He’d left me again, already pushing open one of the doors, and once again I followed him, resentful as hell until I stepped into the dimly lit apartment.

The door closed behind me automatically, and I caught my breath in wonder.

It was like being on the prow of a ship. The front of the room was a bank of windows looking out over the night-black sea. Several of them were open, and I could smell the rich briny scent of it, hear the sound of the waves as they lapped against the rocks below. There were seagulls in the distance, and I breathed a small sigh of relief. At least something in this crazy place was normal.

“Sit down,” he said.

He was standing in the shadows. There were two mission-style sofas in the room, upholstered in white linen, and a low table between them. With a covered tray on top, a bucket of ice with a bottle of champagne waiting, and a bottle of red wine open to one side.

I stared at the table mistrustfully. “Shit,” I said. I knew without question that there would be meat loaf and mashed potatoes beneath the domed cover.

“How did you manage that?”

“Sit down and eat,” he said. “I’m tired and I want to go to bed.”

I stiffened. “And what does your wanting to go to bed have to do with me?”

Such a pretty mouth, such a sour smile. “Since I don’t intend to be anywhere near you when I go to bed, I won’t be around to answer your incessant questions. So if you want answers, sit down.”

“You’re an asshole.” I took a seat and pulled the cover off the tray. The smell of meat loaf was enough to make me moan with pleasure. Ignoring him, I started in on it, only looking up when I realized he’d poured me a glass of the red wine and pushed it toward me.

Way to make me feel like a mannerless glutton, I thought dismally.

“Mannerly,” he said.

“What?”

“Mannerly glutton. You haven’t drooled or dropped food or—”

I dropped my fork. “Stop that! I don’t know how you do it, but stop it!”

He took a sip from his own glass of wine, leaning back against the cushions of the opposite couch with a weary sigh. “Sorry,” he muttered. “It’s rude of me.”

“You bet your ass,” I snapped. Of all the mental assaults of the day, his invasion of my thoughts felt somehow worse than anything else. I ought to be able to have my errant thoughts be private. Particularly when looking at Raziel made them so very errant. When he wasn’t annoying me.

But I’d better behave. “I’m sorry. I’m being rude as well. Did you want some of this?” I gestured toward the decimated meat loaf.

He shook his head. “I don’t eat meat.”

It was my turn to snort. “Yes you do. You ate a hot dog.” I paused. “How do I know that? When was I around you when you were eating hot dogs?”

“I don’t eat meat when I’m in Sheol,” he said.

“Is that what this place is called? Isn’t that another word for hell?”

“It means ‘the hidden place,’” he said. “And you’re not in hell.”

I stopped shoveling food in my face long enough to drink some wine, hoping it might calm me down. I looked up to realize that Raziel was watching me out of his strange black and silver eyes, watching me too closely, and unfortunately it wasn’t with unbridled lust.

“I want to go home,” I said abruptly, pushing away the tray.

“You haven’t had your strawberry shortcake yet,” he said. “I’ll open the champagne—”

“I don’t want any champagne, I want to go home.”

“You can’t. You don’t have a home anymore.”

“Why not? How long have I been gone?”

He turned his attention to his glass of wine. “From New York? A day and a half.”

I stared at him blankly. “That’s impossible. How can my hair have grown this long in a day and a half?”

“You still have blisters on your feet from those shoes, don’t you?”

I didn’t need to touch my heel to check. The blisters were still there. “If I’ve only been gone for a day, then my apartment must still be there. I want to go back.”

“You can’t.”

“Why not?”

“You’re dead.”

“Crap,” I said.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I SET THE WINEGLASS DOWN ON THE table very carefully, pleased to see my hand wasn’t shaking at all. It wasn’t as if I hadn’t suspected as much—after all, I was no dummy. Men with wings, fires of hell, bloodsuckers. One moment I was in New York City, minding my own business, ogling a gorgeous man at the hot-dog stand, and the next I’d fallen down the rabbit hole. It didn’t mean I was going to give up without a fight. “How is that even possible?” My voice was hoarse but, apart from that, entirely calm. I’d learned to hide my reactions and emotions from my mother, Saint Hildegarde.

“You think you were immortal?” Raziel said. “Everyone dies sooner or later. In your case, it was a combination of those idiot shoes of yours and a crosstown bus.”

Okay. I sat back, the meat loaf sitting like a lump in the pit of my stomach, floating in a pool of gravy grease. “What were you doing there? You were there before I crossed the street. You were ahead of me at the hot-dog stand. I remember now.” I stared at him, thoroughly unsettled. “I remember everything now. Why? Why do I remember now when I couldn’t before?”

“I lifted what we call the Grace. It’s one of the gifts we have, the ability to make someone forget things. You wanted to remember, so I lifted it.”

“You should call it what it is: a mind-fuck,” I said, feeling definitely peevish. “What were you doing there? What am I doing here?”

“I was there to collect you.”

I let myself melt off the seat down onto the floor, needing something solid beneath me. I wasn’t going to hyperventilate. I hadn’t had a panic attack since I was a teenager, dealing with my mother’s attempts to save me from the devil. Guess Mom failed, because it looked as if I’d gone to the devil after all, if Raziel’s fangs and blood-sucking tendencies were anything to go by. Calm, I reminded myself. The sound of the sea would soothe me if I could just concentrate on it for a moment or two.

The danger passed, and I sat straight, rallying. “And exactly what were you—”

“Be quiet and I’ll tell you what you need to know,” he said irritably. “Your time was over. My job is to collect people and ferry them to the next . . . plane of existence. You weren’t supposed to fight me. No one does.”