With a mental shrug, she opened her other eye. “Good hunting?”
“Too good. But not good enough. No dead djinn.” He wandered to the kitchen. “We’re out of tea.”
So he sent her shopping with Zane, in charge of supply for the safe houses. She wrinkled her nose at the addition of Ecco as bodyguard, and Archer warned, “The djinn-man wants you, Sera. We don’t know why, but we know we don’t want him or any snacking feralis to have you.”
When it came to snacking, she discovered the terrible talyan junk-food habit that filled up cart after cart. When Ecco groused about the length of the checkout line and the lack of good magazines, she just about lost it.
“Then quit eating so many doughnuts.”
“I’m supposed to save the world on yogurt and baby carrots?” He looked appalled. “Must be a woman thing.”
She glowered. “Go wait in the car.”
He crossed his arms. “And shirk my duty, risking my soul? Assuming Archer didn’t just shred me for compost.”
“Then I’ll wait for you.” She marched for the door.
“Go with her,” Zane said softly to Ecco, as if she might explode if he jostled her with loud words. “I’ll finish here.”
She plunked herself down in the driver’s seat and stared at the first flakes of snow whipped in the wind.
Ecco disappeared into the back. After a few minutes, he cleared his throat. “Do you think you and Archer are compatible outside the bedroom?”
She glared into the rearview mirror. “Excuse me?”
“Does he listen to your dreams? Do you like his friends? You’re a cute couple and all, but that trick you did together with the malice in Bookie’s lab seemed a little kinky as the basis for a long and loving relationship.”
She twisted around. “Are you smoking something back there?”
“You gotta have things in common besides the zing, you know?”
Before she could answer, Zane emerged with his conga line of shopping carts. They made their deliveries in a heavier snowfall, the flakes curdled by the wind into tiny stinging shards.
“That’s it,” Zane said. “I’ll drop you off at Archer’s.”
“I have one more thing to do.” Since her time was ticking away toward death, doom, and probably more damn deliveries.
Zane pursed his lips.
“And don’t give me any fear-of-Archer crap,” she said. “I’m dangerous too.”
Zane shot Ecco a hard look. “Why’d you let her drive?”
“I had my magazine.” Ecco waved the glossy pages with the voluptuous brunette on the cover promising TEN WAYS HE CAN PLEASE YOU IN BED.
Zane looked disgusted. “Shoplifting?”
“Hey, I’m possessed by evil incarnate.”
Sera scowled and headed to the outskirts of the city.
The Good Faith Baptist Church looked even more pitiable without the neon blue flyers to brighten the cement blocks.
She glared at Ecco. “You. Stay. And for God’s sake, don’t do any more of the quizzes.” She speared Zane with a glance. “You coming?”
She marched inside, Zane dogging her heels, and left behind Ecco like a Rottweiler who hopefully wouldn’t eat the steering wheel.
Nanette smiled when Sera entered the office. “Sera. I wasn’t sure you’d come to visit. And you brought a friend. Did our talk help you?”
Zane lifted his head as if he tested a nonexistent breeze. “Angel?”
Sera ignored both questions. “I actually hope you can help someone else.”
Zane darted a glance at her. “Ecco? Really, Sera, all the saints in heaven couldn’t help him, much less one earth-bound angelic possessed.” Suddenly, he recoiled. “Not Archer? He’ll kill you. In the metaphorical sense.” He glanced at Nanette. “Her, maybe not so metaphorical.”
Sera held her flattened palm out to him. “It’s my father. Can you heal him?”
Archer woke from a dead sleep.
Despite the hours of the teshuva’s restorations, his body screamed a protest when he sat up. The slashed muscle and broken ribs were healing, but every night he went out, the malice seemed more numerous and clever, the ferales bigger and bolder.
And without a partner at his back, the shadows crept far closer. It was enough to make a man want to dive under the covers again and wait till the sun came up—except the sun didn’t banish these demons anymore.
And the covers weren’t so welcoming in an empty bed.
He listened for Sera. Despite his avowal that he never heard her, despite her disbelief that kept her quiet as a ghost, he was attuned to her comings and goings. She’d gone out with Zane and Ecco as guards, but still he listened.
Wouldn’t do to jump out of bed in front of her with a raging hard-on.
He sighed, his nearly ever-present erection when he thought of her just one more pain in his wracked body. Unfortunately, not one the teshuva could do anything about.
He rose, dressed, and went to the kitchen. As he waited for his tea to steep, he paced the room to ease the tension from his torn muscles. Out the windows, the tall buildings cast the streets into gloom, and wayward swirls of snow caught the streetlights’ glare. He’d slept nearly the entire day, but his weary body could’ve gone longer. Still, if he took it easy, he’d be fine for the night’s rounds.
Mostly fine. Good enough, anyway. Still safer than proximity to his studious roommate after they’d shared the same bed, same breath, same slick of sweat . . .
So much for easing the tension in his body.
He retrieved his tea but couldn’t stop pacing. One circuit took him past his cell phone. He listened to the message that he had no messages.
The panic button on Zane’s phone linked to Archer’s. If anything went down, Zane would need only a split second and the barest flick of a finger to call for backup.
After the night he’d had, Archer wondered if a split second was too long a grace period to expect.
He called Zane. The call went to voice mail. Ecco didn’t carry a cell phone—said it made him feel wussie. As a last resort, Archer called Sera’s cell.
“Hi.” At her calm voice, relief coursed through him. Then she went on. “Insert clever outgoing message here.” The tone beeped.
He hung up.
All his senses prickled, worse than when the echo of the unbound demon hunting its chosen had haunted his dreams.
Grabbing his coat, hefting it against the weight of the axe nestled inside, he headed for the door. He took the car, cruising the city, hunting he knew not what.
His phone rang. He snatched it up before the first tone faded.
“Archer.” The gasp reached him through the stuttering line. “I need—”
“Sera.” He gripped the phone, as if he could hold the broken signal together with his bare hands. If ever there was a time for that fabled mated-talyan bond . . . “Where are you?”
“Hurry. Ecco is down—” The interference was like nothing he’d heard before. In the static, faint whispers mocked him, making his skin crawl. “Nanette can’t hold them alone.”
“Where are you?”
“The nursing home. Hurry.”
He cranked the wheel, sending the car into a two-lane skid across the road. A horn blared behind him. “Stay inside, Sera. Stay on the line.” Even as he spoke, he knew it was futile. He heard the click and pictured her rushing into the fray.
He called Niall and gave directions to the nursing home.
Niall didn’t bother asking questions Archer couldn’t answer. “Raine and Valjean are almost as close as you. Watch for them. Don’t lose her, Archer.”
He wouldn’t answer that either.
Less than ten minutes passed, but the last of the iffy light had failed as he double-parked outside the nursing home. Before the car rocked to a halt, he was running across the lawn.