The Devil is in the Details

by Maya Daniels

  I still haven’t come up with the right words when we near what looks like a closed off junkyard. The metal fence around it looks rusted, and I rub my hands over my arms at the thought of walking around the nastiness I can see in piles all over the place. Eric drives straight at the double doors of the gate, and pulling a remote out of the glovebox, presses a button, opening it. He makes sure he doesn’t touch me while he does it, and I feel like crying or screaming at him that I’m sorry. Swallowing the lump, I say nothing.

  After the gate opens just enough for us to drive through it, Eric hits the gas, and he drives in. As soon as we are past the gates, my view changes and I’m staring at a building almost as large as the sanctuary, only this one looks more like a hunting lodge. Built from thick pieces of wood, it looks inviting and makes me feel at ease straight away. The dark green roof compliments the bright red front door, making it look beautiful. It’s an understatement to say that I’m impressed.

  People, well demons, in this case, walk around, some clustered in groups chatting. It almost looks surreal, like a scene from a movie showing life in a secluded community—which I suppose this really is when you look at it that way. As we near the clusters of people, they turn to look. Some smile, while others raise a hand in greeting. Eric drives up to another parked SUV, taking the spot next to it, and without waiting on me jumps out of the car as soon as the engine cuts off.

  With a sigh, I turn to open the door while pulling my seatbelt off. I’m surprised when my door opens, and Eric takes hold of my arm, helping me jump down from the high vehicle. What’s more surprising is that he doesn’t let go when my feet touch the ground. His hand glides down my arm and interlaces our fingers. I look at his face and hope blooms that maybe I didn’t screw this up as bad as I thought I did.

  “Oh, you did, but I’ll make you pay for it in other ways,” Eric murmurs and I realize I must’ve spoken out loud.

  “I really am sorry for the way I reacted,” I tell him honestly. “I was shocked more than upset I guess.”

  “Shocked at what? Being my mate?” One eyebrow lifts up, and his intense scrutiny makes me squirm.

  “At being trapped?” Huffing, I look away from his penetrating gaze “At not having the option to choose things of my own free will?”

  “You sound like my father.” At his words, I look sharply at him, making him chuckle. “He goes on and on about free will and the such.”

  “Not funny!” Hitting him in the stomach with the back of my hand, I make him laugh again.

  “It was funny to see the look on your face. Come on.” Grabbing my hand again, he pulls me towards the large home. “Let’s see what we can do here before we have to leave to meet with your friend George.”

  My gut clenches at the mention of George and the Order, but I say nothing as he leads me around the place. The inside is as beautiful as the outside, and Eric tells me Maddison is the one who decorates and purchases things for the home. I would’ve guessed it without him pointing it out. Everything looks measured and elegant, just like her. Eric talks to people, answers questions thrown his way, and keeps walking through the place. I stay quiet, lost in my head, and follow behind him like a shadow. Some of the demons nod at me, others look at me suspiciously, but no one asks who I am or what I’m doing here. The enigma of that is solved when Maddison pops out of nowhere.

  “Ah! You’re finally here!” She walks up to us and snatches my hand from Eric’s. He glares, but she returns it with a bright smile. “Go fix the wards, cousin. I’ll keep your girl occupied until you’re done.” It seems like she yelled the words because silence follows it, and everyone’s eyes turn to me, making my face turn all shades of red.

  “I won’t be long.” Eric tugs me to his chest and kisses me softly on the lips. “Stay with Maddison.” Maddison sighs dreamily, and my face goes from warm to burning.

  I watch Eric’s back as he walks away with two men as tall as him. “You’re not helping, Maddison,” I mumble as I press the backs of my hands to my cheeks.

  “I can’t help it!” She takes my hand, dragging me further into the home. “I’m a romantic at heart. And seeing Eric, the king of no commitment, with a mate makes me want to go on the roof and scream it to the world.” She stops walking and turns to look at me with a serious face. “I’ll scream ‘suck on this, assholes! Love always wins!’”

  I burst out laughing at her serious her face. It’s even funnier coming from her since she always looks and acts prim and proper. You’d think she was the one raised in the Order, not me.

  We spend the time talking about random things and Maddison telling me little stories about Eric and their antics through the centuries. It’s so easy to forget how old they are when they look my age, or maybe a couple of years older. At twenty-one, I’m not even at toddler status when it comes to these guys. There is a moment when it feels like ants are crawling all over my skin, but she assures me it’s because Eric is checking the wards before he places stronger ones over them. I have no reason to worry, looking at the smiling faces outside the window of the cozy little room where we are sitting. Maddison visibly stiffens a moment before the ground shakes with such force I think it must be an earthquake. When I look at her face, I realize we must be screwed. Before I have a chance to ask what’s going on, another rumble almost makes me fall off the sofa. When it stops, something crashes somewhere inside the home before I hear Eric’s roar.

  “Helena!”

  “Helena!” The second time Eric bellows my name, my blood turns to ice. Something is terribly wrong.

  Maddison jumps to her feet just as the door bangs open. It bounces off the opposite wall and tilts to the side when the top hinge doesn’t manage to hold its weight. Eric storms in, looking like a crazy man with wild eyes that zero in on me. His chest is heaving like he’s been running, but I know he doesn’t get winded like that. In two strides he is in front of me, snatching me around the waist and turning to walk out.

  “What’s going on?” Maddison and I speak at the same time.

  “The wards are down.” Eric turns his head to look at Maddison. “The entire Order is at our gates.”

  “Go!” Maddison pushes Eric to move, and she bolts out of the room so fast I didn’t see her cross the space to the door before her red hair disappears through it.

  “Out of all the days, I don’t have my guns today.” My words pass my numb lips as my mind screams that this is all my fault.

  “You don’t need them, because you’re not fighting,” snarling the words, he lifts me off the ground, and holding me to his chest starts running towards the front door.

  I cling to him like a spider monkey, unable to stop him if I tried while he barrels through the panicked people in the hallways. There is screaming and cussing, people yelling words I can’t hear from the buzzing in my ears and the strange numbness that overtakes my entire being. Eric doesn’t stop for anything. He doesn’t even seem to care about anyone else but me and my guilt skyrockets. All this is my fault, and instead of helping his kind survive, he’s trying to get my shocked ass out of here. That thought gets my blood pumping, and anger bubbles up in my chest.

  “Put me down!” I have to yell to be heard even when my head is close to his. Eric ignores me, so I punch his shoulder to get his attention. “Put me down! I can fight!”

  “No!” Snarling, he keeps running, and we exit the front doors to a scene out of a movie.

  There is a wall of hunters around the entire place just standing there, unmoving, with their weapons ready in their hands. Three rows of hunters, one behind the other, stand unnaturally still as if in some sort of trance, while all around me chaos makes faces blur as they run in panic. Eric stops dead in his tracks, drops my feet on the ground, and pushes me behind his back. In my anger, I thump my fist on his back for being so stubborn, but there is nothing much I can do when he stands as an unmovable rock in front of me.

  Just when I think we are doomed, Maddison strides from the side of the large home with a horde of demo
ns the size of Abaddon following at her heels. She doesn’t look one bit fazed by the Order’s display, and she even has a smile on her face. I think the beautiful woman that I’ve started to admire has finally lost her mind. Swaying her hips, she glides towards us and stops next to Eric. Her entourage positions themselves like a living fence in front of us and faces the hunters. The crazy screaming and running around stops and I watch stupefied when the panicked demons, one by one, start joining the horned ones and grab whatever they can find to use as a weapon.

  “You can at least show yourself, Michael!” Maddison calls out, making me wince. “I promise I won’t bite…much!” While she talks, I manage to slide from behind Eric and stand at his side. He doesn’t look happy, but tough luck for him.

  “Maddison,” Michael’s smooth voice rings out before I even see him walk up, the hunters parting for him like some creepy choreographed display. “This has nothing to do with you. I just want the girl.”

  “Aww, that’s where we have a problem, handsome.” She pouts prettily at him, almost making me smile. “So does my cousin.”

  “What?” Michael sounds confused, and so am I.

  “Eric,” Maddison flicks her thumb in Eric’s direction. “He wants the girl, too.” Her smile brightens up her whole face. The woman is definitely crazy.

  “Helena, when the fight starts, I need you to run to the car,” Eric murmurs under his breath, and I gape at him. He wants me to run and leave them to die for me?

  “I’m not playing games, Maddison!” Michael bellows, his face reddening in anger. “I will take the girl. If the rest of you live or die in the process, it’s totally up to you.”

  Ignoring everyone, including Eric who is glaring daggers at me, I start looking around to see if there is anything I can use as a weapon. I mean how hard can it be? These are not demons I need to fight. They are hunters, like me. That makes them human and easy to hurt. I was best in all my training for a reason. None of them could beat my scores, and it’s time to remind them why. Seeing what looks like a shovel leaning on the side of the house, I walk up to it, and stepping on the metal part, I pull as hard as I can, breaking off the handle. Twirling it in my hands, I glance up to see Eric looking at me with raised eyebrows.

  “Playtime!” I twirl it again. Maddison’s laughter makes my smile grow bigger, and finally, Eric’s lips twitch.

  “Kill them all and get the girl alive!” Michael’s angry bellow makes everyone move at once.

  Hunters swarm us from all sides. Sounds of fists hitting flesh and metal and wood bouncing off each other echoes, followed by yells and screams of anger and pain. I don’t leave Eric’s side, and neither does Maddison. The two of us guard his back as he sends one hunter after another to the ground, and they don’t stand up again. I’m hoping they are unconscious and not dead, but since our lives are in danger, I don’t have it in me to care too much.

  I have no idea where she found it, but Maddison is wielding a beautiful carved short sword with a jeweled handle that twinkles in the daylight. There is no blood on it, yet, so I’m guessing she uses it more to hit them than stab them.

  “I wonder how they found us here,” Eric grunts angrily as he punches yet another poor soul in the face, knocking him down. “I know we were not followed.”

  “Does it matter?” I ask just as I whack one on the head who tries to grab at me. He totters for a moment before dropping on the ground like a rock. He will have a horrible headache when he wakes up.

  “Yes!” Eric and Maddison answer at the same time.

  We continue fighting, but after a while, they manage to pull us away from each other. There are just so many hunters, and there is not a moment to stop and take a breath. They just keep coming. I lose sight of both Eric and Maddison, so I concentrate on keeping the hunters away from me. Twist, turn, smack across any part of the body, stop. And, repeat. It’s almost calming when it’s a constant repetition of the same. That was my downfall this day.

  I was so concentrated on repeating my movements that it took me longer to realize that they had stopped coming. A second too late, I heard the whoosh of air above me before two arms grab me around my waist and my feet leave the ground.

  I feel dazed at being airborne and can’t do anything but hang like a deadweight. Eric’s roar snaps me out of it, and swinging my handle, I hit whoever it is as hard as I can, breaking the wood in half. The arms holding me release, and I have a second for my mind to scream ‘Oh, shit!’ before I plummet to the ground.

  My life flashes before me as I brace myself for the impact with the ground, but it doesn’t happen. My flailing body is snatched in the air like some weird game a bird would play with a worm. After a second, I’m unceremoniously dropped on the ground. My stomach rebels with all the flying and dropping, so I bend over with my hands on my knees and empty it all over a pair of shiny black shoes.

  “Oh, for goodness sake!” Michael’s voice sounds disgusted, and I can’t say I blame him. Regardless of that, I smile because I’m so proud of myself for messing up his perfect appearance.

  “Oops!” Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I give him the biggest smile ever. He backhands me, making my head fly to the side, and I taste blood when my lip splits.

  “Helena!” Eric’s scream rips my heart apart, but I can’t look his way. It’ll kill me if I do. Michael is here for me, and if he has me, he will leave them alone so I won’t fight him. “Michael, I would give her back if I were you.”

  “She doesn’t look like she wants to go back.” Michael gloats when he sees that I’m not fighting him.

  “I don’t give a fuck what she seems like, you piece of shit! Give her back now!” Eric is still fighting hordes of hunters, but his eyes are glued on me.

  I forget all about Michael and Eric when another man pops out of nowhere behind Michael. His hair is brown, cut similarly as Michael’s with the same porcelain skin and perfect angelic face. But his eyes are different. His yellow, cat-like eyes watch me curiously, and there is kindness in them that almost makes me weep. He nods once at me, placing a finger over his lips as if telling me not to out him, and then puts a fist over his heart.

  “Raphael, it took you long enough,” Michael snaps, not even looking behind him.

  “You are making a mistake, brother.” Raphael’s voice is soft, but deep, putting me at ease.

  “I didn’t ask you for advice! Just keep them busy until I take her away!” A snarling Michael grabs my arm, pulling me towards him, and as if hypnotized, I don’t fight him. I can’t take my eyes off Raphael.

  “If you take her, I promise you that you will die!” Eric’s voice has so much power packed in it; I feel it burning my skin.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Michael mutters. “Nothing I haven’t heard before.”

  “It’s not smart to piss off the Prince of Hell before you take his mate,” Raphael says as if he is talking about a cookie recipe.

  “Wha…” My question is cut off when Michael presses a spot on my neck, and my eyes roll to the back of my head. The last thought I have is, Oh my god, Eric is the Prince of Hell. I never made the connection, and hearing his terrifying roar, I feel sorry for whoever will be the recipient of his anger.

  To be continued…

  About the Author

  Brave warrior,

  You survived being inside my head yet again, and I salute you! I’m grateful for you, and I hope you enjoyed the beginning of the journey Helena and Eric are taking, as much as I enjoyed writing it. Their fight against Michael continues in “Speak of the Devil” that is available for pre-order, and will soon be in your kindle. Links on the next page. :)

  If you loved reading the story, please take a moment to leave a review. If you like to stay updated on my new releases or giveaways, sign up for my newsletter.

  Happy reading, and may the odds be ever in your favor :)

  Maya xxx

  Also by Maya Daniels

  Semiramis series-Urban Fantasy/PNR:

  Who am I - Prequel to t
he Semiramis series

  Semiramis Awakened Book 1

  Semiramis Reborn Book 2

  Semiramis The Vessel Book 3

  Stand alone-Dark Fantasy romance/ Mythology:

  The Cursed Kingdom

  Hidden Portals trilogy- PNR:

  Venus Trap Book 1

  The First Secret Book 2

  The Obsidian Throne- coming soon

  The Broken Halos series- PNR/Urban Fantasy:

  The Devil is in the Details Book 1

  Speak of the Devil Book 2

  Devilish Encounter Book 3 - coming soon

  New Blood Rising series- Dark PNR

  Risorgimento-Rebirth Book 1