by Stacy Gail
Just her luck, to fall for such an impossibly magnificent man.
The floor of her stomach dropped at the wayward thought, just as two shadows emerged from the blinding gray sheets of rain. Horrified by the notion she might have fallen in love with Kyle while the world was doing its damnedest to come to an end, she hastily pushed it to the back of her mind as the two people almost crashed into the hood of the car. A ragged gasp tore from her throat when she saw it was a half-drowned Kyle with none other than an equally soaked Bambi Dominguez in tow.
“I don’t believe it.” Frantic, Nikita hit the button that unlocked the car even as Kyle reached for the back passenger door and flung the elusive Bambi Dominguez inside. “I can’t believe it, that was so fast! Are you okay? Is everyone—”
“Drive. Just drive.” Kyle dived into the passenger seat, wiping the water out of his face as he slammed the door behind him. “The farther we get Dantalion’s meat puppet away from here, the easier it’ll be for the Nephilim to send him to hell.”
“I thought you said Dantalion could leach energy off of anyone—it doesn’t have to be just his proxy.”
“Do you really want to sit here and argue the matter?”
“Good point.” She wasted no more time in heading back down Biscayne Boulevard toward the closed causeway, with no real destination in mind. “So what happened out there? Is it finally over?”
“Over?” From her place in the backseat, Bambi let loose a high-pitched, eerie laugh that went right along with her oddly sing-song tone. “Over for me, over for you, it’s all over for you-know-who.”
“Good grief.” Risking a glance in the rearview mirror at the other woman, Nikita couldn’t see much of her except dark, lank hair covering half of her too-thin face, and an ear-to-ear grin that would have done The Joker proud. “I take it our little jump has gone around the bend and straight into la-la land?”
“Oh, yes. Dear little Bambi is long gone.”
Nikita couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pity. No matter what a user Bambi was, no one deserved to be twisted inside out by a demon. “Poor girl. I know it’s a small thing at this point, but I suspect Dibby Biers is going to take that news pretty hard.”
“Dibby is a twin.” As Nikita maneuvered the car around a lake-sized puddle, she chanced another look at their passenger only to find the disquieting vision of Bambi chewing on a wet hank of hair while rocking side to side in her seat. “A real twin. Not a fake twin. The fake twins are the tricksy ones.”
“You don’t say.” Not altogether comfortable with having a conversation with a lunatic while driving through a hurricane, Nikita decided to focus on Kyle. “I was surprised to see you show up so quickly. Somehow I thought it would take much longer for you to shut Dantalion down. But I guess with the five of you guys together, one little demon didn’t stand a chance, yeah?”
“Little demon? After all you’ve come to learn, this is how you refer to a Great Duke of hell?”
“Easy.” Caught off-guard by the heat behind his words, it was all Nikita could do to keep from gaping at him. But after a moment’s consideration she supposed she could forgive him for being a tad edgy after busting all kinds of humps to avert a demonic apocalypse. “Just relax. No need to get your shorts in a twist.”
Bambi let out a piercing bray of laughter. “Twisty, twisted shorts. I think I have snakes in my brain.”
Wow. “Kyle, I’m not diminishing your victory here, believe me. I’m only beginning to grasp just how difficult this was for the five of you to pull off.”
“Things haven’t gone exactly according to plan, I’ll give you that,” came the absent reply. “My timing has been slightly off from the moment I started this endeavor. I had assumed that by the time the strongest of the Nephilim finally managed to fumble their individual ways to me, I would have attained the power to wipe them all out in one fell swoop. But, since I’ll have it in the next few minutes, it’ll all end up the same.”
“What are...” Her heart froze from the inside out as the words sank their poisonous teeth into her brain. With understanding dawning like some hideous cancer, Nikita turned to look at the thing wearing Kyle’s face. Before her disbelieving eyes, that face she knew so well melted like wax and reconfigured itself until she was looking at the image of her mother.
“Well done, Nikita.” The thing that wasn’t her mother smiled its rabid approval while the oily twisting in her brain began, until it was all she could do to keep from crying out. “Thanks so much for getting us away from there. Good thing I stumbled across you sitting here, thinking such loud thoughts about the Nephilim lying in wait for me at my meat puppet’s apartment. I would have walked right into that ambush if it hadn’t been for you, and all of my plans would have been for naught.”
“Fake twins are tricksy.” Bambi laughed again. This time, though, Nikita heard it for the scream it was.
* * *
“I’ve discovered something profound.”
Kyle barely heard Nate’s yell over the cacophony of wind and rain as it lashed the building they were plastered against. The apartment they had under surveillance was on the first floor and exposed to the elements. On either side of a barren courtyard were sets of stairs leading up to the second floor that appeared to be even more exposed, so as he huddled under one set of stairs with Nate, he supposed it could be worse.
“Profound? What?”
“I hate hurricanes almost as much as I hate the cold.” Nate cursed when a strong gust of wind blew rain in his face and had him, the biggest of the Nephilim, staggering back. “Man, I hope Ella and the others are okay.”
Kyle tried not to show the worry gnawing away in his gut. “No one’s going to be okay if we don’t get this fucking demon, Nate.”
“Right. One pain-in-the-ass disaster at a time. Got it.” Nate poked his head out to look for Sara, Menlo and Zeke as they took shelter across the way under the other staircase. “It is kind of strange, though, how this storm kicked up just in time for the end of the world.”
“Yeah, like it isn’t difficult enough trying to find and take down Dantalion in a city of several million people, now we have Oscar to contend with.” Though he knew it was ridiculous, he made a face up at the sky. “Thanks loads for all the help.”
“Don’t piss anyone off,” Nate warned. “I’m fine with us getting hammered into the ground by the heavens, but I sure as hell don’t want any otherworldly wrath to be taken out on our loved ones. Right now with this storm going on, that’s pretty much what it feels like.”
“I know.” And it had Kyle’s insides all squirrelly no matter how much he tried to ignore it. Nikita, he knew, was safely on the mainland and far enough away to be out of the line of fire of both Dantalion and the worst that Oscar could throw at them, but he’d come to care for the others as if they were family. “We know they made it safely back to the house, dude. You got Macbeth’s last message, right?”
“Yeah.”
“So we know they’re set up in the storm basement built into that palatial mansion. They’ve got a generator, a satellite truck, every communication device known to man, and enough CheeZee snacks and bottled shots of espresso to launch both Macbeth and Kendall into orbit. Better still, Macbeth has promised he’d let us know if anything happens on their end, while still keeping watch over all of us out here in the field.”
Nate may have chuckled, but Kyle couldn’t hear it thanks to the screaming wind. “I can just picture him now, kicked back in some easy chair and watching our little dots sit here in the middle of a hurricane. How much do you want to bet he’s laughing his ass off?”
“Let’s just hope Kendall’s bugging him by being quicker on the draw when it comes to getting the latest weather reports.”
Nate laughed again before looking away from the apartment long enough to glance at him. “I know this isn’t the best time, but I
’m glad I got the chance to meet you and the others face-to-face.”
Kyle nodded in perfect understanding. “It’s a real shame that life as we know it is trembling on the brink. Otherwise I’d be loving this.”
“Same goes. You’re like the family I should have been born with instead of the crazy family I actually had.”
All too aware of how miserable Nate’s upbringing had been, Kyle lifted a brow. “You’re not going to hug me now, are you?”
With a grin, Nate flipped him off. “Shut the fuck up, asshole.”
“Ah, that’s Nikita’s favorite nickname for me.”
“Dude, I hate to break it to you, but that’s not a nickname.”
“It is when she says it—” He broke off when his phone vibrated. Ducking his head, he faced the building and fished it out of his pocket. “Macbeth? How’d you get a signal? Did reception come back online where you are?”
“No, I’m calling directly from our satellite truck. Kyle, did you send Nikita off to try and get back to us?”
In an instant, ice poured into his veins. “What? No, MacArthur Causeway is closed. She knows that, she was driving by as they were putting up the road blocks.”
“Then why is she heading like a bat out of hell right for it?”
“She wouldn’t.” She wouldn’t. Unless...
Something was wrong.
“I’ve tried calling her,” Macbeth went on while Kyle’s heart pounded so hard it almost drowned out the words. “Since she’s on the mainland with you, she should still be within range of a working cell phone tower, but she’s not picking up. Would there be any reason you can think of why she wouldn’t answer?”
“Yes.” He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. His world was ending, while he stood like a fool in the rain. “Dantalion.”
In a flash of blue, he rocketed into the sky.
* * *
“Slow down.”
Nikita’s fingers tightened on the wheel until they cramped, while the rain-washed scenery of a nearly deserted Biscayne Boulevard flew by. It was just as well the phone in her pocket had stopped ringing; she couldn’t have pried her fingers loose to answer it if she’d tried. “No.”
“That word never should have been taught to you hairless monkeys.” Dantalion, still wearing the guise of her mother, let out a sigh that sounded more resigned than irritated. “It’s wrong to tell your mother no, Nikita.”
“You’re not my mother, demon.” It took all her strength to not glance at the thing sitting beside her. There wasn’t much she could do, but she wasn’t about to help him mind-fuck her any more than she could help. “I just don’t understand why you’re choosing to look like a powerless nobody when you had the great Floyd Hardy image at your disposal. I thought it would have made sense to hold onto that persona. Think how much damage you could have done looking like him. But with the face you have on now, you’re about as unimpressive as you can get.”
A low hiss emanated from Dantalion, and she knew she’d scored a hit. “Once I gain full strength, it won’t matter what I look like. I’ll have ultimate power in this realm.”
“You could have had a portion of that power now if you’d been smart enough to keep Paul alive. Did you overlook that boy’s intention to kill himself? Or did you suffer an attack of the stupids and miscalculate?”
“It wasn’t my decision for that weak flesh bag to die at that point!” The sudden roar that filled the car made Nikita’s eardrums quiver. In the backseat, Bambi whimpered. “He was ideal for the role of decoy proxy—a spoiled, dissolute prince connected with this era’s seat of power. He even killed his own father with barely a hint of prodding from me, he was so eager. He was perfect.”
“I have to hand it to you, your choice in proxies was excellent.” Her mouth was so dry, her lips stuck together as she tried to talk. “The moment I learned about Paul, he became center-stage and I kept forgetting about Bambi. We all did, I think.”
“Because you’re nothing but primates, easily distracted by all the shiny things.” Abruptly calm, the nightmarish version of her mother settled back into the seat. “I had everything running smoothly until my decoy proxy filled himself with poison while thinking of it as candy. Then that diseased fool behind you had the brilliant idea that she should give him something to live for by indulging in their favorite pastime. Even now she thinks she helped him, can you imagine?”
So Menlo had been right. With no evil intention to murder Paul, it hadn’t been fuel for Dantalion’s metamorphosis. “His death really was an accident, then.”
“Yours won’t be.”
Her stomach churned with sick fear, and she had to swallow before she shamed herself by throwing up. “Neither will yours.”
“You can’t kill a demon, don’t you know that? Of course you don’t.” The thing wearing her mother’s face laughed. “Poor, unworthy Nikita. You’ve been kept in the dark all along, haven’t you?”
She clenched her teeth and did her best to blank her mind. She wouldn’t think of the gnawing betrayal, or the hurt of being lied to day after day, year after year...
Ah, hell.
“Nikita.”
She jolted when Kyle’s voice brushed her ears. Wild, magnificent hope surged through her for an irrational second before she turned to look at the demon next to her, once again wearing the face she yearned to see most of all—Kyle.
“You know how lying works, right?” Kyle’s face was gentle, loving. Pitying. “Every lie that has ever been created serves one purpose, and one purpose only. It’s given to those who aren’t worth the truth. That’s how I see you, Nikita. I lied to you for years because you were never worthy of knowing the real me.”
She wouldn’t listen. She wouldn’t... “Shut up.”
“Remember when you thought you were losing your mind? You were so terrified, you were almost sick with it. I knew what had happened, but I let you suffer. I let you suffer because deep down I don’t give a damn about you. But you already know that, don’t you? From the moment I texted you that you were in the way, you understood exactly what I really think of you, right? You’re nothing but a weak, human toy that I’ve been playing with. As soon as I break you—and I will—I’ll just get another one.”
Agony gouged into Nikita before she could prepare to guard against it, and for that moment she thought she might bleed to death. Then that cold, hard curtain of numbness came down, as it had when she was a child and couldn’t tolerate the pain anymore. All that was left was an icy calm that brought with it a crystal clarity that not even Dantalion could fracture.
The one thing she knew, beyond all doubt, was that in his own way, Kyle cared about her.
“Demon,” she said, pleased to hear the flat composure in her tone. “If that’s the worst you can come up with, the human race has nothing to worry about. Your so-called apocalypse? It has no teeth.”
There was a beat of silence, then another voice sounded from the passenger seat. “I see.” Dantalion, now wearing the image of Paul Hardy, looked back at Bambi. “I want this canker sore of a bitch to stop breathing. Kill her.”
“Bambi,” Nikita said before the other girl could do little more than spit the hair out of her mouth. “You didn’t sell your soul to this demon, did you?”
“I always go to the highest bidder,” came the immediate reply. “That’s the way it’s always been, that’s the way it’ll always be.”
“So all this time, you really were juggling two proxies.” Nikita shook her head as she pushed down a little more on the accelerator while signs for MacArthur Causeway came into view. “That was actually clever of you, demon. The Nephilim didn’t see it coming. You should be proud.”
“It’s not a difficult task to outwit this crop of Nephilim.” But by his tone she could tell he was preening. “After thousands of years separating them from thei
r progenitors, they’re practically human, and hopelessly weak. When I first began this campaign, I could only find four that held any threat of being trouble for me down the road.”
That surprised her. “You could only find...? Wait. Are you saying you sought out their attention deliberately?”
“Very much so. There was no downside to targeting the abominations. If I couldn’t outright eliminate them with my proxies or by my own hands, I had the backup plan of making sure they would chase me until they ran into my fully manifested grasp. They did manage to surprise me when they organized, shared information and congregated. Working together...they weren’t supposed to do that. It’s breaking the rules.”
“And yet it’s being allowed.” She chanced a glance his way. “What do you think that means?”
“I think it means you’re like the rest of your arrogant, pestilential race—you talk too much.” He snapped his fingers at Bambi as if she were nothing more than a dog. “Didn’t I give you an order?”
She was back to chewing her hair. “I’m not a waitress, fake-twin Paul.”
Nikita couldn’t stop a laugh, though even to her ears it sounded hysterical. “No wonder you couldn’t get anything done this time around, demon! At first I’d assumed that with two proxies working, you’d be able to kill twice as fast. Yet all they apparently did was screw each other and lose their minds. Kyle told me that while you’re in this form you’re as weak as a kitten, and now I see what he meant. I’d be willing to bet you tried directing Bambi into gunning for her roomie sooner, but with Paul around to distract her, you couldn’t get her to follow through. Directing two proxies at once really was too much for you to handle, wasn’t it?”
