I couldn’t help but wonder what he’d come to this place for back then. And if he’d found it.
Reading my reaction, he chuckled, which he had started doing quite a bit over the past couple of days. It worried me, the way he seemed always to know what I was thinking. Mostly because it made me feel like we were still just ‘us’. Yet everything had changed.
‘How about after dinner I show you one of the reasons people flock to New Orleans?’ he asked.
I raised an eyebrow. ‘You mean apart from the hard-core nudity and debauchery?’
‘Yes,’ he said, his eyes twinkling. ‘Apart from those.’
‘Okay,’ I whispered, unable to resist, even though I knew I should. But there was something in me that needed to see this other side to New Orleans. And even more so, that wanted to see it through his eyes.
CHaPteR tweNty-fIVe
‘For we have already said, that wickedness dwells here …’
Hermes Trismegistus
Over dinner, Leila and Ray painted a dismal picture. Since they’d arrived, their team had been plucked off one by one, leaving them nowhere to hide. Tonight was the first time they had returned to the safe house in months, too afraid to give up the location without the manpower to defend it. As a result they, along with Roman, had been in constant hiding.
‘Why didn’t the Assembly send reinforcements?’ Lincoln asked. ‘How could I not know about this?’
Leila shrugged. ‘We sent out what communications we could. We hoped they got through but you can’t trust anything here and we suspect that exiles control most facets of technology and communication. We sent word out, but we never heard back – not until this morning when the Academy’s navy contact found us and told us you were coming.’
Lincoln, pulling apart his bread roll, listened quietly, but I could tell he wasn’t satisfied. I decided to wait until we were alone to ask him.
Alone. Hell, I need to get a grip.
‘How did they make contact?’ Gray asked.
Ray barked out a laugh. ‘A military chopper landed on the roof of the building we were hiding out in for the night. They’d locked onto the GPS trackers we keep in our phones. He told us that an evacuation team was headed our way and to have transport ready at the airport within eight hours. We figured it must be something big.’
‘It is,’ Chloe blurted out. ‘I mean, he is. Important, I mean. Spence.’ Her cheeks reddened. ‘I mean, he’s my partner and we have to get him back.’ She pushed her plate away – a rice dish called jambalaya that reminded me of paella – and took a nervous sip of her drink. ‘What’s in this thing, anyway?’ she asked, looking at Carter, who had ordered it for her.
Carter’s smile said it all. ‘It’s called a hurricane. Local speciality. Drink up,’ he said, while Ray and Leila simply shook their heads.
I moved her glass away from her. ‘Maybe stick to water from now on,’ I suggested. Chloe nodded just as her elbow slipped off the table.
Good God. How many of those things has she had?
‘Look,’ Ray said, picking the conversation back up with a heavy sigh. ‘We understand you want to get your man out of here, but this place is crawling with exiles and their armies. You’ve brought an impressive team with you, but frankly …’ He shook his head, making it clear he thought we were lacking in numbers.
‘Armies?’ I asked. ‘Do you mean the Nephlim?’
Ray sucked on a long claw of shellfish. ‘I do. But it’s not just the Nephlim they control. They’ve turned this place into a turnstile. People come to New Orleans from all around the world to let their hair down and have a good time, and that makes them prime targets – susceptible to influence.’
Lincoln nodded. ‘I saw the shadowing on the walk here.’
Leila’s eyebrows shot up. ‘You’re a shadow finder?’
Lincoln nodded again.
‘I’ve never met one before,’ said Leila, clearly impressed.
‘Neither have I,’ Lincoln replied, reinforcing how rare his skill of seeing the marks exiles leave behind on humans really was.
‘Humans,’ Gray said, putting it together in the same way that I was. By Ray and Leila’s silence, we knew we were right. All the trails led here. All to Sammael.
‘What about the humans?’ Carter asked.
Gray described to Carter the suicidal humans we had encountered in New York, and their commitment to doing Sammael’s bidding. With a look of disgust, Carter put down his spoon and rubbed his forehead. Apparently even he wasn’t immune to everything.
‘Do you know where the exiles are?’ I asked.
Leila looked me over, then settled back in her seat, showing her first hint of attitude. ‘You seem young to be in charge of this mission.’
‘I am,’ I said, smiling to see that she had no idea who I was.
‘What’s your strength?’ she asked, cutting to the chase.
I shrugged. ‘I have a few.’
‘How about you give me the highlights?’
Choices, choices.