CHAPTER 18
The old man led him to what Stellan decided was a form of domicile beneath the city of Paris in the 16th arrondissement. He’d jumped down a manhole and followed his guide about two hundred yards through a snaking sewer tunnel. Limestone and crumbling cement formed the seeping walls. Dirt and the occasional slab of stone, beaten down from centuries of footsteps, formed a path. It stank down here like a rotting animal corpse covered in maggots. Stellan knew the smell distinctly.
“Here it is.” The clank of a fingernail against metal lured Stellan from his deliciously morbid thoughts. “Just like I told you.”
The vampire leaned in and inspected the object embedded in the rough-shod tunnel ceiling a foot above his head. The headlight helmet the old man wore beamed sharply upon the curve of what looked like dirty tin.
“Indeed, it is as you told me,” Stellan said. “But it’s not glowing.”
“Every so often it glows blue. No specific time or length. Just flashes. You want it or not?”
Stellan reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a few euro notes. “Will you take twenty-five euros for it?”
“Well, now, that’s not a lot of money.”
“Make it fifty then.” Stellen handed over half the money.
The old man swiped the bills from his hand—all of them. “Hundred’s fine. But you’ll never get it loosened from the stone. It’s stuck in there tight. Even tried to chip it out with my lucky horseshoe.”
“I can see that.”
Stellan examined the chipped limestone hugging the two places where the halo fit halfway into the wall. Had to have been down here since the original Fall to fit in so tightly. But he’d found others in tighter situations.
He gripped the halo and worked it back and forth.
“You’ll bend it!” the old man yelped.
“Shut up. These things don’t break. Go spend your money before you die, old man.”
In proof, the limestone began to crumble and bits of it exploded onto Stellan’s leather coat. He pulled out the halo and held it high, as if that might make it glow. Didn’t work. Didn’t matter. The old man couldn’t have possibly lied about something so unique as the halo glowing.
Stellan hooked the thing about a wrist and stomped away from the stench toward the surface. He detected the old man had turned a corner behind him, and decided it had been a few hours since he’d last fed. And really, snatching the whole hundred after Stellan had offered fifty was rude.
He turned and smiled to reveal fangs at the startled geriatric.
* * *
“Michael Donovan was here earlier.”
Pyx sat nestled in the pillows, her garnet hair spilling across Cooper’s shoulder like a bright winter scarf. They hadn’t slept. They’d passed through the night making love and sharing quiet talk about things like mortality and companionship, and the possibility of sharing those two things together.
Cooper sat up in bed and stretched his back from side to side. His muscles were lax and every bit of him felt terrifically spent. The woman may have been a virgin yesterday, but she’d made up for lost time. Whew!
“Donovan. The halo hunter? What’d he want?” he asked over his shoulder. “Did his girlfriend go after the vamps? He said he was going to sic her on them, or something like that.”
“He had some halos to show you. To prove he would stand good on his word to help you. I suspect he wants to keep tabs on you.”
“Who doesn’t?” He scrambled off the bed and grabbed his jeans. The waistband was torn, rendering them unwearable. “Where is he?”
Cooper stood and with a thought, assimilated the kilt, a crisp white shirt and combat boots laced neatly.
“At the Regina in the second quarter.” Pyx leaned forward and toyed a finger along the hem of his kilt. “I do like this look on you. You’ve sexy legs.”
“So the demon finally indulged in lust.” He leaned in and kissed the top of her breast. “Hold that thought. I’ll be back soon.”
“You going to leave me, just like that?”
“He’s got halos, Pyx.”
“I just thought…” She spread an arm across the sheets where he’d lain.
Don’t do that. That’ll make me want to crawl back in bed with you to inhale your bubble-gum perfume.
Pyx sighed. “Don’t mortals snuggle or something like that after they’ve had sex?”
Part of Cooper wanted nothing more than to snuggle up to Pyx and repeat everything they’d done last night. And then repeat it again.
But if Donovan had his halo and was willing to give it to him? Pyx could never understand. And she probably didn’t want it to happen. If Cooper got his soul that meant she was tough out of luck to kill him and claim her soul.
Cooper wanted his lush, gorgeous demon who came wildly and let out her joy at the top of her lungs to have whatever it was she desired. Another part of him didn’t want to sacrifice his happiness when he knew she had the opportunity to find another Fallen, while he did not have the opportunity to live again if she killed him.
“I have to go see them,” he said. He knelt on the bed and kissed the curve of her spine there, where it was so sweet, just below the fiery wing of the tattooed angel. “Mortals do snuggle. But we’re not mortal yet.”
“I know. Snuggling would be too much like a commitment.”
“Er, right. Wouldn’t want to do anything so dangerous as commit.” Especially after they’d discussed that very thing last night. Must have been the endorphins.
“You got that one right. Let me get dressed. I’ll go along with you.”
“To keep an eye on me?”
“You know it.” She retrieved the muse’s black dress from the floor and tugged it over her head. The hem stopped just low enough to cover the treats she’d offered him last night, and Cooper wanted to tug the skirt lower so no man would even think about what he was thinking. “And because I’m not sure I can function for any amount of time now with you away from me.”
“Hey now, sweetie, don’t fall in love with me. You know that’s a no-no for the Sinistari.”
She scoffed, but it came off as lackluster. Did the demon question herself? “I don’t know what that word means.”
“What word? Love? Say it. Come on, I dare you,” he teased.
“No.”
“Because you don’t want to?”
“Because I don’t want to bring Raphael’s wrath upon me for succumbing to the one Sinistari sin.”
Raphael was the archangel who commanded the Sinistari ranks. Yep, an angel led the demons. Didn’t she question that? Was now a good time to tell her his suspicions about her origins? It could either bring them together or force them to opposite poles.
“I’m having a good time, is all,” she said. “Aren’t you?”
Right. Just a good time. Nothing intense or even resembling commitment.
“Having sex with the woman who intends to slay me? That’s about as good as it gets.”
And he meant it. This was one seriously screwed-up relationship. But he’d take it. Because she spoke to him on a level no mortal could ever understand.
And most important, it kept his mind from other women—specifically, his muse.
Damn, he’d come close to harming her yesterday. He could not have guessed how strong the compulsion would actually be. He’d not been able to stop himself from attempting Sophia.
His plans for leaving the city stood, but if a halo was in the vicinity, he wasn’t going to flash away from it until he held it in his hand.
Pyx could find another Fallen.
“Let’s head over to the hotel. I’ll buy you something to eat on the way.”
“Crepes with bananas and chocolate,” she said.
He kissed her on the head, then bent to lick her neck. She squealed, but didn’t move away. Instead, she sat on her knees and pulled his head down to pay both her breasts due attention.
They left for the hotel three hours later.
* * *
Striding down the hallway in the ultra-lux hotel put up Pyx’s hackles. Fancy paper lined the walls. Gold frames caressed centuries-old paintings. Crystal chandeliers tinkled overhead. This fancy lifestyle wasn’t her. Much as she’d take the human soul, she figured if human, she’d live on a farm somewhere chasing goats and eating fresh eggs for breakfast.
But winning a soul meant only one thing, and she was conflicted now regarding that ending after having made love to Cooper. Make that having sex. The L-word had not been involved. No way.
“Did he tell you what room number?” Cooper said over his shoulder. “Wait. He’s close.” The Fallen put out his hands, palms flat, as if reading the air. “Two doors down.”
“How’d you do that? I thought I was the only one capable of reading paranormal vibrations, and the halo hunter is mortal.”
“I think I’m sensing the halos.” He grinned widely, a little boy nearing the end of his quest for the buried treasure. “Come on.”
He held out his hand for her to take. Kind of old-fashioned, like boys and girls often did decades ago. Pyx slapped her hand into his.
But she wasn’t sure how she felt about Cooper finding his halo.
The idea of him claiming his soul sat well with her. He deserved it. The angel fit humanity well.
But then that ruled out her getting a soul. Unless she could find another Fallen and slay it. It wasn’t as though the Fallen were walking the world in numbers. As far as she knew a Sinistari was only summoned when a Fallen walked the earth. And she knew for a fact her brethren were not out in population in the world. Again, vibrations.
Cooper knocked, then drew up Pyx’s hand and kissed the back of it. He winked at her. She guessed he was excited for what Michael Donovan may have, but wished it were because he was with her and was thinking about what they’d shared last night.
So this was emotion, she thought, focusing on the weird stir in her belly. It was complicated, but not so bad. She preferred it by far to memory of Beneath. And it could only increase after she’d claimed her soul—from this interesting, kind and sexy man.
A petite woman with bright green eyes to match her shirt and an even brighter smile answered the door. “You must be the angel and the demon,” she said. “Come in, Michael’s in the shower.”
Cooper paced the elaborate room. Two twin beds had been pushed together, the sheets and comforter spilling onto the floor in evidence of good use. Marble-topped vanity, a writing desk and a television table were placed amongst the damask fabrics on the wall, windows and even the floor.
Pyx hung by the door, eyeing up the vampiress while Cooper tugged aside a curtain to look outside. The Tuileries gardens were in view and the bright evening settled a heavy golden glow across the emerald foliage.
“So you’re Michael’s girlfriend?” Pyx finally asked.
“Vinny.” She offered her hand, and Pyx shook it. She sensed the shimmer, innate to vampires. The weird electrical tingle startled her and she pulled free.
Not going to trust this chick. Not after what she’d seen the vampires do to Cooper with their injection gun.
Vinny bowed her head. “You are a powerful demon to have recognized me. I am at your disposal. Whatever I can do for you, I will.”
The deference was nice. The Sinistari were the most respected amongst the demon realm, simply because they were so powerful and fearless. They were angel killers. Nothing could kill an angel, save the Sinistari.
“Where are they?” Cooper asked, clapping his hands together in expectation.
Vinny pointed to the messenger bag on the striped Louis XIV chair and Cooper opened the flap top. He didn’t reach in, but clasped his hands expectantly.
Michael strode out of the bathroom wearing jeans and no shirt. His short, dark hair and shoulders glistened with water droplets. “Cooper. Pyx. I see you found what you’re looking for. Did introductions get made?” he asked Vinny.
The vampiress nodded and stepped behind him. Interesting, Pyx thought, the vampire being submissive to the mortal. But what had been normal since she’d arrived on earth? No one was playing to character.
Most especially, the Sinistari demon and her prey.
“Will you take them out so I can look at them?” Cooper asked Michael.
The halo hunter did so, laying five halos on the marble writing desk. Cooper, arms crossed high on his chest, winced as each was laid out. The halos were each about a foot in diameter, the outer circle two inches wide and fashioned from what resembled unpolished tin. They clattered as they were laid on the marble.
Pyx had no idea if the Fallen could sense his own halo, or if he were so eager he didn’t know where to begin.
She dug her fingers into her palms and sucked in the corner of her lip. If she had a heartbeat, it would be thundering right now.
Cooper glanced to her. In his eyes lived worry. Or maybe it was a question. A request. Is this all right with you?
The look set her back, and Pyx looked aside, out the window. Of course it wasn’t all right. But it was his choice to make. And that he’d silently conveyed that question to her meant so much.
She would never tell him what to do. She respected him as much as she expected others from the paranormal nations to respect her.
Without touching them, the angel looked over the five disks before him. Nothing fancy, that was for sure. How they could be wielded as a weapon was beyond Pyx.
“Go ahead,” Michael offered, “pick them up, look them over.”
“Not necessary,” Cooper said. “None are mine.”
“But how do you know?” Pyx argued. She approached the table, ready to grab a halo and stick it on top of his head.
“I just know!”
Affronted by his angry response, Pyx felt a cold shiver move from her breast to her belly. The demon did not care to be admonished. “You didn’t even touch them.”
“I don’t have to. I…can’t. They’re not mine. Put them away,” he said to the halo hunter. “Thank you for showing me them.”
“I’m sorry,” Michael said as Vinny dutifully tucked the halos in the bag. “I have more, but not with me. The vampires have quite a few. Vinny was able to find out.”
“How did you get inside their lair?” Cooper asked the vampire. “Did you just stroll in?”
“I’ve a contact on the inside,” Vinny said.
“I don’t like the sound of that. Whoever it is, he could be playing you.”
“We’ve taken precautions,” Michael said dismissively. “Now, what is the plan? I know the two of you have your own issues to deal with, and that concerns me.”
“I wasn’t aware we were working together yet,” Cooper challenged Michael. “My quest for a halo has nothing to do with you wanting to stake a bunch of vampires.”
“And yet the vampires are the key to everything.” Michael eyed Pyx. “I’m surprised they haven’t gone after the Sinistari. She’s the biggest obstacle to their gaining a nephilim.”
“They’ve tried,” Cooper said. “And failed.”
“They obviously know what they’re up against.” Pyx made sure Vinny caught her glare before walking over to the table and pressing a palm over the messenger bag. She didn’t sense anything, but then, why should she?
And then…she did.
Pyx withdrew her hand from the bag. It hadn’t burned, but she had felt something visceral. Deeper than the light shimmer she’d felt from the vampire, almost internal.
Seeing her reaction, Michael scrambled to open the leather bag and shuffle out the halos. They clattered onto the marble surface. “Did you feel something? I saw something.”
“It was nothing,” Pyx said. How could it be anything?
Both Vinny and Michael gasped when one of the halos glowed blue.
“But that can’t be,” Michael said. “She’s…an angel?”
“What’s he talking about?” Pyx looked to Cooper.
The Fallen shook his head and stalked toward the door.
* * *
He couldn’t face her. He could not.
Cooper marched out of the hotel, aware Pyx followed. She didn’t call to him, or try to catch up. She could not be aware of his struggle to fend off anger. And he didn’t want her to see him in this mood. It had nothing to do with her—and everything.
The halo hunter should have kept his mouth shut.
Damn it, would it be smeared in his face now? The fact he may never find his soul, and she—a bloody demon—may be so close.
He kicked a stone and it zinged the hubcap of a Mercedes. With little thought, he’d probably caused a thousand dollars of damage. Cooper marched onward toward the river. The bustling city did not appeal to him. The rush of traffic gave him little concern as he walked across the street, causing cars to slam on the brakes and honk their horns.
Pyx yelled after him. He ignored her.
Have to get out of this city. Out of this country. Far away from the muse.
Far from the unknown. Would he ever have what he wanted? Did he deserve it?
The river was ahead. He could jump into that horrid muck of centuries past and drown. It would be that easy. Angels could not swim; hell, they could drown in a friggin’ bathtub.
Cooper recalled the great flood. It had swept him from his feet and swirled him away from the earth, imprisoning him in darkness for so long. Interminable torture, the lack of all sensation and thought, had been his prison as he’d waited for final judgment.
He would not go back. He’d die before he did so.
The way to achieve that goal was to do the muse, or find his halo.
Only one sat well with his desperate heart.
But the other formed his very nature.
“No excuse,” he growled to himself. “You’re thinking like you did when you were in the ranks, smiting without second thought. You’re not that angel now. I can make a choice.”
Gaining the Pont Neuf, he slammed a fist upon the stone railing and huffed out tight, angry breaths as he stared down into the broth-colored water. Boats and barges lined both sides of the river. A tourist barge passed under the bridge and he sneered at a little boy who cheerfully waved up at him.
Then he was overwhelmed by the scent of her. Bubble gum and sex. The world muted and the sigh of her climax revisited his thoughts. Tender. Rushed. Devastating. If they had only the one night together, he intended to cherish that memory as if it were a stolen jewel.
Pyx approached him carefully, stopping five feet from him and propping her elbows on the railing parallel to him. “What’s wrong?”
“You don’t really care,” he said. “It’s an affectation you think I require to keep me on your side. We’ve already agreed we’re only in this for ourselves so stop the act. I don’t need it.”
“All right then. No pussyfooting around. Although, what does that really mean? Pussyfooting?”
He shot her an arched brow, but controlled his desire to smile. Man, she could ease his anger like that.
“I want to know what got stuck in your craw,” Pyx said. “It had something to do with the halos. Didn’t you see? One of them glowed. It could have been yours.”
“It was yours, damn it!”
Pyx stared unseeing at him. Her head shook slightly, not processing.
Cooper pounded the railing so hard, the stone cracked. “You know nothing, do you? You, the powerful Sinistari demon who came to smite me from the earth. You! You are like me. You are me. We are the same, Pyx. You are a Godforsaken angel.”