Guardian Demon (GUARDIAN SERIES) (70 page)

Falling into the water wouldn’t have hurt her. But he should have known her friends wouldn’t let her fall. Jacob teleported beneath her, caught Andromeda in his arms, and teleported her to safety.

With a triumphant roar, Michael advanced upon Lucifer again.

*   *   *

“Holy shit!”
Jake was shouting as he caught her. And
“Holy shit, you got away!”
as they teleported—

—back to the shipyards, and Taylor didn’t wobble this time, either.

Jake set her down at the front of the third line. “Sorry to dump you and go, but another dragon’s coming through and Irena’s still busy with that first one—”

“So you’re going to drop me onto the dragon’s back,” Taylor said.

“Ha, yeah. What?” Jake looked at her as if she’d gone crazy.

She couldn’t blame him. Taylor thought it was pretty crazy herself. But she’d lost her chance to focus on Lucifer’s threads and yank his, because that fucking sentinel had been holding her hands. Now the demon was moving around too much to get a grip on one from a distance.

But while her Gift had been open, she’d seen something else to yank.

“The dragons have threads.” As black as Michael’s, thick and dense. “Get me onto the one coming through, and I’ll yank the shit out of it.”

His mouth dropped open. He glanced at the portal, indecision warring across his face. “Michael will kill me,” he said.

“Only if I die.”

Jake barked out a laugh. “Oh, God. Just don’t do that.
Please.
”

He grabbed her hand and the next second they were hovering beside Alejandro, facing the portal. “Listen, listen,” he said, and his voice sped up so that if she hadn’t been a Guardian, she wouldn’t have been able to distinguish a single word. “Dragons
know
when we teleport. They’re always ready for us when we pop in. And my lightning frightens it a little, and I can use it to force it in one direction or another, but it doesn’t really hurt it at all. So I can’t stun it or slow it down when we jump in. So to keep it from chomping you, I’m going to drop you from above the portal, then I’m going to pop in just ahead of it, so it’ll go for me.”

“Okay,” Taylor said, and she realized that this was possibly the stupidest thing she’d ever done.

Except maybe playing bait in Hell. But that had turned out all right.

“Whatever you do after that, if something goes wrong,
hold on.
It’ll try to shake you off and as soon as you drop, it’ll eat you. And I can’t pop in and grab you off its back, because then it would just eat both of us.”

Jesus.
This was such a bad idea.

She nodded like it wasn’t, then glanced back as a
thud
pounded through her chest. Her heart clenched. Enraged, Lucifer seemed to be hitting Michael and Khavi harder, faster, driving them back across the bay toward the shipyards again.

“Here we go,” Jake said.

They teleported in front of the mirror, and her stomach roiled, but not because of the teleportation. Below them, the open pit swam with crushed demons. She could smell it with every breath, mingling with the acrid burned-hair odor of the charred spiders.

A few demons had continued escaping the portal—not getting far. One sped through now. Rosalia fired her crossbow, the bolt laced with venom. The demon tumbled into the pit and Icarus crushed it.

Lava would have been far less disgusting, Taylor thought.

Jake let her go and vanished.

She fell. Yellow scales flashed below as the dragon dove through the portal. Taylor slammed onto its back feetfirst, boots sliding until she vanished them and her bare feet gripped a surface as hot as an oven.

The dragon shrieked and Taylor thought her head would explode. Oh, God, this was so crazy. She flattened herself against the scales, desperately tried to orient herself. On her belly, she lay above its shoulders, just ahead of the base of its wings. Heavy muscle undulated beneath her. Ahead, the thick neck twisted as if the creature were trying to get a look at her, then lightning flashed and the dragon rolled into a backward somersault and Taylor screamed and grabbed the threads and held on.

Hunger and chaos and darkness and destruction burst through her mind. Her belly slid sideways across the burning scales, then she was dangling from the anchor of the dark threads. She fought the urge to yank now. If she killed the dragon while it was upside down and the body fell to the ground with her beneath it, she wouldn’t be any better off than the demons in the pit.

The dragon leveled out. Taylor yanked.

The threads didn’t go. They stopped her short, as if she were a human trying to yank a chain out of stone.

The dragon’s roar deafened her to everything but the panic blaring through her head. Bracing her feet, putting her back into it, she yanked again.

The threads didn’t budge.

Oh, fuck.
Oh fuck, oh fuck.

Heat blasted her face as the demon belched fire ahead.

“It didn’t work!”

She screamed the warning into the air, though she couldn’t see Jake or any of the Guardians now, but Alejandro must have been down there because flames suddenly shot upward.

Desperate, Taylor yanked again. Nothing, except that the dragon’s back humped upward, as if trying to dislodge her. But maybe it was the wrong spot.

The dragon’s wings pumped. Wind whipped tears from her eyes. Flying. Taylor could barely see anything as she army-crawled through the thick mass of threads as if they were tall grass. The threads didn’t block her vision but the dragon’s body did, and she looked out as she reached the back of its neck.

Heading out over the bay. She caught a glimpse of Jake popping into the air ahead, his face ashen, Alejandro at his side.

The dragon shrieked and the talons of a foreleg raked the scales near her thigh. Trying to scratch her off like a dog with fleas.

Jesus. Taylor desperately crawled higher along the neck to the back of the head, where the giant horns curved back and offered shelter from its talons. The dragon whipped its head back and forth. Gripping the threads, she held on as Jake threw electric sheets ahead of the dragon.

His shout reached her through the rush of wind and the crack of thunder. “Jump, Taylor!”

While he distracted the dragon with the lightning. So that it wouldn’t eat her.

She felt a tiny bit safer here.

Giving it one last try, she grabbed handfuls of threads and hauled back as hard as she could. The dragon didn’t die. It flipped into a backward roll.

Ready for it this time, Taylor held on, dangling again as the world spun around her. The bay above. The sky below.

And was she just nuts, or had the dragon flipped
because
she’d yanked?

Probably nuts, but she yanked again, jerking the threads to the right. Roaring, the dragon turned that way, wings pumping, shaking its head to dislodge her. She yanked to the left and the furious dragon turned its head in that direction and belched fire.

Holy shit.
She was jerking it around like a puppet.

Which, okay. Not super helpful since they needed to kill it. But she could keep it away from people until Irena could get here with her knife.

Or Michael with his sword.

Sitting up, she peered over the dragon’s head. There he was. Both Michael and Khavi were falling back as Lucifer slammed his blade against their sword and spear again and again. Their weapons all created from a dragon’s heart.

But Taylor had more than a heart available. A warrior like Michael would use anything at hand as a weapon, and here she was, riding the biggest freaking weapon she could imagine.

She yanked the dragon in Michael’s direction and screamed, “Jake! I’ve got reins!” Kind of. “Push this thing closer to them!”

Lightning flashed behind her. The dragon roared and the rush of wind became a battering hurricane against her face as the dragon flew faster. It began to turn and she yanked it back on course, and the dragon roared again as if pissed, belching fire as it flew.

Fire that had vaporized a demon.

And she didn’t need to steer anymore. The dragon had seen the battle just ahead. Three yummy people, one already bleeding from her arm. A little snack before destroying the world.

“Alejandro!” she yelled. “The next time, divert the fire to them! Khavi and Michael can teleport out of the way!”

A moment later, Jake and Alejandro were hovering a hundred yards beneath the fighting three. Taylor thought Michael saw her over Lucifer’s shoulder between the flap of the demon’s wings, but he was so quick, it might have just been her imagination.

Unless it wasn’t. He’d been falling back, but now he returned Lucifer’s blows without retreating.

Keeping Lucifer in place and his back to the oncoming dragon. Lucifer had to know the beast was there, but the demon probably wasn’t worried about being eaten by one—which was what the dragon seemed intent on, heading straight toward them.

Taylor yanked its threads to the left.

The dragon roared, fire jetting to the left. Alejandro’s Gift seemed to draw in and explode outward.

The flames shot upward, engulfing the demon.

And Michael and Khavi?
Oh, Jesus.
Taylor desperately searched the sky. Had they gotten away?

The fire cleared. Lucifer was still there—his flesh burning, but still alive. Crimson eyes glowed with hatred as his gaze fixed on her.

Oh, shit.

The dragon’s threads vanished.

Taylor screamed as the beast fell and—

Thud.

Michael. His sword aflame. He struck Lucifer’s weapon and the demon shot backward from the impact, a trail of smoke and charred flesh across the sky.

Michael teleported after him.

Thud.

And Taylor was still falling. She formed her wings and leapt from the dragon’s head, flapping wildly as she looked down.

Khavi yanked her spear from the dragon’s chest and glanced up. A second later she was at Taylor’s side, grabbing her hand.

“Let’s go! Lucifer isn’t dead, but the fire weakened him!”

Thud.

Like another beat of her heart, each blow pounded through her chest. Then Khavi teleported to the shipyards and Michael and Lucifer were right overhead, each clash of their weapons like a bomb exploding, but now also the heavy thud of bone and flesh as Michael rammed his fist and feet into the demon’s body between swings of his blade.

Faster. Taylor could barely follow the tangle of feathers and leathery wings. The warmth of Michael’s healing Gift rose to a continual burn against her shields.

Because his body or his bones broke with each hit, she realized in horror. He had to keep healing himself.

But still he fought on. Though each blow must have been agony, he blocked Lucifer’s every strike and pummeled the demon with his sword and fist in return, not individual thuds now but a rapid drumbeat of flesh and steel.

Then a flaming sword spun through the air and flared out—
whose
was it?—and she cried out in terror as Michael and Lucifer plummeted toward the ground, still fighting.

Shouts of warning rose from the Guardians. A crowd of three thousand vampires parted like the sea as they sprinted out of the way.

Michael and Lucifer streaked out of the sky. The earth quaked when they hit, knocking vampires to their knees. A plume of thick dust mushroomed up.

Desperately, Taylor searched for any sign of Michael. She couldn’t see anything. Then Khavi teleported closer and a silhouette appeared through the swirling dust. Just one winged figure standing.

Oh, my God.
Taylor stopped, her heart pounding in her throat. She would know that figure anywhere.

Covered in blood and dust and soot, Michael stood with his foot on the back of Lucifer’s head and the tip of his flaming sword through the demon’s spine.

Paralyzing him. And Taylor would have said something, like, “This is for Joe, you bastard,” or just a good old “Fuck off, you fucker,” but the demon looked back at her with glowing crimson eyes.

And Lucifer was smiling.

Still
not believing he could lose. Even with Michael’s sword impaling his back.

And Taylor realized there was nothing she could do or say that wouldn’t please him. Every scream of anger and triumph would stem from her hate and her pain, and Lucifer would savor them. She could shoot or stab him, but the injury wouldn’t hurt Lucifer; instead he would enjoy knowing that the grief of losing Joe still felt like a raw, jagged hole in her heart.

She would not give him another moment of satisfaction. Neither, apparently, would the man who’d defeated him.

Without a word, Michael chopped off Lucifer’s head.

As the cheers erupted around them, Michael’s amber gaze rose to Taylor’s. Heart thumping, she stared at him. His black wings arched high over his head, and blood streaked his skin and armor. Impressions of Lucifer’s fists dented the steel.

His bare foot still pinned the demon’s head to the ground.

Another cheer drew her gaze to the mirrored wall. The shimmer had vanished, along with the view of the frozen sky in Chaos. A red
X
marked where the portal had been.

She glanced back at Michael. His gorgeous grin flashed and Taylor flew to him, flinging herself against his armored chest and holding on. His arms wrapped her tightly, and suddenly she was laughing and crying.

They’d done it. The portal closed. The dragons and demons dead.

The world saved.

Michael’s arms stiffened around her. Taylor followed his gaze.

Khavi was on her knees, head tilted back, eyes glowing with hellfire. A song erupted from her, of pain and horror, but she trembled and seemed to fight it and the melody changed, became warmer, remorse and acceptance so deep that more tears filled Taylor’s eyes.

Then the grigori vanished.

When Taylor glanced up at Michael, his grin was lighting his face again.

“She did it,” he said.

“Did what?” But Taylor realized what it had to be even as she asked. Lucifer was dead. And Khavi hadn’t told her a few spoilers. “Hell linked itself to her?”

Like Caelum had to Taylor.

“Yes.”

“So she’s the Queen of Hell.”

“Not yet.” Khavi suddenly appeared beside them, and her voice thrummed with power. Her arm had grown back. “Right now, I’m just the caretaker. But showing the demons this will help.”

She grabbed Lucifer’s head and vanished again.

Taylor laughed and looked up at Michael. His gaze was sweeping the sky behind them, and she felt his relief.

“And not one dead,” he said.

Not a miracle. Just amazing planning. And sheer luck.

Michael glanced down at her. His gaze fell to her lips, then Guardians were all around them, hugging and cheering.

And so the kiss would have to wait. That was all right, though, Taylor thought. They had enough time.

But Michael ignored the others and kissed her anyway.

*   *   *

Cleanup came first. And then the teleporters had the task of taking three thousand vampires and fifty Guardians back to their homes.

When the giant mirrored wall was gone and every trace of the demon soup buried deep enough that no humans would ever dig it up, when all of the bullet cartridges had been vanished into her hammerspace and every inch of the shipyards examined for wayward evidence, Taylor joined Savi and Colin at their nightclub.

Almost every vampire who usually frequented the club had been at the shipyards. Now many of them showed up, along with the Guardians and humans who made San Francisco their home. Hugh and Lilith and Sir Pup, who drooled over Colin’s table with one head and chuffed out a laugh with another. Drifter and Charlie stopped by before heading up to Seattle, and Jake dropped Alice off while he finished taking the others home. Irena lived up in Siberia somewhere, but she and Alejandro apparently weren’t in a hurry to get there. She sat with him at a table in the corner and drank a full bottle of tequila—not for the alcohol, she said, but for the fire. Rosalia arrived with Deacon just before dawn, and though every vampire should have been heading to bed, her presence meant that the celebration extended into the morning instead. With her crimson skin and glowing eyes, Ash got a few strange looks when she arrived, but she was totally oblivious to them as she tugged Nicholas onto the dance floor. Though a ridiculously handsome billionaire, Nicholas was also kind of an icy-hearted jerk, but his expression when he looked at Ash was anything but cold, and when he wrapped his white-feathered wings around her as they danced, Taylor thought it was the sweetest thing she’d ever seen.

God. Taylor loved these people. She loved being a Guardian. It was crazy to think that just a week earlier she’d considered Falling. She couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.

And she wished Joe had been here to see this. He was the only thing missing. He would have loved hearing about the battle.

Former Cop Rides a Dragon and Burns Satan to a Crisp.

Not a bad headline. A little bizarre. But that was her life now.

This
was her life now.

She felt Michael arrive before seeing him. He stood beside the table, still wearing his armor and wings and Lucifer’s blood. Her gaze lifted to his.

Pure obsidian.

“Andromeda Taylor,” he said softly, and
I love you
echoed beneath. “Would you like to get some air?”

So that I can claim you for mine, again and again.

She leapt for him. “Please.”

*   *   *

Taylor expected hard and fast, but it was slow, slow.

Because they finally had so much time.

Michael tasted her everywhere, every inch of her skin a feast, and as he tasted her his hands drove her repeatedly over the peak, and she was shuddering and languid and wrecked when he finally slid deep. She clung to him down the long, slow fall into the abyss. Breaking apart as they hit the bottom, but her soul still entwined with his when she shattered with him.

*   *   *

Then made whole again with the next beat of her heart. And he held her, just held her, in their huge bed in an empty temple that was already so full of memories and hope.

But after a while, they weren’t alone.

Taylor felt Michael stiffen against her, then she looked up and her heart swelled, full, so full it was terrifying, so full that it pushed tears from her eyes, even though she’d sworn that she was done crying.

Michael had been right. Belial hadn’t looked like an angel. The demon had been painfully bright, but it didn’t hurt to look at the angel standing before them, though the glow was the same.

So beautiful. Three pairs of wings that seemed to shimmer, as did the shadows and light of its skin. Eyes of day and night, gold and dark, and a smile both warm and merciless.

She loved it.

Michael rose with her in his arms. His voice was hoarse with joy and love as he said, “Michael.”

The archangel. The one who had crushed Michael when he was young, then healed him.

“It was well done,” the angel said, and his voice was a harmony of warmth and comfort. “All of you.”

His fingers gripping her tighter, Michael only nodded.

“We feared for you, for everyone. But you, Michael—you have never asked us for anything. We want you to know that we did not abandon you. We wanted to offer our assistance to all of you, but we were told to wait.” Another smile curved the angel’s beautiful lips. “We were told that we should have more faith in humanity. It was a lesson well learned.”

That the
angels
had learned? “That wasn’t why we did it,” Taylor said.

“We know. But actions often have unexpected—and welcome—outcomes, Andromeda Taylor. As you know as well.”

When she’d tied Michael’s threads to hers. “Yes.”

“So why have you come?” Michael said.

“Because there are many actions that we would like to perform, and we have been given leave to perform them. We do not like to unduly influence the lives of humans. But one who lives as a Guardian and who sees what you do will be influenced, regardless. So there is little harm done, and we are gladdened to do these things.” The angel’s gaze rested on Michael. “Some of your friends will find that their marks have deepened, and their lives will be longer than expected.”

Michael seemed baffled for a moment, then his eyes glowed a sudden amber. “Hugh and Lilith?”

“Yes.”

So even though they were human, they wouldn’t die in a hundred years? “Is this a reward?”

The angel looked to her again. “No. It is what makes us happy.”

Probably because he didn’t want Lucifer and Lilith in Heaven at the same time.

The angel’s smile widened. “That would have been a fine reason, as well. I am not certain who is more of a challenge—the father or the daughter.”

He’d heard her mind, Taylor realized. Oh, God.

No, no. Not that.

Oh, gosh.

The angel’s laugh resonated through the temple, but his gaze was somber when he addressed her again. “I cannot give what you would ask now.”

She
had
been about to ask. A new ache opened in her heart. “You can’t bring Joe back?”

“I cannot,” he said, and the warmth in his voice did little to ease the pain. But perhaps nothing could ease that. “In the years to come, he will return and you will meet him again.”

How long?
But it didn’t matter. It was too long, because Joe wasn’t here now.

“I wish that I could ease that pain for you, Andromeda Taylor, but that is beyond even our power. Only time will soften it.” The angel looked to Michael. “And time will bring you new challenges. The Morningstar will rebel again. It is his nature.”

Michael nodded. “How long?”

“In a mountain’s age. You will still have much to do. There are many demons who will never bow to Khavi’s rule.”

So they’d still be busy here on Earth. Good. As lovely as lying around Caelum and soaking up the sun and making nonstop love with Michael sounded, Taylor knew she’d go crazy if she just sat on her hands.

“And so I leave you with my gratitude,” the angel said. “We will meet again, Michael and Andromeda Taylor, when the time comes.”

Then he was gone, and Taylor wanted to cry again at the loss. And she wanted to scream, because he hadn’t answered
anything
.

Michael held her closer, burying his face in her hair, breathing deep. Then he suddenly drew back, staring down at her. “Andromeda,” he said hoarsely, “the Guardians are not the only ones who have been unduly influenced.”

And they were in her mother’s apartment a second later, and her mom was in the hallway, sitting on the floor and sobbing hysterically into her hands.

“Mom! Oh, my God!” Taylor rushed toward her, but this was all wrong.

Her mom only cried when she was happy.

Shaking her head, her mom pointed to a bedroom. Jason’s.

Heart in her throat, Taylor rushed to the door and stopped dead.

Her brother’s eyes were open. Not that horrible, empty stare. But giving her the look that said all this crying was really unnecessary.

“Hey, Andy,” he said. Thin, pale. Hardly more than a whisper.

“Hey,” she said.

*   *   *

They didn’t tell him anything about wings or fangs. She was engaged to Michael Smith—and yes, he did run around in a toga.

When they finally returned to Caelum, Taylor could hardly fit a thought in her head. Everything was too much. But Michael knew just what to do, and he wrapped his arms around her and held her tight.

And there were too many emotions to fit inside her heart, too. But this one was easy to find, so much bigger than all of the others.

“I love you,” she said.

“I love you, Andromeda Taylor.” Eyes glowing amber, he captured her face in his hands. “And I will never let you go.”

She was counting on it. “So this is forever, right? Our souls entwined, our bodies as one, and always ready to kick demon ass.”

Michael grinned and his head lowered to hers. “For all eternity,” he promised.

That sounded perfect. Eternity, together.

And it began with a kiss.