The Prince of Darkness (The Freelancers Book 3)

by Lee Isserow

  Natan trundled over and put his hand on top of his father's.

  “It's okay if he doesn't know. You tried.”

  “He needs to know.”

  Natan shook his head.

  Jules sighed, and wished for some other way to explain it all to his husband. But it had been too long, there had been too many lies. One lie had led to the next, and there was no way to explain one without the whole stack of dominoes sent toppling over.

  “Cheer up!” Natan said, taking his father's head in his hands. “You cheer up, daddy cheers up. Lies are still there, but they're old lies. Just promise no new lies, 'kay?”

  Jules laughed, his son was smarter than he was. Wiser beyond his damn years, and he had never been more grateful for it than in that moment.

  He wrapped his arms around Natan.

  “Okay,” he said. “No new lies. I promise.”

  “Good,” the child said. “And you best not tell him. . .” he trailed off.

  Jules wasn't sure what he was referring to, and his expression read as such.

  “That you went to the Ethereal Garden. . . and met your grandpa. . .”

  Chapter 53

  The small window of success.

  Ana raised her glass, “To doing good!” she declared, slamming it against Rafe's, losing a fair amount of both their whisky in the process.

  “I don't know how much 'good' we actually did. . .“ he muttered, as he took a sip.

  “Shut up. We helped a guy get back to his family―”

  “We had to hurt a lot of people in the process. . .”

  “Magickians have glyphs, they heal up just fine.”

  “What about the guys you and Jules chopped into pieces? Or the men the Old One ate?”

  “They're the exception to the rule.”

  “Because they were evil?”

  “They pissed me off.”

  “Remind me not to piss you off. . .”

  “Is there any point reminding you? You're just going to piss me off all over again. . .” She indicated to Mallory that their glasses had suddenly emptied themselves, and thanked her graciously as they were refilled.

  “Why doesn't he look as happy as you look?” Mallory asked.

  “He's being a whiny old man.”

  “I think we left a case open-ended,” he clarified.

  “How so?”

  Rafe sighed, as he drunkenly recalled that Mallory had no knowledge of the magickal world, and would have to come up with a mundane translation for the events of the last few days.

  “We. . . reunited a father with his kidnapped husband and kid―”

  Ana cut in before he could fumble the finer details of what had happened. “And he thinks there's more to the story.”

  “You foiled a kidnapping?!” Mallory squealed with excitement.

  “I did most of the work, he's window dressing.”

  Rafe glared at her, but decided it was best not to get involved in her version of events.

  Instead, he dwelled on the facts. as much as they had been successful in saving the family, and not died in the process, or been forced to actually try and kill an ancient, powerful creature. . . something didn't sit right.

  The men that kidnapped Akif and the boy had no obvious endgame in sight. What would they have done if they had managed to kill the Old One. What would they do with all that power when it was at their disposal. Rafe had encountered more than his fair share of muscle and hired goons over the years, and that's what the kidnappers had felt like to him. . . They weren't smart enough to mastermind a whole scheme, and that meant the real mastermind behind it was still out there. . .

  “You're not drinking!” Ana shouted, directly into his face. “You should be drinking!

  He rolled his eyes and grabbed the newly filled glass that was waiting for him.

  “To being winning winners that always win at winning!” Ana declared, as she slammed their glasses together again.

  Rafe sipped at the whisky, and took a breath, tried to relish the win, the small window of success. Tried with all his might not to be terribly afraid that somewhere out there, some evil bastard was pissed as hell at the two of them for thwarting his efforts. Stewing in pure, unadulterated rage, as they quietly lusted. . . after the power of a god.

  Chapter 54

  One way or another

  Sitting at a desk in a bright room, flanked by three walls of white, and one of clear glass, the very man Rafe was afraid of was indeed stewing in his anger.

  But he was in no hurry to get revenge. He had all the time in the world, and he was more than comfortable biding that time.

  After all, that full blood 'thulu, that damn god and all the power it contained would be his one way or another. . . and nobody, not even the most powerful magickians in all the land, let alone the plethora of progeny he had littered around the globe, would stand in his way.

  If anything, as this excursion had proven. . . those children might well be the key to getting his hands on all the power he had ever dreamed of

  *

  *

  *

  *

  Keep reading for an exclusive preview of the next book in The Freelancers series!

  Rafe and Ana return in

  Spirited Words

  How do you fight something that knows you better than you know yourself?

  A plague is spreading. It writes on skin, bringing the innermost thoughts of its victim to the surface.

  Until there is no more skin to write on. Then... it brings death.

  Ana and Rafe are completely unaware of the plague, caught up in case after case - until someone they're close to is infected.

  Soon, it's a race against the clock to save them - and there's only one way to stop the spread.

  To pass it on.

  Spirited Words

  Peter Grossman was in the shower.

  He had been in the shower for close to an hour, and whilst the majority of his body was clean and heavily pruned, the skin on the inside of his wrist was red and raw from the frantic motion of scrubbing with a soapy nail brush. It had not broken the skin, not yet at least, but it was close. And if he kept at it for much longer, the water was sure to run red with blood.

  He washed the soap away to get a clear look at whether his attempt to scrub had been a success. The steaming jet from the shower prickled the injury further, stung the sore flesh. But he didn't care, not about the pain. He cared more that it had been a waste of damn time.

  The words remained.

  He stared at them, at it felt as though they were staring right back at him. 'Buy a notepad', such an innocent phrase, written in his own handwriting on his inner forearm. Bright blue ink, spider's legs branching out from the letters, forking along the crooks and valleys of his skin.

  He couldn't remember writing it, but had bought a notepad, done as his reminder had instructed.

  That was two days ago, and for those two days he had tried to wash it away at every possible moment―but still, it remained. If anything, it appeared to be darker, thicker, as if bolstering itself against his attempts to remove it from his flesh.

  He wondered if he had used some kind of joke pen―but could recall times in the past when he had written on himself with permanent marker. It had washed off, each and every one of those times, never was there this level of persistence from the ink of any pen.

  There was something about this that felt different. Beyond the fact that he couldn't recall writing it. No soap appeared to be able to remove it, whether he used hand wash or washing-up liquid, bleach or shower gel. He had tried brushes and pumice stones, wire wool and sponges. He had visited every pharmacy and supermarket, bought and tried every possible combination of cleaning product whether it was meant for skin or otherwise. But still, the words would not depart.

  The nail brush clattered to the floor of the shower. The water pooling around his feet was now tinted pink, blood dripping from the raw skin of his wrist.

  A shiver of horror tore across his
body, rippling down his spine. His knees felt weak, and he fell into a pile in the corner of the cubicle. His forearm was aching, skin torn, bleeding.

  But still, the message to himself remained.

  And soon, it would not be alone. . .

  Spirited Words is available

  exclusively from Amazon.com

  About ABAM.INFO

  ABAM, or 'A Book A Month', is a terrible experiment to see how long a former screenwriter can produce an original novella every month (along with companion audiobook) before he goes insane.

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  Thank you kindly for being an observer to my mental deterioration.

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