XXXI

"So, this is what you guys do the night before a mission?" I asked as Leo handed me a plastic cup of peach iced tea. The twinkling skyline of New York City winked back at us like stars. "Party on a rooftop at midnight?"

And not just any rooftop. Death's rooftop. Which made me think about when Death had showed me his wings.

Leo grinned. "None of us get hangovers, and it's not like we'd be sleeping right now. We rest during the day. And no, we aren't vampires , and we don't sleep in a coffin or on a cold slab in a crypt. This eternal servant of Hell prefers a good ol' memory foam mattress."

"You know, I never got the full backstory on you and the reapers," I said. "Eternal servants of Hell? Sounds like you guys were bad eggs."

Leo took a long sip of his drink. "Speaking of vampires," he said, clearly avoiding the subject, "I heard you cuffed a master vampire at the warlock's?"

"I was a dominatrix in my previous life."

He choked on his drink. "Easily the last answer I expected from you. Especially after the way you eyed Romeo's whip the other day. I thought your eyes would pop out of your skull."

"As would any other woman's if they interacted with Romeo for five seconds."

"You know what? Fair." Leo raised his palm, amusement twinkling his dark amber eyes. "Duncan got what was coming. I've been forced to converse with that pompous prick a few times at social events. Gives his species a bad name." Leo gulped down the rest of his drink. "So, I'm curious. What kind of training did you do with Ace?"

"Nothing too crazy," I answered. "Broke fine china with my ninja skills, levitated books, fought a bunch of magically conjured-up enemies."

"Nice. You nailed the ol' ‘break the vase' drill."

Thinking about how far I'd come, I gazed into my cup.

"What's the matter?" Leo asked, elbowing me teasingly. "You're not feeling insecure about your ability, are you? I've seen you explode an entire bathroom with your power. Although, I think Gunner will do that tonight too, if he keeps it up with those mini burgers."

"Sit on it and spin, León !" Gunner flipped us off from the table of food thirty feet away.

Leo burst into robust laughter, and I covered my mouth to suppress my own.

"It's the curse," Leo explained. "We're all a little overstimulated tonight. Once we get Death's scythe back, it will be manageable."

"No such thing as over stimulated," Romeo jested as the pink-Mohawked reaper sauntered over with a drink in each fist.

"Any idea where His Highness went off to?" I asked Leo.

"No. He just texted me to pick you up tonight."

"Maybe he's nervous for the mission tomorrow?" I suggested to Leo, Romeo, and Denim, who was now looming over Romeo's shoulder.

"Doubt it," Denim chimed in with his booming voice. "Death doesn't get nervous. We were supposed to meet about the plan tonight. He ghosted me."

"What's up?" Gunner asked, looping his arm around Denim and Leo's shoulders. Denim looked like he wanted to tear Gunner's arm off, whereas Leo was passive about the embrace. "Why are we all secretly huddling?"

"Seems like you're the last one who saw Death, sweet cheeks," Romeo said accusatorily.

"Why does it matter if I saw him last? I'm not his keeper."

One of the reapers whistled at my sass.

Romeo chimed in again. "Ever since Death lost his scythe, his moods have been affecting our curses. I haven't been this horny since the seventies. The three-hour-long boner twice a day was thrilling at first, but now it's just a pain in the balls."

Gunner made a disgusted face. "How do we always get on the topic of Romeo's dick? I've heard enough stories about that dreadful thing over the past few centuries."

"Maybe none of you noticed," I said, "but Death has a habit of vanishing for no apparent reason. It's his thing. You guys have known him longer than I have. Don't you have cool paranormal ways to track him? Why ask me?"

"Because you're his inamorata ," Romeo purred.

I choked on my iced tea. "His what ?"

"Girlfriend?" Romeo offered. "Lover? His main squeeze? His boo-boo kitty? Bae AF?"

"I get the picture," I cut him off. "No, to all the above. We're not together, Pinky."

Romeo narrowed his eyes and stepped up to me, inhaling. "Do you want to bone the vicious bastard or not?"

My face flamed. "I—"

"Suspicions confirmed," Romeo said, turning to the reapers and grinning mischievously. "Pheromones are through the roof on our little lady. And she's exceptionally testy. Conclusion: Mommy and Daddy got in a nasty fight. Never doubt the Love Doctor. Now cough up the dough, boys."

The pink-Mohawked reaper held out a hand impatiently toward Gunner and Denim. Cursing, they each coughed up twenty bucks.

"He's probably with that woman I saw him talking to earlier at D Ace explained to you the consequences of exploiting such visions."

"I couldn't care less about the consequences. Not if it saves your life."

Death dropped down behind me, his naked torso brushing the thin cotton of my T-shirt. I froze, fighting the urge to either run or lean into him as the low timbre of his voice wrapped around me like a toxic sheath. "If you speak one word of the vision to anybody, you will deeply regret it."

"I'm tired of your empty threats."

He spun me around, and I gasped as his darkness leapt from his body and shackled my wrists to the mirror. "They are far from empty," Death growled against the shell of my ear. "You've betrayed me in an unforgiveable way. My trust in you ended the moment you said you were with my father."

"I didn't betray you," I said, finding strength within to defend myself. "I didn't voluntarily go see Malphas. One moment, you and I were kissing, and the next, I got swept away and I was there , in some other place, and so was he. I may have summoned him somehow, but none of it was intentional. What happened to you . . . All the anger and hatred you have for your father, don't put that on me, because it's not fair. This wasn't my fault." Rolling my shaking fingers into fists, I lifted my chin. "If you expect me to stand back and let you die because you're willing to cut me off so easily, then you don't know me at all. I'm in this fight. If you disagree, then you're going to have to stop me."

His gaze clung hotly to the side of my face. I shivered when the tips of his talons grazed the left side of my hip and slipped underneath my shirt to scrape against my bare skin. He exhaled a ragged breath. "Was that a challenge, Faith?"

"Since you don't want to talk, yes. Yes, it was. and you're going to accept it." I arched a cocky brow at him and slid out from his shadows' grasp. "If you knock me down and keep me down," I said, strutting to the center of the room, "you get that striptease. But if I knock you down and keep you down"—I pivoted toward him, reveling in his sinful, undivided attention—"then I go to fight with you tomorrow. Yes or no?"

Shadows pulsed off him in wisps and tendrils as he considered my offer. "I don't make deals with virgins anymore. You never paid up on the striptease, and you never planned on it, so what value does this deal have for me?"

"How about I throw in something sugary?" I backed away toward the stairs to the main floor of the old warehouse. "I'll make you the best batch of cupcakes you've ever had."

Death's wicked eyes hooded, and he prodded a fang with the tip of his tongue. A part of him was intrigued. But as he slowly pursued me up the stairs, he seemed to hesitate, and his fists tightened against the railings on either side of him. His expression darkened and closed again.

"No," he said.

"How come?" At the top of the staircase, I looked down at him and inclined my head to the side. "Scared?"

His jaw ticked. He ate up the rest of the stairs in a few leaps and trailed after me into the warehouse. It felt like I was luring a beast from its den, and a dark part of me loved the thrill of it.

"Walk away, cupcake," Death growled. "Go back to the penthouse. Keep your pretty head attached to your neck another night."

"Aw, you said pretty." I clucked my tongue, feeling a boost of confidence in our teasing game. "Is wittle Death afwaid to fight me?"

A noise rattled at the back of Death's throat, reminding me of a snake. "Do not taunt me," he said, a cord of muscle protruding in his neck. "Not when I'm in this form. Not when I'm this unstable. I could suck out your soul in seconds, and you'd be helpless against me."

I pretended to yawn. "Sounds like you any day of the week, kitten."

Death flinched at "kitten." Freeing a low snarl, he rolled back his right shoulder. I watched his jaw twitch as he considered his next words. "I'll fight you," he decided, circling around me like always. "On one condition."

"What?"

Death continued his predatorial walk, those wicked eyes taking their time as they raked over me. One gliding step and he traveled in a blur, the shadowy warehouse shifting with him as he consumed my space. He leaned his face down to my level, stopping close enough that our noses brushed. I held my breath at the frightening, yet alluring, sight of his form up close.

"I want the thong you're wearing," Death said. "Take it off. Hand it to me."

Prickles of heat pulsed between my legs.

"Have some class," I said with a coy smile, "Grim." I visualized an orb of light in my palm and threw out my hand. The power obeyed as blue and white fractured the air with a crackle and fired, nailing Death in the stomach.

I'd pictured him flying back like a rag doll and slamming into the metal structure behind him. Metal would ring out, and he'd blink rapidly as imaginary birdies flew around his head. Instead, the energy seeped into his inhuman obsidian skin like a sponge. The only evidence that I'd hit him was a low hiss that escaped from his fanged mouth and the smoke steaming off his abs where I'd burned him.

"I see how it is," Death purred, his head still bowed. Tendrils of soft black hair tumbled over his forehead as he reared to his full menacing height. "Let the battle begin. Don't say I didn't warn you, cupcake."

He moved in a blur. Deadly talons sliced through the air, grazing my throat as I scarcely evaded his swipe at my face. Adrenaline slammed into me, but I couldn't react fast enough as his body twisted in the air, his foot connecting with my stomach.

I went flying, catching myself at the last second on the wooden crates as I collided into them.

Pain exploded. The blow left me winded, and I bit hard on my lip before a howl ripped from my throat. Trembling, I looked down at the wood impaling the back of my right thigh like a shish kebab and saw black splotches. Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried to jerk my leg outward to free myself, but Death's fist wrapped around the spike, keeping me pinned.

"Not so fast," Death rasped against my ear, manifesting beside me in a whirl of shadows. The talon connected to his thumb brushed my upper thigh, and his power sank into me like hot oil, mingling with the pain. My whole body shivered deliciously. "You won't always have an easy way out with the enemy." His lips hovered over my cheek. "Or be unaffected by their allure."

The all-consuming agony of this moment made me aware of my humanity. "You are not keeping me impaled here," I gasped out, "like an hors d'oeuvre . . . to teach me a lesson."

He grinned. "How about you hand over those panties, and I promise to only toss you around a little more before humiliating you with a defeat."

"Do those big, ghastly horns . . . get in the way of your brain cells? I'd rather drink bleach than let you win."

"That can be arranged," he purred. "How's it feel to be impaled by my wood?"

"Barely feel it." My teeth grated when he pressed his thigh into mine, making the wood go further in. A nasty curse flew out as my hand smacked into his bare chest to push him away. It was like trying to move a mountain. Layers and layers of rock-hard strength. "Besides the river of blood running down my leg and the splotches in my vision, this is a walk in the park," I panted.

"A little blood is normal during your first impalement," Death said, raising one of his talons to his mouth and making a show of licking away my blood. "Tasty."

"Sleeping during the day, soul-sucking one-liners, hidden lairs, eerie insinuations that my beet juice is seasoned just right. Sure you aren't a confused vampire?"

He scowled. "I am not a tick."

"But you are a prick," I quipped. "Two letters away from a major identity crisis."

He smirked, although I was pretty sure it was to show off his razor-sharp teeth. "Mortal blood tastes like cheap wine. However, if you were to offer a bit of flesh . . . "

"My attraction to you is the most mystifying thing of the century."

His eyes lingered on my lips. "Beyond a shadow of doubt."

He unwrapped his hand from the bloody wooden stake and pulled me forward by the hips until they pressed against his.

"Motherfu—!"

Death's laugh boomed as he slunk around my peripheral vision.

"You know, my blood could heal your thigh," Death said, moving toward the clearing in the warehouse. Catlike green eyes burned wickedly bright. "I'll make sure to give it attention when you're sitting on my face later."

Biting the bullet, I gave a warrior's cry and charged while he waited with a shit-eating grin. His whole body vanished right before I hit him, dark tendrils clouding my vision. Coming to an agonizing halt, I grabbed at my leg and tried to breathe through the pain that exploded like firecrackers in my leg and my back.

"That's it ." I tore a strip off my shirt like a madwoman and secured it around the wound on my thigh. Then I concentrated on my bloody fingertips until blue sparks came to life. Soon my entire fist was made of light and fire. "No more playing with me like I'm your ball of yarn, Angel of Dipshit. I'm going to fry you so good you'll start talking in Shakespearean."

A massive shadow cast over the floor.

"Your analogy is incorrect," Death purred. "I'm much more violent with my ball of yarn."

I tore my eyes up, tendrils of darkness melding back together to form Death's menacing figure. He stood on a metal beam above me, where hundreds of industrial arms crisscrossed and stretched horizontally across the warehouse. His enormous frame blocked out most of the light fixture behind him, giving his dark silhouette an ironically angelic aura. I pictured those inky, wicked wings spreading out on either side of him.

"Why did you fall, Death?"

Death cocked his head as he lowered himself to a crouch on the metal beam. Under the light, his horns had an almost lustrous shine to them. "Why do you think I fell?"

"Insubordination. Being good got too boring for you, so you broke the rules." I wandered into the shadowy parts of the warehouse's main floor and climbed a set of metal stairs. I ignored the pain in my leg the best I could. I made it four flights up, but it still wasn't high enough. Standing beneath his spot, I put my hands on my hips in frustration.

"Hmm, you're warm, but be more specific." He sprawled out on the beam and gazed down at me over the side with a lazy smile. All he needed was a catlike tail to complete the visual. "Why would I break a rule in Heaven?"

"Jealousy."

"Warmer, but not warm enough." He snickered in a way that made my temperature rise. It was crazy how he had that effect on me from so far away. "You're going to have to try harder than that, cupcake."

I noticed a stack of crates across from me on a platform that led to one of those metal beams. I started toward it, and the slow smirk that spread across Death's mouth was sinister. He leapt soundlessly to his feet and sauntered across the beam to follow me from above. "What do you think you're doing?" he questioned.

"What does it look like? I'm the firefighter coming to get my big, stupid cat out of a tree."

I got one foot up onto a crate, climbing up and stretching my hand toward a metal beam. The tower of crates wobbled and threatened to fall. Attempting to go up one more step was a mistake as the tower of crates gave way. But before I could fall, a taloned, obsidian hand wrapped around my arm and hauled me up to the beam. My palms leaned against the warehouse wall for support.

When I slowly pivoted on the narrow beam, Death was already so far away it was as if he'd never saved me. His hands were clasped behind his back, one foot behind the other with his spine ramrod straight. He cocked an arrogant brow, confident that he controlled the situation.

"Don't look down," Death taunted. "You might fall. Then you won't be cupcake anymore. You'll be pancake."

When I glanced below us, a sense of vertigo overcame me. My heart pounded as I looked straight ahead at Death.

"It would be wise for you to return to the penthouse," he said. "Let's call it a draw, shall we?"

I edged further along the beam. "I told you; I'm not going to let you die. I'm strong enough to come with you tomorrow, and I'm going to prove it tonight."

"Very well." Death stuffed his hands in his pockets and moved gracefully backward, balancing perfectly. "Tomorrow will be my last chance to enter the portal, you know."

My heart skipped a beat. "What do you mean?"

There was a reluctant pause. "I'm running out of time," he said. "My scythe is my Achilles' heel. There are creatures of the night less civilized than me and Devin, or our soldiers. Night creatures that are more animal than man, driven by primal urges like killing, eating, mating. I've found that my scythe has kept me safe from my own inner . . . " He cocked his head. " Beast . But now, the destructive drives of the Seven Deadly Sins that plague me are spiraling out of control. Soon I'll be driven completely mad by my curses, by my hunger, unable to communicate in the mortal language. I'll forget who I am. Ahrimad knows this. He was diminishing in this way when I found him in the willow. Which is exactly why he's in the Otherworlds, so that I can't get to my scythe and stabilize my curse. Portals between our world and other realms are stronger around a full moon. And tomorrow night, by midnight, I must find one of these portals and enter into the otherworld. Or else—or else it'll be too late."

"There has to be another way," I said. "Can't we draw Ahrimad out from wherever he is?"

"The forbidden worlds are difficult to navigate between. Even Limbo is complicated to travel to. There is a razor-sharp line between reality and imitated memory."

I continued toward him. He seemed strangely more composed in his demonic form than he did in human form. Still, my heart was slamming into my ribs at the thought of him losing control in this monstrous state.

"I'll tell you why I fell, Faith," Death said, staring at me and rooting me to my spot. "I loathed the mortals. I hated how they breathed, I hated how they felt emotion, and I hated how they were all so predictable. Mortality is a miserable element in every human's existence. You fear it, mask it, pretend it isn't there. Here I am, embracing it. Still, I saw the souls of men who lived a thousand lives richer than mine, most of whom had the poorest of circumstances. They had friends, relatives, strangers they left behind, people who loved and grieved to the point of sickness. And I wondered why a part of me envied their pain. Now I understand. Death gives life a significance lost in my eternity."

He held his arms out to his sides, palms out. My heart lurched in my throat as I watched him lean back and fall off the beam. I shouted after him, and adrenaline slammed into me as I rapidly searched the ground below me for his body. I hurried back across the beam to the wall, climbed down, and raced to descend the metal stairs to the ground floor.

His body was nowhere to be seen.

"Are we finishing this fight or what?" his deep, velvety voice asked from behind me. "I'm bored."

I spun toward him. "You idiot! I thought you— ugh !" I came at him in full ninja mode, and this time he didn't vanish. But he did fight back. I was quickly on the defensive, blocking his movements. He fought like it was second nature, like a machine calibrated to kill. And even now, in this frightening form, I could feel him holding back. Watching my every decision as if he were fifty steps ahead of me.

I knew I would never amount to his skill level, but it was so infuriating . I wanted to impress him, though his hard hits quickly fatigued me, and I was forced to back off and put some distance between us. Light burned out of my hands.

"You're fading fast, princess." He tsked with his tongue. "Never fight a villain half asleep."

When he slunk toward me with his head lowered, I followed my instinct this time and backed away.

Death corralled me away from the light, into the dark. He feigned a lunge and dislocated his jaws with a roar, razor-sharp fangs elongating from his gums and his pupils shrinking to thin slits. I lurched back with a shriek, knocking into a shadowy object. Sharp metal brushed against my arm and tore into my bicep before I caught myself.

Panic pulsed in me as I frantically searched around, but Death was nowhere in sight.

Warm blood poured down my forearm and dripped onto the floor. "Stupid demented angel-monster-panther thing !" I hissed, slapping a hand over the deep wound. Now I had two gashes, my arm being the worst of them.

"Klutzy, clumsy, girl. Maybe you're your own worst enemy," Death taunted from the dark. "Did you know your heart quickens when I talk? Sometimes it's slight, and other times I feel it pulse through me like it demands to be heard. And then there's your scent right now . . . "

"Can't say I can smell much of anything except public bathroom in this disgusting warehouse lair," I snarked, tearing my shirt the rest of the way and attempting to tie it over the wound. I managed to loop it around the gash and tighten the cotton knot with my teeth. "Ever heard of Febreze? Or is that your natural form's stench?"

The air shifted as he manifested closer.

A tap on my shoulder. I kicked backward, but his hand shot out and seized my sneaker.

We stared at each other in the dark. Him, a god, with a single hand gripping my foot mid-kick, and me, a helpless flamingo. I watched him decide what to do with me next.

"Hmm." Death hitched up my leg a little, forcing me to hop in a puddle of who knows what with my bad leg. I desperately tried not to cry out. "I believe this requires a witty line."

"You have my sole in the palm of your hand?" I offered between clenched teeth.

White fangs gleamed against the shadows of his face. "That's the one."

Death twisted my foot so I rotated around, and I released a small squeal as he spanked my ass. I lost my balance and hit the disgusting cement floor. I was slow to turn over, but he'd vanished anyway. I cursed violently. His laughter thundered around the warehouse, vibrating the metal slates against the walls. This had been a bad, bad idea. As I moved, blood smeared the floor like a trail of breadcrumbs.

My heart pounded as I pressed back against a cement beam to hide and figure a way out of this.

"I must say," Death's deep, velvety voice said, traveling from all directions, "I'm impressed by your rapid improvement since visiting the warlock. What did he teach you, anyway? How to bite off too much to chew?"

"There's strength in fighting against the odds," I said, edging around the cement pillar. I could feel him lingering around the bend and peered around the side. But he wasn't there. Still in the dark part of the warehouse, I reached for a wooden crate beside me and slammed my foot into it, snapping off a piece. Then I pressed back into my hiding spot with the new weapon clenched in my hand.

Shutting my eyes, I listened to the dark.

"Ace helped me see what you have been trying to teach me all along," I said. "I can't let defeat define who I am or else I'll never learn. Who I am is not defined by where I came from, or my past, or another person's opinion. It's defined by who I want to be now , and I have to live to fight another day to figure that out. Even if it means sacrificing everything. Even if it means to beard the lion in his den ."

His lack of response spoke volumes.

"You know what I've also realized?" I asked, creeping around the pillar. "I'm not the one who's afraid to take what I want. A cat in gloves catches no mice."

Death veered around the corner like a summoned nightmare and grabbed me, his hand encircling my throat. He flattened me against the pillar with his muscular thigh pinned between mine. "I'm not wearing gloves," he hissed.

"Guess this means you can touch me, after all."

His expression slackened. He looked down at his bare hand around my throat, and my nerve endings tingled.

Death could touch me.

When he didn't move an inch, I reached up and grazed his black cheek with the pads of my shaking fingers. My palm spread, cradling one side of his face. Patches of his obsidian skin peeled away, the night fading from his features. While the rage that ripped over his expression warned me to remember his unpredictable state, his hand on my throat had other ideas as it slid down to rest on my racing heart.

"Even when I tell you to run," Death said in a hoarse voice, "even when I'm the worst version of myself, you always stay." He leaned his hand on the pillar beside my head and lowered his forehead slowly to mine. "Nobody ever stays."

I lifted onto my toes and brushed my lips gently against his. He tasted like mint and warmth. When I pulled back, his eyes were hooded, as if he were drunk, and his brows slanted inward. He licked his lips, a smirk tilting one side of his mouth.

"Now I could have sworn ," he began in a low drawl against my lips, "that you said you abjured any interest in me—?"

I wrapped my hands around his neck and pulled him in, crushing my mouth against his. His fingers spread down my spine, pressing me flat against his hips.

"Suck," I whispered in his ear.

He released a soft rumbling noise from deep in his chest. "Suck what?"

"My light beam."

I slammed my ignited fist into his hard stomach, and my light blasted into him with a sonic boom. Death was tossed back, his massive body flying across the warehouse from the momentum and slamming into a metal structure. He fell hard to the ground without the usual perfectly balanced catlike landing. There went a ninth life. Growling out a string of vicious curses, Death rolled over onto his back. His large obsidian hand reached down to fist the splintered end of a piece of wood wedged deep in his stomach, which sparked with light.

"How's it feel to be impaled by my wood?" I shouted, adrenaline pulsing throughout my body as I smiled uncontrollably.

Death crawled onto all fours, keeping eye contact as he pulled the fragment from his stomach and threw it to the ground. Bulging muscles flexed as he planted one foot and then the other to rise to his full height, the wound gradually knitting itself together. He flung his head back and tossed the jet-black hair away from his forehead, then ran his tongue over his fangs.

"You're mine, cupcake," he growled throatily.

A shiver rattled through me.

Death held his hands out, inclining his long fingers toward himself as if to beckon me. Those mismatched eyes blackened as the iris and sclera drowned in the color of the shadows pooling across the floor. The shadows crawled toward me, hissing in low whispers, stretching toward my feet. I tried to conjure up a weapon, but they lurched at me like snakes, wrapped tightly around my ankles, and pulled me down to the concrete.

"Not fair!" I shrieked as a shadow grabbed one wrist, then the other. Soon I was bound by his darkness again, fully restrained on the floor as the shadows glided over every inch of my skin. With every intake of air, they tightened like a boa constrictor. I felt them latch on to the wounds on my bicep and thigh and gasped.

Death approached me with an unhurried swagger and straddled my body with his feet.

"You managed to best me, but where you failed is to pin me down." His shadows peeled away as he grinned and offered me his hand. "Truce?"