A DANGEROUS BARGAIN (The Sentinel Demons) (2 page)

Athena unfolded her hands and laid one of them gently over the fist he held tightly on the table, a gesture of support and comfort. “You will know when it’s time for you to know. I just wanted you to be warned and watchful. We’ve always known the Winston brothers were special. The power will come through them. Soon.”

Kristoff had always known those three men were key to the survival of his people. That knowledge had been crystal-clear from the moment he had bargained with them. “But how?” he asked aloud. It was a question he had asked himself many times during the last two centuries, ever since he had converted them from human to Sentinel.

Releasing Kristoff’s hand and using her goddess powers, Athena manifested an array of delicacies on the table, and an elaborate tea set. Steam rose from the spout of the teapot as she reached for it. “Let’s have tea and share our knowledge. Everything is better with tea.”

He nodded automatically, thinking that he’d really rather have a glass of Scotch, or maybe a whole bottle. He might not feel the effects of the alcohol, but the fiery burn caused by the excellent whiskey was much more suited to his present mood than tea.

Like it or not, he was responsible for every Sentinel on the planet, male or female, and the majority of them were more human than demon, and to say that some days he had conflicting emotions about his destiny would be putting it mildly. It was a duty and an honor, a crushing burden and an exhilarating challenge. But mostly…it was just who he was, and he accepted the albatross easily, donned the mantle of king with pride. Because he
was
proud of the Sentinels…most of the time. They had, after all, kept the fight between good and evil in balance since the time of the ancient gods.

Heaving a very masculine sigh, he accepted the dainty cup from Athena, glad he at least had her occasional company to discuss the things that he couldn’t share with anyone else. Athena helped center him, and had given him wisdom when he had become a little too hotheaded in his younger years. He’d asked her once why she still remained when all of the other gods had faded from existence. Her reply had been both wistful and pragmatic, telling him that she would remain until she was no longer needed.

As the goddess started talking, telling him about her visions, Kristoff couldn’t imagine a time when Athena
wouldn’t
be essential to the continued survival of the Sentinels. They spent the next hour in conversation, sharing their ideas and knowledge before he said goodbye, her melancholic face fading as he transported away.

Kristoff left Athena’s enormous home with a lot of questions still plaguing his mind, and very few concrete answers. The only thing he knew for certain was that the lives of some of the Sentinels were about to be altered, and he had work to do to ensure that everything turned out the way it was fated. Because sometimes, even if one were on a predetermined course, one could still get lost. The Winston brothers, all three of them, in their own different ways, needed to heal from their past to fulfill their destiny for the future.

As king, he cared for all of the Sentinels, but Zach, Drew, and Hunter were special, more friends than subjects to him, which created a real internal conflict. He couldn’t reveal their destiny, but he’d do everything in his power to make sure they fulfilled it.

Kristoff reappeared in Seattle to complete the first of many tasks on his list, determined that, no matter what, he wouldn’t fail.

Be careful what you wish for; it might come true.

The oxymoronic saying floated through Zachary Winston’s head as he sat with his hands under his chin, listening to the satisfying clack of metal against metal as the two end spheres of his Newton’s cradle rose and fell. Kinetic energy, velocity, and scientific explanations were far from his mind at the moment. He simply enjoyed watching the symmetry of the movement, the hypnotic action serving to slightly calm the darkness and bleakness of his demonic soul.

If he had wished more carefully two hundred years ago, his twelve-year-old sister, Sophie, might have actually lived after his bargain with the Sentinel demon king. Zach had agreed to become a Sentinel for eternity in return for fabulous wealth, certain that money could get him the help he needed to save his baby sister from dying of smallpox. It didn’t. She had died alone in the squalor of a pest house while he was out trying to steal things to make her more comfortable, and making an eternal bargain that hadn’t done a damn thing to help her. The deal had come too late; it wasn’t what Sophie needed to save her, and Zach had been left completely alone in the world. The only person in the universe who had cared about him had been ripped from his grasp, regardless of the fact that he had become one of the richest men in the world because of his demon bargain. Actually, he still was one of the richest men in the world, although money meant little to him now. Not after two centuries of guilt and remorse had been plaguing him every single day, his soul growing darker every year.

I should have made a different wish. Sophie was probably still alive when I struck my bargain with Kristoff.

Zach had made the wrong wish, one that had left him with two hundred years of loneliness, and enough time to curse himself for not thinking harder about Kristoff’s offer before agreeing so readily. He would have made a deal with the devil himself to save the sister he had adored, and for whom he had been responsible after the death of his mother.

Zach didn’t remember his father. A fisherman, he’d died in a violent storm at sea soon after Sophie was born. His mother had been left in a poor area of London with nothing except two young children to feed and no money. Zach knew his mother had been a prostitute, using the only commodity she had to feed herself and her two children, and he had never condemned her for it. How in the hell else was a woman with two young children going to make money in the early nineteenth century? His mother could have given him and Sophie up, sent them away, but she didn’t. Instead, she had become old before her time, developing consumption after years of struggling to take care of them. Before she had breathed her last, she’d made him promise to watch out for his younger sister, and Zach had taken that deathbed promise seriously. Still, he had failed both his mother and his sister. Both of them were dead, his innocent sister Sophie at the tender age of twelve.

Why wasn’t it me who died? It should have been me!

“Playing with your balls again, I see.” The deep, gravelly voice sounded from the doorway of his plush office. His eyes rose as he glanced at Kristoff Agares, the Sentinel demon king, as he swaggered into Zach’s office with a smirk, not waiting for an invitation. Not that he ever did. Kristoff answered to no one as far as Zach knew, and he did exactly as he pleased.

Zach reached out a hand and stopped the clacking executive toy, focusing his scowling attention on the tall blond demon. Although he had gained a grudging respect for Kristoff over the last two centuries, Zach had never quite let go of the fact that the Sentinel demon king hadn’t shown up a little earlier, in time to save Sophie instead of him. But he hadn’t. Kristoff had intervened when Zach was caught stealing and had made his bargain with him. Later that same day, when Kristoff had come to complete Zach’s bargain and transform him into a Sentinel, the demon king had found Zach clawing at Sophie’s grave, angry and half crazed because he hadn’t even been able to say goodbye, hadn’t been there when his sister had perished and been dumped in a mass grave along with other bodies from the pest house. Kristoff had transported him away, taking him into his own home to give him time to get over his grief and anger. Unfortunately, although his anger and grief had lessened over the last two hundred years, his guilt and remorse still remained.

Kristoff lowered his muscular body into the roomy leather chair in front of Zach’s desk as he remarked casually, “You need to find your
radiant
. You have absolutely no sense of humor.”

“Did it ever occur to you that your stupid comments aren’t really all that funny?” Zach muttered as he frowned at Kristoff.

“Nope. I’m hilarious. You’re just in desperate need of a
radiant
,” Kristoff told him with a grin. “You need to get laid.”

His radiant? Oh, hell no.

A
radiant
was the Sentinel equivalent of a mate, the one who would bring light back into his dark soul. All Zach had ever found were women who wanted to lighten his damn wallet…not his soul.

Once…just one time…I’d like to find a woman who wants me and not my money.

Truth was, Zach had given up on taking women to bed just for sex a long time ago. It just seemed to make him darker, and more restless. The emptiness of casual sexual romps just no longer appealed to him. It left him even more lonely and unsatisfied than he’d been prior to the sexual encounters.

“I don’t need my
radiant
to get fucked,” Zach grumbled defensively, although he hadn’t gotten fucked for quite some time.

“Trust me. You need more than a quick, unemotional screw.” Kristoff’s expression grew serious, his voice concerned.

“I assume you’re here for a reason?” Zach shot his superior a glare, wanting to change the subject. He
did
want more, needed more, but it wasn’t something he actually wanted to discuss at the moment. He was too restless, too edgy, and he’d been that way for a while now. It was as though he was just waiting, biding his time until some type of mysterious metamorphosis happened, and the uncomfortable, impatient feeling was making his fuse shorter every damn day.

Kristoff shrugged. “Aren’t I always?” He leaned forward and shoved a file across the desk toward Zach. “Your next assignment.”

Zach actually released a sigh of relief. It had been a few weeks since he had been given a mission. He needed the distraction, the challenge. Boredom wasn’t good for him. It gave him too much time to think, and thinking usually led to regrets and guilt. Honestly, he didn’t mind being a Sentinel, and he didn’t regret that part of his bargain. There was nothing he loved more than letting Evils give him a reason to annihilate the ugly little bastards.

Yeah, I need a mission. I have too much time on my hands right now.

Zach didn’t need to worry much about business because there was absolutely no reason why he should. He’d always be wealthy. Winston Industries was worth billions and he knew it always would be. Any decision he made would be the right one to increase his wealth. Being rich was part of the demon bargain he had made two hundred years ago. Demon magic would make it a certainty that he stayed a billionaire, which pretty much took the challenge out of work for him, leaving him with too much time to think, unless he was on assignment.

Zach lifted the file curiously. “A recruitment?”

Kristoff shook his head. “A rescue.”

Zach’s hand halted before he opened the file, his eyes returning to Kristoff with a startled expression. “The Evils are abducting an innocent? How?” It was a stupid question and he knew it. The bastards had a multitude of trickery and deceit to capture blameless souls. But his surprise over being given a rescue instead of a recruitment disturbed him in a visceral way, an instant denial ringing in his head, telling him that he would suck at rescue. Hadn’t he failed in the task of keeping an innocent from harm in the past
? Oh, hell no. Not a rescue.
He was used to recruiting salvageable souls that were straddling the line between good and evil to become Sentinels. He was the last Sentinel that should be left with the care of a blameless soul. More than likely, he’d screw it up; the Evils would take the victim, and he’d end up with another death on his conscience. Whoever the poor unfortunate human might be, that individual deserved a hell of a lot better Sentinel than him as a savior.

Truly evil demons could manipulate humans in any number of ways. Their main goal was to sway as many untainted and unsuspecting humans to the demon realm as possible, using whatever means available. The catch was…the uncorrupt human had to agree, had to give permission to be taken, even when not entirely understanding what the bargain with the Evils entailed, since the assholes weren’t exactly into full disclosure. Wallowing in the pain caused by corruption of an unblemished soul was empowerment to an Evil. The purer the soul, the more power the Evil absorbed. And once the vow to go with the Evils was uttered, that was one more soul lost to the Sentinels. And if there was anything a Sentinel really hated, it was to be defeated by an Evil. The instinct to win was strong, the trait imbedded since the creation of the Sentinels and passed on by demon magic whenever a new recruit was changed and indoctrinated.

Kristoff nodded his head to the file that Zach was holding as he replied, “Emotional manipulation. Not uncommon for the Evils, but pretty dirty this time.”

Zach opened the folder. His breath
whooshed
out of his lungs as his inspection was met with the blinding smile of a veritable angel. With flame-colored hair that tumbled over her shoulders, Katrina “Kat” Larson-the name on the file label-was definitely an unholy temptation. Zach viewed all of her pictures slowly, taking in the creamy light skin and curvy, generous figure in every photo. Every picture showed her laughing or smiling and her spirit was almost infectious, even via the glossy images.

No wonder the Evils want her. Her sweetness practically jumps out of the photos.

Kristoff spoke as Zach continued to stare at the woman’s pictures. “Twenty-seven-year-old female. Coerced to sacrifice herself to the Evils for a week in exchange for her eight-year-old nephew’s life…her twin sister’s child. He suffers from leukemia, which is currently in remission. They apparently told her he wouldn’t die if she would come with them to the demon realm for a week.”