Finale

out the window. I stared at the night, at the blur of trees and fields and fences, here one moment, gone the next. The words in my throat coiled into a scream, all sharp
edges and icy pain. The scream hung there, swelling and hurting while my world unraveled and drifted out of orbit.
    A pile of twisted metal blocked the road ahead.
    Scott swerved to miss it, slowing as we passed. I didn’t wait for the car to stop; I threw myself out, running. Patch’s motorcycle. Beaten and battered. I gaped at it, blinking over
and over, trying to see a different picture. The demolished metal, twisted over on itself, appeared as though the driver had raced at top speed—then jumped through a hole in the wind.
    I ground my palms into my eyes, waiting for the awful picture to clear. I searched the road, thinking he must have crashed. In the impact, his body must have been thrown a distance. I ran
farther, a little farther, searching the ditch, the weeds, the shadows off in the trees. He could be just ahead. I called his name. I paced up and down the roadside, my hands shaking as I plowed
them through my hair.
    I didn’t hear Scott come up behind me. I hardly felt his arms around my shoulders. Grief and anguish rattled me, a living presence, so real and frightening. It filled me with such cold, it
hurt to draw breath.
    “I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely.
    “Don’t tell me he’s gone,” I snapped. “He crashed his motorcycle and kept on walking. He said he’d meet me at the studio. He wouldn’t break his
promise.” I said the words because I had to hear them.
    “You’re shivering. Let me take you back to my house, your house, his place—wherever you want.”
    “
No
,” I barked. “We’re going back to the studio. He’s there. You’ll see.” I shoved out of his embrace, but I felt unsteady. My legs shuffled
one numb step after another. A wild, unforgivable thought gripped me.
What if Patch was gone?
    My feet drifted back to the motorcycle.
    “Patch!” I cried out, dropping to my knees. I stretched my body over his motorcycle, strange, powerful sobs erupting from deep in my chest. I was slipping, sliding into the lie.
    Patch.
    I thought his name, waiting, waiting. I sobbed his name, hearing myself make uncontrollable noises of anguish and despair.
    Tears rolled down my face. My heart hung by a thread. The hope I’d clung to untethered, drifting out of reach. I felt my soul shatter, irreparable pieces of me flying outward.
    What little light was left inside me flickered out.

C HAPTER

39
    I GAVE MYSELF UP TO SLEEP. DREAMS WERE THE only place I could reach Patch. Holding on to a phantom memory of him was
better than living without him. Curled up in his bed, surrounded by a smell that was distinctly his, I summoned his memory to haunt me.
    I never should have trusted Pepper to get the feathers. I should have known he’d screw up. I should not have underestimated Dante. I knew Patch would dismiss my guilt at once, but I felt
responsible for what had happened to him. If only I’d arrived at his studio ten minutes earlier. If only I’d stopped Marcie from lighting the match . . .
    “Wake up, Nora.”
    Vee leaned over me, her voice hurried and charged. “You have to get ready for the duel. Scott told me everything. One of Lisa Martin’s messengers came by while you were asleep. The
duel is at sunrise in the cemetery. You have to go kick Dante’s butt to Jupiter. He took Patch away from you, and now he’s out for your blood. I’ll tell you what I think about
that. Hell,
no
. Not if we have anything to say about it.”
    Duel? The idea seemed almost laughable. Dante didn’t need to clash swords with me to steal my title; he had more than enough ammunition to blow apart my credibility and reputation. Every
last fallen angel had been chained in hell. The Nephilim had won the war. Dante and Marcie would take credit, explaining how they’d bullied an archangel into giving them the feathers, and how
they relished every moment of watching them burn.
    The thought of Patch imprisoned in hell slashed a fresh wave of pain through me. I didn’t know how I would hold my emotions in check as the Nephilim cheered wildly over their triumph. They
would never know that up until the last moment, Dante had been helping fallen angels. Nephilim would sweep him into power. I didn’t yet know what it meant for me. If the army was abolished,
would it matter that I lost control of leading it? In retrospect, my oath