Chapter Five
Thane stood on the other side of the one-way mirror watching and listening to Martin interview Reya. So far, highly entertaining.
Reya was pacing the room like a caged animal. He was a bit curious by her restlessness given the fact that she’d offered to do this. Martin sat in the chair on one side of a long table, his profile to Thane.
“Reya, have a seat,” he said.
She stopped her pacing and looked at him. “I think this room is designed to suck the soul out of anyone who enters it.”
Martin grinned. “Tell me about it. Sit anyway. You’re making me nervous.”
Reya broke into a little smile that grew as she slid into the chair facing Martin and leaned forward, which gave him a very nice view of the tops of her breasts peeking out from under the low V-neck shirt.
“Better?” she asked.
Martin shook his head in wonder. “I love my job.”
Thane nodded in agreement.
She grinned wide. “What can I do for you, Martin?”
“Just a few questions.”
Then she cut a look right at Thane through the mirror. “Shoot.”
“It appears that you were present at a few deaths we are investigating.”
She blinked once. “I spoke with each of the men just before they died.”
Martin tapped his fingers on the table. “Did you know they were going to die?”
“Yes.”
His fingers stopped midair. “How did you know?”
“It just comes to me.”
Martin cut a wary look at Thane through the mirror, and then cleared his throat. “So when am I going to die?”
She rested her arms on the table. “You have time.”
He laughed. “Well, that’s a relief. Just booked a vacation to Disney.”
Reya didn’t flinch, and Martin looked slightly uncomfortable. “So you knew these men?”
“No.”
“How did you get their whereabouts?”
“From a friend.”
Martin said, “Does he have a name?”
“Orson,” she said.
“Orson what?”
“Just Orson.”
Martin shifted in his chair. “We can’t even find information on you—”
“I’m right here. I must exist.”
Thane couldn’t help it. He laughed. She was f*cking insane. He should have known it. And he was now no closer to solving the deaths than he was before.
“So you talked to these men,” Martin said, valiantly continuing his questioning. “What did you talk about?”
“Their sins.”
Thane thought Martin was going to fall out of his chair. “Like parking tickets? Cheating on their taxes? Jaywalking?”
“No, those are laws. Not sins. Although occasionally they match,” she answered coolly. “And technically, they aren’t sins. They are experiences in this lifetime. Good or bad, it all goes into your soul development. We all get a chance to play every role. But sometimes, they like being bad a little too much and get stuck there. I give them a chance to change that.”
Martin stared at her for a moment, and then rubbed his eyes. “So what were their sins?”
“That’s confidential,” she said. “Aren’t you going to ask me how I know their sins?”
He scratched his head. “I’m guessing Orson?”
Reya wrinkled her nose. “Close. I hold the paper with their name on it. Then I know.”
Martin glanced at the mirror for help. “That’s great. So what happens after you tell these men their sins?”
She shrugged. “I leave.”
“That’s it?”
Reya batted her eyes. “That’s it.”
“Do you do this a lot?”
Reya leaned over the table. “It’s my job.”
“Right. Thank you,” Martin said with a nod. Then he put his palms on the table and stood up. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to check on something.”
Thane was still grinning when Martin came through the viewing room door. He looked totally bewildered. “Jesus. How can someone that beautiful be that crazy?”
“At least she didn’t vanish on you yet,” Thane said with a laugh. “Now what?”
“I have no f*cking idea,” Martin said. “She’s certifiable. There’s no way I’m getting her anywhere near O’Brien. In fact, I suggest you give her cab money and send her back to whatever loony bin she came from.”
This was priceless. Thane was enjoying himself. Right up until he heard the sound of a thousand wings flapping. Whispers grew exponentially with every passing second.
He looked toward the door to the hallway. “Shit.”
* * *
Reya got up after Martin left and paced the stark white interrogation room. Bad acoustic waffle designs on the walls, a one-way mirror on one side, a single door on the other, and a table in the middle and two chairs. Who designs rooms like this? Masochists?
She gave the mirror a big smile on her way by. Let them wonder if she was sane or not. If they only knew the whole truth, they’d be a lot more worried about other stuff.
Like why one of Surt’s minions was killing innocent people.
She’d lied to Thane. The newly deceased spirit knew exactly what hit him and who. But why? Why now? Maybe she was jumping the gun and Surt wasn’t involved at all. But the deceased was a gifted medium and had picked up the name Maurice. The only Maurice that Reya knew was Surt’s longtime right-hand man.
It gave her the willies just thinking about Maurice here in this world, and the unconscionable havoc he could raise. He belonged in Hell with Surt.
So why reach over to this side? Why torch innocent people? And how was Thane mixed up in all this? She didn’t believe in coincidences. The Universe was like one big dance, everyone and everything tied together in immortal cohesion. She was beginning to think she should have bargained for more than a jump on the ascension ladder.
She paced faster. She was itching to call Orson down and fill him in, but she was being watched and that would do little to promote her tenuous credibility with Thane. And she couldn’t disappear if she wanted to gain his trust. She needed to start keeping those pesky little promises.
God, being human sucked.
Reya was about to sit down in one of the chairs when she heard them. The lights in the room flickered and dimmed. Something pelted the exterior of the wall.
They were back.
She walked to the door and wrenched it open. Thane was already on the other side. The look in his face told her that he’d heard them, too.
“We have to get out of here,” she told him.
“Why are they after you?” he asked, his tone harsh in accusation.
It would serve him right to find out the hard way. Lucky for him, she wasn’t in the mood. “They aren’t. They’re here for you.”
“What?” he asked, obviously caught off-guard.
And then they came through the hallway. The air felt cold and heavy, moving like gel. People screamed and ducked as a swarm flooded the space, pushing past everyone in search of their prey. The lights died, and the air was filled with a pungent, acidic smell.
Ahead of the swarm, Reya had her staff out and shoved Thane in the back with her hand. “Go!”
They raced down the corridor, and he led her into a stairwell heading down. They were on the eighth floor and skipping steps as fast as possible. The sound of wings followed them, echoing overhead. Reya looked up between the stairs and saw a dark cloud ballooning above. No matter how many steps they skipped, they weren’t going to make it to the bottom.
“Bad idea, Thane!” she yelled as she leapt full flights at a time after him.
“You weren’t exactly specific,” he hollered back and shoved the door open at the fifth floor. They exited and ran to the center of the building, confused people staring after them.
He pulled her into an open elevator door and hit the Close button, leaving them alone in the lift. Both of them were breathing hard as elevator music played softly.
Thane looked at her. “Why are they after me?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “But I’m supposed to protect you.”
He pulled out a Glock and showed it to her. “I can protect myself.”
She laughed at his ego. “Not against these things. They don’t bleed.”
“But they die. I saw what you did to them last time. You fried them. Just like our two burn victims.”
She cut him a glare. “I didn’t torch your victims.”
“No, but I’ll bet you know who could.”
Damn, he was sharp.
The floor numbers moved excruciatingly slow, and really, she had bigger things to deal with than his rampant imagination. At the second floor, a hundred demons pelted the top of their elevator.
The car rocked, but held.
Reya activated her staff and both ends lengthened. She stepped in front of the doors. “Stay behind me. And put the damn gun away before you kill something human.”
The elevator dinged when it reached the basement level. The doors opened, and Reya moved out with Thane beside her, pointing his gun. He was a pain in the ass.
The floor was quiet and dark, the building’s systems humming and thrumming. Behind them, the elevator ceiling became a thunderous metal shield and quaked under the onslaught of creatures just dying to get through. There was a loud snap of cables, and the elevator dropped a few inches as the alarm sounded.
Reya turned and faced the open doors. The lights inside went out, and thick metal creaked and groaned. She held her staff out in front of her and began to spin it. Then all hell broke loose—literally—and rushed through the elevator’s ceiling in a river of black.
The demons flew directly into her spinning staff and disintegrated into thousands of pieces. Dust filled her view. Gunfire erupted from behind her as Thane tried to pick off the ones that got through. His bullets passed through them and punched holes in the concrete walls.
Luckily, her staff worked brilliantly. In a few minutes, the hellraiders were either dead or retreating.
Once again, the basement returned to its humming lull. Aside from the busted elevator, the crispy hellraiders littering the floor, and the smell of brimstone and ash, it was quiet.
“Is that all of them?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “But more will be back.”
Thane walked around to face her and holstered his gun. He leaned in, eyes dark and serious. “Now, we talk.”
* * *
Thane had his mystery woman right where he wanted her. Only now, he wasn’t so sure it was a good idea.
She wandered around his small apartment, investigating every room, checking closets and opening cupboards. He didn’t care to ask what she was looking for. She already knew more than enough about him.
He’d let her into his place, because he figured if she could blow up whatever-the-f*ck those things were with a baton, she could break into his place.
How could she know about him, about other people? He could see if she had access to private files or something like that. But to know about what he’d done, to know when people were going to die. There was no agency on this planet that had that kind of information. Had she really been telling Martin the truth about this Orson person? If it was a person.
As much as he hated to go there, he even considered that she might be clairvoyant. He didn’t believe in that, but the alternative explanations were all worse. Ghost? Is that what he’d been hearing? The whispers of dead people? Jesus. He might check himself into a loony bin.
“You going to tell me what’s going on or what?” he finally said.
She turned from the few photos on the wall and lifted an eyebrow. “You are a patient man.”
He wasn’t. He was biding his time trying to figure out if what had happened was real or not. On the other hand, his shirt was shredded, and he smelled like a bonfire. Sure felt real.
“Fine,” he said and braced himself on the island between them. “What exactly are you? Dead? Alive? Human? Demon? Psychic? Psychotic? What?”
She grinned. “You’ve put some thought into this.”
“Just trying to figure out how to protect myself when the time comes.”
She nodded. “The gun won’t work on me.”
He’d figured that one out himself. It didn’t work on the hellraiders either, which put both of them in the category. “So you aren’t alive?”
“No, I’m alive,” she said a little sadly. “I just have some special gifts.”
“Immortal?” he ventured.
She shrugged and straightened one of the pictures. “We all are.”
He really hated this game. “So why are they after you?”
She walked over to the island. “I told you, they want you, not me.”
Silver eyes dominated her face and looked into him with unnerving intensity. Black hair swept around her face and down her back, sleek and shiny. Pale skin was smooth and flawless. She wore a skin-tight black body suit that few women could pull off under a long gray coat. He wondered how many weapons were stowed in it.
“Forgive me if I find that hard to believe,” he said.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “They didn’t want to kill you. Or they would have. Which means they want you alive. So what is so special about you?”
He was beginning to think that he was the invisible one here. “What are they?”
She tilted her head. “Once I tell you, there’s no going back. Are you ready for that?”
He leaned forward with all menace. “Lady, my entire precinct was just attacked. They might have even killed someone. Believe me, I’m ready.”
She was silent for a few beats and then said, “They work for the darkness. Someone over there really wants you. We have to figure out why before they take you home with them.”
“The darkness,” he said. “Like Darth Vader?”
“You have no idea what you are dealing with,” she said, her tone serious. “You can’t shoot the darkness. You can’t get angry at it or turn violent. You only make it stronger.”
He frowned. “That’s not possible.”
She smiled, looking weary for a moment. “Have you noticed the air change when they appear?”
He stilled. He had. “So?”
“Darkness, negative energy, exists at a lower frequency than light. They are bending the rules of quantum physics to get here from another dimension. Think about that. They’re gunning for you, and someday, they will succeed in getting you. Whether you believe it or not.”
Thane tried to think of a good response, but nothing was coming to mind. Could some other dark side really want him? Was he that bad of a person? He worked hard to push guilt behind him.
Then she looked around. “Do you have anything to eat?”
He hung his head. This was getting him nowhere. “I need to go back into work, see if anyone was hurt.”
He looked back up when she started laughing. “What’s so funny?”
Reya shook her head. “You don’t get it, do you? You can’t go back to work. They want you. You aren’t safe anywhere.”
He didn’t like where this was going. “I have a job to do.”
“So do I,” she said. “I’m here to protect you. You don’t go anywhere without me.”
He couldn’t help it, he laughed. She was the most beautiful crazy person he’d ever met. What a waste. “I have a partner already, thanks. Three’s a crowd. I can take care of myself.”
Reya stood up and tossed her coat on the back of his couch. She stood in the middle of his apartment and crossed her arms in challenge. She wasn’t going anywhere.
Thane didn’t care what insanity had just happened, he wasn’t playing this game anymore. He peeled his shirt off and shoved it in the trashcan. Then he headed through his bedroom to the bathroom for a long shower.
If she wanted to stay here, she was going to get a hell of a show.
* * *
His body was big and nicely muscled. Not too much, but just enough to make it known that he was a powerful man. Aside from the cut marks across his arms and back, he was pretty much perfection. Damn. She licked her lips, tasting ashes. It’d been a long time since she’d spent any time with a man who wasn’t on her hit list. Someone she’s actually consider using this body with.
Seconds later, the shower turned on.
Unfortunately, that kind of distraction wasn’t on her agenda at the moment. How was she going to convince him that this was about him, not her? She wasn’t a freakin’ miracle worker.
“Orson, I need you,” she said aloud, keeping an eye on the bathroom door. Nothing.
She sighed. “Please.”
He materialized beside her. “You rang?”
“Maurice torched a human early this morning,” she told him. In the bathroom, she heard the shower curtain open and close. He was in. Not that he’d be able to see Orson, but she didn’t want to have to explain any more than she already had.
“That is highly unusual,” Orson said, shaking his head slowly.
Reya turned and went to the kitchen in search of food. “No shit. And I suspect he did the same to another person yesterday. Why?”
Orson looked genuinely bewildered. “I have no idea. They don’t need to come to this side.”
Right. She yanked open the refrigerator door. Milk and beer. “Sure they do. For one thing, it’s lot more fun on this side.”
“Regardless, they aren’t supposed to interfere,” he said. “The different dimensions do not engage each other. It is the law.”
She checked the freezer. Months old ice cubes, dried to a powder. “That’s why they’re bad guys, Orson. They don’t do well with rules. So what would make them come here and interfere? What would be worth the wrath of God?”
Orson shook his head. “I don’t know. Do you think Surt is involved?”
Dear God, I hope not. But she already knew he was. Maurice simply wasn’t that ambitious. Coupled with the sick feeling in her gut, she’d put money on it. She opened and closed every cabinet. Cereal and potato chips. Thane had the lifestyle of a hermit. “I don’t keep tabs on Surt anymore.”
“Yes, of course,” Orson said. “But if he were involved, that would be bad.”
And that was the understatement of the century. She stood in the middle of the tiny kitchen and put her hands on her hips. “Yes, it would.”
Then she heard the shower turn off. Thane would be out in a few minutes. Time to say goodbye to Orson. “See what you can find out about Maurice and Surt, and if there are any other people being lit on fire anywhere else.”
Orson nodded. “Any sign of the hellraiders?”
“They attacked him again,” she said, watching the doorway intently. “Persistent little bastards.”
“Sadly, yes,” Orson said. “What about Thane? Is he demonstrating any signs of being a legacy?”
She glanced at the bathroom door. “Nothing more than the voices.”
Orson nodded. “He must not choose the other side, Reya.”
She turned to him incredulously. “And yet, he has free will, Orson. If he decides to use his legacy abilities for the other side, I can’t stop him. That’s the rule you saddled me with. The other side has no such qualms.”
Orson had the grace to grimace. “I’m sorry.” And then he vanished.
Thane appeared in the space that Orson vacated, wearing jeans and pulling on a clean shirt. He eyed her warily before looking around his place. “Was someone here?”
Of course, he’d heard Orson. His powers would increase rapidly, making him a target and forcing him to choose a side. She had to convince him to trust her now, and she had one idea left.
“You started stealing when you were eight. Candy from Mayville’s store,” she said softly. “You didn’t get caught.”
Thane frowned at her. “No one knows that.”
She lifted her chin. “Then you moved on to bigger things. Bikes, tools, radios. You didn’t worry about the law. Your dad was a cop. He bailed you out every time.”
Thane’s expression turned dark. “And kicked my ass for it. I learned.”
“Not really. You altered evidence against Nelson White two years ago,” she said.
“He was guilty.”
“Mmm,” she said. “He was. But you had no right. You’ve beat up suspects—”
“All got what they deserved,” he said, anger rising in his voice.
“Yes, they did. But they would have with or without you.”
“You don’t know that,” he said.
“Actually, I do.”
He didn’t say anything for a few long moments. “What do you want?”
She smiled. “I’m trying to save your life. You have to trust me. Believe me. I know what I’m talking about.”
They stared at each other in silence; the only sound was the empty refrigerator running. Then Reya gave him a crooked smile. “Besides, I might be able to help you find out who killed your burn victims.”
“The dark side,” he said, putting the pieces together.
“You can’t get there without my help. Interested now?”
He shrugged, but she knew she had him. Despite the bad things he’d done, he wanted justice. “Maybe.”
“Excellent,” she said. “We stick together until the murders are solved. If the flying monkeys don’t show up again, you’re safe. And you’ll never see me again.”
He looked relieved by that. “Deal.”
Done, for now. “Good. I’m ordering Chinese.”
* * *
Thane sat across from his new roommate, and watched her steal his last egg roll. For a crazy person, she could eat.
“Did you pay for this?” he asked.
She shrugged and licked her fingers. “Got it on the house.”
No way. “How did you manage that?”
She smiled between bites. “Happens all the time.”
Not in this town. In fact, as far as he could tell her only job was finding soon-to-be-dead people. “How do you pay your rent?”
“Free,” she said and popped the remainder of the egg roll into her mouth. “Are you going to eat all that cashew pork?”
He slid the carton to her side. “Free? Why?”
“Because I don’t have a day job,” she said as if he were the crazy one.
Thane propped his elbows on the island. Everything he thought he knew was messed up now. While he was in the shower, he had a chance to think about what happened at the precinct. People were ducking and screaming, but not one officer drew a gun. “No one saw what happened today, did they?”
“Nope,” she replied and took a big forkful of his dinner. “Well, they heard it and felt it. Probably thought it was an earthquake or something.”
“And how is that possible when I was able to see them clearly?” he asked. He had about a thousand questions in the queue. At this point, he was just throwing them out at random.
She blinked. “I don’t know yet.”
He almost believed her. “Were we somewhere else? Some other world?” he asked, a question he was pretty sure he’d never asked before in his life.
“It’s a place between dimensions. There are a lot of layers. Think of it as purgatory,” she said and put down her fork on the empty plate with a sigh. “I love Chinese food.”
He could tell by the array of empty cartons on his counter. “Purgatory.”
She brushed crumbs off her lap. “That’s what we call it. It’s not really purgatory. It’s just a space between reality and the other side.”
“We?” he said, trying to keep up with her.
“Other Redeemers like me.” Then she smiled. “Not exactly like me, of course.”
He eyed her sleek outfit. That was a shame. “Redeemers.”
“Yes.”
“Where are they all?”
She shrugged and started looking around his apartment. “I don’t know. I only worry about myself. I could really go for some wine.”
Thane sighed and reached under the island to grab a bottle of pinot noir someone had left here after a party. It took him a while to locate a corkscrew. Maybe if he got her drunk, she’d stick to the disaster at hand.
Two glasses of wine later, she was grinning at him like a Cheshire cat. Her eyes were crystalline under dimmed lights. Her lips were amazing. In fact, she was perfect from head to toe. He knew, he’d checked. It occurred to him that Reya might be a dark side all to herself.
He tapped the island with his fingertips. “So we were in purgatory. The whole time?”
She leaned forward. “Pretty much. I felt the shift when I heard them.” Then she grinned. “You’re kind of cute when you smile.”
Big trouble in a small apartment. “A shift?”
Her eyebrows rose. “You didn’t feel it? Because I could swear that you felt it.”
He had. It had been unsettling, just like an earthquake, where the earth beneath your feet no longer held its ground. Like everything was off-center somehow. Like the Earth had tilted. “A little.”
She gave a smug laugh. “You can’t lie to me.”
He was beginning to believe that much. “I can try.”
“And you will,” she said and took her glass for a walk around his tiny place. “So where do I sleep?”
“Excuse me?”
“Me. Sleep. Where?”
Okay, when she said that they were working together, he didn’t realize she had moved in. “You have to stay here?”
She saluted him with her wine. “Flying monkeys, remember?”
How could he forget? Fine. Sexy, crazy woman was staying for the night. “Take my bed.”
“Good night,” she said and walked into his bedroom. The door closed behind her.
Just like that. He was still trying to figure out why she was still here and now she was in his bed. He couldn’t do that on a good night. He picked up his phone and dialed Martin.
“Where did you go?” Martin answered in a hurry. “It’s like the whole building went nuts. Jesus, what happened?”
There was a loaded question. He rubbed his eyes. “Was anyone hurt?”
“A couple people ran into each other, but that was it.”
Thane glanced at his bedroom door. “What did you see?”
“Nothing,” Martin said. “Just sounded like a freight train coming through. The building shook. The lights went out. Then it was like a hurricane or something. Now everyone’s looking at me like I know what it was.”
No one had seen them except him and Reya. Thane was beginning to feel like he had a tenuous hold on reality.
Martin lowered his voice. “You know what happened, don’t you?”
“Not for sure,” he said, but he did. He also knew that if more creatures came after him, someone really could get hurt. Killed. He couldn’t go back to work unless he knew how bad this was.
“I need to take some time off work,” Thane said.
“Oh no. No, no, no. We’ve got burning people, and God knows what tearing through our city. I need you.”
He knew Martin was right, but Thane couldn’t risk anyone around him getting hurt. Reya was more than capable of protecting herself, but anyone else? Not a chance. “Tell O’Brien I’m taking a few vacation days.”
“Christ almighty, Thane. This isn’t funny.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Then he hung up before Martin could protest and make him feel worse than he did.
Thane stared at his bedroom door for a moment before walking over to the couch. It looked damn small. He sat down and listened to the silence. No whispers. He’d heard them again in the shower. He’d heard them right before the attacks. They were becoming so “normal” that he was beginning to wonder if they would ever stop now. Even if he found whoever was after him. Even if Reya disappeared and never came back.
The whispers might be there forever.