How to Seduce an Angel in 10 Days (7 page)

She knew he only wanted to break her, but his strength lay in righteousness. The truth was a sword and Ethelred was a ruthless opponent.

“You’re a raging cock, you know that?” she choked out. “It’s our first date and already you’re trying to get me to move in with you in Hell. I’ve been known to be fast, but so far, I’m completely unimpressed.”

She took a bite of her cherry tart as if he hadn’t just ripped out her heart.

He raised a brow and finished his tea.

“You’re not special because you can whip out the horns and a tail,” Tally drawled as if he were her harmless next-door neighbor instead of a demon who could summon raging hellfire and a thirty-two-ounce Big Gulp of whoop ass.

“I could drill you with my tail,” Ethelred said conversationally. “I think that’s pretty damn special.”

“Boring. You’re not that hot.” She patted his hand with a dismissive gesture that was enough to insult his manhood.

The entire room burst into flames, the fire crawling up the walls and draping like deadly, living ivy over everything in its path. She heard the screaming and the terror of the tormented souls who grabbed for her as the walls melted.

“Hot enough for you?” he growled.

“Temper, temper, Ethelred,” Tally admonished casually, even though he’d scared the sweet living Goddess out of her. “You can toss the slings and arrows, but I have to bow and scrape? I’ve held evil in my body even your
boss
doesn’t want to deal with. Stop fucking with me.”

He leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. “Oh, this is the Tally I like. Much better. Perhaps you learned something today after all?”

“Look what you did to my pastry!” She had no idea how she was going to survive another day with him, let alone the entirety of her parole. “Can I have another one to go?”

“Do you think your hips can take it?” he asked this as if it were a serious question.

Tally gasped.

“You seem determined to make me the gay best friend. I’m simply obliging.” He shrugged.

Tally looked down at her curves. “With friends like you . . .” She let the sentence hang.

“Actually, maybe we should order you two. I’ve been looking into Cupid’s past and he seems to like witches with a little more here.” Ethelred motioned to his backside. “Junk in the trunk, girlfriend.” He shook his head as if Tally’s rump were a shame on all rumps.

“I hate you.”

“Because I’m beautiful?” He tossed his head.

Tally groaned. “Because you’re an ass cookie.”

“Ass cookie, huh? I don’t know if I’ve heard that one before. At least it was creative. You know, for a female, you say ‘ass’ an awful lot.”

“For a demon, you seem pretty concerned about my language use.”

“Demon doesn’t have to mean ill-mannered. You’ve got a mouth that could blister the ears off an entire outlaw biker gang.”

“Thank you.” Tally smirked.

“I don’t suppose it would matter to you if I said it wasn’t a compliment?” Ethelred made a sound as if he were the most put-upon creature in creation to be saddled with such a female.

She grinned, pleased to finally move him to something, even if it was only mild irritation.

“I thought not.” Ethelred shook his head. “Anyway, my dear girl, we’re going to the Appalachian mountains next. I have business with a cursed gypsy prince.”

“I thought you said he was a werewolf?”

“I did. That’s why we’re going.”

“Okay, let’s discuss this logic. There is a werewolf in the mountains. Therefore, we should be somewhere like Jamaica. They can’t swim, can they?”

“Doggy paddle.” Ethelred deadpanned.

“That was bad.” Tally made a face to emphasize how bad.

“I know, but you liked it.”

“I
didn’t
. Anyway, I’m not going anywhere near the mountains. Werewolves are scary bastards. I don’t . . . how do you say in your little Briticism . . .
fancy
meeting one.”

“He’s the gypsy prince,” Ethelred reiterated, as if that should allay all of her fears.

“It would figure,” Tally huffed. “Look, can you get laid on your own time?” She really didn’t want to meet this thing. She’d just watched
The Howling
and she had to say if she went her whole life and never got to experience that brand of suck, she’d be good with it.

“I’m trying to save his life and keep the curse from infecting his sister. And before you get any silly girlish ideas, I’m still a very bad man.”

“Oh, of that, I have no doubt. Which is why there is no way in Godiva that you’ll catch my ass anywhere near your gypsy prince.”

“You said ass again,” he sighed. “Choose your flavor. Me or Falcon.”

“Falcon. Definitely Falcon,” Tally said, pleased with herself.

“He’s going, too,” Ethelred informed her gleefully. “So you might as well go with me.”

“Okay, let’s look at this logically again. You aren’t going to have time to take care of me. And with a werewolf around, I won’t lie—I want to be taken care of. You’re going to be too busy trying to get horns and tail deep in the wrong end of a werewolf. I don’t want any part of that.”

“I suppose I can see where you’re coming from, but what makes you think Falcon will have any time for you?” Ethelred asked the question lightly, but they both knew it was sharper than a dagger.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Shall Not and the Bigger Boss

F
alcon had left the house early that morning to talk to the Bigger Boss. When he’d heard Ethelred running his suck in the bathroom after “the incident,” he knew something had to be done. This attraction between Falcon and Tally was to the Infernal’s advantage and it had tilted the playing field.

He’d found Merlin lounging on the Riviera, looking suspiciously like Dionysus—the Greek god associated with the grape harvest, who was also the embodiment of excess. There was a harem of women around him, all dressed in gold and silks, some stroking his hair, his feet, others feeding him delicacies of this or that, and all cooing over him like some favored pet.

Yeah, Falcon guessed it was hard to be the boss. He rolled his eyes.

“Where’s your charge?” Merlin asked before opening his mouth to allow one of the women to feed him a grape.

“At home. Sleeping. Or hiding.” Yeah, she was probably hiding. He knew she’d been embarrassed by what happened. Falcon had tried to reassure her that it really wasn’t a big deal, but Tally had been mortified.

Merlin looked thoughtful for a moment. “Hmm. No. She’s taking tea with Ethelred.” He chewed some more. “In England.”

“What?” It wasn’t even Ethelred’s day, although why Falcon expected anything different was beyond him.

“Snooze, you lose, I suppose. You’re really not doing a very good job,” Merlin drawled.

“I know. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“You did?” Merlin seemed pleased. “I’ll have you reassigned right away.”

Reassigned? Not a chance in Hell. “Eh, no,” he began, trying to keep his tone diplomatic.

“No?” He took a drink. “Interesting.”

Falcon didn’t care for the way he said “interesting.” As if it wasn’t interesting at all and what he really wanted to do was call Falcon a bastard. “I want Tally to succeed.”

“Really? Could have fooled me. And Ethelred. And her.”

“And Tally? Did she request a new parole officer?” Falcon demanded.

Merlin ignored him, still eating grapes and cheese and sipping wine.

“Well, did she?” he prompted.

“No, but don’t you really think that would be best for her?”

“No, I don’t think that would be best for her,” he said, mocking Merlin’s tone. Rage washed over him at the thought of another warlock, angel, or demon being anywhere near Tally.

“Boy!” Merlin’s voice boomed through the air like thunder. “Do you forget whom you address?” He was no longer sprawled among the women, but nose to nose with Falcon.

Falcon was unmoved. “No. Did you?”

“You’ve got balls, I’ll give you that,” Merlin acknowledged. “So what is it you want from me?”

“I want you to repeal the Shall Not.”

“I find it disconcerting that rather than have your charge assigned to another parole officer, you want the rules to change for you. Rules are rules, Cupid.”

“When rules are wrong, they need to change.”

“Why is it wrong? Because you want her?”

“It’s wrong because it gives the Infernal an unfair advantage. The attraction was between us before I was Cupid, even before the lamia possessed her. It’s not right to punish her for that.”
Or me,
he added silently.

“So it’s all for her, is it?” Merlin sneered.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Good, because then it would be a lie. Lying is also a Shall Not, if you forgot.”

“I admit I want her.” He shrugged. “But she wants me, too. Who better for her to be with now than Cupid? I won’t let anyone else hurt her.”

“Except you?” Merlin ate another grape.

Falcon didn’t like what Merlin implied. “Look, I’m done talking about this. Repeal the Shall Not or I won’t give Nimue her refresher love arrow.”

Merlin narrowed his eyes. “You can’t do that.”

“I can do whatever I want. I’m Cupid. Courtesy of you.”

“Which was my mistake. But regardless of that, we have a situation.”

Had Merlin just said making Falcon Cupid had been a mistake? If he hadn’t become Cupid, the great and terrible evil would have killed him. Nice. He refused to think about that. “And that situation would be?”

“Which do you want me to tell you first? The part where your magick is going to fail if you don’t find a way to believe in love and you’ll lose your job, or the part where you screwed up my Grand Plan for Ethelred?”

“Uh, both?”

“Exactly, boy. You don’t have time to dally with Drusilla Tallow.”

“I’m not dallying with her. I’ll make sure she gets her redemption. Only repeal the Shall Not. Help me help her.”

“You’re fuller of shit than I am. What you’re saying is that you don’t care about Ethelred, or your magick, only getting your wand wet.”

“Hell, no, I don’t care about Ethelred.” He snorted.

“You should.”

“Why?”

“He was propositioned last night by a gypsy princess.” Merlin sat down on a chaise and dismissed the women. “Sit down. Your wings are making me hear calliope music.”

Falcon sat down, unable to suppress a laugh.

“Oh, that’s funny? You’ve fucked up my whole plan.” Merlin slapped the back of Falcon’s head. “He was supposed to fall for her brother.”

“Free will is a bitch, or so I’ve heard you say.” Falcon ducked when Merlin moved to slap him again.

“You are obviously missing the gravity of the situation. Not to mention it wasn’t free will. You shot him with an arrow. True Love is the strongest magick of all. Ethelred’s love was the key to breaking a gypsy curse.”

“I’ll just shoot him with another arrow.” Falcon still didn’t get what the big deal was.

“No, you troublesome whelp. It doesn’t work that way. Read your manual. Luminista and Emilian Grey are two halves of the same soul. But Emilian’s is the half that is cursed. So he needs the True Love.”

“What does that matter?”

“He comes from a long line of dark magick. The key to accessing a great power even stronger than the lamia is in his blood. And his curse. He’s moon-cursed. The beast inside of him will gorge on all that evil until it’s invincible. It will consume Emilian Grey from the inside out and the world will soon follow. He will become what the northmen call the wolf who swallowed the sun.”

So, not only had Falcon smitten Ethelred, but he’d triggered the apocalypse.
Fantastic
. “How do I fix it?”

“Fucked if I know.” Merlin sighed. “You screwed my plan in the ass like a rent boy. There is no plan B.”

“Okay, so . . .” Falcon couldn’t process what Merlin had just told him. He needed him to say it again so Falcon could be sure he’d heard him correctly. “We’re on the verge of an apocalypse and you’re hanging out on the Riviera?”

“First it was the lamia, now this. What do you want from me?”

“To do your damn job. You’re the Bigger Boss. You’re supposed to have this handled.”

“I might say the same of you, my boy.”

“Stop calling me ‘boy.’ ”

“I will. When you pull up your diaper and stop acting like one. Today is your day to guide Drusilla, to help her and where are you? Here, talking to me about getting your wand wet. Are those the actions of a warlock grown?”

Falcon knew the answer that Merlin wanted to hear wasn’t “yes,” even if it was the truth. His shoulders sagged. He was a Crown Prince of Heaven. He was supposed to be better than the average warlock. Merlin was right.

“You better be very sure this is what you want. There is no going back,” Merlin warned.

“No, I’m sure. Very sure,” Falcon said.

“Against my better judgment, I’m going to repeal the Shall Not. But that means for Ethelred, too. She may choose his path.” Merlin smiled slyly. “Especially since he’s going to save her life twice in one day. You know how she likes the hero type. Yes, in five . . . four . . . three . . .”

Falcon used his angelic magick to search for Tally and found her at a small cabin in the Appalachian Mountains. What the hell were they doing there? What was Ethelred’s game? As he teleported, he was sure he heard Merlin’s laughter.

When he materialized, the scene before him wasn’t anything he’d ever have expected—it was right out of a horror movie.

Tally was frozen with her back against a tree as if she’d turned to stone. There was a beast closing in on her slowly. It was bipedal, like a man, but with the twisted, contorted body of a wolf. A slavering maw filled with predator’s teeth had curved into something that was almost a smile. Rage bloomed hot and volcanic inside Falcon. His angelic magick flared around him. The creature took another step toward Tally, and Falcon launched himself between her and the beast.

Slashing claws tore into his flesh, but he didn’t feel it, not really. The wounds healed even as the beast ripped him open again. It registered in his head that Tally was screaming, but there was another woman’s voice begging him not to hurt the animal.

The jaws came too close to clamping around his arm and when it snapped at him again, Falcon grabbed its upper jaw in one hand and its lower in another. He was prepared to rip it apart. His muscles bulged, fueled by angelic strength, but just as the werewolf yelped in pain, Ethelred snapped a silver collar around its neck.

They crashed to the ground, the beast a werewolf no longer, but a man—naked and shivering. The man’s mirror image, but female, pulled him into her lap and Ethelred grinned.

That smug grin on the demon’s face broke Falcon’s thin leash of self-control. Falcon crashed into Ethlered, knocking him to the ground, his fist descending into the demon’s face with impunity.

But Ethelred only smiled wider as the force of the blows broke his nose and shattered his teeth. At Falcon’s cry of absolute rage, the demon erupted in laughter. He didn’t stop until Falcon raised an arrow into the air and held it positioned over his head.

“Fine, I surrender.” His features slowly re-formed, even as blood gushed down his face.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Falcon’s voice was as low and guttural as the werewolf ’s growl.

“What was
I
thinking?” The demon smiled around his broken teeth. “Where were you? It’s still your day. You’re supposed to be with your charge at all times.”

“Is this what you’re going to do with her when it’s your day? Kill her so she has no shot at redemption?”

Ethelred pushed Falcon off him. “What are you going to do with her? Fuck her so she has no chance of redemption?”

Magick crackled around Falcon with his not-so-righteous angelic fury. The arrow in his hand was transformed into pure light and he hurled it at the demon.

White flames burst around Ethelred, and rather than laugh, the demon didn’t make a sound as the fire enveloped him. He was obviously in pain and hellfire sparked to life in his eyes. Ethelred summoned his own bolt of energy, but his was black and heavy like tar. It dripped over his fingers.

Falcon almost didn’t register the tiny fist on his chest or the small blond head between them.

“Stop it,” she cried.

“I thought you’d like us fighting over you, sweetheart,” Ethelred taunted. “Doesn’t it make you feel all those things you want so desperately?”

Tally looked up at Falcon and for a single moment, everything inside her was bright and bare. Her need, her pain, her loneliness. The absolute surety she didn’t deserve any of the things she wanted. Her truths were sharper than any sword, any talon, and they slashed at things inside him he never thought he’d feel. It left him raw and exposed. He was torn between wanting to see more and needing to get away from her.

“No,” she whispered quietly.

“Why not, Drusilla? We both want you,” Ethelred began. “Don’t you like being between us?”

Tally’s cheeks flamed at the insinuation and Falcon gently moved her out of the way.

“I’m going to end you, demon.”

“Just take me home, Falcon.” She tightened her arms around his waist and burrowed into his chest. “Please.”

He could deal with Ethelred later. Right now, Tally needed him. But rather than teleport them back to the house, he took them to his mother’s home. Ethelred wouldn’t be able to enter there.

“I don’t know what Ethelred was thinking,” Falcon said as he washed the blood from his hands in the backyard of his mother’s house. The garden gnome stood patiently with the hose while Falcon did his best to clean up any evidence of their earlier ordeal before his mother saw them.

Tally had a bit of blood splattered on her cheek. He reached out and wiped it away with his thumb.

“I’m so sorry, Tally. Are you okay?”

She pursed her lips, but not before he saw her bottom lip quiver. “Where were you, Falcon?”

Looking down at her, so ready to break, he couldn’t tell her why he wasn’t there. Anything he had to say for himself died on his tongue. He thought she’d be sleeping? He thought she’d be . . . It didn’t matter what he’d thought. He’d promised her he’d be there.

She’d trusted him and he’d failed her just like every other man in her life had. Just like he knew he would in the end.

But it was too late for him to back out now. Merlin’s words about being very sure rang in his head like a fire alarm.

“It won’t happen again, I swear.”

“That still didn’t answer my question. Where were you?” she asked quietly. “You promised.”

“Tally, I admit I was wrong to leave you. It’s my day, so I shouldn’t have left you alone for a second. But why did you go with Ethelred? You can tell him no. You can tell
me
no.” For the first time he wondered if she actually knew that.

“No, I couldn’t. He gave me cramps and made them worse if I didn’t comply. So no, I couldn’t refuse him.”

“He what?” Falcon demanded, rage boiling again.

“Look, you already bashed his face in, which I think he actually enjoyed. Let it go. You’ll be there next time, right?” She dried her hands off on her jeans. “This is what he wants. To make you angry. To make us question everything.”