Levi’s apartment was above his shop and it was small. I was pretty sure my shoe closet was bigger than his entire apartment.
“Sorry about the mess.” A hint of color dusted his cheeks. It wasn’t so much that his home was messy, it was more that he had a lot of stuff and not enough space for it. Books were piled upon each other on almost every available surface, an old sofa dominated the living room, more books piled up on one end. Across the room was a tiny kitchen, an old wooden table that had seen better days, and one dining chair. Two doors led off the living area. One was Levi’s bedroom, the other the bathroom.
A small four-legged creature rubbed itself around Levi’s legs and made a strange noise. I couldn’t contain my squeal. Jumping behind Levi, holding his shoulders to keep him between me and the creature, I practically screamed, “What the hell is that?”
“Mr. Meow. My cat.” Levi frowned at me as if I were insane.
“That’s not a cat!” I protested. “Cats are fluffy and cute. That…that…thing is not a cat. It has no fur.”
Levi reached down and scooped Mr. Meow into his arms, stroking his palm down its back. Mr. Meow purred in response, headbutting Levi’s chin. I stepped away, frowning. When had this happened? When had they created cats with no fur? Levi clearly loved this butt ugly creature and I was struggling to see the appeal.
“I love cats, but I’m allergic,” he explained, his face telling me he was affronted that I didn’t adore his pet.
“I can fix that,” I promised. Stepping forward, I placed my hand on his forehead and pushed some healing energy into him. Any health complaints Levi had were now gone.
“What did you do?” He eyed me suspiciously.
“I cured your allergy. Now let me fix your cat. Geez, the poor thing must be freezing with no fur.” I gingerly placed my hand on top of Mr. Meow’s head and, before our eyes, the cat grew fur. A gorgeous tortoiseshell coat of black, white and tan. “That’s better.”
“What do you think, Mr. Meow?” Levi asked, holding Mr. Meow so they were nose to nose. “Do you like having fur?” Mr. Meow meowed and licked his paw. Laughing, Levi set him on the floor where he wound himself in and out of Levi’s legs, purring even louder than before.
“I think he likes it!”
“Of course he does.” I plopped down onto the only clear space on the sofa, glad that small crisis was over. Mr. Meow promptly jumped up onto my lap, spun around three times before settling into a curled up ball of fluff, his tiny body vibrating as he purred his happiness.
“Notice anything?” I asked Levi.
“What?”
“You’re not sneezing?” I hinted.
“Oh my god, you’re right. It worked. You fixed my allergy.”
“Happy to help.”
Levi’s smile slipped and he put a hand up to his temple, pressing.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m getting a vision.” Moving around the sofa, he swept the books off the end and collapsed next to me, his head resting against the back of the sofa, eyes closed. Curious, I reached out and took hold of his hand, seeing if I could channel his vision. Turned out I could. We both watched as a slightly hysterical young woman stood at the front counter of the police station arguing with the officer that her coworker had been taken over by aliens.
The young woman’s name was Lucina and she was neither lying nor off her meds. She was a bartender at a joint downtown, had a boyfriend who had a penchant for tattoos, and she was addicted to cooking shows…though why anyone would be entertained by watching another person cook was beyond me. And she thought her colleague had been taken over by aliens—that was the only explanation for his weird behavior.
“Explain the weird behavior,” the officer said. He not only didn’t believe her, but he wasn’t interested, at all. His mind was on other things. Like the date he had lined up after work tonight.
“We tend bar in shifts, and Jacob and I are usually rostered on together, so I know him pretty well. But today, he was all over the place. He didn’t know how to pull a beer! He didn’t know how to use the cash register. It was like he’d never worked behind a bar before. It looked like him, but it wasn’t. His body has been taken over. By aliens.”
Pushing further into Lucina’s psych, I discovered that Lucina was also a massive fan of a television show called The X-Files and was obsessed with the idea of life beyond the planet earth. She was right of course, there was plenty of life beyond this realm—she just didn’t know what.
The vision ended. Levi opened his eyes and turned his head to look at me.
“Did you see that?”
“Yes.”
“Is it possible the soul stealer has taken possession of Jacob’s body?” he asked.
“Possible but unlikely. He was already in human form when he came through. Why take control of someone? Unless he couldn’t maintain his human form? That he has to possess an actual human body to maintain his presence here.”
“How much do you know about soul stealers?” Levi narrowed his eyes at me and I shrugged.
“Not a whole lot. They’re not from my dimension. Or yours.”
“Soooo…you know nothing?” His voice was incredulous.
“I know he’s not meant to be here and I need to send him back. Look, you do realize there is more than one God, right? So, Dad, he created this realm—Earth. Of course, he’d already created Heaven, that’s his home, and then, I admit it was an afterthought, he created Hell. We’re all his creations, in these three realms. Beyond that, the pocket realms and whatever else is out there have all been created by other Gods.”
“Ha!” Levi practically fist pumped the air and I knew I’d given him the answer that had been puzzling him for quite some time. He was silent for a moment, then asked, “How do you know it needs the souls of the other two girls to stay here?”
“It’s like a download. When I touched Emily, I got traces of him, what he is, what he’s after.”
“Why is he here? Is he a he?”
“He took male form, so I assume he’s a male. And I don’t know why he’s here.”
“Why not?”
I shrugged. “Because I couldn’t read that from him. Just that he feeds on souls, and he needs Sarah’s and Brianna’s to enable him to stay here. I don’t know why he wanted to come here, or why he wants to stay. We need to catch up with him and find out. And send him back.”
“You want to go check out this bar, see if the girl's story pans out?” Levi asked.
“Definitely.” Our hands were still linked and Levi stood, pulling me to my feet, dislodging Mr. Meow who grumbled in protest, then promptly curled up into a ball where I’d been sitting and fell back to sleep. I tamped down the heady feeling of Levi’s hand in mine. We had work to do.