“Go.” He could escape whatever trap the other two immortals were trying to spring. This was her fight with Lucifer.
He tilted his head to one side and stared at her as though she were speaking a foreign language. “What?”
“Leave.” She made a shooing motion with her hand. “I’m not going to kill you. And I’d just as soon you didn’t kill me. Just leave. Go home and forget you ever saw me.”
One of them should live to fight another day.
Gabriel clapped his hands. When they all stared, he wiped a nonexistent tear from his eyes. “How very poignant. How incredibly moving.” Then his expression hardened, his blue eyes turning to ice. “No one is leaving until I get what I want.”
“Heaven doesn’t give a shit about me.” She was a lowly bounty hunter. “This is about Maccus, about hurting him.” To confuse the men, she smiled. “All the better not to give it to you.”
The archangel flicked his hand, and she shot backward as though launched from a cannon. When she slammed into the solid brick wall, something cracked in her arm. Pain made her scream as she hit the ground. The knife slipped from her numb fingers.
Knives rocketed through the air with deadly precision. Gabriel was flung back, blades sticking in both his arms and legs and several in his chest.
A human would have been dead. So would a normal demon. But he was an archangel. He tried to remove the blades but couldn’t. And he was bleeding. She hadn’t been sure an angel of his power would bleed.
Every bone in her body ached, but the pain in her arm was excruciating. Sweat bloomed on her body, sticking her clothing to her skin. Gritting her teeth, she pushed herself up on her hands and knees. Her knife was in the dirt. She reached for it.
Kayley grabbed it first. Then she lunged. Morrigan jerked to the left, keeping the blade from piercing her heart. It slammed into her shoulder instead.
She slapped her hand over the hilt so her sister couldn’t withdraw the blade. Breathing heavily, she stood. Whatever Kayley saw in her face, it made her pale and crawl away again.
“This is getting us nowhere.” Lucifer waved his hand, and a portal appeared. A demon stepped out. He was tall and surprisingly handsome, even in his demon form. His hair was a rich cherry red, his skin burnished gold. He’d be drop-dead gorgeous as a human.
There was something about him that made her take a second look. She wasn’t attracted to the demon, but there was something almost familiar about him. Had she glimpsed him during her time in Hell? Many memories from that time were murky. Certainly, she hadn’t hunted him. He was too memorable to forget.
“Take her.” Lucifer pointed at Morrigan.
The demon crossed his arms over his wide chest and shook his head.
Wow, she never expected any demon to defy Lucifer. Then the devil smiled. “Don’t you want your daughter with you?”
She couldn’t breathe. She still stood in the dirty alley with a dagger in her shoulder, yet it seemed the whole world had dropped away. It was the eyes—the same green eyes Morrigan saw when she looked in a mirror.
This was her father. Or was it? She glanced at Maccus for confirmation. The hard knot in her stomach grew when she glimpsed pity in those eyes.
The demon tilted his head to one side and studied her. “Morrigan?”
She only nodded, because what did you say to the person you’d thought was a deadbeat dad, only to discover he’d never been around because he was a demon and had been in Hell?
How was her sister taking the news? There was no surprise there—only a look of disdain. “You knew,” she accused. Would the lies and deception never end?
“Our mother had her suspicions when I was born and wrote them in her journal. I discovered it after she died.” Kayley slowly pushed to her feet, pressing one hand against the wall for support.