by Jenna Black
I leapt to my feet. “Don’t!” I held out my hand beseechingly.
“Are you going to answer my questions?”
What choice did I have? I nodded.
“Good. Now why don’t we take this discussion somewhere more private?”
At the moment, my apartment was about as private as you could get, though Der Jäger didn’t know that. I wished I felt more hopeful that someone had heard my screams and called the police. But my neighbors on one side were on vacation somewhere, and my neighbor on the other side refused to admit he needed a hearing aid. I was on my own.
“I’ll do whatever you want,” I said, holding my hands out to my sides. “Just don’t hurt Brian. He has nothing to do with any of this.”
I think Brian’s manly instincts were offended by my attempts to protect him, but Der Jäger was putting enough pressure on his windpipe so that he could barely breathe, much less protest.
“Your concern is touching,” Der Jäger said. “We’re going to go down to the garage and get your car. You’re going to drive, and your boyfriend and I will sit in the backseat. You aren’t going to try any heroic moves, and you aren’t going to talk to anyone. Is that all perfectly clear?”
I nodded, then started moving toward the table and my purse. The Taser beckoned from the floor, so tantalizing close and yet so far away.
“Stop right there!” Der Jäger barked.
I gave him my best innocent face. “I have to get my car keys,” I told him.
Der Jäger scowled. “Move very, very slowly, and keep your hands in plain sight. Get the keys and leave everything else.”
I did as he told me, moving practically in slow motion. I had to remind myself to breathe every once in a while. My fingers itched to reach for the Taser, but I knew if I did, Brian was dead. Lugh pounded at my head. He figured Brian was dead no matter what. But, damn it, I wasn’t giving up until all hope was lost.
All hope is lost, a voice that sounded disturbingly like Lugh’s whispered in my head. I shook it off.
I carefully unzipped the front compartment of my purse, then pulled it wide open so that Der Jäger could see that I wasn’t reaching for a weapon. Heart pounding in my throat, I drew out my keys and let the purse drop back down to the table.
Der Jäger kept his hand wrapped around Brian’s throat as he wiped blood away from his already-healing nose. “Lead the way,” he ordered.
And I did.
CHAPTER 26
It was getting late, and we didn’t run in to anyone on our way from my apartment to the car. Der Jäger gave up his choke hold on Brian, instead grabbing him by the back of the neck and jerking him around like a cop with a juvenile delinquent.
“Don’t you dare try anything!” I growled at Brian when the three of us piled into the elevator. “You’re not faster than a demon.”
Der Jäger seemed to find that terribly amusing, and Brian gave me a mutinous look. My heart almost stopped in fear that he was going to try the heroics after all, but even testosterone poisoning didn’t completely fry his intelligence. I knew he was just biding his time, that if Der Jäger let go of him for even an instant, he would try something and get himself killed.
Der Jäger’s going to kill him anyway, Lugh’s voice whispered in my mind. A chill shivered down my spine. Was I just imagining what he would say if he had a chance, or was he actually talking to me? I didn’t want to know.
I drove out of the garage without incident, the attendant not even bothering to glance at me or my parking pass before hitting the button to raise the gate. What can I say, my building has great security.
It didn’t take me long to figure out where Der Jäger was taking me. It isn’t exactly easy to find privacy in the middle of a city the size of Philadelphia, but as the Art Museum loomed in front of me, I remembered that nearby Fairmount Park covered thousands of acres. Easily enough room for our little threesome to disappear into.
The lights of the boathouses along the Schuylkill River looked incongruously picturesque and cheerful as we drove by them and plunged into the depths of the park.
Once upon a time in the mid—nineteenth century, Philadelphia’s water supply had been in jeopardy because of the rapid development of the city. The Fairmount Park system had been born when the great estate of Lemon Hill had been dedicated as a public park. As the years went by, more and more estates, particularly those situated by the Schuylkill, were absorbed by the park, until it became one of the largest urban parks in the country. Technically, all the parks throughout the city—and several beyond it—are part of the Fairmount Park system, but when Philadelphians think of Fairmount Park, they think of the grounds that had once been those old estates by the river.
Like the city, the park sprawls, some of it beautifully landscaped, with bike trails and horse trails and picnic areas, and some as close to natural forest as you can get in such a major metropolitan area. On a sunny spring day, the place would be teeming, but at this time of night, it was eerily deserted.
Eventually, we pulled into a closed parking lot. I had to drive through the chain over the driveway, but Der Jäger didn’t seem too concerned about the damage to my car. I might have hoped a cop would drive by, see the broken chain and my illegally parked car, and call in the cavalry. However, Der Jäger had chosen this location carefully, and when I pulled into the farthest corner and killed the lights, I realized the chances of anyone seeing us from the road were slim and none.
Lugh pounded at my head again as I followed Der Jäger’s orders and opened the door for him and Brian. If I’d been any less determined to keep him out, I probably would have crumbled under that assault. But I didn’t care how much pain Lugh put me through—I was going to save Brian if it killed me.
You can’t! Lugh protested, and I felt more sure this time that it was really him rather than my imagination.
Fuck off! was my pithy reply.
Apparently, the parking lot wasn’t private enough for Der Jäger’s taste, for he dragged Brian deeper into the park, until the feeble moonlight could barely penetrate the dense canopy of the trees. It felt for all the world like we were in the middle of some remote forest, rather than within the Philadelphia city limits.
Finally, Der Jäger was satisfied with our location and pushed Brian up against a tree, hand at his throat once more. In the thick gloom of the night, I could barely see either of them. Brian’s dark shirt and jeans disappeared against the trunk of the tree, until he looked almost like a disembodied head floating in the air.
“Now,” Der Jäger said, “I think it’s time we have a chat, don’t you?”
“He’s going to kill me anyway,” Brian started, but the sound choked off when Der Jäger’s hand tightened on his throat.
“Only one thing is certain,” Der Jäger said. “If you don’t talk to me, I will kill him. I’m sure you know I’m not bluffing.”
I nodded, though I wasn’t sure he could see it in the dark.
“So,” Der Jäger continued conversationally, “you are still hosting Lugh after all. How interesting. It would seem that Raphael has not been entirely honest with us.”
I did a mental double take at that, though I hoped it didn’t show on my face. I had assumed Raphael had betrayed us to Der Jäger. Why else would he have told me Der Jäger was imprisoned, if it wasn’t to give me enough of a false sense of security to let him get close to me?
It was really easy to assume the worst of Raphael, especially after all I’d learned about his involvement in my life. But if there was one thing we good guys had on our side, it was that the bad guys didn’t seem to play nice with each other all the time. I had no idea who was lying to whom about what, and they probably didn’t, either. It was just as well it stayed that way.
I managed what I hoped was a sneer. “When has Raphael been completely honest with anyone?”
Der Jäger shrugged. “I suppose you have a point.” My eyes were adjusting to the darkness, for I saw the sudden flare of his nostrils as he breathed in deep
ly, then frowned. “I still can’t catch Lugh’s scent on you. I’ve never experienced anything of the sort before.”
I figured at least one of us was going to be dead before this was all over, so there was no harm if I did a little talking—and stalling. I didn’t know if time was going to be on my side, exactly, but putting off whatever nastiness was to come seemed like as good a plan as any.
“He can’t actually control me,” I explained. “We’ve got sort of a role reversal going, where the demon gets to be the passenger and the host drives. I guess that’s why you can’t sense him.”
Der Jäger looked appropriately fascinated. “I wonder why his dear brother would have neglected to mention that.”
I shrugged. “If I understood Raphael worth a damn, I’d do my best to explain it.”
Der Jäger’s eyes seemed to glow in the dark. “Don’t worry. I’ll enjoy persuading him to explain it all in his own words. Unlike myself, he seems to find physical pain an unpleasant experience. A shameful weakness in a royal.”
I had to suppress a shudder. No doubt Raphael deserved whatever Der Jäger would do to him—even if he hadn’t betrayed us—but what about his poor host?
“Your situation leaves me in somewhat of a dilemma,” Der Jäger continued. “It seems likely that you’re telling the truth and you do indeed host Lugh. Obviously you have hosted a demon sometime since I last saw you. However, I have no proof whatsoever that you are currently possessed. Perhaps you are more clever than I’ve given you credit for. If I were to kill you and then find out you aren’t hosting Lugh anymore, I will have lost my chance to learn who you transferred him to.”
“Yeah, that’s a tough situation all right. I’d hate to be you right now.”
The spark in his eye said he didn’t much appreciate my sarcasm, but he kept quiet about it. Still pinning Brian to the tree with one hand, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a pair of handcuffs, flinging them to the ground just in front of my feet.
“Put those on.”
I stared at the handcuffs and shivered. Call me a control freak, but I hate having my hands restrained. Of course, even with my hands free, I was essentially useless against my enemy as long as he had Brian as a hostage.
Apparently, Der Jäger got tired of my hesitation. He drove his fist into Brian’s gut. I let out a choked scream as Brian tried to double over. Of course, Der Jäger’s grip on his throat wouldn’t allow it.
“Put the handcuffs on,” Der Jäger repeated.
I bent and grabbed the cuffs, thinking furiously. No brilliant ideas leapt to mind.
I can break the handcuffs if you’ll just let me in, Lugh said.
God, I hoped he was only able to talk to me like this because of the stress. He was invasive enough in my dreams. The last thing I needed was to be constantly reminded that he was inside me all day, every day.
Of course, if Der Jäger had his way, it wouldn’t be a problem for much longer.
I didn’t deign to answer Lugh as I fastened one cuff over my right wrist. I went to fasten the other one, but Der Jäger stopped me.
“Behind your back, please.”
I bared my teeth at him, though it seemed only to amuse him. Brian’s face was still a rictus of pain, and he’d wrapped both his arms around his stomach where Der Jäger had hit him. Wind rustled through the trees above us, and the movement of the branches opened the path for a pale beam of moonlight to illuminate the two of them.
I had to suppress a gasp when I saw that Brian wasn’t just clutching his gut in pain—his hand had slipped under the tail of his shirt again. In that brief splash of moonlight, I saw the mini stun gun holstered on his belt. No bigger than a pack of cigarettes, it nonetheless had the power to drop a demon.
I forced myself not to stare. I didn’t know what the hell Brian thought he was going to do, seeing as the damn demon still had skin-on-skin contact, but my calling attention to it wasn’t going to help. The wind died down, and the branches overhead shaded the moonlight once more.
“I am losing my patience,” Der Jäger said, smiling at me. “Perhaps I should show you just how much I can hurt lover-boy here without having to take him as my host.”
A wail of protest was rising in my throat when suddenly all hell broke loose.
Der Jäger hauled Brian away from the tree, moving his hand away from his throat as he threw a brutal punch at his face. Brian jerked the stun gun from his waistband, but Der Jäger’s fist caught his chin long before he had time to do anything useful with the weapon.
Blood fountained from Brian’s mouth as the punch lifted him off his feet and threw him backward. The stun gun flew from his limp hand to land in the leaf litter about ten yards away.
Der Jäger had been advancing for another blow, but his head jerked to follow the trajectory of the stun gun. He said something that sounded very much like a curse, though I wasn’t familiar with the language.
There was no way I was getting to that stun gun before Der Jäger got to Brian. There was also no way I could protect Brian unless I was armed, not unless I could let Lugh take over in the span of a heartbeat, which I’d already established I couldn’t. And so I propelled myself toward the stun gun.
And, thank God, Der Jäger did, too, leaving Brian where he lay, bleeding, on the ground.
I dove the last few feet, hands fishing through the dead leaves for the stun gun. My fingers skimmed over something man-made in the midst of the leaf litter, but then Der Jäger’s hand closed over my wrist and squeezed. Lugh flung himself at the barriers of my mind, and once again I tried to let him in. As long as Der Jäger didn’t have a hand on Brian, I knew we were all better off with Lugh driving.
Even as I tried to let Lugh in, I flailed for the stun gun with my other hand. Der Jäger tried to jerk me to my feet, but I caught him in the kneecap with a wild kick. I heard something crack, and Der Jäger collapsed to the ground once more. However, he didn’t let go of my wrist, and his grip became even more crushing. I was actually thankful for the handcuff, which was for the moment keeping my bones in one piece, though it was digging into my flesh. Pain forced tears from my eyes, but my free hand found the stun gun once more, and this time I was able to get a grip. I armed it by feel and prayed it was fully charged.
I rammed the stun gun into Der Jäger’s stomach and gave him a healthy jolt.
He cried out in mingled pain and surprise, then collapsed on top of me in a nerveless heap. I took about half a second to suck in a few frantic gasps of air, then heaved him off me. His eyes glittered with hatred as he lay there in the darkness, but the electricity would keep him from being able to do anything about it for at least ten or fifteen minutes. I started to wonder what the hell I was going to do with him now, but I forcibly yanked my mind away from the subject.
Keeping a close watch on Der Jäger out of the corner of my eye, I hurried over to where Brian lay, still not moving. I knelt beside him and was so relieved I could have cried when I saw his chest rise and fall.
Blood coated his lips and chin, and I hoped to God nothing was broken.
“Brian?” I said, smoothing his hair back from his face. “Can you hear me?”
His lashes fluttered for a moment; then he opened his eyes. I swallowed convulsively to keep myself from bawling like a baby. Brian blinked and groaned, and I knew instinctively that he was going to try to get up, so I put a hand firmly in the center of his chest.
“Take it slow,” I ordered him.
“The demon—”
I hushed him with a shake of my head. “He’s out of commission for the moment,” I assured him, jerking my chin in Der Jäger’s direction. Brian turned his head to look, then winced. I bet he had one hell of a headache. “Are you all right?” I asked, because I couldn’t not ask.
Brian pushed himself up on his elbows, and I allowed it. He then spit out a mouthful of blood. “Could have been worse,” he mumbled. “Much worse.”
I helped him sit up. “Still have all your teeth?”
He grimaced. “All still here, but one feels loose and one feels broken. Guess I’ll be paying a call on the dentist tomorrow.”
“I’m so sorry—”
“Not your fault.” I opened my mouth to protest my guilt more vehemently, but he stared me into silence. “We’ve got more important things to think about right now,” he said, and reluctantly I followed his gaze to where Der Jäger lay.
He was twitching now, but didn’t seem to have enough control of his limbs even to sit up. I double-checked the charge on the stun gun anyway.
“What are we going to do with him?” Brian asked softly.
Nausea roiled in my stomach. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what had to be done. Der Jäger knew far too much, and was far too dangerous, to be allowed to return to the Demon Realm. He had to die.
But killing him meant killing my father, and I didn’t know if I was capable of doing it.
CHAPTER 27
I felt the pressure of Brian’s eyes on me as his question hung unanswered. During the brief time I’d been under Lugh’s control back when I’d almost been burned at the stake, he had used me to help Raphael burn another demon host alive. In that case, both the demon and his host had richly deserved it, and yet everything inside me had recoiled at the idea. I’m sure if Lugh weren’t with me to keep me from dreaming anything he doesn’t want me to dream, I’d have had nightmares about that. But bad as it had been, how much worse would it be when the host was the man who’d raised me since birth?
My head swam, and for a moment I thought I might faint.
I shook my head violently to clear it. Oh, no. I was not going to faint. That might be the easy way out—faint dead away and let Lugh take care of the ugly business—but I’ve never been one to do anything the easy way. And if I was going to condone burning a man alive, I had damn well better step up to the plate and admit it.
“Can you exorcize the demon?” Brian asked me, and I realized I’d neglected to mention to him my hard-won revelation that exorcism merely sends demons back to the Demon Realm.
