I hated to admit he was right.
The Archangels were terrifying.
And now we were on their radar again—thanks to the Genesis, Ethan, and Cassius love triangle.
My heart clenched again.
“He’s right.” Mason leaned back in his chair. “I’ll check in with the wolves while Alex checks in with the Sirens and Demon.”
“Hey!” Alex sat down and frowned. “Why do I have to check in with the Demon? Last time they tried to eat my hand.”
“You have lovely hands.” Mason nodded.
“Could it be because someone told them they tasted like ambrosia?” Alex kicked Mason’s chair almost sending him toppling toward the ground.
“Easy mistake.” Mason yawned.
“I’ll check in with them,” I found myself offering, and all eyes turned in my direction. I shrugged. “What? How hard can it be? Make sure they don’t kill any humans… get a head count…” I shrugged again. Wow, I was doing that a lot. “No big.”
“No big?” Alex grumbled. “Until they eat you.”
“I’m a Dark One,” I half whispered. “They could only try.”
The room fell silent.
Because I’d just brought in the giant elephant and asked everyone if they wanted to go for a ride.
Well done.
“Great.” Ethan broke the silence. “So, Steph will check on the Demon… tonight?”
“Yup.” I nodded, feeling less enthusiastic than I looked. “They’ll be on the prowl so it should be easy.”
“It’s not… dangerous is it?” Genesis asked.
Hell yes, it was dangerous. But maybe that’s what I needed. A bit of danger. I shrugged, a third time, great, and made eye contact with Ethan. “We’re immortal, what’s the worst that can happen?”
Stephanie
GOING OUT AND HUNTING for Demon ended up being a bigger pain in my ass than I realized. First of all, the leader—if you could even call him that—wasn’t at his normal hang out meaning I had to basically bar hop all the way through Belltown asking Demon if they’d seen him.
Most of the Demons shied away from me.
Most of them were too smart to do anything like piss me off.
But there was always that outlier, the one individual who didn’t play by the rules and thought his own crap didn’t stink.
Meet, Jefferson.
“Go away.” I shooed him with my hand and turned my back to him, ordering another glass of white wine.
“You smell like….” His voice was raspy and suggestive as he leaned close, inhaling from my airspace. “…sin.”
“Wow.” I took two large unlady like gulps of the wine and turned to face him for the third time.
He wasn’t awful looking, if you favored blond curly hair and chocolate eyes. But I knew deep down what he was, a social climbing idiot who’d most likely try to kill me in my sleep just so he could steal some of the angel blood for himself and hope to gain more power.
“Ah, you’re warming to me.” He winked.
I nodded then placed both hands on his shoulders raising my knee to his balls in an effortless strike that had him collapsing to the floor in agony.
“If that’s what you want to call it, sure.”
“You bitch!” He wailed from the ground. “What the hell did you do that for?”
“You were pissing me off.” I kneeled down next to him and tugged his black shirt so it almost ripped in my hands. “Now, where’s your boss?”
“Busy.” He spat in my face.
I punched him in the jaw.
“Damn it.” Black blood oozed from his nose. “Would it kill you to give a guy a shot?”
“Yes. Yes it would.” I released him, “Now stop wasting my time. My feet hurt. I’ve been out all night tracking…” I waved my hand into the air. “…smelly little street rats.”
He let out a low hiss.
“Just tell me where he is.”
Jeffrey paled and gulped all at once while a voice said near my ear in a harsh whisper.
“Behind you.”
Every hair on my body stood on edge. Yes. Their leader was about an inch from my neck. Demon bites hurt like hell, and if I moved any more his teeth would graze my soft skin. Though, in the back of my head I remembered I was a Dark One right? So maybe I had more power in this situation than I thought.
Quickly, I turned.
“Timber.” I put my hands on my hips. “About time you showed up.”
“Well…” He rocked back on his heels and lifted his hand in the air. A beer made its way across the bar. He picked it up and took a long swig, the muscles in his neck constricting as he swallowed. Most humans would find him gorgeous. I just found him irritating and an abomination, but who was I to talk? “When a beautiful woman seeks me out…” He set the beer down and winked one of his baby blues.
I rolled my eyes. “Numbers, what are they?”
“Straight to business? No pleasure?” He eyed me up and down his blue eyes flashing red before going back to normal.
“No.”
“You…” His eyebrows knit together as he leaned forward. “You smell… strange.”
I backed up. “New perfume.”
His eyes flashed even redder than before. “No, no, I don’t think that’s it.”
It was like his body grew before my very eyes. He was transitioning into what a Demon really looked like—which was something out of a first grader’s nightmare. Horns would pop up on his head, his teeth would elongate to fangs, and his face would hollow out revealing nothing but skull.