by J. E. Taylor
I scanned the area once more and sucked in a large breath. I met Alex’s gaze and smiled. “Here goes nothing.”
I opened my hand, and pure white light filled the room, wiping all traces of human occupancy away, along with the makeshift throne and anything that could be traced back to Alex, or Grace, or Bridget, or Tom, or Gabriel or Naomi. When I closed my fist, all that swirled on the air was white dust.
I hoped it was enough.
Alex squeezed my hand and then put his arm back around me as we climbed our way out of the dilapidated asylum and into the clean air of the New York countryside.
Nick was leaning against the brick a few feet away, and when he saw us, he straightened.
“Have you been here the whole time?” The thought that Death was lingering about really set my teeth on edge.
“No. I came when you used the blade.” He held his hand out.
“Did you know where he was this whole time?” I couldn’t help the escalating anger. If Death knew where to find Alex and didn’t tell us, I was going to slam him right out of existence.
His jaw tightened. “If you do not give me that blade…” He pressed his lips together and closed his eyes at my glare. “Faith,” he started and glanced at Alex. “I could not intervene.”
“You knew?” I hissed.
“I knew as much as Gabriel and Naomi did.” He met my gaze. “I knew enough to get Tom that blade.” He pointed to my boot. “Now I need it back.”
I crossed my arms even though the movement hurt. I wasn’t feeling like obeying. Not after everything that had happened. It was Alex’s non-reaction that pulled me out of my obstinance. He just stared at Death, dumfounded like nothing that had been said computed.
Instead of continuing this crazy argument and letting the darkness blooming inside me take over, I pulled the blade out and flung it towards Nick. He jumped back as the blade sliced into the ground between where his feet had been.
“Just take the cursed thing,” I snapped.
Anger and the malignancy of Lucifer’s grace scraped at my insides. I pushed it down into a box, mentally locking it before it decided to lash out on its own.
I turned towards the building, remembering CJ’s plan to exonerate Alex. It was something to let my aggression out on instead of taking it out on Death.
I raised my hand, pulling forth only fire this time, and shot a blast right into the entry we had climbed out of. I forced it to incinerate the room where we had just escaped from, using my aggravation and anger to power it. The dry tinder of the building caught immediately.
I closed my hand and turned, expecting to see Nick still standing there, but he was gone and so was the knife.
We needed to get out of there, too. I hobbled away as fast as I could with Alex by my side.
As soon as we were off the grounds and away from the burning building, Alex stopped and pulled me into his strong arms.
His hug hurt and I winced, but I needed his arms as much as I needed the air around me. He loosened his grip and put me on the ground again, leaving very little space between us.
He pushed my hair out of my face and stared down at me. “I never thought I would see you again,” he said and delivered a searing kiss that nearly knocked my knees from under me.
When the kiss broke, I whispered, “I thought I would have to kill you.” Tears filled my vision.
“Would you really have done that?” He searched my eyes and then closed his, nodding. “If you’d had a chance while Lucifer was in me, you would have taken it.” He broke away from me and started walking again, blocking me from his head. His gait announced aggravation.
“Alex?”
He kept walking.
“Ty?”
He stopped and stared at the ground kicking the dirt. I approached him, limping. When he turned, his face was washed in tears.
“I would have done the same damn thing,” he whispered, and pain filled him. “I was present for all the hideous acts he did. I was there, climbing the walls of my own head, and Grace had the rest of my soul locked in that glass orb. For months I wanted to smash that thing. I wanted to knock that bastard out of my body and find my way back to you.” He swiped his face and looked at his hands. “My fist punched through both Naomi’s and Gabriel’s chests. My mouth swallowed their hearts.” He shook his head and turned away. “When Bridget didn’t bring you with her, he used my fists to pummel her to death. The sick bastard reveled in it.”
I put my hand on his arm. “Ty.”
His eyes closed. He covered my hand. “I’m damaged, Faith. Fucked up beyond belief. I don’t have those rose-colored glasses that I had when I first met you, either.”
“I don’t care. I’ve been to hell and back. Literally,” I said and laughed at his cocked eyebrow. “We had to jump through one of the breaches to escape an avalanche.”
“Really?”
I nodded. “That’s what took me so long. What seemed like days down there was months up here.”
“I thought you had given up on me.” His eyes were serious, and my heart just about tore in two.
I stood on my tiptoes and pressed my lips to his. “Never. I always clung to the idea that I could somehow save you.”
“And you did.”
I shook my head. “I couldn’t do anything in those chains. He had me helpless. Well, as helpless as a mere human is. I still got a solid shot at his balls.”
He grimaced and his hand went to his crotch like he remembered the pain too.
Heat bloomed in my cheeks. “I think you broke that orb. I was chained by some serious mojo and couldn’t do a thing. Nothing. At. All.”
His mouth popped open.
I laughed under my breath. “You have a little more of your father in you than you think.”
“Don’t bullshit me right now.” He crossed his arms.
“I’m not.” I stood taller, wincing, and his gaze dropped to my ripped shirt. He blinked like he hadn’t noticed that my entire torso was exposed. My little black lace bra peeked out along with the bruises dotting my abdomen.
His eyes narrowed and his head tilted. When my shirt started to slide back exposing more of my chest, his eyes widened. He stared at the exposed crescent marks of Lucifer’s nails. But my shirt kept moving.
I grabbed at the fabric before it slid off my shoulders, covering myself up again.
“Well, shit,” he said. A slow smile gained traction on his lips, and a chuckle escaped. “So, I could lock the keypad on my father next time?” He wrapped his arm around my waist, and his eyes twinkled with the prospect.
I shifted, uncomfortable with his arm pressed against the bruises, but I didn’t want to lose the connection. However, Lucifer’s words painted doubt in my mind.
I clasped my shirt together. “Was what he said true?”
His smile faded and his fingers traced the welts in my skin that he had been an unwilling partner in inflicting. He met my gaze and shook his head. “No. There is no comparison to what we had. Fucking Grace made my skin crawl. The memory of making love to you is what kept me holding on. My promise to you kept me sane even with every fucked-up deranged thing Lucifer did.”
“Stop swearing,” I scolded and licked my lips.
“Sorry,” he mumbled and offered me a strained smile.
I stretched on my tiptoes ignoring, the stabs of pain in my body, and kissed him softly. “I’ll let you take the heat for locking the door next time.” I lowered myself back to the ground.
His smile became more natural. “You still want a next time?” He teased by running his fingers down the line of my bra, careful to avoid the painful welts his nails had left.
When I didn’t answer right away, his smile faded.
My skin dotted with gooseflesh at the motion of his fingers, momentarily erasing my ability to speak. Whatever connection we had seemed to shoot me into the stratosphere.
Worry flared in his eyes enough to help me find my voice. “Despite the damage Lucifer tried to do to both our psych
es, I still want the first, the last, and the always with you.”
He cupped my cheek. “I go where you go,” he whispered, closing the distance to my lips.
The beep of a car horn made us jump apart. I was acutely aware of our bloodied condition along with the spark of carnal need in both of us. When the car stopped and the car door opened, a German shepherd jumped out and trotted up to me.
“Are you done with your little venture?” Levi said.
I glanced at Alex and back at Levi. “No.” I wanted Alex time.
The dog had the audacity to roll his eyes at me.
Josh stepped out of the driver’s seat. “I’m told there are hundreds of minor breaches to close.” He leaned on the door. “And no time to waste.”
“She needs rest. Like a month-at-a-spa kind of rest,” Alex said, looking between the talking dog and our resident pilot.
“We aren’t going to leave you two in a hotel room for that long,” Josh scoffed. “You’re still sixteen.”
Alex gave him a sideways glare. “I turn seventeen next month.”
“Sixteen, seventeen. Same thing,” Josh said with more than a little exasperation.
Alex’s lips thinned to an aggravated line. “My dad sent you. Didn’t he?”
Josh grinned and nodded. “We are your chaperones for the next however long it takes to do this. He needs to do some damage control before you can go home. Besides, he knows there isn’t anything this side of heaven that would separate the two of you, and this stuff needs to get done. So, here we are.” He spread his arms out.
“Mother…”
I gave Alex a look that stopped the swear from continuing. He put his hands on his hips and glanced at the sky. That familiar countdown started in his head, and I stifled a warm laugh.
Sirens wailed in the distance, coming closer, and that made up our minds.
“Fine.” He stomped toward the car, and I followed with a smirk still plastered on my lips.
“Damn teen angst,” Levi muttered and joined us in the back seat of the car, wiggling himself right between us.
“Really?” I said.
His tongue lolled out the side of his mouth as he gave me his weird canine grin. I fell back in the seat and sighed as I looked at Alex over our diligent little monster chaperone.
His blue eyes sparkled with unshed heat. I reached over the dog and clasped Alex’s hand in mine despite Levi’s warning growl.
“Oh, go eat some demons,” I said under my breath. “I’m holding my boyfriend’s hand, and if you try to stop me, I’ll blow you out of the car.”
Both Josh and Alex snorted laughter at my terse tone as we drove away from the darkness that had overshadowed our lives for far too long.
Epilogue
The jet engine whined, and I turned on my side on the bed in the back room. Thankfully, Levi hadn’t followed me in tonight, but I was sure he was guarding the door from the other side like he had been for the past two weeks.
Knowing Alex was on the other side of that door left me restless. My fingers caressed the hem of Alex’s flannel shirt, trying to get rid of this build-up of nervous energy. This was the same shirt I had worn to bed every night since I found out Lucifer had taken him. For me, because of my little jaunt through hell, that equated to a period of a little under three weeks. For Alex, here in the real world, it was a few days shy of six months.
The day we beat Lucifer was an adventure for more than one reason. Just having Alex comb his fingers through my hair while I lay on his lap on the couch in the main cabin was as near to heaven as I had been since we had made love in his basement. But that contentment ended the moment he flipped on the television and our faces were splashed all over the airways.
Apparently, Lucifer had turned on the live stream when I woke up in that godforsaken basement, and the world saw what transpired.
I’m sure it wasn’t what Lucifer had intended, but it helped our ruse of filming a movie. We executed CJ’s cleanup plan last week. Alex had been perfect. He delivered the scripting that CJ had put together with conviction and as smoothly as a seasoned actor. He had the same natural stage presence as his father once the camera turned on.
As for me, makeup still couldn’t cover the blackness surrounding my eyes, but I was the only one that seemed worse for wear. CJ had an explanation for that, too, and it was one of the reasons we didn’t get to finish making the film. Apparently, our execution of the stunt hadn’t been as crisp as when we’d practiced, and after we filmed that scene, we left to get my nose looked at. Unfortunately, we left the generator on, and it overheated, which is what they believed started the fire that burned down the building.
CJ made sure that was what made it into the fire marshal’s report.
However, with Tom, Naomi, and Gabriel looking as fresh and alive as everyone else, we couldn’t have done better with what we had at our disposal. At this point, we could still get in trouble for the fire, but at least we believed we’d addressed the televised deaths.
We just prayed it was enough.
As for me, Valerie gave me back Raphael’s grace, and the darkness inside me was again balanced. That left me to solely focus on the breaches without worry that Lucifer’s grace would somehow taint me.
So, for now, Alex and I relished the limited freedom we had together with our ever-present and insanely diligent chaperones.
Neither Levi nor Josh had let their guard down enough to let us have more than a blink of alone time.
So, when the door cracked open and Alex slid inside the bedroom and quietly locked the door behind him, I sat up and rubbed my eyes to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.
He put his finger on his lips, and then he crawled across the bed and pulled me to him. He kissed me with such reverence that I sighed under it. He cupped my cheek and leaned back, staring in my eyes. He glanced at the bright light coming from the bathroom and raised an eyebrow.
“Nightmares,” I whispered.
His thumb caressed my bottom lip with a slow stroke. “I get them, too.”
I traced the stubble on his jaw. In six months, he had gone from the pristine, clean-shaven boy to a rough-edged young man. His filter had returned, which was refreshing in some cases, like his bad language filter, but I did miss the frankness of his near-soulless self.
“You want me to be more direct?”
I had not gotten used to him being able to hear my thoughts. He was growing into his powers, and anytime he stretched his mind to do something, it seemed so easy for him. I still struggled unless I was holding his hand. The only thing I was consistent with was closing the breaches with my fire.
He smiled and cocked an eyebrow, waiting for me to stop lamenting and answer his question.
“Yes. I don’t want you to hide your thoughts from me.”
He pushed me down onto my pillow. “Do I have to tell you what is on my mind right now?”
I grinned up at him and shook my head. His desire radiated in his eyes and his aura. “No, that I can read pretty clearly.”
His smile faded as he stared down at me. “When I’m with you, I think maybe neither of us survived, and this is heaven.”
I palmed his cheek. That same thought had crossed my mind a time or two over these last couple of weeks, but with the sentries we had making sure we didn’t have this kind of time together, I knew that was just my fears blooming bright. I got lost in Alex’s thoughtful gaze and the slow progression of his fingers unbuttoning my shirt.
“They don’t need planes in heaven,” I finally said as he pushed the fabric aside and traced the faded bruises traversing my abdomen.
“Do they still hurt?”
Not enough to stop whatever you have in mind.
Dimples appeared in his cheeks, followed by that smile that rivaled heaven’s light. He leaned over and pressed his lips to the first mark like he was trying to erase the damage that Lucifer had done with his fists.
My skin tingled, and a soft light spread over my stomach. The bruise faded away, alo
ng with every other blue and purple discoloring of my skin. Even the scabbed crescents over my heart turned to unblemished skin.
Alex grinned. “I guess I’ve got a little of my mother’s mojo, too.”
I ran my hand over my abdomen, and then as an after-thought, bent my knee. All the pain was gone. I lifted my leg, and the burn mark around my ankle had faded, too.
“And it works on me.” Awe filled every fiber of my being and I met his loving gaze.
“Well, you do own my heart,” he said and went back to what he had started. Each butterfly kiss sent a chill through me that resulted in goose flesh, and a burning need ignited my blood.
This was not like the rushed session in his basement.
This was slow, sweet bliss.
Every glance from him was fueled with heat that sparkled in the bright blue of his eyes. Every stroke created another layer of flame between us. Every flick of his tongue brought me to the flash point.
“Ty,” I exhaled his proper name like a prayer of thanks to the gods.
His reaction was immediate and carnal but controlled in a way that he hadn’t ever been before, and his ministrations made me soar higher than the mountain peaks we were flying over.
When he finally returned to my mouth, he whispered, “I love you, Faith.” And then he delivered a kiss that transcended all of heaven.
The End
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About J.E. Taylor
J.E. Taylor is a USA Today bestselling author, a publisher, an editor, a manuscript formatter, a mother, a wife, a business analyst, and a Supernatural fangirl, not necessarily in that order. She first sat down to seriously write in February of 2007 after her daughter asked:
“Mom, if you could do anything, what would you do?”
From that moment on, she hasn’t looked back.
In addition to being co-owner of Novel Concept Publishing, Ms. Taylor also moonlights as a Senior Editor of Allegory E-zine, an online venue for Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror. She is also co-host of the popular podcast Spilling Ink.