To Hell and Back

by Juliana Stone

  She jumped when the buzzing behind her started up once more and turned toward the high dresser opposite the bed. A cell phone. Logan’s phone. She glanced at the clock on the table beside an overstuffed green-and-black-plaid chair. The hands pointed to 8:30 and the unease in her gut tripled. She stared at the clock for several long moments. Logan should definitely have been back by now.

  His phone continued to vibrate. She crossed the room and slowly reached for it, cheeks flush with heat, stomach tied in knots. But just as she picked it up, the cell phone went quiet.

  For a second her heart pounded so fast and hard that she had to catch her breath. She tiptoed back to the window, but when she carefully looked outside, the stranger was gone. A red balloon floated up in the air until it caught on the branches of an oak tree. She stared at it for several seconds, Logan’s cell phone in her hand. When the balloon suddenly snapped free, she took a step back and exhaled.

  What was wrong with her?

  Kira ran a shaky hand through her newly dyed hair and sprang into action. Something was up. Logan should have been back by now. She forced her hands to stop trembling as she reached for her jacket. After sliding into it, she tossed her toiletry bag into the large one she and Logan shared, and slung it over her shoulder. With one last look around she moved toward the door. She’d find Logan, and as much as she wanted to explore Waterford and all of its Halloween goodness, maybe he was right. Maybe they should leave right away.

  Her hand reached for the doorknob, and just as she was about to turn it, Logan’s cell phone rang out shrilly. The sound grated on her already frayed nerves.

  “Dammit.” But maybe it was Logan?

  With one hand on the doorknob and the other retrieving his cell from her pocket, she paused and took a second to look at the screen on his phone. “P” was all it said. It wasn’t Logan, but who was it?

  Head bowed, she yanked open the door and froze.

  Heavy, military-style filled her vision. Mud had dried along their edges, and she noticed bits of dried debris on the faded beige carpet. They weren’t Logan’s boots.

  She swallowed and her gaze rose slowly, past long, muscular legs, a broad chest, and wide shoulders, until she rested her eyes on a man she’d never met before. She gulped back a pang of fear and froze.

  He was a dangerous, lethal sort. She could tell. It was in his ice-blue eyes, aristocratic chin, and nose. His full mouth was pursed as if he was annoyed, and his brows were furrowed. His hair was thick and black, shot through with bits of silver. He pushed a long piece away from his face impatiently, his expression darkening even more, and Kira hoped he didn’t know how scared she was.

  He was the man in black from the square. He was twice her size and there was no way Kira could get around him.

  “Who are you?” he said harshly, his cell phone in hand while Logan’s still rang in hers. He hit a button and the sound stopped, leaving them with nothing but a dangerous silence between them.

  Kira’s gut roiled but she refused to look away. Logan had taught her a few things and she knew she couldn’t show weakness. Even though she wanted to slam the door shut and hide, she squared her shoulders and looked him in the eye.

  “Who the hell are you?” she answered instead, hoping the tremor that laced her words wasn’t too evident.

  He studied her for a few moments, his steely eyes never wavering. He nodded to the cell in her hand. “That’s not yours.”

  She shrugged. “No, it’s not.”

  He leaned his shoulder against the door frame and Kira had to move back an inch or so. As well as being dangerous, this stranger was an arrogant son of a bitch. “Where is he?” Brow arched, he waited for her answer, but she wasn’t fooled. He was neither relaxed nor friendly.

  Alarm rifled through her, but before she could react, the man pushed away from the door, his long limbs unfolding with surprising grace and a whole lot of strength. She stumbled backward and swore softly as it closed behind him.

  Kira tried like hell to control her erratic breathing, but it was hard. She was scared. Rattled. And—as she gazed around the empty room—alone with a man who could tear her apart before she even opened her mouth to scream. The problem was, she didn’t know if he was friend or foe. Was he part of the league? Was he connected somehow to Logan and his friend Bill?

  She’d met him once—Bill, an original seraphim and head of the league of guardians—and Logan trusted him. Apparently the only reason she was alive was because of Bill—because he’d ordered Logan to retrieve her from the gray realm.

  The stranger pocketed his phone and glanced behind her, at the bed with its tumbled sheets, at the pillows strewn across them. The mess said lovemaking loud and clear. His nostrils flared and his gaze swung back to her, his eyes slowly traveling from the top of her head to the bottom of her boot-clad toes. She knew what he was thinking and she raised her chin.

  “I’m not going to ask again. I need to find Logan.” His voice was subdued, but there was a hard glint in his eyes.

  She arched a brow and carefully tugged the edge of her jacket sleeves so that her wrists were covered. The scars there were too personal … too painful for anyone but Logan to see. Where are you?

  For the moment she didn’t sense danger, but in this world where nothing was as it seemed, she knew things could change in a heartbeat. There was a knife in her bag, a charmed dagger Logan had given her. He’d told her to always keep it on her body because she’d never know when it would come in handy. Smart words. Too bad she’d not listened.

  “I don’t know—”

  “Cut the crap.” He spoke with some kind of accent, one she couldn’t place. For a second her gaze ran over him. She noticed how long and elegant his fingers were. It was unexpected, when paired with the powerfully intimidating figure he presented.

  She narrowed her eyes, the bag now loose in her hands, having slid from her shoulder. “I’ll give him a message.” There was no point lying; the man knew Logan had been here, and for the first time real fear seeped into her bones. Something was off. Really wrong.

  The stranger ran fingers through the long strands of hair at his nape and swore, something unintelligible. But it was a curse. There was no mistaking his anger, or the tense set to his features.

  “How long has he been missing?” he asked harshly.

  “Missing?” Alarm filled her eyes. “He went for food …” Oh God. She fell silent and stared at the stranger.

  “Fuck.”

  He grabbed his cell and turned slightly. He waited a few moments. She slid her hand inside the bag and felt the cold, hard blade, but she froze when he spoke.

  “Cale, it’s me.”

  A pause.

  “I’m here, he’s not.” The man’s eyebrows lifted as he glanced at her once more and she thought that maybe they’d softened a bit. “Yeah, she’s safe for the moment.” He nodded and then pocketed his cell phone without saying another word.

  For a few moments neither spoke, and then he tipped his head toward the bag in her hands. “Save it. I’m not the enemy.” His hand reached for the door. “We have to go.”

  Fear slammed into her gut. “Where’s Logan? I’m not going anywhere without him.”

  Something in his eyes told her that things were much worse than she’d imagined. The fear inside her doubled and she sank onto the bed. “No,” she whispered and shook her head. “I can’t leave without him.”

  He crossed over to her and knelt down, though his eyes remained as hard and unyielding as the rest of him. “Look, I don’t have time to babysit. This is life and death.” She looked away, hating his intensity, his large frame … his overwhelming maleness. But he wasn’t having any of it. He grabbed her chin and when she would have yanked away, he held firm and forced her head back so that he could look into her eyes. So that she could see the truth.

  “They know about you and they won’t stop. I need to get you the hell away from here or your ass is toast.”

  A whimper escaped her lips as his fin
gers dug in. He arched a brow, voice low and steady. When he spoke, it was slowly, as if he was talking to a child. “Do you understand?”

  He let go and Kira nodded, her thoughts chaotic, her heart breaking.

  “But Logan—” Her voice broke and she couldn’t finish.

  “Logan’s not here right now, I am.” He stood abruptly. “Let’s go.”

  “Is he alive?” she whispered. She knew what monsters hunted her, and if he’d come to harm, the blame lay squarely on her shoulders.

  The stranger didn’t answer. Instead he held his hand out.

  Her own crept toward her belly and an overwhelming sadness leeched into her soul. “Who are you?” she asked, though her mind was elsewhere and she barely heard his answer.

  “Priest.”

  She glanced up. “What?”

  He leaned down once more, his breath warm against her cheek. “The name is Priest, and right now I’m your only shot of surviving, because this town is crawling with otherworld. Their numbers have doubled in the last ten minutes alone.” He glanced at the window and scowled. “The air is rank with their smell.”

  A sob escaped her lips but he went on, cruelly. “Winters is long gone and I don’t know if he’s coming back.” His eyes fell to where her hand laid, nestled against her belly.. Her heart was pounding so loudly she could barely hear her own thoughts.

  “Are you coming or am I going to have to carry you from this room?”

  Kira went cold inside. She closed her mind and let the canvas bleed out until it was blank and there was nothing. It was an old trick, one she’d used many times over so that her fragile mind would survive when she’d been in the hellhole that passed as a psychiatric hospital. She nodded, wiped away the few tears that had slipped from her eyes …

  And without glancing back, followed the stranger from the room.

  Chapter Three

  * * *

  PRIEST KNEW HE was in trouble about two seconds after they exited the bed-and-breakfast. Up ahead, just past the giant pumpkin display, stood a pack of blood demons. They’d donned their human guise, of course, but it did nothing to hide the menace they projected. A family of five gave them a wide berth as they traversed the sidewalk and he watched as the mother hustled her children past.

  Smart humans.

  The damn things looked like a bunch of thugs—all of them well over six feet in height, with thick necks, tree trunks for legs, and shoulders as wide as a Mack truck.

  They were mean and strong, but dumb. Bottom-feeders who kissed the asses of most of the underworld. He wondered who they called boss.

  Normally, Priest wouldn’t blink. As an immortal Knight of the Templar, he was used to dealing with all sorts of otherworld scum. In fact, it had been a few months since he’d flexed his muscles and connected his fists with demon hide. Normally he looked forward to this kind of shit because life, such as it was, gave him only a few moments to feel truly alive. Making love to a hot-blooded woman did that. Waking up to the smell of fresh rain did that. Killing a bunch of punk-ass demons did that. He glanced to his side.

  But normally he worked alone.

  Casually he leaned his tall frame against the brick wall, just outside of the coffee shop and kept Kira out of view. The woman didn’t say anything—she didn’t have to. Her pale features and large exotic eyes couldn’t hide her fear. But there was something else there, and it was that something else that was going to make all the difference in the world. Anger.

  He reached his hand forward as if to caress her cheek while his eyes scanned the immediate area looking for otherworld. To anyone glancing their way, they appeared to be a couple deeply involved in each other. Lovers.

  Priest ignored both her flinch and her quick recovery as his gaze swept along the street behind him. His liege—the Seraphim, Bill—hadn’t told him much about this assignment, but he knew enough. He knew where Kira Dove had been.

  The gray realm.

  It was a place he was all too familiar with and he had to give it to her, the little lady had spunk. Anyone who escaped purgatory in one piece was strong. He’d never met the hellhound Logan Wingers, but his woman had guts.

  His eyes hardened when he spied a second pack of blood demons hunkered down near the bed-and-breakfast they’d just left. When he felt the unmistakable shift in the air that spelled real trouble, his insides twisted.

  Lilith’s crew.

  Just fucking great. His Harley was nowhere near where he needed the damn thing to be. He was in the middle of a large crowd of innocents and this little bit of woman had the very bowels of Hell on her trail.

  A new scent drifted up his nostrils. Lilith’s pack hounds were here somewhere and their human disguise would be hard to penetrate. Those guys were pros.

  Priest straightened and dropped his hand from her cheek, sliding his hand down until he was able to draw her delicate fist into his large palm. Damned if he was gonna let the queen bitch of hell get to Kira Dove. Strong white teeth flashed as he smiled and looked down at her.

  “You ready to rock and roll?”

  Huge eyes stared up at him, their dark depths hiding a hell of a lot more than pain and fear. There was strength there, determination and—he smiled—a fuck you attitude.

  She nodded and whispered, “Let’s do this.”

  Kira let the stranger slip his arm around her shoulders and turn her down the alley between the coffee shop and a bank. A cool wind slipped in behind them and she fought the urge to break into a run and to not stop until she was as far away as she could get from the danger she sensed.

  And it was dangerous. There was no doubt about that. She felt it like an ache in her bones, and as her hands once more rested upon her belly, she tried to stifle the fear that filled her. Even now, life grew inside her. She felt it stir—felt the whisper of life—and Kira knew she would do whatever she had to in order to give her child a chance to live.

  A child she’d created with Logan.

  His name was like a whisper in her mind and as she and the stranger, Priest, emerged from behind the building, she pushed the pain that accompanied it away—she didn’t want to think about Logan or what he was going through. Where he was.

  She couldn’t, because if she dwelled on it too much, she’d break, and there was no way she could falter. Not now.

  “This way,” Priest nodded ahead.

  Kira fell into step beside him as his arm fell from her shoulders. The mantle of cold, lethal warrior slipped over Priest as easily as water over ice, and she recognized the same kind of strength in him that lived inside Logan.

  I will return to you, my love.

  The whispered words echoed in her brain before she could stop them, and instead of dismissing them outright as a sign of weakness, she let them settle for a moment. She let them resonate and fill the empty well inside her. Logan’s dark eyes swam before her, eyes that glistened with love, desire, and need. They gave her strength. Hope.

  The emotions burned in her chest so hard she gasped—and then she pushed them away. Kira wouldn’t think about Logan again until she held him in her arms. Until she could look in his eyes and know she was home. From this moment forward, her survival and that of her unborn child was all she would focus on.

  She reached for the charmed dagger Logan had given her as her gaze swept the half-filled parking lot behind the buildings. Beyond the old cracked asphalt ran a railroad line, but from the looks of it, it hadn’t been used in years. Tall weeds and heavy brush lined the rusted rails and she saw glistening water in the distance. A small river ran through the town, and forest covered the landscape on the other side.

  The forest was thick and silent, but a shiver rolled over Kira as she gazed into the multicolored stand of trees. The autumn colors were near blinding in the early morning sun, and though the warmth of reds and gold and oranges were abundant, the shadows that surrounded the trees were eerie. Mist rolled near the edge like long plumes of smoke and she shuddered, remembering the gray realm. Remembering what mist and f
og could hide.

  Something didn’t look right.

  “Shit,” the man beside her uttered harshly.

  Kira glanced up at him but his eyes were trained to where hers had just been. His brows furrowed, accenting the cold depths in his eyes, and she knew this wasn’t a man to be crossed.

  “We can’t go that way. The trees are filled with Askula demons.”

  Kira had no idea what the hell Askula were, but she didn’t like the sound of it or the feeling she got when she stared into the forest.

  He glanced down at her, skimmed over the dagger in her hand, and nodded to his left. The parking lot ended behind the bank, and beyond that was the main street with a children’s playground on the other side. “We’ll go that way.”

  Goosebumps rose on the back of her neck and Kira took off, Priest falling in behind her. Her heart beat rapidly, filling her body with adrenaline, and her legs flew over the concrete.

  When she’d been confined at the Regent Psychiatric Institute many a night she’d lain awake in her prison, dreaming of the chance to stretch her legs and run as far away as she could. Of taking in great gulps of free air and leaving Mergerone and his awful hands, smelly breath, and wet mouth behind.

  “Pick up the pace,” Priest growled, inches from her back. Overhead, gray bulbous clouds blocked out the sun and a cold wind scattered bits of debris into the air. Small stones hit her face hard, like icicles against glass. She gasped as pain rifled over her cheekbones and dug deeper for more strength as she ran across the street, narrowly avoiding a large SUV.

  The driver yelled an obscenity at them as they hopped the guardrail and slid down a steep embankment that led to the park.

  No longer was the town of Waterford quaint. It was teeming with otherworld, with darkness and evil. Fear clutched at her insides, and Kira wove through the metal playground equipment, pausing long enough to catch her breath before Priest pointed to a house set back from the road, a few hundred feet up.