The door flew open, and a huge dude decked out in leather stalked inside, his long black hair whipping around shoulders so broad he barely fit through the doorway. Massive boots with sinister metal talons at the tips boomed like thunderclaps with each step, and Slake swore the room shrank.
“Raze,” he said. “’Sup, buddy. Blaspheme said you wanted to talk to me.” He glanced at the watch on his wrist. “Make it quick. I have a Nightlash uprising to squash.” He smiled, possibly the most evil smile Slake had ever seen. “Literally. Damn, I love my job.”
“Revenant.” Raze gestured to Slake, who suddenly wanted to back up. To Scotland. “This is Slake.”
The second Revenant focused his dark gaze on Slake, all doubt fled. This guy was the real deal. The power emanating from him made Slake’s insides jangle. Holy shit. Or, more accurately, unholy shit.
“We need you to buy his soul,” Raze continued. “You know, if you want to.”
“Wait, what?” Slake asked, incredulous. “That was your plan?” Bad enough that Dyre held Slake’s soul. What would Hell’s overlord do with it?
And again, holy shit.
Revenant and Raze both ignored Slake. “Why would I do that?” Revenant asked.
“Satan used to buy souls,” Raze said. “I was hoping you would too.”
“Satan was a prick. I run things differently.” He glanced over at Slake. “So why do you want to sell your soul to me?”
Raze replied before Slake could even open his stunned mouth. “Because he sold his soul to a Soul Reaper—”
“That was stupid.”
“Yeah,” Raze said, without missing a beat, “we agree on that. Anyway—”
“No, I mean, really stupid.” Revenant leaned against the doorframe and divided his unnerving attention between Raze and Slake. “I mean, it just seems obvious to me. Don’t sell your soul. Seriously. Who does that? What the fuck?”
Suitably chastised, Slake scrubbed his hand over his face. “Yeah. I know. Fucking dumb. I get it. I’m full of regret. But what I need now is—”
Revenant’s deep voice made the entire room vibrate. “You need someone who outranks a Soul Reaper to claim your soul and negate the deal you made with him, and you’re hoping I’ll be more generous than this guy. Right?”
Aside from his annoying habit of breaking into sentences, Revenant seemed pretty together.
“That’s apparently the hope, yes.”
“Huh.” Revenant materialized himself a bottle of tequila and took a swig. “You’re taking quite the risk, given that I’m the King of Hell.”
Raze cocked an eyebrow. “You’re also an angel.”
“So was Satan.”
“Satan was a fallen angel.”
Gods, this conversation was so surreal. Slake had a feeling that if he survived the night, he’d wake up tomorrow wondering if any of this had really happened.
“And you think my status as an angel makes a difference?” Revenant asked, but he sounded more amused than irritated, which might actually be a bad thing. “I was born and raised in Hell. Satan’s blood runs through my veins. What makes you think Slake’s soul would be safer with me than with the Soul Reaper?”
Slake glanced over at Raze. “He kind of has a point. Maybe this was a bad idea.”
Laughing, Revenant clapped Slake on the back. “Man, you’re gullible. Not that I don’t enjoy tearing someone apart slowly from their toenails to the hair follicles on their head now and then, but I make it a rule to only do that to people who deserve it.” He paused dramatically. “You don’t deserve it, do you?”
“Ah, no.” Well, maybe, but fuck if he was going to say that.
Revenant clapped his hands together with malevolent glee. “Then let’s do this.” A parchment appeared from out of nowhere, hanging in the air, with a quill pen dripping blood floating next to it. “Sign on the dotted line, and your soul is mine.” He added an evil cackle for dramatic effect, which worked better than Slake would have liked, because he had one hell of a chill doing sprints up and down his spine.
“Raze?” Slake asked, needing one last nod of assurance, which Raze provided.
“It’s okay,” Raze said. “I promise.”
Slake read the document, which was simple and straightforward. Revenant would own his soul and could use it as toilet paper if he so wished. And yep, it actually mentioned toilet paper.
Slake scrawled his signature on the page, and the quill and parchment disappeared. “Now what?”
“Now,” Revenant said, “you’re mine.”
“You sure?” Slake patted himself down as if he could feel his soul with his hands. “I don’t feel any different.”
“Do you want to feel different?” Revenant asked. “Because if you like pain, I’m generous that way.”
Slake had no doubt about that, but instead of saying as much, he offered a simple, “No, but thanks anyway.”
“You betcha. And don’t worry, you won’t feel any side effects as long as your soul is mine.” He waggled his brows. “Unless you piss me off.” Revenant opened the exam room door. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have an appointment with doctor who promised me a thorough examination before I put down the Nightlash rebellion.”
He took off, but what he said gave Slake a great idea. At least, he hoped it was great. Raze had just given him a priceless gift, a new lease on life, because now he knew he wasn’t going to suffer at some bastard’s every whim.
Without giving himself a chance to overthink this, he locked the door, pivoted around to Raze, and pushed him up against the wall.
“What are you doing?” Raze asked, but he was already breathless, and with his incubus senses, he’d be able to scent Slake’s desire. Yeah, he knew damned well what Slake was doing, but Slake played along anyway.
“I’m running tests.” Slake grinned as he tore open Raze’s pants and went to his knees. “We need to find out if the other night was a fluke.”
Practically trembling with anticipation, he fisted Raze’s cock and slid his hand up and down in a series of slow, lazy strokes. Raze was so hard Slake could feel his pulse hammering into his palm, matching the beat of Slake’s heart.
Raze’s voice went low and husky, vibrating through Slake in an erotic wave. “Smart.”
“So you approve?”
“Oh hell yeah.” Raze hissed as Slake took his erection in his mouth to capture the pearly drop of liquid sex that had formed at the tip. The spicy, bold tang of the aphrodisiac that was unique to Raze’s species tingled on his tongue and spread down his throat. Within a few heartbeats, the sensation infused his entire body, and when Raze jammed his fingers through Slake’s hair as he sucked him, he felt it all the way to his balls. “In fact,” Raze breathed huskily, “I think we might need to run a lot of tests.”
That, Slake decided, would be a very, very good idea.
It turned out that being able to orgasm with Slake wasn’t a fluke. Raze and Slake tested the theory several times over the next twenty-four hours, with breaks only to eat and shower.
Then, at hour twenty-five, they got a call from Dr. Shakvhan. She’d arranged a spell to reveal the bond Fayle had saddled him with, and as a side effect, he could sense her. The feeling was vague, sort of like a buzz in his chest that got stronger when he was facing in the right direction.
They found her in Amsterdam, exactly where Slake said she’d be, and Raze was able to lead them both right to her door.
Raze wasn’t sure why he was surprised that she had holed up in a rented flat near the red-light district, but maybe it was because he figured she’d have hidden herself somewhere a little less obvious. A succubus in Amsterdam’s red-light district. How original.
Then again, it was almost so cliché it might have worked. Even Slake admitted he hadn’t thought to look here until some Charnel Apostle helped him out.
As they knocked politely on the door of her flat, Slake fingered the dagger at his hip and muttered a few harsh words in a language Raze didn’t know. “Bauk
nein maltz. Naychitz! And how fucking stupid does a succubus have to be to hide in sex central?”
Raze snorted. “You’re just pissed that you didn’t think to look for her here first.”
Slake glared, but he knew Raze was right, so he just cursed some more. Raze loved that. Fayle would have stormed off and threatened to make him wait for sex. But Slake . . . just a couple of hours ago, as he’d covered Raze’s body with his, he’d put his mouth to Raze’s ear and sworn that Raze would never again have to worry about getting what he needed. Slake promised to be there for him anytime, anywhere.
Raze nearly groaned at the memory, and damn his cock, it was remembering as well. Only the sound of someone on the other side of the door disengaging the lock prevented him from pushing Slake up against the wall of this dreary apartment building and kissing him senseless.
The door swung open, and Fayle gasped, tried to slam the door shut, but Slake’s size 14 boot blocked it. Menace rolled off him in waves and his hand flexed over his blade, but he let Raze be the one to advance on Fayle as she stared in disbelief, her eyes wide, her face as white as a cavern troll’s ass.
“What are you doing here?” Her voice trembled, and Raze took a perverse pleasure in the fact that it was the first time he’d ever heard her sound less than confident. “How did you find me?”
“Funny thing,” Raze growled as he stepped inside, forcing her backward. “See, I learned all about how your species attaches itself to a host in order to feed off their sexual energy. I didn’t believe it when another succubus told me that I was a victim of exactly that, but it turns out that a simple reveal spell made it clear. I can actually feel the tether, which led us to you.”
Her heart was beating so hard that Raze could actually hear it. Maybe it was part of the spell that gave him the ability to sense her, or maybe it was because she was truly terrified right now, but either way, it didn’t matter. She was off-balance and cornered, and it was exactly where Raze wanted her.
“Raze, I— You weren’t supposed to find out. As a sex demon, you had more energy to give than most, and—”
“Shut up,” he snapped, not wanting to hear any of her lies or excuses. “You betrayed me.” He jabbed a finger into her breastbone, forcing her back another step. “You violated me. After all our years together, you didn’t feel like you could tell me the truth? What is the truth?”
She flung her hand out at Slake, who had closed the door and was blocking the exit. “Why don’t you ask him, since he seems to know so much about me. Has he told you that he’s some sort of merc or bounty hunter? That he got close to you to get to me?”
“Yeah, he did. And it didn’t take him over thirty years to tell me the truth.”
She hissed at Slake, and nasty claws sprouted from her fingertips. “You want the truth?” she screamed suddenly. “How about this truth? If you’d listened to me, if you’d just moved with me when I asked you to, I wouldn’t have needed to blow up Thirst. I’d never—”
“You what?” Raze stared, unable to believe what he’d just heard. “What did you just say?”
“You heard me.” Her chin came up stubbornly, and he searched her beautiful face, looking for something, anything, that even remotely resembled remorse. There was nothing. In fact, her dark eyes sparkled with an unholy pride.
Fury and the pain of betrayal turned his breath into searing whips of fire in his throat, and he had to clench his hands at his sides to keep from strangling her where she stood. “Why? Why would you do that?” His temple throbbed and his vision blurred, letting him know how close to violence he was. “You killed people, Fayle!”
“It was the only way to get you away from that damned job. Your jobs were the reason you didn’t want to move, yes? And that Lexi bitch. Gods, she deserved to die.”
Raze literally shook with rage. Fayle truly thought that what she’d done was justified. “Were you planning to blow up Underworld General too? Was that next on your agenda?”
She sniffed. “I hadn’t gotten that far in planning. I was hoping you’d change your mind about moving after Thirst. I had to get away, Raze. My people are after me. They’re the ones who sent him.” If glares could kill, Slake would be a greasy stain right now.
Slake shot Raze an exasperated look. “Can I kill her now?”
Raze was tempted to do it himself. But he had questions, and before anyone stabbed her in her black heart, he wanted answers.
Still, he found himself wrapping his hand around her throat and lifting her hard into a wall. “What’s going on, Fayle?” Letting his anger reign for the second time in as many days, Raze got in her face. “You told me you ran away from your people because you wanted freedom. That was thirty years ago. So why do they want you now?”
She clawed at his hands with her razor talons, but he ignored the pain and squeezed until she gasped, “They want me because the queen died.” She sucked in a gulp of air. “I’m next in line.”
He stared. “You’re some sort of princess?”
“I’m the princess,” she choked out, and he let up on the pressure. Just a little. Just enough so she could talk without fighting for oxygen. He’d cut off her oxygen later. “I just wanted to be normal. To latch on to a male like every other self-respecting succubus instead of ruling a kingdom and popping out litter upon litter of babies in a world with no color.” She looked at him, but her gaze was distant, shadowed, lost in a place where Raze couldn’t follow. “Did I tell you about my lands, Raze? Did I tell you that there is only black and gray, and even the air is the color of mist? But the human world is so vibrant, and when I found you in it, I knew I’d hit the jackpot.” A wistful smile touched her lips, lips made to make men beg. Men and demons, Raze thought bitterly. “Very few of us are lucky enough to hook an incubus. All that sexual energy . . .” She shivered, the light in her eyes returning and growing heated, the way it did when she sensed sex nearby. “But now I’m on my way home. I’ll take my place on the throne. I’m just here to charge up and enjoy one last fling in the human realm.”
He hated that he actually understood her thinking, because all he’d wanted since he’d reached sexual maturity was to be normal. And not even a normal, heterosexual Seminus demon. To him, normal meant having a relationship with someone he could share a life and a bed with. Someone he could talk to. Someone who wanted him as badly as he wanted them.
Normal . . . was Slake.
Very slowly, he released Fayle, but if she thought he was done with her, she had a huge surprise coming. He glanced over at Slake, who gave him a nod of understanding and pulled out his phone.
“Were you planning to release me?” Raze asked, staying where he was, which was in her face.
A shamed blush swept across her cheeks. “What can I say? I love you as much as I can love anything, Raze, but I’m a demon.”
“So am I, but I’m not—”
She cut him off with a wave of her hand. “I know, I know. You’re not sucking anyone’s energy. Fine. Whatever.”
Before he knew what she was doing, she was kissing him, driving her tongue between his teeth as she hauled his body against hers. She hadn’t kissed him like this since the very first time they were together, when she’d helped him through his transformation. He remembered everything as if it were happening now, felt the electric sizzle unique to her kiss.
An unholy, possessive growl vibrated the air. Instantly, Raze’s body responded as if to a mating call. Slake.
Fayle broke off the kiss and stepped back, giving Raze a shaky smile. Slake, on the other hand, had closed half the distance between them, had drawn blades from the harnesses under his coat, and was staring at her with death in his eyes. Damn, that was hot.
“It’s done,” Fayle said, keeping one eye on Slake. “My ties to you are broken.”
That wasn’t the only thing broken here. He’d trusted her once, but she’d broken that. He’d cared about her once, but she’d broken that too. He’d thought the last thirty-plus years had been about mutual res
pect. She’d shattered that belief.
“Tell me,” he said, “if your council has only started looking for you because your queen died, why did we constantly move? Your species isn’t really nomadic, is it?”
She plucked a candy from the bowl on the counter and popped it into her mouth as if everything was fine now that she’d broken the bond between them.
“Oh, we’re nomadic,” she said, “but that’s not why I insisted on moving every few years. My people were always looking for me. The search just didn’t get serious until the queen died.” She bit down on the candy with a hard crunch. “Now, unless you’re here to kill me, there’s a red-light district that’s just ripe with sexual energy to harvest. So go away.”
“Oh babe,” Slake said, his voice scraping gravel, “you’re the one who is going away.”
In a move so fast Raze didn’t see it until it was over, Slake launched a dart that struck Fayle in the throat, penetrating so deep that blood spurted all over the pockmarked tile.
“What the fuck,” she screeched, clutching at her throat even as her claws extended like a tiger’s and her body began to swell and morph.
“Hurry!” Raze yelled at Slake. He tackled Fayle, taking her down to the floor as Slake wrapped her ankles with rope he swore would contain a succubus of her species.
Fayle swiped at Raze, catching him in the jaw, and pain seared him from the chin to his scalp.
Growling like a werebear awakened from hibernation, Slake snared her wrists and hogtied her, facedown on the cheap floor rug. Her muffled curses followed them as they both stood and looked down at their handiwork.
“You made the call?” Raze confirmed.
“Yup. Justice Dealers should be here any minute.”
Excellent. Justice Dealers were the police of the demon world, and nothing gave them bigger hard-ons than tossing a royal into their jails. Raze was going to make sure Fayle paid for what she’d done to Thirst. And he’d enjoy every minute of it.
Slake turned to him, and abruptly, his humor turned to concern. “You’re injured.” Reaching out, he gently smoothed his thumb along Raze’s jaw, and Raze sighed with pleasure that outweighed any of the pain Fayle had dealt him tonight.