The Kiss of Death

by Auryn Hadley

  He nodded in agreement. "Exactly. Just imagine that you could never touch the beautiful things in life without breaking them. Imagine for a moment that your name was used to scare children into good behavior. Imagine that your face made people weep and beg for your enemy to save them, and then think about what it would feel like to have a delicate little butterfly seek you out. Imagine one frail little girl who fought against all odds just to find you again." He ran his thumb across my chin, refusing to break the gaze. "You aren't afraid of him, Sienna, and that's why he saved you. That's why he keeps coming back for you."

  "Oh."

  "Yeah, 'oh.' So now here's the deal we're going to make. You look up the history of the phrase 'little dove.' Regardless of what you find, I will make sure that good things begin to happen in your life. Do we have a deal?"

  I remembered Nick's warnings about making deals with Luke. "No."

  "You already know you're going to do it." Luke turned my chin slightly. "Do we have a deal?"

  "What will I get?"

  He laughed, nearly breaking the gaze. "I'll make sure everything from that accident the other night goes away, just for starters. From there, I'll see what else I can do." He took a long breath. "Do we have a deal, yet?"

  "No, Lucifer. I'm not making any deals with you. If you want to prove you're not a dick, you can do it without anything from me."

  He smiled and released me. "Shame you feel that way, because Nick's coming back."

  "Luke?" I wondered why he'd come in here, and why he cared what I thought.

  "What now?"

  "Is this how you're always going to look to me? I mean, like men?" I bit at my lips, trying to find the words to ask the question plaguing my mind. "Am I going to ever see your true forms?"

  "True forms? You mean, what we look like in our own realms?" He shrugged. "Does it matter?"

  I didn't want to explain, but I hoped Luke would answer. He was enough of an ass to be honest. "I don't want to be scared because I wasn't expecting it."

  His impish nature dissolved, leaving a beautiful but serious man before me. Suddenly he was just a person, no longer terrifying, no longer something to fear. Luke looked at me as if measuring something in my personality, then nodded. "We'll talk about this more later, ok? Tomorrow?"

  "Ok."

  "Thanks, Sienna. Thank you for trying." He smiled weakly, the first honest one I'd seen from him so far, and I decided he might not be as bad as I thought.

  "Yeah. Why'd you join the demons anyway?"

  He looked back at the door quickly. "Because I believe in free will. Midworlders should be more than livestock, but the angels don't agree. They think you're nothing more than a crop for us to use. They think you're too stupid to understand us."

  "Or fight back?"

  "Or that." Luke pressed his lips together and took a step toward the door. "I should probably also tell you that the only person in five realms who can pull aether from me is Nick."

  "But..."

  He nodded. "And you. Not even the Archangel Michael could unless I offered it." He opened the door, nodding to someone on the other side, then left.

  I wasn't surprised at all to see Nick standing there, waiting. "You ok?" he asked.

  Oddly, I was. "I think Luke and I just came to an understanding."

  He sighed. "Good. He really is a decent guy. I mean, he acts like an angel and all, but his heart is in the right place."

  The irony of his words made me bite my lip to keep from laughing. "I thought demons were supposed to be the bad guys."

  Nick shrugged. "Define good and bad?" He took a step closer. "Are you ready to head home yet, or did you have more questions?"

  "I have so many questions I can't think of them all."

  "I'm sure." He looked at his watch. "Just didn't know if you were aware of the time."

  "Not a clue."

  "Almost ten." He took another step closer. "We have a spare room if you'd rather keep going, or I can walk you home at any time. I'd just really prefer that you aren't on the street alone. The angels are moving into town, which means they know something. That's why Luke came when I asked for a ride. They have to have noticed the peak in the veils has stopped moving, and probably want to know why."

  "And what about tomorrow when I walk to class? What about tonight when I'm asleep?"

  He took the last step, standing just before me. "One of us will be around. The other night, you caught me warding your house. One of the many things I was blocking out was the angels. We will not invade your privacy, but we won't leave you unprotected, either. I swear it, Sia. I won't let them hurt you."

  Unconsciously, I reached up and rested my palm against his hard chest. "And when are you going to explain calculus?"

  He glanced away quickly, that surprised smile playing on his lips again. "You aren't running away from me yet?"

  "I've spent four years trying to find you, Nick. I have no intention of running away anytime soon."

  "Sia." He clasped my wrist, gently caressing the underside. "This is a lot to drop on you. You need to take some time to think about it."

  "What?!"

  Hearing the frustration in my voice, he smiled. "Dove, I'm not going to disappear again, but there's no need to rush things. You have an entire life to live. Go home, give yourself time to let this sink in. Think about what you really want. I don't want you to throw everything away because it seems exciting right now. I promise, it's not. What we're asking of you isn't a small thing, and I won't think any less of you if you'd rather live a normal life."

  I couldn't believe him. "And that's it?"

  "For tonight. One of us will keep an eye on you, but you probably won't even notice. Just give yourself time to process this, because if you get mixed up in our mess, there isn't any going back." He tilted his head toward the door. "And I'm going to be a gentleman this time and walk you all the way home."

  I let him lead me out of the house, but I knew something he didn't. I wasn't exactly the kind of girl to change my mind. I was already committed. I'd found my Death, and I'd be damned if I just let him slip away. Besides, it wasn't like I had anything left to lose.

  Chapter 15

  My alarm went off much too early the next morning. I hadn't gotten any real sleep the night before. After everything I'd just learned, my mind refused to shut off – but that wasn't surprising. It wasn't every day a girl found out the world was a lot more complicated than she could ever imagine.

  With a groan I smacked the button and rolled over, hoping to steal just a few more minutes of rest. As I closed my eyes, the alarm on my phone chimed from across the room. It was clearly a conspiracy.

  "Damn it," I grumbled, pulling myself out of bed.

  A hot shower helped to get my mind in gear, but nothing would matter until I had at least twelve ounces of coffee in my system. I put a pot to brew and jumped into my morning routine with my brain still trying to make sense of what had happened yesterday. Nick was Death. I could handle that. He was a demon. Yep, that wasn't hard to accept either, considering demons were just a race from another dimension.

  But there was the kicker – a race from another dimension. Something about that had my mind a little stuck. I could understand the science of it, in the most basic way, but that I was one of the few people who actually knew it was real? That's where the logic kept failing. Why me? What had I done to be chosen for this? How was this going to change my life?

  The reality was that it wouldn't. Yeah, I may have freaked out when Nick dropped everything on me, but the more I thought about it, the less of an issue it seemed. I mean, so what if I had a big secret wallowing around in the back of my head? Was it really any different from the one I'd been hiding about Death? It wouldn't help me pass my classes. It wouldn't get me a degree. It most certainly wouldn't do much for keeping me gainfully employed and fed for the rest of my life.

  In other words, it didn't matter. Regardless of what happened between demons and angels, I would still need a roof over my hea
d and something in my belly to keep me going. That meant money, which was a hell of a lot easier when the crazy chick had a degree.

  Besides, for all I knew, this could be one seriously intense practical joke. Maybe Nick was the crazy one? Yeah, that sounded nice, except I was the person who'd been dreaming of Death. I'd been chasing his memory since that first kiss. That Nick knew about all those little details from before we'd met? This whole thing might be preposterous, but the evidence suggested it really was happening. Who was I to doubt it? Weird was kinda my normal.

  For now, all I could do was keep on keeping on. My first task? Get my butt in gear and get to class. By the time I was dressed and ready to head out the door, I'd already made at least five mental laps around everything I'd learned yesterday and still hadn't made any progress. Giving in, I grabbed my other backpack – this one filled with real books – and shoved my phone inside. Travel mug in hand, I stepped out, locking the door to my tiny little house behind me.

  Something shimmered at the edge of my vision. Sucking in a breath, I turned, only to have it vanish when I tried to focus on it. For a split second, I was convinced my little yard was haunted – but there was one problem with that. Ghosts couldn't be real, not from the way Nick described dying. To test my theory, I looked back to the door, trying to concentrate on my peripheral vision.

  The shimmer was still there, right around the bottom of the stairs.

  "I'm pretty sure I see you," I said, hoping there was no one close enough to hear me acting like a nut case. "God, I hope I'm not losing it."

  A waft of air and a chuckle was my answer. When I spun around, Luke was standing right there, taking a drink from his stainless steel travel mug like he'd been waiting for me the whole time. Problem: I'd just looked. He hadn't been there.

  Lifting an eyebrow, I let him know I expected an answer.

  "The veil isn't opaque," he explained. "I was just going to follow you in the corridor."

  "Uh huh." Yep, today was going to take a whole lot more coffee to get through. "And you thought that was ok?"

  "Uh, not exactly." He took a deep breath. "There was a threat of pulling out feathers if I didn't keep my eyes on you. Since you've made it clear we're not the best of friends, well, I figured it would be easier if you didn't know I was here. Think of it less like stalking and more like Secret Service."

  "Funny, Luke. Real funny."

  With a shrug, he gestured up the road toward the campus. "Lead on. I can either walk with you or follow in the corridor. I'll let you make that call, but bad things will happen to me if I let you out of my sight."

  "Then stay where I can see you," I decided without hesitation. "Creeps me out to think you're watching me scratch my ass or something."

  I didn't wait for him to answer, just started walking. Luke followed, casually sipping his coffee like he didn't even notice my attitude. The irony was that it made me feel a little guilty. Did everyone treat him like he was a dick? I mean, this was Lucifer, right? The worst of the worst. I had a funny feeling he hadn't exactly gotten a lot of praise over the years.

  "Hey?" I asked. "Are we allowed to talk about this stuff out here? Or is that just an inside your place type of thing?"

  Lengthening his steps, he fell in beside me. "Uh, yeah. That was mostly to contain the freakout." The bastard gave me an apologetic smile. "Which you really didn't have. So, it's not like certain words call attention to us or anything. The problem is more that screaming about demons and angels usually gets people locked away in a looney bin. We don't want to scare you off by heaping too much on you at once."

  "Oh." Well, that was depressingly mundane.

  "Why did you ask?"

  "Because you said you'd tell me about your true forms."

  "Ah..." He took another sip of coffee. "Theology. Yes. Demons tend to be massive things. Brutes, in their own way. Don't mistake that for stupid, though."

  "Like Sam?"

  Luke chuckled. "Sam's a lot deeper than he lets on. He's also a bit of a badass. If you ever get into a fight, you want that punk on your side. I'm pretty convinced he has a thing for pain."

  "And you?"

  Slyly, he looked over. "I've been working with Nick for a long time. Our skills are different but complementary. I was at the robbery, too, Sienna. And the accident."

  "The angel over Death's shoulder!" Why hadn't I figured that out? "That was you?"

  He lifted a finger, warning that I was getting too excited. "Yeah. I gathered the stuff Nick used to put you back together."

  "And at the robbery? Why didn't I see you?"

  He bit his lips together, looking like he was delaying the answer. "I wasn't inside. I was making sure the person pulling that kid's strings couldn't do it again for a while."

  I nodded slowly, accepting that as nothing but the truth. Luke hadn't lied to me yet. None of them had, from what I could tell. It was just easier to believe Nick and Sam. For some reason, my instincts were convinced that Luke couldn't be trusted, but I wasn't exactly known to have the best ones, either.

  "Thank you," I mumbled.

  He huffed something that sounded like acknowledgment. "Nick was fascinated with you from the first glimpse. Then, on that day, we were watching you through the corridor and you shined at us like a brilliant, iridescent beacon. He had to get closer, to see what could cause that." Luke shrugged. "I told him to deal with it while I chased off our angelic competition, never thinking he'd find a Muse."

  "That's kinda a big deal, huh?"

  Luke nodded. "It is now. Humans have evolved in a different direction, making the ability pretty rare. And one like you? Definitely rare. But when he told me what happened? He said you were pushing yourself through the veil so he had to stop it, and the moment you saw him, you smiled. Smiled, Sienna. Not a happy one, but the kind people give me. Dreamy, like you were completely entranced."

  I nodded, able to believe it because that was exactly how I'd felt. "But what's the deal with his true form and name?"

  Luke opened his mouth to answer, then shut it and shook his head. "Uh..." He tried again. "It's complicated."

  "Give me a little something here?"

  "You made a pretty big deal out of my name. His isn't any better. Most of ours aren't. Considering what humans are taught to think of demons? As often as you gape at him or make comments about how handsome he is? Do you really think he wants to give that up?"

  "But he'd still be Nick, right? Regardless of what he looks like?"

  Luke nodded. "But humans love beauty. You rate each other on it. Your entire society praises those who have it. It's only recently that angels haven't been able to just smile their way through everything. Trust me on that."

  I did, actually. I'd seen how Mike and the creepy guy in Creative Writing almost expected people to drool over them. Hell, half my class was even blatant about it. "So the Nick I see here is merely based on the Nick he is there?"

  "Loosely. He's about the same size, but that's another thing you need to know." Luke looked over at me and held up his coffee mug. Clenching his fist, the metal bent, crumpling easily under the pressure. He took one last swallow then snapped the lid closed. "We have to work very hard not to break you. Those of us from the outer worlds? We play by different rules."

  "Oh."

  He hadn't even struggled to bend the stainless steel mug. He'd crumpled it easier than I could a soda can! I walked with him silently, letting that sink in as we made the last half block to class. If Luke could do that, and Nick was quite a bit more buff, no wonder he was worried about me! There were at least two angels who'd taken an interest in me, and just one of them could snap me like a twig!

  Then again, I'd basically asked Nick to kill me last night. Wouldn't that fix this whole mess? I wanted to think so, but that was just a stupid, gut reaction. If I was dead, who would do whatever it was the demons wanted from me? Nick already said they needed my help, which meant he couldn't do it on his own. Or not easily. Truth be told, it wasn't like the angels had really d
one anything to me. Not that I could prove, at any rate. Either way, giving up like some floozy with a broken heel in a horror movie wasn't exactly my style.

  When we entered the Language building, Luke once again fell behind me. When I glanced back, he shook his head. Evidently, he didn't want anyone to know we were friends. Well, friendly. I wouldn't go so far as to say we'd crossed the buddy barrier yet, but he was definitely an acquaintance. He also didn't come off as quite so disturbing now that I knew his little secret. I was leaning more towards misunderstood. Since he wasn't human, I couldn't expect him to have the same empathy as a person who'd, you know, had to grow up.

  I think that's what bothered me so much about the green-eyed creeps. They were amazingly perfect – and seemed to know it. Every one I'd met so far came off like he expected me to feel so graced by his presence. I understood why, now. They'd never had anyone laugh at them, been forced to suck up their pride, or those other awkward things normal people learned from. Nope, they'd convinced humans they were the arm of the divine, and had probably gotten very used to the swooning that came with it.

  Luckily for me, Creative Writing passed quickly. Luke didn't sit beside me this time, but he did claim the spot right behind me. Just like Nick had promised, I was protected – and I had a funny feeling Luke's brass twin, who he'd called Gabe, knew it. Through the whole class, that freak glared at me from the second row. I wanted to punch him in the face just on principle.

  When the professor finally released us, I took my time getting my things together. I didn't want to give angel-boy up there a chance to get his hands on me. I also didn't want to be late to Calculus, so I tapped the shoulder of the girl passing my desk.

  "Hey? Did you catch what chapter she said had the extended list of plot types?"

  "Oh yeah," the girl assured me, pulling out her notebook. "It's chapter twenty-four. She said we needed to learn the differences between the simple list and the extended one because we'd need to cite it for our midterm project."

  "Thank you," I gushed, sticking by her side as we passed through the doorway. "You probably just saved my grade."