He stared at her. “You’d turn your damnation into a striptease?”
“What are you doing with it that’s so much better?”
“Destroying evil.” The hook dug into his leg. “Winning back my soul.”
She shrugged. “That monster only attacked because you lured it in. And you only notice your soul is lost because you’re still looking.”
“Wrong.” He all but choked on the word. Her casual denial of what had happened to her—not disbelief, just dismissal—shocked him. “Possession wasn’t a choice, and neither is what you do next. The demon chose you to fight.”
“I’m a lover, not a fighter.” The sharp edge to her smile belied her words. “It should’ve asked me first.”
“It did. Not in words. Still, you accepted it.”
She waved one hand. “Entrapment. It’ll never stand up in court.”
Frustration made his temples throb. “You’ve already been judged and found guilty. And sentenced.”
She wrinkled her lip. “By you.”
“I played no part in your possession.”
“Didn’t you?” A merciless glint brightened her fathoms-deep eyes. “I saw you in my dream, you know. The one where you said the demon came to me. It was you I thought I was letting in.” A hint of violet lurked within the glint. “Into my body.”
Startled heat flashed through him. Liam had implied that both female talyan had had premonitions of their coming possession. At the same time, their partners had been driven to restlessly roam the streets, the unbound teshuva energies resonating with the demons already possessing them. The league leader had never said outright that the women had seen their ordained mates. Had been tricked by the image of the male talya meant to stand beside them.
He had been willing to lead the demon’s unwitting quarry from darkness toward the light. But he would never have chosen to be the temptation that caused her downfall. When he told her she’d had no choice, he realized once again, the same had been true for him. “I’m sorry.”
She tilted her head. The dreads shifted across her shoulders but never obscured her far-too-perceptive eyes. “You had no hand in it—other than the hand you had in me an hour ago—yet you’re here to save me, even though you hate me. Why?”
“I don’t hate—” He bit off the protest. It wasn’t going to convince her. He continued, each word more clipped than the last, “When my sword hand was severed, the impairment left me out of step with my demon. I need a partner to rejoin the battle.”
Her gaze ticked over him, from his boots to his face. “Maybe you just need to learn another dance.”
“A tenebrae tango,” he agreed. “We will fight together.”
“You said there are others like us? Go fight with them.”
“I have. For a very long time.” Bitterness rippled through him in ragged waves, the same way the teshuva’s thwarted energy swirled and jammed in his gnarled scars without escape. “It was for one of them, I was maimed. And now I can’t . . .”The phantom muscles in his missing hand cramped, sending spasms along his reven. “Now I am even less than I was.”
She tucked in her chin with a dubious look. “Less? Really? So you were, like, Superman before?”
“I could never fly.”
“But the anklet—the demon weapon—gives you superpowers ?”
“No. Without you, the anklet means nothing. But your demon is uniquely aligned with mine, in ways we can’t understand.”
“Can’t understand?” she said, exasperated. “You mean, ‘don’t want.’ ”
“Wanting isn’t a consideration.”
She peered at him. “It’s always a consideration. You just have it sealed up tight. Which is bad, because when that one wanting hits you—and it will—it’ll be worse than if you wanted everything.”
“How very . . . voracious of you. Meanwhile, I believe together we can drive the horde into hell.”
“Oh, you just want me to be your new right hand.”
Said aloud, in her mocking tone, he realized accusing her of mercenary tendencies had been unfair. Now that his perfidy was revealed, he saw no reason to conceal the worst of what he was. “You’ll be the other half of my damaged soul.”
CHAPTER 5
Nim let the hot shower soak away the last of her aches. Jonah had said the demon wouldn’t or couldn’t purge the pain, but parboiling disguised it well enough.
If only the water could wash away everything she’d seen, everything he’d said.
Other half of his soul?
She leaned her head back under the spray until water ran up her nose and she snorted.
“It’s not as poetic as it sounds,” he had said, with a quickness usually reserved for monks disavowing Playboy TV. “Whether possession is a cause or effect of the vulnerability in our perpetual idiopathic etheric force—our souls—we don’t know. But the result is a flaw. Not physical, but within.” He tucked the hook under his left arm, as if he was guarding himself, and rocked to his heels. “The etheric pattern of your demon—and what’s left of your soul—resonates with what remains of mine and binds us. That’s all.”
“So we’re in a spiritual three-legged race,” she said. “Tied together in the potato sack of our souls.”
From the tightening of his jaw, she guessed he wasn’t a fan of summer camp games. Maybe he thought she had cooties. Although wouldn’t the demon’s healing take care of that?
She touched the swirling black mark on her thigh. Reven, he’d called it. She scrubbed her skin until it was bright red, just in case he was quicker with a Sharpie than he’d let on. But she didn’t truly expect to erase it.
Great. The one gift she couldn’t pawn. She’d lost or abandoned or broken so much over the years. She couldn’t believe anything—even a demon—would want to bind itself to her.
And Jonah wanted her too.
Or maybe “want” was the wrong word. He needed her.
The golden boy. Captain of the S.S. Stuck-Up. Even missing his right hand, his self-possession fit him as snug as fishnet stockings. Self-possession—ha. Not that he’d appreciate the fishnet comparison either; too transvestite-y, not to mention full of holes.
How it must grate on him to need someone like her.
She got out of the shower and padded into the bedroom. Buck naked.
But he was gone. The twinge of disappointment hurt more than her ankle. Well, she’d just wanted to shock him again. And he wanted her to wear something nice to meet his friends. Fuck him.
The other half of his soul? That was what he needed from her? It seemed so crazy. But after all that had happened, how could she keep denying? Saying no had never done her any good. But there had to be something in this for her.
And she didn’t need another reluctant half soul. Thanks, anyway.
She rummaged through her closet for an outfit worse than the shorts and found a denim micromini and fitted white baby-doll tee. No bra. For the sake of city ordinances, she slipped on a black lace thong. From the bottom of the closet, she dragged out a pair of black high-top Vans and laced them. Tight. Like, get-the-fuck-out-of-town-in-a-hurry tight.
She was a slut, but not a stupid slut.
She checked that Mobi had eaten his dinner, then went to the window to stare down at the dark street. Maybe she should run now. Whatever tie bound her to Jonah might not break, but she’d see how far it could stretch.
Or did she just want to see if he would chase her?
A tremor went through her, and she could have kicked herself with her own speedy sneakers. Whatever had driven that wildness in the Shimmy Shack’s private room had been a one-shot deal, he’d said, a way for her and her demon to get to know each other better. Jonah had kept himself as separate as he could through the whole ordeal, even with his body raging to get in on the action. He was one of those disapproving types who wouldn’t be swayed by a bit of swaying flesh.