Midnight with the Devil E-Book

Emma Castle

• Herausgeber: Lauren Smith
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Serie: Unlikely Heroes
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 379

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

A stranger offers to save her father’s life…but he demands her body in her return.

Desperate to save her dying father, she agrees to a stranger’s impossible bargain in a deserted hospital chapel. One night. Her body. In exchange, her father lives.

When a contract arrives at Diana’s home she realizes it wasn’t some fever dream. She’d just sold herself to Lucien Star…and her father is suddenly healed.

Lucien Star is obscenely rich, dangerously charming, and unapologetically sinful. He is also Lucifer, the very Devil himself.

For three months, Diana belongs to him.

Lucien needs her soul.

To seal the gates of Hell, he must corrupt something rare: a woman who is genuinely good. Diana refuses to break, even as he draws her into his world of temptation, luxury, and sin—determined to take her body without ever claiming her soul.

But desire is a dangerous thing. And love even more so.

The Devil isn’t supposed to fall from hell into heaven. But that’s what loving Diana is. Heaven.

Now Lucien must choose between saving Hell… or losing himself to the one woman who could never truly be his.

Leseprobe

Midnight with the Devil

Unlikely Heroes - Book 1

Emma Castle

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Epilogue

A Wilderness Within

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Other Titles

About the Author

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2018 by Emma Castle Books, LLC

Edited by Bootcamp Editors

Cover Art by Cover By Combs

All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitutes unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

ISBN: 978-1-947206-39-7 (e-book edition)

ISBN: 978-1-947206-40-3 (print edition)

Prologue

What time his pride had cast him out from Heaven, with all his host of rebel Angels. - John Milton, Paradise Lost

“How you have fallen from heaven, Morning Star, Son of the Dawn!”

“Favorite son no more!”

“No longer will you shine!”

The taunts from his brother angels filled his head as he fell through the clouds. Light and darkness consumed him in flashing turns as he passed through the stars, into the clouds, and toward the earth. The air cut him, and the wind roared around him so deafening that his eardrums burst. Dawn was on the horizon, and he would die before he saw it fully claim the skies.

“You, my brightest star, my favorite among the angels, how you have disappointed me.” Father’s voice was the hardest to bear.

Lucifer closed his eyes, welcoming the end, the death of light, the death of life.

“You were to bring light into the world, inspire my creations, not corrupt them with your jealousies. Now you will rule the corrupted who follow you and become the king of hell.”

The earth rose up to meet him, and he embraced the pain. His angelic heart shattered at the same moment his body broke upon impact. Everything went dark around him. Then bit by bit he became aware of himself, feeling every muscle, every bone, every atom that made up his body, screaming with pain. He hadn’t died?

Lucifer gazed up at the endless clouds above him. The rift in the sky that would have let him back into the heavens was closed. He drew in a breath, the air like knives in his lungs. Something was different. He felt…empty. White feathers floated around him, their heavenly luminescence glinting in the sun.

My grace…it’s gone.

It seemed like a millennium passed before he realized he lay upon the broken, cracked ground of the earth. His body hurt all over, but the pain was greatest along his shoulder blades. He was glad he could not see his back. There would be two terrible wounds replacing his snow-white wings. He reached out and grasped one of the remaining feathers that floated along the ground close to him and slipped it into the folds of the white tunic he wore. He needed that one bit of heaven, that one bit of home, or else he might go mad with grief.

The light inside him—the glowing essence that had once brought him only joy—was gone. There was nothing left inside him, nothing but darkness. He was in a crater in a desert land. Lucifer struggled to roll onto his stomach, his body too weak to stand.

He lifted his head, hearing the distant sounds of birds. Beyond the wasteland he’d fallen to, a beautiful Eden lay ahead, a land of green, full of beautiful beasts and flowers. Father had spoken so often about the world below the clouds.

Rage flooded through his body, giving him new energy and strength. Somewhere in that Eden were his father’s favorite beings—humans. A vile word for vile beings who were no comparison to angels. But he was no longer an angel. He was fallen. A being without wings, without grace.

What am I now?

The question had no ready answer, and he cringed. For the first time in his existence, he didn’t know what he really was.

He dug his hands into the arid dirt, clawing his way toward the garden ahead of him. At the center of the beautiful world, a single tree stood tall among the rest. Amidst its branches hung gleaming red apples. Father had spoken of this tree, the one that bore knowledge for the ages. Humans had free will, which angels did not, and if those humans dared break their promise to stay away from the tree, Lucifer would have his revenge and watch his father’s favorite creations fall from grace.

Lucifer’s lips twitched. He would not have long to wait to get his revenge. He could see the weakness and frailty in humanity. Bringing down the humans, one by one, would break his father’s celestial heart, just as he had broken Lucifer’s.

The wind carried away the feathers of his once angelic wings. He was glad he had caught one and tucked it safely near his heart. Paradise was lost to him, and he would make sure those damned humans would never reach it either.

1

Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven. - John Milton, Paradise Lost

Hellfire Rising was a den of corruption.

A hotbed of sin and scandal.

Here hearts were broken, dreams destroyed, and dark fantasies realized.

It was the closest thing to a home Lucien Star had. He leaned against the balcony overlooking the dancers below, and with a snap of his fingers he held a glass of brandy. He took a slow sip, savoring the dark, hard flavor of the alcohol.

Two years ago, he had left behind the devil that his father expected him to be and remade himself into a different devil. Lucifer—the Morning Star, the once favored angel, the ruler of hell who never left the darkness—was gone. He was done spending the majority of his days in the dark abyss and the fires of hell in the realm of the evil and the damned. He stopped calling himself Lucifer and instead became Lucien Star. He used his powers to create a world that catered to his own desires, Hellfire Rising, a club in downtown Chicago.

He returned to the abyss, to the darkness, only when absolutely necessary to see to his duties. The gates of hell needed guarding, or else they would break and demons would flood into the world, destroying it. That was not what Lucien wanted. Contrary to popular opinion, he rather liked the human realm the way it was. He didn’t want to see it destroyed by flames and left in eternal darkness.

A woman below him on the stairs glanced up, flashing him a sultry smile in open invitation. He raised his brandy glass in salute, but he wasn’t interested. His mind was on other matters, like the strange preoccupation with deep, troublesome thoughts. It was so unlike him that it rattled the bars of the hellish emotional cage he felt trapped in tonight.

He wished hell could run itself, and it did…mostly. The damned didn’t need him there to continue their suffering at all times, which was a relief. He despised hell. But he couldn’t avoid his job completely. He had to watch out for stray demons that wandered into the paths of mortals, then catch and destroy them. That didn’t give him joy either.

He preferred the mortal plane, watching humans make decisions that put them on the path to sin. He loved the secret language of hidden smiles, seductive glances, exploring hands as they gave themselves over to their darker desires. He craved corruption, not evil.

“Lucien.” The smooth, dark voice caught Lucien’s attention. He still stood at the edge of the balcony on the top floor of his club that led to his private office. From the relatively secluded spot, he could see the club patrons below him dancing wildly.

“Yes?” He turned away from the smoky haze of the strobe lights that lit the club below and faced Andras, one of his fellow fallen angels. The blond-haired man had the palest blue eyes, like frozen glaciers. They had once been brothers in the glittering city of clouds, but now they were brothers bound in darkness.

“You asked me to bring you a list of the deals made on crossroads this month.” Andras walked over to Lucien and held out his palm as though to shake his hand.

Lucien put his hand into Andras’s, and his head suddenly filled with a flood of images. A hundred souls, a hundred deals made. Deals made out of anger, greed, and lust.

How utterly dull and predictable.

Lucien released Andras’s hand and sighed as he turned back to face the crowd below. Andras joined him at the railing and remained quiet for a moment. Lucien again fixated on the feeling that had increasingly haunted him the last few years. He wasn’t content. There was a cloying emptiness that seemed ready to strangle him, and he couldn’t shake it. He was no stranger to that hollow feeling, but it seemed worse of late.

“Sir, you seem…unsatisfied.”

Lucien nearly denied it, but he never lied. The devil only ever spoke the truth. Everyone painted him a liar, but it wasn’t true. They lied to themselves and each other in his name.

“I am unsatisfied,” he finally admitted. From the moment he’d been cast out of heaven, he had been restless and full of rage. The rage had faded over the many years he’d been in hell. Corrupting souls was too easy. A hint here, a little nudge there, and these mortals fell into sin so easily. He craved a challenge. The gates of hell required pure souls to be corrupted in order to stay strong. The more souls he took below, the stronger the powers keeping demons in hell were. In a strange way, corruption of a few protected millions. And it had been a long time since he’d focused on pure souls as targets. The gates were starting to crumble.

Nothing like a challenge when hell itself needed saving.

“Are there not any good, incorruptible souls still out there? The gates are weak. I can feel it,” he muttered. It was a rhetorical question, but Andras straightened.

“There must be. Shall I find one for you? I too have been worried about the gates. It’s been a long time since we’ve gone in search of pure souls to power the portal.”

Lucien crossed his arms over his chest, frowning at the crowd below him. He hadn’t expected Andras to offer to find one. He’d been thinking aloud more than anything, but Andras was a loyal soldier and clever. If anyone could find what he needed to protect the gates, it was Andras.

Do I want that? Would the challenge sate my emptiness? Or should I leave it up to Andras to secure the safety of hell?

No, he had to be the one to do it. When he corrupted the soul and secured it in hell, it kept the gates strong and the demons where they should be—locked away in crushing darkness.

If there was even the smallest chance of relieving himself of that awful ache, he had to try.

“Find me a pure soul. One that will be a true challenge. The gates need one that will truly test me if we are to secure the portal.”

“Understood.” Andras vanished, and the flutter of his invisible shadow wings was the only proof of his ever having been there. When Andras fell, he too had lost his snowy white wings. In their place, the scars had formed what were called shadow wings, and those were all that remained.

Lucien turned his back on the club and returned to his office. He closed the glass doors to his balcony and sat in his black leather desk chair. Taking a cigar from the cherrywood box, he removed his silver cigar cutter and cut the tip. Then he snapped his fingers, and a flame blossomed from his fingertips to light the cigar. He drew in a slow breath, relishing the rich, sweet aroma of the smoke, and blew the air back out. The smoke escaped his lips in tendrils that coiled into the air to form a slithering snake.

Andras would find him a soul, a perfect one to corrupt, and it would restore Lucien’s purpose and keep the gates of hell intact.

It’s time the devil got back in the game.

Life isn’t fair.

Diana Kingston knew that was the truth, but it didn’t stop her from hoping for fairness every day. She sat by her father’s hospital bed, helplessly watching him fight for life. He’d slipped into a coma early that morning as the final stages of cancer took hold. Her mother, Janet, held his hand and was talking softly to him about her day, hoping he could hear her. It had been a part of their normal routine before he’d slipped into the coma. When Diana got home from her college classes, she and her mother drove to the hospital to keep her father company while he underwent radiation and chemotherapy for colon cancer. She couldn’t get past the pain of watching her mother lose half of herself with the impending death of the man she had deeply loved for more than thirty years.

Most days Diana kept herself together, but today was possibly the end. The doctor had called her mother early this morning to say that her father, Hal, had slipped into a coma. Only yesterday, her father had been glassy-eyed and exhausted from fighting the inevitable but still awake and talking. The machines beeping beside his bed showed his life ticking away, slowly fading bit by bit. Her heart was breaking, fracturing like a mirror into a thousand shards. She could see herself in her father’s face, reflected a thousand times over as he gave in to death inch by inch. Would her mother look at Diana and see that reflection of her father? Would it cause her mother even more pain? Diana bit her lip hard enough that the metallic taste of blood surprised her. She licked her lips and rose from the stiff wooden hospital chair.

She was a coward; she was weak—she could not sit there and watch him die. It hurt too much.

“Mom, I’m going to get some air, okay?” She hugged her mother’s shoulders and kissed her cheek before she headed to the door.

“Okay, hon,” her mother murmured absently.

Diana paused at the door to her father’s room, drinking in the sight of her parents. Hal was a handsome man with soft gray eyes, eyes that would likely never open again, and brown hair feathered with gray. Her mother, Janet, had been a real beauty in her youth and was still stunning with blue eyes and raven hair. But her father’s illness had aged them both over the last two years, stealing time like fall leaves scattered upon the wind.

When her father died, the blow would crush her mother. They were soul mates. Diana had grown up in a house filled with life and laughter, songs sung in the sun, and dancing in the moonlight. Her parents had a peaceful life, but now life seemed determined to claw back some of the perfection it had given away too freely.

Tears welled up in Diana’s eyes as she stepped into the hallway of the oncology wing at Saint Francis Hospital outside Chicago.

Just breathe, she reminded herself. She wiped her eyes, smearing the tears across her cheeks. She’d been raised Catholic, but her faith had never been that strong, not until her father fell ill. Now she prayed like the world was ending, because for her, part of it was.

“You okay?” A nurse came over and gently touched her shoulder in the nice way people do to strangers in pain.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “Just a bad day for my dad.” The words “he’s dying” couldn’t come out. She didn’t want—and frankly couldn’t handle—anyone’s pity right now.

The woman nodded in immediate understanding. “Everyone has those bad days here, but they’re usually followed by good ones. Hang in there, sweetie.” The nurse’s brown eyes were tender as she smiled.

“Thanks.” Diana tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and glanced around, wishing she could get outside fast, but the hospital was a labyrinth of wings, elevator bays, and nurses’ stations.

“Why don’t you take a break in the chapel?” The nurse’s suggestion sounded good.

Diana thanked her again and walked toward the end of the hall. She reached it and glanced at the door with a little plaque that said “Healing Chapel.” As she entered, she held her breath, but the chapel was empty. A stained-glass window of Saint Francis of Assisi standing in the woods surrounded by animals was at the back of the chapel. She’d come here often these last few weeks, and while she was a lapsed Catholic, she knew enough of the saints to know Assisi. He’d become a quiet comfort to her.

The pews gleamed with a splash of colorful light pouring in from the stained glass. Diana walked to the first row and sat down, then closed her eyes as more tears trailed down her cheeks. Two years ago all that had mattered in her life was college. She would be a senior at the University of Chicago this fall, majoring in architecture. When her dad fell ill, her mother had done her best to hide it from her.

Part of Diana was angry that her dad was ill, angry that he was putting her and her mother through hell. And she was angry that she wouldn’t be able to fix her mother’s broken heart. She was angry most of all at herself for not being able to do a damn thing to help him. Anger felt good, and it made her feel strong, even if only for a short time.

She wasn’t sure how long she sat there before she realized she wasn’t alone. The fine hair at the back of her neck rose as she had that eerie sensation of unseen eyes gazing upon her. Some ancient instinct warned her that she was in the presence of a predator.

Turning slowly, she looked over her shoulder, near the dimly lit entry. She saw a figure that was wreathed in shadows. For a second, she couldn’t breathe. It was as if every nightmare she’d ever had about shapes in the dark, choking, suffocating, and endless nothingness buried in layers of smoke were all there in that doorway. Then she blinked and the shadows vanished.

Instead, a man stood framed in the doorway. His black suit and red silk tie were strangely intense for a hospital setting. She was so used to seeing people in casual, comfortable clothes while they spent long hours at the bedside of a loved one. He held himself in a confident, dominant manner that made her shiver. Gazing upward, she gulped when she realized he was staring at her with the same intensity. The instant their eyes locked, her breath rushed out of her and all the thoughts in her head rattled around. Those eyes—fathomless twin pools of deadly intent that she couldn’t understand—caused fear to sink its claws into her as every basic animal instinct in her shrieked to run. She blinked and the strange, frightening spell was somewhat broken, and she was able to take in the rest of his face.

He was frighteningly attractive, like a model from a fashion magazine. He had dark hair, not quite black, and his eyes were just as dark. She could see no hint of warmth there. His features were perfect, a straight nose, chiseled jaw, and full lips that a girl could get lost in daydreams about kissing. There was an edge of danger about him, something that warned her deep down to be careful, to not run, because she was prey and he was a predator. As silly as the thought was, she sensed it was true on some level. She had to be careful.

Yet Diana couldn’t help but wonder about this man and who he might be. He was fascinating to look at. She had dated her fair share of guys, but this man…he made the whole world fall away. He was completely absorbing in a way she couldn’t explain.

Silence stretched between them. She wanted to wipe away the tears drying on her cheeks, but she couldn’t move, frozen by both fear and enchantment.

“I hope I didn’t disturb your prayers.”

She shivered at his low, silken voice. That voice could tempt a woman to think of her darkest fantasies. Fantasies she fought every day to ignore, yet she couldn’t stop her body’s reaction. She pulled her control together and forced herself to finally move. She had to get out of this room. Her instincts still screamed at her to get the hell out of there.

“Er…no, I was just leaving.” She stood and exited the pew.

He took a step closer, sliding his hands into the pockets of his black pants. The light from the windows moved over him in the strangest way, as though he was bending the light to move away from him, leaving him more in shadow.

Was that even possible? Diana glanced around, very aware that she was alone with this man, and the cold, emotionless faces of the occupants of the stained-glass windows weren’t there to help her.

“Visiting someone?”

“My…dad.” Just saying it dispelled the fear and desire that this man created inside her. She wiped at her eyes, making sure he couldn’t see any fresh tears.

“I’m sorry.” He took another step closer, his gaze sliding from her to the stained-glass window behind her. He stared at Saint Francis with an odd, knowing smile as if he were intimately familiar with the saint, which of course wasn’t possible.

“Thank you.” She grappled for something polite to say. “Are you visiting someone here too?” She studied his profile and the way the light from the stained glass fractured over his features in dozens of colors.

His lips curled in a ghost of a grin. “Not exactly.”

“Are you a doctor?” If he wasn’t there visiting, he had to be there for some reason, right?

He suddenly chuckled as if at some private joke. “Do I look like I save lives?”

“I…I’m sorry, I just assumed.” She started for the door again, disturbed and way too interested in the man.

“Diana, wait.”

Her name upon his lips stopped her dead in her tracks.

“How do you know who I am?” Terror clenched her throat so hard the words barely escaped her mouth.

The man turned to face her. His head inclined toward her, his body moving with a slow grace, his eyes pinning her in place as he came closer.

“You sent a prayer out for your father.”

Stunned, she nodded.

“I’m here to answer your prayer.”

His dark eyes seem to swallow her whole as his words punched her gut. Was this some kind of cruel joke? Was he a doctor playing a game? Or worse, just some creep who lurked in hospital chapels to prey on emotional women?

“I’m not a creep lurking around waiting to prey on emotional women.”

He chuckled again, the darkness edging the sound giving her chills. He’d heard her thoughts. “But…how? You’re not a doctor. You said you don’t save lives. I don’t understand—”

He raised one hand, his index finger pointing up to command silence. She closed her mouth. The man drifted closer step by step, and she still couldn’t move. They were now only a foot apart, and she could feel that awful, crushing darkness rolling off him in waves.

“I’m not a doctor, and I only save lives when there’s something in it for me.”

Diana wrapped her arms around herself. “I still don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t. You’re a sweet, innocent mortal. No need to worry. I am happy to spell it out for you.” He reached out to touch her cheek.

Suddenly the chapel vanished around them and they were in front of her father’s room, peering in at him and her mother from the doorway. Her father lay still, his face waxen with approaching death, and the sight tore at her heart so fiercely she nearly cried out. The man from the chapel was right behind her, his warm breath fanning against her neck. She shivered.

“I make life-changing deals.”

“Deals?” She didn’t understand how they’d gotten from the chapel to her father’s room.

I’m dreaming. That has to be it. No one around them moved. The nurses at the station were frozen, her parents too. The multiple monitors connected to her father were still and silent. This was how all her nightmares went. She couldn’t move, couldn’t scream, she just had to face whatever was happening. This was most definitely a dream.

“Yes.” The man’s voice was low, seductive, like a lover. “You want your father to be well again, don’t you?”

“Of course I do.” Diana stared at her father, his face a mask of pain and exhaustion.

“What would you give for him to be healed?”

She spun to face the dark-eyed man and came face-to-face with his red necktie. He was towering over her; he had to be at least six foot three. She barely came up to his shoulders.

“I…”

“Think now, think hard.” The man’s dark eyes lowered to her lips as though he was thinking about kissing her. A wild flush rippled through her.

“I would give anything.”

“Anything is an awfully dangerous word.” His dark eyes were like fathomless pools, but in them she saw her father walking, laughing, alive. The hunger for that moment, to see her father healthy and happy, was so strong that she was able to shed her fears of this man and bravely speak the truth.

She pursed her lips for a minute but then nodded. “Anything.”

He studied her, and she refused to flinch beneath his assessing gaze. She straightened her back and lifted her chin, wanting to project confidence. The man seemed amused by her sudden change, and a slow, seductive smile lifted the corners of his lips.

“Would you give yourself to me? Sell your soul?” the man asked, his voice hard-edged beneath that layer of silken seduction.

“Sell my…”

“Soul.” He opened his palm, holding it flat as though waiting for her to take his hand.

“What do you mean, my soul?”

“I’ll show you.” He extended his hand closer to hers. She reached out, hesitating, but then finally placed her hand in his. The second his fingers curled around hers she was swallowed by darkness.

Fluttering sounds like the rush of a raven’s wings in the night made her shiver, and she clung to his hand, which still grasped hers. All around her was nothingness, and she couldn’t seem to get any air into her lungs for a long second. Then finally she was able to speak.

“What is this?” she whispered, fear choking her.

“The end of everything you know and love.”

“Hell,” she breathed. Where were the fires and the evil souls?

“Hell is different for everyone. It’s not all fire and brimstone.” His chuckle curled around her, hot and seductive.

“I see only darkness,” she gasped.

“Because your hell is one of nothingness.”

Suddenly they were back in the chapel, and Diana fell to her knees, shaking violently. He stood above her, hands tucked in his trouser pockets, waiting patiently.

“You agree to make a deal with me, and I will give you something in return.”

She put a hand to her chest as she looked up at him.

“You can…save my dad?” Part of her wondered if she was dreaming. She had to be. There was no way she was talking to the devil about making a deal to save her father’s life.

“I can.”

“But you said you don’t save lives.”

The man—no, the devil—slowly smiled. “I said I don’t look like I save lives, and as a general rule I do not.”

“Then why help me?” Diana got to her feet but sat down on the nearest pew. The devil strode to the stained-glass window, tilting his face up, the light playing upon his skin.

“Because you are a pure soul and I hunger for corruption. I need to corrupt you.”

“Corrupt me?” She shuddered at the dark word. When she thought of corruption, she thought of stealing, of hurting people, of unlawful things she’d never do.

The devil turned to face her again, and the shadows pooled around him, his eyes suddenly glowing with a soft ruby-red gleam.

“I want to own your body, your soul, to show you the pleasures of the dark side. I want you to tell me every wicked fantasy, the worst ones, and I want you to let me act them out with you. When I claim a pure soul through pleasure and bring it to the darkness, that soul then belongs to me in every way.”

Her darkest fantasies? She struggled to think, but she didn’t have any fantasies.

“Everyone has fantasies, Diana. Even pure souls like you.”

“You…you said you make deals, right? What would our deal be?” She couldn’t believe she was considering this, but if it meant saving her father, how could she not listen to what the devil offered? He would own her soul. Was her father’s life worth letting him drag her down into eternal darkness?

“You will come to me every Friday night at midnight. I can do with you as I please until dawn, then you can leave.”

“For how long?” She tried not to think about what the devil would do with her.

“Three months. It will be a delightful gift to myself to celebrate the anniversary of my fall from grace. When you die, whenever that may be, your soul will be fully mine, trapped forever in that nothingness I showed you.”

Twelve Fridays? She could survive whatever the devil wanted for her father’s sake. She wouldn’t think about what would happen when she died someday and how she’d be trapped—in hell—with him. “How…how do I know you won’t let him die after you’re through with me?”

The devil’s grin was scary, not because he was scary but because that sexy grin promised all sorts of sins, ones she didn’t think she could handle. “I may be the devil, but I’m not a liar. I get what I want, and I promise on my black heart you’ll get what you want.”

She didn’t immediately respond. Diana wasn’t stupid. She’d seen movies about deals with the devil. There was always a catch, and the trick was finding out what it was.

“What about my mom, or any other friends or family? You’ll save my dad but let someone else that I love die instead, right?”

His eyes widened the slightest bit, and then he smiled as though pleased she wasn’t simply agreeing.

“That is called cosmic balance, you clever child, and no, I do not have to bend to the will of cosmic balance. You won’t face anyone else’s death because of our little deal.”

Diana couldn’t ignore the possessiveness that seemed to emanate from him as he gazed at her. Was her soul really worth it to him? If so, then she had one heck of a bargaining chip, and she refused to waste it.

“I want you to promise that no one I love gets hurt and my dad gets totally healed forever.”

He waved a finger at her. “Now, now, you can’t demand—”

“Do you want my pure soul or not?” The second she issued her challenge, invisible electricity sparked between them. The heat burning through Diana held a promise of what was to come, and it scared the hell out of her. She had to make this deal, but only on her terms. If he didn’t agree, she still had the power to walk away, and she would.

When he didn’t respond, she stood up and started toward the chapel door.

“Fine.” He growled the word as he came up behind her. She turned to look at him, stepping back instinctively as he came too close. “I can give your other loved ones extra protection, but if the other side makes a decision, that’s on your precious angels, not me. I don’t have control over what those winged idiots do. But I swear that nothing I do will cause them harm.”

“Okay, so three months of my submitting to you and you heal my dad.”

“Submitting?” He laughed. “That’s a rather interesting word. Is that one of your fantasies? To have me dominating you?”

Diana shuddered at first, but then an inner voice whispered, “Yes. Dominate me.” A voice she’d buried every time the desires surfaced, because it filled her with shame “Is that the deal?” she repeated.

The devil grinned. “Yes. That’s the deal.”

“Do we…shake on it or something?” She held out her hand. He eyed it and then took her hand in his and tugged. She fell against him, surprised at the feel of his warm body against hers.

Before she could push him away, he bent his head and whispered, “You always seal a devil’s bargain with a kiss.” And then he slanted his mouth over hers, burning her lips with his as he ravaged her mouth, his tongue seeking hers. She was too stunned at first, but as his mouth softened on hers, she melted into him.

A frightening sense of falling forever in the darkness and fluttering black wings surged through her, but he held her, banding his arms around her and tethering her so she wouldn’t vanish in the nothingness.

She tried to banish her fears, praying for one spot of light in the darkness as they kissed. There was a brilliant flash of bright light, the feel of soft downy feathers brushing against her cheek, and then she glimpsed a shining city in the clouds.

Then it was gone. The nothingness remained.

His lips left hers, and the warmth of his body faded. Dimly, she heard his silken whisper in her mind. “You are mine now, Diana.”

When she opened her eyes and jolted awake, she lay on one of the pews in the hospital’s chapel.

She’d only had a wild dream. Her father wouldn’t get better. A tear rolled off her cheek onto the fabric of the seat beneath her. She sat up slowly, combed her fingers through her hair, and tried to compose herself. Then she left the chapel and returned to her father’s room. As the door to the chapel closed behind her, she swore she heard a faint, low masculine chuckle.

“I’m going crazy. The stress of all this is getting to me.”

As much as she would’ve done anything to save her dad, there was no such thing as bargaining with the devil. Because she didn’t believe in the devil.

2

But his doom reserved him to more wrath; for now the thought both of lost happiness and lasting pain torments him. - John Milton, Paradise Lost

Lucien stood in the chapel, invisible to Diana, watching her wipe away her tears and leave the room. She was a beautiful woman, with dark-brown hair and dove-gray eyes that reminded him of lightning in winter snowstorms. He’d seen lovelier women, yet there was something about her that drew him in, a natural beauty that seemed to come from within. It was possible that her pure soul was calling to him, but the longing to thread his hands through the straight waterfall of her hair…that was pure lust on his part.

“You don’t believe in me yet, but you will.” And by the time she realized what bargain she’d made, it would be too late. Her soul would be forever trapped in his clutches, corrupted by his darkness, and that soul would keep the gates of hell strong and secure.

After she left, he raised a hand to his lips, brushing the tips of his fingers over them, wondering.

It had been a most curious thing. When he’d kissed her and sealed their bargain, he had thought he’d seen something, just a quick second of a young girl’s hand brushing over cool blades of grass on a summer morning, the chilly drops of dew tickling his fingers as they tickled hers. It had felt…heavenly. He’d convinced himself that he didn’t want to remember what heaven felt like, how it tasted, how it looked, but kissing Diana had brought back forbidden memories. He buried the rush of pleasure that thoughts of heaven brought because it always brought back the pain of his fall. Instead, he focused on why he would experience that with Diana when he never had with any other mortal before.

He normally saw people’s darkest desires when he sealed their bargains. He exited the chapel and moved unseen through the hospital until he reached the room where Diana and her mother were saying their goodbyes for the night and going home. After they had left, he walked over to where Diana’s father lay breathing softly, his eyes closed. Lucien stared down at him for a long minute. The man was deep in a coma, wouldn’t last the night, not that Diana or her mother knew that. They only knew that time was limited. The doctors had assured them they would have another day or two to say goodbye and take him off the machines. But even the machines couldn’t stop the death that was creeping through Hal’s body.

Lucien reached out and woke Hal from the coma. Diana’s father’s eyes slowly opened up, and he had the look of a man lost, a man who’d begun his travel to the other side but had been pulled abruptly back.

“You’ve come for me?” The man opened his eyes, and they were soft gray just like Diana’s.

“I’m not Death. He’s the one who pays house calls,” Lucien said with a sardonic smile.

“This isn’t a house call?” Hal coughed and winced, and then he relaxed, his eyes starting to close as he struggled to stay awake.

Lucien watched all this in fascination, strangely reminded of his own fall and the struggle to go on. The human will to survive, to overcome any obstacle, even one as painful as death, was so strong.

“So if you aren’t Death, and there’s no way you’re a doctor, then who are you?” Hal asked. Pain filled his voice, but he sounded strong now too. Lucien felt a stab of pride in knowing a man like this had fathered his newest pet, for that was what Diana would be: his pet, a plaything, one he would take good care of even while corrupting her with her own forbidden desires.

“I don’t think you want to know who I am.” Lucien picked up the charts at the end of the hospital bed, flicking through the complicated pages.

“Try me,” Hal challenged.

Lucien put his charts down and walked around the side of the bed, offering a hand. Hal placed his hand in Lucien’s just like Diana had, and he showed Hal exactly who he was by letting Hal glimpse his own personal hell just as he had shown Diana hers.

Hal’s face paled even more. “You’re the…the…”

“Yes.” Lucien didn’t bother to say the word. He’d never been overly fond of devil or Satan. They were such negative words for a being who’d once been named heaven’s brightest star.

“That’s not…you can’t be…” Diana’s father struggled to accept the truth, but after a long moment, he seemed too tired to fight.

“I am. You’d better believe it,” Lucien replied.

“But why are you here?” Hal asked, eyes wide. “I’ve tried to be a good man.”

“And…luckily, you succeeded.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m not dragging you down to hell. Scout’s honor.” Lucien chuckled, but Hal didn’t laugh.

“I’m here because your daughter just bought you the winning lottery ticket.”

“What are you talking about?” Hal blinked in shock as Lucien placed a palm on his forehead.

“Don’t worry, you won’t remember any of this.”

Hal’s eyes closed, and white light went from Lucien’s hand into Hal’s head. The last vestiges of his angelic powers—oddly the ones the heavens hadn’t taken from him when they’d taken almost everything else—still worked.

Lucien dropped his hand from Hal’s face and glanced toward the machine that now beeped in a steady rhythm.

Come dawn, the doctors would be baffled by Hal’s quick recovery, and they would send him home, declaring it a miracle.

But for Diana it was to be a debt. A debt he was very interested in collecting. There was a momentary flicker of guilt at knowing he would be Diana’s destruction, but he buried it deep inside. The devil couldn’t afford to feel guilty, not when the universe’s very stability relied on him remaining a selfish bastard and stealing pure souls. For Diana it meant surrendering her pure soul to the realm of darkness so that it could fortify the gates and keep all hell from literally breaking loose.

Diana slept in, not wanting to leave the comfort of her warm bed in her little apartment. If she was being honest, she didn’t want to face today. She and her mother had spoken to the doctor, and today they would take her father off the machines keeping him alive. The doctor wasn’t certain how long it would take for her father to die, but Diana knew it could be a few days. He was so damn strong, had always been strong, and he would cling to life while she and her mother watched in agony.

I can’t face that, not yet.

Outside the sun was up, light peeking in through the pale-blue curtains on her bedroom window. For a long moment she lay there, thinking about the frightening dream she’d had when she’d fallen asleep in the chapel the day before.

A deal with the devil.

She sighed heavily and forced herself out of bed. Diana couldn’t put off the visit to the hospital any longer. Her mother would need her there, and it would be one of the last times she would get to see her father before…before he was gone. She trembled, and a chill stole through her, settling deep into her bones. Whenever she thought of her dad being gone, it left a burning, hollow ache inside her chest. It would only get worse once he was really gone.

She picked up her cell phone from her nightstand and checked the time. It was nearly noon on a Sunday morning. She’d missed several calls from her mother. Heart pounding, she called her mom back. Something had happened to her dad before she’d had a chance to say goodbye? She tried not to think about it, about how pale he had been last night.

“Diana! Thank God!” her mother gasped when she answered the phone.

“What is it? Dad?” Diana’s voice broke, and she was seconds away from crying.

“Yes, but I think it’s good news. He came out of the coma. I think…” Her mother choked on a sob. “I think he might be in remission.”

“What?” Diana wiped the fresh stream of tears on her cheeks. She didn’t understand.

“It’s a miracle! Your father called me at around nine. He woke up at six this morning feeling better than he’s been in a long time. He called the nurses to have the doctors come see him. They ran some tests and biopsied his colon.” Her mother took a deep breath before continuing. “They didn’t find any cancer cells.”

That couldn’t be possible. Yesterday he had been mere days away from death.

“Mom, they made a mistake,” Diana said. “They had to.”

“They tested him several times on several different machines to be sure.”

Diana bit her lip so hard she tasted blood. It was too dangerous to let hope take over. Far too dangerous.

“So what does this mean?” she asked her mother.

“I think he can come home in a few days. I’m headed to the hospital now.”

“I can meet you there.”

“No, no,” her mother said. “Let me go. Just in case.” The words she left unsaid were loud in the silence between them. In case it really was a mistake. Better to have only her mother’s hopes broken than both of them. But Diana didn’t want her facing that news alone.

“I’m coming.” Diana hung up on her mother before she could protest, and she hastily dressed and grabbed her keys. Her orange tabby cat, Seth, was perched on the arm of the couch in the small living room, purring as she walked by.