Black City

“Guess you’ll have to murder your brother yourself,” I said.

“You don’t seem especially grieved by the prospect, considering we are related to you,” Puck said.

“If I’m lucky, the two of you will destroy each other and then I won’t have to deal with either of you anymore,” I said.

Puck gave a brief laugh. “If the two of us were gone, then Daharan and Alerian would remain. Don’t think that either of them would permit you any peace. Any descendant of Lucifer’s—or mine—would attract their attention.”

“So what about Nathaniel, then? Are you just going to leave him like this, half-baked? What if your enemies recognize him? Will he be able to defend himself?”

“How do you know I have enemies?” Puck said.

“You’re related to Lucifer. You have enemies.”

“The question is not if I will leave him like this, but will you?”

“Why is this on me? It’s your spell. It’s your deal.”

“Ah, but now that you have interfered in the magic, it’s your deal, as you say. I no longer have the power to release it.”

“How the hell am I supposed to do that?”

Puck’s eyes twinkled. “I suspect that you need to do whatever you did in the first place, and just keep doing it until the spell is unleashed fully.”

10

SOMETHING FLASHED IN MY BRAIN—NATHANIEL RISING above me, naked and straining. I could feel my face turning red.

“There has to be another option,” I said.

Nathaniel looked at me. “Would it be so terrible?”

“This is not a conversation I want to have with your father looking on,” I said through gritted teeth.

“He is in danger as long as the spell is incomplete,” Puck said, and he looked like he was enjoying this immensely.

“You are an incredibly powerful being of old,” I said. “I find it just a bit absurd that you can’t wave your hand and fix this.”

“Even I have no control over the rules of magic,” Puck said. “You put the key in the lock. You must be the one to turn it.”

“Madeline,” Nathaniel said, and he approached me with his hands out.

He reached for me, pulled me close, put his face to my ear. I was sure Puck could hear anything we said, but it was nice that Nathaniel was willing to establish the fiction that we were alone.

As soon as he touched me I felt the thrumming anticipation that had haunted me ever since we’d first kissed. It may have been the compulsion of the spell demanding that I finish what I started, but it felt like a sickness, like a disease. I didn’t love Nathaniel like I’d loved Gabriel, but I wanted him more, and I hated that. I hated that I burned for him and there was no love between us.

“Madeline,” Nathaniel said, his voice low in my ear. “If you do this for me, it will not mean that you have to choose.”

“Nothing could make me choose before I was ready,” I said.

“And it does not mean that we must…culminate our relationship,” he said. “We need only to blend our powers together as we did before.”

I shook my head at him. “You know and I know that we wouldn’t be able to stop. And once we’re done, who knows what will happen? What about my baby?”

“Your baby would not be harmed,” Puck said loudly.

I looked around Nathaniel’s shoulder. “Excuse me, this is a conversation between Nathaniel and I. You could at least pretend that you can’t hear.”

Puck held up his hands in surrender and went into the living room. He sat on the couch and flipped through a celebrity gossip magazine that Beezle had picked up somewhere.

“I do not trust Puck, but I don’t believe that he would allow your child to come to harm,” Nathaniel said.

“Because my baby is a bargaining chip with Lucifer,” I said bitterly.

“Whatever the reason, your baby will be safe,” Nathaniel said. He lifted my chin so I would look him in the eye. “I would not harm you, either.”

If I didn’t do this, then he could come to harm. Everything in me was straining toward him. It was probably inevitable, but…

“I can’t do this now,” I said. “Not with an audience. Not with J.B.’s life in the balance.”

Nathaniel nodded, and he bent his head to mine. The kiss had a gentleness that I didn’t know he possessed.

“When we bring J.B. safely home, then,” he said. “We cannot wait much longer. And I would be a better ally to you against the vampires if my power was complete.”

I knew he was trying to make me feel better, but it was difficult not to feel like I was being boxed in. If I slept with Nathaniel, I didn’t want it to be for this reason. I wanted to choose, and like so many other things in my life I wasn’t allowed.

I moved away from Nathaniel. Puck gave the appearance of someone very absorbed by the latest celebrity breakup.

“Can you let everyone else in the house?” I said. “I want to get this show on the road.”

“As you wish, my niece,” Puck said.

He waved his hand, and the back door opened. I heard it slam against the kitchen wall. Beezle flew in, followed by Chloe.

Beezle looked furious. “What in the name of the Morningstar is going on here?”

“Where are Jude and Samiel?” I asked.

“They’re trying to break one of the windows from outside,” Beezle said. “I told them not to bother, but they were getting a little crazed when they couldn’t open the door.”