Demon Soul (15 page)

Gabriel remained standing, shifting from one foot to the other as if he didn’t quite know what to do.

She looked at him, really looked, and caught her breath. "It hurt you, didn't it? I can see it." She could, too. Pain swirled around him in shades of purples and reds and grays. She blinked and the image faded, but it was a sight she wouldn't soon forget.

"The transitions hurt, yes. I never want to get comfortable as my demon. I don't want to give it too much power over me."

His restlessness confused her. “Are…are you all right?”

"You saw my demon form. The bronze skin. The claws. The...tail."  He looked at her from the corner of his eyes. “It didn’t bother you?”

“No. Did you really think it would? Gabriel.” She looked at him, at his uncertainty, and a part of her melted. “You are still you, even in your demon form. You were guarding me. You prevented Sara, I mean Satine, from getting to me again. She would have killed me. You, in demon form, stopped her.” Tears pricked her eyes and she rubbed them. “Besides, I turned into a fire demon earlier. It didn’t seem to bother you.”

He sighed then and leaned against a chair.

“Oh for goodness sake, sit down before you fall down.” She waited until he sat. “I’ve got to talk, I hope you don’t mind. I’m totally amped. I have so much energy from the fight. Do you change into your demon a lot?”

“Yes. No." Gabriel wiped his face with both hands. "No, not a lot. I've experimented in the past. But it was the first time I'd changed in public. I don’t recommend it."

"There’s the whole shredding clothes thing,” she teased. “What else can you do as a demon? I mean, you were amazing in there, beheading demons with your tail and tossing them into walls.”

"I already know I'm a killer." His voice hardened with self-loathing. "I don't need to do any further exploration."

"I think it’s fascinating. Why don’t you want to explore what you are? What about it scares you?" Rose leaned forward, curiosity eating at her.

"This is no time for Dr. Phil, Rose." Abruptly he stood and strode to the door.  "I can't stay."

"Are you kidding? It's the perfect time to talk, while we’re both hopped up from the fight. Come on, Gabriel. Stay and talk to me. You can't walk out now," she protested, jumping to her feet. "Besides, Justin's not back yet."

Gabriel turned to her and the look in his eyes broke her heart. "I can't stay here. I almost got you killed again. Trust me. You're better off without me hanging around." And he turned and walked through the door.

Rose waited a heartbeat before following him, but even as she opened the front door, she knew. Gabriel was gone.

She trembled for him. She knew he wouldn't be found if he didn't want to be. Her frustration died and with it, the late-spurt adrenalin rush that had been holding her together.

Abruptly her vision blurred and the wound in her neck throbbed. She touched her neck gingerly. The toilet paper she’d put there fell apart under her fingers, wet with blood.

Her mouth set in a tight line as her vision continued to go fuzzy. Sweat gathered on her forehead, trickled down her face. Shit. Maybe she
had
danced with the meth pipe, after all.

Help. She really needed help. She moved with care to the phone and dialed. An efficient recorded voice spoke. She took a deep breath, struggled to stay calm. "Los Angeles. Magdalena de la Cruz." The number came in a blur. She pressed the right number to have the call directly connected, and listened to it ring again, ridiculously relieved when she heard a sleepy voice.

"Maggie? It's Rose. Yeah. I'm at Justin's house, but he's not here and Gabriel has gone. I need help." To her horror, Rose burst into tears. "Please come."

* * *

Head down, hands in his pockets and with unfamiliar emotions bombarding him, Gabriel trudged the streets of Santa Monica, determined for once in his life to do the right thing. He’d had to leave her before he grew too comfortable. Rose wasn't for him. If he wanted to keep her alive, he had to keep her at an emotional distance. It was just that simple. He had the history to prove it, didn't he?

He scowled and a street bum moved hastily out of his way. And then tonight, there’d been too many personalities, too much fighting. He hadn’t had that many conversations in one night in years. Plus, she reminded him he’d been responsible for way too many deaths in less than twenty-four hours.

Gabriel kicked at a rock in the street. She scared him. That’s the real reason he left. She carried Mephisto, yes, but also because she tugged at him. Whatever she was—demon carrier, Soul Chalice, or something else they didn't know to look for—she'd made him care. So fast, so very fast.

Was it any wonder she had him reeling? Emotions he'd thought safely burned out of him were springing up like tree seeds the spring after a wildfire. He'd spent more time with her in the last twenty-four hours than he'd spent with any one person in over a decade, and he'd certainly talked more than he had in a decade. He’d tried to keep his distance from her, but how could you protect yourself against a sunbeam?

He sighed. If he never retrieved his soul, he’d build a cabin somewhere in the middle of nowhere. He’d have the wide open spaces, the wildlife, mother nature at her best. A place where he couldn't reach out and kill someone.

Funny how little appeal his long-cherished dream now held.

Anxious and yearning for something he couldn't put his finger on, Gabriel stopped on the sidewalk, not too far from Justin’s house, and searched for Rose in his mind. Just a double check, he assured himself. Just so he could make sure she was safe.

A tall, shiny brass door firmly shut against him blocked his access to her mind.

"You want to tell me about it?" Maggie flipped through her doctor's bag, searching for the tools she'd need. One look at Rose had her nerves strung tight.  Doc Cavanaugh had taught her well, though. She could do this. She
would
do this.

Rose curled up on the kitchen table, unable to stop crying. "I'm so cold. I don't know why. I've been hot most of the night, but now I'm so cold. We went to this sleazy club to find Satine, and I was helping with recon. I kept bugging him to let me help. Oh hey, I leaped onto a balcony!" Rose smiled through her tears. "It took me a couple tries, but I managed to follow him. Thought he was so smart," she sniffed, and wiped her eyes. "This demon stuff is amazing."

"Where was the club? And why the recon?"

"In the not-so-good part where Santa Monica and West L.A. meet. Gabriel wanted to check it out before he met with Satine. At any rate, he didn't get his soul back." She shivered as memory took over. "It's a sick place. They have torture rooms." Rose shivered again. "I could smell it."

Maggie felt her forehead and frowned. "You're running some fever, girl."

"We killed a couple demons in the club, I remember that. There was something about a werewolf, too, and I think she was pregnant. And then he left, and I was somewhere dark and cold, doing drugs again. I killed Kevin." She shook her head in confusion. "Though I'm pretty sure that part was a dream. But then, bam! Satine's biting me. Then he’s protecting me, and we’re fighting more vampires, and then we’re free and moving fast through the city.”

"Sounds like a nightmare," Maggie said. "Unreal."

"It was real, all right. The kitchen keeps twirling around," she complained.

"You just close your eyes, then. I'm almost ready." Maggie cast a worried glance at Rose. Her face had lost every drop of color, leaving her freckles to stand out against the pallor. The bite marks on her body seemed to pulse even as blood welled thick in the holes. Not good. The vamp didn't have time to seal off the wound like they normally would. She poked at Rose's neck, noted the jagged edges of the bite, and sighed.

"Are you sure this was a vampire, and not a werewolf?" Maggie measured Rose's pulse. It was slow and sluggish, her skin hot as well as pale. Rose shivered under her hand.

"Satine did this. Family always knows how to make you hurt. Gabriel rescued me. Then he left. I don’t understand, Maggie. I don’t get it.”

Maggie silently cursed all men. "I don't know. From what Justin has said, Gabriel has always lacked the social graces."

"He hurts. I hurt, too."

"I know." Maggie clucked her tongue as she prepped the vials.

"He rescued me. He didn't have to." Her voice had dropped to a mumble. "Well, yes I guess he did have to, since I hold part of his soul. I shouldn’t have pushed him to talk about his demon powers. I just wanted to know."

"I'll be right back." Maggie hurried out of the kitchen to the living room, grabbed the plaid stadium blanket tossed over the couch. Back in the kitchen, she draped it around Rose and took a deep breath. "Okay now, let's get you down on the floor, chica," Maggie said, and took out an eyedropper. "I don't want you passing out sitting up." 

Maggie helped the shivering girl down to the floor, wrapped her body as warmly as she could. "Now, this will hurt. Are you sure you don't want anything? I can put you into a really pleasant dream while we get this taken care of," she added, and brushed strands of damp hair gently away from her forehead. "I'm really good at that."

"No, no drugs, please. Let's just do this." Shivering violently, Rose turned her face to the floor, leaving the marred side of her neck open to Maggie's gaze.

"Here, then," and Maggie put a towel in Rose's hand. "Twist that up and bite down on it. Unless you want to scream."

Rose took the towel without a word, twisted it and closed her eyes. "Just do it."

Maggie dipped the dropper into her small vial of holy water, and drew some up. "Here we go." Carefully, she dropped two drops of holy water on the jagged wounds in Rose's neck. The water hissed and bubbled, drew blood, and she saw Rose's eyes squinch tight as she bit down onto the towel.

Maggie wiped away the blood and water, and dropped two more drops onto the wounds with the same results. She knew the cleansing of the wound could take hours and many vials of holy water. After the third set of drops, however, the bubbling lessened. Rose's body relaxed. Maggie sighed in relief. It wasn't going to be a bad recovery.

The scream took her by surprise. Rose screamed again, stiffened in pain and clutched her belly. The wound in her neck gushed.

Swearing a blue streak in Italian, Maggie grabbed the towel from where it had fallen and pressed it against the vampire bite. In all her years as a witch, she'd never seen anything like it. Rose screamed again and curled around Maggie in a half-moon shape, sobbing and writhing.

Maggie struggled to stay calm. She stroked Rose's back, her legs, anywhere she could reach, alarmed at how cold she felt when not even a minute before she'd been on fire. "Rose. Talk to me. What hurts? Why are you screaming? Come on, honey," she pleaded.

"Fire, it's on fire, Maggie, oh God," Rose panted, her strength waning. "Thirsty," she said. "So thirsty."

"What's on fire? Rose, damn it, don't pass out on me now," she warned. "You've got to help me. Find the strength, Rose. Find the strength to help me help you."

Rose fought out of the blanket, grabbed the hem of her tee shirt and raised it a bit. "Here," she said on a sigh.  "Damn, Maggie. It's bad. The demon's moving and it hurts." Cold sweat beaded on her forehead. 

Still holding the towel against the neck wound, Maggie stared at the design on the girl's stomach. The red, yellow and black runes swirled and glowed in a spiral pattern, rippled beneath the skin as if it were alive. Flickers of flame dodged through the runes.

Maggie sucked in a shocked breath. "Demon." Carefully, she traced the spiral of the inked skin with a finger, trying to make sense of the design. She frowned. It looked familiar, but wrong, somehow—as though the symbolism had been...reversed? "Uh oh."