“Seth has gone to ground in the same area in which you originally found him. The others are searching for him.”
“Are any of them close?”
“You know we cannot feel them—” Samael broke off, flinching. “Apologies, Lucifer. I did not mean to speak so sharply.”
Leaning back, Lucifer linked his fingers behind his head and allowed himself a small, satisfied smile. He quite liked this new and improved post-beating version of Samael, still a military genius but without those annoying rough edges. He should have reminded his aide years before about who truly ruled Hell; he could have saved himself a great many headaches.
“Apology accepted. Go on.”
“We haven’t been able to track the angels, but I’ve set up a perimeter around the Appointed and will let you know as soon as any of them show up.”
“What about the woman?”
“The Naphil?” Samael shrugged. “Does it matter?”
Lucifer stared into the pale flames. “I’m not sure. It might. The Nephilim bloodline runs stronger in her than I would have expected at this point. It feels different from any others I’ve encountered.”
“I don’t understand.”
“She has to descend from one of the most powerful of angels for that to have happened, don’t you think?”
“From an Archangel, you mean?” Samael frowned, looking equal parts intrigued and disgusted. “You think I fathered her line?”
“You’re telling me you didn’t dabble?”
“Only once. It was one of the more unpleasant experiences of my life and not one I cared to repeat. She was so insipid and fragile. The mating itself nearly killed her.” Samael grimaced. “You really think it possible the woman is of my line?”
“Anything is possible. The question is, does it work to our advantage?”
His aide’s expression cleared. “So that was why you took on the task yourself. She carries your child.”
“She does,” Lucifer agreed softly. “A child that would have been extraordinary regardless, but this…this could mean something more. Something greater. Think of it, Sam, my blood mingling with the line of an Archangel.” He selected a peppermint from a dish on the couch beside him. “I want to keep an eye on her as well. We’ll take the child as soon as it is born. I’ll want it raised separately from the others. How are those arrangements going, by the way?”
“We’re still working out the details. The mortal world is well connected these days. It makes hiding a large number of infants somewhat difficult.”
“I’m sure you’ll work something out, my friend. I have every faith in you.”
Samael inclined his head a final time and then withdrew. Lucifer heaved a sigh of contentment, leaned his head back on the couch, and closed his eyes. It had taken thousands of years more than he would have liked, but at last he would rid the universe of the One’s precious children.
Because with or without agreements or wars or any other unthinkable measures, the One could no longer hope to save the mortals.
FORTY-THREE
Seth slammed his fist into the side of a Dumpster, sending it skidding into a building with a crash that echoed down the alley and sent shards of brick raining down on the pavement. The blow did no good, released none of the pressure building inside him, took away none of the pain or betrayal.
How could she? He had trusted her. Loved her. Believed in her and what she told him about the goodness inherent in humanity. He gazed at his surroundings, at the overflowing piles of garbage, the human refuse, the utter desolation. How could he have believed this to be good? How could he have believed her to be good?
He longed to flee, to seek out some tiny seed of hope that might counter the growing ugliness at his center, but he didn’t dare. They would be looking for him, and this was the one place he knew he could hide, at least for a while. The one place where Guardians were tangibly absent and wouldn’t be able to signal his presence to the others. Wouldn’t be able to see the rage within him, the seething hatred that threatened to overflow his center, or the anguish that drove him to walk the streets and alleys over and over again, in search of a solace he was beginning to think just didn’t exist.
Had never existed.
Seth sent another Dumpster screeching across the pavement in a shower of sparks. A figure scrambled out of the shadows and dropped into an aggressive stance, light glinting from something in his hand. For an instant, Seth tensed, thinking they had found him, but then the smell reached him. The thick odor of unwashed skin, old urine, and stale smoke combined with that of alcohol and vomit…and mortality. His lip curled.
Revulsion, Lucifer’s voice whispered in his memory. Disgust. Repugnance.
The man hawked and spat onto the pavement by Seth’s feet.
Seth lunged forward and, before the man could react, shoved him the way of the Dumpster. Hard. Almost hard enough to kill him…
Almost, but not quite. At the last instant, a thread of regret made him hesitate just enough to weaken his intent and make him catch back a part of his fury. Staring first at his hands, then at the crumpled figure a dozen feet away on the pavement, he wondered what Alex would say if she knew of this.
Hated himself for caring.
Slowly he crossed to the man’s side and stared down into pain-glazed, terrified eyes. Eyes that lived because Seth still valued the opinion of the woman who had betrayed him. Spurned him. Lied to him. Self-loathing swelled in his breast. They wanted him to choose whether all of humanity would live or die, and he couldn’t even get past the weakness of his own desire and decide for himself whether or not to take a single life.
Was he really so pathetic? So feeble?
The man on the ground scrabbled for the knife he’d dropped. As filthy fingers closed over the handle, Seth placed his booted foot on the thin, scarred wrist and reached down to pluck the knife from limp fingers. He might not have any memory of who he was, but he had the truth of what he’d been told. The certainty, in the deepest parts of himself, that he was more than mortal. More than Alex. Whatever hold she had on him, he had to break free. Would make himself break free. And then—
He hauled the blubbering man upright.
Then he would choose.
For himself.
“WHAT DO YOU mean, postponed?” Alex stared at Dr. Warner, who stared in turn at the floor between them. It was 5:00 a.m. and he’d come into her room just in time to stop the nurse from administering the pre-op sedative. One look at his face had made Alex’s heart plummet.
“The anesthesiologist was involved in an accident on the way to the hospital. We’re trying to find an alternate right now, but we haven’t been able to reach anyone. I’m so sorry, I know how hard this must be—” Warner broke off and reached out to her, his brow knit with concern. “You’re not going to pass out, are you? Maybe you should lie down.”
Alex brushed off his hand and focused on drawing a breath into frozen lungs. On thinking beyond the no, no, no, no running on an endless loop through her brain. On not grabbing the obstetrician by the lab-lapels and snarling, “Accident, my ass. Find someone and get this thing the fuck out of me—now.”
The coincidence of an accident was just too great, and not to be able to reach another anesthesiologist in a hospital of this size? No way. There had to be something more to this. Something like a Fallen Angel trying to stop her from aborting his child.
“There has to be another way.”
“I wish there was, but—”
“Alex.” Elizabeth Riley’s voice intruded from the doorway, edged with urgency.
Alex looked past Warner and met agitation in the usually calm gaze. “You’ve heard.”
Riley blinked. “You know?”
“Dr. Warner just told me.”
Confusion crossed Riley’s expression and a surge of alertness chased away Alex’s nausea.
“You’re not talking about the accident.”
The psychiatrist shook her head. “Hugh called. There’s a disturbance down in Downtown Easts
ide. He thinks it’s Seth.”
Alex had shot to her feet at Hugh’s name, pushed past Warner, and already had her street clothes in hand.
“What kind of disturbance?” she asked, motioning to Riley to close the door. Figuring she had nothing an obstetrician hadn’t seen before, she stripped off the hospital gown and, with a speed that came from years of responding to middle-of-the-night calls, was dressed again before Warner had even mustered a proper look of surprise.
“Hugh didn’t say,” Riley answered as Alex slid her feet into her running shoes and stooped to tie them. “Just that he’s on his way to pick you up. He said he’d pull into the Emergency bay.”
“Wait,” Warner objected. “You can’t leave, Detective. I need you to remain here to keep our priority for the OR. If we get bumped, I’m not sure when I’ll be able to get you in again.”
Alex straightened. “There won’t be an again,” she said. “The accident wasn’t an accident, Doctor. It was a message from the Fallen—from the father.”
A dozen expressions flickered across Warner’s face, ranging from skepticism to unease to outright disbelief, culminating in a look that told Alex he once again questioned her sanity. He rocked onto the balls of his feet, hands in pockets, and ahemmed softly. “What kind of message?”
“The kind that tells me no matter how long I wait here, I’ll never be allowed to abort this baby.” Alex snagged her coat from a hook behind the door and met Riley’s gaze, not daring to think about the truth behind her words. Or the consequences. “I’m ready.”
Leaving Warner gaping after them, they traveled the corridors and elevators in silence. Not until they pushed through the doors into Emergency did Riley put a hand out to Alex, pulling her to a stop.
“What you said about not being allowed to abort just now. You really think that’s true?”
Outside the glass entrance, a sedan pulled to an abrupt halt, its dome light splashing red into the early-morning gloom. Henderson leaned across the seat to peer at the ER doors in search of her. Alex’s pulse, already accelerated, kicked up another notch. This was it. This was their last chance.
If Henderson could get her there in time.
She tugged at Riley’s grip. “I have to go.”
The psychiatrist’s fingers tightened. “You didn’t answer me.”
“I know it’s true.”
Riley exhaled in a hiss. “Alex, if you carry this pregnancy to its term…”
Alex pulled her hand free. That would be the part she really didn’t want to think about. “I know,” she said, “but I don’t think whoever’s behind this much cares.”
MIKA’EL LOOKED AROUND as his office door opened without warning and the Highest Seraph stepped inside.
“We have him,” said Verchiel. “I’ve summoned the others.”
“Has he…?”
She shook her head. “Not yet, but it doesn’t look good. The human police have him cornered in an alley.”
The Appointed, cornered? Mika’el’s heart pitched down to belt level. Not unless he wanted to be. Hell. “He’s looking for a confrontation.”
“That’s what I thought. We’re trying to get the Guardians to pull their charges away, but you know what mortals are like when they’re in a state of high alert like this.”
“Where is he?”
“The area where you found him with Lucifer.”
Mika’el grunted. “He stayed that close? No wonder we weren’t able to find him.” His mouth tightened. “This is it, then. All right, let’s get it over with.”
Verchiel put a hand out to stop him as he went to step past. “It’s not going to be that easy, Mika’el. Lucifer has sentries set up around him. He’ll know the minute you arrive.”
“That means he knows a Fallen One attacked the woman.”
“Of course he does. The attack on the Nephilim woman was deliberate—a way around the non-interference clause. Seth was intended to know. To react this way.”
“There must be something we can do.”
Tipping back his head, Mika’el tried to think. But no matter how he looked at things, it all came down to one inescapable conclusion. Lucifer had out-manipulated him. He closed his eyes. He had allowed the Light-Bearer to skirt the rules, to get away with brazen disrespect, even to threaten, all in an attempt to protect the One from having to make that final, impossible decision.
And instead it had come to this.
“Mika’el?” the Highest prompted.
He shook his head soundlessly, remaining as he was, letting the knowledge of what was to come settle into him. He waited for it to fill him. Change him. Instead, failure gave way to a quiet, seething righteousness. A determination. No. He would not give up. Not now, not ever. He reached out with every fiber of his existence, allowing the energy of Heaven itself to mingle with his. Reached until he found and embraced the One’s own power, taking it within him for the first time in more than four thousand years. Feeling her surprise as he did. Her questions. Ignoring them, he opened his eyes and lifted Verchiel’s hand from his arm, giving it a small squeeze as he released it.
“Send the Powers to engage the sentries,” he ordered. “All of them.”
“All? Even—?”
“All,” he said. “Including Aramael.”
FORTY-FOUR
Bailing out of Henderson’s sedan, Alex took in the scene with a sweeping glance. A dozen police cars were strewn across the street, blockading the alley mouth and all possible chance of escape. Twice that number of officers had taken up sheltered positions behind the vehicles, and an Emergency Response Team van had pulled up across the sidewalk, its back doors wide as members scrambled out.
She turned to Henderson. “Get them out of here.”
“Right. And would you like me to drain the fucking Pacific while I’m at it?” he retorted. “It’s too late, Alex. You know they won’t back down at this stage.”
“Then get me in there.”
He patted down his pockets and then spread his hands wide. “Sorry, I seem to be missing my magic wand.”
“Damn it, Henderson!”
He placed his hands on the sedan’s roof and glared at her. “I told you on the way here what it was going to be like. He’s in there, tossing around Dumpsters like they’re goddamn basketballs. They’re not going to let an unknown cop wander in to have a conversation with him.”
A resounding crash backed his words, its echo rumbling down the alley and making cops duck behind car doors again. Henderson waited for the reverberation to still before he continued, his voice calmer but no less cutting.
“He’s holed up in a blind alley with a hostage and he’s not responding to anyone. If hostage negotiation fails, these guys have no choice but to go in there after him, and there’s nothing you or I can do to stop them.”
“You don’t understand. Something changed when he saw me with Aramael. He’s on the edge, trying to make his decision, and I think he wants us to force him into it.” Alex waved a hand at the gathered cops. “If they go in, he’ll kill them.”
Henderson stared into the alley. “If we go after him, he’ll have reason to take one of us out.”
“Or all of you,” Alex agreed. “And if he’s as far gone as I think, you don’t have enough firepower in the city to stop him.”
“Fuck,” said Henderson. “Fuck.” He slammed his fist against the car roof and glared across at her again. “You know I’ll sound like a lunatic.”
“I know.”
“Fuck.” Pushing away from the vehicle, he strode toward the ERT van, yanking his badge from his pocket.
Alex paced a short, tight line beside the car, her eyes glued to Henderson and the ERT supervisor. She saw it all. The raised eyebrows, the scowls, the glances exchanged between supervisor and nearby team members, the angry gesticulations that all too clearly told Henderson to piss off.
And then the lightning.
Stopping mid-stride, she stared at a sky that had been clear when she’d left the hospital
with Henderson—enough so that she’d noticed the crescent moon following them as Henderson drove. Now, the sky that should have been growing pale with an encroaching dawn had instead gone black. A shiver went down her spine. Vancouver weather was famous for its changeability, but this much this fast?
Another shaft of lightning split the sky, then a third.
Just like the storms that had plagued Toronto during Caim’s rampage. The storms that had occurred simultaneously with the murders, earning him the title of the Storm Slasher. Almost as if—Alex sucked in a breath and stared into the still inky-dark alley.
Almost as if Caim had affected the very energy of the world around him whenever he killed. Like Seth seemed to be doing now.
“Got any other bright ideas?” Henderson’s sour voice asked. “Because that one went over like a ton of bricks. By tonight, everyone on the force will think I’m a fucking nutcase and I’ll be lucky if all I get is—”
His words dropped off into silence as the street dimmed beneath a giant shadow passing over it. The hive of activity around them stilled into an eerie silence and Alex watched all eyes turn skyward. Her mouth filled with dust.
“What the hell?” Henderson murmured.
“It’s them.” Grabbing the other detective’s arm, she swung him around to face her. “They’re here for Seth. Whatever you do, don’t let anyone follow me in.”
“Follow you—Alex, where the hell are you going? Who’s here? Damn it, Jarvis, get back here before you get shot!”
Henderson’s furious bellow shattered the stillness as she bolted for the alley, bringing the scene back to life. Startled cops grabbed for her, missed, added their shouts to Henderson’s. Alex dodged, wove, feinted to the side, and ran like she’d never run before. Behind her, Henderson’s voice rose above the others.
“Hold your fire! Goddamn it, don’t shoot! She’s a cop!”
Ahead of her and to the left, a burly ERT member in full gear was on an intercept course. Lightning split the sky again, illuminating the grim determination on his face. She eyed the police cars blocking the alley, looked back at the ERT member, and calculated her chances of evading him. Her step faltered. Then, reaching deep, she found a final burst of speed and her stride lengthened one more time. Vaulting onto the hood of one of the cars, she slid across it and onto the pavement again. Just a few more feet and—
Sins of the Son: The Grigori Legacy Page 28
