Page 14 of I Hope This Email Finds You in Hell

“What if you don’t?”

He meets my eyes over his shoulder. “I will.”

He slips under the door and out of sight. A heavy silence descends as the minutes drag on. The ringing in my ears ebbs, but nothing takes its place. No screams or shouts or snarls or whatever noises demons are supposed to make. No more of the shrieking metallic sound, which must have been something dragging against the steel siding of the hut. I shudder at the vision of curved talons sharp as knives, sure that they could easily rip Luke limb from limb.

I wait for so long my legs ache, the burn in my thighs no match for the twenty-minute YouTube Pilates workouts I only remember to do once every other month. I sink to my knees, careful of the glass beneath them.

After what feels like hours, a noise from the front of the hut makes me spring to my feet.

“It’s me.” Luke’s low voice carries past the equipment separating us. “Alone.”

I straighten, but I don’t lower the rake. “Where’s Beliar?”

“Gone.”

“You took care of…it?”

“As soon as I stepped outside, he fled. He knew it was a trap. I couldn’t catch him.”

I narrow my eyes, keeping my feet firmly planted. “How do I know you’re telling the truth and that he didn’t possess you?”

“Demons like Beliar don’t need to possess humans. They can conjure bodies on their own.”

“Prove it.”

Luke huffs, thinking for a moment. “For Krystal’s birthday party my first week at Curated Care, you made a chocolate cake and then Carol dropped it on her way into the conference room.”

“I still haven’t forgiven her.”

For a fleeting moment, it looks like the left side of his mouth twitches in a smile before smoothing back into a grim line. “Beliar’s not coming back. Let’s go.”

I follow him out, dragging my feet on the grass to get any lingering glass shards off the bottoms of my ballet flats. We come around the side of his house to his driveway. As we pass his car, I notice for the first time all the stuff packed into it. Mostly books and odd items, though a backpack sits on the front seat.

“Are you going somewhere?” I ask, peering through the window to get a closer look.

He sighs, stopping several yards farther down the cracked pavement. He clearly was hoping to shoo me away in my car, just like the other day.

“I was hoping not to,” Luke says. “But then you ruined the trap, so yes, I will be going somewhere.”

“You know where Beliar might be keeping Krystal?”

“I have a hunch.”

“Then why go through all this?” I ask, gesturing back to the woods with the Quonset hut. “Aren’t you wasting time?”

Annoyance flickers in his eyes. “Going after him is more dangerous than luring him to me. Here, I’m on my territory. Being on his opens up a whole slew of unexpected dangers.”

I glance back into his car. It’s full, but there’s still room. “Take me with you.”

The bite of Luke’s laugh cracks the air. “I’m not taking you with me. You shouldn’t be involved in any of this. It’s bad enough you came here today. Go home, Brie. Forget about all of it, including me. I can’t have you foil another plan.”

“I didn’t foil it.” I scowl. I realized something during the aching stretch of time my thighs were on fire in the Quonset hut waiting for Luke. “I’m the reason Beliar came here in the first place.”

“He came because of the sulfur.”

That’s what that smell was. “He came because he’s on the hunt for his next victim,” I state. “I saw the book on your coffee table. It said that demons prefer even numbers over odd, especially when it comes to sacrifices and rituals. So if that’s what he’s up to, he’s going to need another person.”

“Well, then you don’t count. You said it yourself—he’s after women full of guilt and grief.”