I had lost count of the number of demons we'd killed. Their corpses littered the ground. Reggie's cleaning service out of Florida would charge an arm and a leg to clean the house. I snatched the baseball bat off the floor. I had dropped it earlier, when a troll had run into me full force. My next target was the gnome. A dart came at my heart fast and straight. I used the bat to knock it away. My magic may not help during a fight, but I was quicker than a human, and stronger. The little one-foot-tall dude was already reloading his bow. His tiny foot stomped as he readiness the arrow.
A demon came through the portal and hit me in the back, knocking me to the floor in front of the gnome. The gnome's lip curled into a snarl. The damn thing was kind of cute. I wished I could keep him.
As if she knew what I was thinking, Grandma cried out, "No."
Knowing she was right, I reached forward and plucked the bow out of his hand. I scrambled to my feet, picked the little guy up by his arm, and stuck him in the trunk next to the sofa. Demons and trolls were easy to kill. That little guy, I couldn't. Maybe he would give us some intel to use.
I had never imagined the old-school chest would come in handy. It had been on sale a few years ago, and I'd bought it for Grandma. I wanted her to fill it with treasures from around the world. She still hadn't left New Orleans.
The gnome's little fists pounded on the lid as I clasped the lock. Maybe I would keep him after all.
"I saw that," Grandma said as she sent a right hook into the troll.
I turned to face the demon who had pushed me to the ground, but the crack of something breaking made me turn to look back across the room. Grandma stumbled backward, cupping her nose. The demon before me used the opportunity to lunge forward and thrust his spear into my leg.
I grunted and reached down and pulled the spear out. With a flick of my wrist, I speared the demon with his own weapon. Like the others, he let out a blood-curdling scream before his body collapsed on the ground.
Demons kept appearing through the purple portal. We wouldn't win if I didn't figure out a way to close it. I swung my baseball bat at the demons in my path. Not sure what I would find on the other side of the portal, I took a couple deep breaths and poked my head through. Nothing. The other side was black.
Something stabbed my ass. I pulled my head back through the portal and yanked the spear from where it still protruded. Three demons stood around me, drooling and smelling like trash. I used the spear to take out the one on the far right.
"The portal is black on the other side. No sign of life."
Grandma waved her hands, and the surrounding demons flew against the wall. Her chanting was louder this time. Winds gusted through the room, making it hard for me to stand. I grabbed the fireplace mantel so I wouldn't be lifted off the ground. The wind whipped the pictures off the wall for a small tornado tour through the room.
The remaining demons exploded one by one, splattering another layer of blood across the living room floor. Grandma's hands lifted toward the ceiling, and the louder her chants grew, the smaller the portal opening became.
"It's almost closed," I hollered over the roar of the wind in the room. Grandma's perfectly arranged living room was a war zone. Carnage was the only word I could think of to describe what was left.
Grandma's chants echoed in the wind. My fingers were starting to slip off the mantel. I wouldn't be able to hold on much longer. A second before the portal closed, an arrow shot through the air and hit Grandma in the heart. Her body slowly dropped to the ground. The wind instantly stopped. Unwelcome silence greeted me. One demon lived. His end would be mine. I grabbed a sword from the ground and pierced it through the air. I knew I hit my target. Jumping over the bodies, I dropped to my knees in front of Grandma.
I gripped the arrow protruding from her chest and pulled back. My vision blurred from the tears.
I needed to make a choice. My powers would save my grandmother but at someone else's expense. Grandma always told me, no matter what, to never use this part of my magic. With my grandma's lifeless body in my arms, the choice was hard.
Time slowed. Seconds felt like hours as I pressed my hands to Grandma's chest and closed my eyes. The vision of Grandma and me having tea before the portal arrived rose in my mind. Her smile was full and overjoyed. This had been my first time making it to the house in over a month. The caseload at work was at an all-time high. I had neglected my grandma lately.
I watched as we started to fight the supernatural creatures. At one moment, I swore my grandma's eyes locked with mine, and she shook her head. Her eyes were sad, as if knowing what was to come. No one could see me in the vision when I used my magic to view how someone died.
The fight continued to roll on until we got to the point where Grandma cleared out the room and an arrow shot through the portal.
Calling on my magic, I reached out and grabbed the arrow in midair and broke it in half. My magic drained my energy, but Grandma would be okay, only now someone else close to me would die in the next forty-eight hours.
"No!" Grandma screamed. Her lips turned down. Everything flashed black before I was back to the current timeline. I no longer leaned over a dead body. Grandma slumped down into a chair.
"You shouldn't have done that," Grandma whispered in a hoarse voice.
Not wanting to talk about what would come in the next few days. I looked around the room. "It smells like blood and decomposing bodies."
"Don't think for one second we aren't going to talk about what you did." Grandma ran her hand through her long gray hair. "Cleaning services is going to be expensive for this one."
"Why did these creatures come after us?"
Grandmother's eyes flashed for a second. If I hadn't been watching closely, I would've missed it. "I'm not sure, but whoever sent them used black magic." Grandma looked everywhere but at me. She lied.
I clenched my jaw, stopping myself from yelling at her. Why wouldn't she tell me who sent these creatures? I pushed the dead bodies off the couch and sat down. Killing a bunch of magical creatures drained my energy. Grandmother sat down next to me and grabbed my hand. "You know we have to talk about it."
"No, we don't. We both know what will happen. Nothing we do now will change that. But are you going to tell me who is behind this, or are you going to keep acting like you don't know?"
"I have an idea, but I want to talk to a few of my contacts before I jump to conclusions."
I rested my head on the back of the couch and closed my eyes. "I'm one of the top detectives with the New Orleans Police Department. Are you really not going to let me help you figure out why demons appeared in your house?"
Grandma looked toward the hidden door in the living room. On the other side were Grandma's treasures. I loved playing in that room as a kid.
"Dear, I know you are a great detective, and I’ll need your help. Let me reach out to one of my contacts. Go take a shower, and I’ll fix us something to eat."
I sidestepped the dead bodies as I crossed the living room, took a right when I reached the top of the stairs, and opened the door to my old room. Grandma hadn't changed it since I moved out fifteen years ago. Over the years, I had stayed the night on occasion, and I kept a change of clothes for those times. I padded over to the dresser and pulled out a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.
A shower would feel so good. I headed to the connecting bathroom and winced when I saw my reflection in the mirror. My white hair was stained with blood. It would take a long shower to get the decay off my body. I quickly got in shower and let the warm water beat down on me. The water ran red.
I had lost track of how long I stood under the warm when I heard the crash downstairs.
2
"You need to leave," Grandma Cloven barked at the tall, handsome man standing in the kitchen. I ran down the stairs holding my boobs because I hadn't taken time to put on a bra. I had been worried Grandma was under attack again.
It wasn't the black-suited man who had my attention. It was the six-foot-tall half panda, ha
lf unicorn standing beside him. Oh my God, it's a pandacorn. "Mine." New life goals: kill the man standing in the kitchen and keep the adorable creature. As if knowing my thoughts, the pandacorn raised his paw and waved. He fucking waved.
The gesture turned both my grandma's and my new enemy's attention toward me. Grandma sent a bolt of magic toward the pandacorn. "Knock that shit off, Paxdon." She turned her steely gray eyes back to the man in the kitchen. "And I told you to get out of my house."
The man's eyes flashed red for a second. I had never seen anything like it before. "Cloven, you are walking a very fine line. The only reason you are still alive is that my mother would be pissed if something happened to you."
I didn't like anyone walking into our house and threatening us, whether they had a pandacorn or not. When I was fifteen, Grandma had taken me in. My mother had died in a car accident on her way home from work. She had worked at the local hospital as a nurse.
"Who do you think you are, coming in here and making threats? Do you see us walking into your house and being rude?"
With a sigh, he pulled out a kitchen chair and slowly sat. I wasn't sure what to make of the situation. Neither the intruders nor my grandmother had clued me in to what was going on. After the attack earlier today, I had my guard up. I wasn't sure how deadly a pandacorn could be, but the man sitting at the table gave off a dangerous aura.
"Paxdon, get ahold of Reggie and have him clean up the house. Ms. Cloven won't hurt me." The pandacorn rolled his eyes and vanished. The joy in the room left with him. I heard Grandma mumble something about killing the man at the table before she sat down.
Needing to be fully dressed before I dug deeper into the newcomer, I turned and went back to my room. I quickly finished dressing. If I had to fight, I didn’t want my boobs bouncing with each kick. Hopefully my grandmother would wait for me to return before she killed the newcomer.
When I came back downstairs, Grandma and the man were in quite a heated discussion. They both stopped talking as I walked into the kitchen. It wasn't like Grandma to not offer our guest a glass of tea.
"Sir, would you like something to drink?" Kill 'em with charm, and strike when their guard is down. Those were the words Grandma told me over and over growing up.
"Yes, tea is fine. If I remember correctly, your grandmother has the best sweet tea."
Grandma huffed in her seat and crossed her arms. She hadn't taken her eyes off the newcomer.
I grabbed three glasses and filled them with tea and ice. "I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name," I said as I placed a glass in front of him.
He didn't reply immediately. He watched as I sat down and took a sip of tea. "You can call me Lucifer, for now."
I barked out a laugh, but Grandma wasn't laughing. "Are you related to the devil?"
I had seen a lot over the years—trolls, demons, vampires, and fairies—but the devil? In theory, I knew he existed. I just never wanted to meet him in person or have tea with him. What would happen if I accidentally signed my soul over and didn't know it?
"Why are you here, Lucy?" Grandma bit out.
His eyes flashed red. "I don't like being called that. My patience is wearing thin. And I think you already know why I'm here. Do you want to explain why you hid this from my mother and me, or does my mother know also?"
"Gini doesn't know. I only figured it out a year ago, and I didn't want to lose her."
"Lose who?" I asked.
"You," they both said in unison.
Lucifer stood and paced in the small kitchen. "How did you only figure it out a year ago?"
"Someone want to clue me in?" Even with the power coming off the man pacing in the small kitchen, I forced myself to meet his gaze. "Tell me what you're talking about."
"You're my daughter."
"Funny. Mom had a one-night stand. She never knew who my father was. I'm pretty sure she would've remembered sleeping with the devil."
His eyes flashed red. "I didn't sleep with your mother. She stole you from your real mother."
I didn't know how it happened, but my fingers sparked purple.
Grandmother's eyes widened. "Breathe, Pandora. You can't kill him."
I turned from the man claiming to be my dad and looked at my grandmother. "Tell me he's lying."
Her lips turned down, and she ran her hand through her long gray hair. For a second, she looked her age and tired. Lucifer stopped pacing and trained his eyes on Grandma, waiting for her to answer. With each second she delayed telling me what was happening, dread settled in my stomach.
"Last year, I decided to go through some old boxes and found letters from your mother." My mother's death was a sore subject between my grandmother and me. We had gone to the scene of the accident, and I had begged Grandma to let me touch her, to see if I could even help figure out what happened. Everyone said it was an accident.
I screamed for everyone to let me near my mother, but they wouldn't let me because they thought it would traumatize me.
"How could you not tell me my mother stole me?"
Grandma took a sip of tea, and Lucifer sat back down at the table and steepled his fingers.
"You haven't been around much this year."
I winced at her statement. "Sorry," I mumbled.
Grandma nodded and continued. "In the back of one of her boxes was a sealed envelope with my name on it. Inside was a letter she wrote to me. A woman came to her one night and asked her to take her child. Your mother always wanted kids. What I didn't know was she couldn't have them, and she took this as a sign. She didn't ask questions. She took the baby and raised her as her own."
Lucifer squinted his eyes. "How did you find out she's mine?"
"I didn't put it together until Gini was here a few months ago, telling me about Paldon, your other daughter, and when she showed me a picture, I knew Pandora was her twin."
"So my mother kept this from me?" Lucifer asked. The room started to shake. The devil clenched his hands, and his eyes turned red like flames.
"Don't start acting like a two-year-old. I asked your mother for time. Pandora had a right to choose if she wanted to meet you. But I guess when she used her powers today, it sent a beacon straight to you."
"Well, yeah. She raised the fucking dead." He turned his red eyes on me. "You know what happens when you raise the dead, right?"
I clenched my jaw. "I wouldn't have had to if you kept your demons in hell." I took a wild guess. I didn't know if that was where all the demons called home. Now I wished I had paid closer attention to Grandmother when she was teaching me about the magical world. The only thing I had cared about was my power because it helped me solve cases.
Lucifer rolled his eyes. "Have you not taught my daughter anything?"
Grandma threw her hands up in the air. "She didn't listen. I wonder where she got that from."
The devil smirked. "Me."
"So you didn't send the demons, the trolls, and the cute little gnome?" I asked.
"No. Not all demons live in hell. Some live in the plane between here and hell. Not quite evil enough to cross over. Trolls live in Kentucky, and gnomes aren't cute. They are deadly and will kill you for any reason."
"Pandora looked through the portal. It was black," Grandma added.
Lucifer's face went tight. "Was this the first attack?"
Grandma nodded. "Yes. I don't know why we were attacked. Nobody knew about Pandora but your mom and me."
My phone vibrated in my pocket, and when I looked down, the chief's name flashed across the screen. Today was supposed to be my day off. "I need to take this."
Not waiting for the devil or my grandma to answer, I stood up and walked into the living room. Body parts were still scattered across the floor. I swiped across my phone screen and said, "Hello, Chief Cooper."
“Pandora, I need you to come in."
Over the last few weeks, the number of dead bodies had doubled. Today was my first day off in two weeks. I had planned to have tea with Grandma. Afterward, I wanted to go hom
e and binge-watch Lucifer. I couldn't help but chuckle. The real Lucifer sat in the kitchen, and instead, I wanted to go home and watch a TV show based on him. It was almost creepy how much they looked alike. I wondered how Lucifer felt about that.
"Are you there?"
Dammit. I hadn't paid attention to a word he'd said.
"Yes, I'm here. But I'm not coming in. You promised me a day off. I'm not trying to sound like a bitch, but you haven't made any of the other detectives work two weeks straight. Why not call in Wayne or Tyler?" Neither of them were as good as me, and the chief was close to announcing his run for city mayor. I knew he wanted his solve rate to be high. But I also needed a break.
"Everyone is being called in." He lowered his voice. "I also need you here because I think it was a supernatural creature who murdered someone." Chief knew about my powers. I was two months into the job when he figured it out. Mostly it was my fault. I had gone to the medical examiner's office after-hours to touch the body and rewatch how the person was killed. He thought I was having a stroke because my eyes turned bright white and my body was stiff with shock. When he pulled me away from the body, I let out a string of cuss words then took him for a beer so we could talk.
This wasn't the first time he thought something had happened because of the creatures that went bump in the night. Ten percent of the time, he was correct. The other ninety percent were humans being evil and chopping bodies up.
"I swear, if this has nothing to do with the supernatural world, I'm going to have Grammy put a spell on you."
He chuckled. "Ms. Cloven would never do that. She is a sweet old lady." He didn't know she had just murdered close to thirty demons and, if I didn't get back into the kitchen soon, she might kill the devil. Now I wished I would have spent more time listening to the history of the supernatural world. Can you kill the devil?
Fated Mates of the Underworld, Books 1-3 Page 15
