A final image hung to the right of the door. Taken only a few months ago at the dairy farm where Jimmy had once worked, it showed me asleep on a cot in the tack room. The setting sun cast through the windows above, bathing me in soft, pale light.
The glaring absence of any photos since told a tale that shattered my heart, even though I’d suspected the truth for a while now. Jimmy’s love was gone. Too bad mine wasn’t.
I vacated the gallery as fast as I could, leaving Jimmy behind. Once outside I retraced my path to the hotel. My stomach was pitching too violently to even think about coffee.
Discovering Jimmy’s love for me portrayed so vividly for the world was upsetting enough. Realizing that love was gone was like losing him again the way I had at eighteen.
“Lizzy!”
Jimmy chased me down the sidewalk. There was no point in trying to outrun him. In human form we had the same powers. And shifting into a phoenix in the middle of the day in the center of the street wasn’t something I was willing to do, even to get away from him.
I let Jimmy catch up, and we walked a few blocks in silence before he spoke. “I’m sorry. I knew some of the pictures were in New Orleans and one of the shows—”
“Whoa.” I stopped, pulling him to the side. “There are more of those out there?”
“I—uh—needed money. I haven’t been able to work as much as I used to with all the—” He waved one long-fingered hand.
“Chaos?” I supplied. “Death? Destruction? Murder? Rape?”
“I would have said something about the New Orleans gallery before we left,” he murmured.
“Really?”
He glanced up at the blistering sun. “Maybe. I don’t know. I didn’t come here for that.”
“Why did you come here?”
His gaze met mine. “You know why.”
“Because Ruthie told you to, and you always do what Ruthie says.”
Something flickered in his eyes, something angry, something violent. “Don’t you?”
“Yeah.” I began walking toward the hotel again. “I don’t know what else to do.”
My quiet admission deflated him, and he fell in step beside me. We remained silent until we reached my room again. I took the single chair near a small table in the corner.
Jimmy sat on the bed. “Did you find the skinwalker you went looking for?”
“I did.”
“I’ll assume he helped you raise Sawyer, who then sent you here.”
“No,” I said. “According to Sani, Sawyer’s between worlds.”
“How did that happen?” Before I could answer, understanding dawned in Sanducci’s eyes. “You helped him.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
“Lizzy, you’ve never done anything you didn’t want to do in your entire life.”
“You’re wrong,” I said. “And you of all people should know it.”
Jimmy cursed softly.
Just as Jimmy had done things he had never shared with me, I’d done things I’d never shared with him. When you’re eight years old with nowhere to go and nothing to eat it’s surprising what you’ll agree to.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” he murmured.
“You think?”
He ignored my jab, probably because it came out sounding less like sarcasm and more like a serious question from the child I’d once been—scared to death but determined to let no one know it.
“You didn’t want to kill Sawyer,” he continued.
Surprise knocked all the words right out of me. Jimmy had been referring not to my childhood but to Sawyer. I had to take a few seconds to switch gears. When I did, I told him the truth.
“I wanted to kill Sawyer more than I ever wanted to do anything in my life.”
His face, which had been etched with shock and concern, smoothed out. “That was the demon, Lizzy, not you.”
“The blood was on my hands.” It had also been on my feet, my face, pretty much everywhere.
“When the demon’s driving, you aren’t really you.”
“I know that here.” I pointed to my head. “But here?” I laid my hand over my heart. “If good is stronger than evil, if love is stronger than hate, if I’m any kind of leader, I should have been able to stop myself.”
“Lizzy.” Jimmy shook his head.
I held up my hand like a crossing guard. “I realize that’s foolish. I know I had to do it. But still his death haunts me.”
Jimmy sighed. “Probably always will.”
Because I was hoping to find a way to end my eternal guilt, I didn’t answer. Jimmy would never go for it. He’d do everything he could to stop me from getting Sawyer back. So I wouldn’t tell him.
I wasn’t going to lie. Not that I wasn’t capable of it. But in this case, I didn’t have to. A half-truth would do the trick.
“Sawyer’s past the point of raising his ghost,” I said. “I tried. Sani tried. No dice.”
“Oh, well.” Jimmy shrugged. “Tough break.”
“Yeah. But Sani did give me a tip on something else.”
“What’s that?”
“The Book of Samyaza.”
Jimmy rolled his eyes. “Again with the book. Have you forgotten that no one’s ever seen the thing?”
“We will.”
He tilted his head. “When?”
“As soon as you help me steal it.”
“I don’t think it’s a very bright idea to steal Satan’s instruction booklet.”