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I rolled onto my side and blinked my eyes open. Noise drifted from downstairs, a mixture of babies crying and people talking and I stretched, squeezing my eyes closed against the sharp pain behind them. Eventually, I slid out of bed and headed to the bathroom in search of aspirin to take the edge off my headache.
Moving my hands resulted in flares of pain as well and I leaned my forehead against the pantry door, breathing for a moment before continuing. Opening the bottle presented a challenge and I was too damned tired to will the thing open, so I headed downstairs.
Conversation stopped when I stepped into the room and held the aspirin up. “Can someone open this for me?” Even my voice sounded haggard and raw.
It was Steve who crossed the space, ripping the bottle from my grip. His angry glare penetrated every fiber and I think I flinched. I know I took a step back.
“I understand you decided, in your infinite wisdom, that drugs were the answer to your problems,” he said shaking the bottle at me like a weird exclamation point.
My gaze bounced from him to Tom beyond and back.
“Tom didn’t rat you out,” he said clenching his teeth and he stepped closer. “Banging everything in a skirt isn’t the answer, either,” he said and this time there was less bite to his words and I met his gaze. He had been there before. In both places, and I gave him a sheepish nod.
“I didn’t...” I started and studied the patterns in the carpet at my feet. “I didn’t intend to get wasted.” I forced myself to meet his gaze.
Steve could be intimidating when he wanted and he knew how to push the guilt buttons. I had to give him a great deal of credit in taking us in and raising us like we were his own and I hated like hell to disappoint the man. But that’s exactly what I saw in his eyes. Disappointment. And it made me feel like I was ten years old again.
“Can you just open the aspirin?” I whispered, hating the pathetic lilt in my voice.
“I should just let you suffer,” he muttered and his lips pressed together. Instead of opening the container, he pulled my forehead to his lips, opting to give me one more dose of excruciating pain before the tingling started in my hands, my chest and behind my eyes.
“Damn it, I didn’t ask you to fix it. I asked you to open the fucking aspirin,” I snapped and stepped back grabbing the stair railing to steady the after-shakes of his healing power.
“Next time, I’ll beat the shit out of you.” He pointed and turned away, leaving me huffing against the wall.
Silence blanketed the room and I slid to a seat on the steps, cradling my head while Steve’s power magically erased the pain. After a few seconds, the crew resumed their conversations and I glanced between my splayed fingers.
Only one person focused on me, his glare sharp over the edge of his laptop and I dropped my gaze, avoiding Damian’s silent rage. I stood, unsure of where to go to get away from the commotion and his justified anger. I had nearly sold his family out, and instead of confronting it head on, I slipped out the back door and took a seat on one of the lounge chairs, letting the cold wind saturate my clothing.
The door opened and I stiffened, meeting his gaze as he took the seat next to me and handed me a beer. He didn’t speak at first, just stared out at the open ocean, and drained half the bottle.
“I get it,” he said after a while.
“You get what?”
“Naomi. I get why you might be tempted to trade your soul for her.”
I sighed. “No offense, but I really wouldn’t trade my soul for her.” I took a sip of beer. “There just isn’t that ‘I gotta have her’ connection.” I met his gaze. “I was high and horny and I guess getting a viewing of her chest the other day at the hospital put some unsavory thoughts in my head.” I shrugged.
Damian chugged the rest of his beer, the knuckles on his hand gripping the bottle turning white as he squeezed the glass. “You what?” he asked, planting the bottle on the cold concrete.
“She needed help breast feeding the boys while you were out getting a car.” I tried not to smirk, but it appeared anyway. His face turned red and his hands clenched. “Look, I told you the first night you were here, I wasn’t interested in making a play for her,” I said. “I’m still not.”
He took a deep breath, calming the coil inside and I waited, gearing myself up for an attack. Damian surprised me by getting up and crossing to the rock wall where he swung a leg over the wall and took a seat. He stared out at the Nubble Lighthouse in the distance, blocking me from the thoughts going through his mind.
His expression told me nothing and I waited and wondered how much of my sordid evening he got wind of. His head turned toward me and the muscles in his jaw jumped.
“You made the mistake of leaving them alive,” he said, too quietly to carry over the distance but his voice was loud and clear in my head.
His penetrating glare painted a picture in my mind and I shot to my feet, approaching him. “What did you do?”
He stared me down and then looked out at the ocean.
“Damian,” I snapped, even though I had a clear idea.
“I took care of it,” he said.
“You killed them?” A shiver spread through me and then I thought about the DNA evidence strewn all over the family room. Evidence that would point to me.
“It’s all gone. The demons, the drugs, the fucking house. It’s just a pile of dust and burning embers.”
“I’m not sure they were all possessed,” I balked. “Jenna, sure, but her friends, I didn’t know and I couldn’t take the chance of killing innocents.”
“And I couldn’t take the chance they weren’t.”
I stared at him, popping my mouth closed. His cavalier attitude toward killing reminded me of my father. He was a master at justifying it, too. “What gives you the right?”
He swung his leg back and stood, crowding me. “Twenty-five hundred years of dealing with demons. Knowing how they operate, how they manipulate their victims. If I’d let them live, they would have ditched the meat suits and gone onto someone else. Maybe someone you wouldn’t have had the ability to say no to.” He stepped closer, his gaze hard and unyielding. “And you would have been implicated in whatever they left behind.”
I gave him some space and shoved my clenched hands into my pockets.
“If they can’t get you to say yes, they ruin your life to the point you don’t give a damn. Either way, they win.” He stopped and took a deep breath. “I was not only protecting my wife and kids, I was protecting your ass, too.”
I kicked a patch of frozen grass and scanned the cold ocean. I didn’t like what he did, but it was no different than what I did to the nurse and I eventually nodded. “Are you sure there isn’t a way to exorcise a demon?” I needed to know if there was a way we could save the souls they pillaged.
“Without killing the host?” Damian sighed and shook his head. “No.”
I took a moment to scrutinize his memories. What I came back with was confirmation and I turned back toward the house, trudging across the lawn, and sat back in the lounge chair. The chill in the air had been replaced with a chill in my soul and a dark fear encompassed me.
What if they ever got a hold of Sandy?