Page 67 of Death is My Ride or Die

“Nothing has changed,” I hissed out loud. “Doesn’t mean I have to like the thought of her with someone else.”

Then claim her.

“Shut up,” I snarled.

She belongs to us.

My eyes shut as I worked my neck to one side. “Until the end.”

I realized my lips had moved in sync with the monster in my head. The madness was surfacing bit by bit, day by day. The only thing that kept me rooted was the blade and my motivation to break the Seven Deadly Sins curse once and for all. Now I had neither in my grasp.

I was impatient. Putting so much trust in Ace’s premonition felt risky, but despite everything, deep down, I somehow still trusted him, so now I was sitting on my hands waiting for his deadline to arrive. The issue was that after tonight, after imagining Faith kissing another man and barely containing my reaction to it, I wasn’t so sure I’d last two more weeks.

A sense of dread dropped into my stomach like lead at the thought of losing complete control of myother side. I manned up and shoved the fear away.

There.Gone.Time to stop thinking about Faith with Leo too.

I turned away from the dusky city and manifested back into my apartment.

How the hell long was a birthday party anyway?

Fuck!

Thirty minutes later, I was molded into the black leather couch watching last night’s Chicago Bears game. I’d finally run out of whiskey, so a carton of milk lay on my bare chest, and I was absently scratching Cruentas with my big toe.

“Hell’s Bells” blared from the coffee table, the rock riff going on and on. It ended. Then the phone beeped with a voicemail. Groaning, I sat up and slapped the coffee table for my phone, grabbing a Reese’s peanut butter cup instead. I popped the candy, wrapper and all, into my mouth and chewed before slumping back into the couch.

When my phone buzzed with a text message, I unleashed a growl and shoved a bunch of Skittles off my phone to check my screen.

My office. Now.

“Grrrreeeeat.” I peeled myself up off the couch and dropped a bunch of crumbs off my stomach that Cruentas would vacuum up. I bent down to give him a few firm, affectionate thumps on the side. “Watch the house, boy.”

Cruentas whinnied.

I stormed toward a clearing in the room, shadows peeling off the walls and launching onto me as I manifested on the roof. The darkness formed my cloak, the fabric pressing tight to my skin as I sprinted across the roof and leapt, wings unfurling. I tore into the night toward D&S Tower.

Lucifer stood on the roof waiting.Must be important. I dove down, coming in a little too fast. I stumbled as I landed, rolling it off with a slow jog toward him. “Yeah?”

“Don’tyeahme,” Lucifer said. “You took your sweet time getting here.” His nostrils flared as I neared. “You reek.”

“Got thirsty.”

“Just get inside.” A doorway of flames appeared behind him, and we both walked through it to get to his office on the other side. Lucifer stepped up onto the raised platform beneath his desk and plucked a cigar from a golden box.

“I got it, kid,” he said. “I got the location of the book.”

“Already?I didn’t think Sarah would break so easily.”

Lucifer clipped two cigars and lit them with his thumb, tossing me one.

“It wasn’t entirely a matter of breaking her as much as a matter of persuasion.” He gave me a leering look, and I assumed he’d had sex with her.

“Who knew you’d dick your way to getting the grimoire,” I said with a wry smile.

Lucifer grinned back around a plume of smoke. “Don’t be a jackass. We talked at length about Faith’s situation. Her niece is her weakness. It’s a shame, really. She always wanted a child, and she sees Faith as the daughter she never had. Little does Sarah know that when she begged me to save her fiancé’s life all those years ago, her fertility was my price.”

My head snapped up. He’d never told me that. “Why? You could have taken anything from her.”

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