DEMON DOOR (#2 GHOST PORTAL series)

THREE

"No."

Avery wanted to get up, but his legs wouldn't seem to cooperate. A cold chill crawled up the back of his neck, and he was glued to the seat, being swallowed by the cushions.

"No, she's dead. She has to be. The house exploded, Louise. With her inside. We didn't see her get out—I didn't see her get out. Did you, Jamie?" He stared at Jamie, who froze, as if having to think about it; he then slitted his eyes and shook his head. "Right, so there's no way she's alive. No way."

"There is a way," said Louise, walking around the coffee table to sit where Jamie had been sitting previously. "Because she caused that explosion, and I'm willing to bet my life on that. She caused it by unleashing the demons, as planned. Since you, idiot boy," she glowered at Avery, "let her inside, remember? You never confirmed it, but that's what happened, isn't it?"

Jamie grunted, heaving himself up onto the couch. "Yeah, he did. He wouldn't let me kill her to stop her from getting inside."

Louise winced. "Well, Jamie, your impulsiveness—killing her—would have worsened the situation, actually."

Jamie raised his eyebrows. "What do you mean? It would have rid us of the problem."

Avery growled. "Jessamine isn't a problem, you back-stabbing—"

"—Didn't the prophecy say something about killing her in front of the door?" Louise jut her finger at Avery, shushing him, while keeping her gaze focused on Jamie. "Or pushing her in? That it had to be the one specific man to do it—meaning Avery? No," she tutted, reaching over the coffee table to fetch her mug, "nothing else would have worked. You were both idiots."

Jamie's eyes widened and his mouth gaped open in offense, but he said nothing. He also knew that to defy Louise, to tell her she was wrong, was a bad move.

Avery, however, wouldn't let Louise's insult be the last of their discussion. He didn't growl again, but a suppressed irritation began to flow through him. "She wouldn't let us stop her, Louise. Wouldn't let us go back in with her, either. We'd been in there, we could have accompanied her... but she used some weird energy magic shit to shove us out of her way." His fists bunched as he recalled the power Jessamine had exuded, how easily she'd tossed him and Jamie aside, as if they were light as feathers.

Louise sat back in her seat and held her mug close to her chest. "So she was already enticed by them, then." She sucked her lips in and peered into the still scalding liquid coating her chin with steam. "Those things were already calling to her. They'd been calling to her, I could tell when I held her hand. Her aura was distant, polluted. Something beyond her grasp, beyond my grasp was reaching out to her, beckoning her. I... heard them too, inside her mind, though at the time I wasn't sure what I was hearing."

"Fuck," said Avery, getting to his feet to start pacing by the couch. There was little room, but he needed the exercise, needed to get blood flowing in his legs again. His fingers were trembling, his spine tingling, and every time Louise spoke, he wanted to scream.

Because she was about to hurl some truths at him and Jamie, and it was going to hurt, he knew it. She was always right, and there was never any way to understand how or why.

Her gaze went to the ceiling. "You never should have gone there, either of you. And you never should have brought her, dragging her into danger like that. This," she gaped at Jamie, then Avery, "is on you, boys. Whatever happens now is a direct result of what you've done. Or what you failed to do."

"What he did." Jamie groaned, folding his arms and huffing like a spoiled child. "Because I had nothing to do with it. It was his plan, he was the one who brought Jessamine into it. I didn't want her to go, I didn't want to go to that house. But when Avery decides," he rolled his eyes, "Avery gets whatever he wants."