Vengeance: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 3

by Denise Tompkins

  Lacing our fingers together, Hellion tugged on my hand until I moved closer to him. He took over the kiss, breathing into me, his seductive skills manipulating my will power. It was an age-old dance of dominance, with him shifting to standing, forcing my chin back until my neck was held at an odd angle. I whimpered involuntarily and he smiled, his lips still pressed to mine.

  “That’s one of my favorite sounds, Maddy. It means I’ve taken you to the edge, where pleasure and pain converge and the mind cannot tell one from the other.” His obsidian eyes were bottomless this close.

  I stepped back, my thoughts scattering at the rapid change in the tenor of the kiss.

  Hellion sat back down on the bench and invited me with open arms to join him. I did, sinking into his better side and nestling under his arm. He settled his chin on the crown of my head and I felt him slow his breathing to a measured pace.

  “I’ve had all the time I needed to come to a decision. I want that to be clear, very clear, that you won’t change my mind, not as my future bride and not as the Niteclif. I understand the risks and the potential consequences better than anyone. Wait,” he said as I started to ask what the hell was going on. “Give me half a chance to explain. I fell to Connell because I refused to answer his dark magic with my own. It was there, Maddy, there at my fingertips, and it called to me. I could have destroyed him but for my morals. That internal compass nearly cost me my life today, and it cost many their lives last night.”

  Once again, I started to speak then stopped and gestured for him to continue. If nothing else, I’d take the time to think of what to say.

  He nodded once and continued. “I’ll not turn away from the dark arts again. I intend to embrace whatever magics I can call to hand in order to stop Connell and save us from Agares’s abuse.”

  I looked up to meet his gaze.

  Hellion’s face was stony, devoid of emotion until he shook his head and grinned darkly, his hair rustling like silk on silk. I reached out to touch it and he grabbed my wrist, squeezing. “No. Listen to me, and listen closely. You’ve no clue what I’m capable of, the destruction I can cause and the powers I can invoke.”

  Heat spread through me, straight to the juncture of my thighs. My lips swelled and my clit was engorged, my sex flooded with arousal. I crossed my legs and pulled on my captured wrist.

  “Dark magic allows me to take what I will, when I will. I can make you want me with a passion you’ve never known.”

  An invisible hand intimately caressed me and I gasped, my head falling back. It wasn’t right, this sensation, and I pulled against his grip. “What are you doing?”

  “Like everything else, the dark arts come with a cost, Maddy. Nothing in magic is free. It’s an exchange of power that must always be balanced. The exchange here is a piece of who I am for the power to do what needs to be done. I’ve spent my life fighting the pull, but no more. I learned a hard truth today.” His lips thinned. Letting me go, he crossed his massive arms over his chest. His beaten body, still marked with bloodstains, was a reminder of his mortality. The ease with which he embraced his rage and the effortlessness with which he’d claimed my body were reminders of his capability. “You need someone who can partner with you and keep you safe. You’re the only thing that stands between the paranormal and mundane worlds. The two can never meet. You know that.” He turned away for a moment, seeming to gather his thoughts as well as his determination. “Chaos will reign if there’s no Niteclif to mete out justice, and your job is to make sure that justice is always served and the filth of our world never infiltrates the innocence of yours.”

  “I get that, Hellion. What I don’t get is exactly what the hell this has to do with you making this choice?” My voice shook as I fought to clear my head. “There has to be another option, something else.”

  He took my face in his hands and kissed my forehead in a strange kind of private benediction. Pulling back, he stared down at me. “There’s no other choice I can see, Maddy. I fell today, the fault no one’s but my own. I thought I was dead. I failed the people who depend on me and, worse, I opened the door through which Connell might reach you.”

  Hellion sat back against the woody wisteria vines and closed his eyes. “The first thought when I awoke? I knew with radical clarity that there was absolutely nothing I wouldn’t do to keep you safe and to keep you with me, my soul be damned if that’s the cost. I will fight whatever battle I must, whether it’s with Connell or Agares or Lucifer himself. Let the comers come. I will cut them down at the knees.” He pounded a fist against his wounded chest. “I won’t lose you to an archaic moral code, and I won’t let my people suffer lifetimes of abuse because I was too cowardly to do what needed to be done.”

  I stared at the man in front of me, this wounded magus who had tread so close to the darkness for so many years. “I don’t want to lose you to this any more than you want to lose me.”

  “You won’t.” Hellion reached out and caressed my face, his thumb skimming my lower lip. “You’ll be my moral counterbalance, Maddy, the thing that brings me back from the edge when its siren song is too strong for me alone. I need you, and will need you even more once this begins. You’ll see things…” His voice trailed off, reluctance dragging the words out slowly.

  “Things like…” I prompted.

  “It will change me some, Maddy.”

  “No.” The snap of my voice was like the crack of a whip.

  “There’s nothing to discuss. I warned you—my mind is made up. I’m sorry.”

  “You said you needed me to pull you back, right?” I scrambled off the bench and out of his reach. “If you need me, shouldn’t I have a say in this?”

  “Again, I’m sorry.” He sighed and rubbed his chest. “My mind is made up.”

  “So that’s all there is to it.” My words were only words. They wouldn’t sway him, couldn’t change the outcome.

  He stood and moved toward me.

  I backed up. “I guess you don’t see it the same way I do,” I murmured, still reeling that he’d make such a huge choice without at least consulting me. The “why” of it made sense, but there was so much more to this decision. Spinning on my heel, I headed back toward the house.

  “Madeline.” Hellion’s voice wound around me, a slow and sensual caress.

  I kept going, shaking my head and holding up a hand to acknowledge that I’d heard him.

  “We’ll have to finish this discussion sometime soon,” he called out.

  “My calendar’s suddenly full,” I said so quietly he shouldn’t have heard me. But he did.

  “Then clear it.”

  This time when I held my hand up, I flipped him off.

  He laughed, the sound threaded with exhaustion. “We’ll survive this, Niteclif.”

  “I’m counting on it.” Fierce words as I wiped a tear from my cheek.

  I stumbled, nearly going to my knees as understanding plowed into me with gross intent to cause harm. It was entirely possible that the justice I was to deliver was for Hellion, not Micah. The Nephilim had been the vehicle that brought this to my door, but Hellion’s fate was in the proverbial driver’s seat, and it had been all along. I’d just been too engrossed with my own drama to see it.

  Losing Hellion wasn’t an option, but I also didn’t know exactly how to stop it. It didn’t matter, though. He’d made his decision, and I’d just made mine.

  He wasn’t going down.

  Shadows crept across the grounds and through the low windows of the manor house as the sun set. The slow drizzle hadn’t let up from earlier, lending time a sense of neutral ambivalence—it neither pushed forward to get things moving, nor did it drag its feet to afford us more daylight. It was a weird afternoon on a grand scale.

  Hellion hadn’t been back to the house as far as I knew. That was fine. I wasn’t ready to see him anyway. Instead, I sought Micah out and hauled him into the library. His bronze eyes were cool as I began to pace and pepper him with questions about Agares. When his answers dev
olved to single words interspersed with grunts, I stopped. “Do you have a problem, Micah? Because I really am trying to do this for your benefit.”

  A slow, sinful smile curled his lips. “If you want to do something for my benefit, shut the door on your way over here.”

  “Not this again.” My grumbled reply was heartfelt and multidimensional, painted with undertones of anger and frustration. “Do you not get it? I’m with Hellion. Hellion. I don’t want anyone else.”

  Micah stood as if his puppet master had pulled his strings—one fluid movement that was as graceful as it was unnatural. “You’ve been perfectly clear. But it’s you who needs to get on board the comprehension train.” I started for the door as Micah’s next words slammed into me. “You need to understand that until your child is born, this is far from over.”

  Micah faced the fire, refusing to look at me as I turned. “You’ve got my attention.”

  He looked over at me and arched a brow. “Your conception can be terminated, your misconception cleared up, even.” He chortled at his little joke, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning one shoulder against the nearest bookcase.

  “You’re point?” My hand itched to knock the smirk off his face.

  “Quite simple, really. The world rests on your child’s shoulders.” He cocked his head to the side like a bird eyeing a treat. “Whether you will it to be different or not, this is the path divined for you.”

  My stomach flipped in a series of one-eighties, rolling like a stunt car down a wet road. “Then divine another one. You can do that, can’t you? Give me a different path by carving out a new trail?”

  “Don’t sound so hopeful.” His soft voice was backed by a roll of thunder—the heavens’ remorse, maybe. “I cannot entirely change what’s in your path any more than you can avoid it altogether. Some things, my beloved, are simply preordained. Others still have to be taken on blind faith.” He reached out and stroked my hair, his eyes warming.

  I stepped out of range. “Seems like everyone wants a piece of me, from gods to angels to demons, and there’s just not enough to go around. Everyone’s talking about finding faith and…” An idea was born in that moment, full of bravado and more than a little wild hope. If faith could be a solution for my predicament, why couldn’t I use it to my advantage in other ways, namely my situation with Agares and the mysterious Asmodeus?

  “I think I figured it out,” I whispered, backing away from the Nephilim.

  His eyes narrowed. “Maddy?”

  I stopped nearer the door. “How many fallen angels are in Ireland—Dublin in particular?”

  “We don’t gather, as you know, but I know of at least two here. The first is Zerachiel, and the second is Gagiel. They’ve been here for ages. Why?”

  “You might want to reach out to them. I’m willing to bet Agares is going to move on one or the other tonight.” When he paled and started to shake his head, I interrupted. “Do it or don’t. It’s on your shoulders. You’re too insulated here, too protected to be an easy take for Agares and his men. Those two Nephilim have no idea what’s coming.”

  “Where are you going?” he called after me as I skipped down the stairs.

  “It’s about time we started utilizing our resources, Micah.” Hand resting on the banister, I glanced back at him. “I’m about to resolve my issues of faith. Either that or blow it all to Hell. Tell Hellion I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  The Bugatti Vitesse prowled the dark country lanes, the purr of its engine an auditory balm to my soul. I’d opened it up right out of the garage, rocketing down the driveway with the tachometer redlining through the gears. Truth? This car made half the shit with the supernatural world worth it. The other half? Hell, there wasn’t enough money in the world to make it even entertaining.

  No one had followed me from the house. Either they didn’t know I’d left or they’d known but been too tied up in preparing for what they thought would be coming for them. If Micah delivered the message I’d left with him, no one would worry about me. Much. Okay, they’d worry like mad, but I knew I was right about this. Agares wasn’t going to hit Hellion’s house tonight. He was going to try and draw him out, away from his sanctuary and seat of power. No way would I have brought my magus along tonight. It would have been like chumming the waters for the biggest bad out there. I knew what lurked, and I was way too close to chumming as it was.

  My cell chirped with a new text message. Digging around in my messenger bag, I found it and tapped in the screen password.

  Get your ass back here. ~H

  That settled the question of whether or not they knew I was gone.

  I didn’t want to tell Hellion what I’d surmised about my real role in this. I also didn’t want to fight with Hellion over the choice I’d made, but that didn’t mean I was going to capitulate to his wishes that I clear everything through him and, when all else failed, hide behind his heroic self. This whole thing was a part of my job as Niteclif. Micah had seen to that. Besides, if I was right about this, not only would I be able to sort this whole thing out, I’d be coming home with an arsenal Agares couldn’t defend himself against. Probably. Maybe. Crap, I hoped so.

  Thumbing the phone off, I dumped it back in my bag. The “Find Me” feature was handy unless you really, really didn’t want to be found. Of course, driving the Vitesse was a sure-fire way to draw unwanted attention, but I’d take care of that too.

  Cresting a hill some time later, Dublin lay sprawled before me, an urban landscape that glittered with all the allure of a beautiful woman at night. She presented her best side, using shadow and light to her advantage. Dirty alleys were lost to the dark while shiny newness and quaint historic flavor were emphasized. Subtle scents of teahouses tempted me to stop. Raucous pubs called to my need to live a little.

  Later, I promised myself, when this is done.

  Without the benefit of my phone’s GPS, I was stuck wandering the streets and doing my best to read the directions I’d jotted on my hand and wrist. Considering the fact I was a miserable left-lane driver, it took a few round-the-block maneuvers for me to find what I’d been looking for.

  The Four Seasons looked like any other fine hotel, with one exception. It was openly busy, choosing not to hide its activity behind prestige. I pulled right up to the front, trying not to laugh as the valets shoved and pushed in an effort to get close to the car let alone be the one to park it. Leaving it running, I stepped out and was met by a distinguished-looking man in a suit.

  “Madam.” He looked over the car and couldn’t contain his grin. “I’m happy to see to your car.”

  “I need a little something extra.” As discreetly as possible, I slipped him several hundred euros. “It needs to be in as good a shape as it is now, if not better, when I come back. I also need it parked out of sight, please.”

  Money disappeared with one hand while he took my hand and helped me to the sidewalk with the other. Guy’s a freaking magician.

  “Of course, madam. I’ll assign a couple of the lads to look over it. May we expect your return after dinner?”

  This was the tricky part, because I was about to prove myself a liar. “Sure. Dinner.”

  Without batting an eye, he slid into the car and pulled it around the corner.

  The moment he was out of sight, I flagged down a cab getting ready to jettison itself back into increasingly congested traffic. “Our Lady Queen of Peace Parish.”

  “Right then.” The cabbie floored it.

  I sat back to rack my brain over what I knew of Old World Catholicism, miracles and acts of blind faith.

  My knowledge banks being what they were, I was left with plenty of time to sightsee.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Propped open for evening Recollections, the doors to the church vestibule were enormous. Candlelight spilled down the steps, warm and inviting. The deep, melodic voice of the priest settled around me as prayers were recited and the congregation answered in soft whispers. People came and went in ones and twos, rare
ly more. I hesitated. What if this doesn’t work? What if I have to have unquestionable faith? And where am I in the whole fate versus free will argument?

  “Standing at the foot of the steps to a church talking to yourself,” I muttered. Rolling my shoulders, I pretended not to see an exiting couple glance my way nervously before picking up their pace. “Right. Phase one of my evil plan: scare the locals. Implemented.”

  Incense tickled my nose and burned my throat as I took a deep breath and plunged into organized religion for the first time in more than a decade. Unsure whether or not to genuflect this far back, my feet stuttered as my upper body tried for obedience. The resulting move was mildly seizure-like. I slipped into the first empty pew I came to and dropped my forehead to the seatback in front of me.

  Well, that went smashingly.

  Once I got my bearings and convinced myself that no one was, in fact, staring at me in abject horror, I took a look around. The church was beautiful. A tall, barrel-shaped ceiling rose overhead while large stained glass windows along one wall depicted spiritually significant events from the Bible. Pale walls were up-lit, enhancing the sense of height and space. The front of the church had a broad maple table covered with white and gold linens. A priest was handing out the Sacrament beneath the Crucifixion of Christ. Small, dark wood doors along one wall opened and closed quietly as parishioners completed Confession.

  Summoning my nerve reserves, I stood and made my way over to one of the confessionals only to pause. Do I knock? Wait? Take a spiritual number?

  “Try the handle,” said a soft voice behind me. “If it’s not locked, go in.” I glanced back to find an altar boy in white robes staring up at me. The look on his face clearly said Lady, I’m seven and I know what to do.