Free 2 The Judas Kiss by Angella Graff

that we’re to stay out of this entire mess.  I came too close to dying last time, and neither one of us are in a hurry to repeat that experience.”
                  “I’m only asking if you know anything that I should know,” Ben said, trying to keep patient and calm.  “Anything at all?”
                  “Look, we’ve been keeping to ourselves, okay?” Greg insisted. 
                  “Fine.  If you think of anything, just call me.”  Ben hesitated once more and then asked, “Have you heard from Stella, lately?”
                  “No,” Greg said slowly.  “Why?”
                  “Just wondering,” Ben said.  He had a feeling Greg was lying, but there was no point in pushing him over the phone.  “I’ll be in touch if I have any more questions.  Thanks.”
                  He didn’t give Greg any time for a goodbye, and ended the call.  Feeling frustrated, without any answers, Ben decided the best, and only thing he could do for the moment, was head home to wait.

 
    Chapter Four
     
                  Jude woke with a groan.  His entire body ached and his skin felt tender and burnt.  He opened his eyes, but saw only blackness and wondered if the room was dark, or if he had been blinded.  He stretched out his arms, grateful that he wasn’t bound, and felt the floor beneath him was hard and cold.
                  He sat up gingerly and in the very corner of the room, he saw the palest yellow light through a crack in the floor.  So not blind, he reasoned as he attempted to stand.  Though his legs weren’t bound, they were weak.  He was dressed in a shirt and pants that were too big for him, and he struggled to remember what had happened.
                  He recalled the funeral, getting his first glimpse of the detective Mark had been working with while Jude had been incapacitated by his power drain.  Ben looked sad, his very essence dark and confused.  Jude could read instantly that Ben was special.  He wasn’t a god, and he wasn’t immortal, but he gave off an almost scent of power that Jude didn’t quite understand.
                  After the funeral, Mark had driven home, furious with Ben and irritated with Jude.  He knew he should feel bad for refusing to defend himself, but he was so tired, and Mark just couldn’t understand how he was feeling.  Jude, for his part, was finished.  He was done being outside of the mortal coil.  The pair of them had been wandering the earth for so long that Jude barely remembered his former life.  He barely remembered what it was like to feel human, to feel fear.  To feel anything, really.
                  Mark’s gift was different than Jude’s, and while Jude was quickly driven into madness by people draining his abilities, Mark was cursed with the exact opposite.  Mark could not feel even the slightest bit of insanity, and that in itself was its own hell.  Jude didn’t experience it, but he understood it.
                  Feeling stronger, Jude began to pace the room, arms outstretched, eyes squinting in an attempt to see something, anything, in the pitch blackness.  His fingers brushed the wall, and he made the rounds through the square room.  He counted seventy five steps, so the room was small, and the door on the inside had no handle.  He was also alone, so he could only begin imagine where Mark was, and who had taken him.
                  He remembered the woman on their sofa when they got home from the funeral.  She was one of them, those gods, but she was a friend.  She wasn’t good, by any means, but she didn’t wish them harm, and the moment Jude laid eyes on her, he knew she loved Ben.  She wasn’t responsible for this, Jude knew that immediately, and he wondered if she, too, had been taken.
                  The last thing Jude remembered was lying on