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And then my entire body suddenly went numb and I had maybe a second to think—oh, shit—before the entity used my legs to send Pritkin sailing across the room. I saw him hit and pass through the wall, in an odd mirror of what Billy had done. Only Pritkin’s much more material body took the flimsy Sheetrock and hard studs along with him.
And, to my surprise, the creature decided to follow. Maybe it assumed that I wouldn’t be much of a challenge if it killed him first, or maybe he’d managed to piss it off. I didn’t know, but I felt when it started to pull away, when all of the sensations of a seriously overtaxed body came rushing back at once, forcing out a whimper that I promised myself to deny if I survived long enough.
And then I felt its shock as I slammed my shields shut, trapping it inside.
I hadn’t been able to expel the thing, but this was a different story. It had managed to possess me in the first place because I’d been exhausted and careless and I’d been expecting Billy any moment, so my shields were down. But they weren’t now, and this was my body and ownership bestowed some privileges. And I was damned if I was going to let that thing finish off the one guy who had a chance of getting me out of this while he was possibly unconscious and—
And it had figured out that my body had become its prison and it really wanted out.
We apparently didn’t speak the same language, but it didn’t matter, because it started showing me a cascade of images like something out of a horror movie: my heart exploding in my chest, my lungs shredding like tissue paper, my brain—
If you could do all that, you already would have, I thought back viciously, sending the image of it trying to stab me in the eye with a freaking hair pick. I didn’t know why it could trash the apartment and not me, but every single attack had been external or passive, like holding me underwater while I drowned. It was starting to look like maybe it wasn’t all tha
t strong inside the body.
Or like it wasn’t so used to this possession thing, either.
That didn’t make sense for a demon who, presumably, did this all the time, but I didn’t have a chance to figure it out before it started thrashing around inside me. And if I thought I’d been in pain before, it was nothing compared to this. It was determined that I was going to let go, and I was determined I wasn’t, because if it killed Pritkin I was dead, anyway.
And then he was back, bloody and bruised and reaching through the hole to grab something from his footlocker that he tossed at me. “Cassie, catch!”
My arm shot up automatically and I felt my fist close around something cold and hard. And then I didn’t feel anything else for a long moment as I levitated completely off the bed.
Definitely Amityville, I thought blankly, and let go of my shields. My body gave a huge convulsion, and I was immediately surrounded by a storm of dark, flapping wings, a noxious odor and an infuriated, screeching cry.
And then I hit the bed and rolled off the side. That was lucky, because a second later what felt like a miniature cyclone burst out through the window and a shower of glass exploded into the room, in flagrant disregard for the laws of physics. But most of it didn’t hit me, since I was huddled on the floor with my hands over my head, trying not to scream.
Pritkin had crawled back through the wall at some point, because when I looked up, he was crouched on the floor, staring at me. I stared mutely back, panting and limp, every limb shaking in reaction as confetti of dust and tattered bits of wallpaper rained down all around us. And then the door slammed open and Marco charged in.
He took in my naked, multicolored self, the hole in the wall, the broken window and the battered, bleeding war mage. “The fuck?” he said distinctly.
I swallowed, licking lips that tasted like dust and copper. “I think I freaked out the staff,” I told him weakly. And then I fainted.
Chapter Three
Half an hour later, I was still naked and still not enjoying it.
“Goddamn it, Marco!” I croaked. “That hurts!”
“You don’t hold still and it’s gonna scar, too.” The tone was harsh, but the large hand on my abused derriere was gentle.
“Just be careful, okay? That’s living flesh back there.” For the moment, anyway.
“I’ll see what I can do.”
I settled back onto my stomach and tugged at the sheet that was supposed to be protecting my modesty. It mostly wasn’t, but I was too tired and, I suspected, too stoned to care. I knew the table I was lying on was level, but it felt a lot like it was floating on the high seas, thanks to the pills someone had given me and the two drinks I’d washed them down with.
“Can you get seasick lying still?” I wondered.
“If you’re gonna hurl, you’re gonna tell me,” Marco said sternly.
“I’m not,” I said with what dignity I could muster. Since I was sprawled naked on a massage table while he dug glass out of my ass, it wasn’t much.
“Just so we’re clear. We got enough to clean up.”
This was true.
We were back in the suite, trashed as it was, because it had better wards than anywhere else in the hotel. Not that they’d done any good this time, but for the past month, they’d kept out most of the people who wanted my head on a stick. So livable or not, it was where I was sleeping tonight.
