This scene has only been edited for readability. Any inconsistencies between it and the events that take place in the book are a result of subsequent revisions.  For context, this scene takes place after the events in Ch 25, and is written from Dorian’s point of view.

I watched Jacky leave, and had to fight the urge to follow her. To offer her the comfort I knew she’d never accept from me. 

“By the light,” someone whispered behind me, “her grief.” 

I closed my hands into fists. My chest ached as if I’d been punched. Hard. Repeatedly. I knew the diligence angel had felt it as well, but she was an inhabiter. Her borrowed human body provided a shield that blunted the worst of the emotional blow. 

I had no such shield. 

“Dorian?” Howell asked. “Who’s Mikey?” 

I spun slowly on one heel to face the others. Howell’s worry shifted and coiled around him, the hurt he felt that of a werewolf for a wounded pack mate. Another kind of empathy. One more basic to human nature. The brightlings exuded a range of confusion. Suspicion. Hatred. I slid my gaze to the young scion. He could prove a threat. 

“Mikey,” I said, and stopped, wondering how much to give them. Wondering if they even had the right to know. I swept a glance over the brightlings again. The druid, at least, seemed to believe Jacky was in real pain. Her and the two angels. “He’s a bug. Jacky’s known him since he was a toddler.”

And he’d been riding the fine edge of despair and control for as long as I’d known him, short though that acquaintance had been. 

I gave them all time to understand, and reach the logical conclusion. Bugs lived short lives. Unless he’d been injured, there was only one reason he’d end up in the hospital. 

Abigail made another pained sound. 

“I didn’t know demons were capable of caring so deeply for someone outside their sin,” Chris said. I could almost hear their thought process as their emotions shifted from surprise, to confusion, to disbelief, to certainty. “He was her sinner, then.” 

“No,” I said firmly. “Jacky’s been a master for just over a week. Zach is her only sinner.” 

The nephilim’s certainty shattered and swirled into a storm of confusion. “I don’t understand.” 

Werewolves were emotional creatures. And loyal. I felt it, when Howell’s limited patience snapped. 

“She was his friend,” he said, fury a tangled mess of snarling teeth around him, jagged and ready to bite. “She cared about him because they were friends. Had been friends since they were kids. How is that so fucking hard for you to understand?” 

“Howell,” I said, a warning underlying the soothing tone. 

He ignored me. Of course he did. He didn’t think of me as part of his pack. Interesting, that he’d already accepted Jacky. 

He shoved away from the table, his visible eye flashing a pale amber—which shouldn’t have been possible this far from the full moon. 

“No,” he said firmly. “They think we’re fucking emotionless monsters. Centuries of living together, and they still know jack shit about us. Still spewing the lies they’ve always told themselves, despite all evidence to the contrary.” He pinned the brightlings in place with the strength of his stare alone. “You wanna know what a real monster looks like? Go look in the fucking mirror, you empathetic-less curs.” 

Everyone watched in stunned silence as he closed the lids to the bakery boxes, stacked them up, and carried them out. I knew, from the flash of emotion and twisted lips, that the scion, druid, and younger nephilim all thought he was acting out. A childish display of temper, taking the sweets away. 

The rest of us knew better. 

Jacky had brought those as a peace offering. A way to say “we’re not so different, if we all enjoy some of the same things.” Howell had, in effect, declared that offering peace to the brightlings had been a mistake. That Jacky’s offering shouldn’t be wasted on those who denied her grief for a friend. 

It was a very eloquent, very potent statement. 

I remained where I stood, waiting until the roiling boil of Howell’s emotions faded beyond my reach. Then I looked at each brightling in turn. Abigail sat stunned, silent tears rolling down her cheeks. The idiot scion sat in smug vindication. 

Finally, I met Adam’s eyes. We’d been opponents in the courtrooms on more than one occasion. I didn’t like him, nor he me, but we’d long ago developed a kind of respectful, if wary, acquaintance. 

I’m sorry, I planned to say, but this isn’t going to work. Except I thought of the effort Jacky had put into this. How she’d put herself out there, extending the hand of friendship, and…I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t let her sacrifices and effort and pain be for nothing. 

So instead of declaring this attempt at bridging the divide between our disparate communities a lost cause, as everyone I’d ever known had done, I reached out my hand beside Jacky’s.

“We should try this again,” I said. “Preferably at a time more accommodating to everyone on my team.” 

Constantine stood slowly. I met and held his gaze. Then, to my surprise, he partially unfurled his wings and bowed. 

“Yes,” he said. “Please extend our sympathies to Ms Kendricks. We will be in touch.” 

I inclined my head, and left them talking—discussing everything that had happened—in low voices behind me.