Sins of Angels (The Complete Collection)

by Larkin, Matt

  “Watch your mouth, little sister, or even I won’t be able to spare you.”

  “Go to hell, Miah.”

  “Rachel!” he shouted at her. “You want to know what you’ve gotten yourself into? This man, this Ezekiel Knight you seem to put so much trust in, was a government agent. He worked for that festering cesspool of khapiru that runs Gehenna. He was Gibborim, Rachel. A professional assassin whose sole responsibility was to kill anyone who got in the way of the oligarchy. You think you can trust him? Trust him more than your own kin? Rachel—”

  “Mazzaroth off.”

  A hollow lump formed in Rachel’s throat. Terrible pieces of the puzzle began to slip into place. Knight was the most efficient killer she’d ever seen. He had preternaturally fast reflexes and a penchant for destroying anyone who got in his way. Just like Jeremiah had said.

  And God help her, she was living in his apartment.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I have made a mistake. All that matters now is getting the Sefer away from here. I cannot allow Jericho to get their hands on it, no matter the cost.

  A floor board creaked under her foot, and Rachel almost jumped as she paced around the stifling apartment. Five minutes ago, she’d nearly had a heart attack at the sound of the pipes running water upstairs.

  Okay. She was all right for the moment.

  She was living with an assassin who was likely using her on behalf of the government. Maybe killing his own people waiting for her to unlock the secrets of the Sefer.

  And she’d slept with him. Angels above, what a fool she’d been. She’d let a moment of passion, of weakness, throw all her judgment to the wind.

  Okay. Okay, that was done.

  Knight wasn’t here. Maybe he’d really gone back to Machpelah, maybe not. Either way, she didn’t have much time. Could she trust him? No, she could never take that chance. She’d known, she’d known he was dangerous from the moment he killed those Redeemers. If she’d listened to her instincts then she wouldn’t be here now.

  Of course, she might not have the Sefer either. She continued pacing around the room. She’d never sensed an intent to harm her in his emotions. His attraction to her had been genuine, but she was used to that—it came with being an empath. And sometimes she felt an undercurrent of warmth coming off him. Maybe he really did like her. But even if that was true, a man like that might still kill her, if ordered to. The truth was, even if he liked her, she couldn’t trust him.

  He’d taken one of the mono swords and that whip-knife thing. She could take the other sword, but she’d probably just cut her own arm off trying to wield it. Damn. All she had was a MAG that didn’t work on this planet.

  The moment she stepped outside, the government might find her. But if Knight still worked for them, they already knew where she was. She couldn’t stay here. She couldn’t.

  She grabbed her MAG and the Sefer, pressed on her breather, and ran from the apartment. The airlock took ten times too long to open, and then she was on the darkened streets. A hint of illumination lit the red sky, so it must have been afternoon, though it was hard to tell through the thick atmosphere.

  Passersby watched her from beneath head scarfs as she ran. She needed to move fast, but running would draw too many eyes. She darted into an alley and slowed her pace. Every few steps she found herself glancing over her shoulder. Hostility seemed to waft off the entire planet. It filled the city and choked her as surely as the atmosphere itself would. It seeped through her pores, suffusing her consciousness. The vile dregs of humanity threatened to consume her.

  She caught herself running again, gasping for breath. It was her fear, only. No one watched. No one. Her breather felt too confining. If she could just remove it for a second…

  She hailed a cab and jumped in. “Just drive. South district.” It didn’t matter where they went, just away from here.

  The driver watched her from the rearview display, lust and rage oozing from him. Would he rape and murder her given the chance?

  Her heart throbbed against her chest. She was panicking. She knew it. This was just a guy hard-on at work. She was letting fear drive her empathic senses into overload, fixating on every hint of a feeling. Her hand trembled as she reflexively brushed the MAG at her side. She had to get this thing working. It might be all that stood between her and God knew what fate.

  Galizur’s company made the damn thing. Endbringer, indeed. Rachel told the driver to stop and paid him, not even sure where she was. She rushed from the cab, dimly recognizing the area. There was a trade tower nearby, with a pub on the first floor. She forced herself to walk to the airlock and hit the buzzer. No one knew she was here. No one would find her.

  It whooshed open and she stepped inside. The pub was locally infamous for its stiff whiskey and bourbon, and back room services. The first time she’d been here, a waiter had tried to sell her a nanobot-induced orgasm. She’d politely declined, not even wanting to think about machines doing that to her nervous system.

  After a few glances around the pub she strode over to the bar and slapped a kesitah chip on the counter. “Whiskey,” she said, her throat dry. “Strong.”

  The bartender poured her a shot, and she downed it in one swig. The sudden burning in her throat and sinuses took the edge off her nerves. Another might simmer her down… No. It would dull her. She couldn’t afford that.

  “I need a back room. Privacy.”

  “Male, female, or nanobots?”

  “Private, with access to the Mazzaroth.”

  The bartender shrugged. “It’s your money. We can provide whatever you want.” He handed her a key card. “Down the hall, third room on the left, just passed the washroom. Left side, mind. Third on the right is for group play.” He said the last with a wink, and a burst of lascivious emotion that turned her stomach.

  Rachel snatched the card and hustled to the door on the left. Across the hall, she felt waves of erotic energy rippling out from the room. Even through a closed door the emotions reached her, threatened to overwhelm her. A sudden weakness built in her abdomen, and for a heartbeat she considered going back to the bartender for those nanobots.

  With a grunt, she opened the door to her private room and slammed it, disgusted with herself. Being an empath in a place like this, it could get the best of her. She slumped against the closed door and tried to let the edge flow off her excitement.

  She turned on the Mazzaroth and sent a channel to Galizur. No one answered. Angels’ wrath, she was going to kill that bastard. For one moment, she wondered if he’d had any idea about Knight when he sent her to him. But, no, that made no sense. QI was a rival of Jericho. If Galizur knew Knight had been or was working for Jericho, he’d have never brought them together. She was still going to give him an earful for it, though. If her brother had figured it out, it meant the information was out there.

  Her brother. Jeremiah had tried to warn her. He’d told her. He’d said if she came in they wouldn’t wash her sins. Nothing could be more horrible than that. The thought of losing all she was… Worse than death. To have her body go on, have everyone think it was her, when all that made her who she was had fled. If they caught her on their own, it’s what they’d do. Void, her father might order it himself. A telepath would be in her mind, violating her.

  She sunk to her knees and hugged herself. She had the Sefer, but she couldn’t read it. She couldn’t reach Galizur, who might be her only ally. David had turned on her, shown his true loyalty, just like before. Knight was a monster. And Galizur… He either wasn’t in, or wasn’t interested in her call. Probably the former, since he expected her to get the Sefer.

  But she might not have much time. Knight could come back at any point. She had to make a choice.

  “Call Jeremiah Jordan,” she said to the Mazzaroth. She forced herself to her feet. She’d be damned if she’d face them on her knees.

  Her brother’s face flashed on the screen a moment later. “Now you want to talk?”

  “Sorry, Miah. I�
�” God, what was she doing? Saving her life. She didn’t want one of his lectures, but maybe that was the price to be paid. If she’d never left, if she went back now, could all be forgiven? Could she have a family back, if she’d pretend to believe? “They really wouldn’t try to wash me?”

  “People are dead, Rach. This is about as serious as it gets.”

  No shit. She didn’t want to be one of those dead people. “I need guarantees.”

  “I’m your brother. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you, Rach. You know I’m a man of my word. Just turn yourself in.”

  “I…” She could do it. It must mean there were already Redeemers here. All she had to do was go to them, and they’d get her off this planet. Maybe she should just let them have the damn Sefer, for all the trouble it had brought her.

  “Rachel, just tell me where you are. I’ll come get you.”

  “You’re here?” Her brother had come himself to Gehenna. He must love this place. “I’m…” They would take the Sefer. And it would never see the light of day again. They’d never destroy something made by the Angels, but it would be locked away waiting for the return of masters that were never coming back.

  It was better than Jericho getting it, of course. To have the Ark hidden away damned mankind to stagnation, but at least it wouldn’t let this Caleb Gavet conquer the universe one transaction at a time.

  But by handing over the Sefer, she was allowing Jeremiah to damn humanity. Which made her responsible. People would never reach beyond where they were now. They had barely progressed in the last six hundred years. At least outside of Asherah. And if they were really cyborgs there—though she had seen none in her time in Triangulum—then one day they would come and take the rest of the Local Group. Sentinels protected Mizraim through superior training and superior numbers—but one day Asheran technology would far outstrip anything the Sentinels had. They broke the rules and got ahead doing it. It was the way of progress. It was inevitable, if the Redeemers took the Sefer.

  And, in the end, they’d wash her sins. That’s what they did with khapiru. Whatever her brother said, they’d blame her for the death of their own. And even if they didn’t, she had come so far to bring the Ark to mankind, not to let it fall to the Redeemers or Jericho Corp.

  She grit her teeth and shook her head. “You shouldn’t be here, Miah.”

  “Just tell me where you are!”

  She was in hell. But Jeremiah’s wasn’t a hand she could take to escape it.

  “Goodbye, brother. Mazzaroth off.”

  The screen flickered dead.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  I was sixteen when I left my family. My own father called me khapiru because I refused to believe as others believed, because I refused to accept without proof. What he called faith, I called blind loyalty. But if the whole universe thinks me insane, maybe it’s not them. I walked out and I proved to New Rome I belonged there. I passed every test, I gave them no choice but to accept me into NRU. And at long last, I gave them the excuse to cast me from it. And now, with nowhere left to turn, I was actually considering returning to a family I had turned my back on. I find myself asking whether my pride is worth dying over.

  With the bike secured in an alley, Knight stalked the streets of Machpelah, keeping to the shadows. All those years of training made him a ghost, silent and black. No one on the streets saw him unless he wanted them to.

  It was the way.

  The lights were on in the Lazarus Group’s bunker. There were probably government troops inside, now, though. Knight kicked off the side of the building, vaulting from handhold to handhold to ascend to the rooftop.

  They might have set a watch at the window. It was always best not to reuse the same routes. Always be where no one expected it.

  Rachel wanted the damn notes, she’d get them. She’d get the notes, and they’d leave this planet. And then maybe… No! He’d made that mistake with Shirin. He’d let his guard down and she was dead. He would not allow himself to repeat the weakness. He would not let Rachel meet the same fate because he… Knight shook his head and grit his teeth.

  From the rooftop he spotted the exhaust shaft. It would lead down into the air filtration system. He crouched by the shaft and pulled his mono sword. Get in and get out, two minutes, tops. He hefted the blade with both hands and chopped through the lock on the maintenance hatch.

  He flung open the door and jumped into the shaft, slowing his descent with hands on either wall. The shaft reached down three stories; he stopped himself after two. A rotating fan pushed the exhaust upward. Knight focused, allowing the world to slip into slow motion. In his mind’s eye, the already slow-moving fan stilled to a crawl. Watch the blades. Timing is everything.

  He focused on a single blade, waiting until it came around. Then he dropped. Knight folded his arms at his side and shot downward. The fan blades slashed through the tips of his hair as he fell and landed in crouch at the base of the system.

  Knight grimaced, pinching a strand of his severed locks between his fingers to inspect it. Damn it. His hair, and worse, his DNA. For a moment, he considered trying to round it all up, but it would take forever and he’d probably never find every last strand.

  He blew out a breath, then took in the whirring machinery down here. The air was thick and his mind began to swim. Too much carbon dioxide inside this thing. A door led to the main building.

  No time to catch his breath. No time to wait.

  It wasn’t locked—the builders wouldn’t want someone to get trapped in here. Knight edged open the door and peered into the hall. No one up here. He slipped outside, shutting the door behind him, then breathed deeply. The injections they’d given him may have let him breathe the local atmosphere, but they must not have been designed for the inside of filtration systems. Or maybe a normal person would have passed out in there.

  Time was short. He’d already spent almost a minute in here. No shadows to hide in. The direct approach would have to do. His adrenaline shot up and he ran, leaping over the side of the landing rail at the top of the stairs.

  “No way am I going in there to bother him,” someone said from the lower floor.

  Knight caught himself on the rail of the lower level, pushed off from it, then dropped down on the speaker, slamming the soldier to the ground. His comrade tried to shout, tried to attack. Knight reacted faster, catching the man’s arm and driving a fist into his gut. He spun the soldier around and smashed his head into the stair rail.

  Time was ticking.

  He dashed for the lab.

  A soldier was there, standing guard, when Knight came around the corner. “Holy—” the man shouted, raising his lancerod.

  Knight jumped to the wall, running two steps along it to dodge the projectile. It impacted where he had stood. Knight kicked off the wall and crashed into the soldier, driving him into the lab’s airlock. He pressed a forearm into the staggered man’s throat, then slipped a knife between his ribs. The soldier sunk to the floor, leaving a streak of blood on the airlock.

  After pushing the body aside, Knight buzzed the door. Beyond, through the glass, stood the Gibborim. He turned to face Knight, his eyes concealed by his visor, but a slight grin edged the corners of his mouth. He drew and expanded a mono katana. He was in full armor, his chest piece adorned with the Lambada sign.

  Knight stepped into the room, brandishing his own katana. He pressed the button on the hilt and it uncompressed with a slight click, expanding to its full length.

  “It is you, isn’t it, Lambada?” the Gibborim said.

  “So you’re my replacement.”

  “God, you were a legend, you know that?” Lambada shook his head, chuckling. “Sarah’s going to love it when I bring her your head.” Lambada circled him, and Knight followed suit, finding his footing in the lab. “She thought you might come back here. I didn’t think you’d be so stupid. We’re going to get that book, Knight.”

  So it wasn’t just Rachel they wanted. He should have seen that. Why would
they care about some offworlder? “You talk too much.”

  Lambada jerked into sudden motion, flinging a pair of throwing knives from his left hand. Knight’s adrenaline kicked in and the knives slowed. A simple twist carried him between the two projectiles, and he hurled himself toward Lambada, swinging low.

  Lambada jumped on a table, dodging the attack, then kicked at Knight’s head. Knight twisted again. With a flip, Lambada landed on the other side of the table, then chopped it in half with his mono sword.

  Knight attacked, his blade flashing. Lambada was fast, very fast. He parried a dozen strikes before Knight’s sword caught his helmet. It slashed open the visor. Lambada stumbled back and ripped off his helmet.

  Knight circled him. “If legends were easy to kill, they wouldn’t be legends, bitch.”

  Lambada roared at him and charged. Knight bent over backwards to avoid a vicious swing at his neck, then twisted and rolled on the floor. Lambada jumped over his low riposte and kicked him in the face.

  The impact staggered him, sending him sprawling to the ground. Pain shot through him, and he cut it off almost as fast. He landed in a roll, coming up in a two-handed parry to stop Lambada’s overhand chop. Knight was on one knee. Precarious. He parried two, three blows, unable to get the upper hand from this position.

  He threw himself forward, diving under a table. Lambada rushed forward, sword high. Knight kicked off the floor, pushing himself to the wall, then sprung to his feet. He leapt to the wall behind himself, kicked off it, and flipped over the charging Gibborim.

  As he landed, his slash tore open the man’s back, and Lambada collided with the wall, his sword skittering from his grasp. Knight’s replacement turned, slowly, and slumped against the wall. Blood trickled from his mouth. It seemed like he wanted to speak again, but it only came out as a gurgle.