“Is it her?” the shorter one asked with a formal accent that sounded British. He eyed me shrewdly.
“It’s her,” the taller, an American, confirmed. “She’s using a trance. Focus on one detail at a time, the way the Black Hand taught us. Her hair, for instance.”
The shorter Nephil squinted at me so intently I wondered if he could see all the way through to the bricks on the building behind me. “Well, well,” he said after a moment. “Red, is it? I preferred you blond.”
With inhuman speed, they were at my sides, each gripping an elbow so hard I winced. “What were you doing in the warehouse?” the taller Nephil asked. “How did you find it?”
“I—,” I began. But I was too terrified to think up a plausible lie. They weren’t going to believe me if I said sheer dumb luck was responsible for my stumbling through their window in the middle of the night.
“Cat got your tongue?” the shorter said, tickling under my chin.
I jerked away.
“We have to take her back to the warehouse,” the taller one said. “The Black Hand or Blakely will want to question her.”
“They won’t be back till tomorrow. Might as well get some answers now.”
“What if she doesn’t talk?”
The shorter Nephil licked his lips, something frightening lighting up his eyes. “We’ll make sure she does.”
The taller Nephil frowned. “She’ll tell them everything.”
“We’ll wipe her memory when we’re done. She won’t know the difference.”
“We’re not strong enough yet. Even if we could erase half of it, it wouldn’t be enough.”
“We could try devilcraft,” the shorter suggested with a disturbing gleam in his eyes.
“Devilcraft is a myth. The Black Hand made that clear.”
“Oh yeah? If the angels in heaven have powers, it makes sense the demons in hell should too. You say myth, I say potential gold mine. Imagine what we could do if we got our hands on it.”
“Even if devilcraft exists, we wouldn’t know where to start.”
The shorter Nephil wagged his head in irritation. “Always one for fun, you are. Fine. We make sure our stories match. Our word against hers.” He counted down his suggested version of the night’s events on his fingers. “We chased her from the warehouse, found her hiding in the club, and while dragging her back, she got scared and spilled everything. It won’t matter what she says happened. She already broke into the warehouse. If anything, the Black Hand will expect her to lie again.”
The taller Nephil didn’t look fully convinced, but he didn’t argue, either.
“You’re coming with me,” the shorter one grunted, forcing me roughly into the tight space between the buildings at our rear. He paused only to tell his friend, “Stay here and make sure nobody bothers us. If we can extract information from her, it just might earn us extra privileges. Maybe even move us up a rank.”
My whole body went into a slow freeze at the idea of being interrogated by the Nephil, but I’d quickly come to accept that I didn’t stand a fighting chance against both of them. Maybe I could press my advantage. My only hope—and even I knew it was a thin one—was to level the playing field by going one on one. Letting the shorter Nephil drag me deeper into the narrow breezeway, I hoped the gamble would pay off.
“You’re making a big mistake,” I told him, putting all the threat I possessed behind my words.
He rolled up his sleeves, exposing knuckles decorated with various sharp rings, and my courage suddenly felt slippery. “Been in America six months now, waking up at the crack of dawn, training all day under a tyrant, and locked up in the barracks at night. After six months of that prison, let me tell you, it’s going to feel good to take it out on someone.” He licked his lips. “I’m going to enjoy this, luv.”
“You stole my line,” I said, and shoved my knee up between his legs.
I’d seen enough guys at school take a similar hit during sports games or PE class to know the injury wouldn’t completely immobilize him, but I wasn’t expecting him to be ready to lunge at me after nothing more than a pained moan.
He came at me in a blur. There was a discarded two-by-four near my feet, and I snatched it up. Several rusty nails protruded from it, making it a useful weapon.
The Nephil eyed the block of wood and shrugged. “Go ahead. Try and hit me. Won’t hurt.”
I gripped the two-by-four like a bat. “It might not permanently injure you, but trust me, it will hurt.”
He faked to his right, but I was expecting it. When he jumped to his left, I swung down hard. There was an awful puncturing sound, and the Nephil yelped.
“That’s gonna cost you.” He kicked high before I had time to register the movement, his boot sending the wood out of my grasp. He wrestled me to the ground, pinning my arms over my head.
“Get off me!” I yelled, twisting under his weight.
“Sure thing, luv. Just tell me what you were doing at the safe house.”
“Get—off—me—now.”
“You heard her.”
The Nephil’s eyes widened in impatience. “What now?” he snapped, whipping his head around to see who dared interrupt us.
“It was an easy enough request,” Jev said, smiling slightly, but it was all lethality at the edges.
“I’m a little busy at the moment, mate,” the Nephil barked, raking his eyes over me for emphasis. “If you don’t mind.”
“Turns out I do.” Jev grabbed the Nephil by the shoulders and flung him against the building. He splayed his hand across the Nephil’s throat, shutting off his airway.
“Apologize.” With a flick of his head, Jev gestured in my direction.
The Nephil clawed at Jev’s hand, his face flaring with color. His mouth opened and closed like a fish’s, trying to draw oxygen.
“Tell her how deeply sorry you are, or I’ll make sure you have nothing to say for a good while longer.” With his free hand, Jev waved a switchblade, and I realized he meant to cut out the Nephil’s tongue. For what it was worth, I didn’t feel a shred of sympathy. “What’s it going to be?”
The Nephil’s eyes burned with rage as he glanced between me and Jev.
Sorry, his infuriated voice spat into my mind.
“It won’t win an Oscar, but it’ll do,” Jev told him with a vicious smile. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
Wrenching free, the Nephil gulped air and massaged his throat. “Do I know you? I know you’re a fallen angel—I can feel your power rolling off you like a stench, which makes me think you must have been pretty high up before you fell, maybe even an archangel—but what I want to know is if we’ve crossed paths before.” It seemed like a trick question, meant to help the Nephil track Jev down at some future point, but Jev wasn’t baited.
“Not yet,” he said. “I’ll keep the introduction short.” He plowed his fist into the Nephil’s gut. The Nephil’s mouth was still in the shape of an O when he sank to his knees and went slack.
Jev turned to me. I expected him to demand why I hadn’t stayed in the alley like we’d agreed, and how I’d wound up with the present company, but he simply wiped a smudge of dirt off my cheek and buttoned the top two buttons on my blouse.
“You okay?” he asked quietly.
I nodded, but felt tears swell at the back of my throat.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said.
For once, I didn’t protest.
CHAPTER
19
AS JEV DROVE, I LEANED MY HEAD AGAINST THE window, staying quiet. He kept to side roads and back roads, but I had a rough idea of where we were. Another few turns, and I knew exactly where we were. The entrance to Delphic Amusement Park loomed ahead, imposing and skeletal. Jev pulled into the vacant lot. Four hours ago, he would have been lucky to find a place half this close to the gates.
“What are we doing here?” I asked, sitting up straighter.
He shut off the engine, arching a dark brow. “You said you wanted to talk.”
“Yeah, but this place is …” Empty.
A hard smile touched his mouth. “Still don’t know if you can trust me? As for why Delphic, call me sentimental.”
If I was supposed to catch his meaning, I didn’t. I followed him to the gates, watching him vault up and over them with ease. On the other side, he pushed the gate open just wide enough to allow me entrance.
“Could we go to jail for this?” I asked, knowing it was a stupid question. If we were caught, how could we not?
But because Jev looked like he knew what he was doing, I followed. Above the lamplight, a roller coaster towered over the park. An image blazed across my mind, momentarily halting me. I saw myself hurtling off the tracks into a free fall. I swallowed, brushing the image off as having to do with my terror of heights.
I was growing more uneasy by the minute. Just because Jev had saved my skin three times didn’t mean it was a good idea to be alone with him. I supposed I’d been lulled here by the idea of answers. Jev had promised we’d talk, and the temptation had been too appealing to resist.
At last Jev slowed, veering off the walkway and coming to a stop before a ramshackle maintenance shed. It was overshadowed by the roller coaster on one side and a giant spinning wheel on the other. The squat gray structure was the last place anyone’s eyes would travel.
“What’s in the shed?” I asked.
“Home.”
Home? Either he had a sense of humor, or he was redefining simple living. “Glamorous.”
A shrewd smile crept to his mouth. “I sacrificed style for safety.”
I eyed the weathered paint, sloped awning, and paper-thin construction. “Safe? I could probably kick down the door.”
“Safe from the archangels.”
At the word, I felt a jab of panic. I remembered my last hallucination. Help me find an archangel’s necklace, Hank had said. The coincidence tingled unpleasantly under my skin.
Inserting his key, Jev opened the shed door and held it for me.
“When do I get to find out about the archangels?” I asked. I sounded glib, but nerves were making a wreck of my stomach. Just how many different angel spin-offs were there?
“All you need to know is that right now, they’re not on our side.”
I read deeper into his tone. “But they might be later?”
“I’m an optimist.”
I stepped over the threshold, thinking there had to be more to the shed than met the eye. If the walls would be spared by a gusty wind, I’d be amazed. The floorboards creaked under my weight, and I breathed in the smell of stale air. The shed was small—about fifteen by ten feet. No windows. The space fell to total darkness when Jev let the door shut behind us.
“You live here?” I asked, just to be sure.
“This is more like the antechamber.”
Before I could ask what that meant, I heard him cross the shed. There was the low whine of a door opening. When he spoke again, his voice was much lower to the ground.
“Give me your hand.”
I shuffled over, wading through blackness, until I felt him grasp my hand. It seemed he was standing below me, in a recessed area. His hands moved to my waist. He lifted me down—
Into a space beneath the shed. We stood face-to-face in the darkness. I felt him breathing, low and steady. My own breathing was less regular. Where was he taking me?
“What is this place?” I whispered.
“There’s a labyrinth of tunnels beneath the park. Layer upon layer of mazes. Years ago, fallen angels didn’t mingle with humans. They separated themselves, living out here on the coast, going into towns and villages only during Cheshvan to possess their Nephilim vassals’ bodies. A two-week vacation, and those towns were like their resorts. They did what they wanted. Took what they wanted. Filled their pockets with their vassals’ money.
“These cliffs by the ocean were remote, but fallen angels built their cities underground as a precaution. They knew that over time things would change. And they did. Humans expanded. The boundary between human and fallen angel territory blurred. Fallen angels built Delphic on top of their city to hide it. When they opened the amusement park, they used the revenue to sustain themselves.”
His voice was so measured, so steady, I didn’t know how he felt about what he’d just told me. In return, I didn’t know what to say. It was like hearing a dark fairy tale, late at night, with heavy eyes. The whole moment felt dreamlike, fluttering in and out of focus, yet so very real.
I knew Jev was telling the truth, not because his history of fallen angels and Nephilim matched Scott’s, but because every last word rattled me, shaking loose fragments of my memory I’d thought were gone forever.
“I almost brought you here once,” Jev said. “The Nephil whose safe house you broke into tonight interfered.”
I didn’t have to be honest with Jev, but I decided to take the risk. “I know Hank Millar is the Nephil you’re talking about. He’s the reason I went to the safe house tonight. I wanted to know what he was hiding inside. Scott told me if we got enough dirt on him, we could figure out what he’s planning and devise a way to bring him down.”
Something I interpreted as pity flashed across Jev’s eyes. “Hank isn’t an ordinary Nephil, Nora.”
“I know. Scott told me he’s building an army. He wants to overthrow fallen angels so they can’t possess Nephilim bodies anymore. I know he’s powerful and connected. What I don’t understand is how you’re involved. Why were you at the safe house tonight?”
Jev said nothing for a moment. “Hank and I have a business arrangement. It’s not unusual for me to pay him a visit.” He was being deliberately vague. I didn’t know whether even after my gesture of honesty he was unwilling to be open with me, or whether he was trying to protect me. He let go of a long sigh. “We need to talk.”
He took my elbow, leading me deeper into the perfect darkness beneath the shed. We moved downward, twisting through corridors and around bends. At last Jev slowed, opened a door, and picked up something from the ground.
A match hissed to life, and he held it against the wick of a candle. “Welcome to my place.”
Compared to utter darkness, the candlelight was surprisingly bright. We stood at the opening of a black granite foyer that led to a vast room beyond, also carved from black granite. Silk rugs in chromatic shades of navy, gray, and black decorated the floors. The furniture was sparse, but the pieces Jev had selected were sleek and contemporary, with clean lines and artistic appeal.
“Wow,” I said.
“I don’t bring many people down here. It’s not something I want to share with everyone. I like the privacy and seclusion.”
He definitely had both, I thought, looking around the cavelike studio. Under the candlelight, the granite walls and floors glittered as though flecked with diamonds.
As I continued my slow exploration, Jev walked the room, lighting candles.
“Kitchen to the left,” he said. “Bedroom in the back.”
I tossed a coy glance over my shoulder. “Why, Jev, are you flirting with me?”
He watched me with dark eyes.
“I’m starting to wonder if you’re trying to distract me from our previous conversation.” I trailed my finger over the only heirloom piece in the room, a full-length silver-plated mirror that looked like it belonged in a medieval French château. My mom would be truly impressed.
Jev dropped into a French Deco–inspired black leather sofa, spreading his arms along the back. “I’m not the distraction in the room.”
“Oh? And what might that be?”
I felt his eyes devour me as I moved around the room. He assessed me head to toe without blinking, and a hot ache shivered through me. A kiss would have been less intimate.
Shoving down the warmth his gaze stirred inside me, I stopped to take in a breathtaking oil panting. The colors were so vivid, the detail so violent.
“The Fall of Phaeton,” he informed me. “The Greek sun god Helios had a son, Phaeton
, by a mortal woman. Each day Helios drove a chariot across the sky. Phaeton tricked his father into letting him drive the chariot, even though Phaeton wasn’t strong enough or skilled enough to handle the horses. As expected, the horses ran wild and fell to Earth, burning everything in their path.” He waited, drawing my eyes to him. “Surely you’re aware of the effect you have on me.”
“Now you’re teasing me.”
“I enjoy teasing you, true. But there are some things I never joke about.” All banter left him, and his eyes turned serious.
Trapped in Jev’s gaze, I accepted what had so plainly been laid out before me. He was a fallen angel. The power that vibrated off him was different from what I felt around Scott. Stronger and sharper. Even now, the air whipped with energy. Every molecule in my body was ultrasensitive to his presence, aware of his movements.
“I know you’re a fallen angel,” I said. “I know you force Nephilim to swear an oath of fealty. You possess their bodies. In this war that’s going on, you’re on the opposite side from Scott. No wonder you don’t like him.”
“You’re remembering.”
“Not nearly enough. If you’re a fallen angel, why do business with Hank, a Nephil? Aren’t you supposed to be mortal enemies?” I sounded more sharp than I intended; I wasn’t sure how to feel about the idea of Jev as a fallen angel. A bad guy. To keep this revelation from pushing me over the edge, I reminded myself I’d figured this all out before, once upon a time. If I’d handled it then, I could handle it now.
Once again, pity flashed across his expression. “About Hank.” He dragged his hands down his face.
“What about him?” I stared at him, trying to figure out what he was having such a difficult time telling me. His features carried such deep sympathy, I automatically stiffened, bracing for the worst.
Jev stood, walked to the wall, leaned an arm against it. His sleeves were pushed to his elbows, his head bowed.
The Complete Hush, Hush Saga Page 76