by Harley James
She blinked, the corners of her lips pulling up of their own accord. “Did you just quote Rhett Butler from Gone with the Wind?”
“I generally disparage borrowing words. However, there are times that American film classics offer the perfect turn of phrase.” Spencer raised what could only be called an imperious brow, bringing her back to the here and now where the women she hung out with wore coveralls instead of corsets and ballgowns.
Before she could come up with a suitable response, he opened his fist and created a mini fire in the palm of his hand. His eyes glittered behind the flames as he stared at her from across the room. “Now, I have certainly fulfilled my portion of the bargain. I believe it’s time you told me why you’ve sent your family to safety while you’ve chosen to stay and tangle with devils…and the likes of me.”
Chapter 27
She was pushing through his walls.
The only other person who’d been able to do that had been John Jameson, the Scottish lawyer who moved to Ireland when he acquired the Bow Street Distillery in Dublin. The distillery that produced the original Jameson Irish Whiskey.
The wily, fearless son of a bitch had been the best friend he’d ever had, dying at the ripe old age of eighty-three in 1823.
Watching his friend decline had made him angry. A Guardian’s endless lifespan was a curse, but the alternative was Hell.
Literally.
But how bad could it be? Even lower order demons got their chance to return to Earth. And they sure seemed to have a grand time until one of the Guardians dispatched them back to the Pits.
And he knew all about fire.
Spencer closed his fist with a scoff, extinguishing the small blue flame he’d ignited in his palm to impress Sydney. Don’t fool yourself.
Hellfire and a Guardian’s elemental fire were two vastly different things.
Still. Even if Sydney was his soul mate, how could he bear to watch her decline? John’s death had nearly broken him. That unspeakably desolate feeling that the one person in the world who knew the real you was gone. The only one who cared.
In that bleak aftermath, Spencer had made his first venture to North America. He’d taken the Jameson last name and battled demons as though he had a death wish until Alexios had ripped him from the grip of a rephaim who was about to decapitate him during the early days of the California Gold Rush in the mid-1850s. And the rest, as they say, was Guardian history.
Bloody, ugly, and unceasingly repetitive.
Until Sydney.
Spencer ran his fingers along the stitching of the leather loveseat, wishing he was tracing the seam of Sydney’s delightful ass instead. “You haven’t answered my question, which further fans the flames of my curiosity,” he murmured, enjoying the way she squirmed under his perusal.
If he were the praying sort, he’d have offered up a quick request for as much honesty from her as he’d given. But most people didn’t operate that way. And she had a lot to lose by opening up to him, because he was so drawn to her. It was uncommon and uncomfortable and more consuming the longer he was in her presence.
He told her he didn’t deserve a soul mate. But these threads of connection were so much more compelling than what he’d ever felt for Margaret.
Unless all these centuries had dulled those memories, those emotions? How would he ever know?
Sleep with her.
Then he’d know.
Sydney stopped fidgeting and leaned back against the headboard of his bed. “I decided to stay because if I strengthen you, that benefits my family. And the sooner you can defeat Baal, the sooner my life gets back on track.”
Well, there was the honesty, but...it wasn’t as enjoyable as he’d imagined.
He smiled inwardly at his vanity, slapping his knees. “Quite right. Shall we get on with it then?”
Her eyes widened. “Get on with what?”
He stood from the loveseat and advanced on her, reveling in the rising flush on her body. “Vanquishing our foes, what else?” he enquired, not the least innocently.
The sudden suspicion on her face—intermingled with interest, and bloody hell, yes, desire—was damned gratifying. Sydney cleared her throat, but didn’t move to a more defensive position. Oh yes, you please me. He stopped before her, close; one more step and he could be on top of her.
That beautiful flush suffused her high cheekbones. “How shall we vanquish our foes? By exchanging carbon dioxide?”
He smiled as he knelt on the bed, his whole body filled with a single intent as he descended upon her. “You said yourself, you want me ripe with strength, do you not?”
He didn’t give her time to respond, but her answer was in the way she opened to him. Her arms, her mouth, her thighs. In the way her fingers threaded through his hair. Her breath as it spilled from her mouth in a long, pent-up sigh as he kissed his way down her neck.
The tiniest shifts in her body shuddered through his system like an earthquake. As though their foundations were cemented together.
This. This was what he’d been searching for without even knowing what it was.
“Why you?” he breathed into the hollow beneath her ear. Why now, when he was on the brink of accepting his judgment? He didn’t want to keep fighting. If he gave in to these feelings for her, he’d have to continue the battle.
No. She was muddling his mind. He pulled back with a curse, hands cupping her cheeks.
Her hands slid along his arms to his palms that framed her face. She entwined their fingers. “This seems impossible to me, too. I don’t know what we’re supposed to do here. But tell me how I can help you defeat Baal.”
I don’t know. The thought of admitting that to her gave him the collywobbles. “The best thing you can do is stay out of harm’s way and let me focus—”
Spencer registered Pepper’s telepathic alarm the moment before she kicked the door open.
“The priest who’s been helping Father Angus with the exorcisms was just possessed! I tried telling you through the Guardian frequency, but I couldn’t get through. It’s real bad juju.”
Spencer pulled the duvet over Sydney as he stood from the bed. “Father Joseph?” He was one of the youngest priests Spencer had ever encountered.
Pepper nodded.
“Well, it’s not ideal since he knows about our stockpile of holy weapons, but keep him inside the Devil’s Trap. Is Angus in the building?”
Pepper shook her head, her expression thunderous. “That’s the problem—the possessed priest already escaped. We have no idea where he went.”
“Bollocks!” Spencer grabbed a crucifix from the bookshelf near Sydney. When he looked in her eyes, his heart turned over. “Staying out of harm’s way means Stay. Here. Do not defy me in this, Sydney.”
He streamed out of the building so he wouldn’t have to face any challenge in her eyes. Heavy-handed? Definitely. Satisfying? Not hardly.
But her staying put meant he didn’t have to worry about her torture, rape, or possession.
Or her death.
Chapter 28
Sydney laid the tube of purple frosting on the polished white granite countertop of Spencer’s gorgeous—but disgracefully underused—private, upstairs kitchen and stepped back to assess her culinary creation. She smiled ruefully. While Tiana’s birthday cake might not be aesthetically pleasing (Omar, her baker-extraordinaire brother, would be appalled at its asymmetry), it was heavy on sugar and goodwill. That had to count for something.
Now, if they could just locate Tiana.
Sydney put the double layer cake into a covered cake stand and began to clean up the kitchen, already worrying about what she’d do to keep busy after the dishes were washed. It was only 9 am.
For two endless days, she’d done nothing important besides communicating with her family in Minnesota. Two days of climbing the walls, of bothering Inferno’s security team with—mostly declined—requests to help.
Two days of missing Spencer.
She closed her eyes, hands stilling in
the warm, soapy water. She liked him so much already. He was responsible for her safety and that of her family, so it made sense that she cared about what happened to him. That she wanted to know where he was and what he dangers he faced.
Forty-eight hours ago, he’d been called away to help Nate and Katherine fight off demon attacks at Alexios’s Florida club. Apparently, the Guardian head honcho was AWOL on another wild goose chase (Spencer’s words) to track down his missing soul mate, and to hell with the rest of the Guardians and his ancient relic.
According to Atamu, no one knew which holy object Alexios protected. He was one big, brooding mystery, but for some reason, all the Guardians dropped everything and jumped whenever he so much as raised an eyebrow.
Or disappeared.
Spencer had called this morning to say he’d be returning tomorrow. But by then, Tiana’s birthday would be over.
She’d never missed her sister’s birthday—even during the tough years. Clara and Alroy had fostered Tiana for ages before the adoption finally went through. Tiana’s worthless mother never wanted her, but had blocked the adoption year after year out of spite.
Tiana had become depressed and fell in with some unsavory characters the summer after her seventh grade, but she’d come around when the adoption paperwork was finalized the day of her fifteenth birthday.
Her special day, but a gift for their whole family.
Eleven years ago.
Sydney pulled the plug from the stainless-steel sink, rinsed it out, then checked her phone for any messages from her family before exiting the kitchen and heading downstairs to find something to do. Maybe she could fill more bottles with holy water. Anything to stave off this feeling of worthlessness.
Halfway down the stairs, she leaned down to pick up a discarded bachelorette party necklace from the night before, and heard Neo’s smooth baritone call after Pepper in the hallway beyond the stairwell.
“We got word about the missing priest, so Raj went to go check on that. Then a bad chargie give me some news on the girl. I found her, but lost her again. Rasshole, she’s a slippery sistren.”
Sydney froze, her chest tight. Tiana?
Pepper swore. “Lower your voice,” she hissed. “Where was she?”
“Up in de Tenderloin. She was with a tall white woman with long dreds.”
That has to be Willow. Tiana had crashed with the laid-back waitress at a community house once before. Surely that’s where Willow would take Tiana after losing the Guardian tail.
Sydney sprinted down the stairs, the surprised looks on Pepper and Neo’s faces almost comical as she came hollering around the corner into the hallway. “I know where she might have gone!” She hooked an arm through Pepper’s and pulled her along as she moved toward the door. “There’s a community house on Fell Street. We can have Tiana back before noon if we hurry.”
Pepper jerked out of Sydney’s grasp with a frown. “Hold up, rocket girl. You’re not going anywhere. Spencer would disembowel me if I let you out into the streets. Baal’s just waiting for us to drop the ball with you, and then, you’re fucked.”
Neo walked up to them, turning to Pepper. “It’s daylight. They ain’t gonna be high numbers of demons roaming them streets. The girl gonna be less likely to fight us if her sister come along.”
Sydney could have kissed him. “Exactly. I’m sure Tiana will feel much more comfortable if she knows you’re with me. Thank you, Neo!”
He flashed that lady-killer smile. “Yah mon.”
Pepper held up her hands. “Hell. No.” She turned her impenetrable brown eyes on Sydney. “You’re going to give Neo the address of this hideout, and he’ll bring Tiana back…one way or another.” Her gaze swung to the tall, broad-shouldered Guardian. “You need practice with your sleeping spell anyway.”
“But—”
Pepper’s black and white-haired ponytail sailed through the air as her head whipped back to Sydney. “I’m in charge in Spencer’s absence. That means I’m responsible for your ass, which is woefully unprepared to deal with entities like low-level demons, much less archdemons, rephaim, or nephilim.” She folded her arms in front of her chest, her silver serpent bracelets gleaming in the soft, Edison-bulb lighting. “Now, be a good girl and tell Neo where to go. I’ve gotta take a call with Jawahar.”
With one final I-know-how-to-hide-dead-bodies glare at both of them, Pepper turned away, her boots clomping on the wood floor as she strode away in the direction of her office. Moments later, a door slammed.
“Neo, you can keep me safe,” Sydney whispered. He sighed and ran a hand through his blonde afro. He was going to say no. “Please. You know this will be easier if I’m there to smooth things along with Tiana.”
One side of his lips tilted up. “Never could resist a pretty lady’s pleasure.” He shrugged those massive shoulders. “Okay, skim dem teeth and get your coat, Redz. We go together, but we gon’ hurry so we back before Bull Gator gets off the phone, eh? That girl in a rage be worse than war.”
Sydney exhaled and raced back upstairs to retrieve her cold-weather gear, praying this would all be over soon.
Chapter 29
Sydney shivered, crouching behind a stack of wooden crates in an abandoned warehouse somewhere around eight blocks from Inferno. Finding the community house a dead end and lacking new intel about Father Joseph from Raj, Neo had insisted they head back to the club.
As they canvassed homeless encampments along the way, a woman had screamed from a nearby claustrophobic alley. Neo had grabbed Sydney’s arm with one hand and ripped open the boarded-up door to this deserted distribution center with the other and shoved her inside.
Stay here, and don’t you move, Redz. If you don’t listen, you likely to get people butchered, he’d warned, his face grimmer than she’d ever seen it.
His threat was enough to convince her to stay put when all she wanted to do was run full-throttle toward the scream. Was it Tiana? Was she okay? Was Neo?
What. Was. Happening?
That had been twenty, nail-biting minutes ago.
There’d been no more screams, no sounds of fighting, no darkening skies like what had happened when Baal visited her family’s neighborhood. It was like she’d imagined the scream.
Except Neo had gone and left her here alone.
How much longer should she wait? And why was it so freaking cold? Baal had to be behind the deep freeze because this type of extreme cold just didn’t happen in The City.
Her knees began to ache from holding the same position. Her ears strained for the slightest tones of conflict, her gaze traveling around the space for the dozenth time. Graffiti covered the walls and mid-morning light filtered through the broken windows, illuminating patches of likely-hazardous chemicals and bird feces on the pockmarked concrete floor.
The only sounds were random cars passing by and gusts of wind that pushed through the jagged, broken glass windows, quivering long gossamer threads of a spider’s web above her.
That was all creepy, but what unsettled her the most was the fact that there were no homeless squatters here. Sure, the place wasn’t exactly homey, but it was shelter. Why aren’t they here?
Her teeth started to chatter.
This whole failed episode definitely counted as not staying put, and as much as she wished Spencer and Pepper hadn’t been right, she was beginning to regret convincing Neo to help her sneak out.
Spencer was going to be super pissed when he returned from his mission. Right now, she almost longed for one of his highbrow English ass-chewings. Especially when a rat the size of Laura’s Shih Tzu scurried off to her left.
Sydney shot to her feet and tried to corral her breathing. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Okaaaay, time to go find Ne—
The warehouse door blew explosively inward.
She swallowed back a scream and sank down behind the splintered wooden boxes as Father Joseph entered the filthy warehouse like it was St Peter’s Basilica.
Her gaze tracked over the poss
essed priest’s shoulder, hoping Raj would be right behind him, but there was no sign of the olive-skinned Guardian.
She scanned the warehouse for a way out, unseen. Shoulda been doing that all along!
“I know you’re in here, human, I can smell you.”
Goosebumps shot up her arms as a chunk of concrete sailed through one of the few intact windows above her. She ran through the volley of splintered glass, her arms covering her head, sprinting toward the darkened area beyond the east loading dock.
Maybe demons didn’t have as good of eyesight as Guardians. Of course, humans didn’t either, so she’d be stumbling through the shadows trying to find the exit, too, but...
Just go!
Most loading docks had a regular steel door beside the wide overhead doors. All she would have to do is find it and push her way out.
Rapid footfalls behind her, echoing through the cold air. Her heart pounding double time.
Please, let there be a door.
Almost there. She could see a shaft of light through a gap above the door that had probably never been adjusted after an earthquake. Tendrils of the priest’s low-pitched laughter snaked out to wrap around her, putting the squeeze on her chest, making it hard to breathe.
Can’t see!
Focus on the strip of light. Her heart was in her throat. Five lunges away, she tripped on a large mass and went down. She scrambled to her knees when Joseph came into the docking area, shining a flashlight on what had halted her progress.
A heavily tattooed man lay curled on his side, an axe protruding from his back. Oh my God! Sydney gagged at the smell, covering her nose and mouth with her sleeve, her breath heaving.
She shot to her feet. The door was behind her.
The flashlight’s illumination shone upward as the priest unbuttoned his black shirt and tore off his white collar. “You’ll never make it. I can move faster than you can even blink. I dare you to try it, though. Could be fun.”
