“Does it matter?”
“Maybe. Seems their time would be better spent wreaking havoc wherever they can like the rest of the Nephilim. That they’re obsessed with you is . . . disturbing.” To say the least.
“They killed my parents”—Luther shrugged—“but they never found me. Maybe they just can’t let it go.”
“So they keep searching for the next fifteen years? Awful long attention span for a kitty cat.” I thought back to my short encounter with the lion man, and I tilted my head as I heard again his heavily accented voice. “He was African.”
Luther snorted. “Why? Because he was black?”
“He had an accent. He said, ‘Where is de boy?’ ”
The sudden shift in expression on Luther’s face made me pause and ask, “What?”
“Just like that?” he asked. “He sounded just like that?”
“Yeah,” I said slowly. “Why?”
“My mother had an accent. She was from Kenya.” His lips curved into a small sad smile as his eyes gazed toward the mountain. “She would walk in the house, and she would call, ‘Where is de boy?’ and I would come running.”
My eyes got a little misty at that picture. I’d never had a mother—at least one I remembered. By the time Ruthie had taken me in, I’d been far too old to come running and she’d had far too many children in her care to call.
You’d think I’d have flashes of someone—a hazy, ghostly face in the night, a cool hand on my brow, the echo of a voice, a scent that brought back . . . anything—but I didn’t. Before the first foster home there was only a great black void, one I often wished had reached forward to encompass several of the places I’d lived thereafter.
“You’re saying the man who came searching had the same accent as your mother?” I clarified.
“Since I didn’t hear him say anything but—” He opened his mouth and roared so loudly if I were a cartoon I’d have been blown back three feet by the current, then shrugged. “Got me.”
As I’d thought before, it was too damn coincidental that a cadre of barbases had killed Luther’s parents and one had shown up here. Even if Luther had called the thing in, from its question to me in the shower, the barbas had been looking for the kid, and as the boy had pointed out, you aren’t paranoid if they’re really after you.
“Relatives?” I mused.
“Of my mother?” At first Luther appeared intrigued, until he realized that though he might have gained family, that family wanted him dead.
I remembered when I first realized that people—things, demons, whatever—I’d never met and hadn’t personally hurt wanted to kill me. It took a little getting used to. Luther got over it a lot quicker than I had.
His face hardened; he lifted his chin and murmured, “Gonna dust every last one of the bastards.”
“That’s my boy.”
“I’m not your boy.”
The kid still didn’t trust me, and I couldn’t blame him. Without this collar, I’d want to kill him too. Without this collar, I’d probably do worse than kill him for a long, long time.
And wouldn’t that be funnnnn? the demon whispered.
I shivered. I hated this thing inside of me. That I’d sent Jimmy to have his released only made me hate myself nearly as much.
I ignored Luther’s jab. What choice did I have? Pointing out that he was my boy, as in under my command in Armageddon’s Army, would only force another confrontation about having lost my connection to the army’s true general. Since I needed that connection now, pissing off the conduit wasn’t advisable.
Hey, I could be taught!
“Can you bring Ruthie?” I asked.
Luther frowned. “Now?”
“No, I thought maybe next Friday. After we’re all dead.”
“You don’t have to be bitchy about it,” he murmured.
“Obviously you don’t know me very well at all.”
His lips curved just a little. “I’ve never tried to bring her. She’s always just—”
“There,” I finished.
“Yeah.”
Boy, I wished she were just “there” for me right now.
“Close your eyes and—”
“Open,” Luther interrupted. “I know.”
Considering he’d been working with Sawyer for several weeks, I was certain he did. Sawyer was big on being open. Which was downright hysterical considering how “closed” the man was.
Luther shut his eyes, took a deep breath, let it out and waited. I stood helpless, able only to watch, to hope and pray that he’d succeed, but also kind of hoping he didn’t. I’d been able to reach Ruthie solely in my dreams. I couldn’t call her up on a whim no matter how much I might have wanted to.
Time passed. I sighed, shuffled, opened my mouth to tell the kid to forget it, he’d tried, but then his eyelids fluttered, opened, and the eyes that stared back at me were no longer hazel but a deep woodsy brown.
My lips tightened; I glanced away. “Overachiever,” I muttered.