by Mina Carter
I didn’t have much choice. Without the kind of knowledge I had, curses were always fatal. I needed Rafe alive, not just because he was daddy dearest, but because he was my best chance of healing my uncle and stopping a war in hell that could trigger the apocalypse. And stopping the apocalypse? Yeah, that was pretty high on my list of priorities.
“For sure?” Rafe chuckled. “Seem awfully confident there. You spend much time in hell?”
It was a joke, a way of lightening the tense atmosphere in the room, but I didn’t chuckle. Instead I leveled a look at him and carried on studying his arm. From what I could see the origin point was by his hand and it was working up toward his shoulder. It didn’t take a genius to work out it was headed to his heart. Once it hit that, it was end game.
I let out a sigh. Once I figured out which demon this curse had come from, I could either painstakingly unravel and lift it, or I could pop down home and kill the son of a bitch who’d given it to the humans in the first place.
You see, that’s how curses and bad shit like this had started. Some dumb fuck of a demon leaving something they shouldn’t have just lying around for the humans to find. (Pandora’s box, need I say more?) Trouble is, humans are a bit like toddlers. Perverted toddlers. If they find something on the floor, they can’t resist putting in their damn mouths. How do you think they found out about milk? I’ll let that one sink in… And, basically, they have no concept of the shit that can go wrong. We’ve got whole dungeons back home filled with “Here… Watch this…” accidents. Oddly enough, they’re mostly male. Go figure.
Rafe’s face paled. “How long do I have?”
I saw the panic in the backs of his eyes, and it was understandable. Like I said, curses tend to be universally fatal.
Unless you have a princess of hell on your side.
I sat back, folded my arms, and gave him my best “put a good slant on bad news” face.
“Hmmm. Well, given the level of corruption and the spread… Add in the average lifespan of a warlock…” I paused as if doing mental calculations and then shrugged. “Couple of hundred years, give or take?”
He stopped nodding, a look of surprise flowing across his face.
“What? Are you saying you can lift it? That’s not possible, even for a death witch. You might be able to keep the reaper away for a while, but the instant your back is turned she’ll be back.”
I shrugged. “I made a deal, remember?”
I’m not sure why, but I didn’t want to reveal what I was to him. Not just yet. Obviously things hadn’t worked out with the mom so I had no idea what his feelings on demons were.
“How about I make a deal with you? You help scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours…”
His eyes narrowed and he looked me up and down. “Scratch your back in what way?”
Clever. He wanted to know the terms of the deal beforehand. Always… And I can’t stress that enough… Always check the terms when dealing with a demon, or you may find you’ve given away more than you intended. Like say, your soul.
Our gazes locked for a long moment. Lucas moved fitfully beside us, looking from me to Rafe and back again.
“What am I missing here?” he asked with a frown.
Bless him, he was confused. But I didn’t look away from the battle of wills with my dad to answer, and neither did Rafe. Huh, perhaps I don’t just get my stubbornness from the mom. Eventually, the big warlock shook his head as if snapping out of it.
“Nothing. Just witch stuff,” he said looking down at his arm, rubbing at the marked skin. I could practically see the cogs turning in his head. Finally, he nodded, looking up to spear me with a direct gaze. “Okay. Provided it harms none, you have a deal.”
Oh… Clever. I blinked to hide my surprise. With one sentence he’d covered his ass better than a homophobe in a gay bar.
I nodded. “I swear that what I ask you to do will hurt no one.” Technically I was telling the truth. Healing my uncle wouldn’t hurt anybody. I just couldn’t swear to what he’d do afterward.
You see, that’s the thing about my uncle. Thanks to the tremendous PR job that is the Bible, he’s been the bad guy for millennia. But the devil never actually kills anybody. He offers deals… Offers everything they ever wanted, but for a price. A fair practice. Come on, you can’t tell me some talentless little hack from the back end of beyond with absolutely no musical or acting aptitude would ever end up as the biggest star of the silver screen this century? Or some kid, boring with no charisma or any other social grace, in fact nothing going for him at all other than burning ambition and a sense that the world owes him, ends up in a position of power and responsibility?
Sorry, buddy, the world just doesn’t work that way.
But… If they’re willing to pay the price, Lucifer’s price, their world can be remade however they want it.
It’s all down to choice. Their choice.
But… Whatever deals he might make with whoever when he was healed, and whatever they wanted to turn the world into, is not my issue. My problem is the fact that literally it is better the devil you know. Uncle Luce had always advocated freedom of choice for humanity. Good or bad. Heaven or hell. It was up to them. Nabzon, however, was a different matter. With him on the throne, choice would go the way of the dinosaurs, and it literally would be hell on earth.
Rafe smiled and held out a big hand. “If I have your word, that’s good enough for me.”
Hours later, I stepped out onto the porch at the front of Rafe’s and closed my eyes. It had to be early hours of the morning but I’d long since stopped counting. Tipping my head back, I took a deep breath in and let it go slowly. The air trickled from my lips, escaping my lungs in a slow steady stream. As it did, I imagined the tension and exhaustion from hours of spell work leaving my body.
Lifting a curse was tough work even at the best of times, and this wasn’t the best of times. Mainly because I couldn’t access my demon magic in front of other people, just hellfire. The raw stuff. And pretty much anyone could recognize that for what it was. Which meant each time I called on the darkness inside me, I had to pull some fancy footwork with mortal magic. Waving my hands, creating sparks and interesting shapes in the air… All that shit, just so they didn’t find out what I was.
But the more I worked, and the harder it got, the less I put on a show. The curse was leaching Rafe’s life force, quickly, but unravelling it wasn’t the piece of cake I’d anticipated. For one thing, the curse was obviously intentional. Bullshit to that little tale about curses coming about because humanity picked up shit that didn’t belong to them. No one had picked this up by accident. This fucker had been carefully worked out and constructed for maximum damage.
It had been that bad I’d needed E-dub several times. House-cat sized again, the hellcat had worked as hard as I had, winding his nuclear-orange furred body around and between my legs and lending his strength to mine as we fought to the origins of the curse. It had resisted us every step of the way, until with a crack and a warning scream it had given.
One word had hung in the air written in hellsmoke, a substance only visible to those born downstairs. It was a name. An Enochian one—Seradaaki—which identified one of the fallen, a minor one.
E-dub had left immediately to put the demon out of commission and, after settling Rafe down with a counter-curse in place to mitigate the main one, I’d come out here onto the porch to contemplate my existence before heading off up to bed. I’d just ordered a hit on another demon. Power and responsibility… Shit, was this what it would be like if I was queen?
For a moment that possibility sparkled clearly in my mind. Me, sitting on the throne of hell, with all its legions at my command. My breath caught in my chest. I’d be a good ruler. The best. I’d watched my uncle rule for years… I could learn from his mistakes, avoid them, and make hell a better place. And if hell was a better place, then surely earth would be too? I could talk people out of bad decisions that would ruin their lives, refuse to let them make
deals that would hurt people… I should be queen. It was my destiny…
Heat exploded in the back pocket of my jeans and I swore, digging into it and yanking out the small figurine of my uncle. The heated stone burned my fingers and I dropped it with a yelp. The figurine, a horned and tailed devil, bounced twice and rolled to hit Lucas’s boot as he stepped through the door behind me.
“Don’t…It’s hot,” I warned as he bent down to scoop it up but it was already in his hand.
“No, it’s not.” He frowned, turning it over to look at the face. Typically, as the devil is usually represented, the face was split into a leer. I don’t know why my uncle insists on carrying on that illusion when his real form is… well, normal. Ish. He could certainly leave hell and walk among the humans without any of them being any the wiser.
“What is it? Some kind of witch talisman?” he asked, holding it out for me to take. No part of me wanted to reach out and take the thing, not after the way it had bloody burned me, but I couldn’t decline without appearing rude. My body tense, I reached out and let him drop it into my hand.
It was warm to the touch, but not hot. Not anymore.
“Something like that,” I said, tucking it back into my pocket. A small tingle of warning shivered across my fingertips as I let go and I got it suddenly. Even locked down, Uncle Luce had sensed the way my thoughts had turned. Absolute power and all that… if I took over hell and stopped people making admittedly bad decisions, I was removing their free will. Their choice. If hell became… nice, what would happen to heaven? Ying and yang. Light needed dark and all that jazz.
Then the smell hit me. Food. Warm, delicious smelling food. My gaze latched on to the plate in Lucas’s other hand. Hotpot by the looks of it, heaped high with steam rising from the gravy. My stomach gave out a vicious growl any hellcat would be proud of.
“Is that for me?” My voice came out softer than I’d intended, with a note of surprise in it that I’d give anything to eradicate. Wipe out of existence forever, along with the softening in the center of my chest, like my heart was a marshmallow that had just melted. All at the thought of the big, wouldn’t kick him out of bed, werewolf looking after me.
“Yup.” He smiled that panty-wetting smile again and held it out, pulling a fork out of his back pocket and holding it out to me. “Thought you might be hungry. You’ve been cooped up in that room for hours and, I might not be a witch, but I know heavy-duty magic when I see it.”
I grabbed the plate before he could change his mind. What? Where food was concerned it was every demon for herself. I dug the fork in and shoveled a mound of the meaty mess into my mouth. And groaned. The taste exploded on my tongue and short-circuited all my senses. Home-cooked hotpot… it was almost as good as chocolate cake. Almost.
“Oh my... Grandfather,” I mumbled around a mouthful. “Did you make this? It’s awesome!”
He leaned back against the porch railing, arms folded over his broad chest and a smile on his face as he watched me eat. “Sure did. Can’t say the same about dessert. I can’t bake, but cook... Yeah, I can cook. Used to work as a chef two towns over.”
I blinked. My gaze focused on him like a set of laser scopes. “Dessert? There’s dessert as well?”
Two more mouthfuls were inhaled as he nodded. Screw being ladylike, I was so hungry I could eat a scabby donkey. The food disappeared at a rate of knots, demolished within minutes, and I smiled up at him as he pushed off the railings. “Sorry, I was hungry. But… I always eat a lot. Not ladylike, I know.”
“There is dessert… Chocolate cake.” He plucked the plate out of my hands and leaned down. I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t the soft brush of his lips against the tip of my nose. “And I like a woman with a good appetite and curves.” He lifted his head, looking down my body with appreciation. “I’m a big guy. I need a woman with something to her… someone I won’t break…”
Chapter 8
My breath caught in my throat as I clocked the dark look in his eyes.
“Darlin’, I definitely won’t break…” I waved my fingers, reaching into my mortal magic to banish the plate back to the kitchen. Given the sensual promise in his eyes, and the shiver that wound through my veins as I recalled the kiss in his truck, even chocolate cake could wait. I rose on my tiptoes to wrap my arms around his broad shoulders. “In fact, I’m more likely to break you. Sure you can handle me?”
“Oh yeah,” he breathed, big hands on my waist as he turned us, backing me up to pin me against the wall in the shadows behind the door.
A pleased murmur had barely left my lips when he covered them with his own. The murmur became a moan as he pressed against me, using long, drugging kisses to get me to open up for him. The instant I did, he pushed his advantage, sliding his tongue deep. The slow, slip-slide as he found my tongue and teased me took the temperature between us from simmer to all out blaze within seconds.
Hot, open-mouthed kisses became communication as we stood in the darkness and my entire body ached in response. Impatient, I pulled at his shirt, pinging buttons off in my haste to touch him. Skin to skin, I needed it, more than I needed air to breathe. Actually, I needed more than just skin contact, and so did he if the hard bulge pressing into my softer stomach was any indication.
He growled and put space between our bodies to tear at his shirt. Fabric ripped but neither of us cared, my softer moans mingled with his deep, guttural groans as my hands spread over his now naked chest. His skin was like satin over steel, the hard muscles jumping at the softest touch of my fingers. I moaned in pleasure, the tiny sound lost under his kiss.
Big, warm hands slid under my top, cupping me under the fabric, and I whimpered. Clever fingers tweaked my nipples and I stopped thinking. I might even have stopped breathing for a moment there as heat arrowed down from the twin points to my clit. To ease the savage ache in my lady parts, I shoved my hips against his, grinding against the hard leg that had found its way between mine. This needed to happen, and now. I’m no angel, but I hadn’t been in the sack with a guy for months… Hell, probably near on a year… and I so needed this dry patch to be over. Like… yesterday.
A sound in the darkness beyond the porch reminded me we were outside, and I broke the kiss. I might not be Ms. Goody Two-shoes but that didn’t mean I wanted every Tom, Dick or Harry to see me naked. And in a Shifter town where most of the occupants had awesome night vision, the darkness of the porch was going to conceal sweet feck all.
He looked down at me, a question in his eyes. He didn’t stop his thumbs rubbing up over my nips, which were just begging for attention. Much like my clit, which practically throbbed in jealousy and need.
“Upstairs?” I suggested and got a growl of approval in response. Seemed my sexy were had lost the power of speech as well. I didn’t mind, I like ‘em big, muscly and growly.
He moved and scooped me up before I figured out what he was up to. Squeaking, I clung to his shoulders. “You had better not drop me,” I warned in a low voice as he carried me through the darkened house. “It would be a shame to blast this frankly awesome ass you have and turn you into a frog.”
A deep chuckle wound through the darkness as we made the stairs. Got to tell you, for a girl who is, frankly, a little on the curvy side, having a guy pick you up without breaking a sweat? That’s fucking sexy as hell. “Yeah, but frogs get fucked.”
I blinked. “Don’t you mean frogs get kissed and turn into princes?”
He shouldered the door to the guest room I was staying in, kicking it shut behind him before looking down at me. “I like my version better. Up against the wall or on the bed?”
I liked his version better. “I don’t care as long as some D action is going on.”
“Oh, some D action is definitely going on…” He grinned, a sudden flash of white teeth in the darkness, and dropped me on the bed. I bounced, about to rip him a new one for the dick move when he was over me. A lingering kiss stole the complaint right from my lips and by the time he lifted his
head, I was breathless and practically begging for more.
He didn’t disappoint, hard hands unhooking my belt to slide under my pants with a skill and dexterity that had his fingers stroking my clit before I could suggest he just rip the fuckers off. Pleasure rolled through me at the friction of his callused fingertips against my little pleasure button. I just about managed to keep it together enough to banish both of our clothes with a wave of my hand. After all, what use is magic if you can’t bloody well use it, right?
We both groaned as I parted my legs to give him better access and arched my back. The feel of his big body against mine was wonderful, better than I could have imagined (and I have a very good imagination), and the way he smelled had me wanting to rub against him like a cat in heat.
“Fucking hell,” I muttered, grabbing the pillow to muffle my cries of pleasure as he worked me up to the peak quicker than I’d ever gotten there before, even using my trusty BOB. “I’m gonna com—”
He cut me off with a kiss, pulling his hand away and moving over me. “Not yet,” he ordered in a hard voice, his eyes flashing in the darkness. “The first time you come, it won’t be over my hand, but my cock as it should be between ma—”
This time he stopped talking, shoving forward to distract me from the words he’d cut off. Instantly, all my attentions flew down to my nether regions. Fuck. Me. He was big. No, not big. H-U-G-E, with a capital fucking hell. I managed a choked little moan, holding my breath as my body parted to accommodate him. Hands braced either side of my head, he pulled back a little and pushed in again, and again. Working himself in bit by bit until he bottomed out with a groan.