Chapter Nine

 

 

 

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

The words had been a mantra on her lips ever since she’d left the hotel. Her feet beat a smooth staccato on the ground, but she wasn’t sure if she was heading the right way. Acclimating to Roman’s reverse energy signature was a lot simpler in theory than execution. It was one thing when sharing space with the guy—another when trying to find him in a thicket of human-shaped obstacles.

After reality had set in, after her high had receded and the orgasm-induced haze around her head had cleared, the enormity of her epic failure had slammed into her with all the subtlety of an anvil to the face. She hadn’t been able to get the fuck out of there fast enough. Straightening her clothes, finger-combing her hair, shoes—none of it had seemed to matter.

Well, until it mattered, but thankfully she had the ability to magic on anything she might have forgotten with a snap. New York City might not be a stranger to half-naked people wandering around at all times of the night, but it would be her fucking luck to run into the one cop who gave enough of a shit to slow her down.

Invi had dropped the ball plenty in her life. In fact, she was fairly certain Pixley kept a running tally on her impressive string of fuckups. Among her sisters, she had always been the mess. The one unknown variable in an otherwise perfectly predictable set. Ava had the brains and calm, tempered reasoning. Luxi had the confidence and the drive to get things done. Invi had a sack full of good intentions and shit all to show for it.

And even worse? Any time she was close to doing something even remotely responsible, she found some brilliant way to throw her progress down the crapper.

It would be one thing if she wasn’t trying. Fuck knew she’d thought about walking away from her calling more than once, and had taken those scary initial steps a handful of times. Yet always she came back, because Hell was home, and life was nothing without the excitement of the job. Besides, what the crap was she supposed to do with an eternity on her hands, if not dally with mankind? She’d resolved to make sibling rivalry work for her rather than against her, and in the past few weeks—really, ever since Ava had broken up the original cast—she felt she’d really stepped up to the plate. An impressive streak of not screwing up. She’d even been willing to die at one point to help her sister save the man she loved, and that was something Invi didn’t do lightly.

An hour. That was how much time had passed. An hour, tops, since Lucifer had dropped in and given her his ultimatum. No fucking the Guardian.

So, naturally, she’d had to climb the slab of man perfection and take him out for a swing.

Her actions had seemed reasonable in the heat of the moment. And why not? As the story went, it had worked for Ava. Invi clearly remembered her sister laughing about her diversion tactic at the reception Lucifer had thrown for the happy couple what seemed like a lifetime ago. According to Ava, when Dante had nearly been consumed with the need to climb into Mammon’s collection box, she’d managed to sidetrack him by instigating a nice round of suck-face. At the reception, the story had gotten a lot of laughs, and initiated one of those group-pressured kisses from the happy couple, and everything had been right in the world.

But Invi was very definitely not her sister. Rather than kiss the hot guy and pull back, she’d managed to get nice and distracted herself. Such to the point where she’d been able to convince her own fucked-up head that she was being downright charitable by rubbing herself all over his statuesque physique until she’d become thoroughly unwound.

Yeah, she was a real saint. Give, give, give, that was Invi all over.

Now she’d lost him. Her one job, and she’d lost him.

Shit, if Lucifer decided to kill her, she wouldn’t blame him. It was evident Invi’s worst enemy was herself, and that shouldn’t be a surprise.

After all, it had always been that way.

 

* * * *

 

Roman didn’t have a lot of experience with these things—or rather, any experience with these things—but the more distance he put between himself and Invidia, the more he remained convinced that what had transpired in that hotel room was…

Well, he hadn’t quite figured out what it was just yet, but he was absolutely convinced it was something.

His lips burned from her taste, and his phallus—cock—throbbed with the need for attention. Her attention. How she’d gone wild in his arms would be one of those things he would never forget. Something time couldn’t replace with a dull string of monotony. In one stolen encounter, Invidia had redefined his understanding of intimacy, though he had yet to figure out exactly what the view was from his new outlook. Or perhaps the throbbing ache in his body was doing the talking, because every step he took from her was one he wanted to recover.

Those clandestine meetings with the dark woman hadn’t been anywhere near as untamed. Perhaps that was his failing—his inability to contextualize her actions. But with the heat from Invidia’s mouth warming his skin, his fingers tingling with the need to finish their exploration, he had to wonder how anyone, even him, could have mistaken manipulative sex for what he assumed was the real thing.

Unless Invidia was better at manipulation than Lilith, and that thought was truly frightening.

Not quite as much, though, as the notion that even with everything Roman had lost, he still hadn’t learned a blessed thing. How long had it taken him to fall under the spell of another woman? How willingly had he melted in her arms? How badly did he wish to go back?

The answers to those questions filled him with shame even Lilith hadn’t been able to manage.

Everything in his head seemed confused now, scattered beyond recognition. Even after the Seal had opened, Roman had been shaped with purpose. He’d known, as soon as the betrayal had set in, what he had to do. Finding Lilith and stopping her was all that mattered. Lucifer, Jehovah, Heaven and Hell—his loyalty had been to his position first and everything else second. After he faltered in his duty, the only way to set things to rights was to prevent the dark woman from getting what she wanted.

And though he hadn’t made any headway, the objective remained clear. That was until tonight. Until the call of Invidia’s inner light had drawn him into an alley he never should have stepped in. If he’d kept walking he wouldn’t be here now. Sprinting like a madman away from the willing arms of a woman his body craved with unfamiliar but potent desperation. Doubting his role in the universe and his convictions—doubting everything that up until a few hours ago had been so clear.

He didn’t know how she’d done it—managed to worm her way inside him. How the small pressure of her lips against his had unraveled his very foundation. Roman had witnessed the gesture numerous times since leaving the underground, and he’d never once understood it. Humans seemed to relish the act, almost as much as what they called lovemaking. How the melding of mouths encouraged intimacy hadn’t been clear to him until Invidia’s hot body had pressed to his. Until he’d been awash in her pure, earthy scent and engulfed in her heat. Then, oh yes, he’d understood. The second she’d stroked her tongue over his, a part of him had been lost.

It didn’t negate the words they’d traded, or undermine his focus to his self-appointed duty. However, the steps he took now lacked the fervor of his earlier attitude, each punctuated with shards of doubt.

Because in the end, the duty with which he was charged was self-appointed. Invidia was right in that respect. Perhaps in all of them. Three weeks had passed since Paris, since Rome, and he hadn’t located the dark woman. All he’d managed to do was get himself even more lost. His own makers didn’t want his assistance, didn’t have any faith in him, and why should they? He had proven to be a weak link. He’d proven fallible.

Protecting the Seals was his charge, but he’d failed in that regard. Each Seal now had its own protector, plus a few more for good measure. Was he trying to stop Lilith, or was he trying to make peace with his failings as a Guardian? And in either eventuality, would he do, as Invidia had suggested, more damage?

Roman stopped short, his breath catching in his throat, his chest at once painfully tight. He forced a slow blink, then took in his surroundings.

The cityscape was cast in night but bustling with light and noise. The honk of vehicles as they traversed densely populated roads. People, swarms and swarms of people, filled every walkway. The air was thick with chatter, a symphony of voices, conversation. Even with the sky above them black, the streets were alive and bright. Building-sized screens blasted a collage of photos, text, videos portraying food venues, scantily clad women or scenes with humans singing and dancing on what looked to be a stage. Smoke billowed upward in a cloudy haze. Every storefront was open for business. Everything had a price tag.

Roman stared, mesmerized. He stood in the middle of a thriving metropolis, one filled with people who had no idea the danger they were in. Each face that passed him—each smiling or scowling or cursing or laughing or crying or chatting or anything face—was attached to a person who had an entire existence denied to them. People whose worlds could be upended as his had been, only on a scale he could not understand, because he had something the human race did not.

The burden of knowledge.

And Invidia was right. He had the power to destroy each and every one of these small beings. He was fortified with strength beyond strength, the likes of which had never been tested, and was therefore unpredictable. Humans did not know what he knew, and this world they lived in was not safe or predictable. Were Roman to succeed in his mission and find Lilith… Well, he hadn’t thought that far ahead. Finding her had always seemed an impossibility, but a necessary journey to right his horrendous wrong. He knew, though, as well as he knew anything, that any encounter between him and the dark woman would be violent. He could not guarantee the safety of those around him.

He might end up bringing the whole city—be it this one or one of the others—to its knees.

To his chagrin, he found he did not care for that at all.

Roman had never given much thought to the human condition beyond what he had been told all those years ago. The world was Jehovah’s pet project, and it was his job, as a Guardian, to stand between humankind and the end of all time. The Seven Seals were the lock with which Jehovah kept the beasts of Hell—the truly nasty sort—from spilling into his favored world. Roman knew very little of Hell, but from what he did know, Lucifer was its king and it wasn’t a very nice place. The humans who proved themselves worthy in their worldly lives were rewarded with not having to know just how nasty Hell was, whereas the wicked were tortured for eternity. In that sense, humanity was a temporary condition, the mortal shell made weaker than any other in the universe, and the time spent upon the Earth designed as a trial run to determine who was worthy of Paradise and who wasn’t.

The humans around him, be they here or anywhere else, might end up being released to Paradise were his actions to render their mortal shells broken. However, Paradise might not be their stop. It might be the other place, the one not so pleasant.

The one where he’d heard torture was the order of the day. Torture for all eternity. What sort of torture, Roman didn’t know, but standing there in the middle of what appeared to be one of New York City’s busier streets, he realized it didn’t matter. Because torture was torture, and he did not want to be responsible for sending these faceless humans to that fate—not if living longer could turn the tide for them. He didn’t want to be the reason they never got a chance to prove themselves worthy of Paradise.

Because the past few days had been a sort of torture for Roman, and the thought of living like this forever was its own kind of hell.

Roman stood, watching people flock around him. The loud, ignorant, fortunate masses—they who had no idea what lived beneath their feet. He stood there and knew he couldn’t condemn them. Not these people, not any other, and chasing Lilith was too large a gamble.

She would not hesitate in damning souls to Hell.

Invidia was right.

Roman exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he’d held, his shoulders relaxing as he released his tension, as he allowed the fight to leave him. He needed to return to her, let her assume the lead. Following his own wants and desires had gotten him in this mess. He wouldn’t let these underdeveloped emotions lead him any longer.

He turned and began retracing his steps, strides no longer hard and angry, pace no longer determined. He didn’t know exactly how many twists and turns he’d taken since leaving Invidia’s hotel room, but he trusted his ability to find her based on the power she radiated. The same signal that had drawn him to her would draw him home.

A slight growl pulsing from the ground trembled up his legs before Roman could get too far. The sensation was so muted he thought he might have imagined it, but the quake beneath his feet had a certain familiar, terrible cadence to it. One that had beat a tattoo into his chest and haunted him in the hours of quiet. Roman froze, his throat tightening, a sick sensation he knew all too well spreading through his chest.

It might be nothing.

Then it came again. Less muted, but still distant. A tickle through the ground that radiated outward, and climbed inside him with its awful familiarity and squeezed. He’d been so close to it the last time, such that the stone-shattering quakes and the screams of the freed Hell beasts had stitched themselves permanently in his mind. It was the second rumble that convinced him, that had his legs turning again and forcing his body hard back in his original direction.

He had to find the Seal. He could stop this. Lilith might be beyond his reach, but he was a Guardian, and protecting the Seals was in his blood.

A third rumble hit, this one shaking the ground hard enough that the humans around him seemed to take notice.

“Out of the way!” he yelled, shoving past a throng of people. “Move!”

His voice seemed to spark a panic, for the next thing he knew, the air was alight with screams and people swarmed like vermin. The throng multiplied when he wasn’t looking—two people became four, then ten, then too many to count. The ground seized and quaked, and time seemed to crawl. People ran against him, alongside him and past in mad blurs, overturning food stands and street vendors, abandoning shopping bags and mowing each other down in an effort to clear the area.

Roman leaped over a tossed display table and landed with a crunch on broken glass and shattered novelty frames. To his right was a dismantled I LOVE NY T-shirt stand, foam Liberty hats and miniature Empire State Buildings scattered along the sidewalk. Around him, people screamed and ran from an enemy none could see.

The tremors continued underfoot, growing harder, louder and unmistakable. They were running out of time. Soon…

Well, he hadn’t seen the damage from this vantage point the last time, but the screams of Hell’s freed prisoners was something no man could put of his mind. A horde of that magnitude unleashed on these people would be more than disastrous—it would tear the city apart.

Roman broke into another run, this time less polite. He shoved rather than dodged, and didn’t bother to look back, no matter who cried after him, or how hard the ground shook. He had to find the Seal.

He had to stop it before the damage was irreparable.

 

* * * *

 

Times Square was a fucking madhouse, and not in the normal way.

Invi had seen pandemonium before—hell, New York itself was a breeding ground for all sorts of crazy shit. The city had been to a different kind of hell and back more times than she could count, and as a rule, it took a lot to faze the locals. But Times Square wasn’t where one typically found a local, at least not the sort who wasn’t bribed by a punch card.

Hard tremors had seized the ground—real tremors, the sort one might expect in a Michael Bay film. Invi wasn’t privy to everything that had happened in Rome and Paris following the Seals’ opening, but she knew what came next. A sea of Hell Demons unleashed into an unsuspecting world. The worst sort—the sort that always wanted out.

Hell Demons were typically kept locked in their home world, save for wartimes and other natural disasters when it essentially became harvest season. But even then, the number of Hell Demons released was more or less contained, as Pixley had to approve all who took leave. Yet, as Lucifer had explained it, once a Seal opened, a gateway was forged between Hell and Earth, one in which Hell’s most vile occupants could spill out and reap all sorts of havoc unchecked. Once all Seals opened, the world itself would cease to exist, and all Hell’s most unwanted residents would disappear along with the good ole terra firma.

That apparently had been one of Big J’s deals, back in the beginning. Lucifer’s underworld contained a slew of creatures the devil didn’t care for—those most prone to destruction and violence would be among the first to push their way through an open barrier between worlds. It was Big J’s way of allowing Lucifer to, in some small way, clean up Hell following the end of their experiment.

For the way the air hummed, for how the ground shook and split, chunks of flying pavement, for the roars painting the night, she knew what was coming. And though she didn’t know what she would do once she got there, Invi knew she had to make it to the Seal. Ira was there, after all. Ira and Cassie, and hell, maybe even Roman. She had to get there—had to make sure her brother was safe.

She had to—

Something seized her arm, and before she could blink, she was yanked into the mouth of an alley and pressed firm against a brick wall. Invi thrashed, her hands immediately conjuring balls of energy to blast against her assailant, and she would have leveled a mean blow at his chest had she not met his eyes first.

“Roman.”

“The Seal,” he said. “You feel it.”

She nodded, forcing herself to shake off the sudden hum thrumming through her skin, her body at once on fire from his proximity. “I think the whole city feels it.”

Roman studied her for a moment. “Help me stop this.”

“I don’t know where the Seal is. Lucifer sorta forgot to leave me directions.”

Another example of how frazzled the devil was of late. She was supposed to trade places with Ira and Cassie, yet he’d neglected to provide a roadmap.

And it struck her then how completely underprepared she and her siblings were to wage this war. If ever they needed to be in the know, it was now. Lucifer and Big J’s plans to keep the Seals’ location contained only worked when the world wasn’t at stake.

“I do.”

“You do? I thought—”

“It’s open. I feel it now. Come with me, and you’ll feel it too.”

“I will?”

Roman held out a hand, his eyes flickering. “If you are with me.”

Invi blinked, looking at his outstretched arm to his face then back again. “Is this a ‘come with me if you want to live’ moment? ’Cause I never thought I’d have one of those.”

A grin tugged at his lips. “Is that a reference to something?”

“Eighties action movie. After the apocalypse is over, we really gotta educate you on your pop culture.” She grinned and slid her hand over his, trying and failing to ignore the hard shudder that racketed through her body. Now was not the time to relive those last blissful moments in her hotel room. Given that he had sought her out and wanted her with him, she had to assume he wasn’t as adverse to physical intimacy as he had seemed before he fled.

At least she hoped he wasn’t. Or didn’t. Because according to Lucifer, Roman was persona non grata in the world of the Sins. Even if that meant as a temporary bed-buddy.

But for the intense heat in his gaze, Invi had a feeling their conversation had yet to really commence.

And shit, she wanted to feel him between her legs in a big way.

Not the time, she inwardly scolded, shaking her head and refocusing on the situation at hand. “This doesn’t change what I said earlier. We can’t go after Lilith.”

“No,” he agreed. “But right now, we have to stop her.”

Invi swallowed her argument, thrown by his easy acquiescence. Apparently more than just his allergic reaction to sexy times had changed since he’d bolted for freedom. “All right then,” she said. “Lead the way.”