Lethal Rider

to release some fury by paying a visit to Dariq, he couldn’t do it until he got some extra protection for Regan.

Which included protection from himself.

So instead of climbing into bed with her or torturing the vampire who’d betrayed him, he texted Ares and Limos and fetched the dagger he’d relieved her of on the day he’d brought her here. Then he settled himself in the corner chair, crossed his legs at the ankles, and closed his eyes. He’d slept in worse places. He’d survive.

Whether or not he’d survive Regan … that was the question.

Fifteen

The screams reached Reaver’s ears first. Then, as he got closer to the closed door at the very center of the abandoned nuclear power plant, he heard the moans.

Gethel was behind that door, torturing who knew how many demons for who knew what reasons. Right now, Reaver didn’t give a crap what she was doing or why. The three realms—Heaven, human, and Sheoul—were at war, and Reaver had never been above doing what was necessary to win.

He threw open the metal door, and Gethel, standing in the center of the gym-sized room, turned to him. Her white tunic was splattered with blood, and in her hand was a treclan, a glowing spike that was effective only against other angels, including those of the fallen variety.

Which meant that the naked female on the table, her face and body partially hidden by Gethel, was some sort of angel.

“Reaver.” Gethel’s wings flared out before folding against her back, a show of dominance. Angels had hierarchies, and the high-level ones liked to flaunt their status whenever possible. The high-ranking pricks also rarely tucked their wings away, as if they needed to remind everyone that they had them.

Reaver generally kept his hidden, but he flapped them in defiance, letting the sapphire-tipped white feathers whisper against the air.

Gethel’s mouth ruffled in amusement. “I wonder if you were so rebellious before you fell.”

He tucked his wings away. “I’m going to throw out a wild guess and say yes.” And it was a guess, given that he didn’t remember anything before the event that caused his fall thirty years ago, and the weird thing was that no one else remembered him, either.

His lack of a past left him at a distinct disadvantage when it came to the political maneuverings of his angelic brethren, but ultimately, it didn’t matter. He’d earn a place at the top of his Order, but he’d do it without resorting to games.

“I’m not here to chat. I want to know if you have any information on Wormwood.”

She arched an eyebrow. “The star?”

“The dagger. Pestilence wants it.”

She waved her hand. “It’s a silly relic that’s been attributed to angels and devils, saints and sinners. It’s just a dagger. If Pestilence wants it, he must think it has power. It doesn’t.”

Damn. “You sure?”

Gethel shot him an arrogant of-course-I’m-sure-you-peon look. “How is Regan?” Gethel ran a long finger over the smooth surface of the spike she was holding. “And the child?”

As the Horsemen’s former Watcher, Gethel kept up on Horsemen business, and as an angel invested in the fate of the world, she kept up on prophecy and minor things like a baby who could bring about the end of human existence. Sometimes Reaver thought she was a little too involved, but then, he supposed he wouldn’t be able to easily step back from people he’d known for thousands of years either.

“They’re both fine. And since Aegis Headquarters has been compromised, they’ll be staying with Thanatos until the baby is born.”

She tapped the spike against her chin as if deep in thought. “Do you find it odd that Pestilence just happened to trace Thanatos’s movements at the right time to find headquarters?”

Yes, actually, he did. The Horsemen could cast a gate to take them to the last place a sibling had gone to, but by all accounts, Thanatos hadn’t been at headquarters for long. Pestilence would have had maybe a five minute window in which to trace Than to headquarters.

“Why?”

Gethel’s gaze locked on him, and her voice lowered, as if she were letting him in on a secret. “I believe it was Harvester who told Pestilence to trace Thanatos to Aegis Headquarters.” She turned back to her gruesome work, and Reaver drew to a shocked halt at the sight of Harvester strapped to a table, her body impaled by five treclan spikes. “But I don’t think she’s going to admit to it. She also won’t tell me who ordered her to hold you prisoner nine months ago.” She jammed a sixth treclan into Harvester’s pelvis, and the scream that came out of the fallen angel’s mouth made the entire building quake.

As much as Reaver wanted revenge, this wasn’t the way.

“Why are you doing this? You aren’t the Horsemen’s Watcher anymore.”

Black storm clouds passed over Gethel’s expression, disappearing almost as fast as they’d blown in. “This goes beyond Watcher business. Her treachery is expediting the Apocalypse.”

Bullshit. This was personal somehow. “And? There’s something you aren’t telling me.”

“I don’t owe you an explanation.” Gethel summoned another spike. “Harvester and I have … history. But trust me, she knows exactly what this is about.”

Reaver wondered how much trouble he’d get into if he popped Gethel a good one. “Do you have permission to kill her?” As the Horsemen’s evil Watcher, Harvester was in a protected position, subject to execution orders only by mutual consent from agents of both Heaven and Sheoul.

“Unfortunately, no.” Gethel said. “I have to release her when I’m finished.”

“Release her now.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You said yourself you won’t get anything from her. Release her.”

Gethel rounded on him. “She tortured you. Held you so Pestilence could maneuver The Aegis without interference. Because she kept you out of the game, Regan is pregnant, and the Apocalypse may be only days away. Yet you want this evil…thing…released?”

“I want you to release her because I want to be the one to make her suffer. Her suffering, and her death, when ordered, will come at my hands. No one else’s.”

For a long moment, Gethel stared at him, her eyes burning into him as if trying to see all the way to the truth. Which was that yes, he wanted revenge against Harvester, but they would battle it out as equals. She’d been horrible to him, but she’d also been oddly … tender at times, as if she’d regretted her actions. He wouldn’t afford her the same tenderness, but neither would he torture her while she was helpless.

Finally, Gethel shoved the spike into his hand and flashed away in a huff. Harvester, her eyes too swollen to open to more than mere slits, shuddered so violently that the table shook.

Holy hell.

Warring with the side of himself that wanted to leave her to rot and the side that wanted to relieve her suffering, he tugged free five of the treclan spikes, leaving the last to hold her in place while he unbuckled the straps that secured her arms and legs to the table. Once those were removed, he yanked the last spike from her shoulder.

Before he could stop her, Harvester rolled off the table and landed in a heap on the floor. As he came around the table, she dragged her body toward a dusty desk in the corner of the room. When he reached for her, she scrambled beneath the desk and curled into a ball.

“Fallen.” Reaver used the derogatory nickname for fallen angels as a command, putting an edge on it to piss her off and bring her back to her normal nasty self.

Instead, she cried out at the sound of his voice, and her entire body began to tremble. Gethel had done a number on her.

Sinking down on his haunches, he reached for her. “Harvester?” This time, his voice was softer, but she still flinched, and he drew his hand back.

“I’m not going to hurt you.”