by Renee George
If nothing had gone wrong, say someone calling neighborhood watch on a suspicious parked vehicle, then David would be hiding in the house waiting for my cue.
I gathered my nerves and strolled up to the decorative wrought iron security door at the exact center of the home. I slipped my hand into my purse to grip the silver rod. If this demon was ready for me, I would be ready for it.
I rang the doorbell. A short moment later, a woman in a golden halter maxi-dress and gold Greek-style sandals answered. She studied me with the kind of disdain I’d seen from hundreds of demons. They loved feeling superior to humans. She looked down her nose at me. “What do you want?”
To put my boot in your face, I thought. Instead, I let go of the spike and took out my phone. I showed her the black screen. “I’m afraid the battery on my car and on my phone are both dead. Just the worst luck ever.”
“My guess is that it’s not going to get any better.” She smirked, enjoying my fake distress.
I stuck my foot in the gap just in case she tried to close the door. “Well, bless your heart.” I made a point of dragging my gaze across her and hit her with a Southern girl’s best arsenal, the backhanded compliment. “Why you must be all kinds of busy trying to figure out your sense of fashion.” I gave her my most catty smile. “You just keep on tryin’, darlin’. You’ll get there.”
Her annoyed expression melted into one of outrage. Oh vanity, thy name is demon. Nothing tweaked the demonic more than being bested by a human, no matter how small the victory.
She gave me the same kind of lazy, insulting once-over I’d given her. “Wearing black and gray in the dead of summer is so brave,” she said as she eyeballed my outfit. “It must be so nice not to care what people think.”
Glass shattered inside the house, and Sandra looked over her shoulder toward the noise. Crap. Plan B. I dropped my phone into my purse and wrapped the shoulder-strap chain around Sandra’s wrists.
She looked down at her bound wrists and then at me. “What do you think you’re doing?” She should have been hollering in pain, the silver burning her skin, but neither of those things happened. Instead, she surprised me by shaking her hands free of the silver.
“Demons can’t do that,” I said.
Sandra laughed. “You think I’m a demon?” She shook her head. “I’m a minion. Like you.” She stepped back from the door, so I could see past her. Two huge men held David by the arms as they walked him into the living room. Sandra smiled. “Now those two are demons.” She smiled at David. “It took you long enough, honey. I wasn’t sure how much longer I could play verbal footsie with your girlfriend.”
Well, double crap. We’d played it all wrong. I glared at the two demons occupying the linebacker meatsuits. They were dressed like they were about to play eighteen holes of the world’s most boring sport—right down to the plaid shorts and white Nike golf shoes. “Either one of you touches a hair on his head, and I’ll send you back to Hell faster than you say Beelzebub’s tits.” I bared my teeth in a feral grin. “They don’t call me the Madder for nothing.”
They looked at each other and then at me. It was obvious my threat concerned them.
“Don’t listen to her, you morons.” Sandra turned her irritated gaze to me. “Moloch says not to kill your man, but he said it was okay to rough him up.”
“If you like having a face, you’ll keep your hands off him.”
She laughed as she ushered me into a large family room on the backside of the house and gestured to a nearby wooden chair that sat in the middle of a painter’s tarp. “Have a seat.”
When I didn’t comply, she nodded to one of the demons. He removed garden snips from the pocket of his garish shorts and held the sharp blades to David’s right index finger.
“I’ll take one digit for every minute you waste of my time,” said Sandra. “Now, do you want David to lose the ability to give high-fives, or do you want to sit down?”
I sat down. David and I made eye contact as Sandra tied my wrists behind the seat’s high back. Fury swirled in his eyes, but I saw the fear, too. It matched my own. I gave a slight shake of my head.
“I’ve heard a lot about the Madder,” she said. “I thought you’d be taller and much, much tougher.”
I shrugged. “Never meet your heroes.” The couch and other furniture had been pushed to the walls. Thick curtains hung over the bay window blocking the view of the backyard. “Your ex-husband thinks you turned into a bitch after your accident, but I’m guessing you always were one.”
Sandra looked at me, her expression one of pity. “You believed that story I planted at DemonsAreAmongUs.com?” She shook her head. “No car accident. No husband. No demon meat suit. I bargain souls just like you, sweetie.”
I’m betting she didn’t. I went after the morally corrupt who were already writing their own tickets to Hell. “Are you really a nurse?”
“Yes, not that it matters. Unlike you, I perform a public service. Most terminally ill patients will bargain to provide for their families after they die.”
I lifted a brow. “They don’t bargain to live longer or be cured?”
She grinned—and I realized this woman was evil long before she sold herself into Moloch’s service. “I don’t give them that option. Believe me, they aren’t getting a better offer.”
“Don’t tell me—you traded your soul for money.” I rolled my eyes. “How pedestrian.
“At least I didn’t make a deal that dragged family members into the mess.”
Ouch. She knew about my sisters. But I wasn’t going to justify my own bargain to a soul-sucking twit like her. Leave Sandra Barstow alone? Hah. Moloch had played me like a fiddle. He knew I’d want to dispatch Sandra if only to piss him off. He’d planned everything to lead to this moment—the moment he’d force David to give up his soul. Kidnapping Ray. Planting the story on the forum. Threatening me in the elevator.
Damn it, I’d fallen for the oldest play in the book. What’s the quickest way to get a rebellious child to do what you want? You tell them not to do it. You are a sucker, Olivia Madder.
On the other hand, Moloch was getting seriously desperate if he was willing to put two minions in the same room together. It wasn’t like minions were going to unionize or anything, but if even a few of us banded together in an effort to make his sorry ass even sorrier … well, you could see why he forbade any contact between us.
“So, what’s the plan?” I asked, trying to sound disinterested. Instead, my heart was trying to beat out of my chest, and perspiration beaded my temples.
She waved at the lesser demons. “The boss seems pretty confident that if these two hulking demons hurt you, this one,” she jerked her thumb at David, “will do anything to stop it. Such as making a bargain with me.”
I glanced at David. “Don’t you dare.”
He shook his head, but I didn’t know if that meant no, he wouldn’t, or no, he wasn’t going to listen to me. Shit. If David made a bargain with Sandra, then Moloch didn’t have to abide by the one he’d made with me. My sisters wouldn’t get their freedom. In fact, they would spend the next fifty years in those tiny cells waiting for me to finish out my contract. Or worse, we’d all go to Hell because I still hadn’t met my soul quota for this decade.
“You know, if you were smart, you would’ve talked pretty boy over there out of his soul already,” said Sandra. “If I get Moloch David Jensen’s soul then I’m done being a minion. I’ll still go to Hell when I die, but at least I can ditch the job at the hospital. I’m so over taking care of the dying.” She looked almost giddy. “Paris, here I come!”
Not if I can help it, bitch. “Do your worst. David won’t agree to a bargain no matter what you do to me.”
“Oh, I don’t do torture.” She pointed at the demons. “That’s why Moloch sent Doom and Gloom over there.”
“What about Ray?” asked David. “Where is he?”
“That old man is the least of your worries,” she said. She turned to her lackeys. “O
kay, boys. I’ll be working on my tan. When he’s ready to sign on the blooded line, come get me from the pool.” Sandra turned to me. “Those are some stunning shoes,” she said. “Too bad they aren’t in my size.” She smirked. “Little tip, honey. Soap and a sponge will get blood out of leather.” She looked at the demons. “Try not to make too much of a mess.”
The hulking evil dudes laughed as she sashayed toward the exit and never looked back.
Chapter 12
Moloch’s goons grinned, a little too pleased with their assignment.
“So, which one of you is Tweedle-Dee?” I asked.
The grin vanished from the hulking beast standing to the right of David. He grunted, “Huh?”
I flashed a feral smile. “You must be Tweedle-Dumbass.”
David laughed. “There are so many reasons why I love you.”
If my hands had been free, I would have given him the heart sign with my fingers. “Thanks, babe.”
Tweedle-Dumbass AKA the human everyone believed was Omar Thomas smacked David on the back of his head, sending him sprawling to the tarp-covered floor.
“David!”
He made brief eye contact with me before he reached back to his left boot and yanked out a six-inch silver rod with a chain dangling at the end. David swung the chain. It swept past Omar’s ankle, but David brought it around again, and this time, the silver tether wrapped around the fiend’s calf. The demon’s skin smoked where the silver made contact. He screamed as he tried to claw the burning metal from his leg.
Tweedle-Dee, or rather Perry “Meatsuit” Rogers, who’d reared backward to avoid the flailing chain, decided to get back in the game. He roared and rushed David from behind.
“Coming your way, sweetheart,” David yelled as he dipped his shoulder and used Perry’s momentum to flip him in my direction. I kicked my foot up high, jabbing the jerk in the gut with my shoe. It came off my foot as he staggered backward, yanking and twisting, trying to remove the embedded heel from his stomach.
David grappled with Omar, who had managed to get the chain off his leg and was swinging wildly at my man. David surprised the goon with an uppercut that would have made Muhammad Ali proud.
I fought to keep my breathing and pulse even and slow. Adrenaline was an energy sucker, and while it might help you run away, it had just the opposite effect in a fight that took more than one or two punches. I couldn’t save myself, let alone David, if I let my fear for him—for us—erase all my training. I kicked off my other shoe, stood and slid my arms, still tied behind me, up the high back chair. It was too tall for me to slide off, so I stood on the seat and pushed myself up until my arms were free, then I curled up to maneuver my arms under my legs, past my feet, and out in front of me.
Perry quit fussing with the shoe hanging from his abs and flew at me. His shoulder hit me at the hips and threw me backward. The air burst from my lungs as my back slammed into the arm of the duvet. I rolled to the side to avoid the demon stomping my leg. I couldn’t reach my other shoe with its lethal heel. Note to self: If I managed to save my sisters I needed to ask Char to design weaponized flats.
Perry leaned over me, his eyes glowing red and foam bubbling on his lips, and I used the opportunity to grab the shoe embedded in his abdomen with my tied hands. I gave it a hard yank. He screamed as I freed the heel, and blood went flying across the white carpet. He looked at the large hole in his gut, and then at the flared tip of my heel. He knocked the shoe out of my hand, and it skittered under the duvet.
I scrabbled across the floor to my other shoe and flung it at him. He ducked. It embedded into the wall behind him. “Crap!” I glanced at David. He had one hand on the silver rod from his boot, and his arm wrapped around the demon’s neck. In other words, my man was a total bad ass, and I needed to step it up.
I got into a crouch, and when Perry charged me again, I shifted sideways, sweeping his legs as he went past me. He landed on his stomach with a hard thud. I grabbed the shoe from the wall and screamed a battle cry born of anger and frustration as I leaped onto his back and slammed his face into the floor three times. He bellowed and bucked, but I wrapped my legs around his waist and rolled with him. When he was face up and on top of me, I swung the shoe and nailed him right between the eyes. The demon went instantly still.
The guy weighed at least three hundred pounds, and it took a second to get out from under him. With Perry taken care of, I took a breath and adjusted my focus to David, ready to help.
Unnecessarily. He’d gotten the rod separated from the chain and had rammed it right into Omar’s head. He rolled off the demon and turned his attention to me. “You okay, sweetheart?” He rushed to me and untied my hands. He was sweaty, panting, and bloody, and, damn, sexy as all get out.
“You are so hot right now,” I told him.
He gave me a pleased smile.
We heard the garage door opening, and we ran to the front room to stare out the large picture window. Sandra, in a white SUV, peeled out of the driveway and drove off down the street.
“No!” I ran to the door and jerked it open, but it was too late, Sandra was gone. “Fanfreakingtastic.”
I heard a screech that sounded like a yowling cat with a pack-a-day smoking habit. The next thing I knew, an old man hustled into the living room. He held two cans of vegetables. He threw one blindly toward me as he yelled, “Take that, Nurse Bitch!” The can hit the floor with a clunk and rolled until it stopped near my feet.
“Ray?” asked David.
“Don’t you ‘Ray me,’ demon asshole!” The old man turned toward David ready to the lob the other can.
“Ray! Stop! It’s me. It’s David.”
Ray, face red and shining with sweat, looked from David to me then back to David. He dropped the can. “Where are those two demonic asshats?”
“Spiked in the back room,” said David.
“But Nurse Bitch got away,” I added.
“I knew you’d be younger, but Christ Almighty, David, you look like you found the fountain of youth and drank the whole damn thing.” He shook his head. “It’s about damn time you got here. Is Frank safe? Is Ennis?”
“Frank is safe, buddy. So is Ennis,” David reassured his friend. “They’re holed up at the farm.”
Relief relaxed the pinched expression on Ray’s face. He nodded in my direction and raised a bushy brow. “You haven’t changed much, Liv.” He glanced around the living room, where David and I had both tracked blood. “Still making messes.”
I put my hand on my hip. “And you haven’t changed much either, Ray. Still a stubborn ass.”
Ray smiled. “Damn, it’s good to see you, Liv.” He gestured to David. “This one hasn’t stopped talking about you since you left.”
“And you just never stop talking, period,” said David. “I think it’s time to send some trespassers back to where they came from.”
We all returned to the back room, and I looked at the blood everywhere and the hole in the wall where my shoe had been. “So much for using a tarp.”
I dug my heel out from under the couch and then searched around for my purse, but it was nowhere to be found. Outrage curled through me. “I think that low-life Sandra stole my purse.”
“Well, there’s a Walmart nearby,” said Ray. “You can get a new one.”
“You don’t understand. That was a vintage Chanel handbag.” I moaned in distress. “She’s got the damned silver chain, too. And my phone’s in there! And so is the damned banishment kit.”
David pulled a leather pouch from his boot. “I got it covered.”
“Wait a minute. I watched you dress. Where did all this stuff come from?”
Ray gave us both a look. “You all got reacquainted fast.”
David ignored him. “I keep supplies in the truck.” When he unrolled the leather, he pulled out a small white candle, a cigarette, a wooden match holder with striker, a short stick of incense, salt packets, and a silver bell.
I smiled. “Nice.”
It t
ook about five minutes to banish both assholes to Hell.
“Let’s get back to the farm,” said David. “We can regroup and come up with a plan without worrying about if you-know-who will show up.”
I winked at David. “I guess we’re getting the band back together.”
“I need to sit down,” Ray said. His hands trembled, and his face had gone from brick red to bone white.
David frowned. “Ray?” I could tell he was worried for his friend’s health.
“I think he’s dehydrated,” Elise said.
I staggered back as my sister’s visage blinked into the room. “Lise? How...”
She disappeared from sight.
I ran to where she’d stood. “Elise? Elise!”
“Who the heck is Elise?” asked Ray, his voice raspy.
“Her sister, remember?”
“The ghosts. Oh. Right.”
David helped Ray to a chair then joined me. I shuddered, on the verge of tears, as he wrapped his arms around me.
“This is my fault.” I buried my face in David’s chest. “I did this to myself. To my sisters. You should run, David. Run far away from me.”
“Not going to happen.” He stroked my hair. “Don’t you worry. We’ll make Jerkface pay, sweetheart.”
“It’s impossible,” I said. “He holds all the cards.” Frustration boiled over, melted with my terror, and before I knew it, I was blubbering on David’s shirt.
“Now, Liv, don’t you give up,” Ray said. “I may have found a way to break your deal with the demon.”
I sniffed and let go of David. I looked at Ray. “What did you say?”
“I’ve been doing a lot of research, and I stumbled upon a passage in an ancient text that reminded me of something that I read in that Shedim book, so, I talked to a priest who frequents the hospital, and I’m pretty sure it will work.”
David’s expression matched how I felt, shocked and disbelieving.
Ray shrugged. “Why do you think those assholes kidnapped me?”
“We thought he was trying to trade you for David’s soul,” I said.
