by Jenny McKane
“Does it matter?” Plaxo asked cryptically. “He could be used for either side, and either option could be devastating.”
Well, hell.
That just complicated things a bit.
Chapter 28
It was a typical Wednesday night.
Scratch that. It was about to be the strangest Wednesday night of Sunny’s entire life.
She had just been introduced to two former Hunters that had worked for the archangel Metatron. First of all, she had no idea that Metatron even had his own set of Hunters. She was actually pretty certain up until that point, that Michael was the only one who dabbled in human hired help. Yet another thing she had been entirely wrong about.
The two men were giants. Well over six-feet-tall with muscles and bad intentions, just like Gideon. Each carried enough firearms strapped to their body to survive Armageddon. They were also Texans. Gideon had thrown in that last detail so that the massive amount of weaponry would make more sense.
“Republicans, too,” Gideon said with a laugh.
Sunny only looked at him like he was insane.
The men were named Gavin and Stephen, and they had been polite and shook Sunny’s hand, making small talk about working with Michael and their time with Metatron down in the south. They had spent well over ten years with the archangel, had very few complaints, but were happily employed as freelancers now.
“Freelancers basically means mercenaries,” Gideon explained, as they were making their way down to the vehicles.
While most of the work that Gideon and Sunny had been doing up until that point had been about recon and intelligence, tonight they were doing something a little more aggressive that would hopefully put a dent in the power Seumat, or whoever was backing her, was building. In short, they were trying to make a direct hit on Seumat’s source of power.
So, were they headed to some battleground on the edge of town? Were they going to some underground warehouse location downtown?
No. No, they were not. They were headed to a sorority party on one of the largest campuses in town. Sunny had been less than thrilled about that.
As they drove to the campus, Sunny rode with Gideon, and the two mercenaries had their own vehicle.
“Just wasn’t what I had in mind when I thought we were going to make some massive attack on Seumat’s powerbase,” Sunny said. She was all dolled up again, with heels and lipstick and curls in her hair that would not last another ten minutes. Less, if Gideon kept rolling down his window like he was.
“She’s getting creative in her old age, I’ll give her that,” Gideon said. “The old Seumat was all disco clubs and brothels. This new version of her is taking advantage of the younger generation, and all their online dating and social media networking to announce campus ragers. It makes perfect sense if you think about it.”
Of course, it did, but it still didn’t make Sunny feel any better about where they were headed.
They parked about a half a mile away and waited outside of the car while the two mercenaries strapped themselves down with their weaponry. It was a strange balance, having to look young enough to attend a party like this, while keeping enough weapons concealed that they could take down a nest of succubi should they run across them.
Gideon checked his watch, and Sunny glanced down at his wrist. Just a little past midnight. Everybody should be perfectly sauced by now and losing inhibitions by the pound as the seconds ticked by.
“Shall we?” Gideon asked.
On the drive, he had peppered Sunny with instructions and demands about staying safe, making intelligent choices with her weapon, and blending in as long as possible. He reminded her that she should attack only when she felt threatened, or when the signal was given.
She was going to stay with Gideon, while the other two searched in other areas. What were they looking for? Proof of a succubus feeding. They were likely to find one or two, in the midst of the party. Any more than that would be a bonus, but there was such a mixture of hormones and alcohol, that this party was sure to be prime for the succubus belonging to Seumat.
Sunny was almost a little disappointed that there was no burly bouncer or velvet rope to stop them as they approached. She had gotten so used to watching Gideon bribe his way into events, that it was almost a letdown that they just waltzed into the party without so much as a second glance. Gideon’s guess had been right, also. Everybody was completely wasted at this point. People were all over each other, sloppy, sweaty, and full of hormones.
“What the hell have I been missing?” Sunny murmured as they walked through the crowd. She was only half-joking, but Gideon gave her hand a hard squeeze and warning. Too soon?
He also shot her a dirty look. Point taken.
There was a DJ and a makeshift dance floor in the center of the sorority house’s living room. Sunny estimated about twenty people grinding all over each other in various stages of undress. The crowd was young, as was to be expected, and the two hired goons that she and Gideon had brought along with them stood out a little bit, despite their best attempts to look like a pair of ordinary college guys.
Gideon approached a short, perky blonde girl handing out Jell-O shots. Her bright blue eyes about popped out of her head when she glanced up at him. Sunny struggled with not rolling her eyes at the blatant flirting unfolding in front of her.
“Excuse me,” Gideon called over the music.
“Yes?” Blondie batted her eyelashes.
Sunny clenched her fists.
“Can you tell us where we might find Jillian?”
The girl frowned a bit, thinking, before she answered.
“The new pledge?”
Gideon had a look on his face like he had no freakin’ idea if this girl Jillian was a new pledge or not. He went with it though and nodded.
“She’s on the third floor, probably in our girl cave with some of the guys she brought to the party,” the blonde said, offering way too much information now. “She’s kind of a slut. My name’s Mandy.”
She stuck her hand (and her cleavage) out, and Sunny did let her eyes roll then. Gideon just smiled at the girl and grabbed Sunny’s hand, pulling her to the stairs that the girl had just motioned to.
A sorority party at full bore was a sight to behold. The house was bedecked in twinkle lights and mason jar candle holders (with non-flame LED lights, of course) all over the place. It was like an entire Pinterest page barfed inside the four walls.
They rounded the top of the steps and found themselves standing in a finished attic space. It was like a man cave, only not man. It was pink. It was nauseating, and it was overstuffed with floor pillows and white shaggy carpeting everywhere.
It also currently happened to be a succubi feeding ground at present moment.
Nobody paid attention as the four of them entered the space, as at least six couples were busy making out in various stages of undress around the room. One thing was obvious though, all the young men in the equation were unwilling succubi victims, looking at the blank stare and drool rolling out of the sides of the mouth of the dark-haired man closest to Sunny.
It was the same thing she’d seen with Gideon at the strip club with Seumat. The distant stare. The vacant eyes. They were stunned, and the demons atop them were draining them dry of their very life force.
“Damn,” Sunny cursed, a tiny bit overwhelmed at just how invasive it all seemed. She could feel the spark of sex magic in the air and knew Seumat had to be getting a big hit off of this if her minions were giving her a cut of what they were taking.
And this was just one room of one party in a huge city. How many others of her succubi sorority were out at parties or clubs at this very moment draining a victim dry?
The thought was dizzying.
Gavin and Stephen both had obsidian weapons and were quick to begin work. Sunny had assumed they were waiting for Gideon to give them all a signal, but when the first succubus took a blade to the back of the neck and let forth a scream to shake the rafters, the party was
essentially over and the fight was just beginning.
The succubi were quick to respond, despite the fact that they’d been incredibly invested in their craft just moments before. Two launched at the mercenaries, and before Sunny could blink, they had a full-blown fight on their hands.
Gideon produced a weapon of his own, a nightstick with a few obsidian spikes emblazoned on the end and started swinging at the topless brunette demon that had zeroed in on him.
“You,” the succubus said, recognizing Gideon. Another bounty poster from Seumat? Most likely.
Gideon didn’t mince words with the demon and used his stick (and the dangerous jab at the end) to strike the demon in the neck. She was ashes moments later. One of the succubi advanced at Sunny with a feral gleam in her eye, but before Sunny could get a grip on her blade in its holster, Gideon had killed her.
In all, it took about nine minutes of actual combat (and that was putting it lightly) to rid the house of the succubi. There were nearly a dozen of them throughout the second and third floors, and they’d been so bloated on sex energy that they hadn’t been able to put up much of a fight.
Unfortunately, it looked like one of the guys wasn’t going to make it. Sunny wanted to stay and help, but Gideon had insisted they needed to leave. He called the police and reported an unresponsive partygoer, and then the four had left as quickly and quietly as they could manage.
A dozen demons dead within a half hour. It was gruesome and hard for Sunny to wrap her mind around, but she thought Gideon would seem less pissed off after a victory like that. But he was stone faced after saying goodbye (and paying) the two men who had accompanied them.
“What’s eating at you?” she asked finally, unable to take it any longer. “Did something go wrong that you’re not telling me about?”
He took his eyes off the road and glanced over at Sunny for a moment. He was hard to read and was being guarded. As usual.
“I’m glad we did it,” he said. “Those guys would have been meat. But it also confirmed to me just what we’re up against, Sunny.”
The odds. He was probably over there in the driver’s seat doing the numbers in his head. He’d mentioned the chatter he’d picked up that Seumat’s succubus numbers were in the hundreds at this point. Maybe two hundred working for her and active throughout Seattle? More being created every day?
And what about the tainted ones that can work harder and faster for Seumat before dying from the virus?
Gideon was having a hard time, it seemed, coming up with a way for them to defeat Seumat, despite their small victory.
“It’s going to take nothing short of a miracle to win this one,” Gideon muttered miserably from his side of the car.
Miracles. Demons didn’t dabble in miracles. No, their currency was bargains, and at this point, neither of them seemed to have any bargaining chips up their sleeves.
Chapter 29
Sunny made it through midterms week by the grace of coffee and all-night benders of books, typing, and licorice candy.
The math midterm had nearly done her in, and at around one in the morning before the nine a.m. exam, Sunny had been in tears and ready to quit the entire thing. But then, she remembered, some ridiculous error in computing had saved her the last two out of three payments and she was basically getting a great deal on this semester. It’d be a shame to waste it.
So, she went to the midterm, sweat a gallon of stress sweat, and managed to pass with a low B. That was fine. She’d take that.
The following Thursday, she tried to make sense out of her essay question exam that wanted to know exactly everything she knew about British writers from the 1200s she cared nothing about. She’d spent more time on Chaucer than on the equations for the math class, and she found those essay questions were even harder to answer than the math had been.
But by the end of the week, when her last midterm had been finished, she let out a long breath and closed her eyes as the bus took her home.
She’d made it. She had a week off for Thanksgiving in two weeks, and she had earned it. Kitty had even invited her over for some turkey and pie if she didn’t have anything planned. Sunny hoped like crazy that she didn’t have anything planned.
The craziest part about the midterms week was that Liam had been noticeably absent from all classes. She didn’t see him in a single one. There were no messages from him, and when she sent a text to see if he was sick, there was no response.
It was strange.
Another strange occurrence, and one that had Sunny on edge was the uptick in demon sightings around the campus. It was like the small community college had suddenly become a hotbed of activity, and the more Sunny tried to keep her head down and not attract any notice, the more she saw them.
Succubi. Incubi. Nightmares. Seekers.
At certain parts of her day, she’d casually glance to a student a few rows ahead of her and their face would momentarily flicker demon on her. There wouldn’t be the telltale scent of sulfur that usually accompanied a demon’s glamour, but she still had a hard time focusing, and she wasn’t sure if what she was seeing was true or if the stress of the last month was getting to her.
She was riding the Friday night bus home after closing up at The Little Lamb and her head was back against the headrest. Her eyes were closed. Her thoughts were racing around all the balls she had to keep in the air. To drop one meant her whole life would come crashing down.
“Penny for your thoughts?”
Her eyes shot open, and she turned to see Michael in the seat next to her. She yelped in surprise and nearly shot out of her skin.
“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” she repeated, willing her pulse to slow down. “I think you just aged me by at least a decade.”
“I see that,” he acknowledged. Michael was never one to apologize.
“Here for an update?” she guessed. She hoped it was nothing more serious.
He nodded.
“Among other things.”
She opened her mouth to speak but was cut off by a wave of her hand.
“Actually, don’t bother,” he said, shaking his head. He was agitated again. “I get updates on you all the time. I don’t need a rehash. I heard about the sorority house. And the strip club. For once, Miss Bonnard, you’re doing a decent job. I am actually here with a warning.”
She held her breath and waited.
“I have a few sources that tell me that you’re a wanted woman in the succubi world,” he said.
Sunny nodded at that--it wasn’t news to her.
“I had one try to take my head off in a public restroom,” she admitted. “Your little blade came in handy there.”
He tipped his head in acknowledgement.
“Glad to be of service,” he said before changing subjects again. “I wanted to warn you, Sunshine. The game is coming to a head quickly now. Seumat is gaining momentum, and with the pressure you and the demon are putting on her, she’s getting desperate. She’s going to come at you much more aggressively now. I know that for a fact.”
Sunny took a long, deep breath, willing herself not to freak out. Yet. The fact that the demon world was also more focused on Gideon rather than her was also on the tip of her tongue, but something inside her told Sunny to hang on to that little tidbit for a while longer. Something told her that Michael wasn’t exactly on the need-to-know list quite yet.
“I’ve been warned through my network of little rats that you’re the target of nearly every succubus in the Seattle area, or will be by the end of the weekend,” he said. “On my end, I can do as much as I can from the periphery to keep you safe, but my options are limited. My cohorts are angels, and some are distinctly forbidden from interfering in the human realm. You’ll need to make sure you’re staying safe as best you can, as rescue options are limited at this point.”
Not knowing what to say, Sunny just nodded.
“Thank you for the warning,” she said.
“Good luck,” he said. “And the sooner the better. Time�
��s running out, and we need her out of the equation.”
Michael didn’t elaborate on that before disappearing, but then again, Sunny didn’t expect much from him like that anymore. She settled herself back in her seat and silently congratulated herself on how well she took these angelic jump scares from him. Sunny from a year ago might have wet her pants to find herself suddenly sitting next to an archangel on the bus.
The phone rang in her bag, and she fished it out. It was Gideon’s number.
“Hello?”
“You’re on your own tonight,” he said. “I’ve got some things I need to do and a meeting I can’t miss. I have a feeling that things are about to get haywire, and I need to make a few preparations.”
She frowned.
“Oh,” she said, the disappointment probably evident. “Sure you don’t need company?”
Gideon laughed on the other end.
“I wish I could bring you with me, pretty girl,” he said. “But you don’t belong where I’m going.”
The pretty girl part made her heart gallop in her chest, and she had to remind herself of the last real conversation she and Gideon had. He still believed a hundred percent that there was no happy ending for them.
“I should be back tomorrow, maybe a little later. Is Plaxo still M.I.A.?”
“I haven’t heard from him since he and his buddy stopped in. Why?”
They weren’t exactly drinking buddies, those two. It was odd that Gideon would wonder about the dream demon.
“It just wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if you weren’t alone tonight,” he said. “But you should be fine at my place. It’s pretty heavily secured with wards and steel doors. Still, though, don’t hesitate to run like hell if you feel something’s wrong. Take one of my cars and stay with a friend from school. Just not that man-friend. Anyone but him.”
She laughed at his reference to (and subtle jealousy of) Liam.
“Will do,” she said.
