“All right,” I said, then shut the door.
“What’s on your mind?”
He didn’t answer me right away. His hands were trembling—actually trembling—and he shoved them in his pockets to hide it. The movement was so achingly young that my chest tightened. This wasn’t the confident, charming boy who’d walked into Forza West with easy jokes and a practiced smile. This was a terrified teenager.
“It’s okay,” Eric said. “Whatever it is, the hardest part is always the first word.”
Zane nodded. “I—it’s just—I don’t know how to say this.” His voice cracked on the last word. “I’ve been trying to figure out the words and there aren’t any good ones.”
Eric and I exchanged a glance. I had no idea where this was going, but every instinct I’d honed over the years screamed that I wasn’t going to like it.
“Just say it,” Eric said. His voice was gentle but firm. “Whatever it is, just get it out.”
Zane took a breath. Held it. Let it out slowly, like a man standing on a ledge trying to talk himself into jumping.
“Samarek is my father.”
The words detonated in the quiet room.
I stared at him. More accurately, I gaped at him. My brain stuttered, trying and failing to process what I’d just heard.Samarek.The demon who’d been hunting my family. Theancient evil trying to claw his way through the portal in our basement. And this kid. This student we’d welcomed into our school, fed at our table, trusted with our children?—
He was itsson?
Eric had gone completely still in his chair. The kind of stillness that preceded violence.
Eddie was on his feet. “Son of a?—”
“Eddie.” Eric’s voice cut through like a blade. “Let him talk.”
“Let him talk? He just admitted he’s the spawn of the thing trying to destroy us!”
“Which is exactly why we need to hear what he has to say.” Eric’s eyes never left Zane, and I saw the anger there, and the fear. But I also saw understanding. Eric knew a bit about having ties to a demon. “Keep going.”
Allie hadn’t moved from her spot by the door, but her face had gone pale. She was staring at Zane as if she’d never seen him before. Like everything she thought she knew had just shattered.
“Explain,” I said, my voice cold.
Zane flinched as if I’d slapped him. Good. Let him flinch. Let him feel some fraction of the fear Trevor must have felt.
But even as I thought it, another part of me saw the way his shoulders were curving inward, the way his whole body seemed to be trying to make itself smaller. The way he couldn’t meet my eyes.
“He’s been using me. Since I was ten.” Zane’s voice had dropped to barely above a whisper. “Small things at first. Deliver a message to someone. Leave a mark on a door. I didn’t know what any of it meant. I didn’t even know what hewas, not really. He just...he was my dad. The dad who’d never been around, who showed up out of nowhere when I turned nine and said he wanted to be part of my life.”
He laughed, and the sound was so hollow, so utterly devoid of humor, that something in my chest cracked despite my fury.
“My mom was thrilled. We were flat broke, and she’d been a single parent my whole life, working two jobs, barely keeping us afloat. And suddenly, this guy she’d been with once was offering to help. She didn’t ask questions. Neither did I. We were both so goddamn desperate to believe.”
“He had you deliver messages,” Eric said, his voice tight. “What kind?”
“Weird stuff. Tell the man at the bookstore that the shipment is delayed. Leave this symbol on the door of some church.” Zane spread his hands. “I didn’t understand any of it. But when I did what he asked, things were easier. Better. My mom got a promotion she’d been passed over for three times. I aced a test I hadn’t studied for. Little things. Good things.”
His face darkened.
“And when I didn’t...”
He trailed off. His jaw tightened, and I watched him wrestle with something—some memory he didn’t want to share but knew he had to.
“What happened when you didn’t?” I pressed.
