Once You Go Demon (Pure Souls) (12 page)

Dee’s chest expanded and shrank in rapid succession. He ran his hand through his black locks, pulling. “What the Jim Dandy? Did you …” His eyes turned confusedly to Jerry. “Did you just vanquish an angel?”

“Not vanquish, just got him to dismiss himself. It’s an old trick, but I’ve rarely seen it done so ...” Ramiel searched the air for the appropriate word. “… knowledgably.” 

Jerry pushed himself out of the feathered cage, which began to fade back into oblivion. “There’s always time for showmanship,” he offered. “Now, we gonna waste time sitting here yelling? Because both you and I know we got only minutes before he finds his way back here. Personally, I’d like to be safely inside the safe house ASAP.”

A pained expression erupted onto Ramiel’s face. “Get home. Go as quickly as you can.”

Normally up to blindly following whatever Ramiel said, this time the need didn’t feel genuine. Riona still stared blankly where just moments before, a Grigori had stood. “Jerry, what did you do? I don’t understand.”

Ramiel growled. “We’ll talk about it later.” He pushed Riona insistently into Dee with one hand while smacking her on the backside with the other. “Get your ass home, and don’t leave the safe house. I’ll be there just as soon as I can.”

Chapter 13

Dee tossed his keys on the table the second he came in the door.  “I’m calling it a night.” He gave Riona a quick kiss on the cheek as he passed. “Get some rest.”

“That’s it?” She cocked a hip and glared at the demigod who acted like they had just meandered in from a pleasant evening’s walk around the Commons. “You telling me you don’t want to wait for Ramiel? Jesus Christ, Dee, we just had a showdown with a fallen angel.”

A half-smile cracked across the demigod’s face. “Every so often you remind me of how innocent you still are.”

She wasn’t sure if she should be flattered or insulted at that statement.

Dee rubbed his hands over her arms. “I admit, I’ve never been as close to a Grigori as you were tonight. Maybe they don’t like my bone structure. But it’s not exactly the first time I’ve ever crossed paths with one. Besides, you don’t realize the real problem with what happened tonight wasn’t the angel, it was Jerry and you.”

She looked back over her shoulder, but the door was still closed, and Jerry was still on the other side. “Meaning what?”

“Right, because you didn’t notice how you tried to claw your way through me when he confronted Azazel.” Dee shrugged. “You know how they say the key to happiness for couples is not to go to bed angry?”

Riona didn’t know, but she nodded for convenience.

“Well,” Dee continued, “if you want to keep the status quo with Jerry, you better be sure you go to bed with him knowing you still think he’s a right bastard. Your little swoon tonight might have him thinking otherwise. Of course, I’m assuming that keeping the status quo is what you’re after.”

Pulling back the curtain, she looked out on the stoop. Jerry sat, his back turned to her, his fist still clenched in rage, staring out at the street.

“Give him a quick tell off, then let him simmer,” Dee suggested. “Ramiel is going to take a bite out of his ass as it is. Taking on a Grigori like that. It’s surprising we’re not bringing him home in a tin can. Anyways, ‘night.”

If Jerry was aware of her staring at him, he gave no indication. On the contrary, he seemed off in his own world. Half expecting Ramiel to pop in at any moment and tear him a new one, she hung back, too concerned to leave him. Finally, after several tense minutes of going back and forth, she took a deep breath and reached for the door knob.

He addressed her without turning, “Don’t come any closer.”

Her hands went up defensively, though she couldn’t say for whose benefit. “I just want to make sure you’re okay out here. It’s cold. You should come inside.”

The low rumble sounded at first like a truck approaching. When she noticed Jerry’s shoulders shaking and a cloud huffing from his mouth, she realized the laughter was his. “I spent two thousand years coming ‘home’ each night to roast in hellfire. You think I would run away now from the cold?” His back arched as he flexed his hands, making his knuckles pop. “I find the numbness it brings soothing.”

She ignored his cautioning and walked down the stairs to sit next to him. “Congratulations on being the only person I’ve ever met who finds New England winters a turn on.”

His eyes danced circles around her, checking her for signs of mental stability. Finally, the tension reached a breaking point, and they both grinned, then broke down laughing.

“Go inside, Riona. I just need some time to decompress.”

She reached out and took his hand in hers. “Listen, Jerry, about tonight … You know you shouldn’t have done that, right? Taking on a fallen angel … It’s way out of our league.”

He swiveled his head to her and took her in, amused. “Speak for yourself. Azazel ain’t exactly a stranger to me, remember? You know how many nights I spent at his hooves hearing about his glory days? How many wicked ways he taught me to lie, to cheat, to corrupt? And he was more than my mentor.”

“More how?” 

“Lucifer molds most demons into flesh,” Jerry answered. “But sometimes one of the other Grigori do it instead. Special projects, et cetera. Azazel remade me.”

A second father
, Riona thought, though she dare not insult Jerry by saying it aloud. She knew intimately that you didn’t get to choose your dad. “Ramiel was there, he had it under control. Why didn’t you just back off?”

“No, I’m not telling you.”

He could not have appeared more of a petulant child. “Come on. I have to know.”

“Fine.” Jerry huffed out a breath, letting his shoulders droop. “I …”
mumble mumble …

Riona cupped her ear and grinned mischievously. “Sorry, what?”

“I got jealous, I said. I saw you with him and I was jealous, okay? And maybe it’s because of my demon history, or maybe it’s because I’m just still that much of a caveman, but I saw your body pressed to his and I wanted him to die.”

Riona wouldn’t deny the admission gave her a bit of a thrill. “You had nothing to be jealous of. I was only feeling him up for information. I was much more thrown off kilter by his damned demon horse than the pull of his body. Speaking of which …” Until now, she’d forgotten the odd occurrence. “Was that really what it was? A demon horse?”

“I’m sure you’ve heard of the four horsemen of the apocalypse?” Jerry asked. She nodded. “Well,
that
was one of the horses. Nasty hellbeasts, they are.”

“I see.” Well, at least she wasn’t crazy, and the draw to the horse must have been an extension of its connection with an angel.  A chill racked her as the winter wind kicked up again, tossing her hair into a halo around her head. She threaded her arms through his and tried to yank him up, but he refused to budge. “Jerry, please come inside. It’s freezing out here.”

“Can’t.”

“Sure you can. You just lean forward a bit, I’ll pull you up, and we’ll be through the doors in no time.”

“No, you don’t understand. I can’t,” he insisted. She fixed her curiosity on him, and he had the good will enough not to shun it.  “I want to tell you something, but it’s a secret. You can’t tell Dee, and you especially can’t tell Ramiel.”

“Is this our Dr. Phil moment?” Her tone was light, but nerves colored it with uncertainty.

“I’m being serious. Riona, do you promise?”

Jerry sighed, pulling her hands into his. He closed his eyes and went silent. Her eyes narrowed, focusing on his lips, waiting for some devastating truth to tumble out. So fixed was she, in fact, that it took her a moment to register the heat collecting on her fingertips, spreading up her arms and into her chest. When she broadened her field of vision she saw his secret dancing all about them.

Jerry’s eyes shot up, his look the oddest combination of utter regret and a need for acceptance.

“You’re burning hellfire,” Riona muttered. He gave her assertion an acknowledging bob of his head. “But I thought only the damned could wield hellfire.”

“So did I,” Jerry said achingly. “Riona, I’m a good man, or at least I’m trying to be. Don’t doubt that. But … I don’t know. I can still feel Hell burning in my veins. I reach for heavenlight, but there’s still this darkness within me, a temptation to corrupt, to consume. There’s part of me still in touch with my inner demons, and when he saw you tonight with another man. God help me, I wanted to stab him with an ice pick before dragging you to a corner to reclaim you against the nearest available wall.”

She wasn’t quite sure when her breath had hitched, or when she’d started biting her bottom lip. “You did get rid of him, and you successfully kept yourself from going all caveman.”

Before she could realize what he was doing, Jerry had leaned into her, taking in the scent of her hair, putting his lips to the edge of her ear as he spoke. “But there are so many corners in that house. And two big, inviting beds.” As though he himself suddenly became aware of his proximity, Jerry shrunk back, shame-faced. “That’s why I can’t come in now … The Hellfire won’t let me go. It wants me to take you. And Ramiel’s protection charm knows it. I have to cool off before I can cross inside.”

The realization hit her. “This has happened before.”

A nod from the ex-demon confirmed it. “Not as bad, not as intense, but yes.”

“Okay. Okay.” She stood and offered a hand out to him. “I won’t tell anyone, but it’s cold and I can’t leave you out here alone. Get your ass inside.”

He looked at her hand with tender eyes before taking it and rising to his feet. He tried walking up the stoop with her. Two steps in, Jerry bounced backward as good as if he’d been shoved by a bouncer.

“Not ready,” he chuckled, balling fists that he tried unsuccessfully to hide under his jacket.

She lumbered back down a step. “Well, there’s got to be a trick to it. What works?”

“Works?”

“Yeah, centers you. Cleanses your chi. Whatever the hell you want to call it.”

He shrugged. “Usually thinking about something that reminds me I’m human, thinking about people I cared about when I was alive, stuff like that. But I’ve never been this riled up before. It’s not working.”

“Definition of insanity, et cetera,” she said with a wave of her hand. “Try something different then. What else can we think of that would align your soul with the light?”

“I suspect something that might work, but …” His words trailed off as his cheeks went from air-crisped white to crimson.

“But nothing. You’ve forgotten the thrill of being human: trying stuff you’re destined to fuck up. Just do it. So, what is it?”

Jerry looked at her uncertainly, unmoving. Then, in a desperate, needful attack, he anchored his arms on hers and pulled her down to him, covering her mouth with his.

Impish voices in her head told her to pull back, but her head wasn’t exactly the part of her body in charge at the moment. As Jerry’s lips worked over hers, as his scent filled her senses, she felt her heart turning and heard herself moan. She had kissed Marc before, however wrong it had been, and would have expected the experience to be similar now. After all, it might be Jerry’s soul, but there was no physical difference in the mouth on hers. She had never been more wrong. Jerry’s kiss demolished her will.

Clouds of condensation formed between them when at last he pulled back far enough to touch his forehead to hers. Panting, his voice was raspy, sharp. “I’m sorry, it was an impulse. I didn’t mean to …”

“You’re … feeling … human, I guess,” Riona gasped.

Jerry smiled against her mouth. “Actually, it’s been a long time since I’ve felt like this much of a man.”

She pulled back in full without tripping, though barely, to the front door. “And can you cross the barrier now?” 

The next moment, she was sorry she’d asked. He consumed the remaining distance with two paced steps, reminding her of a lion moments before it leapt towards its prey. Without touching her, he came, his hands on the door at the level of her eyes, framing her on each side.

Jerry began to lower his head again, his eyes focused on her lips. “And so you save me again.”

Wildly, Riona shook her head. “Jer, don’t. I … I won’t hold that against you, but I can’t. I … I still love Marc.”

With a dark laugh, he glanced down at the Marc-suit that was his
corpse du jour
. “It’s not like we haven’t role-played before,” he said before looking back up at her. “Or did you not enjoy kissing me again? Those swollen lips and the way you moaned into me suggests otherwise.”

Behind her back, her hands sought contact with the doorknob. Pretend she was with Marc? If not for those blue eyes, she’d be tempted to do just that. But no matter how she rationalized it, she knew it would be a betrayal on so many levels.

“Trips down memory lane,” was her only reply. At last, she felt the stingingly frigid metallic latch under her thumb. “I’m glad I could help, but this was a one-time only thing, Jerry. Don’t expect that this changes anything between us.”

She practically fell through the door when it opened behind her. Jerry let his arms lower to his side as he prowled in to the house after her. “You keep thinking I’m trying to take Marc’s place. I’m not. I loved you first; he was trying to take mine.”

“Come on, Jer, our time together … Even if I was to ignore the fact that you were with me on assignment from the Devil, and the way it ended, the time I was with you, it was never a relationship built on anything except a few laughs and a lot of sex.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“It’s a horrible thing,” she coughed out incredulously. “Fine, yes, I liked being with you back then. But that’s before I knew everything, and before I fell in love with someone else.”

“He’s dead, and I’m not.” He had made up the distance between them, and though his hand raised to her face, poised to stroke her cheek, he withheld. “I’m sorry for what happened to Marc, Riona, but he gave his life to save you. You think he did it so you could make good his debt to the church by making yourself into a nun?”

“Of course not.”

“Good, because you’re not,” Jerry hissed back. “You are a vibrant, intelligent, passionate, kick-ass witch, and you’re fucking sexy as hell. You have powers you haven’t even begun to discover, and a heart that knows no limits. You have a body that demands to be worshipped. And you deserve to be loved and to be made love to, and goddess in grief, Riona, after what I’ve gone through to save you, I deserve at least a chance.” His arm lashed out, his finger pointing the way down the hall. “By all the mercies of Heaven and Hell, let me take you to my room and make
you
feel so much more than human.”

“No.” Tears pricked the corner of her eyes, and she inwardly yelled at the way her body attempted to maneuver itself to lean in to his embrace. If she didn’t take command now, her will was about to join Elvis and her good sense on its way out the building. “Thank you for defending my honor against Azazel, but you’re not demon anymore. No matter what connection you still have with Hell, not in the way that counts. I don’t care what inside scoop you have, we both know that Azazel could have smashed you to paste if he wanted. Please, Jerry, I already have Marc’s blood on my hands. Don’t put me in a position where I have to look at yours, too.”

To her surprise, he relented. Pushing his hands down in to his pockets, his eyes trained on the floor. “Fine.” Kicking the balustrade before turning down the hall, he exhaled. “If that’s the way you want it, I’ll back off.
For now
.”