by Stacy Gail
It’s entirely possible my fellow Nephilim and I are about to be destroyed for doing this.
Damn it, she wasn’t so furious with him that she wanted him to die. No matter how angry and uncertain she was about this man she no longer knew, the idea of Kyle not being there anymore was...unacceptable. No, it was worse than that. It was a nightmare. Just thinking about it punched a sick, black hole inside of her that seemed to have no end.
She could lose him. Forever.
When he came around to open the door and gently pull her to her damaged feet, he made a sound of surprise when she wrapped her arms around him and held on tight. “Hey.” He hugged her back, and a knot tightened like a fist in her throat. Even if he didn’t give a damn about her, when he held her like this it was almost possible to believe she was the center of his world. “You okay?”
Holy crap, he had to be kidding. “My feet are killing me, every muscle in my back is strained after what you put me through, and my vagina will never walk again.”
He snorted. “It never walked in the first place.”
“And you might die by something other than me strangling you. None of this is right.”
“Nikita.” Long fingers sifted through her hair to cradle the back of her head. “You almost sound like you’re worried about me.”
“I don’t know what I am.” She rested her brow against the steady beat of his heart and tried to make some sense of the messy emotions turning her inside out. “I really thought I’d hit my limit with weirdness when I saw my mother, you know? Then I was sure I’d reached it when I learned that angels, demons and Nephilim—you—have been playing a winner-take-all apocalyptic game right under my nose, and I was oblivious to it all. And now there’s this stupid rule you’re daring to break, a stunt that could get you killed. It’s just...” Helplessly she shook her head and wasn’t surprised when it swam with fatigue. “If Dantalion doesn’t make me crazy, the reality of what your life is like probably will.”
The chest she leaned against shifted. Retreated. The arms that held her dropped away. “Which pretty much explains why I never told you about any of this. You’re not the most accepting, open-minded person in the world.”
For a second Nikita thought her ears were on the fritz. There’s no way he just put this on her doorstep. No way. “Wait. Are you trying to say that it’s my fault you kept everything from me?”
He took another step back, as if suddenly aware he’d wandered onto dangerous ground. “Let’s not get into assigning blame—”
“That was your idea, not mine, so let’s do a review, shall we? I didn’t ask for any of this, Kyle. But I’m here now, with you, to take care of business, despite the fact that the business in question is catching a fucking demon. So don’t you dare stand there and tell me I’m not accepting of what’s happening. The fact that I’m here is proof that I’m more than accepting, so if you want to assign blame to someone for my being kept in the dark, even after I was attacked and was terrified and needed help, look in the goddamn mirror.”
His eyelids flinched, but he kept his gaze steady. “I’m not going to apologize for keeping the Nephilim part of me a secret. When you’re different from everyone else on the planet, you get into the habit of keeping secrets and blending in. It’s the only way to survive.”
“Excuses.”
“No, truths. You have no idea what it’s like to live with the possibility that if you step out of line, you get crushed out of existence. You learn early on to never call attention to yourself.”
“You’re right, I wouldn’t have any idea what that’s like, because you never gave me a hint about any of this. Yet when I do finally stumble onto your world-ending big secret, you get pissy because I don’t continue to skip along without missing a beat. Well, guess what? I’m missing beats like you wouldn’t believe. I’m terrified I’m going to go crazy along with everyone else on the planet, I don’t know who you are since the Kyle I know would never have let me suffer with the belief that I’d lost my mind, and I’m sick with worry of losing you now that you’ve broken this no-congregating rule after it’s stood without opposition for thousands of years. I’m. Missing. Beats.”
“You do know me, Nikita. Better than anyone.” He seemed at a loss as to which point of upset he should address first, while his expression spoke volumes of a man who’d been pushed to his absolute limit. Since that was where she’d been for the past twenty-four hours, she felt like she should welcome him to her world. “We’re going to get through this, because failure’s not an option. And as for the rule thing...” He sighed roughly and dragged a hand through his hair. “All I can hope is that someone upstairs has a list of priorities that matches ours. If that’s the case, then Dantalion will be seen as the greater threat, and we’ll be able to send him back to hell without all of us suffering a celestial smite fest.”
“So far the Nephilim scoreboard is showing one giant goose egg in the smite department, but it’s early yet. It could still happen now that you’re here.”
As one, they turned toward a door connecting the garage to the house, from where a woman’s voice had emanated. Skipping lightly down the shallow concrete step was a lean, athletic-looking woman with bright china-blue eyes, her short blond hair styled in a viciously sleek asymmetrical blunt cut that fit her to a T. Lumbering along beside her was a man so huge he made the blonde look pocket-sized. He was as dark-haired and dark-eyed as the woman was fair, a human bulldozer to her precision scalpel. Yet when he touched a hand to her back as they made their way to the far end of the garage where she stood with Kyle, Nikita could all but feel the aura of two halves making a whole.
“Oh great, another Amazon warrior-woman to make Kendall and me feel like refugees from Munchkinland.” The blonde took Nikita in with an all-encompassing sweep that should have been nosy, but the smile in her eyes made it nothing more than friendly. “Are you sure you’re not part of the Nephilim, Nikita? You’re no more than an inch or two shorter than Sara. I’m Ella, by the way, descendant of nobody in particular. Also known as an ordinary human.”
“There’s nothing ordinary about you.” The man beside Ella kissed the top of her head before offering his hand. “Nikita, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you. I’m Nate da Luca, and before we go any further I’d like to offer my deepest apologies for the attack Dantalion launched on you yesterday. I consider that completely my fault.”
While Nikita’s brows shot up, Ella rolled her eyes and Kyle muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like “Idiot.”
“I’m afraid I don’t understand, Nate. How could that...that monster suddenly showing up at my place wearing the face of my long-dead mother be your fault?”
“I’d thought—hoped—I dealt Dantalion a finishing blow this past spring.” Muscles rippled beneath the straining navy-blue cotton of his T-shirt with his shrug, and his eyes grew shadowed with turbulent memories she could only guess at. “With each hit I felt that demon slipping back into hell where he belongs. For crying out loud, he was dissolving as I made him pay for all the innocent lives he’d taken—”
“Nate’s got an angel of vengeance at the root of his family tree, which gives him a hint of locator mojo mixed in with a huge can of whoop-ass just waiting to explode out of those muscles,” Kyle offered while Nikita tried to make sense of what was being said. “Just ignore him. He’s got an over-developed sense of justice that makes him think it’s his fault this demon’s still around, but it’s not.”
“No, it’s mine,” Ella sighed, shooting Nate an exasperated glance. “Dantalion can’t mentally touch the Nephilim, so he can’t siphon any energy off of them. But he sure as hell can feed off a human’s negative thoughts and energy. Did you know that?”
“Uh...I’m learning.” And she was so far behind the curve it wasn’t even funny.
Ella nodded. “Unfortunately I got to learn about it while
it happened. When Nate had Dantalion at his lowest point and there was no other power source around, that sniveling monster latched onto me. And then...” She shuddered delicately. “I still have nightmares about what happened after that. Suffice it to say, I was very sorry I was the only human around to feed him the negativity that kept that monster in this realm. So if anyone’s to blame, I am.”
“This is ridiculous.” Nikita looked from one face to the other, irritated and out of sorts. “The only one at fault here is Dantalion. I’m not going to continue to stand here on my poor bruised feet and listen to silliness when I should be listening to how we’re going to flush our target out into the open. How far along are we on nailing down his location?”
Nate and Ella exchanged surprised glances, before Kyle’s laugh snagged their attention. “Is it any wonder she’s the second-best bounty hunter in Miami-Dade?” he wanted to know, then was quick enough to dodge her punch.
Chapter Nineteen
If Kyle didn’t think his relationship with Nikita was on the rocks in a big way, he would have been having the time of his life. Even with her accusations—words that hit way too close for comfort—ringing in his ears, he was still thrilled to meet up with his favorite group of people, his family of choice, and the ones whom he’d never imagined he’d see face-to-face.
The Nephilim.
People who never bothered to connect with anyone on the ‘net would no doubt scoff at the notion of online friends. Certainly in their minds real friends, even best friends, couldn’t be made when those involved had never met face-to-face. But the definition of friend had nothing to do with physical proximity; it was an understanding of who you were, and an acceptance of all the crap that came with it. Though it was against heavenly rules to be under the same roof with his fellow Nephilim, it was so freeing to be with people he didn’t have to hide from, because they accepted him for what he was.
Everyone, except Nikita.
Inevitably his gaze veered to her. Gideon, Sara’s husband and a former Army doc who now worked in the private sector in Dallas, was expertly bandaging Nikita’s feet with supplies he’d snagged from Lynchpin Security International’s mobile trauma room that was housed in the motor home they’d passed in the driveway. Parked behind a three-desk setup in a corner of the large main room, LSI’s computer genius Macbeth was busy trying to get everyone’s phones synced up, while sneaking peeks every now and again at Nikita. There was definite interest there, and every time he glanced over to where she sat, Kyle had to restrain himself from smacking the kid in the head. The only thing that stopped him was that Nikita seemed oblivious to the sappy crush-vibe Macbeth was throwing out like radio waves. She’d been noticeably quiet as she was introduced to the rest of the Nephilim and the select few who were trusted enough to be part of the inner circle. Odder still, when Gideon insisted he take a look at her injured feet, she hadn’t let out a peep of protest.
Usually Nikita protested the color of the sky if you called it blue.
Was she freaked to be in a room full of freaks? Or worse...was she afraid of them? Maybe she wasn’t interacting the way she normally did because she feared them. Or, as she put it, she didn’t want to be made crazy by what the Nephilim lifestyle was truly like. Well, that was just too fucking bad, he thought, his face hardening as he scowled across the room at her, where muted light from the floor-to-ceiling windows flowed over her like a spotlight. He was part of the Nephilim, and proud of it. He didn’t ask for that particular cross to bear, but he’d tote it through life, no complaints. And if she couldn’t handle it, then she—
As he watched she yawned, folded her arms on the armrest of the plush, oversized easy chair she was in and nestled her head down, eyelids drifting lower until they were almost closed. Oh. So she was tired. Guess that made sense, since he hadn’t allowed her to sleep. He could feed off the energy of the worsening weather without batting an eye, but she didn’t have that luxury. No doubt she was as exhausted and unable to move as he’d wanted her to be.
Or she was rejecting everyone and everything in the room. The existence of angels and demons. The Nephilim. Him.
I’m losing my goddamn mind.
“Your lady’s doing much better than I was expecting.”
Kyle started. He’d been concentrating so hard on Nikita he hadn’t even noticed Menlo Hunter beside him. That was saying something, as Menlo wasn’t a man who generally went unnoticed, and he couldn’t help but wonder if everyone had had the same jolt after getting their first eyeful at the mysterious MenloNotThePark. He was a couple inches shorter than himself, elegantly built and wearing what had to be custom-tailored pants and a silk button-down shirt and vest with all the indolent panache of an international model. Thick mahogany hair waved away from a lightly tanned face that would have also been perfectly at home on the catwalk, had it not been for a wicked-looking scar that sliced up from the corner of his mouth, past his left eye—an eye that was pale gold while the other was a deep cognac brown—and bisected his left eyebrow. It continued all the way up to disappear into his hairline, where the hair that grew there was pure white. But even more than the evidence of a devastating injury long ago healed, there was something both unsettling and relentless in his heterochromia eyes. Though Menlo appeared to be a year or two younger than his own age, it was as though the other man had seen far more than Kyle ever planned on seeing for the rest of his life.
“Yeah?” Because there was nothing else in the room that held his attention for more than a few seconds, Kyle’s gaze zoomed back to where Nikita now looked like she was dozing off. “What were you expecting?”
“The usual.”
“What’s the usual?”
“An irreparably broken psyche unable to withstand the supernatural concepts of heaven, hell and everything in between, which would be us. An inability to accept what she was forced to see and feel, as there are usually no extraordinary coping mechanisms to be had in the mental toolbox of a person who’s lived a run-of-the-mill life. In other words, a complete fucking mess. Instead, she’s so comfortable in our presence and in the face of an impending demonic takeover, that she’s ready to curl up and take a nap.”
“I...guess.” Intrigued, Kyle turned to take the other man’s measure. “Why is it you sound like you know what you’re talking about?”
“Probably because I do.” The corner of Menlo’s mouth indented—not really a smile, more of a wry acknowledgment of what seemed to be a private joke. “In my line of work I deal with people whose lives have been blown apart by demons and other things—things that are nowhere near Dantalion’s level of nasty. Trust me, just about every single one of those people become candidates for the psych ward after what they’ve been forced to see. But to my surprise, after suffering a mind-bending attack from one of the most infamous Great Dukes of hell, Nikita seems to be right back on her battered and beaten-up feet.”
That was food for thought. “What is it that you do for a living?”
“I’m attached to the Vatican as a special liaison.”
“Which means?”
“It means I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you. And speaking of divulging sensitive information, how was Nikita’s reaction to all of this compared to the other people you’ve shared your secret with?”
“You’re kidding, right?” Kyle shot him a glance while silently acknowledging that his first impression of Menlo when they’d met online had been bang-on—the man epitomized the term still waters run deep. “I’ve never told anyone about the Nephilim part of my life. And I wouldn’t have told her about it, at least not now, if that peckerhead Dantalion hadn’t blown the lid off of everything. Nikita’s a lot of things I both adore and admire, but the one thing she isn’t, is flexible.”
“Really? After all she’s been through, I’d say she’s incredibly flexible. In fact, after watching her take all this in—plus having the man in her life
suddenly turn up as a super-powered, not-entirely human being—I’d say she’s incredible, period.”
“Not you, too. If Macbeth keeps panting in her direction I’m going to have no choice but to take away his cheese snacks and put his head through a monitor.”
“Down, boy, I’m not looking at your lady like that.” Menlo’s mismatched eyes narrowed over Nikita while he absently toyed with the double piercing of a Star of David and a cross in his earlobe. “Or at least I’m trying not to. Though I will admit, there’s just something so damn hot about her velvet dark eyes, shiny pure soul and mile-long stretch of golden legs.”
“Damn it.” The impulse to cuss the other man out in a chest-beating display worthy of any Neanderthal stalled out when the other man’s words sank in. “Wait, what? Pure soul?”
“You’ve got electricity and the weather,” came the patient reply. “Zeke’s got shadow manipulation and soulfire that passes spiritual beings from this realm to the next. Me, I’ve got the gift of light and darkness.”
“Dude, that’s awesome.” Kyle paused. “I have absolutely no idea what that means.”
Again Menlo’s mouth curled, and this time it hit full-smile status. “I have the ability to see the darkness that resides in the soul and, when necessary, reveal it in all its terrible glory. I suppose it could be considered a type of telepathic talent, though it’s nowhere near Dantalion’s scale, and I can’t read or insert thoughts the way he can. I just read souls.”
“I guess this means you’re a pretty good judge of character, then?”
“The best. Nikita, for instance, radiates with the most amazing light, despite the vicious knocks life has given her. She’s really something.”
Kyle followed his attention to Nikita now sleepily chatting with Sara, who had come bearing a pair of flip-flops for Nikita to borrow. “That’s good to hear, but I already knew that about her. I mean, I can’t see lights or anything, but she’s the one I’m going to spend the rest of my life with.”
