Page 81 of Breathe Like Hell

“No. For two reasons,” Micah explained. I felt a little bit stupid asking because obviously the answer was no, or else he would’ve done it already. But I stayed quiet for his explanation. “First, I could only make him forget me, not you or Mason. Second, I actually can’t make him forget anything at all, because there’s ichor in his blood.”

“Really? Ichor would prevent it?” I realized I genuinely had no clue what the purpose of Micah’s powers were in the first place, because I didn’t understand how memory manipulation—of himself only—or emotion removal would be helpful to angels living in Heaven. There had to be some purpose for it. I’d ask him later.

“Yes. I could hypothetically make you forget me, but not him. Any of my students, any faculty, same thing.”

“Oh, okay. Well, where will I go after I leave your house?” I questioned.

“You’ll walk to the bus station and go back to your trailer, then into the woods.”

“Into the woods?” Sure, Micah was taking away my ability to be anxious about the situation, but that didn’t make me unable to recognize the massive risks involved with this plan.

“It’s the only way we can be certain to draw his attention.”

“And then when he comes for me, you’ll kill him,” I surmised, internally cringing as I wondered about the details of that. I had not seen a dead body before, and I didn’t really want to. But if Mason was as powerful as he claimed to be, there might not even be a body left for me to see.

“Essentially, yes.”

Mason and Micah looked at each other, something unspoken passing between them, then turned to face me, seeking my approval.

I nodded. It was all I could do.

━━━━━

The next week was full of more planning and preparation, which was irritatingly complicated due to the nature of all this needing to be secret. We couldn’t even scout out the forest behind my trailer because it would be suspicious for Mason or Micah to go there seemingly out of nowhere, and it wasn’t worth risking my life before the plan was fully ready.

We were going off of mine and Micah’s fragmented memory from the one time he’d gone into those woods with me—when I flew with him in the middle of the night for the first time. It was enough to know there was a slight clearing not too far from the tree line, and that there were enough large rocks scattered around for me to find something to hide behind.

The main issue was that we’d need to go much, much farther into the forest.

Mason was going to end up flattening a large area of the trees when he fractured while killing Aamon. That was why the rock was needed. Even then, the rock wasn’t guaranteed to protect me.

Needless to say, I was scared out of my mind and not looking forward to it at all.

Micah was worried, too.

The only one who seemed prepared was Mason.

Clearly, he trusted Micah quite a bit, perhaps even more than Micah trusted himself.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

MICAH

I listened from inside the house while Mason fought with Dakota on the back deck. It would be my turn soon. My hair was still wet from my shower.

This was all part of our plan to convince Aamon or whichever of his demons he had watching the house that Dakota would be alone soon. In all honestly, it wasn’t a foolproof plan, and Aamon should’ve been able to see right through it. But I could sense he was getting impatient, which would hopefully make him careless. He’d been holding out for probably forty years at this point. Since Mason hadn’t cared about anyone significantly after me, Dakota was a rare opportunity. And since she was human, Aamon would always be working on borrowed time.

The back door flung open and she stormed into the house, her terrified eyes flashing to mine, but she didn’t give up on her act.

“You, too!” she shouted, pointing a trembling finger at me. “Both of you fucking control me, and I’m sick of it.”

“Maybe if you made smarter decisions, you wouldn’t need controlling!” I yelled back, hating the way she flinched. The argument was too close to our real issues, and it made my stomach twist. “But you don’t!”

“Well, that’s not your fucking problem, then, is it? It’s my problem. If I want to make stupid decisions, you can’t stop me!”

She tried to walk towards the front door and I blocked her path, grabbing her shoulders to hold her away from the exit. I squeezed her just enough to reassure her.

“I can stop you,” I said firmly.