The screams of the girl quieted. Uneasiness settled in my gut, followed by dread. I hoped I was wrong. I hoped—
“Who is it that calls to me?” His voice was deep as the ocean and expansive as the sky. It was dark and deceptively soft, yet . . . enticing.
A shudder ran through me.
“We have,” another voice said. One of the robed forms stepped forward and lowered his hood. He had light brown hair that was thinning into a widow’s peak and flat brown eyes. His chin was too pointed to be attractive. His skin was drawn tight in certain places and hung flaccid in others.
He was old and ugly and . . . he hadn’t aged a day in the ten years that had passed.
My lips parted as shock ran through me.
My heart pounded in overdrive.
It was him. Claude Lewis. The warlock who could fix her. If I could somehow capture him and—
The demon stood and my mouth went dry. All this time the solution to my problem had been right under my nose in this same city. Now that I’d found it, though, I had bigger problems to contend with than the idiot who should have known better than to try this after the first time.
The demon had to be over six feet tall and built of solid muscle. The shadows still clung to him, but I could see through them, taking in the contour of muscle and the markings that lined his arms and shoulders and back. They looked like tattoos, but I knew better.
A demon wore their name upon their body. Their true name.
It encompassed all that they were: magic, soul, and flesh—and it was completely unreadable to humans, or anyone for that matter, apart from other demons.
“You opened the door,” the demon said, tilting his head. Then, slowly, he turned his cheek. One side of his full mouth curved up in an inhuman smile. “But you are not the one that calls.” He turned around, and my eyes dropped to the ground just beyond him, to the girl.
She laid with her arms sprawled. Dark hair swept to one side, her face was turned at just enough of an angle that I could see her expression.
The glassy-eyed look was hollow. Any sign of life gone.
I swallowed.
Dead.
She was dead.
The magic to summon and contain the demon in their circle had eaten entirely through her and somehow not harmed me. Had neither of us been there, it would have taken its toll on the coven. As it was, we were—and it hadn’t made a damn difference in keeping her alive.
That realization settled around me. If I’d killed the coven as I’d been hired to do, she might have actually lived.
I didn’t, and her death would follow me to the grave.
Few did, even after years of killing. But this one would.
This one was personal.
My fingers felt numb around the handle of the gun. I slowly raised my gaze from the dead teen to the demon in front of me.
Eyes the color of steel and winter nights stared back.
Cold. So cold.
My chest squeezed as my breath caught in my throat. He was the most beautiful and terrifying thing I’d ever seen. The sharp angles of his face were savage. His physical form was perfection, but it was those eyes that told the truth of what he was. The beast beneath the man shone in them.
“We humbly offer this sacrifice as payment—” the man started. His voice harsh and grating.
“Silence, human,” the demon commanded. It only served to rile the coven leader further.
“We have summoned you, creature of the night, being of sin and shadows. You are ours to command!” He raised his voice toward the end, and yet the demon didn’t react.
I wasn’t shocked by his lack of subservience. While the knowledge was almost nonexistent, I knew that summoning didn’t actually gain a coven control of the creature they brought to the world. That’s part of what made it so dangerous.
That and the fact that the magic they used to call them forth nearly burned every member to their source. They could barely complete the actual summoning, let alone what it would take to truly bind a creature from beyond.
The demon regarded me, turning its full attention my way.
The thing that surprised me was its total lack of reaction. There was no anger. No wrath. If anything, he seemed not to care at all what the coven leader said.
He was too busy staring at me.
“You,” he said softly, in that voice of night. “It is you.”
“What is me?” I asked him. The words came out softer than I’d intended. His nostrils flared as he took a step in my direction, not even sparing Claude Lewis a glance.
“You are the one that called.” He took another step, and my very tiny sense of self-preservation kicked in. I stepped back. The demon narrowed his eyes.
This wasn’t supposed to happen.
Not like this, anyway.
They were supposed to summon it, and I would bargain for information. If I were lucky, the creature would turn on them. If not, I had enough bullets.
But this . . . this heat, this pounding . . .
This wasn’t supposed to be here.
But neither was Claude Lewis.
I’d come here willing to do anything for an answer, and I’d been presented with two.
That stumped me. Without bargaining with the demon, I had little chance of walking away. I needed him on my side, even if it were only long enough to shoot and run.
“I wish to bargain,” I managed to say, thankful that my voice sounded stronger—surer than I felt.
“Bargain?” he repeated. Not like he didn’t understand the word, but like he didn’t understand what place it had here. Which was crazy because bargains were the only ways that a summoning could even work. Not that one ever had.
“For freedom,” I said, a plan developing in my mind. “And . . .”
“And?” the demon prompted, taking a step closer. A chilled brush of something ran up my spine, leaving a trail of gooseflesh in its wake.
“I want you to kill them,” I said. My words were met by a cry of protest from those around the circle. While they were not in it, they were also bound to it. If even a single one ran, the circle would break, and with it, any hold they had in keeping us there. I half hoped they would. It would make it that much easier. “That one lives.” I pointed to Claude without looking at him.
The corners of his lips lifted slightly, but it wasn’t a kind expression. It was amused, if not a little cruel. “Is that all?” he asked, stepping forward once more.
“Yes,” I said.
I was making a deal with a devil. Quite literally.
If I didn’t make a deal, though . . . the consequences would be worse. I couldn’t die. Not yet. Not before I fixed her.
The demon took another step forward, coming to stand directly before me.
“Very well,” he said, softly. “I will bargain with you.” I wished I could say that I was relieved, but had I known that Claude would be here, I never would have let them summon a demon. For what demons gave, they asked so much more.
And this demon? I had a feeling he’d demand more than any of them.
“What is the price?” I asked him.
He smiled, and it was tragically alluring. Beautiful and awful at once.
My heart skipped as he leaned forward, our faces only inches apart.
The silver in his eyes was anything but human. It swirled around the dark pupils like mercury. Unnatural and deadly.
I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach what he would ask in return. That didn’t make it any easier to hear.