by Debra Dunbar
He gave a short, sharp nod. “We’ll be there. Don’t be late … and don’t screw up.”
In a flash, he was gone. I yanked off my shirt and tried to staunch the flow of blood as I stood shakily to my feet. I’d done it. Well, sort of done it. Now I had to worry about getting this public claim to work, getting a bunch of demons to Harpers Ferry and keeping them there until our ‘show of force’ was over. I looked at the bloody shirt and felt the trickle of liquid down my nose. Fuck it. Extending the glow of light outward, I healed the cuts and tossed the shirt aside.
Then I felt Gregory’s hand on my shoulder.
“Cockroach, I do believe we’ve found the perfect puppet dictator.”
–28–
I sat in the chair with a thump. “You’re fucking joking me. Of all the angels in heaven, you somehow think that Gabriel is best suited to lead? Puppet dictator my ass. He’ll do the exact opposite of what you want.”
“He’s shockingly predictable, and that works to our advantage.”
Our? I had enough on my plate. I didn’t need to add some secret co–rule of Aaru to it.
“He’ll send Aaru right back into the dark ages. I’ll be confined to Hel. Werewolves will be on an existence contract that makes the current one look like a cakewalk. Angels will kill every demon they see. Gabriel isn’t going to change who he’s been his whole life. He may color outside the lines on occasion, but he’ll go back and change that as soon as he comes to his senses.”
“That’s what I’m counting on, Cockkroach.” Gregory walked over and wrapped his arms around my neck, pulling me backwards — chair and all, against his chest. “Now. Enough about Aaru. Let’s turn our attention to how some members of the Ruling Council seem to know what’s going on in your house seconds after it occurs.”
I leaned my head back against him. “Well, there’s always you. You’re my primary suspect here.”
He rested his chin on the top of my head, his breath stirring my hair. “I’m innocent, you know. But since you’re a demon, I’m sure you have some punishment in store for me regardless.”
Heat blossomed through me at the thought. I could duct tape him to a chair and interrogate him. Ten minutes of my mouth on his cock and he’d be confessing to everything under the sun. Assuming he oblige me and manifest the necessary organ for such torture.
“One of my enforcers has been in the area tracking a curse demon. She’s one of Gabriel’s angels, but my brother would have come to me first if she’d noticed something and told him. Rules, you know.”
Yeah. I thought through everyone who’d been by the house recently while Gregory went down the exhaustively long list of his Gregori staff. Nyalla’s friends were clueless. Candy’s werewolves would never endanger themselves in such a way. I hadn’t seen a vampire beyond that Kelly girl in months, and she seemed completely dedicated to Jaq. The only angels in my house were Nils, and… .
Dalmai.
I jumped up, slamming my head into Gregory’s nose in the process. It hurt me, but the angel seemed oblivious to any pain.
“What exactly did you have Dalmai vow when we released his collar?”
The angel tilted his head as he thought. “I’ll admit I was a bit thrown by the situation and may not have worded the oath to the best of my ability. I commanded him to remain here and serve you. To not physically harm any of the humans under your protection. I relieved him of his Hunter duties.”
“Would he… do you think he was upset enough about your not taking his side over mine that he would betray you?” The very thought appalled me. I could never betray Gregory. Never. I couldn’t imagine anyone who served him straying. But I was extremely biased where this particular angel was concerned.
“He might. Hunters tend to be more individualistic than other angels. I can see one breaking his household tie if given appropriate reason.” Gregory’s eyes narrowed, his energy leak increasing. It’s a wonder he wasn’t setting fire to my flooring. My knees went a bit weak in the presence of such anger, such power. I shook my head to refocus my thoughts. Deal with the potential traitor now. Save the angel sex for later. Hopefully, anyway.
“He was to remain here? Does that mean the building, the property surrounding the building, or any of the properties I own? And ‘physically’ — as in laying his hands on Harper? Or would that cover leaking information to someone else who could do her harm?”
Oaths were important to word correctly, but Gregory could be forgiven for his lapse. It wasn’t every day that his demon lover took a member of his choir hostage, beat the shit out of the guy and kept him a starving captive in her basement.
“Here would encompass your house and the surrounding property that you own.” Gregory scowled. “And no, physical harm would not cover leaking information that would result in harm to any of your household.”
Shit. I took off for the basement stairs just a few steps ahead of Gregory, nearly ripping the door from the hinges in my haste. There was an angel in my basement, but it wasn’t Dalmai. It was Nils, and he was duct taped into a grey ball on the floor.
I ripped the strips from his face, and he gasped, not looking his best with sticky strands still clinging to his skin and red marks where the tape had cut into the flesh.
“Where’s Dalmai?” Gregory thundered.
Fuck Dalmai. “Where’s Harper?”
“Harper? Isn’t she upstairs?” Nils licked dry, chapped lips.
“Harper!” Gregory shouted, spinning me around by the shoulders. “Why isn’t she hiding with the werewolves? Please, for the love of all creation, tell me you didn’t bring her back here.”
There was no time for evasiveness. “I did. Sorry, but she insisted and said she’d walk back herself if I didn’t bring her. You know how humans are — you just can’t reason with them.”
Gregory shook me until I thought my teeth were going to rattle out of my skull. “No, that’s why you enthrall them and make them do what you want them to. You were supposed to protect her, not bring her back into the very place every angel is looking to find her.”
He had a valid point, but there were more important things to do then argue about my poor judgment. Pushing Gregory away, I went to run up the stairs and check. Pregnant women seemed to sleep a lot. There was a good chance my worry was over nothing and Harper was just snoozing in her room. I got two steps before Gregory halted me with an iron grip.
“She’s not there. I scanned and there’s no other being in the house beyond the three of us.”
Shit. Shit. I looked imploringly at Nils and winced as he strained against the duct tape. Dalmai must have used two rolls on the Fallen angel. Poor guy looked like a chrysalis encased in a cocoon.
With a grunt, Nils strained against the restraints. The tape tore but no butterfly emerged. “I was in the kitchen getting a beer. Dalmai came upstairs and hit me over the head with the poker from the fireplace.”
I glanced at his head, noting the dried blood on his clothing. His skull looked intact. Good thing I was the only one able to kill him, because Dalmai must have done a number on the angel to knock him out like that.
“Harper wasn’t even in the room. I figured he just wanted to kill me because I was a Fallen. Why would he take her?”
“Because he is a traitor.”
I shivered to hear the note of violence in Gregory’s voice. It must have had the same effect on Nils, because the Fallen angel winced. Images raced through my mind of abortion and memory wiping, and I pushed down my rising panic.
“He can’t leave the property. He vowed. Dalmai might have found loopholes in his oath, but he can’t leave the property.” My voice was reaching hysteria. I felt Gregory’s hand grip my arm hard enough to break the bone.
“Cockroach, he’ll still be here but he no doubt handed off Harper to another angel.”
I ripped my arm free from his grip and ran up the stairs. Forty acres of property and I was pressed for time. Who knew how long Harper had been gone, or what had happened to her. With a burs
t of energy, I exploded one of the French doors and screamed at the top of my lungs for Boomer.
I heard Nils’s and Gregory’s footsteps crunching on the broken glass of my door as the hellhound raced around the Forsythia bushes, skidding to make the turn. His Plott–hound form blurred, growing several feet larger and gaining mass as an additional head sprouted from a newly formed neck. By the time he slid to a stop in front of me, he was the size of a small pony, saliva dripping in long strands from his jaws.
“Can you sense Dalmai?” I asked Gregory.
“No. Which means he’s gone rogue.”
He’d used that term two years ago, referring to Althean. That angel had wound up dead. I hoped the same fate was in store for Dalmai, although death wouldn’t be punishment enough if he’d hurt Harper or her baby. “Does that mean he can break his vow?”
Gregory nodded, his face dark with anger. “He can, although many angels who go rogue don’t. A vow is a sacred thing, and even angels who have renounced the host refuse to break them.”
I wouldn’t want to be in Dalmai’s shoes when we found him, and find him we would. He might have surrendered his place in Gregory’s choir, but I had a hellhound at my disposal, and Boomer was better at tracking than I was.
“Dalmai,” I told my dog. “He was the Hunter angel who had come for Harper. The one you helped fight. The one who took most of the left side off your body. I need you to find him.”
Recognition lit in the hellhound’s orange eyes. One head dropped to the ground to sniff, while the other rose into the air. In my mind, the few seconds felt like hours, but finally Boomer took off, the three of us racing behind him. Hellhounds are fast. Nils and I were puffing away, while Gregory was doing his odd float/fly thing. He glowed, his eyes black with fury, looking every bit like an angel of vengeance bearing down on his prey. I was never so turned on in my whole life.
We followed Boomer through the horse pasture, where the hellhound paused and spent considerable time sniffing around the border of my property. Then he halted, looking up at me with an intent gaze. I paused, glancing towards Nils and Gregory. Had Dalmai handed Harper off to another angel and remained on my property, or had he broken his vow and left with her? I didn’t want to waste time tracking him down if he didn’t have Harper.
“Nils, can you sense if she stayed with him, or if she left from here?”
His eyebrows shot to the heavens. “Why would I know that?”
“Well, because you’ve been fucking her. I saw you with your arm around her. You admitted to not remaining on the couch all night, and Dalmai said you were sinning with her. I figured you may have marked her. Demons do it all the time.”
Nils turned a brilliant shade of crimson. “I’m not a demon. Just because I’m Fallen, doesn’t mean I go around doing that kind of thing.”
Right. “So you weren’t fucking her?”
“No! I wasn’t … that liar! I never had inappropriate contact with Harper. She’s just been betrayed by one of our kind. I would never do that to her, never take advantage of her vulnerability like that.”
I sensed he told the truth, but what the hell had been going on? “Why would Dalmai lie?”
The angel shifted his feet, not meeting my eyes. “Perhaps he thinks that you have claimed the woman as yours and accusing me of … that would incite you to jealous wrath. He does want me dead, you know. And you’re the only one who can kill me.”
There was more to this, but I didn’t have time to interrogate my Fallen while Harper was gone. For all I knew, Nils could be right and Dalmai lied. I had claimed Nyalla as part of my household, and with my vow, Harper was as good as mine, too.
Oh shit. Nyalla. I had my second panic attack of the evening. “Where the fuck is Nyalla?”
She hadn’t been in the house or Gregory would have sensed her. Had Dalmai taken both her and Harper? He might be an angel and all that, but managing to kidnap two young, fit girls seemed to be a bit above his skill level.
“Cockroach? You might want to take a look at this.”
Gregory’s voice was odd, as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing. Nils and I crashed through the briars and poison ivy to where he stood and looked down. On the ground was an angel I’d never seen before. A dead angel. And he looked as if someone had gone all Norman Bates on his ass.
Harper. Damn, that woman had mad skills when it came to knives.
“I’ve never seen an angel die like this.” Gregory motioned to the angel’s neck, which was surprisingly clean and free of cuts. “It appears that he had been restrained by that collar device of yours. Your girl removed it post mortem, no doubt to use again.”
Of course. Recycle and reuse. What a great motto.
Nils kicked the bloody angel corpse with a booted toe. “So where are they, and where is Dalmai? They must have done this after he left, or he would have assisted this scum in subduing the women.”
Either the girls had run to safety, or Dalmai had somehow found out about this and recaptured them. Taking the worst–case scenario to heart, I turned and faced Boomer.
“Find Nyalla, boy. Go get her.”
His tail nearly wagged off his body as the hound enthusiastically paced, both heads to the ground while he sniffed. After a few seconds, he lifted one head and bayed. Then he spun about and raced toward the house. I tore off after him, not bothering to see whether Gregory and Nils followed me or not.
The hellhound was around the front of my house in the driveway, waiting patiently for me to catch up. As soon as I got within twenty feet, he trotted along the gravel drive and out to the road. I glanced backward and nearly ran into Gregory and Nils. Fuck, these guys moved silently.
“He broke his vow and left the property.” Gregory sounded more pissed about that than the fact that Dalmai had betrayed us both and severed his allegiance. I remembered how incensed the Ruling Council had been over the thought of humans defaulting on their loans. Angels and their weird priorities — I’d never understand them. Besides, if Boomer was going where I thought he was, then Dalmai hadn’t broken his vow.
“Wyatt is part of my household. I’ve claimed him, therefore his house and property would probably be considered mine under the terms of the oath.”
Gregory scowled. “How would Dalmai know that? He hasn’t seen you and Wyatt together. He wouldn’t be aware of your relationship to him.”
I shrugged and picked up the pace, trying to keep Boomer in sight as he circled the house. Angels had such weird skills in regards to determining household and ownership marks. For all I knew, Dalmai may have sensed that I had claimed this house.
Boomer climbed the steps of Wyatt’s rickety back porch and paused by the screen door. It was partially open. The wooden door behind it swung inward, the handle and lock dangling from splintered wood. Thankfully Wyatt wasn’t home. That was one less human I had to worry about.
They’re both here — Harper and Nyalla, Gregory told me silently. They are both unharmed and Harper is still pregnant.
I breathed a sigh of relief. Dalmai was under oath not to physically harm any of mine, but I wasn’t sure if that technically covered the unborn Nephilim or not. I motioned to Gregory to stay back. The angel leaked power like a sieve. Nils and I might go unnoticed by Dalmai, but Gregory certainly wouldn’t.
The Fallen angel and I crept in through the back door, carefully skirting the broken glass and objects strewn across the floor. Clearly there had been a struggle in Wyatt’s kitchen. I glanced over at the gun case and saw it locked. Not that I expected Dalmai to resort to human weaponry, but I wanted to double check, just in case.
Where would he have taken the girls? Somewhere quiet to wait out the arrival of another angel, no doubt. Not the front part of the house. Wyatt may have needed to board up a significant number of windows after the Haagenti incident, but there was still too much glass to provide a safe spot. Not the bedrooms either. I glanced at the door beside the stove and realized the most defensible area of the house would be the ce
llar. The two windows were thick and below grade, and the only entrance was this door.
Just in case I was wrong, I motioned for Nils to stay and watch while I slowly eased the door open. Damp, earthy aromas hit my nose, and I paused to allow my eyes time to adjust to the dark. Dim, gray light filtered through the grimy cellar windows. Enough to keep the cellar from being pitch–black, but not enough to aid my vision. I eyed the single bulb at the bottom of the steps and weighed the risk of turning it on and alerting Dalmai versus breaking my neck in the dark.
I chose the neck–breaking option. Worn wooden steps creaked as I eased down them, ruining my element of surprise. I should have turned the fucking light on. At this point, yelling “I’m coming” would have been stealthier. Still, in spite of the deafening noise of the stairs, no sound came from below, not even a breath. Were the girls knocked unconscious? If he’d hurt either of them, I’d peel the flesh from his body and boil him in pork fat.
I heard a creak as I stepped off the last stair onto the gray concrete and froze. It came from the left, far back in the recesses of the basement where boxes and ancient paint cans blocked my view and any light. Risking a further chance of discovery, I summoned the sword of the Iblis and tiptoed toward the noise.
Again, I heard it. A scrabbling sound as if a giant mouse were fighting its way out of a Styrofoam cooler. I took another tentative step, and everything went black.
“I’ve got him!” Nyalla yelled.
No, she hadn’t, but before I could correct her, the wind was completely knocked out of my lungs by a hard object impacting my body. The blows rained down on me, and I gasped in pain, hoping Gregory or Nils would hear the commotion and come to my rescue before the two girls beat the living shit out of me.
Then sharp stabs were added to the blows. I heard the basement stairs creak.
“I’ve got him!” Nyalla gleefully repeated her earlier statement.
“Yes, I see that.” Gregory sounded vastly amused. Fucker. “Although the appropriate pronoun would be ‘her’ in this instance.”