by C. R. Jane
"Rude." But Ryker leaned down to kiss her forehead anyway. "You know we like to pretend we don't have feelings." He kissed her again, this time lingering over her lips. "That we like to pretend we don't even like each other."
"Sometimes, we aren't pretending," I said drily.
Chapter Four
Ellis
Levi lay back on the bed with his muscular arms tucked beneath his head. "Go save that brother of mine from himself," Levi said, and I leaned back over him again to press yet another kiss to the dimple at the corner of his lips.
"He's come a long way," I said, because Jacob used to be absolutely impossible, incapable of talking about his feelings, and now he's just normal-man-impossible.
"Mm." His fingers caught in my hair, and he turned his head to kiss me back. My lips parted against his and I almost threw my leg over his chiseled, exposed abs for round number two, but instead I kissed him one last time and rolled away.
The wooden floorboards were cool under my bare feet as I headed down the hall and down the stairs, through the darkly shadowed living room where moonlight spilled through the two-story windows.
The lights blazed in the bookshelf-lined dining room, and the scent of black coffee and old pages hung in the air. Jake sat at the head of the table, his chin propped up on his hand, flipping through the pages of his book.
He didn't look up when he said, "Hey there, princess."
"Hey, jerk-face," I said, and then wrapped my arms around him, leaning over his shoulder to look at the squirrely black text. Ancient Latin. I was useless when it came to Latin.
"My nickname for you only started off as condescending," he said, capturing my hand against his chest. "I think I need a new nickname."
"Yeah? What do you want me to call you?" I nuzzled his ear with my lips, and his dark curls tickled my cheek. "Darling? Sweetie? Light of my life?"
He groaned. "Maybe I'll take jerk-face."
I grinned and nipped his ear, taking his lobe gently between my teeth and biting just hard enough for him to feel it.
He rolled his eyes as he drew me into his arms, into his lap. "I've got to keep you where I can keep an eye on you."
"What did you find out?" I asked.
"I don't think we're dealing with a ghost at all." His big hand rubbed up and down my hip absently. "I think we're dealing with a god."
"A god?"
"He's an old one, not very powerful," he said, as if that made it no problem we were going to take on a god.
"Oh, as long as he's not a big-deal god," I said wryly. "Sounds like a fun Monday night. How do we exorcise him?"
"We don't," he said. "There's no exorcising him from the box. We just need to get it out of human hands. Thomas is right. I think people accidentally free the god, and he demands a sacrifice before he loses energy and returns to his box. Either in the old way or… in blood." He shook his head. "The little gods get so feisty about being disrespected."
"What's his old way?"
"Sex," he said frankly. "Preferably of the virgin variety, but I doubt he's too picky."
"Of course. It would be a pervert god."
"All we're going to do is pick up the box and walk it out of the museum and drop it in the ocean," he said.
"No big deal." I deadpanned.
"More fun than a Halloween party."
He probably really believed that. "You don't get out enough, angel-face."
His face brightened with a thought, one that excited him enough that he let that angel-face go. "Although while we're in the museum, I think they have some ancient Hunter weapons in their archives. I thought we could borrow them… some of them might have unusual powers."
"Great," I said. "Let's go pick up a pervert god and some weird weapons all in one go on Halloween night."
He shook his head, and I kissed him even though he was full of bad ideas. This might be the perfect distraction from the darkness in his past. Everything always worked out for us; we'd been through Hell and back together. I wasn't scared. Our kisses drew deeper, and his thumb rubbed across my cheekbone.
"Ready for bed?" I asked archly.
"I'm going to stay up a little later." He smiled ruefully. "I don't know how much sleep I'm going to get tonight."
"Then come be sleepless with me." I kissed the corner of his twisted lips.
"Maybe later." He squeezed my waist. "It's a tempting offer. But I do want to track down some more information on Liber."
"Tell me all about it in the morning? When you bring me coffee?"
"Brat."
"Iced, milk and two sugars-"
"I know how you drink your coffee by now." He caught the hem of my t-shirt and reeled me back in, planting one last kiss on my cheek as he wrapped his arms around me in a tight hug. He whispered into my ear, "Thanks, Princess."
I kissed his cheek, but when I straightened, his perfect angel's face was stoic as ever, as if he could only admit in whispers that anything ever hurt him or made him feel better.
"Anytime, angel-face," I said, ruffling his curls.
He mock-glared at me, and I grinned as I sashayed out of the room.
Love is finding someone to annoy forever.
Chapter Five
Ellis
The moon seemed to hover low over the rooftop of the art museum, scattering moonlight that threw long shadows across the concrete floor beneath our feet. Since we were trying to hide, tonight's full moon was a distinct inconvenience.
"We're in." Jake's words seemed a second too soon, since his fingertips were still flying over the laptop we'd used to hack into the security system, but then the door to the stairs clicked open.
Ryker turned the door knob, but paused without opening the door. The moonlight silhouetted his frame, from his ruffled, short dark hair to broad shoulders and a lean, tapered waist. "Motion sensors off?"
"No, I thought tonight was a good night to get arrested." Jake cradled his laptop on one tattooed forearm as he got up from the ground. He winked at me, his grin rakish under his wayward dark brown curls. "We all know Ellis is the only one that I like to see in cuffs around here."
"Head in the game, Kerr," I said.
"Don't get nervous like this is your first heist." He rifled my hair with his big hand as he passed by toward the door.
"Stealing Nim back from Hell isn't the same. Now we could go to prison."
"So eternal hellfire didn't worry you?" Levi drew his sword as he took his place alongside Ryker, the metal whispering against the sheath. "This is a cake walk."
"And this time, what we steal will be worth something." Ryker's words would have been cutting, but he and Nim had fallen into a close-if bickering and occasionally bloody-brotherhood over the past year. Ryker was no longer the youngest brother, and he seemed protective of Nim. Even if he couldn't help making fun of him.
"Ready, sweetheart?" Nim's hand cupped my hip, drawing me toward him as the two of us joined the others at the rooftop door.
"Ready to become a criminal like the rest of you." I smiled sweetly.
"Innocence is overrated." Nim told me, squeezing my hip.
Jake and Levi made short work of every security measure between us and the grand exhibit hall. The museum felt eerie, with our feet-as quiet as we were-echoing on the marble, and the high domed ceilings above us lost in shadows.
If we were caught, I didn't think the police would buy our argument that the god Liber was just biding his time in an ancient Roman seal box, and that if he was unleashed, the consequences would be brisk and bloody. There was good reason the angels had locked up the old gods.
Sometimes, protecting the world from itself involves a bit
of lock-picking.
When the doors were unlocked to the Romans exhibit, the boys and I filed in. The rooms were illuminated only faintly, and Jake held a flashlight for Levi while he carefully removed the box from the display.
"That's it?" I whispered. The flashlight illuminated the etched golden sides of the box, which was no more than two inches wide.
"Lots of trouble in a little package," Levi said, without looking away from his work. "You'd know all about that, Ellis. Pliers, please."
Nim handed him the pliers.
"All right." Ryker slung his backpack to the floor and drew out the iron lockbox we'd brought to contain the artifacts of an unruly god.
A short, blare of an alarm went off as Levi started to settle the box into the velvet interior of the lockbox. Both Ryker and Levi jumped. It was hard to see which one of them slipped.
But the god-confining seal box fell to the marble floor with a metallicthud.
Jake immediately sunk to the floor, his fingers flying over the keyboard as he turned off the alarm. The rest of us stared at the box, horrified, but it looked unharmed.
It was Ryker who threw aside the lockbox and knelt to pick it up. "Not so bad-" he started to say, and then broke off as he turned it over.
A jagged crack ran across one side of the golden box.
Ryker threw it into the iron box and slammed the lid shut. His hands were quick and sure as he locked it without hesitating. He settled the box into the suitcase and slammed that shut too, for what good it would do.
The shadows shifted around us.
I took a step forward, turning on my heel, putting my back near Ryker's as I watched the shadows. The five of us closed up automatically. When I reached back and drew my own sword, the weight of the hilt was comforting against my palm.
"Hang on," Jacob said, "I'm looking up a book."
"I've got faith in you, nerd," Ryker said.
"Says the guy who dropped the evil god's prison."
"I don't think we should be assigning blame," Ryker said lightly.
Faint music filled the air. I glanced down the hall, looking through the arched doorways of the exhibit. Far in the distance were faint figures in white, wispy and ethereal; I could see through the haze of their bodies to the display cases behind. They were dancing, their arms in the air.
"I think we're fine," Jacob said, even though whenever there are dancing ghosts, things are not fine. "It would take him time to unspool from the box-"
"Hypoethetically," Levi said. "Since none of us are experts on the ancient Greek gods."
"Speak for yourself." Jacob said. "Worst case scenario, some portion of him may have escaped the box."
"Like those?" I pointed the tip of my sword toward the dancing ghosts, which were drifting towards us and then away as they danced, but moved closer every time.
"Ah, fuck," Nim said.
"We can't slay them," Jacob said, in that patient big-brother voice he used at times, holding out a hand to stay our swords. "We just need to keep them under control-and get those weapons from the archive. I think we might have a god-slaying sword in this very building."
But old habits die hard, and even though blessed steel might not help now, he closed the laptop and slid into his cross-body bag, pushing it behind his hip so he too could draw his sword.
One second, the three dancing apparitions were still far down the hall. I blinked and one of them was right in front of me. She danced wildly, ecstatically, raising her hands in the air and swinging her long curls back from her face. Her two companions spun around us, in big circles, their bare feet never touching the floor.
The ghost in front of me danced so long that I began to feel socially awkward and had to glance away. Even when it's the supernatural, there's something weird about someone dancing two feet in front of you.
Suddenly, she stopped and locked eyes with me. Her pupils were wide, dilated fully as if she were high. When she grinned she appeared to be toothless.
"Our god means you no harm, but he demands a sacrifice," she whispered.
"No harm and demanded sacrifice usually don't go together in a sentence for me," I snapped back.
Nim looked toward me, worry written across his handsome features. "You all right?"
"You didn't hear that?" I asked, but the three ghosts were back to spinning around us in wild jubilation, their arms stretched up toward the sky.
When the boys shook their heads, I filled them in on what had just been said.
Jacob cursed.
"What is it?" Ryker demanded.
"Well, a sacrifice in Liber's context usually means virginity," he said. "But that's in short order around here."
Nim chewed his lower lip. "I mean, we do some have some virginity left on the table."
"Excuse me?" Ryker asked, his voice sharp.
"Don't be a prude," Nim said. "Sometimes saving the world comes at a cost."
Levi pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger as if his brothers gave him a headache. "Color me skeptical about gods that must be sated with kinky sex acts."
"That's exactly what I'd do if I were a god," Nim said.
"We know," Ryker said. "That's why we're glad you're just a demon."
"Half-demon, half Alexander. Not sure which is worse."
Sex for the first time with each of them had been special, and I believed that virginity was a made-up construct, not anything that mattered.
But apparently it mattered to Liber.
"I think we can just distract him," Jake said. "Them. Whatever. And we need those weapons."
"I don't like the idea of splitting up." Ryker said.
"Stakes are real here," Jacob said urgently. "We don't have a way to win this fight. But we can hold out as Liber loses strength."
Levi quirked an eyebrow. "You say that like we're…"
"Going to have wild sex in a museum on Halloween?" Nim slipped his hand into mine, and my fingers knit tightly around his automatically. "Look, it's a rough job, but Hunters do what they've got to do."
I slugged his shoulder with my free hand. "You're a little too eager to make sacrifices to the gods tonight."
Nim's lips parted in mock-indignation, and he fixed me with his most innocent look. His unearthly green eyes seemed to glow in the dim light. "Ellis. I am one-hundred-percent in this for thegreater good. And I'd like to point out we actually have one kind of virginity on the table, and as a demon-"
"He's just making things up." Jake ran his hand through his little brother's hair, in a way that was something between friendly ruffling and a cuff in the back of the head. "Demons do not have some of special thing for-"
"Nephilim, on the other hand," Nim interrupted, and that time Jake definitely cuffed him. Nim turned on him, grinning, and shoved his shoulder.
"Later," Jake mouthed at him. The two of them had developed their bond by beating the shit out of each other in training. Men are weird.
And since men are weird, it's my job to keep us all on track.
I clapped my hands together. "All right. Strange night ahead-let's get to work."
Hey, we all make sacrifices for our jobs.
Chapter Six
Ellis
Ryker and Levi both took a quick second to kiss me goodbye-Ryker locked eyes with me, checking in that I was okay, and Levi wrapped me in one of his quick, powerful hugs-and then they sprinted through the dark exhibit hall until they disappeared from sight.
Nimshi slipped a finger through my belt loop and tugged me toward him, a playful smile crossing his lips.
"You're enjoying this, aren't you?" I accused, wrapping my hands around his narrow h
ips, my thumbs pressing into the warm muscle of his chiseled lower abs.
"So much," he admitted, before his lips brushed across my jaw. "I thought being one of the good guys wasn't going to be any fun."
"And then it turns out good behavior is its own reward?" I asked, widening my eyes innocently.
"Something like that." His teeth grazed my ear, then sucked down on the lobe, and my back arched.
"Are the weird ghosts going to watch?" Jacob asked.
Nim straightened, but didn't lose his grip on my waist. "You're killing the vibe here."
"They're killing my vibe." Jake pointed the tip of his sword across the room, where the dancing ghosts were sitting on the floor, surrounding the suitcase that held Liber's box. The three of them gazed at us innocently, a strange haze of dark hair and wide eyes and long, white gowns draped around their bodies.
"They're just fragments of the god itself," Nim said. "Once they're gone, we can get out of here. It's helpful, in a way."
"I know," Jake said impatiently. "But I don't like the idea of a god staring at me while…"
"Virtually everyone believes that a god is watching them while they have sex," Nim said impatiently. "Our situation is just a little more immediate right now, because it's Halloween and no one takes my advice."
Jake stared him down, his lush-lipped, kissable mouth a hard line. "Did you really just turn this into an I-told-you-so moment?"
"Oh yes," Nim said. "I'm going to be telling this story for years."
"So let's make it a good one," I said, hooking a finger through the gap between two buttons of Nim's crisp black shirt and pulling him toward me.
He came without hesitating, wrapping his arms around me tightly, his lips meeting mine. The tip of his tongue darted across the top of my lip, and my lips parted, welcoming him in. His tongue thrust confidently into my mouth. His kiss was full of heat and desire, and I returned it, wrapping my hands around his broad shoulders.
"Don't worry," Jake muttered. "I'll just be over here watching the ghosts watch us."
