the sound of it, you’re oozing supernatural energy from your pores. You’re half demon and half angel, which is completely ridiculous, but I’m going with it, anyway. So figure out a way to get us the hell out of here so I don’t have to bash your brains in.”
My thoughts raced, and again I kept coming back to Bishop and that connection we had—how he was able to find me, even if it was unreliable lately. But I still had mind melds with him, as strong as ever. “There’s only one way I can think of. I need to contact somebody.”
“No cell phone, remember?”
“No, not by phone.” I closed my eyes. “I—I think there could be another way. But it might not work. In fact, I’m pretty sure it won’t.”
She let out a frustrated snarl. “Stop being such a damn pessimist and start trying.”
Words to live by, courtesy of Jordan Fitzpatrick, my high school nemesis.
In my dream about Bishop, the one where we were playing chess before things got disturbingly homicidal, he’d said something to me—that I could control our mind melds. I hadn’t believed it at the time since they were so random, so unpredictable. They came out of nowhere like being flattened by a truck.
Then something Jordan said tweaked something in me. She’d said I was half demon and half angel. But this wasn’t totally accurate. I was the daughter of an angel and a demon. I was a nexus. I was the connection, the center point, the combination of the energies of Heaven and Hell.
If you asked me, that sounded way more powerful.
I’d always doubted this power, taken what came to me when it came. Seeing the searchlights was something I didn’t control. It just happened. Zapping the demons and reading their minds took effort. Other times it was effortless. If they didn’t fight me...it was effortless.
But maybe I was the one making things difficult.
I was certain my mind melds with Bishop were because I’d taken part of his soul—and it was still inside of me. That’s why I could see his memories if I looked in his eyes. Bishop’s soul was a bridge between us and had been ever since the kiss we shared. I needed to find that bridge and walk across it.
And I needed to do it right now.
Chapter 21
I focused on that piece of Bishop that was always with me. The memory of our kiss. The warmth of his touch. The deep and endless way he looked at me, even when I was frustrating him and vice versa.
His soul, the thing that had caused him so many problems, was beautiful—a ribbon of silver that stretched outward from me to a point in the distance I couldn’t see.
And this I saw with my eyes closed. I’ll admit it was bizarre, but I wasn’t going to second-guess myself. It was real. It was him. I knew it.
I held on to that ribbon of silver like a rope and let it guide me to him. I didn’t fight it, I didn’t force it. I just let it happen.
“Hurry up,” Jordan urged.
I pried open one eye with annoyance. “Would you give me a—”
Snap!
“—has to be somewhere in the city.” Bishop paced back and forth along the sidewalk. Dusk had fallen. Tall buildings surrounded him—glass, concrete, steel. Out of the corner of his eye there was traffic visible on the road, rush hour as everyone headed home from their jobs. He was right downtown, a nameless street I was sure I’d been on a million times before.
“Or she’s dead,” Roth said from nearby.
Bishop turned on him. “Shut your mouth.”
Whatever look was on Bishop’s face earned a dark glare in return. “I’m sick of shutting my mouth.”
Bishop cast a glance over the rest of them—all were present, Roth, Cassandra, Kraven, Zach and Connor—watching the angel with varying degrees of wariness, uncertainty or disdain.
He fixed his attention on Cassandra. “Take Roth somewhere out of my sight.”
She approached Bishop, her expression cautious. “We’re all worried about her, you know. When she didn’t come home last night—”
“You should have told me immediately, not waited until today.”
She winced at the harshness of his words. “She wanted us to leave her alone. I didn’t think—”
“That’s right. You didn’t.” He brought his hands up to his face to cover his eyes, hunching over a little. “Not thinking...can’t think...can’t keep it together. My head, it’s messed up, more and more.”
“Come on, Bishop,” Zach said. “You’re strong. You have this. We believe in you.”
Bishop snorted at that,