Despite my misspent youth, I didn’t have a ton of tats. None, actually, since tattoos were somewhat expensive and I’d been super broke most of my life. By the time I had some cash from this job, I’d outgrown the need to ink a Wonder Woman symbol above my cootch, so this was my first tat.

Ink stings. Like bee stings all over your skin. I didn’t particularly like this pain since I was fairly certain it wouldn’t end in a screaming orgasm, but it also wasn’t so bad that I stopped eating.

Trent held out the milkshake Albert had made me. It was one of those breakfast smoothies, but Al knew how to make a wolf happy, so along with the protein powder there was real chocolate to make my day bright. I sucked down a nice bit and then frowned Trent’s way when he took a drag off it, too.

Though I do admit I liked the intimacy of sharing it with him, but he was going to have to be the one to refill it.

“He made more,” Trent assured me as he offered me a piece of bacon. “Do you want this? Are you going to be nice to me?”

I let him stuff the excellent bacon in my face.

“Okay, see this is why I’m a vegan,” Calliope said with a shudder. “Sorry. I’m not usually around werewolves because of the whole ‘can’t keep a tat on’ thing. My usual clientele is witches who want to paint their flesh with the goddess, and vampires who are trying to look way cooler than they are. I did the king’s tat.”

That was some gossip I hadn’t heard. “The king has a tat?”

Trent touched his right pec. “You know the symbol on the queen’s necklace? He’s got it right here. I heard he lost a bet a long time ago. You sure you don’t want that on your lower back. It would be pretty sexy.”

The ward against angelic influence was going on my right shoulder blade. I’d decided to put the ward against demonic influence on my left. Like wings except not. Trent kept trying to get something inked on my butt. I think he mostly wanted to see my butt.

“All right, the outside is finished. I need to switch colors if you want to take a break.” Calliope’s hand moved over my shoulder and I felt a surge of warmth as she completed it with a bit of magic. She’d explained that all her ink was imbued with white magic. I had also been given a lecture on the fact that pigs were alive, too, but I didn’t listen to that part.

The door opened and I was happy to have that break. Gray walked in with his brother in tow. Nemcox was in the same body he’d been in before, and I wondered what the poor dude had done to deserve being worn by a demon, aside from the fact that he was very “Nemcox.” Gray’s brother liked his clothes young, male, and startlingly handsome, but not too far on the masculine side.

“Hello, Kelsey dear,” he began with a gracious smile that quickly became a frown as he realized who was sitting at the edge of the chair, holding my milkshake. “What is he doing here?”

I sat up, readjusting my shirt.

Calliope was staring at the newcomer, her arms covering her chest as though she could protect herself. “Is that what I think it is?”

“Why don’t you go into the kitchen and help Liv prep for the ritual? We can start up again in a few minutes.” It was easy to see the witch wasn’t happy to find herself in the same room as a full-on possessing demon.

She nodded. “I’ll get things ready. And maybe you should think about some other wards as well. You seem to need them.”

She hurried off, her sandals slapping across the floors.

“Hippie witches,” Nemcox said dismissively. “You smell of patchouli and desperation, little girl.” He turned toward me. “And you smell like a whore.”

Trent stood up but I had this one. “And I took a whore’s bath and everything. Guess I’ll try harder.”

“Brother, I won’t put up with you talking about her like that.” Gray stepped in front of his brother.

Nemcox waved him off. “So much testosterone for one room. Grayson, why haven’t you killed the wolf? Do I have to do it for you?”

“I’d love to see you try.” Trent punctuated his statement with a low growl.

It was actually pretty hot, but I didn’t have time to indulge his alpha instincts. I turned around on the chair Trent had dragged down along with Calliope. “Why don’t you go and see how lunch is coming?”

Breakfast wasn’t totally done yet, but I stress eat and Albert knows it. He’d already promised me some of his famous tacos for lunch.

Trent frowned my way. “How about I stay here and make sure the demon behaves himself?”

“Do you think I can’t handle my own brother?” Gray asked, obviously annoyed by all of it. “I won’t let him hurt her, but he’s going to be easier to deal with if he’s not staring at you and trying to decide the best way to murder you.”

“I already planned it out. But for you, I’ll make it a surprise,” Nemcox purred.

Trent’s jaw clenched but he moved toward the kitchen.

And he took my milkshake. Damn it. I was carbo-loading. Also, I really liked Albert’s shakes. The minute we were “alone,” I turned to the demon. I only use the quotes because Donovan was somewhere in the condo and his hearing was superlative, so I was fairly certain he was listening in. “Who is the angel you’ve been working with?”

Nemcox managed a look that conveyed both startled shock and the tiniest hint of insult. “Angel? I would never work with an angel.”

Gray sighed. “I told you. It’s not in his personality to work with someone he would consider the enemy. It could get him in serious trouble with our father.”

He looked up to his brother. “I’m loyal and you know it. It’s precisely why I’m doing what I’m doing now and why you should listen to me.”

“I can’t and won’t allow you to sign a contract with the woman I love,” Gray replied. “You know what my wishes are concerning her.”

“I know that you’ll feel differently when you come home,” Nemcox insisted.

Gray wouldn’t have a choice, but that was an argument for another day. “Put the contract aside for now. If you aren’t working with an angel, then why did you murder Larissa Dymone? She was going to talk to me about the murder of Lester Hixalnaxendallixxxba, which I’ve tracked back to angelic influence, so either you were working with the angel who killed Les or you had another reason to murder her and I need to hear that now.”

Nemcox went still. “I thought the person who killed Les was my puppy. I thought perhaps the king had his reasons and was using his powers to call wolves to control him somehow. Are you telling me some fucking angel managed to control Neil? Are you saying he forced Neil to do things?”

Even I could feel the righteous heat coming off him. This wasn’t some acting job. He was pissed. His eyes shone red. It was a good thing. If I got him emotional, I might get an honest answer out of him. “That is exactly what I’m saying. And I would bet that the same angel who is manipulating the man you love so much that you dragged him to Hell and raped him for years is the same angel who protected you from me.”

“What are you talking about, Kelsey?” Gray asked.

“I tried calling him to my hand for months,” I admitted. “I had all the incantations right and I know his name. I should have had my showdown, but somehow your brother avoided me every single time. I wasn’t wrong. I did everything properly but Nemcox here had an ace up his sleeve. He had an angel working some nice mojo to keep him safe. I’m going to assume from the horrified look on that borrowed face that you didn’t realize what kind of price you were paying for that protection. What did the angel require from you and how did my hooker friend connect to all of this?”

“Nem?” Gray turned to his brother, his face going ashen. It had to be hard to see all the possibilities of the world except the ones that affected him directly. A prophet shouldn’t get blindsided, but it seemed to be the story of Gray’s life. “Is she right?”

“Well, what did you expect me to do, brother? I couldn’t allow your bride-to-be to try to kill me. It wouldn’t have turned out the way she wanted it to. I wasn’t going to kill your lover but she was quite insistent about murdering me.”

Gray shook his head.

But Nemcox was right on this one. “Nah, I was totally going to kill him. Or at least do something nasty if I couldn’t figure out how to off him. I thought seriously about cutting off his head and putting it in a box so I could make sure his body didn’t grow back.”

There was an ick factor to that plan, but sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.

“There, you see.” Nemcox pointed my way. “I had to find a way to stop that. She was going to force me to hurt her, and I couldn’t do that to you, brother. I know all too well what it means to love someone who is stubborn.”

“Which angel are we talking about?” I had a hint of who it was from the way Mia described how the light had made her feel, but I needed a name because I didn’t intend to fight all three of those suckers.

He opened his mouth and then it shut again. He frowned and his hands fisted at his sides. He shook his head. “I can’t. I can’t even say…” His jaw slammed shut.

He couldn’t even give me an indication if we were talking about a male or a female. Yeah, Heaven can work some mojo. “You had to agree to some things to gain protection, didn’t you?”

His whole body went stiff and I could see the anger welling in his eyes.

“What did they do to you?” Gray asked.

Gray was too invested to see that Nemcox deserved everything he was getting, but I could make some educated guesses. “An angel came to you at some point after that first time I called you. You held me off that time, but you knew it wouldn’t work forever. I was going to catch you.”

The demon snorted, an oddly elegant sound. “As if you could. You have no real idea what it means to kill a full blood.”

Except I’d managed to do in a Hell lord, and his ass wasn’t coming back. “Abbas Hiberna might argue with you if he was still alive. So either you got scared and called the Heaven plane version of 911 or an angel contacted you.”

His face flushed and he swallowed twice before he answered. “I certainly didn’t call anyone.”

Now we were getting somewhere. “So this angel offered you help in holding me off, but only if you gave him something in return.”

Gray sank down to the sofa. “I can tell you what it was. Only one thing could allow someone else to control the dragon tied to Roberts’s soul and that’s the original incantation and the blood of the family who bound him. What were you thinking, brother?”

“I thought I was saving my own skin and never did I believe…” He went silent again, the spell working its magic.

I was actually surprised. “You didn’t think the angel would do anything bad with it? Who’s naïve now? What else could he have done with that incantation?”

Gray turned to his brother, his eyes going wide. “You thought he was going to unbind Neil.” Gray stood again, facing his brother. “You were trading your love to save mine.”

Nemcox’s eyes seemed to water. “My love left me long ago. He was pulled from my arms by one of them. Whatever that first angel did made it so I couldn’t call him home. I finally accepted that he wasn’t coming back, but I can save you from the same fate. Kill the wolf.”

Gray shook his head. “I can’t.”

So now I had the whys and wherefores and I could guess the who. “Larissa was the go between?”

Nemcox groaned. “I can’t even nod my bloody head.”

That was good enough for me. “It’s nice to know the Heaven plane uses hookers, too. All right. I think that’s all I need. Gray, could you tell Calliope we can continue with the session?”

Nemcox stepped in between us. “What are you planning on doing?”

“It’s none of your business,” I replied.

“She’s going to look into it,” Gray assured his brother. “I’ll help her. I’m not so far from my old job that I don’t remember how to solve a crime. Between Kelsey, Trent, and I, we’ll find a way to prove this was angelic influence and not the king, and the negotiations will continue. That’s what this is really about. Someone on the Heaven plane wants us at the vampires’ throats.”

Nemcox shook his head. “I hadn’t considered it. I truly thought it was Donovan who’s been killing the halflings. He seemed determined to start a war.”

“And now he’s planning on renewing our contracts,” I pointed out. “Gray’s right. I think this was an attempt to push our planes to war. We have to prove that Neil and Felix were under angelic influence when they committed the crimes or Lester’s family will push the issue.”

“Several families will protest,” Nemcox agreed. “There are rumblings on the Hell plane that since Donovan’s taken so long, we should do what we were meant to do and bring about the end of days. It’s insanity.”

“And what does Lucifer say?” Gray asked the question with no irony in his voice, the same way one might ask “hey, what’s Uncle Maurice’s take on how the Cowboys’ line is this year?”

“He says nothing,” Nemcox replied. “Lucifer says it will play out as it will and he has his own plans which he shares with no one.”

Lucifer was a smart one. “Then it’s up to me.”

Nemcox pointed my way. “You see, that makes it sound like you are planning on doing something spectacularly stupid.”

“Wouldn’t be a Tuesday if I didn’t.”

“You can’t think to take on a heavenly host.” Nemcox managed to sound truly shocked.

“Of course she’s not…” Gray’s eyes narrowed. “Kelsey?”

“Dude’s not going to kill himself.” I wasn’t sure what they expected me to do. I couldn’t let him come down to my plane and get away with shit. If I did that then everyone would try it. “Why do you think I’m getting this sweet tat, babe? Now the asshole angel can’t pull any mojo on me.”

“No, he can pull a fucking sword on you,” Gray pointed out.

“Then it’s a good thing I have a sword of my own. You know Gladys spent some time on the Heaven plane.” She might not be as big as the Sword of Justice, but she was still badass.

“It’s not the same,” Nemcox insisted. “If you attempt to go up against an angel, you’ll die.”

“Like I haven’t heard that one before.”

“Kelsey, we need to talk about this,” Gray said, obviously shaken. “I had no idea you intended to go up against this person.”

Then he either didn’t know me as well as he thought he did or becoming a dark prophet had ruined his brain. Trent had already talked to me about getting some sword training in. He knew what I was planning on doing.

“I’m going to talk to some people, and by people I mean the one angel I know who I’m fairly certain isn’t a psychotic whack job. I’ve already got a call in, but I suspect I’m going to be told I have to handle this myself. If Heaven wants to deal with it, great. But if it comes down to it, then I’ll do my job.”

“Or you’ll be in Hell tonight because I’m putting a contract in front of you,” Nemcox promised.

“It won’t work.” Donovan walked into the room, his lazy strides letting me know he intended to stay calm and collected. “The contract can’t be signed for another forty-eight hours. Your father agreed that she is a protected member of the Council, therefore she falls under the seventy-two-hour rule. And that will be upheld everywhere, Nemcox. Would you like to see the agreement? We signed it as a part of the opening negotiations between this plane and the Hell plane. You can’t even start negotiating that contract for another two days. Unless you would like to come to me directly and explain what you have on my son.”

Nemcox’s face went a nice shade of red and I watched as he forced himself to take control again. “Don’t think for a second I’m letting her out of the trap.”

“If she’s forced to fight, we’ll do it here,” Donovan explained. “You’ll be invited as a witness, but don’t show up in a meat suit. It won’t be allowed. Demonic forms only for those full bloods who can’t mask up.”

Even I winced because that would embarrass the hell out of Nemcox. His inability to change his form was considered a weakness.

“You would let your precious Nex Apparatus die for you?” Nemcox hissed the question.

“I don’t think she’ll die at all,” Donovan replied. “I think she’ll show Heaven that we can take care of ourselves. Now I would like you to get out of my home. I might have to welcome you for the negotiations, since it looks like your father will be the one representing Hell, but you’re not welcome near my family. You’ve done enough damage to us for a few lifetimes.”

The demon turned toward me, leaning in. “Know that if you die, I’ll eat that child’s soul myself. If you even attempt to step out of line, I’ll ensure he never sees another day and can no longer harm my master in any way. Am I clear on that, whore?”

“Brother!” Gray pushed his brother’s borrowed form away from me. “How dare you.”

“I dare much for our family.” Nemcox straightened his clothes and made for the front door. “If you can’t be strong enough to take your fate into your own hands, then I shall do it for you. I’ll be here, Your Highness. I’ll be here in all my glory.”

“I’ll look forward to it,” Donovan promised.

He moved to the door and stopped, his hand on the knob. “Kelsey?”

“Yep?” I was ready for just about anything to come out of his mouth.

“You’re right about that sword of yours,” Nemcox said. “The secret’s in the blood and the line. Blood will unlock blood and unleash the true strength of the sword, but only the strongest of the line will do. There’s a reason the vampires took the sword from their companions. They were afraid.”

He slammed the door behind him and I was left with a million questions.

The good news was I knew who to ask.