CHAPTER EIGHT
After leaving Stieg in the car, Jace walked into the Bird House.
As soon as she entered, Rachel was there, her mouth open to speak. And, to be honest, Jace didn’t want to hear it, which was why she said, “Shut up.” Shocking Rachel into immediate—if temporary—silence.
She’d had such a good day, she didn’t want to hear anything from anyone.
Jace paused and let out a whistle. A whistle her team used in order to track each other down during battle. She received a whistle back and tracked her team into one of the small living rooms. Except for Tessa, they all sat on the couch watching TV or working on their electronic gadgets.
Kera turned around and smiled. “How did it go?”
Jace stopped. Blinked. “What happened to your face?” she asked, horrified. The entire right side of Kera’s face was swollen and black and blue. Jace immediately looked at Erin. “What did you do?”
“It wasn’t me! Why do you guys always assume it’s me?”
When that got nothing but snorts and giggles, Erin looked back at the television.
“She’s right,” Kera said. “It wasn’t her. It was a one-hundred-pound Rottweiler momma who wasn’t a fan of me trying to rescue her babies. The puppies aren’t here,” Kera quickly added when Jace squealed and clapped her hands together.
“Why not?”
Everyone on the couch looked at Jace and she realized she might have sounded a wee bit . . . terse.
But come on! You couldn’t talk about puppies and not have them here for her to play with!
“Right now I’m working with another rescue group in town until I get mine going. So the puppies and their momma are being cared for by them. I’m paying for food, boarding, and veterinarian costs.”
By now Lev had heard Jace’s voice and run into the room. On his hind legs, he pawed at her denim-covered calf with his claws until Jace reached down and picked him up. “Well, you need to get on that, Kera.”
“To help the American vets who’d risked their lives for our freedom and now need a little extra help at home . . . or so you can have easy access to puppies?”
“Why can’t it be both?”
Maeve, sitting on the couch, bundled up in a blanket, held out a thermometer. “I’m sick.”
Erin sighed. Loudly. “You are not sick.”
“I am. It’s either the flu . . . or I’m dying.”
“Dying?” Erin demanded. “Really?”
“My lymph nodes are swollen,” she argued, pressing the tips of her fingers against her throat. “My nose is running. I’m sneezing. My sinuses are killing me—”
“Did you take your allergy meds?” Jace asked, pressing her nose against Lev’s. That was when he started licking her face and nibbling on her chin.
“Allergy meds?”
“The last time you had those symptoms, turned out it was your allergies. As opposed to some virulent form of bird flu.”
“Oh.” Maeve lowered the thermometer, thought a moment. “I did forget to take my allergy pill this morning.”
Erin rolled her eyes; shook her head. “Oy.”
“Hey, check it out.” Alessandra grabbed the remote and turned up the sound. “Isn’t that Betty’s old assistant?”
It was. The leggy blonde looked amazing as she smiled on Entertainment Tonight, talking about “covering for poor Betty Lieberman while she recovers from her recent accident.”
“That’s a lot of fuckin’ gold jewelry,” Erin noted. “What is she? A rapper? She looks like she’s joining Public Enemy.”
With a snort, Kera asked, “Is that the most recent rap group you’ve heard about?”
Erin laughed. “Nah. Just one of my mom’s favorites.”
Tessa walked into the room, stopping beside Jace to pet Lev’s head. “Okay, ladies. We have a job tonight. Let’s gear up.”
“What?” Erin asked. “Again? We just had a job last night.”
“The other Strike Teams are out. So we’re up.”
“Is it a full moon or something?” Maeve asked, between dramatic coughs . . . which everyone ignored.
“Surprisingly no.” Tessa waited a moment before snapping, “Bitches, get up!”
Groaning and complaining, Jace’s sister-Crows got to their feet and headed up the stairs.
Tessa turned to Jace. “Did you tell Rachel to shut up?”
“Yes. But in my defense, she was going to ruin my day by talking to me. I wasn’t going to let that happen.”
Tessa gave a small shrug. “That was probably a good plan.”
Ski perched on the roof of the bar outside Bakersfield. He’d come with Bear’s team again.
They all perched and waited. Of course, what they were waiting for, he didn’t know. He just knew what he had to protect.
“Uh-oh,” Borgsten groaned.
Ski briefly closed his eyes, the sound of motorcycles roaring through the parking lot of the bar irritating him more than he could say.
“By Tyr’s right hand,” Gundo complained, “why them?”
“Because we’re having a bad night.”
The engines of the bikes were shut off, hammers were unslung and rested on big shoulders. The Protectors watched Thor’s human Clan, the Giant Killers, lumber their way toward the front doors of the bar. And Ski knew that as soon as that Clan stepped inside, the screaming would start.
When Ski had been a little boy, he’d never thought there could be anyone dumber than Ravens. He’d quickly learned he was wrong. There was dumber.
Thankfully, though, Frieda was with this group. She was the leader of the Los Angeles Giant Killers. She wasn’t actually smart, per se. But she wasn’t painfully dumb, either. That helped.
Ski raised his hand and signaled his team to move. They had to do this quickly and quietly, which wouldn’t be easy. Not with Thor’s Clan.
Suddenly Ski found himself wishing he was dealing with the Ravens instead. Something he rarely ever thought.
Ski launched himself off the roof and landed hard in front of Frieda.
She immediately stopped, her hand tightening on the handle of her weapon. Her team stood behind her, ready to start swinging those ridiculous hammers at any moment.
Like Thor himself, there was nothing subtle about those stupid hammers.
“Danski Eriksen.” Frieda pursed her lips as she looked Ski over. “What are you doing here?”
“We can’t let you do this, Frieda.”
She gave a harsh laugh. “Oh? Ya can’t? And why’s that?”
“This place is under our protection.”
“A bar? You losers are protecting a bar? I’m shocked.”
“The owner is a favored priestess to Tyr. Now, if she has something that belongs to Thor, I’ll personally retrieve it for you. But you’re not about to go in there and start killing everybody.”
“We’re not?”
“And who’s gonna stop us?” one of the older Killers asked. A Killer who’d been slammed around so many times in fights with the Crows and Ravens that Ski was pretty sure the man had permanent brain damage. Like a professional football player who’d been hit one too many times on the field. “You . . . Urkel?”
Frieda lifted the hammer off her shoulder, slapping the head into the palm of her hand. Ski cringed. That had to hurt.
“Bring it,” Frieda urged. “We’re more than ready.”
“I don’t want to fight you, Frieda.”
“Why? Because you’re a pussy?”
“I don’t like that,” Haldor announced. One of the Protectors who wasn’t just quiet—the man could literally go for months without saying a word.
Frieda gawked at him. “You don’t like that? So?”
“I have a daughter and I’m trying to teach her self-respect in a very male-centric world. And suggesting someone’s weak by calling them female genitalia bothers me. Viscerally.”
“What-erly?” one Killer asked another.
“As a woman,” Haldor went on, “you really should be more conscious of—”
“Shut. Up!” Frieda roared. “Now, are we going to do this or not? Come on, Protector!” she challenged. “Let’s fight!”
Except Ski didn’t really want to fight . . .
Pastor Bruce Maynard sat back in his chair and watched his wife take a stack of bills off the table where all the money they’d made for the night had been counted out.
She held it under her chin, grinned. “How do I look?”
“Rich.”
She laughed and kissed his forehead. “I’ll go home. Get the party started.”
“I won’t be long.”
She walked to the exit, stopped, and reminded him, “No hookers tonight.”
“I said I wouldn’t.”
She rolled her eyes, chuckled, and walked out.
Bruce stood and took a moment to walk around his tent. He was going to be here for another few days. Selling the Word of God. Providing some healing. And earning some money. It was what he was good at. The best long con he’d ever come up with. He even had TV interest. And that was where the real money was at. If he could get the masses pumped up and his wife could do her amazing song and dance, they’d have that private jet in no time.
He heard something on the wood stage behind him.
She crouched there, watching him. She was pretty. A hot little redhead dressed all in black. She couldn’t have been at the sermon, though. He’d have noticed her. Would have had one of his security guards bring her to his trailer. So, who she was?
And where did she come from?
“Hello?”
She stood, arms crossed over her chest, but said nothing.
He walked toward her but heard something behind him again. Turned. This one was Latina. Very pretty. Long blond hair, big brown eyes. Also dressed in black, but she wore a long skirt slit high up on both sides. She smiled at him. He smiled back.
A throat cleared. He faced the redhead again. She was no longer alone on that stage. There were two more women. One black. One white with long, curly brown hair. Both attractive enough.
“Can I help you, ladies?” he asked. Hoping they were here for more than just help.
It was the Latina behind him who spoke.
“We listened to your sermon.” She laid her hand on his shoulder, slowly walked around him until they were face-to-face. “It was . . . interesting. Your message.” She dragged one of her manicured nails, painted a deep red, down his chest. “About God . . . and His apparent need for money.”
Who were they? Some uptight broads complaining about the money taken from their grandparents? How boring.
“Our Lord and Savior—”
“No,” she cut in. “You can’t mention His name. It upsets us so. It’s sacred. Like the people who worship Him. They’re sacred.”
“Perhaps you should talk to my—”
“We’re here to talk to you.” She smiled, her hand moving steadily lower. “And you’re going to listen.”
She grabbed his balls and twisted, nearly had him on his knees. But she quickly backed off the pressure, even though she didn’t release her hold.
“You keep selling those lies, taking these poor people’s money, and we’re going to come back here, and we’re going to rip your soul from your body.”
“Are you insane?” he asked.
Wings extended from her back. Big, black wings.
They all had wings.
At first, Bruce thought it was a trick. They were in Barstow. That was only, like, a two-hour drive away from Los Angeles. Movie territory. It could be some movie mogul’s parents he’d gotten money from. And they’d set up this whole thing.
But then the redhead flew across the room to reach him. She flew. Landing in front of him.
“Do you understand what she’s saying to you?” the redhead demanded. “Do you understand what we can do to you? We’re giving you a chance here. One chance.” She leaned in and whispered, “You heard what we did to Sodom and Gomorrah, right? That was a whole city.”
“I—”
She lifted her hand, flames danced through the fingers, and Bruce tried to lean away but another one of them, wings extended, stood behind him, pressing him forward.
“So,” the Latina said, “you’ll give back the money. You’ll preach the real Word. You won’t try to steal any more money from these people. You’ll get right with our Father or we’ll come back here and we’ll decimate everything you could possibly love. Do you understand?”
“I understand! I understand!”
She pushed him away. “Do not fuck up again, Bruce.”
“I won’t! I swear! I won’t!”
Her wings went up, then down, and she flew out the hole at the top of the tent.
The redhead leaned in and removed the weird bracelet from his wrist that his wife had purchased for him from some high-end jeweler she really loved, who also cleaned their money for them sometimes.
“And I’ll be taking this,” she said as she tucked it into the back of her black jeans.
“Why?”
She leaned down until their faces were nearly touching, her hand raised, a ball of flame in the palm. “What did you say?”
“Nothing! I swear!”
“That’s what I thought.” Then she was gone. They were all gone. And all he could do was cry and tell God he was so sorry.
Big Bavarian pretzels were the bar’s well-known specialty. And as the priestess handed them out to each Protector, along with mugs of cold beer, they ate and stared at the spot where the Killers were no longer standing.
“That was a little less satisfying then I thought it would be,” Gundo mused.
“Were you in the mood for a fight tonight?” Borgsten asked.
“Not really. Still . . . opening doorways, shoving them through. Not exactly Viking-like.”
“If we were going to be Viking-like, we would have killed all the Giant Killers and fucked their corpses.” When Borgsten’s brothers stared at him, he added, “At least that’s what my bloodline was known for. Thankfully, we’ve since moved away from that.”
“Thankfully,” they all said in unison.
“You do know, Alessandra, that you held his balls for a really long time?” Erin asked.
“I know, dude, but they were huge. And his dick was like an elephant’s.”
Kera cringed. “Surprisingly, that does not sound as hot as you’d think it would.”
“It explains why he’s so confident.”
They perched in the trees overlooking the revival tent and watched the pastor run out. He was crying and tripping over his own feet. And there was now a yellow stain on the front of his white pants.
They’d only come for the bracelet. He hadn’t used it. Didn’t even know what it was. Erin could have stolen it and that would have been that.
But after a little research and watching a few minutes of his online videos, Kera wanted to send a message. Her very religious mother used to fall victim to assholes like him all the time. If she could stop even one of them, she’d feel like she’d accomplished something with her life.
You know . . . besides helping to save the world from Ragnarok and all.
“So, what do you guys think?” Erin asked. “Think he’ll really change?”
Annalisa shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s nearly impossible to change a sociopath. And you kinda have to be one to steal from the poor by using their religion against them. Even I was never that shitty. And I was really shitty. But I will say, I do enjoy pretending that we’re angels.”
“I heard the Pope hates when we do that,” Alessandra said.
“He hates everything we do.”
“No.” Erin shook her head. “Not everything.”
“Wait,” Kera cut in, beginning to panic. “How does the Pope know about us? How are we involved with the Pope at all? Why does he hate us?”
Erin chuckled. “I do love ex-Catholic panic.”
“I don’t know which is worse,” Jace suddenly said, her voice soft as she watched Pastor Bruce’s car speed away. “The ones who don’t believe what they’re saying and steal from you . . . or the ones who do believe and still steal from you.”
“Wow,” Annalisa said, “that’s some deep shit.”
“Anyone else hungry?” Erin asked. “I am so in the mood for waffles.”
“We passed a twenty-four IHOP off the freeway.”
They all nodded and the others unleashed their wings and took off. But Jace was still sitting there.
Kera carefully moved across the tree limb to perch beside her. She still wasn’t as confident as the others that the trees could hold her weight, but she was getting more comfortable with the intricacies of her new life. Jace kept telling her it would take time, “but it’ll be part of your every day before you know it.”
“Jace? Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” Jace replied a little too fast. “I was just thinking.”
“About lying pastors?”
She smiled. “You could say that.”
“I’ve met a few myself. My mother used to send them money all the time. Drove my dad crazy. Especially when they came over to the house and he’d find them in his living room, drinking his coffee and stealing his money. He said they were like cult leaders.”
“No,” she said with a shake of her head. “They’re not like cult leaders. Not at all.”
And with that cryptic bit of information, Jace unfurled her wings and was gone.