Her forehead creased, and he wanted to smooth it. She was working her wiles, and he forced down his reaction. “That’s wrong,” she said. “Now I know you’ve got the wrong person. If I committed horrible crimes, I’d know it. I couldn’t commit … atrocities and then live a normal life. You’ve got the wrong person. You’ve got me confused with someone else.”
“I’m not confused.”
“Then who am I? What did I do?” she cried.
And tired of her whining, he finally answered.
“You are evil, a succubus and a murderer of infants. You are a nightmare, a horror, a monster.” He looked into her dazed face. “You are the Lilith.”
CHAPTER THREE
YOU’RE OUT OF YOUR MIND,” I said. My voice shook, even as I tried to be firm. I felt as if the universe were suddenly made of sand and everything were shifting beneath me. “Not that that’s news—I already figured you had to be demented to want to kill me. So who told you I was Lilith? Your neighbor’s dog?”
He stared at me. “What are you talking about?”
“Son of Sam,” I said briefly. “You know, the serial killer? I imagine you’ve studied his work.”
He shook his head. “I am not a serial killer. Think of me as an executioner.”
“Oh, that’s extremely comforting.” I was clenching my hands tightly together, so tightly they were cramping. I was getting nowhere with my whines—I needed to work on this logically. “Look, assuming by some wild chance I actually were this Lilith, why would you want to kill me? She was Adam’s first wife, wasn’t she? Trust me, I don’t feel anywhere near that old. For that matter, I don’t think I believe in Adam and Eve. It’s a nice story, but that’s about it. And even if I were Lilith, is that any reason to kill me?”
“Do I need to tell you all this?” he said, ignoring my protests. “You were Adam’s first wife and you refused to lie beneath him. You ran away, and when he begged you to return you refused. You chose to consort with devils and take the souls of babies, as bloody and terrible as Kali the Destroyer or any of the bloodthirsty demons that have roamed the universe. You fornicate with beasts, you seduce men in their dreams, and you slaughter newborns.”
I stared at him, stunned, and managed to pull one last ounce of attitude from my weary soul, not quite ready to give up. “Honey,” I drawled, “I don’t seduce anyone, in dreams or out. Nor do I fuck animals or murder children.”
“I said beasts. Other demons, neither animal nor human. And you can argue all you want—I know who and what you are, and you have admitted you do not.”
“In that case, don’t you think you should think twice about killing me?”
‘“No.”
There was something implacable in that short, cool word, and I gave up, staring out into the scrubby, deserted brush. None of this made any sense—he might as well be talking about a stranger.
Except for the part about newborns. Why had I felt the desperate need to get as far away as I could from my newborn goddaughter? It had been nothing but instinct, strong enough to make me throw everything away and vanish.
And what exactly had I thrown away? No memory, no history, no family. Could he possibly be right? I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, closing out everything, doubts and stray thoughts and fear. I closed my eyes and waited for what would come to pass.
It must have been hours later when the car came to a stop. I sat up, looking around me with dazed acceptance. The sun was close to the horizon, and we had pulled up to a deserted building that might once have been some kind of farmhouse. The windows, doors, and most of the roof were long gone, and it looked as if no one had been anywhere near it in decades.
Azazel looked over at me. He must have sensed that I was past fighting him. I unfastened the seat belt I’d been wearing, the seat belt I’d been silly enough to wear, considering I was going to die anyway, and slid out of the front seat to stand in the scorching heat of the late afternoon, waiting for him to come around the car.
“Inside,” he said. I went. I was past romanticized visions like Marie Antoinette on the scaffold. Impossible as it seemed, what he’d said made an eerie amount of sense. I knew there had to be some reasonable explanation, but I couldn’t find it, and I was tired of running. If there was any truth to his crazy allegations, and I was beginning to believe there might be, then … then I wasn’t going to fight it. If I had somehow been involved in the deaths of babies, of innocent newborns, I would rather die than risk doing it again.
The inside of the house was empty, nothing but a single chair bolted to the floor in the center of the main room. There were chains and ropes in a neat pile beside it, and belated panic swept through me. “No,” I said. “You’re not going to burn me alive.”
“No, I am not. Sit.”
It wasn’t as if I had any choice. He could move faster than I could, he was stronger, and if I was the demon he said I was, all my abilities had vanished along with my memories. “Is there anything I can say to make you change your mind?” At least I didn’t sound as pathetic as I felt. Though why dying with dignity should matter was debatable. If I screamed and cried and begged, no one would know but this son of a bitch. No one would pass judgment.
I sat. He knelt at my feet and began to tie my ankles together, and I looked down at him, at the broad shoulders, the silky black hair that had fallen forward, obscuring his cold face as he prepared my execution, and I had no idea why I moved my hand.
I put my fingers under his hair and stroked his hard face like a lover, my fingers caressing his skin and dancing across his mouth. He froze and looked up at me, his deep-blue eyes burning into mine with such heat that my entire body was swept with arousal, and I swayed toward him, wanting his mouth.
He stumbled back away from me, cursing, and cold reality hit me once more. I dropped my hand and turned my face away, refusing to look at him.
“If you do that again,” he said in a harsh voice, “I’ll strangle you myself. Though you would probably prefer that,
