by Rob Thurman
“In fact, I am the boss of you,” Griffin said, reaching for his own piece of the pie, only with more napkins. “And you’re the boss of me tomorrow. Remember?”
“Oh, yeah.” Zeke gave a grin. He didn’t smile often, so he didn’t have much of a repertoire to choose from. Pissed and predatory. You-are-dead predatory. You-are-beyond-dead predatory. And this was the newest version that had cropped up since last November. Behind-the-bedroom-door predatory. It was also happy and since Zeke had spent most of his mortal life barely comprehending the word, I forgave the pizza. It was good to see him this way. More free and open than he’d ever been when he’d thought he was human. When he thought he and Griffin were human.
I know. Vegas, right? Is anyone human?
Griffin and Zeke had been demon-killing partners at Eden House Las Vegas. There was also an Eden House Miami, an Eden House Los Angeles, Eden House London . . . Eden Houses all over the world. They’d been around for thousands of years, a secret organization created by man to bring Eden back to Earth. The key word being man. Heaven had nothing to do with its creation, but once the angels saw a source of free labor, they took advantage now and again. And they certainly didn’t have a problem with Eden House trying to eradicate every demon it came across. It did a good job . . . on the slow, lower-level demons anyway.
The angels and the demons had both been after the Light for a long time. I’d just managed to get there first . . . by a few seconds. Having narrowed down the location, both sides had planted sleeper agents in Vegas’s Eden House. An angel, because even loyal humans couldn’t be trusted with the Light, and a demon in case Eden House got to the Light before Hell did. They’d been given the same human bodies demons and angels formed when walking on Earth, only they had been children. Eight and ten years old. For a demon, that’s a doable situation. Hang around with no memory of who you are, grow up, and then get activated by your Hell handler at the right moment. Because Eden House will recruit you as it tries to recruit all humans with empathy or telepathy. Nature was a marvelous thing. If angels had telepathy and demons had empathy, then so would the rest of what roamed the earth. Not everyone by any means, but it was out there . . . in humans and païen.
Hell had planned well. Griffin fit in fine. He was a demon. He had empathy, but more importantly he had free will. All demons did. All angels had. But after the Fall, God had taken the free will of the angels still in Heaven. Some had gotten it back. Relearned it. If they spent enough time on Earth with humans, they would slowly regain it. It was like riding a bicycle, only the lag time was usually much longer. Maybe God figured if they took it in baby steps, they’d get it right this time. No more pride goeth before the big trip down South. I wasn’t sure that was true. I’d met a few real asshole angels in my day. But that wasn’t my call.
Not all angels spent enough time on Earth to get their will back. Zeke had been one of those. When the angel in charge of seeking the Light had assigned an agent, he’d put Zeke . . . Zerachiel . . . in place. Zeke who’d had to learn free will about a hundred times faster than your average angel. Things hadn’t gone well. To this day he struggled. He saw things in black and white. Not only in justice, but in all aspects of his life. That tended to make his decisions permanent ones. Once he chose a course of action, he almost literally couldn’t stop and reconsider. I need to catch the demon in the Jaguar ahead of me. Red light? Demon trumps red light, and so a busload of German tourists was inconvenienced when his car smashed into them. It was just the way things were with Zeke. Sometimes people were inconvenienced; sometimes they were punished with good Old Testament eye for an eye.
And then sometimes they died.
I wrung the sweat out of my hair. “I guess you two are the reason my bar isn’t open and making money. Is the demon under the table your excuse?”
Griffin, ex-demon, and Zeke, ex-angel, defectors of Heaven and Hell, looked at each other. “I told you she would know,” Griffin snorted, and used the one hand not involved in eating pizza to pull a demon up into sight. Zeke helped by pushing the reptilian head up and back using the muzzle of a sawed-off shotgun.
“You’re no fun,” Zeke griped.
“It’s not like hiding him behind bags of cheesy bread is some kind of master plan, guys,” I pointed out, pushing aside those bags and pulling a chair over to the table to sit opposite the demon. And I had a piece of pizza. After today, I deserved it. And what was five more pounds? Just more force behind the ass kicking. I’d exercise, but if I couldn’t eat pizza, cheesy bread, or my own weight in chocolate-caramel ice cream once in a while, I might as well let a demon take me down. What’s the point in living without those things?
I looked over the demon as I chewed one fabulously cheese-laden mouthful. Swallowing, I said, “Tell me you didn’t pull his wing off and bring him here like a cat with a present for my pillow. Killing them is one thing. Torturing them is something else.” Even if they’d done more torture than we’d ever know. I swatted Zeke’s free hand that was making for the last piece of pizza. “Bad kitty.” I closed the lid on the box, saving it for myself.
“No,” Griffin said, sounding defensive. And that was my fault. I tried to be careful about saying things like that these days. Griffin had been a demon, even if he hadn’t known it until last November when the whole mess with the Light went down. He still didn’t remember it. When he’d chosen Zeke and Leo and me over doing Hell’s bidding, the Light had wiped his and Zeke’s slate clean. He had only his human memories and a human body now . . . with bronze dragon wings that came and went when he wanted them to . . . but even if he couldn’t remember, he knew. Every demon was a killer, a torturer, and a devourer of souls. And he’d been a high-level demon—not as high as Eli, but high enough that he would’ve outkilled your average demon, like the one he was holding, six ways to Sunday. Griffin had been one bad demon, very bad, which made it such a miracle he made one of the best humans I’d met.
“We found him this way,” he went on grimly. “We were out hunting.” They still hunted demons, although Eden House Vegas had been burned to the ground by Solomon and nearly all the members killed during the whole Light affair. What else would they do but hunt? That’s what they’d been trained for, it was worth doing, and after being a demon killer for most of what you remembered to be your adult life, you were going to give that up and work at the Gap? Besides, Eden House did pay well and since they were now without a House here, Griffin and Zeke were all the organization had left to take care of the city until they rebuilt.
Eden House obviously didn’t have a clue about Griffin’s and Zeke’s unusual status. Only one angel had known about Zeke being a sleeper agent and all the demons and angels at the battle for the Light had died . . . except Eli. As for Hell, they didn’t give a shit about ex-demons and ex-angels. You had to give them that. Betrayal wasn’t a bad word in their book. It was more like a compliment. It was pretty much every demon for himself . . . except when it looked like someone was out to take every single one of them down. Someone who seemed to have a good shot at it. Griffin and Zeke were good. I was good. But even the three of us couldn’t come close to doing what Eli said was being done.
“And you found him where?” I finished the slice of pizza and went for the hoarded last one, ignoring Zeke’s scowl of deprivation.
“Behind that new club five blocks over.” There was always a new club in Vegas. Usually no point in remembering the names, they came and went so frequently. And they never closed. Gambling and booze and vomiting tourists twenty-four/seven. And no state income tax. Who said there was no Eden anymore? “We’d already checked the inside. No demons. We went out back to see if there were any in the murdering instead of dealing mood and this one comes falling out of the sky. Literally. Almost landed right on top of Zeke. He crapped his pants.”
“I did not.” Zeke’s scowl deepened.
“Screamed like a drunk sorority girl in a haunted house?” Griffin’s short bad mood had passed quickly—they always did—and his blue
eyes were bright with humor. That with his blond hair made him seem more like the ex-angel than Zeke with his red hair and green eyes.
“No. And you’re an ass.”
Griffin grinned at him. “Learned from the best.”
I looked past their fun at the demon. It was quiet, not struggling, not cursing us up one side and down the other. Demons came in different colors and levels, but well behaved wasn’t included in the options package. This one hung limp in Griffin’s and Zeke’s grip. It was conscious. I could see its muddy eyes rolling from right to left, but randomly. They weren’t focusing on my guys’ back-and-forth. They weren’t focusing on anything. Black drool dripped from its open mouth and the one remaining wing twitched, but not in a coordinated movement.
You had to hold on to demons to keep them from flashing back to Hell. And you couldn’t pop one in a crate with a doggy chew and a pat on its cute little head, and expect it to still be there when you came back. It wasn’t as much the physical that kept them from escaping; it was will. A cage didn’t have will. Your hand on a sword through its guts, that had will. Messy for your brand-new rug, but it did get the job done. This demon though . . .
I leaned closer across the table, touching my bottom lip in contemplation with a short painted nail. Those eyes . . . no, nobody home. “Either one of you getting anything off him? Because I think you could put a candle in his head and put him on the porch if it were Halloween.”
Both Griffin and Zeke frowned together. Empath and telepath, and both shook their heads. “White noise,” Griffin said.
“Veggie platter.” Zeke shrugged.
Something had ripped off the demon’s wing, but it had done something else I’d never seen. It had driven a demon catatonic. Now that would be a nifty trick. I’d love to know how that worked. More dark drool dripped from its narrow jaw. Maybe not. It was a murderous killing machine, but this . . . This was sick.
“Can you try a little harder, Kit?” I asked Zeke. He lifted the fox-colored eyebrows—that color had me calling him Kit for a baby fox since he was fifteen. Not that he was a baby anymore . . . but the nickname had stuck. “Dig a little deeper? See if you can get even a glimpse of what did this to it?”
“If you’ll puddle less, I’ll do anything,” he retorted.
“A pizza grudge is a nasty thing.” I swatted his shoulder. He snorted and turned back to stare at the demon again. He focused unblinking for several seconds.
I was beginning to think nothing was going to happen when the demon screamed. And screamed and screamed and screamed. I’d heard demons scream in pain. I’d made them scream in pain, but I’d never heard anything like this. Ever.
Zeke’s head jerked, his eyes rolled back, and he collapsed to the floor, out cold. Griffin grunted as if someone had kicked him hard in the gut and went in the other direction, facedown on the table. But he wasn’t unconscious. His hands clenched into fists against his temples. I dived immediately for the shotgun that had fallen from Zeke’s hands. My Smith was a nice gun, but shotgun slugs were even more of a sure thing. I put two of them through the demon’s skull. I’d put away my fair share of demons, but this was the first time it was a mercy killing.
With most of his head gone, the demon melted to blackness as they all did, and the screaming stopped. In the room and in Griffin’s head as well, because he was back up. There was a trickle of blood at one nostril from where he’d banged his nose on the table. “What the hell was...,” he started hoarsely, then forgot about the demon as he moved to Zeke’s side. “Shit.”
I was right beside him as Griff rested his hand on Zeke’s forehead. It was my suggestion that had Zeke walking through the demon’s brain to read his thoughts and it had been a stupid one. I tried not to make stupid mistakes, but sending Zeke for a look at what had driven a demon insane was one of the worst I could remember making in a long time.
I didn’t have the talent for empathy or telepathy, only a natural defense against them. All tricksters did or we wouldn’t be very good at hiding who we were from those who did have the gift, not to mention angels and demons. I could read someone’s expression and body language though as if I had a map in one hand and a GPS in the other. But I couldn’t do much with an unconscious face. “Is he all right?” He had to be all right. He and Griffin were my boys. I’d taken them in when they were teenagers. I’d thought I was keeping an eye on my competition. And it was just for a while. Everyone who takes in a ragged, dirty-nosed puppy tells themselves that, but those puppies worm their way into your heart even when they piddle in the corner. There’s nothing you can do to stop it.
Griffin frowned. “He’s not in pain.” You don’t have to be conscious to feel pain. Sad to say all three of us knew that.
Zeke wasn’t in pain, which was good, but was he there? Was it still Zeke in there or was he like the demon had been? Alive but gone?
Griffin closed his eyes, concentrating hard, before exhaling in relief. He opened his eyes and smiled. “He’s hungry. He feels hungry.”
Good. That was good. Hunger and catatonia rarely went together. I shifted from my knees to an abrupt flop onto my ass. “Our Zeke. He’s always hungry.” I pushed aside hair that had plastered and glued itself to my forehead with sweat. “Do you want to punch me one for asking Zeke to do that?”
“You’re a girl,” he said immediately, then amended as I raised my eyebrows. “I mean, a woman.”
“I am and one who can kick your butt, but you didn’t answer my question.” I leaned against his shoulder and ruffled his hair.
“A little bit,” he admitted. “Must be the leftover demon in me.”
“No. Just the overprotective demon-slaying partner in you.” I smoothed the hair I’d mussed. “And next time I’ll clear anything I ask Zeke to do through you first. You know him best.”
“I do.” After the rebuke that was milder than I deserved, he reached over and slapped Zeke lightly on the cheek. “Definitely enough to know when he’s faking. He woke up a few seconds ago. Up or no cheesy bread for you.”
Eyes opened combined with an irritable expression. “I was waiting to see if one of you cried. On TV they always cry at the deathbed.”
Equally irritated, Griffin flicked his partner’s chin with a stinging finger before helping him sit up. “You weren’t on your deathbed, and what if I had cried? What would you have said?”
Zeke snorted. “That you were a pussy.”
“That’s what I thought.” He stood and pulled Zeke up with him.
I stood too. “Are you feeling okay, Kit? You went down like a rock.”
“I did?” he asked without too much curiosity, more interested in investigating the bags of bread. He unloaded one batch on the table and looked down at the black puddle on the floor. “Hey, the demon. What happened to the demon?” He turned back to me. “And when did you get here?” He looked me up and down. “You look like you were kicked out of a wet T-shirt contest. I didn’t know you could—”
I cut him off before he repeated the whole insult. I let it go the first time. Twice was asking a bit much. “You don’t remember me coming in?” I felt the back of his head for a bump or contusion.
He swatted at my hand. “You’re being a mom. Quit it.”
“I’m thirty-one,” I retorted ominously. “I am not a mom. I’m definitely not your mom.”
“You’re six thousand and the last thing I remember is eating pizza and waiting for you to get here to see the demon.” He forgot about the bread for the moment and searched the tabletop and then under it. “Where’s the pizza?”
“I’m thirty-one,” I said this time around, “the pizza is gone, the demon is dead, and you were trying to take a peek in his brain to see why he had all the mental capacity of a potted plant when you keeled over like a drunken Baptist minister.”
“Huh,” he commented before moving on to more important things. “Griffin, your nose is busted. If the demon did that, it’s a good thing he’s dead. So who ate the pizza?”
One
thing about Zeke, he never let the little things in life get to him, and other than Griffin and food, they were all little things. At times it was annoying as hell, and at other times it was almost inspirational. To live in the now . . . no worries about the future or monsters that could turn demons’ brains to oatmeal.
Right now it was vexing enough I nearly smacked him with the piece of garlic bread he was considering eating. Sighing, I tried Griffin instead. “You took a hit too when the demon went nuts. I saw it.” I handed him a napkin from the table. “And your face felt it.” He grimaced and held the napkin to the small drop of blood from his nose. “What did you pick up from it?”
“Terror.” He wiped the blood away. “More than I’ve ever felt from anyone, even from people torn apart by demons before we could stop them. More terror than I thought a demon could feel. More than I thought even existed.”
More terror than could possibly exist, and something so horrifying that Zeke’s brain had shut down to prevent him from seeing it.
Well, wasn’t that just peachy?
Chapter 2
I’d given the guys the update on demons dying right and left, a powerful creature running about—mission unknown and headed up to my apartment. By the time I took my shower, changed, and came back downstairs, the place was empty. No Griffin, no Zeke, no cheesy bread. There still was a large black puddle of demon goo on my floor though. Although I’d shot it, the guys had brought it, so technically it was their mess. But . . . I sighed as I went for the mop. Zeke had been knocked flat, had been unconscious, and Griffin was concerned about him. He’d seemed himself—and it was very easy to see when Zeke was not himself—but better safe than sorry.
Griffin probably had him at their house, feet up, TV on, and watching like a hawk for anything unexpected such as twitches, seizures, or the desire to not swap old porn magazines to the Jehovah’s Witnesses for the Watchtower. After all, Griffin was making him get rid of them and in Zeke’s mind this was a valid recycling program. Zeke might be an ex-angel, but he’d never had any sexual hang-ups, which rather made you wonder why people did.