The Trouble with Twelfth Grave (Charley Davidson #12)(59)

“Good for you.”

Ten minutes later, I sped into the parking lot of our apartment building, grabbed the bag out of Cookie’s outstretched hands like a drive-through, slowed down and backed up to grab the coffee cup she held out, then peeled out of the lot and headed back to I-25.

The reality of what I’d done sank in about three miles later. I’d just allowed a woman with the worst fashion sense I’d ever seen pick out clothes for me. Clothes in which I’d have to appear in public. Not the best scenario, but I’d faced worse.

I figured I could wait and change as I got a little closer, so I turned to the heat emanating from the backseat. Seeing nothing, I decided to watch the road again. Going ninety-five in a seventy-five in Albuquerque traffic took concentration. And guts. Mostly guts.

“Are you going to talk to me?” I asked, speaking to the emptiness around me.

Nothing.

Either Rey’azikeen was sulking or he was figuring out how to kill me and drag me to hell. I could’ve summoned him, forced him to shift onto this plane, but I didn’t want to do something so drastic in a traveling coffin. Bad enough that I was speeding.

“You know, you could do me a favor and keep a lookout for cops.”

Nothing times two.

My record was clearly not improving when it came to tall, dark, and sulky. Maybe I would summon him just to piss him off. Maybe— I stilled as a realization dawned. If the priest were on this plane, if he was attacking people, killing them, all I had to do to bring him forth was to summon him. But I’d need his name to do that.

Unfortunately, I didn’t know his name. And I had no idea how to get it. He’d lived in the 1400s and had been locked in the hell dimension ever since.

I racked my brain trying to come up with a way to learn the priest’s name. Researching something like that would take years, and there was no way to know if any of the records from his parish survived. But someone knew. Michael? Would he have that kind of information? And if so, would he share?

Rocket. Rocket would know. But his telling me would be breaking the rules. His own set of moral rights and wrongs that made sense to Rocket and to Rocket alone. Would he break the rules if it were super-duper important?

He would just have to. I would give him no choice. People were dying at someone’s hands, and my best and only guess was the priest, unless Rey’azikeen had lied. Unless he hadn’t taken out the two supernatural entities trapped inside the god glass with him, the demon assassin Kuur and the malevolent god Mae’eldeesahn.

“Why would I lie about something so trivial?”

I flinched and looked in my rearview. Reyes, or Rey’azikeen as the case would be, sat in the backseat, lounging like a delinquent schoolboy in the back of a classroom. Knees spread. Hands resting on his thighs. Expression dark as he locked his gaze onto mine in the rearview. His irises fairly sparked with energy.

It took everything in me to tear my gaze from his and focus on the road.

“You know the name,” I said, almost accusingly. “The name of the priest.”

“Yes,” he replied as though teasing me. Tempting me.

It worked. I practically salivated for it. “May I have it?”

“Tell me where it is and you may.”

“Reyes, look, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I need more information. I’ll help you find it, I swear.”

He turned away from me, frustrated. “I don’t have more information.”

“Okay.” I frowned in confusion. “What do you have?”

“It is ashes. It is embers. That’s all I know.”

“The god glass? The pendant I sent you through?”

“Why would I need that?”

“If you don’t know what you are looking for, why are you looking for it?”

“I do know. I just don’t … have access.” He rubbed the back of his neck in frustration.

“What does that mean?”

“It means that Rey’aziel is keeping it from me. He won’t give me access to the information I need.”

How could Reyes essentially keep something from himself? It made no sense.

Then again, if Reyes was keeping information from Rey’azikeen, it meant that he was in there. Somewhere. Somehow. Holding the information close. Denying Rey’azikeen access to that part of himself.

My heart left my chest and soared. Metaphorically. He didn’t know what he was even looking for. He didn’t know because Reyes was still in there.

“That’s interesting,” I said, trying to keep him talking, trying to think of a way to bring Reyes out, if that were even possible. “Do you know what it looks like?”

He scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s important that I find it.”

“Okay. I can help.”

The expression he rested on me next would suggest he didn’t trust me in the least. “And then what, god eater? Will you sup on my soul?” His voice mesmerized. Flooded my body with warmth. Filled my cells with joy. Tugged at something deep inside me. “Will you swallow my heart and claim it as yours?”

I wanted to say, “Why not? Fair’s fair. Mine belongs to you.” But I didn’t.

Apparently, I didn’t need to. His face darkened, but not in anger. “Crawl back here with me,” he said, his words so soft and deep I had to strain to hear them.