“Rip your—I never—” He balked, and for just a second, paled. But it didn’t last. His expression turned stormy, and his jaw tightened. He came around the desk to stand in front of me and slammed his hand down on top of a stack of papers. “I was locked in a box for a hundred and thirty-one years. I was stabbed and killed and brought back to life. Now I’m becoming a demon. I think I’m allowed a little adjustment. I don’t have to report my every move to you, Jessie.”
His tone kind of hurt. He was right, of course. The last thing I wanted to do was stifle him. But I couldn’t help feeling like we were at a turning point. That his withholding the information meant something substantial. “I agree. All I’m saying is that you should have told me about this.”
He came a little closer. “And what would it have changed?” His voice was sharp and his expression one of fury. All he was missing was the flash of red in his eyes and the ensuing chaos that followed, and it would be Wrath all over again. “The way you look at me? How you feel?”
“Well, that’s just the stupidest statement ever,” I yelled. I planted my hands on the desk, leaning over to meet him. He was half past losing it, but somehow I just didn’t care. Maybe it was all my years facing down bigger and badder things, or maybe it was the demon side of me, rearing its fearless and infinitely stubborn head. “My dad’s a demon. I’m half demon. My damn dog is a demon.”
He backed away, blinking several times. Some of the tension drained from his body. It was like watching a balloon deflate slowly. With a sigh, he said, “My freedom from the box was supposed to make me normal again. Instead I’m finding it’s sometimes harder to control my anger than when Wrath was fused to my soul.” His eyes met mine, and my chest tightened. “It’s not supposed to be harder, Jessie. It was supposed to get easier.”
Great. Now I felt guilty about yelling. “No one ever told you? Nothing in life that’s worth anything is ever easy.”
He shook his head. More of the anger faded, giving way to a look of sadness that nearly melted me. “Every moment I’m consciously telling myself to keep calm. To not rage and scream. To not hurt the people I care about…”
“No way,” I said, taking his hands in mine. “I don’t believe for a second that you’ll go all demonic anger and mayhem on my ass. But a heads-up would have been good. Maybe keeping you out of situations that might set you off until the change is finished—”
“Set me off?” He ripped his hands from mine and slammed the right one against my desk again, this time sending the stapler off the edge, and I won’t lie—I jumped. “Everything potentially sets me off!”
“I didn’t—I had no idea.”
His expression softened again, but there was still an edge to it. A simmering spark so close to igniting. “It’s gotten worse over the last three weeks. Little things are making me angry. Dropping things on the floor. Klaire telling me to file paperwork.”
“You do work—”
He leveled his stare at me, and I closed my mouth. “People interrupting me… It’s everything. Even you…”
It felt like someone stabbed me in the heart. “Me?”
“Not like that. Not like you think.” He sighed. “I know right from wrong, Jessie. I know how I feel about you and how I should act around you. I know there are lines that should not be crossed, and it angers me that I want to cross them. I did cross them.”
I threw up my hands. Apparently, he’d never heard the expression it takes two to tango. I’d been right there with him, crossing that line. I’d wanted to do more than kiss just as much as he had.
He stepped away from the desk and fell back onto the couch. “Damien warned me it would probably happen, and since he’s sure I was tainted by Wrath, that it would be bad. But weeks went by and there was nothing. I thought he was just wrong.”
“And then it started.”
“Yes,” he confirmed. “Obviously it’s not just anger.”
“That kiss in the park…”
“That was hardly just a kiss,” he said, gaze hungrily zeroing in on my lips. “It was me losing control.”
Oh God. Please do it again…
“Yeah, but that’s the kind of slip in control I could get behind.” I meant it to lighten his mood, but judging by his scowl, it had the opposite effect, so I amended. “And technically, I was as much to blame as you.” I flashed back to my not-so-smooth butt/hand move and cringed.
He didn’t seem to notice. “I was fused with Wrath because, in the deepest recesses of my heart, there was darkness. It’s clear now that I will never be rid of it, and unlike Damien’s theory that Wrath tainted me, the truth is, the stain was always there.”
When I reached out to touch his face, he smacked my hand away, and I couldn’t help it. I flinched.
Lukas backed away, horrified. “I am dark, Jessie. Perhaps I was always meant to become a demon.”
I tried not to let his correlation between dark and demon bug me. “Lukas…” I tried to grab his hand, but he yanked it away.
He backed toward the door, gaze never leaving mine. I took a single step, but he threw out his hands. “Don’t. I don’t want you to follow me. Just let me be for now. I need to figure this out. After you—I need to decide what I want.”
He turned and left, and I couldn’t breathe. What he was saying was, if this life was what he wanted.
If I was what he wanted.
Chapter Eleven
Mom came home a couple hours later, having had as much luck with Paulson as Lukas and I had with the books. Zip. His ghost friends hadn’t heard anything, but promised to keep their incorporeal ears to the ground. Dad had made a quick trip back to the Shadow Realm to check out a lead, leaving us to work on some of the backed-up paperwork I’d been slacking on.
“When is Lukas getting back?” Mom didn’t look up from the bills, and I could tell whatever was on her mind, it was stressing her out. There wasn’t a gray hair anywhere on the woman’s head, but she had worry lines across her forehead. Told me I put them there, too, which was completely unfair.
I was only to blame for half of them. Three quarters at the most.
I’d debated telling her about Lukas since we’d sat down. She really didn’t need another thing to worry about right now. But on the other side of that same coin, she needed to know the deal. She didn’t have to know what he’d said when he left. Just the basic facts. I popped a cherry tomato into my mouth. “He, um…”
She looked up from her work and tapped the side of her head with her red pen. “What happened?”
I faked insult. “Why do you assume something happened? Maybe I wanted to chat with my mom about, ah…”
“What happened?” she repeated, setting the pen down.
“Did you know Dad used to be human?” It just sort of spilled out.
She didn’t seem the least bit surprised. “I knew. Yes.”
Of course she knew. Duh. “Do you know how he became a demon?”
“It’s not a topic that’s ever come up. I know your father doesn’t like to talk about it. I’ve never pushed.”
That’s where we differed. Me? I would have pushed. “Well, I can tell you. It’s simple. All it takes is a little death and some demon blood.”
“Okay…” It took a second, but when she understood what I meant, her eyes grew wide. “Demon blood—are you saying Lukas—”
I shook my head. “Not yet. But that stuff Dad said about demonic tendencies? They’re not so much tendencies as, well, realities. Lukas is turning into a demon.”
“Are you sure?”
“Dad told me. We talked the other night. Lukas has been… I think he’s having a hard time with it.”
“A hard time? Why do you think that?”
“I asked him why he didn’t tell us. He got kinda upset.”
Mom sighed and picked up the pen again. Jabbing it at me, she said, “Did you ever think he might have a reason for not telling us?” She leveled her gaze at me. “For not telling you?”
She knew me
too damn well. “He did, and it’s a totally bogus one.”
Mom leaned back and folded her arms. “That’s your opinion.”
“But I’m right.” Actually, she was right, but I wasn’t ready to concede. “He didn’t want me to look at him differently. That’s crap.”
“Explain to me how that’s crap.”
“Because I’m half demon? Why would I go all judgey about him becoming one? That’s stupid.”
Annoyance crept into her expression. “Not everyone thinks like you do. You can’t be so pushy, Jessie. He would have told you when he was ready.”
“How do you know?”
That got me a good stare down. “We are talking about Lukas, right?”
Another good point.
Mom leaned across the table and brushed a chunk of hair from my face. She smiled. “You are a good person, Jessie. Independent, strong, and fiercely loyal. But you’re also hot headed like your father, and pushy like him, too. You don’t know when to back off.”
I laughed. “So you’re saying all my bad habits came from Dad?”
“Naturally. Darker genes are flawless, baby girl,” she said with a wink. “My point is, you need to give Lukas some time. This is a huge adjustment, and after everything he’s been through, he needs to deal with it in his own way.”
…
As usual, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned for over an hour before I gave up. I still had that math assignment to do for Monday, and I thought about getting it out of the way, but my mind kept coming back around to Lukas. I’d tried calling him twice, but there was no answer, and it was driving me crazy. Maybe because it was our first fight. Was it even a fight? There hadn’t been any name calling or door slamming. I had no idea what the requirements were. And after what he’d said, I didn’t know where we stood.
Before we’d maybe-fought-maybe-broken up, I’d decided to shadow over to his place when I couldn’t sleep. The option was still open, and it would give me a valid—in my opinion, at least—reason to see him.
Mind made up, I slipped from my bed and stuffed my feet into my Keds. Since Dad started hanging out at the apartment, we kept the heat turned down. Go figure. A resident of Hell wasn’t fond of the heat. The sneakers were cold, and I bit back a yelp as my toes slid inside.
I stepped away from the beam of moonlight shining in from my window and closed my eyes, focusing on the warm interior of Lukas’s new apartment. The tug started out as a small itch and built quickly to pressure. In a moment of release, I felt myself blend with the darkness, and when I opened my eyes, I was standing in a small white living room furnished with a fluffy brown armchair and matching love seat.
“Lukas?” I called, rounding the corner and starting slowly down the hall. If he was in a bad mood, the last thing I wanted was to surprise him. Everything was quiet, but it was the feel of the place that told me he wasn’t there. The lack of energy. Of life. It was almost two in the morning. I started to worry, which was stupid. Dad said demons didn’t need sleep. Maybe Lukas was at that stage. Maybe, like me, he was working off his insomnia. Just because he wasn’t here didn’t mean anything was wrong. It wasn’t like there was a half-insane, nameless demon running around with a grudge against us or anything…
Yeah.
I closed my eyes and focused on Lukas himself. The shadow was easier this time, which I found to be the case when I focused on a person instead of a place. Like driving in rush hour traffic compared to driving the open roads.
I came out at the edge of a dense forest that bordered a white Victorian-looking house. Lukas was peering through the brush, a few feet in front of me.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, looking around. “And where exactly is here?”
He jumped and whirled around. “Jessie! Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”
“I’m not sure that’s possible. You know, you being a demon and all.”
He glared at me but didn’t respond. Wedged between two large pine trees, Lukas was crouched behind a row of thick bushes. The house was dark, but every once in a while a bluish light would flicker in the front first-floor window. Like a television. Nice to know we weren’t the only ones having trouble sleeping.
“Do I wanna know why you’re skulking in the bushes outside this old house?”
He stood and brushed off his jeans. “Shouldn’t you be asleep?”
“I could ask you the same thing. Men of your age need their rest.” I peered through the brush to get a better look. The house looked familiar, and once I realized the color was lighter and the porch had been removed, I knew exactly where we were. It was the same place in the pictures I’d seen Lukas looking at on the Scott table back at Town Hall. The one his parents had been posed in front of. “I wonder who owns it now.”
“My family still owns it. It’s been abandoned until now.”
“Until now?”
“A man named Patrick Scott recently moved in.”
“Relative?” I mean, obviously he was a relative, but I was trying to get him talking. He wasn’t having it, though.
Lukas sighed. “Really, what are you doing here?”
I shrugged and leaned back against the pine tree. “Things felt weird after you left tonight. I didn’t want to leave it like that.”
“I was abrupt, and I apologize.” He slid back down to the ground across from me. “It was childish.”
“Well, I did kind of ambush you.” I sat down across from him, leaning back against a young pine tree.
“Yes,” he said, looking back at the house through the bushes. The breeze kicked up, making the collar of his jacket flutter just a bit. “You did.”
We were quiet for a few minutes. The sound of the wind, mixed with the occasional chattering raccoon and piercing cry of a hawk, filled the silence between us.
After a few minutes, he sighed. “This is all new to me, too, you know. Not just this new power that’s brewing inside, but us. Our relationship—whatever it is.”
Whatever it is. Ouch.
When I thought Lukas was dying, I’d said the worst of all four-letter words known to man. The most damning and the most dangerous. I love you. He hadn’t heard me. At least, I was pretty sure. He’d already slipped away. But they haunted me, mainly because he wasn’t as terrified of them as I was.
And as if he could see clear into my brain, Lukas took my hand and said, “Things are different for you, and I understand that. There was no playing the field in my time. You found someone, and you stayed with them. If you were lucky enough, you fell in love. I know how you feel about relationships and why, and I think that’s the reason I didn’t tell you.”
“Because you were worried what I’d think.”
He looked away. “What I’m becoming is as dark as the thing I shed when Wrath left me. Possibly darker.”
That hurt a little, but I shook it off. “Then I guess it’s cool that I’m part Shadow demon, huh?” I grabbed his other hand, forcing him to look at me. How could he think I’d be upset about this? “So, then we’re good. You and me? You don’t want to leave—”
His eyes went wide. “Is that what you truly thought?”
“You were so angry when you left. What you said…”
“I didn’t mean I needed to decide about you. You know how I feel.” He shook his head. “Shortly before you arrived, I found out about Patrick. I’m trying to decide what to do about him.”
Relief flooded through me, and I shook off a pang of embarrassment. He was right. I knew how he felt about me. How could I even think… “Do about him? I’d like to suggest taking whacking him off the table.”
Even in the dark, I could see his eyebrows rise in question. “Whacking?”
I sighed. My impeccable wit was lost on him. “Nothing. You mean, like get to know him?”
Lukas rolled his eyes. “I did some research. He’s the only surviving member of the Scott family.”
“Wanna know what I think?”
He sighed, but there was the smallest h
int of a smile on his lips. “Why are you asking me, when we both know you’ll tell me regardless?”
“Good point. I was trying to be polite.” I grinned. “I think you should get to know him. Blood is blood. Knock on the door and introduce yourself. Big deal if you’re a million years—”
“One hundred and forty-seven.”
“Older,” I finished without missing a beat. “Mom and I will always have your back, and Dad, too, but maybe having someone blood related would help keep you grounded. Show you that you’re really not any different than you used to be. You’re improved. The new and improved Lukas Scott.”
“Maybe some day,” he said, sneaking a look back toward the house. When he turned back to me, his face was a mask of calm. “Right now there are other things to worry about. Did Klaire find anything about the demon from the mirror?”
I shivered as the wind kicked up again. The cold didn’t bother me as much since I’d started shadowing, but I wasn’t immune. I suppressed a slight shiver and said, “Nada. She’s gonna pay Cassidy another visit in the morning. I doubt it’ll get her anywhere, but she’s determined to try.”
“That woman is—” A shrill ringing filled the air. Lukas’s phone. As far as I knew, Mom and I were the only ones with the number, which could only mean…
“Yes,” he said into the speaker. A pause. “Yes. No, I understand completely. My apologies.” When he hung up, his expression was grim.
“How huge is the pile of shit I’m in?”
Lukas had been Wrath. He’d gone head-to-head with one of the most powerful witches in the world and faced off against the Seven Deadly Sins, the whole while staying brave in the face of inconceivable danger. But when it came to my mom? He was terrified—and rightly so. “I’d say you’re in pretty deep.”
Chapter Twelve