Mercy for the Wicked (30 page)

“Ben can’t break my heart because I never fully gave it to him.  Parker… Look, I appreciate what you’re trying to do here, but you’re way off base about Ben and me.”

“I know, I stuck my nose in, but I figured worst case scenario, you two can clear the air between you and move on.  I could see how much it bummed you out not to have that closure.”

Closure?  “Since when did you get to be so intuitive?  I could have sworn the only thing you were paying attention to was my cleavage,” I teased.

“Well, that goes without saying,” he gave me a wolfish grin, “but I pay attention.”

“And it’s really okay if I go home early?  You said before…”

“I know what I said, but it’s slow enough that Jilly can handle the bar for a while and I’ll be back out there soon.  You go ahead and get your shit together and be back in bright and early tomorrow ready to work.”

I waited for some other sarcastic remark to come out of him, but he looked to be in earnest.  Coming around the desk, I bent down to wrap my arms around his neck.  “I don’t care what anyone says about you, Parker.  You’re not a heartless bastard at all,” I laughed, hugging him tight.  After a moment’s hesitation, I felt him hug me back.

“Don’t spread it around, I’ll deny it.”

“Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me, boss.”  I dropped a quick kiss on his cheek as I pulled away, untying my apron and tossing it into the hamper.  “Wish me luck.”

“You won’t need it, kiddo.  Now get out of here, I’ve got work to do.”

“Yes, sir.” I gave him a mock salute, grabbing my purse on the way out.  After a quick word to Jilly, I found Ben waiting by the entrance.  I was half convinced he’d lose his nerve and take off by the time I got back to him.

“All set?” he smiled.

“Yeah, let’s go.”

Chapter Twenty

The car ride home was awkward, I’m not gonna lie.  Neither one of us said much, listening to the radio until we got there and I led the way up to my apartment.  “Hold on a sec, I want to make sure we have some privacy.”  I stopped him at the front door.

“Oh, Sam is still staying here, right?”

“Yeah, right,” I nodded with a tight smile.  I didn’t think he was ready to see Nelo again quite so soon.  “I’ll be right back, don’t go anywhere.”  Ducking inside, I switched on the lights in the darkened apartment.  “Nelo?”

“Yes, Mistress?”  His voice came from the bathroom.

“Hey, I have company so try and make yourself scarce,” I whispered through the closed door. 

“You wish me to hide?”

“Not hide exactly.  It’s Ben though, and you know how he gets.”

“Oh.”  There was silence for a moment.  “I understand.  I will keep to the shadows.”

“Great, thanks.  Have you seen Sam around?”

“He is with Miss Daphne at the season’s most hilarious comedy and best feel good movie of the year.  They will laugh and cry,” Nelo reported, and I could imagine Sam going on about it.  I was pretty sure what movie they were at, and I wondered if things between them had graduated into an official date, or if it was still a ‘friends’ thing.  Either way, the coast was clear.  Idly I wondered what Nelo was doing in the bathroom, but decided I was better off not knowing.  Mimsy was safe, asleep on the end of my bed, so whatever it was, he couldn’t be getting into too much trouble.  Could he?

Returning to Ben in the hallway, I opened the door and invited him in.  “We should have plenty of privacy here, Sam’s out with Daphne tonight.”

His brows came up in surprise over that.  “Oh, I didn’t realize they were a couple.”

“Well, they’re taking things slow.” I flipped my hand back and forth.  “Come on in and have a seat.  Can I get you something to drink?  Some coffee?”

“No, thanks.  Mercy…” Ben took my hands when I would have turned away to put the pot on for myself and I guess I couldn’t blame him.  I tended to try and fill the space by focusing on busywork, and we did need to talk.  “I want to start off by apologizing.”

“You’re apologizing to me?” I blinked, not expecting him to say that at all.

“Yes, I am.  I was way out of line the last time I was here.  Here you were, all upset and alone after going through some pretty horrific things, and all I did was jump down your throat.  Do you think you can ever forgive me?”

“I…”  It didn’t happen to me very often, but I was at a complete loss for words.  Usually something smart alecky came to mind, but I had nothing. 

“It’s okay if you need some time, but I wanted you to know I’m here for you if you’ll still have me, and I’m sorry I screwed things up.”

“Ben…”  Christ, could I feel any guiltier?  He was being so nice, how could I break it to him that I’d essentially already moved on?  “It wasn’t all your fault,” I finally added lamely.  “I could have been more open with you from the start.  In fact, there are more things you should know.  Things I should have been honest about with you for a long time.”

“Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter.”  He gave my hands a squeeze.  “I’ve missed you so much these past few days, and to be honest, I was looking for a way to work up the courage to come and beg you to take me back before Parker called.”

Oh no…
  “Ben, we should sit down for a minute and…”

“I should have told you this a long time ago…”

“…there are things you don’t know about my time in Midian and…”

“I love you.”

Oh God…

“I was afraid if I said it I’d scare you away, but I’ve got nothing to lose now, right?” he gave me a lopsided smile and I felt so horribly guilty, it was paralyzing.

“Ben…I don’t know what to say.”

“Say you love me too and we’ll put all this where it belongs, in the past.”

How did I respond to that and not absolutely crush his spirit?  “Ben, come and sit down with me.”  I needed a few seconds to regroup as I led him to the sofa.  “I think… I think we need to take a step back here for a moment and acknowledge we have some real problems.  We can’t slap a band aid on them and hope they go away.”

“I remember the very first time I saw you, lying in the hospital bed and I thought… you were so beautiful.  Even amid all that sickness and death you shone like a star in the darkness, and I knew I had to get to know you.”

My brows drew together at the segue.  “Okay, that was… random.  I’m not saying we didn’t have something real, we did, but something happened along the way.  We grew farther and farther apart, and I’m not convinced we ever really belonged together to start with.”

“How can you say that?” he frowned, picking up my hand again.  “We had some great times together.  The best times in my life were spent with you.  What about the time we went to the park together and fed the ducks?  You love ducks.”

What was with the walk down memory lane?  I love ducks?  He wasn’t getting it.  To stick with the band-aid analogy, I was gonna have to rip it off.  “I am in love with someone else.”

“Adam,” he said succinctly. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to.  In fact, it was the last thing I wanted to happen, but he kinda snuck up on me.”

“Adam will drop you the first time someone else dangles a piece of ass in front of him.”

“Hey!  You don’t know him at all, he loves me too, he told me so.”

“And you believed him?”  His tone was pitying, and it grated on my nerves.

“Why shouldn’t I believe him?”

“You’re going to take the word of an angel who was kicked out of heaven for breaking faith with God, and who has spent the past few millennia debauching himself with anything that moves?”

That seemed a little harsh, but I couldn’t blame him for being upset.  I wished I hadn’t had to blurt it out like that, but he’d forced my hand.  “I know he’s not perfect, and I’m not saying he doesn’t have his faults, but I
know
he loves me.”  My faith in that was unshakable. 

“Where is he then?  Or is he hiding in the bedroom?  Is that who you were talking to when we first got here?  Keep the new boyfriend tucked away while the old boyfriend comes to call?”

“No, he’s not here, I was making sure we’d have some privacy.”

“Oh, then I applaud your discretion.  Were you planning on giving me a pity fuck before you cut me loose?”

“Excuse me?”  I thought I must have misheard him, there was no way Ben would talk to me that way. 

“What, no last go for old time’s sake?  Come now, Mercy, I think you owe me that much, don’t you?”

“I think you should go home now.”  I rose to my feet, but he caught hold of my arm and yanked me back down to the couch again and my heart fell into the pit of my stomach. 

“I don’t think so, I’m not done with you yet.” 

“Ben, I know you’re upset…”

Strangely enough that made him smile.  “Am I?  Do I appear upset?  How good of you to notice.”  I was still reeling from the rapid shift of emotions when he backhanded me across the cheek.  I’m not talking a little love tap either, I mean the fucker hit me hard enough to make my head rock back against the arm of the couch and I lay there, too stunned to move.  Never in a million years would I have imagined Ben hitting a woman, especially one he claimed to love.  And that’s when it hit me with more force than the blow to the head. 

It wasn’t Ben.

“You screwed up.  Ben would never hit me like that,” I managed to get out, my hand going to my cheek, which throbbed something fierce.

“No?  I can’t imagine why not,” Azazael smiled out of Ben’s eyes.  “What a little tease you are, inviting the man back to your apartment to break his heart.  Why didn’t you do it at the club if you weren’t going to give him one last thrust?” 

“Not that I expect you to understand, but I was trying to spare his feelings.”

“How sweet.  Lucky for me you decided to secure the privacy I need to get what I want.”  Ben grabbed a handful of my hair, dragging me closer, and a whimper of pain escaped my lips despite my best efforts to keep my fear from showing.  Unfortunately it shone from every pore as the Grace made my skin start to glow.

“You can’t force me.  It has to be freely given.  That’s what the prophecy stipulated, remember?”

“I’m willing to do a little experimenting.  You’re the one being difficult.  I could have made this beautiful, special.  You’re the one that’s making me hurt you.”  His free hand came up to stroke the cheek he’d hit tenderly and I shrank away from his touch, making me wince as his fingers tightened painfully in my hair. 

“I’m warning you.  Let me go.”  I didn’t want to hurt him, not while he was in Ben’s body, but I wasn’t going to let him attack me either.

“Let’s see if we can’t put that pretty mouth of yours to better use, shall we?”  He smashed his lips against mine in an obscene mockery of a kiss, and I blasted him good with my Grace while I scrambled out from under him.  But instead of going down, he merely absorbed the blow, and with a roll of the shoulders he came right for me again, shoving the couch negligently aside with one hand.   

“You’ll have to do better than that while I’m in this body.  That was barely more than foreplay.” 

So much for my preferred weapon against humans.  That left me one other option besides screaming bloody murder and having the neighbors call the cops.  I called the sword to my hand, gratified to feel its comforting weight in my grasp.  That gave him pause, and he halted his advance, watching me warily.

“So, your little toy works here as well, does it?”

“And I’m guessing yours doesn’t.  Definitely not in Ben’s body, am I right?”  I could tell by the look on his face that I was, but he wasn’t disturbed enough by it to back off.  Instead he circled around, watching me carefully.  “Leave now, and don’t ever come back.”  I circled too, leaving him a clear shot at the door.

“I haven’t gotten what I came for,” he protested, the smile returning to his lips as he started in closer again, moving slowly.

“Don’t be stupid, I know how to use this,”
not a lie
.  Okay, technically it wasn’t a lie, only my skills were rudimentary at best.  He didn’t seem to be too worried about it as he continued his slow advance, but I held my ground.  “Don’t make me do this…”

“You wouldn’t want to hurt sweet, dependable, old Ben, now would you?”  His hands came up in a supplicating gesture, but still he advanced.  I flashed out with the tip of the sword, nicking him in the side.  “Ow, that hurt, you bitch!”  He seemed more surprised than anything else.

“I told you to back off.”

“I’m through playing games.  Sword or no sword, I will have you on your back.”  He stepped forward again and I was forced to respond, managing to hit his shoulder that time instead of his heart as I’d been training to do.  It was both easier and harder than I thought it would be to run a man through, especially one I cared about.  That time the sword cut through flesh and bone alike to reappear behind him.  Ben froze on the end of my sword, his eyes wide with pain before he staggered backwards and I pulled it free.

“Please, just go…” I begged him, worried about the rapidly spreading stain on his shirt.  If Ben died because of me, I didn’t think I would be able to live with myself.

“Alright, you’ve made your point,” he laughed with a raspy cough and I eased my stance a little, until I saw him come up with the gun in his hand.  “I believe a gun trumps the sword.  Marvelous little weapons, these.  So easy to use.  Even without the detective’s skills, I’m fairly certain I could cause you all manner of damage from this distance.”

“You won’t shoot me, you need me, remember?”  I put all the bravado I could muster into those words.

“I need parts of you, not all of you.  It would serve my purpose perfectly well if you ended up a feeble minded idiot in the hospital.  They might even give you into my care, me being the doting boyfriend and all.”

His words painted a frightening picture and I backed away until I came up against the kitchen, the corner of the breakfast bar digging painfully into my side.  “If you shoot that thing, people will come.”

“No one is coming for you, Merceline.  Now yield to me, or find out how far I’m willing to go.” 

“I wouldn’t say no one,” Adam drawled, looking cool and collected as he leaned against the wall.  “Sorry I’m late, babydoll.  Traffic was a bitch.”