Page 84 of Not Today, Satan
“What?” I whisper.
“He’s going to die again.” She settles the mug and sits beside me. “And he’ll go back to Hell.”
She’s lying.
That’s what angels do. I didn’t haul him through the depths of Hell for him to be dragged back there.
“But,” I stammer, “that would mean I didn’t save him at all. This is a trick. You’re trying to hurt me. Father warned me your kind do that.”
I shove away from the table, my chair clattering to the floor, and bolt to the front door. The citrus scent I once found comforting now suffocates me. I throw the door open, gulping down the breezy California air.
“Devica?” My mother places a hand on my shoulder, dropping it when I glare at her. “It’s not a trick. Whatever lies your father has embedded in you about angels, you’re my daughter. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. The body this boy possessed in the afterlife is not meant to walk this Earth. He’ll be sent back very soon.”
A brown furry animal digs into her lawn, then skitters up a tree. My body numbs, and I grip the doorframe, digging my nails into the wood until it stings. “If you’re not lying, it was all for nothing. I betrayed everyone: Father, Attero…the souldiers who spent their lives protecting me. I’ve banished myself, and Nate ends up back there anyway.”
“I’m so sorry, honey. I wish there was something I could do.”
“No.” I blink back the tears that meld the blue sky into the green grass before me like a painting. “I can’t let Father have him. We have to fix this.”
She purses her lips in thought. “I guess we can start by finding him. Maybe he’s fine. I haven’t been an angel for almost two decades. I could be wrong. Are you sure you don’t know where he is?”
A tear trickles from the corner of my eye, and I brush it away with the back of my hand. “His parents died when he was a kid, and everyone else thinks he killed his foster dad. He had nowhere to go. He could be anywhere.”
She inhales sharply. “You didn’t tell me this boy went to Hell formurder. Devica, should you even try to save him?”
“He didn’t do it.” I open my eyes and hold her gaze. “He saved my life on multiple occasions. Killers don’t do that.”
She squeezes my shoulder. “Maybe he knew you were his only way out.”
I frown. Did he? Back on the bridge, I said I was playing him, but maybe it was the other way around.
His smile appears behind my eyes, the memory of lying beside him warming my insides as the sunlight warms my skin. The softness of his lips against mine, the way they tightened when he gave me the name of the park, sure it was goodbye.
I shake my head. “I know his heart better than my own. When we went through Lot Eleven—the lot that shows you the worst of yourself—it was me who saw evil, not him. And when I was injured, he could’ve left me behind, but he chose to carry me instead.” Closing the door, I sink into her kitchen chair and bury my face in my hands. “He needed me to get out of there, but I needed him, too. I still do.”
“Okay.” She blows out a breath, then grabs a set of keys from the counter. “Then we find him and figure out what to do from there. If he doesn’t have anyone left, where would he go?”
“I told you I don’t know.” I tug at my hair until it stings my scalp. “Earth is your domain, not mine.”
“He must’ve said something.”
“He said a lot. Boy never shut up.” Rubbing my temples, I sift through our conversations, trying to separate valuable info from the awful puns.
My back straightens, and I utter a small cry. “Wait. Do you know where to find the Satan Moniker Peer?”
She blinks at me, then laughs. “TheSanta Monica Pieris about a half-hour drive away. He probably wouldn’t have walked there from the park, though. It would’ve taken him hours.”
Drumming my fingers on the table, I shake my head. “We walked way longer than that in Hell. And this place is important to him. He told me it’s where he finds peace.”
“Good a place to start as any.”
I grab my belt and sword from the corner and slide them around my waist.
My mother furrows her brow. “You’re not going to need that, Devica. It’s a beach.”
My jaw tightens, and I press my lips together. “I’m in a world I don’t know with an angel I just met. This goes where I go.”
“If that’s what you need.” She shrugs. “But don’t impale anyone without putting a good amount of thought into it first, okay?”
