Given that I was the only mortal, it was easy for Azrames and I to jump with the sølje. I learned what an inexact science jumping was when Silas struggled to join us. He hit a few different spots before he found us loitering just around the corner from Circus Circus. I’d pushed us to show up on the far end of the strip, away from the crowds. I’d almost given Silas a hard time at his inability to spot us, but I knew enough from making a career of reading people to understand that Silas was ready to be pushed over the edge. It would not serve me to antagonize him further in his dark hour. That said, I hoped some gentle ribbing might drag him back into camaraderie.
A cab threw on its hazards as it pulled up to the curb. The driver jumped out of the car to stick my bag in the trunk as the three of us slid into the back.
“Where to, ma’am?”
“The Fontainebleau,” I said with a smile. It was the newest hotel on the strip; I needed a little distance from the action. I understood his frown as he looked in the rearview mirror. I was a long way from the airport and not dressed like a tourist. I’d had my entire closet of gorgeous things to pluck from as I’d packed my bag and dressed myself. I had gone for a black, silk tie-off shirt that left my cleavage and midriffexposed, both for the breathability and glam. I’d paired it with flowy, high-waisted silk pants. It may be early autumn in the Midwest, but the desert was still baking, and I wasn’t about to sweat through my curls and makeup.
“Business or pleasure?” he asked.
“Business,” I responded reflexively, then added, “though I might try to get into the Vexa concert.”
“Good luck.” He laughed. “I’ve seen scalpers up and down the strip all week. I hear even standing room is going for over a grand.”
If I weren’t trying to lay low, I would have pushed back on his use of the problematic word. It was in my nature to make a scene. I forced myself to respond with, “I have a contact who might be able to get me in,” and I wasn’t sure if it was Marlow or Maribelle speaking.
Azrames chuckled while Silas frowned.
Hell emboldened my subversion at every turn, but I recognized so much of myself in Silas and his reactions. I’d been trained to make myself smaller. I’d spent my life putting others first, considering their opinions, and waiting for approval before I was vocal, or open, or proud. I’d dipped my toes into blasphemy, idling in the shallow end of the pool for about a year before I’d taken the plunge. By the time I had gotten on the plane to go to Colombia, I’d left the church in the jets of a Boeing 747.
Silas had taken the first steps to escape the cult-ture we’d shared. But the head, heart, and body worked at different paces. Azrames gave my shoulder a squeeze as I watched Silas’s profile, brows bundled as palm trees, concrete, and paint blurred through the window of the Vegas strip. I wanted to draw blanket conclusions about demons being good and angels being grouchy, but I understood how subjective morality could be.
I checked the timestamp on my phone obsessively. Every minute took us closer to zeroing out Silas’s clock. He hadn’t officially fallen. Not yet.
To any churchgoer, Azrames truly was the devil on my shoulder, encouraging corruption and tempting a human and angel toward Hell by paving the path with sympathy.
Silas’s crisis of faith wasn’t a one-act play.
He’d made his decision.
But that didn’t make the guilt go away.
The cab turned off the strip and into the sheltered driveway for Fontainebleau. I held the back door open for a little too long as Azrames and Silas slid out. They could probably jump to wherever I was if I slammed the door on them, but given the rough approximation of hopping apart from one another, with the added security blanket of my invisibility, it seemed safer to move as a unit. I gave the cabbie a fifty and told him to keep the change before putting on my most useful personalities.
I strode into the enormous lobby, past the square pillars composed primarily of high-definition televisions playing art displays. It was one of the few hotels on the strip that hadn’t absorbed decades of stale tobacco. Instead, they’d done their best to pump fresh air and something vaguely perfumy through the atrium. The slot machines dinged with muted enthusiasm far enough from the bank of check-in desks to keep from being off-putting to the guests.
A dozen steps into the hotel, we had a problem.
“Shit, shit, shit,” Azrames began a stream of expletives I didn’t understand.
I whipped between the men, only to see that Silas’s eyes were wide. “Take her! Go!”
I didn’t know why I was being guided away from the public or why Az was shoving me toward the bathroom until we’d stumbled through the swinging door toward the women’s stalls.
“You’re on our radar,” he said hurriedly. “Which means the angels—”
“On it.” I dove into my pocket and fished out the baggy. I struggled to unzip it, desperate for its contents, terrified thatit was already too late. My fumbling came at a cost. I came down on the container too hard, shoving my credit card into the plastic, when the force popped it from my grip.
My life flashed before my eyes.
Everything we worked for, everything we’d strived for, tumbled toward the toilet.
If it hadn’t been for Azrames and his preternatural speed, Alessia’s gift would have been lost to the Las Vegas sewers.
Instead, he snatched the bag, dumped a pile onto the silver container in the bathroom stall, and used my credit card to create a line.
“But, yuck, I don’t—”
He shoved my head toward the container, and I sucked every grain up through my left nostril. If it was anyone else, I would have been furious. The Patron Saint of Women, however, would only do what it took to keep me safe.
