trail like a kid on a candy path that led straight into a windowless van. Mom never told me exactly what happened between her and my grandparents that had resulted in her own banishment. “Pretend I didn’t say that.”
He threw back his head and laughed, and it sounded like a dozen harps serenading me and my friend the dumpster. “Don’t worry. I won’t. I meant I’m here to follow up on something.”
“That’s not vague at all,” I said.
His expression hardened as he looked at the basketball court, giving his whole face a seriously dangerous vibe. “Something is…wrong. Out of balance somehow.” His blue eyes took me in. “Maybe it’s the same reason you’re here.”
What if it was? Mom had put me here for my protection, so whatever the big bad was, it must be pretty epic to bring an angel here, too. But why not just leave me in Hell?
“Anyway, your grandparents asked me to check up on you, and imagine my surprise when I found you here outside this fine establishment.” He shrugged apologetically, and the casual gesture didn’t fit him. “Their offer still stands, by the way.”
Yeah, yeah. Apparently my grandparents weren’t too keen on the idea of me taking the throne from my mom. Maybe they secretly knew I wasn’t cut out for it, but whatever the reason, they wanted me to come live with them. In Heaven, without all the soul collecting. What do you say in response to something like that? It all sounded like the plot of the Godfather movie with the character Michael Corleone as the reluctant heir to the family business. Ha, the Godfather? I chuckled at my own joke.
But yeah. I mean no. Besides, I wasn’t about to give up my throne even if I didn’t want it. I couldn’t disappoint Mom like that.
“Metatron, I’m going to turn down that offer, as I always do, with a quote you told me about eight months ago when I left a Nest theater for more popcorn so Mom could punish a pair of soul sacks who wouldn’t stop talking during the movie. Ready?”
He crossed his beefy arms, a wide, expectant grin on his face.
“Here goes.” I cleared my throat. “‘Everyone always asks, ‘Why didn’t you save me? Why do bad things happen? Borefest, 2009.’” I pointed at him. “Your words. You also said, ‘More exciting questions are: How do I survive this? How do I stay me despite it? For these questions, the answers are always different.’”
He shook his head and rolled his eyes Heavenward. “Sounds like a cop out.”
“You said it, buck-o.” I flung my empty milk carton into the dumpster and scored. “Mom seems to want to change me by sending me here. My grandparents want to change me by taking me to live in Heaven.” I dragged myself to my feet, somehow feeling even smaller compared to him than when I was sitting. “How do I stay me despite all that?”
“I’m afraid you got me there. Now I know who to go to for philosophical discussions.” He winked. “Myself.”
I chuckled.
He snapped his fingers, and a white wall of blazing light materialized behind him. “You’ll be okay, Kiera?”
I threw my arm across my face as if the light burned. “Will you?”
He blocked the glare with one of his wings and cast me in a darker shadow. “You don’t have to worry about me.” With a finger wave, he stepped through, and the wall vanished.
I blinked after him. Without him here, I felt oddly alone, even more so than before he’d arrived. Maybe because I knew him, because he was familiar, but this place… It was anything but.
When I turned around to head back inside, I leaped back. The outline of angel wings bracketed the metal door as if the Heavenly light he’d walked into had singed through his feathers, marking the building with religious imagery, and he didn’t even have to burn any toast. Or it could’ve been a sign of protection against…whatever I needed to be protected from. I had a feeling Metatron knew more than he’d let on.
With a deep sigh, I trudged inside. The halls were deserted. I wandered back to my bed and went through the rest of my stuff. Other than the rhinestones and cats—and yes, even rhinestoned cats—there was also tons of black eyeliner, duct tape, a roll of dollar bill
s, and books. Chemistry. History. Dog-eared paperbacks featuring men with flowing hair and women that were popping out of their dresses. I had bad taste in pretty much all the things.
“Whatcha doing, Red?”
I yelped and jumped. Seated on the bed next to mine was a guy with short dark hair, olive skin, a Cheeto crumb-streaked button-up shirt, and a smirk that tried a little too hard to be charming.
“Dante’s Inferno!” I huffed.
His face blanked. “Huh?”
“You scared me.”
“My bad.” He grinned. “Skipping class again?”
“Oh, uh.” Talking to people I didn’t know, who happened to know me, was going to get old fast. “Guess we both had the same plan.”
“Great minds,” he said, tapping his temple with a crusty orange finger.
Yuck. The fake cheese smell seemed to ooze from his pores.
“So. What are you doing in the girls’ dorm?” I cleared my throat. “Do you come here often or…?”
“Looking for you. After I made sure Mrs. Crenshaw was far away, of course.” He winked, but it had nowhere near the effect as Metatron’s. “I think you’ve been dodging me.”
I shrugged. “It’s possible.”
He finger-gunned me. “Good one.”
“What are you guys doing?” a small voice asked.
I lifted my gaze to find the little girl who told me my bed had been peed in last night coming toward us. Without blankets covering her, she somehow seemed even smaller. Of course, her oversize, tan knit cap swallowed half her body.
“Just hanging, El,” the guy said.
She batted her thick eyelashes at him. “Don’t call me that, Michael.” Her gray gaze swept to me. “You really shouldn’t be skipping class today. Crotch rot is a public health issue.”
My jaw dropped. Crotch rot? Elia might’ve been around thirteen years old, but it was hard to tell with the way she spoke. I blinked at her before deciding it was safer to focus on the first half of what she’d said. I turned to Michael, who was laughing and shaking his head.
“Michael.” I pointed. “As in Mikey?”
Daring the Devil (Reigning Hell Book 1) Page 4