Soul Stealer (25 page)

Raphael sighed. “Is this why you came here? The only reason?”

“I found out what got you. It’s definitely a Psionic Vampire, but I’ve got an in. Essum’s helping him.”

“Essum’s helping him?”

“Yup.”

“How is that an in?”

“Essum’s scared shitless of him. He knows the thing’s going to kill him. He’s helping him now but he’s always looking for an out.”

Raphael shrugged. “That’s something, I guess. As long as we know what it is we can try to figure out what to do, right?”

“Right. So I’ll get out of your hair now and come back if anything big happens. In the meantime keep your head down and don’t make any waves, okay?”

Raphael nodded. “I can do that.”

“Good. Now be there when she wakes up. You’ll know you’ve done a good job if she doesn’t want to get out of bed.”

Raphael just shook his head, then watched the most unlikely of friends dissolve and vanish before his very eyes.

He waited to make sure Voro was actually gone. When he was beyond certain he padded back down the hallway to the bedroom, dropping his pants before climbing back in next to Patrice.

The bed was incredibly warm. He pulled the blankets up over his shoulder, then let his eyes adjust to the dimness so he could watch Patrice sleep.

She knew he was back. She rolled back towards him, her eyes slowly opening as she came out of a deep slumber. It made him smile that when she saw him her entire face lit up.

“Good morning,” she murmured, rubbing her eyes.

“Good morning.”

“How do you look so perfect in the morning? I probably look like I got hit by a truck.”

“You look beautiful.”

“Now I know you’ve got brain damage.”

He laughed, planting a kiss on her cheek. “I just want you to know you’re making me so happy.”

She studied him with still-sleepy eyes. “Is everything okay?”

“Everything is perfect.” He traced a finger down her bare arm. “You’re perfect.”

She rose up on her elbow, an arm sliding around his shoulders. “It feels like it’s really early.”

“Sun’s just coming up. Why?”

She leaned towards him, soft lips touching his just long enough to spike his pulse. “We have a long day ahead of us then.”

“Maybe.”

She kissed him again, lips working his mouth open while her tongue slid inside. His entire body came to attention again, just from that simple gesture.

He shoved the blankets out from between them, meeting her naked flesh with his. Her stomach, hips and breasts braced against him softly, so very female. He was hard in every way, and she sighed as that hot length met her thigh.

Her hand reached between them, taking him in her hand and stroking as she kissed him. It made his body tighten up, everything else stopping, his mind grinding to a halt completely. She kept the same agonizing pace, and when he opened his eyes she was smiling up at him, rapt.

“What?”

“I like seeing you like this. I want to watch you.”

“Watch me what?”

“Finish like this.”

“Isn’t that … messy?”

“It’s fine.”

Her voice was so soft, so dreamy. It felt so perfect …

Yeah, that’s all it really took. The pressure completely released in a hot flash, and he even bellowed as he crested the edge and coasted down the other side of the orgasm, completely out of control of his body.

He looked down, saw that Patrice was still smiling up at him, no mess. She held the tip of him in her opposite hand, pinching it painfully.

“Oh God, that was fantastic.”

Her smile widened. “That is such a turn on. You are so beautiful like that.”

“I want to do that to you, too.”

“Okay.”

“You’ll have to show me how. I want to get it right.”

“You did just fine last night.”

He shook his head. “You did most of that.”

That made her giggle as he slid off her and beside her, on his side. “Show me,” he insisted.

She kissed his fingertips, her tongue flicking out, then guided his hand downward. “Soft touch,” she whispered. “Like this.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Essum woke up f
eeling fantastically refreshed. Until a certain smell hit his nose. He frowned, blinking himself out of drowsiness.

Blood.
He definitely smelled blood.

Essum got to his feet shakily, having trouble shrugging off grogginess. But the smell took him around the sofa where he stopped.

There was a horrible, messy, bloody trail leading from inside the front door down his hallway. What the fuck?

He followed the mess, wrinkling his nose. He’d always hated this smell.

The trail disappeared under the bedroom door. He heard sounds inside. Growling, like a frenzied animal. It made him pause with his hand on the door. He didn’t really want to walk in on anything making that crazy noise.

But he had to, didn’t he? He had a
vapor demon in his apartment. He should really check in on how his “roomie” was doing.

Steeling his nerves he swung the door inward, ready for the worst. And Praesul had yet to disappoint.

There was a body on his bed, a young woman. Except for blood in her hair her upper body was unmarred. Praesul was hunched over her right thigh, and it was reduced to nothing but blood and gore where he was gnawing.

Gnawing? He had teeth now?

Praesul was lost to his feeding. There was such blood lust in that dark form he had no idea Essum was even in the room.

“Praesul?”

At his name the being’s head jerked upward, and Essum actually took a step backwards, feeling the sudden urge to piss himself.

Praesul was as close to a skinned man as you would ever see, except all that meat and muscle was black. His eyes were white bulges with stark topaz-like irises. His teeth were there all right; sharp and streaked red.  It was hard to see the blood running down the tendons of the jaw but you knew it had to be there; there were no lips to keep that fluid in his mouth.

“Essum.” His name sounded wet and terrifying.

“What’s … what’s going on?”

“I heard her passing. Her brain brushed against mine. I called her to me. And she came.”

“What’s with all the blood? Couldn’t you have done this in the bathtub?”

“It’s cold in there.”

“This is a mess, Praesul. She’s missing from somewhere. You’ve left a messy and smelly trail.”

“You deal with the problems. This … this is what I’ve needed.”

Essum actually sighed, shutting the door and staring down at the trashed mushroom-
colored carpeting. He prayed for patience, and for time to clean all this up before anyone caught on.

He found carpet stain remover and sprayed the entire bottle on the carpet near the door. Praesul must have startled the girl so she fell, hitting her head on the corner of the half-wall between his kitchen and living room. There was a big smudge and some hair stuck to the corner. He likely killed her by doing the old soul-suck then he dragged her to the back room.

The blood started fading with the chemical almost immediately, and he realized he only had the one bottle. It was like bailing out the Titanic with a tea cup. He needed a carpet cleaner. And he needed to wait on Praesul because chances were the guy wasn’t done making a huge fucking mess.

A knock came at the front door and he stopped, stock-still, willing whoever it was to carry on their way, thinking no one was home.

“Hello? Police. We had complaints about a woman screaming.”

Screaming? Praesul must have put Essum under somehow; telepathically knocked him out. He would have heard screaming. He would have heard someone entering the apartment, for that matter.

“Hello? Ma’am?”

Shit. Police coming to the aid of a woman in distress; would they knock the door down?

Essum’s eyes ran under the door. He could see the shadows of two forms outside the door, that nasty and now very wet blood stain scary-close to seeping out to the corridor.

Shit.

Get your stones together and get rid of them,
he finally told himself. He reached through the door with invisible fingers, into the two young male brains in the hallway.
There’s nothing here. Go on your way.

He heard the footsteps retreating, exhaled, and sat back down on the sofa. Then it was like a slow-motion nightmare he couldn’t even see.

The neighbor’s door opened, and events took off at a pace he couldn’t stop. That bitch next door with the three cats stopped the officers, insisting she heard a woman screaming from that apartment, followed by a thump. He tried to shut her up with his mind but then he lost the bead on the cops and they honed in on his apartment door again, with renewed purpose. Just his luck: three strong and independently-tough minds all at once.

Shit
.
Shit.

“Open this door or we’re coming in. We had reports of a woman screaming.”

Fuck me.

He’d have to get out. As he turned to head back down the hallway the door was kicked inward.

He ran.

A loud noise stopped him.

He was falling, not sure why.

A blinding pain raced up his back, more intense than any other agony he’d known. It was strong enough to cause him to black out.

Anael had walked away from the group when Jehoel began explaining how he’d saved Voro from damaging his human lover just in the nick of time. He seemed to have a scientific interest in it, but Anael knew there was nothing scientific in sex. The female angels all seem quite interested, which brought about strange jealousy.

Her reaction was silly; Voro was not hers to claim in any way. But Anael really did not need to hear what happens between men and women behind closed doors.

One night. It was one night that she couldn’t let go or move on from. Over ten years had passed since her
laqeous
plan had been foiled, and while supervising another trap for a different Sin Eater he’d found her again.

Angels could easily disappear and get away from bad situations, whereas Sin Eaters had to travel and live as humans did. Anael did not remove herself when she should have, however. Her own nature was her undoing.

The
decipio
in this case was a farmer’s son, chasing a woman from a nearby town that had no intentions of courting him. She was the
frustro
.

American mid-west, mid-nineteen twenties. The boy was anxious to visit a barn dance where the young lady would be. Anael had followed him down the dusty lane to a
neighbor’s property. The building was lit from within as though on fire, the music from a live band pouring out the widely-flung open doors. Anael could sense the young man’s excitement, and she had to smile at the innocence he seemed to possess.

Anael waited outside while the
reveling continued, invisible in the warm summer evening. She didn’t realize anything was amiss until shouting sounded from inside, the kind of angry cursing and hollering that usually accompanied alcohol consumption.

Her poor
decipio
was thrown from the dance, literally tossed out into the dust and told to go home and sleep it off.  Anael felt sadness for him. She followed while he stumbled his way home, and when they were far from prying eyes she chose to speak to him.

“She will care for you eventually,” she promised softly, materializing before him on the road under the full moon.

He’d swayed on his feet, alarmed by her appearance so suddenly. Then he smiled sweetly. “You … you’re beautiful. Where’d you come from?”

She shook her head. “Never mind that. When the time comes, your lady will appreciate having you with her. I promise. This is a mere inconvenience.”

He reached out a hand towards her, then thought better of touching her, drawing it back shyly. “What’s your name?”

She smiled then. “I am Anael.”

He was speechless, staring at her as though he had no voice. Of course she knew then that humans instantly desired angels, but this poor man was so heartbroken she knew she was in no danger from him.

“Anael,” he repeated, trance-like.

“That’s right,” she replied. “I’m here to make sure you fall in love.”

Maybe he misunderstood. Or maybe he was actually mentally ill and she hadn’t realized it. But he struck her once with a closed fist, socking her to the jaw so suddenly she couldn’t react.

As she stumbled down to her knees, wondering if she was allowed to kill him, he put his hands on her. Had he not done that she could have dematerialized to safety, but the touch of the
decipio
grounded her to the earth so there was nowhere for her to go.

He fell against her with all his weight, both of them struggling as they hit the dirt literally. The road was still soft from a rain the night before so the fall itself didn’t hurt. The second punch to her jaw did, however.

Anael was the most scared she’d ever been. The
decipio
was pulling at her clothes, trying to get under her skirts but he was so inebriated he likely never would have been able to actually hurt her. If things had been allowed to progress, that is.

He was lifted as though weightless, set on his feet, and then with one solid, wet-sounding shot to the cheekbone and nose he spun and went down, almost comically so. He was unconscious before he even hit the ground.

Anael caught her breath, relief like a golden wash racing over her until she noticed who now stood before her.

Tentatio-Onis was dressed in the period’s fashion, with natural-
colored slacks, cuffs on the pant legs and suspenders holding them up. A collarless shirt was unbuttoned at the neck and he wore a bowler at a rakish angle. But it was definitely Onis.

He held a hand down to her to help her up, and her brain tossed around the possibility of pushing it away or just vanishing now that she was free of the
decipio
’s grasp.

She took his hand.

To say its warmth thrilled her would be a modest statement. Their palms meeting brought back that same erotic thrill that his kiss had over a decade before, and suddenly it seemed as though no time at all had passed.

Onis pulled her to her feet eagerly, her momentum carrying her upright and then causing her to stumble into him. He’d done it on purpose and she made a sound of disdain while pushing herself away.

“Anael,” he chuckled, raising goose bumps on her skin. “Where’s my thank you?”

She rearranged her outfit, realizing she looked out of place in this part of the country dressed as she was in her gauzy shift. Looking at Onis then she wished she’d chosen to dress differently.

“Thank you for your assistance,” she said haughtily, gingerly touching her jaw. “I’ve never had a
decipio
strike me.”

Onis cast his gaze down at the man he’d felled. “They seem to be getting more and more … unpredictable. Have you lot changed the recipe on us?”

She shook her head. “Everything is as it always was. He’s drunk.”

“And strong enough to best an angel,” Onis finished for her. “I never would have thought that possible.”

She shrugged. “Humans surprise me every day.”

“Indeed.” He stepped towards her, and she stood her ground, raising her chin defiantly. He smiled again, and it would have been frightening had he been human. “I get the feeling I make you nervous, Anael.”

“Stop saying my name.”

“Why ever would I do that?”

“It sounds filthy when you say it.” The second it flew out of her mouth she likely grew pale. What a ridiculous thing for her to admit.

He threw his head back to laugh heartily. She tried to ignore how her insides quivered at the sound and failed.
Get away from him. Disappear!

His eyes fell on hers again and she stopped breathing. Dammit, he could likely smell how she wanted him.

As she thought it she knew it was true. She wanted him implicitly and felt as though it would kill her to be denied his flesh.

He stopped laughing, and she knew something in her face had changed. “Anael,” he drawled, knowingly. “What is on your mind?”

She kissed him. She stepped into his personal space, to a closeness where his body warmth could be felt without actual contact and pressed her lips to his, demanding he reciprocate. And he did.

His hands latched to her hips, so lost on her lips that he leaned her backwards slightly in his enthusiasm. He was instantly aroused, out of control, and that knowledge was the best part for her.

When he pulled away, not letting go at all, he whispered hoarsely, “Alone. I need you alone immediately.”

If he feared contact with an angel it didn’t show. And touching her didn’t seem to hurt him at all. Anael’s inner woman was triumphant; Anael was going to take a man inside her, and she was thrilled.

Onis led her by the hand off the road, down a secondary lane. The walk seemed too long, but tripping over her feet and landing somewhere soft with him would have felt too long to wait at that point.