Vengeance: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 3 (9 page)

Hellion followed, snugging in close.

“To the east, maybe three blocks.” I stroked his neck. “Hurry.”

Bahlin’s wings unfurled and we were air-born between heartbeats. His tail whipped the tops of trees as we rose. Sweeping back and forth, he kept an eye on the ground and generally ignored us.

“Never thought he’d impress me,” Hellion muttered.

Bahlin snorted.

“Nothing like it.” I leaned forward, every hair on my body standing on end. “There.”

Banking hard, Bahlin dropped like a stone. His wings beat furiously, stirring up the detritus of the alleyway where the confrontation had broken down to the most fundamental form of conflict—life or death.

I leapt from Bahlin’s back before he’d completely landed and sprinted toward the fight. Hellion’s curse was inconsequential. He’d be behind me with Bahlin backing us both up.
 

The Dominae had the fallen angel, Zadkiel, down and was beating him senseless. Every time he tried to rise, the Dominae would deliver another punishing blow that drove him back to the ground. A vicious kick to the jaw had Zadkiel spitting blood and broken teeth.

“Hey,” I shouted, leveling the gun at the Dominae.

He turned with exaggerated care, a slow blink preceding his wide grin. “Madeline Niteclif. Agares said to expect you.” The demon was nearly as wickedly attractive as Agares. Nearly.

Zadkiel was doing his best to drag himself away.
 

The Dominae turned back and, from nowhere, pulled a sword.

“Don’t,” I ordered, squeezing the grip and disengaging the safety.

“Mind’s already made up.” He kicked Zadkiel hard enough to flip him over and ran the sword through his thigh, effectively pinning him to the ground.

The Nephilim cried out, raising violently shaking hands to the wound.

I shot the Dominae in the back of the head.

Blood and brain and bone exploded from his forehead. He collapsed in a near boneless heap next to the pinned Nephilim, his fingers spasming.
 

“I said, don’t.” I took a step forward, gun still raised.
 

Wraiths appeared at the same time a second Dominae cleared the shadows. “Agares said to expect that too.” He spared a brief glance at Zadkiel before shifting his attention back to me. “I have a message for you.”

“Should’ve used Western Union. Or a candy-gram. I would’ve been more receptive.” Lactic acid buildup in my arms made them ache. I dropped the weapon only to raise it again when he took a step toward me. “Leave the fallen angel.”

“Agares wants you to know you’re in for a world of hurt, Hellion.” He grinned revealing serrated teeth that belonged in no human mouth. “Come with me now and she’ll be spared.”

“Move and I’ll shoot you in the foot.” I didn’t even look at Hellion as I issued the threat.

“Maddy—”

“He’s lying.” I squeezed the grip, disengaging the safety again.
 

The Dominae tossed his head back and laughed. “You’d be signing your own death warrant if Asmodeus hadn’t a use for you.”

I was confused. “Agares is our issue, you son of a bitch.”

“Oh, lovey, you have no idea what’s in store for you.” He looked at Hellion appraisingly. “Both of you.”

Bahlin, crouched low, moved forward.

The Dominae arched a brow and inclined his head in the direction of the dragon. “Keep your lizard on his leash or I’ll make this hurt worse.”

“Walk away,” I warned.

“Not in my nature.” The wraiths went preternaturally still, hovering like a memory that was just out of reach. “Collect.”

They dove for Zadkiel.
 

He screamed for mercy.
 

Horrified, I took my eyes off the Dominae.

The wraiths either couldn’t hear him or they didn’t care. As one, they funneled through his mouth, exploding from every physical opening, creating new ones where there were weak spots—eyes in particular. Rising and diving again and again, they appeared to rip him apart from the inside out.
 

It was over as fast as it started. The wraiths moved back to circle the Dominae. A silver wisp rose from Zadkiel’s decimated body to join the others, his mouth open in a silent scream of apparent agony.

The Dominae retrieved the sword.

I shot him too. Maybe it was delayed reaction, but the only justice I could fathom for Zadkiel was exchanging the closest thing to an eye-for-an-eye as I could.
 

The Dominae collapsed near his brethren.

“Holy shit,” Bahlin said, the awe in his voice unmistakable.
 

I lowered my gun and looked over to find him standing naked beside me. “What?” I averted my eyes.

“You shot both of them without flinching.”
 

“Yeah, well, I didn’t know what else to do.”
 

“Clearly.”
 

“Shift back so we can get back to Hellion’s before the police are called about the bodies.”

“Body,” Hellion corrected.

I looked back to find both Dominae dissolving into black sludge that seeped into the ground like an oil spill. The smell of decaying flesh and hot asphalt hit me with prejudice. “I think I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.”

“Let’s go.” Bahlin’s voice was already warping, changing as he did.

In that moment between his shift from human to other, a blinding light seared my eyes. Blinking, I reached out blindly to find Hellion reaching back. Bahlin nosed me hard enough I stumbled forward. As the world came back into focus and the stars in my eyes burned out, I realized the Nephilim’s body was gone.

Bahlin snorted into my back and nosed me again.
 

“Right. We should go.”

Hellion gave me a leg up before climbing on behind me.

We returned to the house, the only sound the beating of Bahlin’s wings—soft, powerful, unseen.
 

When he set down in front of the house, we slipped off his back. Bahlin shifted and started for his clothes.
 

Hellion laid an arm around me and turned me toward the door. “We’ll be in the library. Gather everyone if you would and meet us up there, yeah?”

We headed up the stairs hand in hand. Silence hung between us like a shroud, obscuring things so effectively that every breath Hellion took sounded to me like censure.

“Do you think I was wrong to shoot them?”

His hand clenched mine tight before relaxing. “No. I just wish I’d been the one to pull the trigger.”

“This is an equal opportunity partnership. I just took the opportunity sooner.” That earned me a quick smile. I’d have been happier if it had reached his eyes.

We reached the library and sank down onto the sofa in the same spot we’d been in before. Forty-five minutes. It had only been forty-five minutes since we’d left. Hellion dropped his arm over my shoulder and I curled up next to him, unable to shake the nagging feeling that something big was coming. We sat that way until the first knock on the library door sounded.

Time to get started.

Chapter Five

As everyone trickled into the room, I realized I was exhausted. My side ached, I hadn’t eaten in who knew how long and while the sexiest thought on my mind involved a bed, the only activity that interested me was sleep. I slumped into Hellion and whispered, “I don’t want to do this. Not right now.”

Hellion looked down at me, and I could see him weigh and measure how much more he thought I could stand. He curled a finger under my chin and leaned in, kissing me gently. “One try. If it doesn’t work, I’ll take you to bed.”

He stroked my head and was just about to address the group when Bahlin bit out, “If this is for my benefit, I get it. She picked you, Hellion. No need to put on a show.”

Hellion was about to snap back when I put a hand on his thigh and looked up at him, pleading.
 

“Gentlemen,” Hellion said, never taking his eyes off mine, “I think Maddy and I need to speak to Bahlin alone. Darius, would you be so kind as to stay on the first floor and watch over Micah?”

Darius gave a small smile. “Sure.”
 

“Micah, until we know why you’ve come and what it is Maddy can do to help, I suggest you stay here where we can best work together for your safety.”

“Agreed.” Micah inclined his head slightly and left the room, Darius close behind.
 

That left Bahlin.

I could feel the tension in my body nearing explosive levels, and I was afraid I was going to lose it and commit lizard-cide, which wouldn’t have been beneficial to anyone. Bahlin sank down in a club chair and stared at the two of us indifferently.

“What mess have you conjured up now?” he asked, and I was unsure to whom he spoke.

“Excuse me?”
 

Hellion patted my leg before he got up and closed the library door. He turned to the dragon and said, “I think what Maddy means to ask is what the ever loving hell gave you the right to fuck her over like you did?”
 

“Look, I show up here and find you with a fallen angel. Then I’m ‘summoned’ to deliver you to creatures who clearly kill them, though those two you capped won’t be doing much more killing tonight. What I actually came for was to find out how the three of us are going to work together, because I’m tied to you for twelve years whether I like it or not, love,” he snarked, arching a brow at me.
 

The familiar gesture did nothing to move me.

“Really? ‘Twelve years,’ is it?” I asked, fighting for control of both my voice and my emotions. No such luck. I exploded out of the chair and headed for him for the second time in less than an hour, fists clenched and murder on my mind.
 

Caught off guard, Bahlin scrambled over the back of the chair and landed flat on his ass as I was once again intercepted, this time by Hellion. I fought and kicked, trying to get closer to the damn traitor who was getting up off the floor. Hellion mashed his hand into my side and I arched away from him, hissing at the pain.

“You’d better get a hold of yourself,
anamchara
, or I’m going to have real issues healing this later tonight.”

I relaxed a little, breathing heavily and still eyeing Bahlin as I tried to decide if it was worth trying for him one last time.
 

Hellion pressed again.

“Ouch! Okay, okay. Enough. I give.”

Whether as a precautionary measure or as a means of support I wasn’t sure, he took my hand in his and pulled me down next to him on the sofa.

Bahlin stood and brushed away the imaginary dust and lint before turning to me, his eyes that familiar icy blue of his beast. “What…the…
fuck
, Madeleine?” he ground out.

“Consider that he doesn’t know,” Hellion said to me. I looked at him in disbelief and he repeated himself, adding, “He’s of two minds.”

Bahlin watched us with such clear confusion that I relaxed a little before asking, “Do you remember what happened in the park? I mean everything, Bahlin.”

Pain flashed across his face so quickly it was there and gone before I could blink. “If you brought me up here just to be cruel, then I’ve got to object as it’s entirely uncalled for.” He turned for the door.

I stood. “You killed me,” I called out across the large room.

He stumbled. Then he froze.
 

That got his damned attention. I would wager a guess that not even the moth fluttering around the lamp breathed in that moment.

“Come again, love?” he said, finally turning back to face me, though he did it ever so slowly. “What exactly have I done, because you look right as rain to me.”

“You took to the air as we left the park,” Hellion said, joining me to stand near the end of the sofa. “For two days she slept and I watched over her carefully. On the morning of the third day, she awoke. We redressed her wounds and she slept a bit more. I was watching the news when they showed the devastation that had occurred at Pickledean Henge.”

Bahlin visibly paled and shook his head, whispering, “No. I don’t believe it.”

I felt a strange compassion for him that I didn’t want to feel, so I clung more tenaciously to my anger. After all, I theoretically had a very, very long time to get over being mad. Indulging my temper—just a bit—seemed reasonable. “You remember Pickledean Henge? The place my Evolution occurred?” I walked slowly around the end of the sofa table and stood across from him. “It’s been destroyed—stones ripped up, the altar stone cracked, the point stone in several pieces. Talon marks were shown in the stones. The mundanes had no idea what they were looking at, but speculation ran the gamut.” Turning away, I fought to keep my voice steady. “You stole my mortality, effectively killing any chance I had of getting out of this alive.”

I got a little choked up and cursed myself for my tendency to cry when angry. Why couldn’t I have become wittier? Snarkier? Developed a kick-assitude that was unstoppable? Nope, not me. I was stuck with tears. I slowly wiped away a couple that broke free, closing my eyes as I struggled to regain control.