It was said he cast spells against those who opposed him. Whether it was the spells themselves or his belief in them, he carried himself with an undeniable arrogance, the kind of confidence only success could bring.
There were some who said the title of wizard wasn’t so far off, that he practiced magic of the darkest kind, that he was a magus—a dark magician. That he summoned spirits. And demons.
Though she had researched and studied, she hadn’t really believed it, had chalked the stories up to Templeton’s enormous ego. It had seemed too unreal, hard to believe. But looking at Asmodeus, there was no doubt now the stories were real.
There was an awful satisfaction in Gordon Templeton’s dark eyes. Gabriel should have known Templeton was behind this.
A chill went through her just at that look but she didn’t dare let him see it.
This was as bad as it could get. Maybe worse.
She kept her eyes level and her mouth tight.
A beam of light speared through the darkness, off to the right, beyond the rings. One of Templeton’s minions stood at a podium and chanted from a book as Asmodeus writhed in agony beside her on the floor.
The Book of Demons. The one that had summoned Asmodeus and now tortured him.
With a gesture like limning a door, Templeton stepped through the circles with careless disregard for the danger of them.
Slowly, Gabriel got to her feet to put herself between him and Asmodeus—as useless a gesture as that was.
“Hello, Gordon,” she said quietly.
As an agent with the FBI, Gabriel had investigated Gordon Templeton for years but he had lots of money to cover his tracks. His business practices had always been shady but in all those years she had never been able to prove anything against him. Until recently. She had been close to having a solid case against him, finally.
His business partners and competitors frequently suffered astonishing bad luck, horrific accidents, fires, arson—nothing she could prove or trace back to Templeton—while Templeton consistently made a profit. In the last few months that bad luck had expanded to include anyone who had ever crossed Templeton.
Some of those who had crossed him had disappeared.
Including her too, it seemed. Apparently, she had been getting too close.
She didn’t waste her time pointing out to him the penalties for what he had done. Despite the stiff punishments for assaulting and kidnapping a federal agent, given the circumstances, she didn’t think it likely that anyone would ever know what became of her. She would simply disappear like all the others. Escape seemed unlikely.
That didn’t mean she wouldn’t try.
“Well,” Templeton said with a thin smile. “How does it feel, Special Agent Nicholas, to be served up as a slave, as mere food, to a demon?”
A pause as he nudged the prostrate and powerless Asmodeus angrily with his toe.
“My demon.”
Seeing the anger and the avid look in Templeton’s eyes, hearing it in his voice, it was clear to Gabriel that Templeton had wanted to watch as Asmodeus took her, had imagined Asmodeus raping her with his huge cock, but Asmodeus had preserved their dignity as best he could.
This was the price for it.
A demon who had more consideration than a man? What a shock, Gabriel thought dryly and bitterly. She had always thought that man was far more vicious than any of his so-called enemies.
For a moment she thought she heard Asmodeus’ deep voice in the back of her mind, a sound that almost seemed to resonate in her bones.
Thank you.
She glanced at him and saw his eyes glow brilliantly despite his pain.
Turning back, she looked at Templeton and asked quietly, “What do you want with me?”
With a dismissive laugh, Templeton said, “You? Nothing. You’re nothing to me. Do you understand? You are nothing. Not anymore. Not to me, not to anyone. I have you, Special Agent Nicholas. I own you now. No one, not even the FBI, knows where you are, knows that I have you, which gives me more pleasure than you can know.”
Gordon Templeton glared at her and then his eyes settled on Asmodeus with evident displeasure.
A terrible anger and satisfaction had filled his voice and chilled Gabriel to the bone. He was working himself up to something.
Templeton’s voice dropped to nearly a whisper. “When he’s done with you though, I’ll have you. And I’ll use you until you grovel just at the sound of my voice.”
Although her skin crawled at the thought, Gabriel just looked at him and yawned, to all appearances bored. She had heard many threats like that over the years.
By her feet, she heard Asmodeus smother a furious growl. His impotent rage, his despair, beat at her.
Curious, she shot a thought at him, Templeton would only suffer by comparison, Asmodeus. To her surprise, she sensed his spirits lighten a little.
She hadn’t imagined it—she had heard his voice.
A gift of my kiss, he explained softly, mind to mind, as the memory of his fangs as they pierced her flesh went through his mind in a flash of heat and into hers. Of my venom.
So she had felt the effects of something else. Venom.
Gabriel remembered it coursing through her veins, the fiery heat of it as it flooded her body with delicious pleasure even while his spirit had opened to hers. And hers to his. Although she hadn’t understood that then.
His dark eyes furious, Templeton held out a hand to one of the minions who had followed him through the gateway in the rings.
“You though, Asmodeus, must be punished for your defiance.”
That minion slapped what looked very much like a cat-o’-nine-tails into Templeton’s hands.
Gabriel stiffened, horrified by the vicious thing.
This was what Templeton had been working himself up to do.
It was a horrific-looking implement. There was a short handle to which were attached a number of tightly woven, long, supple leather thongs, each secured at the tip with a thick bead of iron.
For the first time Gabriel noticed the condition of Asmodeus’ back, the ridged scars on his red flesh, the darker stripes there. They had done this to him before. He had felt the lash of that thing already.
Asmodeus.
Her throat tightened in horror as she realized what it was they were about to do.
At the sight of the whip, Asmodeus gritted his teeth and resigned himself to endure. If he were free, able to defend himself, this man would never dare touch him, would not be able to touch him…but he was not.
My angel. Do nothing. You cannot stop this.
It was a comfort for him in a way, to sense her concern, to know she feared for him, hurt for him. Still, another kind of fear shot through him.
Fiercely, he sent, As you love me, do not give them another weapon to use against me, mishea.
If she fought, he would have to fight as well, despite the geas, he would have to try to defend her, to fight beside her. If they knew she cared, if they knew he did—more than cared—they would use her as a weapon against him.
“You will learn, demon,” Templeton said, furiously, “not to deny me or defy me.”
The whip lashed down with a harsh whistling sound and the iron beads at the ends tore into the flesh of Asmodeus’ back.
Pain seared through him as the whip sliced like fire across his flesh, each of the iron beads like white-hot embers as they struck his skin, caught, burned and tore—a coda of additional agony at the end of each lash.
The shock of Asmodeus’ words scorched Gabriel to her soul. Rocked her almost as much as the echo of pain in her own back as the whip burned across his shoulders. She caught her breath at the pain and at his words.
As you love me, he had said.
Could she? Was that even possible? Her heart wrenched. How long had she looked for that and yet never found it? She couldn’t deny that something in him called to her, had called to her from the moment she had seen him standing there, so strong, so brave, so impossible. Hours it ha
d been. Less? More? Forever.
She clenched her hands into tight fists at the sound of the whip striking his flesh.
It flashed through her mind that Asmodeus had known this would happen. She fought back the stinging in her eyes, the tears she dared not shed, for his sake as he’d asked.
It was also clear that Templeton definitely enjoyed what he did as he brought the lash down again and again, the chant keeping Asmodeus locked immobile, helpless against the torture. If Templeton had not been able to take his pleasure from watching them, he would take it from Asmodeus.
Blood ran down Asmodeus’ broadly muscled back in thin streams and pain etched every line of his strong, handsome face, limned every taut muscle of his body. His wings were tucked to each side in a vain attempt to keep them safe, to protect them from the rip and tear of the lash.
Every stroke tore at her heart as it tore into his flesh.
The sound was indescribable. It was even more horrible to watch, but Gabriel could not turn away. Each time the thin little strands of leather struck, a half-dozen stripes would appear on his skin, beading with blood, and Asmodeus would jolt, however much he fought not to.
“Stop it,” Gabriel cried, unable to bear it any longer. “You’ll kill him.”
Templeton sneered at her. “He’s a demon. He can’t die.”
A sense of something from Asmodeus gave the lie to that though Asmodeus himself said nothing.
Greater horror ran through her.
Asmodeus was neither immortal nor indestructible as Templeton clearly assumed. He could indeed die given enough punishment. And if a part of him wished to, wished for an end to this agony, to his imprisonment. She could sense it. Something deep inside her went still as a new kind of pain tore through her, a new kind of grief.
“You bastard,” she said to Templeton, tightly, furiously. She knew he reveled in her impotent outrage but she couldn’t hold it back.
Though it was heartfelt, it was much less than what she wanted to do, to say. Would have done if she could, if Asmodeus had not asked her not to. Every muscle in her body was taut with the need to lash out, to fight, to defend and protect. It was what she was, who she was. It was why she had joined the FBI. She had promised. As much as she wanted to, she couldn’t break it. As futile as the gesture might be, she wanted, needed, to fight…and she couldn’t.
The first stroke of the lash had taken Asmodeus’ breath away as it always did. The pain, no matter how often he suffered it, was always shocking in its intensity.
In a corner of his mind Asmodeus was intensely aware of Gabriel, of how furiously she struggled not to fight for him. Spirit to spirit, he knew what it cost her to stand aside and do nothing, despite knowing any action would be a useless gesture in this place, against such odds. But he knew she would have fought for him, had he not asked her to stay her hand.
The lash came down again and again, until the torture of it obliterated all thought and there was only agony. All there was within him was the thought of Gabriel and the determination never to bow his head to the man who held the whip.
It ended at last with Asmodeus braced on a forearm against the floor, his head bent but not bowed, breathing heavily from the pain as blood ran down his sides to drip onto the floor in a steady patter that sounded like rain. He would not break. Most especially not now, with Gabriel here. There had to be a way to end this, to escape, although he had searched for it constantly all these long months.
Every inch of his body ached from fighting the constraint of the spell but his back, shoulders and wings felt as if they were on fire from the whip and its wicked little iron balls. The pain was terrible, sickening. Each spot where they had ripped into his skin burned. He fought the fear that his wings had been permanently damaged. The thought that he might not fly again was nearly as much torture as the cat-o’-nine-tails.
“Be ready in the morning, demon,” Templeton said as he tossed the bloodstained whip to his subordinate and glanced toward his other minion to indicate that he should stop chanting. “I will have a use for you then.”
He and his people stepped through the shimmering gateway and left. It closed behind them.
In an instant, Gabriel was on her knees at his side as he struggled unsteadily to his feet, lifting one of his arms over her shoulder. Pain shot through him sharply and he did not know if he could have gained the scant comfort of the bed without her aid.
“Asmodeus,” she whispered.
“No, my angel,” Asmodeus said, but she put her fingers over his lips.
Don’t speak, not aloud. It is no more than Templeton would expect me to do, being one of the good guys. Asmodeus, you should know that his people can watch and listen to us from a distance.
She used her mind to send images of hidden cameras and listening devices as she helped him to the bed.
When he had conjured the smoke, he had only done so to conceal them from the watchers. But this. Shock went through him, along with a bitter understanding. Suddenly much made sense.
So, that is how he knew.
Knew what? she asked.
That I could contact my brothers on the other plane. His mouth tightened. Thinking myself alone, I spoke aloud to them. They would have come to rescue me but they would have come here, where they would have been trapped as well so I forbade it. Templeton wanted it, wants it still. To have all of my people trapped here and at his bidding. I would not call my brothers though he asked.
It would have given Templeton an army, a terrible army.
Templeton had beaten him into unconsciousness again and again, but he had not broken. He would not condemn his brothers—Ashtoreth, most particularly—to this kind of hell, not again. Even now he could feel Ash calling to him in frustration, worry and fear, but Asmodeus blocked him.
Gabriel caught the image of it from his mind and she suddenly knew how he had gotten the other, older marks on his back.
In spite of herself, as tough as she thought she was, as many horrors as she had seen in her career, tears stung her eyes once again.
“Dear god,” she whispered.
So many of them.
You know him? Asmodeus asked, his lambent eyes shadowed, dimmed. Templeton?
She nodded grimly as she eased him down. I’ve been investigating him for years. I know he’s dirty, he’s swindled thousands of people and he’s used less subtle means of persuasion to convince companies to sell to him. I just couldn’t prove it.
A significant glance around at the mercenaries hidden in the shadows was enough.
When I bring him down, it’s going to make Enron look like a walk in the park. But every time I’ve gotten close, witnesses have changed their testimony, disappeared, or died.
She suddenly went a little cold and looked at Asmodeus. Something inside her cried out in rejection at the very idea of it. Asmodeus must have sensed her fear.
No, my angel. Daemonae do not kill without reason. I do not kill without reason. Were I to get my hands on Templeton, I would be sorely tempted to mete out the harshest form of judgment but even then I would not kill in cold blood. I had nothing to do with those losses.
Asmodeus… She caressed his shoulder in apology, wary of the lash marks. Is there anything I can do?
No. He averted his gaze.
She caught his thoughts anyway, just an inkling of what he would not ask, and she looked at him steadily as a glimmer of understanding went through her.
That pride of his was so much a part of him.
Asmodeus, she said, quietly but firmly.
He swore softly, vehemently, under his breath in a language she could not understand but the meaning was clear enough.
She swatted his shoulder lightly, impatiently. Stop that.
In surprise, Asmodeus looked at her, a little startled at her action.
What do you need? she asked, insistent.
He shook his head, his eyes locked on hers almost pleadingly.
Gabriel stared him down, waited patiently. She had all the time
in the world—it wasn’t as if they were going anywhere.
It’s too soon, Asmodeus said almost desperately.
It was too soon and in more than one way. Asmodeus would have given her more time to get used to him, to the idea of what they were to each other. Each time he took from her…
There was no choice. There was too much she needed to know if he continued to feed from her. It wrenched his heart but choice had been left behind the moment Templeton had summoned him from the other plane.
Asmodeus took a long, slow breath.
My angel, Gabriel. His throat tightened. There is something you should know if you would do this. Each time I feed on you, what I give you in the venom…it changes you. It helps your body give me the sustenance I need, yes, but it also binds us more closely. It takes what is there between us and it binds you to me. It is no sacrifice on my part. Not ever. Not knowing what he now knew. His heart wrenched as he laid a hand on her belly. It also prepares you in other ways.
An odd emotion slipped through Gabriel at the implications of that gesture, a sweet yearning she had thought past.
Once she had thought she could have it all but then one day she realized time had slipped by her. She had begun to realize that, though she hadn’t been looking, time for a husband, a home, a family, had finally run out.
The pain of that knowledge whispered through her, old and familiar, but she put it aside, there was no time for it now. Or for the soft glimmer of hope that it seemed he suddenly offered.
But not now? she asked. Not right this moment?
For Gabriel there had never been any question, not after what she had just guessed, and certainly not after what she had just watched. Not after seeing his courage, his strength. How he had to suffer it. For her sake. And for his.
How could she do any less? It had always been her way to do what needed to be done. It was who she was.
And, to be honest, she craved it.
She wanted it, wanted to feel him feed from her. She ached for the delicious pleasure of his mouth on her throat, of his teeth as they sank once more into her skin, with a desire that was very nearly sexual. The very thought had her going hot. He took, yes, and she gave. Willingly. She loved the feel of his strong arms around her, the feel of his long, hard body against hers.
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