He turned around and shot me a look. “No!” he snapped. “I can’t fucking sit in there anymore!” His voice shook, his hands clenched into fists.
“You have to,” I growled. “You can’t leave it alone to torture Isaac.”
“That’s my brother!” he shouted.
“I know!” I shot back. “And you need to get back in there and cover his ass!”
He let out a deep breath. “It won’t shut up.” He seemed to deflate. “It… it used her voice. It told me how much he wanted to die.” His eyes watered.
“Fuck,” I growled, guilt eating at me. Ethan’s face was ragged, his eyes tortured. He’d been in there for hours. I couldn’t make him go back inside. If he couldn’t do it, he couldn’t.
“Go. Take a walk and come back,” I told him.
Ethan turned back to me. “What?”
“Take a break,” I said again. “He’ll be okay for a few minutes.”
Ethan’s face was dark, his eyes storming, as he walked away with his head down. I looked back at the door. Someone had to stay in there and distract it. Fuck.
I walked into the small room. Andrew, that priest for the Templars, was doing the recording today. He looked up. I didn’t bother to stop, I continued into the room with the demon.
It grinned as I walked to the chair.
“Zeke,” he greeted me in his voice. Isaac didn’t look good. His eyes were becoming sunken, his skin extremely pale. “Let’s talk about that day…”
Lexie
I woke up slowly, warm and comfortable. A heartbeat sounded under my ear. Wintergreen surrounded me along with strong, lean arms and a bulky cast.
“Sorry, Nemo,” I muttered into his undershirt.
He chuckled softly. “It’s alright.”
I lifted my head and opened my eyes to look up at him. I was lying on him again, my body between his knees, my arms around his neck.
“How’d you sleep?” he practically whispered.
“Good,” I said. “You?”
He grinned. “Better than I have in a while.”
“You must be a cuddler too,” I teased as I pulled my arms from around his neck. He lowered his leg and moved his arms so I could shift off him and back to my side of the bed. “What time is it?”
Miles reached over to the nightstand, turned on the light. He picked up his phone to check. “It’s only four, you still have three hours.”
“Good.” I got to my feet and went to the bags of clothes on the dresser. I wanted to check on Ethan and Isaac then talk to Father Francis about the tattoos the Templars had. I grabbed some clothes and hurried to the bathroom. I quickly pulled on blue jeans and a black boyfriend shirt. Whoever Miles got to pick out the bra was amazing because it fit perfectly. Huh. I rushed my morning routine and hurried back out. Miles was just getting out of bed when I was putting on my sandals.
“Why are you in such a rush?” he asked, rubbing his eyes.
“I want to check on the twins. Then I have some questions for Francis,” I told him.
He nodded.
“What are your plans for the evening?” I asked.
“Sitting outside that room,” he said, his voice still half asleep.
“I’ll meet you there,” I offered as I got to my feet.
“How about I meet you in the cafeteria?” he suggested. “For breakfast... or dinner... to get something to eat?”
Oh, yeah. Food. “Yeah, you’re probably right. I’ll meet you there.”
He grinned at me as I closed the door behind me. First, Isaac. I hurried down the hallway.
When I reached the door, I was surprised that Zeke wasn’t there. Maybe he had finally gone off to get some sleep. I opened the door, stepped in and my heart dropped. Hades was lying on Isaac again. Zeke was inside with the demon. And it was talking. Memories from yesterday surged through my mind as I rushed through the inner door. The demon stopped talking immediately. I didn’t stop. Furious, I reached Zeke as he got to his feet, grabbed the neckline of his shirt and dragged him out of the room. I slammed the outer door open and dragged him further into the hall. I turned back to him and let him go.
“What the fuck?” I shouted. “It was talking to you!”
Zeke’s face was hard and pale. His haunted eyes met mine. “Yeah.” His voice was strained.
“Why didn’t you say something?” I couldn’t seem to stop shouting.
“Miles and that priest told me not to!” he snapped back. “After it talked to me, they said I couldn’t stay with Isaac.” His jaw clenched and unclenched. “Not with my history.”
I closed my eyes as my heart broke. Zeke had more trauma than I did. An extremely abusive father, finding his parents dead… That would just be a field trip for the demon. My eyes shot open.
“Why the hell were you in there? Where’s Ethan?” I demanded.
“He needed a break,” he bit out between clenched teeth.
“You should have woken me up,” I snapped.
His eyes narrowed on mine. “Why? So you can be tortured even more?” he growled. “It’s perfectly fine for you and Ethan to get torn apart, but not me?”
My eyes burned as I looked up at him. “We don’t have the shit you do!” My voice came out raspy. My throat hurt and I didn’t care. I kept yelling. “It isn’t that bad!”
“Bullshit!” he shot back. He stepped closer until I had to look up at him. His voice was hard as it grew quieter. “I know you, Baby. When you came out of there yesterday you were hurting. So don’t give me that crap about how it didn’t hurt. Don’t fucking lie to me and tell me you walked out of there fine.”
“I can fucking take it, Zeke,” I growled as I clenched my fists. “That’s Isaac, it can fucking talk all it wants. ’Cause that’s all it fucking is! Talk!”
“That is Isaac,” he shot at me. “One of my best friends since I was four. His brother, another of my best friends, needed a fucking break because it was tearing him apart! So, yeah, I went in and it tore into me for a while.” His eyes met mine. “That shit has taken a lot from me. I’m not going to let it take Isaac too.” He strode past me.
I wiped tears from my face. “Are you okay?” I didn’t turn around to face him; Zeke hated it when I cried, anyway. And I was still too angry.
“I’ll survive,” he snorted in disdain. “I always fucking do.” His footsteps faded as he walked away. I took a deep breath and wiped my face.
“I seemed to have missed something.” Ethan’s voice had me turning around. Zeke continued walking down the hall. Ethan’s chocolate eyes ran over me as he stopped in front of me. “What happened?”
“Zeke went in,” I said, my voice raspy.
His face grew pale, his eyes wide. “What?”
“Zeke. Went. In,” I repeated. “Apparently it fucking talked to him, too, but Francis and Miles refused to let him sit with Isaac.”
Ethan’s face grew dark. “Yeah… I can see why.”
I met his eyes. “How long were you gone?”
“Thirty, maybe forty minutes.” He swallowed hard. “It used Sophie’s voice. I needed a break.”
I nodded. “Next time, send a Templar for me first.”
His eyes were shadowed as he looked down the hall at Zeke’s retreating back. “You got it.” He turned back to me. “Now, go get some tea. It sounds like you just fucked up your voice.”
I nodded and walked down the hall already knowing what was wrong with my voice. The therapist and the doctor had warned me - don’t strain your voice until you’re completely healed. I had a nagging feeling I had just fucked it up even more.
I went upstairs and into the cafeteria. Thankfully the cold cases usually had sandwiches for between meals. I grabbed one and made some hot tea. I ate my sandwich quickly, trying not to think of what that thing could have said to Zeke. I was sipping tea when Miles came in.
He got a sandwich and coffee before he came and sat across from me. He eyed me as he sat down. “What’s wrong?”
“Zeke sat with Isaac,” I told him, my voice rougher than usual. His face grew white. “I agree completely that Zeke shouldn’t have sat with him. What I’m struggling with is that neither one of you told us that it spoke to him.” I took another sip of tea. My hand trembled around the mug.
“I didn’t want to embarrass him,” he explained, his voice quiet.