sent him a bright smile outlined in blood red lipstick.
She ignored Kennedy's presence in the room. It made the girl wonder if the woman was plotting to have the man she'd just called Lion added to her endless collection of animal print garbage. Damien bit back the urge to insult her and went straight to the point.
“Have you any messages for me, Seer?” He asked coldly.
“I will never understand why human women fawn all over your kind. You're such cold, insensitive people. But, such is life.” She handed him a folded piece of paper.
“Here's your message.” Damien practically snatched the note from her outstretched hand and quickly unfolded it.
It read, in very familiar loopy handwriting, “The trail to the Archer is hidden on the back road that runs through the Cloud Forest.”
“Who gave you this?” He folded the note and stuffed it in his pocket. He already knew the answer and hearing it wouldn't make it any less harder for him to accept.
“Well, your brother, of course.” She said, like if the fact that Dante wanted to help him was the most normal thing in the world.
“He said that you shouldn't try to contact any of them anymore until the human was safely within the sanctuary and also something about Eden not being safe at the moment. But, I didn't quite get that last bit, he seemed to be in a hurry.”
Outwardly, he was calm and aloof. Inwardly, Damien was reeling. He couldn't see what Dante's angle was.
If what he said was true and Eden Manor wasn't safe anymore, it could mean only one thing, Lilith herself had surfaced. It was a bold move on her part that indicated that she was taking matters into her own hands.
Kennedy, on the other hand, was about to blow a fuse. The Cougar Lady kept looking at Damien through hooded eyes while she talked with her stupid sensual voice. She glanced between Damien's stoic stance and the lady's too calm demeanor and wondered if they were secretly communicating in some way.
“You're looking for enemies where you should be looking for allies, Mr. Anghelescu.”
“Stop calling me that, the sad boy that you refer to is dead, I go by Leoni now.”
“So you do, but what's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet – she recited theatrically – a name doesn't change who you truly are.”
“You quoted Shakespeare at me – he said incredulously, then gestured to Kennedy and himself – we are leaving now.” Damien finally turned to look at the neglected Kennedy and was confused when he saw the anger reflected in her gray eyes.
“Leave, so soon? We have yet to know each other.” Andy vouched for his attention.
“Yes, leave. Get over yourself, you crock!” Kennedy exploded at last. She instantly regretted the jelous undertone in her words.
"Don't presume to call me names, little girl." The seer appeared to notice her presence for the first time.
"I'm not little, you scamming old hag!" She screamed.
"Kennedy, she is on our side." Damien interceded a little too roughly.
"No she's not! She'll probably tell whoever it is that's behind us where we're headed right after we leave, for the right price." Kennedy disliked feeling that way.
Those emotions were so alien to her that she found it hard to control them. She hated not being able to refrain from making a scene and knew that she was only succeeding in embarrassing herself.
"That's enough, I will not sit here and be insulted in my own place by a childish girl that doesn't even know what she is." The seer interrupted. Her voice was calm despite the ice that laced her words.
"I know who I am." She clenched her jaw as to not let another word come through.
"Really? You'll notice that I said what, not who.” Kennedy said nothing.
Andy looked straight into her eyes and whispered, “Witch."
“Screw you.” Kennedy growled out and stormed from the office. She went straight to the bar to wait for Damien.
There, she saw some guys with pitch black eyes, all dressed in black clothing, having drinks. The bartender was talking to them and smiling as if it were the most natural thing in the world. She was taken by the all too familiar instinct to run, but she grabbed the edges of the bar stool she had chosen to sit on hard and held on for dear life until Damien came to get her not a minute later.
“Care to tell me what was that in there?” Damien said as he followed her out to the bar.
“Seriously?” She hunched her shoulders in a dismisive action and looked the other way.
“How can you decide to completely insult someone after barely a minute of conversation?” He insisted.
“You mean, the conversation that I wasn't a part of? Well, that was easy peasy, lemon breezy.” As if! Didn't he insult her the very first time that they had met?
“Am I supposed to know what that means?”
“It means easy as pie, dumbass.” She tried very hard to keep from lashing out, but his insistence didn't make it easy for her.
“I do not know what is worse, your tragic misuse of the english language or the dirty nature of your name-calling.”
“Can we just go?” She asked tiredly, finally meeting his eyes. There, he saw what was really wrong and just like with the previous night's sleepless realization, he firmly denied it and shoved it away.
“Very well.” He acceeded.
They went out using the back entrance where the car was parked. Damien thought absently of switching cars. His Charger made them all the more noticeable and easier to identify.
He just couldn't find it in himself to be sepparated from his baby. He'd had it for so long. He even had it brought into the island by boat when he temporarily moved there.
Just as they reached the car, the back door of the bar opened behind them and two of the black eyed men that had been sitting at the bar stepped out.
Damien reached into his jacket pocket and took out the dragon athame he had made for Kennedy. He tossed it at her, it slid along the car's rooftop to meet her hand.
"Take it and stay back!" He told her in a comanding tone that sent chills down her spine. The evil pair spared no time at engaging Damien.
He muttered something that sounded like, "Asmodai", under his breath and the same glowing knife, or athame that she had seen him use to kill the giant cricket materialized in his right hand.
He clutched the dagger tightly and surged forward against one of the men. He made sure to block their way to her as he did so.
Kennedy watched as he feinted right then surprised his opponent with a left hook, successfully sending the man – or shadow, she still had a little of a hard time tying it together – crashing to the ground five feet away, only to turn and do some of the same with the remaining one.
The evil things didn't give up. No matter how many times Damien threw them down, they kept getting back up and going after him. Watching them fight was mesmerizing. Damien's eyes glowed bluer every time that he retracted his arm to send a punch and she could've sworn that she had even seen him smirk when one of the men had managed to land a solid blow on his jaw.
She grasped the car's door handle tightly in excitement as she watched him punch, dodge, swing and kick, never appearing to get tired. It was like watching a coreographed fight sequence in a martial arts blockbuster. She was sure that her mouth must have been hanging open.
Where was her camera phone when she needed it? Oh, right. Somewhere in the back of Damien's car.
Strong heavy arms wrapped around her. A wide chest blocked her movements as she tried to step back. She had been grabbed from behind and was forcefully held in place between her assailant and the Charger's door.
She desperately looked at Damien for aid and saw that he was busy tackling both shadows at the same time. Frightened, she tilted her head back to look at her captor and saw that she was within Tyler's hold.
“Damien!” Brave Kennedy screamed in reaction. It momentarily distracted the battling Damien who subsequently l
eft himself open to one of the shadow's oncoming attacks.
The small window allowed the thing to stab his midsection with an athame of his own. That one not glowing, but looking a lot like Kennedy's.
Damien roared furiously. His eyes turned as black as night. He took out the big knife that stuck out from his gut and threw it angrily on the alley floor. A glowing ball of energy formed in his hand and, at close range, it blew up the offending shadow like it was nothing.
The guts of it showered the alley along with everything in it, including themselves. It was then that Kennedy realized that he had been holding back, making sport of the unlikely villians as he did his best not to kill them.
Could it be that he was actually concerned about the fates of their human hosts?
She tried fruitlessly to defend herself with the athame that Damien had given her, but her opponent was too strong and slapped the weapon out of her hand without the least bit of an effort.
Damien destroyed the other shadow in a blink and turned back to Tyler. He assesed the situation.
He tried to figure out why Kennedy wasn't dead yet. Unless, it was really true what Nathan had said, that he was going over the Brethren's orders and aiming for the bigger fish, Damien himself.
“Release the girl and I will go quietly.” He tested his theory and, just as he had suspected, the shadow nodded and gave a grunt in agreement.
“No!” The hostage in question yelled desperately, but he would hear nothing of it.
Her mortal life was more valuable than his own to him. He surrendered his blade, letting it fall to