Chapter 20
Malachi
Nineteen minutes and forty-two seconds. That’s how long I’ve been without my little summoner, and I am fairly certain the white-noise machine is a low-grade psychological weapon designed to liquefy the brain.
I am bored. Deeply, dangerously bored. So bored that I’m currently debating whether to rearrange the furniture or see if the receptionist’s head will actually explode if I look at her too hard.
My fingers drum against the plastic armrest, seeking some form of distraction, when my gaze lands on the creature sitting across from me.
I tilt my head, eyes narrowing as I trace the architecture of her face.
It appears to be an elderly female, swathed in a purple pashmina that smells faintly of mothballs.
But the structure is… wrong. The skin around her neck is loose, hanging in soft, draped folds that don't quite adhere to the muscle beneath. The eyelids are heavy, drooping significantly over the eyes in a way that suggests gravity is winning a war against the tissue. It looks sloppy. That shell’s at least two sizes too big for her.
Who is she? A spy? A low-level imp sent to stare at those seeking their ridiculous therapy?
“You’re slipping,” I whisper as I lean forward, gesturing vaguely to the loose skin of her throat.
She blinks, her watery blue eyes widening behind thick spectacles. She clutches her purse tighter to her chest, the leather creaking. “I… excuse me?”
“The shell,” I clarify, keeping my voice low. “It’s sagging. Did you get this off the rack? Or is your boss cutting corners on the biomass budget again? It looks like it’s about to slide right off the bone.”
She stares at me, her mouth opening and closing. She’s playing the part well, I’ll give her that. Dedicated to the performance.
“What do you think about the atmosphere in here?” I continue, inhaling deeply and curling my lip at the taste of the air. “I don’t know how you tolerate the humidity in this skin. My pores feel like they are suffocating.”
I lean in closer. “So… what Division are you with? You aren’t Ninth… Eleventh maybe? Or are you independently contracting?”
The woman presses herself so far back into the chair I think she might actually merge with the upholstery.
I lean in a fraction more, my nose hovering inches from her face, and finally, I take a proper scent. Only to be hit with a wall of peppermint, stale cat dander, and the unmistakable, sour decay of actual biology.
My stomach drops.
Oh.
Oh no.
Not a demon. Abort. Abort immediately. This is just a grandmother.
“I…” I run a hand through my hair, pulling back slowly, my mind scrambling for a way to explain why I just insulted her flesh. “We’re all in therapy for a reason, right?”
Before I have to debase myself further, the door to the office slams open and Eden bursts through, followed by the doctor and her sister.
“Eden!” Piper pleads. “Eden, stop! We have twenty minutes left!”
I rise from my hostile chair and smooth the front of the coat, keeping my expression one of mild, supportive curiosity for the sake of the audience.
I take a half-step toward her, leaning in until my lips are inches from her ear. “Have they caused you distress?” I whisper, my eyes flicking toward Piper and the doctor. “Just give the word and I can end them both. I’ll make it look like a tragic, albeit very messy, accident with a plastic chair.”
“No,” she gasps, her hand flying to my lapel and bunching the charcoal fabric in a white-knuckled grip that I find entirely too endearing. “No. No. I just need to go. Right now. We’re leaving.”
It seems the head-shrinker’s office didn't provide the catharsis she was hunting for; it provided a breakdown.
“I’m so sorry, Piper,” Eden stammers, her voice cracking as she begins to physically haul me toward the exit.
Piper is on her tail in an instant, her face a mask of horrified confusion. “Eden, wait! You can’t just—we aren't finished! Dr. Aris was just getting to the breakthrough! You need help!”
My little summoner gives no fucks—or perhaps she gives too many. Either way, she drags me through the lobby without looking back. We burst through the glass doors, right into the unforgiving street.
The mediocre cacophony of city sirens, exhaust fumes, and poisoned street meats attacks my senses in one fell swoop.
It is a sensory assault of the highest order, a symphony of mortal filth, and it is certainly not doing any favors for Eden’s currently stuttering lungs.
She stops near a concrete planter, her chest heaving, her eyes darting around the sidewalk like she’s looking for an alleyway to disappear into.
What in the Pit did they do to her in there?
I stop dead, letting a commuter slam into my back, and before she can protest, I reach down and haul her up into my arms.
“Put me down!” she gasps, her hands instinctively flying to my shoulders as I hoist her up like a fair maiden, her thighs pressing against my chest.
“I shall not,” I say simply, hiking her higher.
“Malachi, people are staring! Drop me!”
“Let them stare,” I purr, beginning to stride down the pavement, adjusting my grip to ensure my forearm is pressed firmly against the perfect swell of her ass. If I’m to be chivalrous, I’m certainly going to enjoy the architecture while doing so.
“You’re being ridiculous,” she hisses, though she’s stopped kicking, which I take as a victory.
“I am not. I’m being your sanctuary, baby girl,” I say, pitching my voice to what I’d imagine the velvet-cocked protagonist of her book would sound like. “You are safe now. My arms are the only fortress you require.”
She pulls back just enough to look at me, her eyes narrowing through the messy, tear-streaked thatch of her hair. “Is that… are you quoting Shattered Desires? Are you actually trying to ‘hero' me right now? Malachi, you look like a kidnapper.”
I click my tongue, my smirk sharpening. I am nothing if not a quick study, yet the student remains unappreciated.
”Yes,” I say simply, leaning down so my breath fans the shell of her ear.
“This, apparently, is ‘The Grand Gesture.' I’m protecting your honor and signaling to the local males that you are spoken for. Am I doing it wrong? I can always go back to the porn if you prefer. I recall the plumber’s dialogue being significantly more concise.”
The blush creeping up her neck is a magnificent shade of crimson. It’s almost enough to make me forget the car horns and the stench of their dying planet. Almost.
“We need to go home,” she groans, finally giving up the ghost and burying her face in the crook of my neck to hide from a group of teenagers who are whipping out their phones—probably to film my romantic act. “Just… get me out of the daylight before I die of shame. Please.”
Fuck. No.
I’m not taking her back to that hovel. I refuse to let her rot away in that bedroom like a forgotten piece of fruit. If we return now, she’ll just hide under a heavy blanket and dissolve into a puddle of mortal salt-water.
A shudder rakes through me as her breath hitches against my skin and I tighten my hold, my thumb tracing the seam of her jeans, thoughts spiraling into a very dark, very un-chivalrous place.
We need something else. A distraction. Something visceral enough to drown out the echoes of the therapist and her boring sister.
I weave through the crowd, ignoring the glares as my eyes scan the urban landscape—filtering out the mundane storefronts and the hidden, lesser demons masquerading as accountants and street merchants—until I spot exactly what my little summoner needs right now.
The gutted, skeletal remains of a building slated for the wrecking ball. It’s a beautiful carcass of a place, fenced off and smelling of wet concrete, rusted iron, and old dust. I smirk, my pace quickening.
This is perfect.
I lean my weight against the metal chain-link fence, the wire groaning and snapping under my touch as I shove my way through the perimeter.
“Malachi, what are you doing?!” Eden squeaks, her panic returning with a fresh, sharp edge. She squirms, her hands pushing against my chest as she tries to find her feet. “Put me down! Look at the sign—it says No Trespassing!”
“Hmm. Does it?” My fingers dig into the soft give of her delicious thigh as I hike her higher, heading inside the bones of the building. “How interesting. I must have missed the 'Mortal Laws Apply to Hellish Entities' fine print.”
“Why are we here?” she demands, her voice echoing off the hollow structure.
“For fun,” I say, finally letting her boots hit the gravel-strewn floor.
“For fun?!” she repeats, looking around the desolate, dark wasteland of rebar and rubble. “Malachi, what the hell does that even mean? What if the police come? We’re going to get arrested!”
“Your moral-high-ground do-gooders won't come here, little summoner.” I reach my boot out and kick a discarded ceramic tile toward her feet, watching as it skitters across the ground. “Smash it.”
She blinks, eyes darting from the tile to my face. “What?!”
“You heard me,” I drawl, crossing my arms over my chest. “Pick it up. Smash it. Obliterate it. Whatever verb satisfies that sensitive little heart of yours.”
“Why?”
“Because,” I say, stepping into her space until the scent of her sweat and those damned peaches fills my senses, “I am sick of you weeping and panicking. Life is built on things that can be broken, Eden. You feel like the world is crushing you? Fine. Crush something back.”
I nudge the tile again with the toe of my boot, closer this time.
“Go on. It’s a piece of ceramic, nothing precious. Unless you’d prefer to go back to the couch and discuss your thoughts and feelings over some tea?”
Eden stares at the tile for a heartbeat longer, her chest heaving with an unsure breath. Then, with a desperate lunge, she snatches it up and hurls it against a half-built wall.
It cracks apart, dropping to the floor in three pathetic pieces.