by Jessa Slade
She pictured vignettes of his life in the isolated circles. The low couch of leather and steel where she was still half reclining under a wool blanket. A computer workstation against one brick wall. A weight bench on the only rug softening the concrete floor. A kitchenette with one white coffee cup turned upside down on the rack beside the sink. Shielding the bed, a freestanding accordion of white plantation shutters, as if a chunk of destroyed Tara had landed in Chicago.
She slanted a glance at him. “So I take it demon-ridden don’t have girlfriends. Or interior decorators.”
He gazed impassively around the room. “Do I need one?”
“Decorator? Or girlfriend?”
“You tell me.”
Suddenly, lying unconscious in a strange place seemed safer than sparring with him—definitely safer than remembering that kiss, the rough silk of his mouth, and the raw grind of his body. . . .
She swung her feet to the bare floor. He crossed his arms, making no attempt to stop her, so she rose and edged away to one of the mullioned windows.
She flattened her hand against the glass. The daylight was gone, the street empty. “Why did you bring me here?”
“To give you a chance.” He stood just outside the circle of lamplight, where his black shirt and jeans melted into the darkness. The lit half of his face was hard, his jaw set so she almost felt the strain in his muscles.
When he’d pushed her against the wall, that tension had run all through him, ratcheting up with every stroke of tongue. She forced away the thought. “I feel like maybe I’ve run out of chances in my life,” she admitted.
He let his arms fall slack at his sides. “Where there’s life, there’s—”
“Hope?”
“Another chance to die.”
She choked on a laugh. “No girlfriend. No decorator. And not a whole lot of party invitations either, I’d bet.”
“Stalking demons all night cuts into my calendar.”
She restrained a shiver. “That’s what I have to look forward to? Becoming a night stalker?”
“There are worse things.”
“Worse than fighting monsters like that?”
“Being one.” He crossed to the kitchen to fill the coffee cup from a kettle on the stove. He approached her with the mug out.
She took the cup, sniffed. “Demons drink green tea?”
“I drink green tea.”
“You’re a demon.”
“No.” He left her standing by the window and went to the couch, where he pushed the blanket aside. “I’m possessed, not a demon myself.”
“Right. The thing that attacked us . . .”
“Feralis. Rather than possessing humans, ferales manifest physically—very physically, as you noticed—by consuming animal substance from this realm.” He rubbed at his shoulder. “You’ve had several following you, drawn to your demon ascending.”
Where he rubbed his shoulder, the black shirt gaped, revealing paler skin. Her breath caught on a silent intake. “It got you.”
He fingered the edges of the gash. “Guess so. Unless that was you.”
She opened her mouth to deny . . . and couldn’t speak. She had attacked him, after all. Twice, if she counted that violent kiss. Embarrassed heat rushed through her.
The corner of his mouth twisted up. “Demons have shitty tempers. Probably what got them kicked out of paradise in the first place.”
“I didn’t mean what I said.” When he lifted one eyebrow, she clarified. “About killing you.”
He shrugged. “It wasn’t just you talking. But you can understand why you need to be separated from the good folk of our fair city.”
The demon. How could she believe? How could she not believe after what she’d seen, what she’d done?
She leaned against the cold window. “What is happening to me?”
He sat back in the couch. “As the demon aligns with you, the resonating energy spikes. Your strength and quickness will increase, along with the ability to integrate sensory data. You’ll heal from everything except an instantly fatal blow.” His voice was clipped, as if he read from a brochure: The Perks of Possession. “The coldness and killing rage will get worse too, until you reach an equilibrium with the demon.”
“What if I don’t find a balance?” The glowing orange eye flashed in her memory. “Will I become one of those ferales?”
He tipped his head back. “Worse.”
She wrapped her hands tighter around her mug and pulled away from the chill at the window. “What’s worse?”
“A demon is ascending from the depths of your soul. The question is, which of the two demonic strains chose you? A djinni, devoted to evil? Or a teshuva, a repentant demon?”
She paced across the room. “Good demons? Who knew?” She’d always fancied herself sensitive to the unknown, but a secret pitched battle had been raging with no one the wiser. What else had she been missing?
Archer rolled his head against the cushion to look at her. “Did you think good and evil were black and white?”
“Well, sort of, by definition. In the movies, you get a white hat or a black one.”
A smile flickered across his lips. “The teshuva wear gray hats. Teshuva are trying to atone for their wicked ways, to earn their way back into grace. The djinn . . . aren’t.”
She wandered toward the weight bench. The loaded bar held more iron disks than seemed possible. “How can they atone? Why do they need us?”
His relaxed sprawl never changed, but the sudden intensity of his dark gaze speared her. She realized for the first time she’d voluntarily included herself in their little nightmare for two. But after encountering a feralis, she definitely didn’t want to be alone in this madness.
“To make amends,” he said, “the teshuva cleanse this realm of accumulated weaker demonic emanations like ferales and malice. The djinn rile up the lesser demons to make our realm a little more like their hell. Kind of a spiritual terra forming. But neither teshuva nor djinn can manifest fully in this realm. So they need a weapon. Us.”
Speaking of weapons . . . On the back wall, her reflection broke over steel blades of all shapes and sizes. Regular honing had left faint whorls that scattered the light, the designs as intricate and menacing as the reven on Archer’s arm.
And still nothing looked as wicked as the grotesque beast’s claws. “I would think six-shooters blazing would be better.”
“Attracts the wrong sort of attention, useless for close-quarters combat. And unreliable.” His hand, stretched out on the back of the couch, tightened into a fist. “More importantly, our demons have to get up close to do the dirty work. It’s harder to damn from a distance.”
Beside the weapons, another shelf held a collection of small statues. She recoiled at the toy factory massacre. Beanbag animals had been dismembered, limbs replaced with baby-doll or action figure parts. Long blond hair and a shapely plastic leg were crudely nailed to a fast-food toy from a cartoon monster movie, while a grinning, strong-jawed manly face was stapled into the belly of a stuffed pterodactyl. Dozens of the dolls slumped against one another like half-slaughtered soldiers.
“Um,” she said. “Ferales dolls?”
“Our fearless leader decided the league needed to recognize our many years of service. He made Ecco—you remember him from the town car—our morale officer. That is the result.”
She eyed the carnage. “How . . . sweet?”
“Not really.”
She turned her focus to the lounging male, more deadpan than the dolls. Yet for all his outward indifference, he’d kept the trinkets. “So how many ferales corpses does it take to build a ladder over the gates of heaven?”
If she’d hoped for a lightbulb joke, she was disappointed. “I’ll let you know when I get them piled high enough.”
Judging from the well-honed blades, the trail of dispatched demons might reach around the world. Apparently that wasn’t enough. “What do we get out of this unholy alliance? Besides the opportunity to fight fore
ver.”
“Die in battle, and you get back what’s left of your demon-mottled soul.”
She grimaced. “Sounds like we’re getting the short end of the stick.”
“Just make sure the ferales get the pointy end. And take what pleasure you can in destruction, because you’re saving the world along with your soul.”
She shook her head. “Nobody even noticed. A half dozen town houses overlooked the alley.”
“If anybody looked down, they saw some street people Dumpster diving. Or maybe a nice couple walking their bad dog.” At her incredulous huff, he grinned, with a sudden flash of white teeth. “A very bad dog. People see what they think they’ll see, what they want to see. And gray hats are easy to forget.”
She had to admit, she might have justified away the horror. If it hadn’t been drooling all over her. But willful blindness had only ever ended with her walking into walls.
She turned away from the blades. “I want to live.”
“I’m told such a desire is a useful first step.”
“And the next?”
“Listen to me.”
She tried to keep her expression unreadable, but he cocked his head. “Why is it so hard for you to obey?”
She glared. “You ask that with a lot of arrogance for someone standing so far from his weapons.”
“Even when we kissed, you would not be still under my lips.”
“Excuse me,” she sputtered. That was one question she kept sliding away from. Why had she clung to him in the alley as if he were her last chance? She wished the answer were simple lust.
“It has been a while since I kissed—”
“Since the 1950s, apparently.”
He shook his head. “Longer than that, I think.”
“Probably never with that ‘obey’ crap.”
“Oh, I have loved.”
Even across the room, she felt the weight of his gaze on her mouth. Betrayed by the phantom sensation, she licked her lips. Could she blame the demon for that?
He closed his eyes. “You can’t let even the dying go quietly, but must point and give directions. Fate’s crossing guard.”
She stiffened. “You make me sound like a monster.”
He shook his head. “I’ve seen such monsters as feed on death. I don’t think you’re one of those.”
“Don’t think?” She gave a bitter laugh.
“Nothing is certain. Which is why your search for answers is doomed.”
His axe couldn’t have cut deeper. She walked to the kitchen area, washed her cup, dried her hands on a paper towel, and finally turned to face him. “Why are you trying so hard to convince me? Will it make this possession easier?”
He hadn’t moved. “No. But what comes after might not hurt so much.”
“I was told by one of my first patients that pain isn’t the purpose of life, just sometimes the price.”
His lips twisted in an unkind smile. “Too bad we couldn’t ask him for bonus insights after he died and went to the heaven I’m sure he deserved.”
“Her last postcard was from her third Caribbean cruise. The doctors called it a miraculous recovery.” She lifted her chin. “Or are you going to tell me there are no such things as miracles?”
When he didn’t answer, she wadded the paper towel and tossed it toward the garbage can. Two points. “If I’m stuck here, where’s the shower? I have demon guts in my hair.”
He waved her toward a glass-blocked corner of the loft . When he flicked a switch inside, the space glowed like a candle, lit from within. She eyed the translucent glass.
“Whatever,” she muttered, and marched forward.
Archer let out a long, slow breath to soothe the dangerous coiling inside him. Damn demons. Damn hers, damn his, and damn that crazed feralis, attacking in the waning daylight. Couldn’t keep its damn half-rat paws off her.
No more than Archer himself, apparently.
Damn.
The water came on. A whiff of hot wetness spiked with honeysuckle snagged his breathing again. He wheeled away. The message light on his phone blinked with ever greater urgency as the number of messages increased. At its present speed, it could cause seizures. Just as well he never left the ringer on.
He’d been too preoccupied with the limp weight in his arms. Calling on the demon had shorted her out.
Until that moment, though, she’d been magnificent. The image of her lunging at the feralis, her puny weapon brandished high, was shock-locked in his brain. She should be dead, of foolishness if nothing else.
If he’d been a kinder man, perhaps he’d have let her die.
Instead, he brought her home, wiped away the blood from the nick under her eye, and watched her sleep.
Now who was the fool?
He punched SPEED DIAL on the phone. “Quit leaving messages you know I’m not going to answer.”
Niall grunted. “We hauled the feralis off for de comp.” He hesitated. “Any other bodies we should know about?”
At the word “bodies,” Archer couldn’t stop his gaze from drifting to the shower. “Not yet.”
Niall let out a sigh. “I’d hate to lose her to a bad-luck encounter before her demon even had a chance to save her.”
“Yeah.” She’d shown no fear, no hesitation. Once she and the demon meshed, she’d be a formidable opponent.
Still no match for him, of course. Even the fierce and fearless fought to win, and that, in the bitter end, would fail against someone who fought to die.
Archer went to the dark window. “That feralis didn’t just stumble into the alley. It was tracking us. It wanted her bad.”
Niall was silent a moment. “Homing in on her demon?”
A lot of etheric energy had soaked the alley, and not all of it Sera’s. There’d certainly been enough wide-beam annihilation-class violence, thanks to that kiss, to warn off even a stupid feralis. “Maybe.”
Niall jumped on the note of reserve. “I told you this war is changing.”
As if he didn’t have enough to deal with. Archer cut him off. “You might also notice, I changed my security codes. Don’t send anyone here. Don’t contact me until this is over.”
Niall clicked his tongue. “I want updates. Bookie thought he’d record the last stages of an ascension.”
“Thinking and wanting just don’t have much place in what’s going down.” Archer’s breath fogged the win dowpane except where the print of her hand cleared the glass.
Wanting might still be a problem.
He scowled at the imprint. “I’ll call you when the possession is complete. Either way.”
“Good luck.” Niall’s soft voice barely registered down the line.
Archer hung up without answering.
The water cranked off. In the charged silence, he realized he’d invoked his demon-boosted perceptions. Listening for the last droplets to fall. Tasting the tang of warm, moist flesh. His heightened nerves prickled in anticipation, keen for the faintest pulse of air as she moved through space.
Cursing even more softly than Niall’s parting words, Archer clamped down on his control. He rifled through the armoire beside the bed for a fresh shirt.
He’d wait for his shower until she slept. God knew, those glass blocks barely hid a damn thing even from purely human eyes.
He stripped off his torn shirt. His twenty-four-hour dry cleaner had commented once that pinning a note over stains would ensure spots were properly treated. Archer just gave him everything in a duffel bag stenciled with the word “stained.” The man had blanched, but his daughter was a tidy seamstress who’d saved his trench coat more than once.
He turned sideways to the mirror, tracking the wound that curved around his shoulder. Only a little worse than the bloody nose. The demon was as efficient as his seamstress.
Sera’s gaze found his in the reflection. “That was definitely the feralis’s fault. I don’t have claws like that.”
He reached for his shirt. “Not seven in a row anyway.”
�
��Don’t you need to bandage it?”
“It won’t kill me.” He should be so lucky. “Let the demon earn its keep.”
She shook her head and marched back to the bathroom, returning a moment later with a soap-bubbled washcloth, a roll of gauze, and a bottle of hydrogen peroxide.
She hefted the bottle. “This is all you have for first aid supplies?”
“I use it to soak out the worst of the stains.”
“Out of your skin?”
“Out of my clothes.” He waggled the shirt in his hand. “My dry cleaner has convinced himself I’m a butcher.” Archer started to slide into the shirt. “I guess he’s right.”
Sera plucked the shirt from his hands. “Not until you disinfect.”
He opened his mouth to tell her off, knowing the demon’s wariness of close quarters would lend its double-octave warning to keep her distance, to not distract them from its mission of atonement. But nothing came to him. He blinked. “Fine.”
She sat him at the kitchen island under the pendant lights. “These gashes go right through the dermis into the subcutaneous fat.” She swabbed at his shoulder with the soapy cloth. “Not that there’s much fat on you.”
He held himself straight, struggling not to lean into her hand despite the twanging pain. “You sound like Bookie.”
She wiped away the suds. “Who’s Bookie?”
“The Bookkeeper, our records keeper and historian. We call him Bookie.”
“Imaginative.”
“It’s an honorable title, passing down centuries of study. I’m sure he could whip out a damage-infliction chart categorized by demon subtype.” He hissed as she upended the bottle of peroxide over his shoulder. “Burns worse than ichor.”
She caught the runoff with a towel at his elbow. “Are you always such a wimp about cleaning up?”
“Never been cleaned up before.” He glanced up from the bubbling scratches and caught the momentary softening in her eyes. “Don’t feel sorry for me,” he warned.
“You’ve been hurt worse than this. I see the marks on you.” She traced one finger near his spine. Though the demon lay dormant in him, still strangely undisturbed by her closeness, he couldn’t stop the shiver that wracked him at her touch. “Even with preternatural healing, you must’ve been laid up for weeks with this one.”