Dead Harvest

  'OK, I took you from the hospital. I saved your life when you took those pills. I made you an omelet!'

  'If you have Sam somewhere, you might've made him tell you all those things!'

  I racked my brain for anything that might convince her. 'When you were young, you used to be afraid of the man who lived downstairs. For years, you refused to take the elevator alone, and at night you'd sleep beneath your bed, your pillows under your blankets as a decoy in case he came for you.'

  She stared at me for a long moment, but I don't think Kate really saw me – she had a faraway look in her eye, like she was suddenly somewhere else entirely. 'He had a glass eye,' she said finally.

  'What?' Anders said to her.

  'He had a glass eye, and it didn't fit so well. Once, when we were talking in the elevator, it fell out. He popped it back in like nothing had happened, but from then on I was terrified of him. But how could you possibly know that?'

  I flashed her a wan smile. 'Comes with the job, kid.' Truth was, my head was crammed full of countless such moments, every one of them but Kate's serving as a painful reminder of a soul I had dispatched. They filled my dreams in my sleep, and when sleep would not come, it was those stolen memories – those cast-off echoes of a life misspent – that robbed me of my rest. They were my punishment. My burden to bear. And they were never very far from reach.

  But Kate didn't need to know any of that just now. She beamed back at me and threw her arms around my neck, squeezing until I thought I might pass out.

  'Where are my manners?' she said once she released me from her grasp. 'Come in, come in!'

  Anders and I followed her into the office. She swung shut the door, and Anders helped her drag the scarred metal desk back in front of it. They tilted it on its side such that the desktop was wedged beneath the doorknob, bracing the door closed. The room itself was small and cramped, and flickered with the light of a dozen candles, which dripped wax on every filthy surface. Besides the desk, there was a ratty desk chair, its black vinyl cushions cracked and peeling, a hulking gray filing cabinet, and a dusty old floor lamp, its cord chewed through just inches from the base. I fingered a stack of unlabeled cans piled high atop the filing cabinet, and Kate smiled. 'Pickings are kind of slim around here,' she said. 'We never know what we're gonna get until we open them. They're mostly just beans, but Anders swears he can tell which ones are peaches by the sound.'

  My eyes settled on a pile of old clothes in the corner, arranged in a sort of makeshift bed. 'Church up the street is having a clothing drive,' Anders said. 'I snagged those off the steps last night. Figured we're as needy as anyone. We're sleeping in shifts,' he added lamely, as if I might have assumed otherwise.

  I tried to raise an eyebrow at that last, only to find that Flynn here couldn't manage it. 'I'm just glad you two are safe,' I said.

  'And what about you?' Kate asked. 'When last we saw you, you were convulsing on the floor, and now you show up here days later in a new body, only this one already looks like you put it through the wringer. Spill it, Sam – I want to hear everything!'

  And so I told them. I told them how I shot my way out of the apartment, and how I'd requested all units to the front of the building, allowing them an opening to escape. I told them how the rookie got the jump on me, and put a bullet in my vest. I told them about the hours of interrogation, and my subsequent release. I told them of my meeting with Merihem, my run-in with the demon in Chinatown, and my unlikely deliverance at the hands of a small ceramic cat. They listened rapt throughout, asking only the occasional question of clarification, and I was suddenly struck by how young they both were – far too young, I thought, to have to deal with such unpleasantness. Then again, if life is suffering, these two were old beyond their years.

  Funny, how that thought failed to comfort me.

  What I didn't tell them were the circumstances of my release, or indeed of my meeting with the seraph at all. Even now, I'm not sure why. Maybe I didn't want to frighten Kate with the knowledge that the angels were aligned against her. Maybe I wanted to spare her the seraph's accusations of her treachery and deceit, and the fear and doubt they would instill. Maybe I didn't want to plant the notion in her head that I'd eventually betray her, as the seraph said I would.

  Or maybe, just maybe, there was some small part of me that wondered if what the angel had said was true.

16.

'I'm coming with you.'

  Kate's statement hung in the air like a trial balloon, daring me to shoot it down. After two days of itchy, nerve-jangling wakefulness, I'd curled up on the office floor for a little shut-eye, waking just moments before to the sound of clanking pipes. Kate and Anders were busying themselves in what was left of the kitchen, their candlelight reflecting orange off the open office door. I propped myself against the wall and rubbed sleep from my eyes with bloodied knuckles. I had no idea how long I'd been asleep. Long enough for the soreness to set in. I don't know if you've ever had the experience of being tossed about like a rag doll, but I gotta tell you, I don't recommend it.

  'Are you off your nut?' I called back, my voice echoing through the dark expanse of the basement kitchen. 'That's completely out of the question!'

  'Oh, come on, Sam, I'm not some helpless little girl. If this guy knows who set me up, I want to help you get him.'

  'First of all, Kate, Merihem is not a guy – he's a demon. As in powerful and evil and, whether he's involved in framing you or not, very interested in getting his hands on you. Or have you already forgotten why I got my ass kicked just yesterday?'

  'I haven't forgotten. I just figured maybe you could use me – you know, like bait.'

  I said, 'Bait only works when you've got yourself a trap to put it in.'

  'So then – what's the plan?'

  'I don't know yet – but it sure as hell involves you staying here.'

  'You're being ridiculous.'

  'Am I? Let's forget for a second that the entire demon-world is looking to deliver your immortal soul to