Doomed Cases Box Set: The Complete Collection Books 1- 4 & Prequel
Page 63
“All right, yes. You should stay here and deal with any clients. If they ask, tell them that the owner is fighting for his life in the hospital,” I told her, and then went to my own office to check for anything that could be useful there. Potion ingredients, herbs, some knives, and a fresh bottle of liquid magic. I had to retract that and opened the drawer again. Yeah, someone had left it in there, and it wasn’t me. There was a note, too.
I have to apologise. Don’t cross me off yet.
Paul.
So, the retired Watcher, or angel—who the hell knew who he was now—broke into my office and that wasn’t cool. I couldn’t believe he dared to leave this shit in my personal drawer. Didn’t he realise I was an addict?
I stared at the golden liquid and my throat began to burn. I wanted to taste it, knowing that everything would suddenly be better, but as far as I was concerned, Paul couldn’t be trusted anymore.
I had too many other things on my mind to worry about and I couldn’t afford to become the drunk, unpredictable Maxine again.
I picked out what I could and charmed the lock, making sure that this bottle wouldn’t tempt me another time. The tiny voice in my head reminded me that I was done being an addict.
“Right, let’s get going. I have to pop over to my flat and pick up a few things,” I announced. Zach was standing by the window. He was lost in his own thoughts. The striking heat rolled over my stomach, letting me know that he was still available. That night in the car, he stripped me down and looked into my soul.
“Where are we going?” he asked, folding his arms over his chest.
“North of England. Meet me in Victoria in two hours,” I requested, telling myself that I had to get it together. In any other circumstances, I would have gone with the flow, but my priorities had shifted.
He nodded and then left. Emma sat in her usual spot, sorting out her stationary. I placed my hand on her arm, sensing that she was unsure about what the future held for her and all of us.
“Don’t worry, he’s going to make it,” I said, thinking about hugging her, but then I changed my mind. She jumped off her seat and a second later she was squeezing me hard.
“Oh, I hope so. I just want everything to go back to the way it was,” she cried, with her sweet tone of voice. My body stiffened, but I kept breathing, telling myself that friends showed each other affection.
Several minutes later when I left the agency and started walking through the streets, I wiped the tears away. I never cried, well, I kept telling myself that I was too tough for this shit, but friends meant everything to me. Ricky had to get better, but his vitals were decreasing each day. That curse was deadly, and his time was running out. This trip had to be successful, and with magic or without, I was planning to kill Alexis with my bare hands.
Chapter 19
“These beings, full of happiness to see the face of God from which there is none who hide, at no point turned their eyes away from that.”
―Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy
I hadn’t been up in my flat for a little while, well, since things went wrong in Gjöll. Rodriguez was looking for me, using his position to get me under his control. He knew I lived around here since he caught me by surprise in my local pub. I had a feeling that Lucifer himself was on my side, and Rodriguez was going to abuse his position for as long as possible.
After relying on Ricky’s demonic books, I needed to stock up my collection of potions. Fighting with Alexis wasn’t going to be easy and, in the past several days, my stocks had been running on empty.
I walked toward my street, staying vigilant and using my demonic energy to detect if there were any suspicious-looking demons nearby. I dared to wonder what was happening with Mrs. Patel. She liked checking on her tenants from time to time, and I had been late with my rent for several weeks now. My savings from the office were mostly gone, and I had kept some cash in the floorboards. It wasn’t much, but this money would have to tide me over for the next few months.
Ten minutes later after I made sure that it was safe for me to enter the car park, I snuck into the building. I suspected that Rodriguez had someone watching my place, but it’d been weeks since I had been here.
When I got to the second floor and approached my door, my senses indicated that my flat had been broken into. The door was ajar, and I felt burning magic in the air. Walking in on my tiptoes, I discovered the whole place trashed—furniture was either broken or upside down, drawers had been emptied out; my dishes had been smashed to pieces. The contents of almost every item in the kitchen cupboard were spread on the floor. The burning smell of magic wafted around. I stood in the threshold, clenching my fists and cursing the old demon. He was the only one who could have done this. Rodriguez most likely sent his pit-bull Watchers to make sure I wasn’t hiding anything. There was no point crying over my clothes or collection of DVDs, so I went straight to the bedroom.
It wasn’t any better there, and it pissed me off that whoever was here had dared to tear my demonic books apart. The pieces of paper were spread over my bed, and there was blood, too, but I refused to touch it. I started looking for valuable potions instead. I had no idea what Rodriguez was hoping to find in here. Any correspondence, things that Arthur had given to me I hadn’t kept in the flat. Sometimes being paranoid paid off.
I started picking out whatever I needed to take with me up north. Luckily no one had found my old stash of cash in the floorboard. The money itself wasn’t important, but the business wasn’t generating me anymore income at the moment, so every penny counted. I found my old rucksack that still hung on the door, packed whatever I could, and ten minutes later I was walking back to the tube station. Mrs. Patel was going to go mental when she discovered the mess. I suspected that she had already seen the flat and was waiting to evict me. I could say goodbye to my deposit, but I couldn’t worry about it now. My housing situation was always complicated, but soon Hell would take care of this problem.
It took me another half hour to get to Victoria station. I arrived ten minutes late but managed to locate Zach quickly enough. My pulse sped up when I saw him standing alone with that stoic expression on his face. Things like that worried me; my hormones were willing to have a party at my expense. No, no, no. I couldn’t keep thinking that this was perfectly okay. Our relationship had gotten very complicated; he wanted to take things further where I was holding on, thinking that my future was too uncertain to commit to no-strings-attached sex.
“Hey, sorry I’m late,” I said, hushing down whatever emotions were crawling up my spine. “Are you ready?”
“Pretty much. Where are we going?”
“Up north, to a small fishing village called Langston. The name is insignificant, but it’s the place where I gave birth to Summer,” I explained, feeling odd talking to him about something so personal.
“All right, Flower, let’s get on with this,” he agreed, already thinking about sleeping arrangements. I rolled my eyes behind his back. This was going to be difficult, keeping my hormones on a leash and Zach away from me.
We bought the tickets in the most human way possible and headed to the platform. I sensed demons nearby; it was obvious that there were going to be a few of them in such a busy place.
“What’s wrong?” Zach asked when I turned around the third time, scanning our surroundings.
“Nothing. I think I’m paranoid,” I muttered, certain that we were being watched. “My flat was vandalised, and I bet that my landlady is going to evict me. I saw it coming a long time ago.”
“You have to report it, Flower. Maybe the station will give the case to a good-looking detective who will find the bastard that did it,” Zachary said, winking at me. Only Zach could find something positive in the fact that I was homeless. There was no way that Mrs. Patel would let me back after I had been late with my rent a few times. On top of that the place was trashed.
“Forget it, besides, I know it was Rodriguez and his people. The old bastard wants to bring me down for questioni
ng,” I said, wishing that Rodriguez would stay in Hell once and for all.
“I never asked, but now I’m kind of curious. What is Hell like? What happens to humans when they die?”
I blinked a few times, wondering if Zach was serious. There was nothing attractive about Hell, and I wished I hadn’t experienced my last trip with Morpheus. It was better that he stuck to things he knew.
“I have never truly been inside, so I don’t know. Most of the mongrels who are summoned are treated like dogs downstairs,” I explained. Even the new election wouldn’t change a thing. Mongrels were always going to be second-class citizens.
“That sucks,” he muttered.
He didn’t dwell on the subject, and I was glad that we didn’t have to carry on with that conversation. We squeezed ourselves into the train seats, and I was suddenly aware of the all-to-familiar heat that flooded ever inch of me when he was close. For a short period of time I kept telling myself that I needed to stay focused—Alexis had my daughter—but Zach’s advances were becoming challenging.
Eventually I fell asleep somewhere in York. Lately I hadn’t been sleeping well, so it was bliss, finally getting two hours of kip. The dreams were conflicted, and I woke up when it was dark outside. The train was just approaching the station. Zach was snoozing, too. I thought about Ronan. I hadn’t heard from him since he left the letter in Ricky’s apartment. He left Nameless behind. Their relationship had been complicated from the start, but Ronan must have left some kind of instructions to Nameless. I should have questioned him in the hospital.
I woke Zach, and then we departed the train on a small platform in the middle of the English countryside.
“I hope you know where we’re going?” Zachary asked, as we found ourselves outside the station on a pitch-black road. I failed to see any taxis around and instantly regretted that we didn’t take the car. We were several miles from the coast and Ronan’s place.
“We have to walk for a few miles. There is a B&B in the village, or we could sleep in Ronan’s cottage,” I said, feeling silly that I hadn’t actually thought this through. Ronan had abandoned me, but I was certain that he would help us out by giving us a bed for a night. There was a part of me that believed Ronan wanted to reunite with his son, but after years of living alone, he wasn’t sure how to resume the dialog.
“So, Ronan helped you when you left the job in the palace?”
“Yes, he did,” I replied, and explained what happened to me once I was done with Arthur. My story was difficult to tell, but Zach was willing to listen. He didn’t judge me straight away like others had.
Zach opted for us to head straight to Ronan’s place. We started walking through the gloomy country road that would eventually lead us to the village where I spent nine months of my life.
In the distance I smelled the salty air. We were near the coast, and I remembered how uncertain I was when I showed up here for the first time two years ago. Nostalgic feelings came back, and now I was returning to the place where everything began.
The temperature was dropping slightly, but we kept going. After at least a mile, I was certain that someone was following us. I hadn’t sensed any demons on the train. There were masses of them in Victoria station, but not in such a remote village like Langston. Sometimes I thought I was too paranoid, but my instinct felt another half human approximately a hundred meters away from us. Energy shifted around me, changing the consistency of the air, and my fingertips inflamed. We were passing a forest on our right, so I grabbed Zach’s elbow and started dragging him toward the bushes. Whoever was tailing us couldn’t have had any professional training.
“I really enjoy having sex in wild places, Flower, but I’m kind of knackered,” Zach said, with a flirtatious tone of voice. I had to roll my eyes this time, looking out at the empty road.
“I haven’t dragged you here to have sex. Someone is following us. It’s probably another mongrel,” I hissed, and took a potion from my bag and quickly spread it around us. “This should mislead whoever it is a little.”
Ten minutes passed, and I started getting agitated, knowing that my demonic senses had never let me down. The magic vibrated through me, linking itself to the soil. I was just about to tell Zach to start moving again when a demon appeared on the road. He looked toward us, then glanced around with confusion. Zach had noticed him, but he couldn’t see as well as me in the pitch-black darkness.
The male demon was short with shaggy dark hair and a beard. He wasn’t anyone I knew or even recognised. He could have been one of Rodriguez’s men, but he didn’t fit to anyone from the palace.
“Stay here. I’ll be right back,” I whispered to the detective. He grabbed my hand, sending a jolt of heat waving down my spine.
“You’re not going anywhere alone,” he hissed.
“Chill, I’m not a baby. Let me take care of him with magic and don’t stress. I’ll be all right,” I replied. It seemed that Zach wanted to argue, but I was already walking away, holding a potion in my hand. The energy flew down my arms, as I snuck right behind him. Obviously, he wasn’t trained. My potions were weak, and any other demon would have used his protective wards. He was just standing in the middle of the road, waiting to be attacked.
I reached out for my small knife, licked my lips and jumped on him before my charm faded away.
“Hello, darling. What ya doing here, following me around? You have one chance to tell me who sent you, or I’ll cut your fat throat,” I snarled, locking my arm around his head, and using my left leg to get him on the ground. The knife was in front of his eyes. He tried to conjure some energy to defend himself, but he was too clumsy and ended up burning his jacket with flames.
“Let me go, and I’ll tell you who I am, Maxine Brodeur,” he hissed, trying to push me away.
“I had a hell of a day and really want to go to bed,” I snapped, sitting on him and balancing a fire ball in my hand, ready to give him a taste of my power. I didn’t give a fuck anymore about demonic rules. We were far away from any city, and the faction could kiss my arse. “Tell me who sent you, or I’ll fucking kill you.”
His eyes gleamed with green light and I flinched, shocked at seeing this kind of ability. I was a hundred percent sure that I hadn’t met him before. His boring, plain clothes and inability to defend himself would have made Mammon very angry. I was cold, tired, and pissed off that he was hiding shit from me.
A second later Zachary joined me, holding a gun in his hand.
“I’ll just blow off his head, Maxine. It will save us some trouble.” He grinned, pointing straight at the stranger’s head. All right, I had to give it to him; he wanted to act tough, too.
“The dark lord, he’s part of all this. You have to tell him that I have done nothing wrong,” the demon mumbled, making no sense whatsoever.
“Who the fuck are you?” I roared, grabbing his chubby face. I was on the verge of losing my shit with him. I was fed up with lies, deceit, and the fact that people were keeping shit from me.
“My name is Dimitri. I’ve escaped Hell. They are after me. You’re the only person who can help me,” he hissed and widened his eyes further. I noticed tiny blood vessels in his irises.
Okay, maybe my anger was unnecessary, but still, the past few days weren’t particularly relaxing. Zach glanced at me in confusion and lowered his gun.
“Help you? How? Start making sense, Dimitri, and stop wasting my time,” I ordered, loosening my grip.
“The dark lord values your opinion. There is a connection between you two. The demon who guides you—he knows, he always knew,” the demon continued his mumbling, and I was itching to kick his arse.
“Listen, I think you’ve made a mistake. I have nothing to do with Hell. I’m a mongrel girl. There is nothing special about me,” I insisted.
“Please, I’m begging you. My family is still there, my children. The city was busy, and I couldn’t approach you. Other demons would have noticed. Please tell your father that I have done nothing wrong!”
“I don’t know who my father is.”
Then, there was a large snapping sound, and the demon froze. In one split second he was staring at me, and the next, his eyes rolled to the back of his head. He was dead before I took a second breath.
Chapter 20
“The flesh of mortals runs to yielding flab.
So good beginnings aren’t enough to last to acorn time from when the oak is born.
―Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy
“Max, what the hell? What’s wrong with him?” Zach asked, putting his gun away. I stood there, my hands suddenly shaking, as questions mounted inside my head. Was it me? Did I kill him?
No, it was impossible. His energy went dark and it began hurting him. Dread filled my lungs.
“He’s dead,” I rasped, feeling suddenly numb. I heard him correctly—he said that my father could save him, and then he dropped dead. Did he mean Lucifer or someone who stood beneath him? There were so many possibilities.
Flames started covering the body, and Zachary cursed a few times, backing away. I stared at the demon’s body, paralysed, wondering what was happening. The flames burned the corpse for a good minute, before the demon vanished completely. Someone could see us in the darkness, but we were literally in the middle of nowhere, still a good mile away from the village.
I tapped into my source, considering calling Morpheus. Maybe he was the one who sent the demon to give me this odd message, but he was with me only yesterday. No, I discounted that.
“Did I mishear him, or did he really say something about your father?” Zach asked me, finally calming down.
“Come on, we have to keep moving before any human notices us,” I said, kind of limp, not knowing what to say. That demon must have followed us all the way here from London Victoria. I had years to find the demon who got my mother pregnant. Talking about a man who had never even tried to find me made me uneasy.