Sure as shit, given his fucking luck, it would find its way to Mae—
All at once, and without warning, the Bastard released his grip. Just opened his hands and let the goddamn thing go.
With no more opposing force working against him, Sahvage’s backward momentum was so great that he slammed into the opposite wall, the impact knocking him stupid for a split second.
Meanwhile, across the now-empty display case, Balthazar looked down at his hands as if he didn’t understand what he’d done—or maybe that they’d acted independently.
His eyes lifted and he spoke with resignation. “Where are you taking it?”
For some reason, maybe because Sahvage recognized the numb despair in the other fighter’s face, he found himself answering.
“Where no one can use it ever again.”
“I need it. To get the evil out of me.”
“There is no evil in you.”
“You are very wrong about that, and the Book is my only hope.”
If only Rahvyn were still alive, Sahvage thought. She used to take care of problems like that in their village back in the Old Country.
“I’m sorry,” Sahvage said. And meant it.
With that, he dematerialized out of the room. Out of the gallery. Then it was out of the corridor and into the stairwell.
But he didn’t go up. That’s where the Brotherhood was—or had been. He went down, ghosting through the concrete landings faster than a heartbeat. At the bottom, he opened a fire door and expected to find all of the Brotherhood with their guns pointing to him. Nope. Just a sleek marble lobby with a couple of humans at a set of desk areas and two women coming in with shopping bags.
As he jogged across that shiny floor, he heard someone shouting for him.
Outside, in the darkness in front of the building, he expected the Brotherhood again. Or the brunette. Or shadows.
Nothing.
For a split second, he looked around and wondered what the fuck had happened to all the characters in his play. The stage was really fucking empty. But like he was in a position to argue with shit finally breaking his way?
Feeling like a bank robber on the heist of a lifetime, he closed his eyes and took to the cool spring night.
As he left the downtown, he had a bizarre thought.
It was almost like Balthazar had let him go.
• • •
Up in the book room, Balz fell to the floor and put his head in his hands. “Fuck. Fuck . . . fuck.”
When he looked up again, he was not alone. Lassiter was right in front of him, and the fallen angel slowly lowered himself down so they were eye to eye.
“Hi.”
Balz swallowed hard. “I don’t know what I just did.”
“Yes, you do.”
“How do I know this is actually you? I don’t know what to trust anymore—and that includes myself.”
“Give me your hand.”
As the fallen angel extended his own palm, Balz had a thought that if he touched what was being offered to him, he might well be trapped forever in—
Fuck it.
Balz clasped what was in front of him and braced himself for . . .
With an abrupt surge of energy, he felt warmth, like sunshine. Acceptance, like from a mahmen who loved you. Peace, for a tortured soul.
You did the right thing, Lassiter said without moving his lips.
“It was my one and only chance, though.” Balz wasn’t sure how he knew this with such certainty. “I’m going to be eaten alive by her, from the inside out.”
No, there is another way.
All Balz could do was shake his head. But then Lassiter smiled.
True love is going to save you.
Balz almost laughed. “I don’t believe in true love.”
When was the last time you saw the sun?
“My transition.”
And yet it has continued to exist and warm the planet and sustain life, even without the benefit of your eyes. You’re less powerful than that, Balthazar. True love does not require your acknowledgment to be a force in this world.
Whatever. “They’re going to kill me, the Brothers and my bastards. I let Sahvage take the Book.”
No, that’s not what happened. There was a struggle, and you slipped and turned your ankle. As you released your hold on it, Sahvage made off with the Book—
“Ow, what the fuck?” Balz dropped hold of the angel’s hand and grabbed for the bottom of his right leg—which was suddenly killing him.
When he looked up again, Lassiter was gone, but the agony was so great, he couldn’t worry about the departure. Grimacing, he rolled over onto his back and wondered how in the hell the joint in question was screaming like he’d—
Well, like he’d slipped on something and twisted the shit out of it.
Fumbling for his phone, he triggered a call, and required no promise of an Oscar statue to grit out, “Motherfucker, he took the Book—I fell flat on my ass, I can’t fucking walk or dematerialize . . . you’re going to have to come evac me, and no, I don’t know where that asshole went.”