“What was that?” Jordan gasped. “Did you feel that?”
“Feel what?” Bishop asked.
“That sensation.” She frowned deeply, her expression haunted. “I felt that at the mall, I swear I did. Samantha, that was the same feeling I got just before Julie lost it.”
I stared at her. She’d felt it, too. Now I remembered that I had felt something at the mall, but hadn’t thought anything of it at the time.
“What is it?” I asked, my voice hoarse.
There was fear in her eyes. “I don’t know.”
“You need to kill me,” Stephen whispered. “It’s too much. I’ve hurt too many people.”
I whipped my head in his direction. He’d slumped a little in Connor’s grip, like he was losing his strength.
“What game are you playing now?” Bishop said carefully. “You want me to kill you?”
“He’ll do it,” Kraven said, his arms crossed. “If you say pretty please.”
Stephen drew in a shaky breath. “They can’t see me. Nobody can. It’s like I don’t exist. But I do. I’m here. I was there for so long, but now I’m back and all it does is hurt. He never should have let me out.”
I inhaled sharply. “Look at his eyes. They’re not right.”
Stephen’s eyes were normally a cinnamon color, a medium rusty-brown. Right now they were glazed over with a sheen of white.
“Do you see me?” he whispered.
I flicked the briefest of glances at Bishop to register his confusion matched my own, before I returned my full attention to Stephen.
But this wasn’t Stephen. Not right now. Clarity dawned for me, growing brighter with every second that ticked by.
“I see you,” I said firmly. “What do you want?”
“I want it to stop.”
“What is this?” Bishop asked. “What’s going on?”
“This...I’m sure it’s the new demon,” I said. “The one that escaped the Hollow. The one driving people in Trinity to kill themselves. That’s who you are, isn’t it? Somehow, someway, you’re able to drain the will to live from those you touch.” Realizing this made me want to run in fear. But I stood my ground.
Stephen’s spooky eyes stayed on me. He nodded, his expression etched with despair. “Yes. But you’re wrong about one thing...I’m not a demon.”
When I drew closer, Bishop caught my wrist, keeping me from taking another step. He, like everyone else present, regarded Stephen now with shock.
“What are you, then?” Bishop asked.
He drew in another shaky breath. “I am...I was...an angel.”
Bishop’s eyes widened. “An angel?”
Zach and Connor exchanged a surprised look, but they didn’t budge an inch. Jordan shivered a few feet to my right, and Kraven watched all of this with interest. He rarely looked surprised about anything that ever happened, even the shocking stuff.
For me, I was stunned by this revelation. Stunned speechless, in fact. If my aunt had been an anomalous demon that hurt people, that made a twisted kind of sense. She’d been a demon. But an angel...
They were supposed to be the good guys.
“How did this happen?” I managed to say.
“I was expelled from Heaven,” the angel speaking through Stephen explained. “The soul inside me, it drove me crazy. It was torture, every day I existed here in the mortal world. I wandered, trying to find a place for myself, but there was nothing but pain and misery. Finally, I couldn’t take it any longer. I had to end my suffering. I—I set myself on fire, hoping the flames would purge my pain. That death would give me silence and peace. The Hollow claimed me.”
“That was stupid,” Kraven said without emotion at this horrific tale. “A fallen angel or an exiled demon can’t kill him or herself with fire. Or a bullet. Or a hungry shark. That soul inside you takes on a life of its own and retains your consciousness, even if the body’s been destroyed.” His lips thinned. “But I suppose you’ve already figured that out, haven’t you?”
Stephen’s face held endless misery. “I have nothing left except my hunger. When I move through those here in this world, it gives me temporary relief.”
“But you’re hurting them,” I said, my throat tight. “You have to stop.”
He nodded. “Tonight I will ease my pain once and for all. It’s why I’m here. Why I was released from his kingdom. I do what he tells me.”
“What who tells you?” I asked.
“The only one that matters. The only one that knows the truth.” His eyes locked with mine. “You know, but you don’t. You can’t see, not yet. But you will. You will see everything like I do. Like he wants you to. Soon, very soon.”
I shivered.
Bishop met my gaze and his expression was bleak and haunted. This was a fallen angel, just like him, one whose soul had driven him insane. But this angel had chosen suicide as his only way out, which only made things worse.
He composed himself quickly and turned away from me to face Stephen again. “What do you mean? What are you going to do?”
Instead of replying, Stephen let out a strangled moan and dropped to his knees. Connor and Zach finally lost their hold on him and seemed uncertain of what to do with this most recent development.
“Bishop?” Connor asked.
“Don’t touch him again,” Bishop warned. “Not yet.”