“Forgot my badge.” She smiled and scrawled a name and number in the book.
The man didn’t even ask for ID before he shoved an access card across to her. “Sucks to be you, working this early on a Saturday.”
“Gotta take care of a few things before I fly out.”
“Well, have a good one. Pete takes over at nine. Just leave the key card with him before you head out.”
She nodded her thanks and with a swipe of the card was on her way to the nineteenth floor. Richland Tech’s suite was dimly lit, with nothing at the receptionist desk but wilted flowers and the requisite guest book. Asta stared through the bank of glass doors, doubting the access card she held would get her into this office. Rubeus would probably be tipped off if she broke in, but there wasn’t any other option. The angel glanced around, wishing that Dar was here with his lock-picking skills. Where was the demon? She’d expected he’d meet her here.
Time was in short supply, so she reached forward and gently tugged on the door handle. And nearly fell backwards as it swung open.
Unlocked. She might be a naïve angel, but she wasn’t stupid enough to think a tech firm would leave their doors unlocked on a Saturday. It was a trap. Rubeus knew she was coming and was making things easy for her.
And if he knew she was coming, what had happened to Dar? Her breath caught as she thought of all the horrible things the genie could have done to her demon. Was he dead? Injured somewhere inside this office? Or dumped in the middle of Lake Michigan?
Rushing into a trap wouldn’t do either of them any good, so Asta entered slowly, her senses on high alert as she hid her energy signature as best she could. The office seemed strangely devoid of any presence and silent as the grave. Wouldn’t a tech company have computers humming away even in the off hours? Even the HVAC system was soundless.
As were her heels on the marble floor. Magically soundless. Some spell had muted every noise past the doorway and had equally muted her ability to sense any life-forms. Well, this worked both ways. Rubeus couldn’t hear or sense her either, although. . . . Asta glanced up at the round half-globes strategically positioned on walls and ceilings throughout the office. Rubeus could probably see her. Curse him. The element of surprise would be completely on his side.
A light flickered on in a rear office. Asta smiled, realizing that was where she was supposed to go — and no doubt where Rubeus lay in wait to jump her. Instead she went the opposite way, down the hallway to the left, past row upon row of cubicles. Looping around a hall at the back edge of the building, she made her way to the lit room from the opposite side. She snuck into the office across from it and knelt in the doorway and waited.
The light went off, and sound came roaring back into the office. Everything seemed five times louder than it should — the humming computers, air from the vents, her beating heart. Something creaked in the conference room. Asta hugged the wall and slowly edged towards the door.
Rubeus was there. She could see him, still in Phelp’s body, crouched behind a conference table, something long and pointy in his hand. If she walked in the door, he’d be on her. Asta didn’t recognize the pointy thing but was pretty sure it was deadly. Slipping off her shoes, she snuck around to the other side of the conference room. The door opened to a small cafeteria area. The tables had been pushed to the side and chairs stacked up. A floor buffer stood in a corner next to the vending machines. Best of all, the wall across from her separated the cafeteria from the conference room. One wall to blast through, and she’d be the one to surprise Rubeus.
The tile was cold under her bare feet as she tiptoed across the room, slamming into an invisible barrier two feet from the wall.
What the? Asta reached out her hands and traced the barricade, realizing as she worked her way around that it encircled her. Hoping no one was working in the office below, she sent a blast toward her feet and yelped as it bounced off, ricocheting around the invisible walls and ceiling before dissipating. A laugh rang out behind her. She turned. Rubeus stood in the doorway, his arms folded across his chest.
“Phelps might be a clever boy when it comes to computer stuff, but I’m the fucking brilliant one here.” He flicked off the lights, and the floor glowed with an intricate array of runes and glyphs. “I’ve got the know-how, and human-boy’s got the body to execute, and voila! One trapped angel. How does it feel? A lot more spacious than that fucking bottle, let me tell you.”
Shit — shoot. Shoot, she was stuck in this infernal circle. Rubeus would safely escape, and by the time the new enforcer found her . . . well, this whole thing was humiliating.
It was more than humiliating. Rubeus reached around the doorway and brought forward the pointy thing. It looked like a lance; three feet long and white, it spiraled to a sharp tip. Her enclosure was only four feet in diameter. He could safely stand on the outside and stab her with the thing. She’d be forced to run around like an idiot while he tried to stick her, healing each time he met his mark. What a degrading experience — a captive being prodded and chased by a demon. Even though pride wasn’t her sin, this was going to sting.
Rubeus swung the pointy thing like a flag. “Amazing the things you can buy off the internet.” With a lightning-fast lunge that would have done an Olympic fencer proud, he jabbed into the circle, piercing her arm before yanking the odd-looking lance safely back.
Ow. More than ow. Pain spiked through Asta’s arm, down beneath the flesh to her spirit-self. What in all of creation was that thing? Suddenly she realized that humiliation wasn’t Rubeus’s intent. He meant to kill her and somehow had a weapon that could do so. Where was Dar? Had Rubeus killed him with the lethal pointy thing? Her heart raced, torn between the hope he was somehow alive to rescue her and the fear he was dead and bleeding in a cubicle somewhere.
The genie laughed. “Hey, get in here and help me kill her. I’ll let you take a few stabs for luring her in.”
Dar stepped through the doorway, his gray eyes impersonal and cold. Asta felt something shrivel inside her. All she could do was stare at the demon she’d trusted, the one she loved, the one who had betrayed her and led her to her death.
“Nah. Not my thing.” Dar waved the lance away. “I like poking angels with other things, if you get my drift.”
Rubeus’s laughter roared out. It seemed so strange coming from Carter Phelps’s body. “Tempting an angel into physical intercourse, and you barely over a thousand years old? I’m all in admiration, my friend, although this angel seems pretty stupid and gullible.”
Dar shrugged, making his way around the perimeter of her barrier while Rubeus followed. “Next time I’ll pick a brighter angel as my victim, one a bit older and more skilled.”
Fury ripped through the pain in Asta’s heart. The genie feinted then lunged again, but she was quicker, knocking the lance aside before it pierced her side. Her arm burned where it touched the skin, leaving a smoldering line of red she couldn’t take the time to heal. Better to keep her attention on staying clear of that lance, and trying to find a way out of this circle.
“With you dead, no one will know how to find me until it’s too late. I’ll hitchhike a ride inside Phelps until the coast is clear. By that time, your angel friends will be too busy doing damage control to track me down.”
He was like a two-bit-dime-store-novel villain, revealing his plans in a boring, pompous soliloquy while she avoided his attempts to run her through. “The archangels will get you. No matter where you go, what you do, they’ll eventually find you and rip your ugly fucking head from your body.”
“Tsk, tsk. Such language for an angel. You really brought this one down, Dar. Nice job.” This time he hit, slicing along her thigh, cutting through pants, skin, and muscle down to her spirit-being. She hopped backward, tensing herself against the pain.
“How did it feel to fuck her? Did she moan? Did she beg you for more?”
Asta jumped to the side, narrowly avoiding the lance.
“Did she get down on her knees and suck you of
f? Did you come on her face, make her lick you clean?”
She caught her breath, trying to block out his taunts and avoid the stabbing lance. Focusing on the weapon, she almost missed Dar pick up a pair of scissors from beside the coffee machine, flipping them open in his hand like a butterfly knife.
“No, but maybe next time.” He reversed his grip and swung, the movement blindingly fast as he slashed the scissor blade across the genie’s thigh. Rubeus bellowed, clutching his leg with one hand as he dropped to one knee. Dar pivoted, and, with a downward strike, plunged the blade deep into the genie’s chest.
Crimson blood fountained as the pressure from the human’s heart launched its contents across the floor. Rubeus’s scream changed pitch, becoming higher and more faint. His eyes met Asta’s, and she saw the genie recede, leaving Carter behind. Fear bloomed for a second before his eyes lost focus and he slumped into a sea of blood.
He was dead. Carter was dead, and the demon’s song screamed in her ears. Rubeus had seconds to form a replacement body or he would die.
“All yours, babe. You can thank me later.”
Dar winked at her and raced out the door. Time seemed to stand still as his meaning sunk in. Phelps was dead — the caster of the circle. She was free. And beside the human’s body, another was rising, shaking off the shock of his sudden transformation.
Rubeus. The blood spread like a red tide across his scaled legs and clawed feet. His legs trembled, and down he went, flailing as he tried to gain control over his new body.
Asta started toward him then saw Carter’s blue eyes, pupils dilated as they stared unseeing toward the ceiling. Of all her fledgling skills, healing had always been her strongest. But this — this would be more like a resurrection. And would she have time before Rubeus found the muscle coordination to attack?
There was no time for thought, so she acted blindly, dropping to her knees in the sticky carpet and placing her hands over Carter’s chest. Gold light filled the air, and she poured every ounce of healing she had into his body. Arterial puncture, create new blood to fill his veins, start the silent heart. But would it be enough? It had only been seconds, but sometimes that’s all it took for the soul to flee.
The breath left her lungs as white-hot agony pierced them. Looking down, she saw the twisted end of the lance jutting momentarily from between her ribs before it was pulled from her back.
Everything went dark, and all Asta could think about was the pain. Luckily her physical form seemed to have a mind of its own, because she launched herself sideways. Her vision cleared. She jumped to her feet to see Rubeus in his demon form, struggling to yank the lance from where it had embedded in the floor.
If I’m going to die, I’m not going out alone. Steeling herself against the agony shooting down her entire left side, Asta dove at the genie, knocking him to the floor. His claws dug into her shoulders, sharp spurs scraping along her legs as she wrapped her fingers around his neck and squeezed. The demon twisted, bucking until her hands slipped against the scales of his neck. Then, with a powerful kick, he launched her across the room.
Asta hit the vending machine, feeling the glass crack and give against her back. She’d expected Rubeus to come after her and spun to the side in anticipation of his attack. Instead of claws against her flesh, she felt the now-familiar burn of the lance. He’d managed to dislodge it from the floor and was swinging it back and forth in front of himself, driving her backwards toward the corner of the room where she’d be trapped.
The lance came at her in a sweep. Gritting her teeth against the pain she knew was coming, Asta grabbed it with both hands. She staggered with the momentum of the weapon, her hands sizzling against it. There was a moment of confusion in the genie’s eyes right before she kicked out, knocking him back.
His grip on the lance slipped, but he kept hold. Asta was yanked forward, her hands blistered. A tug of war ensured that she was sure she was going to lose. She had to get this thing away from him. It would be hard enough fighting him without it, but this weapon reduced her odds to near zero.
There was an odd whoosh noise, and Asta found herself staring at the point of a sword, inches from her nose. The blade was buried in the genie’s neck, lodged in one of his vertebrae. Her eyes met the demon’s, and she saw her surprise mirrored in them.
“Damn mother-fucking piece of shit. Why are there no decent weapons in a twenty-five story office building?”
The sword jerked back and forth in Rubeus’s neck, making his head bob like a marionette. Asta had to pull her own neck backward to avoid the sharp tip.
“Would have had better luck trying to take his head off with a fucking copier, stupid fucking waste of metal.”
Dar.
Rubeus let go of the lance and grabbed the sword with one hand, elbowing backwards with the other arm. Dar made an ooof sound then a crunch noise as Rubeus drove the pommel into the other demon’s face.
Kicking the lance aside, Asta wrapped her burned hands around one of the demon’s horns, pulling and twisting as she tried to remove his head. Dar scrambled to his feet and threw the coffee pot at the genie’s head.
Pull. Pull. Dar’s aim wasn’t particularly good, and Asta felt herself pummeled with mini bags of chips and candy bars as she yanked. Rubeus ignored the demon and grabbed Asta’s arms, trying to loosen her grip as he worked his way across the room. He was heading for the lance. She was exhausted, burned, horribly injured, and this demon was right at the edge of her abilities. Still, she couldn’t let him get the lance, and getting his darned head off was a priority.
Something huge flew towards her, and Asta ducked, feeling the splash of water as the five-gallon jug from the cooler plowed into her shoulder. Ready to yell at Dar to cut it out, she was amazed to see it bounce off her and smack into the sword lodged in the genie’s neck, dislodging the weapon and sending it clattering to the floor.
Cheap piece-of-feces sword versus an angel’s waning strength. The sword won, and Asta dropped her grip on Rubeus’s horns, reaching out to grasp the pommel as she hit the floor. Rubeus sprang toward the lance, only to be knocked sideways by a flying microwave.
Bless Dar and his little rat heart. Asta rose and swung the sword with all her might. It slowed a bit on the bone, but this time it went through. The genie’s head toppled to the side in a spray of blood.
A headless demon wasn’t always a dead demon. Throwing the sword to the side, Asta grabbed the body before it hit the floor and put forth her final blow, feeling the flesh turn to sand beneath her fingers. The room spun, and Rubeus’s head seemed to roll in slow-motion as she collapsed on her hands and knees.
“Damn, girl. Watch your aim. You almost skewered me with that five-dollar museum-quality reproduction.”
Asta looked up. Dar stood next to the oak-veneer cabinet, the bent sword quivering inches from his head. She started to laugh, the sound edging into hysteria. “Need to rest,” she finally gasped out, sliding down to blessed nothingness on the blood-soaked carpet.
***
She was oh-so-warm, floating in steamy heat while her wings soaked in water. Something behind her stirred, and she realized there were arms around her — and a naked human pressed tight against her back. It shouldn’t feel this good to have all this skin touching hers, but it did, and she didn’t want to move. The water, the warmth, it all helped ease the horrible aches that went deeper than her physical-self. She felt a kiss pressed against the side of her head, a hand lightly rubbing her waist, and a very familiar demon’s spirit-being gently exploring hers, anxious and worried over her injuries.
Dar. Asta was vaulted into full consciousness by the thought of him so close, the memory of what had happened. She hid her wings with a snap and struggled to pull herself from his lap. In the worst moment of her life, she’d thought he’d betrayed her, but then he had stayed behind and risked his life to help her fight Rubeus.
“Easy, easy.” His voice rumbled against her back, his breath stirring the loose hair at the top of her head. “A
re you recovered enough to finish healing?”
“I can’t heal this.” She touched his spirit-being with the injured part of herself and winced.
“I know, but it will get better in time. Trust me, I’ve got lots of experience with these things, although I’ve never personally been stabbed repeatedly with a bespelled unicorn horn.”
So that’s what the lance had been. Now she knew to stay away from unicorns. It hurt, but she concentrated and managed to finish healing her physical form. Then she resumed trying to get out of the tub — and most especially off Dar’s naked lap. His physical body was beginning to express some very non-saintly desires, and as vulnerable as she felt, Asta wasn’t likely to say no.
“Take it easy. Just relax. I’m not going to do anything. I vow on all the souls I Own that I’m just going to hold you until I’m sure you can stand on your own without collapsing and spilling your brains all over the bathroom tiles.”
Darn. It would be kind of nice to have him do something, although, as bad as she hurt, it probably wouldn’t be a good idea.
“Why are we here?” Thank the Creator her voice sounded less weak and pathetic.
“You were shaking with cold, and I figured a hot bath would help. After scraping you up off the floor and carrying you through the business district, I didn’t exactly want to let you drown in a tub, so I got in with you.”
“Naked?”
“Did you want me to ruin my suit?”
Of course not. It was a very nice suit. Wait—. “You carried me? You carried me all the way here from the Loop?”
“It’s not like I could take a taxi or anything. You revealed your wings when you passed out. I had no idea how to get you in the backseat of a vehicle with those things. Maybe if I stuck them out the windows, but I didn’t want to risk breaking them in half. You’ve got some big-ass wings, girl. I like it.” The demon began to sing a song about how he liked big wings and he could not lie.
Oh, by all that was holy — her wings. Demons had no ability to entrance humans. Everyone they passed had to have seen her wings. Everyone on the street, in the hotel lobby….
Demons & Djinn: Nine Paranormal Romance and Urban Fantasy Novels Featuring Demons, Djinn, and other Bad Boys of the Underworld Page 50