A knot formed in my stomach. “He mentioned Misha, and he must’ve figured out who I was based on the questions I was asking.” That wasn’t exactly a lie. “He knew that I’d killed him.”
“Trin.” Zayne reached for me, and I felt the brush of his warm fingers against my arm.
An immediate rush of raw, pounding emotion swirled through me, and I stepped out of his reach. “He also knew about the Harbinger. Said roughly the same thing my father did. Rivers were going to run red and it was the end time.” I left out the part about Misha’s soul, and me being a part of it all, because I couldn’t believe the first part and the latter made no sense. “Didn’t really say anything helpful before literally impaling himself on my dagger. It was bizarre, but I think...”
“Think what?”
“I don’t know. He said he was already dead because I was the nephilim.” I folded my arms. “Like killing himself was the only option.”
Zayne seemed to mull that over. “Like he feared that either Bael or the Harbinger would know he’d been in contact with you, and that was it for him?”
I nodded slowly. “Doesn’t really make sense.”
“But it does if the demon was that afraid of what the Harbinger would do if it believed he’d talked.” His wings unfurled, creating his own gust of wind. “Or the demon understood once it figured out what you were that there was no escape. You’d kill him, anyway.”
True.
I would’ve totally killed him just because he made really lame threats, but I didn’t think it was that. The demon was more afraid of the Harbinger than me, and that didn’t bode well.
Not at all.
5
The rest of the evening was pretty uneventful. No more demons, just human-on-human violence. It ended with a shooting at a club we’d walked past that was apparently over a drink being spilled on someone’s girlfriend.
One thing was for sure, humans didn’t need demons to prompt them to do terrible things.
I thought about that after we got back to Zayne’s apartment and parted ways, him to the living room, me to the bedroom. Sometimes I wondered why God made such an effort to save humans and their souls when humans were so quick to throw it all away.
There had to be a balance of good and evil. That was why some demons, like Fiends, were allowed topside. They were a test, working humans’ every last nerve by destroying random things around them to see if they’d snap. One outburst of anger wasn’t a ticket to Hell, but everything a human did or thought was tallied up, and since the invention of social media, I could only imagine how long those tallies were becoming. Even some Upper Level demons had a purpose, interacting with humans to tempt them into using free will for sin and deviant behavior. It became a problem only when the demons crossed the line by actively manipulating humans or harming them. Of course, demons that didn’t look human—and there were a lot of them—weren’t allowed near humans, and that was when the Wardens stepped in.
Then again, most Wardens killed all demons on sight, even Fiends, and had since, well, the beginning.
But God had created Wardens to look after people, to risk their lives to help stack the odds in favor of eternal glory instead of eternal damnation, and people just... They still sought to destroy one another and themselves, as if it was innate. Some would say it stemmed from the self-destructive nature of Adam and Eve and the apple, that the battle played out every day, in every person, and that was the serpent’s greatest accomplishment—or curse—but at the end of the day, humans chose their own paths.
There was a whole lot of losing going on these days. Murders and assaults, robberies and greed, racism and bigotry, hatred and intolerance—all of it increasing instead of getting better, as if a boiling point was coming. Were these things symptoms of demons doing a damn good job, or were humans bound and determined to do the demons’ job for them?
Kind of made you wonder what the Hell the point was some days.
“God,” I muttered as I wiggled my arms. “That’s dark.”
Annoyed with my thoughts, I rolled onto my side and shut my eyes. I missed those tacky stars that had adorned my bedroom ceiling. They glowed a soft luminous white in the dark and made me feel...comforted. I knew that sounded strange.
I was strange.
I had no idea when my brain clicked off and I fell asleep, but it felt like only minutes before I opened my eyes and saw that the darkness had lifted from the room.
Feeling like I hadn’t slept at all, I dragged myself out of bed and got down to the morning routine. Letting my hair air-dry, I dressed with the same speed as I’d showered, and I was ready to leave the bedroom, glasses perched on my face, within fifteen minutes of waking.
I hesitated before I opened the bedroom door, preparing myself to see a sleepy, disheveled Zayne. I’d left the door unlocked again, and I refused to think about why. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the brighter room. Zayne wasn’t at the island, so that meant...
My gaze coasted toward the coach, and yep, there he was, sitting up and...
Muscles flexed under golden skin and rippled across bare shoulders as he lifted his arms over his head, stretching. His back bowed, and I didn’t know if I should be grateful or disappointed that the couch blocked most of my view.
“I can’t look away, even though I need to,” Peanut said, and I jumped about a foot off the floor as he appeared out of thin air beside me. “He makes me feel like I need to spend more time at the gym.”
My brows inched up my forehead.
Zayne twisted toward where I stood. “Hey,” he said, voice rough with sleep as he thrust one hand through his messy hair.
“Morning,” I mumbled, thankful when Peanut blinked out of existence. I lifted my hand and bit down on a nail.
“Sleep well?” he asked, and I nodded, even though that was a lie.
When Zayne rose, I looked away and hurried toward the kitchen, all the while hoping my face didn’t look as red as it felt. I didn’t need an eyeful of the glory of Zayne’s chest. “Want anything to drink?”
“I’m good but thanks,” he replied. “Be back in a few.”
Zayne wasn’t talkative when he first woke up, something I was learning. After grabbing a glass of OJ, I took a sip and then placed it on the island next to the plans for the school. The paper was still unrolled.
I heard the shower turn on and hoped Peanut wasn’t in the bathroom being a creep. I went to the couch and turned on the TV, settling on a news station, and then folded the soft gray quilt and draped it over the back of the couch before going back to the island. I finished off my OJ and had moved on to a can of soda when Zayne finally stepped out of the bedroom. Nervous energy had me chewing on my thumbnail again as I wondered why it took him double the time it took me to shower. His hair was wet and slicked back and he was, thankfully, fully clothed in a pair of navy blue nylon pants and another plain white shirt. His feet were bare.
He had nice feet.
“Soda for breakfast?” he commented as he strolled past me, catching my hand and gently tugging it away from my mouth.
I sighed. “This is dessert.”
“Nice.” He made his way to the fridge. The wintery scent that always clung to Zayne lingered. Was it some kind of bath wash? I didn’t think so, because I’d already scoped out the bottles in the shower.
I swiveled around. “Do I need to remind you of our water conversation yesterday?”
“Please, God, no.” He opened the fridge. “Want some eggs?”
“Sure. Can I help?”
He looked up as he placed a carton of eggs and a tub of butter on the island. “Aren’t you the person who almost burned down Thierry’s house trying to make fried chicken?”
I snorted. “Aren’t you the person who said you’d teach me to make grilled cheese?”
“You know, you’re right.” He picked up an egg and pointed it at me. “But I need to feed myself first.”
“Priorities.”
“And I really don’t want you to do the eggs. Even though they’re hard to mess up, I have a suspicion you might do just that, and then I’ll be embarrassed for you.”
“Really?” I muttered dryly.
He grinned, and I was sure I got a little goofy in the face as I watched him. “Scrambled okay?”
“Sure thing, Chef Zayne.”
That got me a low chuckle. “You know, you can sit on the couch. Got to be more comfortable than the stool.”
“I know.” And it probably was, but Zayne slept there, and for some reason, I felt like that was his space.
How long could we keep this up? Zayne sleeping on the couch, us sharing a shower? Where would we go, though? We had to stay in the city. There was his clan’s compound, which had room for us, but besides Nicolai and Dez, his clan didn’t know what I was, and it had to stay that way. Also, I had a feeling Zayne wouldn’t be down with that idea.
“I figured after breakfast we could do some training,” Zayne said, drawing my attention back to him. “I haven’t come up with anything in particular to help with the vision thing, but if you and Misha practiced daily, we should be doing that.”
I glanced down at myself. My leggings and loose shirt were perfect for training.