Chapter Seventeen

 

 

 

For as little sleep as she’d gotten, Invi should have been wiped. Even Sins needed their beauty rest, and when one’s batteries ran out, it typically took more than a couple of hours and a few bouts of hot sex to get them reenergized. Yet that was exactly how she felt. Revved. Aware. Ready to take on the world.

Or, at the least, Campbell, who looked seconds away from blowing his lid. For what reasons, Invi couldn’t say. True, Lucifer’s instructions had come with strict guidelines as to how very off limits the Guardians were, but why Campbell would give a shit about her breaking yet another in a long line of Lucifer’s rules was a mystery. As it was, she didn’t care if her brother decided to tattle. Aside from the devil having more to worry about than Invi’s sex life, she’d lost what little desire she’d had to follow the rules the second Big J had confirmed the Sins could be used as keys to trigger the world’s apocalypse.

Lucifer again had withheld vital information while expecting nothing short of her full dedication. After a while, that game had gotten stale, and she no longer felt like playing. If anything, she just wanted to get to the other side of Armageddon so she had somewhere to go when she tended her resignation.

The real one this time. There was only so much bullshit a person could take, and Lucifer had violated her personal quota too liberally in too short a period.

He’d let them believe they’d be good as dead if anyone outside of Hell discovered their origins. Lie.

He’d used Luxi as a pawn in some twisted dick-measuring contest with Big J. Lie.

He’d sent them to help save the world without letting them know their blood could be used to destroy it. Lie.

Yeah, safe to say, Invi was fed up. Campbell could read her fifty shades of the riot act for all she cared. Following the rules had never been her strong-suit, particularly when the person making the rules couldn’t be trusted.

And though she knew her reprieve with Roman had an expiration date, she couldn’t help but feel that she was losing something with every step she took away from him. This made little sense, seeing as she hadn’t even known the Guardian for twenty-four hours, but…

Fuck. She didn’t know.

Invi sighed and closed the hotel room door behind her before rounding on her brother. “Try not to yell,” she said. “People on this floor are still sleeping.”

Campbell’s eyes narrowed. “What the fuck do you think you were doing in there?”

She fought back a wince at his volume. “Seriously, Cam—”

“Look at me and tell me whether or not you think I give a shit about waking up the tourists.”

Invi crossed her arms and cocked her head. “Would you just get on with it?”

“You’re fucking the fucking Guardian. The same guy who got us into this mess, and you expect me to get on with it?”

“First of all, it’s none of your business who I do or don’t sleep with.”

“It is when he’s the reason the world might stop existing, Invi. Did you even stop to think about that?”

Invi felt her grip on her temper fumble, and she scrambled to keep a tight rein before her instincts had her doing something stupid—like blasting a hole in Campbell’s self-righteous chest. If the night had proven anything to her—and it had proven plenty—it was Roman was an innocent in all this. No matter what Lucifer or Big J or Campbell had to say about it. Her Guardian had been played a fool. That didn’t make him a criminal, it made him a victim. An easy goddamn victim, thanks to the absent attentions of his creators.

She inhaled and dropped her hands to her sides, her fingers flexing. “I think I know him a bit better than you do.”

Campbell rolled his eyes. “Of course you do.”

“Are you gonna tell me what you’re doing here, or are we going to go eighteen rounds on my love life?”

Love life?

Invi refused to wince. Reacting would draw attention to her blunder, and Campbell didn’t need any more ammunition.

As it was, fate was most certainly not on her side. Campbell seemed to wrestle his eyes to make sure they didn’t bug right out of their sockets. “Your love life?” he repeated. “You’ve gotta be fucking shitting me.”

Down the hall, a door opened and a sour-looking man poked his head out, glaring. “Do you two mind?” he spat.

Campbell rolled his eyes and, before Invi could reconcile what she was seeing, had tossed a firebolt at the wall beside their intruder’s head. The resulting explosion of plaster and drywall was drowned by the man’s scream.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Campbell ignored her, instead turning his attention down the stretch of hallway, where the noise had attracted attention and inspired more vacationing guests to investigate. Half a dozen hotel patrons in various states of undress had opened their doors and stepped into the hall.

And all of them wore equally horrified expressions.

“Next time, I won’t miss,” he barked. “Everyone stay in your goddamned rooms and let me talk to my sister.”

A chorus of slamming doors followed this proclamation, leaving Campbell looking somewhat pleased with himself.

“Always wanted to do that,” he muttered. He finally looked back at her, and immediately resumed scowling. “Now, where were we?”

“What the hell was that?”

“Insurance that we don’t get interrupted again. They’ll thank me when the world doesn’t end.”

“How altruistic of you.”

Behind her, the door to her own hotel room rapped. “Invidia?” came Roman’s muffled voice. “Do you require assistance?”

Campbell scoffed and shook his head. “Is this guy for real?”

Invi ignored him. “I’m fine, Roman. Campbell couldn’t hurt me if he wanted to.”

“I don’t fucking believe you,” her brother drawled. “Fine fucking time to have one of your episodes.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“I dunno, Invi, why don’t you tell me?” Campbell gestured at the empty hallway as though illustrating a great point. “If it’s not one thing, it’s something else, huh? I thought you stopped doing shit like this.”

That comment hit her like a sucker-punch. “Like what?”

“Getting into messes I have to fix.”

Invi stared at him. “Have you fallen and hit your head on something? When did that ever happen?”

“I’m guessing you just think this shit goes away on its own, don’t you?” Campbell continued. “If it’s not Roman centurions, it’s the clergy. Or a lower demon. Or a higher demon. Fuck knows Ira never looked out for you for shit.”

“Why the hell would Ira need to look after me?” she retorted. “I’m a big girl, Cam. I can do it myself.”

“And I’m sure you think that,” Campbell replied. “Never stopped to wonder how these assholes just up and disappear right, do you? How your problems just magically solve themselves. Fuck knows you’ve never taken an ounce of responsibility in your life, so it can’t be because you get it together.” He held up a hand and began counting off fingers. “Forneus. Buer. Gomory. Naberus. Should I go on? Dead, dead, dead and dead. Why? ’Cause they made you cry. ’Cause that’s what I do, Invi. And I’ll be fucked if I have to do it when this asshole breaks your heart too.”

Invi stared at him, her blood running cold. “I don’t understand.”

“Of course not.” Campbell snorted. “You made it clear you didn’t want to be treated like the kid sister a long time ago,” he retorted. “And they heard you. Ira and Gula and Ace. Luxi and Ava had each other. No one watched after you.”

“I didn’t need anyone to watch after me.”

He rolled his eyes. “Bullshit.”

“That’s insulting.”

“That’s the truth. These assholes used you as a fucking stepping stone. None of them original. To get to Lucifer, you get close to one of the Sins.” Campbell tore a hand through his hair. “We’ve all been there, Inv. You’re just the only one dumb enough to let it happen over and over again.”

“Fuck you.”

“Except eventually you wizened up and I didn’t have to be on guard all the time. So now’s a great fucking time to fall back into old habits.” He jutted his chin at the closed door behind her. “And with a Guardian? Even if he wasn’t the reason we’re all fucked sideways, they can’t love, Invi. None of ‘em can.”

She stiffened, her warring mind pulling her in a thousand directions, her body stiff with tension. Never in her considerably long life had she ever received the slightest indication that Campbell was even halfway interested in who she let into her bed. Her elder brother had always been aloof and distant. He and Ace were loners in many ways, not antisocial but never outgoing. Invi had always been closest to Ira and Gula, and only recently had started forming a substantive relationship with Luxi. She didn’t know why the group dynamic had always been so divided, but it had. There was family and there were friends and sometimes the two overlapped. Sometimes, but not always.

Until Ava had quit. Once Ava had quit, everything had changed. The Sins had started talking more—to each other, rather than other people. They’d started relying on each other more. Changing more. Growing together.

To learn Campbell had been looking over her shoulder—really looking—upset her worldview. Because he was right—Ira and Gula never treated her like a sister. And while Invi maintained she could take care of herself just fine, the thought that someone had been watching out for her made her feel…

Well, she didn’t know. Foolish, perhaps, that she’d never questioned what became of the asshole exes who harassed her. Instead, she’d counted her blessings when said asshole exes dropped off the radar and had moved to the next thing.

“Campbell,” she said, her tone gentler. “Roman and I…”

What?

The tight anger warping Campbell’s features loosened, but only just. “He can’t love you, Invi. Whatever this is.”

Invi wet her lips, her mind flashing her to the awed expression on Roman’s face, the way he’d looked at her when she’d lowered herself onto his cock. How he worshiped her with his body, how his kisses burned her skin. The way he’d caressed her that morning, and the glances he stole when he thought she wasn’t paying attention. None of this equaled love, of course—even if it did, she wasn’t fool enough to believe something as complicated as love could be born in such a short while. But Roman wasn’t what everyone assumed he was. She had yet to meet the simpleton Lucifer had warned her against, or the calculating master villain everyone else seemed to assume lurked behind his eyes.

He was a man lost, more than anything else. A man with a defined sense of right and wrong, one which had been tested in ways not many could withstand.

“I don’t believe that,” she said at last. “I’m not saying he loves me, or that I love him. Because…well, I’ve known him for around twelve hours. But he’s not… He’s not whatever it is Lucifer and Big J think he is. He feels deeply. I know it.”

Campbell stared at her a long moment, then rolled his eyes, his shoulders slumping. “Shit, you are falling for this asshole.”

“No. I had sex with him. There’s a difference.”

“Not a big one when it comes to you.”

“That’s low.” She did not fall in love with every man she slept with—that Campbell would even assert such a thing proved he didn’t know her as well as he thought he did. “And wrong.”

“Whatever you need to tell yourself. In the meantime, we got this problem of the world ending to deal with. Now’s not the time to be thinking with your cunt.”

“Wait just a—”

“The Seal in London opened.”

Invi’s blood ran cold, her mind whiplashing from the sudden change in subject. “Shit, Campbell, you think it might’ve been a better idea to lead with that? What the fuck?”

“I planned to. Your incredible lack of judgment threw me off.”

“Fuck you. What do we know?”

“Ava and Dante are missing.”

Invi’s eyes went wide. “I can’t believe you! Ava and Dante are missing and we’ve lost another Seal and you decided to give me the third degree on who I’m fucking? Goddammit, Campbell—”

He ignored her. “Well, you know now. Pack your shit and grab lover boy. We gotta—”

The sound of a chirping ringtone cut him off. He blinked at her, then cursed when he realized it was his phone. Had Invi not been close to tearing his head off his body, she might have snickered at the abrupt shift.

Campbell dug the device out of his back pocket and brought it to his ear. “This better not be bad news, Gula, or I’m gonna fucking—”

He stopped talking, and the muted sound of Gula’s voice hummed between them. With every word, Campbell’s face seemed to lose more color.

Invi swallowed, dread pooling in her belly.

“Yeah,” Campbell said after a long moment, locking gazes with her. “I got it. Invi’s here too. We’re on our way.”

He hung up, his arm dropping to his side.

“What?”

“It’s Luxi,” Campbell said, hoarse. “Luxi and her preacher. They’ve gone dark. No one knows where they are.”