“You look cleaner.” She paused and tilted her head.
“Uh. Thanks?” Emma stopped nursing her hand.
“It’s a waste, though. We’re all about to lose. Everett’s running this place into the ground, and things are getting in. I’m glad I’m not in a cage.” She shrugged and continued walking, her heels clacking on the stone.
Soon after, Emma heard the lair door slam and Everett reappeared, looking even more manic than usual. “Well, bitch, enjoy this reprieve. As soon as I get back, I’ll have all the power I need to tear you apart. And then I’ll put you back together and do it all over again. Can’t wait.” He ran backward down the passageway until he was out of sight, smiling the whole time.
Emma was scared, because her hope had jumped to an impossible conclusion: maybe in the chaos she could get free.
Chapter 17
Kate was a fairly strong swimmer, but the “pond” was a viscous, thick mucus that instantly slowed her down. She treaded water—or whatever this stuff was—and turned to see Tiffany laughing so hard she wasn’t making any noise. Jason kept trying to walk into the water, but he was repelled by some sort of invisible wall. Naked Jack just shook his head slowly and scanned the water around her.
Kate waited for something to happen. Jack had seemed Hell-bent on getting in this pond, and Tiffany and her pooches had been here forever protecting it. She’d assumed swimming in the water would give her some sort of power. She was wrong.
“Um, Jack? What’s going to happen next?” Treading was getting harder. Her pajamas were heavier and heavier as they saturated with whatever this pond was made of.
Jason was now cornered by two of the three giant poodles. He shot frantic glances in her direction. “Kate, get out!”
“Can’t believe she jumped in,” Tiffany said. “Wow. This is going to be quite a show. Bet it sucks her skin off first.”
Jack was the closest to the edge, and she could see his jaw clenched. “Kate, it’s one minion at a time in there,” he told her. “You’ve got to get out. He’s gonna get you.”
Kate was not wild about the idea of her skin being removed, nor the concept that “he” was coming for her. “Why did you want in this, Jack?”
Her mouth was barely above water now. Her ears had filled with the liquid, making it impossible to hear his response. Judging from his lips, he was mostly cursing anyway. This had been a dumb idea. She’d hoped for a boost of the powers her half-breed body seemed to be missing—just something to give her an edge when saving Nero.
She was just starting to swim for land when a hand grabbed her ankle and yanked her underwater. There wasn’t even time to suck in a breath of air. She was under and flailing. This was it. Whatever had her was crazy strong and super fast. She tried to open her eyes to see what the Hell it was, but the mucous pond was as black as her eyelids.
All at once she was pulled out of the liquid and into a cave. There was air, so she took care of her need for that first. As she choked and sputtered, the liquid seemed to come out of every hole she had. She rubbed her eyes again and again until she could finally see. The cave was well lit, and she sat on an oriental rug. TVs flickered in the distance, and classical music seasoned the air with a false sense of serenity. Over her shoulder she noticed one of the walls of the cave was not a wall at all, just a sheer, floor-to-ceiling rippling edge. It was the pond, being kept from filling the space in a way not apparent to Kate. And a man worked at hanging a portrait on the wiggling wall. How he was getting it to stick, Kate wasn’t sure. Finally he stepped away.
He turned and regarded her as she tried to make sense of where she was. He was average height, average looks, save for his bright red hair. His outfit would easily have gained him access to a business meeting without pause: a nondescript, dark blue suit.
“And you are?” He waited for an answer as if Kate had arrived for an appointment rather than being dragged through a Hell pond.
“Kate.” She stood. She was unsure why this painfully normal man lived in a Hellhole, literally. He nodded and sat on a comfortable-looking couch. Kate waited in the awkwardness. The man obviously lived here, and there was no exit except the watery wall behind her. She took another look. The picture he’d been futzing with was a simple landscape, and it was staying put, even though it shouldn’t have. How do you nail something to water?
Kate cleared her throat a few times, but it was obvious the man wasn’t going to explain anything. “Uh, sir? Can you tell me why I’m here?” Her voice sounded harsh mixed with his delicate music.
“You want me to tell you why you jumped in my house? That’s interesting.” He turned his attention to the wall.
“I, well, I knew there was something powerful in the pond, and I was hoping to get it…to help me find my dad. So I guess I know why I’m here, but I don’t know what I need to do next.” Kate twisted her fingers together in a complicated knot.
He looked bored. “So you want me to tell you what you need to steal from me? That’s interesting too.”
“You’re not going to tell me squat, are you?” Kate exhaled loudly. She really didn’t know if she could find her way to the top of the pond without his assistance. Could she just walk through the wall of water?
He stood and came closer to Kate, his voice soft and soothing. “Do you know what your appearance means for me, Ms. Kate?”
His eyes were so much older than the rest of him. She took a guess because the silence seemed to demand it. “Um, you need to clean this rug now?” She gestured to the puddle near her feet.
He looked tired. “It means that Hell has a breach in security. It means I have to do something. I don’t like doing anything.”
“That makes you different from the Devil—or at least the last Devil. Jack likes to do everything.” Kate willed herself to stop talking. The whole room seemed to be losing air as the man in front of her grew angrier.
Before he could answer, the wall behind her exploded. Jack tumbled through the liquid and came to stop, panting and still naked, on the floor near her feet. She fell to her knees and pounded him on the back, trying to expel the thick, slippery water.
When he managed to get a breath, he hissed, “Quit slapping me!”
Kate stopped. “I thought it was only one at a time in the pond?”
Jack pushed himself to sit on his knees. “One minion at a time. Or half-minion. I’m human, remember?” Jack began coughing again.
Kate tried not to look between his legs. She failed.
In one instant Jack glistened with the glop from the pond, and in the next he was dressed in a suit that matched the other man’s. And he was dry.
Jack stood and held out a hand to Kate. “Thanks, Lucy. Can you clean her up too? Put her in something revealing.”
In another blink, Kate felt hands all over her body, drying her, dressing her. “Whoa.” As soon as she registered the sensations, they were gone. She now wore a suit that matched the boys’, right down to the blasé tie.
“You’ve no fashion sense for a dude as old as you are.” Jack tsked with a disapproving look at Kate’s modest attire.
“Don’t call me that, Jack. You being human just exacerbates your failings. Now what are we to do? Hell is compromised, and I have to do something.” The red-haired man shook his head and sat back on the couch.
Jack continued to talk, but his eyes drifted to the many black-and-white TV screens at the back of the cave. “Condemning me for failures, Lucy? That’s fucking ironic. Where’s the hallway I created? Show me that feed.”
“Call me Lucifer instead of Lucy or your genitals will be my head covering.” Lucifer’s head turned from side to side as if watching an invisible tennis match.
Jack found a remote and began clicking through the channels with amazing speed. “Your neck isn’t strong enough to wear my giant dick as a hat.” He stilled. “There it is.”
He stepped forward and Kate joined him in looking at the screen. The hallway he wanted appeared to be empty. “Where is she? Where
is she?” Jack muttered the question under his breath, but Lucifer answered anyway.
“The captive? I haven’t been watching. Everett’s let everything slide since that one’s been here—a huge backlog of souls to be sorted. This is unacceptable, Jack.” Lucifer’s head moved faster from side to side, but his words were clear, as if his mouth wasn’t moving at all.
“Where is she?” Jack clenched the remote, knuckles white. “Swing the camera to see the rest. Is the gate down?” He whirled and growled with furious emotion.
Lucifer’s head stopped moving, and Kate was relieved. She’d been trying to prepare herself for when it spun all the way around.
“You left, Jack. You were the best I ever had, and you left. Now you know what’s next. I’m not ready for that. I don’t want to do anything.”
“Lucifer, you giant taint punch. Really? What’s the worst? You’re forced to lose? Your huge punishment is awareness forever? What the shit do you think you’re doing now? You’ve been in this hole for eons. Eons! He’s not changing His mind. God’s been here plenty, and not once has He decided to cancel this bet.” Jack tossed the remote into the wiggly wall. It absorbed the device with an audible suck.
Kate cleared her throat, and both men focused angry eyes on her. “Listen, your catfight is adorable. No, really, it is. But I need to get my father out of here, so do I get out through that disgusting thing?” Kate pointed at the wall.
They refused to answer and turned back on each other.
“Lucy, God’s done being your friend. You’ve got to let it go. Stand up and be the fucking Devil. That’s what He wants from you.” Jack loosened his tie and slid it off, only to begin wrapping and unwrapping it around his wrist.
The red-headed man showed a glimpse of sadness, a tensing of his jaw. “He might come around.”
Jack exhaled loudly. “Not with the whole damn place coming down around your ears. You’re not even trying. I’m here. I’ll help. Make me Devil.”
The redhead stood slowly. “I can’t do that. You have to defeat Everett.”
“I’m never going to win like this.” He motioned to his human body as if it were disgraceful. “He’s a big, slobbering asshole, but there’s no way…”
Lucifer whipped his head toward Kate. “She’s an example of your failure, Jack. Her mere existence marks a lapse in security. Which minion was responsible?”
Jack shook his head just a fraction as he met Kate’s eyes, and she bit her tongue, which had already curled around who and how many, preparing to announce.
“If there’s blame it’s mine. I’ll take the punishment that comes with the escape and procreation.” Jack looked every inch a general as he refused to condemn his minion. “But with all due respect, I was doing your job. If there was something you didn’t like, you needed to get your ass off this couch.”
Lucifer changed then. Suddenly he was way too big for the small space. His red wingspan was three times his size, his crimson body laced with tense muscles and tendons. Kate fell to her knees as his wing slapped her on the back, and lust hit her like a tidal wave. If fear of Lucifer’s immense wings wasn’t keeping her down, she would’ve been air-humping him like unneutered dog. In the next heartbeat her soul filled with hate and rage. Kate hadn’t realized her body was capable of harboring so many poisonous emotions. As the giant Devil turned to address Jack, her body was released from his spell and the turbulent feelings he’d caused. She went limp. She peered up from the floor to find Jack still standing his ground, unflinching.
Lucifer’s voice could only be described as rocks grating on stone. “You will bow before me, insolent one.”
Jack fought it, but soon his body collapsed under the words that fell like lava from Lucifer’s mouth.
“You can make me bow, but understand this: killing me will never solve your problem. I’m the only one who can fix it, and you know it. Unless you found your balls recently and you want to man up and run Hell?” Jack tossed the words out while seething on his knees. “Then it’s on me.”
There was an edge to the room then. A moment of decision Lucifer had refused forever. As quickly as he’d inflated, he deflated. “Rise.”
Jack stood and dusted off his knees. He helped Kate up, whispering, “Say nothing.”
“I’ll grant you as much power as I can, but you know it’ll only be half of what Everett has at best.” Lucifer sat on the couch again as if he’d never been a winged beast at all.
Jack nodded. “You should rethink this. Before everything gets out of hand, ask for a meeting with God.”
Lucifer almost smiled. “He and I were friends once. Almost brothers. I wanted to make Him proud.” There was such aching loss in his voice.
“Lucifer?” Kate ventured. “Um, God seems like a nice guy. I bet He doesn’t like that you’re hanging out in a Hellhole.” Kate winced as Jack gently grabbed a fistful of her hair, a reminder, no doubt, that she was supposed to be quiet.
“Ms. Kate. No one leaves this cave. Ever. The trip down is a sentence. Are you ready to be my footstool for eternity?” Lucifer held his feet up as an invitation.
“No offense, but it doesn’t sound like you have eternity to threaten me with. Give me power, and I can help Jack.” The hand in her hair loosened a bit.
“Ms. Kate, you speak as if you have something to bargain for.” The man’s eyes were creepy and endless as he held her gaze.
“Unlike you, waiting isn’t my style. I’ll go down in flames before I stand by and do nothing.” She lifted her chin a bit.
“Very well. Come forward. All that’s required is a kiss. Jack, you first.” Lucifer tapped his lips at his sexy servant and smirked.
Chapter 18
There were so many reasons Jason hated Jack. Big, horrible reasons. One of them was having to deal with the huge, disgusting poodles that now surrounded him. If their owner wasn’t hating on Jack so much, she might not be Hell-bent on feeding Jason to her dogs.
“Why is Jack human? Where did you come from? Why are you not full minion?” Tiffany’s dogs growled with her every question.
“Jack’s a human because he’s a jerk. I’m half minion because I was born that way. And I came from up there.” He pointed.
One of the poodles gave a deafening bark at his movement. He tried not to be rattled, but he didn’t have a lot of composure left. Kate could be dead. Jack too.
“So what’s in the pond? Are they ever getting out?” Jason stayed as still as possible.
Tiffany licked her lips and looked him up and down. “Don’t think so. Surprising her skin wasn’t sucked off. The few times anything has gotten past me, that’s the first thing that happens.” She neared a poodle and petted its dingy fur. “I wonder if it’s time.”
“Time for what?”
“Well, everything comes to an end, right? Maybe this is the beginning of the end.” Her maniacal eyes seemed to have a gloss of sadness. “Maybe it’s time for it all to come to a head.”
Jason longed to make a move, do something to help Kate. He hoped that by keeping Tiffany occupied he was helping a bit. As if in response to his thoughts, he watched Kate surface in the pond. He kept a poker face as she struggled against the thick liquid, wondering what to do. He didn’t want the dogs to get to her. “Bark! Bark!” he yelled.
The poodles immediately fixated on him, cocking their heads and growling. But Tiffany whirled around, looking for a disturbance. Kate clambered to the edge, filthy and dripping. She glanced behind her, and Jack popped up next. Jason continued barking and growling, and the poodles edged closer, despite Tiffany’s protests and demands that they turn around. When Kate and Jack were both finally standing, Jack clucked his tongue and the dogs sat and were silent.
“Attack! Gem, Fifi, Buster, attack!” Tiffany pointed at Jack with all the venom a woman scorned could muster.
Jason stood and waited. Tiffany waited. Jack smirked and turned to Kate. “So, anything yet?”
She shook her head. “I’ve been trying to get clean since
I pulled myself out. No dice.”
Jason held up his hands in a shrug and a question. Kate mouthed, “Tell you later.” He couldn’t help but feel incredibly grateful she was okay, even if Jack had to be the one who saved her. He felt at home when he stood next to her. Somehow it was his natural place.
Tiffany let out a growl similar to her poodles’. “Jack, get over here and die like a man!”
Kate ignored her. “Wish I had a picture of you kissing that dude, though. Excellent blackmail material.”
Jack gave her a dangerous look. “What happens in the Hellhole stays there.”
Kate laughed, and the poodles lay down as if it was a command. “Absolutely not. I’m telling everyone who holds still about how you and I made out with the same guy.” She walked past Tiffany with confidence and petted the chest of the nearest poodle. Its tongue lolled happily out the side of its giant mouth. Then Jason watched as she turned and headed for him.
“Jack and I sucked face with Lucifer,” she explained as she approached. She wiped her mouth as if trying to get the slime away from it.
Tiffany dropped to her knees as Kate passed, holding her head low in subservience. Kate stopped and gave her a wide-eyed once-over.
Jack caught up to Kate. “I did not suck face with him. It was a very chaste pressing of skin, like a handshake.”
Kate pointed at Tiffany. “What’s she doing?”
“All women get on their knees when my dick is near.” Jack smirked.
Kate rolled her eyes and focused on Jason. “Sorry I’m so slimy. And I’m pretty sure now I can find my father without Mr. Oops-I-forgot-and-stuck-my-tongue-in-a-guy’s-mouth over there.”
Jason looked from the minion on her knees to Jack shaking his head and taking off a very slimy suit jacket.
“It was either the bad lighting or your extremely active imagination,” Jack protested.
“There’s a guy in that sludge? What’s going on?” Jason took Kate’s slippery hand and squeezed it gently. She was beautiful, even sopping wet.