Chapter 12
Lynx
Iwas fully prepared to sit and have a conversation with Sable about what just happened. Instead, my worst nightmare is unfolding.
Satan save me.
Tony’s here.
And Sable is holding the grimoire, open to that same spell she used to summon me, looking confused. Did she try to summon her sister again?
And now we’re stuck with this hyperactive motherfucker?
Tony’s gaze lifts to me. A goofy grin filled with so much mischief spreads over his face, and I die inside.
“Yooooo! Big dog’s not happy with you.”
“Fuck off.”
“Ouch, man. You’re hurting my feelings. Come on. No hug?” His eyes flicker between me and the ghost, and his eyes brighten, seeing something that isn’t there. “Wait. Are you two fucking? I can smell the tension between you two, and whew. Get a room.”
He’s been here for barely a minute, and I already want to kill him. “Go back to Hell.”
Sable’s voice cuts in before he can give a snarky response.
“You’re a demon?”
Tony winks at her. “You know it, beautiful.”
A divot forms between her brows, her lips parting as scarlet flushes her pale skin. She’s as red as she was when she was under me, feeling my cock rubbing up against her.
Nope. Not happening.
“Leave. Now,” I snarl at Tony “Before any guards realize you’re gone—”
“Hey, hey, a lot of angry energy over there. I’m going to need you to bring it down a couple notches. I’m really not feeling your vibe. You, pretty lady.” Tony points at Sable then throws his thumb in my direction. “How’d you get linked up with this sad sucker?”
“She summoned me,” I snap, seeing the ounce of fear leaving her eyes. Sable is none of his concern. “It’s time for you to go.”
Tony holds up his hand for a high five, and Sable, very slowly, lifts hers, watching him wearily. My eye twitches when they touch. “That’s sick. I didn’t know that was possible. Wait, wait. Was that when you disappeared? Dude, I was worried.”
“How did you get here?” I ask, wanting to tell Sable to fuck off so he’ll stop flirting with her.
Tony shrugs. “Felt a pull from our dorm. Decided to follow it.”
Sable raises a brow, glancing between me and the hellhound. “Dorm?”
“Don’t answer—”
Tony cuts me off. “Yeah, we bunk together. I called dibs on the top one two minutes before he came into the room on induction week.”
Fuck this day.
Is he going to spill every bit of detail on our lives? To this human? To this fucking stranger he just met?
Before he can attempt to embarrass me further, I step forward. “That’s enough. Let’s go,” I say to Tony, gesturing to the door. “I’m sure you have a lot to tell me.”
“Why can’t the hot girl hear?”
My temper rises, veins bulging in my neck. “Tony,” I warn.
Instead of heeding my tone, he nudges me and looks at Sable.
“Just ignore him if he’s giving you a hard time.
We were working on some breathing techniques before we left to help him chill out.
Don’t think it did anything. But Lincoln—trust me, you don’t wanna call him Lynx. He has always been a grumpy bastard.”
“Your name is Lynx?”
“Lincoln.” She doesn’t get to call me that. Only my little brother can.
“I prefer Lynx.”
I flinch at her words, like my soul is glass starting to shatter, and my mind rockets elsewhere.
“Lynx,” Dylan whispers, refusing to call me by my real name because it’s harder for him to pronounce. “Can we play?” He holds up a little toy dog I made him; there’s another one beside him that doesn’t have any legs.
“Sure,” I reply, taking the broken one and grabbing a piece of chalk. He follows the line I draw on the wooden flooring with his toy, both of us crawling on our hands and knees until we reach our mom’s bed.
We both pause, the animals no longer moving, as we hear her heaving on the other side of the cloth we hung up to act as a wall. The sound grows louder as she coughs and chokes, then goes silent.
I press my finger to my lips. She doesn’t need to know we can hear her.
Mom always tries to hide her illness from us and puts on a brave face, but I know it’s getting worse.
Being the big brother, I do as I’ve been told when she’s like this and pick my brother up, wipe the dust from his knees, and take him to the hallway to continue playing.
I blink away the memory that slams into me, anger still tight across my face as Tony leans his elbow against the wall near him.
Lowering his voice, he asks, “If you ain’t tappin’ this fine ass, reckon she’d want a bit of me?”
I roll my eyes. “She can hear you, fuckwit.”
Sable doesn’t exactly tell him to get fucked, and the way she chuckles at him makes my heart accelerate.
Why is she chuckling? He isn’t funny. He’s an asshole who never knows when to shut up.
“You have a girlfriend,” I point out.
“Fuck me sideways. We aren’t a thing.” Casually, like this is an average, normal interaction amongst friends, he asks her, “Have you ever had a threesome?”
That’s all I need to grab him by the ear and drag him the fuck out of the room and away from her.
“The fuck, dude?” Tony shrugs me off but keeps walking beside me, matching my stride. “I was playin’ around.” Then he scoffs. “We’ve never let pussy get between us before—”
I swing my fist and melt it right into the side of his face to shut him up, only knocking him back one step before we both continue walking again.
“Not cool,” he says, rubbing his cheek. “Also, not sure if you’re aware, but I can smell demon residue all over this place. Let’s fight in the yard so we can create more.”
“Do you want a Tor’Oth to come here and drag us back?”
He stops me with a hand to my chest. “Uh, yes? I need my wingman.”
“I’m not going back there. I can’t.”
“Nothing to do with the pretty little ghost?”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“Knew you wanted to fuck her. You’ve never been this jealous before, not even when I slept with your fuck buddy.”
Fuck buddy is a loose term. In Hell, it’s basically innate behavior around our kind to have group sex—or orgies, as humans call them. The one I usually stuck my dick in ended up latched on to Tony, and he’s never let me live it down since.
Sex is just sex. It means nothing to me.
Unless it involves a certain ghostly human, who probably has one hundred thousand questions for me now thanks to Tony’s arrival.
Giving him any sort of reply would only encourage him, so I shake my head and take a sharp left, knowing he’ll trail me.
Down the stairs, we head to the dining room, and I slam the door shut to make sure Sable can’t hear us.
“What the fuck?”
He tilts his head. “I’m not following. Ain’t you happy to see me? I don’t feel very welcome here. Do you want me to go back?”
“You can do that?”
He looks puzzled now. “Can’t you?”
“No.”
“Oh, I thought you wanted to hang around the chick you have a crush on.” He laughs. “The guys are gonna love this.”
The thought of everyone in Hell knowing I’m here makes me straighten my spine. They’ll come here—drag me back and… hurt Sable.
Not that I give a fuck.
“You can’t tell anyone I’m here,” I say, sitting down at the table.
He sighs and takes the seat next to me, angling his chair to face me.
When he stays silent, I lean my elbows on my knees. “You can’t.”
“Under one condition.”
“What?”
He smirks. “Tell me you ain’t tapping that?”
“Fuck me,” I mutter, leaning back on the chair, closing my eyes when I feel her getting closer, closer, closer, until the door swings open and…
“I have questions.”
Of course she does.
“What d’ya wanna know?”
“My sister. I need you to help me contact her.”
Tony tilts his head. “Does she look like you?”
Confused, her lips move without sound coming out, before she shakes it off and replies, “I guess?”
“Can’t help you. Unless she’s down under, I can’t reach her. And I’d remember seeing such a pretty face—”
I shove him before he can finish his sentence.
Sable’s gaze flickers to me, a silent questioning look that says, What the fuck is your problem?
My hyperactive friend isn’t getting to flirt with her. It isn’t happening. He’ll charm her, like he does with everyone, and the thought of the two of them fucking…
Not. Happening.
She asks more questions. Not much about where we came from but what landed us in Hell—Tony obviously found a boundary though, because instead of giving her answers, he tells her she has nice eyes.
She does. But he has no right to fucking tell her that.
And great. She’s blushing again.
I shake my head and walk to the window, staring out at the world as their voices mingle into one annoying sound.
I tug at my collar, suddenly feeling hot when I hear a laugh slip out of her.
For someone who just died and wants to speak to her dead sister, she sure seems comfortable with this social fucking butterfly.
It’s why he’s been positioned to welcome our new arrivals.
His job is to lead newcomers to their stations, make them weep out their sins, mark their skin with flames, then lead them to their forever home.
We got lucky with our dorm. Most people end up curled up on top of a mattress with five others, covered in burns, tears soaking their cheeks.
We’ve all been there.
They earn their way to comfort.
I watch the far-off sunset, the orange and pink hues taking over the sky.
It’s been a while since I watched one. I used to take Dylan to the lake when Mom was having a really bad day.
We’d eat what we could find, and I’d tell him a story.
Most of the time, he’d fall asleep, and I’d carry him home.
Other times, we’d stay there for as long as possible, avoiding the reality of watching our mother withering away.
When darkness takes over the scene in front of me, I turn around and lean against the window frame. They’re still talking, Tony continuing to pretend he has a clue what Sable is saying about her dead sister.
“So basically, she died and you tried to talk to her with your witchy-woo book, you somehow died, and you’re stuck here?”
“Not somehow.” She jabs her finger at me. “He snapped my fucking neck.”