Page 104 of Hounded: Ashes to Ashes

“I got rid of them.” I motioned to the sink. “Sully had my pills. She was holding onto them for me, and I…” I trailed off, realizing how much I sounded like a high school pothead in denial, then sighed. “I didn’t take them.”

Loren’s brows knit together. It took longer than it should have for him to process, or maybe I needed his approval more than I realized because I found myself holding my breath until he said, “Good.”

It was rare to get much from him, and he must have been choked with a thousand things that had nothing to do with me or my addiction and seemingly small victory over it. I was along way from sixty days, after all, and he had every right to be skeptical. And distracted. And too full of his own troubles to have room for mine, but I asked anyway.

“Are you proud of me?” My voice softened as I added, “I want you to be proud of me.”

His expression went slack, like the thread of tension inside him had snapped. Typical for me to ask for more than he could give. To want or need things I hadn’t earned. Like approval. Or forgiveness.

After too many seconds, he finally croaked, “Indy, I…”

A knock on the door cut him short.

Hope swelled inside of me. The hounds were back. They’d escaped. Survived. It was a miracle. Possibly the second one we’d received tonight.

I sprinted toward the door, ignoring Loren’s call to wait. Flinging it open, my jubilant grin drooped when relief collided with surprise, then slid swiftly into disappointment.

Rather than Gunnar, Dottie, and Abigail, our visitor was none other than the heavenly beacon of a man who had sent the hellhounds scurrying at the bowling alley. Evander stood on the other side of the entry, and I was tempted to slam the door in his face. But I didn’t, and neither did Loren when he arrived beside me. He didn’t growl or even glare. He simply hung at my side and stared at our uninvited guest with an increasingly vacant expression.

“Lorenzo. Indigo.” The angel nodded to us each in turn. “I presume you know why I’m here.”

The last time I’d seen this fucker, he tried to abduct me. He’d spouted nonsense about my heavenly home and how safe I would be in the clouds with a harp and halo. I thought I’d made it clear how opposed I was to that idea, but I couldn’t fault the guy for his tenacity.

“Not interested,” I said then did, in fact, swing the door toward closing. But Loren’s long arm stretched over my head and caught it.

I looked up, then back, frowning hard. Loren turned aside, full of avoidance—and shame?—while Evander stepped through the open doorway.

Staggering back, I ducked from under Loren’s arm so I could retreat into the open area. The air had a strange charge to it. I couldn’t recall a time I hadn’t seen Loren snarling or snipping at the angel and, considering Evander had just Human Torched the shit out of every demonic entity at the bowling alley, Loren should have been wary. But he wasn’t.

I backed all the way into the kitchen island, then stalled. It felt wrong to be at odds with both of them. Worse still to see Loren siding with the angel, reluctant and remorseful though he appeared to be. It was almost like he endorsed this man’s invasion and whatever came from it.

Evander glanced at Loren. “Didn’t you tell him?” he asked.

Loren’s eyes fluttered closed, freeing twin tears to streak down his face.

After all that had happened, why was he cryingnow?

My stomach churned. “Tell me what?”

Rather than answer, Evander continued to Loren with an exasperated sigh, “I assumed you would take the time you were given to explain. It would have been kinder than this.” His gesture toward me made my skin prickle, and I stomped my foot.

“Explain what?” I asked. I would have accepted an answer from either of them.

Evander watched Loren, waiting for words that didn’t come. This was another thing my boyfriend had clearly chosen to suppress rather than say. That meant it wasn’t easy. Wasn’t good.

After a pause and another noisy breath, the angel shook his head. “What I suppose I must.” His features grew severe as he rounded on me and said, “Indy, you’re dying.”

It was the kind of statement people usually prefaced with a warning. Like, “Are you sure you want to hear this?” or “Maybe you should sit down.” I got no such courtesy and was, subsequently, left reeling. But not in denial. As a person quite practiced at dying, this seemed different. It was like the sense I got when Nero tore through Whitney: palpable finality.

“I tried to tell you before,” Evander carried on, “but you weren’t prepared to accept it. Your time on Earth is over. The phoenix’s flame is extinguishing. For good.”

I didn’t argue because I’d felt it, recently more than ever. That cold, sparkless sensation, like my very soul was empty and dark. Dead or soon to be.

I turned toward Loren, who reluctantly raised his eyes. They were full of tears, overflowing, and I remembered how cathartic it could be to cry. I wondered if he felt better letting out what he had been keeping in; I certainly didn’t.

“You knew about this?” I whispered.

Loren fixed his gaze on the floor, and my body flushed with heat.

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