by Rose Wulf
Now what?
“Infernal shit,” Zahk exclaimed from behind her. Izzy flicked a glance back to him only to find he was already gone. Apparently he hadn’t wanted to share air-space with the newcomer.
“Um…?” Letty asked hesitantly.
The stranger turned his piercing gaze toward Britt, Letty, and the other women who’d gathered inside during the exchange with the owner. “Why don’t you ladies take shelter in the other cabin?” He phrased it like a suggestion but Izzy realized quickly it wasn’t.
“Yeah,” Britt said slowly, clearly uncomfortable. “Sure…” She looked over at Izzy hesitantly and Izzy smiled.
“I’ll be fine.” In truth she had no idea what the hell was going on, let alone if she would be okay. Despite her faith in Darr, this new guy oozed so much power she was genuinely frightened. And she didn’t want her friends anywhere near that.
No one in the room spoke until the door closed behind Britt and the others moments later. Darr remained stationary, like a rock in front of her. Izzy did her best to keep breathing normally. And then the blown-out hole in the wall became solid again, taking with it the damages to the floor. Even the scorch disappeared.
“What…?” How was that possible? Unless… Oh my God…
Could this guy be Satan?
Chapter Six
“Who are you?” Izzy demanded before she could clamp her mouth shut. She didn’t need to see his face to know Darr did not approve. Hell, she didn’t approve. But it was too late for that.
The man met her gaze easily, his expression entirely unreadable. Or bored. It was impossible to tell. “I am Kai.”
“What do you want?” Darr interrupted. This guy—Kai—clearly made him uncomfortable.
Kai’s eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly when he switched his attention to Darr. Izzy got the distinct impression Darr’s clear dislike of him was mutual. “One of my enemies was here moments ago,” Kai replied plainly. “I’d hoped to catch him while he was on Earth, but he sensed me coming. Still, he wanted something from you. I need to know what that is.”
Izzy gaped. She could only assume Kai had been referring to Creed—a point in his favor—but she couldn’t believe his arrogance.
“It’s not that complicated,” Darr returned. “He wants me dead.”
Kai’s gaze returned to Izzy. “And you are the demon’s weakness.”
Izzy swallowed as Darr stepped more properly in front of her. “She’s a victim in this.”
“Agreed,” Kai said. “Stand down, demon. I’ve no intention of killing you tonight. You could prove useful, and your loyalty to the human woman is … admirable.” He definitely hadn’t liked praising Darr, whether because he was a demon or just because he didn’t often dole out praise was another question.
“Wait,” Izzy interrupted, moving to Darr’s other side in an effort to stay in the conversation. She looked between them and settled on Kai. He at least seemed willing to answer questions. “I’m confused. You’re not a demon, and you’re not … human. So what are you?” ‘Human’ wasn’t what she’d wanted to say, but she was uncomfortable using any reference to Satan out loud. And she didn’t want to risk upsetting Kai.
Kai looked back to Darr with a question of his own. “She doesn’t know?”
Darr released a breath but didn’t otherwise relax. Nor did he take his glare off their guest. “He’s an angel.”
Izzy stumbled back and Darr’s hand shot out to catch her by the elbow. She knew she’d been more than a little disoriented earlier, but apparently it hadn’t worn off after all. Because Darr hadn’t really just said ‘angel.’ Right? “What?”
“I am an angel,” Kai echoed firmly. “A warrior.”
Oh man… He’d said it, too. Or she was still hallucinating. “This is crazy,” she muttered, stepping up to Darr and twisting her hands in his shirt for support. “I think I’m hallucinating. I think I need to lie down. I swear you said angel.”
“Trust me,” Darr replied, curving his arm around her. “I don’t like it, either. But you’re not hallucinating.”
“But…” But what? What was the right question to ask? The right question to start with? Was there a ‘right question’?
“We may meet again,” Kai declared. “If you wish to stay alive, stay out of my line of fire when that time comes. Creed will return for you and I for him. If you choose to warn him, I’ll strike you down on the spot.”
And with that he was gone in flash of pure, white light.
****
“Angels are real?” Izzy repeated for the hundredth time the next morning. She’d barely touched her breakfast.
After Kai’s disappearance, and in light of everything that had happened, Izzy had allowed Darr to talk her into coming home. She’d been so exhausted she was practically asleep on her feet for the short time it took her to pack and apologize to Britt, and she’d been sound asleep by the time he tucked her into her bed. Given what she’d been through—just that he knew of—Darr figured she’d be starving when she woke up, so he’d prepared a good breakfast.
Izzy had had other ideas of what to do with her morning, of course. He wasn’t surprised, but he sure as hell wasn’t in the mood to be grilled about Creed and angels. Although, honestly, he’d take the angel talk over the Creed talk any day. Fortunately she was more focused on that, too.
“Yes,” he repeated. “Eat before the food gets cold.”
Dramatically stabbing her fork into her chopped potato bites, Izzy rambled, “Why didn’t you tell me earlier? Wouldn’t angels and demons be natural enemies, then? So why didn’t he attack?” She proceeded to stuff the potatoes into her mouth, muffling whatever might have come next.
Darr sighed and sat back in his chair. “That’s a long, complicated story. The simple answers are that I didn’t tell you because I try very hard to stay out of it. We are natural enemies and I have no real clue why he didn’t attack. I can’t imagine he’s that desperate for bait.”
Izzy’s hand stilled over her plate and she swallowed heavily. “Actually,” she said, voice calmed, “that reminds me. Creed … he was going to hold onto me. He said he wanted to use me as ‘bait,’ for you.” He could hear the question in her words and he struggled to hide the cringe.
It was time, then.
“I’m sorry, Izzy,” he started. “Creed and I … we have a long, sordid history of mutual hatred. And I imagine it pissed him off when he lost track of me after your father’s summoning.”
Izzy frowned. “So you were actively fighting each other?”
Darr shook his head. “Nothing so straightforward.” She cocked an orange brow and he added, “He was my master.”
Silence stretched between them for a long minute as Izzy released the fork entirely. At length she finally asked, “You mean, like … mentor or something … right?” It was clear in her voice that she was more hoping than asking.
Darr shook his head again. “I was his slave, not his pupil.” Creed didn’t have pupils or apprentices. Well, unless ‘for dinner’ came at the end of the thought.
Hands flying over her mouth and eyes immediately watering, Izzy jumped from her spot and rounded the table until she’d properly squirmed her way onto his lap. How the hell she’d managed to do that, he wasn’t sure, but having her unexpectedly pressing against him in a tight embrace wasn’t something he intended to complain about.
“Oh, Darr,” she mumbled into his hair. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea.”
“I know,” he assured her, wrapping his arms tight around her waist. “And I swear, Izzy, I’ll never let him touch you again.”
Izzy eased back until she was framing his jaw in her hands. “I know.” She leaned forward, then, and pressed her lips tenderly over his. But he wasn’t in the mood for tender after the night they’d had.
The moment her lips grazed his, Darr’s blood burst into flames and he growled, tugging her impossibly close and angling his head to better devour her mouth. His tongue stroked hers firmly and she mo
aned, threading her fingers through his hair. He kissed her deeply, fervently, until he’d sucked the oxygen from her lungs.
As he released her from his kiss, he swept an arm out and shoved the plates from the table, letting them crash to the floor in a clattering mess. With his other hand he caught her ass and lifted her to the table top.
Izzy laughed lightly, her breathing unstable, and caught the collar of his shirt in a loose grip as he leaned over her. “You’re so cleaning that up,” she teased.
“Later,” he rumbled, already working on her shorts. In no time he’d tugged them down and off and his cock pulsed with need as she willingly spread her legs for him. Latching his lips to the side of her throat, Darr’s hands landed on her hips and slipped beneath the sides of her panties. His thumb dipped between her thighs at the same time as he nipped at her flesh and Izzy moaned low. The sound went straight to his cock.
Finding her already more than a little wet, Darr growled against her skin and jerked his hands apart. The motion, combined with his physical strength, snapped her soft, pink panties with ease.
Izzy shook with laughter and he caught her covered breast in one palm, molding the pliant flesh roughly. He needed a taste of her so badly he was nearly bursting.
His other hands landed on the inside of her thighs, parting them a bit more, and he dropped to his knees. He heard Izzy suck in a sharp breath when she realized his intent and one of his hands dipped beneath the hem of her shirt again. Searching and massaging, earning another delicious moan from her mouth. Then he found his target with his mouth, letting his tongue tease her folds as he lapped at her juices.
One of Izzy’s hands immediately tangled in his hair, holding on tight, and her hips rolled a little closer. He took the opportunity to slip his tongue into her wet heat and tried not to growl again at the sounds she made in response. He licked and stroked and nipped as deeply, as hard as he could. As hard as he dared. And when he sensed she was on the edge he plunged two fingers deep into her core while switching his lips to her clit and sucking hard.
Izzy screamed out her orgasm, her body bucking sharply before she collapsed back on the table. Probably thinking he was done.
Instead Darr pushed to his feet, unbuckled and unzipped his pants, and let his hardened dick pop free. With a grunt and a long, leisurely stroke of his hands down her sides, he tugged her hips forward as he thrust into her tight core. She was hot and soaked and so fucking tight he nearly came on the spot. The surprised, ecstasy-laden gasp that tore from her didn’t help.
She moaned again, her back arching as she took him in. Her legs lifted and locked around his hips as her hands curled into the table top, seeking purchase. “Darr,” she breathed, gasping for breath as he pumped into her relentlessly.
Darr shut out the world around them as he took her, filling her to the limit every time. Her pelvis rocked against his balls and his hands slid up again, seeking his own purchase. He found her breasts and pulled them free of her bra, still under her shirt, in order to play with her nipples.
Izzy moaned her appreciation, bucking harder against him. “Yes!”
He ground his teeth in an effort to control himself at least enough not to actually hurt her and gave her nipples a hard flick. Izzy’s nails dug into his forearms and he thrust into her with more strength than he’d meant to.
Another pleasure-filled scream tore from Izzy just moments before his own orgasm slammed into him, ripping a guttural cry of his own from his lungs.
He nearly collapsed to the floor before his senses returned to him, and he gently pulled out of her, her legs falling limply to dangle off the table. He had to brace his weight with both hands just to stay on his feet.
Izzy’s voice was breathless when she finally said, “Thank you for breakfast.”
****
Izzy would bet money her father had never considered that his little girl would fall in love with a demon. Let alone the very same demon he’d summoned to protect her. And she was sure her father would flip a lid if he somehow learned she and her demon had had hot, carnal sex on the dining room table he’d purchased for her a few years back.
The knowledge almost tempted her to tell him. Not that she would of course. What girl wanted her father knowing anything about her sex life?
Still, there was one other thought that popped up in her mind while she was toweling off after a late-morning shower. In all the chaos of the night before, Izzy hadn’t had an opportunity to talk to Darr about their circumstance. About her feelings. She still wanted to, possibly even more so now, but she was hesitant. There were a hundred ways it could go wrong if she even began that conversation. Most of them ended with him cutting things off between them in all ways he could.
Some ended worse.
And that was when a crazy, stupid, little idea struck her. Her dad had been dealing in demons since around the time he’d summoned Darr. In all those years, he may just have come across something useful. He wouldn’t like the idea, but she was a grown woman. He no longer had the right to make her decisions for her, and she’d just have to make him see that. So she hurried to get dressed and darted to the nightstand for her cell phone.
It’d been a few months since she’d last talked to her father and, like always, her stomach knotted with the prospect of how this call would go. She loved him, and she could never cut him out of her life, but she honestly wished he’d change his ways. So much about his life disturbed her that she couldn’t spend much time in his company anymore. Not even over the phone.
“Isolde? Is that you, baby?” He’d been answering her calls like that since she’d first moved out of the house in college.
“Yes, Dad,” she replied obligingly. “How are you?” He’d expect the small talk, so she figured she’d do her best to just race through it.
Gerald sighed on the other end and she heard something thump, like a book or a heavy item hitting the floor. But his voice was calm when he spoke again. “Oh, I’m fine, sweetheart. Business is strong lately. I think I’ve even met a good woman. Maybe you’ll let me introduce you to her if she sticks around for a few months?”
Izzy’s heart clenched painfully in her chest. She hated when her father tried dating. As a teenager she’d been angry, thinking he was trying to replace her mother with some stranger. But as she’d grown she’d come to recognize that moving on didn’t mean forgetting, and he wasn’t. If there was one thing she knew about Gerald Duchane, it was that he’d never really be over his late wife. It was one of the few things they still had in common. “Maybe I will,” she promised reluctantly. A few months could change everything, after all. “Listen, Dad, I’m sorry to cut the small talk, but I need to ask you about something. Do you have a minute?”
“For you, Izzy? Always.”
Moving to sit on the edge of her bed and glancing nervously toward her closed door, she lowered her voice just a bit and chomped down on the proverbial bullet. “Is there a way to release Darr from the binding spell?”
Silence greeted her question. Seconds ticked by before her father finally asked, “Why would you want to know that? Aren’t you two getting along?”
Fabulously. That’s the problem. Releasing a breath, Izzy said, “Yes, it’s just… This guilt eats me up, Dad.” There, truth. “He’s done so much for me. Besides, do you have any idea what it feels like to know that if you slip and break your neck an innocent person will die?”
Really, the Life Bond was a terrible curse. In the simplest terms if she died for any reason other than ‘old age,’ Darr would die, too. Whether he would suffer the same method of dying—or at least feel like he had—or his heart would just simply cease, neither of them knew. She’d asked on multiple occasions.
Her father spit out a bark of laughter. “Innocent? Izzy, sweetheart, I love that you have a good relationship with your bodyguard, but it’s his job to protect you from things like slipping and breaking your neck. Besides, he’s a demon. He’s never been innocent. That’s the beauty of it, honey. They’re expen
dable.”
Izzy’s heart stalled in her chest and her breath caught in her throat. Had he really just said that? About Darr? About the only reason she was still breathing? About the man she loved? Tears of anger and irrational betrayal burning behind her eyes, Izzy snapped, “Then I must be expendable to you, too.” She jabbed the End Call button and tossed the phone toward the far pillow, fighting back her sobs. I can’t believe he—
“Izzy?” Darr was kneeling beside her, one warm hand on her thigh and worry in his eyes. He reached up with his other hand and brushed a wayward tear from her cheek with more tenderness than any human man had ever shown her. “What’s wrong?”
Desperate to keep her composure, Izzy drew in a deep breath.
“That’s the beauty of it, honey. They’re expendable.”
“That bastard!” she exclaimed furiously before she knew what she was doing. “How could he?”
Darr straightened and pulled her into his arms, taking a seat on her bed and allowing her to curl into him. With her head on his shoulder, his hand in her damp hair, and his cheek resting over her temple, he whispered soothing sounds in an effort to comfort her. “Shh. Take a deep breath, baby,” he whispered. “I’m here. I’ll help you through it.”
Izzy’s tears slowed as his words washed over her. In all their years together he’d never called her by any nickname other than the one she’d chosen for herself. But the tenderness in his words and actions now warmed her to her soul. Was there any way this man could possibly resent her for her father’s choices?
Struggling to get a proper sentence out, Izzy said, “It-it’s my father.” She swallowed and let her eyes close. “He’s a horrible man, isn’t he?”
Darr was silent for several seconds, providing the answer she’d anticipated. Still, when he spoke, his voice was gentle. “He has redeeming qualities.”
“Name one,” Izzy challenged, looping her arms around his shoulders.