The first thing she saw was the Cornelius and Baker gasolier, swinging with enough force to crack the ornate crown molding that supported its base. One of the Old Paris vases had shattered, sending shards of colorful glass across the entry hall floor. And as Varina stepped fully into the hall, her gaze was drawn magnetically to the crumbled photo in the midst of the vase’s debris.
She knew what it was without needing to see it. Hell, she didn’t want to see it, but her feet, ignoring her brain’s protests, carried her forward anyway. The rest of her body had declared mutiny from her mind—she couldn’t stop herself from kneeling beside the debris or picking up the photo, and her eyes refused to close until they had confirmed what she already knew.
It was the photo she’d found the first night. Her father, young and healthy, holding a plump, ginger child in his lap, her chubby fingers poised above his beloved typewriter. But his eyes had been burned out, and someone had replaced Varina’s face with hard, angry ink pen scribbles.
That ugly hot fear returned, burning its way through Varina’s stomach and stretching across her chest. The back of her neck began tingling, and the hairs on her arms reached for the ceiling.
“Fuck you,” she whispered. Then, lifting her head to the room, she screamed, “Fuck you, Legion! Fuck you!”
Her ears rang as her cry met the walls and suffocated. There was no response.
“You can’t scare me anymore! I’m done. Fucking done!”
“It’s pretty when it lies.”
Varina whirled around, not sure what she expected but surprised in spite of herself when she discovered nothing was behind her. But that voice had been Legion’s—deep and liquid-like, the sound itself a bruise.
Her heart took off at a sprint. Varina stumbled over the vase shards, the photo still in hand. She didn’t know from where she’d heard Legion, but the demon’s presence was a thick blanket, seconds away from catching on fire. And when it did, it would try to consume her.
She couldn’t will Legion not to take her body, but she could put up a fight.
She hoped.
A hard knock on the front door battered through the dam of her thoughts, breaking the quiet again. And though she had been waiting for a crash, Varina couldn’t keep herself from jumping.
Fuck.
She stared at the door for a long moment as her racing nerves began to calm. A moment passed before awareness took over, and the chaotic mess her head had become stilled once more into something resembling the person she’d worked so hard to become.
The energy surging from the other side of the door was intimately familiar. With it came a pang of something Varina didn’t care to examine too closely. All she knew was she wanted him back for the moment. She was strong enough to admit when she needed help.
And there would never be enough emotional distance between her and her past to deal with Legion on her own.
Campbell didn’t knock again. She knew he wouldn’t. He’d told her he’d be back, and he knew she’d know when he returned.
Still, when she turned the knob and took in the surprise in his eyes, Varina couldn’t help but entertain a rush of satisfaction.
“You took your sweet time,” she said, then offered a small smile—a peace offering—and swung the door open wide in invitation.
26
Campbell let out a shaky breath. “You…you’re letting me in?”
Varina nodded, then, evidently deciding not to wait for him, turned on her heel and retreated into the house. He stood gaping after her for a moment before his brain jump-started his feet and warned him about examining gift horses too closely.
The instant he stepped inside, though, he understood. The air was thick with Legion’s stink and there was a pile of shattered porcelain at the foot of the petticoat table.
A prickling of worry tickled at the base of his skull. Campbell swallowed and closed the door behind him. “What happened?”
“Legion started redecorating,” Varina replied without slowing down. “Watch the gasolier too. I’m not sure the crown molding is going to hold.”
His gaze went to the gasolier, which betrayed itself with a muted swing. “I see.”
So it was entirely business, then. Varina needed him, and she was pragmatic enough to recognize it. Wanting him was a different matter.
Varina disappeared into the kitchen then returned a second later with a broom and a dustpan. “I wasn’t a huge fan of that vase anyway,” she said.
Campbell watched her sweep up the loose shards, took in her mechanical movements and felt his heart give a pitiful whimper. This was a different woman than the one he’d left last night, and almost unrecognizable from the one he’d met at Rat Trap. Varina was guarded now as she hadn’t been before, as though expecting him to lash out or start juggling fireballs. But something had changed—that much was clear. Otherwise she would never have opened the door, much less welcomed him inside.
Varina balanced the full dustpan on the petticoat table, beside the collection box, which he just now realized had been moved from the kitchen. He hadn’t given it much thought since he’d brought it inside—his mind, hands and everything else had been too entangled in Varina.
At least she hadn’t thrown it away. There was one small miracle.
“I read it,” Varina said, jarring him from his thoughts, her tone suggesting she was continuing a conversation.
He wondered idly if she’d spoken and he’d been too distracted to notice.
He didn’t have to wait long for an answer.
“The dedication,” she clarified the next second, and her voice broke a bit on the final syllable.
“Oh.” Campbell fisted his hands and dug his heels into the floor. If she wanted him, she’d let him know. He waffled for a moment, then decided to go for broke. “I’m not sure what to say. I’m not even sure why you let me in.”
Varina locked eyes with him. “You said you’d be back.”
“Yeah. But I didn’t expect you to welcome me inside.”
“Then why did you bother knocking?”
Good question. Campbell flexed his mouth around a few silent words before answering with a lame, “It’s polite.”
She released a mirthless chuckle. “Polite? The demon is all about manners now.”
“I’m not a demon.”
Varina rolled her eyes, and at last some of her personality began to leak back into her expression. “Sin. Whatever. Didn’t we decide it was the same thing?”
“No. They’re not. Demons were creatures born for Hell. The Seven Deadly Sins, the idea of them, were created by humans.”
“I still say you’re splitting hairs, but again, whatever.”
Varina made her way across the hall, and it didn’t occur to him that the parlor was her destination until she had already disappeared inside. The move was so abrupt he wasn’t sure he was supposed to follow. Then he didn’t care, and followed anyway.
He found Varina in a wingback chair near the piano. He waited for direction, and when he didn’t receive any, moved to the piano bench.
In all his years, he didn’t think he’d ever been more aware of himself. The long moments that followed were thick with the loudest sort of silence—Varina thinking so hard her thoughts practically shouted at him, but he didn’t know the language. Campbell sat and waited, his elbows on his knees, his attention fixed unabashedly on her. If she was unnerved by the scrutiny, she didn’t let on. She just stared at some unseen point.
And as he studied her, details he’d managed to ignore or overlook became strikingly prominent. Like the fact that she was wearing the same battle gear she’d donned last night, and that her hair resembled an animal in the midst of an escape attempt. Her eyes were dark with lack of sleep, and her skin seemed to cling to her.
“You need rest,” Campbell said before he could stop himself. When she blinked and looked at him, he added, “You look like hell.”
To his utter amazement, she cracked a grin. “Hell. I get it.”
&nb
sp; “Varina—”
“I’m not going to sleep. I can’t.” She rubbed her lips together. “I… Tell me. Help me understand.”
“About what?”
“You. Whatever you are.” Varina sighed and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. Not that it did much good. “There are things I have always known. Things I learned. These things helped me survive. But…I don’t know anymore.”
He wanted so badly to touch her he almost had to gnaw his hand off to keep from reaching out. “Don’t know what?”
“You.” The word was blunt. At least she didn’t hold back. “I don’t know anything about Sins. You come from a place that made Legion, that let Legion into my body—”
Campbell bit his tongue. Protesting wouldn’t do any good.
“—but you slept across the hall from me. You helped me. You scream at night. You…” Varina blinked, and a shine of those terrible tears reflected in her eyes. “You said you love me.”
More tongue biting. This wasn’t the time to interject.
“That’s not the Hell I know,” she continued. “I don’t know you. Or Sins. Or your type of Hell.”
“Tell me what you want to know.”
“Everything.” Varina rubbed her lips together. “You’re a Sin. What exactly does that mean?”
Campbell stared at her for a moment, his brain racing in an effort to find a workable story in his long history. Not for the first time, he found himself wondering how his siblings had managed to come clean and wishing he could have taken a crash course in relationships.
The silence between them was on the fast track to becoming uncomfortable, though, so he didn’t have a lot of time to sort out his thoughts.
Campbell cleared his throat and just started talking. “Lucifer made us,” he said. “Around the time the church was just coming together. He took the idea that there were seven of us and decided to give us form. This was after he and Big J had a big falling out, so the story goes.”
“Big J?”
“Who you would call God, I guess. Jehovah.” Campbell shrugged. “Until a year or so ago, I’d never met the guy. He and Lucifer used to be really tight.”
“I know that story.”
From the dismissive look on Varina’s face, Campbell could guess at what she was thinking—the story everyone thought they knew. “You probably don’t,” he said. “Lucifer didn’t fall. He is essentially Big J’s equal. From what I’ve been told, there’s a lot of love there. They’re a lot like brothers, but Lucifer eventually couldn’t stand what Hell was. It’s not a nice place. The worst of the worst people go there, and you can’t get far enough away from their screams.
“There are demons like Legion, and they’ve just always been there. And honestly…I say they’re made there, but I don’t know if that’s true. It’s what I’ve always assumed—they were there long before I was. But for all I know, Big J could have given them to Lucifer or they could have created them together, or if they are fallen angels like the story goes. But Lucifer asked Big J to grant mercy on those in Hell, and Big J refused. So Lucifer stopped talking to him. Eventually, he became lonely and, if I know him at all, probably moody as fuck. Around this time, the humans had started putting together the rules of Christianity, and someone decided there were deadly sins, seven of them, and Lucifer decided to make himself a family of his own.” Campbell spread his hands. “So here we are.”
Varina looked at him, her expression unreadable. “How are you not like demons?”
“Like I said, we were created in the mind of man. We were born in Hell, but not made of Hell. And our purpose isn’t to destroy.”
“Then what is your purpose?”
Campbell’s tongue felt heavy. “Sometimes I don’t know. I don’t even think Lucifer wanted us to know—we didn’t realize until recently how much he cared for us. Lucifer has always been like a dad, but a distant dad. He’s been through his own share of shit, with Big J and Lilith—his ex-wife. I think he thought we’d hurt him too, if we got close enough.” He paused for a long moment. “The way I’ve been told is this—Hell Demons exist to test humans…at least they did before the Sins were born. But they’re some of the nastiest assholes in existence. Their purpose was to create chaos. I don’t think Big J knew how attached he’d get to the human world when he created it. I think he was a lot like a kid who wanted to see how a bug would react if you pulled its wings off, so he and Lucifer—or whatever, I don’t know if Lucifer was involved in that or not, but that was the reason these demons existed.”
He stole a glance just to see if she was still with him. When he saw she was, he continued, “But Lucifer became really attached to this world, and by the time he made us, he didn’t have much use for the Hell Demons. These demons are only allowed out of Hell so often, and they’re heavily monitored. On occasion, if there’s a natural disaster or something, Lucifer will let a bunch out at once.”
At that, Varina snickered. “During a disaster—that’s the time to let out a bunch of demons with hard-ons for destruction? Sounds like a great guy, Campbell.”
“It’s the best way to keep everything in balance,” he argued. “In the rush of whatever’s happening, humans are quicker to dismiss demonic activity. Things are confused as it is. These are demons that could do a shit-ton of destruction on their own, and make the whole world panic. Lucifer’s a powerful guy, but Hell’s a freaking huge place to police. If they wanted to stage an uprising, they could. Probably. Granted, Lucifer would wipe the floor with them, but in the time between, a few could get out and cause a lot of damage. The way things work now keeps them in line.”
“In line? Why not just kill all these assholes?”
Campbell’s lips twitched. “If I knew the answer to that question, I’d be happy to provide it.” He blew out a breath. “Though it probably has to do with the fact that Lucifer doesn’t like killing. At all. Death is ugly and permanent. He couldn’t even kill Lilith, and she nearly ended the world.” He paused. “But he does keep Hell Demons—the really dangerous ones—segregated. That’s where Legion was, until Lilith let it out. And since I caught it last time, I got sent in. That’s why I’m here.”
Varina was quiet for a moment. “How did you capture it last time?”
“It was trying to possess a lower demon. I caught the lower demon.”
The shock that flooded her eyes chased whatever lingering anger away. Campbell warned himself not to be too optimistic, but he couldn’t help the way his gut clenched and his heart somersaulted.
“Legion was trying to possess another demon?” Varina asked. “H-how?”
“Lower demons are part human,” Campbell said. “Some of them barely have any demon blood, some have more. Hell, a lot of lower demons don’t even know they’re not human, whereas others are very aware. Like the guy who owns the Olds is my sister’s beau, and he’s a vampire.”
She blinked. “A vampire? Like…Dracula?”
“Who, for what it’s worth, wasn’t a vampire or any other kind of demon, just a guy with porphyria.” Campbell offered a half-grin. “But yes, vampires are just a kind of lower demon. Half or mostly human with a particular strain of demon in them. They’re just as likely to be possession victims as humans. Some even more so, because many have abilities that humans don’t, and Hell Demons love power. Collecting lower demons is also a hobby among a lot of Hell Demons—they store them in collection boxes and let them loose whenever they want to be destructive. That’s how I caught that demon, actually. The one possessed by Legion.”
He drew in a deep breath. The next bit was important, but he still wasn’t sure how much Legion could overhear, and he didn’t want to give the demon more of an advantage. He just hoped Varina could follow him long enough to make the necessary leap.
“It was with a collection box,” he said. “That’s how I caught it.”
Varina’s brow furrowed. “A collection box?”
“A small box carried by Hell Demons. They use them to collect lower demons—Earth demo
ns. You know, the way some guys collect trading cards.” Campbell drew still again, considered a moment, then continued, “The only reason that worked was Legion was inside a lower demon. Collection boxes aren’t made to hold creatures from Hell.”
He held her gaze, unblinking, then issued a deliberate, however slight, nod in the direction of the hallway. He waited a long beat until her eyes flickered with recognition.
There it was. Campbell exhaled, some of the tension riding his shoulders loosening. After a moment—when he couldn’t take her naked stare anymore—he lowered his head, his gut unclenching as his racing heart began to slow. The air felt thick with things unspoken, but at least she knew now. At least she would be prepared.
“I want to believe you.”
Campbell looked up again so fast his head spun. “What?”
Varina’s expression hadn’t changed, though her eyes seemed softer now. “I don’t want to have been stupid about you. I don’t want it to be that the first person I let close to me turns out to be… Well, I want to believe that someone actually gives a shit.”
He didn’t know what to say, so he opted for nothing. He just waited.
“No one’s given a shit in a long goddamned time,” she continued. “I’d forgotten how nice it was to feel…anything. I lost my mom, then my dad…and with Legion, I lost myself. Getting kicked out of here was window dressing. It hadn’t been my home for a long time. And from nowhere, I get tracked down by my father’s estate attorney, and I come back…here…and then there’s you.” Varina sucked in her cheeks and turned her attention to some far off spot behind him. “I want to believe you, about everything. But I don’t want to be stupid.”
At that, he couldn’t help himself. “You couldn’t be stupid if you tried.”
She inhaled, then looked back at him. And finally, he saw it—a spark of that raw vulnerability, the part of her she kept so well guarded he figured she’d convinced herself it didn’t exist. The part that was brave enough to want yet scared of the consequences at the same time. She’d been beaten so thoroughly it was a miracle any hope had survived this long, but it had, and if he was careful, she might let him help it grow.
Deliverance from Sin: A Demonic Paranormal Romance (Sinners & Saints Book 5) Page 25
