With This Ring: Imp Series, Book 11

by Dunbar, Debra

  “Thanks.” He put his hands on my cheeks and gave me a sloppy kiss. “Missed you, Ma.”

  “I missed you too.” I looked over his shoulder to see Nyalla. “Thanks for taking care of him. I got caught up in a few things and didn’t have access to my phone.”

  Nyalla smiled. “I’m just glad you’re back. I grilled up bratwurst and some corn. Are you hungry?” She headed to the French doors that led out to the back patio.

  “Starving.” I set Lux down. “Oh, and I’ll clean up all the dead rats after dinner.”

  Nyalla stopped and looked over her shoulder. “Sam, there’s something weird with those rats. At first I thought it was just animals poisoned by one of the neighbors, but there’s so many of them. And they don’t look like they were all that healthy before they were poisoned. One of them was nothing more than a skeleton. It tried to bite me.”

  I felt a flame of rage tear through me. Nyalla was mine. No one would hurt her and live. No one.

  “I’ll find out what’s going on.” I tried to keep my voice cool and composed as the fire tore through me. “In the meantime, you and Lux use the back door if you see any animals out front.”

  While Nyalla was finishing dinner, I sent Gregory a quick message letting him know I was home, then I walked over to visit the Lows. Thankfully Snip was there. I pulled him aside and asked him if he remembered Terrelle.

  “Yep, although I haven’t seen her since Aruba,” he told me.

  “Can you go get her? I need her to come to my house. I’ve got a job for her.”

  Snip shot me a puzzled frown. “I don’t know where she is, Mistress.”

  Of course he didn’t. I expanded my awareness, opened myself up to all the demons this side of the gates, then traced the energy signature I knew belonged to Terrelle. Thank the fuck at least this part of my abilities still worked. Still, the ability to sense other demons was so new to me, and it still felt very weird. How did Samael get used to sensing everyone in his choir? How did any of the archangels?

  “Orando, Florida,” I told Snip. “I’m not exactly sure where in Orlando, but I think she’s near the penguins at Sea World. Tell her to pack because I’m not positive how long she’ll be staying. Maybe a week. Maybe a month. Can you do that?”

  The Low puffed his chest out. “Of course, Mistress. I’ll get right on it. Will you teleport me there, or should I purchase a plane ticket?”

  Ugh. I couldn’t teleport—either me or anyone else. “Take a plane down. You and Terrelle will need to fly back too.”

  Snip headed off to the airport and I walked back to the house and began cleaning up the dead rats. Then I went inside to shower, coming down just in time to help Lux set the table. It was amazing to have a home cooked meal for once. Deciding I should do my part, I cleaned up the dishes after dinner while Nyalla read stories to Lux.

  I was ready to take a food-coma nap on the sofa when Gregory appeared in my living room. He took one step toward me, and halted. He could tell. Just one look at his face and I knew he knew. And he was smart enough to not say a word.

  “Did I miss dinner?” He smiled over at Nyalla as he picked up Lux and walked the rest of the way to where I sat on the couch.

  “Leftovers are in the fridge,” Nyalla told him. “I grilled. Sam called me to say she’d be late, and I knew Lux would be hungry. It was fun to cook for once.”

  “Well, thank you. And thank you for watching over Lux while we were occupied,” Gregory told her

  She blushed pink. “It was nothing. I love taking care of him. He’s smart, and fun, and so sweet.”

  Nyalla went into the kitchen and warmed up a plate of food for Gregory, then scooted off to meet some friends. We both listened to Lux tell us about his day, holding off anything more serious until the little angel went up to bed.

  After tucking Lux in for the night, Gregory and I came downstairs, but instead of sitting beside me on the sofa, he went into the kitchen. A few minutes later he returned with the bottle of Van Gogh Double Espresso Vodka from my freezer and two shot glasses.

  Pouring us both a shot, he put a glass in my hand and sat down. “What happened to you?”

  “First tell me what you see, or feel. What does this look like from the outside?”

  He tilted his head, narrowing his eyes. “Like you’re covered in thick clear plastic. I can see you, but everything about you that’s an Angel of Chaos is under the plastic. I can’t touch you. It’s like you’re in a giant cell where only your corporeal self is free to move about.”

  I let out a breath and downed the shot. It was icy cold and tasted like bitter coffee with an afterburn that scorched my throat. As it settled in my stomach, I felt the alcohol shoot right up to my brain, leaving me with a pleasant fuzziness. As much as I tried to experience every sensory pleasure and pain as a demon, somehow feeling it all as a human was…different. More, somehow. It gave me a new appreciation for these seven billion beings walking around each day.

  “I was worried it was all gone,” I confessed. “That all you’d see was a human me.”

  He sat his shot glass on the coffee table and pulled me into his arms. “You’re still there. Whatever happened, it didn’t destroy the demon part of you, leaving only a human shell. And even if it had, you’d still be my imp, my Cockroach.”

  My vision blurred with tears and I buried my face into the soft cotton of his shirt, letting all the fear leach out of me and into his strong arms. When I felt better, I wiped my nose on his shirt and sat back, giving him a watery smile.

  “So, any idea how to break me out of this clear plastic prison?”

  He reached forward to take a lock of my hair and rub it between his fingers. “I’d prefer to know what happened before I start attempting to smash my way through whatever it is imprisoning you.”

  “I think this all has to do with Project Woo-woo.” I picked up his shot glass and drained it before settling back in his arms to tell him the whole story, from my meeting with the president, to my stint in jail.

  “And this weapon was a gun? A human firearm that has been modified by sorcery to neutralize our abilities?”

  I nodded. “From what you’re describing, I’m thinking it acts like the elven nets and the elven collars did, except there’s nothing to physically remove to undo the effect.”

  “Do you want me to pay a visit to this sorcerer Gareth?” Gregory’s voice was dark and menacing. It totally turned me on.

  “No, I’d rather do it myself. He knows me. We’ve done a lot of business together in the past. I know this doesn’t sound very impish, but I think we’re better off not sending in the big guns here—that’s you, in case you didn’t realize it. You’re the biggest of the big guns.”

  “Are you referring to when I manifest human sexual organs?”

  He was teasing. I felt lighter, as if a burden had been lifted from me. If Gregory was teasing, joking about sex, then this couldn’t be too bad. He could still see me somewhere beneath this spell. It would all be okay.

  And that realization allowed me to stuff the worry and fear under the rug with the rings and think strategically.

  “That’s the big gun’s big gun,” I teased back. “I do want to see if this is something you can break through. Snip is out finding Terrelle. She’s an information demon, a Noodle. If anyone knows how this weapon works and if there any cracks in the system, she will. Worst case scenario, I’ll wait until my trial. I’m assuming they’ll reverse it then if I’m acquitted.”

  “Doesn’t the human justice system take months, or sometimes years? Now is not the time for you to be powerless even for such a short time.”

  I agreed. “If you or Terrelle can’t break it, I’ll get Gareth to reverse it. I’m going to meet with him in a few days. But I don’t like the idea of the humans holding the only cure on this type of weapon.”

  Gregory leaned forward and filled both shot glasses again. “I understand the humans want a way to fight back if an angel or a demon gets out of hand, but the potential
for abuse here is substantial.”

  “True. But if we have a way of reversing it, then we can correct cases where an angel or demon has been unfairly shot. And if the shooting was justified, then they can just suffer through the human legal system.”

  “We wouldn’t want the antidote to have widespread availability though,” Gregory mused. “Let the humans have the comfort of some control, and let both angels and demons know that there will be serious consequences for their actions. We’ll let the humans manage justice their way and only intervene in cases where the angel or demon is clearly in the right.”

  Like me. Or like Lux truly not understanding that what he was doing was wrong by human standards.

  “So we’ll need to keep quiet about any method we have of reversing the effect,” I said. “Just keep it within the Ruling Council.”

  I liked this idea. Responsibility for policing demons breaking laws would no longer be on my plate. Let the humans deal with it. I’d laugh at those who got stuck in jail, and tell them that maybe next time they’d follow the rules, or just stay in Hel.

  And as for the angels…well, I especially liked the idea of humans being able to plug those jerks in the ass and stick them in jail. Those stuffy pricks deserved to sleep on hard metal benches and get yelled at by human judges.

  “Sounds like an optimal plan.” Gregory handed me both shots of vodka. “Drink up.”

  He didn’t have to tell me twice. I sucked down the contents of both glasses, amazed at how incredibly drunk I was. Damn, I was a cheap date as a human. Four shots and I was practically under the table.

  “Ready?” Gregory asked.

  “Yessssh,” I slurred. “Ready.”

  I stared at him. He stared at me.

  “Are you doing anything?” I asked.

  “Clearly not anything that’s working,” he drawled.

  He pulled me onto his lap wrapping his arms around my waist. I rested my head on his shoulder and enjoyed the hug. Damn, I was drunk. If he kept this up, I was going to fall asleep here and now.

  “I’m guessing that’s not working either?” he asked.

  “Nope,” I murmured, snuggling my face against his neck.

  “I’m going to try something else,” he told me. “It might hurt.”

  “Mmmm.” He was so warm, smelled so good. What did angels wash their clothes in? Did they even wash their clothes? His shirt smelled like sunshine.

  Something deep inside me pinched. Tight. Hard. It was like a ghostly hand had grabbed my intestines with a vice grip and twisted. My hands fisted, my shoulders were rigid as I braced against the pain. There was a sharp tearing sensation and I gasped, trying to jerk away from Gregory.

  He stopped whatever he was doing and held me tight, rubbing my back until I was able to breathe again.

  “I punched through, but couldn’t completely tear apart the barrier without possibly damaging you.”

  I laughed weakly. I’d been damaged before. I’d been so damaged that I’d needed to live in a bucket as slime mold for what felt like fucking forever. While I didn’t want to go through that again, I didn’t want to be trapped as a human until some asshole judge reversed the spell.

  Gregory continued stroking my back and I remained curled up in his arms for a while longer before sitting up and taking stock of my condition. The first thing I noticed was that I was sober. The second thing was that I felt…something.

  Frowning, I tried to teleport to the kitchen. Nope. Then I tried to create electricity and nearly squealed when sparks jumped from one hand to the other. Desperate, I tried to reach out to Gregory’s spirit-self with my own. Nope on that as well. It was like shoving my hand between the bars of a jail cell, straining to reach something across the room.

  “Do it again,” I urged him. “Try to make the hole bigger. Let’s see if we can crack it open.”

  He reached up and touched my cheek. “I don’t want to hurt you, Cockroach.”

  “Hurt me, baby.” I turned my head and kissed his hand. “Do it. Just once more.” I’d endured a fuckton of pain in my life. It would be totally worth it to see if he could undo whatever the cops in Phoenix had done to me.

  He stared at me for a while, then nodded. “All right. I’m going to try something a bit different.”

  With no more warning than that, he dove into me. I felt the scorching heat of his spirit-self. My skin blistered, my clothing singeing. The torn edges of my magical prison twisted and melted, cracks spiraling outward. The heat radiated through the opening, searing my own spirit-self with an agonizing fire. I was burning. Inside and out, I was burning.

  My physical body thrashed in flames. I tried to scream, the sound dying as my lungs charred. Through the agony, a part of me wondered if I’d be able to recreate my physical form. That thought would have terrified me years ago, but now I trusted Gregory to keep me safe. Even if my corporeal form died, even if I could not form so much as a microscopic body to live in, Gregory would hold me close inside his own form. He’d protect me. I trusted him more than I trusted anyone.

  Suddenly the heat vanished, leaving me freezing cold, every nerve in my body screaming with pain. I looked down to see the blackened skin of my arm, a yellowish fluid oozing from the cracks.

  Fix yourself. Recreate your form.

  Gregory’s words were unspoken. I sucked in a painful breath, realizing that I heard him. I heard the angel-speech. And I’d inhaled with lungs that should not have been able to function at all.

  Concentrating, I slowly repaired nerves, muscles, blood vessels and skin. What should have been done in a blink of an eye took me about twenty minutes of focused effort. But I did it. Finally breathing easy, I sat up and unfurled my wings, knocking shot glasses and the half-empty bottle of vodka off my coffee table.

  “Fuck, this feels good.” I grinned at Gregory. “You are a damned god, Asshole. I don’t care what anyone else says, you’re a god.”

  “I am not a god.” His smile faded. “Don’t ask me to do that again, Cockroach. Don’t ever ask me to do that again.”

  “Oh trust me, I don’t want to ever go through that again. How the hell anyone survived going up against you in battle, I’ll never know. Fuck, you’re hot. I mean, you’re hot as in sexy, but you’re also hot as in hot. Like you could burn your way through a small planet hot.”

  “I believe I could incinerate a moderately sized solar system, although it would be taxing.”

  So modest. I rolled my eyes, remembering that Samael wasn’t the only archangel who had the sin of pride. Though it probably wasn’t pride if it was true, and I got the idea that Gregory was not exaggerating his powers in the least.

  I reached out and touched his spirit-self, delighted that I could still do so. But as thrilled as I was with my newly regained abilities, I was still very aware that some of my prison remained intact. There were jagged edges of it that still hindered me. I hoped they’d break free in time, but if they were still there in the next few days, I’d confess to Gareth what had happened and see if I could buy an antidote.

  In the meantime, I was relatively free, and enormously grateful that I had this big jerk of an angel on my side. Mine. I snuggled against him, yawned, and this time I did fall asleep.

  Chapter 9

  I was up uncharacteristically early the next morning, testing to see what I could and couldn’t do. Teleportation was still a no. I had wings, though and that was certainly a hell of a lot faster than most human modes of transportation. I could summon electricity, but not quite to the level of lightning. My energy attacks were sadly the equivalent of smacking someone with a broom. My sword did appear when I called it, but I couldn’t get it to change shape or do anything beyond what a normal sword would do.

  Basically I wasn’t much of an angel or an imp right now, if I used those yardsticks to measure my abilities. What I did have was a shit-ton of energy still stored inside me. I could fix injuries, but couldn’t manage to grab enough of the energy to recreate my entire form. Transmutation was the rea
l magic of demons, and right now I sucked at it.

  Devouring? I wondered if I still had that ability or not. I suspected I did, but wasn’t willing to sacrifice someone to test it out.

  “You’ll recover.”

  I nearly had a heart attack at Gregory’s voice behind me. Normally I could feel him just as I could my demons—more so, actually. But this morning I’d been focusing so hard on what I could and couldn’t do I hadn’t noticed the archangel coming down the stairs.

  He wrapped his arms around me. “You are indestructible, my Cockroach. No matter what happens, you always recover.”

  “I just need to devour an entire archangel this time,” I teased.

  “No, you just need to do whatever your chaotic impish self feels like doing, and things will fall into place.” He nuzzled my hair. “They always do with you, even if the journey is often incredibly painful.”

  I smiled and leaned back against him. “Is Lux up yet?”

  “Sleeping as if he actually needed to do so.” Gregory’s spirit-self reached out to caress mine. “Thank you for texting me about that wild gate in Ireland, by the way. I don’t know what intuition led you to check on it, but I’m glad you did. We put up a barrier around it to protect the humans and their livestock, and I assigned one of my angels to keep an eye on the area, just in case it reappears and something tries to come through again.”

  I turned in his arms to face him. “Did your guy ever find whatever things killed those ten angels?”

  He shook his head. “The humans saw nothing. There were no deaths beyond those angels. Not even a cow was killed, and nothing has been out of place since that night—except for the reappearance of the wild gate, that is.”

  “Good. Maybe they were freaked out at coming through and having to defend themselves against a bunch of angels, so they went back home. It’s not like I saw anything when I stuck my head through the gate either.”

  Gregory sucked in a breath. “You did what?”

  “Stuck my head through.” I patted him on the chest. “Don’t worry, I put my arm through a few times first, just to check. And I made sure the majority of my body was on this side.”