CHAPTER 33

I’d forgotten about the fairy. I’d had a few things on my mind. Seeing her turn up right in the middle of the chaos . . . I wasn’t sure what to think.

“Where’ve you been?” Jimmy asked.

“I—uh—” Summer put her hands behind her back, thrusting out her perky breasts as her tiny white teeth bit her perfect pink lip. “Well, you see—”

“She’s been hanging around here.” The Phoenix spoke from the porch steps, where she sat paging through a book.

Hello.

The tome appeared very old, very familiar. I could see the star and the lions on the cover. I had to resist the urge to run across the yard, snatch it and—

What? Stand there while she murdered me, or at least tried?

I was going to have to kill her to get it. I’d known that all along.

I glanced at Jimmy, but he couldn’t seem to take his eyes off of Summer.

She looked the same as she always did. Impossibly pretty in her fringed white halter top, cowboy hat and boots. Did she ever wear anything else? Why bother when that looked so good?

“Why have you been hanging around here?” I asked, unease bubbling in my belly.

“Go ahead,” the Phoenix said, continuing to absently page through the key. “Tell them that you work for me.”

Summer narrowed her cornflower-blue eyes. “Not yet.”

“What is she saying?” Jimmy’s voice shook.

I cast him a quick glance. He was pale beneath the olive tone of his skin, his dark eyes hollow.

“And you said I broke him,” I muttered.

“You did.” The fairy transferred her glare to me. “So I had to fix him.”

“He’s fine.”

“He doesn’t look fine.”

Summer and I moved closer as we argued until we were almost nose-to-nose. Or nose-to-throat, considering she was the size and weight of a ten-year-old.

“My patience is waning,” the Phoenix interrupted. “I need a decision.”

Summer spun on her booted heel. “Jimmy isn’t available for your sick games.”

The Phoenix glanced up from the book with a smirk. “And why is that?”

Summer hesitated. “You know why.”

“Because you sold your soul to protect him?”

“Yeah.” The fairy sighed. “That’s why.”

My eyes widened. I glanced at Sawyer, whose expression gave nothing away—had he known or hadn’t he?—then Jimmy, whose expression revealed all. He hadn’t known, and he was as horrified by the revelation as I was.

I shoved Summer in the back. “You’ve been on their side all along?”

She stumbled forward several steps before whirling, hands clenched into fists as mine had been. “No!”

“Are you aware what selling your soul means?”

“More than you are.”

“I’d have to agree. Because I’d never do it.”

“I know you wouldn’t,” she shouted. “You don’t love him like I do.”

“Summer,” Jimmy whispered. “Why?”

All the fight went out of her. Her shoulders slumped; her hands went limp. She closed her eyes and took several breaths before facing him. “I can see the future. I knew what would happen if I didn’t. You’d die.”

“That’s going to happen anyway.”

“No. I made a deal.”

“You didn’t make a deal with me,” the Phoenix said.

“I made it with your boss.”

“He isn’t my boss yet. He won’t be my boss until I find the right sacrifice. Once I do, then I’ll be bound by his agreements. Until then, kiss my ass.”

Wow, she really was my mother.

Summer didn’t waste time arguing with a crazy person; she shot her hands out, spewing fairy dust like water from a fire hose.

All right, I thought. We are in business now. We might just get out of here alive.

Then the sparkly stream seemed to hit a wall a few inches in front of the Phoenix, and it ricocheted, streaking back in our direction, coating both Summer and me in enchanted silver dew.

The dust had no effect on me; it rarely did. Fairy magic doesn’t work on those on an errand of mercy, which was pretty much the story of my life. However, Summer got knocked on her ass.

She tumbled into me, cursing. Between the swear words, I caught “charm” and “rowan.” The Phoenix had come prepared to repel fairy magic.

I reached out to steady Summer. As soon as my palms grasped her arms I saw everything.

Summer arrives at the lake in her light blue ’57 Chevy Impala. She gets out, appearing exactly the same then as she does now. Tight jeans, boots, cowboy hat. The only difference is a fringed western shirt instead of her usual halter top.

The lake is deserted. Sawyer is gone; the body of Maria lies where he left it. Summer loads the Phoenix into the trunk and heads east.

The Impala’s headlights wash over the Welcome to Cairo sign. Summer drives straight to the cemetery and in the shadow of the moon digs a grave, then tosses in the Phoenix and fills it back up. She shoots fairy dust across the damp, dark earth and new grass sprouts; then Summer turns and goes back to the car.

Before she’s taken five steps, fire erupts on the grave, flaring high and bright, painting the silver-tinged night red and orange and gold. She keeps walking, ignoring the flames. She has her hand on the Impala when the thin wail splits the night.

Her head hangs between her shoulders; her fingers clench on the handle, but she doesn’t jump in and drive away. Instead she returns to the grave.

The new grass is french-fried. The place smells like a bonfire. In the center of the blackened earth a naked baby squalls and kicks. A girl, with a cap of dark hair and burnished skin. When Summer’s shadow falls over her, she opens her bright blue eyes and screams even louder.

“I am born,” I whispered.

And Summer slugged me in the gut.

I let go of her arm. “You—” Cough. Cough. Breathe. “Moved the body.”

“The only way to be resurrected was to be truly dead,” the Phoenix said from her perch on the porch.

“You were dead.” If she hadn’t been, Sawyer wouldn’t be the sorcerer we all knew and feared and I wouldn’t be here.

“Yes and no.”

Why couldn’t anything ever just be yes or no? Good or evil. Black or white. Lately everything was one big glob of gray.

The Phoenix set the key aside as if it were no more important that the latest New York Times bestselling beach read. My fingers fairly itched to snatch it, but I had to bide my time. First I’d kill her; then I’d grab it.

“You know how a fire seems to die,” she explained, “but deep down the embers still glow, and the only way to be sure is to kick dirt over it?” I nodded. “Same principle. I’m a phoenix. The only way for that last spark of life to go out was for me to be buried in the earth of my homeland.”

“This isn’t really Egypt.”

She picked up the book again—was she taunting me with that thing?—and shrugged. “Names have power. A little grave, a little magic, and it was obviously good enough.”

“Obviously,” I agreed, gaze on Summer, who’d crept closer to Jimmy, though she didn’t get too close. He was still looking at her as if she was Satan’s handmaiden, which apparently she was.

“You dropped me on a doorstep,” I accused.

“Would you have preferred I left you to die on the ground?”

Considering certain memories of my youth . . . maybe.

“Why didn’t you take me directly to Ruthie?”

“You were the daughter of a traitor,” Summer said. “Your mother tried to kill the light.”

I jerked a thumb at Sawyer. “So did his.”

“By then he was a big boy. He didn’t need anyone to protect him.”

“You were protecting me?” My voice was aghast. “You really do need a dictionary.” I thought of the note that had been left along with me. “Why ‘Elizabeth Phoenix’?”

“ ‘Phoenix’ so we could find you later.”

“And ‘Elizabeth’?”

“I liked it.”

“You say you sold your soul for Sanducci, but he wasn’t even born when this happened.”

Her dewy blue eyes met mine. “The future was bright with him. I dreamed of him when I slept. When I woke, my chest ached for missing him. I saw how it would be when I lost him. I couldn’t let that happen.”

“So you dialed Satan’s hotline and volunteered your immortal soul?” Call me crazy, but that wasn’t love; it was obsession.

“Samyaza found me,” she said.

Ruthie had told me that Satan had been pulling strings on earth since he’d been thrown into the pit. All he needed was a willing conduit, and there were plenty. We had one right here.

“I just had to bury the Phoenix, and Jimmy’s life would be spared. It seemed so easy.”

“It’s all fun and games until the Apocalypse shows up,” I muttered.

“He’d be dead by now if it wasn’t for me,” she snapped.

“Well, we’ll never really know that for sure, will we?”

Summer lifted her chin. “I do.”

“How did the key end up in there with her?”

“Wasn’t me,” Summer said.

“Time’s up.” The Phoenix crossed the yard; the key lay discarded on the top porch step. “Choose now, or I’ll choose for you.”

“You can’t choose Jimmy,” Summer blurted.

I narrowed my gaze on the pastel perfection of her face. “How about we kill you?”

“No!” Jimmy shouted, and I turned to him in surprise.

“I’m sorry. Did you actually say no to killing the soul-selling fairy?”

“Lizzy.” His face was tormented. “You can’t.”

I could, but that wasn’t the point. That he was so bent out of shape about it seemed to be. Since when did Sanducci care? Sure, he’d slept with her. A lot. But he hadn’t loved her. He’d loved me.

Except he didn’t anymore.

Why Jimmy loving Summer mattered I couldn’t quite say. I had bigger issues at hand.

“Choose!” the Phoenix screamed, and her hands began to glow.

“Shit,” Summer muttered. “I think we’re gonna need a bigger phoenix.”

I actually laughed. Nerves? Panic? End of the world fever? Probably all three.

“Elizabeth.” Sawyer’s gray eyes seemed to glow as silver as the lightning that had flashed from the sky on the night he’d killed my mother. “Listen to the fairy. Think. And remember.”

My laughter died as I stared at Sawyer, and all the little pieces clicked into place.

Lightning.

I looked at Jimmy.

Love.

I returned my gaze to Summer.

A bigger phoenix.

And I knew what I had to do.

“I choose Jimmy,” I said.

“No!” Summer shrieked, and lunged for me.

The Phoenix backhanded her; the fairy flew several yards and lay still. My mother walked across the grass and stared at the still form. Then she lifted her foot over Summer’s head. Before she brought it down, I turned and hurried toward Jimmy.

I could tell by the way he stared at me that he’d added all the parts and come up with the same solution.

I kissed him, quick and hard. No time for anything more. “I do love you.”

“I guess we’re gonna find out.”

I reached for my collar, casting a quick glance at Sawyer, who nodded, grim-faced, so I opened the catch. The necklace tumbled to the ground and someone gasped.

I stilled as the change flowed over me, relishing the flare of strength and power, the knowledge that anyone with a brain should be afraid. They should be very afraid.

In this form life was magnified—color and sound and scent. Every whisper, every movement, from the revenants crashed in my ears like waves breaking on a rocky beach.

Sanducci’s eyes glistened onyx, his hair blue-black night, his skin—

“Ahh.” I rubbed against him.

The sun sparkled off his skin, and he smelled like . . .

“Lunch.”

The vein in his neck pulsed as it called my name.

Ba-bump. Liz-zy. Ba-bump. Liz-zy.

“Do it,” Jimmy growled.

“Happy to.”

When I was a vampire, the urge to kill was impossible to deny. Hand in hand with that urge went another, that of an alpha wolf drawn to destroy any other alpha in the vicinity. I felt myself pulled toward Jimmy like the tide.

My fangs lengthened, the sensation itchy. The only thing that would soothe it was blood; the only way to end the buzzing in my brain was death.

But how to kill a dhampir. It wasn’t easy. Twice in the same way. Two stakes to the heart. Two golden bullets—kill shots in the exact same place.

I had no weapon but myself. I wanted to drain him, but how did I do that twice? Only one way to find out.

I reached for his head.

“No!”

The word swirled around me, along with a cool, twinkling mist. My arms fell to my sides. I was no longer on an errand of mercy; in this form I didn’t even know what that meant. I still wanted to kill Sanducci, but because of the fairy dust I couldn’t.

I guess Summer wasn’t dead. I’d fix that later.

My fangs still itched; my throat was parched; my stomach cramped in agony. But there was another powerful being very nearby.

I turned toward Sawyer.

“Lizzy, no,” Jimmy said. “That won’t help. You have to kill me.”

“Can’t,” I muttered, drawn across the grass toward the dazzling scent of blood and man and magic that was Sawyer. “And I’m not Lizzy.”

Jimmy began to curse and fight his bonds in earnest.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw fairy dust flying like cat fur in a catfight as Summer splashed the army of revenants.

“Grab her,” she ordered, and they went after the Phoenix like fury.

She fried them of course, but it took her some time. Which allowed me to reach Sawyer.

His face was so sad. I tilted my head. Sadder than I’d ever seen it. His pulse did not beat my name; his pulse barely beat at all.

“You chose him,” Sawyer said.

“Liz loves him. Always has, always will.”

“I know.” In his voice lay despair, and I breathed it in like nectar.

“So sad,” I murmured. “I like it.”

I pressed my hand to his chest, felt his heart beating beneath.

“One thing before I go,” he said.

“Be quick.” I was focused on the steady thump-thump against my palm. I wanted to feel that on the outside instead of the inside. I wanted to taste a heart as it stopped beating. I thought I probably could.

“I chose to leave a child behind.” My eyes flicked to his. “You must protect that gift of faith.”

“Whatever,” I said, and tore out his heart.