Chapter 21
Silver Springs held their annual Harvest Festival on the last Saturday of the month. Occasionally, it fell on the same day as Halloween and rolled right into trick-or-treating festivities, but this year it fell on the twenty-eighth.
Community volunteers, together with the Silver Springs Department of Parks and Recreation, had gone all out, transforming the town center into an autumnal oasis.
The streetlights and gazebo were hung with wreaths of golden maple leaves and crimson chrysanthemums. Big bales of hay sat stacked on the south side of the park, creating a perfect photo op for families.
On the opposite end of the park, a little artists’ alley had been set up across from stalls selling fried apple pies, hot cocoa, and kettle corn.
The day had kicked off with a well-attended parade, jointly sponsored by Fannin’s Five & Dime and Flowers by Farrah, followed by several fall-themed contests and competitions, including a chili cook-off challenge in which Martha won by a landslide for her creamy white bean turkey—not chicken—chili, a pumpkin pie–eating contest, and bobbing for apples.
Peyton and Chrissy had roped Effie into helping at the face-painting station.
It could’ve gone terribly, considering her artistic talents stopped at anatomically incorrect hearts and stick figures, but had actually turned out all right, thanks to Peyton’s huge binder full of face-painting options for the children to choose from like a menu, options that handily listed out step-by-step instructions for the “artists” doing the face painting.
While she was busy turning children into fall fairy princesses and stenciling cobwebs onto cheeks, Finn was helping a small group of older kids and teens carve pumpkins over by the hay bale photo op on the other side of the park.
Bea was with him, rolling around on her tummy on a thick plaid blanket.
Chrissy and Peyton had left to meet Monty and Jeb for a quick bite to eat, sticking a Be Back Later sign on the face-painting station’s table.
They’d invited Effie to join them, but Finn was still up to his elbows in pumpkin guts, so she’d told them to go ahead, settling in on a bench to people watch.
She’d only been sitting for about five minutes when someone joined her.
“Lovely day, no?”
It was the old woman she’d met outside Fannin’s Five & Dime the day she’d liaised with the gnomes.
“Mrs…. Clootie, right?”
The old woman’s cloudy hazel eyes lit up, her lips curving into a wide smile. “You remembered.”
“Small town.” Effie smiled politely. “And I’m good with names.”
“That does help, the town being so small. Everyone knows everyone.” Mrs. Clootie chuckled. “How are you liking it? Well, I imagine, since you’ve stuck around.”
Across the park, Finn laughed as he dodged a handful of stringy pumpkin seeds flung at him by a giggling little girl wearing galoshes with sunflowers all over them.
“The place certainly has its charms.”
Mrs. Clootie hummed. “I know that look.”
Effie turned, brows raised in question.
“You’re in love.”
She ducked her head, smiling stupidly down at her lap. “Good eye.”
Mrs. Clootie scooted closer. “I hope it’s not an overstep, but I will admit to being a tad bit confused. It could be because I’m getting up there in years, but I could’ve sworn everyone’s been saying you and Finley are getting a divorce.”
“Change of plans,” she said. “We decided to give it a second chance. Make a real go of things this time.”
Mrs. Clootie’s eyes crinkled. “How wonderful for you.”
The pumpkin carving had been abandoned for a full-blown pumpkin-gut fight that Finn seemed to be caught in the crosshairs of, all the children ganging up on him, careful at least not to sling slime and seeds on Bea.
“He’s great with the children, isn’t he?”
Effie smiled as Finn threw himself down on the grass, letting the little girl in sunflower galoshes believe she’d successfully tackled him. “He really is.”
“Such a shame you won’t be able to give him any.”
Effie turned, smile slipping. “I’m sorry?” She chuckled uncomfortably. “I don’t think I heard you right. What did you just say?”
“You heard me, dear.” Mrs. Clootie smiled patiently and reached out, patting Effie on the back of the hand. “We both know you’re as barren as the moon.”
She flinched, snatching her hand away. “Excuse me? How could you say—”
Her stomach sank.
“Ah.” Mrs. Clootie giggled. “There it is.”
It took great effort to swallow. “You’re not Mrs. Clootie, are you?”
“I’m sure not.” Her once-cloudy eyes now shone clear and bright. “Guess who.”
Her heart thudded dully against her ribs. “Lucifer.”
The smile that spread across the old woman’s face was grotesque. Her papery lips stretched too wide, with too much gum and too many teeth on display. “Always so quick on the uptake, Eithrig. I adore that about you.” Lucifer patted her on the thigh. “A shame you’re such a traitorous little bitch.”
Her breath sped. “What did you do to Mrs. Clootie?”
“Oh, she’s fine.” Lucifer batted at the air.
“The old bag is with her family, slowly broiling under the Florida sun. Brilliant timing that little vacation was for yours truly, let me tell you. No, no, you needn’t concern yourself with old Mrs. Clootie.
What you ought to be concerned about is what I’m going to do to you. ”
Searing pain exploded in her leg, her breath seizing in her lungs. Her eyes fell to her lap and—god. With claws that looked out of place on Mrs. Clootie’s liver-spotted hand, Lucifer had stabbed her thigh. Blood bubbled up around his fingers and soaked into her jeans, spreading fast.
“It’s time we have a long-overdue chat, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know why you’re here. I haven’t broken any rules. I haven’t done anything—”
“No?” He laughed. “You can’t think of a single thing you’ve done that might have earned my ire?”
Her spine stiffened, her own anger flaring. “You’re easily provoked. It doesn’t mean I did anything to—”
A strangled sob lodged in her throat as he squeezed her thigh, fingers boring holes in her flesh all the way to the second knuckle.
“Mouthy little thing, aren’t you?”
Effie writhed, stomach roiling and heaving, her hands twisting in her lap, claws pricking her palms.
“Oh, control yourself,” he chided. “This is nothing. It’s just a flesh wound.”
She gritted her teeth against the pain, her breath rattling in her chest. “How’d you even know to come looking for me?”
“Hell and its denizens are my domain. Nothing happens without me knowing about it. You think your flagged betrothal contract would escape my notice? Oh, no, no, no. See, when the Department of Records sent you an official summons, they also alerted me,” Lucifer said.
“I had a sneaking suspicion you’d seek out Mr. MacDonald, so I made haste, arriving several hours before you. ”
“I had no choice. I had to come here. Or did the OIIA conveniently leave out that part? That I had to convince Finley to renounce his vows in person?”
“The right thing to do, what you should have done, was come to me first. Still, despite your transgressions against me, I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt. I could have confronted you as soon as you arrived in town, but I decided to wait and see what you would do. I wanted you to have the chance to prove yourself, but you disappointed me.” His lips pressed bitterly together.
“Alas, it seems they don’t make loyalty like they used to. ”
“I didn’t—”
“But you did. Tell me truly, did you really think I’d let you play house with a human? You belong to me, Eithrig. That is what you agreed to when you sold me your soul, when I so graciously spared you an eternity of torment.”
“Why do you care so much if I’m with him? I’m not asking to be let free from my contract. I’m not asking for my soul back. You allow demons to marry all the time.”
“I allow demons to marry one another. It’s different.
It’s like…making my Barbies kiss.” He grinned, another of those grotesque smiles that looked wrong on Mrs. Clootie’s face.
“See, when a king allows his subjects to wed, it’s with the understanding that their loyalty is to king and country first. One demon’s loyalty to another is acceptable only so far as it serves me.
To marry a human is to divide your allegiance.
You pledge to put them first, and it makes me, what?
Second?” He sneered. “That doesn’t work for me.
So here’s how this is going to play out.
I’m going to give you two options because I’m generous like that. Are you listening?”
She gave a jerky nod.
“Option one, convince Mr. MacDonald to renounce his vows. And because I’m so generous, I’ll give you until midnight on the first of November. That’s a few days to bring him around to the idea and to say your goodbyes.”
“And option two?” she asked, cold sweat beading above her lip. Her flesh tried in vain to knit itself back together, Lucifer’s fingers making it impossible.
“Option two is…Well, I have a slight preference for it, but no pressure! You and Mr. MacDonald can remain married—if he wishes for it.”
Bile burned in the back of her throat. “You—you want him to sell you his soul?”
“A marriage for a soul, yes. It would really bring your relationship full circle. I mean, talk about symmetry.” He kissed the tips of his fingers.
“You sold your soul to keep him, he sells his soul to keep you. And again, because I’m so generous, I’ll sweeten the deal and go ahead and offer him the works.
Full demonhood, to be granted upon his pledge of fealty to me.
I won’t even make him wait until he kicks the bucket. ”
“And if I don’t like either of those options?” she asked. “What then?”
“Well, then.” His pink cardigan–clad shoulders rose and fell in a little shrug. “I’ll kill him. And I know what you’re thinking. Lucifer, that’s so predictable. And I’m ashamed to admit, it is. Which is why I’ll also kill…what’s her name? Beatrix?”
All the blood in her face drained, her chest going cold.
“See, now, that is the reaction I was hoping for!” Lucifer inhaled deeply and tossed his head back with a moan. “Mm-mm! I love that smell. Pure unadulterated terror. Nothing quite like it.”
“Fuck you.” Her lip curled in a sneer.
Lucifer leered, looking her up and down. “Are you offering? Because you’re not really my type, but I wouldn’t say no if you—”
Effie reared back and spat in his face. “Go fuck yourself, you bastard.”
His eyes narrowed, the only warning she got before he dug his fingers in deeper, goring her to the bone, his claws scraping against her femur.
She doubled over, stomach roiling, her nose and throat burning as she retched, vomiting until there was nothing left.
She sat up, breathing through her mouth, the coppery smell of blood and sour sick thick in the air, threatening to make her heave all over again.
“Well, that was gross,” Lucifer said, wrinkling his nose.
“Go to Hell,” she panted.
Lucifer tsked. “I don’t think you’re quite grasping the gravity of this little…what did you call it? Contractual snafu you’ve found yourself in, so let me impress upon you just how serious I am.”
Tires squealed as a dark blue Silverado heading south on Sycamore Street blew through the stop sign.
It hit the curb and kept going, sailing over the sidewalk and into the park, fishtailing wildly once it hit the grass.
Children screamed as they scattered, leaving their pumpkins where they fell. Effie’s heart climbed into her throat.
Finn stood four yards from Bea and the blanket she was lying on, too far to both make it to her and clear the car headed straight for them.
Effie could make it. She could, if it weren’t for Lucifer’s hand pinning her thigh to the bench.
“Stop,” she croaked.
Before the word had passed her lips, the truck veered, crashing into a nearby walnut tree. The horn blared ceaselessly, and thick black smoke poured out from under the hood. All across the town square, people shouted and sprinted for the truck to check on the driver.
“See,” Lucifer said. “Serious.”
“You can’t kill humans.”
“Eithrig, Eithrig, Eithrig.” He tutted. “News flash! I’m the devil. The rules don’t apply to me.”
He removed his claws from her thigh with a sickening sucking sound that made her stomach churn. Fingers bloody, he reached out and booped her nose. “The decision is yours. Choose wisely. Either way, you have three days.”
Lucifer disappeared the way only he could, leaving no trace behind, not even a puff of smoke.
“Effie!” Finn sprinted toward her clutching Bea against his chest. “Watch Bea? I’m going to see if they need a hand helping with—”
Finn blanched so fast that she went dizzy, his eyes opening wide so that the white showed all around his irises as he took in the abundance of blood.
“Fuck, baby,” he croaked. “What did—”
“He knows, Finn,” she said helplessly. “Lucifer knows.”