“Except you?” Merlin ate another grape.
Falcon didn’t like what Merlin implied. “Look, I’m done talking about this. Repeal the Shall Not or I won’t give Nimue her refresher love arrow.”
Merlin narrowed his eyes. “You can’t do that.”
“I can do whatever I want. I’m Cupid. Courtesy of you.”
“Which was my mistake. But regardless of that, we have a situation.”
Had Merlin just said making Falcon Cupid had been a mistake? If he hadn’t become Cupid, the great and terrible evil would have killed him. Nice. He refused to think about that. “And that situation would be?”
“Which do you want me to tell you first? The part where your magick is going to fail if you don’t find a way to believe in love and you’ll lose your job, or the part where you screwed up my Grand Plan for Ethelred?”
“Uh, both?”
“Exactly, boy. You don’t have time to dally with Drusilla Tallow.”
“I’m not dallying with her. I’ll make sure she gets her redemption. Only repeal the Shall Not. Help me help her.”
“You’re fuller of shit than I am. What you’re saying is that you don’t care about Ethelred, or your magick, only getting your wand wet.”
“Hell, no, I don’t care about Ethelred.” He snorted.
“You should.”
“Why?”
“He was propositioned last night by a gypsy princess.” Merlin sat down on a chaise and dismissed the women. “Sit down. Your wings are making me hear calliope music.”
Falcon sat down, unable to suppress a laugh.
“Oh, that’s funny? You’ve fucked up my whole plan.” Merlin slapped the back of Falcon’s head. “He was supposed to fall for her brother.”
“Free will is a bitch, or so I’ve heard you say.” Falcon ducked when Merlin moved to slap him again.
“You are obviously missing the gravity of the situation. Not to mention it wasn’t free will. You shot him with an arrow. True Love is the strongest magick of all. Ethelred’s love was the key to breaking a gypsy curse.”
“I’ll just shoot him with another arrow.” Falcon still didn’t get what the big deal was.
“No, you troublesome whelp. It doesn’t work that way. Read your manual. Luminista and Emilian Grey are two halves of the same soul. But Emilian’s is the half that is cursed. So he needs the True Love.”
“What does that matter?”
“He comes from a long line of dark magick. The key to accessing a great power even stronger than the lamia is in his blood. And his curse. He’s moon-cursed. The beast inside of him will gorge on all that evil until it’s invincible. It will consume Emilian Grey from the inside out and the world will soon follow. He will become what the northmen call the wolf who swallowed the sun.”
So, not only had Falcon smitten Ethelred, but he’d triggered the apocalypse. Fantastic. “How do I fix it?”
“Fucked if I know.” Merlin sighed. “You screwed my plan in the ass like a rent boy. There is no plan B.”
“Okay, so . . .” Falcon couldn’t process what Merlin had just told him. He needed him to say it again so Falcon could be sure he’d heard him correctly. “We’re on the verge of an apocalypse and you’re hanging out on the Riviera?”
“First it was the lamia, now this. What do you want from me?”
“To do your damn job. You’re the Bigger Boss. You’re supposed to have this handled.”
“I might say the same of you, my boy.”
“Stop calling me ‘boy.’ ”
“I will. When you pull up your diaper and stop acting like one. Today is your day to guide Drusilla, to help her and where are you? Here, talking to me about getting your wand wet. Are those the actions of a warlock grown?”
Falcon knew the answer that Merlin wanted to hear wasn’t “yes,” even if it was the truth. His shoulders sagged. He was a Crown Prince of Heaven. He was supposed to be better than the average warlock. Merlin was right.
“You better be very sure this is what you want. There is no going back,” Merlin warned.
“No, I’m sure. Very sure,” Falcon said.
“Against my better judgment, I’m going to repeal the Shall Not. But that means for Ethelred, too. She may choose his path.” Merlin smiled slyly. “Especially since he’s going to save her life twice in one day. You know how she likes the hero type. Yes, in five . . . four . . . three . . .”
Falcon used his angelic magick to search for Tally and found her at a small cabin in the Appalachian Mountains. What the hell were they doing there? What was Ethelred’s game? As he teleported, he was sure he heard Merlin’s laughter.
When he materialized, the scene before him wasn’t anything he’d ever have expected—it was right out of a horror movie.
Tally was frozen with her back against a tree as if she’d turned to stone. There was a beast closing in on her slowly. It was bipedal, like a man, but with the twisted, contorted body of a wolf. A slavering maw filled with predator’s teeth had curved into something that was almost a smile. Rage bloomed hot and volcanic inside Falcon. His angelic magick flared around him. The creature took another step toward Tally, and Falcon launched himself between her and the beast.
Slashing claws tore into his flesh, but he didn’t feel it, not really. The wounds healed even as the beast ripped him open again. It registered in his head that Tally was screaming, but there was another woman’s voice begging him not to hurt the animal.
The jaws came too close to clamping around his arm and when it snapped at him again, Falcon grabbed its upper jaw in one hand and its lower in another. He was prepared to rip it apart. His muscles bulged, fueled by angelic strength, but just as the werewolf yelped in pain, Ethelred snapped a silver collar around its neck.
They crashed to the ground, the beast a werewolf no longer, but a man—naked and shivering. The man’s mirror image, but female, pulled him into her lap and Ethelred grinned.
That smug grin on the demon’s face broke Falcon’s thin leash of self-control. Falcon crashed into Ethlered, knocking him to the ground, his fist descending into the demon’s face with impunity.
But Ethelred only smiled wider as the force of the blows broke his nose and shattered his teeth. At Falcon’s cry of absolute rage, the demon erupted in laughter. He didn’t stop until Falcon raised an arrow into the air and held it positioned over his head.
“Fine, I surrender.” His features slowly re-formed, even as blood gushed down his face.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Falcon’s voice was as low and guttural as the werewolf ’s growl.
“What was I thinking?” The demon smiled around his broken teeth. “Where were you? It’s still your day. You’re supposed to be with your charge at all times.”
“Is this what you’re going to do with her when it’s your day? Kill her so she has no shot at redemption?”
Ethelred pushed Falcon off him. “What are you going to do with her? Fuck her so she has no chance of redemption?”
Magick crackled around Falcon with his not-so-righteous angelic fury. The arrow in his hand was transformed into pure light and he hurled it at the demon.
White flames burst around Ethelred, and rather than laugh, the demon didn’t make a sound as the fire enveloped him. He was obviously in pain and hellfire sparked to life in his eyes. Ethelred summoned his own bolt of energy, but his was black and heavy like tar. It dripped over his fingers.
Falcon almost didn’t register the tiny fist on his chest or the small blond head between them.
“Stop it,” she cried.
“I thought you’d like us fighting over you, sweetheart,” Ethelred taunted. “Doesn’t it make you feel all those things you want so desperately?”
Tally looked up at Falcon and for a single moment, everything inside her was bright and bare. Her need, her pain, her loneliness. The absolute surety she didn’t deserve any of the things she wanted. Her truths were sharper than any sword, any talon, and they slashed at things ins
ide him he never thought he’d feel. It left him raw and exposed. He was torn between wanting to see more and needing to get away from her.
“No,” she whispered quietly.
“Why not, Drusilla? We both want you,” Ethelred began. “Don’t you like being between us?”
Tally’s cheeks flamed at the insinuation and Falcon gently moved her out of the way.
“I’m going to end you, demon.”
“Just take me home, Falcon.” She tightened her arms around his waist and burrowed into his chest. “Please.”
He could deal with Ethelred later. Right now, Tally needed him. But rather than teleport them back to the house, he took them to his mother’s home. Ethelred wouldn’t be able to enter there.
“I don’t know what Ethelred was thinking,” Falcon said as he washed the blood from his hands in the backyard of his mother’s house. The garden gnome stood patiently with the hose while Falcon did his best to clean up any evidence of their earlier ordeal before his mother saw them.
Tally had a bit of blood splattered on her cheek. He reached out and wiped it away with his thumb.
“I’m so sorry, Tally. Are you okay?”
She pursed her lips, but not before he saw her bottom lip quiver. “Where were you, Falcon?”
Looking down at her, so ready to break, he couldn’t tell her why he wasn’t there. Anything he had to say for himself died on his tongue. He thought she’d be sleeping? He thought she’d be . . . It didn’t matter what he’d thought. He’d promised her he’d be there.
She’d trusted him and he’d failed her just like every other man in her life had. Just like he knew he would in the end.
But it was too late for him to back out now. Merlin’s words about being very sure rang in his head like a fire alarm.
“It won’t happen again, I swear.”
“That still didn’t answer my question. Where were you?” she asked quietly. “You promised.”
“Tally, I admit I was wrong to leave you. It’s my day, so I shouldn’t have left you alone for a second. But why did you go with Ethelred? You can tell him no. You can tell me no.” For the first time he wondered if she actually knew that.
“No, I couldn’t. He gave me cramps and made them worse if I didn’t comply. So no, I couldn’t refuse him.”
“He what?” Falcon demanded, rage boiling again.
“Look, you already bashed his face in, which I think he actually enjoyed. Let it go. You’ll be there next time, right?” She dried her hands off on her jeans. “This is what he wants. To make you angry. To make us question everything.”
“He had no right to do that to you, Tally. It was an abuse of power.”
“And he wants you to do the same. He wants you to be angry. He probably thinks he can corrupt us because we have history. He’ll play us against each other if he can.”
“Aren’t I the one supposed to be giving this speech?”
Tally laughed. “I guess it was my turn today. That would be pretty cool if we could save each other, don’t you think? I mean, I kind of owe you.”
“You mean like in those books Middy likes to read?” He smirked. “I’m not romance novel material, baby.” But wouldn’t it just be something if he was?
“Why not? We live in a world with magick. Lots of people think that’s a fairy tale. So why can’t I save you, too? It’s not like I asked for shining armor or anything. Dred’s already got that buttoned up.”
Something sharp and hot flared at the comment. He didn’t like it. “I can’t believe Middy got him to wear shining armor for their wedding.”
“Well, he was willing to die and damn himself for her, so I’d think wearing armor would be a little thing in comparison. I think he already wore the thing to a Samhain mixer at Academy, anyway. As much as he denies it, he likes it.”
“As well he should. He’s lucky my sister even looked twice at him.”
“I know. He wasn’t even put off by the Trifecta.”
“That never stopped you,” Falcon replied.
“You never struck the fear of Merlin into warlocks on my behalf.”
“Oh, I beg to differ,” he began and the garden gnome handed them each a towel.
“Really? Who?”
“Grigori Hampsteath.”
“He stood me up for—You ass. I cried on your shoulder about that for half the night.” She handed the towel back.
“I knew you’d be angry, but he was running his mouth about getting you to put out, so I encouraged him to steer clear of you if he wanted to keep his teeth and his balls.”
“Falcon, people have always been talking about me. Ever since my father was convicted and sentenced to the Hall. Then my mother went crazy and killed herself. I was always fodder for the gossip mill. Since birth, apparently. You know I don’t care what people say.”
“I know. But you deserved better than that.”
She wrapped her arms around his waist and tucked her head against his chest. “And here you said you didn’t wear shining armor.”
He found himself wishing for just a moment that he could be that warlock—the one that the shining armor would fit.
CHAPTER NINE
Cupid, Drop Your Bow
The first part of her parole with Falcon was almost over, thank Merlin.
Tally was torn between wanting to see Falcon all the time and never wanting see him again. He hadn’t brought up the Crimson Tide Incident, or the Werewolf Incident. In fact, he acted like none of it had happened. She supposed that was just as well. It was a Shall Not, after all.
He’d stuck to her like a burr, as he’d promised. They spent a lot of time on the beach, walking and talking, shelling. She had a whole basket of shells that she had no idea what to do with, but had wanted nonetheless. He cooked out, she dragged him on the dolphin-watching cruise, and they did all of the tourist things the island had to offer. She’d been so nervous about being alone with him, but he treated her like she was one of the guys, or worse, his little sister’s friend.
Tally couldn’t make up her mind; she thought that was what she wanted, to go back to the way things had been. For him to forget everything that had happened between them because it seemed the universe was decidedly against it. That wasn’t what she wanted at all, but it was what she needed. Her body cried out in protest that what she needed was to get laid—hard and fast by the sex in leather that was Falcon Cherrywood in his full Cupid regalia.
Whenever she’d pictured Cupid in her younger years, it had always been as a petulant child with a Botticellian mouth and a little bow and arrow. A stereotype? Sure, but it was what she’d been taught. Not this giant of a man with shoulders like Atlas, guns strapped to his thighs, and a mouth that could despoil a cleric with a smile.
Tally was embarrassed to admit she was looking forward to his turn in Weekly Warlock. He’d be 3-D pervy goodness all for her ogling. Tally wondered briefly how mortal women got along without live-action centerfolds. That wasn’t something she ever wanted to know firsthand.
She’d reenact the scene from the living room, among other things. She’d dress him up like a Victorian lord, a SWAT commander, maybe even a gunslinger outlaw from the American West. He could show her how to sit a horse and she could practice on him. She licked her lips at the thought and had to cross her legs for fear of getting stuck to the chair like an industrial suction cup. Something like that ran right down her vein of luck. She’d end up having to explain to the object of her nefarious desires that she’d been fantasizing about him and had gotten so wet . . .
No. She’d just have to put him from her mind.
She popped another cookie in her mouth, and then spit it out into a napkin. Her jeans were starting to get tight on her ass and with no magick to move a button one way or another, she had to watch what she ate.
No magick definitely sucked.
Tally looked down and realized she might as well have eaten that last cookie, because it had actually been the last. There wasn’t anything left but the empt
y package staring up at her with reproach in its little crumb eyes.
Falcon was going to be back any minute and she was wallowing in cookie crumbs in her not so skinny jeans, and hadn’t brushed her hair. Damn the no magick twice on Sunday.
Tally crammed the cookie package into the full trash can and cringed. She’d never had a full trash can before. What did one do with it when it was full? The cleaning gnome took care of that. She prayed no magick didn’t also mean no cleaning gnome. She wasn’t sure if she could stand it. Previously, the house had just stayed clean; she wondered who did it if not the cleaning gnome?
She didn’t have time to wonder further. When Falcon came through the door, she could tell something had definitely changed. Perhaps it was because he was in partial Cupid regalia. He had guns strapped to his hips and thighs and he was wearing the red leather pants.
“Hard day at the office?” she asked in a saucy tone.
“You have no idea. The Cherubim are harder to corral than sock gnomes and have sharper teeth. My brothers both got blind dates with Valkyries and the gals won’t stop calling my WitchBerry asking when Hawk and Raven are going to call them. They’re Valkyries, for Merlin’s sake.”
“Women are pretty universal, Falcon. Even hardass warrior chicks with big swords. I’ve heard stories about them though. If they get tired of waiting for your brothers to call, they might decide a raid is in order.”
Falcon grinned. “As in a pillaging sort of raid, like in the days of yore?”
“Yeah. Picture Raven and Hawk trussed up like game birds and tossed over a Valkyrie’s shoulder.”
He pulled his WitchBerry out of thin air and started texting.
“What are you doing?”
“Telling the girls they won’t be getting a call any time soon.”
“Are you sure you’re an angel?” Tally asked.
“Not entirely, no,” Falcon admitted with another devastating grin. “I’m trying to get a transfer. Too bad Death’s not open.”
“See, I always knew Cupid was a dick.”
“That hurts, Tally.” He pretended to clutch his heart.
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