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vials
of holy water and set them on the stove. He tossed the water in the
entity’s direction. Like the smoke and salt, the water went right
through the vaporous creature.
    The creature laughed at his efforts. He was
not the first human being this entity had conquered. This was not
the first time someone had attempted to destroy this darkness. A
low choking sound vibrated through the walls.
    Standing with his back to the wall, he
watched the creature condense into a nightmarish form. Almost
serpent, not quite human, the black smoke entity settled in front
of him. Pulsing tendrils of power and control came off its torso.
Jacob took ear plugs from the fanny pack and stuck them in his
ears.
    “ Try it now,” Celia
said.
    As if he was hitting a racket ball, Jacob
hit a vial of holy water with the palm of his hand. The open vial
spun across the room flinging water. The holy water dropped on top
of it before the creature could disperse. Through the ear plugs, he
heard the entity let out a high pitched screech.
    “ Salt!” Celia
coached.
    Jacob threw a handful of sea salt on the
entity. For a fraction of a second, the pulsing tendrils
retreated.
    The creature flashed solid with power. Out
of the corner of his eye, Jacob saw the spirits of three elderly
men appear into the kitchen. The tramps’ spirits showed the marks
where a black tendril had been before Delphie had freed them.
Enraged, the spirits moved toward the entity. Other spirits
appeared.
    Trapped between the enraged spirits and
Jacob, the entity attempted to return to its vapor form. Jacob
doused it with handfuls of salt and the rest of the holy water. The
creature screeched. It rushed toward the spirits but in its
weakened state, it was pushed back into the room. Stepping away
from the wall, Jacob moved toward the center of the room.
    “ NO!” Celia
screamed.
    In a flash, the entity consumed Jacob.
    ~~~~~~~~
    Monday early morning — 1:17 A.M
    .
    Aden ran as fast as his legs would carry
him. They’d barreled down from Brighton at over one hundred miles
an hour with Jeff’s police cruisers lights wailing. Even with the
luxury of a police escort, he might be out of time.
    Sandy had spiked a fever and was…
    He wouldn’t allow his mind to complete the
thought. He just had to get there. He ran though the Emergency Room
and into the ICU. He passed a stunned looking Tanesha. Heather wept
silently in a chair in front of her bed. Jill hovered close.
    Sandy’s mouth was open for the tube that
went into her lungs. Her lungs rose and fell with the pressure of
the machine. Her long hair was still in the cockeyed braid that
Noelle had given her. Her eyes were closed.
    She looked so peaceful and so very dead.
    He grabbed her hand and almost immediately
let go. Her hand was cold. Outside of the machine that kept her
heart beating, his Sandy was dead.
    “ Oh Sandy,” Aden
whispered. He fell to his knees by her bed. His face pressed
against the blue sheets of her hospital bed. His hands went around
her body.
    “ I’m very sorry sir,” a
doctor with a thick Indian accent said. “We did everything we could
do.”
    “ How could this happen?”
Seth asked.
    “ Her fever increased,
sir,” the doctor said. “Her kidneys shut down. After that, it was
only a matter of time. Her brain, well, baked from the heat. She
held on as long as she possibly could. I believe she was waiting
for you. But…”
    The doctor shook his head and stuffed his
hands in his white medical jacket.
    “ We waited to remove her
from life support,” the doctor said. “We figured you might want to
take the time to attend to this matter.”
    “ What did you say?” Seth
asked.
    “ We don’t expect her child
to survive,” the doctor said.
    “ Rachel?” Aden looked up
from the bed. “But…”
    “ Too much infection for
such a tiny baby to survive,” the doctor said. “She hasn’t
succumbed yet but we expect her to do so within the
hour.”
    “ No,” Aden sobbed. “How
can that be