Darkest Before Dawn: A Muse Urban Fantasy (The Veil Series Book 3)

by DaCosta, Pippa

  Well, damn. My gaze hooked up on Ryder. He wasn’t happy about this, and considering his rigid glower, I could assume it wasn’t his idea.

  “What makes you think I’m going to work for you after everything that’s happened?” I met and held Adam’s eyes.

  “We’re not the bad guys here, Muse. The demons are. If they go unchallenged, if it’s true, and there are princes on this side of the veil, people will die. Good, normal, everyday people. This is just the beginning, and you know it. Do it for the people of Boston, for your neighbors, your friends. You’re a good person. You know what this means, and you can do something to stop it.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed.

  I flicked my gaze across the stern faces of the others crowded around the table. I had no friends here. Most of these people would happily put a bullet in my head, Ryder included. But this wasn’t about the Institute, not any more. The demons were coming. “I’ll help you. But I’m not dishing out your justice, Adam. I’m not needlessly killing demons for you. I will provide you with intel about the princes, because if you’re right and they’re here, then you’re gonna need more than me. You’ll need something not far off divine intervention.” Perhaps Dawn could have turned the tide. She’d had the power to kill an immortal. But she was gone.

  Jenna eased into the group beside me. A warm smile briefly lightened her lips. I failed at hiding the sharp intake of breath. She nodded, understanding my hesitance. “Playing both sides, Muse. Just like you.”

  “That’s a dangerous game, Jenna.” My brother was not to be messed with. Once he tired of her, he’d destroy her in ways I didn’t even want to think about.

  “I know.” She regarded her colleagues with pride bright in her eyes. “We’re the frontline. If we fail, they’ll be nothing left of Boston.”

  “Can we count you among us?” Adam asked.

  “No.” Their collective gasp brought a smile to my face. “But I’m not against you. I promise you that much.”

  The Enforcers talked strategy, but none would look me in the eyes. I listened, soaking up their camaraderie. I was no longer part of their world, but I never really had been. Always on the outside, that was me. Nowhere to call home. Half demon, half human, wholly fucked. I finished my drink, grateful for the warmth spreading through my otherwise cold soul, scooped up the Operation Typhon file, and moved to leave when Adam’s heavy hand clamped around my good arm. He drew me to one side, away from his devoted employees.

  “What you did, I won’t forget it.”

  I flicked my gaze down to his hand, which he promptly removed as though I’d scolded him. “Just because I saved your ass, it doesn’t make us best buddies. I’m not your hero, Adam. I’m your enemy. Don’t ever doubt that.” I turned away from him before I really told him what had crossed my mind back in his office. He was a smart guy. He’d have figured as much.

  Outside, I stole a few moments to deliberately breathe the slightly briny air of Boston into my lungs and soak the ambience of the quiet street into my pores, letting the city sounds and smells subdue my rattling anxiety. I didn’t imagine the creeping sense of unease. If Adam was right, then whatever was happening beyond the veil had reached a tipping point, and those demons who could get out were scrabbling for freedom. Unfortunately for them, the Boston streets weren’t demon friendly. They never really had been, but now gangs and death squads awaited newly arrived demons. People would die. Both sides were losing what was fast becoming a bloody turf battle. The body count was rising. Before long, the press would catch on. The fuse was burning down to a whole load of explosive material and the Institute was woefully underprepared, outmanned, outgunned and vulnerable. I admired their tenacity even if it would get them all killed. Never let it be said the Enforcers were cowards. They knew they were fighting a losing battle, but they were going to take the demons down with them.

  I closed my arms around the Operation Typhon file and hugged it to my chest. Inside, there would be information about the other half bloods. They’re like animals, Jenna had said. The Institute was going to need them, but could they be controlled? From what I’d learned about my half-blood comrades, the answer was no. We didn’t have a great track record for control. At least if I stepped out of line, Ryder would shoot me down.

  A tight sizzle of heat trickled down the back of my neck, alerting my human senses to the wholly demonic presence behind me. I could have ignored him and walked away, but walking away from the Prince of Greed wasn’t an easy step to take.

  “Am I going to find your name all over this file?” My voice carried through the crisp night air. Distantly, a siren wailed, but even the very real noises of the city couldn’t detract from the netherworldly throb of power he radiated, especially when I felt the tease of his fingers through my hair.

  I gasped and snapped my head around, expecting Akil to be standing right behind me. He emerged from the shadows of a blocked-up doorway, as though those curtains of darkness had created him. In the subdued light where color fled, red embers sizzled in his eyes. The fall of his expensive suit accentuated a body I’d recently become intimately reacquainted with. He didn’t approach as I’d expected him to, but stood back, reading me, likely waiting for the accusations that burned on the tip of my tongue.

  His gaze flicked to the file in my hand, a cursory glance, guarded with indifference. “The contents of the file is irrelevant, as is the past. The Boston Institute is rubble and ash. Their meddling delivered them their well-earned justice.”

  He was entirely too nonchalant. I’d bought the blasé bullshit from him for ten years. Not anymore. The infinitesimal widening of his eyes, the slight flare of his nostrils, the slippery smile that hardly touched his lips: they all added up to a hint of something like smug satisfaction.

  I glanced at the closed doors to Stone’s Throw. A murmuring undertone of voices drifted through the still night air. At any moment, my little chat with a Prince of Hell could be disturbed. My fraternizing with Class A demons wouldn’t go down well. “There are upward of seventy Enforcers behind those doors. Any one of them would give their right arm to capture you, and you’re standing not ten feet from their back door. Are you trying to get caught?”

  His heated gaze stayed trained on me with laser-like intensity. “Do you really believe seventy or seven hundred Enforcers could capture and hold a demon of my caliber?”

  And there were seven—scratch that—six smug-ass princes just like him eyeing up our world. Hell help us. I licked my lips and watched as the movement caught his molten gaze. He’d scored me with that gaze as we’d lain together, wrapped in the trappings of lovemaking. Was that what he was thinking? Undressing me with his eyes? I couldn’t pretend the sex hadn’t meant anything, but neither could he. The change between us simmered like an electrical current in my veins. I had the distinct impression I’d somehow dragged him down to my level, and he’d elevated me to his. And there we were, standing on mutual ground, eyeing each other with sharp intent and dark knowledge. I’d seen him lost to grief, heard him beg to be loved, and while he may not have said those exact words, I knew what I’d felt in his fevered kisses and urgent touch. In all likelihood, he didn’t understand what was happening between us. An immortal chaos demon could not love. He was incapable of wrapping his egocentric mind around it. Love was impossible for him, and yet... Those things he felt, they were alien to him, and I bet that drove him wild. I let a satisfied smile sit easily on my lips. His fire-touched eyes narrowed, but his smile stayed, curious, uncertain. He looked at me as though I were a puzzle, and the very fact he couldn’t figure me out drove him to distraction. Good. He could know exactly how it felt to have the one you love shut you down. He’d done it to me. I was foolish then, naive and weak. That half blood girl was long gone. Whatever I was becoming, I was on a par with him. Equal.

  When I spoke, my tone implied an equally blasé and nonchalant attitude. I’d learned from the best. “Things are different.”

  “Indeed.” His statuesque masculinity ser
ved to remind me of the demon I was facing off against. Akil’s human vessel was a trap, but which one of us had been caught?

  “You could have stopped all of this from happening, but you didn’t lift a finger. It’s your fault Dawn’s dead. As sure as Ryder pulled the trigger, you killed her.” My calmness didn’t sound right to my ears, but the glassy undercurrent mirrored in my thoughts was exactly what I needed. It felt good not to care for his reply as though he couldn’t hurt me, no matter what he said or did. I was beyond that.

  “Dawn’s demise was necessary.” Still, he didn’t move, and he watched me as though he might actually care about my reply.

  “How did you get her in? Did you just drop her off at the door and shoo her inside like you did at my apartment?” She’d been so eager to learn, brimming over with wonderment. The little girl Akil had left in my care with her mismatched socks and tatty rabbit could have been saved.

  “I gave her to David Ryder. In this instance, he and I were in agreement. Did you know he has a teenage daughter and an ex-wife?” Akil’s lips tightened as he saw disbelief on my face. “You do not ask enough questions of those around you, Muse. I make it my business to intimately know my enemies. David Ryder is a private man with many secrets. Humans find it difficult to look innocence in the eye and see the potential for madness. He knew Dawn was dangerous but failed to acknowledge the depth of chaos corrupting her young mind. He hesitated to administer the delightful drug they use to subdue demons. Perhaps he listened to you and gave her the benefit of the doubt? As a father himself, I imagine he let his own feelings cloud his impeccable judgment. Regardless, he made a mistake. He is, after all, only human.”

  I briefly closed my eyes, understanding the stalwart determination in Ryder’s expression right before he’d pulled the trigger. He’d been the one to take her in. The deaths inside the Institute were on his hands. Maybe he had listened to my incessant belief that she could be saved. I’d asked him not to judge her on what she was, and she’d killed within hours. I should have handed her over when I had the chance, when Ryder first asked me to. It would have been the right thing to do. But I’d let my own past obscure the truth of what she was.

  I opened my eyes. “Don’t you feel anything?” I asked quietly. “You sent a little girl to her death.”

  He dipped his chin and peered at me through dark lashes. A predator’s glare. “She knew what she was. She acknowledged her fate and accepted it. If I feel anything, it’s a sense of achievement.”

  “How could you be sure they wouldn’t use her against you?”

  “Chaos cannot be controlled.”

  I drew in a measured breath as the truth of his words presented itself to me. “You knew Ryder would hesitate. You knew she’d tear it down around them...” Not a question but a realization. “You handed her over like a Trojan horse.” Ryder was right all along. He’d even said as much to me while standing in my kitchen right after Akil had left her with me. “You used a nine year old girl to bring down the Institute.” It made sense now. “From the second you showed up on my doorstep telling me to do the right thing, you thought I’d give her to Adam, or at the very least, that they’d find her with me.” Slippery son-of-a-bitch. This hadn’t been about saving Dawn at all. He’d condemned her the second he stole her from Carol-Anne. Kill two birds with one stone. Dawn and the Institute. Both threats to his existence. And to look at him now, his understated confidence and the glint of infinite knowledge in his eyes, you’d think he’d done the world a favor.

  He had never looked more reasonable than he did standing on that street outside Stone’s Throw. “I believed you’d do what needed to be done.”

  “You don’t know me at all, do you?” How could he think I’d subject any half blood to the Institute’s attentions, especially a little girl? “You thought you’d leave her on my doorstep, and I’d send her to her death? What kind of monster do you think I am?”

  “You’re smarter than this, Muse. You are fully aware of the devastation half bloods can summon. Need I remind you of Stefan’s downfall? You must, by now, appreciate your own potential. You should have handed her over to David Ryder. You should have done the right thing. You failed her by filling her head with hope when there was no hope for that half blood.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “No. I’m right.” He held my glare, eyes midnight black. “I could have delivered her into the hands of the Institute myself, but they’d treat her with less suspicion coming from you. When it became clear you had no intention of doing what must be done, I found other means to achieve the required outcome. Dawn was volatile, a threat. She could not be allowed to remain within Leviathan’s grasp. Any one of the princes would have exploited her. I took advantage of an opportunity and put into motion the only possible outcome. Had I thought I could control her, I’d have secured her in my care long ago.”

  The same as he’d done with me: saved a wretched half blood girl from her abusive owner, mentored her, manipulated her “...and groomed her as your weapon later? Is that what you sought to do with me? Is that why you kept me all those years? Were you nurturing a weapon? Is that still your plan, even now?”

  He broke the stare and looked away, perhaps searching for the right words. Whatever he was thinking, he barred it from his face. “Fire—our shared element—consumes. We are forever hungry, you and I. Fire devours, leaving nothing but ash, remnants devoid of life. Fire is the definitive destroyer. The demon you harbor has the potential to be wonderful in ways you do not yet fully understand. I see brilliance in you, but the time has passed where my attentions could be ignored. The princes know you now.” The streetlight sparkled in his eyes and cut shadows across his face, making him appear leaner, sharper, harder. When those fire-lit eyes found me again, he swallowed. “Yes, you were to be my weapon. I am guilty of all those accusations and more. I find myself inexplicably disarmed in matters concerning you. I grew impatient and made mistakes... although those mistakes had the desired effect of awakening your latent abilities. Unfortunately, the resulting incarceration in the netherworld dampened my plans somewhat.” He smiled. I didn’t. With a sigh, he declared, “I admit my original intention was to use you as a weapon against my enemies. Is that truthful enough for you?”

  At one time, his confession would have sent me spiraling into rage. The truth should have shocked me. I waited for the gut-wrenching fear to consume me, but nothing happened. The dark touch of Damien wrapped around my soul, gave an acknowledging squeeze. I’d not felt its touch since lying with Akil, but it was there now, an ever-present threat, a beast stalking the remnants of my shredded humanity, waiting, growing impatient. Hungry. My head was crowded with dark dreams and impossible wants. Some were my own desires. Others belonged to other netherwordly inhabitants of my body and mind.

  I stole a step closer to Akil and would have walked right up to him had he not stepped back. I cocked my head, frowning. “When I saw you at Blackstone, by the fireplace, you were grieving, Akil. You believed me dead, and it cut you up. I know what I saw, and I know what I heard in your voice when you asked me to love you. What am I to you now? Just your weapon or something more?” My tone told him not to screw with me. I wasn’t in the mood for lies, and this wasn’t about hope, or some love-struck fanciful dreams. If Akil felt anything for me, I could use it.

  I already knew the answer, but I waited for the lie he would surely tell and scrutinized his expression for any hint of him working to formulate a response. He eyed me steadily, breathing slowly. A muscle pulsed in his jaw. Amber fringed his eyes, revealing the demon poised inside his human avatar. At one time, it might have startled me to realize how he fought with the truth. He wanted to lie. I saw that much, but the foundation of our relationship had changed. Lying was no longer an option. We’d progressed too far beyond lies.

  “I...” the words caught in his throat. He dipped his chin and lifted his glare, peering through his dark lashes, his gaze baking me in elemental heat. “You mean something else entirely.
” It pained him to say it. He couldn’t have looked more disconcerted if he shuffled from foot to foot with his cap in his hand. As it was, he stood rigid, locking his vulnerabilities behind a mask of stubborn denial. He’d told me once the Prince of Greed didn’t recognize denial. He does now.

  I smiled. There was no need for me to rage at him. It wouldn’t change a thing. It didn’t matter anyway. The past was irrelevant. The wretched half blood girl, the silly little whelp he’d planned to exploit, was now something else entirely. I’d outgrown him, and I had him exactly where I needed him: under my control.

  From the slight pinch around his eyes, he hadn’t expected to see the slow crawl of a smile slip across my lips. Acknowledgement darkened his gaze. He’d expected me to yell, to accuse him of using me. Maybe he wanted me to beat my fists against his chest. I might have done all those things once, but my smile told him more than he could have imagined. I’d accepted my fate. I knew what I was, what I was becoming, if I hadn’t already crossed that Iine. I didn’t fight the thing inside me—the half of me that danced in the dark—not any more. Cool, hard acceptance shuttered my emotions, sealing them off from my humanity. I stared back at him, mirroring his guarded-yet-fractured mask of indifference. He now knew what it felt like to have a piece of his soul at the mercy of another. I had him. The tables had turned. A fundamental shift in our relationship had altered everything. He was the demon sprawled in front of his fireplace, drowning in grief. Those birds were on the ground again. Waters were once more running up stream. The Prince of Greed was mine.

  “New titles are born. Old titles die.” He inclined his head, as though bowing, submitting, subservient. “You are ready.” And with that, he vanished in a burst of static.

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  I fumbled with my keys outside my apartment. What had just happened? Akil had admitted why he’d kept me safe and why he’d saved me all those years ago. Dawn’s fate could easily have been mine. We’d both been pawns in Akil’s game. I’d survived, whereas he’d led her like a lamb to the slaughter. All those years, I’d looked up at him with wide innocent eyes—the same way Dawn had looked at me. I’d have let him take my hand and walk me to my death once too. He’d only let me live because he believed me powerful yet pliable. I was his means to an end I didn’t yet understand.