Blind Speed Dating #14 (YA)

Title: THE ELDER RACE

Genre: YA URBAN FANTASY

Word Count: 80,000

Query:

Seventeen-year-old Carri Helms is not the first mortal the Goetia, a legion of Fallen Angels and demons, has attacked. But she is the first to survive.

After walking away from a car accident the Goetia orchestrated to kill her, Carri discovers she’s the key to opening Heaven’s gates—whatever the hell that means. More interested in graduating from her posh prep school than fulfilling an ancient prophecy, Carri tries to pretend nothing happened. But as the Goetia’s primary target, everyone Carri knows and loves is in danger. Breaking the Angel rule never to intervene in mortal affairs, Riker Irin—a Guardian Angel with a killer smile and authority issues—saves Carri from a Goetia attack.

Together, Riker and Carri travel deeper into his world, where the truth about Carri’s Elder heritage is more dangerous than their forbidden feelings for one another. With Carri central to Hell's plot to storm the gates of Heaven and restore the Immortal War between those Above and the Fallen, the Goetia kidnap Carri’s sister to guarantee her cooperation. Now, Carri and Riker must come to her rescue, put an end to the Goetia, and stop the War…or die trying.

First 250:

Tonight could go straight to Hell.

The screen on my phone blacked out as the last of my battery drained, leaving me with the world’s most expensive paperweight. So much for my text to Chandler going through.

“Dammit,” I muttered under my breath. I never wanted to come to this stupid party. Wouldn’t have, if Ana hadn’t talked me into it and Chandler hadn’t needed a ride.

I could think of a million other ways for Ana to get over her breakup. None of which involved this dumbass lighthouse. And of course, my sister ditched us when her boyfriend showed up. Jokes on her, she could find her own way home.

The crash of waves on the cliffs below boomed around me, adding to the party’s deafening cacophony of dance beats and drunken blather. The tang of salty mist hung in the air like a heavy veil. Through the sparse evergreen growth, an approaching storm angered the waves, foaming their peaks with ghostly whitecaps. I shoved my phone in my back pocket as an icy breeze rushed off the water and up the rocks, biting my skin through my black chenille sweater.

 “Carri, I’m ready whenever you are,” Ana said from behind me. She tucked herself into the passenger seat of my Jetta and her door thumped closed.

I climbed into the driver’s seat and buckled up. “I’m so done with this party. It’s been nothing but drama.”

Coming here tonight was a mistake. Things couldn’t possibly get any worse.