Damali left the refrigerator door open as she went to the back door and flung it open wide. Fresh air, for one thing. The room was too warm, and she hated air conditioning. She went back to the fridge to study the shelves. She smiled and closed her eyes. Carlos, naked, in bed, right now, no drama, no attitude, not drunk, vaporizing her one cell at a time. Yeah, that was definitely what she wanted. She licked her lips as her mouth went dry from the mental sight of his lit second tattoo on his base, one of his sweet spots, and therefore hers. Caramel. She laughed. Oh, yeah, she practically breathed out, that tasted real good.
A shiver swept through her as the vivid image made her moisten and swell. She wasn't sure if it was the cool air that wafted from the opened refrigerator door, or just her thoughts of him that produced gooseflesh. Her hardened ni**les strained against her tank top as remembered what his warm, wet mouth felt like... what the tip of his tongue did to them, when he was so inclined. Damn, she missed that man... why'd he have to flux with a hint of fang and then get salty!
She hadn't felt intense arousal like this in months. And he'd picked this night of all nights to act stupid. Men. If he woulda allowed a mind lock, she could have sensed what was running through his brain, sent him some serious Balm of Gilead for whatever ailed him and sobered him up... shoot, they might not have even made it back to the house. But, noooo.
Damali wrapped her arms around her waist when her Sankofa at the base of her spine lit and nearly screamed up each vertebra. Her head dropped back as the old puncture wounds on her throat began to taunt her. One by one, she could feel each bite he'd ever laid down begin to burn hot with memory. Aw, man... forget pride, she was going over to his house in a minute. Whatever was wrong with him and jacking with his head, he was still her pleasure master as far as she was concerned.
Didn't he know that his touch simply dissolved her? Just thinking about his mouth made her bud throb. And his voice... dayum. When he got all into it and lost himself... started that Spanglish in her ear, rolling r's till her womb contracted... and when he'd finally put it in... umph, umph, umph. Yeah, she was gonna call him. Had to now. Had messed herself up just remembering. Open transmission: Baby, I'm sorry - whatever I did.
She inhaled deeply and dabbed her forehead with the back of her wrist. If this was a prelude to his real apex, then she would probably burn to ash when he went there to the max. Her baby was awesome in that department, not to mention all the other cool shit he could do. Why was he trippin' so hard, though? His other powers were coming in, just like new shoots came up from the dirt in the spring. It would be all right. He was still da man. Baby, I'm sorry. Let's talk about it. Okay?
No answer. Shit. He was gonna make her beg and just say it. She let her breath out hard, deciding. Memory sent a hard contraction through her canal and the sensation squeezed more hot liquid want into her panties. "Aw, c'mon, baby, I'm sorry, for real," she whispered out loud. He was the one, the only one who could make her feel this way.
All right. I admit it. I've been acting funny for months. I'm sorry. I don't know why I've been feeling out of sorts. But tonight, I promise you, by tomorrow we won't remember why we were arguing. I've got this new place to christen...fireplace ready and waiting, just for you. You don't have to be all subdued and quiet, neither do I - nobody's within earshot; Big Mike's in Houston, and even he can't hear that far.
She laughed quietly as desire tears began to wet her lashes. Suddenly she wanted Carlos so badly it actually hurt. This is a nine-one-one. Come home, and answer this emergency, stat... okay, papi? All right, you call the shots. Cool?
No answer. Fine, then. Damali shook it off, and slammed the refrigerator door. She caught a glimpse of something flash past the deck and smiled. Stop playing and come inside, Carlos.
She paced out to the back of the house, stared up at the moon, completely understanding why werewolves howled. Her focus was singular as she briefly closed her eyes again and inhaled sharply. Carlos was still in her nose. His near apex scent haunting, teasing, making her hands tremble... and he was three sheets to the wind, out here acting crazy.
She opened her eyes and a tall, dark male form was in the shadows just beyond the house lights. She placed her hand over her heart and held on to the deck rail. "Oh, wow, baby, I thought..."
Damali sniffed again, and the stench of rotting flesh hit her just before the shadowy figure moved like lightning from behind a cactus and toward her. Gangrene-pitted flesh hung from a contorted, skeletal face. Eyes too big for the sockets glowed something blackish green, like withered, rotten olives. Half of the creature's head looked like it had been bashed in, the other half was gone, and tattered, filthy clothing hung from his gruesome body. But the claws at the ends of his long, gnarled fingers, along with the twisted fangs protruding from his hideous mouth, made her know he was deadly and a demon. What the hell... Damali felt herself go from aroused to pissed in two seconds flat. Damn! Couldn't a sister get a moment's peace?
She whirled around and ran into the house, glimpsing over her shoulder once. Her peripheral vision caught something rushing, fast behind her. The weapons room the guys had created was her destination. There was a heavy thud on the deck porch. He was coming into her house!
The crossbow by the door was the closest thing to her. She grabbed it, cocked it, and leveled it toward the window. The moment she went deeper into the room to go for a nine millimeter, she saw him speed by the main open window in a blur.
Damali's gaze shot around the room, following the sound to get a bead on the creature's current location.
She heard a thump overhead and jumped. He was on the roof. Shit! Damali stayed in the center of the house in the hallway, watching as he scampered across her skylight.
Damali dashed back to her weapons room, but the thing leered at her through the secondary bulletproof glass-block window and screeched. Screw going near the window for the Glock. The Isis dagger was closer. In one deft swipe it went into her back jeans pocket as she backed away from the window and readied the crossbow.
A few seconds was long enough for her to see that the creature's face was mangled, dripping red flesh, skinless - as though an Amanthra serpent had swallowed him whole and puked him back up. She'd seen those half-eaten, soul-damned humans before in Hell's feeding zones. The chest and abdomen were also torn open, and he stunk of sulfur. He presented yellowish green dripping fangs, upper and low canines. The were-demon signature of foul sulfur stench combined with the heavy wet-dog odor was as strong as the Amanthra on him. His head had been half blown off, obviously by a shotgun cartridge, and the sucker moved way too fast.
Damali stalked along the corridor leading to the kitchen, hugging the wall, her weapon before her. Why hadn't he come in? The prayer barriers and sea-salt lines over thresholds and windowsills had to be the reason. They'd done the interior of the new house, not the perimeter, assuming the hallowed ground around it was enough. It should have been! What was this thing?
It didn't matter what he was. This creature couldn't be allowed to escape. The fact that she hadn't felt him before he manifested really worried her.
As she crept toward the back door, she could sense him waiting for her. She kicked the screen door open; he rushed the door. She fired her crossbow, dead aim in the thing's chest. He just looked at her and scooted to the left side of the house. She glanced at the crossbow and set it down slowly. Okaaay. No response to a silver stake in his chest? Her mind quickly scavenged for information. Demon food - the heart was the first thing eaten out. No heart meant nothing to stake. But he still had flesh, open wounds, where purified, prayed-over sea salt could catch and burn him - ignite that sucker.
No time to lose, she rushed to her cabinets, grabbed a bag of anointed Red Sea salt - shrapnel to slow him down - then dashed to her weapons room, snatched up a semiautomatic filled with hallowed earth rounds, and went hunting.
As she ran through the house, the creature's ugly face popped into each window, following her moves. She ran out onto the back deck, unafraid. This low-level, wannabe demon thing had actually tried her, the Neteru! Didn't he know she'd smoked master vamps and had been to Hell and back? The bitch had actually tried to break into her house! She was too angry to feel fear.
She waited, on guard, Red Sea salt in one hand, semi in the other. He leaped down from the roof to the ground just beyond the deck rail, and she hurled the opened bag to strew holding salt at his feet, instantly lowering her weapon and squeezing off death rounds.
Damali yanked her weapon upright as the thing squealed and began to smolder. But she noticed the bullets hadn't affected him. The creature was melting from his feet up, turning into a puddle of black liquid ooze as he screeched. Then she saw his face in earnest as he began to transform back into what he looked like before he had died and had been fed upon in the lower realms.
She stumbled back until her spine hit the house wall. Her foster father? "I thought you were dead, you child-molesting bastard!" she screamed, running forward and blowing off the creature's head. "Inez's family saw your ass in Hell! Time to go back!"
Raw emotion kept her weapon firing even after the thing had no head. Gaining her wits quickly, she saw that the head she'd blown off just rolled around in an angry circle, snapping and snarling, while the body went into a black puddle and within moments, disappeared into the ground.
Damali dashed back into her house, grabbed another handful of salt, and flung it at the spinning head. Oddly, it began to smoke and disintegrate, too, but not before looking her squarely in the eyes.
"You can't keep us down there," the head hissed. "We're all coming back!" Then it dissolved into black muck and was gone.