Blighted Angels, page 6
Father Keller came in with refreshments. He must have picked the drinks up before we got back, because the cups had the familiar logo of the Daily Grind. I sniffed mine appreciatively. Coffee, straight black. For Jane, he had gotten some frothy thing with whipped cream on top, one of those drinks that has a couple drops of coffee and a couple pounds of cream and sugar.
He offered a cup to Reggie, but Reggie shook his head. “No, thanks,” he said. “Caffeine is the last thing I need right now.”
“It’s tea,” Father Keller corrected. “Chamomile. Good for the nerves.”
Reggie took the cup and gave a grateful gulp.
Once I had a few sips of caffeine in me, and Reggie had downed the entire cup of tea, I spoke first. “I can help you,” I said. “But you’re going to have to tell me the whole story. I need to know everything, even if you don’t think it’s relevant. Start from when the blackouts started happening. Better yet, start from this incident you told Jane about—the one with your business partner.”
Reggie shot Jane a look. “You told him?”
“I was trying to help you,” said Jane. “You disappeared on me—and after what happened in my apartment, with…” She gestured vaguely at his eyes. “I was worried sick. And for good reason.”
“I thought you’d use your police connections. Not tell a stranger my business problems.”
“This is what Nic does. He helps people like you. People with… unusual problems.”
“But only if they let me,” I cut in. “So are you going to tell me that story, or not? Because you were awfully eager to get my help when it meant getting out of jail.”
“You know something happened to you in there.” Jane walked over and leaned down to scratch Sparky behind the ears. “If you don’t let Nic help, it’s going to happen again.”
Reggie narrowed his eyes at her. Then at me. “Just how do you know this guy, anyway?”
“We’ve worked together a few times,” I said. “I consult for the police on occasion.”
Jane raised an eyebrow at me. She knew as well as I did that consulting hardly described what brought me to her office. More like making use of police resources without the cops finding out. But she didn’t say anything.
Reggie caught the gesture, though. “Hang on,” he said, his face darkening. “Are you two… is there something going on here I should know about?”
I shook my head. “We’ve seen each other at the station a couple times in passing,” I said, a hair more emphatically than necessary. “She knew my name, and what I did, so she came to me when she needed help. Now she’s my client, same as you.”
That little speech might have been more effective if Jane hadn’t been blushing hard the whole time I was talking. And now she was looking at me with wounded eyes.
“And even if there was,” she said, turning her hard gaze away from me and toward Reggie, “why would it be any business of yours? It’s been a long time since we had anything between us. You shouldn’t have come to me in the first place.”
“I came to you because I knew you would help. I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have, but I was desperate, all right? I took out a lot of loans to finance that expedition. It took everything I had. It was nothing like what I normally do—this was an around-the-world kind of thing. I know what you’re thinking, but the information was real this time. I laid eyes on the artifact myself. I touched it. If he hadn’t made off with it, I’d be rich right now. As it is, I’ve got a month before the creditors start knocking on my door.”
I leaned back in my chair and laced my hands behind my head. “That’s as good a place to start as any,” I said. “What’s this artifact you were after? And who’s this business partner who screwed you over, but somehow isn’t mentioned in any of your official paperwork?”
Reggie sighed the sigh of a man who knew he was all out of options. “It was a one-time deal,” he said. “Maddox was an old high-school buddy. We lost touch years ago. But he came around again a couple of months ago. He’d lost his job and needed some quick cash, and he had a hot tip.”
Jane made a noise in the back of her throat. Reggie shot her a wounded look. “It’s not like that, all right? This wasn’t some get-rich-quick scheme. He came looking for me because he knew I was a treasure hunter.” He puffed his chest out a bit at that. “He said he needed someone with the right set of skills. A real Indiana Jones type.”
“And you said yes,” Jane said with a shake of her head. “Even though this guy hadn’t spoken to you in years. Even though the closest you’ve ever gotten to Indiana Jones is picking up an ultra-rare movie prop at auction—which turned out to be a fake, by the way.”
“A friend needed me. What was I supposed to do?” He twisted his hands in his lap. “And to tell the truth, I needed it too. Things haven’t been great since we split up. Another few months of slow business, and I’ll lose my office. But this… if it worked out the way he said it would, if it was half as valuable as he said, I knew it would turn everything around.”
Jane made another wordless noise.
“I told you,” said Reggie, in a wounded voice, “this was the real deal. We flew out to Siberia, and hiked ten days to a cave deep in the mountains. We got caught in a snowstorm five days in, and almost froze to death. But we got there. I got us there.”
“You haven’t said what this artifact was,” I reminded him.
“I’m getting there. They say a secret order of monks hid it in the cave a thousand years ago. The entrance was sealed up, but there was a secret passage. And there were traps—real ones! It was just like the movies. Like nothing I’ve ever—” He caught himself and cleared his throat. “I mean, it’s a good thing Maddox got in touch with me. He needed somebody who knew what he was doing.”
“The artifact,” I pressed.
“It was a book.” Reggie’s voice went soft and reverent. “But not an ordinary book. It was made of this old-fashioned parchment that almost crumbled away when I touched it. It was all written in fancy calligraphy, in some language I couldn’t read. Latin, Maddox said. But not the kind I remember from high school. And there were pictures all around the edges, like one of those old illuminated Bibles.”
“Pictures of what?” I asked.
Reggie shivered, even though my office was warm. He answered with one word. “Fire.”
At that moment, a faint thump from the basement made Reggie sit up sharply. “What was that?”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said with a wave of my hand. “Tell me more about this book. What was it? Who wanted to buy it?”
“To tell you the truth, I don’t really know,” Reggie admitted, looking down at his lap. “Maddox said he was handling all that. All I knew was that it was one of a kind. Priceless. He said he had a buyer lined up already—someone who was prepared to pay eight, maybe nine figures. I didn’t ask too many questions.” His hands twisted again. “I got the impression it wasn’t the kind of thing I wanted to ask too many questions about, you know? But with my bills, I couldn’t afford to be picky about where the money came from.”
“So he didn’t tell you anything about what this book was, or what this mystery buyer wanted it for?” I asked. “Nothing at all?” I tried to keep casual about my questions, but my radar was on high alert. I’d gotten decent at reading clients over the years, and all of a sudden, Reggie was acting like someone who was holding something back.
Reggie squirmed. He didn’t look at either of us. “Not… not at first.”
“And after you found it?” I pressed.
“That’s when the trouble started. I said we had to seal the book up right away, to make sure it didn’t get damaged. We needed it in mint condition. But Maddox said no, we should use it for ourselves first. He said if it did what it was supposed to do, we could get more than what his buyer promised. We could be richer than anyone on earth.” He shot Jane a guilty look. “I know, all right? I know. But you weren’t there. You didn’t see that book. There was something special about it. It had this… energy radiating off it. Like getting your hands too close to a live wire. And I swear, he never said a word about… demons.”
“What did you do?” I asked. “Was there a ritual?”
“I didn’t do much of anything. Maddox was the one who could read the book, not me. And he said he’d use it on me first, since I’d done so much to help him. He said I could use it on him next—he’d tell me what to do.”
Jane gave a loud sigh. “So you let this guy do some demonic ritual on you because, what… you thought it would make you rich? I swear I should have shut the door in your face the other night.”
“I didn’t believe him about the money,” said Reggie, with a defensive bite to his voice that told me he had believed every word. “But… there was no reason not to try, right? It’s not like I believed in magic or anything like that. It was a silly game. There was no harm in it.”
“And what did this game involve?” I asked.
Reggie shrugged. “There was a lot of chanting. It went on so long I almost fell asleep. He drew some symbols on the floor, I think.”
“Could you draw them for me, if I gave you a piece of paper?” I asked.
Reggie shook his head. “It was all a blur at that point. We had been hiking for days. We were both exhausted.”
“So he performed the ritual,” I said. “And then what?”
“And then… nothing. I didn’t feel anything. I figured it hadn’t worked. But when I woke up the next morning, he was gone, along with half the supplies. I had to hike all the way back out of there by myself, and buy my own ticket back home.”
“And since then?”
“A whole lot of nothing.” Reggie scowled. “I haven’t seen any money, if that’s what you’re asking. Not from the ritual, and not from Maddox’s deal. As far as I can tell, he screwed me over big time. The phone number he gave me doesn’t work. I went to his house, and it wasn’t even his real address. Some other family was living there, and they looked at me like I was crazy.”
“But that’s not all that’s been happening,” I said. “When did the blackouts start?”
“A couple of weeks ago, maybe? I didn’t think anything of it at first. I thought I was just tired. I haven’t been sleeping well, considering everything that’s been going on. When Jane told me what she saw, I didn’t know what she was talking about. But ever since then… it’s been lasting longer. I’ll black out in the middle of the day, and when I wake up, it’s three in the morning. Sometimes I’ll wake up in places I’ve never been before. And then… then I woke up in jail. You know the rest.”
“Thank you,” I said. “That’s very helpful.” Or it would be once I could track down some information about this book of his.
“So… what’s next?” Reggie asked. “You did say you could help, didn’t you?”
As if on cue, a soft knock came at the door to my inner office. “Come in,” I called. “We’re just about finished in here.”
Father Keller eased the door open. “And I’m just about finished downstairs,” he said. “Everything is ready whenever you are.”
Reggie looked from me to the Father. “Ready for what?” he asked, his voice faint all of a sudden. Maybe he had caught sight of the grave expression in Father Keller’s normally twinkling eyes.
“Your exorcism,” I said. “Lucky for you, I’ve got a priest on call.”
Chapter 13
The basement was Juliana’s space. I’d offered it to her as a workout space, since her cramped apartment wasn’t suited to it. She’d set it up as a utilitarian training space, with foam mats on the floors, and the walls painted military gray. She kept a wooden practice dummy set up in one corner—a different one every few weeks, since she kept breaking them. The stale smell of sweat always hovered over the poorly ventilated space.
Most days, that was what it was like down here. But not today. The incense swirling up from a censer blotted out the smell of sweat, along with most of the oxygen in the room. I coughed and blinked away smoke as I looked around. The lights were off, casting the basement in darkness except for the ring of candles in the center of the concrete floor. The foam mats were tucked away somewhere I couldn’t see, along with the practice dummy. Only Juliana’s weapons rack was still visible, the candlelight gleaming off sharpened steel.
“Is Juliana back from her… errand yet?” Father Keller asked me carefully.
“You don’t need to worry about keeping her secret for her anymore,” I told him. “I know she’s dating. She told me last night.”
Father Keller frowned. “Perhaps we should wait to get started until she returns. I would feel more comfortable with her here to handle the demon once it separates from the human host.”
Reggie shifted and made an audible noise of fear.
I glanced over at Reggie. His eyes were still human—for now. But it had been a while since the incident at the prison. “How often do these blackouts tend to happen?” I asked him.
Reggie shrugged. “A couple of times a day, maybe? It’s hard to tell, now that they’ve been getting longer.”
I turned back to Father Keller. “I don’t know how long we’ve got, and I don’t feel like betting on it. I’d feel more comfortable getting this started before the demon makes another appearance—especially since it sounds like it gets stronger every time.” I patted the hilt of my sword. “I can fight a demon, if it comes to that.”
Jane shot the hilt a skeptical look. “I know this isn’t my area of expertise, but do you really think you can fight a demon with that?”
Right—all she could see was a plain, slightly battered knife hilt. “It’s not what it seems,” I assured her. “Trust me.”
She nodded a bit too quickly for my taste. Wasn’t sure I wanted her trusting me that easily. Wasn’t sure she should be trusting anyone that easily.
“You really should start locking your windows at night,” I said to her.
She frowned. “What?”
Reggie cleared his throat. “Are you sure we have to do this at all? I mean… do we really know it’s a demon?”
“I know what I saw back there in the jail,” I said. “It’s more than a bad burrito, that’s for sure. And when someone draws a bunch of symbols on the ground and starts chanting over you in Latin, it’s a good bet something serious is going down.”
Reggie reached for Jane’s hand. Jane gave it a quick pat and just as quickly pulled away. “Nic is the expert,” she said. “I think we should trust him.”
I nodded in Father Keller’s direction. “Actually, the priest is the expert here. And if he says we need an exorcism, that’s what we’re doing. Whether you like it or not.” I shot Reggie an apologetic look. “You’re on my turf now, which means you follow my rules. And I’m not real keen on fighting that thing again.”
Reggie’s eyes widened in alarm. He shot a glance over his shoulder at the stairs. “Am I a prisoner?”
“Of course not,” Jane said.
“Not the human part of you,” I said at the same moment. “But the thing in your head isn’t leaving until the priest gives it a good talking-to, and unfortunately, where it goes, you go. For now.”
Reggie swallowed. “You’re saying if I go through with this… this will be over? I can leave and pretend this never happened?”
Jane looked at me. I nodded. “That’s the best-case scenario, yeah.”
“Will you help me track down Maddox afterward? I really need that money.”
“As soon as we get that demon out of your head, talking to him is next on my list,” I promised. What I wanted to talk to him about had nothing to do with getting him to pay up, but I didn’t need to mention that to Reggie.
Reggie nodded. He took a shaky breath. “Okay,” he said. “Okay. Just tell me what I need to do.”
“All you need to do is stand in the center of the circle,” Father Keller said in a low, soothing voice. “I’ll take care of the rest.”
“And I’ll take care of the demon.” I patted my sword hilt again.
Then I turned to Jane. “You should wait upstairs. After the priest forces the demon out of Reggie’s body, things could get a bit messy.” As a general rule, most demons weren’t too happy about being forcibly evicted. And pulling them out of their human hosts didn’t generally do much to diminish their strength. Quite the opposite, in fact. The price a demon pays for taking a human host is giving up access to a chunk of their power. Once they’re free of the host, all that power comes right back.
And from what I’d seen, the demon inside Reggie was already plenty powerful enough.
But Jane shook her head. “I’m staying with him. He should be able to see a friendly face.”
From the look in her eyes, I knew she wasn’t going to budge. “Stay by the stairs, then,” I told her. “If things get hairy, you run. Got it?”
She gave me an unconvincing nod. I supposed that was the best I was going to get.
With one last nervous look toward Jane, Reggie slipped through the line of candles and stood in the center of the circle. Father Keller started speaking in low, rhythmic Latin. A thousand years ago, I used to know the language, but now I could only catch enough words here and there to know that any demon listening would be getting more pissed off by the minute.
As he spoke, Father Keller shed the sweater-wearing-grandpa persona. He still looked the same, he still sounded the same, but I could sense that standing in front of me was a warrior as fierce as any angel in Heaven’s army. And considering I’d fought a good number of those, I knew what I was talking about.
I looked over my shoulder to see how Jane was taking all this. She watched wide-eyed, her gaze darting between Reggie and Father Keller. The candle flames flared at a shout from the Father, and Jane gasped.
Then another flame flickered, one that didn’t come from the candles. It came from the center of the circle. From Reggie’s eyes.
