I sat back, impressed. “Okay, this is a really cool story.”

“Thank you.”

“But why am I the first as well as the last?”

“If you do that math—”

I gaped at him in horror. I had no idea there would be math involved.

He ignored me. “—you’ll realize that seven original gods, and the ghost gods they created, could only have produced a thirteenth if all of them had eventually merged. All seven of the original gods and three of the original ghost gods had merged until only two ghost gods were left. For the first time, two ghost gods, with the power of all those who came before them, merged and you were created from their union.”

I squeezed my eyes and tried to envision the process. “I don’t think you’re very good at math.”

“I’m very good at math.” He took a pencil and paper and drew me a chart with X’s representing the originals and O’s representing their offspring, the ghost gods. He was right. Seven, when boiled down to one, was thirteen total. Seven original and six ghosts.

“So, it’s like my mother and my father gave up their lives to create me?”

“Yes, and no,” Osh said. “They still live inside you. If this is right, the power surging through every cell in your body could destroy this universe. Could destroy a million universes and everything in them. Thankfully, your species is very kind. I like to think the gods before you are sort of like—” He looked at Reyes for the word.

“Like counselors,” Reyes offered.

“Exactly. They’re like counselors. They’re still there inside you, in the consciousness and memories that define your genetic make up. You’re just a separate entity”

“So, to answer your question,” Reyes said, “you are the first pure ghost god, the only one created from two ghost gods. And because there are no more, you are also the last.”

“That’s kind of sad,” I said. “But they’re all still here?” I placed a hand over my heart.

“Like advisors.”

“Think about it, though,” Osh said, gazing at me in awe. “All that power, all that energy, the potency of seven original gods, has been harvested and passed down to you.”

Reyes looked at Osh and did something I’d never seen him do. He sought Osh’s counsel. “This is where I get lost.”

Osh nodded to encourage him.

“Why is she here on this plane? If she is the last god of her universe, of her people, the very last of her kind, why is she here?”

“That’s something even I can’t fathom.”

“The first time we had sex,” I said, making Reyes a little uncomfortable and Osh perk up, “I saw you see me.” I looked at him. “I saw you pick me out of a thousand beings of light. They were all just like me. There has to be more of us.”

“They were not all just like you. To give you a metaphor of what your dimension is like, imagine God, the god of this dimension, among his angels. He is not one of them. He created them. He has the power to reduce them all to ash with a single thought, but he still lives among them. And his angels, while more powerful than the mortal life in his realm, are not like him, though they are made of a similar substance. Of a similar light.”

“So you saw me among my angels?”

“Metaphorically speaking. And, again, you have to understand, all of this took place over millions of years. Probably billions. The gods of your dimension are more ancient than any other beings I’ve ever come across.”

I had an epiphany. “Then I’m older than you.”

“What?” he asked.

“You may be centuries old, but I’m older. I’m millions of years old.”

He grinned. “Yes.”

“I robbed the cradle,” I said, quite pleased with myself. “I wish I remembered all of this.”

“From what I understand, you will once you know your celestial name. It’s like a safety switch. But you aren’t supposed to know your celestial name until your physical body dies.”

“But I did die!” I argued. “When the Twelve attacked us. I stuck a blade in my chest and died, baby. I saw the heavens above us. Trust me.”

“You died, but you came back,” Osh said, struggling to understand himself. “That’s the only way it makes sense. You didn’t take up your position as the grim reaper like you’re slated to do.”

“So, the other grim reapers, the ones that reaped, for lack of a better phrase, before me, they were from my world as well?”

“Yes,” Reyes said. “But they were like the angels. No god has ever taken on such a menial task.”

“Then why leave the gene pool?” Garrett asked. “Why bring in a being—a god, no less—when you already have people for that?”

Reyes nodded, agreeing that the whole thing was utterly illogical. “Like I said before, it’s like sending a queen to do the janitor’s work.”

“Or a god,” Osh said, “to clean up someone else’s mess.”

Garrett sat in thought, then looked at me. “So, whose mess are you here to clean up?”

7

A friend will help you if someone knocks you down.

A best friend will pick up a bat and say, “Stay down. I got this.”

—TRUE FACT

Cookie and I compared notes as we ate some of the wonderful fare Reyes and Osh had grilled up. We came up with very little, unfortunately. She was still waiting on information from Kit, and as long as I was stuck at the convent, I just couldn’t do much. I felt helpless, and the dread that had taken up residence in the back of my neck concerning the Loehrs weighed on me. I didn’t know how to tell Reyes what I’d done.

I begged Cook to go, spend at least the night with her husband in a nice place, but she was adamant about staying. Gemma and Denise were still there, too. They’d been hanging out a lot. It was weird and a little disturbing. Well, Denise was a lot disturbing, but she kept to herself mostly. She picked up our plates and made herself useful. So there was that.

Quentin and Amber went back to watching movies, which reminded me, I needed to call Sister Mary Elizabeth before it got too late. If anyone had the lowdown on what was going on up top, it would be her.

Reyes got up from the table to clean the grill. Gemma found a plush corner in the living room in which to read. Uncle Bob had to get back to the city. Osh was nowhere to be found. That guy kept odd hours. Kit sent over the interviews they’d done with all of Faris’s friends, and Cookie couldn’t wait to dive in, so I took the opportunity to chat with Garrett, since we were the only ones left at the table. All our conversations were about prophecies and hellhounds. I wanted to know how he was doing. Kind of. Really I wanted to know how his son was doing and his baby mama, Marika.

I gestured him to move closer. He frowned suspiciously, then scooted his chair over. Like half an inch. Jerk.

“So?” I asked, drinking a cup of hot chocolate. Another one. Since I was officially off coffee until Beep was born, hot chocolate had become my friend. We weren’t as close as me and mocha latte, but we were getting there. It took time to build a relationship. Trust had always been an issue for me.

“So?” he asked, drinking a beer, his beverage of choice.

“How’s Zaire?”

One corner of his mouth went up. “He’s good. I get to see him almost every week.”

“And what about Marika?”

He lifted a shoulder and leaned back in his chair, straightened out his legs in front of him. “She’s doing well. We’ve been talking.”

I scooted closer. “And?”

“She wants to try dating again.”

“Dude, that’s great.”

“I don’t know. She used me to purposely get pregnant and didn’t tell me.”

“Of course she didn’t tell you. What would you have done if she had?”

“Run in the other direction. But it’s still not okay, Charles.”

He was right, of course, but we all make mistakes. I decided to remind him of that. “Do you remember that time I was helping you out with a bust—?”

“You mean that time you butted into my stakeout because you wanted me to lick your coffee cup?”