Infatuate Read online

  “Yes,” Connor said, giving a mighty weight to the word. “Yes, you are.”

  Lance leaned forward, pushing his glasses up on his nose. “But then what does that mean? We can’t be killed?”

  “That means that the kinds of things that might kill a mortal—swimming with alligators, getting shot, jumping out of a plane with no parachute—will not kill you. You may still get some injuries, like your scratches today, but whatever you receive will be nothing compared to what should have happened.”

  “So we’re invincible. Awesome!” Brody clapped his hands once.

  “That’s where I gotta stop you,” Connor said in a stern voice. “No. You can still be destroyed by representatives of the underworld. They can seize your souls and then you’ll be committed to an eternity of . . .” He seemed to be searching for the words. “It’s worse than being killed.” He sat down, hands on his knees, leveling with us. “Listen to me: They’re looking for you. You’re being hunted. They are going to find you. Look to your right and to your left . . .” He paused as we all did this. I glanced at Sabine and then Lance, whose eyes read pure concern. I could feel his mind working, sorting through all this. “One of them may not be among us in a few months,” Connor said in a tone that chilled me. “It’s going to be up to all of us, working together, to keep one another safe. Hear me?” Everyone nodded.

  “Pardon the question, but dude, how?” Dante asked.

  Connor thought a minute before replying. “That’s something we’re gonna spend every minute of every day trying to figure out.”

  10. The Thrill of the Chase

  After giving us a chance to wash the reek of the swamp off ourselves, change, and eat something, Connor led us out of the cabin and over to a patch of grassy, mossy land where five objects had been set along a fallen tree trunk.

  “Hey, my suitcase!” Dante said the minute we got close enough to make out the animal print. “That thing better not have a scratch on it.”

  Connor stood in front of the tree trunk. “Sorry, buddy,” he said. “As Dante noticed, I helped myself to some of your things for this exercise.” In addition to the suitcase, there was a can of hair spray, Max’s fedora (which, according to Dante, was one of many since Max preferred to cover up the scar on his head), a basketball, and, as Lance pointed out to me, one of my worn gray T-shirts. I didn’t like the idea that Connor had gone through our bags. I was surprised people had managed to pack such frivolous, fun things at four in the morning. I hadn’t even been clearheaded enough to grab one of my nicer shirts. I was just grateful Connor hadn’t taken my phone. No one had asked about those mysterious messages. It seemed every other major question had come up, even though Connor hadn’t answered them all. I wondered if there was any significance to those omissions.

  “One part of our training will be working on skills every angel should have in some capacity.”

  Dante already had his hand raised. “Are we gonna learn to fly now? I’m dying to fly.” Max and I exchanged looks and smiles.

  “Dante, man, you’ve gotta crawl before you can walk.” Connor laughed. Dante looked disappointed, and Max patted him on the back. “Flying comes way later, guys. Relax, okay? Today we’re just gonna try levitating some stuff. Trust me, it comes in handy. So let’s start small and see what ya got. Who’s up first? Emma? Since it’s your hair spray?”

  She stood opposite the metallic can, staring it down, but succeeded only in making it shake.

  “I mean, how do we do this? Are we supposed to make any movements or think about anything in particular to make this happen?” I asked. I wondered if everyone else had done this kind of thing before.

  “Nope, just don’t think so much, Haven. Everyone has a different way of doing things. You’ll figure it out,” Connor said, but I felt helpless. “Like anything else, some of you will be better than others. But hang in there. With practice you’ll all master it.”

  One by one he had each of us try to raise Emma’s hair spray. Nearly everyone had lifted it at least an inch for a moment before it was my turn. I focused on it, steadying my gaze and tuning out everything around me. I imagined it aloft, taking flight. But there it sat, refusing to budge. I stared some more but after a few long, painful minutes, I had succeeded only in making the heat rise in my skin.

  Connor cut me off. “Okay, let’s keep moving. Brody?”

  “But I’m not done,” I said, frustrated.

  “Haven, there’ll be time. Don’t worry.”

  Brody, who’d been busy chatting with Tom, took his place before the can. In the blink of an eye, he had it floating. Connor applauded.

  “And that’s how it’s done,” Brody said, giving a bow.

  “Nice work,” Connor said. Sabine went next and even in her shaken state, she lifted it too, though not for quite as long as Brody had. Connor had the two of them try the other objects, and they made it through everything but the basketball and suitcase. I tried to dissect how they did it, but there was nothing to study. It was such quiet, internal work. Brody seemed downright relaxed about it—with the larger items, he extended his arm, but that was as much exertion as he showed. And though Sabine’s concentration was clear, she didn’t seem on the surface to be doing anything differently than I had.

  We worked at it until nightfall, some of us—like Lance—improving and some, like me, not improving and growing angrier, more sullen with each attempt. “Shake it off, baby,” Dante said, kneading my shoulders and patting me on the back. But something else was eating away at me too.

  When we finally climbed into our hammocks to go to sleep, my mind and muscles felt equally weary. Connor had retreated to a room in the back of the cabin, leaving us unsupervised. Some had already fallen asleep—I could make out Dante’s trademark snore cutting through the still air. No sooner had I nestled into my brightly patterned hammock, the tightly woven nylon molding to hold my body, than I heard a giggle and footsteps, followed by the creak of a wooden post. I could only imagine it might be Emma creeping over to join Jimmy. Their ups and downs were dizzying. But the room was oppressively dark, and it hit me: what if it wasn’t Emma and Jimmy? The events of the day had set me off balance, and now it was difficult letting myself fall asleep while having to wonder about this.

  As light-footed as possible, I hopped down from my hammock and felt in the darkness until I reached the one in front of mine. “Are you awake?” I whispered.

  “Hey. No, I’m asleep,” Lance whispered back with a soft, woozy chuckle. Relief set in. I had been paranoid, which I could blame on exhaustion.

  “Want some company?”

  “Yes, please.”

  I climbed up, and he enveloped me instantly. The strong arms that rescued Sabine were mine now, again. His lips found mine and for a few moments everything else, and everyone else, melted away. He kissed my neck and pulled me close and I drifted off to sleep.

  I awoke to the clanking of dishes in the kitchen, a sizzling stove, and spirited voices. Sabine was seated on the counter watching Connor flip pancakes. Only half of the group was up.

  “We’re trading stories,” Brody said. “What’s yours? Who tried to recruit you for the underworld? Mine was a hot librarian.”

  “Really?” I asked. I grabbed an apple from the fridge. “I wouldn’t think that would be your type.”

  “I know, go figure. Max’s was a hot history teacher on a model United Nations summit trip.”

  “Hot camp counselor.” Drew shrugged. “I think Tom’s was something like that too.”

  “No, his was a tennis coach,” Jimmy said. “But I think it was at a tennis camp, so that’s close.”

  “Hot band frontman,” River said, angry still.

  “Oh, cool, ours—Emma’s and mine—were a couple of owners of the coffeehouse we played at,” Jimmy said.

  “Played?” I asked.

  “We have sort of a country music act going. I play guitar, she sings,” he said like it was no big deal. “What about you?”

  I was unaccust
omed to talking about this, but everyone had been so open. “Mine was a hot internship boss,” I declared, feeling like I’d completed the secret handshake and belonged to the group now. And then a different impulse hit me: that note from Lucian. I had the scrap with my name in my wallet right now.

  “Me too,” said Sabine, nibbling from a bowl of blueberries.

  “Wow, what was the internship?”

  She ignored the question. “And Lance and Dante were with you, right?”

  “Yeah.” Everyone in the kitchen looked at me as though I’d said something truly shocking. Connor glanced up from making the pancakes.

  “That’s crazy,” River said, a hint of venom. I wasn’t sure exactly what part of that had been so upsetting to her.

  “See, I told you: amazing, right?” Sabine said.

  River shook her head. “I mean, you guys are enough,” she said to Jimmy. “But all three of them? All three?” She stormed off, as though offended.

  Unable to make sense of it, I tried to change the subject. “So what was your job like? I don’t know about you, but my internship would’ve been pretty cool if not for, you know, the whole soul-buying business.” It was actually kind of comforting to be able to talk about it. Maybe I could get used to this sharing stuff, I told myself. “We were working at a hotel.”

  “That’s cool,” Sabine said flatly. She didn’t offer anything about her experience. Then she perked up again just as fast. “By the way, you’ve got a great guy there.” She pointed as Lance stepped into the room. She hopped down from the counter and grabbed a plate of pancakes from Connor.

  “Yeah, he’s okay,” I joked, blushing.

  “Thanks for the help yesterday,” she said. On her way to the dining table, she gave Lance a quick peck on the cheek.

  “Anytime,” he said shyly. I just smiled, trying to suppress that feeling in my gut. Sabine had already taken a seat beside Brody and sat chatting and laughing with him. It was hard to believe this was the same girl who had fallen apart yesterday.

  As the last few late risers drifted in for breakfast, we convinced Emma and Jimmy to perform for us. There was a guitar in the corner of the cabin’s living room, and Jimmy began to play and sing. He seemed to transform as he strummed, his voice carrying the melancholy tune; Emma joined in, her notes so delicate and rich. It was a familiar old song, from the eighties, with lyrics about someone loved and left behind. I had found my mind wandering during their performance, thinking back, and it had taken me a few seconds to realize when they had finished singing to join the rest of the group in applauding.

  After everyone was dressed and nourished, Connor announced we’d be spending the afternoon doing some more levitating and then climbing cypresses and leaping from the highest branches because, as he explained when we gathered to head outside, “Even though you’re not gonna get hurt, you’ve gotta learn to land on your feet. And no taking the stairs out here. I want everyone jumping off the porch. You’ve gotta look for every opportunity to use your strength.”

  I looked to Lance, who read my mind and had already calculated the distance from the porch to the ground: “Twenty feet.” He shrugged, like it was no big deal.

  Then came the scream.

  Emma had just opened the door. I thought maybe she had fallen from the porch, but she still stood there, at the front of our pack. We all spilled out, crowding around her. Connor rushed to her side.

  I pushed through and saw on the worn, splintered wood of the porch a pair of angel wings drawn in blood.

  There were many serious faces in the van on the way back, everyone, I suspected, with the same thoughts running through their heads. Once in a while someone would shout a question to Connor, but it would be one we had already heard the answer to at least ten times that afternoon and yet still needed confirmation on.

  “If they knew where we were, why wouldn’t they just attack us right then?” Dante piped up at one point.

  “That’s not how they roll. There’s a thrill in the chase for them,” Connor explained. I watched him in the rearview mirror, his brows knit. “Let’s not sell ourselves short. You guys are actually an exceptional group. My gut tells me that they aren’t confident about taking you all on at once. They’ll want to divide and conquer.”

  “So there really is safety in numbers?” I called out, hopeful.

  “You’d be surprised,” he said.

  By the time we got back to Royal Street, dusk had fallen and Connor had informed us of a new addition to our daily schedules: each night two of us would stand watch over the house, walking the halls, peeking into the courtyard, keeping an eye out lest anyone—or anything—should leave a stealthy message as they had at the cabin. Or, of course, make their presence known in even clearer ways.

  Part Two

  11. You Are Going to Be Taken

  Though we now all knew our real purpose in New Orleans, we still had to keep up our volunteer cover. Over the course of the next week, we each made a couple trips to the swamp in smaller groups. We would arrive early and do that treacherous swim again, then we would climb the cypress trees, swing on the hanging moss, and leap to the ground, over and over. By midmorning the buses would arrive carrying a group of school kids ready for their tour. We would ride the boat with them, teaching them about the various creatures we had secretly been swimming alongside only hours before. For lunch, we would take them out for the best po’boys anyone could ask for and then we would send them home, fed and entertained.

  The week brought some other new assignments as well. Lance and the guys at the house next door would be taking a hiatus from that renovation project to work on some Habitat for Humanity homes on the outskirts of town. Max, Drew, and Sabine would be joining them. Dante and I would be planting a community garden.

  But today, I was still stationed in the city of the dead. Lance kissed me goodbye, leaning in and whispering in my ear, “Careful, okay? I don’t love having you in that cemetery alone all day.”

  “I’m not alone, you know. There are all those dead people.” I tried to laugh, but he didn’t quite appreciate the humor. A few yards away, Dante slapped Max on the back. We stood on the curb, waving goodbye as the group boarded Connor’s shuttle and pulled away.

  Dante and I were left to wander to work together. It was our first chance to talk, just the two of us, since our world had been turned upside down.

  “So, what’s new?” I said, deadpan.

  “Yeah, you know, not much,” he replied in a kidding tone.

  “Yeah. Living with a whole bunch of angels. Devils are drawing bloody wings on the doorstep, the usual.”

  “Good times,” he chirped. It was comforting that, no matter what went on, Dante and I could always make each other smile.

  “Ohhh, where to begin, Dan?” I sighed, shaking my head. We recounted all that had happened in the past forty-eight hours.

  “And to think on Friday night we were chowing down at Antoine’s, not a care in the world,” he said. “Or I mean fewer cares than now, at least.”

  And then something struck me. “Remember that group Friday night? The Krewe or whatever?” I asked him. “You know, the one girl had a fleur-de-lis right here.” I held up my wrist.

  “Hav, we can’t run around declaring everyone with a tattoo a devil. I mean, have you looked around this place? That would be, like, this whole city. And half the people at school back home,” Dante argued as we made our way toward Rampart Street, the morning sun already beating down on us. “Mariette has a tattoo. It’s a sort of snake coiled around her upper arm. But I don’t feel like she’s one of them. Come by later, snap her picture, see for yourself.”

  Something else I’d forgotten: the pictures from the other night. I hadn’t printed them yet. “Okay, if you think she won’t mind.”

  “And I’m just going on the record as saying, with the other inked hottie, from the Krewe, I think you’re being a little crazy with this one, and I say that with great love and respect,” he said. “Why would they be so o
ut in the open? Even the Outfit was really, you know, tucked away in their little hotel, waiting for the souls to come to them.”

  But I wasn’t ready to let it go. “Dan, I’m just saying, I got that feeling, that flare, you know, right here.” I patted that place above my heart where I had those scars, three sharp slashes. “That group feels to me like it’s who we’re looking for. There were feathers left by that dead guy on New Year’s, D. They were white like her outfit that night.”

  He was quiet for several seconds and then: “I just don’t want you to be right, that’s all.”

  I nodded. “I know. I don’t want to be right either. But this is how it is.” We reached the corner where we would need to part.

  “Hey, can I ask you a totally frivolous girl question?” I said, embarrassed.

  He lit up. “My favorite kind!”

  “Do you think . . . I mean . . . it probably doesn’t mean anything but . . . Sabine, I think, kind of has a crush on Lance, and I wondered—”

  “Please, that’s nothing. Whatever. He saved her from being gator food, and she’s grateful. It’s fine.”

  I exhaled. “Thanks, D.”

  The cemetery positively bustled today, for a cemetery at least. I spotted not one but two tour groups winding through the narrow walkways near Marie Laveau’s grave in such close proximity to each other that I worried a shoving match might break out. I set my paint, tray, brush, and roller by the tomb I was assigned to, spread my newspaper on the ground, and set to work. I had been there nearly an hour, rolling out a second coat of paint, my muscles straining as I reached to finish up the top of the tomb. Already I had begun to feel encased in a film of sweat, which wasn’t the best start to the day, when I felt the stinging. I patted at the scar on my chest and glanced around me, noticing nothing out of the ordinary. More tour groups filtered through, business as usual. I felt for my wing necklace and found it beneath my shirt. Perhaps it had irritated that scar. I pulled it in front of my shirt, then returned to work.