Touched by Fire (Demons of New Chicago #1) - Kel Carpenter Page 0,43

one finger. “Paranoia.” I held up the second. “Technology. Those two go hand in hand for a demon. He’ll be paranoid about anything he deems as his, and he’ll want to oversee it himself to some degree, and he likely won’t trust technology one bit. He’s also cunning. He wouldn’t want people to know he’s here. For one as old as him to have never been caught, and still be ruling after all this time, he’s gotta be in New Chicago more often than not. I suspect Anders reports to him personally.”

“And if he’s not?” she asked skeptically.

“We cross that bridge when we come to it.”

Nathalie released a breath. “No wonder you were paranoid I was an assassin sent to kill you. You must have really wanted that information from the demon to be willing to gamble like this.” It was subtle. A sly attempt at nudging the conversation that way. My lips tightened around one corner of my mouth.

“I do, yes.”

Silence passed between us. Her gaze trying to prompt me to tell her, and my own flinty stare telling her not to go there.

“But it’s not the most pressing issue right now,” I added. “We need to take out Lucifer. Permanently.”

Her eyebrows inched up her forehead. “How exactly do you plan to do that?”

“We’re going to kidnap Anders and get his whereabouts from him,” I said.

It was her turn to frown. “That’s it?” she asked. “That’s your plan?”

“Anders isn’t the only one who knows how to track. I followed him home a few times. I know where he lives. We can get the drop on him undetected and then find Lucifer.”

Nathalie put her hands up and then pressed her palms into her eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she muttered to herself. She dropped her hands and gave me a serious look. “First, you’re assuming Anders knows his location. He might, but that’s a big if. Are you sure you want to bet on that?”

“I don’t have a better plan to find him,” I said. “It’s not like there’s a phone number I can look up to call and book an appointment. This guy is a demon, and he’s a secretive one at that.”

“Okay, assuming that Anders does know—which is an assumption, and not a good one—how do you plan to kill him? Do you even know how to kill a demon?”

I pressed my lips together.

“Oh my god. You don’t know how to, do you?”

“I was planning to figure that out once I found him,” I said in a tight voice.

“You can’t just figure that out,” she argued.

“Sure you can,” I said, pulling one of my pistols from the holster at my hip to place it on the table. “He wouldn’t be the first supe I’ve hunted without knowing how to kill them. I’ve figured it out with all the ones in the past. I can do it again.”

“This isn’t just a normal supe,” Nathalie continued. “Demons don’t even come from earth.”

“I’m aware,” I snapped.

“But you don’t know how to kill him.”

“I’ll figure it out,” I repeated in a hard voice. Part of the problem was that I did have a plan, or rather, a solution. I already knew bullets didn’t work, but bullets weren’t the only weapon in my arsenal. The white fire I created while in my other form would destroy pretty much anything. Except Ronan. I pushed that thought aside. Even Ronan said it could destroy almost anything. I had a feeling Lucifer counted.

But I wasn’t planning on telling Nathalie that just yet.

“I vote we come up with a new plan,” she said.

“You don’t get a vote.”

“Sure I do,” she said dismissively. “We’re both going to die when this fails, so we both get a vote. I vote to come up with another plan. A better one, where we don’t die.”

“You said yourself that you’ll live as long as you stick with me.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m testing it,” she said, throwing her hands up.

“Could have fooled me,” I muttered, pushing away from the table.

“Where are you going?” she demanded as I got to my feet.

I motioned to myself. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m sweating my ass off right now. I need a shower.”

Nathalie got to her feet to follow me. “Your shower can wait. We need a plan.”

“We have a plan,” I groaned. Talking to her was like talking to a brick wall.

“A new plan,” she corrected.

“For fuck’s sake,” I snapped. “We have two objectives. Two. Find Lucifer. Kill Lucifer. The only contact I