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The Rite of Exorcism.

“The pages are marked,” Dimitri yelled. “Read.”

Priest had the book open in seconds, and he and Alara began reading. Dimitri and I were the only ones faster, having committed the rite to memory.

Lukas and Elle joined in, Elle’s voice shaking so badly I could barely understand her.

Gabriel cracked the whip again and Azazel snaked through the bars, biting into Andras’ flesh. The demon cried out, but he didn’t fall. Instead, he focused his gaze on me, and I felt a surge of energy hit me. A heavy sensation spread through my limbs, paralyzing me.

“Kennedy?” Dimitri called my name, but I couldn’t answer. My muscles had stopped working, the heaviness in my arms and legs replaced by the sting of numbness.

My body rose from the ground. Silence spun around me, cocooning me inside it. Hands reached for me. The
others called out, soundlessly. My arms were stretched out at my sides, the crumbling ceiling above me.

Azazel’s barbs snapped in the air, but I couldn’t hear the tiny demon bones wailing. The whip caught Andras, slamming him into the bars.

I kept rising.

The metal door flew open at the end of the tunnel, and someone stepped into the dim light.

A man carrying an open book, larger than any of the volumes Dimitri had carried down with him. His lips moved as his eyes darted from Andras to the book, then finally to me.

Those eyes.

The whip snapped again, the vertebrae and claws unhinging in the air beside me. This time, I heard the bones scream.

Andras cried out. I couldn’t be sure if it was a result of Azazel’s attack, or of the
Rituale Romanum
rite my friends were still chanting, or of the words the stranger was reading.

I was falling—

Air and light. Sounds and screams.

My body fell into someone’s arms, and Priest stared down at me.

Gabriel had Andras against the wall, chaining his hands as the demon thrashed against him. Azazel was
wrapped around him, pulsing like a heartbeat each time he strained against the barbs.

Alara charged into the cell, throwing handfuls of ash over Andras’ wet body. Dimitri stood in the middle of the tunnel, with his back to me, staring at the man approaching us.

Clean-shaven, wearing jeans and a rough canvas work jacket, he could’ve been anyone. But the moment his green eyes had found me, I knew exactly who he was.

My father.

S
tay away from him,” I called out. “Bastiel could be shape-shifting again.”

I remembered when Elle acted jealous after seeing Lukas and me talking, and the night I found her reading the book about summoning demons. When I mentioned the book the next day, she acted like she had no idea what I was talking about.

Because she didn’t.

Dimitri’s eyes narrowed. “He’s not Bastiel. A demon can’t touch the
Diario di Demoni
.”

The battered leather-bound book in my father’s hands was the diary of the Vatican exorcists, the one thing the original Legion members had taken the night they fled. My dad held it in front of him and recited the words. He
looked different than I remembered, worn out in a way that had nothing to do with age.

Andras twisted and jerked, as if the words were more painful than Azazel’s barbs. His body swayed to one side, and he hit the floor.

Dimitri rushed to clamp the shackles around his wrists, the whip still wrapped around Andras’ neck. But the demon didn’t move. His chest rose and fell, the only real indication he was still alive.

My father closed the book without a word.

When Dimitri dropped the chain on the cell floor, it startled us both. “Alex. You’re the last person I expected to see here.”

My father turned toward Dimitri. “And you’re the second-to-last person I want to see.” My dad’s eyes fell on Gabriel. “But based on what I just witnessed, you two aren’t capable of cleaning up the mess you’ve made—not without help.”

Dimitri fished a Dunhill out of his pocket. “The demon is the Legion’s mess, not ours.”

“It’s my fault,” I said, my heart pounding. “I’m the reason Andras is free.”

A worried crease formed between my father’s deep-set eyes. “You shouldn’t be involved in any of this, Kennedy.”

A shiver ran up my spine when he said my name.

My dad turned away and joined Gabriel and Dimitri in the cell, circling around them like they were infected with a deadly virus. “I assume this is Andras, the demon responsible for killing my sister?” He rested his boot against Jared’s side and pushed his body over. “I didn’t realize the Illuminati were keeping demons as pets these days. Which is the only reason I can come up with to explain why he’s still alive.”

“We’re trying to save my brother,” Lukas said, from where he stood outside the cell. “And they’re helping us.”

When my dad saw Lukas, a troubled look passed across his face.

“It’s a delicate situation.” Dimitri flicked the cigarette against the wall and walked toward my father. “One that just became even more complicated before you showed up.”

“There’s a second demon,” Gabriel said.

My dad whipped around at the sound of his voice. “Gabriel Archer. I thought you crawled back into your hole after the last time I saw you.”

Gabriel stiffened, and he looked at the floor.

“If I find out you had anything to do with Faith’s death, after what you did to her, I swear I’ll kill you with that aberration in your hand.”

Gabriel Archer.

“You’re the one who spied on my aunt? The one who used her and broke her heart?” I waited for Gabriel to deny it.

“Your mom and I were mixed up with the wrong people, Kennedy.” Gabriel raised his eyes to meet mine. “We thought we were doing the right thing.”

“Shut your mouth.” My dad pointed at him. “Don’t talk to her. When this is over, I’m going to bury you.”

“How did you find us?” Priest asked my father.

“Bear.” My dad said the Doberman’s name, and the dog trotted over to him and sat at his feet. “He has a chip. I went to check on Faith and found the grave.” He swallowed hard. “When I realized she was gone, and I saw that crap all over her bedroom walls, I tracked Bear here.”

“What’s the radius on the GPS?” Priest asked. “In square miles.”

Alara elbowed him.

“Ouch.” He rubbed his arm. “It was a scientific question.”

My dad ignored him and stared at Dimitri. “You’re serious? There’s another demon? Want to explain how you superheroes let this happen?”

I pointed at the summoning circle hidden within the writing and the symbols on the walls. “Andras summoned her. He hid the circle in the drawings.”

“Which means the gate is at least partially open,” Dimitri said.

“Nice work.” My dad’s voice was full of contempt. “Where is the other demon now?”

“She turned herself into dust or some kind of particles and took off,” Priest said, his eyes flickering over each of us. “I mean, it looked like she did. But she’s a shape-shifter, so she could be any one of us.”

My father took a carved wooden cross out of his jacket and tossed it to Priest. “Recite the Lord’s Prayer… or any prayer, for that matter.”

Priest looked confused. “Our Father, who art in heaven—”

“That’s enough.” My dad gestured at Elle. “Pass the cross to your friend.”

She’s
my
friend. Something you’d know if you hadn’t left.

We took turns passing the cross around to prove that
a shape-shifting demon wasn’t in the room, disguised as one of us.

“The gate’s partially opened, so what’s your plan?” my dad asked.

“After we figure out how to get Andras under control, we’ll go after the other demon. But we can’t leave while he’s this strong.” Dimitri studied my father. “Does that mean you’re in?”

Gabriel watched my dad from lowered eyes.

“Do I have a choice?” my dad asked.

“Kennedy, can I have a minute?” My father caught me as I came up the stairs from the containment area.

You could’ve had thousands of minutes if you had bothered to stick around.

I stood in the sterile steel hallway. I had imagined this moment—the one where he’d finally come back and tell me how much he regretted leaving, and promise that he’d spend the rest of his life making it up to me. Those were the fantasies of my eight-year-old and twelve-year-old selves.

By the time I was fourteen, I started thinking about what I’d say to him. How I’d find a way to emotionally destroy him the way he had destroyed me.

It was only when I’d seen him standing at the other end of the tunnel that something else occurred to me—something that could bring me even more pain.

What if I threw every hateful thought I’d been saving at him, and he didn’t care?

“I don’t know what your mother told you—” he began.

“She didn’t tell me anything. I memorized the note you left, even though I couldn’t read it.” All the pain I’d bottled up inside for so long poured out. “Mom wouldn’t tell me what it said. She cried herself to sleep at night for years after you left.”

“It wasn’t your fault.” His emerald eyes seemed even greener than I remembered.

“That’s not what I thought when I was old enough to understand what it meant.” I pictured the lined sheet of paper, ripped on the corner.

“ ‘All I ever wanted for us—and for Kennedy—was a normal life. I think we both know that’s impossible.’ What part of that doesn’t sound like it’s about me?” I asked.

My dad raked a hand through his salt and pepper hair.
“When I found out about your mother, I had to leave. Faith didn’t know how to protect herself. I’m not sure how much she told you, but the Illuminati hunted her for years.”

“Dimitri and Gabriel?” I had to know.

“No. But Gabriel had already ruined Faith. She never trusted anyone except me after what happened. She’s my younger sister, and our parents were dead. It was my responsibility to protect her.”

“What about your responsibility to your daughter?” I demanded.

He leaned against the wall, shoulders sagging. “I couldn’t take you from your mom. You would’ve hated me, and she loved you. She never would’ve done anything to hurt you.”

My father dug in his pocket and held out a stack of photographs. “But I made sure you were okay.”

He fanned out the photos, and my childhood unfolded like a deck of cards: a shot of me sitting on the slide with pigtails in my hair and my OshKosh overalls; wearing my second-grade Little Red Riding Hood Halloween costume with the stuffed wolf puppet my mom sewed over the shoulder; me and Elle eating ice cream cones in front of Baskin-Robbins a block from our junior high school; last year, carrying a canvas to the art fair in a pair of baggy overalls, with charcoal smudged on my cheek.

There were at least a half dozen more.

“Did you take all these?” I couldn’t look away from the photos.

“I’ve always kept track of you, Kennedy. But I didn’t want to put you or Faith in danger. She was kidnapped by the Order once. They wanted information about her paintings. Faith had what they call prophetic dreams, and she painted her visions of the future.”

I thought about the entry in Faith’s journal that predicted my birth and called me the white dove. “She told me about the kidnapping.”

He gave me an incredulous look.

“Are you the fifth member of the Legion now?” As much as I hated to ask him, I needed to know for sure.

My father put the photos back in his pocket. “I’m afraid so.”

I closed my eyes and nodded, trying to swallow the knot in my throat. “Guess I’ll never be a black dove, after all. Glad I didn’t rush out and get the tattoo.”

“Faith used to say black doves fight the battles that need fighting, but the white dove ends them and sets us all free. For what it’s worth, she always said you were our white dove.”

It wasn’t worth anything coming from him. He obviously didn’t know I’d read the entry in Faith’s journal. She was the one I believed.

“It didn’t stop you from leaving.” I sounded heartless and cold, but he deserved every word.

“I hope you’ll be able to forgive me one day. I’ve always loved you.”

Too little too late.

“One day I might forgive you, but it won’t be today.” I walked by him, letting all the missed birthdays and Christmases, all the nights I was afraid and he wasn’t there, rebuild the walls around me, one broken promise at a time.

And I’ll never forget.