A Darker Past (The Darker Agency #2)(35)

“Hel…is on…ay,” Lukas said, kneeling beside me. He wrapped his arm around my shoulders, attempting to pull me close, but I jerked away.

“I tried—she’s—” And that was it. The only words that came. I meant for there to be more, but my brain wasn’t working right. Simple functions had all but shut down, focused on a kind of fear I’d never experienced before.

“She’s going to be okay, Jessie.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t answer. In seventeen years, I’d never seen my mom like this. We got hurt on the job all the time. Gushing blood and broken bones were just a part of the deal. This though…this was different. This was center of my universe, my rock, at her weakest and most vulnerable.

I was sick. The air was too thin, and bile surged up my throat. I wrenched sideways, dry heaving until my insides felt like they’d spill from my mouth. My internal organs were vibrating. Moshing to some phantom metal beat. A familiar itch rippled through me with violent ferocity. The disconcerting pull that told me I was being summoned.

No… “Not now.” I growled, sucking in a breath and holding it. The subtle flurry in my limbs expanded, and I resisted with every nerve in my body. In the distance, I heard the sirens. They wouldn’t make it in time. I submerged my fingers in the icy snow and bent forward, eyes squeezing shut with as much force as I could muster. Everything in that moment was so vivid. The chill in the air and the intricate swirls my breath made as I panted against the effort of remaining topside. The way my hands and legs stung from the penetrating, wet cold. Under different circumstances, I would have pulled up a handful of the white stuff and thrown it into the air like I’d done a million times as a kid. Maybe chucked a fistful at Lukas and laughed as he made that sour face he sometimes did.

But not this time.

“No… Please.” The tug grew stronger the more I fought it, and by the time it reached critical, there were tears in my eyes. I tried to call out for Lukas, to tell him to stay with Mom, but there was no breath in my lungs. All that escaped was a slight wheezing sound as my heart hammered against my ribs.

I wanted to stay.

But I needed to go.

I blinked. A simple, instant flutter of my eyelids. One minute I was kneeling next to Mom with my digits numb in the freezing snow, the next I was standing in a hallway, beneath a grossly ornate, vaulted ceiling, next to Valefar. He watched me with an odd expression, head tilted to the right and eyes narrowed in surprise. “Did you—were you fighting my summons?”

“Please,” I begged. I grabbed the front of his shirt and tugged hard. A small part of me was horrified. Begging a demon for a favor? I’d hit an all-time low. But this was different. This was Mom. “Send me back!”

“Impossible.” He shook his head. “I need you here right now.”

He brushed me aside and made a move to step away, but I grabbed his arm, not the least bit concerned with the fact that I was pleading. “I’ll do anything. Add another twenty years to my contract if you want. Just send me back. Now!”

The desperation in my voice must have bled through. His shoulders tensed, and I knew it must only be a trick of the light, but he actually looked concerned. “What’s the matter?”

“My mom. The ambulance was just getting there. I have to go back. She’s—”

“Klaire was injured?” He turned away from me and motioned to a demon a few feet away, by the door. He leaned in and whispered something. The other demon nodded, and in a puff of black, was gone. “Etine will check on Klaire Darker. He will watch over her while you are away.”

I was only half aware that I was still shaking my head. “Please, Valefar. Just let me—”

He grabbed my hands and squeezed. Not painfully tight like I would have expected, but firm, yet oddly comforting. “Listen to me, Jessie. I do regret keeping you from Klaire’s side, but right now you need to be here. Were it up to me, I would allow you to leave.” The sound of my name on his lips shut me right the hell up. He rarely called me that. Cookie, Pumpkin, Snicker Doodle…but never Jessie. He pointed toward a door at the other end of the hall. “However, sadly, it is not up to me. Pity. I would have taken your offer for extended service in a human heartbeat.”

Numb, I let him herd me through the doorway and into a cavernous white room. In the middle, taking up 80 percent of the space, was a monstrous oval-shaped table full of people—demons—I didn’t know.

Well, that wasn’t accurate. I knew a few of them. Two, to be exact.

Valefar pulled out my seat, then took his own beside it. Down at the other end of the table, Lukas, wearing an expression of confusion, sat next to Dad, who looked ready to explode when his eyes met mine. He jumped from his seat as others milled around and stormed over to where we were.

Valefar leaned in and whispered, “For his own safety, keep Klaire’s injuries a secret. He must remain here.”

I wanted to ask him what the hell was going on, but Dad reached us before I had the chance. “What the hell are you doing, Valefar?”

“The ambulance arrived,” Lukas mouthed with the smallest hint of a nod.

The slightest rush of relief flooded my system. We were stuck here, but at least I knew she was safe. I turned back to Val as he yawned. “Nice to see you, too, Damien. I trust you’re enjoying your freedom?”