Deliver us from Evil - Logan Fox Page 0,14

because I can’t. I’ve never been able to. It’s like I was wearing a blanket, and some invisible hand snatched it away.

A shudder ripples through me so hard that my teeth clench.

Gabriel looks at me. At my trembling body. And I guess he realizes what’s happening. Something switches on in his head. Or off.

Because where I was convinced—convinced—he was about to tell me everything, perhaps even break down in a fit of conscience—

Gabriel throws back his head and laughs. Just once.

He grabs me.

On instinct, I struggle.

But I guess he’s had a lot of practice dealing with unruly kids, because he kicks my legs out from under me and tips me to the side in one smooth motion.

My shin slams into the side of the bath, but that barely slows me.

One minute I’m standing, the next I’m under a sea of hot water and bubbles. My gasp of shock has me choking, my throat burning as water goes where it shouldn’t.

I fucked up.

I pushed too hard.

I thought I was ready, but I clearly wasn’t. My struggles are weak and pathetically ineffectual against Gabriel’s strong arms.

He easily holds me under the water. When I reach up and try to gauge out his eyes, all I’m really doing is brushing his face with my fingers.

I manage to close my mouth. Hold my breath. It hurts like nothing I’ve ever felt, because my lungs still want to expel the water that went down my windpipe. And I’m trying to suppress those convulsions best I can.

Pain flickers red hot inside me. Building. Building.

My eyes are open, and they burn too because the water’s too hot.

I don’t know how long I can hold my breath, but it already feels like it’s been too long.

My limbs are so heavy. My body weighs a fucking ton.

I can’t even reach Gabriel’s face anymore. So I try and grab onto his shirt.

Can’t hold on.

Hands slap into the water.

My body convulses on its own, this time I can’t stop it, and my lungs empty themselves. It takes forever, but then it’s over in a heartbeat.

Only pain and emptiness left now.

And the faint sensation of his hands on my shoulders, holding me down.

Chapter Nine

Rube

“Anything?” Apollo asks quietly as soon as he spots me. I’m sitting on the couch, Trinity’s big white bible on my lap. I was reading it, but not with enthusiasm like I usually do. More just paging through, hoping for a sign that she’d read it too. A dog-eared corner. Some notes in pencil.

But there’s no trace of her on here.

Maybe she never even opened it.

Which means I have nothing to remember her by.

“I’d have told you,” I say, closing the bible and letting out a sigh.

It’s been almost hours since I watched that car drive away. I’ve been waiting for a contact of mine who has an in at the Bureau to run Gabriel’s plates and see if he comes up anywhere. But it’s as if they disappeared off the face of the planet. For all I know, they switched cars as soon as they hit Redwater.

I rub my eyelids.

Zachary’s been MIA. I saw him last at the front entrance of Saint Amos, a fact I reluctantly laid out to my brothers as we began piecing together what had happened this morning.

None of them reacted like I’d expected when I told them what Zach had done. Cass just stared, and Apollo let out a rueful snort like I’d told him he lost a bet he hadn’t been expecting to win anyway.

I don’t even know if he’s still here at Saint Amos. We’d know when we go to the garage. And that’ll be soon, because we have to leave.

That much we’ve decided on at least.

But where do we go? Anywhere past Redwater could be taking us further away from Trinity, from Gabriel. And we’d have no way of knowing.

We tried everything. Searched every record of Gabriel and Trinity’s in the admin office. All we found were dead ends. Gabriel had cleaned house.

I don’t blame Zach for hiding. I would too if I got a message like the one I sent him earlier.

WE WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU

I didn’t have to ask the others. I know they feel the same. Apollo’s chewed his nails to the quick. I’m surprised Cass hasn’t passed out from oxygen deprivation from chain-smoking.

They’re fucked.

We’re fucked.

And Zach did nothing. He just stood there and watched. For all we know, he helped Gabriel carry Trinity to his damn car. Maybe even wished him well as Gabriel sped off.

“Might