Stolen Redemption

by Michel Prince

  “DeTello,” Tucker, my partner, snapped. “Are you coming?”

  Donna Tucker was latching her bulletproof vest with the large CPD emblazoned across its chest. She’d been my mentor since I entered homicide a few years prior. Only five years older than me, Tuck knew the streets from her misspent youth—her words, not mine. Although she was a female her hair was cut in a tight fade as her skin the color of honey completed the sight of my partner, one of two women in the squad. She was one of those few women who looked striking with little to no hair.

  “It wasn’t that I didn’t want to come…” I stood and stretched my back out.

  “I’m not your doctor. Tell them about your erectile dysfunction.” This was why she was one of the guys. Her smart mouth and quick comebacks. Showing me up had been the final sign she trusted me when I started out. Before that it was business for business sake.

  “Her mouth wasn’t big enough…you know what I mean.”

  “Most twelve-year-olds have that issue. I know mentally you’re on the same level, but you do need to start hitting the high schools.”

  McMillian shook his head at our usual barbs.

  “That ruins all the fun.” I pulled my vest over my shirt and tightened the buckles on the side.

  “Their daddy issues are more developed, deeper, they might even take you to their prom.”

  “You think N-Sync is still playing the circuit?”

  “What private prep school did you attend?” Tuck said as she slid into the driver’s seat and we led a group of five cop cars and two other plain clothes.

  “You might want to cut back on the twelve-year-old jokes, by the way.” I braced myself as she rounded the corner.

  “I’m not the one who brought an eighteen-year-old to the softball game last weekend.”

  “She had daddy issues, doesn’t that give me points?”

  “Daddy issues and a yearning to get out of tickets.” Tucker shook her head. “Don’t these girls reach for loftier goals? You could totally help her cover up a murder.”

  “Only yours.”

  “I’m hurt.” She placed her hand on her chest until her focus zeroed into our location. Sliding to the side, she stopped the caravan, then popped out of the car as the other officers did the same. Standing by our car she gave instructions on the no-knock warrant issued to the apartment on the corner of the next block.

  Two uniforms hefted the black battering ram. We would use it on the steel door of the side-by-side duplex standing as a warning to those in the area. Unlike the others on the block, this one was not to be knocked on. It was to be avoided as well as the person or persons inside. Our warrant called for the arrest of Luther Randolph, aka Twist. We’d finally tied six murders to him after six months.

  Tuck was no longer the bright-eyed jokester. Now she’d become the commanding officer who wasn’t there to mother this suspect. Not this one. This one needed the tough Donna Tucker who didn’t take shit from anyone, least of all a man who cared so little for human life he’d taken the life of a nine-year-old boy who had the misfortune of walking to the park with his father.

  Twist had let the father live because he owed him money. Shot him in the knee. His son Jordan wasn’t as lucky. Jordan was a warning to the father who had three other kids.

  “Now once we enter there are five rooms on the first level. We’ll need to split up once it’s cleared. Half upstairs to clear the bathroom and two bedrooms. The others will go to the basement. From what the landlord says it’s an open area so keep your back against the wall.”

  “Where did you want us?” a patrolman late to arrive asked.

  “I need you on the backyard in case he runs out.” Tucker looked in the eye of every officer there. “Are we a hundred percent on what’s happening?”

  No one responded and we moved in. We knew Twist was dangerous, but as we cleared the first level I heard a shuffling upstairs and Tuck and I bounded up stairs two at a time. The first shot caught me in the back. A sledgehammer the size of a felt tip pen sent me careening into the wall, knocking the wind from my lungs. Otherwise the vest did its job. The second shot sent blood across my face right as I turned to see Tuck get struck in the arm. Luckily it was her left as she kept her gun trained on Twist. She fired off a succession of shots that made his body jerk like a marionette until it crumpled to the ground.

  “You okay?” I asked Donna with my gun still drawn as I approached Twist gasping for air and reaching for his weapon that had dropped. With a kick I sent it flying across the floor. A crack echoed when it hit the wall, followed by a gasp.

  Tucker slumped down and grasped her neck. Blood gushed from between her fingers and Luther laughed behind me. Rushing to Tuck’s side I called for an ambulance.

  “I hope it’s for me.” Luther coughed. “I might be able to survive, but you killed her.”

  “I did not,” I spat as I held pressure on her neck. Tuck’s doe-like eyes spoke of forgiveness. “Come on, Donna, you know it’s just a flesh wound.”

  “Paper cut,” she choked out.

  With each pump from her heart, blood warmed and covered my hand. Light faded in her eyes and she softly stroked my cheek.

  “Promise you’ll give up the teenagers.”

  “Only if you stay with me.”

  With a jolt I woke. Electrical current burned through my chest and my body left the surface it was on, only to crash back down. I was the one in the hospital. Or was I? I’d been in the ER in the Henry County Hospital a handful of times and this wasn’t it.

  Esther was there with the man with half-rimmed glasses. He had a fresh shirt on and was holding a set of defibrillation paddles. That was the last thing I needed. He seemed to agree as he placed them back on the box.

  “Are you still with me?” Esther asked as her hand delicately took mine.

  Chapter 7

  Pivane

  THERE are few times when Masako has a good idea, but hunting a blonde doctor seemed like a good plan to me. Human doctors knew the extent of the human body and although they might not know how to handle all of LaDressa’s bodily functions, they should be able to figure most of it out.

  Wandering into the emergency room I was disappointed to be greeted by a dark-haired nurse and a male doctor. I waved them off as I explored the halls to find a wall with the pictures of all the doctors servicing the facility. Only one candidate caught my eye and I prayed it wasn’t an old picture. The woman looked fresh from medical school and eager to please.

  “Excuse me.” I approached the registrar who was reading a tattered library book. “I’m a patient of Dr. Pound. Is there a chance she’s on call tonight?”

  “No, Dr. Yager is on call for the clinic tonight. Do you need to speak to him?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Are you thinking you need to be seen by our ER doctor?”

  “No…Dr. Pound’s been treating me for a rare condition and most doctors have to spend hours figuring it out. She’s an expert.”

  “Dr. Pound’s an expert?” The woman held back a scoff as she adjusted her rotund belly. “Let me just get my nurse, I’m sure she could give you some advice.”

  “I don’t want to be a bother,” I added and dug into the woman’s mind. Searching for the location of Dr. Pound. Flipping back a few hours to when she arrived earlier in the day, I found a call list. The doctor was on call, but not for the clinic, but the prison. I smiled as I nodded and the woman fell back into her book and I left with no one remembering my arrival.

  Driving to the prison strengthened me with the hatred and anger pulsing from the building. Betty, the woman at the desk, wasn’t impressed with the young Dr. Pound, but had many tidbits of information tucked away. The least of which was her car, the same one I saw parked in the physician’s only parking spot. I loved it when I didn’t need to work too hard to get what I wanted. Although I did wonder why she’d be here so late. Maybe my dear friend Warren had suffered an aneurysm. Sadly it was m
ore likely the young physician was overly diligent.

  The sound of fumbling keys jarred me from my ponders as the blonde practitioner left the building with a messenger bag full of notes. Ah…diligent, that could play out so well.

  “Doctor Pound,” I called, and she looked up and her light gray eyes flashed from the street lamp.

  “I’m sorry, do I know you?”

  “I’m in need of your help.”

  “There’s an emergency room with a doctor ready and willing to—”

  My hand circled her upper arm as I placed a gun next to her ribs.

  “I’m afraid I require more from you, and although normally I play with my food to avoid the taste of fear, I don’t have the time.”

  “I scream—”

  “I’ll kill you before the air can travel from your lungs to your lips.” Her heart was racing and the smell of fear brought my arousal to its peak. Did we really need the princess to live? No, but if I expected to have the Deumos follow me I’d need to put out the appearance I’d tried. “A woman is hurt.”

  “By you?” she bit out as I led her to my car.

  “Sadly, no,” I retorted before fastening her into my passenger seat. Terror crossed her face as I kept my gun trained on her head and circled my car to the driver’s side. “Now, if you help her and she lives, so do you.”

  “Are you serious?” she screeched as we pulled out of the parking lot. “What bad eighties movie do you live in?”

  “The one where you die if she does.”

  “Let me guess—I’m going to have no supplies and I’ll have to build an ECG machine with three paperclips, a lamp, and grape juice.”

  “I don’t keep juice in the house.”

  “Is this a joke? Some sort of initiation for the new girl?”

  “How new are you?”

  “Very funny.”

  “I don’t know anything about you.” I looked over at the woman who had lost some of her fear and shifted into annoyance.

  “I’ve got clinic in the morning and as much as I loved the thirty-six hour power sessions from residency, I’ve already done that. Now I enjoy sleeping and eating at least one meal a week that doesn’t come from a vending machine.”

  “But vending machines have such variety,” I retorted.

  “Drop me off at my house.”

  “I don’t know where you live.”

  “Then return me to my car.”

  “Dr. Pound—”

  “Eliza. Please. This is so far from a medical situation.”

  “Eliza.” The name rolled off my tongue and I wished it was the tip of her clit. She must have felt the desire laced among the syllables, for she squirmed. “I do need your skills.”

  Crossing her arms, she pouted until she saw the cul-de-sac I drove into. The first home no longer had a roof; instead, it possessed just a tarp stretched across the top due to the princess’ temper tantrum. The others had broken shutters and walking paths in need of a shoveling. LaDressa didn’t know dilapidation could draw human attention to our safe houses, although after the last attack we were no longer safe by any stretch of the imagination. Sadly, she didn’t care about that either.

  “This place feels haunted,” Eliza said.

  “In a way it is.”

  I got her out of my car at gunpoint and brought her to the home I currently occupied. No longer living among the smells and distraction of the Deumos was just another disappointing part of my day.

  Screams came from the room I’d placed LaDressa in. The sharp piercing sound reverberated throughout the small rambler. Eliza jumped and reached for me.

  “She’s in pain,” I said.

  “What are you doing, torturing her?”

  “No.” I sighed with regret. “That would probably feel better.”

  “What took you so long?” Masako’s panicked voice didn’t quell the reaction from Eliza.

  “This isn’t funny. Why would you hunt down a doctor instead of dialing 9-1-1?”

  “There’s a complication.” I led the doctor into the room where LaDressa was thrashing, causing more injury to her already broken legs. Masako attempted to hold her down as the princess spat and snapped at us.

  “Did her head spin around before or after she fucked herself with a crucifix?”

  “Um…I’ve been gone for a half hour…Masako?” The servant of the princess wasn’t amused.

  “I have no Haldol so how about you call an ambulance?”

  I placed my finger on the princess’ forehead and uttered words only known to those in the highest stations of demon royalty. She instantly silenced and fell into a deep sleep.

  “Now heal her,” I ordered Eliza.

  “Call a priest. She’s possessed by the devil.”

  “No, that’s just her dad.” I sat on the side of my bed and brushed back her hair. “She fell from quite a height. Now she’s injured and needs medical attention.”

  Eliza walked over to LaDressa and placed her wrist on her forehead. Then opened the princess’ eyes only to be met by the black and silvery eyes no human could possess.

  “What’s going on here?” she asked. “She has a fever, scratches, and compound fractures everywhere, and her eyes…”

  “Here’s the deal,” I explained. “I wasn’t joking before. Her father is Lucifer and she’s her Royal Holiness Princess LaDressa, daughter of Lucifer the IV.”

  “Fourth…there have been four Lucifers?”

  “She has a brother.”

  “Of course, Lucifer the V. Right…” Eliza headed to the door, only to be blocked by Masako. She had a look that said “try it.” I think Masako needed some fighting too. Good to know. “This isn’t funny although you did a great job with this whole setup.”

  “Tell me what I need to get you and it shall be yours,” I said with all earnest. “She must be saved.”

  “This is real?”

  “Does she look like she’s faking?”

  “And she’s a demon princess?”

  “Yes.”

  “And if she dies, I die.”

  “Yes.”

  “Do I die either way?” Eliza’s pale gray eyes appeared defeated.

  “Probably,” I confessed. “But it depends. Do you want a chance for life or not?”

  Eliza walked back to LaDressa and dictated a list to me as her lashes began to stick together from tears. Soon she breathed in and out a couple times and settled into the situation.

  “I’ll need a name so I can fill a prescription.” Eliza fumbled in her bag for a prescription pad.

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “How are you planning on…” She shook her head. “Do you have any idea if I fell asleep at my desk again?”

  “Nope. As far as I know you’re awake.”

  She looked back at LaDressa, then to me and Masako. “Then get what I need. Just in case this isn’t a nightmare.”

  * * * *

  Esther Benson

  “They’ll notice he’s gone soon,” I said to Dr. Ashworth, who thankfully had started building the trauma ward he used when a Hell’s Mouth closed.

  The rush of demons, combined with the increase in members of the Frozen, led to many injuries and Dr. Ashworth had decided he’d rather heal than fight. Although he might as well have married his profession because he’d never die and forever be in the service of the Frozen, he seemed fine with it. Unlike the rest of the Frozen working off their debt with each bantling or demon they killed, he had no way to obtain absolution.

  “I can’t make his body heal faster. Gabriel has done all he can. Now it’s up to Vincent to heal himself.”

  “Where am I?” he said through dried lips.

  “You’re in a hospital,” I lied and brought a straw to his mouth so he could sip some water.

  “Where?”

  “A hospital,” I repeated.

  “Where is the hospital? This isn’t any ER I know.”

  “Don
’t worry about that,” I assured him as I set the cup on a cart.

  “What happened last night? I need to call in the animal on the street. What kind was that?”

  “So many questions.” I shifted nervously. “You need to focus on healing yourself.”

  “Esther.” He pushed up and looked for something on the side of the bed. “Where’s the control…is this a regular mattress?”

  “For your comfort.”

  “What is going on, Esther?”

  “Vince,” I pleaded and curled my fingers around his. “The less you know—”

  “I’m in someone’s home, am I not? Who is that guy?”

  “Dr. Ashworth and yes, you’re at my home.” Why did I say that? Seriously, he shouldn’t know anything about us. Gabriel was going to smite me. “You were bitten by something we call a bantling.”

  “A newborn?”

  “Yes, in a way a newborn de…” I breathed in. “Demon. They try to take forms that will have them comfortable with humans.”

  “A King Charles Spaniel the size of a grizzly bear.”

  “If it would have been puppy-sized you might have scooped it up.”

  “It looked like it had mange.”

  “I guess. Dr. Ashworth has to run some tests on you and I need to…” Get away. Vince’s eyes controlled me in a way I couldn’t grasp. He was all I could think about. This past twelve hours had been painful for me and although he was accepting what I was saying, he still scared me. The way his lips formed words caused a warming in my belly and the wetness to return. “I have an appointment with someone.”

  Running from the room I went in search of Kiriana. She wasn’t in her office so I headed into the kitchen. Nye was trying to be patient, but I could see his frustration when I walked into the room. Kiriana was dicing an onion. Nye paced behind her while his face contorted.