Darker Days

Chapter Nine

Ten minutes later, they breezed through the door casual as could be. Mom first, followed by a face I hadn’t seen in almost five years.

Still impossibly tall with dark, wavy hair, he stopped in the doorway and stared. New additions to his look included a closely clipped goatee, a silver earring, and a new tattoo snaking down his arm and around his right wrist. He hadn’t aged a day since I’d seen him last. It might have been due to the fact that I’d built him up in my memory. Constantly looking at old pictures to keep his face fresh in my mind.

Or it might have been the demon blood running through his veins.

I’d heard the story a thousand times. How my very human mom fell in love with my deadly demonic dad. They met when Mom was just sixteen. She was working with Grandpa at the agency, and the way she tells it, Dad sauntered in looking for help retrieving a powerful amulet. According to Mom, the sparks were instant. There was more to it than that, but I’d blocked it out. Mom and Dad smoochies were not a thought I cared to entertain.

Grandpa, of course, didn’t approve, but who could blame him? What father would want his daughter to hook up with one of the very things he’d spent his life battling? In the end, it hadn’t mattered. Mom was like me. Stubborn to the core. She loved my dad—demon or not—and refused to give him up.

I crossed the room and threw myself into his arms. He smelled the same way I remembered. Slightly spicy with the tiniest hint of sulfur.

“I’m sorry, Jessie.”

“It’s true? You’re the one who opened the box?”

“I’m sorry,” he said again, pushing me away. His eyes found Lukas, and the tone of his voice changed instantly. It was deeper and darker. Demonic. “Wrath.”

Lukas’ eyes widened, and he took an unsteady step back. “Please—for everyone’s sake, don’t come any closer. It’s very hard for me to control my anger and you—”

“Make it harder?”

“Yes.”

Dad advanced a few steps wearing a wicked smile. “I’m a demon. We do that.”

Shadow demons, like my dad, had strength and speed, but their big claim to fame was shadowing. It was their trademark move and made them excellent employees for higher ranking demons, put to work as assassins and thieves. They had the ability to blend in—to become one with the shadows—and travel between them. Virtually undetectable, my dad could take you out before you even knew he was there. I’d slept with my lights on for an entire year when I was six because of a story Dad told me detailing a job he’d done once. That had been the last time Mom let him pop in to put me to sleep.

“Stop.” I grabbed Dad’s arm and pulled back. It was like trying to move a mountain, well, up a mountain.

“There is a Sin in the room with my family.” His voice was calm, but I knew better. I hadn’t spent much time with my dad, but I knew that tone. I’d heard it a thousand times from a thousand different demons. Threatening. Dangerous. It was the last sound you heard just before your world went splat.

“There’s a Sin in the room because you opened the box,” I said calmly. Hah. Take that, logic.

He turned to me, expression softening. “I didn’t open the box on purpose.”

“So what happened exactly?”

“We got word it was stolen and about to change hands. Valefar, my boss, sent me to stop the trade. There was a woman—I didn’t see her face. I chased her for the box, easily overpowering her. Too easily.”

“Too easily?” Mom came up beside him and rested a hand against his shoulder.

Dad nodded. “She all but surrendered the box—and then she tripped me.”

“She tripped you? As far as attack methods go, that one is a little middle school if you ask me.”

Understanding creased Mom’s features. “She wanted you to open the box.”

Again, Dad nodded. “I believe so. I tried to stop it from opening, but it was too late.”

“Why would you want to stop the box from being opened?” Lukas asked. He was watching Dad from across the room with a mixture of fear and awe. “You’re an instrument of Satan. Bred to spread evil.”

We stared at him.

Dad scoffed, offended. Arms folded and nose turned up, he said, “Ignorant human. You are a perfect example of why your species is inferior.”

Mom cleared her throat, and Dad amended with a wink, “Most of the species.”

Lukas looked confused. I patted him on the shoulder and shook my head. His view might be a little archaic, but it really wasn’t any different from the rest of the world’s. “The whole heaven-hell-angel-demon thing? So not what you think. I’ll explain later.”

“I’m not sure I want to know,” Lukas said, sinking back onto the couch. He ran a hand over his face and sighed. The poor guy was having a rough few days. “They’ll be looking for you. They need you to keep their freedom. There’s nothing they won’t do to break their tie to the box.”

“They’ll have to find me first.”

Mom was pale, and I could see the worry in her eyes, but she was a tough cookie. A woman used to kicking ass and taking names. A little thing like this wouldn’t slow her down. “This changes things,” she said with a quick glance in Lukas’ direction. He met her gaze for a moment before she turned away.

“Changes…?” And then I understood. Dad was the bastard that opened the box. The one we’d planned on switching Lukas with. “Craps,” I spat.

On the couch, Lukas remained silent and unsurprised. He’d figured it out before I did.

Dad leaned against the wall next to Mom’s desk. “Fill me in.”

“Lukas was human—trapped in the box,” I said.

Dad narrowed his eyes. “Human? How is that possible?”

“A witch,” Mom supplied with a frown. She moved around to the other side of the desk and settled into her chair. “And as you know, something done in blood cannot be undone without the same.”

“Ah.” Dad nodded. “Never been a fan of witches.”

“We were planning to transfer the sin to whoever opened the box…”

“I see.” Dad turned to Lukas. “You’ve found a descendant then, I take it? Of the one who trapped you?”

“We were searching for one,” Lukas said. “We’ve had no luck.”

“And this descendant you’re looking for can remove the Sin?”

“I believe so, yes. It’s how I became infected. By magic.”

Dad didn’t look convinced. “But you need someone to transfer the sin to. Is that correct?”

And this is where the problem was. Assuming we could find a Wells witch, we were now short one bad guy. “What about another demon? We bust bad ones all the time. Could we just—I dunno—pick a bad one and transfer the sin to them? Problem solved.”

Mom rolled her eyes, and Dad actually looked annoyed. He fixed his gaze on me, and in that moment, I was almost glad he’d been absent during my early years. The parental stare of death would have been hell coming from him. “Even if it were possible—which it’s not—I wouldn’t condemn one of my kind to that.”

Oops. No wonder Dad was mad. All demons came from the Shadow Realm and most were, in some small way, related. Technically, when we sent a demon back, there was a good chance we were deporting a relative of his—and mine. A distant relative, but still. We shared some small amount of blood.

“What do you mean, if it were even possible?” Mom asked.

I couldn’t help staring at them—my parents. Mom in the chair, and Dad standing beside her; they looked like the perfect couple. So normal… It was hard sometimes for me to remember they weren’t normal. Mom being human and Dad, well, not. Demons could look normal when it suited them, but you could spot them if you knew what to look for.

From the time I could talk, Mom taught me how to pick them out in a crowd. There was always a slight difference in eye color—usually too bright or too dark. Height was another indicator. Demons tended to be a bit taller than normal humans and had long, unusually slender fingers.

But the real way to sniff out a demon—the foolproof way, as Mom would say—was to pay attention to mannerisms. The devil really was in the details. Contrary to TV and movies, I’d never come across a volatile demon. They really didn’t go around wreaking random havoc—not unless it suited their plans. Demons were actually a pretty mellow bunch. Always observing. Waiting for their in. They didn’t talk much and never blinked—if a demon was looking at you, you knew it.

“The Seven Deadly Sins are the core demons. Ancient and powerful. You can’t transfer one demon essence to another. It won’t work.”

Hell. That meant the original plan was out. We couldn’t just grab an innocent person off the streets. And if demons were immune, we were going to have to find an alternative. Fast. Today had obviously been a waste. Sure, Mom found the person who opened the box, but I didn’t see her toting any Sins along when she and Dad came through the door.

I glanced over at the clock on Mom’s desk. After five already. That pretty much only left three full days and change to find six Sins and hopefully track down a Wells descendant.

Lukas stood. He was trying to be discreet, but I could see him glaring at Dad out of the corner of his eye. Dad, in turn, hadn’t taken his eye off Lukas. “I think I’d like to get some air, if you don’t mind.”

Mom must have noticed the tension between them, too. Always eager to diffuse a bad situation before it got started, she waved toward the back door and said, “Of course. If we need you, we’ll call.”

As soon as he was through the door, I turned to Mom. “Okay. Options?”

She shook her head. “Realistically? I don’t know that there are any.”

I stared. “So you’re giving up? Miss, I’m a woman of my word even if it kills me? You promised him you’d help.”

She turned to Dad. A look passed between them and I’ll admit it, I was a little jealous. Not only of her time spent with him before I was born—which was crazy, of course—but of the fact that she had someone who so clearly understood her as well as I did. “I know—and I shouldn’t have. Even if it hadn’t been your father, I don’t know if I could have condemned someone else to Lukas’ fate.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “But you said—”

“What was I supposed to say, Jessie? We’re talking about the Seven Deadly Sins. We need Lukas’ help to track them.”

“So you lied? Figured you’d use him to get what you want with no intention of keeping your word?” I was going to be sick. This was something I’d do. Not her. She was perfect. Noble. She’d never screw someone over like this…

“Jessie…”

She was upset.

Good. So was I.

“It’s not that I have no intention of helping him—I just thought maybe we could find another way. It doesn’t look good, but I’m not giving up. There’s still time. I’ll still search for the witch, but finding the Sins has to take precedence now.”

“Time? How can there be time to search for the witch if you won’t let me help?”

She opened her mouth, then closed it. Sighing, she said, “I have your father’s help, now. And maybe there’s a way to break Lukas’ tether from the box. Keep him out while putting the others back inside.”

“With Wrath still inside him?” I said skeptically. I knew she didn’t believe it, and it pissed me off that she’d try to pass off such a blatant lie. To me of all people. Like I couldn’t see through it? Her words might as well have been made of plastic wrap. Just as clear and twice as flimsy. For the first time I could ever remember, I was ashamed of my mom.

“Other witches, Voodoo priests, an elemental mage—we’re not out of options yet. Let me talk to Kendra’s mother. She might have an idea. They’re long shots—very long shots, but I won’t give up so long as you promise to tread lightly with him.”

I balked. This just kept getting better and better. “Tread lightly? What’s that supposed to mean?”

She glanced at Dad again. God, I wished she’d stop that. “You just seem—”

I grabbed my purple hoodie from the couch, pulled it over my head, and made my way to the door. I was not giving her a chance to finish that thought. It was pure insanity. “Whatever. He’s just a client. I’m trying to do what’s right, here. Apparently, I’m the only one.”