by S Lawrence
I can’t. I don’t know her. My breath catches in my throat as a need like nothing I’ve experienced before rushes through me.
I need to know that. I need to know her expression for every emotion.
Desire. Anger. Rage. Lust. Satisfaction.
I will spend eternity learning them.
Chapter 11
CHARLIE
Send them away? Why would I do that? How would I do that? Not like I can kick the Devil out of anywhere.
I let my fingers loosen around his hand, and his twitch again.
My heart is pounding. I can’t breathe. Sweat is pouring down my back.
“She doesn’t look too good.” I hear the one called Torryn saying the words from a distance. He sounds far away, but his face is inches from mine when I look up.
I flinch back, gasping for breath.
“Calm down, Charlie.” Easy for her to say.
My eyes scan around the room, over and over as my heart beats faster. The music is blaring in my head as Lucifer reaches out for me. I back pedal, trying to get free of him, of this place, of all of it.
Dagen’s fingers slip from mine, and instantly everything becomes a thousand times more. Louder. Smaller. Less air.
Lillian’s eyebrows draw down just as Torryn laughs loudly. “She’s going down.”
What? Who is? And then I feel my legs turn to liquid, not even jelly, just completely useless.
Are you fucking kidding me?
Twice in one day is my last thought as the darkness winks before my eyes and then envelops me.
This time, I wake up in minutes. They’ve moved me to a bench at the foot of the bed. I feel fucking ridiculous. No one says a word. Good. I don’t have to kill them. I can tell the smartass really wants to. I look at him.
Do it, my face says. He shakes his head once and looks down at the woman standing in front of him. My lips twitch. Damn, I didn’t want to like him.
Lillian slowly squats down. “I know this is a lot. Like I really know.”
“She ran barefoot into the swamp,” Torryn rats her out while shaking his head.
“You nearly set headquarters on fire and then didn’t sleep, eat, or shower for days,” Lucifer murmurs.
“You didn’t?” Her voice has gone all sugary and soft. She straightens, turning as she does, and melts against him.
“I was worried you’d choose one of the others,” he says against her neck. Well, shit, I like him even more.
“Never.” Her hands slide up to his jaw, pulling his lips to hers.
I swallow hard; I want that. Blinking at my thought, I freeze. Do I? Yes. I just don’t know if I want it from a demon while we wage a war against angels, Fallen or not.
I don’t know if I’m that person. The person who runs to danger. All my life, I’ve been running from it. I swallow again as I feel my eyes start to burn.
“Are you alright?” Apparently the King of Hell is super observant.
“I…” What do I say? Thanks but no thanks. “I…” I start again and then stop sighing. I’ve got nothing.
“Why don’t we give you a little time to think?” I find myself smiling at him and fighting the sudden urge to hug him tight. I’m not a hugger. I bet he isn’t either but I still can’t shake the urge.
Standing as the others walk out, I watch him. He hasn’t moved yet, his eyes focused on Dagen. Finally, he looks at me, noticing I’ve moved close, right beside him.
“I can’t imagine what this is like for you. I can’t imagine what your life has been like, constantly running. Terrified. Alone. The guilt.” He shakes his head and I struggle to breathe. “Try…” He stops, seemingly at a loss for words, like me. “Well, I guess maybe just imagine what it would be like to not be alone. To have all of us at your side.”
He turns to leave. “Luci…” I stop myself, remembering he likes to be called Luc. “Luc.” He turns back after his shoulders relax, and before I can talk myself out of it, I rush at him, wrapping him in my arms and hugging him tight.
He’s stiff for a full minute, and I can’t let go. I imagine the Devil gets few hugs. That makes me sad. Something eventually gives, and he relaxes. I smile against his chest as his arms come around me carefully.
“Thank you,” I whisper. “For understanding.”
He rubs a hand over my back, not saying anything.
“I don’t know if I believe it all, but you’re right, the guilt eats at me.” I want to stop but for some reason, I pour out the things I’ve kept locked away since that day under the cabinet. “I’m the reason they have all been killed and not just killed but…” A sob breaks free. “Destroyed. Torn apart.”
“I’m so sorry, Thea.” I cry harder. How does he know that name?
I realize I asked out loud when he responds. “The memory of your mother calling you that is so strong, it broke past your natural barriers. Sorry.”
I shake my head. “Don’t be. I just haven’t been called that for a very long time. I’m sorry.”
“For what?” He pulls back slightly, looking down at me. I wipe at his wet shirt, focusing on the beautiful shade of blue for a moment so I can get the courage to say it.
“For everything we think of you,” I murmur as I force myself to meet his equally beautiful blue eyes, which widen at my words.
“Did you make her cry?” Dagen’s deep voice is rough from fever, and we both whip our heads to the side and look at him.
His eyes are bright but narrowed, and Luc laughs. “What are you going to do if I did?”
The demon in question struggles to rise, but I break away from the King of Hell and rush to him, pushing his shoulders back down.
“Are you insane? You almost died and now you want to pick a fight with Lucifer?” Dagen makes a noise of derision.
“I will if he made you cry.” I shake my head but smile at the idiot.
“He didn’t make me cry. He was just being nice.” I turn as the Devil in question is stepping through the door, his hand on the knob.
He glances back and nods once as he continues forward and pulls it closed. I turn back to the extremely pale demon on the bed. I have no idea what to say.
“Thank you,” he says, grabbing at my hand.
“What? I should be thanking you. You almost died saving me. Stopping them.” I frown at the image of him falling to his knees in the hall.
“You saved me, girl. Kept me from the nothingness.” I shake my head, prepared to argue about that. “It was you.”
His tone leaves no room for an argument. So I don’t.
“I see you don’t believe me. Well, know this - I felt you there, and you were as real as you are here.” He shakes his head. “I don’t know how magic or power or whatever you might want to call it works, but you saved me.”
I lower my eyes and let them skate over his chest and down his stomach to the wound. It looks awful, with the skin blackened from the blade.
“I’m so sorry, Dagen.” He shakes his head as I step back. “You wouldn’t have even been hurt if it wasn’t for me.”
I spin and race from the room, straight through the other toward the elevator. I don’t slow even as he bellows my name. The others call out also, not Luc but the rest, as I repeatedly push the button.
Luc understands and even though he could stop me, he lets me go.
“Remember what I said.” His voice reaches my ears as I step through the door before it is even done opening. I turn and lock my eyes on his as the door slides closed.
I don’t know where I’m going. My things are at the other hotel but they know I was there. I have clothes at the club. I head that way, my only thought to get the stuff I have there and then get to some of the places I stashed money around town. One such place has spare keys to my car. I need my car.
You need everything in that room, I tell myself. It’s too dangerous. I’m walking in the backdoor of Flex before I know it. It is quiet, solemn. People are crying and hugging.
“Charlie. Thank God.” I’m pulled tight
against breasts made from padding and a dress covered in sequins. Jesus, I love these people. “I knew you had left just before it happened. I was afraid.” He stumbles to a stop, hugging me tighter.
“I’m sorry, David, I should have called.” I don’t elaborate.
“We are doing a tribute all of Cheyenne’s favorites. Will you sing one for her?” How can I say no? I want to just to keep them safe but instead I find myself nodding.
“Let me get ready real quick. I have to be somewhere later.” I rush to my locker and pull everything out while he goes out to tell someone to add me to the line-up.
Years of hiding as a boy makes my transformation quick. In less than twenty minutes, Sin steps out onto the stage. I drag a stool to the middle and sit, letting the soft spotlight shine on my bowed head.
I swallow. “This is for my friend, Cheyenne. She was brave and selfless. She will be missed.”
The slow piano introduction of James Blunt’s Goodbye My Lover. No, he wasn’t my lover, but I did love Bill deeply. I lose myself and my pain in the words of the song. As the music dies away, I raise my face and see him standing near the entrance, Luc at his side.
Dagen.
Tears shine in his eyes. He holds out a hand tentatively, his song tumultuous. I can’t leave him. I know it in that instant.
I will sacrifice everything for him.
Including myself.
Chapter 12
DAGEN
She is there on the stage, dressed as a man, and they - both sides of her - are breaking my fucking heart.
I glance at Luc. He is watching her, amazed, and he finally looks at me and grins.
“I told you.” I frown.
“Told me what?”
“He creates the perfect other half for you.” He shakes his head, looking at the stage again.
Shit. I didn’t realize he knew anything about that. “I’ve always known, Dagen. It just doesn’t matter.”
Great, now he’s reading my damn mind. I follow his gaze back to her. She might actually be perfect. Not for me only, just perfect. I’m still fucking pissed she ran but I get it.
She thinks she’s going to save me by staying away. The song ends and she looks up; eyes filled with tears lock onto mine and she sighs, standing up as she slips the microphone back into the stand and then bows to the loud applause and yells.
People come to their feet, blocking my view. I start moving through the crowd, maybe shoving a little harder than needed a few times. When I break through, she’s gone.
Fucking hell, she’s slippery.
“A lifetime of running has taught her well.” Luc glances around as he speaks.
“That it has, but we’ve had much longer than a lifetime.” I narrow my eyes and turn to my right, heading to the side of the stage. “Hey, darlin’, I’m here to see Sin or Charlie, whichever you call her.”
Dark brown eyes framed by thick fake lashes narrow. “Sorry, darlin’. No one gets backstage.”
Damn, I must look worse than I thought. Luc steps to my side and those same dark eyes widen in interest.
“We really need to talk to her. It’s about that unfortunate incident last night.” His hand comes out and smooths over a forearm as he smiles up at the face towering over him in four inch stilettos. The added inches make the woman’s height somewhere around six foot eight when she stood.
“Well, maybe just this once.” She smiles and leans down slightly. “For you,” she whispers in his ear, and I bite the inside of my lips to keep from grinning.
Sorry, ‘lady,’ you’re barking up the wrong tree. Well, I think you are. Honestly, I have no idea. I hazard a glance at the man at my side. His face is polite, but there’s no heat there. Yeah, wrong tree. Your loss.
She lets us by, her hands gliding over him, and I feel him tense beside me. The man doesn’t love to be touched or maybe he just isn’t used to it. He seemed fine wrapped around Charlie earlier.
A growl rumbles up my throat, and the man in question elbows me. Hard. I glance over at him, and he puffs out a breath which hangs in the air. Shit. Looking around, I see people rubbing their hands over their arms, confusion stamped on their faces.
“Get it under control, Dagen,” he warns as his power flares out slightly, bringing the temperature back up to normal.
“Sorry.” I’ve lost control more in the last couple months than I have since my rebirth.
He looks at me, waiting for a reason. He ain’t getting one. No way will I admit to being jealous of him. Did he just roll his eyes like a teenage girl? Yes, yes he did. Satan rolled his eyes at me. I feel my lips twitch. He just shakes his head and stalks away. Chuckling, I start after him, lengthening my strides until I catch up.
“Charlie?” I ask to no one in particular.
A couple ‘ladies’ stop in their tracks, staring at us. I smile as the scent of their hunger reaches me.
“Lucky bitch.” The redhead points farther into the dimly lit hallway. “Second door on the left. Come find me if you get bored with her.” He smiles to take the edge off. I wink before starting down the hall.
We stop at the door he had indicated and look inside. Nothing. A single locker stands open. Empty.
“She’s running.” My anger flares as I say it. I punch the door frame and dust falls on us. “She doesn’t trust us to keep her safe.”
“I don’t think that’s it, Dagen,” he murmurs as he looks around.
“What do you think it is then?” It sounds bitchier than I’d like.
“I think she is trying to protect us all but especially you.” I think about that, about how her face looked right before she ran from my home.
She had looked at the wound in my gut, and her face had paled then hardened. Shit. I really am an idiot.
“I don’t know how to do this.” I pace away rubbing my hand over my head.
“Do what?”
Spinning, I wave my arms wide. “All of this. Even before, I was with the animals ninety percent of my time. I knew about Eve wanting to eat the apple but I didn’t care to stop her or Adam. I just wanted to keep the animals safe. I failed everyone.”
I stop pacing and slide down the wall. Watch the Garden, Dagen. That’s what He had said before He sent me there. Watch it and protect it. I didn’t think Eden would do what she had. I didn’t even know she had until that day so many lifetimes later. I was surprised to see her there that day, standing in the very center under the tree of knowledge, right where she had tempted Eve.
Of course, now people believe it had been the man standing across the room from me, but nope, it was Eden, named after the very place she destroyed. I approached her unworried, thinking she had been sent to help me.
Instead, she destroyed me. In every way.
Tricked me, bound me, and after she slit my wrists, she slaughtered the animals that had been in my care for eons. I fought the chains until the last drop of blood fell from my body.
The fires of Hell had been nothing compared to the heat of their bodies burning around me as she destroyed the garden.
To the Fallen, it represented the beginning of all the transgressions against them. The birthplace of human women. To Eden, it was just pleasure. She loved the killing and the destruction of entire species.
And if Ever could be trusted to tell the truth, Eden had been doing it ever since. At least I know she can’t kill anymore. I smile even as images of animals lost both recently and long ago play through my mind. So many lost, it breaks my heart.
“Dagen?” I look up and see he’s staring at me. “I said do you have any idea where she would run to?”
I shake my head. “I told her before you came for me to run. To keep ahead of them. I thought I’d die before you’d find me. I was just trying to keep her safe.”
Pushing up, I start to pace again, my frustration bubbling over. I want to kill something or maybe fuck something. I don’t know. Energy is zinging through me.
Then it hits me — her car. She can’t run without it. I mean, she
could, but it would be much harder.
“We need to get to the casino.”
“The Venetian?” He grabs me to take me there.
“No, to where you found me. She’s going for her things,” I yell.
Goddamnit. They will be watching, I’m sure of it. Lying in wait like a pack of jackals, ready to rip her apart. We flash away, turning into something less than us, flying through space until he forces us back together.
I gulp a deep breath. I hate how that shit feels. Spinning in a circle, I look for her, but she’s not here. Neither are her things.
“She’s already come and gone.” I run to the door, flinging it open, and race down the hall, knowing he is right behind me.
“Get to the Nugget. Now. We might need help,” he growls behind me. Good, calling for reinforcements.
This could turn into the park all over again, and Charlie doesn’t have a Grace to save her. The thought chills me, and my power ripples through the casino. Silence falls as everyone freezes from shock. If they don’t get out, they will freeze for real soon. It’s a mini ice age in the hotel. I can’t control it.
Just as people start running for the exit, Torryn and Lillian stroll in. He locks eyes with me as I run by him, not slowing. I hear him fall into step behind me as his heat starts to thaw the fountains that are solid ice now.
“I’ll get everyone out,” Lillian cries out as she turns and runs the other way. “The others will be here in minutes. I called them all in when we realized Dagen had been close. They all landed within the last hour.”
She is fucking amazing. She knew another fight was on the horizon. “That’s my woman,” Torryn practically crows, and I guess he has lots of reasons to be proud of her.
“What if they get to her first?” Even as I ask, I pour on more speed, a mere blur to any humans looking.
“They won’t,” he replies. So sure, so confident.
“But.” He moves up beside me and shakes his head.
“Nope.” His jaw clenches. “I will make sure they don’t.” His wings extend and he rises, flapping them even as they graze the walls. Those black as night wings carry him through the long hall faster than I could imagine.