Tirade (Heven and Hell #3)(33)
Author: Cambria Hebert

“We have to get him out! We have to go now!” Logan began to cough. Deep coughs that shook his body and made his shoulders hunch. I went to his side and placed a hand on his back. He felt very warm, like he was running a fever. Again.

“Hey, calm down. Sam’s fine, okay? I’m going to get him out. He’ll be home very soon.”

Logan kept coughing and I led him to the sofa and made him sit down. Finally, he stopped with a deep, ragged breath. When he looked up at me, his eyes were rimmed with red and had deep circles beneath them. His lips were pale, but his cheeks were flushed. “I want my brother.”

“I know you do.” I glanced up at Riley, who was watching us with no emotion on his face. “Will you grab a bottle of water out of the fridge?”

He disappeared and I brushed the hair off Logan’s forehead. “You should’ve told me you were feeling bad again. I can call Gemma.”

“No.” He cut me off. “No more healing; it doesn’t work anyway. Just let me heal on my own.”

Riley came back in the room with Cole on his heels. “I laid the stuff you asked for on the counter,” he said as he came in. Then he paused. “What’s going on?”

“Logan’s not feeling so hot right now.” I took the water from Riley and twisted the cap off to give it to Logan. “I want you to relax the rest of the night, okay? Just chill. Everything is going to be fine.”

“Promise?” Logan said, looking more like the little kid he was than he usually did.

“Yup. Sam will be here tomorrow, just wait and see.”

He nodded and I handed him the remote to the TV before getting up and walking into the kitchen. Cole and Riley followed.

“Hev?” Cole asked as Gemma came through the back door.

“I lost the scroll.”

The silence that followed my announcement was deafening. Then Cole spoke up. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, no… I don’t know,” I said as tears filled my eyes. “It might be in Gran’s car. It could have fallen out, but she isn’t here and I can’t go look.”

“Where is she? I can go check for you,” Gemma said, the lines around her eyes looking grim.

“At the hospital with my mom.”

“I’ll just flash over there and look. I’ll be right back.” She disappeared out the door before I could thank her.

Then another thought occurred to me. “It could have fallen out in Colin’s car.” I looked at Riley. “Did you look in his car before… you know?” Before he sent it barreling over a hill and lit it on fire. I would laugh if this wasn’t so horrible.

He shook his head, and for once he was showing emotion. He seemed so regretful. “I didn’t. I was too focused on making sure everything was cleaned up.”

“What are you talking about?” Cole wanted to know.

I shook my head. I didn’t have the energy to go through the story of how I killed someone. “I’ll fill you in later.”

Gemma came through the door and we all turned to see her. She shook her head.

I let out a sob. “It had to have been in Colin’s car… so that means it’s destroyed. I destroyed the one thing I was charged by God to protect.”

“I meant I didn’t see anything. Gran’s car wasn’t at the hospital.”

I paused. “She wasn’t at the hospital? Then where is she?”

“Someone’s coming up the drive,” Riley said. I ran over to the window to see who it was.

“It’s Gran,” I murmured.

I looked at Riley and Gemma, unsure what to do. “We’ll go upstairs,” Gemma offered.

“Thanks. If you want, maybe you can go through my room again. Maybe you’ll find the scroll.”

My friends disappeared from the room and moments later Gran entered. Her aura almost knocked me over. Something was terribly wrong. She looked like she had been crying, and from the tissue clutched in her hand, I had a feeling more tears weren’t far away. “Gran?”

She looked up and her eyes widened a little. “I didn’t see you there.”

“What’s the matter?” Cole asked, going to her side.

“I… I don’t know…” She looked up at me, tears filling her eyes. “I’m so sorry, honey, but your mother died this evening.”

“What? No.” My ears began ringing. “She was awake. She woke up.”

“Yes. For a while. Then she slipped back in her coma. She died a few minutes before I got there.”

I shook my head. “No.”

Gran came forward and hugged me. I didn’t hug her back. I couldn’t. I stared straight ahead at nothing. “It’s going to be okay.”

She pulled back to look at me.

“How?”

“They’re not sure. They did everything they could.”

The room around me seemed to narrow and close in on me. My mother was dead. I was an orphan. Cole guided me into a nearby chair and sunk down beside me, his hands gripping mine.

“She’s dead?” I whispered.

“We’ll need to go to the funeral home in the morning to make arrangements.”

“Arrangements?”

“Don’t worry about that now. We’ll deal with it in the morning.”

I heard her moving around in the kitchen and I smelled brewing coffee, but I never really knew what was going on around me. I heard Cole’s voice as he spoke to Gran, but I couldn’t understand his words. I felt his hand in mine, but I didn’t want him. I wanted Sam. I jumped to my feet, startling everyone in the room. “I…”

They were both staring at me with pity and sorrow and suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. “I… just need a moment.”

I ran outside and down the stairs into the falling night. I hoped it would swallow me whole. Sam.

What is it, Heven?

My mother is dead. She died, Sam.

Oh, baby. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to say…

I want you, Sam. I need you.

I’m here, baby. I’m here.

He’s going to take you too.

What?

Beelzebub. He killed her. He finally got what he wanted. She was fine and he killed her. It was in that moment I knew for sure I had lost the scroll. Now everyone around me was going to start dying. I had no more leverage.

What do you mean? Are you sure?

I’ve never been so sure. And now… It finally happened. Tears started falling. You have to get out of there, Sam. He’s going to come for you. I can’t let you die.