Angel Fire: Angel Fire, Book 1

by Johnston, Marie

  Andy didn’t hesitate. “We failed at getting the analyst.”

  Jameson’s mouth flattened. That was indeed bad news.

  “The warrior happened to be with her the night my men tried to kill her.”

  Ah, fuck. “Did he kill one or both of them?”

  “No, sir. Only knocked them out.”

  Damn. It was worth a shot. An angel could fall for killing a human, even in self-defense if the tribunal decided other actions were warranted. “You took care of them?”

  Andy inclined his head. “Naturally. They both overdosed last night in a cheap motel room.”

  “Perfect.”

  Andy was worth his weight in gold. He had started as a loyal black rose, an accountant for the club, headhunted because of his shady history allegedly embezzling. He’d advanced to become Jameson’s right-hand man. Where others groveled at Jameson’s knee, Andy had always seen what needed to be done. The man was efficient and meticulous. He also knew the consequences of reverting to his embezzling ways, or what happened if he otherwise crossed Jameson.

  “Any good news?”

  “The Numen haven’t found the watcher’s body yet.”

  A slow smile spread across Jameson’s face. No one knew of his methods, and the less they knew, the better. And the archmaster Jameson currently “partnered” with was more compliant if he didn’t know Jameson needed the double scythe to cross into the Mist.

  “Have you talked with Gerzon recently?” Andy inquired.

  Jameson grunted. Think of the devil and he shall appear. “I try not to. I met with him last week to pay him our agreed upon rate of two vials of angel fire a month for his demon minions protecting the club.”

  Gerzon was an asshole, even for a demon. His power in the demon world was Jameson’s ticket for revenge, and Jameson was Gerzon’s ticket into Numen.

  Andy shifted in his chair and cleared his throat. “Another demon is interested in partnering with you.”

  Jameson cocked an eyebrow. “Really?”

  Sure, he’d garnered much attention from demons with his activities. But Gerzon was a major power in the underworld, and any demon interested in usurping his authority ended up dead. Gerzon wanted to be the force securing rights to the fountain of angel fire after Jameson ousted the Senate and took his rightful station as ruler of Numen. Of course, no demon would be content with only controlling angel fire. Gerzon would have to meet with a nasty end when Jameson conquered his former realm.

  But first, he had to gather enough power to get there.

  “An archmaster.” Andy peered down at his tablet. “Sandeen.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “I’m having him checked out. I told Gerzon’s archmaster servant, Zanda, that he’s an archmaster who wants to frequent the club. Should be innocuous enough that she doesn’t report him back to Gerzon. She’s interrogating some sylphs to get information on him.”

  “The evil little spirits wet their ethereal little drawers whenever she’s near.”

  “Absolutely. Though it is unnerving that she uses the elderly as her hosts.”

  Nothing was as disconcerting as a wrinkled old grandma reminiscing about how she was once thrown into the Mist by a warrior she later beheaded. Then cackle with her dentures rattling in her mouth.

  “It’s ingenious,” Jameson said. “They often live alone. No one misses them if they disappear for a few hours. When they can’t remember what they did all day, no one blinks an eye.”

  “I highly doubt they last long after Zanda carts their frail bodies all over town doing her ill-begotten tasks.”

  “Any progress on weapon smuggling?” Jameson’s only Daemon weapon was his double scythe—he wanted more. After his fall from grace, Numen steel seared his skin, branding him as unworthy of touching it.

  Good times.

  But if one Daemon weapon drenched in Numen blood could help him cross into the Mist and back, it made sense other weapons made with Daemon metal could, too. From the Mist, he could figure out how to cross into Numen entirely. “Gerzon refuses to trade in weapons, only demons for angel fire. I set his lessers up with humans to possess and he gets the angel fire from the warrior kills they log.” At least Numen were dying during this deal.

  “Thus the reason I think meeting with Sandeen may behoove you. The demons we are using work for Gerzon and would report to him if we used them to target other demons for weapons. But Sandeen may have his own agenda we can capitalize on.”

  Jameson considered all the angles. After he’d beheaded Magan, he’d drenched himself in her blood and tried to transcend. As a senator, he’d had the ability to move freely between the realms.

  For one heart-stopping second, he’d wavered between corporeal and nothingness. He was close, dammit. But it’d do no good to materialize in Numen with one measly weapon. His untrained army couldn’t cross into the Mist without special tools.

  Maybe this Sandeen would be willing to deal in weapons.

  * * *

  “Oooh, I like this one,” the hot blonde whispered when he entered the dressing room.

  Sandeen smiled from inside the human host he was inhabiting for a few short hours. When Lindy had reached out to him and said she’d be leaving Jameson Haddock’s penthouse and why, he told her he’d meet her in one of the changing rooms of the lingerie shop.

  He had watched as she walked in, breezed by stacks of panties to go toward the bustiers and garters. The busy salesclerk helping a bridal party tittering over a set of crotchless panties hadn’t noticed Lindy. His target picked an impressive collection to try on and headed to one of the private changing areas in the back, leaving the door unlatched.

  “You know you’re supposed to keep your underwear on when you try on clothes,” he murmured. The sight of her large breasts tucked into a lace bustier and garters lining her long, shapely legs tightened the manhood of the uptight banker he’d possessed. The black fuck-me heels she wore solidified the human’s cock. A delicious ache.

  Uptight humans were the easiest targets. When Sandeen started using their bodies, he marveled over both their horror and their elation at the activities he made their bodies perform. Most never remembered once Sandeen left them, but some did, seeking to find that special awakening they hadn’t found on their own.

  Sandeen could empathize. It was part of the reason demons wreaked such havoc when they possessed humans. Life in Daemon was nightmarish at best, so it was the only time they could feel pleasure, freedom, and escape the oppression of living under nothing but cruelty. The opposite of why angels came to Earth to aid the sick, the ragged, the down-trodden. Both beings got a strange rush being close to emotions they never experienced due to their role in creation.

  Lindy giggled. “I never wear underwear.”

  Naturally.

  He’d met the buxom bombshell at Jameson’s club when he was studying the fallen angel. After taking her home—easiest pick-up of his life—he’d found that while she might be free with her body, she also had a brain. She already had her black rose tattoo and was willing to help Sandeen learn more about Jameson, as long as she rose in power alongside him. How a little human thought she could maintain the upper-hand when it came to demons… If he didn’t get killed and officially enter Hell while trying to gain his freedom from Daemon, then he’d deal with her. He wasn’t into long-term relationships of any sort.

  “Have you found out anything?”

  She twirled so her backside ground against him in the small room. “Can you buckle me in?” He gritted his teeth and obliged, tolerating her delay only because her firm ass was divine. And she knew it. “He’s keeping me like a pet.” This was said with some annoyance. “I mean, he’s good in bed, but I’m worth more, you know?”

  Oh yeah, he knew—as far as her bedroom prowess went. She leaned forward, putting her hands on the wall, looking back at him invitingly.

  “I’ll have to take a rain check, Lindy dear. Can’t have Haddock getting suspicious.”

  Lindy
wiggled her hips, but he left his zipper firmly latched, as much as he hated to.

  He would find a willing partner later. That was why he needed to be able to roam freely with the humans and not be confined inside of them. There was no pleasure in sex in Daemon. Only fornicating for reproduction’s sake. And pain’s sake. And torture’s sake. Inflicting both on others, preferably. They were demons after all.

  “Give Haddock time, keep him interested,” Sandeen instructed her. “He’ll either start to trust you or slip some information accidentally. I have a meeting with him soon, and I doubt he’ll be completely forthcoming if he decides to work with me. I’m sure his sidekick is using his Daemon resources to check me out first. If Gerzon tries to kill me, then I’ll take that as a rejection.”

  Lindy sighed and stripped off her lingerie. Watching her get dressed again, he had to adjust himself. Soon, buddy. He’d find someone to get off with soon. He caught the wink of light glinting off the wedding ring worn by the man he possessed.

  That’d truly be an asshole thing to do—possess a body sworn to another and lead them into blind betrayal. Some demons got off on that, a true test of their power to make the faithful open to possession and lead them to stray. Not Sandeen. He preferred the reluctant deference a soul gave him when he led them down the forbidden path they had already been treading near. This repressed banker with divorce papers sitting on his desk had been ripe for the picking.

  Again, he felt the man’s avid response to Lindy and wished, not for the first time, that humans could get off more than once before needing a break. With most bodies he inhabited, it was one and done. Some days, he was tempted to inhabit women just so he could experience multiple orgasms in one possession. In Daemon, they could rut for hours, but no peak was attained for either party involved. Not unless one of them was suffering, which was their lot in life for having the misfortune of being born in the realm. Sandeen, always the oddball, never preferred it, seeking mutual pleasure in the human realm.

  Lindy blew him an air kiss and strutted out of the changing room. Sandeen planned to wait until the clerk was ringing up Lindy’s order before he left. Suddenly, the door swung open and he faced a startled young woman. She was the bride of the group the sales associate had been helping.

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” She started to turn away, alarmed at having caught a man lurking in the changing area of a lingerie shop.

  “No worries. It seems my lady friend has stood me up. We had arranged to meet in here for a little, well…” He shrugged sheepishly. “It doesn’t matter.”

  Managing to adopt a likeable, abashed smile, he caught her eye. The handsomeness of his host kept her from turning away. He knew instantly when she warmed to his hound dog routine. Her gaze swept his expensive suit clad body, interest lighting their depths.

  “You’re welcome to stay.” The banker spoke low, his body primed from hours in the gym and not at home with his soon-to-be ex-wife.

  He read her well and knew the ways this could play out. She could laugh with him, shoot him a smile, and leave. Fast forward years after her wedding, to a night when she’d be out with friends, wondering what-if. What if that guy watching her at the bar was interested? What if she was single? Then she’d send her spouse divorce papers, just like the ones sitting on the desk of Sandeen’s host.

  Or…she could bat her lashes and step inside. One last adventure before she tied the knot. It was her party, after all. Then she’d leave, and the guilt would drag at her until she called the wedding off.

  All she had to decide was whether she would experience years of heartache before realizing she wasn’t ready to settle down.

  Which one would it be?

  Her gaze flicked back up to his. Sandeen let his interest shine through, earning him a seductive smile. After a glance back toward her friends to see if they were watching her, she stepped inside.

  Chapter 12

  In the barracks, Bryant located Jagger, pulled him aside to speak in private, and explained the assignment.

  The young warrior’s face paled, then red crept up his neck until his face flushed with anger. “No.”

  Bryant silently cursed the situation. If it weren’t for Felicia’s past, he wouldn’t have gone along with her demand. “I wasn’t asking.”

  Julian, or Jagger, as they had come to call him, firmly shook his head. Bryant had guessed there was history between Felicia and his warrior, but she trusted the male.

  “Sir, I can’t. I might just step aside and let whoever it is rid us of the migraine that is Felicia Montclaire.”

  Bryant had the urge to grab the young warrior by his shirt and drag him up to his face. Using his scars to intimidate was instinctive at this point. Forcing himself to remain placid, he steeled his resolve. “I know she can be difficult. But you have to trust me when I say she needs our protection and you’re the only one she would allow.”

  “Figures. She couldn’t control me once, so she’s using you to do it.”

  “You two were together?” Bryant inquired.

  Jagger scoffed. “She wishes. I turned her down, didn’t play puppet to her master, but she let the rumors spread that we did. I looked like an ass and my girlfriend, the one I planned to sync with, broke up with me. It was humiliating. And all because a spoiled senator’s daughter got rejected.”

  Bryant suppressed a sigh. Bugger it all. Why couldn’t this be easy? Yet Bryant had faith in Jagger that he’d do the right thing—eventually. At least Bryant didn’t have to worry about a male guarding Felicia getting distracted by her beauty and sexual nature. But Bryant could see why Felicia had chosen Jagger. It would look like she was trying to have the last laugh, an in your face to the young, arrogant warrior. When really, she’d picked the male who wouldn’t have ulterior motives where she was concerned.

  Bryant wouldn’t put it past her to lord the circumstances over Jagger.

  It could be a giant mess, but Jagger was a reliable warrior. Bryant would do what he could to mitigate relations. “What happened between you two is in the past and you need to let it stay there.”

  “The past?” Jagger’s wings twitched in agitation. “Not when people see I’m shadowing her every move.” He threw his hands up. “They’re going to think it was all true.”

  “You know it’s not. She knows it’s not. You can’t control what others think.”

  Jagger made a derisive noise. Bryant wished he could tell Jagger the complete truth about why Felicia needed protecting, but he couldn’t. He had vowed to tell no one what had happened to her. For now, his team would think she needed protecting because she was Odessa’s sister and, therefore, may also become a target.

  Jagger’s head fell back, his surfer blond hair brushing the tops of his wings. “There’s nothing I can do?” he asked quietly.

  This was a big step for Jagger. The hothead kid of two senators had taken a giant step down in social ranking when he chose to become a warrior. He’d been put with Bryant because Bryant was seasoned enough not to care what class Jagger had been born into. Bryant had been veteran enough not to put up with Jagger’s righteous attitude or allow him any leeway after learning how and why the young warrior had lost his father.

  Jagger had become a stellar fighter, earning his nickname. He was honorable, cultured, but brutal on the battlefield. Bryant just hoped after all that, he didn’t lose him to the insanity Felicia could incite in males.

  * * *

  Odessa waited with Felicia in Director Richter’s office. Bryant went in search of Julian and after a few moments of awkward silence, the director had stepped out to “check on some things.”

  “I’m not staying with you guys. Bryant doesn’t need to blame me for cockblocking him.” Felicia bounced her long leg that was crossed over the other. “Julian can guard me in the human world.”

  Thanks to time spent with human friends, Odessa knew the term and laughed. “Bryant cockblocks himself better than anyone. You’re welcome to stay. We can take the master suite and the warriors can
take our old rooms.”

  Felicia tossed her long ponytail over her shoulder, where it swung freely without her wings to impede it. Odessa suspected that was one of the many reasons she lived among humans. She could keep her wings morphed into her back. She’d get questioned too often in Numen as to why she kept them tucked away. And revealing a less than pristine set of wings? Filly already had a reputation. Without a functional set of wings, she would be shunned, humiliated, and avoided. Well, more than she was now.

  “Nah. Julian can go where I go. No need for him to corrupt Bryant where I’m concerned. Your mate seems to not hate me. He even treats me with respect. Julian would encourage him to do otherwise.”

  Odessa studied her sister and her practiced nonchalance. Felicia cared that Julian thought so little of her. “Bryant seems to not hate me, too. But why would Julian hate you?”

  Was the cause rooted in her sister’s reputation? Odessa had heard enough angels drop crude comments about Felicia for her benefit. As much as Odessa had wanted to be nasty back, she forced herself to choose the high road—mostly because she had agreed. After catching Filly in bed with Crestin, as much as she loved her sister, she had been disappointed in her. Why hadn’t Filly told her that he was planning to stray?

  Odessa studied her fingernails. Because she would’ve been too afraid to be honest with herself and would’ve stayed by Crestin’s side, and she would’ve inevitably caught him with another female.

  “He thinks I’m a worthless whore.” Felicia kept her tone light, but it didn’t fool Odessa. Filly pretended not to be bothered by the warrior’s opinion.

  Understanding dawned. Her sister had made it look like she was with Crestin knowing that big-mouthed jerk would tell everyone he’d been with her, regardless of the facts.

  “You want everyone to think you’re a worthless whore, don’t you?”

  Her sister made a puh-lease face. “Why would I do that?”

  More information clicked together. “You can defend yourself. You probably fight really well. Is that what you’ve been doing on the earthly realm, learning all those moves you taught me?”