The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance 2 (18 page)

“Oh, for Christ’s—”

BOOM
.

The explosion drowned the spawn’s shriek just as a wave of energy traversed the air a couple inches above Cain’s head. Gunshot followed the detonation. A
lot
of gunshot. Someone had their finger on the trigger and wasn’t letting up. He floundered to his hands and knees, ashes choking him, still reeling from his short trip to hell, and turned in time to catch a scene that tore a curse from him.

A lone woman stood in the middle of the street, blond hair in a punk cut, dressed in white vinyl from head to toe except for black military boots that reached up to her knees and an assortment of belts that crisscrossed her muscular frame. Bethany Simard, infamous keeper for one of the most powerful demons, Asmodeus, pain in the butt extraordinaire and probably Cain’s one and only weak spot.

Great timing
.

He couldn’t help giving her a good, long look. Hot
and
dangerous.

“I’m easy on the eyes, huh?” She cracked an irreverent grin. “Behind you, handsome.”

Cain whirled around, thanked his lucky star he still had his gun. A gold and silver bullet took off half of the fiend’s head. The rest hit the fence, dissipated in glowing coals and ash.

Movement registered in the corner of his eye. He turned back to the street. Bethany was gone. Mocking laughter, rapidly diminishing, floated to him from the other side of the fence.

“Shit.”

He took a moment to fish his silvery shotgun from the snow bank before chasing the woman over the fence. He knew exactly where she was going, and he intended to prevent it. Velvety silence greeted him once he landed on the other side of the fence. Cain circumvented the mansion, his heart thumping. Ahead into the gloom, he spotted a figure darting left and right amongst the skeletal bushes separating the mansion from its neighbour. He lengthened his paces, pumped his gun-free arm hard and fast. Cold air burned his lungs. From a tiny darting figure, the woman’s silhouette grew clearer. She’d reached the back porch. Bethany had always been
fast
. Thankfully, he was a
tiny
bit faster. Cain caught up to her just as she flipped back a sling strapped across her shoulder like a postman bag. A matte black MP5 submachine gun hung from the sling.

He gripped it, yanked sideways and sent the woman crashing against the stone wall. With a yelp, she extended a hand, caught herself against the balustrade. Cain used his long arms to seize her by an arm, whirled her around and pinned her there with the barrel of his shotgun pressed against her wrist.

“Hey!” She cocked her free arm to punch him, he caught that wrist, too. He knew her too well to let her have a free arm around him.

They stood face to face, their breaths mixing in puffs of steam. He’d neutralized both her arms, but that meant he didn’t have one left either. Cain angled one foot back so she wouldn’t get any ideas to kick him.

“That’s how you thank me?” Bethany twisted one arm then the other. “I thought you were one of the good ones.”

Cain squeezed harder. Her neck tendons corded like violin strings as she struggled to free herself. He wouldn’t hold the diminutive Valkyrie in place for much longer. “Why are you here?”

“Why
are you
here?” she snapped.

He glared at her. “Don’t make me send you back, Bethany.”

Black eyes heavily rimmed in kohl flared in fear a brief instant, then bravado replaced it. “You’re not like that.”

“You’d be surprised. Your master sends you, or are you on one of your ‘goodwill’ hunts?” He’d had to answer to a very displeased Berith once because of her. Demons didn’t like the idea that lowly keepers would do freelance hunts for others. Or that other keepers didn’t turn the renegades in.

“It’s one of his.”

“Well, you can go back, because this one is mine.”

Bethany smiled, batted her eyelids dramatically. “Maybe we can share?”

“And have Berith after my ass like the last time I ‘shared’ something with you? I don’t think so.”

“Aw, come on, it wasn’t all bad.”

It hadn’t been all bad. In fact, he’d enjoyed working with the cheeky woman. Even damned as she was, she still had a verve for life that he found very intriguing. And appealing. Plus, no one ever talked to him, not with his reputation and “charming” personality. Evangeline and Bethany were basically his entire social circle.

“It
was
bad. You’re a pain in the ass.” The smudged mascara, crazy hair and attitude didn’t deter him at all. He suspected he found her attractive
because
of it and not in spite of it.

“But oh-so-irresistible and brilliant. Come on, Cain, we got another kick at the can, we should make the most of it.” She gave him a pronounced once-over, actually winked in a very suggestive way. Simply unflappable.

“I wouldn’t turn my back on you for a second, never mind taking my guns off.” A smile escaped him. “Plus, you’re not my type.”

Liar.

Bethany grinned. “I bet you’ve always been a heartbreaker, even before . . .”

“Before I was damned?”

She shrugged. “Call it what you want. I call it a second shot at life.”

“It’s not
life,
Bethany. Not even close. We’re on borrowed time, with our own personal demons yanking on the leash.”

She lost her smile. “Party-pooper.”

“Look,” he began, regretting the words as they came out. She
was
his weak spot. Dammit. “Some day, maybe . . .”

A sparkle made her dark eyes look like coffee beans. Smile lines appeared at the corners of her eyes and mouth. She arched her hips off the wall and pressed herself against him. Her heat seeped into his clothes. “Maybe what, hm? You’d like to see
more
of me?”

“Yeah, I’d like to see ‘more’ of you.”

Bethany’s eyes sparkled.

Damn, he couldn’t think when she pulled that shit. “Look . . .”

He must have relaxed his hold on her arm and saw his slip too late. The top of her head struck him on the chin. Pain exploded in his brain. His grip failed as he bent over.

And she was gone again, her boots thumping madly.

Cain stumbled into the house through the back door she’d left open. Careless, loud, obnoxious. He could’ve followed her progress from outside the house. Good old Bethany. Two by two, he took the stairs, followed her by the smell he’d come to associate with her – vinyl and body lotion. Up to the third floor, down a carpeted hallway lined with thick frames of dead people. Someone walked by – oblivious to the two gun-toting bounty hunters racing down the hall – as if moved by unseen hands into the place Cain had just occupied a split-second before. He’d always wondered what would happen if a mortal occupied the same space he did? Would they feel him?

There, at the end of the hallway. Light filtered out from underneath a door. Cain gripped his shotgun tighter as he silently pushed against the panel. There she was, his “saviour”, bending over the dying politician, a wizened Asian woman. In the golden glow of a baroque lamp on the dresser, his competitor resembled an elf. But armed to the teeth. Bethany was too busy fishing around in a tiny leather purse strapped to her belt to pay much attention to him.

Cain sneaked up just close enough to press the barrel against her nape. “Don’t make me send you back.”

She froze.

“Start running, Bethany. I’ll give you ten seconds head start.”

“I need this,” she whispered, turned her head slightly so she could look up at him. Tears welled in her eyes. Her chin trembled. He’d never seen her that way, so vulnerable, so afraid. He’d never seen her afraid despite some pretty serious fighting and crappy odds. He could only imagine what a woman went through at the hands of a demon. “Okay? I
need
this, Cain. Please, I’m not yanking your chain.”

Staring into those pleading eyes wasn’t as easy as he would’ve thought.

“Asmodeus . . .” She stopped, swallowed. “He’s going to send me down another level if I don’t bring him this one. You know what that means . . .”

Cain twitched in spite of himself. If Berith’s reputation for viciousness was well known in all levels of hell, another demon beat him by miles and bounds. Asmodeus, king of demons, with untold legions at his command. Cain wouldn’t want to be anywhere
near
the Tormenter if he’d failed to do his bidding. And being sent down another level was dying all over again. She’d have to start over. He could only imagine the horror. No wonder Bethany looked desperate.

But it wasn’t any of his business. Or his problem.

The woman straightened, slowly, turned to face him with her hands at shoulder level on either side of her. “What level are you on, Cain?”

“Seventh.”

She nodded. “So you have a temper, huh?”

“You have no idea.”

“Look, I’ll help you with something else. Anytime, anywhere. But please, let me have this one here.” She turned toward the older woman on the bed who lay with her eyes closed and a rosary tucked in her joined hands. Except for the ones his ammunitions contact made for him, he hadn’t seen a real rosary in over thirty years. Traditions were dying at an alarming rate.

Cain shook his head. “And you think Berith will be happy to see me when I go back empty-handed?”

“I have connections, you know I do. I’ll help you. I swear, okay? Name it.” She grinned wide. “Anything for you my cutie patootie.”

“Don’t push it.” Cain cursed under his breath.
“Anything?”

Her gaze hardened. She lifted her chin defiantly. “Yeah, anything, even that.”

He wasn’t thinking about
that,
but preferred to keep the dangerous woman on her toes. “You
owe
me.”

Since when did he give breaks to people? Was he losing his edge? Would Berith keep him in hell instead of sending him back to the mortal plane for another job? Damn that woman!

Bethany blew him a kiss, turned to the dying woman and pulled out a tiny black lacquered box when she noticed the telltale sign of the woman’s passing. She collected the secrets – a whole cluster of them, he was so in shit over this – slipped the box back into its home at her belt and backed to the door.

“Would you have helped if it hadn’t been me?” she asked.

“Why do you care?”

“Is that a no?”

“Just get the hell out. You owe me, Bethany. Big time.”

She agreed with a nod. “In all the years we’ve known each other, you never once asked what level I’m on.”

Cain sighed long and hard. This was turning out to be a very bad day. He hated bad days. They invariably ended with his butt in hell, being tortured and taunted then tossed back up. “I don’t give a shit.”

“Yes you do. You’re just too proud to admit you care.” She winked. “I’m on the eighth.”

Before Cain could process the implications, she was gone.

The eighth level of hell was reserved for usurpers and swindlers. And
liars
.

The one time he gave someone a break and this was what happened. That woman would be the end of him.

“Bethany, you trouble-making little shit.”

He took off after her. She was easy to follow if only because of the racket she caused. As if she didn’t care if he followed. Or maybe she didn’t
mind
.

Winter air blasted him across the face when he burst out on to the back porch, ran along the fence and cleared the mansion corner just in time to catch Bethany leaping over the fence. While running, he aimed more or less in her direction and fired once. The shot clanged against the iron fence, busted the closing mechanism, and Cain only had to dip his shoulder as he ran into the opening.

As Cain chased the little liar down Avenue Pierre de Coubertin, the air filled with the flap of wings. A leathery
fap-fap-fap
that presaged nothing good for either of them.

“Give me the box!”

He was out of time. She could disappear down below whenever she wanted. She just ignored him and kept on running.

A city bus on its lonely night run temporarily obscured her when she crossed the wind-swept street. The stadium loomed in front. If she lost him in the maze of concrete ramps and walkways, he’d never find her again.

Three silhouettes suddenly rose near the underground parking entrance. Cain only had time to mutter a curse when Bethany ran right past them. In her haste, she must not have spotted them. Bright muzzle flashes preceded the thunder of several firearms. With a yelp, the woman stumbled, managed to fire a shot before she crashed against the concrete ramp. Like vultures, the three attackers jumped from their perch to finish the job. By that time, Cain had silently caught up to them. Wind drowned what little noise he made as he crept up behind the trio of men.

“Do not kill her yet,” said the man to the right, a tall fellow with a dark coat that reached the ground. His courtly speech pattern tickled Cain’s memory. “There is no reason to be hasty, is there?”

Bethany used the ramp for support as she gingerly climbed back to her feet. “Guys, guys, it’s just a misunderstanding. We can work through this, right. Just hear me out.”