Rogue Rider

Ten

“What happened?” Reseph’s voice was low, deadly, and this time, Jillian knew she wasn’t going to get away with deflecting or telling him she didn’t want to talk about it.

“I’ll tell you everything.” She looked around and shivered. “But I want to go home first. This place is giving me the creeps.”

Reseph gave a decisive nod and headed to the snowmobile. “I’ll drive. You look like you’re about to pass out.”

“Do you know how to operate one of those?”

“Strangely, yes. I can drive a car, too. Pretty sure I’m good at horse-drawn buggy.” He hopped on and held out his hand, which she took, and settled herself so her body was flush against his, wrapping her arms tightly around his waist. “Lower.”

“What?”

“Move your hands lower.”

Inhaling the warm, earthy scent of his silky hair, she obeyed, and then punched him in the shoulder. “You and your one-track mind.”

“Can’t blame a guy for trying.” He started the engine, the roar cutting off any hope of a smart comeback. Which was, no doubt, the reason for his convenient timing.

He gunned it, turning them around in the circular drive. As they started down the long, winding driveway, headlights flashed between the trees, coming at them. Reseph stopped the machine.

“Who is that?”

She tightened her arms around him. “Could be the police. Or the special investigators.”

“Who are they, anyway?”

“Demon hunters.” She’d never seen any, but talk of them was all over the news.

Reseph went taut, the muscles in his back turning to cement against her chest. “Is there another way back to your place?”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. I just have a bad feeling.”

“About them?”

“No,” he said roughly. “About me.” His entire body went even stiffer as the vehicle got closer. “I can’t explain it. We just need to go.”

Unease licked at her, but Reseph hadn’t steered her wrong yet. She pointed toward a thin grouping of trees. “That way. There’s a meadow we can cut through.”

Reseph didn’t waste time. He hit the gas and tore through the forest. Jillian held on for dear life, although she had to admit that he drove the snowmobile like he’d been doing it professionally for years.

“You’re good,” she yelled into his ear.

“I know.”

“Arrogant ass,” she muttered, and she swore he chuckled.

He ripped across the field, keeping close to the tree line, as if he didn’t want to get caught out in the open. Ahead, a deer bounded over a log and into the trees, turning to look at them as they sped through the snow. Reseph saluted the creature and turned the machine into the forest at the trail Jillian gestured toward.

They arrived at her house in one piece, which almost seemed like a miracle. Reseph drove well, but he drove like a maniac.

As soon as they were inside, he stripped off his shirt and socks, leaving him only in jeans. She might think his hatred of clothes was strange, but she certainly didn’t mind looking at his bare body.

“Now,” he said, crossing his arms over that magnificent chest. “What happened?”

“I don’t even get a chance to relax?” She headed into the bedroom, and he followed.

“You had time to relax on the way here.”

She shot him a dirty look. “If you think being on the back of a snowmobile with you is relaxing, you’re crazy.”

“That’s highly likely.” He propped himself in the doorway. “So.”

“So.” The dark memories of her past rose up. Delay. She needed to delay even for just a minute. “Why don’t you go first and tell me what about the demon investigators made you nervous?”

“I don’t know,” he murmured. She measured him for the truth, studying his body language right down to the twitch in his straight, strong jaw and the glint in his eyes, but it dawned on her that it was a waste of time. She was batting zero when it came to judging men. “I guess I had a witch hunt freak-out. You know how zealots see what they want to see? What if they took a gander at my situation and decided I should burn at the stake? Look what happened during the Salem witch trials. No one put on trial was actually a witch. One was a demon, but no witches.” He paused. “How do I know that?”

“Maybe you saw it when you were online. But yes, I can see how running into demon police types could be a little unsettling,” she admitted.

“Exactly. Now,” he said, in a deep voice that dripped with command, “tell me what happened to you.”

Dammit. He definitely wasn’t letting this go, but she couldn’t blame him. She’d invited the discussion the moment she showed him her scars. God, she wasn’t even sure what had possessed her to do that. She hadn’t even let Stacey see them.

“It happened a year ago.” She sank down on the bed and pulled a pillow onto her lap. “I was leaving work at the Orlando air traffic control tower after a swing shift, so it was almost midnight. The parking lot was well-lit, but all of a sudden, the lights dimmed.”

“A year ago. That’s about when all the demon stuff happened, right?”

“Sort of. Apparently, it had been happening for a few months, but the general public didn’t really know until then. That’s when the shit hit the fan and just kept getting worse.” Until three months ago, when everything just… stopped. “So yeah, there were rumors and stuff, and it was getting scary, but world leaders were trying to downplay everything.” A shudder rattled her. “I wasn’t as cautious as I should have been, but I was supposed to be meeting my fiancé in the parking lot—”

“Fiancé?” Somehow, Reseph’s voice went even deeper.

“Yes, but, I mean… it’s over. We’re not together anymore. Obviously. Or I wouldn’t be here.” Good God, could she have babbled more? And why did she feel the need to explain? “Anyway, I was in the lot, and when the lights went out, I should have run back inside the building. Instead, like an idiot, I went to my car.”

“You couldn’t have known,” he said. “And weren’t you at an airport? Isn’t the control tower in a secure area?”

“Yes, which is probably why I had a false sense of security.” She inhaled, bracing herself for the rest. “When I was almost to my car, I saw blood. A lot of it, leaking out from under the truck parked next to mine. At the time, I thought it was oil.”

“Because it was dark.”

“Exactly.” She winced. “But I remember the smell. I should have known. It was so stupid.” She didn’t give him a chance to offer comforting, useless words. “I walked around the back of my car, and that’s when I saw Sandy. She was the electronic technician who monitored the weather instruments in the field. She was being… attacked… by some kind of monsters.” The things had been sexually assaulting her, even as they ripped at her body with their massive teeth. “She was dead… God, I hope she was dead.”

“What did you do?”

“I ran. Tried to run, anyway. One of them had me on the ground before I made it ten feet.” She looked up at Reseph, who was watching her with concern, but, thankfully, not pity. “The strangest thing is that I don’t remember the pain. I know it was cutting at me with its claws, and I was terrified, but I don’t remember it hurting.” The fear though… she’d never forget that.

“What else do you remember?”

“Its breath.” She shuddered again, this time hard enough to shake the bed. “It was like rotting eggs and meat mixed with feces.” She realized she’d been rubbing her belly, running her palm over the scars, and she pulled her hand back. “And then there was the man.”

Reseph shoved off the door frame in a slow, sinuous motion. “Man?”

She nodded. “In the shadows. I didn’t see him, but I… felt him. It was like he was a big furnace, only instead of giving off heat, he was radiating evil.” She gave a nervous laugh. “Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?”

“We’re talking about demons,” Reseph said, as he moved in front of her. “So nothing sounds crazy. Or maybe all of it does.”

“I think it all does.”

He kneeled at her feet and put his hands over hers. “Then what?”

“I don’t know.” It was a lie, but she wasn’t ready to relive the gory details. She doubted she’d ever be ready. “I remember the sound of flapping wings, though. It was so odd. There were all these growls and snarls… and through them, I heard the whisper-soft flap of wings.” A few seconds passed in silence, and when she spoke again, her lips were numb from pressing them together. “I woke up in the hospital a month later. The doctor said airport police had found me during a routine patrol. I didn’t remember anything for a few weeks, and by the time I did, I was discharged from the hospital. I couldn’t go back to work, so I quit my job and came here.”

“And your… fiancé?” Reseph’s last word came out as a low growl.

“I never saw him again.”

A vicious smile curved Reseph’s mouth. “Did the demons eat him?”

“I wish,” she muttered. “A day after I woke up in the hospital, I had my first visitor—his wife.” Apparently, Jason had confessed everything to his wife, saying that he’d intended to leave her, but the circumstances around the world had made him see the light, blah, blah. That was why he hadn’t met Jillian in the parking lot like he was supposed to. He’d changed his mind about her and his marriage. His wife had been the one to come to the hospital and tell Jillian that the relationship was over.

“You were engaged to a married man?”

Humiliation spread like wildfire over her cheeks. “I didn’t know he was married. He told me he was divorced.”

“Bastard,” Reseph snapped.

“Can’t argue that one.”

Reseph studied her, and once again she got the impression that he was far, far older than he appeared. “Stacey knows what happened, doesn’t she?”

“Yeah. She’s the only one. Until you.” She squeezed his hands, grateful for his presence. “I was doing really well, and now… shit.” She closed her eyes, but it didn’t shut out what she’d seen in the neighbors’ trailer. “The same kind of demon butchered my neighbors, didn’t it? God, what if it was because of me? What if it’s here to finish what it started? Reseph, what if it’s coming after me next?”

“Then I’ll kill it,” he said, his eyes blazing. “I swear to you, Jillian, no monster will ever touch you again.”

A lot of men had made a lot of promises to her in her life, and she’d learned not to believe them. But she believed Reseph. She didn’t know why, but she did. Now she just had to hope that when he finally remembered who he was, he wouldn’t forget the things he’d promised.

Kynan Morgan climbed out of his rented SUV, his boots crunching in snow torn up by vehicles, including at least one snowmobile. He’d seen a flash of red metal through the trees as he’d driven up, but whoever had been here was gone, the fresh tracks leading off into the forest.

“Who do you think that was?” Arik Wagner, Ky’s partner and relative-by-marriage, stared off into the distance.

Ky peeled off his sunglasses. “Local, maybe?”

“Wanna follow the tracks?”

“Feel free, if you have snowshoes in your pocket.”

Arik snorted. “Ass.” He headed toward the house, halting at the door.

Neither one of them liked going into scenes like this, and the one they’d just come from down the mountain had been horrific enough that Kynan’s mind was still going back to it. Not to mention the fact that sometimes demons lurked near the scenes of their attacks, reliving the kill, feeding on the horror and fear of the humans who visited the scene. Kynan, at least, didn’t have anything to fear; thanks to Heofon, the amulet around his neck, and the charm that came with it, he was immune to harm from anything but fallen angels.

“Go, man.”

Arik opened the door. The odors common to death-by-demon scenes slapped Ky in the face, and he could only be thankful that it was winter in the north and that the house hadn’t been cooking in humid summer heat in Louisiana or some shit.

“Fuck,” Arik muttered. “Fucking hate demons.” He didn’t mean it… not about all demons, seeing how his sister was a werewolf mated to a demon, and Arik himself was married to one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Then again, Arik had spent a month in hell—literally, hell—being tortured. So he pretty much despised any demon he wasn’t related to or having sex with.

Ky combed the house, taking note of the footprints, the claw marks, and the injuries on the victims. “Soulshredder. Just like the last scene.”

“So that makes two families in the area, plus a couple of hunters.” Arik drove his hands through his hair. “How many demons are we talking about, do you think?”

Kynan blew out a breath. “Definitely just one at each scene, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have a pair or even an entire pack hanging out in the area. The weird thing about it is how they’re killing.”

Soulshredders didn’t usually kill everyone at a scene. They liked to leave one person alive so they could torture them over time, coming back to the person every once in a while for years, driving them crazy, haunting them.

“And why here?”

“The demon or demons must be drawn here for some reason. Maybe to a person.”

“So we have to find the person.” Arik cursed. “I was really hoping for a quick in and out on this case.”

Ky cocked an eyebrow. “Limos keeping you busy?”

“You have no idea.”

“Oh, I have an idea. Gem wants another baby, and when they decide they want one…”

“They don’t think about anything else.” Arik nodded. “Yeah, I know. And Limos is… insistent.”

Kynan laughed. Yeah, Limos was definitely one to get what she wanted, when she wanted. And after five thousand years of celibacy, she had a lot of catching up to do. Not that Arik complained. Much. But the boy was always dragging ass. Sure, he dragged ass with a smile, but still.

“Okay, so let’s chart all the kills and see if we can get a bead on commonalities. Whoever the Soulshredder is drawn to will probably be inside the kill circle.”

Arik sighed. “I can’t believe we’ve been reduced to supernatural CSIs.”

“Someone needs to do it.”

“It used to be The Aegis’s job,” Arik muttered.

Bitterness coated Kynan’s tongue. The Aegis had been—and still was—the oldest and most major anti-demon force in the world, and Arik and Ky had been part of it. Hell, they’d run it. But the organization had broken apart three months ago, and Kynan, along with Val, Arik, Decker, Tayla, and Regan, and a few others, had been forced out.

Now Ky and the rest of the outcasts were working to build an agency that operated on the principles that had gotten them kicked out, but it hadn’t been easy. Most Aegis members preferred the “old ways,” which pretty much involved killing all demons, vampires, and shifters on sight. The Aegis didn’t believe in “good” demons.

But the new offshoot, the Demonic Activity Response Team, headed by Ky and the others, had recruited a few members, enough to form two bases, one in New York and one in Madrid. They were planning another DART office in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, The Aegis wasn’t being a good sport, and they’d been causing trouble where they could, when they could.

Kynan pried a piece of broken claw out of a cabinet. Sometimes DNA could be used to locate its owner. “The Aegis never really worked like this, though.”

Nope, The Aegis had been an uber-secret agency that mainly operated with its ear to the ground, taking care of problems as they heard about them through police and news reports and rumors. Now they were out of the closet and were so busy putting down demon rebellions around the world that they didn’t have time for small local issues like this one.

Which was where DART came in, filling a void that needed to be filled. They’d made themselves known and available to law enforcement agencies, and shit, they’d been kept busy. Most demons had gone back to Sheoul when Pestilence had been destroyed, but some had remained behind, preferring the human realm over the demon one—and honestly, Ky couldn’t blame them. Sheoul sucked.

“What if we’re dealing with a summoner?” Arik asked.

“If someone has been summoning this demon, we kill them, too.”

“And if it’s an unintentional summoner?”

Ky ground his teeth. This was where the job got tough. An unintentional summoner was someone who’d been marked by a demon for some reason… to be used as a breeder or as food or as an energy draw. In any case, the person would be a magnet for all demons of that species, which meant that killing a single demon wouldn’t solve the problem.

“We do what we always do,” Ky said. “We take them out.”