Page 51 of Viper

Ella switched it on and pulled up a movie on the streaming service. She had no intention of falling asleep. But her eyelids became heavy and she eventually nodded off …

Everleigh paced up and down in the kitchen of her home, refusing to look at the man who claimed to love her yet seemed set on keepingher at arm’s length. “Why don’t you trust me?” She heard the hurt lacing her voice.

“I do trust you,” he promised her. “I don’t trust many people, but I do trust you. I wouldn’t have told you who I am if I didn’t.”

Yeah, learningthathad been a shock. Especially when she’d assumed he was just an average angel. Halting, Everleigh turned to him. “Then why not tell me about the curse as well?”

“I already have.”

“No, you told me a curse would befall you when you left heaven. You have not explained what that means.” She’d asked and asked, but he’d evaded the question each time. “It can’t be worse than what my imagination has conjured up.”

He gave her a sober look. “Don’t be so sure.”

“There’s only one way either of uscanbe sure.” She crossed to him. “Tell me about it.”

A resigned sigh slid out of him, and his shoulders lowered. “Something happens to angels who fall, Everleigh. It changes them. Twists them. Turns them into a kind of monster.”

A loud beep pierced her sleep, making a dozen cracks spiderweb through the scene in her mind. She groaned, feeling her dream slip away image by image, word by word, thought by thought.

Ella opened her eyes, her brows meeting. She rubbed at her throat. It felt thick with emotion, as if she’d been sad during the dream. She frowned, striving to dredge up snippets of it. None came to her, annoyingly.

Realizing it had been the arrival of another text message that had woken her, Ella sat up and reached for her phone. The message was from Neve:Is Brock’s situation as weird as it seemed?

Checking the time, she swore. It was 11:45pm. She had fifteen minutes before Mary would appear.I’ll soon find out, she texted.

Ella tossed her cell back on the table, pushed off the sofa, and then went upstairs. Inside Brock’s bedroom, she confined herself in his closet. There she waited, still and quiet, alert for any noise.

It was when 12am hit that she heard it. Theslightestbuzzing sound. It was coming from the en suite bathroom, and she recognized it as being the sign of a portal opening. Not one that enabled people to travel from realm to realm, only from spot to spot withinthisrealm.

Ella would need to act quickly to subdue her visitor or they’d escape her clutches by opening another portal. She called to her magick, not yet bringing it to the surface of her palms but letting it dance beneath her skin. The magick would otherwise be seen and heard; would glow through the door slats and slice through the silence with all its crackling and zapping.

The light patter of bare feet on tile came next. Each step was slow, deliberate, taunting. The bathroom door lazily creaked open, and mist spilled out of the room.

Mary then came into view. Petite. Dark-haired. Clothed in only a ratty nightgown that, like her hair and every visible inch of her skin, was streaked with blood.

Ella acted fast. She burst out of the closet and unleased her magick, chanting quietly as the shimmering ribbons of red, green, and yellow rushed at Mary and snapped around her like a full-body straightjacket.

“The fuck?” the newcomer burst out.

Ella gave her a polite smile. “Hello.” She walked over to Mary, easily noticing the spell that clung to her. Ella didn’t need to take any time to ‘read’, it, she’d seen many such spells before.

She focused on unraveling the magickal threads, picking at them; unwinding them; tearing them. Finally, they fell away … and the vision before her altered in an instant. The petite woman’s face morphed into another, her lank black hair turned a shiny golden-blonde, her old-style gown became pajamas dotted with tiny sheep, and every streak and dot of blood vanished from her body.

“Nice glamor spell,” Ella praised. “You’re PJ, Brock’s ex, I’m guessing. And a demon to boot.” A fellow incantor, as it happened. “But I imagine he doesn’t know that last part.”

PJ bared her teeth, struggling to free herself from Ella’s magickal hold. A hold so secure that it prevented PJ’s own magick from rushing to her rescue. “Let me go.”

“Just why did you want him to believe that he’d invoked a vengeful spirit?” asked Ella.

PJ jutted out her chin. “He deserved it. He fooled around with my best friend, and then heliedto me about it.”

Ah. “That makes him an asshole for sure. But all this? A little melodramatic, don’t you think?”

PJ’s ears turned red.

“Look, I don’t judge those who seek revenge. I do the same myself. But he hired my services, and I don’t let down my clients.”

“You can’t make me stop.”

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