Page 22 of Hell Bent

Hear the silence of an empty home. No one will be made welcome. When Sandow had realized Darlington might be alive on the other side, he’d used the last moments of the ritual to ban him from Black Elm and the living world.

Dawes tilted her head to one side. “I think he’s trapped.” Then it was as if she had woken from sleep. She looked almost panicked. “We have to find a way to get him out.”

Alex cast a glance at the horned and naked creature sitting in what her mother would have praised as a very fine sukhasana pose. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

But Dawes was already striding toward the circle. She reached for it.

“Dawes—”

As soon as her hand broke the perimeter of the circle, Dawes screamed. She stumbled backward, clutching her fingers to her chest.

Alex lunged for her, pulling her away. The smell of sulfur overwhelmed her again and she had to struggle not to gag. She crouched beside Dawes and forced her to release her wrist. Dawes’s fingertips were singed black. Alex remembered Cosmo howling out of the kitchen. He’d tried to cross the circle too. He’d tried to get to Darlington.

“Come on,” Alex said. “I’m getting you back to Il Bastone. There’s got to be some kind of potion or balm or something there, right?”

“We can’t leave him,” Dawes protested as Alex dragged her to her feet.

Darlington sat silent and unmoving like some kind of golden idol.

“He’s not going anywhere.”

“It’s our fault. If I had finished the ritual, if the portal—”

“Dawes,” Alex said, giving her a shake. “That’s not how this works. Sandow sent the hellbeast—”

A low growl rumbled through the room. Darlington hadn’t moved, but there was no question that sound had come from him. Alex felt a shiver pass over her.

“I don’t think he likes that,” whispered Dawes.

Is it you? Alex wanted to ask. She wanted to try charging straight through that circle. Would she end in a heap of cinders? A pile of salt? And what was waiting on the other side of that shimmering veil? Darlington? Or something wearing his skin?

“Come on,” she said, herding Dawes out of the ballroom and down the stairs. She didn’t want to leave him, but she didn’t want to be in that room a minute longer.

Alex was locking up the kitchen door when her phone buzzed. She drew it from her pocket, keeping one eye on Dawes, one on the light from the boarded-up windows above. She hesitated when she saw the name on her screen.

“It’s Turner,” she said, pushing Dawes toward the car.

“Detective Turner?”

Call me.

Alex scowled and replied: You call me. Remember how?

She didn’t know why she was bitter. She hadn’t heard from Turner in months. She’d understood he was angry after the dean’s death, but she’d thought he liked her and that they’d managed some pretty good investigating together. To her surprise her phone rang almost immediately. She’d been sure Turner would ignore her. He didn’t like to be told.

Alex put the detective on speaker.

“You do remember,” she said. She nudged Dawes toward the passenger seat and whispered, “I’m driving.” Dawes really must have been hurting because she didn’t protest.

“I’ve got a body at the med school,” said Turner.

“I’m guessing there are a lot of bodies at the med school.”

“I need you or someone to come take a look.”

That stung too. Turner knew better than most what she’d been through last year, but apparently she was just a Lethe deputy now.

“Why?”