Page 182 of Dead Beat

Now the candles had been lit, the symbols drawn. Alex and Darlington and Dawes and Turner walked the circle as they had once walked the Gauntlet together, each taking their position at a compass point. The nexus was open and once Dawes began the exorcism it would be Alex’s job to draw the old demon out of the walls and shove it back into hell. She doubted this monster would go easy.

In a way, she could sympathize. Once you’d found your place, you’d fight with everything you had to keep it. Alex had thought she was fighting to keep her spot at Yale; now she understood she had been seeking something more.

“Let me know when you’re in position,” Dawes said as she took up her spot and raised a rattle supposedly made from demon skin. “Don’t start until you hear the rhythm.”

Turner was next, his face stoic. “See you on the other side.”

There was a new ease in him, a kind of hopefulness she had trouble reconciling with the detective she knew. It could just be that they had won and he was sleeping better. But she understood victory meant something more to Turner. He believed that good had triumphed—and that meant someone was watching over him and the city he fought so hard for.

Alex wasn’t sure what the other side might look like. The steps she had taken could not be undone. Reed’s death, the closing of the nexuses. It was an experiment, maybe a mad one. Soon the societies would discover that something was very wrong, though they wouldn’t know who or what to blame. Lethe would come to the rescue, just not the way they might hope. She had no idea what story they would tell the Praetor, but at least the board would have to answer his emails now.

All she knew was that she couldn’t go back. She had missed too many classes, told too many lies. Her ties to Yale had always been tenuous, and now she’d slipped her moorings.

“Are you ready for this?” she asked Darlington as they rounded the northwest corner of the house and the hedge maze came into view. “There’s a good chance we’re about to see Black Elm come tumbling down.”

“You forget,” he said softly, “I’ve already seen this place turned to rubble. If I wasn’t ready to grieve it then, I am now.”

Alex wasn’t sure she believed him, but he’d made his choices. They all had.

“Stern,” Darlington said, the gravel crunching beneath his boots. “I got an inquiry from a professor I did some research for. She’s based out of the University of Turin. An artifact has gone missing from their collection, one connected to the haunted abbey at Lucedio.”

Alex stopped walking. “You’re leaving?”

“I’m not enrolled anymore. I thought it might be worth looking into.”

“Seems good.” What was she supposed to say? She had known she was a tourist here and he was just one of the beautiful sights she got to see before her visa ran out.

Darlington turned to her, no sign of the demon visible. In the soft spring light he looked both human and hesitant. “I … thought we might go together.”

“You don’t have to say that.”

“I’m saying it because it’s what I want. But if you—”

“You want me to go with you?”

“Yes.”

“To Italy.”

“Yes.”

“To investigate Grays in a haunted monastery?”

“Something like that.”

“Do you speak Italian?” Alex asked.

“Of course.”

Of course he did. A ridiculous question.

“And do we get paid?”

“Heathen.”

“It’s a reasonable question.”

“I told you I wanted to be with you all the time.” He reached for her hand. “I meant it.”