Free Redeeming Angel by J.L. Weil

might.
    Bon voyage, mother
trucker.
    Motionless, her eyes went wide. The
sound of rubber shrieking was followed immediately by the
ear-piercing crunch of metal, like a sonic blast that shook me to
my very core. Glass fragmented, showering the inside of the car and
nicking my flesh as I was thrown from every which angle in my seat,
but I didn’t feel it.
    While the car tumbled and rolled again
and again across the pavement, I went for the blade sheathed in my
sock. The bone-shattering impact of each complete spin made the
simple process of reaching down difficult, but I battled against
gravity until my fingers wrapped around the handle.
    The demon herself couldn’t be sent
back to Hell, but I could force her out of her host. It would buy
me the time I needed to get to Angel.
    I was quite acquainted with
the feeling of spinning wildly out of control. Kira? Not so much.
She let out a war cry of frustration, snapping her seatbelt. Bad move, bitch . Her head
whacked the roof of the car, neck angling in a way a human’s was
not meant to bend.
    Shit had definitely gone
downhill.
    When she came back down, she dove
straight at me, nails extended like claws and flaxen hair floating
around her face. It made my job of running the blade into her heart
as simple as pie. She basically landed on it. I gave my wrist a
twist, driving the dagger home. “Apstergo,” I said.
    As soon as I finished the chant to
expel the demon from her body, the car finally stopped rolling. It
teetered on two wheels before falling back down to the ground in a
tremor that rumbled as if it reached the earth’s crust. Kira’s
weightless body slumped on top of mine, and I waited for that
pivotal moment when she disintegrated to ash.
    Damn demons.
    Of course she wouldn’t follow
protocol. Pushing aside the body of some nameless woman who’d been
unfortunately possessed by Kira, I dragged in a long deep breath,
and as soon as I was sure my lungs were working, I padded my hands
over my body. Hella-freakin’-lujah. I was still in one piece.
Mostly. No missing limbs—maybe a broken rib or two—and the cuts
would heal in a few hours. In a situation like this, it was good to
be supernatural.
    Removing my seatbelt, I leaned to my
left and kicked the door with my foot. Blood seeped down the side
of my face and dripped down the back of my throat. The door
clattered to the ground, and I stepped out of the car, taking in my
surroundings. There was a line of trees in the distance. The car
had tumbled off the shoulder into the grass.
    I climbed up the embankment and looked
down at my handiwork. Good grief. My car insurance was going to
cost me a fortune. Two totaled cars in a year. I sighed at seeing
another one of my vehicles charred.
    The roar of flames licked the car and
caught, burning metal and melting plastic. A steam of heat rose up
in the vicinity, creating a mirage. Smoke billowed in the air,
escalating and disappearing into the clouds. It carried the smell
of roasting oil and grease, hardly pleasant.
    Dusting the glass and dirt off my
rather ratty clothes, I ran a hand through my hair, shaking loose
any debris. I needed new transportation and quick. I could travel
the entire way running, and heck, it probably would have been
faster, but I’d only wear myself out. Saving Angel was going to be
exhausting in itself.
    So I was going to “borrow” the first
car I came upon, and hopefully the burning pile of metal beside me
would only aid my plight. As luck would have it, I didn’t have to
wait long.
    A silver sedan flew by, breaking when
the driver caught a glimpse of the crash and me beaten up on the
side of the road. I walked up to the driver’s side
window.
    “ Hey, do you need me to
call for help?” a man with slightly receding hair and crow’s feet
around his brown eyes asked.
    Granted, this wasn’t my first rodeo.
Travis and I had been known to hotwire and hijack cars for shits
and giggles, mostly Dev’s until he bought us cars of our own. I
doubted