“Margaret Percival,” Dad said.

Margaret looked down at the chunk of wood protruding from her chest. “You should never make promises,” she said, her voice no longer deep and demonic.

She pulled the bedpost from her chest. She looked happy in the rain.

“This way,” came a voice from the door.

Cody.

Chapter 52

“Get out,” Wayne said, shoving Kendra out the door. “Now.”

Smoke roiled in the hall, and flames flickered in eager fingers of golden heat.. Cody had yanked his shirt up over his face so the cloth acted as a filter, but his eyes were red and narrow. The ceiling joists groaned overhead.

“Service stairs,” Wayne shouted.

Future of Horror, I hope to God you’ve got a future.

He slammed the door behind them and flung the deadbolt. Kendra screamed at him but he offered no answer. She yanked on the door handle, but Cody must have had enough sense to lead her away before all hope of escape was lost.

Satisfied that now his daughter had a chance, he turned to face his demons. All of them.

The sprinkler system gave one final gush and then fell to dribbles. Steam curled above the carpet, and Wayne’s boots conducted heat up through the soles of his feet. For an absurd moment, he wished he had his top hat. The prop would have given him a little courage, as if playing a Victorian undertaker conferred an indifference to death.

“You’re not Margaret.”

“I’m way older than that,” it said. “She is just another vessel.”

“I didn’t believe in you, and now I do. Isn’t that enough?”

“Faith is never enough. You need proof. That’s why you’ve been looking so hard.”

Wayne glanced at the bedpost that lay on the bed, a gooey slickness coating its tip. It hadn’t worked the first time, but it was all he had.

Unless....

“How long have you been in the basement?”

“As long as people have needed me.” The demon touched the hole in Margaret’s chest, as if curious about the ephemeral nature of flesh. “As long as God asked me to be.”

“Look. Only two ways this can go. You kill me, or I die when the hotel caves in. So either way we’re stuck together.”

“More than you know.”

The smoke grew thicker. Boards detonated from stress. A huge piece of roof sheeting slid past the window. The heat was palpable now, and each breath carried pain to the bottom of Wayne’s lungs. Outside, the forest glimmered with the reflection of the rising conflagration.

The fire fighters had probably reached Kendra and Cody by now. No reason to wait any longer. It wouldn’t do any good for him to stay here forever, too.

“I kept my promise,” he said.

The demon reached up and yanked the pencil stub from its ear. “Took you long enough.”

“We just said we’d meet again. We didn’t say when.”

“I went to a lot of trouble for you.”

“You caused a lot of trouble, you mean.”

The demon’s face shifted from Margaret Percival’s to Beth’s as fire leapt across the attic and lit up the gash in the ceiling. “Well, I didn’t want Kendra to see me like this.”

Even with her damp hair, the bloom of blood on her chest, and the reflection of the encroaching flames in her eyes, she was beautiful. Digger’s half-dead heart twitched in his chest, revived enough to ache. “She’s not ready to know what she is.”

“She’s almost a woman, Wayne. Haven’t you noticed?”

“I’ve been trying not to.”

“Thanks for bringing her. It was so good to see her.”

“Sorry I waited so long. I was just—”

“Scared. I don’t blame you.” Beth sat on the soggy, gypsum-covered bed as smoke and steam swirled around her face. “We knew something was here. Dumb as we were, we somehow knew.”

A gutter banged against the windowsill and glass shattered. Another chunk of the ceiling fell down, and the attic rumbled and copper roofing flapped from the heat of the updraft.

“Go now,” Beth said, looking at the sketch pencil in her hand. “Get her away.”

“I can’t lose you again.”

“Somebody’s got to fit her for wings.”

“I’m not much—”

“But you’re all she’s got. Dying is the easy way out. I should know.”

“The hotel....”

“Ashes to ashes and all that. Get out of here. I’m tired of goodbyes.”

“Six demons against one angel. Odds are not good.”

“When God gives you a job, you just do it. Come hell or high water.”

Wayne wished he had Beth’s faith. He struggled to leave her with something, even as the walls crackled, but all he had was doubt. “How will I know who wins?”

“See me in heaven and you’ll know.”

He staggered through the smoke and kissed her. She was already gone, air, ether, mist, a cloud in heaven. All that was left was crackling flames, a cacophony of splintering wood, and the filthy sketch pencil lying on the bed.

He grabbed the pencil and ran for the door. The deadbolt blistered his fingers as he racked it loose and swept the door wide, then entered a hall of hell.

“I love you,” he shouted, words lost in the roar of Belial’s fury.

Chapter 53

Violet’s fingers played over the petty cash. A few hundred. Not so hot, but it would do until the unemployment checks came through.

Outside the office, windows shattered and the fire fighters sprayed their futile hoses. They must have thought everyone was out by now, because no hero types were barging through the lobby looking for lost souls.

The real pity was that there was no time to raid the cash register in the bar.

She folded the rumpled stack of bills and slipped them in the waistband of her pants. She wasn’t worried about the fire, not yet, because most of the damage had occurred on the two wings. The front door was barely 50 feet away. She played the flashlight around the office, glad she’d found one that worked.

Violet wondered what else Janey might have stashed away. Maybe there was a lost-and-found drawer, with jewelry, watches, and wallets. She opened the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet and rifled through papers. Aside from a half-empty bottle of Merlot, there was little of interest.

She tried the one above it, now conscious of the smoke collecting in the office. The cabinet was empty except for a photograph of a young woman. The photograph was yellowed with age and chipped at the edges, and Violet would have disregarded it except the face looked disturbingly familiar.

She retrieved the photograph and peered at it.

“Margaret,” Janey said.

Violet turned, nearly dropping the flashlight. The round cone of light framed the manager’s face as she sat behind her desk, smoking a cigarette.

“We couldn’t let her leave,” Janey said. “She was pregnant.”

“We don’t have much time.”

Violet started toward the door and saw it was closed. When she spotlighted Janey’s face, the woman’s eyes were utterly black and no light reflected from them.

“We have a lot of time,” Janey said, except her voice was deep as graves, as cold as a winter tombstone. “And the White Horse needs a new manager.”

Violet tried the door but the handle was so hot that the flesh of her palm sizzled. She yelped and banged on the wood with the bottom of her flashlight, now desperate for heroes.

Chapter 54

Almost....

The floor had nearly fallen away, but Wayne managed to reach the service stairs. Her energy had sluiced before him like a cool winter storm, pushing the flames away, parting the red sea of hell. The demons grabbed at him, claws curled, their howls of rage melding into the larger scream of the dying hotel.

Beth’s ether enveloped him, proving the permanence of devotion, yet he couldn’t touch it. The substance was like mist, white vapors that pushed against the darkness and chaos.