by Misty Dietz
Ari’s gaze shot to Dorian before smiling. “Raj is almost as old as Alexios, so he has lots of Guardian babysitting experience. And on the bright side, if our teenager gets an STD, at least it won’t kill him.”
Kat pulled a box off a shelf. “I’m not worried about him.”
Dorian wrinkled his nose at them. “Yo, I heard all that.”
Ari leaned down to Katherine’s ear. “If you need an outlet for your anxiety, beat up on me. Dorian’s doing us a favor. Cut him some slack.”
Kat pursed her lips momentarily. “I guess you’re right.” She raised a sassy eyebrow at Dorian. “Thanks for your assistance, lad.”
Dorian’s dark eyes twinkled back at her. “Hey lady, I can’t help it if I’m not as el-der-ly as y’all. Wait, you want me to talk slower? How about talk louder? CAN. YOU. HEAR. ME. N—”
“That’ll do, Dorian,” Ari warned, watching to make sure Kat didn’t do anything they’d both regret.
Dorian’s broad shoulders shook with mirth as he raised a hand to high-five and bro-hug Ari. “Hey man, we cool. I told y’all you had nothing to worry yourself over. I know Lady K’s crusty on the outside, soft and goo—”
Ari flushed a rapid pulse of air up Dorian’s nose to put a stop to that incendiary comment. As Dorian wheezed and coughed, Ari slung a friendly arm over his shoulders. “Unlike a few of our snooty Guardian brethren, I don’t mind a little youth in our ranks. You must have about a decade under your belt now, right?”
“Hell yeah, man. I’m no greenhorn any more. I got hopes Michael will be giving me my own relic to guard in a year or so. I’ve been building quite a badass rep among the incubus. Those fallen angels don’t scare me at all.”
“Too bad stupidity isn’t painful,” Kat muttered, moving off to converse with Stark, Kai, and Father Angus near three dazed-looking humans they’d picked up off the streets. They must’ve been recently exorcised. Score three more for Team Good.
I’ll do the mind wipes. Just give me a sec, Ari told Kat telepathically.
She shook her head and raised her hand in a downward swipe without bothering to look back at him. Fine, he’d let her do it without interfering, but he’d definitely be on watch to make sure she wasn’t over-extending her abilities. She needed to be as close to full-strength as possible when the showdown came with Leviathan.
Something told him it would be tonight.
“Any Rephaim activity around here in the last couple of hours?” he asked Dorian.
“No. I almost wish they’d poke their heads around, though, because I’ve been itchin’ to try out my dragon scroll dagger I bartered with Jinx for. That little ninja piece of ass drives a hard bargain.”
Ari swatted him on the back of the head.
“Ow, what the hell, man?” The younger Guardian slid the dagger back into his waistband.
“If you think it’s okay to call a woman a ‘piece of ass’ and have no fear of what fallen angels can do, you’re a long way from being entrusted with your own relic. Besides that, you won’t be alive much longer if Jinx hears you call her, or anyone else, something so disrespectful. Now, how many exorcisms has Father Angus performed since we left?”
“Eight. Raj mind-wiped two of them before I suggested we do another patrol of the perimeter. When the sky got all weird, we came back inside. Three are on the floor there,” he pointed to where Kat was placing her hands on a young woman’s forehead, “and the other three are sleeping in the employee lounge. Mind wiping isn’t my strong suit yet, but I got the Sandman powers down pat.”
Which meant he could put people to sleep. “I’ll take care of the rest of the mind wipes. You and Raj head outside again, paying particular attention to the ocean side.”
“I’m on it.”
“Dorian.”
The young Guardian swung back, his hand already on the door. “Yeah?”
“Fire’s your element, right?”
“Damn straight. I light ’em up and burn those bitches down, Grimm.”
Good. Elemental diversity for the coming fight would be important. He had Air, Kat had Water, and Raj possessed the rare Ether power, like Alexios. Their various energies would work synergistically against Leviathan. Hopefully it will be enough.
Once he and Kat had wiped the remaining human minds of what they’d experienced during their demonic possession and sent them on their way home, Ari pulled her aside.
She spoke before he had a chance. “Why hasn’t she come yet? She was obviously ready for a confrontation back at my house. And she had to know we’d come back here because of the Chains. I don’t understand what she’s waiting for.”
“She knew it would have this effect on you. Remember, she lives for manipulating people’s emotions. The more rattled she can make you, the more your power diminishes.”
“I can’t take this waiting, plus we have to get the Rod of Moses back anyway. Why don’t we go after her?”
“And face her Rephaim army on their turf?”
Her shoulders sagged as she slid onto a bar stool. “Well, what do you suggest?”
“How long will it take to unward the Chains?”
“The minute that relic comes out of the reliquary, it becomes vulnerable. Look what happened to the Rod of Moses.”
“We’re about to go toe-to-toe with an archdemon, North. We have to pull out all the stops because we only get one chance when this shit finally goes down. Right now, with you, me, Dorian, and Raj, we have all but the Earth element represented. That’s definitely in our favor, but consider the opposition. An archdemon alone is bad enough, but she has who knows how many Rephaim and a holy relic in her corner. I relish a challenge, but even I don’t like those odds. Using the Chains of St. Peter would help balance the battle.”
She ran a hand through her hair. He realized then that she hadn’t re-pinned it into the bun she always wore. Maybe that’s why her staff had been looking at her with an unusual amount of interest. He kissed her forehead and squeezed her shoulders. “Let’s do this. I want to get this over with and get on with our lives. I want to adopt a house full of children with you.”
“Oh Jesus, are you kidding me? I’d make a horrible mother. I own a nightclub. And. We. Hunt. Demons.”
“So we’ll be unconventional parents—we’ll teach them how to do it, too!”
The ground suddenly quaked with such force Kat tumbled into Ari. As they stumbled, they locked eyes.
She’s here.
Screams poured into the building from the crowd gathered out front. Ari ran to open the door, letting the people flow inside to safety. “Earthq-q-quake! We c-can’t be inside!” stammered a coed in five-inch platform heels, caught up in the massive current of bodies streaming into the club.
“Everyone’s okay,” Konani yelled over the melee. “AQUA’s earthquake resistant!”
Ari wasn’t worried about earthquakes, however. And not just because AQUA’s inner skeleton had extra steel bracing, giant rubber pads, and embedded hydraulic shock absorbers designed to withstand shifts in the earth’s crust.
Leviathan’s power was water-based, not land-based, so this land movement was probably about as severe as it was going to get. She didn’t have the juice to cause significant damage using terra plates. What was troubling, however, was that she’d likely generated an underwater disturbance to create a—
“Tsunami!”
The Civil Defense sirens began to blare, and people screamed louder. Kat’s hand pressed against Ari’s back as she shouted orders to her staff to get everyone to the upper level, lock down the cement shutters, and sprinkle salt along the perimeter of the rooms. She grabbed his shirt in her fist. “Can you calm them down? They’re safe from the elements in this cement bunker, but they’re going to kill each other in their panic before the demons even get to them.”
He raised both hands, palms outward, to emit a massive pulse of energy to stimulate serene alpha brain waves in all the humans. Then he grabbed Katherine’s wrist before she could spin away from him. “
I don’t want you out of my sight.”
“That’s not practical right now, Grimm. We have work to do. But first…” Her eyes blazed into his. “We need to find an unoccupied closet so we can bond, then we’ll unward the Chains.”
Ari had always scoffed at people who’d said they’d been struck speechless, but…
Whoa.
Had she really said what he thought he’d heard? He watched a flush creep up her neck.
She glared at him. “Do we have to light candles and be horizontal to make it official, or can we drop our pants, say a few sappy words and, presto, we’re good to go?”
Ari put his hands on his head and pulled his hair to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. She wanted to motherfucking bond. With him.
“For chrissakes, North, you want to do this now?” He could hear and feel the winds howling outside, banging detritus against the side of the building. A wall of water traveling at four hundred miles an hour was bearing down on Waikiki, and she picked now to bond.
“It will give us extra mojo, won’t it?”
“Well, yeah, but this isn’t something you do just because you need an edge.”
Something exceptionally large and metallic—a car maybe—slammed into the side of the building, raining plaster dust from the ceiling onto the floor. Stark ran to the Devil’s Trap with a broom to make sure the circle of protection wasn’t marred or covered.
“Can’t think of a better reason to up my edge than when facing sudden annihilation,” Kat cried.
She wanted to bond not because she wanted to finally join her everlasting soul with his, but because she wanted extra juice to fight Leviathan.
As much as he wished it would be for the right reason, he couldn’t deny the cold reality that they’d need every advantage. He grabbed her arm and steered her toward the men’s bathroom, trying to tamp down the racing of his pulse and the anger simmering in his veins at the way this was going down.
“I don’t care what you have to do, but keep the demons the fuck out of here for five minutes,” he barked at Dorian and Raj, not even waiting to see the looks on their faces as he shoved the bathroom door open.
Three people cowering in the stalls ran out after one glimpse of his face. When they exited the room, he flipped the lock and passed his hand over the door, adding a ward to keep unwelcome guests out.
“Ari, I—”
He unzipped her pants, pulled her jeans and thong down her body and hoisted her to the cold countertop. Everything inside him protested what was happening. But death was knocking on their door, and her protection as his bonded mate mattered more than her pleasure or whatever fantasies he’d had about this moment of their joining.
He wanted to give her languid whispers and, hell yes, candlelight. A long body massage followed by a sensual meal, then a bubble bath and roses.
Instead it was fluorescent lights and a goddamn quickie.
He couldn’t even look at her as he unzipped his fly and brought his swollen erection to her softness.
It was over in less than sixty seconds. The sacred words exchanged in a place where people washed germ-filled hands and vomited excess alcohol.
They were well and truly mated now, but as he watched her fix her clothes and race from the room without looking back, he knew he’d never forget the tears rolling down her cheeks as she’d climaxed.
Chapter 24
Desperation could make even a cold heart do foolish things.
Katherine wiped the wetness from her cheeks, ignoring the people’s cries to deliver them from something they instinctively knew was worse than their nightmares. Their fear clawed at her, but she had to shut them out to do this. The bonding energy she’d tapped into when she’d joined with Ari pulsed under her skin in every vein and sinew. So much power.
She didn’t regret bonding with Ari. It was awful and beautiful and inevitable with the perfect mortifying rightness she’d imagined.
If only she hadn’t hurt him.
Focus, Katherine. None of that would matter if Leviathan annihilated the island.
Get the Chains. Take her down. She could do this. They could do this.
As long as the Chains didn’t kill her when it sensed the evil inside her.
It was a chance she had to take. If she didn’t, thousands could lose their lives. Their souls even. That was worth the risk.
If she lived, she’d tell Ari how she really felt about him.
Katherine streamed down the hallway to the sanctorum, her mind stumbling over the Latin words of the unwarding spell to unlock the door. When she finally got the words right, she looked over her shoulder and stumbled into the room, pulling the door closed behind her.
She looked around the room with its lovely, but eerie darkness—the low, tray ceiling, the expensive antiques, the imported floor tiles—all to honor a relic.
A loud boom her made her heart skip a beat and restart on a gallop. Had the first wave struck the building? Were the Rephaim here? Had Leviathan been able to breach the building’s wards already?
Her throat squeezed. She breathed slowly through her mouth to calm the panic. She’d worked through that. Her Viking had showed her she could control her fear. Could control the very thing she feared. Water was hers to command. Remember.
She ran to the dark mahogany paneled walls and shoved the Louis XVI chair out of the way so hard the priceless antique splintered. She pressed the right series of raised panel moldings, trembling, whispering the words that would unlock the sanctorum’s inner secrets. The impenetrable wood slid away as her words faded, revealing the ornate gold and glass reliquary containing the heavy iron chains. The chains that had shackled the Apostle Peter when he was jailed in Jerusalem. An angel had come, broken the iron bonds, and led him out of prison the night before his trial.
The entire room was lit from the glow of the relic, an unmistakable hum of power thrumming in the space. Katherine’s stomach quavered as she lifted the massive gold cover of the container. Guardians were not supposed to remove holy objects from their reliquaries unless it was a dire emergency.
A fine sheet of perspiration coated her body as she set the lid on a velvet stand. Her hand shook, her fingers poised above the old iron shackles. If the Chains didn’t kill her, Ari probably would for attempting this. The greater the risk, the greater the reward. She hoped his words would prove true.
She listened to the rush of her blood—and something else. A low reverb that made her shiver as it faded away into the darker hollows of her body. A bad taste rose in her mouth, black licorice and tar. Katherine gagged, shook her head, then inhaled and exhaled slowly. “You know what’s inside me,” she said aloud to the Chains. “Help me do what needs to be done to rid this island of evil.”
She blew out one last shaky breath and wrapped her fingers around the Chains.
Dense and warm, they vibrated against her skin, mainlining healing energy straight to her Guardian life force. She stiffened suddenly, so filled with light there was nowhere for the toxin to hide. She dropped to her knees, hanging on to a section of the Chains in one hand, the back of a chair with the other as she vomited a black, oily soot that lit on fire and then disintegrated on contact with the Chains.
She shifted to plop down on the floor, waiting for her trembling to abate. She rubbed her hands on her arms as she closed her eyes and drew inward. Observing, probing. But there was no more static. No darkness hovering at the edges of her consciousness. No desire to appease the archdemon. No muscle weakness or fatigue. No defeatism.
Well, maybe a little of that, but that was all her. She came by her cynicism naturally.
She was cured.
No. More. Toxin.
She laughed more freely than she had since happier times so many years ago with Ari. Laughed until her belly hurt, and she realized she owed a debt to the relic.
She’d never held this, or any other relic, before. But as she stood and draped the Chains over her shoulders, she understood for the first time why they were so critical in th
e battle between good and evil. Could finally comprehend why the Guardians were created to protect not only humanity, but relics such as these. They were a symbol of light overcoming darkness. They offered hope in times when it seemed so out of reach. They should be placed in public instead of hidden away in dark rooms—safe, yet available for all to see and benefit from.
Katherine chanted a canticle ward—the most powerful, yet risky magical shield in a Guardian’s arsenal. She sliced her palm with the small dagger she’d tucked into her blouse, using a few drops of her blood to metaphysically link the Chains to her body. If a demon wanted to take the relic, it would have to kill her to sever the relic’s connection with her.
A soft squeak behind her made her spin toward the door. She froze when she saw the small figure standing in the doorway. “M-Mary?”
The girl held out her hand, then let it fall, tears gathering in her large, green eyes and slipping down her pale cheeks. “Kitty.”
Chills shot down Katherine’s spine. Another of Leviathan’s tricks. She could see it for what it was now. Thank heavens. How she could make Mary look sooo real? Katherine rushed to the apparition, expecting to be able to walk through it. But two feet from the ghost, the Chains burned Katherine’s shoulders, halting her forward progress. What was this?
“Why didn’t you help me? Don’t you love me?” ghost Mary said.
An enormous knot settled in Katherine’s throat. Don’t answer. She’s not really here. Mary had been an innocent child. She was in Heaven, or wherever children, animals, and good people went when it was all over here on Earth. If that was not the case, Katherine would give up right here, right now. Forsake all her duties and just say to hell with it all.
She attempted to open her pathway to Ari, but found only silence. Same when she tried to send out a general call to the other two Guardians in the building. The humidity climbed to uncomfortable levels, making sweat gather at her hairline. She swallowed hard and attempted to move forward once more, but the Chains burned her shoulders again, rooting her feet in place.