Eve of Chaos (3 page)

...which didn’t
come.

Shock froze Eve.
She’d gambled with the loss of the katana and rolled snake eyes. She always
feared this day would come. Formerly agnostic, she didn’t show the deference to
the Almighty that others did. She wasn’t disrespectful per Se, but she might be
too forthright in voicing her inability to understand the way God handled
things.

She asked again,
throwing in a “please” for good measure. The result was the same. Nada. Eve
growled, furious that she would be denied the tool required to complete the
task she was forced to perform.

The
yuki-onna
quickly deduced what had failed to happen. She giggled, a lovely melodic
sound. “Perhaps he realizes that saving you is hopeless and not worth the
effort.”

“Fuck you.”

“It is rare that
Sammael sets a bounty so high or allows everyone in Hell a chance to claim it.”
The demon grinned. “But then, this is the first time someone has run over one
of his pets.”

“What bounty?”
Eve hoped she hid the sudden fear she felt. “Is Satan upset that I ran over his
dog?
That’s hysterical.”

I’m not
laughing,
Alec snapped.

1 know.
Eve sighed.
My life sucks.

She struggled to
her feet, favoring her impaled leg. Reaching down, she yanked the ice dagger
free and tossed it aside. Blood spurted from the gaping wound, then gushed. She
ignored it for now. She had bigger problems.

“What is funny,”
the
yuki-onna
retorted, “is how you will be ripped apart by everyone in
Hell.”

“Everyone, huh?”
Eve shrugged. “He’ll have to do better than that, if he hopes to take me out.”

That’s my
girl,
Alec praised.
Never let ‘em
see you sweat.

But she heard
the unease in his voice. She also felt him poised to leap to her rescue.

I’ve got
this,
she’ said, staying him. She
wasn’t sure how, but she would figure it out on her own. Damned if some ice
bitch in clogs would kick her ass.

“Sammael wants
you,” the demon taunted. Her disheveled hair and wide eyes only made her more
beautiful. “And I will be rewarded for bringing you in.”

Laughing through
her growing panic, Eve made a third request—not quite a prayer—for a sword.
Again, she was ignored.

She deflected
the demon’s next icicle with her forearm, then darted to the left to catch
another. She threw it back. It was knocked off course by a burst of frosty air.
All the while, she closed the distance between herself and the wall that held the
katana.

“You can take
hostages,” Eve taunted, “but you can’t take me.”

Bravado.
Sometimes it was all a Mark had.

“I am beginning
to think otherwise,” the demon retorted with a malicious gleam in her dark
eyes.

Pounding came to
the locked door, followed by a string of anxious-sounding Japanese. Not for the
first time, Eve wished her mother had taught her the language. All she knew was
that someone wanted to come in, and the demon she was fighting was no longer
eager to get out. In fact, the
yuki-onna
seemed energized by the
intrusion.

Eve took another
step closer. Her boot slipped on an ice shard and she skidded, her balance
compromised by her injured leg. She was inspired by the near fall, her mind
seizing on a possible means to the end.

Dependent upon
God’s willingness to cooperate and give her a damn break, of course.

Kicking hard,
she sent up a spray of water and ice. As the
yuki-onna
retaliated with a
rapid volley of icicles, Eve shot forward, using the slush on the tile to drop
to the floor in a careening, feet-first slide into home plate.

“I could really
use that sword now,” she yelled skyward, as the white tile rushed past her in a
blur.
“Please!”

Nothing.

Time slowed to a
trickle...

The demon leaped
gracefully and was held aloft by icy air currents. Levitating into a prone
position, the Infernal’s facade of beauty fell away, revealing the true evil
beneath—eyes of blood red, a gaping maw of blackened teeth, and grayish skin
with a network of inky veins that spread into her hairline. With arms splayed
wide, spears of ice appeared in her hands like ski poles.

Alec and Reed
roared in unison, their shouts reverberating in Eve’s skull with such volume
they drowned out everything else. In slow motion, she watched the demon
hovering like a ghostly apparition, her white robes in tatters, her hair a
sinuously writhing mane. Eve raised her arms to ward off the coming attack,
then jerked in surprise as a heavy weight forced her forearm to drop to her
chest…

…weighted by the
miraculous appearance of a glaive in her hand.

Her grip
tightened on the hilt and her back arched up. Hurling the blade forward like a
javelin, she struck the
yuki-onna
straight in the chest. The glaive
pierced deep with a sickening thud.

The demon
exploded in a burst of ash.

Eve continued to
slide until she slammed into the wall. At impact, the katana dislodged from its
mooring, twisting to fall point down toward her head. She jerked to the side,
rolling to avoid the blade. It pierced the floor where she’d been an instant
before. Behind her, the glaive—no longer embedded in the demon’s body—clattered
to the tile.

“Holy shit,” she
breathed.

A pair of
steel-toed boots appeared next to her head, then a hand extended into her line
of sight. Looking up, her gaze met eyes of rich chocolate brown. Once, Alec had
looked at her with a heat so scorching it burned her skin. She missed that
look. Then again, she got hot enough for the both of them just checking him
out.

At a few inches
over six feet, Alec was as ripped as one would expect a skilled predator to be.
He was God’s most revered and trusted enforcer, and his body reflected that
calling. His hair, as always, was slightly overlong, but she would fight off
anyone who approached him with shears.

“Could God have
waited any longer to bail me out of the mess he put me in?” she groused.

“Did you note
the lack of fire?” His voice—dark and slightly raspy—was pure seduction, even
when laced with the resonance unique to archangels. It didn’t sound that way
when he spoke to her telepathically, which was sadly appropriate. Who he was in
reality was far different from who he was in her mind.

She blinked up
at him.
“You
bailed me out? What the hell? Was he just going to let me
die?
Again?”

“Obviously not,
since you’re not dead. It was a lesson in faith.”

“More like a
lesson in ‘I am God, see me fuck with you.”

“Watch it’ he admonished.

Eve accepted his proffered hand. As he pulled
her upright, his powerful chest and tautly ridged abdomen flexed noticeably
beneath his fitted white T-shirt. She couldn’t help noticing stuff like that,
even though she couldn’t touch what she was looking at.

“What is it with demons and bathrooms?” she
asked. “Grimshaw started a trend when he sent that dragon to kill me. I swear
I’ve vanquished at least half a dozen Infernals in bathrooms since then.”

The dragon had been a courtier in Asmodeus’s
court, but he’d killed her for Charles Grimshaw— former Alpha of the Northern
California Black Diamond Pack and father of the wolf she’d had to kill twice.
Demon retaliation was a bitch.

Alec cursed at
the sight of her thigh. Her toes were squishing in the blood soaking her sock
and puddling along the sole. She would need a new pair of boots.

He bent to
examine her wound more closely. “I would have gotten here sooner, but I had to
scare off the crowd of Infernals in the hall first.”

“Crowd?”

“I don’t think
the ice bitch was kidding about the bounty.”

“What do you
know that I don’t? You wouldn’t believe an Infernal without some sort of
proof.”

Alec had assumed
control over the day-to-day operation of Gadara Enterprises—the secular front
for the North American firm of Marks—since the archangel Raguel had been taken
prisoner by Satan a couple of months back. That meant Alec was privy to almost
every hellacious and celestial happening that occurred between the top of
Alaska to the end of Mexico.

“The number of
Infernals in Orange County has tripled in the last two weeks.”

Which was when
she’d graduated from training. As she was often reminded, nothing was a
coincidence. “No wonder it’s been so busy around here.”

He gave her a
resigned look. “It will get busier, if Sammael’s set his sights on you.”

“With a
free-for-all bounty open to all classes of demons? Jeez, you’d think I kicked
his puppy or something. Oh wait.
. .
I did.” Eve put weight on her wounded leg and winced at the immediate
throb of agony.

Alec tucked his
shoulder under her arm to support her. “We need to bandage that leg, smart
ass.”

“You
like
my
ass, and not because of its IQ.”

“Love it.” He
gave her butt an affectionate squeeze. Alec might be restricted from feeling
emotional love for her, but lust wasn’t a problem. “But I love the rest of your
hot body, too, and I’d like to keep it in one piece.”

The mark enabled
her to heal super fast. In an hour or two, only a pink scar would remain, and
by nightfall, the injury would be nothing but a memory. But she could help move
things along in the recovery department by closing the hole with some butterfly
bandages. She’d have to hurry; her mom was still waiting for her.

I’ll take
care of Miyoko,
he assured her.

“I’ll take Eve
back to her place to change,” a deep voice intruded.

They turned
their heads to find Reed by the door. The men’s features were similar enough to
betray them as siblings, but they were otherwise polar opposites. Reed favored
Armani suits and faultless haircuts. Today he wore black slacks and a lavender
dress shirt open at the throat and rolled at the wrists. It was a testament to
how completely, robustly
male
he was that he could look so damn fine in
such a soft color.

Alec’s arm at
her waist tightened. The two brothers were like oil and kerosene together.
Dangerously flammable. They refused to tell her what started their lifelong
feud, and they kept the memory so repressed in the darkest corners of their
minds that she hadn’t yet been able to find it. Whatever the sore spot was, the
murderous rage it incited was easily goaded.

They’d been
killing each other for years—Cain more so than Abel—but were always resurrected
by God to fight some more.

Which was just
nasty in her opinion. Why God enabled the two brothers to keep fighting was
beyond her comprehension.

“What are we
going to do about this mess?” She offered a soothing smile to Alec before
stepping away from him. A trail of blood marked her recent kamikaze slide
across the floor. The rapidly melting ice was spreading the crimson stain along
the grout lines, creating an oddly compelling map.

Stepping into
the water, Alec snapped his fingers and the liquid and blood filled the nearest
sink, transferred so quickly she hadn’t caught the movement even with her
enhanced senses. She would go home with Reed in similar fashion.

Thankfully,
Marks had handlers to pick up after them. She was luckier than most in that she
had Cain, too, although that created some friction with many of the other Marks
who thought she had an advantage. They didn’t take into consideration how many
demons wanted to use her to get to the deadliest Mark of them all. She might as
well wear a bull’s-eye for cocky and rash Infernals to aim for.

Then again, it looked
like Satan had taped the target on for her.

“Come on,” Reed
said, extending a hand to her. “Before your mother calls in the cavalry.”

“Forget the
cavalry.” Alec winked at Eve. “Miyoko would charge in herself.”

She was halted
midlaugh by the stench of a sewer. Looking for the demon whose proximity had to
be the cause, she found herself staring into an inexplicably lingering puddle
at her feet..
.
and familiar eyes of malevolent,
crystalline blue. A face in the liquid. She stomped instinctively, destroying
the visage of the water demon in an explosion of spraying droplets.

“What the hell?”
Reed barked, catching her as her wounded thigh caused her to stumble.

In the literal
blink of an eye, Eve found herself in the kitchen of her third-floor condo in Huntington
Beach. “Did you see him?” she gasped, leaning heavily into his hard body.

Reed’s arms
tightened around her. “Yeah, I saw him.”

He’s gone.
Alec’s tone was grim.
I’m heading out to hold off
your mom, but we need to address this when we ‘re done here.