Holy Socks And Dirtier Demons (7 page)

Lilith smiled, and pointed the tracking device into the air. The beam changed

from a stream of white lights into one beacon of blue. “He’s close.”

A trace of sulfur swirled around us. “He’s not the only one. Move it.”

I pushed Lilith toward the underground elevator, but it was too late.

Five demons appeared. Pishachas, or Hindu demons by the look of

them. Bulging veins, red eyes, and the stench of curry swirled around them

like a chorus line in a Bollywood musical.

“Liyliyth.” They danced in unison, tails wagging. “We missed you.”

“Friends of yours?” I gestured to Lilith and pulled my nine-

millimeter. Not that a gun would do a damn bit of good, but it would give me

a small measure of comfort as my limbs were ripped from my body.

Boom.

Sparks flew from the barrel of Lilith’s gun. The weapon recoiled,

sending Lilith flying across the pavement. She hit the ground with a squeak.

I glanced from Lilith, sprawled unladylike on the ground, to the

Pishachas. One of the cuter demons wore a watermelon-sized hole in her

torso, directly below her heart. Blackness seeped from the wound, rising into

the air like mid-afternoon pollution.

A wail screeched from the remaining demons, a loud piercing cry of

grief and hate. I blocked my ears, but the sound bounced around my

brainpan.

“Shut up.” From her position on the ground, Lilith fired three more

rounds. The bullets struck true, but the demons didn’t fall. Instead, they

moved closer.

I flipped through my mental good versus evil training manual. A

manual reluctantly provided by the angel after he arrived at my door, baby

Jesus in his heavenly arms. Thankfully, Hades had supplemented my reading

with demon lessons, and booze.

Let’s see, there was: Paimon, Pazuzu, Penemue, Phenex... Damn, too

many fucking demons. Too many hangovers.

Pishachas.

Bingo.

Now how did I stop them?

“Aum Aem Khreem Kleem Chamundaya Vich.” Lilith stumbled to

her feet as she chanted the words. Her voice grew stronger with each

incantation, and the demons slowly backed away.

I translated in my head. The mantra equated to killing ones enemies,

and bringing great happiness to ones friends.

Oh, that wasn’t good. A burning started in my lower body, like

flames licking along my clothing, until an intense pressure inside me

exploded.

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“Shut the fuck up,” I ordered Lilith seconds before it was too late.

She stuck out her tongue and repeated the curse, “Aum Aem Khreem

Kleem Chamundaya Vich.”

Poof.

In a puff of curry-based smoke, the demons vanished as quickly as

they had appeared. But it was too late for me. I fell to the concrete in an

exhausted heap, my breath coming in short gasps.

Lilith ran to me, her hands still grasping her big-ass gun. “Are you all

right?”

I shook my head, trying to catch my breath as I hovered in the place

between life and death, better known as the afterglow. My heavy eyes closed,

and a soft snore escaped my lips.

Her hands grabbed my shoulders and shook me, hard. “Damn it,

Jace. Answer me. Are you okay?”

“Damn it Lilith, don’t ever do that again.” Embarrassment, a new

feeling for me, heated my face. I hadn’t cum in my pants since fifth grade

when my eighth grade girlfriend had cupped my nuts at recess.

“Come on, at least you had a happy ending.” She pulled me to my

feet, my blood slowly leaking back into my brain. She added, glancing

around the parking garage, “Besides, the demons are gone, and you’re no

worse for wear.” Her lips formed a wicked grin. “Maybe you should thank

me.”

“Yeah, right. Find the kid and I’ll give you plenty of thanks.” I

picked up the blue beamed tracking device and followed the intense glow

down the street.

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Eleven

Zap. A pulse of electricity shot through my hand, the handheld Jesus

finder cupped inside of it. The light winked out, and darkness swallowed

Lilith and me. “What happened?” I asked, my hand slipping to my nine-

millimeter.

“He’s here.” Lilith dropped to her knees and caressed the ground.

“Where? I don’t see shit.” Trash, not Jesus, littered the ground.

Condoms, needles, and cigarette butts, yes, but no tiny Messiah.

She cocked her head and sniffed the air. “Do you smell that?”

I inhaled sharply and smirked. New Baby Jesus smell. A mixture of

baby puke, carrot sticks, and purity. The kid was close. “Hey kid, where you

at?”

No response.

“J.C., it’s all right, sweetheart. We are here to help you.” Lilith

circled the sidewalk, kicking at the bushes as if she was searching for a

wayward cat.
Here Messiah, here Messiah.

“He is gone.” The angel appeared suddenly, looking like he had been

run over by a truck. “No, a bulldozer if you must know,” he said with a huff.

“Where did he go?” Lilith shook a fist at the angel.

He visibly swallowed. “I cannot say.” Smack. “Owww! Fine. His

captors took him some place safer. Newark is no place for a child.”

“Where?” I glanced at the angel before focusing on the three gang

members circling us like prey. And why not? A hot girl, a guy with cum-

stained jeans, and a freak in hair rollers and a white robe made for tempting

victims.

The angel rolled his eyes. “The kidnappers went home.”

Home? Was that Heaven or New York?

A flash of lightening in the distance highlighted the New York

skyline and answered that question.

“Thanks for the help,” I told the angel as I took Lilith’s hand.

“Thanks would not be necessary,” the angel sneered, “if you would

do a better job.”

I smiled and waved to one of the gangbangers. “That dude in white

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just called you a pussy.”

The angel’s mouth dropped open, and Lilith and I disappeared down

the street.

~ * ~

Smoke flared around my head. I waved it away and examined the

woman next to me. God, she was a beauty. Mystery. Danger. Evil. Snakes.

Medusa winked at me, and I turned back to Lilith, who was seated a bar stool

away. The Underworld seemed like the perfect place to drink our

disappointments away.

“What’s plan B?” I took a long drink of my Heineken, rolling the

mellow flavor along my tongue and down my throat.

“Do you have a plan B, because I sure as hell don’t.” She lit another

cigarette, ignoring the one already burning in the ashtray in front of her.

“We will find him.” Why I wanted to console her was beyond me,

but I did. Pulling her into my arms, I stroked the scar on the back of her neck.

“Trust me. I will not let you or him down.”

She grinned, but shoved me away. “I know. It’s in your blood. You

can’t help it. God’s chosen one.” Her smile grew grim. “But I’m not all that

innocent, Jace, and you’re not invincible.”

Passion flared between us as my fingers caressed her face. “I’m no

angel, and Heaven to me is a cold beer, a naked woman, and a hockey game.

So you tell me, why am I the chosen one?”

“You’re God’s—”

“Come sail away, come sail away…” The boom of music through the

bar room speakers cut off Lilith’s words, and broke the spell of intimacy,

leaving me flushed. I pounded my fist on the bar with frustration, both sexual

and spiritual.

Lilith jumped from her barstool and motioned to the bathroom. For a

second she seemed to glow like the fires of hell, then she disappeared into the

crowd, leaving me staring after her.

Lilith’s wine glass was empty, so I flagged Hades down and gestured

for another round. As our drinks arrived the jukebox fell silent, and the bar

door opened. Intense white pissed-off angel light flew into the room followed

by one pissed off angel.

He stomped toward me, halting an inch from my nose. “Do you

know what those men did to me?”

I wiped at a glob of stinking angel spit clinging to my shirt, and

raised an eyebrow. He didn’t look hurt. If anything, he wore a new layer of

protoplasmic glow.

“They… I…” The angel swallowed hard. “They made me

blaspheme. How could you—”

I reached behind the bar, and handed him a foamy clear drink with a

red umbrella and two cherries. “Here. I got you a Zima.”

His eyes misted, and the angry glow flicked off like a light bulb. “For

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me? I thought they didn’t serve it here.”

“I stopped at the liquor store next door.” I hadn’t really. Instead, I

had filled a glass with seven-up and vodka. He would never know the

difference. Angels, unlike their demon counterparts, could not indulge in

pleasures of the flesh, including eating and drinking, or so the angel had

mentioned a million times in our short acquaintance.

“Thank you.” He sniffed once, and like the crying Christ statue in

Bolivia, a blood-red tear slipped down his face, staining his robe pink.

“You’re welcome.” Yeah, I’m an asshole. “I need a favor.” Anyone

else would have looked suspicious at my sudden gesture of friendship, but

not the angel. His serene smile pricked my conscience, but I shook it off. “I

want you to lie to God for me.”

“
What
?” The ”Zima” in his hand crashed to the floor. He looked

around as if he was being Punk’d. “Lie to God? Are you insane?”

Probably. “A small lie.”

“But He’s omniscient.”

I’d heard that. “Sure, but He’s also a busy guy. What’s one little lie?”

“No.”

“Just don’t mention the kid’s missing when you give your weekly

report. That’s all.” I smiled, trying to instill confidence. “Come on, friend,” I

said, nearly gagging on the word. “I just need a little more time to find the

kid.”

The angel gave a barely perceptibly nod, his ectoplasmic glow

dimming. Slapping the angel on the shoulder, I waved to Hades. “Get my

buddy here another Zima.”

God taken care of, now I had to find the kid, defeat the kidnappers,

and figure out what Lilith was before it was too late. Because, she wasn’t

what or who she appeared to be, and that made her even more dangerous.

Returning from the bathroom, Lilith threw back the full glass of wine

on the bar, and smiled at me. “What do you say we get out of here? Make

tonight a night never to forget?”

Hell of an idea. Weeding Lilith through the bar packed with Gods

and Goddesses, I called over my shoulder to the angel, “Don’t wait up.”

Outside of the Underworld, the night closed around us. An

ambulance siren screamed in the distance, and steam rose from the metal

grates, but here, in our dark corner, it felt as if we were the only people left

on Earth.

I brushed a strand of hair from Lilith’s cheek. “So where to?”

“Queens.” Moonlight illuminated the starkness of her skin, and for a

moment, her yellow eyes burned red.

I should have said no, pleaded exhaustion or dysentery, but stupidly I

nodded, hailed a taxi, and slipped to the dark side.

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Twelve

Three a.m., a few beers, a mysterious girl with a big-ass gun, and a

cemetery in Queens. What could possibility go wrong?

I lit a match. The brief flare of light bounced off the gravestones of

some of the biggest names in mobster history. Joey Diamonds. Lupo the

Wolf. Lefty Guns Ruggiero. Cold blooded killers sleeping with the worms.

Romantic.

“What are we doing here?” I shook out the match before it burned

my fingers. Lilith didn’t answer. Instead, she slipped between the headstones

like a child at a playground. In and out she weaved, the blackness of her hair

and dress absorbed by the darkness.

Losing her behind a stack of headstones, I jogged to catch up, but it

wasn’t fear that quickened my steps. I didn’t fear the dead, worm riddled

bodies or decomposing flesh. Nope, it was the damned who scared me. Those

that had shuffled off their mortal coil, chained to this world by the lives they

lived, or in some cases, lives unlived.

Dammed if you did, and dammed if you didn’t.

Queens smelled bad enough, but the stench of the cemetery curdled

my stomach. The aroma of death seeped from rotting graves, swirling around

the blackness like a disease, ready to strike. Lilith looked right at home.

“Come here.” She crocked her finger at me, and then to a marble

mausoleum a few feet away. Like an idiot, I followed, pausing outside the

heavy stone archway.

“This isn’t going to turn into one of those late night horror movies,

the one where the hero follows the succubae to his death?” I stepped inside,