by Jenna Black
“I need to gather a core of faithful supporters. In the Demon Realm, I have a council of advisors, although I don’t know how many of them are truly loyal to me. I inherited them from my father, and some of them are no doubt as enamored of the old ways as Dougal and would be happy to be rid of me. I need to build a new council, one that will serve me on the Mortal Plain.”
“Okay,” I said slowly. “How do you plan to do that?”
“I will start with those I already know are loyal to me.”
I frowned. “In other words… Adam. Not much of a council.”
He watched me warily. “I am including Raphael. I know you aren’t convinced of his loyalty, but I think he genuinely wants to put me back on the throne.”
“But—”
“He told you far more about what happened in the Houston facility than he had to.”
I laughed, the sound swallowed by the cavernous hall. “Were you listening to the shit he was telling me? He’s not one of the good guys, Lugh.”
He shrugged. “Consider him a necessary evil, then.”
I didn’t like it, but the fact was Raphael was too deeply entangled in my life and Lugh’s to exclude. “Fine. Your council consists of Adam and Raphael.”
“And you and Dominic.”
“Practically an army.”
I wasn’t sure, but it looked like Lugh was counting backward from one hundred. I had that effect on him, and it wasn’t exactly by accident.
“At this point,” he said when he overcame his apparent desire to strangle me, “I can think of only one other demon I would trust enough to draw into my inner circle.”
I don’t know if it was an out-and-out premonition or whether I just made an assumption based on the look on Lugh’s face, but the stupid corset suddenly seemed to be squeezing the air out of my lungs.
“Please don’t say what I think you’re going to say,” I begged, and the regret in his eyes told me I’d guessed right.
“Saul was particularly targeted because of his loyalty to me, and he and Dominic proved to be compatible. There will be… complications if he joins us on the Mortal Plain once more, but I need more allies.”
I shook my head as I struggled to breathe. Never mind that this was just a dream, and I didn’t actually need to breathe. “No!”
I had never met Saul. I don’t consider the short time we spent together while I was exorcizing him as a real meeting. But despite my sometimes bad attitude toward Dominic, I had to admit I considered him a friend. I didn’t want to lose him, as I’d lost everyone else who’d ever mattered to me.
Okay, that was melodramatic. I hadn’t actually lost Brian, though it wasn’t for lack of trying. But I’d lost my best friend, my father, my brother… It was enough.
After my moment of self-pity, I allowed myself to think of others. “You can’t do that to Adam!” I protested. I might not like Adam, but even the most clueless idiot could see that he loved Dom. He’d been in a relationship with Saul before, but from everything I’d observed, I knew that relationship hadn’t had the same emotional intensity.
“I know Adam will be unhappy,” Lugh said, “but he will understand it’s for the greater good.”
I thought I’d been angry before. Now I knew what angry really was. “You cold-blooded, cold-hearted bastard! What about Dominic, huh? You’ll just volunteer to sacrifice him for the common good?” I dragged up the hem of my skirts and petticoats or whatever the hell it was I was wearing and stomped up the steps to the dais until I could glare down at Lugh. “How dare you?” I suppose I’d gotten over being awed by his kingly mien. I dropped my handful of skirts and seriously considered throwing a punch, fat lot of good it would do. But it might give me a little outlet for the rage and hurt and, yes, fear that boiled in my gut. Every time I started to think of Lugh as a pretty decent guy, I’d get some kind of a reminder that he was a demon, and that demons don’t think like humans.
“Calm down,” Lugh said, looking up at me and showing no outward reaction to my outburst.
I doubt there was anything he could have said that would have calmed me less. I decided to throw that punch after all. He made no attempt to avoid it, but then it wasn’t like I could hurt him. His head jerked back with the impact, and his crown slid sideways, but his facial expression didn’t change.
“When you’re through having your temper tantrum, let me know and I’ll finish saying my piece.” He crossed his arms over his chest and affected a pose of exaggerated patience.
I was sorely tempted to continue my “temper tantrum,” as he called it, but I fought that temptation. Maybe I’d misunderstood what he was trying to say. Maybe he wasn’t planning to offer up Dominic like a sacrificial lamb.
Nah. That was exactly what he’d meant, and I knew it. But as satisfying as yelling, screaming, and otherwise making a fool of myself might be, I knew it wouldn’t do me—or Dom—a bit of good.
I sucked in as much air as I could manage, my head feeling light and fizzy from lack of oxygen. “Get me out of this damn corset,” I snarled at Lugh.
Once the words left my mouth, I wished I could suck them back in. Whenever I complained about the way he’d dressed me, I always seemed to end up in something worse. I braced myself for something embarrassingly flimsy, but for once he declined to torment me.
My breathing came easier, and when I glanced cautiously down at myself, I saw that I was now dressed in loose, comfy gray sweats. The outfit didn’t exactly blend in with the grand hall or Lugh’s kingly red and gold, but it was definitely more me than the Marie Antoinette getup. I clamped my jaws together to stop myself from saying anything else as I glared at Lugh, who remained calmly seated on his throne.
When he was satisfied that I wasn’t going to light into him anymore, he spoke again.
“Adam is one of my subjects. If I command him to step aside while Saul takes his lover, he will do it.”
If I ground my teeth any harder, they would break. However, I managed to keep my temper in check, waiting for him to finish.
“However, Dominic is not one of my subjects, and I have no authority to give him orders. I will request that he agree to host Saul once more, but in the end, it will be his decision.”
Dominic, like most legal demon hosts, had a hero complex. He might agree to take Saul back even if he knew it would mean losing what he now had with Adam. And even if losing him would break Adam’s heart. But I wasn’t one of Lugh’s subjects. Perhaps I could conveniently “forget” to mention his request.
Lugh shook his head at me. “Would you rather I take over the next time you’re asleep and give Adam a call myself?”
My heart sank at the thought. “You’re probably doing that right this moment, aren’t you?” It would hardly be the first time.
Slowly, Lugh unfolded from his throne, forcing me to take a couple of steps back to maintain my personal space. I’m a tall woman, but Lugh is at least six foot five, and he towered over me. He reached for me, and I’d have backed up farther if I didn’t think I might fall off the edge of the dais. His hands landed on my shoulders, and he gave them a firm squeeze.
“I’ll do you the courtesy of giving you the chance to do it yourself, first. But the request will be made, one way or another.”
I swallowed past a lump that had formed in my throat. “I hate you.” I couldn’t stand to look up at him anymore, so instead I stared at one of the ornamental gold buttons on his waistcoat.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why does it have to be Dominic? Can’t someone else host him?” I was still staring at the button, but it didn’t seem to bother Lugh.
“Do you have someone else in mind?”
I scowled, because, of course, I didn’t. We no longer had anyone on the inside with the Spirit Society, so it wasn’t like we could get Saul into a legal host. So just who would I “volunteer” for the role?
“Keep in mind also what you know of Saul’s… inclinations, shall we call them?” Lugh said, forcibly reminding me of the kin
d of relationship he’d had with Adam. I didn’t know—and sure as hell didn’t want to know—what kind of S&M “play” they’d engaged in, but I knew it was brutal enough to be too much for Dominic—and to require a demon’s healing ability.
“Many, if not most hosts would have trouble coping with his particular tastes,” Lugh continued, hammering away at me. “I know his union with his last host before Dominic was not a happy one.” He frowned. “I’m afraid Saul can be most abrasive when he doesn’t like someone.”
“You mean more abrasive than Adam?” I asked incredulously, and I forgot to stare at the button and looked up into his amber eyes.
“There’s a reason he and Adam are friends.”
“You mean because they’re each the only creature in existence who can tolerate the other?”
Lugh smiled crookedly. “A bit of an exaggeration, but fairly accurate.” The smile faded, and his grip on my shoulders tightened. “We already know Dominic and Saul get along well. Any other host might… suffer.”
I wasn’t keen on the idea of shoving a demon, especially an abrasive one, into any human host. If Saul ended up in another host, I’d feel guilty as hell at the idea that the host was suffering and being ill-treated. But better some stranger than Dominic. I suppose that was selfish of me, but I didn’t care.
“Don’t do this,” I begged. “Don’t ask this of me, or of Dom.”
His hands slid up the sides of my neck until he was cupping my face in his palms. His eyes were wells of regret, but there was no hint of yielding in them. His thumbs caressed my cheeks in a way that was either supposed to be soothing or sexy, I wasn’t sure which. And for the first time ever, my body failed to respond to him in any way.
“Take your hands off me,” I said, and I’d never heard my own voice so cold.
Lugh’s jaw tightened with what might have been anger, but he let go. “I’ll give you twenty-four hours to approach Dominic and Adam with the proposal. If you haven’t done it by then, I’ll do it myself.”
There were times I’d been angry, even furious, with Lugh before. None of them compared to how I felt now. I glared at him, for once glad that he knew exactly how I felt. His face didn’t change expression.
Knowing things were only going to get uglier if I stuck around, I mustered my mental forces and slammed the doors of my mind shut.
I woke up back in my own room, the rage still burning high. I wanted to break something, but I settled for hurling my pillow across the room instead. It wasn’t anywhere near as satisfying.
It was only a little after four in the morning when I woke up, but I knew I wasn’t getting back to sleep. Cursing Lugh some more, I gave up the effort and hauled my sleep-deprived carcass into the kitchen to brew some extra-strength coffee. After I’d gotten the first cup down, a few of my still-sleeping brain cells woke up, and I realized I’d forgotten to ask Lugh an important question.
Lugh was talking about summoning Saul to the Mortal Plain, but as far as I knew, the only way to summon a specific demon was by its True Name. As Lugh had explained it, only demons who were extraordinary in some way earned the dubious honor of being granted a True Name. Lugh and his brothers had them because they were part of the royal family. The only other demon I’d known who had a True Name was Der Jäger, and he’d earned it through being a sociopath with the unique ability to hunt demons on the Mortal Plain.
I could only assume if Lugh meant to summon him that Saul had earned a True Name, but I had no idea how. Maybe that wasn’t important, but if he had any special abilities, I’d rather know about them. Of course, since I was planning never to speak to Lugh again—yes, I knew I’d have no choice, but it made a nice fantasy—I wouldn’t be able to question him. I could ask Adam, but since Adam wouldn’t tell me squat without Lugh’s permission, I knew it wouldn’t do me any good.
When the sun came up, I made myself a cold breakfast of Cheerios with slices of a banana that was past its prime. I had until four o’clock tomorrow morning, give or take, to tell Adam and Dominic what His Majesty had requested. Until then, I would keep my lips tightly zipped, and I would do my best to ignore the problem.
Instead, I focused on the problem of Tommy Brewster. Even if Adam dropped by Sammy Cho’s office and discovered he was possessed, there would be no proof that he’d been possessed when he’d examined Tommy. Demons might not have the same rights as humans in our legal system, but I still had to have some concrete evidence that Tommy’s demon had done something wrong in order to legally exorcize him.
However, if Raphael believed that reality would cause me to drop the case, he didn’t know me as well as he thought. I’d just have to figure out a way to get proof.
Easier said than done, naturally. I wasn’t what you’d call a private investigator. But it occurred to me that perhaps the best way to prove that Tommy’s demon had possessed him illegally was to get the demon to admit it.
I supposed that meant it was time for me to have a face-to-face chat with Tommy, the superhost, and the scum-sucking bottom-feeder who currently inhabited his body.
Chapter 9
I wasn’t sure exactly how I was going to engineer this meeting with Tommy Brewster. After all, exorcists had very little excuse to hang out with legal demons, and I didn’t imagine I could just call him up and ask him to meet me for a friendly chat. Well, I could, but I sort of doubted he’d agree.
In the end, I decided the easiest way to go about it was just to drop by his apartment and use my charm and persuasion to convince him to talk to me. Okay, so charm and persuasion aren’t my strong suits, but I didn’t see a whole lot of other options, so it would have to do.
Tommy lived near U. of P. in an ancient brown-stone that had no doubt once been a single-family home, but had been converted into tiny apartments catering to students. It turned out Tommy was auditing some classes while he waited to start med school in the fall. I couldn’t imagine how he’d gotten into an Ivy League university with his God’s Wrath affiliation; unless, of course, they didn’t know about it. I also wasn’t sure why he was still going there now that he was possessed. It wasn’t that unusual for legal demons to go through med school and become doctors, but it seemed like an odd thing for a demon in Dougal’s camp to do. Unless he was in training to become another of Dougal’s mad scientists. And wasn’t that a cheerful thought?
Tommy wasn’t home when I stopped by, and his roommate informed me that this was the status quo. Being a helpful sort—and being at just the right height to stand eye-level with my breasts, a convenience of which he took full advantage—the roommate informed me that my best shot at running into the new demonic Tommy was at his favorite nightclub, The Seven Deadlies.
My friendly, if false, smile died on my face when the roommate—whose name I’d already forgotten— mentioned that proverbial den of iniquity. He was too enamored of my chest to notice, and I decided the little creep was icking me out. I forced myself to thank him relatively politely before I hastened away, wondering if I really had the nerve to show my face at the club where Raphael had held and tortured Brian.
The easy way to handle it would have been to call Adam and ask him to meet up with Tommy there. Adam was a card-carrying member, and far from being repulsed by the club’s sickening purpose, he actually liked the place. At least, he’d liked it before he and Dom had had a run-in with Shae, the club’s owner. I doubted Adam would set foot in there again for any reason other than official business. Besides, I didn’t want to talk to Adam, not with Lugh’s request/order looming. Yes, I’d rather present it to Adam and Dom myself, but I’m a big fan of procrastination.
I wasn’t what you’d call happy with my decision, but I suppose you could say I was resolved to it. I spent the afternoon and much of the evening loading myself up with caffeine to get me through a long night and trying not to think about what I was about to do. At around ten, I put on my favorite pair of black leather pants along with an emerald green halter top that left my belly button bare and revealed the tattoo o
n my back. It wasn’t the kind of top I could wear a bra with, but it had a flimsy built-in shelf bra that slightly reduced the jiggle factor. I finished the outfit off with some platform sandals that added another couple of inches to my already greater-than-average height, then looked myself over in the mirror.
I looked far more demure and conservative than I’d looked the last time I’d set foot in that club, but I was dressed sexy enough to fit right in. I was also dressed sexy enough that I could probably persuade some hormone-crazed demon groupie to take me in as his guest, seeing as I wasn’t a member myself. I’d then have to find a way to ditch said hormone-crazed groupie, but if there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s the cold shoulder.
The Seven Deadlies is located on South Street, home to some of Philadelphia’s most outlandish citizens. Bars, clubs, tattoo parlors, fetish shops, New Age bookstores. You name it—if it’s off the beaten path, you can be sure you’ll find it somewhere along South Street.
I looked downright conservative next to some of the South Street regulars I passed as I made my way from the garage where I’d parked to the club. Mohawks, funky dye-jobs, ostentatious body piercings … Maybe I’d need to get another tattoo or ten. Nah. I didn’t plan to come here ever again.
On the outside, The Seven Deadlies looks relatively ordinary, just a normal South Street alternative club. Even on a Monday night, there was a steady stream of customers going in. Still, I decided I’d try to get in on my own merits before going for the charming-a-helpless-male technique.
I was glad to see the Guardian of the Gates was a young, handsome guy. That upped my chances of conning my way in. When I approached the window, I put on my friendliest smile and pressed my shoulders back a bit to make sure the halter top clung to my breasts just right. Handsome Guy gave me a thorough once-over with his eyes before greeting me with a bland “Can I help you?”