I knew it before he said it.
“You are the god eater. The one to survive a war that raged for eons. The lone survivor, for you eventually ate them all. You are the victor, and to the victor goes the spoils.” He gestured toward Reyes, who was inside working the bar. “And what lovely spoils they are.”
When Shawn inched closer, Eidolon tightened his hold on the girl’s throat. He held her in some kind of a trance. On the outside, she looked perfectly calm. But on the inside, terror ripped her mind to shreds. He was torturing her. Terrorizing her.
Shawn backed down but didn’t relax.
“You’re lying,” I said, racking my brain for some kind of plan. No way could I get to the girl. He’d snap her neck before I got two inches. “My dimension is peaceful. I’ve seen it.”
He roared at that, his false teeth almost flying out. He stuffed them back in. “Jehovah really did a number on you, did He not? A number. Where do they come up with such witty phrases, do you suppose?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“You are the most violent of all the war gods from your dimension. And the most cunning. Which would explain why you are here instead of Al-Deesh or Ran-Eeth or Ayn-Eethial or … I could go on. Or perhaps you don’t remember the gods you ate?”
I ate gods? I really was a god eater? In the literal sense? Was I any different than the Colombian who wanted to eat my flesh to absorb my power?
No. He was wrong. Ran-Eeth and Ayn-Eethial merged to form me. That much I did remember. He was lying.
“Why do you think you’re here?” he continued. “Jehovah is babysitting you. Nothing more. Do you think He needed to outsource for the reaper position? He had His choice among billions.”
“You know, every time I talk to one of you gods or an angel or a departed who might know a little more than most, I get a different take on what I am. I’m Charley Davidson. That’s what I am. I don’t go to war. I don’t eat gods. I’m the least violent person you’ll ever meet.”
“Oh yes. I could sense your peaceful nature when you had the Razer kill all those men the other night.”
I startled, surprised he knew about the Colombians.
“It is in every fiber of your being. You devour your enemy without remorse. You make war look like child’s play. The generals of this world would do well to recruit you.”
I wasn’t going to argue with him.
“Then why are you here?” I asked as if I didn’t know. But I had to stall. To come up with a plan. I couldn’t just stop time to try to get to her. It wouldn’t work on him. He’d be right there with me. I didn’t dare try to get Reyes’s attention, although he’d probably figure it out sooner rather than later.
“Ah. Well, as you know, we are gods. We can go anywhere and become anything we desire on any plane as long as we have a way to get there. A portal? And therein lies my problem. Lucifer got us into this dimension. He used Rey’azikeen to do it. But the Razer only works between this dimension and Lucifer’s. Doesn’t do me much good. Therefore, I need a portal that can get me anywhere.”
“I’m a portal.”
“Yes, well, your Jehovah and I are not on speaking terms at the moment. He owes me a few thousand soldiers. Never paid up on a contract.” He leaned closer. “Just between us, don’t trust the Guy. No, I need your daughter.”
Every muscle in my body tensed in a knee-jerk reaction.
“I am not here to kill her, Elle-Ryn,” he said, rushing to appease me. “I would not be so base.”
“I thought you were helping Lucifer for that very reason.”
“Not at all. I just need her to get back to my home dimension. True, I’m going to kill every living being there when I get back, but you don’t know how they treated me.”
“What makes you think my daughter is a portal to your dimension?”
“Please, Elle-Ryn. Isn’t deceit beneath us?”
How the hell did he know? I just barely found out myself. I braced myself. Forced myself to calm. To think of something to say to stall him longer. “Then … then why are you helping Lucifer if you just want to leave?”
“Public relations. I scratch his back sort of thing. Her death is inevitable, either way.”
“You just said—”
“I don’t want to kill her. I did say that. And I don’t. But an everyday traveler using a portal is one thing. A god, however … we tend to destroy them. Portals. They’re usually only good for one trip, us being so vast and powerful.
“So, yes, I will end up killing your daughter, thus fulfilling Lucifer’s greatest desire. But I won’t kill her out of spite or malice. I mean her no harm. Harm is just an inevitable part of who she is. It’s in her genetic makeup.”
I eyed him curiously, trying to keep the anger from my expression. “Perhaps I’ll use your heart as a candy dish.”
“Perhaps I’ll split your skull while Rey’azikeen watches.”
We could do this all day. Hurl threats and insults at each other. I crossed my arms. “So, again, why are you here? Did you expect me to hand my daughter over to you?”
He cackled again, thoroughly enjoying himself. “Oh, no. We’ll find her eventually. We are hundreds. Thousands. If she is still on this plane, we’ll find her. I just need you out of my way first.”
“Do you?”
“You are proving more cumbersome than we’d imagined. Though I must say, Lucifer did warn us.”
“Who is us?”
“Lucifer’s army, of course. You didn’t think he’d forgotten about you? Or your daughter? He’s a little obsessed with all those prophecies that swear she is going to bring him down.”
“He’s just a fallen angel. I could bring him down with my little finger.”
“Yes. And you should have when you had the chance. He’s in his home dimension now. Safe from you.”
I let the barest hint of a smile slip across my face. “Never.”
He cackled again and clapped his free hand on the table.
People began to notice the hold he had on the girl. They whispered to one another. Weighed their options. Tried to decide if they should intervene.
“I’m sorry,” Eidolon said. “It’s just been so long since I’ve been around a power like yours. I’m getting—what do they call it?—a rush just being near you.”
“You mean a hard-on?” I asked, trying to insult him.
“In the worst way.” Before I could comment, before my next heartbeat, before the next ray of sunshine found its way into my hair, he moved. Fast, like Reyes. And just as deadly.
I threw both hands over my mouth when the girl’s head whipped around. Her neck cracked, and she crumpled to the ground, her tiny body like a doll’s.
I sat there, stunned, my vision blurring instantly.
Shawn moved first. He lunged for the thing that only looked like an elderly man. I barely got out the word No! before I heard another sharp crack. Shawn fell onto the sidewalk. His head on backwards.
People started screaming and running in the opposite direction.
Even more so when Eidolon brought out a revolver. “I have to make an impression.”
He raised the gun to his head and pulled the trigger. The body he’d inhabited fell, bringing the total count up to three.
I slid to my knees beside them and stared, aghast. Why? The man was already dead.
Then it hit me. While I sat confused and focused on the bodies, Eidolon burst into a cloud of smoke—shattering the windows nearby—and enveloped me. Forced himself inside.
A blinding pain, beginning in my chest and spreading through my whole body, clawed its way into every cell. Shredded my tendons and cracked my bones. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t see. He was trying to rip me apart from the inside out. He concentrated his efforts on my heart, digging as though searching for something.
I clutched at my chest. Fought to take in air, but my lungs were cement. Just as I started to lose consciousness, I felt Reyes close by. Furious. Powerful.
I blinked, tried to focus past the pain, then wondered if I were seeing things, because he had transformed. In my blurred vision, he looked angelic. But there was nothing angelic about Rey’aziel. Colossal black wings. Solid body. Muscles cording with each movement.
He raised his sword and bought it down in one defining stroke.
Eidolon shattered. Swirled. Tried to regroup.
I gulped at the air around me and held my arms to my chest before realization dawned. Everything I felt, every ounce of pain, every spike of fear, was only the human part of me. The miniscule part. The grain of sand.
He had yet to see the rest of me. So I showed him.
The essence that was Eidolon turned to face Reyes. That seemed to make my husband happy. Reyes lowered his head. Watched him for that split second from beneath hooded lids before Eidolon launched forward.
The instant Eidolon reached him, prepared to overpower him with his energy, the malevolent god jerked back as though a dog reaching the end of a chain.
Surprised, Eidolon took an almost human shape. He gazed back at me. And if mist could look surprised, I imagined that’s what it would look like.
I plunged a hand into his center. That part of him that had more mass than the rest. It was what he’d tried to get from me. My heart. The core of my being. The very center of it.