She also hated feeling like an outsider, even though she should’ve been glad she was. She wasn’t supposed to have anything to do with the fallen. Unfortunately, these members of the fallen were exciting and compelling, and she was drawn to them. She wanted to be part of their inner circle.
“Ox, how much do you weigh?” Merrick asked.
You have got to be kidding!
“Two-eighty…three hundred,” Ox speculated with a shrug.
Lysander had convinced Merrick? Just when she’d started to rethink her position on Merrick, he was actually going to send his bodyguard to safety rather than her?
“What do you say, Lyse?” Merrick asked.
“You’ll have to leave the gear.”
“Sure,” Merrick said with a shrug. Merrick grabbed a belt that looked like it belonged to Batman and tossed it to Lysander. The angel hooked it to his low-riding leather pants and cinched it around his waist. Then Merrick put another belt around himself. He hooked a length of cable between them and inserted several hooks along its length.
“Ox, take that hook in the middle and secure it to your belt and hang on to the hold. Cerise, come here.”
She strode to him, her jaw still clenched angrily. He hooked cable through her belt loops.
Alissa glanced down at her dress, which obviously had no belt loops, but she didn’t seem concerned. And why should she? Of course, no one would ever suggest leaving Alissa behind. As if on cue, Lysander stretched out a hand to the ethereal blonde.
Cerise stared daggers at the angel. “So now he thinks he can carry us all? When he initially wanted to leave me on the roof?” Cerise reflected coldly.
“It’s not what you think,” Merrick said, the corner of his mouth curving up.
“I think he’s an ass.”
Lysander glanced at her.
“You’re an ass,” she said.
In Latin to Merrick, Lysander said, “She misunderstands. Let her.”
Merrick grinned and returned in Latin, “You don’t want her to know that you find her dangerously beautiful? And that her skin’s gorgeous scent stays with you for weeks?”
What?
Cerise’s brows shot up, but she quickly covered her shock with a neutral expression.
Lysander’s eyes narrowed. After a moment’s contemplation, he asked in Latin, “Alissa, does your friend speak Latin?”
Alissa fought the smile that threatened. “She’s a muse. Like archangels, we have the gift of tongues.”
Lysander’s frosty gaze settled on Merrick for a moment, then the angel moved very close to Alissa. Lysander whispered something in her ear, and Alissa’s blush was evident from several feet away. Merrick’s amusement faded.
Lysander’s arm snaked around Alissa’s waist and pulled her body against his. “This amount of weight will be a strain. You should hold on to me,” Lysander said.
Alissa slid her arms around Lysander’s neck. Merrick rolled his eyes.
With his free hand, Lysander wrapped the cable around his arm and held it tight. Lysander pushed off the ground, his wings beating hard as he and Alissa rose eight feet in the air. When the cable was stretched taut against Ox’s weight, she watched Lysander rise against it and lift the massive bodyguard.
“Shit,” Ox murmured, holding the cable in a white-knuckled grip.
The sound of bullets hitting the roof door made Cerise and Merrick whip their attention to it.
“Can he manage it?” she asked, glancing up when Lysander’s body halted midair as he tried to pull her and Merrick off the roof, too. The cable around her waist tightened as they rose a few inches above the cement.
“Hang on,” Merrick said, holding her with only one arm so he could pull his gun out at the sound of impact against the soldered door.
Cerise put an arm around Merrick’s neck, but with her other hand, she pulled the gun free of the back of her pants and pointed it at the door.
With a sudden upward surge, they rose another foot above the roof. She and Merrick both stiffened to keep themselves steady and their guns ready, but by the time the door burst open, they were well into the finely shredded white of the clouds.
Above them, Lysander chatted to Alissa, whose chuckles could occasionally be heard.
“What’s he speaking now?” Cerise asked. “I think that’s…”
“Etruscan.”
“Wow. That’s a really dead language. Do you speak Etruscan?”
Merrick shook his head with a mirthless smile.
“That’s the point?”
Merrick nodded.
“Would you like me to translate? I’ve never been as facile with languages as Alissa, but if I concentrate, you’ll have the gist.”
Merrick shook his head. “Let him win the moment. Neither of them would betray me.”
She arched a brow. “How can you be sure?” she asked, surprised. She would’ve expected someone like Merrick to be suspicious of everyone. “You barely know her, and isn’t he a fallen angel?”
Merrick smiled, and this time it reached his eyes. He let the question lie, smoothly changing the subject by saying, “When you said you know how to handle a gun, you weren’t exaggerating. That was nice cover on the street.”
It was her turn to smile, and she inclined her head in return. “And you live up to your reputation. Grace under extreme pressure.”
He shrugged.
All in a day’s work for him apparently. That level of cool is attractive. No wonder Alissa fell so hard.
“So,” he said, “how are you enjoying your visit to the Varden so far?”
She laughed, and, oddly, as she hung in the shredded mist, so clean and sweet, with the echo of the words dangerously beautiful still on her mind, she had to admit that on some level, despite the car chase and the car crash, despite the flying bullets and terrifying moment of finding herself without a cell signal or a way to escape, she was enjoying it a ridiculous amount.
Fresh from the shower, Tamberi toweled herself off and slid on a pair of black lace underwear. When she heard the knock on the door, she called, “What?”
The door opened and the eyes of the ventala in the doorway immediately locked onto the points of her small breasts.
“Well?” she said impatiently as she rubbed lime-scented lotion on her arms.
“Merrick escaped, but three of his guys were seriously wounded and one’s definitely dead—beheaded. Merrick did down the chopper, and we lost seventeen.”
We can afford more losses than he can, she thought. If we don’t get lucky and kill him during one of these firefights, we’ll grind his security force down to a skeleton crew and then overtake him.
For show, however, she frowned and exaggeratedly rolled her eyes. “Merrick continues to make fools of the ventala who train the syndicate assassins. He gets to laugh again tonight. He once told me that St. Vincent’s girls’ rugby team has a tougher lineup than our hit squads,” she lied. “Is he right?” she demanded.
The men flushed, shaking their heads. Tamberi pulled on a knit top.
“He didn’t just have Orvin and North with him. There was a second woman in the car. A tall dark-haired woman. Good with a gun.”
Tamberi narrowed her eyes. “Was it Cerise Xenakis?”
“It could’ve been. They thought it looked like her.”
Tamberi licked her lips, her pulse thrumming. Had they really been so close to capturing Cerise Xenakis? Tamberi’s fingers twitched, and she closed them into fists. She wanted to kill Merrick and Alissa North to avenge Cato, and she could put North’s or any of the muses’ dying blood to good use, but Tamberi wanted Cerise’s bare throat under a knife for personal reasons, too. “Xenakis and North aren’t close friends. They’re in pictures together a lot at official functions, but they don’t hang out together. Especially on our side of the wall. If it was Xenakis, what was that about? And is she still outside the Etherlin? If she is, I want her. Preferably taken alive.”
“We can’t send another wave tonight. We need
air support, and replacement choppers can’t get here until tomorrow.”
She glared at them. She knew if they waited they’d risk Xenakis getting back to the Etherlin where it was impossible to get to her. “Send a couple of teams into the Sliver and have them lie in wait near the Etherlin gates. If Merrick tries to take her back, we can surround his car. We’ll have him outnumbered and away from his stronghold. And if he doesn’t try to take her back tonight, she’ll still be in the Varden tomorrow when we’ll send a triple crew of assassins to storm his place.”
They nodded and turned to go.
“By the way, like North I want Xenakis alive.” Her fangs ached for a taste of Cerise Xenakis’s blood. Wouldn’t that be a sweet end to Tamberi’s unfinished business with the rock-and-roll muse?
When they were gone, Tamberi slicked back her hair and poured herself a shot of bourbon. She sucked it down, and then she had a second. Dropping onto the king-sized bed, she stared up at the swirled glass sculpture overhead. As she drifted toward sleep a face that was almost too beautiful to be male shimmered within the writhing mass of glass snakes. The heart-shaped face and its accompanying waves of sepia-colored hair were familiar. She’d had a vision of him once before.
“Tamberi,” the melodic voice hissed as the demon courted her.
“What?” she murmured. “I told you. Twice, I’ve raised demons, and twice, they haven’t done much. You guys are a lot of flash, a lot of talk. The lesser demon killed a few people at a party. Gadreel blew the top off a hotel.” She shrugged. “Not impressed. Why would I waste my time helping you when I can do more damage on my own?” She stretched an arm above her head. A sensation slithered over her skin, tweaking her nipple.
“Nice,” she sighed. “Demons do make great lovers; I’ll give you that. But for the first time ever, I don’t care about getting off. What I want is to set the world on fire and then watch it burn.”
A flame sparked on her hip and seared her flesh.
She slapped her hand over it, hissing in pain. “Fuck off,” she ground out.
“Haven’t you long wanted to add art to your body?” the voice murmured in her head.
She did regret that tattoos weren’t permanent on ventala skin. She rolled up and looked at the shape of the burn. The crisp lines were perfectly rendered. A smoking skull with a stemmed cherry in its teeth leered at her. In the smoke curls were the letters M, M, and Y.
“Marks of a Misspent Youth”? The Molly Times song?
She narrowed her eyes, a bittersweet taste tainting her tongue. Her gaze rose to the slithering glass. The demon’s face morphed into the boy’s, and her heart clutched. Then the demon’s face bloomed again, a dark rose opening and banishing the face she hadn’t seen in a long time.
“Your name?” she asked, her voice a ragged whisper.
“You want to burn down the world. I’ll provide the match.”
“Do we know each other?” she demanded.
“Sure.”
She tasted blood. It dripped from her fangs down her throat. She tasted the boy she’d enjoyed, bitten, and helped destroy. The only guy she’d cared for other than Cato. Was the phantom taste of him a trick of the demon’s? Or did this member of the damned really know things?
“I don’t have the spell-book with the demon-raising ritual anymore. A disgustingly pure archangel named Nathaniel took it away. And you know what that means. Once the power in the page is gone, the memory of the ritual decays instantly. I couldn’t raise a demon even if I wanted to.”
“I don’t want to be raised in the flesh, but I need a warm welcome for what I do want. I’ll show you the way if you’re willing.”
She stared at the face with its perfect symmetry, its unnatural beauty. Heaven’s lost candy. “You’d be welcome here if you’re more than pyrotechnics. But come without the match I need, and you’ll be the first thing I burn.”
His lips curved into a glorious angelic smile that blistered the room with its white light.
“Fuck,” she said, the shards of light like dagger tips poking her eyes. She flung an arm up to shield her face, but before it covered her eyes, his mouth yawned open and down his throat she saw an abyss of souls drowning in molten tar.
She could not drag her gaze away. His mouth closed slowly.
“Counted among the first, most dare not speak my name.” His lips drew back in a fierce sneer. “I invented warfare.”
A chill raked over her skin, the sting as sharp as frostbite. She wanted to reach for the blanket, to curl up against the bitter creeping cold, but couldn’t. She struggled against invisible tethers. How could he reach across the physical world to restrain her? It shouldn’t have been possible.
The menace in his whisper struck a chord in her soul, and she recoiled from the dread it wrought. Humanity had been this demon’s bitch, his victim down through the ages. She wanted to scream that she wasn’t just human. She could swallow darkness, too. But her voice wouldn’t come. There was no way to challenge him or to doubt his power any longer.
“I invented warfare, Tamberi. What do you say to me?”
“Thank you,” she said, gasping, hardly able to squeeze breath from her stiff chest, as if he’d already killed her and now watched her body cool and contract with rigor.
She fought the urge to beg for mercy, but finally she moaned in pain.
Just before the cold released her, she heard, “My name is Reziel.”
Chapter 7
Cerise had seen many beautiful gardens, but the unexpected ones were always the most memorable. Looking down on the roof of Merrick’s building as they descended, she thought it seemed the fusion of many other places: Versailles, Italy, Japan. There were geometric patches of green grass and shrubs, potted orange trees, fountains of water falling over slabs of stone, a reflecting pool, a bamboo partition, cushioned benches, and a collection of marble statues.
“So many elements. They’re surprisingly well-balanced,” Cerise said.
Merrick glanced at the roof, but didn’t comment. His silence had stretched over the past fifteen minutes.
“Something on your mind?” she asked.
He shook his head. They touched down, and he unhooked her, sliding the cable free of her belt loops. He divested himself of the belt and rolled the cable. Ox grinned when he landed.
“Pretty peaceful up there, eh, boss?”
Merrick nodded, and Ox unhooked himself and opened and closed the hand that he’d been using to tightly hold the cable.
Lysander landed, a sheen of sandalwood-scented sweat evaporating like mist. He set Alissa down, and she touched his face briefly and murmured, “Thank you, Lysander.”
He nodded, unfastening the belt. He tossed the belt to Merrick, and a look passed between them that was apology and understanding rolled into one.
“We’ve got spiced meat, fresh oranges, almonds, and figs. I know you must be starving now,” Alissa said to the angel.
“Thank you for the offer of hospitality, Alissa,” Lysander said, walking away.
“Lysander, please come in and eat.”
“Let him go,” Merrick said, coiling the last of the cable as Lysander stepped off the roof with a beat of his massive wings. In moments, he’d risen into the clouds and out of sight.
“Did he leave because of me?” Cerise asked, staring into the sky.
“He comes. He goes,” Ox said with a shrug. “You can’t take it personally.” Ox strolled across the roof to the door. He waited for them, holding it open.
“Are you hungry?” Alissa asked Cerise.
“I could eat,” Cerise said, falling in step with her. She glanced over her shoulder, wanting to see if Merrick was staying behind or would join them. She was surprised to find him only a foot away. He moved silently, like the predator he clearly was.
“So where does your friend live? And does he often take things that don’t belong to him?”
Merrick quirked a brow, but didn’t take the bait and ask her what she was talking about. Still, the q
uestioning look was enough of an invitation for her to press on.
“During the hail of bullets and winged escape I forgot why I came tonight. Lysander took a book that doesn’t belong to him.”
“What book?” Alissa asked.
“Griffin Lane’s songbook that’s been missing.”
“Griffin Lane’s death was such a tragedy. It must have been really hard for you to lose one of your aspirants at the height of his talent…terrible.” Alissa shook her head. “And you believe that Lysander has his songbook?”
“I know he does. I saw him take it.”
“Huh. Well, maybe he wants to look through it. Lysander’s a musician. I’m sure he’ll give it back when he’s done. Don’t you think?” Alissa asked, looking at Merrick.
Merrick shrugged.
Alissa frowned. “Well, they’re Griffin Lane’s songs that he wrote with Cerise’s inspiration. They belong to his estate. His bandmates were his siblings, right? Of course they should have his final songbook. We’ll talk to Lysander about it. I’m sure when he knows the situation, he’ll return it.”
Cerise wasn’t looking at Alissa. She was studying Merrick’s enigmatic expression, which didn’t reassure her. Nor had his silence when Alissa suggested that they would speak to Lysander on her behalf.
Sconces lit the stairwell, making the glossy black walls gleam as though they were covered in patent leather. The foursome descended until they reached a door that opened into a hall with alternating lengths of indigo carpet and white marble. A black-and-white photograph of a French horn seemed to float above the ground, held in place by thread-thin wires. The walls were papered in a silver geometric pattern reminiscent of gift wrap.
“Nice,” Cerise said, pointing at the horn picture.
Alissa smiled.
“Ox, go to the control room, and let Tony know we’re back. There’s still no cell signal, so tell him to send a runner out to the guys still in the street. Have him pull everyone back.”
Cerise’s and Alissa’s expressions turned somber. With the immediate danger over for them, Cerise had forgotten that Merrick still had people in the streets, possibly looking for them and fighting for their lives against rival ventala.
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