Crave

“They gave you us, asshole,” Adrian snapped. “And that’s all they can do—I’ve already gone over and asked them who’s supposed to be next. I figured it would help you, you ungrateful bastard.”

Jim popped his brows at the Mr. Thoughtful routine. First time through the park with Adrian, the guy had silver-plated Jim to the enemy—to the point where he’d ended up fucking Devina in the parking lot of a club. In his truck. Without knowing she was a demon.

“Times have changed since then,” Ad said gruffly. “You know they have.”

In a flash, Jim remembered what the guy had looked like just a day or so ago after Devina had finished using and abusing him in a variety of ways. He’d given himself over to her so that Jim had had half a chance at winning the first round.

“Yeah, they have.” Jim offered his knuckles in guy-speak for, Sorry I insinuated you’re dog shit.

As Ad gave them a pound, Eddie said, “We’re technically against the rules.”

Jim shrugged. “If it’ll help me win, I’ll take it. Rules are relative.”

Which was why he’d been chosen, wasn’t it. He was hardly a frickin’ Boy Scout—

Jim’s head snapped around at a metal-on-metal squeaking sound. The portable octagon had been dismantled and was being shoved through the door by four guys who then carried it over to a U-Haul van. Next trip in and out they were carrying the eight concrete corner weights and poles and then no one was left but him and Eddie and Adrian.

Which was a metaphor for the sitch he was in, wasn’t it.

Fine. This was how the game was played? Cool. He was used to relying on himself and his instincts in the field . . . and everything was pulling him toward Isaac.

The question was: where was Devina? Assuming she was after Isaac, she’d be searching for a way into him so her parasitic nature could take him over and she could ultimately own him forever in Hell after she killed him.

Jim refocused on his angels. “If Devina is possessing someone, is there a way to tell? Any markers? Reference points?”

At least then he could get a bead on her.

“Sometimes,” Eddie said. “But she can wipe away her fingerprints, so to speak—and now that she knows me and Ad are with you, she’ll be extra careful. However, there are some clean souls she’ll never touch, and those glow.”

“Glow? You mean like . . .” Shit, that blond attorney who’d taken Isaac home with her had had a light all around her body—which was why when Jim had seen her, he’d stared at her as he had. “Like a halo?”

“Exactly like that.”

Well, at least there was one thing working in their favor. He’d assumed he’d just been seeing things. Turned out he was—and thank God for it.

Jim took out his GPS receiver and called up Isaac’s two little blinking dots. Sooner or later, if Devina was fucking with the guy, she was going to make an appearance in one form or another—and they were going to be there when she did.

“Are there such things as protective spells?” he asked. “Anything I can put around Isaac to keep him safe from her?”

“We can work something out,” Eddie said with an evil little smile. “ ’Bout time to start teaching you that stuff.”

You got that right, Jim thought.

Closing his eyes, he unfurled his wings, their great weight settling on his spine and shoulders as they became visible. “They’re heading into town. Let’s go—”

“Hold up,” Eddie said, his wings appearing. “We need to go by the hotel and get some supplies. Assuming you don’t want us going inside the house?”

“As long as Devina doesn’t show, I’ll stay on the out.”

“This won’t take all that long.”

“It’d better not.”

As he grabbed a couple of running steps to get the momentum working for him, he felt the irony of everything like a great gust under his body: He never would have believed that angels existed or that the eternal battle between good and evil was not only real, but something he’d be fighting in.

Then again, when you weighed in at about two hundred and twenty pounds of solid muscle and were able to haul yourself off the ground with a network of metaphysical feathers . . . the crazy-ass reality you were in had a fuckload of credibility.

He was going to be goddamned if Devina got her claws into Isaac—in whatever form she was currently copping to. Isaac was his boy, and the idea of that man falling into his enemy’s hands was not acceptable—especially if that demon happened to be wearing a familiar face.

Which just happened to have an eye patch.

CHAPTER 13

Isaac had been in the Boston vicinity only twice, and both times had been for pass- through trips on his way overseas—the kind of thing where all he did was walk across a tarmac at Otis Air Force Base down on Cape Cod.

That being said, as Grier hung a left off something called Charles Street, he didn’t need to have had a guided tour of the city to know they were in prime real estate-land. The town houses on both sides of the hill they went up were all pristine brick with glossy black shutters and doors. Through clean windows, he could see interiors that were antiqued up to within an inch of their lives and had enough crown molding to crush a king’s head.

Clearly, he was in the natural habitat of the blue-blooded Yankee.

As ancient Saturday Night Live sketches of Dan Aykroyd doing Kennedy impressions about “chowdah” rolled through his head, Grier took a left into a small square that was demarcated by a wrought-iron fence and brick lanes on all four sides. In the middle, its little park had graceful trees with tiny buds already showing, and the surrounding walk-ups were the best of the best in this bestest-ever neighborhood.

So not a surprise.

After she parked her Audi parallel to the fence, they both got out. She hadn’t said much on the trip here, and neither had he. But then again, he wasn’t a big talker to begin with—and she had a fugitive for a passenger. Not exactly a so-how-about-this-weather? kind of gig.

The house she indicated was hers was a bow-front on the corner and had white marble steps up to its black front door. Fluted black planters the size of Great Danes sat on either side of the entrance, and the brass knocker was as big as his head. One light glowing on the third floor; several on the exterior. And as he surveyed the area, there appeared to be nothing out of place—no unmarkeds trolling by, no sounds that were wrong, nobody suspicious lurking.

As they walked over the uneven bricks of the street, he wanted to reach out and steady her, given her heel situation—but he didn’t dare. First of all, she probably still wanted to slap him . . . and second, he had palmed up both his guns inside his windbreaker on a just-in-case.

He was always careful with himself. Having her in tow? He took vigilance to a whole new level.

Besides, Grier handled the trip to her front door just fine, in spite of the fact that she was walking in stilettos and had been attacked by some drugged-up asswipe.

Too bad they hadn’t met in a different world. He would have really liked to—

Yeah, right. Take her on a date?

Whatever. Even if he had gone the law-abiding, I’m-not-an-assassin route, they were from opposite ends of the spectrum: he was all farm boy and she was all fabulous.

And he really had to cut the double-think when it came to how attractive she was.

Her security alarm went off the moment she opened the way in and he was glad, although he didn’t approve of her letting riffraff like him in the house. And how was that for fucked-up?