Illusion: Chronicles of Nick (27 page)

As if sensing the question, Simi appeared instantly on his six. “Akri-Nick! You made it. Good for you.” She slapped Caleb playfully on his arm. “See, the Simi done told you that that mean ole darkness wouldn’t eat his head like you said it would. You didn’t believe me. Next time the Simi tells you something, you’ll listen. Mmm, and speaking of, all this inner dimensional travel done made the Simi hungry again. What you gots to eat in this place?”

Caleb pointed to Zavid. “I hear barbecued wolf is a delicacy on most continents.”

Offended, Zavid glared at him. “Excuse me?”

“I would, Z, but you keep doing stupid crap. And there’s just no excuse for that.”

Nick ignored them while he waited on Kody to join their group.

After a couple of minutes, he glanced back at the two demons, who were still arguing while Simi was rooting through Caleb’s kitchen pantry. Lightning flashed outside before the sound of thunder rattled the windows.

“Hey, guys! Can I have your attention for a sec?” He counted his concerns off on his fingers. “One, where’s the alternate me so I can repo my bod and get back to normal? Kind of miss it, and I don’t want to stay like a ghost. And two, where’s my girl? I miss her more than my body.”

Zavid grimaced in distaste. “Since I don’t hear the screeching whine of a child that makes my ears bleed, I’m assuming Nick Two is still unconscious inside the closet I locked him in.”

Caleb rolled his eyes. “Are you serious?”

“You told me not to let him get eaten or kill him until you got back. He’s not eaten and I didn’t kill him. Really, you should congratulate my restraint … which was seriously hard won.”

“Congratulations. I’m not going to kill you.”

And still, neither answered the most pertinent question. “Where’s Kody? Do I have to summon her by name, too?”

“She’s not a demon,” Caleb reminded him. “That only works on us.”

“Then where is she?”

Zavid shrugged while Caleb scratched uncomfortably at his neck. That was never a good thing where Caleb was concerned.

An awful feeling went through Nick. “What?” he asked Caleb.

He refused to answer.

Oh yeah, this was going to suck.…

With a box of Ding Dongs in hand, Simi drifted back into the foyer where they stood. “Man up, demon. Tell the boy what he’s asking about.”

Still, Caleb hedged.

“What?” Nick repeated, this time to Simi. “What’s happening? Why isn’t Kody here?”

Simi sighed heavily then swallowed her mouthful of cupcake. “You know Miss Akra-Kody not human, right?”

“Yeah, I’m not that oblivious.”

Simi dug out another package from the box. “Well, see, there’s a little problem. Akra-Kody be a ghost and they can’t travel like we does and Caleb couldn’t bring her back like he did me, ’cause she got no real living body. She gots one of them borrowed bodies that are … different. Once they leaves a dimension, they can’t really get back to it.”

The knot in his stomach tightened to the point he thought he’d be sick. “I don’t understand.”

Caleb groaned under his breath before he picked up the explanation. “You know the old joke about the dead, don’t go into the light?”

“Yeah.”

“We went into the light. Kody won’t be able to cross back … ever.”

Rage erupted inside him. Before he could stop himself, he grabbed Caleb and slammed him into the wall. He wasn’t sure how he could do that while Caleb still couldn’t touch him, but he was too angry to question it right now. Not while he had more pressing concerns. “You’re lying to me!”

Caleb shook his head. “I wouldn’t do that. And you know Simi could never.”

Releasing Caleb, Nick didn’t want to believe it. Tears made his vision swim as an unbelievable agony tore through him.

Kody gone? How could that be true?

“Why didn’t she say something?”

“She knew you wouldn’t come back without her and we didn’t have time to waste. We still don’t. You have to merge back into your body, kick down your army, and seal them out before the next new moon. Which is roughly sixteen hours from now, give or take.”

A loud, piercing screech erupted from somewhere Nick couldn’t locate. It sounded like the air itself made it. The storm outside increased its intensity. If he didn’t know better, he’d think they were in the middle of a hurricane.

Zavid flinched as if something had struck him. “Definitely less. That’s the cry from another
š
arru. Something just broke its seal and released it into this world. We have to move fast.” He rushed for the stairs.

“Nick?” Caleb said in an earnest tone when Nick didn’t rush after Zavid. “What are you thinking?”

He was thinking that he wanted to go back and get Kody. Right now. He was thinking that he had no desire to be here without her. To live in a world where she didn’t exist.

She’d given up everything for them, without hesitation.

And that made him even angrier. Did she not love him at all? How could she just let him go without saying anything, knowing she’d never see him again?

Did she not care?

I meant nothing to her.

She hadn’t even put up a fight about it. She’d just kicked him out of her life as if he was nothing but an unwanted nuisance.

Caleb snapped his fingers in his face. “Nick! Stop!”

He glared at the demon. “Stop what?”

“I can tell by the fire in your eyes what you’re thinking. Kody loves you. More than you understand. What she did, she did for
you
and you alone. Had you not left, Thorn
would
have returned and enslaved you, and the others would have killed you. Don’t you dare let that Malachai hate build up inside you and take away from her selfless act. I was there after you left. I saw her break down and weep like you can’t imagine. And now she’s trapped there, completely alone. With no one at all. So don’t you dare hate her for what she did to save
you
.”

Even so, it was hard. The Malachai wanted to hate, and keeping that at bay was a constant struggle for him. Hatred was quickly becoming his go-to happy place.

But the thought of Kody in tears … that hit him hard. He couldn’t stand the thought of her in pain. Especially not because of him. “I have to go back for her.”

Caleb shook his head. “Without the Magus Stone, you can’t. And right now, the most important thing is to reunite you and your body and put down your army before they get together and party. Not to mention, we don’t know what your spirit will do here in this realm if it’s not grounded in your body, and with the two of you existing in the same time and space … that’s never supposed to happen. And I don’t know the full ramifications if you exist together for long. So let’s take care of one catastrophe at a time. Okay?”

A human scream sounded from upstairs.

Zavid growled low in his throat. “Speaking of catastrophes, wanna bet that’s Nick Two getting eaten by something?”

Without hesitation, Nick teleported to Caleb’s room. Ready to battle to the death, he froze at the sight of the true terror that awaited him.

No, Lord, anything
but
this
.

Demons, vampires, werewolves, brain-hungry zombies, cruel jocks—Nick could handle anything,
anything
 … except this—this was way beyond cruel, and far beyond his ability to cope.

Truly, truly horrified, he gaped at the boy in his body who was standing on a chair, squealing and pointing at the floor, where the most terrifying thing in the world looked up in horror, too.

Disgust overwhelmed Nick as he glared at the stranger in his body. “What are you doing?”

“It’s a spider!” Nick Two screamed as he continued to gesture toward the tiny creature on the floor.

A spider? Really? Thank God it wasn’t a rat. That would have probably sent him into an epileptic seizure.

Nick sighed wearily. “You screamed like that over a bug? Seriously, dude? We live in New Orleans. Ground zero for insects. And here I thought something was about to kill you.”

Something other than
him.

“It is! That’s a brown recluse! They’re poisonous.”

Nick scoffed at his unwarranted hysteria. Thank goodness this hadn’t happened at school—he’d never live it down. And rightfully so. Anyone this big a baby over something so ridiculous needed to be mocked. It was a moral imperative. “It’s a granddaddy longlegs and he’s laughing his butt off at the human idiot he chased up a chair. Dude, have some dignity, especially while you’re wearing my skin. Last thing I want is for someone to think I got treed by a harmless spider. It’d kill my rep forever.”

Trying not to roll his eyes or say something really mean about it all, Nick stepped forward to pick up the spider and remove it from the room. But the moment he touched it, an electric shock went through him.

One second it was a tiny, harmless spider, and in the next, it was a beautiful woman with a vampiric dental problem. An evil smile curled her lips as she reached for Nick. Jerking him into her arms, she sank her fangs into his neck.

“You are mine, Malachai … All mine.”

CHAPTER 18

Nick’s head swam as he appeared in a large living room with antique furniture. He wasn’t sure if he was still in a human realm or in an alternate one. There was no way to get any real bearings here. It might be New Orleans.

Heck, it might all be a dream or hallucination. There was no telling. Especially when it came to his extremely screwed-up life.

The woman holding him let go and stepped back to give him a hot once-over he might have found seductive had she not just taken a chunk out of his neck. He glared at her as he rubbed at the nasty wound that held a perfect impression of her serrated teeth. “For the record, nibbling on a guy’s skin is nice. Taking a bite out of his flesh, not the way to get a second date. Just letting you know, you need to update whatever whacked-out guy manual you’re using.”

Tall, raven-haired, and pale-skinned, she licked his blood from her lips as she smiled and playfully ruffled his hair. “You’re much sweeter-tasting than Adarian. I think I like you better already.”

Yeah, okay … There was so much about this that made him uncomfortable, he had no idea where to start listing things. But the primary concern he had was simple—“How can you bite me and make me bleed when I don’t have a physical body here?”

She laughed. “You’re very real to me, and no matter where you are, I will always be able to find and touch you.”

Had that come from Kody, he’d be thrilled with it. From this woman … that ranked up there with a Freddy Kreuger threat. “Who are you?” More importantly,
what
was she?

Laughing again, she nipped at his chin with enough pressure to make it hurt. “I’m your
Š
arru-Ninim, Livia. As soon as I awoke, I followed the scent of your blood to you. Or so I thought. I knew the real Malachai couldn’t be that sniveling coward who feared my lesser form so. While many things have changed about the world while I endured my stygian nightmare, some things will always be. And a strong, fearless Malachai is one of them.” She ran her hand down his chest toward an area of his body that made him jump away from her reach.

Nick caught her hand and pulled it away. “Babe, I don’t know you and my
no zone
has a very short guest list. Consider my belt the velvet rope no one crosses without an express invitation.”

She fisted her hands in his shirt and pulled him against her for another kiss.

He dodged her lips then twisted out of her arms. “Demon, please. You don’t just bite a guy, make him bleed, and expect him to fall all over you. Don’t know where you’re from, but here, that’s considered rude.”

She scoffed at him. “You need to feed from me, Malachai. I am the one who will always give you the most power. I’m the one
š
akkan you have on your team that no one is immune to.”

He removed her hand from his arm. “I still don’t understand how you can touch me when I have no body.”

“Like you, there is only one of me, and we are bound by the blood of your ancestors. Corporeal or not, makes no difference. Now come, kiss my lips and feast on the nectar you need to take your rightful place to unite and lead us into battle.”

Nick shook his head. “No offense, I don’t want to feast on anyone’s nectar.” Mostly ’cause it didn’t sound all that sanitary or healthy, especially given how free and nonchalant she was with handing it out. But he didn’t want to hurt her feelings, either, so he quickly added, “Not until I have my body back. Until then I don’t need to be partaking of anything other than working on an eviction notice for an arachnophobe who’s currently humiliating my real body.”

She stared at him as if he made no sense to her whatsoever.

“Malachai!”

Startled, Nick turned around to find Zarelda behind him. “What’s wrong?”

“They’re coming.”

“They?”

“The ones who want you dead. They’ve tracked you down.” She passed her hand through both him and Livia. “I can’t stop them. Not even
she
can see me. Only
you
, Nick. But you need to know. They’re about to attack my brother. Please help him.”

“What is wrong with you?”

Nick glanced over his shoulder at Livia. “You really can’t see her?”

“See who?”

Nick shook his head as Zarelda ran for a wall and vanished into it. “Never mind. You have to put me back together.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m your commander, right?”

She nodded.

“Then that’s my first round of orders. I need to get back to the others. Now. Take me to where you found me.”

Her eyes turned deep, dark red. Resistance burned bright inside them as if she was fighting against some inner force so that she could disobey him.

Finally, she let out a frustrated sound. She threw her head back, wrinkled her nose, and stomped her foot. Then she sighed and looked at him as if nothing had just happened. “Fine.” It came out like an insult the way she said it.

But before she could make good on his order, another flash blinded him to the point he saw stars from it. He held his hand up to shield his eyes from the intense light source. A loud, enraged hiss rang out, followed by a blast that exploded so close to Nick, he could feel the heat of it.