Crave fa-2

by J. R. Ward

  Stupid bastard. He could have gotten more for that on eBay than any cash he’d find in her wallet.

  Half of her mind was in a panic, the other part icy calm, and she went with the latter, because she was nothing if not her father’s daughter: This freaked-out addict was going to spin her around at some point because he was going to want her jewelry, and when he did, she had a good chance of kneeing him where it counted.

  Even if she had to pretend she wasn’t about to throw up all over her shoes—

  The weight crushing against her wasn’t so much removed as it was vaporized, gone as if it had never been: One second she couldn’t breathe. The next, she had all the oxygen in the world.

  As she dragged in a tremendous gulp of air and held on to the car roof to keep standing, grunts sounded next to her.

  Pushing herself around, she had to blink a couple of times to understand what she was looking at—but no amount of wait-maybe-I’m-not-seeing-this-right changed what was going on: Isaac had come out of nowhere, pinned her assailant to the ground, and was giving the guy a root canal the hard way.

  Namely with his fist.

  “Isaac—” Her voice cracked and she coughed. “Isaac! Stop it!”

  Louie the PI’s voice echoed through her head: That SOB could be a murderer.

  “Isaac!”

  She was expecting to have to jump on him or call for help to get him to stop the beating, but as soon as it started, it was over. Isaac quit the Rocky routine on his own, flipping the man onto his stomach and wrenching his arms back to immobilize him.

  Nothing was broken this time.

  And Isaac wasn’t even breathing hard as he glanced over at her. “Are you okay?”

  His eyes were sharp, his expression deadly and calm, his voice even and polite. It was obvious that he was in total control of himself and the situation . . . and it dawned on her that he might possibly have saved her from something awful. With addicts, you never knew what they were going to do.

  “Did he hurt you?” Isaac said. “Are you okay?”

  “No,” she answered roughly, not sure which question she was answering.

  With sheer, brute strength, Isaac picked the man up and gave him a shove and there was no argument, not even a comment. Her attacker scrambled away like he was damned well aware he’d narrowly missed the beat-down of his life.

  And then Isaac picked up her things. One by one, he gathered what had been in her purse, wiping off the mud on his own sweatshirt, lining everything up on the hood of her car.

  Falling back against the driver’s-side door, she was captivated by how very careful he was, his bloody hands gentle.

  Daniel appeared right beside him, seemingly struck by how he treated what was hers. Let him take you home, Grier. You’re in no condition to drive.

  “He hasn’t asked me,” she mumbled.

  “Asked you what?” Isaac said, glancing over.

  When she waved the words away, he went and got her bag, putting everything into it before holding the thing out to her. “I’d like to drive you home. If you’ll let me.”

  Bingo, her brother said.

  She opened her mouth to shut up Daniel, but just didn’t have the energy to follow through with it.

  “Ms. Childe?” With her client’s Southern accent, that came out as one word, MzChiiiiilde.

  God, what to do. And of course, Hell, no, was the healthiest response—in spite of Daniel’s opinion.

  Trust me, Daniel said.

  Isaac’s voice dropped. “Just let me get you home safe. Please.”

  For some unknowable reason, her instincts were telling her to trust this stranger with a bad past and a criminal present who was on the run. Or was it just a case of her savior complex overriding better judgment?

  Or . . . was it the look on a ghost’s face? Like Daniel was seeing something she couldn’t in this collision between her and a dangerous stranger with a soft Southern drawl.

  “I don’t need a driver. That I can do myself.” She took her bag from him. “But I do need you to stick around and face your charges.”

  Isaac scanned the area. “How about we talk at your house.”

  “I carry Mace, you know.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “And a stun gun.” For all the good it had done her just now.

  Good Lord, she couldn’t believe she was even thinking about going home with Isaac. The meth head had been a twitchy amateur . . . and her client sure as hell seemed like a professional.

  His pale gray eyes bored into hers. “I’m not going to hurt you. I swear it.”

  With a curse, she wrenched open the car door. “I’m driving.”

  The question was, Where the hell was she going? And with whom?

  Jim watched the Audi drive off, its milky exhaust rising up behind both cold tailpipes. He was utterly unconcerned about where the pair went—he’d slipped transmitters into both Isaac’s sweatshirt and the bag with the money.

  “You could have just let me do a locator spell,” Eddie muttered.

  “I’m used to working with the GPS shit from my old job.” And who could have guessed he’d ever suffer from technology nostalgia?

  Speaking of intel—it was time for some clarity in that department: Although he could see how and why Isaac might be up next on the list of seven souls, a little face-to-face time with his English dandy of a boss was the only way to be certain.

  Lot of pressure off him if it turned out saving Isaac’s ass had a larger purpose.

  He swiveled his head toward Eddie. “Tell me how to get over to the Four Lads. Do I have to die again?”

  If he did, he had a Beretta on him and he already knew what kicking the bucket from a gunshot was like. Snore.

  “Don’t bother.” Adrian cracked his knuckles. “They’re not going to tell you anything. They can’t.”

  What the fuck? “I thought I worked for them.”

  “You work for both sides, and they’ve given you all the help they can.”

  Jim looked back and forth between the two angels: Each of them had the tight expression of a guy with a shoestring noosing up his balls.

  “Help?” he said. “Where’s my goddamned help?”

  “They gave you us, asshole,” Adrian snapped. “And that’s all they can do—I’ve already gone over and asked them who’s supposed to be next. I figured it would help you, you ungrateful bastard.”

  Jim popped his brows at the Mr. Thoughtful routine. First time through the park with Adrian, the guy had silver-plated Jim to the enemy—to the point where he’d ended up fucking Devina in the parking lot of a club. In his truck. Without knowing she was a demon.

  “Times have changed since then,” Ad said gruffly. “You know they have.”

  In a flash, Jim remembered what the guy had looked like just a day or so ago after Devina had finished using and abusing him in a variety of ways. He’d given himself over to her so that Jim had had half a chance at winning the first round.

  “Yeah, they have.” Jim offered his knuckles in guy-speak for, Sorry I insinuated you’re dog shit.

  As Ad gave them a pound, Eddie said, “We’re technically against the rules.”

  Jim shrugged. “If it’ll help me win, I’ll take it. Rules are relative.”

  Which was why he’d been chosen, wasn’t it. He was hardly a frickin’ Boy Scout—

  Jim’s head snapped around at a metal-on-metal squeaking sound. The portable octagon had been dismantled and was being shoved through the door by four guys who then carried it over to a U-Haul van. Next trip in and out they were carrying the eight concrete corner weights and poles and then no one was left but him and Eddie and Adrian.

  Which was a metaphor for the sitch he was in, wasn’t it.

  Fine. This was how the game was played? Cool. He was used to relying on himself and his instincts in the field . . . and everything was pulling him toward Isaac.

  The question was: where was Devina? Assuming she was after Isaac, she’d be searching for a way into
him so her parasitic nature could take him over and she could ultimately own him forever in Hell after she killed him.

  Jim refocused on his angels. “If Devina is possessing someone, is there a way to tell? Any markers? Reference points?”

  At least then he could get a bead on her.

  “Sometimes,” Eddie said. “But she can wipe away her fingerprints, so to speak—and now that she knows me and Ad are with you, she’ll be extra careful. However, there are some clean souls she’ll never touch, and those glow.”

  “Glow? You mean like . . .” Shit, that blond attorney who’d taken Isaac home with her had had a light all around her body—which was why when Jim had seen her, he’d stared at her as he had. “Like a halo?”

  “Exactly like that.”

  Well, at least there was one thing working in their favor. He’d assumed he’d just been seeing things. Turned out he was—and thank God for it.

  Jim took out his GPS receiver and called up Isaac’s two little blinking dots. Sooner or later, if Devina was fucking with the guy, she was going to make an appearance in one form or another—and they were going to be there when she did.

  “Are there such things as protective spells?” he asked. “Anything I can put around Isaac to keep him safe from her?”

  “We can work something out,” Eddie said with an evil little smile. “ ’Bout time to start teaching you that stuff.”

  You got that right, Jim thought.

  Closing his eyes, he unfurled his wings, their great weight settling on his spine and shoulders as they became visible. “They’re heading into town. Let’s go—”

  “Hold up,” Eddie said, his wings appearing. “We need to go by the hotel and get some supplies. Assuming you don’t want us going inside the house?”

  “As long as Devina doesn’t show, I’ll stay on the out.”

  “This won’t take all that long.”

  “It’d better not.”

  As he grabbed a couple of running steps to get the momentum working for him, he felt the irony of everything like a great gust under his body: He never would have believed that angels existed or that the eternal battle between good and evil was not only real, but something he’d be fighting in.

  Then again, when you weighed in at about two hundred and twenty pounds of solid muscle and were able to haul yourself off the ground with a network of metaphysical feathers . . . the crazy-ass reality you were in had a fuckload of credibility.

  He was going to be goddamned if Devina got her claws into Isaac—in whatever form she was currently copping to. Isaac was his boy, and the idea of that man falling into his enemy’s hands was not acceptable—especially if that demon happened to be wearing a familiar face.

  Which just happened to have an eye patch.

  CHAPTER 13

  Isaac had been in the Boston vicinity only twice, and both times had been for pass-through trips on his way overseas—the kind of thing where all he did was walk across a tarmac at Otis Air Force Base down on Cape Cod.

  That being said, as Grier hung a left off something called Charles Street, he didn’t need to have had a guided tour of the city to know they were in prime real estate-land. The town houses on both sides of the hill they went up were all pristine brick with glossy black shutters and doors. Through clean windows, he could see interiors that were antiqued up to within an inch of their lives and had enough crown molding to crush a king’s head.

  Clearly, he was in the natural habitat of the blue-blooded Yankee.

  As ancient Saturday Night Live sketches of Dan Aykroyd doing Kennedy impressions about “chowdah” rolled through his head, Grier took a left into a small square that was demarcated by a wrought-iron fence and brick lanes on all four sides. In the middle, its little park had graceful trees with tiny buds already showing, and the surrounding walk-ups were the best of the best in this bestest-ever neighborhood.

  So not a surprise.

  After she parked her Audi parallel to the fence, they both got out. She hadn’t said much on the trip here, and neither had he. But then again, he wasn’t a big talker to begin with—and she had a fugitive for a passenger. Not exactly a so-how-about-this-weather? kind of gig.

  The house she indicated was hers was a bow-front on the corner and had white marble steps up to its black front door. Fluted black planters the size of Great Danes sat on either side of the entrance, and the brass knocker was as big as his head. One light glowing on the third floor; several on the exterior. And as he surveyed the area, there appeared to be nothing out of place—no unmarkeds trolling by, no sounds that were wrong, nobody suspicious lurking.

  As they walked over the uneven bricks of the street, he wanted to reach out and steady her, given her heel situation—but he didn’t dare. First of all, she probably still wanted to slap him . . . and second, he had palmed up both his guns inside his windbreaker on a just-in-case.

  He was always careful with himself. Having her in tow? He took vigilance to a whole new level.

  Besides, Grier handled the trip to her front door just fine, in spite of the fact that she was walking in stilettos and had been attacked by some drugged-up asswipe.

  Too bad they hadn’t met in a different world. He would have really liked to—

  Yeah, right. Take her on a date?

  Whatever. Even if he had gone the law-abiding, I’m-not-an-assassin route, they were from opposite ends of the spectrum: he was all farm boy and she was all fabulous.

  And he really had to cut the double-think when it came to how attractive she was.

  Her security alarm went off the moment she opened the way in and he was glad, although he didn’t approve of her letting riffraff like him in the house. And how was that for fucked-up?

  As she punched in her code at the ADT panel, he looked down at the soles of his combats—which were caked with chunky mud and fuzzy sod. Bending down, he unlaced them, slipped them off, and left them outside.

  Her black-and-white marble floor was warm under his socks—

  Looking up, he found her staring at his feet with an odd expression on her beautiful face.

  “I didn’t want to track in,” he muttered, shutting the door and locking it.

  After he took off his windbreaker, he got out the Star Market bag with his life savings in it and they just stood there: her in her black designer coat and her soiled purse that had one strap hanging loose; him in his sweatshirt with a load of dirty money in his bloody hand and two guns she didn’t know about in his pockets.

  “When was the last time you ate,” she said softly.

  “I’m not hungry. But thank you, ma’am.” He glanced around, looking into a tall-ceilinged room that was painted a rich red. Over the regal marble fireplace was an oil painting of a man sitting up straight in a gilded chair with a pair of old-fashioned spectacles perched on his nose.

  It was so quiet here, he thought. And not just because there weren’t any sounds.

  Peaceful. It was . . . peaceful.

  “I’ll make you an omelet, then,” she said, putting her bag down and starting to shrug out of that coat.

  He stepped up to her to help, but she moved back. “I’ve got it. Thanks.”

  The dress underneath . . . Dear God, that dress. Modest and black had never looked so sexy, as far as he was concerned, but then that was more about her than the design or the fabric.

  And those legs. Fuck him, but those legs with the sheer black stockings . . .

  Isaac snapped his man-whore back into place with a reminder that it would be an open question whether someone like her would let him so much as wash her car—much less allow him take her to bed. Besides, would he have any clue what to do to a woman like her? Sure, he was good at raw fucking—he’d been begged for repeats enough times to have confidence on that front.

  But a lady like her deserved to be savored—

  Damn him to hell. He had a feeling he was licking his lips.

  “Kitchen’s in the back,” was all she said as she picked up her bag and walke
d away.

  He followed her down the hall, taking note of the rooms and the windows and the doors, noting escape routes and entryways. It was what he did in any space he went through, his years of training with him sure as the skin on his back. But it was more than that. He was looking for clues about her.

  And it was weird . . . the peaceful thing kept at it, which surprised him. Old-fashioned and expensive usually meant tight-assed. Here, though, he breathed deep and easy—even though that made no sense.

  In contrast to the rest of the house, the kitchen was all about the white and stainless steel, and as she set to work pulling out bowls and eggs and cheese, he put his money down on her counter and couldn’t wait to get out of the room: Across the way, there was a wall of windowpanes that were probably six by eight feet apiece.

  Which meant anyone with a pair of eyes could go all looky-looky on them.

  “What’s in the back?” he asked casually.

  “My garden.”

  “Walled in?”

  Her arms full, she stepped up to the cooktop in the granite island. “Security conscious?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She went over, turned on an exterior light, and canned the inside ones—which gave him a perfect view of the back without a lot of hassle. God, she was smart.

  And her garden was surrounded by a ten-foot-high brick oh-no-you-don’t that he totally approved of.

  “Satisfied?” she said.

  In the darkness, her voice took on a husky quality that made him want to track her body through the room and ease her up against something so he could get under that black dress.

  Man, her question wasn’t one she wanted to ask him tonight.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he murmured.

  When the lights came back on, there was a faint touch of red in her cheeks—the sort of thing he might not have noticed if he hadn’t made it his business to stare at her as much as he could. But maybe the color was just her being keyed up because of everything that had happened tonight.