Freedom at last.
I turned back to the angel.
Somehow his golden eyes twinkled at me as if he knew exactly what I was thinking. The slate was wiped clean, the past split in two. Like that dead tree, all my regrets and the high-school drama lay disintegrated behind me now.
Except Jake still lunged at me, his hand gripping my wrist, eyes wide. “What was that? There wasn’t even a storm. Did you do that?”
“Sort of.” A grin curled up my lips.
The demon shadows had regrouped, circling each of Jake’s limbs with their dark tentacles. Like a deranged puppet, his other hand clamped around my free arm.
Desperately I combed the dark sky for the golden-eyed angel.
A clap of thunder rumbled from the angel’s light. Suddenly, as if the idea came with the thunder, I remembered the self-defense lesson from my training sessions with Dad. Target the four sensitive zones—solar plexus, instep, nose, groin.
Shackled by Jake’s iron grip, I couldn’t elbow him in the solar-plexus, but my feet were free. I lifted my boot and slammed my heel down on his instep as hard as I could. His grip loosened.
I wriggled free and started to run away from the library.
A dark specter screeched to a halt in front of me as Jake lunged for my foot. I smacked into the sidewalk, first my knee, then my cheek scraping the pavement. Warm stickiness pooled on my face, on the sidewalk. I couldn’t think about that now. I had to get up.
Gingerly, I rolled onto my back and kick-boxed his wrist with a vengeance until he let go of my ankle.
Above me, the angel thrust his sword into the shadow. It split in two, just like the tree, sparking and screeching into a high-pitched inferno. With a low scream of wind and air, the flames sizzled and morphed back into one wraith-like form, tentacles hovering behind Jake. Did I do that?
The angel planted his fury behind me.
I scrambled to my feet, racing to the open lawn as fast as I could, footsteps pounding behind me. I picked up the pace, shifting into a new gear as I sprinted across the quad, lungs heaving.
Something yanked my right wrist, pulling me back so hard my shoulder cracked.
Pain ripped through my shoulder like a scalpel, and I screamed in complete agony. I blinked as stars clouded my vision, matching the ripples of pain that shockwaved from my shoulder blade.
Jake spun me around to face his dead eyes, clutching my unwounded forearm in his iron grip.
“Don’t you care what happens to me? They want you, not me.” His eyes had turned a strange shade of red, his face twisted with anger and jealousy, with a dash of something darker. A shadowy tentacle wrapped around his forehead.
“You always cared more about yourself than anyone else. That hasn’t changed.” I hissed through the blinding pain, my shoulder throbbing with its own piercing heartbeat.
“You stupid girl.” His voice held a demonic edge. Then he shook me like a rag doll. The pain was so unbearable that I couldn’t do a thing to stop him. “You’re coming with me. Now.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.” With my good shoulder I crashed my whole body weight against him, thrashing and kicking like a wild dog. I couldn’t let him take me somewhere, but it didn’t do any good. “Help!” I wailed as loud as I could.
He slapped his hand over my mouth. I twisted my head around the quad for a glimpse of my lightning angel
.You are now the Seer. My powers are your powers.
Behind me, I gasped at the biggest showdown I’d ever seen. Hordes of demon wraiths were lined up, facing off with my angel, his bright light stark against the forces of darkness. With my free hand, I turned it palm up. Electricity sizzled through my veins, shooting at Jake’s grip on me.
“Yeoow!” Jake screeched and crumpled to the ground me behind me.
Now to the real problem. I took two steps to reach my angel’s side, squaring off with the host of shadow demons in front of us.
“Let’s do this.” I glanced at him with a grin, wincing as I held out both palms in front of me. Lightning crackled into two swirling orbs, one hovering in each hand. Ready to strike. With a war cry, I thrust both arms straight out in front of me, or as straight as I could with one dislocated shoulder.
The sky flashed purple and white as lightning sparked across the darkness and jolted into the front line of shadows. One by one they exploded in a puff of smoke and orange sparks.
“Your turn, angel.” I huffed, gathering my angel fire again.
With pleasure. Angel lanced the blade to his left, twisting it into a large swirl of shadow. It burst into flames, fireballs screeching from the epicenter in every direction like fireworks.
The angel swung his sword in a wide arc of silvery white across the sky. Then he pointed the tip at me and bobbed his head once. In an instant the searing pain in my shoulder eased, enough for me to at least see straight.
Streaks of purple and silver lightning crackled from my palms as my angel and I battled the shadows around me. On instinct, my body twisted into the Krav Maga moves my dad and brother taught me as I shot lighting fireballs from my hands. The lightning seared into a wraith on meyleft and he exploded in a burst of orange fire. An icy tendril wrapped around my right ankle, but I shot a bolt of angel fire straight from my palm that vanquished the demon in two seconds flat. The rest of the demon wraiths were retreating back to whatever hell they’d come from. But I wouldn’t let them get away. They’d turned my ex-boyfriend into a bigger psycho than he already was. My blood boiled with anger and supernatural adrenaline buzzed through my veins. One by one, Angel and I vanquished
