Lassiter, page 8
Ad turned back to the job at hand. “You used to be more fun, you know that.”
Yeah, actually… he did.
CHAPTER TEN
After Eddie played bulldozer with the demon, taking her through not just an exterior wall but two interior ones, he rolled on top of her and tried to keep her pinned. He knew it wasn’t going to last, but the dominance didn’t have to. He just needed enough time for Adrian to evac Lassiter in the Mini.
Straddling Devina’s hips, he put his elbow to the front of her throat and grabbed his own wrist so he could lean in and apply even more pressure. The choking sounds were satisfying, and so was the gaping maw of the demon as she tried to drag air down into her lungs—and to get herself free, she clawed at his face, her nails ripping into his skin, the scent of his blood blooming.
Red drops fell from the scratches onto her cheeks, and for a moment, she was so beautiful in her straining hatred, he nearly lost his concentration. Even messed up from the tackle, her physical perfection was undeniable, but that wasn’t the attraction: He hated her with a passion that sometimes confused him, because on occasion, when they were face to face like this, the wires got crossed and he wanted her.
Not because he loved her, though.
Fuck no—
You snooze, you lose.
As she rallied without warning and sent him flying, that was what went through his mind—and hey, check it. They were in an open-air office, the two desks he sailed over messy with paperwork and colorful brochures. The far wall caught his momentum, his shoulder shattering the glass on a poster of a Carnival cruise, his body landing on a Xerox machine the size of a small refrigerator.
No more fucking around.
Swiping the blood off his face and spitting out a shard from the picture mount, he quick-footed his balance, sank down into his thighs, but left his guns where they were, holstered under his light jacket. No use throwing bullets into this mix. She’d be just as likely to send them back at him.
Across the travel agency’s layout, Devina was looking like she’d been in a collision with—well, a building. Her hair was matted with gray blood, her bustier and skintight black leathers smudged with dust, one heel missing from her stilettos. Yet she stood there with her hands on her hips, all Wonder Woman, like she was ready to cat walk.
“Is that how you greet an old friend?” the demon said before coughing and then spitting off to the side. “Fuck, Blackhawk. You could have just called me a cunt.”
“Cunt.”
With a roll of her eyes, Devina cleaned herself up, all the dust and debris—including the paper clip hanging off one lock of hair—disappearing, her leathers no longer scuffed, that heel back where it needed to be.
“Look, I’m not interested in your interference,” she announced. “Whatever is going on between that angel and me is none of your business—”
“The Creator sent us for Lassiter. You want to get in the middle of that? You’re welcome to. I’ll just grab a chair and my popcorn and watch the floor show.”
Those black eyes narrowed. “So you’re taking him away? From the earth?”
Eddie was not an angel who ordinarily shared intel with the enemy, but something about the way she’d gone suddenly still made him inclined to chat.
“Yup. We’re here to collect him.”
Crossing her arms over her breasts, she seemed to get lost in thought. “Fair enough. Have him, he’s yours—but just so we’re clear, when you leave with him, he’ll be gone. Like out of commission forever.”
“The end result’s not up to me. I’m just the messenger with the summons.”
“Lucky you,” she murmured. “I’ll let you live then.”
At that, she blew him a kiss and dematerialized like she had an appointment somewhere. Maybe to get her nails done. Or have some poor bastard drawn and quartered.
Gritting his molars, Eddie hated when she did the whole last-word thing. Goddamn it, now he was going to spend the rest of the night trying out retorts and wishing he could feed them to her—
“What the fuck happened here—”
“Why the fuck did you run off—”
Two of the Brothers arrived on scene in midsentence, the male with the goatee in the lead—Vishous was his name—and the blond Ken doll right on his heels. And it went without saying that they didn’t use the locked glass doors, but stepped through the cutout in the brick wall. More efficient that way, and it didn’t trigger the alarm.
The fact that there was a hole in the side of the building but the security system was silent seemed like a fine commentary on the way the night was going.
“It was the demon, wasn’t it,” Vishous said. “And that’s Lassiter’s blood on the pavement out there, isn’t it.”
“I didn’t have time to explain back in the basement,” Eddie shot back as he brushed dust off his jeans. “But yeah, she just took off.”
The blond Brother, the one with the bright blue eyes, lowered his black dagger as he looked around. “You know, I like the way you redecorate. It’s whimsical, with just a hint of wrecking ball.”
“I was inspired,” Eddie muttered. “What can I say.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“I’m fine.”
Over at the hole in the outer wall, the scarred Brother stepped in and announced, loudly and clearly, “Your friend drove off with Lassiter, and you’re going to take us to them now.”
“Says who.”
“So you’re kidnapping the angel, then.”
Eddie tilted his head. “Are we going to have a problem here?”
“Yeah, I think we are.” The Brother’s yellow stare flipped to black, those eyes narrowing. “But it’s not going to be a big one. You’ve lost a shit ton of blood, so you’re not going to be a lot of trouble, and we can prisoner swap you for our angel if we have to.”
“Or the other guy can really just keep him,” Vishous intoned. “I mean, let’s look at all the options, shall we?”
As Eddie opened his mouth to respond, the world went for a little spinny-spin-spin, and he threw out a hand, hoping to save himself from another Xerox-related recline. The copier was saved, however. The big blond one swooped in, and like the lead in a dance pair, did a waist-and-nape grab that made Eddie the girl in the dip.
The Brother smiled as he looked down, flashing bright white fangs. “Tootsie Pop?”
“Whhha…?” Eddie mumbled.
Something in a purple wrapper appeared in his face. “I think your blood sugar’s low.”
A whiff of grape was the last thing Eddie was aware of before he went library book… and checked the hell out.
* * *
Behind the wheel of the Mini, Adrian was ten-and-two’ing it, his body curled around the steering column, his right leg straight out into the wheel well like someone was goosing him in the ass. The smell of Lassiter’s blood was thick in his nose, the sweet perfume like fresh-cut flowers—none of that copper human crap.
Funny how eau d’artery motivated a guy to screw the traffic laws.
Not that Ad was really bound by anything human.
He had no real idea where he was going as he barreled along, blowing through red lights and stop signs, the buildings that flanked the one-way crowding up close to the sidewalks like they wanted to try traveling themselves. The direction he was heading in didn’t matter. The only thing he cared about was getting some distance between him and Lassiter and that demon. Well, that and having Eddie somehow show up unhurt after he’d—
The ghostly apparition appeared right in front of the car, and Ad barely got a glimpse of the spooling white hair and the shockingly pedestrian clothes before he stomped on the brakes and wrenched the wheel.
The Mini veered off course like a jumping bean, popping the curb and catching some air. Fortunately, the thing wasn’t much wider than a shopping cart, so as it hit the sidewalk, he was mostly able to course correct and keep it from ending up in the display window of a boutique. But then a municipal trash bin jumped into his path and he had to hit the brakes again. Somehow, the paper-clip-sized calipers and what was left of the donut-sized radial tires did the job.
As he bumped against his seat belt and caught his breath, he thought, Wow, just in time: He was staring into the plate glass frontage of a bagel shop, the headlights piercing inside and picking out the tables with their chairs upside down and off the floor.
“What the hell was that?” he asked no one in particular. “And I wonder how good the lox is.”
Then the back door was wrenched open.
Snapping a hold on his gun, he swung the muzzle into the seat behind him—
It was the apparition.
“Let me help him, please,” a soft voice said. “I beg of you.”
Ad lowered his weapon. The female was not of the world, but nor was she an angel. He didn’t know what the fuck she was. What he was clear on, though, was the heartbroken way she was looking at Lassiter.
“G’head,” Ad heard himself say.
She couldn’t kill him, after all. At least… she shouldn’t be able to.
And Lassiter did need help. He was crumpled in the rear, crammed in, creamed from the careening—and there was silver blood all over the black seat. Just as Ad was about to offer to get the angel out—or shit, he didn’t know what—the female extended her hands and closed her eyes. As cold night air weaved through the Mini’s interior, ushering out the bouquet of an immortal’s blood spilled, she started to hum.
No, that wasn’t her. That was… what was coming out of her.
Glowing light pooled all around Lassiter, its vibrational waves creating the sound, and Ad knew without any doubt that the energy was from the font of the Creator: Instantly, the injured angel’s body eased, a shuddering exhale released as pain clearly drained out of him.
“Who are you?” Ad whispered.
He didn’t get a reply. The female was concentrating solely on the summoning and delivery of salvation, her delicate face fierce in her endeavor—
As the theme from Star Wars lit off, Ad jumped—and wondered what the hell John Williams was doing conducting an orchestra in the middle of downtown Caldwell. Except then he realized that it was his phone.
Fumbling around in the pocket of his leather jacket, he answered without checking the screen. Then again, there was only one person who had the number.
“Where are you? I have Lassiter.”
“Well, that’s just great. We have your boy Eddie.”
Ad closed his eyes. “I’d ask how a vampire got this number—”
“You’re Eddie’s only favorite in the phone log thingy. This is Rhage, by the way.”
“Rhage, how’re you.”
“Good, fine, yup. Oh, hey, good news, Eddie’s alive.” There was a pause, and then the Brother said, in a wry way, “I mean, I don’t think he can be dead, can he? It looks like he’s having a little nap? Anywho, you have our fallen angel, we have your buddy. How about turning this into a one-for-one tradesy situation.”
Ad refocused on whatever was happening in the back seat. “Lassiter’s a little busy right now.”
“Why, because you have a TV?”
“No, I think a female with silver hair is playing auto mechanic with his proverbial engine.”
“Rahvyn?”
Ad shifted the phone away from his mouth and said to the female, “Is that your name, Rahvyn?” When he didn’t get an answer, he said into his cell, “Is that her name?”
“Where the hell are you?”
Ad turned back around so he could check the navigation map that was glowing on the dash. “Market and Fifteenth. And I’m not going anywhere, trust me.”
It had been a pretty good plan, driving off with the angel they’d come to find. Of course, the head wound had been a wrinkle, but nothing that he hadn’t intended to solve, provided Eddie handled the business with that demon.
How the hell had Devina managed to escape from the Well of Souls?
“We’re coming now,” the vampire said.
As Ad ended the call, he wondered where the demon was now. Wondered what would have happened if this female hadn’t shown up. Wondered how the night had come to all this.
When he’d bought the Mini, it had been as a joke. Now the thing was an ambulance without the bubble lights and the sirens.
Proof, he supposed, that on any given night in Caldwell, New York… any fucking thing could happen.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Well, wasn’t this cozy.
As Lassiter opened his eyes, he recognized that he was lying down comfortably on something soft, and Eddie and Adrian were standing next to a bunch of brothers. The fact that he recognized all of the males was probably a good indicator that he hadn’t suffered any ill effects after cracking his head open like an egg on the pavement. And hey, he could remember how it had happened, too: After Devina had gone nuclear on him, he’d hit the—
“Rahvyn,” he croaked.
This brought all kinds of heads in his direction, and to avoid meeting the eyes of his peanut gallery, he glanced at the monitoring machine he was hooked up to. Oh, look. He had a heart rate, his lungs were working, and he had blood pressure.
And he knew where he was: The Black Dagger Brotherhood’s subterranean training center. Which had, among its many attributes—including a very nice break room with a good television and a lot of free food, a weight room that he avoided like the plague, and a swimming pool that was as big as a lake—a hospital-grade clinic with its own OR, examination rooms, and recovery suites.
And what do you know, they’d put him in one of their medical beds.
“Where’s Rahvyn…” he mumbled.
“She’s just down the hall,” somebody said. “She’s fine.”
He wasn’t sure who was speaking—which suggested that though his memory was fine, his faculties were maybe not as a-okay as he was hoping.
“Can I see her?” No, that wasn’t forceful enough. “I will see her now.”
Someone stepped forward out of the gathered fighters.
It was Vishous, and of course, the guy was a wet frickin’ blanket: “Not yet. You’ve got some talking to do.”
For a split second, Lassiter thought of all of those doctor soaps he’d watched in the seventies and eighties. Marcus Welby, M.D. St. Elsewhere. ER. Fine, ER was in the nineties. Inevitably, there had always been some poor schlub in a hospital bed, people surrounding them, a dire prognosis saved by the brilliance of the medical staff—except when the show had needed a bad outcome so it could seem real.
And on the staff, there’d always been one brilliant, cynical sonofabitch everyone loved to hate.
As Lassiter’s vision sharpened a little further, he thought, Annnnnnd here we are, Caldie style.
V was like Hugh Laurie in House. Except smarter, and better-looking. And for once, the brother wasn’t smoking a Turkish hand-rolled. The rest of him was right, however. The goatee, the tats on the side of the face, the black hair, the black leather all over the body. And the expression of irritation and hauteur.
Like a Nobel Prize winner who’d been asked to read a grocery list.
“Where the hell have you been,” came the demand.
Lassiter glanced at the other brothers, and then the fallen angels. All of them were also waiting for an answer, just being less judgy about it, as if they might have recognized that sometimes, people had a right to take a couple of nights off—
“You have no right to flake out on us,” V snapped. “You don’t want my mahmen’s goddamn job, fine. But don’t take up space if you’re not going to do shit—”
“Fuck you,” Lassiter cut in. And then he went on a roll, rising off the bed as his voice rose in volume. “I fucked that demon so Balthazar could have his female, and I kept Devina occupied tonight while you all went into her lair—and I’ve done a dozen other stupid fucking things I shouldn’t have, to make sure none of you get hurt or disappointed as you live your lives. So excuse me if I need a goddamn break every once in a while!”
By the end of it, he was yelling, and when he finished, he flopped back down—and hit the back of his tender head again.
“Fuck!” he barked as he put a hand up there.
As he felt around and got no sense of wetness, he thought, well, at least he wasn’t leaking anymore.
Abruptly, Rhage leaned out of the group. “You want a Tootsie Pop? Eddie rudely turned me down back at the travel agency he assaulted, so I have an extra one.”
“To be fair, I passed out,” the angel muttered. “That’s not rude—”
“Yes, fuck, I want one,” Lassiter bitched as he put his hand out. “And can you unwrap it.”
Rhage played an excellent Fritz the butler, just without the wrinkles and the penguin suit: Split second later, there was a purple globe on a white stick front and center, and you know what? It tasted fan-fucking-tastic.
Man, thank God he wasn’t human. Or a mortal. He’d be dead or hooked up to a ventilator while they debated on when to pull the plug. Instead, he was going to be all right in another hour or two. Tops.
All because in the back of that Mini, Rahvyn had helped the healing process along immensely.
She’d followed him. The sneak.
He thought of her standing in front of him in the lee of that golden glow at the Mickey D’s, so resplendently beautiful, more lovely than he remembered, her eyes on his as she leaned forward as if—
He left me because of you! For me to have my love, you can never have yours!
As Devina’s voice barged in, Lassiter bolted up again, and immediately, the brothers and the angels leaned away, like they expected him to Exorcist-it and start golf-sprinkling pea soup.
He looked at Vishous, because, hey, if anyone could figure out anything, it was him. “Devina… is in love, right?”
V took out a hand-rolled. As he put it to his lips, somebody pointed out, “There’s oxygen in here.”
“Yeah, there is, unless you think we’re breathing water?” The male lit up, exhaled, and motioned to the far side of Lassiter’s bed. “That cylinder over there isn’t hooked up, relax. And as for the demon, it’s true. She’s got herself a little boyfriend and we’ve got problems. Lash is back, and fully functional. We found evidence that he inducted a lesser outside her crib, and the two of them shacking up is bad news for us.”
