I know I’m not really there.
I know I’m in the basement of my own house.
I know this is just a trick Trent is playing on me.
But it feels so real. I’m helpless. Weak. Only able to hide under my blankets until I muster up the courage to get out of bed and go find Mommy and Daddy. I’m just a child and need my parents.
Stop it!I mentally scream. I squeeze my eyes shut tight, clench my fists, and open my eyes to stare down Trent. The smile on his face disappears when he meets my eyes.That’s right, asshole. I’m back.
“I killed your parents while you slept,” he whispers, and though he’s sitting several feet in front of me, he’s in my mind and it’s as if he’s standing behind me, pulling back my hair and putting his lips close to my ear. I can feel his hot breath on my neck.
I flinch, hand going to my neck. Get it together, Ace. He’s not there. He’s in the chair, tied up. I need to do this. I need to focus so I can take the amulet off. It’s dark magic…I don’t want to risk it influencing me later on.
“I know you killed them, you piece of shit,” I growl back. “So tell me where the demon powers are.”
“Your mom died first,” he snarls, and I feel myself slipping again. The smell of sulfur burns my nose. I hear myself crying, and I get a flash of little Ace running through the dark living room, blood on her hands after she tried to shake her mother awake.
Tears well in my eyes and the pain that clutches my heart almost brings me to my knees. My parents are dead. I’m all alone. Scared. I don’t know how to go on without my—
Family.
I have a family, and they’re standing around me right now.
Narrowing my eyes, I focus on Trent and mentally force my way deeper into his mind. He took my parents, and I won’t let him do it to anyone else.
Suddenly, my vision tunnels and it’s as if I’m looking at the world through Trent’s point of view. Only, I’m not sitting in the chair in my basement. I’m back at the penthouse, sliding a large brass box into a hidden safe in the wall.
The demon’s powers are there.
Next to the box is the deed to the building and several bundles of hundred-dollar bills. Something whispers my name, and I feel the pull of darkness closing in on me. I want to stay here, in Trent’s mind, and get more information. I want to control him, make him do whatever the hell pleases me.
But then I’m like him, controlling another human being. He’s an evil man with a soul damned to hell, but that doesn’t mean I can use him like this. I pull the amulet off and yank the chain from around my neck.
“Did you…well, do whatever you needed to do?” Gil asks.
“Yeah,” I say, going over to drop the amulet in the box. “And I saw something else that gave me an idea.”
“What?”
I smile, and look from my guys to Trent and back again. “How do you feel about owning a fifteen-story building and running our own paranormal PI business?”
