by Evans, Misty
DANCING WITH THE DEVIL
Witches Anonymous Step 5
Misty Evans
Dedication
To all the Witches Anonymous fans…
Amy and Luc finally get a happily ever after because you asked for it!
Acknowledgements
An author is nothing without her support team…
Michelle and Amy …as always, your insight and editorial skills deserve
my undying gratitude and a truckload of Dove chocolates.
Mark, your ability to design my covers is out of this world.
And to my brainstorming team: Nana and Michelle…thank you for responding to all my wacky emails and endless “what if” questions!
Dancing With the Devil, Witches Anonymous Step 5
Misty Evans
One step forward…
Ex-witch Amy Atwood has never wanted anyone the way she wants Lucifer. As she tackles Step 5 of Witches Anonymous—atoning for the sins she committed as his right-hand witch—she may actually land him and the magic-free life she desires.
Two steps back…
But when an ancient curse is revealed, a heavenly force determined to remove Lucifer from her life traps Amy between giving into her love for him and saving the souls of her family and friends.
Will this be the end for Amy and Lucifer?
As the war between good and evil reaches a tipping point, Amy must rely on the devil she knows—and can’t resist—to break the curse and help her redeem the souls she’s damned to spend eternity in Hell. Souls Lucifer has no intention of giving up.
Chapter One – Law of Rebound
Having been Lucifer’s right-hand witch for seven years, I can tell you there are three elements necessary for proper Devil worship: an evil witch, a propensity for evil spell-casting, and, of course, the help of the Devil himself.
When I say “help”, I mean the kind where he infuses your body, mind and soul with full-on wickedness. Oh, yeah. That kind of help is the whipped topping on the whole evil hot-fudge sundae.
So when it came to proper Devil worship, I, Amy Atwood, was at the head of the class. Evil witch with a proclivity for casting evil spells and a Devil-take-me-to-Hell attitude? I received an A-plus in every subject.
But even wicked witches believe in the Law of Rebound. You know the one that states you reap what you sow? Witches, Wiccans, Pagans, Christians…ninety-nine percent of us believe what you do to others comes back to you, only with more force.
With my past, odds are, I’m headed for a fall of giant cauldron-size proportions.
Since I joined Witches Anonymous—going magic-free in the process—I’ve been hoping for a reprieve. At the very least, a lighter sentence. Because if what goes around comes around, I’m going to need more than Lucifer’s help to deal with the fallout. I’m going to need God’s.
Yeesh.
New Year’s seemed like the perfect time to tackle Step Five of the Witches Anonymous thirteen-step program. A new year, a new outlook on my relationship with Luc. It was time to knock this step off my list—admitting all the wrongs I’d committed and to whom—and move on.
Problem was, it was a damn long list.
The other problem being that I was required by WA rules to admit all these wrongs and those I’d committed them against to my mentor. Technically my mentor was an angel named Cephiel who posed as Father Leonard, a priest at Immaculate Conception. Since he’d probably stroke out over the exact nature of the Devil-inspired wrongs and lecture me endlessly about turning my soul over to God, I wasn’t exactly rocking the confessional. The Devil made me do it excuse wouldn’t pass muster with Ceph.
To add to my predicament, Lucifer was waiting for me in my apartment when I got home from work on New Year’s Eve. The sight of him made my heart speed up. My chest felt lighter. The magic securely contained behind reinforced prison bars next to my heart purred.
He had that look in his eyes. The look that said we were going to do a bit of New Year’s Eve celebrating before the official party at my friend Keisha’s place.
Luc slid up to me and took the boxed ice cream cake out of my hands. “Mm mm. You smell like a banana split.” His lips nuzzled my neck right below my ear. “And I’m hungry, witch.”
Damn. I was hungry too. A hunger pain squeezed my lower stomach. Okay, fine, it was lust. My skin tingled where Luc’s hot breath touched my neck. The sensation ran all the way to my toes. They curled ever so slightly in my boots even though my feet were killing me from a long day of taking end-of-the-year inventory. “It’s the ice cream cake,” I stammered. “My latest concoction is a cross between a banana split and a brownie.”
I lived above my business, Evie’s Ice Cream Shop, and I’d promised Keisha I’d bring a dish to her party. Since I suck at cooking, baking and, well…everything, I offered to bring ice cream. My prowess for whipping up extraordinary treats is akin to my A+ in Devil worship. I excel at it. Everything else? Well, let’s just say, it sucks to be me.
Except when it comes to casting spells. If your neighbor has loud parties and parks on your grass, I can make a sink hole open under his house. Got a cheating boyfriend? I can give him a flesh-eating disease that only attacks certain, ahem, body parts.
And if you’re the Devil and need a lover to broker deals on souls? I’m your witch.
Or at least, I used to be. Now I’m good.
Sort of.
I’m trying, anyway.
Luc breathed deep, grazing my cheek with his lips as he brought his face in front of mine. The hand not holding the box wrapped behind my neck as he stared me in the eyes. A lock of hair tumbled across his forehead, making him look carefree and debonair. The heat coming off his body would melt the cake and me if I didn’t move away.
But I didn’t want to move.
“Kiss me,” I said, ready to get this party started.
He lowered his lips, and just like always, my world tipped sideways and the floor under my feet seemed to rise and fall like I was riding a wave. You want to talk connection…we had it in spades. Always had.
Hence, my problem.
His tongue teased my lips open and I sighed, giving him complete access to my mouth. He licked my lower lip and my inner bad girl did a fist pump. My fingers curled around the soft cotton of his long sleeve T-shirt and I drew him closer, deepening the kiss.
“Did I mention,” he said, breathing as hard as I was, “that banana splits are my favorite treat next to you?”
My heart double-tapped my ribcage. Next door, my imprisoned magic rejoiced.
Danger, Will Robinson.
Luc and I had a long, complicated history. Seven years of wickedness and creating havoc on Earth before my sister, Emilia, intervened and tried to save my soul from eternal damnation. Instead, she ended up Luc’s playmate and I ended up with a giant archangel headache named Gabriel. Luc and I broke up and that’s when I joined Witches Anonymous. I’d been keeping my magic under lock and key ever since.
But that wasn’t all. I went to Hell and back, literally, because of Lucifer, and now here I was, ready to chuck my magic-free life in the Witches Anonymous garbage can over a sweet, romantic line comparing me to a banana split.
Sweet, romantic lines get me every time. “You had me at I’m hungry, witch.”
Luc smiled. Lust and magic swirled around us, tingling my skin the same way Luc’s breath had. The sigil on my forehead—the worst gift ever from my guardian angel—warmed. “No magic,” I reminded Lucifer.
The sigil was the Mark of Cain, a protection symbol that came direct from God. Anyone who tried to use dark magic on me or hurt me in any way would be obliterated by s
aid mark.
Being that I was in love with the Devil, and he’s the essence of darkness and magic, you can imagine the problems this could cause. Talk about cramping a girl’s love life. Luc and I had been stepping around both our magics for six months and never getting past first base. My frustration level had hit DEFCON 1…maximum readiness coupled with imminent nuclear meltdown if I didn’t get some hellacious relief and soon.
Which brought me to my current take on the whole good/bad situation. A magic-free lifestyle was heroic and all that, but totally, totally, overrated.
Especially as we approached the New Year. So what if we survived the Mayan prophecy about worldwide doom? Who was to say we wouldn’t all die at the stroke of midnight, our New Year’s resolutions dying with us? Hell, at the rate I was going, I could be the apocalypse that wiped out civilization. How absurd would that be? I’d stick to my magic-free oath but self-combust, taking out the world like some ass-backwards martyr.
Either way, at that moment, with Luc’s lips trailing their way down my neck, I, for one, planned to go out with style. I didn’t want to be saved from magic, Lucifer or anything else, and I was tired of having God’s stupid mark dictating what I could and couldn’t do.
“Why do you still have clothes on?” I asked the Devil.
Luc chuckled low and deep. Every nerve in my body sat up and said hello, sin. “Ladies first.”
Grabbing the box from his hands, I broke free from his hold and ran into the kitchen, shoved the cake in the freezer and ran back to the living room. On the way, I shucked my sweater and started unbuttoning my pants.
Another chuckle rose from his throat and he grinned a very sexy grin. “For real? You’re not just teasing this time?”
This time. There had been a lot of this times since the summer when I’d returned from Hell with a new attitude and a slight complication in the bad-witch-dying-to-have-sex-with-her-ex department. “No magic. No spells. No hexes. We should be safe.”
Luc and I had fooled around every day since I’d been resurrected from Hell, but I hadn’t been able to seal the deal. Giving the Mark a test run seemed imprudent when it could fry someone you care about. Didn’t mean I hadn’t tested the boundaries…we’d had a few close calls where the Mark struck and Luc ended up slamming into the wall across the room. Still, my libido kept me coming back for more, Will Robinson danger or not.
Luc seemed to need to remind me of the fact I was a tease. “You give me that line about no magic and we’ll be safe every time I nuzzle your neck, and then, right when push comes to shove, you back out.”
He meant the push-comes-to-shove part literally. And it was true.
But not this time.
“No backing out.” I kicked off my boots, wiggled out of my pants and reached for his belt buckle. This was it. I was going to do it. The sigil on my forehead be damned. “Just keep your magic to yourself.”
Clothes went flying as Luc joined me in disrobing. “I’ve never had sex without magic.”
Memories of sex with magic skipped joyfully through my mind. The way Lucifer had used it to seduce me. The way he’d used it to enhance the experience…
Heat flooded my body and the room swayed. An uncomfortable tightness set up camp in my throat. “Holy hexes, Batman.”
Luc tossed his black jeans on the floor. “Are we role playing? I thought you were over your Batman fixation.”
“Never,” I tried to joke, but when he grabbed me, brought his naked chest against mine and kissed me so deep, his tongue practically touched my tonsils, the spot on my forehead sizzled and my stomach clenched.
His pores oozed magic. His kisses teemed with it. The touch of his hands sent electrical charges rippling over my skin. He wasn’t purposely raising his magic, but it was so much a part of him, there was no way I could escape it.
With trembling fingers, I pressed my hands against his chest and pushed. He didn’t budge, except to stop kissing me. “Amy.” His tone was edged with frustration, just like the hundreds of times before when I backed out of having sex.
“I’m sorry. We can’t do this.”
“Of course we can. I promise, no magic.”
It was a promise I knew he couldn’t keep. And the Mark was an unforgiving son-of-a-bitch. “I won’t jeopardize your life.”
His dark brows pinched together and he stared at me through his long, gorgeous lashes. “I’m a fallen angel. Nothing can kill me.”
We’d had this argument on a several occasions. Biting my lip, I stared into those dark, gorgeous eyes and wavered.
I wanted so much to believe him, I let him kiss me again.
He didn’t need further encouragement. His parts and my parts started a hurried hookup and I ignored the searing pain in my frontal lobe. Big mistake.
Wham. An electrical charge the size of Kansas blew us apart. A lightning bolt of white energy blistered the air, and I threw an arm over my eyes. I landed on my butt across the room, my forehead feeling like I’d been hit with a sledge hammer.
The moment the light winked out, I smelled singed hair and charred wood. A quick scan of my body told me my parts were all in place and I was fine. Except for the migraine pounding in my head.
Thick smoke hung in the air. Ignoring the pain, I scrambled around, waving my hands through the smoke and trying to clear my vision. “Luc?”
My new hardwood floor had a black gouge in it, the edges scorched and giving off steam. The black gouge looked like the outline of a man. On further inspection, not a man. The gouge was a hole in the shape of an angel.
Oh, shit. My heart, which had been beating hard and fast before, locked up in my chest.
Nothing could hurt him, right?
Right, my mind said. Except God.
I thunked the Mark with my palm—which only made the migraine pound harder—and fell to my knees next to the charred hole.
Nothing like starting the New Year off with a bang…
And killing the Devil to boot.
Chapter Two – Holy Smoke
“Luc?” I called into the hole.
An unholy silence met my ears.
I stood on shaky legs and waved a hand through the smoke, coughing as it stole into my non-breathing lungs. The Mark of Cain no longer burned, but I scrubbed at it anyway. “Lucifer! Answer me.”
The only answer came from my cat, Cain, who mewed as he sauntered into the living room and over to the hole. The smoke was thickest there, churning and spinning like I’d stuck a blender in it. He sniffed and mewed again, giving me a look that demanded I bring back his favorite person in the whole world.
“Shit, shit, shit.” I scooped up my clothes and pulled them on, then drew Cain away from the smoking pit. I continued calling Luc’s name even though dread sat like an elephant in my chest. Surely, I hadn’t really killed him.
I reached for my stash of Dove chocolates. Ripped the wrappers off two and ate them like candy. Okay, they were candy. And maybe it was more like six pieces.
A minute later, when Cephiel picked up his phone at Immaculate Conception, I blurted, “I killed the Devil. I killed him!”
The chocolate had hit my nervous system, and instead of calming me, it had added to my hysteria.
There was a pause. “While that would make my job of guarding you incredibly easy,” —his voice was unconcerned— “that’s simply not possible.”
“This is your fault. You had God put this stupid sigil on me and now Lucifer’s dead.”
“The Mark zapped him? What were you doing? Wait. Scratch that. I prefer not to know. Did I not warn you about your iniquities?”
I paced the kitchen. “I’m a bad witch. What do you expect?”
“You’re not bad. Just…confused.”
“Yeah? How will you like it when this confused witch hexes your holy ass back to Heaven? I did it to Gabriel. I can do it to you.”
He sighed, long-suffering. “Would you like me to come over?”
Yes. No. “You’re damn right I want you to come over. Come
over and get this thing off my forehead and bring my boyfriend back.”
I punched the end button, fingers shaking. Luc was more than my boyfriend. So much more. The word boyfriend, in fact, couldn’t begin to encompass everything he was to me. For good or bad, better or worse, we were inextricably tied together.
“Please don’t be dead,” I whispered to the empty room as I resumed pacing. “Please don’t be dead.”
Cain looked up from grooming his leg, which was apparently filthy by the way he’d been licking at it. Either that, or he’d found some of the catnip Emilia had brought over again. His big green eyes stared at me, condemnation evident. He’d always favored Luc. More than me.
Traitor.
“I know, I know.” Bending over, I stroked his head and scratched behind his ears. “I screwed up again.”
A young female voice came from down below. “Amy? Are you okay?”
I stepped to the edge of the hole and peered into the smoke. I couldn’t see a thing. “Mikayla?”
“Um, little problem down here.” Mikayla was my newest employee, and at eighteen years old, my youngest. She was also a witch, but just coming into her powers. I’d left her to close up the ice cream shop after our day of inventory. “More like a big problem.”
The way she drew out the word “big” made my body tense. “This hole goes all the way through to the shop?”
Below, she yelped. I heard something crash and a man’s voice yelling for her to get down. There was a hissing noise and the sound of shattering glass.
“Demons!” Mikayla yelled up to me. “Lots and lots of demons!”
Demons. Back in the summer, Lilith had sent three demon assassins to kill me. One of them had burned down my apartment, nearly killing my cats and destroying my extensive Dolce and Gabbana shoe collection. No way I’d stand by and let more of their kind hurt Mikayla or damage my shop. I didn’t know why they were there or what Lilith was cooking up this time, but it didn’t matter.
