“Do you know who it was?”
Scarlett shook her head. “No, but I can feel his torment. His agony infests the very air. I can taste it with every breath.” She looked like she was gonna be sick.
“What is there to gain from this?” It was too much of a coincidence for this not to be related to Asmoday’s attempted coup against Baalth, but for the life of me, I couldn’t see how the two were connected. Neither could Scarlett. “I don’t know.” Her answer was little more than a whisper. Her eyes flitted about the room, taking everything in. “Whatever he intends, Armageddon is the final goal. He never forgave God for his fall.” She said the last as if it explained everything. I guess to her it probably did. She raised her hand, moving it through the air as if waving in slow motion. “The dimensional wall has been savaged here. It would take little more to collapse it completely.”
Not entirely surprised, considering my reasons for being there, I extended my senses to better see the damage. “Jes-” I cut myself short knowing how sensitive Scarlett was about using the Lord’s name in vain.
The invisible barrier separating the dimensions from one another had been badly battered. It felt like it had been mauled by a bear. A very, very, very pissed off bear on PCP. Deep psychic slashes had shredded Page 71 its substance, leaving the core bare to the supernatural world. I could sense Hell seeping through from the other side. I’d never seen such carnage.
“We must stop Asmoday,” she proclaimed, her eyes steely, staring off at nothing. I could feel her rage. Seeing the opportunity to aim Scarlett, not as if she really needed the motivation, I took it. “Abraham thinks Asmoday intends to take out Baalth.”
That got her attention.
“I think it’s in everyone’s best interest Asmoday be put down. Baalth can wait for another day.”
Her eyes narrowed and locked on mine. “Do you do this for Abraham or for Baalth?” She could be quick sometimes.
I saw no point in lying. “A little of both, but I’m mostly doing it for myself.” I shrugged as her face went slack, disappointed. “I know it’s hard for you to see the gray between the black and white, but the truth is, Asmoday is the greater threat to the world. Baalth, for all his bluster, is in no hurry to bring about Armageddon. I don’t put it past him to hold it in reserve as a sort of end game scenario, but he fancies himself the new Satan. He wants his own little Hell on Earth and he’s not gonna bring about the end if it doesn’t benefit him. Asmoday has no such qualms.”
She sighed. Though she tried to keep her face neutral, she had to have known she was being manipulated, but she couldn’t find a flaw in my logic.
“You win. I’ll leave Baalth alone, for now.” She raised her eyebrows to emphasize the now. “Do you have a plan to deal with Asmoday?”
I shook my head. “Not really, but I’m not known as the brains of the organization.” I raised a finger to ward off the snarky reply I saw forming on her lips. “I’ll hand over whatever I have to the Council and they’ll decide the best way to go about handling him.”
“Let us be on our way.”
“Not so fast. I have one more location to check out. I’d hate to think I missed something we could use to put Asmoday away. Care to tag along?”
Impatient for revenge, but seeing my point, Scarlett nodded.
“Okay. Let me round up a few things, then we’re on our way.”
I worked my way back to where McConnell blasted me and retrieved my guns and shoe. I then went and found my other shoe and grabbed the manacles before returning to meet Scarlett at the door. She looked at the cuffs with one eyebrow raised.
“And just what do you plan to do with those?”
A million and one fantasies flashed through my head in the span of an instant. Every one of them had something to do with her naked and a metric shit-ton of Astroglide. I just smiled.
“Nothing.”
Revelation
We drove to the third location in silence. Scarlett stared out the window, extending her senses as we neared the site. She turned a slight shade of green as we pulled up outside the abandoned church, which corresponded to the map. It wasn’t a good color on her. It also didn’t bode well for what we were going to find.
“A devil and an angel are sitting in a car…”
“Shut up.” Her mood hadn’t changed.
“Just trying to lighten things up a bit, sheesh.”
She glowered at the rundown church, her fists clenched so tight her knuckles almost glowed. “They have defiled a house of God on top of all their sins.”
I chuckled. “They’re demons, it’s what they do.”
She snorted, ignoring my comment. “I sense no one inside.”
I looked up at the building, admiring its architecture despite its battered appearance. I’d always liked the aesthetic appeal of churches; the sharp angles and Gothic spires, the intricate knot work shielding the stained glass windows. They always remind me of a horror flick. The good psychological ones, not the gore fests they try to pass off these days. This one was no different. I could feel the wrong committed here. My own senses were rattling off the chart. I tempered them to keep from being overwhelmed and wondered how Scarlett was doing with it all. The furious look on her face kept me from asking.
“But they’ve been here.” I turned the car off and got out. I checked my guns and headed for the church, Scarlett at my heels.
Like the warehouse, the doors stood wide open, but I sure didn’t feel welcome, not that I ever did at a house of God. It’s not like He and I were enemies per se, despite my bloodline, but I could never be confused for one of the faithful. Stopping Armageddon was a personal, selfish kind of thing. I wasn’t doing it to curry favor with the Almighty, wherever He might be.
“How about you go in first?”
Scarlett huffed and led the way. It wasn’t that I was scared or anything, I just liked watching her walk. The church lights silhouetted her figure nicely. Difficult as it was, I pulled my eyes from Scarlett’s ass just as we hit the entrance. I saw her shiver, then felt a sudden chill myself as we passed through the door. She looked back at me and I could tell by the way her eyes narrowed, glistening like tiny daggers, she wasn’t pleased. Without a word, she headed deeper into the church, slipping through a set of intricate double doors. I took a second to look around.
Like most every other church I’d been in, the entrance opened up into a small, pleasant foyer filled with comfortable sofas, small plants, and plenty of end tables covered in propaganda leaflets. Hallways extended to the left and right leading to the offices, classrooms, and kitchen. Like Scarlett, I knew there was no reason to search those rooms. If there were anything to be found, it’d be in the main cathedral. I followed her through the door. For once, my eyes were on the room rather than her.
An aisle of red carpeting ran down the center, splitting the room in half, wooden pews on each side. At its end sat a small stage with a podium at its center. A giant wooden statue of a crucified Christ loomed above it. Normally, I would go out of my way to avoid looking at it. I hated those things, the way their eyes seemed to follow me around. Today, however, I didn’t have to worry. Its face had been mutilated by what looked like a hammer of some sort and splashed with thick, oozing blood. This particular statue wouldn’t be doing much staring. It was a bitter kind of comfort. In front of the stage lay another pentagram like at the warehouse. Scorch marks on the floor told a similar story. Edging closer to it, I could see the same tiny piles of burnt flesh. Whoever he was, our little captive angel was having a very rough few days, being dragged around town and tortured.
Scarlett stumbled and dropped onto a pew. I heard her sob, her sensitivity getting the best of her.
“You all right?”
She shook her head, her hands covering her face.
I could tell she was hurting. Even my own dull senses were stung with the residual magic released here. It was a lot like being covered head to toe in pissed off fire ants. I could only imagine how bad she felt. I moved
