Of Consuming Fire (7 page)

“
Grace!
”

Grace jumped, and the momentum caused one of the tears she’d been fighting to tip over the edge of her lower lid and trail down her cheek. Grace squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath, certain every second would be the last she maintained control.

You are beautiful,
the Voice whispered to her mind.

Grace’s eyes popped open. The Voice had been speaking to her constantly since the moment she found out that the angel was capable of invisibility. It whispered …
encouragements
to her. It was just unsettling enough to pull Grace from this latest dark reverie.

Her eyes focused to find all four of her fellow prisoners staring at her with varying expressions of concern and wariness. She focused on Dahlia, who was closest and had her mouth opened, as though she were going to say Grace’s name again.

Grace took a shuddering breath. “What?”

Dahlia snapped her mouth shut. Apparently, now that she had Grace’s attention, she didn’t know what to do with it. After several seconds, “Are you okay?”

Grace breathed a disbelieving laugh.

The corner of Dahlia’s mouth turned up fractionally. “Let’s get you some clothes, okay?” she asked softly.

Grace let her eyes fall shut as she fought to keep from remembering just how disgusted the angel had sounded as he looked upon her exposed skin.

Grace, no
, the Voice whispered.
You misinterpret
—

Grace’s gasp interrupted the Voice. She snapped open her eyes. She
misinterpreted
? That was not something Grace did.
Ever
. She embraced the anger that overshadowed the shame. The Voice had to stop. It was creepy and weird, and she couldn’t take any more changes right now.

She turned to Dahlia once more. “This Voice thing … .”

Dahlia’s eyes widened. “It’s speaking to you?”

Grace nodded. It was all she was capable of as she tried to find a diplomatic way of asking how to make it go the hell away.

“Isn’t it great?” Jericho asked, drawing Grace’s eyes to him.

Grace felt one eyebrow rise and her lips pinch, but Abilene and Eli were too busy adding their like-minded comments for anyone to notice.

Dahlia, however, snorted, and all eyes turned to her. Grace felt a flare of comfort that was quickly squelched by the woman’s next words: “Actually, it
is
pretty cool.”

Et tu, Dahlia
? Grace scowled. “What is it supposed to be,
God
?” Okay, even Grace recognized how bitchy that sounded. Proverbial crickets sounded in the aftermath, as everyone looked at her with mouths open.

Eli spoke first in calm, measured words. “Is that a problem?”

Grace swallowed hard, but refused to back down. “Come on. I’m an intellectual.”

Now Eli was angry. “Whereas I’m dumber than dirt, so I’m
allowed
to think it’s God?”

Abilene spoke up from the bed. “Okay, okay, corners, people.” Her eyes held understanding as she looked at Grace. “Why does it matter if it’s God, Grace?” she asked softly.

Grace felt her brow crinkle even further. “Oh, seriously, I can’t be the only person in this room who’s thinking it.”

“Thinking what?” Jericho bit out in a low voice.

Grace sighed. Great. She’d pissed him off, too. “That if it’s God — and it seems to
like
us — then why is there an
angel
here set on killing us?”

More crickets.

“Huh,” said Dahlia. “How ’bout that?”

Eli clenched his fist. “That is — a really good question.”

“Are we sure he’s an angel?” Jericho asked.

“He’s too much of a self-righteous asshole to be anything else,” Dahlia muttered.

Grace sidled closer to Abilene’s bedside as the other three continued to mull over this newest question.

“Don’t worry,” Abilene whispered. “It takes some getting used to, but soon you’ll love it.”

They were back to talking about the Voice. “Does it ever go away?” Grace couldn’t keep herself from asking.

Abilene shook her head at the same time the Voice whispered,
I am always here
.

Grace had the feeling she was meant to be comforted by that. Instead, every muscle tensed. One of the few comforts Grace had was her solitude. Was even that to be taken from her?

I do not take, only give
.

“Yeah, right.”

Abilene smiled, and Grace realized she’d spoken out loud.

“Crap,” Grace said.

Abilene giggled. “Don’t worry. We all do that sometimes.”

“ — ’bout to die of boredom.”

Grace and Abilene turned toward the other three.

“We could clean up the wing from the earthquake,” Jericho offered. “It would keep our hands busy at least. You know, with something other than throttling the angel.”

Grace leapt at the opportunity. “I’ll help.” Anything to keep her distracted.

When Grace tried to follow them out into the hallway, Dahlia stopped her. “Let’s get you some clothes first, all right?”

The words were said kindly, but that didn’t keep Grace from flinching.
I do not want to see that anymore.

“Oh, Grace, I didn’t mean — ” Dahlia reached out to touch her. Grace sidestepped, and Dahlia’s hand hovered in the air.

“Right.” Grace didn’t even recognize her own voice. “Clothes. Of course.”

Grace lay in bed the next morning and stared at the drop-tile ceiling. She was in the room at the end of the medical wing, away from all of the others. There were a good three rooms between her and her nearest co-prisoners, Jericho and Dahlia.

She didn’t think standing in a corner and hugging herself while wishing to be invisible would make this go away. Last night, after cleaning the wing, they sat through a tense communal dinner of liquid spaghetti and meatballs. And, though a nine-and-a-half month pregnant woman lay, literally, in their midst, they had all eyed
Grace
like she was a ticking time bomb.

For someone who was used to disappearing into the walls, it was very disheartening.

But not quite as disheartening as the brief flares of discomfort along her nerve endings that had sent her to bed at eight o’clock. No,
those
had been absolutely terrifying. As terrifying as Abilene’s response to Grace’s whispered question, “How bad will it get if I don’t … ”

Bad.
Very
bad
.

Grace had the covers tucked up to her chin. Underneath the sheet, she wore only a baggy scrubs top, which hit her mid-thigh when she was standing, and a pair of no-nonsense panties. She turned her head and stared longingly at the one-size-too-big scrub bottoms meticulously folded over a chair. With every fiber of her being, she longed to put them on. To cover her new body — she estimated she was now a size 16 — with frumpery and go on with her day as though nothing had happened.

But something
had
happened. Grace idly scratched her neck at a brief flare of hot, itching pain. It was worse today. The flares were closer together — already, since waking, Grace had experienced several of them. They showed up at random spots on her body. And always, accompanying the physical discomfort, her brain flashed images of the angel behind her eyes. His flowing, vibrant brown hair. The skin so warm and sweet in color she wondered if it tasted of raw sugar. Those eyes a color she’d never seen: honey-drenched moss. His height. His broad shoulders. The powerful body his robe did nothing to hide. His chest.

Her lips opened as her new, improved memory provided a perfect sensory recollection of his massive, beautiful chest. Flat planes of muscle that spread forever. Muscle she could sink her fingers into. Rest her cheek against. Nuzzle.

She squeezed her eyes shut and slapped a hand to her forehead. “Ugh, no!” she scolded herself. She held her breath until the unwelcome image began to have black dots pierce it. With a whoosh of air, she threw herself onto her side. She did
not
want to think of that
creature
as a sexual object. She hadn’t thought of a man in that way since she was seventeen — too young, naïve, uneducated, and hormonal to know better.

Bad.
Very
bad
.

For perhaps the millionth time since last night, Abilene’s grave warning flitted through her head.

Grace heaved a sigh, and with her eyes squinched shut as tightly as possible, she put her right hand beneath the sheets. She began to trail it down her body slowly, giving her mind — already at the verge of panic — time to accept the inevitable: they were going to have to do this. Her fingertips passed through the valley between her breasts. Grace’s skin began to crawl. They reached her soft, rounded belly. A fine tremor settled into Grace’s arms. They reached the elastic band of her panties.

Grace’s mind bailed ship.

“Seth, this isn’t funny,” she said, clutching her hands to her breasts and eyeing her boyfriend’s best friend, Joe, where he stood silhouetted in the doorway. Whatever was going on, his addition to the private moment between Grace and her boyfriend was unwelcome.

Grace couldn’t see his eyes in the darkness of the room, but she imagined they were glowering as Joe’s dark form observed her where she lay half-naked on Seth’s bed. “Wow, you got this far,” he said to Seth with a sneer. “You sure you need my help for the rest?”

From where he sat beside her on the bed, Seth laughed the same vibrant laugh that had first gotten Grace to notice him. “Man, this is as far as she ever goes.” Seth gestured Joe into the room. “Let’s do this. I’m so ready for it to be over.”

Grace tried to snatch the sheet over her body, but Seth was sitting on it, and he didn’t budge. Dread was slowly fermenting in her stomach. “Um, I should go,” she offered timidly. Both men turned to her like hawks spotting prey. “My roommate is expecting me.”

They laughed, and then Joe entered the room, closed the door behind him, and clicked the lock into place. The snick of the gears shot through the last of Grace’s hesitation and hopeful doubt. She jumped up from the bed where she and Seth had been kissing and touching only moments before, and snatched her shirt from the floor, making a beeline for the door.

Joe easily snatched her against his chest as she tried to push past him in the small dorm room and flung her back to the bed.

That was the moment when Grace fully realized that they were going to rape her. Her vision wavered, and she turned her eyes upon Seth as he stood from the bed and began to undo his jeans. “Why would you — ” she swallowed down a panicked sob. “Seth … I love you. Don’t do this.”

Joe let out an abrupt bark of laughter. “Oh my God!” He clapped Seth on the back. “You’re good, man, you’re good. You got her to love you? That wasn’t part of the deal. Shit, not even I’m that cruel.”

Grace scrambled back on the bed and hit the wall with a thud.

“Shut the fuck up, man, and just grab her arms. Let’s get it done.” He made a noise of disgust. “Look at her. She’s such a fat cow.” He glanced down and Grace’s eyes automatically followed, landing on his flaccid penis. She turned her face into the wall with a gasp. “How am I even going to get it up?” Seth asked.

Grace moaned, wondering why, with what was about to happen, his words were what were hurting her most. Like a child, she covered her head with her arms. Light shattered her attempt at hiding as her arms were jerked over her head. Joe held her down and said, “You’ll figure something out, man. Picture someone else.”

Seth laughed. “I always do with this one.” Then he flopped himself down on top of her.

His hot breath fanned her face with the stench of cheap beer. Joe’s excited breathing echoed behind her head; his fingers dug into her skin with unforgiving force. Grace turned her face into her shoulder as tears pooled in her ears, trying to ignore the fact that her pants were being yanked down her legs.

Seth shoved her legs apart with his knees. Horrid, gut-wrenching terror speared her at the foreign feeling of an erection pressing against her naked flesh.

“You’re nothing,” Seth whispered to her. “Nothing but a stupid bet.”

He drove into her body, and after the first searing sting, the only thing she felt was the shattering pain of his hands on her body.

With a cry that neared a scream, Grace wrenched her hand out of her panties. She rolled violently to the side, finding air and then the unforgiving floor, pain shooting up through her knees and hands as she hit concrete.

For several heart-wrenching seconds, Grace thought she had lost all of the control she’d gained over the last thirteen years. The entire rigor she’d put her mind through. All of the knowledge she’d gained. The prestige. Her work.

For a moment, she feared she had degenerated to the wallowing mess of a teenager she’d once been in the years after …

She hovered on the precipice of complete mental breakdown for a few seconds more before she was able to pull her panic back a fraction. Several more seconds saw the panic pulled back by half. Five minutes later, she was frazzled, but back to as close as she would ever get to “normal.”

She rose to her feet unsteadily, and then once she was sure she wouldn’t collapse with her first step, launched herself at her pants. She pulled them on with jerky movements, her harried breaths echoing around the room.

Once her armor of ugliness was in place, she allowed herself a deep breath.

“You’re okay,” she told herself, the words coming to her from the hidden place of daily repetition and long-term memory. “You depend on no one. You are your own person. Just make it through today.” Her voice cracked.

The words didn’t have the same effect they usually had, and she stared at the bed with longing.

Just one day,
she thought fervently.
Just one day in bed. I won’t let it get like it was in the beginning
. When she had spent several months without once leaving her room.