Demon Fire (The Angel Fire Book 3)

by Marie Johnston

  He rubbed the center of his chest. Air disappeared from his lungs and he wasn’t confident he could draw in another breath. Grief was an insidious beast like that. One moment, he was fine. Then he thought of the life he’d had and everything he’d lost, and the gravity of it crushed him as completely as if it were a physical force.

  If Sierra cared to notice her surroundings, she’d never guess a thing about his old life. There were no certificates. No medals. No knickknacks. And definitely no pictures.

  He’d come here to forget.

  The storm had passed. He’d shoveled the roof clear of the heavy snowfall. Cleared out the drive all the way to the highway, which wasn’t far. He hadn’t exactly lied to Sierra about that. They weren’t close to an interstate. But the cabin wasn’t far off the highway.

  There was no good goddamn reason Sierra was still here, but there she was. In his bed.

  She might be healing, but her mind was shut down. He couldn’t shuffle her off to be someone else’s problem until she had a snowball’s chance in hell of caring for herself.

  Anger gnawed at him. Why couldn’t he be a heartless prick?

  Call the police. Get her the hell out of his house. He’d be done.

  With her gone, he wouldn’t look around his cabin and see a whole lot of nothing. His whole life boiled down to a secluded cabin where he didn’t bother to talk to his shadow, much less help another person.

  He wasn’t a hero anymore. He’d learned too late that he’d never been a hero.

  He let his gaze roam over Sierra’s face, the only part of her sticking out of the blankets. She hadn’t outright showered, but she’d summoned enough energy to clean herself up and give herself a sink bath. He’d ripped up an old T-shirt so it wouldn’t cling to her back, and she’d tied it off behind her so it wouldn’t gape open and bare her front. She also wore a pair of his boxers. She’d gotten them to stay up and he hated that he was curious to know how.

  He hated that he was curious at all. Controlling boyfriend? Something about that story had soured his mood. It would fit why she didn’t have a single possession and was nowhere near where she claimed home was. But it wasn’t right. She’d lied.

  Was it something about him that attracted women who couldn’t tell the truth to save their life?

  What was it about him that thought he could help these women? He of all people knew how badly it would end.

  Sierra’s eyes fluttered open. He didn’t bother to look away. She knew by now that he wasn’t a creep, unless she considered the way he pestered her to drink some water as a sign of perversion.

  “You should get up.” He said it at least once a day and he meant it more each time. At first, it was because the sooner she was mobile, the faster he could get her out. Each day that went by, a different sense of urgency mounted.

  He had plenty on his conscience. He wasn’t going to add letting a woman he’d rescued succumb to whatever demons haunted her.

  “I’m tired.”

  “I know. You’ll get stronger the more you move.”

  Her pink lips turned down. His gaze landed on those a moment too long. She was attractive in a rumpled way, and he should fear the thought of her actually taking a shower and wearing decent clothing. He’d been able to keep himself from imagining how sexy she probably was. Good thing she didn’t have decent clothing. He didn’t trust her enough to leave the cabin and go buy some in town. The movement would irritate her back, but he might find her camped on the curb, unwilling to go through the effort. He could take her. She’d have to come with him, and then once they were in town and she was in actual women’s wear, there was nothing stopping him from putting her on a bus and waving as it departed the station.

  That scenario loomed far off. Sierra didn’t twitch. “I’m tired.” Her eyelids drifted shut.

  A thread of his patience snapped. “For God’s sake, get up and do something.” Dammit. He shoved his hands through his hair. He needed a trim. Same with his beard. He was the poster child for a mountain man and he’d just raised his voice to a petite, defenseless woman.

  He turned away and paced the small living space of his one-room cabin. If he wanted to expand his path, he could veer into the kitchen and make a lap around the line of counters that functioned as an island, a table, and bookshelves. “Do you think you’re the only one who’s been through some shit? Do you think you’re the only one who’s wanted to waste into nothingness? Do you think you’re the only one—”

  His chest heaved. Truth was, he’d run out of shit to say. He didn’t know anything about her. After her lame attempt at a backstory, he’d left it alone. He didn’t need to know the truth to rehab her and move her along.

  But two weeks had passed and other than scabs that dwindled in size and severity, there was no progress. At all.

  “I . . .” A furrow formed between her brows and he stopped, hanging on her words, hoping for something that’d explain why she acted the way she did. “I don’t want to move. I don’t want to get better. You should’ve left me in the snow.”

  Acid ate at his gut. He’d thought of doing just that. For the briefest of moments, but he hadn’t. He wasn’t a hero, but he wasn’t a monster. And she didn’t care.

  She had no idea what she did to him. His physical wounds were healed, but the emotional ones had gaped open as soon as he’d spotted her.

  “But I didn’t,” he bit out. His volume increased with each word. “I didn’t let you die. I live in this place so I don’t have to care about any goddamn thing anymore, yet here you are. I had the balls to give a shit and all I’m asking is for you to do the same.”

  He hadn’t yelled at a woman, at anyone, for two years. Memories assaulted him. The tormented face of his wife. The wicked gleam in her assailant’s eyes. The tearing in his chest that had nothing to do with the gunshot in his side.

  “You don’t know what you being here does to me,” he croaked, trying to stomp those memories out like they were nothing more than a harmless campfire. But he might as well use a water gun on a forest fire. “The least you could do is take a damn shower.”

  He spun and stormed out of the cabin. He had his boots on. A coat wasn’t necessary. Anger burned through him so hot that near-zero temps weren’t going to touch him.

  He didn’t know where he was going, or what he was going to do now that he was stamping through the snow. He didn’t have a plan. Just like he hadn’t planned to be alone in a cabin with a beautiful woman who made him care about life again.

  There was a lot to unpack in what Boone had said, but the overall message was simple: he’d been hurt, he didn’t want to be hurt again, and she was hurting him.

  He cared about her and he didn’t want to. He cared about her because she was a living creature in his care. He cared because it was the right thing to do and he couldn’t help it.

  She stared at the log wall. By now, she had memorized the long, elegant grains of the wood. Where the knots were. The bumps in the seams between the logs. She’d watched them like she was bingeing on Netflix.

  She was pathetic and he was going to hate her for it.

  That . . . bothered her.

  The last thing she’d wanted to do was fall and have someone care about her right away. But her inaction when Winger had left was Boone’s punishment. He was stuck with her.

  The least she could do was shower.

  She pushed herself into a sitting position. The cabin was empty. The bathroom door gaped open like it was inviting her. She wasn’t filthy. She’d cleaned up. Boone regularly changed the bedding whenever she was in the bathroom and she hadn’t wanted to climb in and make a mess. Though her hair hung limp. No number of cat baths would be as good as a thorough shampooing.

  Boone was a simple guy. The only toiletries he kept were shampoo, a bar of soap, and a can of shaving cream. The medicine cabinet held supplies for each when they ran out, and his toothbrush and toothpaste. He’d had an extra toothbrush. She even used it.

  As much as she wanted
to shrink away from the world, she’d been doing the bare minimum to care for herself. Not exactly the actions of a woman who gave up.

  Time to be brave and do something a normal human would do. It all started with a shower.

  Running the water, soaping her hair, washing off were entirely familiar and utterly foreign at the same time. It felt more like ten years had lapsed since she’d done this instead of five or so weeks.

  Coming out of the bathroom, dabbing at her damp hair, she scanned the small living area. Boone was still gone. His coat hung on the rack by the door. Same with his snow pants.

  She frowned. He was still outside?

  She bypassed the bed. Her back tightened up, pulling at the scabs that remained. She ached with the effort not to crawl beneath the covers and try to forget who she was and what she’d done.

  At the chest of drawers, she found a new shirt of his and a pair of sweats she’d swim in. With enough rolling and tucking and tying, she got them to stay on. Her heart hammered from the effort, but she didn’t dare sit on the bed. She had to keep going.

  She made it to the kitchen, which was a trek measured in feet, not yards or meters. Her stomach rumbled. Between the fatigue, the mental fog, and her constant nausea, she’d rarely experienced true hunger since her fall.

  She was starving.

  Searching the few cupboards on either side of the oven, she found the oats that Boone was so fond of. A little brown sugar would make all the difference, but the cupboards were like the rest of the cabin. Plain and uncluttered.

  Other than the oats, she found baking supplies like flour, along with staples like rice and pasta. Jars of tomato sauce and cans of vegetables. The freezer wasn’t any more exciting, but he had some meat packaged in white butcher paper. Since she found rolls of butcher paper in a cupboard, she assumed the meat was from Boone’s hunting efforts and not a grocery store.

  In Numen, she got food from the market. Angels who had assumed servile roles in the realm procured all the items they needed, mostly fruit and vegetables, some grains, and the occasional chicken breast. They either grew it or transported it from the human realm. Food broke up the days, brought loved ones together.

  Sierra had often eaten on Earth, preferring the variety. And the isolation. In the home base her team would help her make, she had stared at screens all day. She’d learned to cook during the longer missions.

  Skills that were more useful to her now than knowing ten ways to kill a demon.

  She dug out meat labeled pheasant and wished for a little internet. A pheasant might be a bird, but did she treat it like chicken?

  It was getting treated like chicken. Thankfully, Boone had used scant counter space for a microwave. While she thawed the bird, she came up with a side of pasta and tomato sauce. In between thaw cycles, she wandered to the windows.

  Where was he?

  Her back ached and sleepiness weighed down her eyelids. Her stamina had turned to shit. She shook herself and stretched her arms to the side, then over her head. The pleasure-pain the slow moves caused was worth it.

  Boone had been right. This needed to be done.

  She dug out the flour. Fried pheasant might taste like crap, but that was what they were having. If Boone complained, he should’ve come back.

  It took less than an hour to cook the small bird and make her pasta. She didn’t feel right eating without Boone. He’d done so much for her and this was the first time she’d done anything in return.

  Where was he?

  She left the food and went to the coat rack. His parka was long enough to fall to her knees. His spare pair of boots would be enough to keep her warm as she searched for him. Light was fading fast and she was no longer immortal. If she was going to look for him, it had to be now.

  Outside, she sucked in a breath. Damn, it was cold. Air wicked across her face, stealing all heat. Her breath puffed out around her. The world was still, like all life had frozen. So quiet, she could either forget everything that had happened, or do nothing but remember it.

  She worked on forgetting as she slogged around the cabin in boots that were too big. Snow had been meticulously cleared from the door and windows, all the way down the drive that disappeared between towering evergreens. They weren’t as close as she expected, not having bothered to look out the windows. They were massive and spread out, kind of like Montana itself.

  “Boone?” Behind the cabin was a shed. No wonder he’d cleared such a wide path around the cabin.

  The shed was actually a garage. Was he in there?

  A muffled thump caught her ear. Instead of calling for him, she shuffled toward the noise. The sound wasn’t rhythmic. It sounded more like he was stacking something.

  She rounded the back of the garage. A massive wood pile was haphazardly stacked against the back wall of the garage. Boone’s back was to her. He bent to grab a couple chunks of wood and she bit her lower lip.

  She had no right—no right—to ogle his ass. But he had a fine one. It wasn’t hard to look at, unlike his eyes. Eyes that hinted at a well of emotion she could drown in. Eyes that were concerned for her.

  But his ass was safe to look at.

  Her face heated. She’d been down the road of unthinking desire and she couldn’t go down it again. Boone didn’t deserve it.

  “Boone.”

  He stiffened, his head cutting to the side, but not quite looking over his shoulder. Frost covered his beard and the hair closest to his face.

  “I made supper.” She shifted her weight to her other foot. “And I showered.”

  That made him turn around, his lips tugging down. “Is your head wet?”

  “It’s dry. You’ve been gone awhile.” She pointed her finger straight up. “It’s almost dark.”

  He cocked a brow. “Really?”

  She caught the dry sarcasm and her small chuckle surprised her. “It’s been a while since I’ve had to talk to people.”

  The corner of his mouth tipped up. “Me too.”

  They stared at each other. Other than his red cheeks and the red tip of his nose, he didn’t act like the cold affected him. The gloves he wore must’ve been an extra pair in the garage. Without them, he would’ve been frostbitten by now, or worse.

  She didn’t want him to get hurt because of her.

  He dropped the hunk of wood. “You cooked?”

  “I guess it’s time to enter the land of the living.”

  His lack of a reply unnerved her. She hadn’t asked to be rescued, but she felt like she owed him something.

  “I can’t tell you what happened.” He wouldn’t believe her anyway. “I tried my entire life to be a good person, to protect others. I tried my whole life to make my father proud, but in the end, I did something that got someone I admire hurt.”

  Her whole team could’ve been killed.

  Again, Boone didn’t reply right away.

  “I knew someone like that. She tried to be a good person. In the end, it wasn’t enough.” Hurt resonated in his voice.

  He didn’t like the person he spoke of. Would he hate her too?

  “I like to think that if she got a second chance, she’d do better. What about you, Sierra? Are you going to do better?”

  She didn’t answer right away. He might think that type of question should have an immediate answer, but he’d also had to yell at her to shower. “I want to. I’ll be honest, I don’t know how.” Her worries spilled out, the real reason she’d been afraid to do more than stare at a wall. “I have no money. I have no home. No clothes. I should probably change my name.”

  No one should want to find her, but her sensible side, the trained warrior side, told her that to protect those around her, she should ditch everything about her old life.

  “I don’t have any documents,” she continued. “No papers to prove who I am and who I’m not. I don’t know how to apply for a job, or how I’ll get paid. I don’t know anything, Boone. I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

  She hated how frantic her voi
ce got the more she spoke. But her situation was dire. Other fallen had managed to drag themselves out of the gutter. But more had succumbed to their circumstances for the very reasons she’d named.

  She’d tried succumbing, but Boone hadn’t let her. He hadn’t let her be a coward. She couldn’t backtrack now.

  “There’s more snow on the way.”

  She looked at the cloudy sky. The air smelled like pine and snow, but she was surrounded by both. Did he have an innate sense about the weather or better cell service than she’d thought?

  “I don’t want to risk getting stranded in town, but when the weather passes and the roads clear, we can deal with the clothing issue.”

  “I can’t let you—”

  “I couldn’t help my wife. Let me help you.” His jaw flexed so hard she wouldn’t be shocked if teeth cracked. The person who’d failed him had been his wife. Was she alive?

  Sierra didn’t think so. “I want to be able to say no, but I don’t even have a pair of underwear to call my own.”

  “It’s just money.”

  He said it as if throwing money at the problem—her—was fine as long as he didn’t get invested in any other way.

  “We’ll get you on your feet, Sierra. As long as you’re trying, I’ll help.” He pushed a hand through his hair and it stayed exactly where he’d pushed it, the sweat freezing it in place. It gave him an adorable, approachable feel that she was better off not noticing.

  “I’m afraid I’ll fail.” She was fallen. She wasn’t supposed to matter anymore. But she couldn’t escape the sense that something had a hold of her and wasn’t done yet.

  Boone leveled her with a solemn gaze. “Then don’t.”

  Chapter 3

  Two months of stalking this poser club and Sandeen had come up with nothing. Disguised as a hip goth club, Fall From Grace was the place demons—and that human bastard Andy—used to recruit gullible humans for underworld use.

  Genius in its simplicity, the club had been started by that slick fallen Jameson, who had used tattoos to denote the “level” each disciple achieved—and to amass power. With no other way to interact on Earth other than through humans, demons had become beholden to the fallen. Jameson provided willing humans, and demons liked the ease. They’d gotten lazy.