Pandora's Box (24 page)

Chapter Forty-Two

Two months later

Cedar Rapids, Iowa

Defeated! Defeated by the demon Beliel! Nix would rather have drunk crushed glass than have walked into the trap the demon King set for them.

Nothing about this hunt had felt different than any other job. They were between stints and all were bored. Their last job ended with nothing more exciting than expelling a ghost, and they were itching for a challenge. Nix was on edge, antsy to find Mads and tell her how he felt. Spending her birthday with her had rattled him more than he could’ve anticipated.

When the local, California news covered mysterious cracks in Iowa, they were ready to jump at any hint of activity. Nix, Gage, and Zoe had climbed into the Charger and took off to investigate, excited to have another agenda. Nix hadn’t expected to find much. His best hope had been a cold beer and a fast lay because the fissures weren’t classic symptoms of a supernatural presence.

They walked into a hornet’s nest, mutilated animals, farm and household pets alike, with their organs removed and their carcasses left in the town square. The Sherlock’s best guess was the horrific slaughters were done to taunt the local townsfolk.

Demons always left a sulfuric imprint, either smell or the substance, sometimes both. None could be found anywhere. On the second night, they discussed the likelihood a human was involved. A sick mother fucker, in Nix’s estimation. The following morning, they found a note written in blood clipped beneath his Charger’s wiper blade. The message: Catch me if you can, Birminghams, signed by Hell’s minion. In retrospect, they should’ve put the town in their rearview mirror. But Sherlocks weren’t easily cowed. Later that evening, a too easy trail of sulfur led straight to an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town. Before setting out to follow the path, Zoe had remarked the demonic footprints were a trap. Nix suggested he go in alone, but neither Zoe nor Gage would hear of turning back.

A demon pressed the cold barrel of his gun against the back of his head hard enough to leave an indentation. Galling to have his own gun used against him.

A baseborn demon forced Gage to his knees and held his head at a hard slant. Any attempt to move put him at risk of having his neck broken. The demon’s claws raked down Gage’s throat, drawing not just a groan of pain, but spending blood and scarring him for life. War-wounds his cousin would display proudly—if he survived.

Another demon held Zoe with an arm around her waist and a knife pressing into the skin of her throat, a bleeding lip the least of her injuries. Her arm rested at an odd angle, the chalky white of her bone piercing the flesh of her bicep. Wincing at her ashen skin tone and eyes glassy from pain, Nix wished she would pass out to alleviate her agony. She’d given the demon hell before suffering defeat.

A blue-skinned creature the likes of which he had never seen before stepped up to him. “Let me introduce myself.” His voice lowered so only Nix could hear him. “I’m Beliel, one of the Kings of Hell.” Nix stared at the fallen angel, a little awed by his presence. “Each time I meet you, I’m disappointed, Phoenix.” Beliel sucked on his teeth, the sharp, protruding points reminding Nix of a horror flick version of a vampire or werewolf. “After all your exploits, I expected more from you.”

The demons would be the last thing he saw before dying, and he planned to go out holding his head high, ballsy to the very end. “I would say I’m sorry to disappoint, you gotta know it’d be a lie.”

Beliel’s eyes flared the bright color of smoldering coals. Maybe angering him wasn’t the best path to follow, but Nix’s only real regret was not following his heart where it concerned Mads. All the years he’d spent wanting her, wasted because he tried to protect her. She was as damned to this life as he.

“Slice her throat,” Beliel said.

“No!” Gage screamed as the demon dragged the blade across Zo’s neck slowly—for maximum suffering. Blood bloomed, ran like paint splashed against a wall, and Zo gurgled, choking on the fluid.

Fuck CPR! She couldn’t come back from the mutilation.

“Oooo….” Beliel shivered in delight. “The gurgle of death…a composition vastly more beautiful than anything Bach could compose.”

“I’ll kill you, motherfucker,” Nix promised.

Gage sobbed, choking out Zoe’s name over and over, a eulogy to the woman he adored. Nix’s hands trembled. God, he’d never wanted to outlive any of his family. First his parents, and now Zo. Pawns in a demonic game.

“Phoenix…Phoenix…Phoenix….” The King frowned. “We both know I win.” He sauntered toward Nix, his appearance shifting from the blue demon persona to his human form. The demon smiled as his façade settled into a cohesive countenance.

Nix’s heart plummeted to his gut. He knew the King’s human face. “Madison’s ex-husband,” he whispered, horrified at the man’s visage.

“Correction…I remain Madison’s husband. Hell does not recognize human divorces.”

Beliel and Micah—the same fucker.

“How could you terrorize Madison the way you have?”

“Tactics necessary to set her on the path she must take.”

Nix closed his eyes. Madison would be sick to her stomach, knowing she followed her ex-husband’s designs.

Beliel halted in front of Nix, gripped his chin, and jerked his head back to stare down at him. “Kill Gage.”

A sound like knuckles popping hit his ears, and Nix didn’t need to see Gage to know his neck had been broken.

Blinking back tears of frustration and despair, his sinuses burned from the effort. The boy he idolized in his misspent youth gone at the hands of Mads’s ex-husband. Dead. Gage represented everything Nix ever wanted to be, and he was dead.

Nix went after Micah, intending to rip him apart with his bare hands and wallow in the King’s blood when he succeeded, but the pistol butt slammed against his temple brought him to his knees. Micah chuckled.

“Fiesty. I like feisty.” Micah extended a claw from his index finger and picked at his teeth.

“I promise I will fucking kill you.” Nix glared at him.

“Boo hoo.” When Micah offered him a triumphant smirk, he knew more suffering would follow. “All this whimpering over mortal bones doesn’t suit you.” The King toed him in the ribs, and Nix scrambled to his feet to take another go at him.

A punch to the demon’s jaw shattered the bones in Nix’s hand, or felt like it. The pistol-whipping demon collared him about the throat and brought him back to heel.

“Finished with all the drama, Phoenix?” Micah asked. The demon’s eyebrows arched high on his forehead, and Nix dreaded whatever terror tactics would come next. “Although, I must say, your anger is amusing. Highly entertaining. Too bad James and Georgie aren’t here to add to the show.”

“Just kill me and get it over with, you evil motherfucker!”

Beliel gave him a victorious lopsided smirk. “I am a mother fucker. I fucked a mother, more than once. You want to know my favorite mother to fuck?”

“Piss off.” He ground his teeth together.

The King chuckled, a grating sound which slithered along Nix’s spine. “You got it bad for my wife, eh? Can’t say as I blame you; she’s a fine piece of ass. For the record, she’s mine. Never forget that.”

He lifted his hand, placed his palm on Nix’s shoulder, and extended his claws, sinking them into his flesh. Groaning at the puncture wounds, Nix went to his knees as the demon applied pressure.

“I like you, Phoenix,” he said, a devil-may-care kind of smile hitting his lips.

God, I hate freaking demons!

“I really do,” Micah continued. “You have spunk and the nerve to fight me for my wife. I admire greed and lust. Coveting another man’s wife, I can easily relate to as well. All attributes I find endearing in you mortals.” Micah extracted a gold coin from his pocket and held it at eye level. He retracted his claws and flicked the mintage to make it spin between his fingers before smacking the cold metal to Nix’s forehead.

Nix held his tongue, wishing the son-of-a-bitch would quit his yapping and kill him already! The metal warmed against his skin to the point he couldn’t tell it remained there. Micah lowered his hand without the object between his fingers. The demon stared at his forehead and shifted between angel and man, alarming Nix with his obvious lack of control. Emotions running high over something? A scary concept, face-to-face with a demon’s unmatched power.

“A mirror,” he told the baseborn demon behind him, and extended his hand. A moment later Micah held a small hand mirror in front of Nix’s face.

Nix peered at his image. The outline of the coin indented his forehead, but grew wispy as it faded. Reminded of the encounter when Micah shoved Pandora’s Box into Mads, anger surged inside him.

“What’d you do to me, you motherfucker?”

“Nothing you weren’t destined for.” Micah tossed the mirror and it shattered. Nix hoped he suffered all seven years of bad luck. The King met Nix’s stare without blinking. “The coin proves you’re the Ark of Heaven. The first step to you becoming all you were intended to be.”

What the hell was that? And what’d it mean?

“You’re my nephew, Phoenix.”

Nix hoped he lied, except his lie-radar wasn’t beeping.

“You’re the sole heir of Jesus Christ.”

Nix laughed. Either that or go crazy at an idea so insane he couldn’t accept it literally.

“I’ll teach you how to resuscitate your cousin and his girl. All you need to do is accept my offer.”

“Me resuscitate them?” His voice grew high-pitched. “I don’t have the power to bring people back to life. I’m just a human, you crazy fuck!”

“Incorrect.”

Nix turned his face aside. He couldn’t listen to any more of Micah’s psychotic ramblings.

Micah smacked his cheek and yanked a handful of Nix’s hair to force him to face the fallen angel. “Listen to me, boy; this is important information. You have the power of the Messiah in your blood. You can perform many of his tricks. Giving life back to your family is only one of them.”

Nix stared at the demon a long time. If he bought into the King’s mumbo-jumbo, ‘teaching’ him would no doubt come at a high price. Even giving his family life wouldn’t be worth whatever Beliel wanted in return. “Fuck you. I decline.”

Micah released his hair. “I thought you might resist. Bring me Madison.”

Nix sent a quick scan about the room, his heart ramming into his chest like a battering ram. As if on cue, the clicking of footsteps ticked against the concrete floor, growing louder as someone approached. A moment later Madison came into view, a handful of demons surrounding her.

“Nix!” Mads said when she spied him. She kicked at a demon, but they restrained her with ease. Panting, she glared at the King. “Let him go, Micah. It’s me you want.”

“I need him more, kitten.” Micah faced Nix. “Covenant your lineage with me, and I’ll spare Madison’s life.”

“You wouldn’t kill her.” No way would the demon take Mads’s life.

“I need you, Phoenix. I only want her.”

His stared into the demon’s eyes and his lie-radar went crazy. “You’re lying.”

Coolly Micah strode to Madison and ran his knuckles along her cheekbone. “My apologies, kitten.” He turned to face Nix as one of the demons wrapped an arm around Mads’s waist and clamped his hand over her mouth and nose. “Remember, you’re to blame for her death, Phoenix.” Mads gagged behind the demon’s hand, her eyes bulging as oxygen continued to be denied. She twisted to gain freedom, and Micah choked on the demonic command, “Ichnaday, Madison.” He cleared his throat. “You’re prohibited from moving.” A whimper of defeat, and she froze as tears surfaced.

“Oh, God, don’t!” Nix breathed as Mads wheezed desperate gasps. “Whatever you want! Whatever you want, just stop.”

“Too late,” Micah replied calmly, and the other demon added more pressure. A white line imprinted her skin around the edges of the demon’s palm. “You must comprehend the seriousness of the offer I extend to you. To gain what I need, I give up someone special to us both.”

The sting of tears hit Nix’s eyes mere seconds before they rolled down his cheeks. Mads jerked in the demon’s arms and went limp. Another long minute elapsed while the demon held her in the same position, probably to ensure her death.

“My beautiful Queen, dead, because of your stubbornness.” Micah extracted Mads from the other demon’s arm and traced her jaw with his finger. “What will Amos think when he learns of your guilt?” The King met his eyes and tears glittered in their fiery depths.

“Promise your lineage to me, and I’ll teach you how to bring them back,” Micah offered once again. “Together we can accomplish great things.”

Great things for whom? Not humankind.

Blurry eyed, Nix stared at Mads. She hung limp in the King’s arms, eyes wide-open and glassy. Anger and pain burned in his belly. He wanted to kill Micah with a quick shot to his cold, dead heart and rip the other demon apart, but knew he would never be given the chance.

He’d heard lots of legends about making deals with the devil. He never thought them actually possible. “You want me to sell you my soul?” he asked, voice scratchy from holding back the depth of his emotions.

Beliel snorted. “No. Deals for souls are tacky. I propose a blood covenant with a King, and they’re seldom offered.”

Deals and covenants were starkly different. Covenants were blood oaths. And a King of Hell wasn’t just a demon. A high level angel, refusing to bow to God’s human creation, he’d been thrown out of heaven with his fallen brothers, created Hell and cast lots for human souls ever since. A pact with a King wasn’t to be taken lightly. If one reneged, blood family would be haunted by severe ramifications, or so the rumor went.

“Why?” What could Micah possibly gain by the offer?

“I require the power of your lineage.”

Micah believed Nix was the Messiah’s descendent? “What for?”

The demon King shrugged. “I have my reasons.”

A demon’s reasons couldn’t be good. But….

“Refuse my deal, and the three of them remain dead.”

Why would the demon King want him badly enough to coerce him into submission? Killing those he loved the most.