Mammon (Devilry #2)

24. Mammon

TWENTY-FOUR

MAMMON

I take a swig of my drink, letting the dark whiskey burn through my throat. With a weight on my shoulders that’s become second nature, I hunch over my desk, digging a hand through my hair. I try to make out the numbers and labels on the page in front of me, but it all blurs together until I can’t take it anymore, and bang my fist against the desk.

“We need to talk.”

I snap my head up as Asmodeus barges into my office, nostrils flaring, and slaps a piece of paper in front of me. “Look what a conduit brought me this morning.”

“Another poster,” I mumble, pushing away the image that has caused me nothing but trouble. “What’s new?”

“No, not just one. There were hundreds of these plastered around the town center.” He grows more and more agitated with each word. “We need to come up with a plan.”

I nod dumbly, licking at my chapped lips. “Okay.”

“Wait…” He cocks his head to the side and snorts in distaste. “Are you fucking drunk?”

My breath hitches as shame heats my neck. “No.”

Scoffing in disbelief, he curses under his breath. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

“It’s just a drink,” I huff, chugging the rest of the whiskey. “Everything is fine, Asmodeus.”

“Everything is fine? That’s what you want to say to me?” He takes the now-empty glass from my hand and walks it over to the bar cart, slamming it against the top. “We have a real problem here we have to deal with!”

I grit my teeth, rage and annoyance making me stand, although I wobble as I do. “Don’t you think that’s what I’m doing?”

“No. You’re doing what you’ve been doing for the last couple of months and that’s stewing about fucking Bel and Gore!”

My spine straightens with a quick snap. Slowly, I turn my head to him and curl my lip into a snarl. “What did you just say to me?”

He doesn’t bow to the threat in my voice or the way I round my desk to stand chest-to-chest with him. Standing his ground, he balls his hands into fists as he narrows his eyes. “Do you think I wanted this job? Do you think I want to worry about these things? I don’t. I want to fuck off by myself and not be involved in all this political bullshit, but you wouldn’t have that. And now that I’m in this position, I’m taking it fucking seriously.”

I beat my hands against his chest, then shove him a step back. “So am I!”

“Are you?” He chuckles, dropping his head for a second before raising it and cocking an eyebrow. “Tell me. What’s the last actual work you’ve done?”

“I…”

But I can’t think of anything. There are dozens of decisions I make every day—hundreds of things I do—but I’m drawing a blank.

“Have you found a replacement mayor? A new deputy?” he presses, throwing his hands up in the air. “What’s the situation like with the mainland?”

A headache blossoms in the back of my skull, forcing a deep buzzing to rattle my teeth. I haven’t gotten around to any of that yet and I should have, seeing as though it’s been at least… Fuck, I don’t know how long it’s been.

I sigh, squeezing my eyes shut for a second as I walk back to my chair. “I see your point.”

Following me, he places both hands on top of my desk as I sit. “Do you?” He looks like he wants to hold his tongue, digging his teeth into the inside of his cheek, but decides against it. “All of this power has gone straight to your head, Mammon. You’re not thinking clearly and you need to get your shit sorted, and fast, because you started this crap and now you have to see it through.”

I’m seized with a sudden and unfamiliar sense of fear. I’ve let things fall away, overlooked details, and put myself at risk. For fuck’s sake, I don’t even drink and I’m halfway through an ancient bottle of whiskey at ten in the morning.

I’m… I’m not who I used to be. I’ve become something else, someone else. I never in a million years would have thought I’d have a fucking revolution to deal with, but that was my lapse in judgement in the first place. I thought that I’d handled all the things thrown my way, but I haven’t done it well. Not immediately replacing the idiots Bel and Gore killed was my first mistake. The second was believing these whisperings of revolutions were nothing but ridiculous rumors.

Where is the rational side of me I used to cling to? What the fuck has happened to make me so weak-willed and foldable? What does it say about me that I can’t fucking handle all this responsibility?

But deep down, I know why. I know why my mind has been somewhere else. I know why I’ve been letting things slide. I know why I’m in this big fucking mess in the first place.

Because I allowed myself to indulge in a dream that turned around and became my nightmare.

“Mammon!” Asmodeus yells, snapping his fingers in front of my face. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

Letting out a long breath, I scratch at the corner of my jaw. “It’s them.”

“No shit,” he snips sarcastically, sighing as he takes a seat. “So, Bel and Gore?”

I raise an eyebrow at him. “Are you still speaking as my second in command?”

“No.” Reaching for the bottle of whiskey, he takes a long swig straight from the spout. “I’m just your brother now.”

That pressing weight lifts just a bit as he hands me the bottle. I hold it against my lips, still fighting against myself to share what I used to believe was too vulnerable to say, but the alcohol gives me the courage to be reckless. “Bel turned Gore against me.”

He snorts. “That crafty fucker knows exactly what to do to make Gore crack, but you know Gore hasn’t been seeing him either, right?”

“What?” I ask, nearly dropping the bottle as I finish my sip. “What do you mean?”

With a shrug, he plants his feet on my desk, leaning back casually like he doesn’t have a single care in the world. “Gore’s back in his own room. He’s been ignoring Bel for the last few days, which you would have known if you ever stepped out of this depressing office.”

A ball forms in my throat that makes it hard to swallow. My heart begins to race and sweat blooms on the back of my neck. “H-How—” I clear my throat. “How are they?”

“As to be expected. Bel won’t shut up about missing Gore and Gore’s locked himself in his room until further notice.” He eyes me carefully and with calculation, a bit of his apathetic gaze gone before he speaks. “You really fucked this all up, didn’t you?”

I throw my head back and try to ignore the twisting in my gut, but it’s too strong and overpowering to be overlooked. “I guess I did.”

Because, at the end of the day, it is all my fault.

Bel and Gore had a beautiful relationship. They leaned on each other, depended on the other, couldn’t survive without the other by their side. Gore was a stunning beacon of psychotic innocence who needed Bel’s nurturing and protective hands to guide his way. They floated around each other as if drawn by some supernatural cosmic force that I once thought I belonged to as well.

Like toys, I wanted them and I broke them when they threatened to mean too much to me. I dipped into the dream and panicked when I realized it was far better than any reality I had been living in. I let my pride and my ego and my need for overwhelming control shatter their connection.

“I don’t know how this happened,” I admit truthfully, the whiskey working to loosen my lips. “I don’t know how it could have come to this.”

“Are you kidding?” Asmodeus rolls his eyes when I blink at him and groans. “Why the fuck am I always the one who can see it?”

“Then share,” I demand through gritted teeth as I snatch the bottle from the center of the table.

He rolls his eyes like he can’t even be bothered, but relents. “Don’t you see it? The three of you are so fucked up together; it’s a miracle it took this long to make you crack.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you’re obsessed with those two psychos. You and Bel have always loved to play with Gore’s precious little heart”—I snarl at his tone, but he waves it away—“and you and Bel have always butted heads about it. In the end, only one of you gets to be in charge and the two of you are in a pissing contest to see who it is.”

“Sounds healthy,” I snark.

He levels me with a serious look. “It’s not. None of it is. Your need to control Bel and Bel’s tendency to control Gore is like the least healthiest train I can think of. What the three of you have is toxic as hell.”

I raise an eyebrow. “But?”

“But Gore’s insane and Bel’s desperate for someone to take care of him.” He rubs his hand down his mouth and sighs. “And you won’t be satisfied until you have two pets for boyfriends.”

I wonder what I’m supposed to feel toward having “pets.” I won’t lie and say that the way Bel and Gore worship at my feet isn’t pleasing. I do want the two of them to bow to me, crave me, and do whatever it is I tell them to. I need them completely devoted to me, so they’ll never question anything I do. In return, I’ll love them. Fuck, I already love them, but I’ll give them all of me.

“Gore doesn’t want to be a pet,” I say, thinking back to the way Gore screamed in pain when he realized he was held by an invisible puppet master. “Bel certainly doesn’t want to be.”

“If you want them to be your pets, stop treating them like strays,” Asmodeus mutters before sitting up. “Look, in some sort of fucked-up way, the three of you work. The question is, are you willing to change who you are to get everything you want?”

I don’t even have to think about it. “No.”

He grins. “And, funnily enough, I don’t think you need to. I think you know what you have to do.”

I nod, then chuckle. “So, toxic as hell?”

“Maybe second place? Have you seen Luc and Levi?” We laugh together and I really do wonder—in a contest of unhealthy relationships—which one of us would win. Asmodeus sobers first, however, and raises a questioning eyebrow. “So, what’s the plan?”

I let out a deep breath and stand, going to the bar cart to pour myself a glass of water. “First, I sober up.”

“Then?”

“I talk to Bel.”

Bel needs to come first. Talking to both of them at the same time isn’t going to work, not when Gore’s mind has been fractured because of the two of us. If Bel and I aren’t on the same page, there’s no way we’re getting our princess back.

“Before or after you deal with this?” Asmodeus asks as he waves the poster from his seat in front of my desk. “What’s more important right now?”

I said I wouldn’t change for Bel and Gore and I meant it. I’ll never be a soft soul who only wants what’s best for them. If it doesn’t benefit me, I couldn’t give a fuck what they want or what they need. I’ll never ‘let them go’ because I want ‘what’s best for them.’ I’ll keep them tied to me for the rest of their lives because it’s what I want but, luckily, I know that they wouldn’t want it any other way.

Still, this conversation with Asmodeus has been revealing in more ways than one. I have to admit to myself now that, despite what I cared to believe before, I need those two little shits. I need my bratty baby and my gentle princess. I need them to have a clear mind, to stay focused, to be the best version of myself who can claim what’s rightfully mine.

Asmodeus sees this and clicks his tongue with a nod. “I see. Well, good luck.”

I drink an entire glass of water and then another, going to my desk for a quick mint before rounding the corner and placing a hand on Asmodeus’s shoulder. “Thank you, brother.”

He snorts and produces his sketchbook from his back pocket. “Whatever. Try not to take too long. We have shit to deal with.”

Nodding, I let him stay in my office as I head into the hallway. I cast a longing look to the very end at Gore’s door, but steel myself to wait. He’ll have to suffer for a bit longer while Bel and I sort through the mess we’ve made.

I never thought I’d be the one waving the white flag first.