I stepped to catch up with the demon—he hadn’t gone very far—and the couple came into view. They were at least five hundred yards away, but I could see them clearly, thanks to the bright street lights.
He placed his hand on the side of her face. She laughed again, and he pulled her closer. Then they kissed.
I glared, clenching my jaw. Are you kidding? Who kisses on a second date? Did she know how stupid that was?
Okay, maybe I was being an idiot. Kissing on a second date wasn’t weird. Kissing on the first date wasn’t weird.
Yet it still angered me.
I knew a lot of my frustration was because of the fact that it was Lizzie doing the kissing.
But to my credit, some of it was because she didn’t know much about him. He’d appeared out of nowhere. To me, at least. And he’d moved pretty quickly.
If he was someone dangerous, though, wouldn’t he have done something by now? Besides, Lizzie had her amulet, plus her common sense, which I was learning to trust. She wasn’t helpless or unprotected.
The demon only got a little closer to the couple before he froze too. I smiled at that. He was just as annoyed that Lizzie was on a date. Or maybe I was projecting.
I was probably projecting.
Rather than attack like I’d expected him to, he just stood there. I stared at him, trying to figure out what sense he was using. The place where eyes should have been was still covered with black lids. He wasn’t facing her exactly, so I knew he wasn’t hearing or seeing her. And he obviously had a different sense for tracking.
The demon surprised me by turning and heading down a side street.
Not sure what else to do, I followed. He lurched, exhausted and tired from his chase, toward the nearest house. He practically stumbled his way up the sidewalk to the door. It was a little bungalow with a trashy yard and broken windows.
The demon opened the door and stepped inside.
People started screaming right away. A gun went off. I ducked and barely missed getting hit by one of the bullets as it whizzed overhead.
More screaming. I rushed through the front door in time to see the demon’s hand dissolving around the throat of a big burly man. Mud spread up and down his neck, becoming indistinguishable from his skin. He held the gun limply in his hand. His eyes bugged out of their sockets, staring up at the ceiling before he slumped, his body dropping to the floor.
“Get out of my house!” another man screamed, rushing the demon.
I intercepted just in time.
“Stop!” I shouted. “He will destroy you!”
The man fought me, pummeling me with huge fists. I’d definitely have bruises. But panic and inexperience are no match for training. I had him pinned to the floor in moments.
“It’s a demon!” I shouted at him and the two panicked, sobbing women. No children were present, thank goodness. I’d probably have nightmares from what I’d just seen. “He can’t hear or see. If you attack—any of you—he won’t stop until he doesn’t feel threatened anymore.”
The man went limp under me, but I knew better than to let him up just yet.
“I’ve been hunting him for days, trying to keep him away from a client of mine. I’m supposed to destroy him, but I haven’t found a way yet. Everyone who has tried before me has died. I’ve been following him all over the valley instead, trying to learn as much about him as possible. This demon hides in basements—in the walls there. He’ll be—”
“My babies are downstairs!” one of the women screamed.
Crap. No way was I letting a kid get killed.
I released the man, jumping to my feet and following where I’d last seen the demon heading. He was on his way down the stairs when I caught up with him. No sign of children yet. Had they slept through the guns and screaming?
The demon finally reached the bottom of the stairs, then stumbled along a cluttered hallway and into an even more cluttered family room. As I expected, he stepped up to one of the walls. Following the same process as before, the demon put a hand on the wall, then dissolved into it, leaving just a trace of silt behind.
I waited for a moment, wanting to be sure he wasn’t coming back. And then I turned, unsurprised to find that the people had followed me. Human nature calls for self-preservation over anything else, even caring for deceased loved ones, and they wanted—needed—to know they weren’t in danger anymore. My heart twisted as I thought about what had just happened. I felt so bad for them.
“I’m going to set up a spell,” I said, watching their pale, panicked faces closely. “It’ll alert me when the demon returns in several days. Please, please don’t try to stop him or get in his way. If you leave him alone, he’ll leave you alone.”
They didn’t answer—just stared at me. I grabbed an old receipt from the top of a dusty shoebox near me, picked up a little stubby pencil, and wrote my number on the receipt. “Who owns the house?”
“We do,” the woman who’d mentioned her kids said, motioning to herself and the man I stopped from attacking the demon.
I handed the receipt to her. “Call me when he appears. I’ll get here as fast as I can.”
Then I pulled out my cell and dialed Detective Evans’ number. While waiting for him to pick up, I told the woman, “Call 911. Let’s get you guys taken care of.”
She nodded, then shakily led the way upstairs.
“The demon attacked and killed a man,” I said when Detective Evans answered. I rattled off the address, poking my head out the front door to verify that I’d remembered it correctly. “I have to leave, but I’ll be available for questioning. The homeowner is calling 911.”
He thanked me, and we ended the call. I nodded at the three adults before heading out the door. There wasn’t much more I could do for them. I wasn’t well versed in the condolences side of death, and Lizzie’s date would be ending soon.
We had a storage unit to blow up.
26
She wasn’t home yet when I got there, so I hopped on her porch, sat in one of the wicker rocking chairs, and settled in to wait.
I was just debating having my nightshade tattoo let me nap and wake me when a car pulled up.
Drop her off and go, dude. Drop her off and go.
Either he sucked at telepathy or I did because they got out of the car, linking hands as they walked up the sidewalk.
My stomach curled and my mouth went dry when he stopped several feet from the door. He was going to kiss her again.
The man trailed his hands up her arms and pulled her close, enveloping her in a passionate kiss.
I practically stopped breathing. I couldn’t move, couldn’t react, couldn’t even look away.
It should be me!
Why wasn’t it me?
Why wasn’t I pummeling him to death? Shooting him through the skull? Stabbing him in the heart?
Because I cared for Lizzie. I didn’t want to hurt her. And it was obvious she liked the man.
My eyes smarted. My heartbeat slowed so much, I could barely feel it. My throat closed up, and I couldn’t swallow.
Lizzie threaded her arms around his neck, pulling him down and closer to her, rising up to meet him as best she could.
The man chuckled against her mouth and glanced sideways, toward me.
He knew I was there.
The disgusting pervert was doing this for me. He obviously wasn’t doing it because he genuinely liked her.
That cemented it for me. He had to die.
Thoughts and ideas and plans for how to take him out flooded my mind, and for once, I welcomed them. They weren’t about murdering Lizzie.
I tried to look away, tried to focus instead on my murderous intentions, but I couldn’t. Couldn’t even distract myself with thoughts of his blood all over the cement.
He grabbed her by the waist, turned her around, and pushed her against her door, his kiss increasing in urgency.
I was finally able to tear my eyes away at that point, completely embarrassed at my behavior, at the fact tha
t he’d been able to goad me so well.
And then I realized I didn’t need to sit there and take it. As much as I knew it would embarrass Lizzie, I had to alert her to my presence.
I cleared my throat.
The man glared at me, but Lizzie gasped in shock, jumping away from him and turning toward me.
Her hand shook as she raised it to tuck hair behind her ear. Even in the darkness of her porch, I could tell she was blushing.
She turned to her date, and I saw anger register in her eyes as she realized he’d known I was there.
“Ready, Lizzie?” I asked, annoyed that my voice didn’t come out sounding normal.
I pushed my emotions aside, forcing a mask of indifference onto my face. I couldn’t deal with what I’d just witnessed now. I couldn’t.
“Uh . . . give me a moment.” She dug her keys from her purse, unlocked her door, and went in, shutting the door quickly behind her.
And the man and I were alone.
He sent me a smile, his eyes narrowed, and it was all I could do not to rip out his throat then and there.
Before I could move or say anything, he said, “All right, tiger. Possessive much? It was just a kiss. A long, hot, passionate kiss. We might have made it to second base if you hadn’t—”
That’s it.
In a flash—faster than he expected—I had my hand around his throat and him pinned up against the pillar behind him.
“If you touch her ever again, ever, I will destroy you.”
He raised his hands in a gesture of acceptance, and I set him down, itching to do more to him so badly, it nearly killed me.
The man jumped off the porch and raced to his car. Right before he ducked inside, he said, “You didn’t make me pinky swear.”
My first reaction was more anger, but then I felt the blood drain out of my face. Any normal person would have been intimidated, or at least angry, wanting to wipe the ground with my face. But he was taunting me, playing with me. Facetious and uncaring.
He had to be an enemy. He had to be. But what type? Not a hound—Lizzie’s amulet would have alerted her to his presence immediately. And not a supernatural creature—my tattoo would have alerted me. That left only one other option.
He was a regular human who had been hired by the hounds. But to do what? Mess with me? Mess with her? Distract us from our plans?
I shook my head to myself, watching as he drove away. They wouldn’t be successful. Not now, not ever.
As much as my heart hurt to think of Lizzie falling in love with another man, I wouldn’t be distracted from my jobs.
The door opened behind me, and Lizzie stepped to my side.
It hurt that she kept a large distance between us.
It hurt even more that she’d let another man in—someone who’d just waltzed back into her life after being gone for years.
That was exactly what I’d done, but my reception hadn’t been nearly as warm.
“Ready?” she asked quietly.
I didn’t respond. I didn’t move. I was barely even breathing. It occurred to me then that the man wasn’t after Lizzie at all, but was there because of me specifically. Maybe the Shadow Prophet hired him to assist me in getting over Lizzie.
Was that it? I gritted my teeth. It made complete sense, and it was definitely something he’d do.
Lizzie peered up at my face.
“Are you . . . are you okay?”
I gave a curt nod. I couldn’t push my thoughts away—couldn’t get the image of his sneaky grin out of my mind, couldn’t stop thinking about them making out.
It finally occurred to me that she was waiting for me, that we had work to do, and that her date was achieving his purposes simply by how I was reacting to everything that had happened. And so I stepped off her porch.
27
Lizzie timidly followed me to my car. I didn’t know how to break the silence, to talk to her, to find out what my heart so desperately wanted to know.
Why didn’t you invite me in the way you did him?
She didn’t trust me. And was it any wonder? I’d been a jerk to her. I’d done my best to stop my love for her, to convince myself—by being abrupt with her—that I needed to move on. I’d pushed her away through all of that, and I’d still failed at getting over her.
Irony. Total and complete irony. I was desperate for her love and approval while trying to get her to leave me alone while trying to stop myself from loving her while feeling jealous when she fell for someone else.
Ridiculous. Totally and completely ridiculous.
The clock on my dash showed it was nearly midnight. Lizzie’s date had gone a lot later than I’d thought. Oh, well. I had the bombs on the back seat, weapons in the trunk, and a job to do.
I parked the car some ways down the street from the facility, and Lizzie looked at me skeptically.
“Why’d you park this far away? What if we need to make a quick getaway?”
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” I said, trying not to sound curt. “I’m fast on foot. What about you?”
She didn’t answer, but I doubted she’d have any problems with it. She was in good shape, and I knew she’d been a professional dancer for many years before becoming a Fire Impeder.
Lizzie and I hopped out of the car and stepped around to the trunk. I popped it open, and we sifted through the various weapons available. Once we’d selected a few, I grabbed the explosives from the car while I put on a small backpack.
Lizzie raised an eyebrow. “Bombs?”
“I couldn’t figure out another way to deliver the gas without us getting knocked out in the process. If I’d had more time, I would’ve built something to pipe it into the unit. We’ll have to make sure we’re far away before the trigger gets pulled.”
“And then we run as fast as we can before the cops arrive?”
“Before they arrive? They know who we are. Besides, haven’t you noticed the horrible security here? There are only a couple of cameras.”
I entered the code to open the gate. It was simple, only four digits—a generic code that would be the same for everyone—and it wouldn’t tell Tony who was coming or going. I had a feeling it hadn’t been changed in a while.
I said as much to Lizzie, and she responded with, “Yeah, this place definitely needs better security.”
We entered after the gate swung open. Lizzie held the amulet, an apprehensive expression on her face. It looked like she expected the amulet to start yelling at her any second, warning her that someone was near. But apparently, that didn’t happen because she relaxed, and we started walking up down the rows of units.
As we got closer to the storage unit, we heard noises coming from inside. The door was open by about four inches. Lizzie glanced at me. I don’t know why I did it—I knew she was an adult, not a child—but I put a finger to my lips.
Lizzie rolled her eyes in response. Yeah, she knew I was being ridiculous.
I got to work immediately, setting up the explosives just at the opening to the storage unit. A slight glow came from inside, and it sounded like a meeting was going on. Lizzie crept close to the edge of the door, then got down on her knees and listened for a moment before peering inside.
I glanced under the door as well once I finished with the last bomb. Multiple chairs faced away from us. All of them were filled. The people inside were discussing something, their body language tense and alert. We’d have to be very careful.
I made sure the switch was ready to go, then we tiptoed the way we’d come, with me unrolling a spool of wire as we went.
We stepped around a corner about five hundred feet away, and I stopped short.
Four people stood there, waiting for us. I assumed they were hounds. Two were women, and all were dressed in black. The men jumped to attack Lizzie, the women aiming for me. What the crap? Shouldn’t the men have come after me?
Oh—they thought Lizzie was the real threat. And she was, with her amulet. But even without a magical device that killed instantly, I w
as deadly.
My knives flashed in the moonlight as I launched at the men, stabbing both. They slowed, but didn’t stop their charge for Lizzie.
One of the men grabbed her by the wrist, giving a hard-enough shake for the knife in that hand to fall. I groaned. I hadn’t trained her—she wasn’t ready for this.
Lizzie must have accessed the power from the amulet because the man collapsed, dead. And I had a feeling it was a permanent death due to the fact that she hadn’t done anything to harm him.
The other man gasped, his fist missing Lizzie’s face as he lurched to get away from her. The women also panicked, and I used the moment of distraction to dispatch them by breaking their necks.
The guy continued backing away from Lizzie. He jumped out of Lizzie’s reach and bolted.
Trusting that Lizzie knew what to do with the women, I raced after him, catching up with him around the corner. I grabbed the back of his collar and flipped him over me, dropping him to the ground. In one swift movement, I jerked him back up and slammed him against the cement wall hard enough for his teeth to rattle.
He was starting to shift into a hound when Lizzie rounded the corner, nearly smacking into me. His face had elongated, fur sprouting everywhere, and his ears were way higher than normal. Oxygen wasn’t reaching his brain due to my grip around his throat, and he couldn’t seem to finish shifting.
Lizzie stepped up next the man and practically wrapped herself around him. I raised an eyebrow. She apparently had to be really close to get the amulet to function. I’d assumed that as she used the amulet, the distance between herself and the hounds would get better, not worse.
The amulet did its job—I sensed a fleeting bit of magic, and the man went limp under my grip.
“We have to get rid of the bodies,” Lizzie whispered.
I nodded. “First, the gas.”
The fighting had been relatively quiet—none of our enemies had made noise, and only scuffling sounds had resulted. We raced back to where the fighting had originated, where the detonator still sat. I picked it up and pushed the button. A series of explosions went off, not big enough to rock the ground, but definitely loud enough for my ears to ring.
Evening Storm (Midnight Chronicles Book 2) Page 9
