Burned (2 page)

“Why are you here, Danton?” I asked and the violence leaking into my voice made me hope I wasn’t going to get into a fight with him. I didn’t think it would come to that since I was trying really hard, but for all I knew, this was part of some elaborate ruse to lure me off-guard. Hey, I might be overly paranoid, but I was also alive.

“To save you, obviously,” he replied, looking me up and down. “I found out an interesting bit of information.” He glanced at Ricky while motioning at me. “Did you know he killed Van?” Van had been the Cursed I’d killed after getting my powers. It was a big deal because he was the right-hand-man for a Prince of Hell, and his age was measured in centuries. In the end, it hadn’t mattered much. A sledgehammer to the brain is deadly no matter how old and powerful you are.

“Yeah. Hard to believe, I know.” She smacked my ass. “Turns out he’s more than a pretty face.”

“I guess if you’re into the rich country club in desperate need of a punch in the face type,” Danton said, snapping his fingers. The zombie corpses, along with the bits and pieces clinging to me, exploded into plumes of foul-smelling green smoke, leaving no trace they’d been there at all. Well, that was one way to clean up after yourself. If I had a trick like that, maybe I wouldn’t leave a trail of bodies everywhere I went. Then again, maybe I did have a trick like that. What with all the killing, I hadn’t had a chance to really learn much about the extent of my own magic.

“You couldn’t have done that to the zombies when they were trying to kill me?” I spouted, incredulous.

“It only works for disposal. So how’d you do it, Mac? How did you kill one of the most powerful Cursed in the world?” Danton fixed his icy blue gaze on me. His stare seemed to penetrate all the way into my soul. As he looked at me, I felt the cat demon who had granted me my magic stir anxiously. See, even the demon in my head didn’t like Danton, and she liked, well, no one, but still.

“He was being overly arrogant and let me get close enough to slice off his arm with a knife. I followed it up by shooting him in the chest with a Desert Eagle a few times.” I sighed, thinking back to the fight with Van. It was hard to believe that’d only been about a day ago. “Then I smashed in his skull with a hammer. You know, just to make sure.” I waved my hand at Danton. “So far all the bad guys I’ve met have an annoying tendency to not die. I wanted to make sure he did.”

“Well, since Death showed up on his pale horse and took him away, I’d say you did the job. To be honest, I wouldn’t have believed it myself if I hadn’t heard it from upstairs,” Danton said, shaking his head in disbelief. “And then, without taking a break, you take out Pierce Ambrose, the most powerful shifter in the state.” He walked over to me and clapped me on the shoulder. “With Cursed like you around, I’ll be out of a job before you know it.” He began leading me toward the overpass. “Trust me when I say this. You have no idea how happy that would make me.”

The sad thing was, I got the impression his words were true. He’d be more than happy to hang up his demon hunting shtick and go home. So why didn’t he? What kept him doing what he was doing when he clearly didn’t want to do it at all?

“Danton, you still haven’t answered my question.” I shrugged off his arm and fixed him with my best “I will kill you where you stand” stare. It probably would have been more effective if he wasn’t blurry, but I worked with what I had. “Why did you save me?”

“Mac, I
need
to help you.” He looked down at his shoes like they were the most interesting thing in the world. “I can’t expect you to understand it, but my bosses,” he gestured vaguely upward, “have informed me I’m supposed to help you rescue your family.”

“Uh, huh,” I said, resisting the urge to ignore him completely. Was he seriously implying God and His Holy Angels were telling him to help me? I’d fallen out of an airplane, not a turnip truck.

I glanced at Ricky, and even though I expected her to be as skeptical as I was, she looked like she believed him. Well, that was weird. Had I gone loopy? I must have because what he’d said sounded bat shit insane.

“Ricky?” I asked, waving at Danton. “What do you think about that? You’re the resident supernatural expert.” I left the “I’ll trust your judgment,” part of the sentence unsaid. I wasn’t sure what it was about Danton that bugged me, but something about Danton was off in a “sandals with socks” sort of way.

“I think he’s probably telling the truth.” Ricky shrugged. “His kind aren’t known for lying.” She looked at Danton. “Are you lying?”

“No,” he said, making eye contact with her as he said the word. “I’m not lying. I need to help him save his family.”

“He doesn’t smell like he’s lying,” Ricky said, putting her hand on my arm. “He will probably help you.”

“But why would a demon hunter help me?” I asked, holding out my black as pitch arm. “You told me I’m not allowed to live because I sold my soul to a demon for power. I’m your natural enemy.” I let out an angry, annoyed breath. “What’s next, cats and dogs living together in harmony?”

“As amusing as that would be,” Danton said, turning away and walking toward the overpass. “You’ve surely heard the saying ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend.’ Right now, the demon who has your family has been marked for death by the Heavenly Host.” Danton shrugged like that made perfect sense. “I mean, he has been marked since the falling, but now you’re going after him, and for some reason, the Host thinks you might win, so I’m the short-straw-drawing bastard who has to help you.” He grinned stupidly. “It’s probably because we get along so well.”

Ricky laughed. I didn’t. I just glared at him.

“Well, if you want to help, you need to start pulling your weight,” I said, letting out a sigh. “Charming personality isn’t going to do it for me.”

“You should enjoy my company while it lasts, Mac. After this is over, my number one priority will be putting you ten feet under.” He glanced from me to Ricky. “Even dogs won’t be able to smell you that deep underground.”

“If you think I’m going to let you touch even one hair on his head, you’re in for a big surprise,” Ricky said, stepping in front of me and baring her teeth in a way that made me think of a guard dog defending its owner.

“Down girl,” he said, holding up his hands and taking a step back. “There’s no need for that now.”

“Let’s everyone just take a step back and pretend we’re on the same side,” I said, putting a comforting hand on Ricky’s shoulder. “After my family is safe, we can see who has the bigger dick, okay?” I shot Ricky an apologetic look, you know, because she wasn’t a guy.

“Sounds like a plan,” Danton replied, spinning on his heel and walking back toward the overpass he’d come from.

I wasn’t sure where he was going, but I followed behind him anyway. For the moment he was on my side. I could work with that, but the second this was over, I was putting
him
ten feet under. Until then, getting my sister and nephew back from that demonic son of a bitch was my only goal, and right now, I didn’t have time to be sidetracked by Danton and his stupid antics. I just had to find my family.

Chapter 3

“And just who is the demon holding my family hostage?” I asked, not bothering to follow Danton toward the overpass. “He must be a pretty big deal if your buddies want
you
, the big bad demon hunter, to help
me
, the cursed by Hell assassin, take him down.”

“Mac, trust me, you don’t want to know who he is.” Danton shook his head. “In this case, ignorance is bliss. In fact, I wish I didn’t know who it was. I’d be a whole lot more gung ho about the whole thing if I didn’t know. I’ve fought demons before and even killed a few, but this one… I’ll be honest. Our chance for survival is not high.”

“You think he’s so scary, knowing who he is might make me rethink my decision to go after him?” I snorted. “Todd is going down no matter what. I don’t care if he is Lucifer himself. Besides, I didn’t know what Pierce was, and we all know how well that turned out for me.” I splayed my blackened fingers in front of his face. “If it comes to it, I’ll just go get a bigger fly swatter.”

“He’s not Lucifer, right?” Ricky said, swallowing hard. The look on her face made me think it was almost possible for Lucifer to actually be behind this, but that was impossible. Demons were one thing, but Lucifer… there was just no way. At least, I really hoped not because if it was Satan himself, I was going to need a lot more bullets.

Ricky took a step toward Danton and glanced between us like she wasn’t sure what to do. That was easy, she should follow me. I was the guy who jumped out of an airplane to save her. Surely, that meant she was on my side. Then again, Danton had saved us from the zombie helicopter. I could have done that too. Probably. Maybe not. I’d have tried though, and you know what, sometimes that’s enough. Screw Yoda and his “there is no try” bullshit.

“No, but close, love.” Danton smiled a fragile, weak smile that made my gut clench. He
was
worried. Really worried. “Why won’t you just follow me to a safe place? We can talk there, not out in the open where we can get gunned down.” He gestured to the flaming wreck of a helicopter. “I may have been all thunder bolts and lightning, but until I recharge, I won’t be very frightening.”

“I see what you did there,” I replied, turning my back and walking toward the amusement park even though it was several miles away. “But if you recall, the last time you helped me, you tried to cave in my skull with a steel chair. Thanks but no thanks.”

“You can’t seriously be holding that against me, can you?” he replied, with a shrug of his shoulders. “I mean, seriously? I could have killed you like six times over and all I did was knock you out.”

“Which was completely unnecessary, by the way. A simple, I’ll be on my way now, would have sufficed.” I wasn’t sure how late it was, but I wanted to get back to the park before the day crew showed up and decided to call the police due to the many dead bodies littering the place.

I knew I should probably sleep, but I didn’t have time. I had no idea what had become of my family and every second I delayed was a second that put them closer to death, if they weren’t already dead. No, sleep wasn’t an option. Besides, I was so hopped up on adrenaline and caffeine, I didn’t think I could go somewhere quiet and relax. I needed to be doing something active, or I’d go crazy. Besides, what was that saying? No amount of planning could make up for poor execution but perfect execution could make up for poor planning? Something like that.

Right now, I was ready to execute something perfectly and with gusto. Besides, maybe the walk would do me good. You know, assuming I could make it several miles with my swaying gait. Hopefully, no cops stopped me on the way. I could probably pass a sobriety test, but it might be a near thing.

“You aren’t going to make it far like that, Mac,” Danton said as Ricky sidled up to me and put my arm around her shoulder. So she was coming with me just like that. Something about it made my heart sing. “I mean, even if you weren’t shambling like a drunken leprechaun, you only have one shoe.”

“You should trust him,” Ricky whispered, looking up at me. “But if you don’t want to trust him, I’ll follow you anyway. Screw him and his lightning.” She made a psshaw noise that warmed the cockles of my curmudgeon’s heart. At least I think it was my cockles. I’m not really sure what they were to be honest.

“I want to get back to the park before daybreak. Fighting through police and staff might make searching for clues more difficult,” I replied, glancing at her. Her red hair had caught the moonlight and seemed to burn with radiant fire. I must have had a weird look on my face because she stopped moving and looked up at me.

“What?” she asked, touching her hair with one finger. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” I replied, smiling at her. “I was just looking at you and forgot how to breathe.”

“Mac Brennan, I’m not sure who taught you how to talk to the ladies, but it’s certainly working.” She smacked my chest. “But right now, let’s focus on what we’re doing. What is that by the way? It isn’t like you to be super concerned with the park’s workers, especially since you just shot a ton of them.”

“While I may be okay with breaking eggs when making an omelet, I don’t want to break any more eggs than I have to. That’s just wasteful. I just want to go back to where I left Todd and look for clues,” I said even though I was pretty sure I’d told her that already. I was also pretty sure I wouldn’t find him there, but there had to be a clue. Either way, I was checking it out. If I had to go all “demonic arm” on some locals, I wasn’t above it.

Part of me still couldn’t believe that after everything, Todd had betrayed me and not returned my family. Actually, I could believe it. Todd was a demon and had kidnapped my family to get me to murder Pierce Ambrose. I should have expected the demon’s betrayal. After all, he was a demon, and if Faust had taught me anything, deals with his kind never ended well.

Now, I just had to hope he hadn’t already fed my family to his wood chipper. I mean, I was going to kill him either way, and even though I couldn’t really remember my sister or her son, if it was a choice between killing Todd and letting him go to save my family, I’d pick my family. After everything I’d done, he’d have to know that. Keeping them alive for now was the smart play.

Still, something about the situation was bugging me. I was getting the feeling I’d been a damned good assassin in my past life. If I’d failed to kill Pierce, why had Todd felt the need to kidnap my family in order to get me to try again? Why hadn’t I tried again, anyway? I certainly seemed like the type to try again. Had I been in the process of doing so and just been too slow for Todd’s liking? That didn’t make any sense though. No one would unnecessarily complicate things by kidnapping an assassin’s family to get the already willing assassin to carry out his task. So why had Todd done it? I didn’t know, but I was going to find out.

“Has it occurred to you that I might know where the demon in question is?” Danton asked from behind us, and I heard the sound of his work boots on the concrete behind me. He was following us. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. Partially relieved but mostly worried because he hadn’t just left me to my own devices. Something about that made me think he’d be sticking around for a while.