A Cursed Embrace (WG 2) (9 page)

He stood with Aric and the other wolves. “We need to track the demon children,” Gemini said. “The scent of the woman’s death is too fresh for them to have gone far, and they’ll need to feast soon.”

“We’ll need more noses,” Aric said. “Call Paul and the other team.”

“I can
change
and help, too.” It’s not like I’d forget that festering smell soon.

Aric sighed, moving toward me. I tried to meet him halfway until an odd sense of cold shoved at my chest like a pair of enraged sports fans. Gemini the wolf leapt to his feet, snarling at the same time my tigress snapped to attention. An earth-shattering scream cut through the silence. The twins had found their next meal.

I charged toward an overgrown path leading deeper into the woods only to be yanked back by Aric.
“Stay
here,”
he growled.

He released my arm and
changed
, joining the rest of his pack already jetting into the dense forest in beast form. Only the original Gemini wolf remained. His hulking body blocked mine when I ignored Aric’s request. “Damn it, Gem!”

“Celia?”

Emme’s shaky voice kept me from barreling through Gemini. I didn’t want to leave Aric to fight this thing alone. I glanced back at my sisters. Shayna already palmed two daggers. Taran’s blue and white flames danced along her fingertips. No, I didn’t want to leave Aric. But I also couldn’t abandon my family.

“Wh-what is it, Celia?” Emme stammered.

“I don’t know.” I paused. Something dropped onto the roof of the mill from one of the overhanging branches.
One
.
Two
. Like softballs . . . with feet. My ears perked. Whatever it or they were pushed between the splintering shingles and scrambled into the building. Gem crept toward the door. He’d heard it, too.

“Stay here,” I muttered.

“Like hell,” Taran shot back.

Gemini’s tail batted against my stomach as I followed him back into the dust-filled and moldy building. The nauseating stench returned, this time with greater potency. We passed into the first large room, the one with the broken office furniture. I froze. Something scurried across the second floor. Just above where we stood. It scratched the battered wood with sharp little nails as it scampered from one side to the other.

“A squirrel?” Emme asked hopefully.

I really wanted it to be a squirrel. But squirrels didn’t move as fast as this thing did. Nor did they hiss. Gemini tore pass me and up the stairs. Garbled screeches followed angry snarls. Dust and pieces of mold pelted us as Gemini’s powerful paws pounded the ceiling above. He’d found one of the demon children.

So then, what the hell was Aric hunting . . . and where was the other twin?

A dark blur the size of my shoe scuttled like a crab above our heads. Then to the right. And then quickly down the wall and behind the armchair in the corner. I couldn’t make out what it was. Just that it had wings. Bat wings.

“Oh, Jesus,” Taran whispered.

Emme clutched my arm as I inched toward it. “Celia,
don’t
.”

Gemini’s paws continued to beat down more dust and his roars shook the building. The thing was fast enough to keep him busy, and small enough to fit into cramped spaces. Like underneath the chair. “We need to kill it, Emme. No telling how big this thing will get. Shayna, Taran, knife or blast it as soon as I move the armchair.”

I didn’t dare avert my stare to see if they nodded, but their hard swallows affirmed they’d heard me.

I stalked my way to it, slowly. Considering that the bulky piece of crap rested just a few feet from me, it seemed to take a long time for me to reach it. Not that I was in a rush, mind you. Creepy crawlies from hell had that effect on a gal.

The
swoosh
from Taran’s fire signaled her readiness to burn the thing to cinders, if Shayna’s daggers didn’t find it first. Shayna slid the blades she held against each other—her way of challenging the thing, and urging her inner mistress of all things sharp and deadly forward.

They were ready. I was ready. And now I’d reached my destination. My shaky hands extended toward the armrests. Dust poofed out in brown little clouds as I gripped the thick and torn fabric. I took a breath to steady myself and lifted.

The other twin poked its head from the bottom.

And clenched its mouth around my instep.

My lids peeled back and I screamed. Boy, did I scream! But only on the inside. I watched in shocked horror as this sickly gray creature pierced its yellow fangs through my sneaker and into the bones of my foot with a hair-raising crunch.

It hurt like the stab of hot needles, but I could handle a great deal of pain. What I couldn’t handle was a
demon
child
biting through my shoe and slurping my body fluid like a thirsty dog. My blood ran cold. I dropped the damned chair and jerked my foot in my own freaky version of the Elaine dance.

“Did you get it, Ceel?”

I whirled around to show Shayna that no, I didn’t get it.
It. Had. Me
. My sisters screamed. The demon child held tight, flapping its long leather wings as it continued to feast.

“Get . . . It . . . Off . . . Me!”

They screamed once more, because that was
really
helpful. Finally Shayna came to her senses. Sort of.

“Keep still, Ceel.” She lifted one of her blades. “I don’t want to cut your foot off.”

Neither Shayna’s comment nor the fact that the demon child continued to suckle motivated me enough to stop prancing around. I kicked out hard, flinging the thing off me. It bounced off the wall, using its thick little frog legs to propel itself toward where my sisters huddled.

They jumped. But then it vanished. Shayna spun around, daggers out. “Where’d it go?”

Taran’s head jerked in all directions. “Goddamn it. Do you think it has the power to disappear?”

My eyes scanned the room as my heart continued to make my rib cage its bitch. “I don’t know. Aric said their time on earth is limited. Maybe it got summoned back to . . .” My voice trailed off as I caught Emme’s blanching skin. She stood still, staring blankly at one of the metal chairs leaning against the wood-paneled walls. “Emme. What’s wrong?”

Emme failed to answer, at least with words. She pirouetted carefully until her back was to us, revealing the demon child digging the claws of its hands and feet into her red wool coat, its tail whisking back and forth. It zipped up her back, tangling into the strands of her honey-colored locks before I could blink.

Taran jumped back. “Holy
shit
!”

I lunged at Emme, only to freeze when the demon child’s ears perched back and it reeled its head to face me. Quarter-size red eyes narrowed over a toadlike head and mouth. It screeched, protruding and elongating its serrated yellow teeth.

I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to fight it.

But Shayna did.

The blade of her knife caught a trickle of light filtering in as the gamut of her power rose in one tremendous sweep. She elongated the cutting edge of her dagger with her
gift
, manipulating the metal until it lengthened into a giant sword.

Before I could shout a warning to Emme, Shayna two-hand-gripped the hilt and brought it straight down Emme’s back, slicing a large chunk of her hair along with the demon child’s appendages. Four sets of claws remained attached to Emme’s coat and hair. One of them crawled along her shoulder and caressed her cheek before dissolving into a maggot and falling at her feet. Emme’s eyes rolled into the back of her head just before she crash-landed into Shayna.

The demon child hissed and lurched onto the ceiling. Taran blasted it with a jagged bolt of lightning, then another, and another, as it flew from one section to another. Gemini yelped above us. He nudged his head through one of the holes, his powerful jowls holding the limp body of the other twin.

The remaining demon child swooped down, clutching an old wall calendar with mutilated limbs as a rapid beat of paws arrived on the other side. Taran gathered her magic and screamed, hurling a tremendous ball of fire at the wall.

I roared,
“No!”
The side of the building exploded, the force knocking us back. Taran’s great ball of fire took out the entire section, missing the demon child and thankfully our wolves. One by one they poked their human heads through the cindering edges. “What the
fuck
?” Koda growled.

I didn’t have time to explain. The creature dove at Taran’s neck, its fangs exposed. I caught it midair, piercing its toad body with my protruding claws. Its slimy, cold-leather flesh made my skin crawl. Emme came to in Shayna’s arms, just in time to join my others sisters screaming as they watched the demon child writhe beneath my grip. Its strength surprised me, especially given its small size. My hand jerked and shuddered as it tried to escape. And yet the more that I stared at it, the more the little bastard pissed me off. Not just because it bit me, or attacked my sisters, but because it lived. Something this evil didn’t belong in my world.

“Shayna. Wanna play pin the wings on a demon child?”

Shayna stood slowly and answered in a tone that clearly meant she’d prefer a round of Monopoly. “Okay, Ceel.”

I pitched the demon child against the wall. Hard enough that its little body indented into the paneling.
One
.
Two
. Shayna’s daggers found each wing. The demon child hissed, its forked tongue extending past its mouth.

The wolves charged in. Naked. My eyes widened as the full breadth of Aric’s heat licked my body in teasing strokes. I spun away, barely catching a glimpse of the perfectly cut muscles layering his broad chest, shoulders, and powerful arms.

Aric paused behind me, his voice a soft rumble. “Are you okay?”

No. I wasn’t okay. I’d fought a demon child following the discovery of four carcasses and a half-eaten woman. And now there stood Aric in all his hotter-than-hell glory making my female parts tap-dance to “Eye of the Tiger.” “Yeah. Totally.”

Large hands covered my shoulders, turning the temperature in the chilly building up to a sweltering ninety degrees. “What’s wrong?” he murmured.

My body shuddered. Of course he hadn’t believed me. He didn’t have to possess the ability to sniff lies to detect my blatant dishonesty. My heated body, speedy pulse, and all my girl parts waving hello proclaimed loud and clear that my self-assured tigress had torn from the building and left the inner, awkward, socially inept girl in charge. Thanks a ton, old faithful inner beast.

“The girls aren’t comfortable around naked beings,” Gemini offered. “In their defense, they haven’t associated much with our kind.”

Aric stiffened behind me, although not in a good way. “I’m sorry, Celia. I thought since we were together now . . .” He sighed, the warmth of his body rising. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I’ll use more discretion in the future.”

Oh God
. I buried my face in my palm. I’d embarrassed him. And myself. I hated not knowing how to behave, or what to say, to a male, especially now when it mattered so much. Aric caught a pair of sweats thrown to him. I wanted to turn around and watch him dress, to prove that yes, I wanted to see him. All of him. He needed to know—to
understand
how much I wanted his touch.

But I didn’t say or do anything. Instead I waited until I heard the elastic of his pants slip above his legs and snap onto his waist. My tigress made us strong. And yet she stood no chance against the dorky female who ruled on the other side.

The squeals of the squirming demon child beckoned Aric forward. I followed close behind him and stood on his right side as he and the other wolves snarled at the sinful creature. Aric glanced my way, appearing surprised I’d join him and dared to stand so close.
Way to go, Celia. Maybe you should nut-punch him for an encore.

My sisters kept their distance. Koda winked over his shoulder at Shayna. “Good job snagging it, baby.”

“Eh,” remained Shayna’s sole response.

The little bastard continued to skeeve her out. Me, I just wanted it gone. I touched Aric’s arm lightly with my fingertips. He tensed beneath my caress. And it damn well nearly broke my heart. I cleared my throat. “Why hasn’t it returned to hell? I thought you said its time is limited.”

“Because he’s not from hell. He was created on earth through a human vessel. The human side gives him unlimited time on earth.”

I said a silent prayer thanking God Almighty these damned things were rare. “He? How do you know it’s male?”

Koda’s jaw tightened. “They’re all male. That way they can impregnate a female if given the opportunity.”

I exchanged glances with my sisters following another thank-you to the Big Man upstairs. Their slacked jaws and paling skin told me we shared the same collective thought.
Eww
.

Liam pointed between the demon’s legs. “This one hasn’t reached sexual maturity yet. Look. Only one of his four balls have dropped.”

My sisters’ gags announced that they, like me, had enough of Demon Child 101. “Can you please get rid of it?” I asked.

Aric yanked it off the wall by its throat, ripping the wings clean from its body. The wings almost immediately shriveled to resemble dry leaves. I followed Aric, but not before Koda wrenched free the daggers and handed them to Shayna. She seemed hesitant to hold them. “Don’t worry, baby. Nothing of that thing will remain. I swear to you.”

She shoved them back in her holsters and clicked the snaps closed. “How do you and the others know so much about demon children? Especially since they’re so rare, puppy?”

Koda cupped her pixie face. “Mostly from scriptures confiscated from dark witches throughout the centuries.”

Shayna bit her bottom lip. “So a dark witch is involved?”

Koda paused. “Maybe at first. But if she raised anything strong enough to impregnate a woman with twins, I guarantee she didn’t live long enough to see them born.”

C
HAPTER 6