Hell Inc. (40 page)

“So. You, my new niece-in-law … ” I
squinched my face up but neglected to comment. “Are going to
play the part of an Infernix employee.” Levie's mouth opened to
protest, but the Devil stood, pointing a menacing finger at him.
“Don't speak, nephew of mine, or they will be the last words
you ever say. Your little pet there has screwed up royally, more
than once, and threatened our business in a way Infernix never would.
Now, I'm giving you both another chance. Do this for me and Levie …
” The Devil returned to his seat and squeezed the slinky in his
hand until the plastic snapped in several places. “You will
retain your spot in my will, and you and your little pet can take
over the business for me.”

I wanted to protest. I
wanted to tell them both that I hadn't made up
my
mind about what I was going to do with Levie, but the excitement in
his eyes stopped me. He looked … well, there really was no
other word for it but
ecstatic
.
I couldn't erase that look from
his face. I just couldn't. It was in that moment that I finally
realized it. It felt stupid to admit it. I hadn't known him very
long. He was my first … uh, sexual experience but I …
I …

“I love you.” I said it out loud, but I
hadn't meant to. I clamped my hands over my mouth and tried to force
the blood that was rushing to my face back down to my legs so that
they could run me away from there. Fortunately, obliviousness seemed
to run in the family. Levie glared at me out of the corner of his
eye, and the Devil smiled.

“I love you, too, cupcake.”

Just a few more favors and this will all go away. I
took another stiff legged step forward and smoothed down my navy
pencil skirt. Just smile and act nonchalant.

“Name?” The Cyclops asked, his one brown eye
narrowed and focused intently on my right eye.

“Prudence Feterbean,” I lied through
clenched teeth, hoping I had pronounced my new last name correctly.
I forced the corners of my mouth up and hoped I looked pleasant
enough. Harmless. Not like a spy for a rival company. Oh Gods,
please let this go well. The Cyclops was running a sausage sized and
very hairy finger down his list. He nodded once and handed me a
plastic security badge. I snatched it with more than just a little
relief and squeezed through the turn style, flashing the badge at the
next uniformed Cyclops security guard. He opened the front door for
me, and I gasped at the rush of heat. The entry hall had been cool
and pleasant, but the lobby was hotter than Hell Inc.'s offices. I
wiped at the sweat on my brow and tried to remain invisible as I
squeezed past demons and other unmentionables.

My office was exactly where they had said it would be,
down the first hall and to the right. I pushed open the door slowly,
carefully. I didn't know what I had been expecting. It was an
office. Oak desk and bookshelves, leather computer chair, and that
same ridiculous navy carpeting. I sighed and set my briefcase down
on the desktop. I didn't even get a chance to snoop around before a
girl sporting pink and white spiraled horns and a skirt so short, I
could see the Hanes logo on her underwear, slammed a pile of papers
onto the desk. I stood up on my tiptoes and gave her a, “What
the hell am I supposed to do with these?” look.

She smacked her gum a couple of times and twirled some
hair around her finger. “The boss needs these on his desk
before five.” She stared at me for another minute and
continued to chew like a deranged cow. The boss. Terrence. Or
Teranopolopalis. Or whatever his name was. I swallowed nervously.
The glamour covering my face suddenly felt transparent. What if he
saw through the six foot tall, tan, bleach blonde demon facade to the
nervous, pale skinned Ginger Malloy? I'd be dead meat. For the
third time. It didn't sound appealing. Not to mention I had no idea
how the Devil would react. He'd been so giddy dressing me up in my
designer suit that I was now twice as terrified as I'd have been had
he been sullen and irate.

“Okay, sure,” I said and waited, hands
clasped behind my back for her to leave. She smacked her gum again
and then shrugged, retreating back into the hall. I sat down in the
rather luxurious brown leather office chair, rubbing my hands along
the mahogany arm rests. Infernix had way too much money to blow.
The bastards. I grabbed the first document off of the stack. It was
like a Facebook page pulled right off of the Internet; there was an
excessive amount of personal information like birthday, height, and
blood type, along with several photographs. I turned the paper over,
but the back was blank. I had no idea what I was supposed to do with
it.

I decided to put it aside and grabbed the next page off
of the stack. It was the same thing for a different person. And so
was the next. And the next. I separated the stack in half, but it
was just more of the same. I sighed.

I checked the hallway, but the Hanes girl was already
gone. Several other people passed by me, and I tried to smile like I
expected a demon should, full of mystery and danger. I'm sure I only
succeeded in looking like I had had some sort of muscle numbing
facial surgery. I ducked back into the office before anyone had a
chance to look too closely at the lovely new Prudence Feterbean and
began to rummage through the other furniture in the room.

The bookshelves were full of useless crap like
How to
Win Over Humans with a Smile
and
Thirteen Ways to Strengthen
your Wings at your Desk
. The desk in question was even more
useless. Most of the drawers were empty except for a scattered
assortment of blue ballpoint pens and paperclips. I took a deep
breath and switched on the computer. It immediately prompted me for
a password. I sighed and clicked the 'I Forgot my Password' link.

The operating system beeped cheerfully and pulled up the
security question.

“What was the date of your last pap smear?”
I read aloud and blushed. I punched the power button on the monitor
with more force than was really necessary and sat slumped over in the
chair. The Devil hadn't given me much information, and the real
Prudence Feterbean had been even less helpful. She'd stared at me,
who at that point had already been glamoured to look like her, and
gaped like a fish. Her mouth opened and closed for several moments
before she'd been able to get out even a few words of advice. I
didn't know if she'd been shocked at my imitation of her likeness or
by the Devil's heated presence, but if I'd known what I knew now, I
would have made sure to ask her more in-depth information about her
lady parts.

As it stood, I was getting nowhere fast. I sighed and
stood up, smoothing my skirt down in the front. I needed to take a
look around the office. If I could just find Hanes girl again, maybe
I could wrangle some more information out of her gum smacking ass.

I sauntered into the hall, trying to keep my shoulders
back and my chest out. Like Levie. My heart thrilled in response to
the thought of him. It both bothered and exhilarated me. I was
making a pretty big commitment on very little information. But I was
excited. He'd been excited. In the few moments we'd had between our
meeting in the Devil's office and my subsequent glamouring by Vae,
I'd tried to tell him how I felt.

“Levie,” I'd said, my finger tracing the
little whorls in the wood on the Devil's desk. “About what I
said earlier ... I'd kind of meant to say that to you.”
Levie had stepped close to me and pulled me into his arms. His skin
had been warm but not with the boiling heat he had when he was angry,
just an enveloping warmth that spread gently through the places where
our skin was touching.

“Which thing, Ginger?” he'd asked softly,
placing his lips against my forehead. I'd shivered in delight and
tried to say it again. My lips had felt stiff, like the words were
so difficult to say that they had seized up in anticipation. When I
finally felt a rush of courage, Levie's hands traveling down my back
in a very deliberate path towards my ass, the Devil had burst into
the room, the navy skirt suit in hand. He'd made a lewd comment or
two about demon babies that had set me into an irate, spluttering
mess and the moment had passed me by.

“Fucking prick,” I growled to myself in
reference to Lucifer. I'd just entered the central office area set
up in typical corporate cubicle style and got several wary stares
from the employees seated within. Even demons that talked to
themselves were considered weird. I just couldn't get a break.

I didn't see the girl that had left me the papers, but
what I did see thrilled me to the core. Genies. A whole lot of
genies.

They were standing in a line, their selection of neon
skin tones reflecting the white light in a rainbow sheen, as they
waited to get into one of the corner rooms. They were mostly silent
and were flanked by another line of humans. Guardians. More people
like me. It was one of those moments in life where you should get to
be excited but can't because of a little, nagging voice in the back
of your mind that says,
“Yeah, you've been waiting to meet
another person like you your entire life and now that you finally
have, they're a bunch of kidnappers. Sorry girl, but you're out of
luck.”

The most disturbing part of my little, nagging voice was
the fact that it sounded just like Dia.

“
Yeah, girl. It's me. Thanks for fucking
ditching me earlier.”
If
I'd had any telepathic abilities, I would have used them to reply
that she was the one who had betrayed me first. The bitch.

“
I'm in a holding cell in the basement. It's
where they're putting all of us, Guardians included, while they
figure out how to control us without the human's consent. It's a
fucked up plan, girl. None of these idiots even know what they're in
for until they get down the stairs and past the first set of guards.
A Cerberus. Can you believe that? They're using a fucking Cerberus
to keep us in line.”
She
stopped talking, and I had to wander over to the water cooler to
pretend that I was actually there for a purpose while I waited for
her to continue.

“
Look,”
she
paused, her voice going soft.
“I'm sorry about what
happened earlier. He threatened me after you left the two of
us alone together. I just want to set my people, free. You
understand, right?”
She
waited for a moment as if expecting me to respond. I didn't know
what I would say even if I had the ability to. She took my silence
as acceptance.
“Good. Then I need you to do exactly
what I say ...”

The line at the bakery stretched out the door of the
cafeteria and down a hall used only for food deliveries. Demons
apparently had a real fetish for cakes and pies. I stood tapping my
black kitten heels on the linoleum and doing my best to ignore the
press of bodies in the enclosed space. Dia had been very, very
specific in her request.

Honey cake.

I needed it to get past the three headed dog and get her
out of there. Not that I was sure I even wanted to, but I was
running out of options. It was already half past nine, and I had yet
to make any other discovery worthy of pursuing. The Devil had said
there was a good chance that I could keep up with this ruse for
several days, but several days of clerical office work surrounded by
demons was just a few too many.

As I waited in line, I did my best to try my hand at
telepathy. I sent no less than three messages to Dia attempting to
berate her for her attempted betrayal earlier.
Why should I even
save you? How do I know I can even trust you? What the hell is
honey cake anyway?
She didn't respond, and I just assumed the
messages weren't getting through to her. I was really was an idiot
if I thought trusting people who'd betrayed me was a good idea. It
had been a mistake with Terrence. It could be a mistake with Dia.