Fire Touched (Page 73)

I ran to the window to make sure he was okay because there was nothing to break his fall, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Salt circle broken, Sherwood had wasted no time in freeing the prisoners, starting with the hands of both men. The pastor reached up as soon as his fingers were free and ripped the duct tape off his face.

“How dare you?” he said to me, his voice rough. “This is a house of God. How dare you bring your supernatural evil into God’s house?”

His first instinct, as evidenced by what he’d said on the phone, had been to protect me. Apparently, he’d gotten over that. The other man took his time peeling the tape away from his mouth.

“Other way around,” I said in as mild a tone as I could manage. Another day, I’d feel bad about this, but right now, I needed to make sure Pastor White and the man he’d been counseling were safe, then go find out what was happening at home. “That supernatural evil brought me here.” I couldn’t help a bit of temper, and added, “I suppose I could have stayed away, and they’d probably have killed you.”

“Pastor,” said the other man.

“Married to a werewolf,” Pastor White said, spittle leaving his mouth with his words he was so upset. “I should have asked you to leave as soon as I found out.”

“Pastor,” said the other man again, his voice very quiet. Sherwood had freed both men’s hands first and was working on the stranger’s feet. “Pastor White, I think some reflection might be called for.” There was just a hint of something in his voice that made me think that he’d been called to reflect on things by the pastor once too often.

“This lady just saved both of our lives,” the man continued. “And I think the fae who jumped out the window cured my need for alcohol because I swear to God that this is the first time in twenty years I haven’t had the thirst. Not since that witch cursed me down in Bogotá.” He looked at me. “Josh Harper, ma’am. You must be Mercy Hauptman. Thank you for coming.”

Bemused, I shook his hand while Pastor White continued to be very unhappy with me, the werewolves, and most everything about this church in a rant that no one listened to, except for Zee.

That might not be healthy for Pastor White.

“Fear is a hard thing,” said Sherwood as he finished the last cut to free Pastor White’s feet. He patted the pastor on his knee. “You should give yourself some time to think about that.”

Impelled by Sherwood’s touch, the pastor surged to his feet. He opened his mouth again, looked at us, closed his mouth tightly, and made haste out of the room and down the stairs. I followed him, and I guess everyone else followed me down because we were all there when the pastor saw the chapel.

“Who is going to pay for this?” Pastor White whispered. “We’d been saving up for a new roof. It’s taken us two years to raise half the money we need.”

“You should wait until the morning and call someone to board up the windows,” said Zee.

“What happened to the bodies?” Sherwood asked. Because neither the woman Sherwood had killed nor the one Zee had beheaded were in the sanctuary.

“Bodies?” asked Pastor White.

“We fade when we die,” Zee told Sherwood. “At least, most of us do. There aren’t any bodies.”

“Look what you’ve done,” said Pastor White. There were tears in his eyes. “This stained glass cannot be replaced. Look at the pews.”

While he took inventory of the destruction, I tried to call Adam and got a “this customer is not available” message. I tried to contact him through our mating bond, but it was being obstreperous again. I could feel him, but I couldn’t contact him.

“We need to go,” I said. And I let my actions follow my words.

—

As we drove up to the house, the first thing that I noticed was that there were no lights. No house lights, no yard lights, nothing. It wasn’t just our home. The nearest house was a twenty-acre field away, and it was vacant, with a FOR SALE sign out front. I guess living next to a werewolf pack was too exciting for some people. But that didn’t explain the darkness that had swallowed the rest of the homes along our road.

Or Mary Jo’s car pulled mostly out of the road and empty. About a hundred yards beyond that, a black SUV that was a near match to Adam’s down to the elegant HAUPTMAN SECURITY hand-lettered on the driver’s side was parked—Adam was here.

I pulled into the crowded driveway and stopped the car. No one was dead, I reassured myself. I’d felt it when Peter died. If someone else in the pack died, I’d know it.

The three of us got out of the SUV and shut the doors quietly.

There was a howl and a crunching noise from the back of the house—at the same time the big glass window in the front room shattered, a dark shape hurtling through it. It smelled of rotting bog and salt and looked a little like a horse—it had four feet and hooves—but its head was more reptilian than equine. Its body was shaggy with fronds that made a slithery sound, like a wet hula skirt. The Fideal screamed when it saw me—long yellow-white teeth flashing for a moment in the still-lit SUV headlights.

I pulled out my Sig and shot the Fideal in the body twice as it galloped toward us. It reared and screamed again—but not because of the bullets. Sherwood threw the ax and hit it in the head. The ax dislodged from the Fideal’s head and slid down to his shoulder before it bounced off to the grass. The touch of iron left a brown gap in the plantlike hair from the top of the Fideal’s neck and down his chest.