Rob Thurman: Grimrose path

Four more years. Who would I be then?

Me. I'd still be me. Tricking and laughing my way through life as always. Nothing was going to change that. I'd said that the past ten years. I could keep telling myself the same thing as long as I had to.

When I made it home, the closed sign was still on the door. I grumbled as I unlocked the door. Maybe Leo in his god days could make gold coins fly out his ass, but I knew the value of a hard-earned or stolen buck. It was two in the afternoon now and he hadn't opened the place when I'd left? What was he thinking? I was surprised we didn't have a few of our regulars going into DTs right there on the sidewalk.

Opening the door loudly, I made sure to close it more so behind me. There's no point in being pissed off if there's no way to share it. But before I had the chance, besides the door slamming, someone said, "You look like you were kicked out of a wet T-shirt contest." There was a pause. "I didn't know you could get kicked out of those."

Zeke. Straightforward tell-me-the-truth-and-I'll-tell-you-no-lies Zeke. Because lying was too much of a bother for him and if you lied to him, well, he'd probably just shoot you. He was sitting at one of the tables eating a pizza. Double cheese, pepperoni, sausage, mushroom, peppers, olives, and a cardiologist on call. Eating it in front of me. And there were bags… bags and bags in front of the table, full of garlic bread and cheese sticks from the smell of it. The exquisite smell that put the plumeria-soaked breezes of Hawaii to shame. That was worse than the wet T-shirt remark. I narrowed my eyes at him and dripped on the floor as he chewed and swallowed a bite. "You're… puddle-y." He looked at his Eden House partner across the table from him. "Is puddle-y a word?"

Griffin quirked his lips. "I think fewer moisture-related comments and more eating might be a good idea."

Red eyebrows pulled into a scowl. "You are not the boss of me." Slightly lighter red hair was pulled into a short ponytail… dry, not cascading buckets like mine. Zeke's shirt was a plain gray long-sleeve T-shirt and his jeans were faded. What he wore didn't make much difference to him. As long as he had a jacket to cover his gun, he was good to go. Fashion didn't appear on his top-ten list of priorities.

"In fact, I am the boss of you," Griffin said, reaching for his own piece of the pie, only with more napkins. "And you're the boss of me tomorrow. Remember?"

"Oh, yeah." Zeke gave a grin. He didn't smile often, so he didn't have much of a repertoire to choose from. Pissed and predatory. You-are-dead predatory. You-are-beyond-dead predatory. And this was the newest version that had cropped up since last November. Behind-the-bedroom-door predatory. It was also happy and since Zeke had spent most of his mortal life barely comprehending the word, I forgave the pizza. It was good to see him this way. More free and open than he'd ever been when he'd thought he was human. When he thought he and Griffin were human.

I know. Vegas, right? Is anyone human?

Griffin and Zeke had been demon-killing partners at Eden House Las Vegas. There was also an Eden House Miami, an Eden House Los Angeles, Eden House London… Eden Houses all over the world. They'd been around for thousands of years, a secret organization created by man to bring Eden back to Earth. The key word being man. Heaven had nothing to do with its creation, but once the angels saw a source of free labor, they took advantage now and again. And they certainly didn't have a problem with Eden House trying to eradicate every demon it came across. It did a good job… on the slow, lower-level demons anyway.

The angels and the demons had both been after the Light for a long time. I'd just managed to get there first… by a few seconds. Having narrowed down the location, both sides had planted sleeper agents in Vegas's Eden House. An angel, because even loyal humans couldn't be trusted with the Light, and a demon in case Eden House got to the Light before Hell did. They'd been given the same human bodies demons and angels formed when walking on Earth, only they had been children. Eight and ten years old. For a demon, that's a doable situation. Hang around with no memory of who you are, grow up, and then get activated by your Hell handler at the right moment. Because Eden House will recruit you as it tries to recruit all humans with empathy or telepathy. Nature was a marvelous thing. If angels had telepathy and demons had empathy, then so would the rest of what roamed the earth. Not everyone by any means, but it was out there… in humans and paien.

Hell had planned well. Griffin fit in fine. He was a demon. He had empathy, but more importantly he had free will. All demons did. All angels had. But after the Fall, God had taken the free will of the angels still in Heaven. Some had gotten it back. Relearned it. If they spent enough time on Earth with humans, they would slowly regain it. It was like riding a bicycle, only the lag time was usually much longer. Maybe God figured if they took it in baby steps, they'd get it right this time. No more pride goeth before the big trip down South. I wasn't sure that was true. I'd met a few real asshole angels in my day. But that wasn't my call.

Not all angels spent enough time on Earth to get their will back. Zeke had been one of those. When the angel in charge of seeking the Light had assigned an agent, he'd put Zeke… Zerachiel… in place. Zeke who'd had to learn free will about a hundred times faster than your average angel. Things hadn't gone well. To this day he struggled. He saw things in black and white. Not only in justice, but in all aspects of his life. That tended to make his decisions permanent ones. Once he chose a course of action, he almost literally couldn't stop and reconsider. I need to catch the demon in the Jaguar ahead of me. Red light? Demon trumps red light, and so a busload of German tourists was inconvenienced when his car smashed into them. It was just the way things were with Zeke. Sometimes people were inconvenienced; sometimes they were punished with good Old Testament eye for an eye.

And then sometimes they died.

I wrung the sweat out of my hair. "I guess you two are the reason my bar isn't open and making money. Is the demon under the table your excuse?"

Griffin, ex-demon, and Zeke, ex-angel, defectors of Heaven and Hell, looked at each other. "I told you she would know," Griffin snorted, and used the one hand not involved in eating pizza to pull a demon up into sight. Zeke helped by pushing the reptilian head up and back using the muzzle of a sawed-off shotgun.

"You're no fun," Zeke griped.

"It's not like hiding him behind bags of cheesy bread is some kind of master plan, guys," I pointed out, pushing aside those bags and pulling a chair over to the table to sit opposite the demon. And I had a piece of pizza. After today, I deserved it. And what was five more pounds? Just more force behind the ass kicking. I'd exercise, but if I couldn't eat pizza, cheesy bread, or my own weight in chocolate-caramel ice cream once in a while, I might as well let a demon take me down. What's the point in living without those things?

I looked over the demon as I chewed one fabulously cheese-laden mouthful. Swallowing, I said, "Tell me you didn't pull his wing off and bring him here like a cat with a present for my pillow. Killing them is one thing. Torturing them is something else." Even if they'd done more torture than we'd ever know. I swatted Zeke's free hand that was making for the last piece of pizza. "Bad kitty." I closed the lid on the box, saving it for myself.

"No," Griffin said, sounding defensive. And that was my fault. I tried to be careful about saying things like that these days. Griffin had been a demon, even if he hadn't known it until last November when the whole mess with the Light went down. He still didn't remember it. When he'd chosen Zeke and Leo and me over doing Hell's bidding, the Light had wiped his and Zeke's slate clean. He had only his human memories and a human body now… with bronze dragon wings that came and went when he wanted them to… but even if he couldn't remember, he knew. Every demon was a killer, a torturer, and a devourer of souls. And he'd been a high-level demon-not as high as Eli, but high enough that he would've outkilled your average demon, like the one he was holding, six ways to Sunday. Griffin had been one bad demon, very bad, which made it such a miracle he made one of the best humans I'd met.