Shire Bottom Chronicles

Chapter Twenty-Seven

"How are you feeling?" Matt tucked a loose strand of hair behind Rory's ear as everyone took their seats around the conference table.

Rory dabbed her bottom lip with a Kleenex and forced a smile. "I'm okay," she insisted. "I think the bleeding has stopped. She didn't bite me too deep." In the nine years that Rory had known Cat, the older woman had never attacked her before. Rory understood that Cat had gone through a very traumatic experience and needed time to recover, but it was still scary to think about how easily Cat could have killed her.

"I hope Bane's right, and Cat is back to normal tomorrow," Matt whispered. His gaze drifted around the room; a large AV screen hung on the wall above the head of the table. Bane sat in the executive chair, eyes glued to his laptop, while Cat sulked in a plush chair beside him. Bane clicked his mouse and several photographs materialized on the AV screen. Matt's eyes fell upon the blonde-haired, blue-eyed image of his mother, dressed in a long white robe.

"James, why don't you get us started?" Bane suggested. 'Did you find out how Michael is communicating with the organization?"

"Yeah, and it's nuts." James took a drink of water from a glass on the table in front of him. "Michael possessed Matt's mom, Beverly. I heard his voice speaking through her. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but it looked like she was glowing."

"He possessed her?" Matt demanded, his mind reeling as he thought of all the times she had forced him to attend church growing up. She always said that God would take care of her family if they remained devoted to Him, and punish those who turned their back on the path of enlightenment, whatever that was. In his parents' warped sense of reality, injury and disease were the work of the devil. The only way to be cured of the dark sickness was to pray and beg God to forgive your sins. If prayers didn't work, that meant your soul was lost. "Why would he choose her?"

"Michael needed someone who could deliver his message," Bane insisted. "Beverly's faithful worship of Vanicais, or God, made her a suitable candidate for possession because she wouldn't reject Michael's spirit. I suspected years ago that both her and Raymond were members of the organization, but I didn't have any proof."

"When you were recovering in the medical wing after Jules attacked you, Raymond stole a product from the weapons lab," Komazzi said. "He initially confessed that he planned to sell the device for extra cash. He presented a security risk, so Bane fired him. Then, when Bane and I were going through Edwin's emails a few weeks ago, we learned Raymond had been spying on the company from the very first day he worked there."

Matt slumped in his chair. "I can't believe it," he mumbled. "Why didn't you tell me about this?"

"We found the emails while you were in the hospital, and I didn't want you to fall into a depression," Komazzi said. He reached across the table and squeezed Matt's hand. "Bane and I came to an agreement we would wait until you had fully recovered to break the news."

"And now we know what role Beverly is playing," Bane said, typing notes onto the screen. "What did Michael say, James?"

"Well, he has this crazy idea that Cat is the daughter of an angel and a demon, which is just insane," James insisted. He furrowed his brow. "Michael said that the angel is his sister Gabriel, and she covered up Cat's birth to prevent her from being killed. He told me that both you and Cat are Nephilims, and they want to destroy you because you're a threat to humanity or some bullshit.."

Cat giggled and flipped her long blonde hair. "It's not crazy if it's true, sweetheart."

"What? I thought you were vampires like Komazzi, but with more powers," Rory said, her gaze flickering between Bane and Cat. That day at Crimson Inc. when Cat levitated Edwin off the ground flooded back to her. She remembered the black lines that crawled up Cat's skin like veins, and how her eyes had filled with blood. At the time, it hadn't dawned on her that Cat wasn't a vampire. How could she be so naive?