Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 55109 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 276(@200wpm)___ 220(@250wpm)___ 184(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55109 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 276(@200wpm)___ 220(@250wpm)___ 184(@300wpm)
“Well. For one, you were talking about eating it. For two, we don’t have the infrastructure to protect it. For three, Fleisch is going to try to reclaim that, with great violence, if necessary. I’d rather they assaulted Texas than Direview. And four, I don’t know if you noticed, but they stole it from us at gunpoint.”
“So we lost,” Cosmos frowns.
“I don’t think so. We kept Elise safe, and that’s all that matters.”
I’m surprised. “You all came for me?”
“Yes, Elise,” Bryn sighs. “We do take our responsibility to our angels seriously. You are one of us, no matter how much of a spoiled brat you are.”
“So you let me go, so you could get me back, and infiltrate this compound, and get Katya and the relic into Starlight’s hands.”
“We let you go because some people only learn from their mistakes. You do know this was a mistake, I assume. You can never ally with Fleisch. They are our enemies. They will always be our enemies. You belong with Cosmos and with us. The world outside the Brotherhood doesn’t belong to you anymore.”
He might be right. I don’t want to admit it, but everything they’ve ever told me might be right.
“When we get back to Direview, we’ll see what we can do about upgrading that old computer suite,” Bryn says with the air of a kindly British benefactor. “This shows me we need better security and more surveillance in general.”
He’s not wrong, but the prospect of returning to Direview right now fills me with a deep sense of dread. Fortunately, Cosmos has other plans.
“I’m taking Elise on vacation,” Cosmos announces. “Thank you, everyone, for everything. We owe you. Big time. But I want a proper honeymoon with my wife. And I think it’s time she got to enjoy something that’s not part of a plot to reclaim a tasty, long-lost artifact.”
“You have got to stop talking about eating it,” Bryn growls.
“Why? It’s part of the whole thing,” Cosmos reminds him. “The lore is full of eating Christ.”
Bryn sighs, clearly exhausted from fighting and from talking to Cosmos. “I’m going home to my wife. Thor, you coming?”
“Yes,” Thor says. “Absolutely. Crichton and Crocombe will have had their hands full with Anita. Let’s go see if Direview’s still standing.”
“Thank you,” I say as they gather their stuff. “For coming for me. For not just… I don’t know, that big speech I made, it must have been tempting to leave me to my fate.”
Bryn smirks. It’s not often I see wry amusement on his face. He’s usually too busy glowering or glaring or growling.
“There’s nothing cuter than watching someone be self-righteously wrong, only to find out what a mess they’ve gotten themselves in,” he says. “You seem like such a logical, strait-laced little thing, and yet you littered the countryside with singed bodies, put a hole in the wall of a heritage listed building that happens to be my ancestral home, forced us to make an all-out assault in a foreign country, and you’ve led to the divine flesh being liberated to America, of all places. You are the most chaotic person ever to come to Direview, Cosmos included. The two of you belong together. Enjoy your honeymoon.”
EPILOGUE
Two weeks later…
Cosmos
I’m lying on a beach on the French Riviera with my wife by my side. Elise is in an adorable little bunny-themed bikini and I’m wearing what the Australians call budgie smugglers. Sun beats down on us both in a warm embrace and the world feels good and hot and right.
But I know something’s not quite right with Elise. She’s been quiet, and not in a I-fell-asleep-in-the-sun way. In an adorably brooding and yet again overthinking sort of way.
“Hey,” I nudge her. “What are you thinking about?”
“I feel bad for Katya.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“I know, but Starlight was so cruel to her. And I think he enjoyed hurting her. Imagine what he’s doing to her now.”
“She might be someone who needs to be hurt,” I remind her. “Sometimes sadism is the answer.”
“Starlight deserves to be hurt,” she grumbles.
Cosmos laughs. “You’re still angry about him smacking your butt.”
“Aren’t you?”
“He was probably right. You probably did deserve it. Wouldn’t hurt you to know that there’s more than one person capable of keeping you in line if anything ever happens to me.”
“You nearly caved his skull in for that. And I’d never let anybody else touch me. That place was shielded and I couldn’t do anything about it.”
“He deserved to be hit. And so did you. It was one big chain of deserved whippings.”
“You make no sense,” she laughs at me. “You wanted to kill him for doing it, but you also think I deserved it?”
“I’m a demon hunter in a religious cult that is fifty percent demon by weight at this point. Holding conflicting beliefs is what I do.”
She’s cute when she laughs. I pull her on top of me, cupping her sandy butt in my hands as she squirms on top of me, a little sweaty from the sun and quite gritty from the sand. She looks down at me, her hair forming a golden halo shield around our heads.