Page 12 of The Eleventh Hour

“What?” the driver barks.

I open the door. “Nothing.” I slide out of the car and spin, sticking my head back in the car. The driver’s face is white in the rearview mirror, the whites of his eyes are huge, and his pupils are blown. “Uh, thanks, buddy.”

He makes a strangled sound.

I step back from the car, and he drives the car away before I can even close the door. I watch as it screams down the driveway. Sometimes, the shadows linger, and people see them when they’re close to me. Not properly, but through a mirror or a pane of glass. I’m guessing he saw Gideon.

“So, losing his job tonight if he doesn’t quit.”

The Queen won’t accept careless drivers in her fleet. I make my way up the five steps, dragging my feet, but it only gets me a few more seconds of freedom. The door swings open, and River stomps out, only to stop short when he sees me.

“Thank fuck and all the horses that bitch rode in on.”

“Seriously?” I arch an eyebrow and try hard not to laugh.

“She’s on fire this morning. Like breathing it. If ever there was doubt about her parentage, I’m telling you now, the demon is showing.”

I turn around. “See ya.”

River jumps down the five steps and ducks in front of me. He’s tall and handsome, and looks like my father, if our father were thirty years younger. His hair is dark brown, and he has this warmth that makes everyone love him. “If I have to suffer, you have to suffer. Get your ass in that house.”

I pout. “You are the worst baby brother on the planet.”

River smirks. “Nah, I’m the best. Covered for you when you went AWOL, didn’t I?”

He puts my arm in his and wheels me around to face the house. “Breathe deep the fresh, clean air. From here on out, all you get to breathe is brimstone and sulphur.”

I get a horrible chill as I cross the threshold of the house, and immediately, the strident tones of the Queen echo around the many rooms.

“Ew, ew, ew. She’s in my brain already.”

River snorts and hides a laugh behind his hand. A woman with long red hair sweeps across the room, giving us a filthy look. She’s younger than me by seven whole years, but there’s no mistaking the stunning beauty that is my half-sister Stevie. She disappears through another door, not even bothering to say ‘hi’, ‘how you been’ or ‘hey, bitch’. Strangely enough, I’m not surprised.

“She’s been getting hassled by her supreme evilness, the Queen of Hell. Something about marriage and babies,” River whispers. He pulls a horrified face, and then wipes his expression clean and casts a quick look around the room. “Did she see?”

“No, the devil’s eyes are averted,” I whisper back.

“Praise the cloven one.”

A white blonde woman with an hourglass body runs down the stairs. She stops when she sees us and sneers.

“What the hell is she doing here?”

“She’s family, and she’s helping you celebrate,” River snaps back.

“She’s not. Ask anyone. No one knows who the hell she is, and I’d like to keep it that way. It’s been almost fifteen years of bliss. Why ruin a good thing?”

“Gotta say, I kinda feel the same,” I mutter, eyeing my younger sister. The resemblance is uncanny.

Andy narrows her eyes. “If you ruin this for me, I will never, ever forgive you.”

“I won’t ruin anything. I promise. You won’t even know I’m here.”

Her lip curls, and the muscles in her shoulders tighten, but there is nothing she can do, so she turns on her heel and retreats up the stairs.

“She really would be perfect for a part as an evil stepsister.”

“What you talking about, she is an evil stepsister,” I hiss, jabbing him in the ribs.

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