Unearthed (18 page)

“Yeah well, he hasn’t changed much.”

When the plastic bag was empty, the angel took back the clothing he’d given her piece by piece and put it back inside. As soon as Keira’s hands were empty, she helped him hold it open.

“Thank you,” he said, still not at all surprised by her help. “After the Treaty’s laws were set down, it seemed as though he’d traded in his dark, empty soul for another. He followed the line of the law so adeptly, I could not help but think all the Treaty had done was make him better at hiding things. Terrible things.”

M stopped packing and turned towards her. But he wasn’t looking at Keira, he was looking
beyond
her. To memories? Regrets? “Lamere’s lack of conscience and morality is evident when he is allowed to brutalize—in the Treaty’s fight of Champions, for instance. With almost a child’s joy, he destroys.” He blinked to refocus. “This is not helping your hunt.”

It wasn’t helping her emotional state, either. “He’s been an upstanding vamp since then—pretending to be, at least?”

“Until this unfortunate episode began, he has always been a perfect subject to the Treaty and the Highworld.” He went back to the old clothes. “As to why he made such a large and obvious mistake after being so careful for so many years, I do not know.”

Keira didn’t really care. She knew how evil he was, how little he deserved to exist. “Do you know why he chooses to live here?” Lamere’s English wasn’t even that good. “Or why he’s staying here, even though he knows he’s being hunted?”

“I believe he enjoys being near power.”

“The council?”

He shook his head. “The North American council is based in San Francisco because this area, and a few others, hold stronger magic. These energy centers draw supernatural creatures as well as humans; therefore, they have all become large cities.”

They spoke for a little longer, until all the clothes had been placed gently into the bag, but M didn’t tell her anything new or surprising. She’d spent more time with Lamere than anyone else. She knew him better than anyone else. Which meant she was the one who had to find him.

Before she picked up her pack, she wiped her hands on her pants, trying to get rid of the grimy feel the clothes had left.

“Thank you for your help,” M said, spinning the plastic bag around to close it.

“Are you taking them to the shelter now?”

“Of course not.” He laughed as they walked towards the street…together. “I have to take them to the coin laundry down the street first. Then they’ll go to the shelter.” An angel at the laundromat. Not something Keira had ever imagined, probably because she didn’t think angels got dirty.

“I wish I could tell you more. But there is…” After only a few steps, he stopped and set down the bag. “While I can never give you all Lamere took away, I can return something of yours that might help you in your quest. Unfortunately, it may also bring you pain.”

“Shocking,” she said on a laugh. “Nothing ever seems to come without pain.”

“That is no longer true. If you could—”

“Yeah, okay. What have you got for me?”

He didn’t look upset that she’d interrupted him, which was really annoying actually. Proof that an angel’s life would never be disrupted by a seer’s.

“A memory he wiped from your mind,” he said.

“Just one?” For once, she was glad Lamere was a sadist. If he’d taken all of them, she wouldn’t hate him enough to want him dead. “I don’t care about the pain. It’s mine, and I want it.”

M lowered his head until it almost touched hers. She may have blacked out for a second, or
whited
out considering the whole angel connection. Then she felt it. As if a tiny point of light expanded, opening up a passage.
In my head?
Pretty sure it’s not good to have holes in your head.
Outside or inside.

Her pack slipped out of her hand and hit the ground when the memory appeared. Of her. Of the house she’d grown up in, where she’d been safe and warm and loved and normal. Her mom’s car was even in the driveway.

Keira’s vision shifted to the cement sidewalk under her bare feet, down the street, around the corner. She struggled to keep up with the images, running until she stood in front of an iron gate attached to a thick stone wall. She’d probably passed it a thousand times on her way to school without ever really seeing it. Magic.

The image jumped, bringing her into the place where she’d grown up another way, in fear, humiliation, and pain. She suddenly understood why, of all her memories, Lamere would’ve taken that one.

She’d been kept and tortured and raped for three years in a house so close to her own that if she’d had the strength to scream, her mom and dad might have heard her. If she’d gotten free, she could’ve walked home. How many times did her parents pass her prison, looking for their little girl? If she hadn’t given up or stopped hoping she’d ever escape, maybe…

No. “That’s not possible. It can’t be.” She shook her head, trying to make herself believe it was a trick. Did angels trick people? “It wasn’t real, was it?”

“I simply gave you back what you had forgotten. I did not see anything for myself.”

Three years. For three years she’d been searching, and the only place she’d never thought of looking was her hometown. She couldn’t go back there. What if someone saw her? A classmate or her parents?

I have to.
The only thing more haunting than her time there was the possibility that Lamere had replaced her and that some poor girl was going through what she had. The probability of that increased when she’d found out that he’d
turned
someone. Someone who looked like her.

The vampire he’d made and abandoned had been found almost a month ago. A month gave him more than enough time to find a new project.

“I gotta go.” She picked up her pack and flung it over her shoulder.

“Before you do, I would like to give you a gift.”

“Is it a pony? Because I could sure as shit use a pony right now.”

“Had I but known…” The softness of his eyes as he smiled stopped her breath. It was impossible to hate him. She wondered if he or Davyn knew they had anything in common. “This is something you may eventually need even more than a pony.”

“What?”

“My name.” He explained how it worked, how seldom angels spoke their names to any being outside of their race because of the risk. “It is how we communicate, how we can be called. It is a sign of my belief in you, as well as my penance for what you went through because of our mistake. The risk is even greater because of the relationship you share with your demon.”

“Eww. First off—relationship? Totally wrong word to use. He and I don’t have a relationship.”

“When more than one being is involved, it’s a relationship.” Davyn had said almost the same thing about negotiation.

“It doesn’t matter, but he’s not
my
demon.”

The angel just smiled.

“He’s not,” she mumbled.

“I did not disagree.” Great. He didn’t agree either, now did he? “If a demon were able to communicate freely with an angel, be able to invade his mind, neither they nor anyone around them would be safe. You must promise you’ll never tell Davyn my true name, no matter what.”

“Okay, I promise.” She put her hand to her head when she felt a pressure. Not painful, but not pleasant either. Just…unnerving.

Then she heard it, a faint whisper she knew no one else would hear—

‘
Micah.’

“Wow.” She shook her head, trying to make sure he wasn’t still in there. “That was…weird.”

“Was it?” he asked, amused. “Then, if you say my name…‘weirdly,’ and ask for assistance with your whole heart, I will come to you. But it must be with your whole heart.”

She’d be sure to put that on her Never Going to Happen list, but she couldn’t deny it felt good to be so trusted. “I don’t think I’m ever going to understand immortals.”

“We are fairly ‘weird,’ aren’t we?” He laughed. When his wings came out, she stepped back and turned away. First, because they were huge and took up a lot of space, and second because they were so beautiful she actually felt her eyes tear up.

“Thanks for…you know. I appreciate it.”

“You have already returned the favor.” He nodded to the bag of clothes, and then looked at her. “However, if you wish to do more, then I would ask you to do something for yourself.”

“What do you mean?”

“Decide what your true goal is—to end the life of your abuser or to begin a new life for yourself—because the two are not compatible as you are now. And understand that we can never move forward while our feet are stuck in the past.”

Good advice. But Keira already had lots of plans for her feet, and the only thing they would be stuck in was blood.

Keira finally decided she hated Micah more than she hated all the other angels combined, because Micah was right. As soon as Lamere was dead, Davyn would go do whatever it was that demons did, and she’d never see him again. Eventually, the weird feelings she had for him would go away too.

But the rest of it would stick around as long as she let it.

“It’s time. Make it happen.” Maybe she should eat first. Or take a nap. Or hibernate all winter. It didn’t even have to be her—somebody else could go.

No
. If she never went back to that house to see it as it really was, it would stay in her mind just the way she remembered it, from the perspective of someone imprisoned inside it. It wasn’t as if she’d suddenly be healed, there’d be peace on earth, and a bunch of fairies would get their wings, but when you wake yourself up screaming enough times, something needs to change.

Now that she knew where the house was, knew there was a possibility another girl could be suffering the same way she did…in the same place…so close to safety…

It had to be now.

And hey, who knew? Lamere could be there. He hadn’t lived there full-time when she had, although “lived” seemed an odd word choice for either of them.

Her own fear and disillusionment aside, it wasn’t about her. He could be hurting someone else, and the faster he was wiped off the planet, the better off the world was. Both worlds.

“So…” A short trip to check out the house where she grew up the hard way and kill the bastard who’d kept her chained to a wall whenever he wasn’t playing with her. Multitasking at its finest…and its most fatal.

Time to put on her big-girl boots, fill up her gas tank, and pack up all her favorite weapons.

“Where are you off to, puppet?”

She slammed the trunk of her car and flipped to face the demon. If he was human, she’d have heard him long before this and he’d be on the ground, bleeding already. “Every single time.” Was she slipping, or was he really that good? If he was, she needed him. Maybe she needed him even if he wasn’t that good. Maybe—

“Are you stalking me?” She leaned down to pick up her keys, pushing on the trunk lid to make sure it was latched. Wouldn’t be much fun if it popped open on the freeway and stakes and silver chain flew everywhere.

Davyn put a hand on his heart, wounded. “That’s the
bad
kind of creepy. Not my style.”

“I’ll get a restraining order if I have to—and for demons, it comes with a Bible and a priest.”

He laughed. “Where are you going?”

“How did you know I was going anywhere?”

“Because I’m stalking you, and have no plans to stop any time soon, so you might as well tell me where you’re going.”

“Shoe shopping. Wanna come?”

He looked down. “Your feet have never worn anything but boots, have they?”

She glared at him but didn’t say anything because no, they hadn’t. Not for six years, at least. The last time she’d worn pretty shoes was when she was seventeen.

“Thought not. So sure, I’ll go shopping with you. I might even buy you a decent-looking outfit. You have a body under all that armor, I know it. Well, I know you have breasts, fantastic breasts, because you showed them to me. Thank you for that, by the way.”

“You know I’m not going shopping,” she grumbled. She’d used exactly the wrong excuse. He probably loved shopping. Weirdo.

“Yeah, but I had my fingers crossed. I was planning on phasing into your dressing room at regular intervals to see the sights.”

“You’re not going to leave now, are you?”

“When things might finally get interesting? Not a chance.”

She couldn’t put off this trip even one more day. It could be the day Lamere decided to play one of his games or lecture about his “living art” to the person he was slowly killing with it. It had been three years too long already.

“Where are we going?” he asked.

“
I’m
going to his house.”

“Been to all of them. They’re empty, although…the one in Montreal was a little dusty if I remember correctly. Dust
a la Otis
.” Only a demon would make a joke about what they’d seen there.

“Not his apartments. I’m talking about his house in the suburbs. Oh my god, is this proof you
don’t
know everything?”

“He has a house I didn’t know about, in the ’burbs.” He was speaking to himself, laying it all out in his mind, maybe looking for a reaction from her. “That’s where he kept you, and now you’re going back.”

“Yeah, I already knew that. Try to keep up.”

He studied her, his brow furrowed, head tilted. “You hoped I would come by, didn’t you?”

“Believe me,” she said, laughing, “that’s something I would never, ever hope for.”

“Maybe not normally—although I can’t imagine why not—but today you did. Because you don’t want to go alone.”

That wasn’t true, was it? Damn it! She could’ve come up with a lie he’d believe. Why hadn’t she? “No idea what you’re talking about, demon. I like being alone.”

“You’re so nervous, you’d even take me if you had to. Which you do, because you don’t have anyone else.” That was true…and pathetic.

“Maybe I should let you through my shield just to prove how incredibly wrong you are.” She hated that he saw into her so well, that she seemed so easy for him to read. She wasn’t. No one knew anything she didn’t want them to know.
She
controlled what people knew about her. No one else.