Chapter Thirty-Three - Evie #3
Luc’s face was carved from rage. “Then give me a map.”
Lilith’s eyes narrowed. “Of what?”
“The entire place.”
She went still.
Luc leaned closer, voice dropping lower. “Every room. Every corridor. Every hidden passage. Every place He keeps them. Every. Fucking. Room.”
The words hit the floor like knives. Lilith didn’t answer, but I could see her thinking, plotting. I could almost hear the gears turning behind that beautiful, venomous face.
Luc released her throat, slowly. I didn’t think he was done with her, but he probably wanted both hands free, just in case.
Lilith rubbed her neck once, delicate and theatrical, though her eyes never left him. “A map,” she said.
“A true one.”
“There are no true maps of The Beloved.”
“Then make one.”
Her smile flickered. “You ask as if that would be simple.”
“I ask as if your freedom depends on my generosity.”
She laughed under her breath. “Generosity.”
“I chose the polite word.”
Lilith’s gaze drifted toward me again. This time, Luc let her look. Her eyes moved over my face, my body, then the IV pole.
“Does your mate know you’re bargaining with a woman you once bound in blood?”
My stomach dropped. What?
Luc’s face went blank. Too blank. “Evie knows enough.”
“No, no, I really don’t,” I said.
Lilith smiled. “I imagine that’s a recurring condition.”
“Look,” I said, and my voice shook but held. “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but if Mara is alive, if all of them are alive, then help them.”
Lilith looked at me for a long second. Something strange crossed her face, almost recognition, like she was seeing the edges of the glass box I had just crawled out of. Then it was gone.
“You still think help is something people give because it’s the right thing to do,” she said. “How sweet. The Beloved really didn’t have time to ruin you properly.”
Panic flashed through me again, hot and white. Luc’s head turned slowly toward her.
Lilith smiled. “But perhaps next time…”
He moved. This time Azazael caught his arm before he crossed the room. I hadn’t even seen him enter. Neither had Lilith, from the way her eyes sharpened.
“Lucifer,” Az said quietly.
Luc’s whole body shook once with the effort of not tearing free.
Lilith watched, delighted and wary at once.
“A map,” Luc said, voice lethal.
Lilith lifted her chin. “My page.”
“If I find the Book.”
“When you find it,” she corrected.
“If.”
She smiled. “You will. You always do find the dangerous thing eventually.”
Luc said nothing.
Lilith stepped away from the cracked wall, smoothing her hair as if she had not just been held there by the throat.
“The map will take time.”
“You have three days.”
Her brows lifted. “Three days?”
“Earth days,” he said. “Not Heaven’s slippery little interpretation of time.”
She studied him. “How precise.”
“I have learned not to leave room for your creativity.”
Her mouth curved. “And where am I meant to deliver this miracle?”
“The Valley of Fire.”
My pulse kicked.
Lilith’s smile thinned by a degree. “Dramatic.”
“You should feel at home.”
Her eyes flashed.
Luc continued, unbothered. “The amphitheater. You will arrive alone, one hour before sunrise.”
“Alone?”
“If you value your ability to walk away afterward.”
Lilith’s gaze sharpened. “And if I bring company?”
“Then the deal is over before you take your first step out of the dark.”
“You’ll come alone?”
“No.”
Her smile returned. “How disappointing.”
“I’m not the one asking for freedom.”
Her jaw tightened.
Luc stepped closer, his voice dropping into something low enough to make the room feel it.
“You will bring a complete map of The Beloved. Not a sketch. Not a pretty lie. Not a handful of corridors that lead my people into a trap. Every room. Every hidden passage. Every place He keeps the Beloved when He wants them admired, punished, hidden, or forgotten.”
Lilith stared at him. “And if I don’t?”
“Then if I find the Book, your page stays in it.”
The silence after that felt alive. Lilith looked at him as if she hated him, as if she remembered loving him. Like both things had rotted together long ago and grown thorns.
Her mouth twisted. “You always were tedious about terms.”
“You always were tedious about betrayal.”
For a moment, they only looked at each other.
Then Lilith smiled. “A pleasure doing business with you.”
“It never was.”
She glanced at me once more. “Sleep carefully, little Beloved.”
The words crawled over my skin. Then she vanished. One second, she stood there, black and beautiful and poisonous. The next, the shadows folded inward and took her with them.
None of us moved, and then the glass on the bedside table finally cracked in half.
Luc reached for me. The fury in his face shifted the second his eyes found mine. Redirected.
“Evie.”
I stared at him. My heart was still pounding. My hand still locked protectively over our babies.
“What Book?” I asked.
His jaw tightened.
Behind him, Topher stirred. “Don’t,” Topher whispered.
Luc closed his eyes. And I knew, with a horrible certainty, that this had just become something none of us were ready to survive.