Lethal Blow: (Succubus Hitwoman Book 2)

by Eliza Hendrix

  Drax takes a step back, sighs, and reaches across the bed to grab the nearest bag of chips. “We should have gotten more food.”

  I’m about to grab myself a bag when my ring’s reflection catches my eye.

  Devania made it clear that she wouldn’t appear unless the situation were critical. The thought of calling for her leaves my mind as quickly as it entered. Although this feels critical, I know it isn’t. At least not in the grand scheme of things. But it isn’t the idea of reaching out to her that has me thinking—it’s the ring itself.

  “Hey,” I say, still staring at my ring. When I realize no one knows who I’m talking to, I point my nose at Rachel. “How good are you at your portals?”

  She shrugs. “I mean, I’ve gotten better. Why do you ask?”

  “If I gave you something,” I say, “could you create a portal that leads me to its source?”

  With her jaw hanging loose and her eyelids flat, she projects pure teenage attitude. Obviously, I’m not making any sense, so I slip off my ring and hold it in front of her face.

  “Someone gave this to me. She told me it’s made from the same metal as the Heart of Danu.”

  With a sly smirk, she tilts her head back. “I get it. You want me to try to get you to wherever the stolen talisman is.”

  “Exactly,” I say. “Whoever has it is causing a lot of shit to go down. All I want is to be taken to wherever it is so I can steal it back.”

  “I imagine that means you want me to leave the portal open,” she says.

  I give her a sarcastic twitch of the lip meant to signify, No shit, smart-ass.

  “You do realize that puts us in danger,” Rachel says. “And you also realize there’s no guarantee this will work. For all I know, I might end up sending you to some faraway mountain where the previous stone came from.”

  Pinching the bridge of my nose, I close my eyes. “What option do we have, Rachel?” I throw an arm upward, pointing at the dragon through the roof. “Getting burned alive by a dragon or trying to take action? The sooner we get this problem resolved, the sooner that dragon will disappear.”

  “Maybe the dragon’s gone,” she points out.

  “This isn’t about the dragon,” I say. “Shit will keep getting worse. Do you understand? This is bad, Rachel. Super bad. I suspect that Zerachu—or whoever was controlling her—is on the hunt for the rest of the book, if they haven’t already gotten to it. Don’t you get it? A war is starting.”

  “All because of my grandma’s book?”

  Admittedly, I feel kind of bad for the kid. She must think all of this is her fault, when it’s mine.

  A few hours ago, all I could think about was fucking Veerka.

  Now, the entire world is about to crumble all because of my selfishness.

  I should have been more careful.

  I should have been better.

  If Jamal were here, he’d be ashamed of me

  As my throat swells, I shake my head. “Fuck the past, okay?” I tell her. “This isn’t your fault, and it isn’t the book’s fault. Shit happened, and now we have to deal with it. I’ll do whatever I can to get your stuff back, okay? Or at least out of the dangerous hands it landed in.” When she doesn’t respond, I add, “Can you create the portal, or not?”

  Rachel moves toward my ring and sticks out an open palm. Puffing out my cheeks, I tug the ring off.

  “Don’t lose that,” I say, giving her my I’m the boss look.

  She turns around as if she didn’t hear a thing I said—likely running all sorts of recited spells in her head—and brings the ring up to eye-level.

  “So, it’s made from the same metal?” she asks.

  I nod.

  “Okay, I think I can do this.”

  When I don’t respond, she turns to me and says, “Can you guys give me some space, please?”

  Mr. Mushroom runs away as if he understands, which I know he does. He’s a smart cookie, and I don’t give a shit what anyone else says—he understands English. Sometimes I think he’s a reincarnated witch. Either that, or he used to be human and someone morphed him into a dog out of spite.

  Drax and I move to the back of the motel room and near the bathroom where the stench of mold escapes. It’s so strong that I turn to Drax to breathe in his scent of mud, apples, Taiwanese plastic, and weed. I’m thankful he isn’t one of those demons who reek of something rotten.

  “Riskus,” Rachel says, and without questioning her, Riskus reaches into his pocket and pulls out a brown pouch that I assume contains powder.

  This isn’t the first time I see Riskus give her powder, and now I’m wondering if he has an endless supply of it. Is he wearing some sort of powder-producing pants? I suppose anything is possible these days. Either that or his body creates it. Staring at his long gray hair fastened into a bun, I cringe. Maybe this magical powder she keeps using is nothing more than his dandruff.

  She reaches for the pouch, opens it up by its rope strings, and sniffs the contents. “Not that one.”

  Riskus nods, his fleshy pointed ears wiggling, and reaches for another pouch. When he hands it to her, she opens it and pours a few grains into her palm. The stuff is orange and clunky, reminding me of pink Himalayan salt.

  “That’ll work,” she says, squeezing her fist around the pouch.

  Riskus grins from ear to ear, making him look like a smiling great white shark. It’s obvious he wants praise, so she pats him on the head and adds, “Good job.”

  Rachel pours a teaspoon worth of the salt-looking grains into her palm, closes her eyes, and recites a bunch of gibberish. Considering she started creating portals recently, I have to hand it to her—the kid’s a genius. I’ve seen her cast some spells after reading them a single time in her spell books. It’s almost like she’s able to retain every single piece of information that enters her brain.

  Maybe her grandmother was something special.

  As I watch her sprinkle the orange dust into the air, I wonder if maybe Rachel possesses the same capabilities as Zerachu. They are related, after all. Maybe I don’t give her enough credit. Someone once told me that witches who are fortunate enough to attend witching school often require years of experience before being able to create a portal. And even then, most schools refuse to include this in their curriculums due to the dangers of traveling through time and space.

  But Rachel? The kid hasn’t even gone to witching school and she’s already creating them.

  Mr. Mushroom whimpers and licks his nose when a frizzy orange light swirls around the room. It forms an oval shape, twirling in circles the way storm clouds do before sending a devastating tornado to the ground.

  The brighter the color gets, the faster the portal spins. Rachel flicks her wand left and right, and her long red hair flows behind her as if she were standing in front of a giant fan.

  It gets so intense that I’m forced to pull my hair out of my face.

  “It’s ready!” she shouts over the loud humming.

  I glance sideways at Drax as if to say, Wish me luck, and he returns a look with slanted hairless brows that doesn’t reassure me whatsoever.

  Moving toward the portal, I shout, “Close it in five minutes.”

  “What if you aren’t back?” Rachel says.

  I don’t answer her, which is an answer in itself. It shouldn’t take me more than five minutes to grab that talisman and jump back into the portal. If it does, it means something happened and I can’t risk anyone else coming back into this room if I’m not here.

  Rachel might be developing as a witch, but she and Drax are no match against evil beings.

  I pull my long black hair back into a high ponytail and tie it with the elastic I always keep around my wrist. Sucking in a deep breath, I turn to Rachel, who stands awkwardly as if debating whether to hug me before I leave. But before giving her the chance to get all mushy, I say, “I’ll be back,” and I step into the portal.

  Chapter 18

  ──────────

 
; I breathe in, feeling intoxicated.

  That smell.

  I know that smell.

  Where am I?

  I blink once, then twice to figure out what’s going on. Did I even leave our room? Everything around me looks the same, but Mr. Mushroom, Drax, Rachel, and Riskus are nowhere to be seen.

  Did she send me into another dimension?

  “What the fuck?” I say aloud.

  “You,” comes a familiar voice.

  Snapping my wrist blades out, I swing around, prepared to go for the kill.

  But the second I lay eyes on him, I stiffen.

  “You,” I say right back.

  I should be interrogating him, but how can I? He steps out of the motel’s bathroom wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist, his muscular abs popping out above the fold. He runs a hand through his freshly washed hair, his bicep bulging, and then over his short and scruffy beard—which, might I add, looks fucking sexy on him.

  I part my lips to say something, but nothing comes out.

  What the hell is wrong with me?

  He smirks like he knows what I’m thinking. I know that look; I give it to feebles all the time. Now I know what the problem is… and it isn’t me.

  “Would you stop it?” I say.

  “Stop what?” he says nonchalantly.

  “Stop trying to seduce me!”

  I know he’s doing it because he used his powers on me in Adam Shaw’s house. I didn’t know it at the time, but this guy’s an incubus, which means he has the same powers as me. We came close to screwing but some asshole witch who tried to turn me into a pile of ashes rudely interrupted us.

  He cocks a brow. “I have to protect myself.”

  I scowl at him. “Protect yourself from what?”

  “Isn’t it obvious?” he says. “From you.”

  I let out a laugh—something that feels foreign to me. “I get it. You’re trying to seduce me to avoid me seducing you.”

  His lip pulls up on one side, revealing a few bleach-white teeth. “Precisely.”

  “Well,” I say, my eyes making their way to his towel. “You can stop. I promise I won’t use my powers on you.”

  He doesn’t seem convinced, but I’m not backing down. Then, his attention shifts to the portal behind me.

  “What’re you doing here?” he says.

  “Getting my friend’s talisman back,” I say. “Now hand it over.”

  He stares at me like I’ve lost my mind. “What’re you talking about?”

  “Don’t play stupid, asshole,” I say. “This portal sent me to—” but I stop myself short when something shiny catches my eye. I point at his hand and the silver ring with a red ruby around his index finger. “A Battalion ring,” I breathe. “Where’d you get that?”

  With his other hand, he covers it as if trying to protect it from me while his gaze shifts to my ringless hand. “How do you know what this is?”

  “I have the same thing,” I say, flicking my ringless hand in the air. “Well, my witch friend has it. That’s how I got here.”

  “I’m not following,” he says. “What do you want with the talisman?”

  “I’m trying to get it back,” I say.

  His stare narrows. “So am I.”

  I want to believe that this guy’s sincere—I mean, he has a Battalion ring. Devania made it clear that anyone who wears one is an ally.

  “So, we’re on the same team,” I say, cautiously.

  “It would appear so,” he says.

  An awkward moment of silence fills the room until finally, the portal behind me disappears with a loud swoosh.

  “There goes my ride,” I say. “Where am I?”

  Rubbing his chin, he gives me a full up-and-down. It’s a look that tells me he’s trying to figure out whether I’m confused or downright crazy. I take the opportunity to stare at his smooth chest and chiseled abs.

  “Let me get this straight,” he says, rubbing his scruff. “You jumped into a portal without knowing where you were going?”

  “I knew where—would you put a fucking shirt on?” I snap.

  Shaking his head, he lets out an amused laugh and reaches for a plain white T-shirt sitting at the edge of the motel bed. He slips it on, almost too slowly, as if wanting me to take it all in before it’s gone.

  He glides his hands over his T-shirt to flatten the creases, raises his chin, and crosses his arms. “You’re in motel room 309 and I’m beginning to think you’re following me.”

  “Motel room 309? Are you fucking—”

  With clenched fists, I storm toward the front door.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” comes his deep, soothing voice.

  With my fingers wrapped around the door handle’s shitty metal, I turn around. “Wouldn’t do what? Leave? Am I your prisoner now?”

  He’s still smiling, and it creates the strangest sensation in me. I want to fuck him and punch him in the face all at once. I’m not used to men, or women, being so cocky around me. It’s usually the other way around.

  “There’s a dragon out there.”

  I pinch my eyebrow to hold in my anger. “It’s still out there?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “That’s fine,” I say. “I don’t need the door.”

  Without hesitating, I march straight toward the side of the motel room where a cheesy painting of a half-naked woman hangs crookedly. With a tight fist, I punch a hole through her face and the drywall.

  A beam of wood splits and bits of drywall fall to the ground. Extracting my claws, I grab whatever I can and tear back. The painting splits in half and flies behind me, missing the incubus’s face by an inch. In front of me is a now huge, gaping hole in the wall.

  Through it, Rachel stands with eyes so big you’d think she was having an allergic reaction.

  Sticking my face in the hole, I say, “I asked you to send me to the talisman, kid. Your spell didn’t work. All it did was send me to the nearest item made of the same metal.”

  She opens her mouth and it makes a sticky sound, but nothing comes out.

  Chapter 19

  ──────────

  I’m not sure what’s more frustrating—the fact that Rachel’s portal didn’t work as planned, or the fact that it led me to the one person I now can’t stop fantasizing about. As I pace back and forth in his room, he watches me. Behind me, Rachel does the same thing with her face pressed up against the hole.

  “Are you going to say something?” he asks.

  I stop walking and shift my weight onto one leg. “Sure. For starters, what the hell’s your name?”

  He seems amused by my attitude. I’m bitchy because I’m getting hungry. Who the hell am I supposed to feed off of? As much as I want to pin this guy down on the bed, how can I trust him? He’s an incubus. If things get out of control, there’s a good chance he’ll suck me dry.

  I like to believe that I’m stronger than that… that he’s the one who should be afraid, but he’s powerful, and with the amount of alcohol I’ve had coursing through my bloodstream over the last few years, I suspect I’m at a disadvantage.

  I mean, come on. Teleportation? Seriously? I haven’t let that one go. The guy clicked his fingers when we were in Adam’s basement and disappeared instantly.

  I’m beyond jealous.

  I must be glaring hard at him. He reaches for his face, glances over at Rachel, and says, “What? Do I have something on my face?”

  Seems he’s a comedian, too.

  How much more perfect can this guy get?

  Clearing my throat, I roll my eyes. “You gonna tell me your name, or not?”

  “Ace. Ace Hendrix. And you are?”

  Ace and Alexis… now that’s hot.

  “Sorry?” I say, realizing I disappeared into my head again.

  He raises his nose in the air and sizes me up. “Your name.”

  “Alexis,” I say like he’s wasting my time. “Alexis Rayne.”

  The short grains of his bea
rd follow the rising of his cheeks as he grins. “Alexis. It suits you.”

  I make a conscious effort not to cross my arms. “Why’s that?”

  “It means helper or defender.”

  I scoff. “Right. That suits me.”

  I suspect this guy isn’t buying into my whole fuck off and leave me alone vibe.

  “You came here looking for the Heart of Danu, didn’t you?” he says.

  I don’t respond. How can I? I know where he’s going with this and I’d be an idiot to argue with him. He’s right—I’m trying to do the right thing, even though I’ll never admit it to him, to myself, or anyone, for that matter.

  The air around us gets heavy and quiet until finally, Ace clears his throat—a deep rumble that makes me want to tear off his shirt and run my hands across those bulging muscles of his.

  Jesus Christ.

  “I think we need to create a plan,” Ace says.

  He’s got organizational skills, too. He can organize me any day.

  For fuck’s sake, Alexis. Shut up.

  “I think that’s a good idea,” comes Rachel’s voice.

  Drax’s face suddenly appears through the hole. “What’s a good idea? What’s going on here?”

  Without responding, I bend down, pick up the painting of the naked woman I punched a hole through, and hang it in front of Drax’s face.

  He disappears almost entirely, leaving his yellow eye to peep through the woman’s torn vagina.

  “Hey!” he says.

  He blinks between her thighs.

  It’s a bit freaky to look at, so I say, “Would you get away from the wall? This doesn’t concern you. You guys are distracting me.”

  The truth is, Ace is the one distracting me, but he’s about all the distraction I can handle.

  Without saying a word, Drax backs away and covers the hole with a towel.

  The moment he disappears, I sense Ace’s gaze lingering on me.

  “Are you planning to fuck me?” he asks.

  My knees buckle and I catch myself against the crooked painting.

  Son of a bitch.

  I force a laugh—it’s choppy, loud, and awkward, but it eases the tension. I’m not used to anyone being dominant with me—not like this.