Epilogue
Jake groaned as he woke up, his arm sore from Marlene laying on it for half the night. He hadn't wanted to move her, though, and he took a few moments just to stare at her sleeping form before he kissed her forehead and moved his arm from underneath of her.
She didn't say anything, but she did exhale loudly and move to stretch, telling Jake that he had in fact woken her up.
"Lo siento, mi sol, I didn't mean to wake you up."
She didn't respond, she simply opened her eyes and smiled at him. He smiled back, moving his hand to touch her face softly. Oh how he had missed her green eyes.
He kissed her gently, and she wrapped herself up in him, silently begging him not to leave. For a few minutes, he didn't. He simply let himself be embraced by her, for the time they got together was scarce between his work for Khonshu and Marc and Steven. He knew he was lucky that Marc nor Steven had woken up this morning, but Jake was getting better at pushing them to the back of their mind. He hated taking time away from their own lives, and he knew it would be more difficult now that Steven had found a new job, but it was necessary, and Jake was constantly longing for Marlene.
When he finally did get up, he did so hesitantly, and Marlene let him. "I won't be home later," he informed her. "You may not see me for a few days, in fact."
The bed they shared was large. As a matter of fact, the entire house they shared was large. Between Marc's work as a mercenary, Steven's brief stint as a gift shopist, and Jake's job as a cabby, the three of them had enough money to buy a house. Marlene didn't want to stop there, though, and her father's inheritance had made her much richer than Jake expected. It was no wonder she disappeared for awhile. Rich people always had a target on their back.
Jake wouldn't lose her again, though. Not with Khonshu's help, anyway.
Marlene huffed. "Why not?"
Jake threw a shirt over his head and found his pants that had been thrown on the floor the night before. "I've got a job to do today, and Steven's first day at work is tomorrow. Much as I love staying here with you, mi sol, I have to be careful of Marc and Steven."
"When are you going to let me meet them?"
It wasn't that Jake didn't want her to meet them. It was quite the opposite, in fact. He was not embarrassed by his hermanos nor their condition. He loved them dearly and he wished desperately that they wanted to know him as he knew them. They knew there was someone there, but the fact that they had not yet attempted to reach out and find Jake told him that they were perfectly content with being ignorant of him and his life. That was okay with Jake. He didn't want to burden them with his work, especially since ditching Khonshu had been their idea. Besides, meeting Marlene would be awkward, he assumed, considering their situation with Layla.
"Someday, I promise." He finished dressing himself and kissed Marlene again, already missing the warm embrace of her arms.
She sighed. "This house is very big without you in it."
Jake chuckled. "This house is big whether I'm here or not. It is what you wanted, after all."
She raised an eyebrow at him. "You act like you don't like it."
He shrugged. "Not what I would have chosen, but you know I would do anything for you, mi sol."
"How sweet of you."
He stood there for a moment, debating just ignoring Khonshu's request and staying in bed all day with Marlene. Her arms were so inviting, and after all, they had years of time lost together that they'd had to make up for.
It had actually been Layla that helped Jake track down Marlene. Layla was an expert in finding artifacts stolen and sold on the Black Market, and Jake knew as much. Finding an entire person likely would have been ten times easier, and turns out, it was. Besides, Layla had kept her promise to Jake. She had earned his trust, and thus, he finally had someone he could turn to for help. He understood why Marc and Steven were so enamored with her. She wasn't Jake's type, but he had quickly become his best friend and most trusted ally.
"We musn't delay, Lockley. While Harrow and Ammit live, the world remains in danger," Khonshu said, standing at the foot of the bed, now. Since having Jake become his avatar, his style had changed from mummified robes in favor of something akin to the suit Steven had worn while serving Khonshu himself.
Jake sighed. "I really must go, mi sol. But I'll see you in a few days. I promise."
He kissed her again, and walked out of the room before he could change his mind.
"Alright, where's the coño at?" Jake asked the bird once he was far enough away from the bedroom. Marlene, of course, knew about Khonshu, but that didn't mean he wanted her to know exactly what he was doing. She understood that he was helping people, and she knew why he killed, and that was enough for Jake.
"He's in a medical facility not too far from here. The nurses have been keeping him sedated out of fear. He will be difficult to get to."
Jake scoffed. "You underestimate me, pájaro tonto."
He grabbed his flat hat, black, driving gloves, and his jacket that were all sitting next to the door to the garage, and he headed out to do the one thing he had been wanting to do since he first met Harrow back at that small town in the Alps: kill the bitch.
The limo he drove was a little too flashy for Jake's tastes, but the windows were tinted, and no passerby ever asked questions. It had taken a bit of getting used to, as Jake was typically known to drive cabs around New York rather than a flashy limo around London, but it was nothing Jake couldn't handle. The front license plate spelled out "SPKTR", something that was actually Marlene's idea. "Well, if you don't want your identity to be well-known, probably best not to be driving around a large vehicle with your name on the front of it," she had said. Always five steps ahead, that woman was.
He started the limo and pulled out of the garage, careful not to hit any of the other cars in the vicinity, and before he pulled out onto the road, he checked to make sure he had everything. Knife, check. Gun, check. Fake ID, check. He decided that was probably more than enough, as he really didn't expect this job to take too long. This was something he was very passionate about, after all. He didn't plan on delaying it for too long.
He allowed Khonshu to guide him to the medical facility, the two working together with ease. It had become much easier since Marc and Steven were freed from Khonshu's servitude. Neither of them had ever particularly liked Khonshu, and Marc only worked with the deity because he felt he owed him. Steven had only worked with Khonshu out of circumstance. Jake, however, trusted and respected the bird enough to actually work with him. He almost even considered him a friend, if you could call an Egyptian god that was sort-of-but-not-really in your head a friend. Their time together was easy-going, and Jake enjoyed bringing justice to those who deserved it, regardless of how it happened.
Jake couldn't help but pull a toothy grin as he pulled into the gated parking lot. Here he was. He was going to finally put an end to Harrow and Ammit's shit.
He parked his limo and decided that he would try to get through to Harrow without donning the suit, unless absolutely necessary of course. He walked in through the front door and was immediately greeted by a nurse. "Um, excuse me, sir, but this is private property. You can't come in without making an appointment first."
Jake snarled and grabbed the nurse by the collar. "Oh, tengo una cita, está bien," he snapped, before stabbing the nurse quietly in the stomach. She fell to the floor with a thud and he lifted his head up to meet the eyes of an orderly, looking panicked. Before he had the chance to sound an alarm, Jake pulled the knife out of the nurse and threw it at the orderly. He dropped his tray and fell to the ground, eyes still open, a face of permanent fear.
He walked further down the hall and every person that tried to get in his way, he would cut down before they even had a chance to see him coming. Jake thought he cut down a total of four nurses and two orderlies, but he had lost count, really. He saw a radio that was blasting music throughout the facility, and he smiled a bit. He walked over and changed the station to his favorite Spanish radio station, and hummed along to Más Allá Del Sol. He walked into the main lobby, and there the whore was. Jake tried to hide his smirk and walked over to talk to the nurse that was about to take him away.
"Lo llevaré," Jake told her, grabbing the handles to Harrow's wheelchair.
The nurse, who clearly didn't speak Spanish, stared at him blankly. "I beg your pardon?" She asked.
Jake gave her his best flirtatious smile and patted her shoulder affectionately. "Cálmese, señorita, cálmese."
She backed off a bit and Jake patted Harrow's shoulders a bit harder than how a friend would. Jake gripped the handles and began walking him back the way he had come through. He whistled along to the song that played in the background and he noticed as Harrow pointed at the door to what Jake presumed was his room, and Jake couldn't help but smile as Harrow appeared to get more tense as they walked past the bodies that Jake had racked up on his way into the hospital.
When they finally got outside, Jake opened the door to the backseat of the limo and threw Harrow inside. Jake's anger had risen to a boiling point, and he kicked the wheelchair that Harrow had been in, getting it out of the way, before stepping back into the driver's seat.
From the front seat, he heard Harrow laugh. "Khonshu," he chuckled. "You can't hurt us."
Khonshu was in the backseat of the limo, his legs crossed. He seemed unphased by Harrow's nonchalant attitude. "Yeah. You wanna know something?" The bird turned to look out the window. "Marc Spector truly believed that after he and I parted ways, I wanted his wife to be my avatar." Jake tensed at Marc's name, but he didn't make a motion to move. "Why would I ever need anybody else when he has no idea how troubled he truly is?" The bird chuckled. He rapped on the window, and that was Jake's cue. "Meet my friend, Jake Lockley."
Jake stared at Harrow briefly in his mirror and watched as his face fell. After a few moments, Jake turned around, his lips drawn into a hard line. "Hoy es tu turno de perder," he said, raising his gun. He watched as Harrow tried to put his arms up and tell him to wait, and that was when Jake allowed the smile to creep up his face. The man was dead in one shot, but he shot three more times, just for fun.
Jake scoffed and with a grin, turned back around in his seat. He cranked up the radio, which was playing Frank Sinatra's "My Way of Life", and began driving away. "Where are we throwing out the trash?" Jake asked Khonshu, glancing over at the bird through the mirror. The deity was simply staring out the window.
"Anywhere is fine. No one is going to miss this scum," he said. Then, "You did well, Jake."
Jake was not used to receiving any sort of praise, and he drank it up. Despite himself, he smiled, and tried to focus on getting their ass back to the mansion to drop off the limo, then running back to Steven's flat before Marc or Steven woke up.
Maybe not everything was terrible in Jake's life.