Page 110 of Chaos
“Knocking her up doesn’t keep her any safer. It doesn’t end when she’s got a bun in the oven.”
“What do you mean?” Chaos snarled.
“Lucifer is either going to find her and make a baby, or he’ll find her and kill her when she’s not useful to him. We are going to have to protect her from him until he’s dead or locked up.”
Chaos loosed a slow breath, his expression hard and eyes trained on the distance the way they usually did when he was contemplating strategy. “The antichrist is only one way that Lucifer wins. He’s going to be obsessed with it since it’sessentially an automatic victory, but even without Merri to help him make his heir, he can still fight his way to the top. That’s the whole reason he’s building a fucking army.”
“So no matter what happens with Merri, if we want this to truly end, we have to kill him,” Grim said.
“Can Lucifer even be killed?” Malice asked.
“If there is a way, I’ll find it,” he promised darkly.
“We know he’s been caged before. So there’s that. Could be a way to put things on pause while Grim figures it out,” I offered.
The way those shadows coming from Grim darkened told me I had hit a nerve, but I didn’t feel the least bit guilty. We all knew the truth. Merri was in danger. She would be for as long as Lucifer walked freely.
Malice’s phone began ringing from his pocket, the blare of his ringtone cutting through the tension like a hot knife through butter. He pulled the slim device free and glared down at the screen.
“It’s Hades.”
All this talk of Lucifer and the possibility that he’d been masquerading as Hades during the last call put all four of us on high alert.
“Answer it,” Grim demanded.
“On speaker,” Chaos added.
Mal nodded and answered. “Hades, what is it?”
“Do you not know how to return a damn phone call?”
“You seem to think that my schedule revolves around you. Newsflash, it doesn’t.”
“Maybe you haven’t noticed, but the world is fucking ending.”
“Yes, I gathered that. I’m pretty well informed on that particular topic.”
Hades heaved a very in-character sigh before clearing his throat. “Well, while you were gallivanting all over creation doingGod knows what, I’ve been trying like hell to figure out how to save the damn world from Helene’s fucking apocalypse. Think you could put aside your project and help?”
Little did he know our project and his were perfectly aligned.
The four of us exchanged looks. We still couldn’t know for sure that this was actually Hades. But if it was Lucifer in disguise, it might be the opportunity we needed to figure out what he was up to and then use that information to keep Merri as far away from him as possible. At this point, I didn’t think we really had any other options; we had to follow this lead. And from the resigned set of Grim’s shoulders, he agreed.
“Tell us what you know,” Grim barked.
“Oh, you put me on fucking speaker, Malice? Nice to hear your voice, Grimsby. Are the rest of your little band of brothers with you?”
None of us answered.
“Get over yourself and give us the information you so clearly have,” Grim grumbled.
“Not over the phone. This is a conversation best had in person. As you so clearly demonstrated, you never know who is listening in.”
“Fine,” Grim growled. “Usual place?”
“I can be there by nightfall.”
“Are we even sure that’s still possible?” I asked.
