Straight to Heaven (2 page)

Before he could finish the transaction, however, the elderly lady with the walker bumbled back into the lobby. “Young man! Young man! I think you left your headlights on.”

The sound of her voice broke my spell. My client blinked, and I watched all my hard work fall to pieces. Damn it! As I fumed, the old woman smiled sweetly at me, flashing the most brilliantly blue eyes I’d ever seen.

My client hurried out of the post office, and I followed him to his truck. The angle of the sun made the headlights look like they’d been left on, but on closer inspection, it was clear they weren’t. “I guess she was wrong,” I said. “Your lights aren’t on.”

Ignoring me, he unlocked the driver’s side door. Frantically, I ran around to the passenger’s side. If I could get inside the truck and keep talking to him, this might still work. I yanked on the door’s handle, but it was locked. My client started the engine.

“Wait!” I pounded on the window. “Hold on!” I cast about for a reason that would make him stay. “Can you give me a ride to the bus stop?” I asked. “My car’s in the shop, and – ”

His expression was a mixture of fear and disgust. Apparently, I’d gone from a seductress to a crazy, desperate woman. Which, of course, I was. When he pulled the truck out of the parking space, I leapt backwards to keep my foot from being run over. Then, before I could catch up to him, his pickup squealed out of the parking lot.

Damn.

Once I stepped into the otherworld, the strip mall and post office disappeared. Instead, I faced a labyrinth of hallways with doors that led to every conceivable place in the human world. To my surprise, William Benedict, my incubus counterpart, was waiting for me. I hadn’t seen him in weeks, which was perfectly fine by me. He was an arrogant, insufferable cad whose every word was a lie and who had nearly tricked me into giving up my daughter.

Unfortunately, he was also a highly seductive, incredibly charming, and impossibly gorgeous man. He embodied every fantasy I’d ever had. He was well-muscled with a chiseled chin and jaw, yet his pouty lips and dark, slightly-bewildered eyes appealed to my softer side. He managed to be both a bad boy and a sexy nerd. Superman and Clark Kent. Although these contradictions were impossible for a human, William’s demon pulled them off. If I didn’t watch myself closely, I’d be at his mercy.

William had been leaning against the wall, and he stood up straight when he saw me. “That didn’t go well, did it?”

So he’d witnessed my epic failure. Terrific. He’d never let me live it down. “Things were going fine until that old lady got in the way,” I said. Curse that interfering woman! It would take another six months to rebuild my record. I resumed nibbling my cuticle.

“An old lady? Is that what you saw?” William laughed. “That, my dear Lilith, was a guardian angel.”

Guardian angel?! I replayed the events in my mind, suddenly realizing how easily the old lady with the walker had thwarted my attempts to seduce my client. Her timing had been perfect, and those piercing blue eyes had been supernatural. “No one warned me about angels!”

“They can be a nuisance, especially if they’re assigned to your client. They may work for Heaven, but they know as many dirty tricks as we do.”

“So they’ve given you trouble before, too?” I asked hopefully.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said. “I’ve never once let an angel stop me from tempting a client.”

I should have guessed. William had a perfect record of seductions; something he loved to brag about. “How did you manage it?” I asked him.

He gave me a knowing smile. “It’s the easiest thing in the world. I seduced them.”

I rolled my eyes. This whopper was over the top even for him. Seduce an angel? Yeah, right.

William followed me as I started towards my house. Hell’s hallways were painted institutional gray and laid with industrial carpeting. Fluorescent lights flickered overhead. There were doors and cross hallways everywhere I looked. The sheer scope of the place terrified me, but my demon assured me she could get me safely home before my daughter and niece returned from arts and crafts camp. Sure enough, within a minute, I reached the doorway that led to my bedroom. I went through it, and William followed uninvited.

“Do you think Miss Spry will be angry?” I asked. My cuticle was bloody, but I couldn’t stop tearing at it. “I mean, I did my best to finish the job, and I’ve been doing really well lately. I haven’t lost a single client since January.” Now that I was home, the full weight of my failure hit me, and I started to panic. Miss Spry was not a patient or understanding demon. One disastrous temptation might make her steal my daughter again. Suddenly, the walls to my bedroom closed in on me, and there wasn’t enough air to breathe. My vision grayed at the edges.

Seeing my distress, William put his hands on my shoulders. “Relax, Lilith,” he said. When I continued to shake, he took me in his arms. “Deep breaths,” he murmured. “Slow and deep.”

I buried my face in his chest. “But what if she takes Grace back to Hell?” I said.

“Listen. Helen was trying to make a point: that you belong to her in body and soul. She wanted you completely terrified, so that you’d never consider defying her again.” He held me a little tighter. “I think she got the message across, don’t you?”

Boy, had she ever.

“Don’t worry, Lil. Now that Helen knows you’ll always do what she says, she’ll be more understanding. Everyone makes mistakes. Besides, a grown woman is more useful to her than a child.”

William continued to murmur assurances while I clung to him. He rarely showed his human side, and it was good to see it now. It made being in his arms feel so right. So natural. His true, human self was the part of him I liked best. Unfortunately, it was also the part of him that
he
liked least, and he hid it whenever he could.

I gave in to temptation a little longer before reluctantly pulling out of his embrace. Then, still feeling wobbly, I sat on the edge of my bed. “What mistakes have you made?”

He tilted his head and cocked an eyebrow.

“You just said,
everyone
makes mistakes. What about you? Any epic fails?”

He laughed and shook his head. “No.”

“Not one?” I asked.

“Not one.” His impish smile had returned. Just like that, his demon was back in the driver’s seat. It figured. “I have a perfect track record, remember?”

“You’ve mentioned it once or twice,” I said sourly.

William sat next to me on the bed, and when I didn’t move he bounced up and down a little to get my attention. “Neutral walls, no-nonsense bedding, not even a romantic fireplace or a TV with dirty movies. This is the un-sexiest bedroom I’ve ever encountered.” He winked. “It’s like all you do in here is sleep.”

I wasn’t sure if he was trying to tease me out of my depression or seduce me. With William, it was never easy to tell. “Sleeping
is
all I do in here,” I said.

“Then let’s fix that.” He took my hand and began kissing the tip of each finger. “I promise that I can make you forget your troubles.”

I drew my hand away from his. Too late, I realized that I should have entered through the kitchen. “Is that why you were spying on me at the post office?” I asked.

“Maybe.” He reached for me again. “You know that I want you, Lilith. Very, very much.” His dark eyes held a wanton invitation.

It was hard to resist William’s supernatural allure, especially when he had been so kind and understanding only a few minutes before. For all his arrogance and selfishness, I
knew
that there was good buried inside his heart, no matter how deep it was or how hard he tried to hide it. Plus, the thought of using sex to make my pain go away had its appeal. Feeling anything, even lust, would be better than the guilt and anxiety that constantly threatened to break through my defenses. Right now, I wanted to put my arms around William’s waist and rub my cheek against the stubble on his chin. I wanted to feel his hands slip under my shirt and beneath my bra.

At the same time, I also wanted a real relationship, something he insisted that we would never have. I moved farther down the bed. “You promise to make me forget my problems, but will you also promise to stay with me once the passion’s over?”

His expression clouded over. “You know better than that. Pleasure, Lil. Pure pleasure. That’s what I can offer you.”

As good as that sounded, it wasn’t enough. “I’m sorry,” I said, “but no.”

At that moment, I heard the front door open and my daughter and niece come inside. “Mom,” Grace yelled. “Mom!? Are you here?”

I stood up. “I think you’d better leave.”

William looked sulky, but he stood up as well. He cupped my chin in his hand. “I’m not giving up on the idea of you and me and that bed. Someday, Lil, you’ll appreciate what I have to offer.”

Unless that someday included a genuine commitment, I wasn’t about to let it happen. And since demons weren’t allowed to love, it wasn’t likely that either of us would get what we wanted.

Chapter Two

That afternoon, I lounged poolside while my neighbor, Vickie Ballard, filled me in on the neighborhood gossip. Grace and Ari, my niece, swam in the pool, doing their best to avoid Vickie’s three jet-fueled monsters who were splashing and screaming and generally raising hell.

Vickie had just been telling me about how Debbie Crenshaw from down the street was back in rehab, and how Casey Scarsdale from next door had
another
new boyfriend, and that Sue Bristol had caught her husband doing a live web chat while he was dressed in her lacy bra and panties.

I’d always been the queen bee of the neighborhood, but while it felt good to hold court with the neighbors again, I was hardly listening to Vickie. Vickie’s gossip was like an overly sweet dessert: tasty at first, but sickening after you’ve had your fill.

Annoyed that I wasn’t lapping up her precious tidbits of scandal and asking for more, Vickie went silent. She looked over the top of her sunglasses, her eyes traveling from the kidney-shaped pool, to the bricked patio and the extravagant landscaping, and then finally resting on the outdoor furniture that Pottery Barn had delivered the previous week. I could almost feel the vibrations from her buzzing brain as she tried to calculate the total cost.

“Looks like you’re doing pretty well for yourself, Lilith,” Vickie finally said. “You must have taken Ted to the cleaners in the divorce.”

Obviously, I couldn’t confess that I was working for the Devil. So, instead of telling every bit of the truth, I went for the abridged version. “My insurance company finally came through for me, and the payoff was very generous.” But only because Helen Spry had pulled a few strings on my behalf.

“Really,” Vickie said, impressed. “I wish I had your insurance policy.”

Yeah right, I thought. You couldn’t afford the premiums. She wouldn’t survive a day as a succubus. But I had to admit that although the job was awful, the benefits were terrific. The rebuilt house and the new pool were only part of the package. I also received a mysterious – and extremely generous – weekly deposit into my bank account. This was another reason why I had given in and embraced my role as a succubus. Being poor sucked. I was tired of worrying over every penny, having to return groceries because I didn’t have the money to pay for them, and avoiding phone calls from collection agencies. William had been right; I needed to get over my guilty conscience. Besides, I only
tempted
people to sin. Ultimately, the choice to do wrong was theirs.

Vickie smiled, but she was still in viper mode. “So what they say about karma must be true. Do something good, and good will come back to you.” She nodded at Ariel who was climbing out of the pool. My niece wore a Marilyn Manson T-shirt over her swimsuit and had used a black Sharpie to give herself an enormous skull-and-crossbones tattoo on her left cheek. “You took in that little juvenile delinquent, and the universe has gifted you with a lovely new house.” Karma might have been smiling on me, but Vickie wasn’t. “Let’s just hope she doesn’t burn this one down, too.”

I wanted to smack her with a really good comeback, but before I could, I felt a shiver in the air which meant someone from the otherworld was about to pay me a visit. This time, it wasn’t William but Patrick Clerk, Miss Spry’s assistant, who walked from the house and out onto the patio.

“
Bon jour
, Mr. Clerk!” Grace waved from the top of the water slide. This was another part of my new life: integrating my mundane existence with my supernatural one. No more sneaking around for me. Well,
almost
no sneaking around. Of course, no one knew the real reason why Mr. Clerk visited me, but hiding my otherworldly guests was too stressful. Grace and Ariel knew who Mr. Clerk was, they just didn’t know what I did for him.

“
C’est la vie
?” Grace asked. Now that I’d become rich again, I’d bought Grace the French horn that she’d so wanted. Since learning to play it, she had become fascinated with all things French. She ate brie, referred to every kind of bread as a
baguette
, and even wore a beret, despite the fact that Ariel made fun of her for it.

Mr. Clerk returned Grace’s question with a nod. “
Trés bien
.” Mr. Clerk, thin, gray-haired, and fussy, was dressed, as always, in white. White linen pants, perfectly creased, and a white T-shirt with a pair of dark glasses hanging from the neckline. He glowered at Ariel when she splashed him. “Lilith, we need to speak.”

“Who’s this?” Vickie asked.

“My, uh, insurance agent,” I said.

Mr. Clerk’s eyebrows shot up.

“Really?” Vickie lowered her sunglasses. “I didn’t know that insurance agents made house calls. Maybe I should change companies. What kind of policies do you offer?”

Mr. Clerk looked from Vickie to me and back again. There was a trace of panic in his eyes. I abruptly got out of my chair. “I’m sorry, Vickie, but I’ve got to go. Maybe you and your boys could stop by later in the week.”

Vickie took the hint, but she obviously wasn’t happy about it. She reluctantly got up and hollered at her boys to get out of the pool. “Thanks for the swim, Lil. We’ll be back.”