Kami Garcia - Unbreakable

Walking up to a stranger’s car felt crazy, but there were plenty of university students on the sidewalks. Even a psycho wouldn’t kidnap me in front of witnesses. My eyes darted to the license plate for a second just in case: AL-0381.

My knees turned to rubber as I knocked on the driver’s-side window.

It rolled down slowly.

Jared Lockhart stared back at me, still wearing his green army jacket.

I must have been in serious shock last night because I didn’t remember him being this gorgeous. Intense blue eyes and full lips, balanced by a roughness that came from a fight or two, kept him from looking like your average pretty boy.

“How long have you been out here?” I couldn’t believe I’d spent the whole day trying to find him and his brother, and they were sitting in front of my house.

Jared shrugged sheepishly. “Awhile.”

Lukas leaned forward in the passenger seat, rolling a silver coin over his fingers. “Glad you’re happier to see us this time.”

“I’m sorry about last night. But I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

Lukas threw me a crooked smile. “Apology accepted. I’m just glad we got there when we did.” He seemed sincere, and something inside me relaxed.

“You guys showed up out of nowhere,” I said. “How did you know I needed help?”

Jared’s eyes darted from me to his brother.

“We heard you screaming.” Lukas didn’t miss a beat. “Your window was open, remember?”

How could I forget—struggling to breathe, the pressure on my chest, almost suffocating. Screaming was the only part I didn’t remember. They weren’t telling me everything. I just didn’t know why.

“Do you guys carry around a gun full of salt and shoot ghosts every night?”

Jared shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “It’s kind of a hobby.”

A hobby? He made it sound like they were playing video games, and I was scared to walk into my own house.

“But I’m safe now? I mean, there’s nothing else in my house, right?”

Jared frowned, his scar disappearing between the worry lines in his forehead. “Those are two different questions.”

Lukas’ smile faded. “Jared, we have to tell her. She’s in danger.”

My skin went cold.

What was inside? The ghosts of other dead girls?

“I thought you got rid of the spirit.”

“We did.” Jared stared into the growing darkness. “But he’ll send others.”

“Who?” My voice wavered.

Lukas stopped rolling the coin and looked at me. “The demon that’s trying to kill you.”

Let me get this straight. A demon is sending these vengeance spirits to kill people?”

It was hard to believe we were having this conversation at the table where I ate my cereal every morning. It wasn’t that I’d never considered the possibility of ghosts, especially after my mom died. I wanted to imagine her out there somewhere in a better place. But a vengeance spirit possessing my cat and murdering my mom was on a completely different level. And now we were talking demons.

Lukas watched me from across the table, measuring my reactions. “The demon isn’t sending them after just anyone. He wants them to kill specific people. And you’re one of them.”

It didn’t make any sense. “Why me?”

Jared had been pacing the room like a caged animal since we came inside. He stopped and turned to his brother, a silent question passing between them. Lukas nodded, and Jared took something out of his pocket. A tattered sheet of yellowed parchment, the creases so deep it practically fell apart when he unfolded it.

Jared slid the paper across the table. “Have you ever seen this?”

A hand-drawn symbol filled the center of the page. It reminded me of a music stand with two lines curving upward, each capped with a triangle like the devil’s tail. “No.”

“Are you sure?” Jared’s eyes drilled into me.

Of course I was. A basic image composed of three continuous lines wasn’t a stretch with a memory like mine. Not that I was admitting that to them.

I studied the symbol for their benefit. “I’d remember something like that. Are you going to tell me what it is?”

“It’s a seal.” Lukas took the silver coin he’d been toying with earlier out of his pocket. It looked like a quarter, but the image was different. His fingers rose and fell in a steady rhythm as the coin rolled over them and back again. “Every demon has a unique seal, like a signature. It’s used to summon and command the demon. This one belongs to Andras.”

Now the demon has a name?

Jared reached for the page, and his hand grazed mine. He yanked it away like he was allergic to human contact, and shoved his hands in his pockets.

“Ever heard of the Illuminati?” Lukas asked.

The name was familiar. They were one of those conspiracy groups featured on the History Channel all the time. “Like the Knights Templar?”

“They were both secret societies, but the Templars fought for the Catholic Church, and the Illuminati wanted to destroy it.”

I paused before asking the next question, testing out the words in my mind. There was no way to make them sound right. “What do they have to do with the demon?”

The one I don’t know if I believe in? The one that’s trying to kill me?

“I’ll give you the short version, but it won’t make sense unless I start at the beginning.”

I stayed quiet, encouraging Lukas to continue.

“In 1776, five guys in Bavaria formed the Illuminati. They wanted to take down the governments and churches so they could create some kind of new world order. They targeted the Catholic Church and decided that killing the pope would be a good place to start.”

“So they were insane?”

“Pretty much.” Lukas leaned forward, resting his arms on the table. “The church formed a secret society of its own—the Legion of the Black Dove. Five excommunicated priests with orders to destroy the Illuminati.”

I wondered if Lukas had seen too many of those documentaries. “Why were they excommunicated?”

“Different reasons.” He gave me an awkward half-smile. “Let’s just say none of them played by the rules.”

“Five people doesn’t sound like much of a legion.”

Jared stopped pacing. “It’s a reference from the Bible. Jesus met a man who was possessed, and he commanded the demon to tell him its name. The demon said, ‘My name is Legion: for we are many.’ ” Jared’s deep voice grew quieter. “The ex-priests called themselves the Legion to remind them of what they were fighting. And of what they had to become in order to win.”

I didn’t know where they were going with this.

“But there was a problem,” Lukas said. “Since no one knew the identities of the Illuminati members, they were impossible to stop. So the Legion turned to a grimoire.”

“A what?”

He watched me for a moment before answering. “Grimoires are texts that provide instructions for communicating with angels… or summoning and commanding demons. The Legion used one to call Andras.”

Angels? Summoning demons?

I stared back at him, speechless.

Lukas walked over to the empty cabinets and rummaged around, unearthing a forgotten coffee mug. He filled it with water from the faucet and handed it to me. “I know all this might sound unbelievable—”

“You think it might sound unbelievable?” I stood up and leaned against the refrigerator behind me, the bite of cold metal spreading up my back. “Which part? The fact that demons exist or that one’s trying to kill me?”