Deliver Me from Temptation (25 page)

“I’m sorry, Jess,” he said, lowering his gun to his side.

“Returning to the scene of the crime?”

Logan folded his arms, planting his feet before the cop who came out the back entrance of Jessica’s apartment building. He wasn’t sure whether he was relieved or not that Detective Mike Ward wasn’t one of the “cop friends” currently keeping Jess company, but that he was blocking the doors ticked him off.

“Yup. And I’m in a real pisser of a mood, so unless you have actual evidence to bring me in on, get out of my way.” He had to get back to the hospital, but first he needed to pack Jessica’s bag. She would not be coming back here. Not until he could get her place properly warded and even then…well, they’d see.

“Oh, I have evidence, all right.” The cop held up a folded note card between his fingers. “Unfortunately I don’t think you wrote this.”

“What’s that?” Logan tried to snatch the card but Mike held it away. Dick.

“It’s a note. Found it stuffed into Jessica’s door. Funny, it wasn’t there earlier when CSU processed the scene.”

“What does it say?”

“That’s not as important as who it’s for. Because whoever that is has gotten Jessica messed up in some serious shit.”

Logan narrowed his gaze, not liking the prick cop’s attitude any more now than he had earlier. “Any guesses?”

“About who’s dishing out the shit? Not really.” He tipped his head. “But about the intended recipient of the note? Actually, I have two possibilities. One I’d like to pin this on a lot better than the other. Seeing how I’m already planning on pounding that fucker’s face in.”

Logan folded his arms. “Aren’t I lucky?”

Mike nodded. Oh yeah, the prick was enjoying himself. Logan had to give it to the cop, his protective instincts for his partner were commendable, and that made Logan uncomfortable. He didn’t want to like Mike. Mike had tried to bar him from Jessica. Probably had a thing for her as well. If Logan wasn’t so angry at being kept from his mate when she was hurt he would have almost felt sorry for the bastard.

Jessica was his and he was hers. End of story.

“What about the other guy. If the note’s for him are you going to pound his face in too?”

“Not sure. First I have to find him. Funny thing, though, his car used to be parked right there,” he added, indicating the empty spot near the building.

Logan’s eyebrows shot up. The other man had been here earlier? “Is this guy another tenant?”

“Damon? No. He doesn’t live here.”

Then
why
the
fuck
was
he
here, asshole?
“Who’s Damon?”

Mike shrugged looking at him slyly. “A cop. Oh, and Jessica’s boyfriend.”

“Bullshit.”

“At least three dates that I know of.”

Logan fisted his hands, telling himself to calm down. Officer Michael Ward was baiting him. Even if Jessica had dated this Damon schmuck it didn’t mean anything. Couldn’t mean anything. Not when she was his mate.

“Let me see the note, please,” he added, proud of how calmly that came out. Yup, the unsaid or-I’ll-tear-your-throat-out was barely noticeable.

Mike clucked his tongue, looking between the note and Logan. Finally he held it out and Logan snatched it from his hand. Logan read it through once, twice, sweat breaking out on his skin.

“What did you say Damon’s last name was?”

“I didn’t.”

Logan gave him a withering look. “Does he have almost black eyes?”

Mike’s eyes narrowed. “Yeah…I don’t see how that—”

“Does he make your neck itch?” Logan interrupted.

“What the hell kind of question is that?”

Logan shook his head. “Never mind.”

Mike took a step closer, his head tipped in a suspicious tilt. “You think the note was for Damon?”

“No. It’s for me,” Logan corrected, all but choking on the words. But he could give a guess who it was from: a cop named Damon, who, oh by the way, was also one of Ganelon’s merkers. It was the perfect cover. A position of power. Access to an unlimited amount of susceptible souls. And no one would suspect they had a demon spawn in their ranks. Not even Jessica—who’d dated him.

Fuuucking hell.

Mike’s mouth thinned, the skin around his nose pinching. “Do you know what that gibberish means?”

“I thought that was obvious.” Logan shoved the note back into Mike’s chest. “It’s an invitation to Hell.”

***

All those Hollywood movies were bullshit. Tracking someone across the city without the use of his gift was not sly or easy—it sucked. But he didn’t dare slip into the shade. Not when one of the peeps he was following could pop him out again with a simple flare of her power. And given that he’d be naked if she did, not a good idea.

Damn nulls. And damn all the stupid fucking pedestrians in this city. Though it was probably because of those pedestrians that he’d caught up with them at all. A half block out from the hole in the chain link fence they’d cut, they stopped to play cover-up. Ammo and rifles went into padded duffel bags; trench coats went on over the rest. Even with that little breather he almost lost them,
twice
, the last just now as they hopped subway lines at Lexington. He jumped on the E behind them just in time to do the crunch-crunch dance with the closing doors. Luckily the Hollywood movies were right on this point: New Yorkers stuck on a subway train together didn’t pay attention to each other. And sure he was at the other end of the car from his quarry, but not a one of them looked over when he played the let-me-in game with the door.

Man, all this BS better be worth it. He hoped Logan’s mate was all right. Logan, though a bit of a prick at times, was okay. He was solid, with a good head on his shoulders, but not so much of an ego that he couldn’t see the shit going on past the end of his nose. And oh man was Valin going to be in a pile of his own the next time he went to Haven. Logan’s daddy was not the forgive-and-forget type. Maybe Valin went a bit far when he used his gift on his Paladin brothers, but he’d wanted to have a chance to speak privately with the interesting null girl about the message she was supposed to deliver.

He rolled his shoulders, his skin itching from his neck down his back. Oh all right, he didn’t give a rip about the message; it was the source he cared about.

Gabby. The succubus/mentor/whatever role she was playing that day had to be Gabby. She was alive. And Valin wanted to find out just what this group of li’l-bit-bloods knew about her—just not in front of his Paladin brothers.

Thank God he’d read Gabby’s messenger right. She’d been all bravado back at Haven but under the act was a scared young woman. Calhoun Senior’s threat of holding her there against her will had put the fear of God in her. So the first chance she got—
you’re welcome, sweetheart
—she bolted. And Valin was ready to follow. And wasn’t being trapped in a moving subway train the perfect time to have that chat?

Easing past a harried mother juggling an agitated toddler and bag of bottles and poo-catchers, Valin made his way to the other end of the car. He sidled right up beside their little group and still not a one of them noticed. Holy fucking crap, how had they survived so long?

“You know, if you had to go, you could have said good-bye first.”

The null jumped, spinning toward him, as did the rest of her entourage, equal looks of shock on their faces. Points to her nearest companion who recovered quickest and tried to move in to shield her, but Valin gave him a don’t-fuck-with-me glare that had him compromising with a shoulder in the way and a hand in his long trench coat on what was sure to be one of those pretty handguns they’d left stuffed in their pants.

“Crap. How’d you find us?” null girl said, signaling Trigger Happy to stand down.

“Not find. Follow. You really should pay more attention to your surroundings. It’s amazing you all have lived so long.”

She tipped her head, then jerked her chin toward the large African American across from her. “Keon can sense them. At least when I’m not pulling.”

Pulling—that was an interesting name for her lights-out magic routine, but whatever. He wasn’t here for chitchat. “Where’s Gabby?”

Her brow furrowed, then lifted. “Oh, you mean Red. Sorry, can’t tell you.”

“Can’t or won’t?” he growled, his hand clenching with the urge to grab her and shake the answers out.

She shrugged. “She comes and goes as she pleases.”

“Where? Comes and goes where?”

“Now, that I
won’t
tell you.”

“I could follow you.”

“You could try.” She smiled. “Won’t be so easy now that we know you’re here.”

Valin clenched his teeth, checking it back. Info first, throttling later. “You had a message for us?”

“No, not all of you, just Logan, though I guess Red would be okay with me telling you.”

And why was that, he wondered. Had Gabby talked about him? “Okay, I’m listening.”

She glanced around the subway car around them.

“As if they’d care,” he told her. She pulled her upper lip through her teeth, but nodded. “You’re right.”

Of
course.
He folded his arms, patiently waiting. Damn his neck hurt. Tension, no doubt, from all his fucking restraint.

“Okay, so we told you how Red has helped us out. Well she’s also been giving us information.” She tipped her head. “You know what she is right?”

He nodded. “Tiny li’l pint-sized vamp.”

Null shot a quick look around the train, letting out a relieved breath when she confirmed no one was paying attention—duh.

“Okay,” she went on, “so, you also probably know she doesn’t bat for them anymore.”

He nodded again. From what he got from Logan during their little partnership—and what his own instincts told him from their one memorable encounter—he doubted she ever truly had.

“I think we also told you that there’s been a lot of pressure on us recently. The vamps, they’ve been especially bad.”

“Why?”

“According to Red, they want to recruit us.” She air-quoted the word recruit. “I guess their new leader is obsessed with refilling the ranks after some major loss last summer and he thinks that if he can turn some of us part-breeds who already have gifts, then his army will be stronger for it.”

Valin frowned. “How does Gabby know all this?”

“She’s been keeping tabs. Says now that the old Poobah is dead, stripping the thoughts right out of their minds is easy peasy for her.”

Valin rolled his jaw. Why would that be? Yeah, he’d felt the taste of how powerful her mind gifts were back in the mine last summer, but from what he knew of vampires and how their mind powers worked it wasn’t the same thing as what demons, merkers or Paladin did. A thrall could be done to anyone weaker than the vamp performing it, but a pathway into the mind could only be forged through blood. At least that’s what he’d been taught.

Damn, he really had to find her. If for no other reason than to ask her what the fuck she thought she was doing.

“So, yeah, this new leader, besides looking for recruits, is taking the whole secrecy thing very seriously. No blatant displays of fangs, no drained bodies left out in the open. And that’s where the message comes in.”

“And that message would be?” he urged. Time was slipping away. Hopefully Logan would be reachable once he got out from under all this concrete, dirt, and steel because Valin had other things on his agenda than hand-delivering messages.

“Red said that the vamps want to kill Logan’s girl because of some case she’s working on, I guess.”

“Yeah, we got that.” With the whole Logan screaming like a girl thing. Damn. Too bad null girl didn’t deliver her message earlier. Not that it was any skin off Valin’s back, he still would have followed this group to find out about Gabby, though now that they knew he had, it
was
going to be difficult to continue to trail them. Fuck. He rubbed a hand through his hair, sighing as he looked down at the sticky floor.

“Why so bummed? I haven’t told you the best part yet.”

Valin tipped his head back up. “Oh?”

“Sometime yesterday new orders came down the pipeline. This one from some guy called Ganelon. Guy must have some weight, huh?”

“You could say that. What were the orders?”

“New rule is he doesn’t want her dead, just captured. Guess whoever nabs her is going to get some kind of big reward, too.”

Valin scowled. Why wouldn’t Ganelon simply want her dead? He hated the Calhouns, more so than he hated the Paladin as a whole, something about Logan’s grandfather refusing to help when Ganelon’s mate was dying. Which, okay, Valin could see of Logan’s father, but everything he heard of the eldest Calhoun said the guy had been a fucking saint.

Damn. Ganelon must be setting some sort of trap. And Logan’s pretty detective was nothing more than bait. Valin had to warn Logan, and if he couldn’t get in touch with him then Valin would have to call…crap. Senior Corncob was going to be fucking livid.

Jessica breathed in and out, in and out, trying to focus on easing the burning sensation in her lungs and not the man standing rigidly beside her, gun no longer raised and ready but lowered to his side in defeat.

Damon. Damon set her up. Damon was in league with the man and that…thing across the room. Why? It didn’t make sense. Not unless he was…Oh, no way in hell.

So
this
is
what
it
feels
like
to
have
your
world
stand
up
and
coldcock
you
in
the
face.

The room spun, her chest rattling as she choked out a demand. “Explain.”

Damon shook his head, his features, normally so perfectly handsome, contorted. As if he were the one who had been attacked. As if he were the one staring betrayal in the face.

“Tell me it’s not true, Damon. Tell me you didn’t know what waited in this warehouse.”

He stuffed the gun in his holster, his hands fisting as he turned to her. His face was twisted into a livid mask. She sucked in a sharp breath.

“I asked you if you were sure. I tried to get you to leave this alone. It was your choice, Jessica.”

“So you knew.”

He cracked his knuckles, his gaze straying to the man and demon on the other side of the room. She waited. Though really, he’d put his gun away. What more could he say?

When he looked back at her his face was as smooth and handsome as it was any other day of the week. “I knew. I was supposed to bring you here.”

The pain clamped down on her. Growing like some sort of high-speed cancer through her chest. Only thing that could have hurt worse was if it were Mike or Logan standing there saying those words.

Had to concentrate. Had to think. Work through it. Mike and Logan were going to kill her if she didn’t get out of here.

“Oh, poor Detective Waters. Poor little
babe,
alone and betrayed.”

Jessica jerked her attention back to the man across the room. That’s right, Damon’s betrayal was not her only worry right now.

“Here.” The man looked down at the gun in his hand, glanced at the demon hissing and spitting behind him, shrugged. “Maybe you’ll feel better with this?” He lifted the gun, making a point to flick on the safety as she watched, then tossed it toward her. She snatched it out of the air, her right arm screaming at the abrupt movement and forcing her to pass the gun into her nondominant hand.

What. The. Hell. Did he really just give her a weapon? Like maybe it was some sort of consolation prize before the creature behind him ripped her to shreds?

“Jessica.” Damon’s black boots shifted in front of her, his hands closing around her biceps, his voice harsh as he whispered in her ear. “Don’t listen. Don’t let him t—”

“Why?” she managed, forcing her head up to meet his gaze.

“Yes, Damon, tell her why you betrayed her. Moreover, tell her what you are.”

Damon glanced back across the room, then again at her, his dark eyes impossibly black as he stared at her. “I’m an incubus.”

Incubus?
“What the hell is that?”

Damon hesitated, but then jerked, as if someone stabbed him, or electrified him, only she did nothing and the man sat back down in the chair, the demon crouched on the floor behind him.

“Go on, Damon. Tell her what an incubus is.” He said Damon’s name like someone might say
slave
, and Damon jerked again.

He’s controlling him.
Exactly like a master and slave, the man held Damon on a leash, keeping him in line and whipping him into obedience.

Not
for
long. Not if I kill him.

Damon was speaking again, his tone hollow as he recited a description of what he was that sounded right out of a text book. “…a demon of seduction. I can seduce with my body, my voice, my mind.”

“Your mind?”

Damon jerked again, a shimmer running over the black pits of his eyes. The more she looked, the deeper that pit became, the black swallowing everything his gaze landed on.

Windows
to
the
soul.

Jessica’s body trembled, her eyes growing heavy; she swayed. Alarm spiked. Holy crap! What was he doing to her? And oh God, had he done it before?

“Jessica.” Damon’s hands gripped her shoulders, steadying her as his possession over her body eased. “It’s not too late.”

“Not too late?” Jessica jerked back out of his hold, the gun rising in her trembling hand. “For what? Not too late to trust you? Not too late to leave? Not too late to save Grim? Or are you trying to tell me
that
,” she gestured at the demon perching on the husk of skin, “doesn’t mean he’s dead.”

“Damon, Damon, Damon. No scaring off our guests.” The way the man said it sounded more like he was a predator telling a young cub not to scare off dinner.

Damon lowered his hands, stepping back. His face shut down as he turned his head away from her and looked at the man across the room. His deference obvious.

His father. He said his father was making him do something he didn’t want to do. Like a slave.

Her gun wavered between them. Godfather indeed. “Are you his father?”

“Oh, I like this one Damon. She’ll be a real prize for the collection.”

Collection. She could only imagine what that was. Her gaze shifted to the demon. It vibrated as it sat on its haunches, a rabid dog chomping at the bit. And though it was obviously eager for her blood she had a feeling it would sit like that for however long the man made it.

“So you’re a demon too? Are you…the devil?” she asked Damon’s father.

“Do I need to spell it out for you?” He tsked. “Really Jessica, you’re smarter than that.”

She was, but obviously not smart enough to have seen it before. She’d kissed Damon. Told him things she shared with no one. Trusted him to watch her back. And he was the son of evil incarnate.

Sins of the father. But did that make Damon all bad?

“Oh, she still has a sliver of hope. How quaint.” The man motioned with his hand, urging Damon to him. “Come here, my son.” As if on strings, Damon shuffled across the floor, his back rigid as he stood before his father. “Turn around. That’s right.” His voice lowered, seductive, sibilant. “Now tell her your assignment.”

Damon opened his mouth, his voice mechanical as he began to recite one horrible word after another. “As you can see I look relatively normal. No glamour needed. This makes my assignment to infiltrate your world easy. Humans are both gullible and selective. They believe what they want to believe. Make a case for their personal version of right and wrong and they’ll follow you anywhere. I find the susceptible souls. A victim bent on revenge. A drug addict on the verge of killing. A cop boiling with hate. I screw with them, point them on the path that will lead them into our Lord Lucifer’s embrace.”

“But…you’re a cop.” And oh what a stupid statement that was. Gullible indeed. Jessica knew that cops could go bad; but she never considered that she might be dating one who was inherently so. But there he was. And she’d trusted him. Let him sway her opinion. Let him into her life.

Damon’s father chuckled. “Go on. Tell her what else you do.”

Damon’s mouth thinned, his jaw going stiff. His entire body jerked. Once. Twice.

“Now, now, don’t be stubborn.”

One last jerk. Damon fell to his knees, panting as he stared at the floor. “I seduce the young and gullible into fucking me. Or I convince the bastards of the world to do it instead.”

She shook her head. Must have heard that wrong. Sounded like he said he was a rap—she cut the thought off, not willing to even give it life in her mind. “What did you say?”

“I said I fuck humanity. Literally.” He raised his head, his black eyes like pits of rolling tar, mouth twisted into a sneer. “And I like it.”

She took a step back. She was wrong. The man in the chair was not the most evil thing in here. All of a sudden, Jess couldn’t breathe. The memory of the few kisses she and Damon shared clamped down on her lungs. Not enough air.

“You rape them?”

“No.” Damon dragged himself back up, first one foot, then the other. “I seduce. Fast cars, long-stemmed roses.” He jerked the collar of his jacket, straightening it. “The assholes I play, say a group of frat boys…they do the raping for me.”

Hatred. Pure and unadulterated, it flowed through her. Every breath of air was thick with the evil bastard’s taint as it filled Jess’s lungs, making her stronger. She straightened. The room still spun but she could see Damon clearly. He looked at her, black eyes fathomless, his face chiseled in stone.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice devoid of inflection.

“You’re sorry? You’re fucking sorry?” Her entire body shook with anger. “Was it you? Where you there whispering in their ears when they gang-banged her?”

No answer. All he did was stare at her with those empty, black eyes. Damn him. Probably didn’t even remember who she was talking about. Not that it mattered. Somewhere, sometime, another family’s Julia had been brutally raped because of Damon. She thumbed off the safety.

“Don’t do it, Jess. I’m not worth it.”

He was right. He wasn’t, but Julia was.

For a split second she hesitated. A split second where the cop Jessica, the one who upheld the law, the one who firmly believed those who shot someone down in anything but immediate defense, deserved to be behind bars, stayed her finger. Her gun started to lower. But then the monster smiled.

Smiled as if all the deaths he brought meant nothing.

The room wavered in a red haze of anger as her finger squeezed down on the trigger. Darkness drenched her. Wrenching agony tore through her arm and resonated through her body, knocking her off balance. She scrambled back, trying to keep her footing even as her mind seemed to split.

“Fuck, Jessica,” someone wheezed. “Why’d you do it? Why did you have to go and actually do it?”

Damon. She’d missed? How the hell could she have missed?

Lift
it. Shoot it. You can still kill him. Go ahead. You know you want to.

She stared down at the gun in her shaking hand, watched clinically as it began to lift. It seemed detached from her. As if someone else were holding the weapon. As if something else were controlling her movement.

As if something was
in
her.

Someone laughed.

“I told you not to listen to him.” A hand closed down over hers, strong and large—Damon, must have crossed the room while she stumbled around—but even then her arm continued to rise, as if her anger gave her super powers or something.

Only she wasn’t angry anymore. Just drained. Tired. She just wanted to give up, sleep.

Somehow Damon managed to snatch the gun, tossing it across the room. In the time it took her to blink he grabbed her upper arms again, shaking her. “Stupid woman. Now it’s your fight. I can’t help you anymore.”

Fight? Fight what?

The chuckle rose again. It snapped her enough from the sense of drifting that she was able to twist her head. She looked past Damon to where the man still sat in the chair, his hands clasped behind his head, watching the show.

Cocky
bastard. Likes to play with his puppets. Let’s kill him too.

She sucked in a breath. Did she just think that?

“What’s happening to me?”

The man chuckled again, twisting just enough to drop his gaze toward the floor. She followed the movement. Saw the pile of skin. Cold washed over her. “Where’s the demon?”

“Inside you,” Damon said, shaking his head as a smile—no, a grimace—twisted his lips. “Welcome, babe. Welcome to my living hell.”

***

Logan ended the call, Roland’s furious voice still screaming at him as he flicked the cell phone shut and glanced down at the last lines of the note once more:

“…Follow the smell of sulfur.”

The directions were simple enough, both in their instruction and in execution. The air in the city was positively choking with brimstone. And the more Logan suffered its effects, the closer he knew he was getting.

Should have stayed with her. That he hadn’t was a test to how messed up he was back in that hospital room. But he’d been so worried over how Jessica was letting her sister’s death ruin her life that he went running off on a wild goose chase. And now Ganelon had Jessica. And Logan’s blood all but froze at the thought of what the insane bastard could be doing to her. He felt no pain, so hopefully she was all right.

He knew he was walking into a trap, one that he might not walk away from. He didn’t care. As long as he could save Jessica. Death, damnation. Didn’t matter what price he paid, so long as she was saved. She would live a long life. And then she’d enjoy a longer stay yet in Heaven. His reward as he burned in Hell would be to know he gave her the chance.

“
Come
alone.”
That part of the instructions was not a problem. The call he made to Roland wouldn’t have any impact until later. It would take Roland a while to get across the city, and by then his plan would either have worked or not. Didn’t matter, so long as his friend arrived in time to save Jessica—and look after her thereafter if need be.

Ditching Mike at Jessica’s apartment was easy, too. A pull of light to blind the man, then he took to the shadows in a move that would have made Valin proud. Not because he wouldn’t have minded if the cop saw for himself that his theories were all wrong, but because Logan was not going to be responsible for the man’s death. Especially given that Jessica cared about the schmuck.

What had taken him longer was retrieving the relic from Haven without being seen.

But he’d succeeded and got what he was after. And because he had, the command to come alone wasn’t really necessary.

None of his Paladin brothers would have understood why his plan included the relic and thus wouldn’t have understood him having taken it. They would have tried to stop him.