B00AO57VOY EBOK Read online

With acceptance came peace and the strangest series of sensations I have ever experienced. A warm breeze blew around me and I felt light as air. It lifted my hair and warmed the chill of my skin. It wasn’t like the heat I had felt before, right before I had become a human torch, this was like a soft caress. It was love and strength and the promise of wonderful things to come. I tasted fresh, cold, water on my tongue. I smelled the rich aroma of soil and heard the crackling of a roaring fire—which, oddly enough, didn’t send me into a full-fledged panic attack.

  Kim laughed in delight, and I looked down to see that I was glowing with a weird golden light. Strange? Oh, you have no idea. But, it was actually kind of beautiful, too. I looked up at Nathan, intending to ask him what it was, but he was staring down at me in mute wonder. Blake came through the exit door at the end of the hall and stopped in his tracks before giving me two thumbs up and walking over to put his arms around Kim. Turning to Kim, I saw tears glimmering on her long lashes.

  “All right, Tinkerbell, let’s go,” she said, laughing and pulling away from Blake before slipping an arm around my waist. When I continued to look at her, my eyes demanding she tell me what had just happened, she just laughed again. “Explanations later. Food now. We also need to figure out who’s going to explain what happened here today to Shea. I nominate you, Nate.”

  “Why me?” Nathan asked, making me laugh when I saw the appalled look on his handsome face as Kim and I passed him. Kim just smiled at him sweetly and batted her eyelashes.

  “Because, you’re the only one here she can’t kill.”

  It was the strangest, scariest, saddest, happiest, most exhilarating afternoon of my life, starting with Bastian trying to abduct me and ending with all of us at a table at our favorite restaurant having the weirdest celebration party in history.

  As it turned out, I didn’t even need Grams to finish removing my bind. It had come unwound or whatever all by itself. That’s what the whole freaky earth-air-water-fire thing had been about. I had come fully into my powers. I was a full-fledged blood witch.

  Which would have been totally frigging awesome if I’d had the first clue how to actually be a blood witch

  “It’ll be easier once we figure out your element,” Kim said, smiling patiently when I admitted how worried I was about not knowing how to do…well, anything. “All bandraoithe have their own element that helps them focus their power. For example, my element is water.”

  To demonstrate, she poured the water from her water glass into a bowl and then caused it to rise in droplets before letting it rain back down one drop at a time. Blake’s element was air. He created a tiny little tornado right there over the table, and I watched in awe as it whirled and twisted, sucking up used napkins and ketchup packets before Blake waved his hand and dispelled it.

  “So what’s mine?” I asked, excitedly.

  “Fire, baby,” Nathan said, smiling, before Kim could even open her mouth. “Yours is most definitely fire.”

  Fire? Oh, goody.

  “I was trying to break that to her gently, Nate,” Kim grumbled when she saw the look on my face. “You know, because she’s terrified of fire!”

  Terrified of fire? Uh, that didn’t even begin to cover the way I felt. For as long as I could remember, I’d avoided fire in any form. Candles, fireplaces, bonfires, matches. If it flamed, I stayed away from it. So, yeah, finding out that the thing I feared most was the key to my ‘awesome’ power was a revelation I could have done without.

  “Sugar coating the truth won’t change it,” Nathan told Kim, putting his arm around my shoulders and giving me a gentle squeeze. “She wanted to know what her element was, I told her.”

  I made a mental note to never ask him anything I didn’t really want an answer to.

  We went our separate ways after dinner, Blake to take Kim home and Nathan and I back to the house we were currently sharing. He was unusually quiet as he drove, and I took the opportunity to think over everything that had happened over the afternoon. I had been given so much information that I was on overload.

  But, of all the mysteries that had been explained, I was quick to realize one thing had been overlooked.

  Where the hell was Bastian?

  “There’s something I don’t understand,” I said, quietly, breaking the long, comfortable, silence that had fallen between me and Nathan as we drove home. “When Bastian disappeared in a puff of smoke, where did he go?”

  “Off somewhere to lick his wounds would be my guess,” Nathan said, scowling. “That puff of smoke was the demon equivalent of teleportation for a bandraoi, which I’m sure you’ll learn soon enough.”

  “And what about the real Jack?” I whispered, staring out at the inky night sky. “What happened to him?”

  That thought bothered me more than anything else. My friend was trapped inside his body with that creeper, unable to fight back. Was he in pain? Was he dying a slow spiritual death? Was that demonic piece of crap sucking the very essence out of him? The questions just kept mounting up.

  “I don’t know, baby,” Nathan murmured, reaching for my hand where it rested on the console between us. “We’re going to find some way to get rid of the demon controlling him, don’t worry.”

  “But, what will he be like after that? After playing human suit to a demon?”

  Nathan hesitated a little too long before he answered. His silence said more than he wanted it to, I’m sure. Jack was never going to be the Jack I had known again. He would be different. Nobody goes through something like demonic possession without some really messed up issues as souvenirs.

  “Is he going to die, Nathan?” I whispered, blinking back tears.

  “I can’t answer that,” he said, squeezing my hand gently. “It happens, baby, I won’t lie. It really all depends on the host, on how strong their will is. But, you’re right. He’ll have some serious emotional and mental scars. Nothing we do can change that now.”

  I nodded and decided I’d heard enough. Suddenly, I felt wiped out. All I wanted in the world was to go home and curl up against Nathan’s chest and sleep for a week. As it turned out, sleep wasn’t in my future. The second Nathan pulled into the garage, the door to the kitchen opened and Grams stood there glaring at both of us.

  “Damn,” Nathan muttered, his eyebrows shooting up. “I really thought she got it all out of her system when I called her.”

  I giggled at that. Nathan had spent the first fifteen minutes of dinner with his phone held at least six inches from his ear as Grams tore him a new one for screwing up and losing me long enough for me to almost become a demon snack pack.

  “What happened to the wards I put on this house?” Grams demanded as Nathan helped me from the car.

  Nathan and I glanced at each other in confusion. Wards? I had no idea what a ward even was. Seeing my confusion, Grams’ glare got even darker.

  “Protective wards, Ember!” Grams snapped. “They’re meant to keep out negative energy. I want to know what happened to them.”

  “Well, I certainly don’t know,” I told her, kind of insulted by her accusatory tone.

  “What’s going on here, Shea?” Nathan asked, calmly. “You know she doesn’t know anything about wards. What happened?”

  “Come see for yourself.”

  She turned and stormed off as if we were personally responsible for whatever had happened. Sharing an exasperated look, we followed her and came to a quick stop just inside the door. The kitchen was a disaster area. The cabinet doors had been ripped off. Broken dishes littered the counters and every single pane had been busted out of the back door, adding their glittering shards to the rest of the destruction. The entire room was flooded due to the fact that the taps had literally been pulled off of the sink and water was spraying like a geyser. The refrigerator was laying on its side, the contents spilling out and the light blinking eerily. The stove looked like someone had taken a bat to it and the oven door was hanging on by one twisted, mangled, hinge.

  Nathan and I exchanged another look
and I shivered as I wondered what could have wreaked such devastation. I mean, what kind of force would it take to do all of that? Someone would have had to be in a blind rage…

  Bastian. So much for licking his wounds. The whole thing had his name stamped on it like a neon sign.

  Mumbling curses under my breath, I grabbed Nathan by the arm and followed Grams into the living room. The destruction there made the kitchen look tame by comparison. The entertainment center was turned over, the electronics it contained smashed in the fall. The sectional looked like someone had gone at it with a hatchet, and stuffing leaked from it like it was bleeding. The lamps were all overturned or busted and the coffee table and end tables looked like a rampaging giant had stomped on them.

  All of that was bad enough, but what actually pissed me off were the windows and walls. There was one word written on every inch of available plaster and glass: Mine. I began to shiver uncontrollably. It wasn’t just the anger, either. The room was as cold as a deep freeze. You could have literally hung meat in there.

  “Bastian,” I hissed, white-hot rage thawing my blood and my mouth at the same time.

  “I don’t think he would have…” Nathan began, but I cut him off.

  “Whatever,” I snapped, irritated with him for doubting me. “It was him, Nathan. I know it was. Look at the damn windows!”

  I gazed around at the destroyed room around me again. It was time for this prick to get the message and I was more than ready to spell it out for him. I would even use small words so he was sure to understand. I was never going to belong to him. I belonged to me.

  If it was a war he wanted, it was a war he was going to get.

  “Ember, just calm down, sweetheart,” Grams said gently, giving me a look that said she was ready to run for a fire extinguisher any second. “I know you’re angry, but don’t be rash.”

  “Rash? A demon just destroyed our house after trying to make me his favorite Barbie doll. Nothing I do could be considered rash at this point, Grams. Inevitable, maybe, but definitely not rash.”

  My fingers were literally twitching with the urge to strangle the vindictive jerk. I had to find some way to end this. Kim had implied that I was powerful enough to do everything I had seen her do—with a little practice, of course. Even if it killed me, I was going to take Bastian’s demonic ass down a notch or two.

  “We can’t do anything about it tonight, baby,” Nathan said softly, massaging my shoulders. “Let’s do some damage control and then we’ll call in the others and see what we can come up with.”

  Grams nodded her acceptance and began trying to right the room around her without another word, giving me little choice but to go along with Nathan’s plan of action. It was a useless effort in my opinion, but Nathan and I walked into the kitchen to begin the clean-up effort there. Nathan lifted the fridge with one hand as if it weighed no more than a sack of flour and smoothly put it back in place. He turned and saw me watching in fascination and gave me a roguish wink.

  “Show off,” I grumbled, making him laugh.

  I walked over to the sink and reached under it to turn off the water. I had accidentally pulled the faucet off at my parents’ house once, so I knew what to do. By the time I got the stupid thing to turn, though, I was soaking wet and shaking like a leaf again in the still frigid air of the house.

  It was then that I felt them. Not one ghost, but multiple entities. My shock must have kept me from feeling them before. Once I started calming down, though, they came through loud and clear.

  “Nathan!” I whimpered, nearly knocking myself out as I tried to stand up before I was completely clear of the cabinet. I rubbed the back of my head, groaning in pain, and winced when Nathan removed my hand and gently prodded the bump that was already beginning to form.

  “Forget about that,” I snapped, moving away from him, my eyes darting around wildly. “Can you feel that? They’re everywhere!”

  Grams came running in from the living room at my cry and walked over quickly to take my shoulders and look deep into my eyes.

  “What is it, sweetheart?”

  “Ghosts!” I cried, beginning to tremble harder. “Lots of them!”

  Suddenly, a warm presence surrounded me and I smelled the scent of lilacs in the air again. I sighed as the peace I had experienced in the morgue flowed over me and my terror level went down.

  Do not be afraid, the same beautiful, French accented voice that had defended Nathan’s innocence whispered across my mind. They mean you no harm. They only wish to help you as you have helped so many of them.

  “They want to help?” I whispered, feeling like I was almost in a daze as my mind grappled with that. “They only want to help.”

  “Who wants to help?” Nathan asked, looking as confused as I felt.

  “The ghosts,” I told him, my eyes so wide that I probably looked comical.

  But, how were they going to help me? If it had been a ghost, maybe they could have done something, but we were dealing with a demon. Bastian didn’t exist on their plane, but on ours.

  “Well, all they’re doing right this second is freezing you to death,” Grams said, exchanging a worried look with Nathan, taking charge again. “Why don’t you go dry off and change, sweetheart. We’ll take care of things in here and then we’ll all sit down and figure it out together.”

  I nodded, still reeling over the revelation that my ghostly companions were trying to help me for a change. I stumbled down the hall to Nathan’s room in search of warm, dry, clothes. I let my eyes drift closed and rubbed hard at my temples when I found a demolition zone there, as well.

  Most of the clothes from the closet were scattered across the room. Looking around, I spotted a pair of jeans and headed for them. I stopped to pick up a bright red fleece as I passed it and nearly died of heart failure when I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. I forgot all about the clothes hanging limply in my hands as Nathan’s favorite painting slowly started to rise into the air and hung itself back on its hook. Open-mouthed and unable to breathe, I watched as it straightened itself perfectly and a wispy form appeared before it, stepping back to give it an assessing look.

  “There, that is a start, is it not?” my new ghostly companion said, turning to smile at me. “The removal of chaos is the key to a happy life, yes?”

  “If you say so,” I muttered, thinking that the only key to my having a happy life was the removal of a certain demon.

  I could feel the bruises all over my body from my showdown with Bastian beginning to throb, and I knew I would be too stiff to move the next morning. I had done my best to hide the damage from Grams and Kim, but once I was alone I felt perfectly safe to wince and groan to my little heart’s content.

  Making a point of turning my back on my spectral visitor, I stripped out of my wet clothes and limped over to the full-length mirror on the closet door to check out the damage. I grimaced when I saw just how bad it was.

  There was a huge bruise on my shoulder where I’d hit the ground when Bastian threw me off the desk and my left arm was a mass of blue and black. I almost moaned when I saw the bruises on my hip and thigh that would make sleeping on that side nearly impossible. Sighing, I started to work my tank top up, seeing the bruises on my stomach and sides, as well.

  I wasn’t just going to be stiff; I was going to be aching from head to toe.

  With a sigh that seemed to come from my feet, I pulled on the dry clothes I’d found during my trek through the ‘chaos’ that was now my bedroom. I knew by the warmth in the room and that wonderful peace she seemed to exude that my ghostly companion was still there. Sure enough, when I turned back around she was studying me with a smile.

  “You are very different,” she said out of the blue, tilting her head to better examine me. “You have more spirit than the others. You will be a good match for Nate.”

  “Nate?” I repeated, arching an eyebrow at her as I sat down on the edge of the bed to put on dry socks. “How did you know what Nathan’s friends…?” />
  Wait. The French accent, her defense of him after he’d told me and Grams about the tragedy of his newborn vampire days. The clothes she wore, the way she spoke.

  Suddenly, I had a really bad feeling I knew who my friendly, curiously happy, ghost was.

  I froze in place, the sock I’d been about to put on falling from my suddenly numb fingers. Feeling like I was having to fight against my own muscles to complete the action, I turned my head to look at her. She beamed at me, her eyes sparkling with laughter.

  I couldn’t speak, my shock was so intense. I was so curious about her that the questions chased each other through my mind. I wanted to know why she was so warm, why I felt such peace in her presence. I wanted to understand what she had meant in the kitchen, about the others wanting to help me. I wanted to blurt all those questions out, but I was too overwhelmed to do more than stare at her.

  Yes, she was very different from the ghosts I was used to. There was a peace about her the others had never had. I just couldn’t figure out why that was and I couldn’t think how to ask her. I couldn’t just blurt out: You’re dead. Why are you so happy?

  “So…you’re Gabriella?” I asked, my voice coming out much higher than normal.

  “Yes,” she said, smiling and nodding her head regally in acknowledgement. “And you are Ember Blaylock.” She laughed softly when I gave her another shocked look. “You are well known amongst the spirits here. You help those who are lost find their way. That is a very noble mission, mon ami.”

  I blushed at that praise, knowing good and well I didn’t deserve it. There was nothing noble about what I did. I helped the ghosts that came to me to get rid of them. That was all. If I didn’t, they made my life unbearable. Even when I did help, I didn’t do much. Most of them just had someone they wanted to say goodbye to. I took care of that for them and then they just faded away and I breathed a sigh of relief to see them go.

  “Is that why you’re here? Do you need my help?” I asked, a ball of shame beginning to form in my stomach. I guess I had never thought of the ghosts who came to me for help as people with feelings until right then. Suddenly, I really felt bad for the way I had treated some of them.