“All right, start the portal while I talk to Michael about it,” Lincoln told Shea, then jumped up from the driver’s seat with Noah quickly replacing him.

My mind whirled as I took a deep breath. Maybe I could erect my shield to cover the entire bus, protect the tires and windows from further damage while we did this portal thing…

My plasma-like wall began to rise up off my body, and I pushed it outward, covering Shea and then Noah.

“Umm… what the hell is that?” Tiffany’s shrill voice came from behind me.

Ignoring her, I focused on my breathing.

“Oh, Emberly told me about this. I’m excited to experience it.” Grace walked headfirst into my shield fearlessly, as I thinned it around her body to make room for her.

“Tickles, huh?” Emberly commented, stepping inside as well.

“Don’t touch me with that thing!” Tiffany scrambled toward the back of the bus, retreating from my advancing shield.

I rolled my eyes, pushing the plasma film out even farther. Lincoln stood on one of the seats, his head popped out of the roof while talking to Michael, as I covered him as well.

Tiffany screamed in fear as my shield came for her, just as a fresh round of bullets hit the side of the bus.

“Oh, shut up already!” Shea growled, trying to keep her concentration on opening a giant bus-sized portal to Hell. The film finally engulfed a freaked-out Tiffany, and moved on to Mikey, Luke, and the others, who didn’t seem to mind as my protection wall passed over them.

Once I was convinced that I’d covered the entire bus, I looked out the front window. A slight panic rippled through me at the sight of the desolate wasteland of the underworld. My time in Hell had left its mark on me, and going back there was always my least favorite thing to do.

“All right, listen up.” Lincoln jumped down from his perch. “Brielle, good job on the shield. Try to keep it going—Michael says he’ll help. Noah, Michael and I are going to attach the discs now, and we’ll go ahead with Shea’s plan. Michael says Metatron would never give us something unless it worked 100 percent.”

That was only slightly comforting, because if it didn’t work, then my husband, his best friend, and Michael, were all going to die instantly.

As he and Noah attached the discs to their forearms with leather wristbands, I focused on keeping my shield strong. At least a hundred demons had reached our bus now, and were shaking it, shooting at it or trying to slash the tires. At least we’d distracted them from killing the humans, and that’s what mattered.

Noah revved the engine as Shea pulled the portal wider.

“Can I help?” Catia stepped up next to her.

My bestie looked at the Light Mage and nodded, directing her on how to utilize her energy to assist in keeping the portal open.

“What if they just come right back out?” Noah asked his fiancée.

“Shhh, I got this.” Shea’s forehead was slick with sweat, hands out before her as she chewed her lip in concentration. Catia looked strained now as well, and I decided that being a Mage was probably one of the harder magical gifts.

I was staring through the portal into Hell when I saw another portal opening on the other side. It looked like it led back to this world.

“Shea, are you doing two portals at once?” I asked, completely dumbfounded.

She didn’t answer, all of her concentration on the task at hand. Even Catia, standing next to her, looked completely focused.

“Go. Fast. Now,” Shea ordered calmly, and Noah gunned the bus so hard that I flew backward into Lincoln’s outstretched arms.

Mikey and Luke grunted as we mowed down a few demons, and we shot right into Hell. Lincoln’s body tensed against me, when we sped through the portal and into the Devil’s homeland. Catia and Shea held onto the railing at the front, while they kept throwing their magic at the portal.

Please God, keep them safe, I sent up to the man upstairs, just in case.

The bus was fully in Hell now, and the demons were running in after us, just as planned.

“Are you okay?” I looked over at Lincoln, whose brows were pinched together.

“Yeah. It’s… tolerable.” He seemed in awe.

Relief poured through me, but it was short-lived.

“Okay, stop!” Shea instructed Noah, and the bus came to grinding halt. We were in Hell, in the middle of nowhere. Red misty fog rolled across the dirt ground, and there were a few mountains off in the distance, but that was all.

I peered behind me to see the demons had followed us in here. A good-sized crowd was still waiting at the portal opening on Earth, but we’d lured about half, which could be the game changer we needed.

Shea took a deep breath and clapped her hands together. In that moment, the portal behind us closed, trapping the demons inside with us.

“Sigillum,” Shea whispered, causing green light to flare inside of the bus, then looked at Noah. “Go!” she roared.

Noah didn’t question her as he gunned it, rolling our huge bus across the hellish desert toward the second portal she had opened, which looked like it led to the other side of the park on Earth. The demons were running and flying after us, but we were faster. Bullets and magic spells crashed against the bus, yet, I held my shield strong.

“Faster!” Shea screamed, and Noah pressed the pedal down to the floor.

As the front of the bus went through the portal to Earth, Shea and Catia started to shrink it around us. “Sigillum,” Shea said the second we were fully through, and that green light flared out once more.

Noah slammed on the brakes, crashing halfway onto someone’s front yard, and we all braced ourselves, trying not to be thrown forward.

The rooftop hatch popped open then, and Michael stuck his head in. “Naughty, naughty. That was dark magic.” He looked at Shea, but she just shrugged, which made the archangel grin. “Well done. Let’s load the humans and get out of here.”

“What was the green light stuff?” I asked my bestie, as I reached for my gun.

“After you were taken to Hell, Lucifer made it so we couldn’t create any portals while in Angel City.”

I grinned. “You learned the spell, and locked the demons inside?”

She nodded. “They’ll have to walk quite far to get out.”

Perfect.

A low growl from behind us broke up our conversation. My brother’s wolf wanted to pass us, eyes glowing yellow and ready to fight.

“Stay by my side,” Lincoln ordered me, leading us out of the bus while I dissolved my shield. I needed to keep my strength up for fighting, and boy, was I ready to fight. These bastards would pay for what they’d done to the humans.

The moment I stepped off the bus, I let my wings free and stepped beside Lincoln with my sword drawn. A very enraged-looking Brimstone demon was leading the gang of Hellspawn that descended on our small group.

Michael leapt from the roof and landed before us, holding his blade aloft. Blue sparks glimmered off the sword, so brightly even the advancing demons shied their gaze.

“Surrender, or be met with swift death!” Michael’s voice boomed as if it were amplified.

In response, a fiery ball of magic hurtled through the air, right at the archangel. Michael reached up and sliced the ball in half with his sword, and the war began.

We all charged forward then. Mikey was a mass of muscle and fur, ripping past me to land on the Brimstone demon and tear his throat out. Luke was right behind him, and they worked as a team.

I stayed at Lincoln’s side, as he’d asked me, and we were just cutting down a gang of Snakeroot demons when a bloodcurdling scream drew my attention. Pulling my gaze to the direction of the noise, my stomach dropped. An Abrus demon was inside of the gated-off area with the humans, and he had a knife to one of their throats, asking the others to do something. Probably take a contract.

Without thought, I burst from the ground and tore through the air. I heard Lincoln call my name but ignored it, my gaze solely focused on the demon with the blade. My wings cut through the air as I pumped them faster, sailing over the tall fencing. I dropped into the pit just behind the Abrus demon and took his head in my hands, jerking quickly to the side like Lincoln taught me, I snapped his spine.

The hand holding the knife fell away from the girls’ throat as his lifeless body clattered to the ground with a sickening thud. Did I trust that an Abrus demon with a broken neck wouldn’t somehow come back to life and kill me? Hell no. Reaching to my hip, I pulled out my sword and cut his head clean off in one swift movement.

Some of the humans gasped and shied away from looking, but most didn’t. Most of them stared with a visible hatred brewing just below the surface.

“We’ve come to take you to Angel City. Free souls are no longer welcome in Demon City,” I told the group, then spun when I noticed white wings in my peripheral vision.

Lincoln.

My husband cut through the fence like it was made of butter, making a hole for the humans to climb through it. But instead of running for freedom or weeping in joy at my declaration, the people just stared at me with tears of utter sorrow in their eyes.

A young girl with bright red hair who looked about twelve years old stepped forward. “You expect me to leave my mom in this shit hole? My grandma too?”

She reminded me of myself when I’d first come here, bitter and full of fire. I followed her gaze beyond the fence to a middle-aged woman with red hair, and the red crescent moon tattoo on her forehead.

It wasn’t fair. The demons made humans sign lifelong contracts for small and simple things like a job, money, power, a car, food, healing. Things you should be able to work off in a year or so.

It. Wasn’t. Fair.

“Your mother and grandmother made their choice when they chose to align with evil. But for you there’s still a chance, and I’m sure I speak for your family when I say they would rather you be in Angel City alone, than grow up here as a demon slave, which is now your only alternative.”

Lincoln’s words shocked me. He’d always hated this place, these people. He’d always been insensitive to the reasons humans took a slave contract. He couldn’t help it; he was ignorant of their ways. But I wasn’t. I knew. I’d been in that place myself, but I’d also just had an epiphany.