by Jessa Slade
No excuse except those dreams that always ended in flames and darkness.
He pounded his head once into the pillow and stared up at the ornate headboard above him. Entire grave-yards boasted fewer chubby, cavorting cherubs than this oak behemoth. He couldn’t imagine what the wood-worker had been thinking. It would be impossible to have sex in this bed.
Yeah, that could be the other excuse for no good night’s sleep.
In five minutes, he’d run a cold shower, downed a cup of burned coffee, and ensconced himself behind his desk.
After the league’s last refuge had been poisoned in the tenebrae attack, they’d retreated to one of their holdings fronted by an architectural-salvage warehouse. The warehouse lacked the style of their previous retro hotel, but it had a kitchen, a few apartments, a dormitory, and an armory. If there was one thing the league did well, it was break things and pick up the pieces. The three-legged walnut desk he’d propped up on a knock-off Grecian urn at least had a certain presence. Anyway, it was big.
He gripped the thick edge and waited for Sera’s knock. She entered and stopped just inside the door, while Jilly marched up to the other side of his desk and tossed her puffy silver coat on the guest chair.
She planted her hands on her hips, which puffed up other parts of her. Under her snug short-sleeved T-shirt, the roundness of her breasts seemed counterintuitively soft. He found himself distracted by the butterfly tattoo that rode the upper curve revealed by the V neckline, the navy cotton setting off her anger-flushed tawny skin.
“What the fuck?” she snapped.
Good thing it was a big desk. He slanted a glance at Sera, who grinned and sidled out.
He returned his attention to Jilly and wondered if the oak headboard would have blocked more of the fury that vibrated off her. No. No thinking of Jilly in his bed. “Which part is fucked?”
She glared at him, and for a moment he was mesmerized by the golden snap in her eyes, the tint of flames in straw.
“If you wanted to recruit me, sell me yourself.” She faltered, as if that hadn’t come out as she intended. “You knew I’d come, given the chance to find out what’s happening to the kids on the street. You didn’t have to send Sera.”
“She had the best chance of convincing you.”
“And do you always use people for what they can do for you?”
He steeled himself against the sting of her words. He was spread too thin to regret delegating when necessary. Not when he knew that strain would bring him one step closer to a break the league might not survive.
Not when her burning eyes were the straw to break the beast of burden.
“I save myself for the fun parts,” he said coolly. “I’m sure Sera explained what we’re up against.”
“She explained a lot.” Jilly set her chin off-kilter, as if she was holding back words. “What are we doing to chase these monsters—what did you call them?—these tenebraeternum off the streets?”
“ ‘ We’?” Liam leaned back in his chair and templed his fingers. He waited for the flare of triumph at bringing another tyro aboard. God knew, he needed this ardent young fighter in front of him. Instead, her fierce zeal made him feel older than the dirt that crept into every nook of the league’s salvaged stronghold.
And his need would never be assuaged.
“The tenebraeternum is the place where the demons come from,” he said. As if reciting the chronicles of league history would relieve the ache that arrowed through him. “The lesser demons en masse we call the horde-tenebrae.”
She wrinkled her nose at the impromptu lesson. “Sera already made it clear I might not even survive my demon’s ascension. If I only have another hour or another day, then I want to find out what happened to Andre and make sure the things and the place never bother any of the kids again.”
She paced in front of his desk, all impetuous curves and spiky nerves. He tightened his jaw against the clomp of her impatient boots. She wasn’t much more disciplined than the kids—streetwise teen hooligans, more like—she claimed as her own. But he’d bent wilder spirits to this unending task. “I can’t promise that.”
“I don’t believe in promises anyway. Give me something real I can sink my teeth into.” She swung to face him, her hand cocked on the hip of her low- riding jeans. “Give me something bigger than that stupid box cutter and I’m your warrior woman. For tonight anyway.”
He felt the tightening in his muscles, the prickle of his skin, as the demon in him stirred at the unruly battle cry in her words. He wrestled down its ready and willing mayhem, so in tune with the young woman before him. The demon possessing him might take hungry leaps toward repentance, but every swing of his war hammer thrust him away from the desperate detachment keeping what was left of his soul—what was him—intact.
Once, he’d worked with his hands to create; now he was half ravager. And the molten gold of Jilly’s eyes only lured him closer to his doom, like a stupid moth to singeing flame.
“Come on, then.” He thrust to his feet and strode past her.
“Where are we going?”
“I’m giving you what you want.” Avoiding the jumble of iron railings, reclaimed brick, and unique old tile, he led her through the halls. The stairs down to the basement were hung with empty picture frames, too opulent to hang above any couch and too battered for a museum. At the bottom of the stairs, he slapped his palm over a pale green lit square. When it beeped at him, he threw open the double doors. The lights brightened automatically.
Axes, double-edged swords, daggers, razor-tipped gauntlets, and more lined the sterile white walls. Even under the buzzing fluorescent fixture, the blades shone with brutal, honed beauty.
Jilly cleared her throat. “At least I know where to arm myself if World War Three breaks out.”
“It already has.” Liam strode into the room, then turned to survey her. He tried to keep his gaze critical as he swept her once from blue-streaked locks to heavy black shit-kicker boots. “Good weight on the bottom, at least.”
She stiffened at his perusal. “You saying my ass is big?”
It took all his unholy strength to move his gaze onward. “I’m saying, no sense throwing off your balance with an oversized weapon.”
“I’ve handled bigger weapons than yours.”
Her bold words rebounded between them. The first hint of uncertainty he’d seen in her—even when she faced the ferales in the alley with nothing more than a dull razor blade—flushed her cheeks with color, and she bit her lip.
The hunger that stirred in him at the slight vulnerability had nothing to do with the demon. He swallowed hard against it, and leveled his tone coolly. “No doubt your bravado has served you well. Did the demon come to you with the promise that now you’d finally be able to carry through with all that bluster?”
She stiffened at the question; her cinnamon-honey eyes narrowed.
“The demon always makes an offer we haven’t the strength to refuse,” he explained. “It knows us better than we know ourselves. I suppose that is the nature of temptation.” How fortunate for him that he’d been around long enough to amass scars of resistance.
“I’m tempted,” she said, “to grab that spiked mace and take a swing.”
He forced himself to focus on work. Pairing an unproven talya with the right weapon was vital. “If you want to try it out—”
“Just on you.”
Ah. He balanced on the balls of his feet as the demon shifted eagerly within him. “Always happy to help my tyros, my new fighters.”
“Yours?” When she wrinkled her nose, the piercing there glimmered.
Oh, so the ancient military term didn’t bother her, just the implicit hierarchy. He crossed his arms over his chest. “I am the boss.”
Her hands clenched as if longing to wrap around that mace handle. Or maybe just his neck. “If you’re the boss, you should know human resources regulations don’t allow you to ask how people were lured to the dark side.”
“You’re no
t a human resource anymore, and technically, we’re the repenting side, which is at least a half dozen steps from the dark side.” Thinking of her hands on his skin wasn’t helping his focus at all. But how had the demon cozened her if not through her boldness?
He took a long step back—physically and mentally—and swept out one hand. “Choose.”
In his many years commanding the league, he’d learned a new talya’s choice of weapon indicated something about the man and the teshuva inside him. He was getting ahead of himself, putting Jilly through his tests so soon, but the urgency that had ridden him since the appearance of her unbound demon strengthened when she was near.
And with her hell-bent attitude, he suspected she might need all the weapons she could get.
He held himself silent and still though every muscle twitched to follow as she stalked past him to circle the room. She paused near the mace, slanted a molten glance at him, and kept moving.
She passed the white- men-can’t-jump wall of massive, double-handed swords representing a wide, bloody swath of European history. The aesthetically organized Asian collection of katanas and throwing stars earned not even a second look. Instead she came around again to the blunt-force-trauma corner. “No guns? No rocket launchers?”
“Rocket launchers tend to get noticed. We try not to be. More important, our teshuva need to get up close and personal with the tenebrae to destroy them.”
“I tracked down my sister’s pimp about a year ago, trying to find out where she’d gone. He stabbed me.” She put her hand against her left side, just under her breast. “Punctured a lung. Nicked my heart. But you already knew that—didn’t you?—from the dossier your people put together. Did it tell you that, even coughing up blood, I managed to knock out a few of his teeth?”
Liam pursed his lips. “So you’re saying you don’t need a mace.”
The protective cup of her hand slid around to settle on her hip again. “I’m saying I don’t need a mace.”
He wanted to argue in favor of the mace, full Kevlar—never mind that body armor interfered with the draining of demonic emanations, which was the sole reason for their immortal existence—hell, throw in a popemobile too. After all, the ferales had sniffed her out for some nefarious reason. And she was the one who’d asked for a weapon.
Ah, of course. He’d dealt with some angry, violent men in his time with the league, but nary a one as prickly as Jilly. She needed a weapon—she might even want one—but she wouldn’t want to need his. Or him.
Understanding didn’t blunt the poke of annoyance at her rejection. Just what he needed: yet another fiercely temperamental, insubordinate diva to go with the others—female and male—he already had. The teshuva seemed inexplicably drawn to the type, himself excluded, which often made him wonder how he had ever become their leader. Despite her rebellious independence, she’d come back to him. He would make her see she needed his protection.
And yet, he couldn’t quite curtail a pang of reluctant respect. Like all incoming talyan, she had to be confused and scared, but unlike some tyros he’d dealt with, she hadn’t collapsed in a catatonic trance, overwhelmed by the teshuva’s energies. Instead, he suspected her teshuva was going to have its hands full reining her in. Much as he himself would.
Refusing to indulge the image of his hands full of her, he gave a deliberately casual shrug. “When you change your mind about the weapon . . .”
“I’ll be sure to let you know.”
He withheld a snort. She’d voluntarily admit to anything that smacked of weakness only after a snowball survived August in Chicago. Which was even less promising than its chances in hell.
She marched out of the weapons room but paused as he closed the door. “Sera said I’d meet the rest of the crew.”
He hesitated, picturing the predatory interest of his wayward, womanless fighters. “Later. They’re recovering from last night’s battles.” When she opened her mouth to protest, he added sharply, “You’ll be one of them soon enough.”
From the defiant flicker of violet in her eyes—obvious in the basement gloom—he thought soon might come even sooner. Instead of stopping at the main floor, he continued up, their steps clanging on the steel treads, until they reached the roof. He shoved open the access door to a swirl of frigid March air.
Thin clouds blanked the sun into a matte white disk that leached the dimensions from the surrounding industrial district. The gray-walled buildings looked flat as cardboard cutouts. Even the graffiti, unreadable at this distance, assuming it was ever readable, had dulled.
The wind rattled Jilly’s blue-spiked hair but couldn’t bend it. “King of all you survey, hmm?”
“Not even a knight,” he demurred. “I want you to see what we’re fighting for.”
“We’ll be hailed as conquering heroes, no doubt.”
He shook his head. This part of the test was always hard for the tyros to swallow. “No one besides us will ever know. Demons stalk the Magnificent Mile as often as the South Side, but the battleground doesn’t matter.”
“Not so different from my day job. I did three-quarters of my work on the street anyway. And just like those horde-tenebrae, the kids are half invisible to most people. Hell, most people didn’t even see me.”
Did she truly understand, or was this more of her bravado? Against the bleak landscape, her bright hair and warm skin tones gleamed. “They’d see plenty more hell if not for us.” He curled his fingers into fists to stop himself from reaching out to her and tilted his face to the sky. “Unfortunately, this is as close as you’ll get to heaven.”
She pivoted to face him. The wind bit through his shirt and he knew she must be equally chilled, but she stood without shivering. Though the top of her head didn’t even reach his shoulder, she sized herself against him with a long, slow look even more deliberate than the one he’d given her. Was it his imagination, or did she linger over places a good repentant demon should make him forget?
She breathed out a soft noise that left him no indication which way she had judged him. “This close, huh? And I haven’t even been properly damned yet.”
She took a step forward, tilting her head as if to get another perspective.
He tightened his hands into fists at his side, not against the cold, but against a rising heat that seemed to spark off those spiced eyes. “You will be. Soon.” Obviously some demon was at work that she would tease him so.
“We have hours before nightfall,” she said. “Hours before I can meet your fighters. Or my demon. So let’s go. Show me something to make me believe I have a better chance if I join you.”
And that latent demon in her apparently still had power to call to him, because he—who of all the talyan should know better than to give in to temptation—followed her.
CHAPTER 5
Jilly tried not to feel him like a shadow at her back, dark and silent, down the stairs. She wasn’t ready for whatever he had to show her, even if, as Sera implied, she now had supernatural fighting skills to rival her old superfriends’, but she’d be damned—again, apparently—if she let him know that. They retrieved their coats from his office and headed out to the street.
Despite her purposeful stride, in one long step he moved up to pace her. “I told you we’d look into Andre’s disappearance. We discovered his last general whereabouts.” Liam steered her down the sidewalk. His big hand cradled her elbow, the old- fashioned gesture so instinctive she wondered if the women he favored had trouble walking on their own. “He had a favorite corner. You already knew he was dealing solvo.”
She lifted her arm out of his reach. “He was kicked out of the halfway house because of it. You said solvo has been connected to some bad shit.”
“Soullessness,” he reminded her. “Yeah, that’s about the worst.” He ran his fingers through his hair, then drew one lock forward around the tattoo that spread from his temple, not quite hiding it, but enough that a passerby wouldn’t notice anything strange. Just a tall, lean man with eyes that had seen t
oo much.
She recognized that look. She stuffed her hands in her pockets, although it was harder to bury the unwelcome rush of sympathy. “How can a drug steal your soul? I mean, other than the metaphorical soul stealing.”
“Not steal, in this case. Dissolve. Gone forever.” When they crossed the street, he passed behind her, edging her with the bulk of his body to the inner part of the sidewalk. “It’s a djinni weapon.”
“Djinni?”
“In the hierarchy of malevolent forces, the djinn rank among the most treacherous. The malice are clever but weak; the ferales strong but dim. Djinn are smart, strong, and unstoppable. And they possess humans just like the repentant teshuva. Only the djinn aren’t sorry for any of it.”
“Humans possessed by evil incarnate?” She shook her head. “That’s no more shocking than repentance incarnate, I suppose.”
His gaze weighed on her, heavier than his hand. “You don’t have to pretend this is easy.”
What were her other choices again? “Would ignoring what’s right before my eyes be easier?”
The faintest dimple appeared in one cheek as he gave her a lopsided smile. “That’s what most people believe. Of course, if you were most people, you wouldn’t be here with me now.”
She couldn’t decipher from his tone if he was pleased or pained at her presence.
Once clear of the sparsely traveled warehouses, they caught a cab across town. The backseat of a sedan had never seemed so confining. As he maneuvered the long length of his thighs, he took up his legroom and half of hers. Pressed against her door, she avoided the open flap of his duster, but she couldn’t escape her awareness of him. Even in stillness, big hands resting on his knees, he radiated a compelling force. More than the heat of his rangy body that seemed to lull the tension in her muscles, beyond the unique male scent of him that teased her with a hint of woodsmoke and heather, his aura of effortless dominion captured her focus despite her very best intentions not to be awed. The demon, or the man? She hoped it was the demon, as unwise as that sounded, because entrapment by a demon seemed more forgivable than being drawn to a man who broke all her private rules: too big to throw out, too tough to care, or too hard to forget.