Once You Go Demon (Pure Souls)

by Killian McRae

  Behind her back, her hands sought contact with the doorknob. Pretend she was with Marc? If not for those blue eyes, she’d be tempted to do just that. But no matter how she rationalized it, she knew it would be a betrayal on so many levels.

  “Trips down memory lane,” was her only reply. At last, she felt the stingingly frigid metallic latch under her thumb. “I’m glad I could help, but this was a one-time only thing, Jerry. Don’t expect that this changes anything between us.”

  She practically fell through the door when it opened behind her. Jerry let his arms lower to his side as he prowled in to the house after her. “You keep thinking I’m trying to take Marc’s place. I’m not. I loved you first; he was trying to take mine.”

  “Come on, Jer, our time together … Even if I was to ignore the fact that you were with me on assignment from the Devil, and the way it ended, the time I was with you, it was never a relationship built on anything except a few laughs and a lot of sex.”

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

  “It’s a horrible thing,” she coughed out incredulously. “Fine, yes, I liked being with you back then. But that’s before I knew everything, and before I fell in love with someone else.”

  “He’s dead, and I’m not.” He had made up the distance between them, and though his hand raised to her face, poised to stroke her cheek, he withheld. “I’m sorry for what happened to Marc, Riona, but he gave his life to save you. You think he did it so you could make good his debt to the church by making yourself into a nun?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Good, because you’re not,” Jerry hissed back. “You are a vibrant, intelligent, passionate, kick-ass witch, and you’re fucking sexy as hell. You have powers you haven’t even begun to discover, and a heart that knows no limits. You have a body that demands to be worshipped. And you deserve to be loved and to be made love to, and goddess in grief, Riona, after what I’ve gone through to save you, I deserve at least a chance.” His arm lashed out, his finger pointing the way down the hall. “By all the mercies of Heaven and Hell, let me take you to my room and make you feel so much more than human.”

  “No.” Tears pricked the corner of her eyes, and she inwardly yelled at the way her body attempted to maneuver itself to lean in to his embrace. If she didn’t take command now, her will was about to join Elvis and her good sense on its way out the building. “Thank you for defending my honor against Azazel, but you’re not demon anymore. No matter what connection you still have with Hell, not in the way that counts. I don’t care what inside scoop you have, we both know that Azazel could have smashed you to paste if he wanted. Please, Jerry, I already have Marc’s blood on my hands. Don’t put me in a position where I have to look at yours, too.”

  To her surprise, he relented. Pushing his hands down in to his pockets, his eyes trained on the floor. “Fine.” Kicking the balustrade before turning down the hall, he exhaled. “If that’s the way you want it, I’ll back off. For now.”

  Chapter 14

  In customary fashion, Ramiel materialized out of nothing into full form before her in a flash. It was so unfair that while their magic no longer worked in their safe house, the angel could still Mary Poppins shit all he wanted. Riona counted herself lucky that he had let her alone for the night, allowing her to get in some much needed shut eye, but wished he had waited until she was at least one cup of coffee into the day before arriving to lecture.

  “I know you want to be all ‘What the fuck were you thinking, Riona?’, but I’m heading for the bathroom and I assure you, I’m not going to be crossing paths with any angels along the way—fallen or otherwise. Unless you’re more of a peeping tom than I thought.” Her memories flashed back to the time he had revealed his presence to her immediately after she had worked herself into a frenzy while fantasizing about Marc.

  “Well, that’s easily avoided. Just tell me what the fuck you were thinking last night, and I’ll leave you to your WC.”

  “It’s called, ‘feeling up the enemy for information,’ Ramiel. Seriously, have you never seen a single Tom Cruise movie?”

  Undeterred, the angel poked his finger into her shoulder. “Did you know he was a fallen angel when you decided to audition for the part of his pants zipper?”

  She glared daggers at him.

  Ramiel evaporated as she turned away, only a moment later to reform right in her path, blocking the entry to her three-quarters. “Damn it, Keystone, answer me!”

  Crossing her arms over her chest, Riona huffed out a sigh and cocked her hip. “Fine! Yes, I knew he was an angel. When someone sets my ovaries going like maracas and that person isn’t either Channing Tatum or Beyoncé, I get suspicious. And yes, I knew he was fallen. He smelled wrong. Sulfuric. Poisonous.”

  Ramiel nodded approvingly. “Good, at least you haven’t lost all your senses. So, did your little seductive kitty act work? What exactly was it you were trying to learn? Something about Marc?”

  “No, I was hoping he could give me an overview of the history of the French Canadian fur trade.”

  The corners of his mouth twitched, but all too soon, he resumed his dour, daunting stance.

  “I’m scared, okay?” Riona shouted out. “I’m trying to stay focused on what’s coming when Marc comes back. Excuse me for thinking a Lord of Hell might be able to give me some perspective on that. Listen, I really got to go, and I know you can, like, hear me peeing even through walls and stuff, which is kinda creepy, so do you mind, um …”

  “Fine. I’ll meet you and the others downstairs in ten minutes.” Stepping back, his body shimmered at the edges, the customary stream of light behind his frame momentarily revealing the arc of wings otherwise kept hidden. In a flash, the angel vanished.

  Dee and Jerry sat at opposite ends of the table with their hands wrapped around a cup of coffee, looking into the dark liquid in their mugs like gypsies into a crystal ball. Riona grabbed herself some of the morning tonic before heading back into the dining room.

  “You look like you’re in a time out,” she said as she took her seat.

  Ramiel’s sudden apparition on the remaining chair led her to believe that’s exactly what was going on. The angel took a deep, clearing breath, before proceeding in words that on the surface, sounded calm, but under which Riona understood deep currents of disappointment flowed.

  “I’ve tried yelling,” he said. “That seems to have no effect on this band of righteous rascals who think their endowments of magic mean they’re smarter than me, a celestial being who’s spent more time on this Earth than the pyramids. So let’s try this touchy-feely crap that’s so popular in your pansy ass culture these days.” His head swung right. “Jerry, anything you’d like to share with us? Maybe why you chose to spear one of the Grigori with a flaming pitchfork, for example? You know I could have handled him.”

  The one-fingered response the ex-demon sported was probably not the one Ramiel was hoping for.

  Riona rolled her eyes. “Please, Jer, just get it over with.”

  “And quick,” Dee added while glancing down at his phone. “I’ve got to get to work.”

  “Fine.” Jerry sat up, running his hands back and forth over the pants leg of his jeans. “I was worried he’d mount Riona to his horse.”

  Dee chuckled. “Is that what the kids are calling it these days?”

  Ramiel’s face screwed up. “Other than inducing lust for destruction in the rider, I’m not really sure why that would be an objective.”

  “Because the horses of rapture are old school methods of transport, no? Chaos isn’t their only card trick. They’re also the only way to carry a human over the River Styx without them boiling into nothingness.”

  If she had been a dog, Riona’s ears would have perked up on that comment. She shook a pointed finger at Jerry. “He said something about that. Said something about how a human can’t survive Hell.”

  “And it’s true,” Jerry confirmed. “The River Styx isn’t an actual river, mind you. It’s Hell
’s border. A mortal soul ‘crossing the river’ takes on physical form, but it works both ways. A human body crossing the border will boil and die. But in the distant past, there was occasionally a need for a human to cross into Hell, or a soul to cross out. Big Boss created the four horses so that could happen.”

  “Four horses?” Dee perked up. “You mean of the apocalypse? I thought that whole book of revelations thing was a political allegory.”

  “It is,” Jerry confirmed. “No one but Big Boss knows how it all goes down in the end. But the horses are real enough. You can ask your sister if you don’t believe me. Word is she was tied to one when Hades kidnapped her and dragged her down to the Underworld.”

  Ramiel was making modern art of their kitchen table with all the fist pounding he’d subjected it to. “So that’s how that son of a bitch did it.” When all eyes turned to him in confusion, he cleared his throat and motioned for Jerry to continue.

  “I’m sorry I pulled a reset on him, but it’s a good tactic to use, don’t you think?”

  Dee’s hand shot up in the air. “Question: reset?”

  “Azazel told me about a design flaw in the angels,” Jerry answered. “Of course, he intended me to use it if I was ever cornered by one of you archangel motherfuckers in the field, but it came in handy last night. When angels manifest flesh, they’re just as susceptible to all the damage and pain as the rest of us, and the pleasure.” He winked conspiratorially at Ramiel. “Flesh burns, so I torched his ass, and he had to dissolve himself because of the pain.”

  Ramiel jumped in. “It gives you a few minutes. Here’s the thing though, landing fire on an angel is nearly impossible. If I hadn’t been there distracting him, you’d be a side of toast to his tea right now, Jerry. Not to mention, there’s a chance he recognized you. I couldn’t see his face when you did that. Did he say anything that suggested he might have ID’ed you?”

  Riona had grown to recognize the twitch under Jerry’s eye when he lied.

  “No.”

  “Good,” Ramiel continued. “One of the few advantages we have heading into Marc’s return is that, to the best of our intelligence, no one downstairs knows about your resurrection. So do me a favor in the future and don’t do anything that liable to fuck us up again, you arrogant, demon motherfucker.”

  Apparently, the last straw was pulled on that one. Jerry’s face flushed as he leapt to his feet. “Fuck you, Ramiel. We both know he’d have grabbed an innocent for leverage if he wanted to get away with anything. Besides, how much of a heralded hero do you think he would have been if he managed to grab back his hellhorse, capture a Pure Soul, and made away with one of us?”

  “You know I wouldn’t have let something like that happen!” Ramiel belted back. “I had the Council on standby. They would have popped in and kicked ass if Azazel had tried anything. You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

  “Right, because you’re the one who actually knew about hellhorses and how they could do that. You have no idea what a pissed off Grigori is actually capable of. You don’t have a fucking clue on a lot of stuff, actually, do you? And when you do, when there’s something critical we need to know,” Jerry’s eyes flashed to Riona before his glare was thrown back at Ramiel, “you don’t bother telling us, because it’s ‘not your place.’ Fine, if you know so much, you don’t need me. Figure it all out your damn selves, then. I’ve had enough of this.”

  Jerry’s chair slammed against the wall. He was halfway to the door before Ramiel, in a fit of cussing that would make a trucker blush, did much the same, vanishing into a beam of light. Dee and Riona exchanged glances, both uncertain what to say.

  Finally, Dee rose. “Whatever. I’ve got to get to work. Suzette says she needs me for something.”

  Riona watched him stick his phone in his pocket as she headed towards the stairs. She needed a heavy jacket if she was going to traipse all over Boston, trying to figure out where Jerry went. She didn’t care what Dee and Ramiel said; Jerry had done right by her, and she was through pretending that she didn’t care about what happened to him.

  Chapter 15

  Azazel watched another minute tick-tock away. The actual time to which the Mickey Mouse arms pointed meant little; Hell didn’t exactly fall into any of Earth’s delineated time zones. His older brother took sadistic pleasure in reminding all the Damnationals of time passing, of time being wasted, of time being unattainable. Of time—period. Turned out the effect wasn’t wasted on elites like him either. Azazel was older than the dirt men walked on, but he still felt every nanosecond of eternity since the Grigori’s eviction from Heaven like a punishment created especially for his displeasure. When they’d been of the Light, centuries could pass in what felt like moments. Now hours felt like … well, hours, and those son of a bitch things were long as fuck.

  And to top it off, Lucifer, as usual, was taking his sweet old time showing up.

  Finally, at what the clock claimed was sixteen minutes past three, the Sultan of Sin plowed his way through the double doors and into the board room. Lucifer swaggered like P. Diddy at the Oscars, the recent public embarrassments he’d suffered causing no change in his Hell-manifesting demeanor. Slick and sly as sex on a stick, the head fallen angel’s heat could still make plastic fruit juice itself.

  He made no apology for his tardiness, just got right down to business as he sat himself at the other end of the exceedingly long executive table. Somebody’s compensating for something, Azazel thought, when his infamous sibling had conjured the thing into existence.

  “What?”

  Azazel stifled a sarcastic hack. “Why, hello, brother. Me? As fine as can be expected, all things considered. Heard you had a little scuffle and got yourself vanquished, though. Way to screw up being the Devil.”

  “Is that what this little tete-a-tete is about? You wanted a chance to tell me what a fuck up I’ve been lately?” Lucifer leaned back in his chair. “Get in line. It starts outside the door and ends in Timbuktu.”

  “Not quite, but while we’re on the subject … Do you know there’s a few tabloids running the story in their loony pages?” Azazel held out his hand, mocking words lining up across a marquee. “Humanity saved! Devil given a pink slip. Of course, being that you can’t materialize topside for a generation, and you were always bad at renewing your subscriptions, I bet you didn’t get that issue.” No point in sugar coating anything. Besides, inflicting pain was too much fun. “Trouble is, they’re not exactly sure how it happened. They’re chalking it up to something to do with a hidden code on the Mayan calendar. Since their sources were tightlipped around the details, I was wondering if there’s anything else I should know.”

  Lucifer’s eyes boiled with hate. Azazel couldn’t care less. His status in the hierarchy of Hell might not be as lofty, but he wasn’t going to be sent with wings shaking by anyone, even Satan. Wasn’t as though Lucifer was even more powerful than him, when it came down to brass tacks. Somebody had to be in charge of Hell, though, and since that whole coupe d’etat and ousting Hades thing had been Luc’s idea, he cinched the CEO position by default. Besides, even back in Heaven Lucifer had fit the profile of “charismatic cultist leader,” right down to his excellent singing voice and chintzy guitar strumming.

  Lucifer gnashed his perfect teeth. “There were extenuating circumstances. Look, I let my fascination with the prophecy distract me. I was so convinced I had a handle on the sitch that I let down my guard. I figured, ‘hey, little human, easy to corrupt, no problem.’ But I was blindsided. And now …”

  Lucifer huffed out a breath, his body crumbling under the weight of his admission. Azazel felt the corners of his mouth twitch, but schooled his features.

  “I’m scared, Az. Last time I got vanquished, it was because I pulled off an amazingly daring feat on Earth.”

  “Well, the Lutheran reformation wasn’t going to launch itself.”

  “Exactly,” Lucifer agreed. “But this time, everyone’s saying how stupid I was, laying everyt
hing on the line for a girl. They don’t understand what this one means, what this one’s potential is. She’s special.”

  Azazel held his hand up. “If you dare say she’s different from the others, I’m going to slap you. Jesus Christ, Luc. You sneaking in dime store romance novels between roasting the wicked and corrupting the weak?”

  “But she is different,” Lucifer insisted. “I got greedy, I wanted her for myself. Now I just want her brought down, and I don’t care which demon or Grigori does it. She will be ours.”

  “Personally, I’m starting to like that you got booted from Earth. It sounds like you needed a vacation anyways.” From the ether, Azazel summoned a cigarette, using the tip of his finger to light it. “But I’ll bite. What’s so special and different and unique about Riona Dade?” Besides having more balls than the National Football League, he added in his head, remembering how the witch had actually tried using her curves to cleave some info from him.

  “Making her fall isn’t just taking down another Pure Soul,” Lucifer informed him. “Taking her down is getting revenge against the asswipe who kicked us out of Heaven.”

  “How, pray tell?”

  If John Wilkes Booth had been leaning over to Lee Harvey Oswald, the tone could not have been more conspiratorial. “Riona Dade is his daughter.”

  Azazel leapt to his feet. “Fuck me, no!”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, good.” Azazel pulled a long drag, then pursed his lips, blowing a column of smoke over his head. “But if we’re going to save your rep on this and get some sweet revenge, you’ve got to be on the level with me, and a little birdie says you’re still holding out some cherry info.”

  Lucifer shifted in his seat. “Such as?”

  “Such as how it came to be that when I crossed paths with the Pure Souls yesterday, one of them looked like a dead guy we have boiling in our fires and, oh, you’ll love this part … the son of a bitch could throw hellfire magic around. Not a common skill amongst wiccan warriors.”