Eleventh Grave in Moonlight (Charley Davidson #11)(83)

They stopped. Everyone stood still and listened.

“What?” Mr. Foster said.

The man shrugged. “I thought I heard…”

“They’re about two miles away,” Angel said.

While their attention was elsewhere, I shot to my feet and ran. Or, well, stumbled to my feet and did an interpretive dance of autumn leaves dying and falling off a tree.

I’d expected to let them chase me. To lead them away from the front gates so the local law enforcement could get in. What I hadn’t expected was the loud crack that split the air and echoed against the walls. A searing pain that burst in my back. What seemed like a hundred white-hot pokers stabbed me from behind, and I tripped, skidded onto my knees, and pitched forward, ending up barely twenty feet from where I’d started.

Reyes jerked in his constraints, but I shook my head. He had to see this through. To finish it.

But I hadn’t expected them to finish it first. I lay on the ground, bleeding out, and watched as they put the shotgun to Reyes’s chest.

I cried out in horror. Had he been wrong after all? Could he die? It was simply not worth the risk.

Fear consumed me to the marrow of my bones.

Blood pumped into my stomach and lungs and throat.

A pain like an inferno spread through me, but all I could think about was Reyes.

A microsecond before they pulled the trigger, Mr. Foster shushed them again. Sirens could be heard in the distance, prompting the Diviners into action.

“Close the gate!” he yelled.

Reyes and Angel had been right. My plan had sucked. The Diviners scrambled to get to the gate before Reyes could get there.

Mr. Foster turned and nodded toward his man. The shotgun exploded. Buckshot plowed into Reyes’s chest at point-blank range. He shuddered and coughed before going still.

I covered my mouth with both hands. This was not happening. Blood pumped out of him in a slow and steady stream.

“You have to know,” he said. Just like he had before. “Dematerialize.”

“I … I can’t.” My chest ached, but not from the buckshot. “I have holes.”

The grin that slid across his face was a most wicked thing. “I know. I like your holes.” He really was evil. The Fosters were right! “Do it, Dutch.”

“But the holes. The ones in my back.”

“Dutch…”

“All right. Holy crackerjacks.”

But before I could act, his lids drifted shut. And for a split second, I studied his face. Beaten and bloody but serene. No, accepting. Just like in that picture. He’d resigned himself to his fate as though … as though he deserved it. The Fosters did that to him. Earl Walker did that to him. Made him feel less than he was.

The anger that truth evoked was the catalyst I needed. I dove inside myself, struggled past the drugs, dug my heels in and forced my molecules apart.

The world exploded. Storms raged around me in both the celestial realm and the tangible. I made the Earth quake and tremble, as though trying to shake some sense into it. I bent the winds to my will, forcing them to twist and curve and spiral. Forcing them to do my bidding.

Then I saw everything. I saw the Diviners arming themselves and running for the gate, trying to close it before the cavalry arrived. I saw others barricading themselves inside the main building. I saw people running and stumbling, trying to get away from the tornado. From my tornado.

I ripped the gate from its hinges. Tore the doors off the main building. Threw men into trees and onto roofs.

Then I turned back to the barn. I lay Shawn gently on the ground and knelt beside my husband. His eyes were open and he seemed to be looking at me with something akin to admiration.

I knelt beside him and punched him as hard as I could. Not really. But Hard.

“You didn’t die.”

“God,” he said by way of an explanation. When I rolled my eyes, he added. “You’re so gullible.”

I did a full-body scan. My sweater was a goner, but I was still alive and kicking. “I’m alive!” I said, raising my arms in victory. Then I looked back at Reyes. “Your turn.”

“Not just yet. Remember, this has to look good.”

I gave him a once-over. “It looks good. A little too good. As in, they may wonder why you’re still breathing. Please, Reyes.”

“Dutch, I’m fine. Promise.”

Finally able to touch him, I put my hands on his face. “Why did you let them do this to you?”

“I told you—”

“I don’t believe you.” I set my chin and glared, but only a little. “I think you wanted to be punished. For some idiotic reason, I think you wanted them to do this. And worse.”

His smile held more sadness than humor. “So, was the plan to run and stumble and get shot in the back or to call out your inner tornado? Either way, I’m impressed.”

“Do you remember what they did to you?” I asked, ignoring him. “As a baby?” The very thought broke my heart. “Please tell me you’re not lying.”

“Have I ever lied to you?”

I closed my eyes in a pathetic attempt to block out the truth. He did remember. At some point over the last few weeks, probably when he learned his godly name, he became like me. He remembered everything.

He raised up until his mouth was at my ear and whispered, “Don’t.” Then he moved his mouth to my other ear. “Don’t you dare.”