Good Intentions (Book 3 in the Road to Salvation Series)

CHAPTER 14

Deb turned to Katie, her eyes wide. "What?"

Katie turned to Wes. "Yeah, what?"

It wasn't true. It couldn't be. How would they even expect her to accomplish that task? There was no way she was creating anything. He had to be lying. Maybe he was just telling her this to get her away from Josh. She definitely wouldn't put it past him. His other attempts hadn't been successful.

"I know they told you about Lilith and having her soul."

Katie nodded. "Yeah."

"And I'm sure they served up a tale of betrayal and abandonment that made you feel sorry for her."

"So?" She didn't try to hide her irritation.

"So if they told you what they were really planning, would you have stuck around?"

Katie thought about that for a moment, but only a brief one. Of course she wouldn't have. She'd even told Josh specifically that she didn't want to be Lilith if that meant innocent people would get hurt. He'd told her they wouldn't. He'd assured her that only sinners would be targeted. He wouldn't lie to her. But if Wes was telling the truth, he had done just that. Unless he had been lied to also. And that must have been what happened. Josh had always been forthcoming and honest with her. He would have told her what was going on. She was sure of it. And yet, he hadn't told her she was Lilith. She'd had to get that information from Lucifer. She shook her head. No. She wasn't going to doubt Josh. Wes wasn't going to mess her brain up anymore.

"Like I said before," Wes said. "Lilith is complicated and not one thing or the other. She has the ability to show compassion, to sympathize with others. She knows how to love. And with her soul being dormant for so long, it reset to a blank slate. Everything was forgotten. She has to be reminded of who she was."

She hated to admit it, but that made a lot of sense. It explained a lot, like why she had such an unexplainable affinity for both good and evil, and maybe it explained her tendency to drift toward evil. But it didn't have to be that way.

Katie swallowed thickly. "And that could mean either the good side or the bad side."

Wes nodded. "Exactly. And, as you can imagine, it's more beneficial for evil if she remembers her hate and anger."

"But why all the games?" Deb asked. "Why not just expose Katie to pure evil and let everything unfold that way."

"Because they have to deal with her human side. If they had discovered her as a baby, that's exactly the course they would have taken. But since she's older and has a sense of right and wrong, they have to convince her that what they are doing is better than what the other side is doing. They have to skew her knowledge of good and evil."

Katie scoffed inwardly. They didn't have to try that hard. Wes had done a really good job of making "good" super unappealing.

"Why isn't the good side doing something to sway me the other way? Why haven't I been visited by God or angels?"

"The good side has tried to influence you. Every day. Deb and your mom have expressed their concern and tried to bring you back to our side, but you refused to listen. My father and I tried. Maybe not in the best way, but we were there." Sadness covered his face. "Goodness is around you all the time, but you have to recognize it for what it is and let it help you. The same is true with evil. Josh and Braden never forced you to do anything you didn't want to. They just laid the temptation in front of you and you made the decision to take it."

"That's not true!" Katie snapped. "They threatened to kill my mom. I didn't have a choice there."

Wes held his hands out to his sides. "Of course you did. You had several, including the one that you made."