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Two women stood there, both brunettes.
But neither one of them was Constance.
They halted as they stared, as if they didn’t know what to make of me.
I didn’t know what to make of them either.
The older, lighter-haired brunette came closer. “Uh…who are you?” They stuck to the opposite wall, unsure if I was friend or foe.
The disappointment was almost too much to bear. “Benton.” I nodded behind me. “Bartholomew.”
Their eyes switched back and forth between us.
“Benton…?” the woman said the name slowly, savoring it. “You’re not…Constance’s Benton, are you?”
I swallowed, touched that she even wanted to say my name after what I did. “Yeah.”
She came closer. “You’re here to save us.”
“Yes.”
Now the younger woman came closer too, just as stunning as the taller woman, her hair a darker, richer shade of brown. They were both in the white gowns with wings, their hair curled, their makeup heavy. There was a strict dress code here, apparently. “What do you want us to do?”
“Get all the girls here.”
“Some of them want to be here,” the older woman said. “They actually buy in to this bullshit. I’m Laura, by the way.”
“Rayna,” the shorter woman said.
“Get them here anyway,” I said. “We’ll tie them up and keep them out of our way.”
“Alright,” Laura said. “We’ll round everyone up.” They both left the church in a hurry.
I took a seat again, and Bartholomew hadn’t moved at all.
I just had to wait a few more minutes—and I’d see her again.
Three of the women really believed they were angels and they needed to help their demons ascend, otherwise, their sins would never be absolved. They were tied up at the front of the church, but that wasn’t enough for Bartholomew.
He taped their mouths shut. “Not gonna listen to this bullshit all day.” He tossed the tape back into the bag and took his seat.
The women sat in a circle together, their backs against one another, their wrists all tied to the statue at the altar. All they could release were a couple muffled words, so they eventually gave up and turned quiet.
Rayna hadn’t returned—and Constance wasn’t here.
I started to get nervous.
What if I was too late?
The door opened again, and Rayna returned.
But she was alone.
No. “Where is she?” I stepped forward, my chest cracking in fear.
Rayna rushed over and joined us near the altar. “She’s not in our cabin…so she must be with Forneus.”
Twenty-Four
Constance
I sat on the birch throne across from him, and just like old times, we sat there for a lifetime and didn’t speak. His hands curled over the armrests as he sat there, naked from the waist up, built like a brick house.
He must spend all his time lifting weights and doing acid.
“What are your sins?” I finally asked.
His stare hadn’t left my face, not for the last thirty minutes. He could stare at me forever, utterly fascinated by my appearance. His obsession was so deep, but not once had he tried to be physical with me. Perhaps my angel status made me off-limits in that way. I was too innocent, too pure.
Thank god.
“I have many.”
Yeah, I figured. “I know you killed those people at the market.”
“It was nec-ess-ss-sary.”
Nope. “Still a sin.”
“I did it for my an-gel. I had to.”
Now he’d killed in my name, and that made me feel worse.
I thought I could play along to stay alive, but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be alive anymore. All those people died because of me. And then every day would be like this, listening to a maniac confess all his murders. We would take the acid, I’d hallucinate and feel like shit, and then I would do it all over again in a couple days.
What was the point?
There wasn’t one. “Let’s ascend.”
He was always the one to initiate it, and he seemed slightly surprised that I took the lead. But he didn’t hesitate to produce the paper and add the drop to the surface. He was about to place it in his mouth, but I stopped him.
“More.”
He stilled at my words.
“We can’t ascend with that.” It was an out-of-body experience, a complete disregard for my life. I just didn’t care anymore. I had no hesitation at all. This was how it was going to end at some point anyway. May as well just get it over with. “We need more.”
He added more to the paper then handed it to me.
“More.”
“An-gel.”
I didn’t press again, not when he used that tone. I took the paper, popped it into my mouth, and hoped it would be enough to get me where I wanted to go.
We sat there together for a while, staring at each other, and slowly, my heart started to pick up the pace. It was a slow start, a jog that turned to a run, and then turned into a sprint. Just enough would send me into cardiac arrest. It’d been over within seconds, not enough time for me to even feel pain.
