Wicked Souls (3 page)

I jerked away and a wave of dizziness almost
toppled me, but I righted myself.
“You mean, did I cast a spell on
him?
Of course not.
I’m two days and a few hours away from hitting
my six-month magic-free anniversary.
I’m certainly not going to
jeopardize that with spellcasting.
Besides why would I cast a spell
on Gabriel?”

Luc laid a hand on the tile behind my head
and leaned in close.
The heat coming off his body hit me in waves.
Waves that felt good.
Too good.
“What about Emilia?”

As another chill swept through me, I fought
the urge to snuggle up to Luc’s warm body.
Every cell, every
muscle, every bone wanted to press against him.
Must’ve been my
brush with death making me act stupid.
“Emilia is not a strong
enough witch to cast any kind of spell on Gabriel.
Without your
help, that is.”

At that, I gave him my best
Law &
Order
confess-your-guilt glare.
Luc seemed unfazed.
Either I
needed to practice harder or give up the idea I’d make a good
cop.

Luc heaved a frustrated sigh, then narrowed
his eyes as his gaze stopped on the hand still rubbing the spot
between my breasts.
“Are you still in pain?”

“Not pain,” I said.
The sensation was hard
to describe.
“Just…empty.
Like there’s a hole in my chest.”

The showerhead let go a series of rapid
drips and all the muscles in Luc’s body tensed.

His gaze scanned me from head to foot,
hyperaware, as if he were searching for something.
“A hole.”
It was
said in an unemotional way, but all his nonverbal intensity made
the warning bells in my head ring like Immaculate Conception
calling me to prayer.

“Probably nothing.”
I forced a smile,
stopped rubbing the spot, and took a step to the side.
The ticking
of the clock in the locker room echoed off the walls, reminding me
I was definitely going to be late for my appointment with Father
Leonard.
“Anyway, it’s over.
Hopefully he won’t be back.”

“Oh, he’ll be back,” Luc said, staring again
at my chest, although not in his usual, rakish manner.

The tone in his voice made the warning bells
go even crazier.
“Why is that?”

He straightened and lightly touched the spot
with the tips of his fingers.
“Because, Amy, he took a piece of
your soul.”

Chapter Three:

Soul Be It

Father Leonard’s office at the church was as
big as my whole apartment.
Towering bookshelves filled with dusty,
leather-bound tomes, as well as best-selling legal thrillers, lined
the walls.
A monstrous mahogany desk and chairs anchored one end,
surrounded by antique wooden file drawers.
At the far end were a
brick fireplace, couch and coffee table.
While he kept the casual
seating area—the place he comforted parishioners, entertained
fellow priests, and counseled me on a regular basis—neat and tidy,
his desk and file drawers were a complete disaster, manila files,
papers, pens and pencils in tangled disarray.
Two jars, one labeled
“Cuss”’ and the other “Cliché”, sat on top of two stacks of books.
The priest hated both foibles.

From his window overlooking the front of the
church, I could read his latest quip on the changeable sign facing
the street.
“If God can’t satisfy, what can?”
Besides the bad
grammar, the statement made The Rolling Stones play in my head.
I can’t get no…no satisfaction
.
God and satisfaction didn’t
go together in my book.
In fact, in my personal dictionary,
Lucifer’s picture was on one side of the satisfaction entry.
Adam’s
on the other.

A rainbow of sticky notes dotted Father
Leonard’s outdated computer monitor, all of them reminders of
important dates and times he couldn’t fill in on his desktop
calendar because it was covered with junk.
A pink sticky note read,
“Tuesday, 6 PM, Amy!”
in his bold script.
It was an inefficient
system, yet seemed to work.
I had no doubt he would be at my
ceremony on Tuesday, not because he was my sponsor and would simply
remember the important event, but because his system was
flawless.

That didn’t mean he was always on time.
I
needn’t have worried about being late—his office was empty when I
arrived.
As I paced around the large desk, I chewed a fingernail
I’d broken during my fight with Gabriel.
Snakes of worry twisted in
my lower gut, Luc’s words still ringing in my ears.
I’d been so
freaked out after his last statement, I’d simply thrown on my
clothes and took off, walking the six blocks to Immaculate
Conception in a rush, trying to squash my anxiety.
Did no good and
I became even more freaked out when I sensed Lucifer following me.
Not in his usual stalk-the-witch mode, but as my bodyguard.
The
fact I needed a bodyguard as powerful as Lucifer sent all my
careful reasoning about Gabriel’s attack out the window.

As I turned a corner of the desk too
sharply, I knocked off a stack of files.
Papers flew
everywhere.

“Damn it.”
Without thinking, I started to
throw a gathering spell, but caught myself before my hand made the
motion over the papers.
“What the hell?”

Barring my latest encounter with Gabriel, I
haven’t had the urge to use magic since the last time I sent him
packing back to Heaven at Halloween.
And while he was trying to
kill me, my resolve not to use magic had stayed strong.
So why was
I now about to chuck that resolve out the window over some dropped
papers?

I’m a neat freak, no doubt.
It’s ingrained
in me as much as magic is in my blood.
Emilia and I had grown up in
a house where every surface had been covered with objects.
Empty
whiskey bottles on every counter, black candles, herbs, beads and
other spellcasting props scattered on bookshelves and table tops.
Clothes, capes and veils thrown over furniture.

Our aunt, whom we lived with, spent the
majority of her time in the spirit world, hanging out with Elvis
and downing Jack Daniels when she had to return to reality.
Every
time I walked into Father Leonard’s office, I had to fight the urge
to start straightening, tossing and cleaning.
Childhood habits and
all that.

With shaking hands, I dropped to my knees
and hastily shuffled the papers back into the manila folder.
Damn
angel.
No way was I letting him shake me up bad enough to blow my
six-month magic-free streak.

The moment I set the folder back on the
desk, the office door opened and Father Leonard hustled in.
He was
grinning like he’d heard a good joke seconds before, but when he
saw me his grin fell and his forehead creased in a downward
squiggle.
Keeping his gaze on me, he closed the door behind him and
started unbuttoning his coat.
“You look like you just saw a ghost.
What’s wrong?”

“Cliché.”
I pointed at the jar on his desk.
“And it wasn’t a ghost.
Try angel.”

He tossed his coat on a nearby chair and
followed it with his hat.
He scratched his short black hair and
eyed me suspiciously.
“Which one?”

“The big blonde guy.
You met him at
Christmas.”

It took a second for the cogs in his brain
to click into place, but when they did, he looked stunned.
“Gabriel?
What in the Lord’s name did he want?”

“He tried to kill me, claiming I put a spell
on him.
He couldn’t get the job done, though, thanks to…” I
hesitated to admit Lucifer had helped me out of situation.
“Outside
help.
Instead he took a piece of my soul.”

The squiggle on Father Leonard’s forehead
shot up to his hairline.
“He did what?”

I started pacing again, my own brain cogs
running in circles.
“I don’t get it.
My soul belongs to Lucifer, so
how could Gabriel take a piece of it?
And what does he want with
it?
Is he going to turn me into his holy bitch and force me to do
things—like hand out religious tracts at the airport—I don’t want
to do?”

Father Leonard moved toward the desk,
pulling his wallet out of his back pocket to stick a dollar in the
cliché jar as he pondered my story.
After a minute of watching me
pace, he gave up figuring it out and tried to reason with me.
“You
seem more concerned about Gabriel having a piece of your soul than
about the fact you gave your soul to the Devil.”

Really?
That was the best he could do?
I
rolled my eyes.
“Lucifer’s never tried to kill me.
Gabriel, on the
other hand, is a freak who’s tried to kill me twice now.
You do the
math.”

Chuckling under his breath, he took my elbow
and steered me toward the couch.
“Your soul is tied to your
freewill, you know.
Highly unusual for an angel of God to seek a
soul.
In fact, I’ve never heard of such a thing.
I’m sure you’re
blowing this whole thing out of proportion.
What exactly did
Gabriel say to you?”

We sat and I told him the story from the
beginning, leaving out unnecessary details, like my raging
horniness and the fact that when I thought I was going to die, the
person I thought of was Luc.
“Why Gabe thinks I put a spell on him,
I don’t know.
First of all, I’m not strong enough to do that.”

His blue eyes mocked me, and a probe, like a
finger, poked at my magic.
“You did it before, didn’t you?
You sent
him back to Heaven at Halloween last year.”

It wasn’t the first time Father Leonard had
poked at my magic, nor was it the first time I’d considered the
idea he was more than a priest.
Unlike Lucifer’s full body scan,
however, the priest’s was more like a needle drawing a sample.
When
I’d called him on it once before, he denied being psychic or having
any kind of supernatural abilities.
One of these days I was going
to figure it out, but at the moment I had bigger things to deal
with.

“I was still a powerful dark witch at the
Witches Anonymous meeting at Halloween,” I explained.
“My magic was
fueled by all the emotions in the room that night, which were
pretty intense, thanks to Emilia trying to kill us all.
Plus Adam
was lying at my feet, hurt and definitely going to die if I didn’t
do something.
Today, I haven’t practiced magic in six months, and
I’m no longer tied to Lucifer.
A lot of my power at Halloween came
from him.”

Father Leonard leaned forward, placing his
elbows on his knees and staring into the cold fireplace.
“Who else,
what other witch, has that kind of power?”

“None I know.
Lucifer hasn’t hooked up with
anyone since Emilia, and I’d be able to sense another witch that
strong here in Eden if she were openly casting spells.
There isn’t
one.”

“Are you sure about that?
Seems to me there
is one practicing the dark arts, and you’ve told me yourself she’s
very powerful.”

I tried to recall when I told him that and
who I’d been talking about.
The only person in Eden practicing the
dark arts was…

“No,” I said, eyes widening.
I considered
the idea again and shook my head.
“She wouldn’t touch an
archangel.”

But as soon I said it, I doubted my
conviction.
Keisha was my best friend.
She was also big on an eye
for an eye.
We’d sat in my office at the ice cream shop on many a
slow day during the winter months discussing various ways to make
Gabriel’s life hell if he ever came back to earth.
I’d thought we
were playing a game.
Maybe Keisha thought differently.

“Shit.”
I jumped off the couch and went for
my coat.

Father Leonard tsked.
“Cussing.
You owe the
jar a dollar.”

Reaching for the door, I jerked it open.
I
had the feeling I was going to owe the cuss jar more than a dollar
before the day was out.
“Put it on my tab, Father.”
Realizing that
statement also warranted a buck, I sighed in frustration.
Sometimes, a cliché was the only thing that would do.