Vex (39 page)

Gage and I race downstairs.

“Holden?”

Gage pounds on his door and heads inside.

Trash is piled knee high in all four corners. An array of clothes twists along the ground like one long colorful fabric snake. Holden lies on the bed, eating pistachio nuts rather calm and sedate, tossing the shells onto the floor when he’s through.

“What?”

“Are you feeling OK?” I’m afraid to step inside. It’s a hygienic nightmare in here with all the dirty laundry, empty cans, and smattering of food wrappers. Hazmat units are going to force their way inside one day, and I’ll know why.

“Never better.” He opens his laptop, ignoring the two of us.

Gage and I step back out into the hall.

“He’s still an ass,” I shrug as we close the door.

“Some things never change.” Gage presses me against the wall with a kiss. “I promised my mom and dad that I’d watch a movie with them tonight. They still haven’t recovered from the fact I was M.I.A. due to my inadvertent jail stint. Wanna come?” There’s a longing in his voice I haven’t heard in a while, like he misses me even though I’m standing right here in his arms.

“I’d love to, but I have a feeling I should hold down the fort. Will you come back after?”

“You couldn’t keep me away.”

***

Just before bed, I head downstairs to turn off the lights and, well, to check and see if Holden is still pumping air through Ethan’s lungs. Apparently the girls from East have made a reprisal because there’s a dangerous amount of giggling coming from inside. I don’t even want to know what antics warrant that much laughter, I just back away from the door in disgust.

Mia and Melissa’s dog swishes around my feet in a tizzy.

“What is it boy?” I bend over to pat him on the head, but he bolts to the entry and back again. He probably wants to go to the bathroom. I’ve seen Mia let him out a million times, so I don’t hesitate opening the front door. And, to my horror, he bolts down the driveway and up the street.

Shit!

I take off into the clear dark night while a bitter wind blows clouds off the island after weeks of nonstop rain. My socks saturate with ice water as I squish into the mud that’s been draining down our street thick as pudding.

“Sprinkles!” I bleat out a nervous laugh as I come upon him sniffing in the ivy, just as I’m about to grab him, he takes off another ten feet up the street. We repeat the scene until I crest the hill well past the house.

“Sprinkles!” I scream, irritated and to the point.

He continues to elude and ignore me. Instead, he darts up another fifty feet to a dark bump on the sidewalk and begins fornicating at a frenetic pace.

Crap. I’m going to have to snatch him up in the middle of his procreating frenzy. I can’t think of anything more disgusting.

I pull off my sweatshirt in an effort to take him by force, crouching over his gyrating body for the kill. I’m wearing nothing but my bra underneath, and the icy night air gives a quick introduction by way of flash freezing my skin.

“Hello, Skyla.”

I look up.

Next to the stalwart pine stands Demetri draped in a long black trench coat.

I jump back. His teeth glow off and on as he interrupts a smile to pull at the leash in his hand. The bump below Mia’s dog unfurls itself into a rather deformed looking creature, dark as a shadow. It turns to look at me with six pairs of glowing eyes.

“Shit!” I snatch up Sprinkles and leap backwards, landing in a puddle halfway up my shins.

“He’s friendly towards strangers,” he scratches the beast just shy of its neck, and all three heads twist for affection.

“Oh, my God,” I breathe the words. It’s Cerberus—it’s real. Demetri probably had the poor dog surgically altered if that’s even possible. He’s that twisted.

I step out of the puddle, forcing my legs to drag me back towards the house.

“What’s the matter, Skyla? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Demetri straightens—proud of the fact he’s managed to freak me out with his mutilated mutt. He snaps his fingers three times fast, and the creature goes rabid in a fit of angry snaps and growls as it lunges in my direction. His palm flattens in the air, and all motion ceases. “You know why I had to kill your father, don’t you?”

I shake my head, sidestepping my way down the street.

“So I could bring you here where you belong, to fulfill the destiny of my people.”

“I don’t die, and you don’t get my blood.” Actually, I have no idea if what I’ve just said is factual. I’m basing it all on the prophecies of my seventeen-year-old boyfriend who probably wanted to get into my pants in the first place.

Of course, I’ll have to die eventually, and I did regenerate Chloe, who will probably take over the entire Nephilim kingdom, so, most likely, I’ve already altered the destiny of his people, but I don’t bother bringing this to his attention. Instead, I try and make a mad dash for home.

He keeps pace with me as I trot down the hill on my tiptoes while suffocating a horny dog in my favorite West Paragon sweatshirt that happens to bear the effigy of
his
freaky looking canine.

“Aren’t you the least bit curious as to your role?” Demetri’s voice drums through the night.

My ankle turns in a pothole, and I fall to my knees. I bounce up as if I were on springs, sending a searing hot pain up my leg.

“You’re the perfect adversary, Skyla!” He shouts after me as I begin to gain some serious downhill momentum. “With three near perfect Celestra—switching sides—trying to kill each other—who needs to fight a war?”

Gage pulls into my driveway, pausing at the bottom.

“Gage!” I trip over a branch and nosedive in a river of muck at the base of the sidewalk. Sprinkles wrangles free, darting up to the house and in through the front door as if this entire nightmare never even happened. Damn dog.

I turn my face up towards Demetri. His clothes, his entire person begins to fade into the night, his dog dissolves in an instant with a loud clap. I can hear his laughter—it echoes unnaturally long after he’s gone.

Humans don’t do that. They don’t disappear.

Demetri Edinger is no freaking human, and I have a feeling he never has been.

He’s a Fem—and his little dog, too. 

Chapter Sixty-Eight

Punishment

I spend the night with Gage wrapped around me, tired and shaken after we logged some serious hours exchanging bizarre theories. Gage and I are pretty sure Demetri was telling the truth about his strategy to divide and conquer the three most powerful Celestra alive, and he’s done a stellar job at achieving his goal.

My door flies wide open.

“Yup, he’s here, too,” Tad shouts into the hall. “The roll call of debauchery is complete. Maybe we should run a brothel, Lizbeth? It might be the one business venture we’d be successful at.”

“Shit!” I pull the covers up over our heads as Mom pokes her head in.

“Skyla Laurel Messenger! Downstairs right now, you, too, Mister!”

Gage groans into the pillow.

This is shaping up to be a real shitty day.

Gage and I file downstairs fully clothed just the way they found us or would have had they attempted to pluck the comforter off my bed. We head into the family room with our hair combed back, presentable, not all disheveled as though we just woke up from a wild romp like Brielle and Drake or Holden and his pussycat dolls. Gah! There are three of them now. God—they left and brought back a friend. What kind of superpowers does he have, anyway?

“Ladies and gentlemen of the peanut gallery,” Tad employs his official I’m-the-asshole-of-this house tone, “you are now free to exit the red light district of Paragon. Would you be so kind as to show yourselves to the door, make yourselves scarce, and never the enter the premises of this love shack again.”

“Excuse me?” Brielle points to her baby bump.

“Just go home, Hon,” Mom bats her away.

My fault. I should have never closed my eyes. Sorry, I’ll make it up to you.
Gage gives my hand a quick squeeze before following the girls out the door.

It’s not his fault. It’s Chloe’s. If she hadn’t used her sorcery to bind some keep-Gage-away-from-Skyla spirit around the house, none of this would have ever happened.

“What on God’s earth can we punish you kids with?” Tad throws his hands up in defeat.

“We’ll get creative,” Mom nods in my direction as though it were me she was gunning for. “Get ready for school. We should have something worked out by the time you get home.”

“I know it looks bad, but we didn’t do anything, I swear.” I try to quell her disappointment.

She motions me upstairs with the flick of a finger.

Everything in her screams, I don’t believe you.

When I finally do have sex with Gage, I won’t have to worry about feeling guilty. I’m already paying the price.

***

Logan is under a three day suspension for his brawl in the hall, otherwise I would have cornered him and told him all about Demetri, the exploding Fem.

Nevertheless, I skip cheer practice for court, which I’m escorted to by both Mom and Tad. Gage shows up as a means of support. It’s intimidating here, staring at the judge in a mahogany paneled courtroom as he glosses over my paperwork.

“Ms. Messenger,” his elongated face is accentuated with matching pillow-like bags beneath his eyes. The way he says my name sounds far less provocative, in contrast to Marshall who breathes it out with lust driven fire. “You have the option of serving three nights in the county jail or working your time off through community service. Which do you prefer?” His sad eyes drag over me, red with fatigue.

“I’ll do the service. Thank you.” I’d donate various body parts if he wanted me to as long as I didn’t have to step into a jail cell, ever. That’s one way I don’t plan on losing my virginity. Just the thought of prison sex makes Marshall’s offer more and more palatable. I could probably get him to up the ante and make me queen of the world if I wanted—although he did offer me dominion, which would make me queen of two worlds to be exact, if you count the ethereal plane.

“So it shall be,” the judge sounds it out soberly. “In addition to one hundred hours of community service, I charge you a penalty fee of five hundred dollars. You may be dismissed.” He sounds his gavel.

One hundred hours? In an orange jumpsuit, picking up trash on the side of the road while Chloe drives back and forth with Gage? Of course, she’ll have the bitch squad join in on the fun, heck an entire parade of kids from West will drive by to capture the new wallpaper for their phones. I hate this.

“Looks like you got off pretty easy,” Gage comes over and gives a hesitant smile because he knows I didn’t.

I pull him in and bump my nose to his trying to stave off tears from the trauma of the whole ordeal.

“You may now kiss the bride,” the judge booms with sarcasm. He points hard to the door in an effort to make us disappear.

“I love you,” I whisper to Gage just before I sneak in a quick kiss.

Gage solidifies like a statue. His face turns a strange ashen grey. His eyes dull out unnaturally as though he were looking at something horrific and he were too startled to speak.

“Wait,” I point a finger towards the judge. “You don’t think,” I don’t bother finishing the sentence.

I don’t care what just happened. I’m marrying Gage in a courthouse one day because I’ll be damned if he was wrong about that one.

***

I sulk in the back of the car on the way home with Mom and Tad.  

I’m thankful justice has landed me on the right side of the penitentiary, and I still get to choose who I lose my virginity to, but still, lackluster about that whole jumpsuit thing. And I can’t even think about Gage’s prophecy coming true at an untimely moment. God, that was so weird and uncalled for. I had pinned my entire future on what Gage had told me. Of course, I still believe I’m marrying Gage. This was just a coincidence—only, too bad I’ve recently stopped believing in those.

I watch the trees whir by in a blur, the dark clouds in the sky drift by at dizzying speeds. Nev glides by, then slows down until we’re coasting down the road in tandem.

Nevermore went against the faction council for Ezrina and their love, and now he’s forever imprisoned in fragile bones, feathers—eats worms and sleeps in the cold harsh elements. I straighten a little at the epiphany. I wonder what punishment the justice alliance will pass down to Logan and me?

I look back up at Nev as he soars like the majestic creature he is. Who knew that Ezrina and I were so likeminded? And she’s a Celestra no less, or was. I can’t bear the thought of working shoulder to shoulder with Ezrina forever. Maybe that’s why Gage thought I would live to a ripe old age? I’ll be immortalized as a monster for all eternity while he carries out his courthouse fantasy with someone else. Hopefully I can rely on some good old-fashioned nepotism, and my mom won’t have the heart to turn me into a frazzled old witch. Nevertheless, she said my punishment would be embedded in the infrastructure of the war. Little does she know, the ultimate punishment waits until the end of the war—the heartache of wrenching Logan’s heart out one final time, already I know I have to.

“Skyla?” Mom turns around. Sorrow and pity clot up her expression. “We’ve settled on a punishment.” I’m about to cannonball into a bottomless pit of dejection I can feel it. “No going out for two weeks.”

“Two weeks?” It might have sounded like a protest, but, really, I’m astounded at the leniency.

“That includes winter formal.” She gives me that you-brought-this-on-yourself look, before turning around.

“OK.” There’s no way I’m missing winter formal. I’d die knowing Gage was there with Chloe while I sat home, crying in my pillow.

I pull out a curl from behind my neck—straighten it over and over while looking up at the sad girl in my reflection. I take my finger and trace a butterfly onto the foggy glass, give a dry smile.

Of course, I’m going to sneak out.

Of course, I’ll never fess up to any of my butterfly room jailbreaks to my mother.

How can I ever expect her to trust me when all I ever do is lie?