by Michael Todd
“You wouldn’t happen to like four-wheeling, would you?”
“Are you kidding?” He laughed. “I love it! I used to do it with my brothers all the time before…you know.” He gestured to the bar. “All of this.”
“How about we get out of here and go do some?” She had a glint of mischief in her eye.
“That sounds perfect,” he agreed.
She smiled and pulled him off the dance floor. Pandora had given her a bit of juice, pushing her to get the hell out of that bar so he was more than surprised to almost fall over as her little body—well, compared to his—yanked him away from the crowd. She grabbed her bag and looked at Damian, who looked up from his book with a lifted eyebrow. Katie smiled broadly and kissed him on the cheek, not saying a word as they rushed from the bar. She was very glad she had decided to take her truck that night. Noah’s mouth hung open as she beeped the alarm and got into the driver’s seat.
“Nice,” he said, climbing into the passenger side and buckling his seatbelt.
“I know the perfect place to have some fun,” she told him excitedly.
She headed out to the desert about forty-five minutes outside of town. When she found the turnoff she and Derek had taken, she pulled off the road and up into the hills, laughing as he held on tightly with a wild look in his eye.
They had an amazing time, taking turns running through the sand, jumping over the hills, and coming to a sliding halt on the other side. She liked how he looked in her truck, his big muscles tensing and relaxing as she alternately hit the brakes and slammed the gas down.
Finally she left the sand and headed for the mountainous terrain, driving up the slope as she’d done before. They sat there on the lookout talking about what they had just done, both their bellies hurting from laughing so much. When they were finally quiet, Katie couldn’t help but notice that he hadn’t made a move yet and she worried that he had lost interest. She didn’t need another brother; she had plenty of them.
He’s interested, Pandora hissed.
How do you know? Katie asked. He hasn’t tried anything.
He has a sign. It’s in his pants, and it’s ten inches long and about six fucking inches in diameter, Pandora told her. Unless it’s a sock. Holy shit, if that’s a sock I’m going to be pissed.
I doubt he wore a huge stuffed sock in his pants to the bar, Katie replied, exasperated.
You never know with men. It’s like socks in the bra, padding to look more desirable. Either way, it’s got the words “jump me” written all over it.
You don’t know that, Katie responded, sitting awkwardly next to him.
He smiled and took her hand. His hands were surprisingly smooth and gentle, and she could feel the electricity pulsing through her body. She hadn’t had that feeling in a very long time, and had almost forgotten what it was like to be nearly breathless from just holding a man’s hand.
Seriously? Pandora asked, sniffing their hormones. I don’t know what else you want. You are too damned confused for this century. You want to be treated like an equal, you want to do one thing on Monday, but something different if it’s a full moon. Tuesday is completely off the charts, and you want him to read your fucking inscrutable mind. I swear, I now understand exactly why the book was written.
What book? Katie snapped.
Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus. Pandora sighed. More like women are from hell. I’m so glad I’m not a man in this century.
He is acting totally appropriately, and not pushing anything on me whatsofuckingever, Katie argued. Which, I might add, is exactly how a man is supposed to behave toward a woman. Why are you snapping at me?
Because you are whining in my ear about wanting to know his intentions and annoying the hell out of me, Pandora said. It is very obvious what he wants. He’s a guy! What do you THINK he wants?
Not all guys are the same, Katie argued. Maybe he’s a gentleman.
Oh, please. Pandora scoffed. That snake in his pants is a big indicator. Ask him if he wants to fuck, because tomorrow you both might die.
I can’t handle you right now, Katie growled.
“Katie?” he said, making her jump.
“Mmmhmm?” she replied, trying to push the image of his manhood out of her mind.
“Do you like this life?” he asked. “Are you fulfilled?”
“I, uh, am I filled? I mean, fulfilled? In some ways I am very much fulfilled,” she answered, trying not to blush. “Are you?”
“In ways, yeah,” he agreed. “But sometimes I miss the idea of a partner. You know, a woman to spend my time with. Someone who can be my best friend.”
Oh boy, Pandora groaned. He is laying it on thick. Hey buddy! You don’t need to say all that stuff. Just touch her hoo-ha, and it’s in the bag!
Shush, Katie chastised her.
“I don’t know.” He laughed and looked out the window. “Maybe it’s just the old times rearing their ugly head again. It’s probably stupid.”
“It’s not stupid.” Katie smiled and gripped his hand tighter. “We are still human. We still crave that closeness; that relationship. We still want the same things we wanted before, we just have to figure them out in a different way.”
“You’re right.” He smiled. “You’re definitely right. I like sitting out here with you. I feel normal—like a regular guy hanging out with a beautiful woman.”
Oh yeah, I feel you buckling under the pressure already. Pandora laughed.
Be quiet, Katie demanded. I am not going to sleep with him.
In the darkness of the mountain, all you could hear was the sound of a zipper slowly being pulled down. Insects chirped from the bushes as Katie lay in the back of her Raptor, wrapped in the arms of a big burly man. Pandora was in seventh heaven.
ABOUT DAMNED TIME, she yelled.
Oh gawd, Pandora gasped. That’s bigger than… Well, that’s a big-ass snake.
Shut the fuck up, Katie mentally shrieked.
22
Stephanie stood at the kitchen counter staring at the pot of coffee, trying to keep her eyes open long enough to find a cup.
She had definitely drunk way too much the night before, and though her hangovers were usually pretty mild, that morning she felt like she had been at a rager all night. She forgot that when you dance the night away you tend to forget how much alcohol you have ingested.
She was pretty sure Korbin had carried her into the compound over his shoulder and put her to bed in her room. She was surprised she hadn’t hit on him, but if he had been carrying her she wouldn’t have been in any shape to be throwing out sexual demands.
She poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down at the kitchen table, holding the cup up to her nose. She looked up as Katie came through the door and smiled.
Katie nodded at her and strode over to the coffeemaker, looking more awake than normal. Stephanie ran through her memories from the night before and tried to figure out where Katie fit into them. The last thing she remembered was Katie on the dance floor with some hottie, but then she got lost in her own desires.
“Where did you go last night?” Stephanie took a sip of her coffee.
“I went four-wheeling with one of the guys from Amy’s team,” Katie told her nonchalantly. “Then I came back here. I think you guys were already in bed.”
“Mmmm, when I got back I was out like a light.” Stephanie groaned, eyeing Katie as she took a seat across from her. “That’s what shots of tequila and cheap beer do to me. This body is not recovering like my younger version used to, though.”
“Cuss out your demon,” Katie advised, not making eye contact.
“What’s up with you?” Stephanie asked. “You’re acting different than normal.”
“No, I’m not,” she argued, holding back a smile.
“Yes, yes you are. You are acting like you got… No… Did you… Nooo!” Stephanie gasped, covering her mouth.
Katie chuckled. “What in the world are you blabbering about?”
Stephanie pointed ac
ross the table at Katie. “YOU BITCH! YOU GOT LAID!”
“Shhh!” Katie reached over and slapped Stephanie on the hand. “Oh my God, tell the whole fucking world, why don’t you? How in the hell did you know that?”
Oh please! Pandora laughed. Anyone could tell from a mile away. First, you disappeared with a hot guy and didn’t come home until the sun came up. Second, you are beaming and have red cheeks, and you’re holding back a smirk. Third, you are acting all fluffy and light, like the world revolves around you. Fourth, that bitch was a madam, okay, and she has a sex demon in her. She can smell that shit a mile away. I told you point-blank you were never going to be able to hide it, but nooo! You wanted to act like you were Elizabeth Fucking Taylor.
I am not acting like that, Katie replied, putting her hand to her cheek. Am I?
You are practically screaming at the top of your lungs that you just got some dick. I’m serious; even Korbin would know just by looking at you.
“Okay, tell me all about it,” Stephanie demanded, suddenly awake. “Was he hot? Did he have a big…you know?”
“He was more than hot,” Katie whispered, giggling. “Muscles for days, blue eyes that almost completely hid his demon circles they were so blue, and yeah, his you know was probably the biggest I’ve ever encountered.”
“Oh my God,” Stephanie exclaimed, fanning herself with the napkin. “Did he know how to use it, though? He could have a billy club down there, but if he doesn’t know how to use it it’s a waste of a man. You just have to throw the whole man away and start over.”
Katie giggled through a mouthful of coffee. “No, he definitely knew what he was doing, and it was like he could read my fucking body. It was intense.”
“Oh my God, I love it.” Stephanie groaned. “You needed to get laid, like seriously. Did you know that while you were gone Korbin asked me out on a date?”
“Really?” Katie exclaimed excitedly. “It’s about damn time.”
“I know, right?” Stephanie laughed. “I was such a dipshit, too, I thought he was talking about an incursion, so I’m acting like it’s no big thang, telling him I didn’t want to get blood on my heels. Then I looked at his face. He was like a puppy dog. That was when I realized… Oh. My. Gosh! He is asking me on a real date. So we went out for Italian, and it was amazing.”
“I’m so excited for you guys,” Katie told her. “Seriously, you both deserve to be happy, and I’ve known forever that he had feelings for you. I knew he was scared, though. I’m glad he finally came to his senses and asked you out.”
“Me too.” Stephanie sighed and sipped her coffee. “Now I just gotta get used to navigating his very complex mind.”
Korbin was in his office right after the sun came up and he smiled at his coffee pot, thankful that he decided to install one in his office. He’d had a blast with Stephanie the night before, but she had been wasted when they got home so he’d put her to bed and sat close by, just making sure she was okay. Finally, he had gone to his own room and passed out until the alarm went off. It was going to be a slow day for him, but he was okay with that. He hadn’t had one of those in a very long time.
His office phone rang, and he picked it up.
“This is Korbin,” he answered.
“Korbin, this is the chief, over at the Los Angeles Police Department.” He sounded nervous as hell. “We have a problem.”
“What is it, Chief?” Korbin asked, sitting up straight and grabbing a pen.
“We had a call that two gangs were coming together, but then something strange happened out in the hills. We don’t really know what is going on, only that people are now missing. We sent a small search party out there first, figuring we would check it out before calling you guys, but they never came back. We heard people screaming into the radios about some kind of monster, then we lost all communication with them. I feel like at this point it is smarter to call you guys than lose a second search team. Those guys were veterans, so if they were screaming about a monster you can be sure as hell there is something out there that is not normal; not even for the hills of Los Angeles.”
T’Chezz looked at the drifting souls groaning through the fiery landscape. Moloch sat beside him, chewing on a human leg bone as he leaned back on the bench. He was trying to give T’Chezz some advice, but the demon was struggling to understand what he was trying to tell him. He wanted Moloch’s help, there was no doubt about that, but he felt like T’Chezz wasn’t listening and it was starting to frustrate him.
“You use brute force, T’Chezz,” Moloch told him, smacking his demon lips. “You throw your dregs against their best, but what you need to be thinking about is pitting their best against other humans who can match their skills. Humans who have our interests at heart and allow their demons to direct them. If they have a team hunting us, we should be playing right along with their little game.”
“I don’t see how that would rid us of the problem,” T’Chezz grumbled.
Moloch glanced up from his snack. “Because humans who fully accept enlightenment are much stronger than those forced to do the demon’s bidding, even if they are sharing their power with the human. These Enlightened on our side can be the power for you. Your personal hand of the devil.”
“I’ve been working on a plan, though,” T’Chezz replied. “I’ve been setting up these politicians; the rich old white men who pretty much run the world over there. They are slowly taking down their defenses from the inside while my demons crush the military teams in the rural areas.”
“Come with me,” Moloch ordered, tossing the bone into the lava below and licking his fingers. “I want you to watch something.”
Moloch stood up and cracked his knuckles, then waved his hands. T’Chezz watched as a portal began to open right in front of him.
Moloch nodded and walked into the portal, leaving T’Chezz standing there. Finally he went in after him, coming out safely on Earth.
This was why he wanted to move up. Moloch was much more powerful than he was, but he knew he could get to that point.
The system was designed to make the higher demons more powerful. The more levels you climbed, the more powers you possessed. T’Chezz had no doubt in his mind that he could be one of the most powerful of the Seventy-Two.
23
Korbin stood in the training area watching the team packing up their weapons and gear. They were headed for Los Angeles to help in any way they could.
He had a feeling this was going to be a big one, especially since the gangbangers had never returned and the search party had gone missing.
He knew the Chief had been nervous since the last big incident and didn't want to take any chances. He wouldn't have called unless he was almost certain there was an incursion happening.
Los Angeles was a busy place, and densely populated. If word got out, not only would people’s lives be in danger, but the media would be all over the damn thing.
Katie shoved two guns into her bag as backup, just in case, and ran her hand over the box of bullets. She had learned to hate big incursions; there was a good chance that not everyone would make it out alive.
Their team was tightly knit, more so than ever before; she couldn’t imagine losing one of her teammates. She shoved the thought from her mind. This was her life, and though she had gotten caught up in the other side of things, the reality of it was that she had to deal with this—the potential loss of family.
There were lives at stake; not just theirs, but the lives of those who couldn’t protect themselves from the forces that were seeping through the gates of hell.
Anybody else—anybody not familiar with this concept—would scoff at the idea of running off to put your life on the line to help some gangbangers, but not Katie.
She could still vividly remember those boys in the cemetery that night. They had stood strong and fast, trying to help; trying to hold back that demon with their illegal pistols.
She could still see the pile of bodies on the ground; not one of the gang members had wal
ked away from that fight. They may have been caught up in a lifestyle they shouldn’t have been, but when it came down to it they were brave. They had stood up for other innocent people, only to lose their lives.
Katie shook her head and shoved the box of bullets into the bag. This wasn’t the time for second thoughts.
The team loaded their gear into the helicopter and Korbin took the stick, having spent the last few months flying as much as he could. He didn’t have his pilot’s license yet, but he didn’t have time to wait for the pilot to get there. They needed to get to Los Angeles fast.
“I think we should skip the airport, boss,” Calvin suggested as he climbed in.
“I’d have to agree,” Derek said, his laptop in his lap. “This one is big, whatever it is, and we don’t need to waste time going to one airport and flying to another, only to have to take a car to the scene. It’s out there a ways, so our best bet is to fly right to it.”
“I agree with you both,” Korbin said. “I’d like to have my own ride there; it makes for a quicker exit.”
“Very true,” Derek agreed, nodding and closing his laptop.
“Except,” Korbin grumbled, “no one better throw a gravestone and crash my multi-million-dollar bird.”
“If that happens, you will know how I felt when I lost my beautiful baby-blue Ferrari,” Katie told him, shaking her head. “It was purely tragic.”
“Except we would all die,” Eric pointed out.
“Meh, maybe.” Katie dismissed the thought. “But if not, you would feel the intense yearning for revenge. Nobody messes with the ride.”
“You might be right.” Korbin buckled in. “Let’s hope we don’t have to find out.”
Katie nodded, still shaking her head thinking about the loss of her baby.
Sure, she loved her Raptor and wouldn’t trade it for the world, but she still thought about her first love—the California T, sitting so shiny on the lot as it waited for her to take it home.