I’m sweating. The heat from my body seeps through my blankets. I toss them off, and through my closed eyes I notice it’s brighter than normal.
Panic grips me. It’s a fire.
Please no. Not again.
I bolt upright, coming face-to-face with the masked demon. She’s on the bed, kneeling over me, staring at me with those frightening demon eyes.
I scurry back, hitting the wall.
For a moment, neither of us say anything. An odd orange glow reflects off her mask. I don’t know where I am, other than in a bed. She’s so close, I can’t see anything but her. She’s wearing a yellow dress. Her long brown hair frames her face hidden underneath that same mask. She sits with her feet tucked underneath her.
I find the courage to speak first. “What’s going on? Where am I? Were you . . . watching me sleep?”
“I wanted to inspect you close up,” she says.
“The TV doesn’t get in close enough for you?”
She shakes her head. “On screen you are untouchable. Here, you are not.”
I swallow, then glance past her to determine where “here” is. I expect it’s Hell, but instead it’s my bedroom.
I see my dresser and nightstand. This is my bedding. The ceiling glows with my glow-in-the-dark stars. Everything is in place except . . . my baby blanket is missing. I dig through the blankets.
It’s gone. Did she take it?
“Why are you in my bedroom? Get out!” I yell.
“This is not your home, Maddy,” she says. “It is mine. I recreated your bedroom to learn about you by living as you do.”
I look around again. The walls are the exact shade of lilac, but they’re shinier. I reach out and run my hand over the wall. It’s stone. I look up high above me and see that the glow I saw earlier is not my stars but a huge candelabra. Low flames run along the base of the walls and cast the orange glow. Where my door should be is a stone archway. I can see it leads into the room I was in before, the one with the TV.
It’s true, then. I’m back in Hell.
I wanted one night without angels and demons, and she brings me here.
“So much has happened to you, and it is all important,” she begins. “I brought your soul here rather than leave you to dream. Even though Elizabeth’s memories are important too, they would not allow your mind to fully process today’s events. You need to sit back, take a break, and examine things from a new angle with more objectivity—without emotions getting in the way.”
She wants me to remain emotionless in the face of so much pain? I can’t do that.
“You are scared,” she says “You are scared that you cannot save the girls. You are scared that you will die. But mostly, you are scared of being hurt again. That is why you push MJ away every time things get rough.”
My heart constricts at the mention of MJ. She’s right. On everything. But there is so much more to it than that.
She scoots closer. “I understand. You are afraid there is something wrong with you. Up until today, you’ve always wondered if that was the real reason your birth parents ga—”
My hand covers my heart. “You can’t possibly know all that.”
“I have watched you all your life. Plus, I have been inside you. I have glimpsed your mind.” She sits there, gazing at me. “Maddy, you must be patient. You learned of your abilities only a few days ago, and they are changing. It is impossible to master them so soon. Relax. Let MJ help you.”
I shake my head. Growing up, Dad would tell me to take my time whenever I was learning something new. Be patient. I need to learn to walk before I can run. But I didn’t need to be patient. I mastered bike riding in less time than it took him to put on and then take off my training wheels. I could play anything by Beethoven the day after learning scales on the piano. No matter what it was, I mastered it with ease.
That’s why I’m so frustrated by my abilities. I can’t control them. I barely understand them.
What does she know? Here I am, trying to control my abilities, but she only adds to the problem by overtaking my body and soul whenever she wants. She’s yet another person who’s kept the truth from me about the demon and the hundreds of people who have died as he makes his way to me.
I grind my teeth, then storm out of bed, through the archway, and into the massive room.
I stand in front of the fireplace. I’m not cold. I’m still sweating buckets, but the dance of the orange and amber flames is oddly soothing. The firelight creates shadows on the stone.
As I look at the shadows, I once again know she’s right. I am letting the truth I learned today overshadow what MJ and I have together. I’ve been so upset about him keeping secrets from me, yet the moment I learn that truth, I immediately use it to push him away.
I feel her hand on my shoulder. Her essence flows into me, and all at once, everything feels right again.
“You have your first chance at happiness with MJ, but you are ruining it. You are letting the truth you learned today overshadow your feelings for MJ and his feelings for you.”
Her words immediately bring back the flood of pain. “I don’t deserve to be happy. People are being murdered. People are being killed in my name.”
“They have been since you were born. The only difference now is you know about it. You have dreamed all your life of being loved. You have that now. You have always had it, actually. Not just from your adopted family and your friends, but from those of us doing everything we can to keep you alive. But MJ . . . he loves you, and I know you love him too.”
“I . . . I don’t know what to do. It feels wrong to be with him, to be happy, while they’re suffering for me.”
“They are dying so you can live. Do not let their sacrifices be for nothing. Love MJ—while you can. Let him help you. Work on your abilities, find your inner strength, pull back when it gets to be too much, but mostly, do not give up fighting. Ever.”
Love MJ while I can? I sigh. I know time isn’t guaranteed for us. It never has been.
I panicked last Sunday when I thought I had only a day with MJ. And it turned out to be the best day I’d ever had, even though some of it was intense. But it wasn’t the end. We got a second day, and third, and they were even better.
But each day, more angels and demons learn of me. At least two beings are after my soul. Now I don’t know if I’ll get an hour with MJ, a day, a week, a month, or an eternity. No matter how long I’ll have with him, it won’t be enough.
I can’t waste another second of it.
I turn to face her, pleading into her fiery eyes. “Send me home, please. I need to fix this. I need to fix us.”
“Not right now,” she says.
“Please, you must,” I press, frantic. “I have to get back to MJ.”
Her hand still on my shoulder, she sends her essence to calm me. “There will be time for that later. At the moment, MJ is off on important tasks of his own.”
My head moves back in surprise. He did leave. Even though I asked him to leave, I never thought he’d do it. I never expected him to trust me or his team enough. Maybe I don’t have much faith in him either. I should.
She removes her hand from my shoulder and walks toward the living room. “I have something to show you.”
I watch her walk to the living room area, not wanting to follow her. I followed Duane into the guest room, and look how horrible that turned out.
“Yes, it was a bit overwhelming,” the masked demon says, reading my thoughts. “Which is why I want to help you digest it. Come here.”
She directs me to sit on the leather couch in front of the TV. She herself flops down into the loveseat, lying on it lengthwise and letting her feet dangle off the armrest. She swings her legs in a slow, almost hypnotic rhythm.
I watch her. “I sit like that too,” I say, trying to show her we have something in common.
Red eyes meet mine. She tilts her head and says, “I know.” Then her legs resume swinging. She grabs the remote and turns on the TV.
The screen shows me sleeping in bed—it’s my physical body back in my real room at this moment. Then everything moves backward. She’s rewinding my life.
She presses play, and suddenly there is MJ on the bridge, cradling my limp body against him. He bows his head, breaking down.
“What is this?” I sputter. “This isn’t real!”
“It is. This is what happened to your body once your soul went into the vision of girl eight.”
Without thinking, I stand in front of the TV and run my fingers across the screen, trying to soothe him.
I hadn’t stopped to think about the pain he suffered while I suffered inside Lauren.
A tear falls down his cheek, and I clamp my eyes shut as my lips tremble.
Oh, MJ . . . I’m so sorry.
I never should have said what I did after talking with Duane. I never should have pushed him away.
In MJ’s arms, my body begins to move, pounding the air, mimicking the horror of the vision. A terrified scream sounds, coming from my body.
The demon mutes the TV, but sound or no sound, I still watch in shock. People said I moved and talked in the dreams, but seeing it happen is . . . there are no words.
MJ falls to his knees, his face twisting in pain and agony as he holds me. After a moment, Alexander lifts up the hem of my jeans to reveal my legs are charred.
I reel back in alarm. Did my skin actually burn?
“Yes. The angels healed you,” she answers. “It took all three of them.”
The masked demon lifts the remote and turns off the TV. I gape at the blank screen, unable yet to break away.
“These visions,” she says, “are dangerous. If you cannot pull out of them, you could die inside them. You did not have visions of the other girls. Why now? It is imperative you solve this before the killer goes after girl nine. What has changed?”
Everything. Everything has changed.