“My name is Reese,” she told him, her hands on her hips. “Reese. It’s one syllable. What does ‘darl’ even mean?”
The left corner of his lips curled up and his hooded eyes continued to look at her without wavering. “Are you finished, darl?” he asked, pushing his brow up as though to challenge his term of endearment for her. “Because we have a pressing engagement we need to get to.”
“Pressing engagement?” she asked, throwing her arms out. “Are you insane? I’m not going anywhere with you. Just because you helped me out with that Gabe thing—that I was perfectly capable of handling myself, thank you very much—doesn’t mean we’re friends. Speaking of which, I have to look for my friends to make sure they’re okay.”
“Are you finished yet?”
The look on his face made Reese want to slap him. “Yes, I’m finished,” she snapped.
“Great.” Without warning, he threw her over his shoulder and proceeded to walk out from under their protection from the rain in order to cross the street. “Henry already let your friends know that you got home safely. Now, darl, I know you’re small and all, but could you stop struggling? It’s doing nothing for my shoulder and you wouldn’t want me to drop you and ruin your pretty little dress, would you?”
There were too many things running through Reese’s mind for her to immediately respond. The fact that he claimed to know Henry and that he was somehow in on it completely threw her off to the point where she stopped pounding on his back with her fists and trying to get the attention of the crowd in the street too worried about Noir to notice her. Then he continued to talk which only aggravated Reese more, so she put more effort into her shaking.
“You realize you’re shaking your body around in a wet, white dress, don’t you?” She could hear the smirk in his tone and gave him a particularly hard hit on his shoulder blade.
“Why is nobody stopping you?” she asked, more to herself than to him. “If we were in Beverly Hills, I’d be filling out a police report by now.”
“This is Onyx, darl,” he said as he reached the stairwell. Reese craned her neck and saw they were in front of Bacchus Brewery, a bar that was neither high-end nor seedy, and only a block away from the Spirit Museum. “They’ve probably seen things stranger than this. I’m about to head up some stairs so unless you want me to drop you and break your neck, you’ll stop moving.”
“You’re not going to kill me, are you?” she asked as he did so.
“If I was, do you think I’d tell you?”
“I would hope so. I’d like to know if I was going to die.” She heard the squeak of a doorknob being turned and the whoosh as the door opened. “You don’t lock your doors? You do know the high crime rate here, don’t you? Especially with Noir back out on the streets.”
“Yeah, I don’t think Noir is going to honor us with his presence,” Ollo replied, shutting the door behind him. “I’m going to let you down now, but I’m giving you a warning: I’m faster than I look and I have no problem tying you to a chair.”
“Charming,” she muttered as he placed both hands on her hips and set her down.
Reese’s eyes immediately locked onto Ollo’s living arrangements. It was dark, but she knew it was a studio apartment since there was only one room. There was no furniture, save for a couch and one bed in the corner with a quilt, no sheets, and a pillow without a pillowcase. The space that would be dubbed the kitchen was little more than a stove with one burner and a sink that was probably also used as a dishwasher. A small fridge was under the counter, and judging from the strong scent of alcohol and the multiple bottles that littered the hardwood floor, Reese believed there was little food in the fridge. She wrinkled her nose and turned to face him. He had a look of amusement on his features and she scowled.
“If you’re not going to kill me,” she began, crossing her arms over her chest as she tried to suppress the shivering from the cold, “what do you want with me?”
“There are some things we need to discuss,” he said. He tilted his head as he continued to peer at her and bent down, picking up another handmade leather jacket, this one just as dirty as the one he wore. He handed it to her before walking over to the fridge. Reese looked down at it, surprised that he even thought she might be cold. She hesitated before slipping it on, not wanting to get dirt on her white dress; although, if she was honest with herself, she could admit the dress was already ruined. As she put it on, she was surprised by its warmth, not so much by its smell.
“Like how you’re still alive, what with all the drinking?” she asked as he cracked open a bottle of liquor.
“Cute, darl,” he said, pouring the brown liquid in a glass of ice. “Actually no, we need to talk about what Gabe said.” He took a long sip and made a satisfied grunt.
Reese shook her head and looked away, her fingers idly buttoning the jacket closed. “What?” she asked in a dry voice. “That I’m kind of a Seer?”
He nodded his head and took a seat on the edge of the bed. “Yup.”
“Well, what about it?” Her eyes snapped back to him. “You can’t possibly expect me to believe it.”
“Of course not,” he said. “But it is true.” Reese opened her mouth, ready to argue, but Ollo seemed to recognize this and jumped in before she could do so. “Think about it. Have you had any visions lately? Your sight goes black and you see what appears to be the future as clear as a movie, like you’re actually there? Maybe your stomach flip-flopped or you got goose bumps or something.”
She swallowed but said nothing. He grinned as he poured himself another glass.
“We call those visions, darl,” he said before taking another sip.
“Gabe said I wasn’t a psychic though,” Reese pointed out.
“He’s right about that too,” Ollo said. “You are much more important than just a psychic. You are the key to the impending war between angels and demons.”
Reese snorted and started laughing. “Are you kidding me?” she asked. “A war between angels and demons? Why doesn’t God end the war?”
“Free will,” Ollo said simply. “God gave humans free will. He gave the same gift to his angels too.”
“And demons?”
“Demons are just fallen angels,” Ollo said in a tired voice. “Nephilim. They, too, have free will.”
“What starts the war?” Reese didn’t believe for a second this was real, but she decided to humor him.
“There’s always been tension between angels and demons, but it has never escalated to the point it has now. God is a very forgiving being. He may punish a person, but a soul is always granted access to the kingdom of Heaven. Sometimes that punishment is served on Earth. Take Henry, for example. He used to be a respected angel, a ruler of his own kingdom in Heaven. The guy could speak, I’ll tell you what. Until one day he gave that all up because he fell in love with a mere mortal. Beautiful, she was, but the whole story is cliché as all Hell. He gave up everything for her, but God punished him before she could ever return his love. Now, every lifetime, he is placed directly in her path, but she doesn’t know he’s alive. He has to watch her grow up, fall in love with someone else, have a family, and die before the cycle starts all over again.”
“Henry?” Reese asked in disbelief.
“The ironic part of this whole thing is that besides you, he’s the most powerful demon on the planet.”
“I’m a demon.”
“No, you’re a Seer, darl. Weren’t you listening?” Another glass, another sip.
“What, just because he can make deals with everyone makes him powerful?”
“It’s more than that,” Ollo said as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Henry controls where the souls go.” Reese continued to stare at him blankly, and Ollo made an impatient snort. “Do I have to spell out everything, darl? He’s Charon.”
“Charon?” She pressed her brows together. “Isn’t he a Greek myth?”
“When you reduce religion to the simplest terms, they basically repre
sent the same thing: be a good person. There are many stories in the Bible, many myths from the Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, native tribes, every culture on every continent to illustrate what it means to be a good person. And, like all legends, they are based on facts that get muddled with time and interpretation. Humans want to differentiate between their religions because they want to know without a doubt that their belief is the right one. In reality, what you believe in doesn’t amount to much compared to how you act on Earth, and that’s the thread that connects religions together. There is no one true religion because all religion is true.”
Reese let his words sink in and was surprised to find that despite his slurred tone, he actually made sense. “If Henry’s really Charon, why doesn’t he just ask God to forgive him and go back to his kingdom?” she asked.
“He refuses to apologize for being in love.” He rolled his eyes and took another drink.
“Okay, but that doesn’t explain why this war is starting and why I’m the key to ending it,” Reese said.
“The devil, Satan, whatever you want to call him—”
“Hades.”
“No,” Ollo snapped. “What is with you humans equating the Underworld to Hell and Hades to Satan? The Underworld was a place where all souls went after they died and Hades ruled over them. That doesn’t make him evil.
“Anyway, to put it simply, Satan wants more souls. You can’t have power if you don’t have people to exert that power over. In order to get more souls that want to spend their afterlife in Hell rather than Heaven, he needs to corrupt their thoughts on God. This is where Noir comes in.”
“Noir is involved in all of this?” Reese asked.
He gave her a flat look at her interruption and she narrowed her eyes.
“As I was saying, everyone fears Noir because he kills people for no reason,” he went on. “He doesn’t get some cheap sexual thrill from it; he doesn’t do it for money, or fame, or anything else. He also doesn’t discriminate when it comes to killing; he’ll kill women, babies, puppies, whatever he wants. Technically speaking, he’s an Excom, an Undesirable, which means neither Heaven nor Hell wants him. You can tell Excoms by their scars. Satan burns the right side of their faces himself as a reminder that this particular soul refused to be in Hell, so his pride won’t let him accept the soul no matter how badly he needs it. Excoms are sent to places with the smallest populations, if there is a population at all, such as the desert. Deserts are the worst because the heat and the lack of water is torturous. In Noir’s case, he was sent to the Sahara until Satan found him and set him loose on Onyx a year ago. Satan believes that if someone murdered innocent people for no other reason than just to murder, people would lose their faith in God; because if there was a God, why would He let awful things happen? See, people have this interesting perception of the world and can’t seem to comprehend the fact that bad things happen to good people. When things like that happen, they automatically blame God for it.
“Now, while God won’t do anything to stop Noir, He can help protect the people of Onyx.”
“The Black Wing,” Reese said in awe.
“Right.” He nodded. “Some people aren’t exactly thrilled with the Black Wing’s presence, but he’s helping restore faith.”
“Is the Black Wing a fallen angel?”
“From what I know, yes,” he said with a smirk as he sipped his fourth glass of alcohol. “He was some arrogant prince from a small kingdom in Heaven set to take over once his father stepped down, but his father didn’t think he was ready or taking it seriously so he sent his son to the Guard. He got placed in Onyx and the rest is history. Rumor has it he’s not happy with his position.” He snickered to himself.
“So this war?” Reese asked, getting annoyed with his sidetracks.
“It’s all because of a woman,” he said, clinking his ice in his glass. “Noir has become intrigued with a woman, and that is bad for Satan. And before you ask why, I will tell you. The only way an Excom can be redeemed is if a person loves and accepts him for exactly what he is. Not for who he used to be, or what he will be, but for who he is now. As impossible as it sounds, it has happened before to other Excoms, and Noir’s already changing. Normally, he kills all his victims. But he left her alive. Satan’s not happy about this, which means he’s going to lash out in some way. Heaven will retaliate and the war will break out, which is why you’ve been awakened.”
“Oh, right. Because I’m a Seer.”
“Not a Seer,” Ollo corrected. Reese wasn’t sure how it was possible, but although he was on his fifth glass of liquor, she could understand him quite clearly. “The Seer. See, while God can’t stop the war from happening, he can give someone the ability to see particular visions that, depending on who you share these visions with, will assist them with how to win the war.” Reese continued to stare at him blankly and he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Your name is Reese Delilah Philbin, right?”
“How do you know that?” she asked, though the more she thought about it, the more she realized that if Henry was involved, he’d probably told Ollo about her.
Ollo ignored her. “D-E-L-P-H-I,” he spelled out. “The first three letters of your middle name and the first three letters of your last name. You are the Oracle of Delphi.”
Reese burst out into laughter because she wasn’t sure what else to do. “Okay,” she said. “If I’m supposed to be the Oracle of Delphi, then does that make Gabe Apollo since he claimed I’m his?”
Ollo’s eyes darkened at the question. “You were right about what you told him, darl,” he said. “You belong to no one. Gabe isn’t Apollo either. He’s Satan’s son.”
Reese forced all the questions that sprang up from Ollo’s statement out of her head, and instead asked, “And you? Where do you fit in?”
He gave her a sardonic smile that didn’t quite reach his hooded eyes. “I’m your trainer,” he said.
22
Andie
Andie wasn’t sure what could have happened that would cause everyone to leave the museum so abruptly. All she heard were the loud murmurs of the crowd, and when she picked up the phrase, “Noir sighting,” her heart stopped. In that moment, the voices and the blaring alarm were drowned out, she couldn’t feel the rain on her skin, and completely forgot that Jack was less than a foot behind her. Her focus turned to running back to the museum and finding Keirah. Before she could, Jack’s arm locked around her waist and pulled her against his chest.
“Don’t even think about it,” Jack said, his voice a gritty murmur.
Before she could say or do anything, Commissioner Jarrett ran up to the pair. His hair was matted to his face and his suit completely soaked. His eyes were sad, his appearance disheveled. The look on his face told her everything she needed to know; Keirah was gone.
From that moment on, everything that night was a blur. Jarrett said something about Keirah, Jack pressed her to his chest and held her tight, but she didn’t cry. Commissioner Jarrett said he wanted to take her home himself so he could explain what happened to her sister. Jack assured Andie he would tell Miranda where she went and made her promise to call him tonight so he would know she was as okay as could be expected.
Andie went through the motions. She got in the backseat of Jarrett’s car still bundled in Jack’s jacket, and the commissioner escorted her up the stairs to her second-floor apartment. When he told Judith, she cried and yelled and cried some more. Jarrett stayed for as long as he could before he had to turn his attention back to actually finding Keirah. The moment the door closed, her mother whirled around to face Andie.
“This is all your fault!” she exclaimed.
Judging by the rapid movement of Judith’s mouth, Andie knew there was more, probably something along the lines of how Andie should never have invited Keirah to the party, how Andie should have told her that Keirah left in the middle of the night, how she was the reason Noir was after Keirah in the first place, et cetera. All Andie wanted to do was to take a hot shower, wrap herse
lf up in blankets, and cry.
A stinging pain in the left side of her cheek made her feel again, however temporarily.
“Are you even listening to me?”
Andie blinked and looked at her mother. She had slapped her. Judith had slapped her.
“Of course you’re not listening to me,” she said, dropping the offending hand so it smacked her pajama-clad thigh. “I can’t do this anymore. You need to leave, Andie. Right now.”
Andie pushed her brow together. “Are you kicking me out?” she asked. Now she could hear quite clearly.
“Yes.” One nod, firm and resolute. “For now. I need to worry about finding Keirah.”
“What about me?” Andie asked, all her pent-up emotions spewing out of her like an erupting volcano. “I’m your daughter. I'm seventeen-years-old. Where am I supposed to go?”
“I don’t care.” Judith stopped and at least had the decency to wince at her abrupt answer.
“But—”
“You’re more like your father anyway,” her mother continued in a soft voice. Her dark eyes clashed with Andie’s light ones and she clenched her jaw. Any remorse she might have had about what she was doing to her youngest daughter had vanished, and Andie couldn’t be sure if it had ever been there in the first place. “You’ll survive. He has. I need to find Keirah. Get out.” She thrust her index finger to the front door. “Now.”
“Can’t I even get my things?” Andie asked.
“I said get out!”
Andie jumped and grabbed her purse before rushing out the door and slamming it shut behind her. Pressing her lips together to keep from crying, Andie opened her purse to grab her car keys when her phone started vibrating. The name on the caller ID made her heart leap in her throat and she immediately thanked God for helping her when she had no idea how to proceed.
“Jack?” she all but sobbed.
Awaken: Book 1 in The Dark Paradise Chronicles Page 17