Mortal Sin (11 page)

You freed me. You’re my new master.

She shook her head at the thought. Daggers didn’t have thoughts.

Demons did.

“It’s a him,” Skye nodded.

“I don’t know who it is. It’s vague, an impression, but yeah, I guess I feel he’s masculine. His passion is that dagger. The dagger itself—it is full of passion. For killing, for slaughter. I don’t know! But as long as the dagger is out there, whoever has it will kill again. The dagger will turn the killer even more violent each and every time he kills. And it gives him a power, a demonic power.” She paused and considered how the scene played out. It wasn’t like the death imprint in Los Angeles; it was more subtle than that. “He didn’t intend to kill Joe, touching the dagger unleashed something evil in him. But using the dagger made him more powerful.” Moira stepped out of the building and finally felt like she could breathe freely again.

“The good news,” she said, trying to look on the bright side when bright sides were few and far between, “this isn’t the handiwork of a demon or magic. But the dagger is—the dagger… ” Her voice trailed off. Maybe there was a demon, but not one of the Seven. Not her bailiwick. “The dagger is trouble. Anthony can find out exactly what kind of trouble. That’s what he does. This is right up his alley.”

“I’ll call him. He’ll meet us here—and I’ll ask Hank to pick up Lily and then you. Is that okay?”

“Sure,” Moira said. “So what if I’m a little late to Olivet? Rico only threatened to throw me in a dungeon for the rest of my life.”

Skye stared at Moira as she walked down the alley and leaned against Skye’s truck, hugging herself against the cold. Against the fear.

Skye wasn’t entirely certain Moira was joking about the dungeon.

Rafe looked around the too clean, too bright, too sterile room that was the Santa Louisa morgue. The drain in the middle of the floor and the three stainless steel tables unnerved him. “Can I just say I don’t want to be here?” Rafe said.

“No one does, but they don’t usually complain about it,” Rod Fielding said.

“Why are we here? You’re not going to cut me open.” He was half-joking.

“I’m waiting until a friend of mine gets on duty at the hospital so I can sneak you in for an MRI.”

Rafe didn’t want to go to the hospital. He hadn’t liked them before his coma, now they really creeped him out. Yesterday when he and Moira searched the area where he’d been kept in a coma, he had a borderline panic attack. He could only tolerate the endeavor because Moira had been with him.

“I’m fine,” he insisted.

“Bullshit.”

Rod sat at his desk and motioned for Rafe sit a chair next to him. The desk was devoid of clutter. An inbox and an outbox housed files, all neat and organized. A phone. A computer. The keyboard stored neatly on a tray under the desk.

“I’m here because Moira trusts you.”

“Then you need to trust me.”

“I do.”

Rafe was squeamish. Rod was one of the few people who knew just about everything since the Seven had been released from Hell. He’d developed a theory about how the demons infected their victims, at least how, biologically, the sins affected the human body. He was working on a cure, or an immunization,
something
to stop people from dying.

But it was all just a theory, and until they had more answers, they couldn’t be certain how the demons infected their victims or how their victims were killed or cured. After Rafe’s battle with Lust ten weeks ago, he knew what happened to the souls. The demons retained and controlled them. They were trapped, painfully. In a brutal attack, Lust had thrown all the souls it had collected at Rafe, and he’d collapsed from the physical assault. He’d managed to disperse them, sending them
out
, but he didn’t know where they’d gone, if they’d gone to Heaven or Hell or Purgatory or were stuck in the astral plane. He couldn’t spend the time or energy figuring it out because that would have given any of them a better opportunity to possess him or someone else.

Rafe didn’t like how Rod was looking at him. Assessing him. But he didn’t know exactly why it made him nervous. Rafe forced himself to sit straight and keep a blank face. He needed to stay calm. Rod was a friend. He was safe here. As safe as he could be anywhere.

“Tell me exactly what’s been happening. And don’t lie. Moira already told me about the migraines.” He paused. “And the memories.”

“Then you know everything.” He wished Moira hadn’t said anything. They’d kept the worst of it from Anthony and Skye, downplaying the frequency and the intensity.

“What happened today?” Rod asked.

He hesitated before he answered. Moira trusted Rod, and Moira was worried. For her, he responded truthfully. “I pushed the memory.”

“What do you mean by that?”

He sighed, rubbed his head. The headache was still there, but it was dull, throbbing. “Sometimes, the memories come, but I don’t consciously do anything. Meaning, I get information, I
know
things. Like a prayer. Or an ancient exorcism in a language I don’t know. Or information about a demon. Things I know I didn’t learn, but came from somewhere else. It’s tiring, and I’m left with a dull headache. Yet, every time I try to focus, every time I consciously attempt to remember something that I know isn’t
my
memory, my head hurts, like the worst migraine you’ve ever had.” That was an understatement. “When a flood of information comes all at once, it’s like I’m in the past, seeing and thinking and feeling what the priest felt.”

“The priest? Which priest?”

He hesitated. “All of them.”

They sat for a minute before Rod slowly said, as if he’d just stumbled upon an unbelievable truth, “You have the memories of the twelve priests who were massacred at the mission six months ago.”

Rafe sighed. He wasn’t surprised that the scientist was unconvinced. “It sounds incredible.”

“Nothing sounds incredible anymore. Just unfamiliar.” He paused. “I’m new to this. Are you sure this isn’t a ghost or something?”

“I know it’s not a ghost.” He didn’t want to go into the details on how he knew that. Ghosts seemed to be able to contact him, talk to him, easier than most people. Because of the memories? Because he’d nearly died? Rafe had no idea, and he didn’t want to explore that path yet. All he knew was before the massacre he’d had no sensitivity to spirits; now, he did, and then some.

“I don’t know that it’s
all
the priests,” he said. “I’ve only remembered the flashbacks of four, specifically. But other snippets of information come and go, and I don’t know where the knowledge came from.”

Rafe rose, even though he still felt light-headed, but didn’t want to sit anymore. “The flashbacks are different than a brief memory. Like today, while Moira and I were in the garden at the mission, a brief prayer came to me, part of an exorcism that I had never heard of, but I knew that’s what it was. I had the overwhelming need to share the information with Moira because it’s going to help her. She doesn’t trust it, but I do, and I can’t explain
why.
” He frowned, but continued. “The flashbacks are intense. It’s usually a traumatic event, the kind of things that happened that sent the priests to the mission in the first place. Until the one today about Jeremiah Hatch.” He shook his head. “You can’t help me, Doc.”

Rod didn’t comment on that, but said instead, “This last memory was different, wasn’t it?”

“I told you, I pushed it. I had a sense of déjà vu, so I forced the memory to the surface. That’s what made my nose bleed.”

“You lost a shitload of blood for a nose bleed, Rafe.”

“I’m okay.”

“Hardly. Let me see what’s going on in your head, okay? I’ve been doing a lot of research on the brains of the victims—”

“I haven’t been infected by the Seven.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know.”

“Then you have nothing to worry about, do you?”

“You’re not going to learn anything.”

There were things Rafe wanted to know… and things he feared to learn. There was a memory barely buried, and it was there today. Something he should know… but hadn’t quite remembered.

But it was
his
memory that was missing. Something in
his
past that was important.

Something that Jeremiah Hatch had known that was just out of Rafe’s reach. A tidbit that was slipping in and out that related to Hatch and the murders at the mission. Something that might help them send the Seven back… or help Rafe understand what had happened to him at the mission, and why he was spared.

Which meant he needed to get into this head of his and dig around for the truth.

He wanted to remember. He
needed
to remember.

“Rafe, you with me?” Rod asked.

Rafe nodded. “I don’t think you can help, but truly, if you can, I would be grateful.”

“Really? Because you’ve been arguing with me since we got here.”

“I’ll cooperate. I want to know what’s going on. More, I need to learn how to control it.”

Rod glanced at his watch. “Well then, let’s go.”

#

Skye sent Moira off before Anthony arrived at the storage facility. Hank had arrived, and Skye knew Moira didn’t really want to miss her flight to Montana. She’d been antsy and worried, so Skye told her to go, that she’d explain the situation to Anthony. Moira had certainly been relieved that she wasn’t going to be late, but said she’d call Anthony while they were driving and tell him what they’d found.

Skye wondered what Rico had done to Moira in the past when she hadn’t obeyed orders. Moira was not a woman who took orders from anyone else.

Skye didn’t like being in the abandoned building alone, and it was getting chilly, so she waited in her truck. She had plenty of work to keep her occupied, but her mind wandered, thinking about Moira. And Rafe. And Anthony. Her life had been turned upside down over the last six months. The massacre at the mission. Juan Martinez being possessed by a demon. Anthony nearly dying. She’d watched a miracle as water healed him, and she still didn’t know what to make of that. But she’d seen it with her own eyes.

Then the ritual at the cliffs, the destruction in her town, the spread of these Seven Deadly Sins to other cities and towns. If Moira was right, and there really was one of these demons in Canada, how far could they go? Everywhere? How could they ever hope to stop them?

Car lights flashed around the corner and parked behind her truck. Skye didn’t get out until she saw Anthony emerge. He walked to the driver’s side as she opened her door.

“I’m sorry I’m late,
mi amore
,” he said. He touched her arms, kissed her cheek. Always the gentleman. Always polite. He could get angry—especially at Moira—but he kept it bottled up, as if he’d been punished for it in the past and needed to keep the anger under tight control.

“I was doing paperwork.” She put her clipboard aside and locked her truck, then started toward the entrance.

Anthony took her by the hand and pulled her to him. “Skye,” he said, then kissed her.

The sudden affection surprised her. Maybe because there had been so little between them lately as Anthony spent more time at the mission than with her, but the kiss pushed all of that away. The kiss told her that everything was the way it had been before. Or was that her own wishful thinking?

“I’ve missed you,” he said quietly, resting his forehead on hers.

“Ditto,” she whispered and squeezed his hands. She looked him in the eye. It was dark, but the security lighting gave her just enough visibility. “Are you coming home tonight?” She hoped she didn’t sound desperate. But after today, maybe she was.

He caressed her face. “Yes. I am truly sorry I have had to spend so much time at the mission. If it wasn’t so important, I would never leave you.”

“I guess I’m just being selfish.”

She was joking, but he stared at her as if she’d committed a grave sin. “Do not say that, Skye. You are the most patient, generous person I know. I love you in a way I never thought I could love a woman.” He kissed her again, this time with urgency. She responded immediately to his heat. This Anthony, the one he kept wrapped up in manners and propriety, she craved. The passion that poured into her like a euphoric drug.

“Anthony,” she breathed out as his lips skimmed behind her ear and her knees went weak. He knew her sensitive spots. She wanted him home, naked.

If they could postpone this search for twelve hours, she would.

She stepped back. “Let’s get this over with so I can get you back to my bed and you can keep the promise you just made me.”

He smiled, a bit confused. “Promise?”

“The promise of wild sex. You didn’t say it, but your kiss did.” She smiled. “I’ve missed more than your pretty face.” She needed to bring some levity back to this because his intensity was going to mess with her investigative skills.

He nodded, but for the first time in weeks, Skye saw a happy gleam in his eye. Anthony was always serious, but when they were alone, together, when he was fully relaxed, he was playful and sweet. She liked both sides, but right now she wanted the play. Needed it. There was too much death and anger and violence in her life; she had to relax as only Anthony could make her relax.

They walked to the entrance and Skye unlocked the police lock for the second time that night. “Did Moira call you?”

He nodded crisply. “She should have stayed.”

“I thought you’d like that she was obeying orders.” Skye was joking, but Anthony didn’t joke when it came to Moira.

“I need to question her. She might know more than she’s saying.”

Skye let that comment slide as they stepped into the dark building. She turned on her flashlight and handed one to Anthony. “No electricity. The bank owns the building. Several storage units were in default, and the bank plans to auction off the goods next week, sight unseen.”

“That might have been the impetus for the thief to break in.”

“He’s a killer. A thief, yes, but he killed Joe Smith.”

“That’s what Moira says.”