Zia whirled away, reaching for a tarot card on top of her bureau and slapped it into Lucia’s hand. “Seven of Cups. Wishful thinking, my dear. Your head is in the clouds.”
“I don’t understand.” But she did. Her aunt was trying to tell her this was all a fantasy. Being Delia’s mother, Armaros’s partner. A physical pain began in her chest and she rubbed at it, wincing when her hand touched her breastbone. Pulling her shirt away from her chest, she glanced down at herself. Even shadowed, she could see the bruises marring her skin. A handprint between her breasts, fingertips along her stomach. She whipped her shirt off and her mother and aunt gasped.
“Lucia!” Her mother placed a shaking hand on her side, matching a handprint and then grasping Lucia’s hand to place their palms together.
“I was fighting to get free,” she whispered by way of explanation.
“You’re a mess, but it will all heal.” Zia attempted to comfort her, but it was an unfamiliar role and sounded strange. “Now, important things. Seven of Cups.”
“I’m being stupid,” she answered, pulling her shirt back on, wincing and grimacing as she did so. “I get it.”
“Of course, but there’s more. First, Seven of Cups always represents temptation. Wishful thinking, yes, but be careful of the temptation to take what shouldn’t be yours. Now, look beneath it.” There was another tarot beneath the first, one she hadn’t noticed.
“The Empress,” she breathed.
“Yes,” her aunt agreed. “Power over life. Birth. The nurturer. Creation.”
“Zia, I don’t understand. I’m wishing for things I can’t have…”
“Yes, but Lucia. The Empress. Creation. Who says you can’t have the things you wish for? All you have to do is create them.” Slowly, her aunt grinned. Her smile was genuine, and so rare, Lucia couldn’t help freaking out a little.
“I’m so confused.” Her head pounded, and the pain in her chest throbbed. In a matter of hours, she’d been sliced, made love, and been possessed. Her body was a mess, her emotions were all over the place, and she was one step from losing her mind. “And I’m kind of hungry.”
“Come on.” Her mother opened her bedroom door. “I made meatballs.”
“Sounds good,” Lucia answered distractedly, catching her aunt’s eye.
“Frozen,” Zia mouthed the words, and she forced a smile. It was the same house, the same arguments, the same people, but it was all somehow unreal. Still, she was grateful this was her family, and they didn’t blink when she brought crazy into their lives.
Lucia
Armaros hadn’t returned. Five meatballs and a loaf of bread later, there was no sign of him. Lucia considered asking Zia to scry for him, but left it alone when her father entered the kitchen and glared at her for the length of time it took him to finish the pot of sauce and meatballs.
“Dad,” she began.
He sliced his hand through the air. “Save it. I don’t want to hear it.” Standing, he slammed his chair beneath the table and left the kitchen. His footsteps thumped up the stairs and overhead where the door to his bedroom shut so hard, the giant fork and spoon fell off the wall.
“I better go talk to him. Clean the kitchen before you go to bed, Lucia.” Her mother clearly had no sympathy for her moving around like an old woman.
“Okay. Night, Mom.”
“Night, Connie,” Zia repeated.
Dropping a kiss on her head, her mother tilted Lucia’s chin toward her and kissed her nose. “It’ll be okay, Lucia. I love you.”
“Love you, too, Momma.”
It was Zia and Lucia, alone, again. Drumming her fingers on the table, Lucia studied the kitchen. How could something so familiar feel so strange? Home was always comforting. No matter how long she was gone, she settled in. Now, it was empty, and… not hers. She didn’t belong here. Her family was her family, but in the space of a few days, her focus became Delia and Armaros. She needed them with her.
“Armaros.” Her aunt’s voice jarred her out of her daydreams.
“What about him?” She was prepared to defend him if need be.
“He’s dangerous to you,” she started.
“No—”
Holding up a hand to halt her tirade, Zia went on, “He is. You don’t understand what kind of creature you’ve attached yourself to, and what it means.”
“I’ve been dealing with the magical since I was born, Zia. It wasn’t such a huge leap.” When she became an adult, Lucia viewed Zia as overly superstitious, and maybe a little cracked. But when she was younger, her aunt was mysterious. A fascinating otherworldly being who left all the other relatives in the dust. It shouldn’t have been so difficult for her aunt to accept Armaros and Lucia’s choice to love him.
“No.” Zia pointed her finger at her, face serious. “You haven’t. Throwing salt over your shoulder and reading tarot touches the surface of what exists in the universe. You, my darling niece, are interfering with the divine. With the original evil and good. Armaros made his choice long ago, and when you give him a place in your heart, you opened yourself to—You can’t even imagine.”
Her hand reflexively pressed to her chest, over the throbbing bruise. “I do understand.”
“Lucia.” Zia’s head dropped into her hands and she rubbed her eyes. When she looked up, her face was sad. “What do you think is going to happen here? What kind of future do you think you can have? He’s evil. No matter how he treats you, what he does, what he claims. He is evil. He’s not going to suddenly change sides, piccola.”
“You don’t know him.”
“I don’t have to.”
“Zia.” It was too much, she couldn’t listen to another word. In her heart she knew, Armaros was not evil. Misguided, definitely. But not evil.
Standing abruptly, Zia stormed out of the room. Like her father earlier, Lucia could track her movement. Stomping up the steps, slamming her bedroom door open, walking across the floor, wrestling with her bureau, marching back across the floor and down the stairs again. When she came through the swinging door, her aunt’s face was red and angry as if her walk had riled her up. In her hands were her tarot, and she was already shuffling.
“Zia…” Lucia began.
“Zip it.” Lips moving with a prayer, Zia divided the deck into three piles before laying out three cards. Past. Present. Future. Each card was revealed with a slap and terse word. “The past: The Fool. Present: The Moon. Future: King of Swords.” Pointing to the last card, she glared at Lucia. “See?”
She did. Understanding swept over her and she smiled. “Yes, Zia. Listen. In the past, The Fool represents the mistake Armaros made. He made the wrong choice, and he fell from grace. But now, The Moon. It leads Armaros along a path. It’s rough and he can’t really see it, because the moon doesn’t illuminate the world very much, but he’s moving in the right direction.”
“What about the King of Swords, Lucia. How do you explain that? Judgment. Ruthlessness. This is your future.”
“Or is it a man with strength? Who will be ruled not only by what he knows, but what he feels?”
“You’re being naive.”
“And you’re being dramatic,” she snapped. Armaros was her future. Part of the family she would have as soon as she found the kid she lost.
“Am I?” Zia scooped the cards from the table, shuffled them, and then slapped down one last card. “You: The Hanged Man. Tell me. What’s good about this card?”
The Hanged Man. Traitor. Martyr. Her eyes remained glue to the upside-down figure hanging from a tree. Try as she might, she couldn’t find a way to spin the card into something positive. Gently, Zia picked up the card, tucking it away in her deck. “Don’t be stupid, Lucia. Please.”
Struck dumb, Lucia could only nod. Her ever-ready words left her. In her mind, she saw the card. Traitor. How was it possible she would betray Armaros and Delia?
Armaros
“What am I doing here?”
Lucifer sat on his throne, legs draped over the arm, rega
rding Armaros angrily.
“Do you want to explain why I suddenly have Warriors fluttering from the clouds with their pretty pink wings and twinkling around my gates like they found Neverland?” The Fallen swept his long hair to the side. He stood, walking slowly to Armaros. “This is my domain, Armaros.”
Why would the Creator’s warriors be coming to Hell? Earth was the battleground. Unless… “Warriors or Messengers, Lucifer?” he asked, watching the original Fallen closely.
Eyes darkening with anger, his form grew until he loomed over Armaros. But if he thought his size would intimidate him, he was wrong. “You think I can’t tell the difference?”
“You haven’t answered my question.” Leave it to the devil to speak from both sides of his mouth. “Were they Messengers or Warriors?”
“Both,” he finally answered.
It had to be about Delia. As far as he knew, there’d never been another like her. Her appearance was the only thing Armaros could think would merit the Creator risking his precious minions. “Do they have her?”
“Your misplaced niece?” Returning to his usual form, Lucifer turned his back on him, retreating to his throne. “No. But they want her.”
“I have to find her.” And in order to find her, he had to get out of Hell. As soon as the urge rose in him, something blocked it, smacking it back like a mosquito.
“Not yet.” The Original wasn’t finished with him. “Have you asked yourself why a half-human would cause so much upset that the Creator would send his Warriors after you, and risk my ire by sending both them and Messengers to my dominion?”
No. His main concern had been Lucia and finding Delia. He knew his niece’s appearance had thrown off the balance, but the eternal war between Lucifer and the Creator wasn’t his problem anymore. Lulls and spikes in aggression between both sides had happened for eternity.
“Why are you surprised?” Armaros asked. “Fallen can have offspring. We can create. There’s more to us than soul collection and stock-piling power.”
“Idiot.” Lucifer scoffed. “This isn’t new. Your sister wasn’t the first to become enamored of a human. She’s not the first to have a child.”
“Impossible,” Armaros challenged. If there had been children before Delia, he would have known.
“Delia is the first child to make it past infancy,” Lucifer went on. “I tried to find the others. My curiosity was piqued, but as soon as a child was born it disappeared, or died. In reaching childhood, your niece is the first. Not all Fallen are as caring as your sister, as you well know, but I never discovered evidence one of us had destroyed their own child. In fact, most of us died with the child, or disappeared along with them. Strange, don’t you think?”
“The Warriors are murdering the human-Fallen offspring.”
“Yes.” Lucifer sat on his throne, leaning his head against his palm. “And you need to spend more time keeping her safe and less time smiting helpless demons.”
“Belias possessed Lucia. She’s mine.”
“This is your home, Armaros. The Fallen and demons are your brothers and sisters.”
Releasing a breath, Armaros examined the throne room. He’d been here a million times, but saw it now with new eyes. It was both gilded and dark. Created to show the power and depravity of Lucifer, it melded the obscene and divine. Oil paintings created by Renaissance masters tortured with visions of Hell lined the walls. Souls writhed in flames, skin melting while in others, Fallen tortured humans, twisting their bodies, eyes rolling in sockets, tongues swollen and black. Columns of skulls stood at each edge of the room. Gemstones winked at him, caught in the light of the ever-burning flames flickering through the stained-glass windows.
Linking his fingers together, Lucifer watched him pace. “Once you made a choice, my friend. You chose freedom. Now, you are tying yourself to a human and to a child. Soon, I fear, you will be forced to choose again.” His voice held a tone of warning, one which had Armaros’s wings extending and touching either side of the golden room.
“Don’t threaten me.”
In response, Lucifer’s wings erupted from his back. “And don’t think to disobey me. I am still master here.” He sat on his throne again, wings curling over his shoulders. “Now go. Find your niece and your human. Have a care, Armaros. More than Belias are interested in you now.”
The power binding him to Hell disappeared, and rather than debate, he found the thread leading him to Lucia and flashed there.
As soon as his gaze landed on the figure, head resting on a round chrome and Formica kitchen table, something inside him relaxed. The threads leading him to her wound their way around her body, drawing him closer and closer until he could lift her into his arms. Sleepy eyes blinked at him. In his eternal life, he’d never seen anything as beautiful as her the moment she recognized him. Unfiltered joy dawned, and she reached for him. Her arms wound tightly around his neck, drawing his head to hers so she could kiss him, but he stopped her.
“I’m so sorry, Lucia. I never thought…” Three long scrapes ran the length of her face, evidence of Belias’s cruelty. Suddenly, he had to know what else he’d done to her. His growl filled the kitchen. Sitting her on the edge of the table, he tore off her shirt. A roar built in his chest. No. Not a roar. A howl. Bruises marred her skin, each one a clear imprint of a hand or fingers. “You fought,” his voice broke.
He fit his hand to the largest bruise over her heart. His palm dwarfed it. Picking up her hand, he slowly fit it to the outline. It was a perfect match. “Lucia…”
She stopped him with a kiss. Using the chair, she stood, gathering his body to hers. His ear rested over her heart, the steady thump reassuring. Gently, she threaded her fingers through his hair, her nails scraping against his scalp. “I’m okay. You saved me. Brought me here, got that thing out of me and destroyed it.” Pushing him back, she examined every inch of his face. “You’re okay, right? It didn’t hurt you?”
He kissed away her concern. “As if a Dominion could ever overpower me.”
“Of course not.” Something in her tone had him pulling back. She bit her lip, but her eyes danced.
“It couldn’t,” he reiterated.
“I never said it could,” she agreed.
Stepping back, he put his hands on his hips. “I’m strong and powerful. There are not many, not even the Creator’s Warriors, who are threats to me.” Carefully, she stepped off the chair. Her movements spoke of sore muscles and aching bones and he growled. “You need to lie down.”
“I will. But first I need to assure you I have every confidence in your strength.” He didn’t miss her wince as she attempted to stand on her tiptoes to kiss him. In response, he swung her into his arms and strode purposefully through the kitchen and upstairs to her bedroom. Placing her on the bed, he gingerly eased himself on top of her. Her legs immediately parted, knees lifting to squeeze his hips.
“How will you reassure me?” he teased. “My self-esteem is very fragile.”
Her hands snaked between their bodies, fumbling with the buttons on his pants and pushing at the waist. “I have some ideas,” she answered breathlessly.
He groaned when her hand encircled his length, pumping him up and down. His control was exhausted, and her hand felt too good. Taking her hands, he held them above her head and kissed his way down her body, lingering on each bruise, laving it with his tongue and tickling it with his lips.
Beneath him, her body undulated, meeting each of his advances with her own. Without knowing how, he divested them of their clothing until there was nothing between them. Plumping her breast in his hand, he tugged her nipple into her mouth. Her low groan vibrated through his body, and suddenly, they weren’t close enough. Releasing her hands, he spread her knees, arching up and impaling her. Her sharp intake of breath ended with a moan and then her hands were on his ass, urging him forward, faster and faster.
He lifted himself onto his knees, pulling her into the cradle of his hips. Her hands scrabbled at the bedding, seeking purchas
e to push against him. His breath bellowed out of him, sweat dripping down his temples and along his jaw. He watched a drop land on her chest, rolling under her breast to be absorbed by the sheet.
“Armaros,” she gasped, grabbing his biceps, fingers digging into his muscles. The pinch of pain was all he needed to set him off.
Her muscles clamped down on him hard, clutching and releasing him. His release went on and on. Lucia’s face, her response, it all served to hold him at the pinnacle of pleasure.
He rolled onto the bed, drawing her into his arms and kissing her face. He was desperate for her, and embraced her hard, wishing there was a way to shield her, to wrap her up and keep her safe forever.
“I love you,” she whispered. An ache began in his chest, lancing him with pain, and he closed his eyes.
“I choose you, Lucia. Forever. I choose you.”
Armaros
Armaros had received less deadly glares from demons than the one he was currently wilting under. Albert, Lucia’s father, pinned him with a stare at breakfast and hadn’t looked away.
There were some blinks, a grunt or two, but otherwise nothing except eyeball-to-eyeball stabbing.
At a loss, Armaros tried small talk. Constanza, Lucia’s mother, answered when it became clear Albert had nothing to say. Even Zia Valeria took pity on him. Not Albert.
He had as much mercy as Lucifer.
“An angel,” Constanza began. “We go to church every Sunday, you know.”
Across the table, Lucia choked on her coffee. Zia pounded on her back, an evil smile gracing her lips. “I’m sure Armaros doesn’t care if you go to church, Connie.”
“He’s got a direct connection up there. It can’t help to put a good word in.” She turned her attention to him again. “You’ll put a good word in, won’t you?”
“Armaros isn’t an angel, Mom,” Lucia began.
If he needed to, he could make it to her in less than a second and poof them out of here. Silently, he begged Lucia to stop talking. He was in the unusual position of needing to impress his… what was she? Soul mate? Lover? Girlfriend? Human? Whatever-she-is’s parents. Her father was unimpressed with his current designation of angel. What would happen when he learned Armaros was the opposite?
The Darkest Fall Page 14
