Abaddon squats in front of me, still scrutinizing the tip of the blade poking into his finger. “Of course, the blade must be activated first.” His eyes meet mine, their red glow somehow more sinister than usual, and I growl as he leans in to whisper in my ear, “But that only requires a sacrifice.”
The words hit me like a bomb blast, and it happens so fast that my gaze can’t even beat the dagger to her. Abaddon’s hand stays suspended in the air, a direct arrow to Nyx, who is clutching the handle in her hands, a look of shock in her face as she stares down at her chest. He teleports to her in less time than it takes me to blink. My breathing turns rough and jagged as I watch him pull the blade out before Hex lowers her lifeless body to the cold concrete.
But any mourning I might have wanted to do over the chick who landed me here in the first place is over when Abaddon vanishes. The blade’s already slipped between my ribs by the time he reappears in front of me. The steel is hot, slicing through flesh and muscle until the hilt presses into me, and he twists. I stare him down, baring my teeth as the pain rips through me. All the light stored deep inside and just out of my reach ignites. An overwhelming sense of perfection. I feel everything I was—powerful and divine. Everything I’m supposed to be again. Then it seeps out of me, abandoning me and leaving nothing. A void that smothers my cells. I might not have been able to feel it before, but having the light truly gone is worse than anything I could have imagined.
I growl, thrashing against the chains, a wild animal deprived of oxygen. “I’ll kill you!”
I don’t feel the blade anymore, barely notice the clink of it hitting the floor beside me, and then icy fingers grip my throat, lifting until I’m once again on my knees, torso stretched straight.
“No,” Donny says, his face in mine. “I’ll kill you.”
Then he squeezes, bearing down until I’m truly a wild animal without air.
About to go extinct.
Here’s the thing about dying: it gets real old, real quick. And I’ve done it enough to know a thing or two.
For starters, there’s more than one type of death. The first is physical. The body goes into shock, if you’re lucky. The organs shut down, the lungs stop, and then the heart shudders through a final beat.
Next comes the death of the mind, which includes a full-life replay. Every moment, good or bad or mundane. Thank God this life only lasted a little over a year because I really don’t have time for this shit right now.
It starts at the crosswalk, where a drunk driver clipped me and left me to bleed out in the middle of the night. Fast-forward to Hex, the demonic ex, showing up to offer the one thing I couldn’t refuse. Then the vision lingers at the bar, the Watcher Angel watching me, his full lips on my skin while he fucked me against a wall, and then there was the rasp in his voice when he told me I didn’t want to see him again. I can almost feel the heat of his hands on my face. The same way they felt in his charge’s kitchen after I showed up with plan B and again after the car wreck when he tried to erase what had happened between us.
I wish he could have. Maybe then I wouldn’t have noticed the change in how he looked at me, realizing I’d set him up. It cuts just as much to see the second time around, all the curiosity and heat in his eyes draining away and leaving me haunted. But it still fails to compare to the pain of my own realization. Abaddon’s betrayal plunging into my chest and spilling out over my hands.
And then I relive the physical death itself, an intake of air as the steel broke through my sternum, the cool handle against my palms, hot blood coating them as he ripped out the blade. Finally, Hex lowers me to the ground with his lips at my ear. “See you soon, love.”
The words echo until I open my eyes. I’m over my body, not quite here or there. A blue haze covers everything, sounds warble, energies shift. It only takes a glance at the pool of blood surrounding my physical form for the rage to slam into me. Hex might have known what would happen if I died, but Abaddon sure as hell had no idea when he killed me.
But he’s about to find out.
The anchor to my physical body weakens by the second, not giving me long in my spiritual form, so I have to work fast. Seeing where my last plan got me, I let the primal need for payback drive me. Abaddon stole my life, so I’ll take away what he wants more than anything—his revenge.
I seek out Chaz, still on his knees, and I focus on the life pumping through his veins, slowing the longer he struggles against the demon’s hold on his throat. I have little to compare to with him being the first angel I’ve encountered, but the energy inside him feels different than any other I’ve sensed. I latch on to it with everything I have anyway and search for the same inside of Abaddon. The demon’s essence is cold, harsh, and sharp-edged, like Hex’s. When I pull it from him, it’s blacker than black, a void and a complete contrast of the brightness inside the angel.
The forces repel, fighting to stay apart, but I drive them toward each other. Even though I’m stronger in this form, it takes all my focus to bring them together, and when they finally meet, they detonate. Two volatile chemicals exploding on contact. Pure energy, unlike anything I’ve sensed from life sources, unleashes around me, shock waves pulsing from ground zero until I can’t hold on any longer.
I concentrate on the body beneath me. My lids fall closed, the rest of me falling right behind as my soul returns to where it belongs. I will myself to feel, to breathe, to live, my mind returning to life. Then the first of my muscles twitch, a hard beat of my heart, and my real eyes flutter.
Abaddon’s commentary about the pleasure of watching me fade from existence comes in and out. The words are heavy in my ears, and his hand is tight on my throat. Except then his voice cuts off, and I think that’s it. I’m done, gone, a memory. But then coughing and sputtering. He stumbles backward, my vision going from black to red as the pressure on my neck releases.
I suck in a breath, choking on the rush of air to my starved lungs. Then another and another. Oxygen hits my brain, the ringing in my ears diminishing, and I realize the slack in the chains. I jerk until I can bring my arms in, struggling to my feet. We stare at each other—him grasping his own throat while I run my fingers along mine. After a second, he lunges for me but stops dead at a voice behind him.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
My eyes dart over his shoulder to Nyx, very fucking alive in my blood-soaked sweatshirt. Her brow arches when she pauses on me.
What the actual fuck?
Hex sidesteps, putting distance between them, before Abaddon spins around.
“What did you do?” he shouts, storming toward her. He’s flaming—literally with fire blazing in his hand.
To be honest, so am I but in the nonliteral sense. It’s one thing to be killed by your nemesis after one of the longest-running feuds in history, but it’s another to be saved by the chick who’d helped him almost kill you in the first place.
Nyx stands her ground when he reaches her, letting the demon snarl and huff in her face like a raging bull. With her being the center of attention, none of the lackeys notice me dip down for the Dimming Blade. Any movement tugs at the edges of my wound, but I clench my jaw and push up the back of my shirt enough to slip the dagger through the belt loops of my jeans. Nyx glances over, too late to see anything, and her focus jerks back to Abaddon when he clutches her jaw in his non-burning hand.