Carry On Wayward Son(22)

She opened it, grabbed the nail file, and headed back to the window. The slim metal file slipped under the frame, caught the square of paper and pushed it all the way through. A breeze caught it. She pressed her hand against the window as it spiraled away from its target. “No—no, no, no—”

Below her, Simon moved, following the flutter of pink. They both froze as it hit the ground. On this side of the fence.

Simon looked up at her. Claire closed her eyes for a moment, surprised to find him still watching her. He seemed to know when he had her attention; he mimicked climbing over the fence.

“No, Simon—” She slapped the window. He saluted, and jogged out of sight. “Damn stubborn man.”

He popped up over the top of the fence, landed lightly on her side. Praying Zach was somewhere without a window view, she watched Simon make his way to the small square of paper. And held her breath until he had it in his hand and was climbing back to safety.

With a relieved sigh, she turned away from the window, and froze inches from Zach.

“I allowed him to leave. He cannot harm me, not without harming you.” Swallowing, Claire waited for him to tell her he knew—what she was, what she had been. Instead, he started pacing, favoring his left side, pain and anger flaring around him. “What was in the note, Claire?”

“I wanted him to know we were all right. You hardly left a good impression on him.”

“And now you plot behind my back? Treat me as you would an entity of evil?” He moved forward, so close she could feel his breath on her cheek. The exhaustion he fought to hide leaked through. “Until I get what I want—until I have my life—no one leaves this place.”

Before Claire could open her mouth he disappeared. Left her trapped in the locked room. Again.



*



Simon vaulted back over the fence so fast he brought some of it with him.

“Damn it—” He gripped his right wrist, cursing as he saw the thick splinters imbedded in his palm.

“Let me see.” Eric cradled his hand, tested the splinters, smiling as Simon cursed louder. “Sorry, sorry. Those are really dug in. I have my bag in the car. Don’t poke at them.”

Simon opened his other hand, held out the crumpled paper to Theresa. “Open this for me, will you?”

She unfolded the paper, held it up just as Eric got back. “Sit,” he said, setting his black medical bag on the lawn and kneeling next to it. “You can read it while I extract.”

Simon raised one eyebrow—and jerked his hand away when he saw the tools in Eric’s. “Oh, hell no.”

“Read the note, let me do what I do.”

“You work on animals, last I checked.” Eric merely smiled again and grabbed Simon’s wrist.

“They’re splinters. I think I can handle them without much bloodshed.”

To distract himself, Simon nodded at Theresa. She held out the pink paper; it took a couple tries to decipher Claire’s scribble. And when he finally did, he had to read it twice to actually believe it.

“Damn it, Claire—what did you step in?”

Brown eyes wide, Theresa stared up at him. “What is it?” She started to turn the note around.

“Don’t bother—I’ll just tell you.” Maybe saying it out loud will make it seem less—surreal. “She wants to know if I can do a banishing spell.”

“For what?” Eric lowered the giant tweezers just before they gripped the first ugly splinter. “Are they dealing with another ghost possession?”

“If only it were that easy.” Letting out his breath, Simon looked at them. “Heaven help me—she wants me to banish a guardian angel.”





NINE



Claire lowered herself to the only chair in the room, still shaken. Zach had to know about her; he cracked the wall blocking her power, touched her more than once. But he still treated her as if she were like the others. As if she was completely human.

Pressing one hand to her chest, she felt the scar, just below her sternum, where Natasha plunged the knife into her the night everything changed. The night she gave her life to save her friends.

Now it ached, throbbing, as the wall Zach fractured, the wall Azazel built to block her power, started to crumble. She didn’t know what lay behind it, and part of her was terrified that the demon waited, crouching behind her shiny new soul.

If that were the truth, if Azazel left that part of her inside, she had no way to keep it contained—both her tattoos, her barriers between her true self and the world, were broken, cut by iron and steel.

She would not put the people trapped with her in danger, and she no longer knew if the angel she had been or the demon she became when she fell would win. She had touched too much evil, lost too much of herself, to know where she stood anymore.