Where the Devil Don't Go, page 2
This time, it wasn’t a growl but more a frustrated rumble. “This is madness. I have no use for a human. You are strange, silly, frivolous creatures. I have a job to do. But… But I won’t kill you.”
Christopher should have felt relief at his words, but disappointment flooded his system, soaking his words as he scoffed. “Look at me. Look what he’s done to me. What kind of life can I have with half of my face mutilated? If you don’t want me, you might as well kill me.”
In the time it took Christopher to blink, Sam was in his human form once more, back in his gray suit. Fuck, that was cool. When Sam stepped forward, butterflies took flight in Christopher’s stomach. When he cupped his face, his cock throbbed. How long had it been since somebody had touched him in kindness? Had they ever?
A strange warmth seemed to pulse from Sam’s hands, and when he dropped them to Christopher’s shoulders and turned him toward the full length mirror leaned against the wall, his mouth fell open. His pale skin was no longer marred by raised red lines. There was no thick scar running from the corner of his mouth to his brow. His eyelid no longer drooped from where Vincent had severed the nerve.
Christopher stumbled closer to the mirror. It was him but…not. His long dark hair still curled down to his shoulders, but his pale skin looked pink and healthy, the dark circles under his eyes had disappeared, his lips were cherry red, and his pale blue eyes seemed lit from within. He turned back to Sam. “What did you do to me?”
“I healed you. Nothing more. You have the face of an angel. Believe me, I’d know. There’s nothing you couldn’t have looking the way you do. Humans are such simple creatures. Especially human men. You can have anything you want from them, if you only ask.”
Christopher met Sam’s gaze, noting his eyes were a rich jade green with threads of gold. “What if I don’t want that?”
“Want what? To live?”
“What if I don’t want some simple human man?” Christopher asked.
Sam shook his head. “What are you asking?”
Christopher smiled. “I guess you could say I’m a human standing in front of a demon, begging him to let me call him Daddy.”
The movie reference was clearly lost on Sam, but he studied him with such intensity it felt like he was examining his insides. Finally, he shook his head, seeming both confused and exasperated. “Put some clothes on. You can’t go anywhere dressed like that.”
Christopher’s heart soared in his chest as he rushed to comply. He pulled on the first pair of jeans he found and a soft oversized silver sweater. “You realize they’re probably going to think I murdered them, right?” he said, tone conversational.
Sam snapped his fingers. “You can’t murder anybody if you’re dead.”
Christopher froze. Was that a threat? Was Sam just toying with him? Had he intended to kill him this whole time? Sam smirked, pointing to the bodies on the floor. Christopher sucked in a breath at the sight of his face on the dead twink’s body. He jerked his head back before the mirror, lip curling as he realized he wore the dead boy’s face.
Sam chuckled. “Relax, pet. It’s simply a glamor. It will be gone as soon as we are. Let’s go.”
“How did it go?”
Sam cut his eyes to his brother, Arakiel, who lounged behind Sam’s large oak desk, feet kicked up, voice droll, as he twirled a pen end over end along his knuckles. Arakiel already knew how it had gone. He was just being an ass. He was always just being an ass.
“I’m not in the mood today, Brother.”
Ari snorted, his laugh condescending. “Are you ever in the mood?” When Sam didn’t take the bait, he asked, “Are you going to do it?”
Sam pinched the bridge of his nose, fixating on the gray brick walls, letting his eyes roam higher to the ribbed vaulted ceiling. “I have no use for your riddles or head games. What is the ‘it’ you speak of?”
Ari chuckled. “I love when you make me work for it, Brother. The ‘it’ I speak of is the human boy I imagine is currently lounging in all his cherubic glory on that gothic monstrosity of a bed in your chambers down the hall. Do you truly intend to…bed it?” The last words dripped with mock disdain, like he’d seen a roach crawl across Sam’s desk.
Sam didn’t ask how Ari knew. He always knew. With a flick of his wrist and a shake of some animal bones, Ari could see all. Yet, somehow, he couldn’t—or most likely wouldn’t—see how close he was to pushing Sam too far. Annoying people was Ari’s version of a hobby and Sam was his favorite target. They might have celestial roots, but Ari was very much suffering from middle-child syndrome.
“And if I do?” Sam asked, kicking himself for even entertaining the question. It wasn’t Ari’s business. Sam was the head of the Grigori. He didn’t need to justify his actions to anybody, least of all Ari.
Ari let his loafered feet fall to the gleaming hardwood floors. “If you do,” he said, rising from Sam’s chair to stretch loudly, giving him a glimpse of toned copper skin and black ink tattooed across his side, “I’d ask if you were off your fucking nut.” At Sam’s snarl, his brother added, “Respectfully.” His tone was mockingly light, his hands gesticulating wildly.
Sam wanted to tell Ari to mind his own fucking business, that he was free to do as he pleased, but, instead, he walked to the bar in the corner of his office and poured himself two fingers of bourbon, swallowing the fiery liquid like it was ice water and he was dying of dehydration.
Sam had no idea why he’d taken the boy. His dick twitched behind his zipper just at the thought of all that pale skin and curly shoulder-length brown hair. Okay, so he had some idea as to why he’d taken him. In the eons he’d been on this planet, never once had anyone, much less a human, gazed up at him in his true form and asked to serve him. It was a heady sensation. One Sam hadn’t been able to ignore, whether he intended to take the boy or not.
It wasn’t as if Sam was desperate for sexual gratification. He wasn’t. There was no shortage of his kind walking amongst the humans. Sam and the other watchers had made sure of that years ago. There was no need to try to seek comfort with a…human. While they might be his father’s favored progeny, to him, they were nothing more than pretty chimpanzees with quirky habits. He enjoyed studying their customs, their cultures, and, once upon a time, he’d even enjoyed teaching them all the knowledge his father had tried to hide from them. But now, he viewed them the way humans might a pretty insect.
But this boy, Christopher, had thrown him when he’d gazed up at him with those liquid hazel eyes and begged not to live but to serve, serve Sam—service Sam—in his demon form. It was madness, really. He wasn’t certain any human could handle him in his true form, at least not comfortably, but Christopher hadn’t sought comfort, just his life and maybe some form of wish fulfillment, because when he’d looked at Sam in his demon form, he’d been not only scared but aroused, and it was that combination of fear and sex that had overwhelmed Sam’s better judgment. How could he say no to that?
As wrong as it seemed, Sam wanted to know what it felt like to bed and breed the boy, not only in his human form but as his true self. Especially when the boy had called him Daddy. One of those odd human quirks he’d once found so fascinating. People with Daddy issues wanting to call a stranger Daddy while bedding them. Over several centuries, Sam had sired hundreds of offspring with other demons, but he was no father figure.
But Christopher didn’t want a father figure. He wanted a master—somebody to use him—and Father forgive him, he’d slipped. His first slip in a thousand years. Even now, when he should be forming a cohesive plan to finish his list and end his millennia of suffering, he could only think about the boy in his chamber.
“Well?” Ari said, impatience leaching into his voice.
That’s right. His brother had asked him a question. Sam sighed, pouring another two fingers and downing it. “This conversation is tedious. There’s no harm in me playing with him until I’ve completed my mission.”
Sam watched Ari’s reflection cross his arms over his broad chest in the large mirrored wall before him. His brother was an odd duck in human form. Tall and toned, skin sun-kissed like those of Middle Eastern descent the originals created in his father’s image with inky black strands, a full beard, and lashes so black he always seemed to be wearing makeup. Sometimes, he was. Today, he wore expensive tailored black slacks and an obnoxiously loud button down shirt, which had probably cost as much as his Balenciaga loafers that he insisted on wearing without socks, a habit Sam found nauseating.
“You’ve got five more names on your list and then you’re finished. Forever. You get to finally rest. Why would you risk losing your chance at salvation by dabbling with a human? It would be like deciding to stick your dick in a houseplant. They aren’t like us. They can never be like us. They’re…simpletons.”
Sam spun around. “Who cares? What precisely is so great about us? We led a rebellion, fell from grace, corrupted our father’s chosen ones. The ones he loved over all others. We bred with demons and created a race of monsters so vile we’ve been cleaning up our own mess for centuries. And don’t get me started on those who fell and bred with the daughters of man.” Sam took a deep breath and let it out, reining in his temper. “I’m just amusing myself. Why shouldn’t I enjoy my final days here on Earth before I blink from existence?”
“You could be saved.”
Sam rolled his eyes. “Our father told me himself that the best we can hope for is nothingness. A peaceful abyss. Do you truly believe we will be saved? That Heaven will invite us back in with open arms? You can’t. Because only a fool would believe that, and you, for all your many, many faults, Arakiel, are no fool.”
“Look at you, minutes into this human’s presence and you’re already becoming quite maudlin, Brother,” Ari said. “I choose to believe that there is redemption and forgiveness for even the darkest of souls.”
“We have no souls, Ari,” Sam reminded him. “You can choose to alleviate your fears with thoughts of rainbows and reunions with our brothers, but the truth is, all that waits for us when we finish our lists is a swift death and an afterlife in the void, floating in darkness.”
Ari’s dark eyes softened. “Brother—”
Sam held up his hand. “I have no fear of judgment or the darkness. After centuries here, it sounds like a bliss I can only begin to imagine.”
“So, this boy, this…human…is some final hurrah? A going away gift to yourself?” Ari asked, no longer sounding amused or even angry, just confused.
Sam didn’t blame him. He’d had no love of Earth, no true pull to see anything good happen to his father’s most prolific science project, but yes. If he was being honest with himself, the idea of spending his final months bedding and breeding that boy, forcing him to bend to his will, burying himself in every part of him…it seemed like a gift. One he wouldn’t refuse himself after all these years. “Perhaps.”
“And the others? Our brothers? The ones who sit around that table,”—he gestured to the large oak table—“what of them? Will you tell them they can now go out and take human lovers? Keep them as pets? Use them the way our half-demon offspring have? Surely, even you, the great Samyaza, God’s chosen one, can see the danger in giving this lot even a small amount of freedom. Look at the havoc we’ve already caused.”
“What I do is none of their concern. I didn’t ask to be your leader. If you wish for me to step down, then say so. If not, I suggest you, and them, mind your business and focus on your own missions. Besides, they need not know why he’s here.”
Ari scoffed. “They are seers, animancers, necromancers, clairsentients, clairvoyants. They already know. I knew the moment you arrived with him. I can smell him even down here among the stagnant water that runs beneath the city. He smells like overly perfumed flowers.” He wrinkled his nose. “I can smell how much he wants you, and, if I can, so can the others.”
“You’re being dramatic. Have I kept you from practicing your talents? Do I force you to keep your magical gifts bound? No. My gifts are flesh based. I’m the embodiment of lust. That is how Father made me. Despite all his attempts to make us sexless, unfeeling soldiers, my gifts always came down to two things, Arakiel. Fucking and fighting. I set off a chain reaction of events that bred a race of halflings just like the incubus I murdered last night. All to set myself free from His hold so I could fully explore my gifts. Sex, lust, attraction, desire, obsession…that all only exists because I fell. Why shouldn’t I reap the fruits of my labor? Why shouldn’t I be able to have one last pretty thing for myself before being cast into the abyss?”
Ari raised a dark brow. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you become so vocal about a human before. Or anybody, really.”
Sam shrugged. “It’s not the boy, it’s your insolence. I don’t like being questioned.”
“I hadn’t noticed,” Ari said with a smirk before it fell away once more. “You won’t be able to hide him from the others. Like I said, I can smell him. But more importantly, I can feel him. He’s the snake hidden beneath the flowers, Brother. Mark my words. Bringing this human into our midst just set off a chain reaction none of us are prepared to face.”
Sam thought of the boy’s countenance once more. “He’s no serpent. Azazel was the serpent. He’s the one who triggered the first chain reaction by falling in love. First with Lilith and then by breeding with Eve.”
“Yet, Azazel pled for forgiveness, kissed our father’s feet, and swore to never fall again. Now, he reigns supreme in Hell.”
Sam scoffed. “Is that what you wanted? To be the king of pain? To rule over lakes of fire with nothing but the screams of suffering humans as the soundtrack to your life?”
Ari shrugged. “I would have at least liked the opportunity to repent, to beg forgiveness. Doesn’t it ever bother you? Azazel is the one who talked us into this rebellion and yet he’s forgiven, even after introducing sin to Father’s chosen ones. It’s bullshit.”
Sam crossed the room, falling into his chair and leaning back. This was hardly the first time they’d discussed Azazel and it most certainly wouldn’t be the last, but, tonight, he found he had less patience for it than usual. “Bullshit or no, we don’t get to question Father’s decisions. Doing so is how we got here in the first place.”
Ari shook his head. “I truly don’t get you sometimes, Brother. You are supposed to be the level-headed one. The one who rules with his head, not his heart. The head on your shoulders, that is. When the others realize what you’ve done, you’ll start a war.”
“Over a human boy? He’s simply a play thing. A bed-warmer. Surely not worthy of triggering a global outcry from our kind. I’m not the first fallen one to bed a human. Hell, I walked in on one an hour ago doing just that. They seemed to be enjoying themselves quite a bit.”
“And where are they now?” Ari asked.
Sam’s stomach clenched. Fuck. He’d walked right into Ari’s trap. “Dead.”
“Precisely. As they should be. It’s immoral for our kind to mate with their kind and you know it. You’re being selfish, Samyaza. Kill him. Or if, for some reason, you can’t bring yourself to do that, fry his brain and then cut him loose in the city and let him ramble on the sidewalks about angels and demons like the other forgotten humans do.”
The thought of chucking Christopher out into the streets, brain scrambled, a victim to both other humans and the elements made his blood boil. The boy might be just a play thing, but he would be Sam’s plaything only. He didn’t like sharing his toys. Especially not pretty toys filled with dirty promise, begging him to break them.
“I’ll do no such thing. Let it go, Ari. None of this is as dire as you make it out to be. If you offered up predictions like this to your followers, they’d label you a charlatan without a moment’s hesitation.”
“That’s the difference between us, Brother. I don’t mind being labeled a fraud if the warnings and predictions I give are true. I’d rather speak the truth and be mocked than sell pretty lies at the expense of my integrity.”
“Integrity? You spawned a race of halfling psychics, mediums, and empaths. You, yourself, have bred with humans and demons alike over the years, causing them to be filled with angst and dread. You gave them just enough knowledge to make them feel hopeless and insignificant, so spare me the lecture on integrity, Arakiel. Nobody would thank you for their gifts if they knew the price they’d paid for receiving those gifts.”
Ari threw up his hands in a dramatic display. “You’re being impossible. I’ll do my best to keep the others at bay, but you better sort your shit out, and fast.”
Sam felt a smile spread across his face at his brother’s theatrical tantrum. He’d missed his calling as a flamboyant Vegas illusionist. “Goodnight, Arakiel.”
Ari didn’t say a word, just threw up his middle finger, holding it at a height Sam wasn’t likely to miss.
Once he was alone, he found himself replaying his argument with Ari. The irony was he’d had no intention of honoring Christopher’s request. He’d only taken the human boy with him so he’d have more time to figure out what to do with him. At least, that was what he’d told himself before Ari decided Sam couldn’t have him.
Sam might have started out life as one of God’s perfect soldiers, but he’d never been a fan of orders, of being told what he could and couldn’t do. Maybe that was why it had been so easy for Tamiel and Azazel to convince Sam that the key to their happiness was to fall from Heaven, to wreak havoc on Earth.
Sam had done a great deal of stupid things just to prove he could and many more just to prove to others that if they said he couldn’t, then he not only would, but he’d do it in a spectacular display of defiance.
It brought a smile to his face to think that Ari’s dire warnings and grim predictions about Christopher’s place in Sam’s bed were the very thing that had driven Sam to make the decision to bed him in the first place. One might even say it was Ari’s fault.
Sam had never mated or bred a human before, but he imagined it couldn’t be much different than bedding another angel or even a demon. He just needed to be careful. He wanted Christopher broken, wanted him begging, but not so broken Sam couldn’t put the pieces back together when he was done with him.
