Page 16 of Demon Sworn
“I know that! You think I don’t know that?!” I rise up off Zolroth’s lap, propping my hand up on the ceiling of the moving vehicle. Why? I dunno. Power pose? I want them to take me fucking seriously though.
We hit a pothole, a big one, and I have to shove my hand hard against the roof while spreading my legs in order to balance, and all my power pose authority vanishes as Van’s lust magic smacks me hard.
“Stop that,” I snap at him.
“Sorry,” he apologizes, dragging his eyes up from my legs with an apologetic shrug. “Instinct.”
I turn my eyes from him and focus on Akor, whose leg is bouncing in anticipation already. If bloodlust had a scent, he’d reek of it. “I know we want to find Adam, but we have to do it right. We’re wasting our time going back to a dead end we already—”
“There is no such thing as right and wrong!” Akor’s tone grows dark, and his eyes shutter for a second before a wild smile crosses his face. He pulls out a small dagger from his pocket. “Who wants to play catch?”
Kastros huffs out a sigh and shoves the bag of sandwiches in front of him. This works as a distraction, because Akor pulls out the subs that Kastros made and carefully extracts some of the ingredients from each sandwich, building himself a strange turkey-roll burrito filled with olives, pickles, and smears of mayo he was able to scavenge from the bread.
I look back at Zolroth, desperate for someone to agree with me. “What new evidence do we have that the angels at the farm did this?”
Zolroth’s eyes narrow.
“The answer is none.” I do a very ungainly, unbalanced walk towards the panel with the control buttons. I jab at the button to lower the glass between us and Raz.
“Pull over!” I tell him.
“What’s wrong?” My nightmare demon’s dark eyes glance at me in the rearview mirror.
“JUST DO IT!” I am fully aware of how shrill my voice has gotten. This badass version of myself is awkward, like I’m in the middle of my first kickboxing class and everyone around me is doing the moves right but I kick and flick my ankle as I try not to flail my arms wildly. In short, I suck at this. But I don’t back down.
How can I, when I know I’m right?
Am I breaking down? Maybe. But I just have this gut feeling that right now, we’re driving in the wrong direction—we’re heading away from finding Adam, not towards him. I can’t shake the feeling that we’re missing something.
Angels can’t lie. Angels can’t lie,I repeat in my head, then out loud as Raz pulls over to stop on the side of the road. We’re already outside the city, and when he pulls off, I can see we are in the remnants of a field of some sort, crops shorn for winter like a bad haircut.
I climb out of the SUV and pace while four of my demons watch me in solemn silence and the fifth gorges himself on his homemade meat burrito. I walk back and forth over and over again, shaking my head and wondering why my family is a target, why my guys are a target, why all of this is happening.
My family, my brother, my guys.
My guys, who’ve become my family.
Could it be that my family is under attack because of my guys? That thought makes me blow out a stiff breath and sink to the ground. “We need help,” I mutter. “Like, big time help. If the people who are attacking you guys are the same ones that went after my parents and Adam…we’re in way over our heads.”
My eyes scan the demons because I’m about to fucking fall to pieces. That shred of determination I’ve been holding on to is disintegrating in my hands.
Raz comes over and crouches next to me. He places a hand on my shoulder and rubs his thumb gently across it. “I know someone I can call.”
7
Katrina
The guys aretense around me as they wait for the person Raz called. Akor paces with his bedazzled grenade in one hand and his machete in the other. Don’t ask me why. He claims that they bring him comfort. Van lounges on the sofa in our living room, his fingers combing through his red hair repeatedly as his teeth nibble on his plush lower lip. Zolroth has taken to ironing his suit. Again. Right smack-dab in the middle of the living room while he wears nothing but tighty-whities. Like with Akor, I don’t question his crazy behavior. They’re all on pins and needles, waiting with bated breath for the person’s arrival.
And Raz…
Raz won’t stop staring at me, something nearly pleading in his dark gaze. The wings tattooed onto his chest are clearly visible with the low-slung white tank top he has on, and I allow my eyes to fix on them for just a moment before I force them away.
“Are you sure I can’t convince you to leave?” he asks gruffly…the same damn argument we’ve been having for the last half hour.
“Are you sure you can’t tell me who’s coming?” I retort immediately, and he presses his lips together in a grim, unrelenting line, once more refusing to answer my inquiries.
But fuck if that doesn’t make me more uneasy.
