“Understatement,” I muttered.
Candy’s words hit home hard. Living forever sounded far more like a curse than a blessing. I was not Immortal. I had no footprint. That seemed to be the deciding factor. Yes, I had developed farked-up powers, but I could explain them. Each time I dove into the mind of one of the dead, I came out slightly different. I no longer needed glasses and could run insane distances without breaking a sweat. Of course, knocking down trees and houses and creating wall winds and iron fortresses were a little more difficult to wrap my mind around.
Along with all my new gifts, I seemed to be aging backwards—nothing too alarming, but it was noticeable. My Botox-obsessed human buddy, Jennifer, had pointed it out on multiple occasions. Blowing it off and lying to her was getting harder. I was fairly sure I’d extended my life a bit, but I was okay with that. I didn’t regret helping the dead and I would continue to do it. It fulfilled me in a way I’d never known. Plus, it gave me more years with Gideon.
Pushing my worries about myself aside, I focused on the present. “We need to talk with my mom and dad,” I said. Saying the words mom and dad sent a little thrill through me. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine spending time with my parents. Granted, my mother was a ghost, but it still counted. The more I got to know my father, the more I loved him. “Alana implied that she might have an idea of how to destroy Clarissa.”
No one said a word.
That didn’t bode well.
“Somebody speak,” I ground out. “Keeping things from me at this point is a very bad plan.”
Charlie nodded warily. “How familiar are you with the Bible?”
“Not very,” I admitted. “Why?”
“There’s a passage in Leviticus that states, ‘And a man who injures his countryman—as he has done, so it shall be done to him.’ Basically, an eye for an eye,” Charlie explained.
“That is correct,” Tim said. “However, if we move on to the new testament, in the book of Matthew, Jesus repudiates that notion. ‘Ye have heard that it hath been said, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.”
“I’m gonna go on record and say Daisy is more like Jesus than Leviticus,” Candy said. “I would have survived choking on my picks, but it was damn nice of Daisy to Heimlich me, even though she rearranged my intestines.”
I laughed. There was no other choice. “You’re welcome.” I wasn’t sure my act merited comparing me to Jesus, but a compliment was a compliment no matter how freaking weird. Plus, it was ingrained in me to be polite—Southern DNA.
Gideon pulled into the driveway and cut the engine. “Actually, we can take this conversation all the way back to Hammurabi’s Code before any of the books of the Bible were created.”
“True,” Candy said. “Mesopotamian King. He was an interesting guy—very nice ass. He was the first to demand an eye for an eye, along with a bunch of other shit.”
“Shit is a rather dismissive word,” Tim pointed out. “Hammurabi’s rule of law is what much has been based on through the centuries.”
Candy shrugged. “And he had a nice ass.”
Pressing my hand to the frosted window, I made a print. Religious history was barbaric. Religion itself was pretty barbaric. I was still somewhat torn about what I believed. I could no longer deny an afterlife. I’d seen the light and I’d seen the darkness, and I’d helped the dead move on. Heather had explained the afterlife as more of a state of mind than a place.
None of it truly computed in my mind. Grappling with it constantly, I felt I needed to try to understand since I was helping to send people on. But making sense of words and ideas that bloody wars were still fought over was close to impossible. The more I learned, the less I knew. And while the lesson was interesting, I wasn’t following why I needed to know it.
Or, maybe I was.
An eye for an eye… a life for a life.
Crap.
“Wait. You think Alana is planning to go down with Clarissa to satisfy the ancient rule?” I asked breathlessly. “She’ll let herself be destroyed to end the Angel of Mercy?”
Gideon put two fingers under my chin and turned my head to face his. “I think if she could do that, she would. She did it thirty years ago and traded her human life for yours. Her love for you is not up for debate. But she’s dead—your mother is a ghost. The tradeoff wouldn’t work.”
“Accurate,” Charlie confirmed. “It doesn’t satisfy the eye-for-an-eye edict. But…”
My mind raced. The car went from feeling spacious to tiny and cramped. “They plan to trade my father’s life for Clarissa’s,” I blurted out, jerking open the door and hopping out of the car. Where the frigid air had bothered me earlier, I welcomed the painful bite. “They want to be together. Michael will die so he can be with Alana.”
“In theory,” Candy said, getting out of the car and stretching. “However, if Michael is successful in ending the cow bitch, not real sure he’s headed to the same place your mom is.”
“Shit,” I said. “Son of a bitch, shit, shit, shit.” If Gram was awake, she’d wash my mouth out with soap. However, shit was mild compared to what I wanted to say. Again, I felt like peeling my skin off. Instead, I removed my coat and let the icy breeze cut straight into my bones. “No can do. No one else who I love will pay for Clarissa’s sins.”
“We’re not sure that’s what Alana has planned,” Tim said, picking up my coat and wrapping it around me with his one good arm. “But we’ve come up with nothing else viable thus far.”
“Guessing could be disastrous,” I said, waving Tim’s arm around in my distress. “No more speculation. No more cryptic bullcrap. We lay it all out and then prepare to wing it since Clarissa is a devious jackhole with nothing to lose.”
“Solid,” Gideon agreed, removing Tim’s arm from my shaking hands before I accidently launched it into the woods. “We need to get Heather up to speed, then meet with Clarence and Alana. We will work as a team. And we’ll work fast.”
I nodded and pressed my palm to my forehead, trying to ward off the headache blooming over my eyes. “I need coffee. ASAP.”
“Coffee, then talk,” Charlie said.
“On the front porch. I have heaters outside. We’ll be comfortable,” I told them. “If Gram wakes up and hears us discussing Alana, that could backfire in a way I’m not prepared for.”
“Yep, I’ll go apeshit on anyone who harms Gram again—like an un-lubed-pole-up-the-ass apeshit—a big f-ing pole,” Candy said, looking down at her feet and wiping away a tear.
“That’s a bit graphic,” Tim commented.
“It’s a fact,” Candy shot back.
Candy adored Gram. Gram had been riding Candy’s ass like a freight train for the past few weeks. Candy Vargo was Gram’s newest project and she had been suffocating the mannerless woman with love and attention. While Candy bitched and moaned, she not so secretly loved it. No one had ever cared so much for her and her well-being. When Gram woke up—which she would—she’d have a dang fit that Candy had let herself get decapitated.