From Hell (11 page)

Then, as if on cue, there
was a loud
thud
right outside the tiny apartment, the sound followed by a
tattoo of meaty
thumps.
I smiled, glad that my cousin had been watching
rather than listening. The drumming ended in muffled grunts that
went silent immediately after. Then something heavy fell against
the door.

That’s when hell broke
loose.

Jack didn’t wait to see what happened.
He just started pulling the trigger.

Bullets flew, and I ducked
for cover. One grazed my thigh as I slipped behind my makeshift
shield, but a second shot slammed into my shin. I felt the bone
splinter as I hit the ground. A gush of blood warmed my leg and
spilled into my boot before the pain registered. It was if someone
had started a fire under my skin. I growled as bullets
pinged
against the metal
covering and
thunked
into the wood. Splinters rained down over me as I crawled to
the corner of the barrier where I’d left a tiny space open so I
could return fire from safety.

I stuck the barrel of my Webley
through the hole and fired. Screams rang out and the flurry of
bullets increased. The smell of gunpowder was stifling, an acrid,
bitter stink invading my throat and nose. There was nowhere for the
smoke to go. It billowed up and grew thick in the air, making it
hard to see and breathe. I just kept firing until my revolver
clicked empty.

The door burst open then, brightness
pushing its way past the hazy gloom. As I struggled to reload in
the sudden lull of gunfire, I heard the unmistakable calling card
of an abattoir, the blade striking meat. Men shrieked as Scarlett
cut into them. They’d crossed the line opening fire the way they
did. She was an avenging angel now, doing the Lord’s work, Old
Testament style. They’d all be dead in a moment, but I wanted my
share of Jack’s ass.

I slapped the cylinder home, and
pulled myself to my knees, teeth clenched at the grinding agony in
my shin. And there he was.

Jack bolted around the corner of my
barrier, fury and terror waging a war across his features. He saw
me and his rage won out. Before I could bring my gun to bear, he
charged in, knocking the Webley aside and barreling straight into
me. My leg gave way, and down we went. I swallowed a scream as his
boot collided with my leg, my head thumping against the hard wood
of the floor. My gun slipped from my fingers and bounced out of
reach. Then I was eating punches.

Blow after blow rained
down while stars filled my vision. His fists were like bricks. Each
one crashed into my face as if they’d been thrown from the roof.
Subconsciously, I caught the rhythm of his attack—left, right,
left, right—and managed to shift my head out of the way. His fits
slammed into the floor beside my ear, the collision
whirring
into my brain.
Knuckles popped, and Jack bit back a shout as he pulled his injured
hand back.

That was all the pause I
needed.

I wrapped my good leg around his ankle
and turned my hips, yanking my leg up behind me. Jack twisted, only
helping provide the momentum I needed, his own leg getting tangled
up in mine. I sat up and pushed, and Jack toppled to the floor. He
landed flat on his back, flinging a handful of curses my way as I
used his leg to leverage myself up until I was on top of
him.

“
Sticks and stones,
asshole.”

I drove my elbow into his side with
all my strength and weight behind it. The brittle snap of a rib was
an orgasm to my sense of retribution. He cried out and clasped at
his torso, but I just grinned, ignoring the metallic taste of my
blood, and started on his face. Jack might have hit hard, but he’d
never had his ass kicked by a demon.

Several punches landed to his cheeks
and jaw, before he thought to cover his head. I just hit him in the
ribs then, driving the broken one deeper into his chest. He rolled
to his side and tucked himself tight, but I kept on. Jack coughed
blood as I beat him, a crimson spray dotting the floor. I knew I
should save a piece of him for my uncle, but right then, I didn’t
give a damn. My mother’s voice resounded inside my skull, and while
I knew it wasn’t really her screaming at me to kill the bastard, it
seemed like a pretty good idea to me. I pounded on him until
Scarlett pulled me off.

“
That’s enough, Frank,”
she told me as I huffed and struggled against her grip. Her hands
were vises. She had no intention of letting me go.

I glared at Jack until the adrenaline
faded. He was slumped on the floor, gasping to draw air into his
battered lungs. His broad chest rose and fell, but there was none
of the easy rhythm he’d shown earlier. No, this was the chug of a
train struggling up a hill in the rain, wet and labored.

Finally I relaxed against Scarlett’s
hold, my anger settling. The feel of her boobs against my shoulder
blades helped. She let me go once she felt I would play nice. I
sighed while she helped me to my feet. My leg still burned like a
case of rampant syphilis, but I could stand on it. I staggered over
to Jack, staring down at him.

“
Not so bold now, are you,
Jack?” It felt good to see him humbled after all he’d done. Right
then, it didn’t matter which side got what was left of him, but I
my desire to see him suffer hadn’t entirely been sated. I hovered
over him, hoping he’d give me a reason to hurt him more.

He just coughed up a phlegmy ball of
mucous and blood as he looked up at me. The crimson slime oozed
down his chin as he whispered something.

“
What?” I asked, leaning
in closer, fists clenched and ready to crush his skull.

“
N-n-not…” he sucked in a
pained breath, his face drawn in severe lines as he formed his
words. “N-not Jack. Ke-Kelvin.”

The words were like a knife thrust
into my spine. I snapped my head around to look at Scarlett to see
if she’d heard him. Her face was a mask of conflicting emotions,
fluttering between disbelief and horror.

“
You’re not Jack?” I
asked, grabbing him by his collar and pulling him up so we were eye
to eye.

He groaned at the motion, but shook
his head with conviction. A tiny smiled glistened across his bloody
lips. It fell away in a fit of coughing when I shoved him back to
the floor.

“
If he’s not Jack, then
who the hell is?”

“
I am.”

Thirteen

The answer sang out at our backs, both
Scarlett and I spinning about to see a figure standing in the
doorway.

And what a figure it was.

My gaze bounced up from the pal
cleavage on display to the face of the woman who’d spoken, my brain
only just then catching up the fact that she was, in fact, a woman.
But not just any woman.

She was the redheaded
woman I’d seen at the bar and at the cabal’s house; the same who’d
been so close as to sniff my nutsack when she’d grabbed my leg. I
let my senses loose and instantly picked up the same odd sense of
magical energy I had at the bar and the murder scene. The same I’d
noticed when
Jack
ran from the house we’d raided. And then it hit
me.

She’d been at each of those
locations.

My eyes darted back to look at the man
who’d called himself Kelvin. His boots on full display, they looked
to be right around the same size as the pimp’s. I turned back and
glanced at the redhead’s feet. She wore heavy boots. My gaze
lingered, trailing along her feet all the way to her toes. The
boots came to a slight point, unlike the ones on Kelvin. My heart
jumped into my throat as her energies played against my
senses.

She
was our killer.

Scarlett stared at her, finding her
voice first. “Who are you?”

The woman smiled. “The name’s
Jacqueline, but you can call me the Ripper, if you prefer.” Gone
was the scared and timid creature who’d begged for her life on her
knees. She stood there bold, chest jutted out, the wicked gleam of
foot-long silver blade sitting steady in her hand. The glistening
tear from earlier had been replaced by a malevolent glimmer and the
subtle dance of fire.

Jacky wasn’t human; at least not
completely. There was the definite musk of demonic heritage about
her. It wafted off her clearly now that I knew where to point my
senses.

“
Did Lucifer send you?”
she asked.

My cousin’s head swiveled
to me, only confirming that she’d picked up on Jacky’s
scent
, too.

“
I know, I know. Jesus,
woman, I know!” Scarlett waggled an angry finger at me. She hated
when I used the Lord’s name in vain. “No, Lucifer didn’t send us,”
I barked, turning my focus back to the other woman.

“
You aren’t here to take
me home?” Jacky’s eyes narrowed and she inched forward, the blade
shifting our direction. “If my lord Satan did not send you, then
who are you? Why are you here?”

I raised my hands to the sky.
“Seriously, can you just stop with that shit, already? I’m having a
hard enough time as it is.”

Scarlett huffed as she swallowed back
a chuckle. “Care to revisit our earlier conversation, Frank? You
remember, I’m sure, the one where you emphatically stated Lucifer
wasn’t involved in any of this.”

“
He’s not, damn it.” I
pointed a finger at Scarlett. “You’re starting to piss me off, you
know that?”

“
Prove me
wrong.”

“
I’ll prove my foot in
your ass.”

“
Stop talking to that
whore of an angel and answer my question,” Jacky shrieked. The
words were like daggers, each syllable sinking in to the
hilt.

Scarlett’s head snapped about to face
Jacky. “I’m a what?” The tips of her ears were a bright pink,
standing out against the golden blond of Scarlett’s
hair.

I took a cautious step to the side,
putting some distance between my cousin and me. Things were about
to get ugly.

“
You heard me,” Jacky
shouted back, brandishing her knife, “whore!”

There was that word again.

It was barely out of Jacky’s mouth
before Scarlett was on her. Curvy flesh slammed together as the two
women flew through the open door to disappear outside. I hobbled
after them, cursing the bullet hole in my leg, and paused in the
door frame where there was an excellent view of the cat
fight.

Well, cat fight might be a bit
misleading. It was more of a cat mauling, a pissed off lioness
versus a kitten. For all her bluster, Jacky was just a blip of
energy compared to the brilliant star that was Scarlett. Whatever
power she’d accumulated was more a side effect of the rituals she’d
been performing, leeching off the aether as she pecked the
dimensional walls. It wasn’t natural magic like Scarlett
controlled. It wasn’t even close.

Jacky clearly had demon in her
bloodline, but she hadn’t run up against any others and hadn’t
evoked a soul transfer to increase her natural power. She
definitely had never seen a real angel before, let alone one as
sensitive as my cousin. If she had, she would have known better
than to cast an unchaste accusation Scarlett’s
direction.

Angelic fists slammed into Jacky’s
face and forehead, reddened welts trickles of blood marring her
features. Our little Ripper was getting her ass kicked.

I knew I should jump in and save
her—letting someone higher up, or much lower, decide the woman’s
fate—but I was having too much fun. Jacky’s chest heaved, damn near
popping out of her tight, low cut blouse. She grunted with every
blow landed. Scarlett’s chest wobbled side to side, and I felt my
neck cramp trying to keep up. It’s not often I get entertainment
like this without being on the receiving end of the beating, but
all good things must come to an end.

After giving Scarlett a few minutes to
get her licks in—metaphorically speaking—I yanked her off Jacky,
reminding her she’d done the same to me with Kelvin. She snarled
but gave in easier than I expected her to. Jacky moaned on the
ground, lying in a pool of her own blood, barely able to do
anything but twitch.

“
What do we do with her
now?” Scarlett asked. She paced as she tried to catch her breath
and cool her anger.

“
Want to split her like a
wishbone and each of us take a piece?”

Scarlett stopped and stared at me. If
I didn’t know her better, I’d have thought she was taking me
seriously. After a quiet moment, she let out a sigh and shook her
head. “You have a better idea?”

“
Metatron wants her
punished, right?”

She nodded.

“
Then I have the perfect
solution.”

Fourteen

“
Color me impressed,
Frank,” Baalth said, patting me on the shoulder as he walked by and
dropped into a chair across from my uncle. “More surprised,
admittedly, but still…vaguely…impressed
.
”

“
High praise, indeed.” I
did my best to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, but my protruding
tongue probably gave me away.