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He wasn’t dead. Yet. He would have bet good money on this encounter leading to his immediate demise.
Shax slumped down to the smooth concrete floor, his back to a wall. He stared at the dreary, industrial beige wall where a few minutes ago, a rift had closed on Kheone’s smug face. Surrounded by cleaning supplies and stacked tables and chairs, his own breathing sounded unnaturally loud in the stuffy confines of the room. The musty air held a tang of bleach, adding a strange note to the metallic taste of fear in his mouth.
Kill her or run. Those were his choices. And his sorry ass had gone with Door Number Three: save her life.
What was wrong with him? Shax cradled the hand he had cut to make the blood pact, his other thumb stroking where the gash had been. His body still tingled where they had touched, and a lightness of being he hadn’t felt since he called Heaven home suffused him.
Heaving a great sigh, he stood up and tried the door handle. Locked. Shax put his shoulder to the door, trying to force it. Still no luck. He transformed into his cat form, to no avail. There were no windows and only a small drain in the middle of the floor, too small for a cat to squeeze through. The only way in or out was the locked steel door.
The cheap fluorescent light flickered. Shax leaned his head against the wall and looked up at the struggling fixture. He was not ready to die, but she deserved to kill him. After all, the last thing she remembered about him was he tried to kill her. That took the fucking cake, killed by the very angel Lucifer had sent him to eliminate. Irony was a bitch, and Shax suspected God was, too.
Why did he even care what she thought of him? He had needled her from the first moment he’d seen her, looking down her nose as their masters had exchanged prisoners. The look on her face when he’d slit the condemned demon’s throat was something he would carry with him to the end of days. Mostly horror and disgust, he had also seen disappointment. They had been enemies ever since. Shax had tempted souls from under her nose, damning them to the nonexistent mercies of Lucifer, and picked more than his fair share of fights with Kheone. Her opinion of him mattered not one bit.
The tiny voice in the back of his mind chimed in. Keep telling yourself that, dickhead.
Lost in his thoughts, he almost missed the subtle hint of ozone in the air warning of an imminent rift. He grabbed the end of a broken broom, the first thing he touched. Rising, he prepared as best he could for what came next.
Kheone stepped through, purple rings of exhaustion under her reddened eyes, her silver irises dulled by grief.
“Hello, blackguard.”
“You need to work on your insults, Blue.”
He’d expected to get some sort of response out of her. Anger, annoyance, anything to chase away the fatigue rolling off her in waves. But she only leaned against the wall across from him, stiff-shouldered and wary.
“Not in the mood. Let’s get this over with. You tried to kill me. Give me one reason not to return the favor.”
Just because he had stayed his hand a year ago didn’t mean shit to the angel. She should be grateful. Without him, she could have died in the blast or been smashed by the other angel’s body today. Without him, she wouldn’t have realized the connection between this murder and their exile.
“I didn’t try to kill you. I saved your life.”
A derisive snort brought the barest twinkle to her eyes.
“I did. If I hadn’t been there, that body would’ve fallen right on you, and you’d have two dead angels on your hands.” He smirked at her. “Well, not your hands.”
“Not now. Before.”
He wondered if she would remember. His own memories had been fuzzy at first, only Kheone coming through loud and clear.
Shax gave her his best roguish grin and tried to lighten the mood. “The Devil made me do it?”
“Ugh.” Her sharp tone was an improvement over the dull one of a moment ago.
“I had my orders.” No use explaining he could not carry those orders out. She would never believe him. “Circumstances have changed. With the Gate gone, I am no longer bound by Lucifer’s command. You can trust me.”
“Not likely.”
“How about because I’m the only other witness and the only one who knew your friend’s death and the destruction of the Gates are related.”
She straightened from the wall, never taking her eyes off him.
“If you didn’t have anything to do with Serel’s death—”
“I didn’t. Blood oath, remember?”
“—then you’re of no use to me. Give me a better reason to keep you alive. Demons are too cowardly to work alone. Tell me who you’re working with, and maybe I’ll let you go.”
“Satan’s balls, Blue, I’ve been trying to stay off the radar. I’m not working with anyone.”
“So, what I’m hearing is you’d rather die now than later?” Her words took on a menacing tone, and she reached for something in her boot. If memory served, she kept her favorite knife there.
He had to give her something. “I’ll help you.”
Kheone raised her eyebrows, disbelief replacing distaste, but she did not draw her blade.
“Liar,” she said.
“Off the top of my head, there are only about a dozen beings capable of that kind of magic on their own,” Shax said. He ticked them off on his fingers. “Lucifer. The Dukes of Hell. Archangels. A few sorcerers.”
She scoffed.
Shax continued, ignoring her incredulity. “Lucifer is still chained. Rumor has it that there’s only one Duke left on Earth. If an Archangel is involved, I’ll eat my coat. So we’re looking at a powerful sorcerer, some other entity we’re not tracking, or a weird alliance between these beings. Believe what you want, but you need my help.”
“I still don’t trust you.”
“I know you don’t, but you have nothing to fear from me.”
“We have been enemies since the beginning of civilization, Shax. I have everything to fear from you.”
“I never wanted to be your enemy, but no demon can deny Lucifer. When he ordered me to cross my sword with yours, to steal the souls you’d redeemed, to kill you, I had to. With the Gates gone, he can’t control me. I am here of my own free will.” Shax looked around the small room and grinned his roguish grin at her again. “Well, mostly.”
Kheone peered at him, judging his words. After a moment, she nodded, and for a fleeting second, he thought he detected the faintest upturn to her lips.
“Help me find the bastard who killed Serel, and not only won’t I kill you now, I’ll make sure no one else will, either. Not even Michael.”
Shax rubbed at his face. He had slept little, waiting under the bush for Kheone to do something. And then fought for his life. There was nothing he could do about it now but accept his new fate and come up with some way to get out of this mess alive.
“Fine,” Shax said through gritted teeth. “You keep Michael, or any other angel, from killing me, and I promise to help you find who killed your friend.”
She nodded.
“You first. Tell me what you found out,” he said.
Kheone dropped her gaze, addressing her feet.
“We’re not sure what killed Serel. Could be the fall or the explosion or something else.”
Kheone reached into a pocket and pulled out two fragments of pottery with symbols inscribed in gold leaf.
“Found these. The only symbol I know is angel.”
When Shax reached for them, she curled her fingers around the pieces. He dropped his hand and examined them. Something about them was familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.
“Have you shown these to anyone?” he asked.
“Not yet. Michael left before I found them.”
“Would you mind transcribing the symbols on them for me?”
“Okay.”
A long, awkward silence descended into the storeroom. Kheone looked everywhere but at Shax. He could not keep his eyes off her.
“How are we going to do this?” he asked when the quiet was too much to bear. “Are you going to let me go?”
Kheone bit her lip in thought. Something about the simple gesture made her vulnerable. She had been his nemesis since forever, projecting only strength with the occasional burst of anger whenever he wormed his way under her skin. He never imagined her vulnerable. Two beasts fought in head. One wanted to take advantage of her exposure, strike at her, kill her, even. The other wanted to curl around her and protect her.
“I know a place where we can meet in private. I’ll take you there now.”
Kheone straightened and offered a hand to help him up, the same one he had stabbed to form the pact. Shax took it and found himself mere inches from her. He tamped down the twist of longing that snaked through him at her simple touch. Grief and fear and doubt all vied for control on her stately face. Mostly, she looked tired. He wanted to pull her into his arms and offer what comfort he could. His better judgment quashed the impulse. It would only earn him a knife in the belly.
Wordlessly, Kheone opened a rift. Shax walked through, his steps muffled by grass. They stood in a small stand of trees. People hurried by, no one lingering on this cold, cloudy morning. A large Neoclassical building dominated his view, a gigantic badminton birdie on the vast lawn. He pushed aside the other name for the object, knowing he would start giggling like a teenage boy. He recognized it as the museum where he had found Kheone.
The angel walked over to a tree and patted the rough bark.
“Meet here every evening at seven, but not tonight.”
Right, angel funeral. Held the sunset after death. If he was sober enough, his furry alter-ego might make an appearance. The plan was to be anything but sober, but his plans had not turned out well lately.
“If I’m not here, I’ll leave a message in the branches. If you can’t make it, leave a message for me. Michael doesn’t come here.”
“Got it.” Shax turned to go, but something in her posture caused him to hesitate. He looked behind him. “It will be okay, Kheone. We’ll figure out who killed your friend.”
“I know we will. I’m just not sure I’m going to like the answer.”
“Perhaps not, but the Valkyrie bitch I know won’t let that stop her.”
“Regretting your promise yet, Shax?” This time a wry smile graced her mouth.
“As soon as the words were out of my mouth.”
“Goodbye, turd goblin.”
“That was almost a good insult.”
Kheone stepped through the red rift and disappeared from view.
Shax gazed at his hand, still tingling from her brief touch. Christ, he needed a drink. Judging from the position of the sun, it was mid-morning. Should be somewhere open for service by now. He found a seedy-looking bar halfway to the motel and claimed a spot in the establishment, as far from the other patrons as he could get. There was plenty of space at the ill-kept bar. He signaled to the bartender and placed one hand down on the bar. It came away sticky. Sometimes he hated people.
“A burger and the cheapest bottle you’ve got,” he said when the man finally answered the summons.
“Bottle of what?”
“Vodka, whiskey, whatever’s cheap. All I want to do is get drunk and stay drunk.”
Drinking alone in his crappy motel room was less appealing than drinking in this crappy bar. At least he had some company here.
“You driving?” asked the bartender.
“Don’t even own a car.”
“Fine. A burger and a bottle of corn whiskey coming up. Pay first.”
Shax gave the bartender most of his cash and poured a glass when the man finally delivered the bottle. He drank down the contents, the cheap alcohol scorching his throat. Repeating the process twice more before his burger arrived, his nerves settled. The voice in his head telling him this whole deal with Kheone was a horrible idea mellowed into a soothing whisper.