One Handsome Devil (38 page)

"Who dares disturb the rest of Beljackseroph.” The male voice was angry, powerful, and most definitely Jack.

"Is that your real name?” Katra asked.

"You humans have caused more than enough trouble for me. I ordered you to leave me alone, to stop your petty requests."

"Maybe you guys should go,” Sara suggested. “I think this is something that Jack and I need to have out in private."

"Good idea.” Katra actually giggled when she left. “Good thing you decided to wear that outfit."

Sara blushed in the darkness. The cool but diaphanous dress Katra had persuaded her to buy now seemed just a little too forward.

"Remind him I want just one more cup size,” Mona said as she followed her sister out the front door to Sara's apartment. “Oh, and ask if he has any friends."

"Get out."

Mona closed the door firmly.

"I asked you a question,” Jack growled.

"There aren't any wards. You can come over here and have a seat,” Sara told him.

Her eyes adjusted and she could now make out Jack's looming shape.

He looked like he had just gotten out of the shower. His hair was tousled, his jeans still unbuttoned, and no shirt marred the beautiful shape of his broad chest and hard stomach.

"I could use a glass of water."

"I'll get you one.” She walked to the kitchen and poured him a large glass, then got one for herself.

"I know you're angry,” Sara told him as she passed him the glass. “I treated you badly, didn't trust you even when Katra explained what you had done."

"So you decided to destroy me by dragging me back to this plane again, after I had told you about my paradise."

She nodded. “I had to."

He waved a hand and the lights returned, glowing more softly than their electrical circuitry normally allowed. “I don't understand."

"I love you, Jack. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, have your babies if that's what you want."

"I can't stay here."

He had explained that enough times that she could hardly have missed the point.

"Then I'll come with you."

Jack stared at her and she knew he was doing it again, looking into her with those strange demon powers he had. “You need the open spaces. I don't have any. It isn't going to work."

She shook her head. “You're not going to get away that easily after all I've done to get you back. Fix me, the way you fixed Katra. Go into my brain and straighten things out so I won't be afraid of the enclosed spaces any more."

He took a large swallow from the glass of water that she'd given him, then stepped toward her. “Is that what you want?"

"What I want is to live with you. Everything else is negotiable."

He reached out for her, his hand searingly hot on the naked skin of her arm. “I can't fix you."

"Why?"

"Because you aren't broken. Because your love for the outside is genuine love, not a fear. Because if I ripped that part of you away, I would destroy you."

She nodded slowly, ignoring the tears that welled in her eyes. This was worse than she'd feared but at least he wasn't rejecting her outright.

An errant thought came to her. “You know, you used the word
love
."

Jack looked thoughtful. “I—hum. I would have thought that impossible."

Not that it mattered. Sara took a deep breath and plunged in way over her head. “So what if you can't cure me? I'll be with you and that's what's important."

Sorrow and want filled his eyes, but he shook his head. “It is too much to ask."

Anger flared up in her. “Nobody asked you. Unless you tell me, honestly, that you don't want me, I'm going to spend the rest of my life with you. I think the operative question is, your place or mine. My place doesn't work so we're going to yours."

He reached out, stroked her arm gently. It had been so long, too long, and the simple sensation of his warm hand brushing against her skin created a sensation so sensual and erotic she nearly collapsed into a boneless heap.

Instead, she leaned against him. “I'm not proud, Jack. I'll beg."

He steadied her, holding her close. “No. I will stay here."

"But you can't. You already said that the angels will hunt you down. That you'll—"

He shook his head forcefully. “I was wrong. The great weakness of any demon is our ability to fool ourselves. That, of course, is what got us into trouble in the first place. I was fooling myself that I had found a universe separate from Hell. Without you, heaven itself would be torture."

Hope welled in her breast. “What are you saying?"

"I love you, Sara. Every one of uncounted billions of demons knows that a demon cannot love, but still I love you. My little dimension would destroy you, change you into something you are not. So we'll stay here."

"But Earth will destroy you. So we're back to square one."

He took her chin in his hand, tilted her face so she looked him in his sapphire demon eyes. “There is a difference. My dimension would destroy your soul. Here, I risk only my earthly body. I'm prepared to take that chance."

Her legs had no strength. She wanted to give in but their problems remained. “But Jack—"

He swung her up in his strong arms, carried her out onto the porch of her apartment, and gazed at the sky. “It is a beautiful world. Perhaps, together, we can make it more beautiful still."

A half filled moon gleamed down on them despite the glaring light of the sun. “I wished for this, Jack. But I'm afraid."

He laughed, then bent his lips toward hers. “We will have time to fear,” he murmured. “But also time to love."

How had he imagined he could survive without Sara? It was impossible.

Jack had initiated the kiss, but Sara threw her arms around him, pressed him closer to herself and deepened the kiss, her tongue caressing his lips, seeking his own tongue.

Desire flamed darkly in her aura, but he let himself see the brighter flame of real love as well. It was undeniably there.

"Oh, Jack."

"Of course we will have to make some changes."

Sara stiffened. “Changes?"

"I was thinking a house rather than an apartment. Enough room for an office for each of us, a library, and—"

Sara looked doubtful, disappointed. “I guess we could afford that with the money we made."

He shook his head. “That money is for your business. I'll buy the house with my salary."

"What?"

"It won't be much at first, but I've gotten a lectureship at University of North Texas.

"Can we afford a nursery?” Her voice told him that the question didn't matter, that she was his no matter how he answered. He knew better.

"Would you take a chance on a half demon baby?"

Sara shook her head firmly. “Absolutely not. I'd only take a chance on our baby."

Love welled within him. Despite everything he'd done, she no longer saw him as a demon, to be used and scorned. To her, he was simply her love. To him, that was so much more than the highest titles in the princely hierarchy of Hell.

"Conception might be difficult. It shouldn't be impossible."

"In that case, perhaps we should get started."

"Huh?"

Sara's grin was mischievous. “This conception thing. I want your baby. If we have to make love a lot to get there, so much the better."

He took one step toward her bedroom, then stopped. “There is one other thing."

Sara grinned. “Can it wait until after we make love?"

"No."

Her smile faded. “Tell me."

"I know how hard it is for you to share, but I want it all. I want you to be my wife, to m-marry me."

"Can you?"

If he'd been human, he would be sweating. As it was, he had to beat his wings to keep his internal temperature from boiling over on Sara. He was greedy to want so much, demanding to insist on it. Yet he needed to know if she shared the commitment. “Can I what?"

"Can you go through a marriage ceremony. Won't you burn up or something if you go into a church?"

"An outdoor weddings, then. Under the sky."

Sara's face broke into a smile that lit his universe. “That would be wonderful, Jack. But if you don't take me now, I think I'll burn up before we get there.

Jack knew the feeling. He let his wings bear him off the ground and into the sky.

"Watch out for churches,” Sara murmured as her hand sought its prey.

THE END

Epilogue

Jack bent over to look at the perfect being before him. Jennifer giggled, then stuck a pudgy fist in his direction grasping his forefinger with all her might.

"She's so beautiful,” he murmured. He was still overwhelmed by the experience.

"She should be. She's your daughter,” Sara said.

"Our daughter.” He shook Jennifer's little rattle, amazed he, a demon, could have been involved in new life, in new creation.

He continued to hold the rattle but shifted his free hand to his wife, tracing her motherhood-softened curves.

"Hey, don't get used to these.” Sara was trying to sound stern but her giggle kept her from achieving her goal. “Once I finish nursing, they'll be shrinking right back up. And don't tell me you could fix me up like you fixed up Mona."

"Then I'd better enjoy it while I can. How would you feel about a flight?"

Sara giggled again. “It's too soon after having Jennifer. I'm still a little sore."

"Can't we fly without making love?” He was still amazed in his ability to use that word without pain, without punishment.

"I don't know. Neither of us has tried very hard."

Before he could answer that, the doorbell sounded. Almost instantly, their home, a sprawling bungalow just blocks from the University of North Texas, was invaded by female voices. Maura, Katra, and Mona all descended on them like locusts only bringing more food rather than taking it.

"Give me that baby,” Katra demanded. “You two go away for a while and let Aunt Katra and Aunt Mona give her some sugar."

He'd noticed before that perfectly rational people, if that isn't a contradiction in terms, could get completely irrational over babies. Now that he had one of his own, he had begun to understand.

"Looks like you get your wish,” Sara told him. “Let's go for a flight."

"You be careful,” Maura warned. She hadn't changed her feelings on religion or demons but to her, Jack was now family and family trumped even the church.

"We will."

Jack swept Sara into his arms, shrugged his jacket, and spread his wings.

"There is this lease I've been wanting to look at,” Sara told him. “Maybe we could fly out west about a hundred miles."

"And maybe we couldn't. You're on maternity leave, remember."

"It's my company. I can't take leave."

"I think the line is that it's your company and you can do what you want."

He forestalled any arguments by launching himself into the air, his wings clawing for height.

"Hey, what's this?” Sara demanded.

"Just a normal takeoff."

"No, you've got a gray hair."

Poor Sara had never given up on her search for some attribute of humanity about him, some reason for her to believe that he wasn't what he had always known himself to be, a perpetually damned demon. “Impossible."

"No, I mean it. Land over there."

Over there turned out to be a crystal-clear pond. Jack disturbed a pair of swans as he landed, but they soon glided back, joining him as he sought what Sara claimed to have found.

"There. I told you."

Impossible or not, she was right.

"A demon is unchangeable,” he reminded her. “This must be a mistake."

"It's no mistake,” Sara argued. “Don't you see, I gave you my heart and my friends gave you part of their bodies to make you. You melded your spirit with my soul."

"So—"

"So you're a person now. You've earned your right to stay here on what you call the human plane."

He spread his wings and used his demon senses to look into Sara's soul. “But look at me. Isn't this proof enough that I'm what I've always been."

"Hey. Nobody said you had to be an ordinary man, Jack the Demon of my love.” Sara closed the distance between them, her lips seeking his. One of her hands reached for his horns, caressing their length while the other traced the zipper of his jeans. “Definitely not average. Now do you think you could be real careful..."