Page 30 of Loved By Monsters (Everwood Demons 2)

“Dezikiel said they’re afraid of my power, he thinks there’s corruption in the High Council too,” I said, deciding that it was better to tell them everything I knew since they already suspected it.

“Well, I guess it’s possible angels and demons could be rebelling against the High Council and teaming up in secret. But that thought is also terrifying,” Hadley said, her face marred with uneasiness now.

“Why are you so special though? Is it your new special fire?” Dylan mused as he tried to understand their motives. “It can’t just be because of your bloodline, right? They must think you’re super powerful.”

“No idea,” I muttered, wishing I had all the answers too.

We fell silent as the library door opened yet again, and Xander entered.

He headed over to join us, glancing around our group nervously now that we were quiet.

“Sorry, I heard everyone talking in here…” He said sheepishly, looking rather awkward as he looked around at us all.

Why had we all fallen quiet anyway? Did no one here trust him? I trusted him for some strange reason.

Maybe it was because I’d sat down with him once in the library when I’d spied him sitting alone.

“Hey, you okay?” I asked as I sat down on the couch beside Xander while he gazed out the window.

“Huh? Ah…yeah,” he murmured, clearly off in his own thoughts. He cleared his throat as he turned to me and smiled. “Sorry, was just thinking.”

“Anything you want to talk about?” I asked, noting his slightly frustrated expression.

“I don’t know,” he said, sighing as he glanced back out the window. “I guess I’m just wondering about things. Why I retained my soul perhaps.”

“No one really knows why,” I said softly.

“I know… but still. I hit that poor girl when I was driving drunk. I still wish I could take it back. She’d done nothing wrong. Becky Channing. When I came back, I looked up my accident and found out who she was. She was in her last year at college, studying to be a teacher. Loved by all her friends and family. A light in the dark was what they wrote on her tombstone,” he said, his voice dropping to barely a whisper. “I was the one who snuffed out her light.”

I didn’t know what to say as he stared out the window, his shoulders stiff and his jaw set. His eyes glittered, but he blinked them clear as he looked at me with a sad, pained smile.

“I went to her grave and left flowers, vowing to make my second chance worthwhile. I want to help this world in any way I can to repent for my sins. I don’t know if anything I do will ever be enough, but I can only hope,” he said softly as he looked down at his hands.

I just rested a hand on his shoulder, not sure what words I could offer to comfort him.

We sat in silence for a short while, just gazing out the window together.

“We’re just talking about how that creature was part angelic and how it could’ve crossed the wardings, not to mention how Charlie slipped through the High Council’s vetting,” I said, continuing to fill him in and feeling better when he relaxed.

There was no reason to treat him any differently just because he was a true demon. He was nothing like Charlie, and we all knew that, surely.

“We didn’t even get there until Dezikiel was killing it. We were too slow,” Dylan said sheepishly as he slapped a hand down on Xander’s shoulder.

“Yes, I wish I could’ve gotten there sooner, but I didn’t know what weapon to grab,” Xander mumbled.

“Honestly, what could you have done? None of the demonic weapons did anything,” Diane blurted, and I winced at Xander’s defeated look.

She was right.

“Hell, half of us were useless. We need angelic weapons to fight angelics. Even Paris and Wayne couldn’t do anything against it,” Thomas growled.

“Are there any angelic weapons here?” I asked.

“No, not that we know of.” Hadley shook her head.

“Only Dezikiel’s sword,” Diane added.

“Surely they must have some somewhere,” Thomas said in exasperation.

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