Demon Kissed: Book 2 of the Venandi Chronicles (An Urban Paranormal Romance Series) Read online

  As I leaned against the door frame, I glanced into the hallway. No sign of Ziltha. I couldn’t see a trace of blood. Where could she have gone? When I heard the crack of her skull against the wall, I could have sworn she’d have a bad concussion if nothing else.

  “I did see her. She held a knife to my neck.” I placed my hand over my throat to show the policeman where Ziltha had threatened to stab me.

  “Was she asking for money? Trying to rob you?”

  “No, not money. She wanted . . . this is going to sound crazy, but she wanted me. She wanted to take me to see someone.”

  “Her dealer, maybe?”

  I gave a short little laugh. “I wish it were that simple.”

  The officer stepped back, trying to get a better look at me in the dim light of the hallway. The lights in the hall were always broken, kind of like the window in my apartment. Nothing ever got fixed.

  “I think you’d better come with me, Miss,” the officer said.

  I reeled back. Did they know something about Ziltha? Was she dead?

  “Am I being arrested?”

  The officer didn’t answer. He just grabbed both of my wrists in one hand and snapped on the cuffs with the other. The cuffs felt heavy and cold. I tried to hang on to the door, but he yanked me through as easily as if he were pulling a weed out of a garden.

  “My rights! You’re supposed to read me my rights!”

  “There aren’t any rights. Not where we’re going,” he said.

  That’s when I noticed the lettering on the officer’s badge. It read, “City of New York Police Department.”

  Which would have been reassuring if we weren’t in Chicago.

  I started to scream. I kicked at the demon’s knees, trying to deliver a blow to his groin, but he was too strong for me. He clamped one hand over my mouth and pulled my long hair—hard—with the other.

  Where are all the neighbors? The ones who keep me up all night fighting, partying, cursing at each other?

  Except for my screams, the apartment building was as quiet as a tomb as the demon in a police uniform dragged me down the stairs.

  1

  Carter

  It wasn’t the first time I’d been dumped by a female, but it definitely hurt the most.

  I trusted you, she cried, her violet eyes glittering like amethysts in the rain. I believed in all of you. You were my friends!

  And we let her down. I, in particular, let Georgia down because I had nominated myself as her partner and protector.

  When Georgia announced that she was leaving the Venandi, the only thing that stopped me from begging her to stay was my male ego. She had already dealt me a crushing blow when she accused me of violating her trust by failing to tell her that her father is a demon. Asking her to stay would have knocked me even lower, and I wasn’t ready to go there.

  To be perfectly honest, what I’d wanted to do was act like an alpha male and hold Georgia so tight that she couldn’t leave if she tried. In the darkest corner of my heart, I wanted to tie her up, hide her away from the world, and make her stay with me until I could talk some sense into her.

  Instead, I warned Georgia that it wasn’t safe for her to go out in the city alone with Paimon and his legions swarming around her. But she wanted to strike out on her own, like the heroine in some cheesy, made-for-TV movie, to prove that she could make it without us.

  It wouldn’t be long until she found out that I was right.

  I hung around the warehouse for the rest of the day, convinced that Georgia would come back or at least call. Several hours later, I still hadn’t heard from her, and I was getting more than a little nervous. If I tracked her down at her apartment, she’d never speak to me again.

  But she wasn’t speaking to me now, so I figured I might as well reassure myself that she was okay.

  By the time I got to her apartment, Georgia was already gone. The place had been ransacked—not by a human being, but by wind. The window beside her desk had been left wide open, and the floor was scattered with papers, pens, and trash. That cold wind howled through the half-empty rooms like some kind of monster celebrating its victory.

  Anything that would have been useful to Georgia, if she’d been planning an escape from the city, was left in her closet. She hadn’t even taken her most prized possession, the six-string guitar that she had owned since childhood.

  But she was definitely gone. The door of her apartment had been standing open, an accomplice to that evil wind. The only trace of Georgia that I found was a pad of note paper sitting on the desk beside her computer. The pad had been pinned down by her keyboard, which had kept it from blowing away.

  The letters of her note wobbled across the page, and she’d pressed down so hard with the pen that she’d almost torn the paper.

  Ask Carter—PAIMON?

  Call me an egotistical jerk, but the fact that Georgia had written down my name, that she’d thought of asking me anything at this point, made my heart give a hopeful leap.

  Then, reality kicked in. I didn’t know where Georgia had gone, but I had a pretty good idea who she had left with and that thought made me sick with fear.

  I’d never driven so fast on urban streets as I did that evening. Since I had no clue where Georgia might be, my best bet was to get the Venandi together to look for her. I would lead the charge, of course, and be the one to save her from the demons who were now stalking her day and night. I would find her, save her lovely ass, and win her over to the cause of the Venandi again.

  But I had to admit that I had a secret agenda. I wanted to be her hero again. I didn’t ever want to see the pain on Georgia’s face that I’d seen earlier today when she accused me of betraying her.

  When I got back to the warehouse, I found Kingston in his library, pouring over one of his dusty tomes. Sitting at the table with the antique reading lamp, encircled by vaults filled with books, he looked like an ancient scholar consulting the oracles of history.

  That image wasn’t far from the truth. As a fallen angel, Kingston has been on the earth longer than anyone knows. Kingston himself had trouble recalling exactly when he’d fallen from divine grace or when he landed on this troubled planet. I was just happy that I’d ended up running into him.

  We had known each other for years, ever since we met while I was trying to find my human family. My vampire mother, Leora, refused to tell me who my father was or, more likely, she didn’t know. I had run into Kingston at one of the darkest moments of my life, when I was questioning my identity, my purpose in the world, and even my sanity.

  Kingston had given me an identity and a purpose. I became a hunter, one of the original Venandi, and my purpose was to slay demons and keep the realm of mortals safe.

  Whether or not he had saved my sanity . . . that was still up for debate.

  Kingston looked up when I entered the room. His reading glasses slid down the bridge of his nose, making him look like a slightly absentminded dad.

  “Carter. I hear congratulations are in order,” he said, closing the book he was reading.

  Dumbstruck, I stood staring like a fool in the doorway.

  “For what?”

  “For destroying that demon. You know, the one who was killing the girls at the carnival?” Kingston prompted. “You and Georgia won a major victory this morning. You should both be proud. In fact, I’ve planned a celebration tonight—”

  “Wait.” I lifted my hand. “Didn’t anyone tell you?”

  “Apparently not. Whatever it is, you’d better tell me now.”

  My legs unsteady, I sat down at the table across from Kingston. I felt like a kid who’d been called to the principal’s office, only this principal didn’t even know how bad my confession was going to be.

  “Georgia’s gone. She’s been gone for a while, since we got back to the warehouse today. That demon, the one at the pier, told her that she was a cambion. That she was the daughter of a major demon. That she needed to join forces with darkness because that’s where she came from.
”

  “Ah.” Kingston took off his glasses and leaned back in his chair. He sighed. “I was afraid of this.”

  “What? That a brutal, serial-killing demon would be the one to tell Georgia about her background instead of her friends?”

  He smiled sadly. “I wanted to tell her about her background when she first came to the warehouse. But she was so new to her powers and so new to the supernatural world that I’d assumed she couldn’t handle the shock. Now I feel responsible for waiting too long.”

  “I felt the same way when she first showed up here. She had just found out that she was being chased around by demons—I thought she’d really freak out if we told her she was a demon’s daughter.”

  “It’s not too late. We can talk to her tonight, all of us.”

  “No. That’s the worst part. We had a fight when we got back to the warehouse. She told me that she felt betrayed. That we used her powers for our own gain while assuming she was too naive to handle the truth about her father.”

  “So, she didn’t handle it well.”

  “No. Not at all. She threatened to leave the team, and I told her that she wasn’t safe out there on her own. Now that Paimon knows where she is, he’s not going to let her go, and his minions will be stalking her everywhere she goes. I tried to convince her to stay, but she walked out.”

  “She’s a proud young woman,” Kingston said. “And stubborn. She’s got a mind of her own.”

  “Believe me, I know that. I just wanted to keep her safe.”

  “Ultimately, it’s her decision whether to stay with us or go out on her own. As a fallen angel, I’m all too familiar with her predicament. I had to choose to assert my power or stay with the side of divine good. You know what choice I made, Carter.”

  I stood up. “Are you saying we should just let her go?”

  “No. I’m saying that we can’t force her to take our side. If we did, her choice would be invalid.”

  “Kingston, she’s been kidnapped, I know it. I went to her apartment to find her and the place was empty. She hadn’t packed anything, just left all her things . . . even the guitar.”

  Georgia’s guitar. It was a symbol of the fragile hope she’d carried with her as she grew up in the foster system, the one thing that represented who she really was.

  I had to stop. The memory of that guitar in her empty apartment choked me up.

  “Carter, calm down. We aren’t just going to let Georgia go. We can’t force her to come back, but we can find out where she is and help her if she’s in danger.”

  “Right.” I straightened up. This was no time for a meltdown. “You go and talk to Jose. He should be able to tell us where she is. I’ll load up the weapons and—”

  “Wait.” Kingston put his hand on my shoulder. The gesture was fatherly but firm. “Not so fast, Carter. I don’t want you involved. Not this time.”

  “What? Are you kidding me?”

  “I’m very serious. Georgia doesn’t trust you right now. She doesn’t trust any of us. We need to find someone outside the Venandi who can intervene; otherwise, we’re likely to lose her.”

  I hated to admit it, but Kingston was right. Knowing how stubborn she was, Georgia could be mad at me for the rest of my life, and given that I’m immortal, she could be pissed off for a very long time.

  “Okay. Who do you want to send?”

  “Someone close to me. I know he’ll get the job done.”

  “Well, who is it? Let me go with him as backup. I’ll wait in the car while he finds Georgia and makes her come back to us.”

  “Listen to yourself, Carter. That’s exactly why you shouldn’t be involved. We just agreed that we can’t ‘make’ Georgia do anything. Otherwise, we’d be no better than our enemies.”

  “Then what do you want me to do? I can’t sit here and do nothing.”

  “You can stay here and wait. Waiting isn’t doing nothing. In this case, it’s the best thing you can do.”

  I stared at Kingston in disbelief. He stared back, and we faced off like a couple of lions. I dropped my gaze first.

  Kingston and I had been friends for so many years that I couldn’t even put a date on how long our bond had lasted. I just knew that he had been a part of me for most of my adult life. Now he was telling me to back off at a time when I was critically needed by a woman I cared about.

  A woman you probably love. Just admit it, Carter.

  “Fine. Whatever you say,” I said. “I’ll wait here.”

  “Good. I’m going upstairs.”

  Kingston went upstairs to find Jose. At sixteen, Jose was the youngest member of the team. He was a highly sensitive psychic whose dreams often reached the level of prophecy. If anyone could tell Kingston where Georgia was, it was this supernaturally-gifted kid.

  Left alone in the library, I paced around the room. Kingston, who had always shared everything with me, who had always relied on me in a crisis, was telling me to wait around and do nothing while some other guy went to rescue Georgia.

  For now, I had no choice but to accept Kingston’s orders.

  But I wasn’t going to take this lying down. Whoever this mysterious savior was, he was going to get the ass-kicking of his life if he didn’t bring Georgia back safely.

  2

  Jacob

  The blind date was going well. Surprisingly well. In fact, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had so much fun with a human being.

  Her name was Melanie. She was pretty in a tomboy way: shiny blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail, sunburned cheeks bare of makeup, green eyes that crinkled at the corners when she laughed. She worked at an animal shelter, owned three pet snakes, and loved baseball.

  So far, there was nothing too intense between us. No pressure. Just a lot of laughs. The kind of laughs that can suddenly turn into a kiss if you add the right amount of beer. It was two-for-one pitcher night at Grubby’s Pizza, so my prospects for that kiss were looking good.

  “So, Jacob, tell me about yourself,” she said. “You’ve heard all about me. My job, my snakes, my baseball obsession. What about you?”

  “There’s not much to tell, really,” I said. “I’m twenty-six years old, and I’ve lived here in Chicago all my life. I work in construction, but work has been slow lately. Oh, and I collect old baseball cards.”

  I left out the part about my dad being a fallen angel. The one time I tried to be honest with a woman about my identity, she staged a mental health intervention on our second date and I almost ended up on an involuntary psych hold.

  Melanie’s green eyes widened. “Really? You collect baseball cards? Me, too!”

  As our pizza dwindled to a single slice and we started in on our second pitcher, I felt Melanie’s thigh brush mine. Arm propped on the table, she rested her chin on her hand and beamed up at me, her green eyes sparkling. She leaned in closer, until I could feel the warmth of her desire emanating from her tanned skin.

  Then my phone rang.

  I might have pretended not to hear it, except that I recognized the ring tone that I’d chosen for this caller. If there was any call I couldn’t ignore, it was this one.

  “Hey, Melanie,” I said. “I hate to be a jerk, but I have to take this call.”

  “Sure, no problem. I need to take a trip to the ladies’ room anyway.”

  For some reason, the women I date never assumed I was lying when I had to interrupt the evening to answer the phone. Other guys had told me that in situations like this, their blind dates would assume it was a pre-arranged rescue call, but this never happened to me. Maybe it was the dimple in my cheek, or maybe it was the fact that I generally make it a policy to tell women the truth. Maybe being the son of a fallen angel had something to do with it—who knew?

  As Melanie walked away, I admired the way her tight, faded jeans hugged her full hips, and I wondered if she was planning to make a discreet exit out the back door of the pizza parlor. Could my father possibly have called at a worse time?

  “Hey, Dad. It’s been awh
ile,” I greeted him. “What’s up?”

  Even though he’d very likely ruined the only decent date I’d had in months, I couldn’t be mad at my father. I loved the old guy too much.

  “Jacob, there’s something important I need you to do,” he said. He was cutting right to the chase, so this couldn’t be good.

  “Sure. Anything.”

  “Come to the warehouse, and I’ll give you the details. Are you far from here?”

  “Couple of miles. What’s going on, Dad? Can’t you tell me over the phone?”

  “No, we need to move fast. And you need to be armed. Meet me at the warehouse, and I’ll have weapons waiting for you. I’ll have full instructions when you get here.”

  I stood up, pulled a few bills out of my wallet, and paid for the pizza and beer. Scanning the room, I saw Melanie making her way back to the table. She gave me a confused smile when she saw me preparing to go.

  “Anything wrong?” she asked. “Looks like you were planning to leave without saying goodbye.”

  “No, Melanie, it’s nothing like that. It’s my dad. He’s got an urgent job for me, and I have to leave right away. Can I call you tomorrow?”

  She gazed at me for a few seconds with those clear green eyes, and I knew I’d lost her.

  “Sure.” She reached out and shook my hand. “Thanks for the beer, Jacob. I had fun.”

  Her handshake was firm and final.

  Damn it, Dad. This had better be good.

  Jacob

  The warehouse was only a few minutes away from Grubby’s Pizza. Somehow, I always ended up gravitating to that neighborhood by the docks, even though my dad and I didn’t see each other all that often. His strong, kindly presence drew me like a magnet, and I always felt better knowing that he was close by.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt your evening,” my father said, drawing me into a hug as soon as I entered the building.

  I sighed. “No big deal. What’s going on?”