chest. The witch’s eyes were panicked, but her body was too weak to offer a defense. “The second I’m gone, let him back in his body so he can save her.”
“Marc?” Ramiel stuttered. “Marc, what are you …? Marc! Holy God, no!”
The priest’s aim put the devil’s to shame. The dagger plunged through Marc’s heart with an accuracy that would have brought a Swiss watchmaker to tears.
An anguished bark of heartbreak broke from Riona as she lashed out, reaching for him. The struggle brought a fresh red discharge trickling down her stomach. Ramiel dove, trying to pull the dagger back, but the damage was done. Before Marc’s knees even buckled under the weight of his own body, he was gone.
Lucifer crushed forward, past the angel who was trying his best to wrestle the blade from Marc’s chest, toward the witch whose will to live had deserted her and was on the edge of slipping away.
“Touch me with the blood of your intent and agree,” the devil breathed, falling down to his knees next to the witch. “Give me your soul and I can still save him. Souls don’t descend until sunrise. If your priest was telling the truth and your other Pure Soul has healing powers, his body can be remade. Then I can restore his soul. Seal our pact!”
“Jerry… my … hand…”
With trembling nerves, the demon paused. “Riona, are you sure?”
“No!” Lucifer growled, slapping away Jerry’s offer to assist. “It must be under her own power, or it is not binding.”
She was slipping. Jerry could feel her frame lightening in his hold, as her soul began detaching from her body.
“You!” The devil’s vice-like grip aimed straight for Jerry’s neck. Even Dee’s massive ropes of neck muscles that could best a yoked ox, burned under the pain. “Take yourself from this body and let the soul whose property it is return. He needs to save her. I need her.”
An observer would need a degree in ancient civilizations to grasp the full breadth of Jerry’s biting reply, which he spat out in a tongue long dead. “And that’s assuming you could keep it hard that long,” he finished off in English.
“Cur! You want the woman you love to die?”
“Yes!” Jerry lashed back. “If that means keeping her from you! She dies now, she goes to Heaven. And you…”
Jerry looked up just in time to see the gleam of the dagger’s tip, precariously positioned and ready to strike, in the hand of the eager archangel behind them.
Jerry was so going to love this. “You can go to Hell!”
Green ooze shot out in all directions when the dagger pierced through Lucifer’s corporeal form. It burned on Jerry’s skin like acid. Lucifer barely had time to look down before his solidity began to waver. His skin peeled, his bone softened to ash, as his whole being began to scatter like dust upon the floor. The dagger, losing its anchor, fell unceremoniously into a heap of powder.
Jerry looked up to the panting angel. “Thanks.” Then, to the dagger. “How the hell did she get a hold of that?”
Ramiel swept the silver blade from the floor, putting it in his belt. “You heard the woman, her father gave it to her.”
“Son of a bitch. You mean he’s her daa…”
Ramiel’s fingers flew up to his pursed lips. “Not yet.”
Jerry nodded his understanding. He took one more look at Riona; her breath was weaker than ever. She was on the edge. He leaned over and kissed her once on the cheek. “I’m sorry for everything, Ree. I love you.”
And with that, he closed his eyes, sending a call to the cosmos for the return of Dee’s soul. He knew exactly where he was going, and that Lucifer was going to be more pissed than an hour-late Walmart customer on Black Friday when he passed back over the River Styx and through the gates of Hell. Wasn’t no big thing; he knew where the bus was going when he bought the ticket. Still, he was going to miss Riona Dade. Forever.
He exhaled, his breath, carrying with it his spirit, and felt the cold fingers of damnation pulling him back into that burning abyss.
Chapter 26
“What, right now?”
Ramiel picked one hell of a time to launch a stand-up act, and Dee was so not digging the joke. He knew it wasn’t exactly in an archangel’s repertoire to offer much in the way of tea and sympathy. They were more of the “Hark! I bare ye good tidings that will screw up