Child of Mercy (6 page)

Ben’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, and he pulled a pair of handcuffs from somewhere, slapping them around my wrists before I realized what was happening.  “Okay, let’s talk.”

I stared at the metal cuffs stupidly, my drugged brain having trouble processing the fast motion for long seconds.  “You cuffed me.”

Ben shrugged, scooting off me to sit at the opposite end of the couch.  “The coffee’s decaf, so it’s safe for the baby.  I made it just how you like it.”

Did he expect me to thank him?  “Yeah… but you cuffed me.” I waggled my fingers at him. 

“You can still eat.  Go ahead, before the eggs get too cold.  We don’t have a microwave here.”

Dutifully, I picked up a piece of toast and munched on it, more because I figured a little food might help me recover from the effects of the drugs than out of any real hunger.  At least my hands were cuffed together instead of to anything else, so that left me mobile.  Could I fly with my hands cuffed together if I needed a quick getaway?  I wasn’t sure my muscles would let me move in the right way.   

“I will,” Ben muttered, his head canted towards the kitchen.

“You will what?”

“What?  Oh, nothing.  It’s too soon to think about that, we have to get you on board with our new life first.”

I didn’t like the sound of that…

“Ben, you know you can’t keep me here indefinitely, right?  Eventually I’ll break free, and if I don’t, someone will come looking for me.  What do you think Adam will do when he finds out you’ve taken me like this?”

“Can’t you see what I’m trying to build for us here?” he replied, a trace of irritation in his voice.  “We have a chance at a real family, the three of us.  We can be happy together, Mercy, you’ll see.”

“No, Ben.  I’m sorry, but I told you, Adam’s the one for me.  That’s not gonna change just because you blew a mental gasket.  Take a look in the mirror, Ben.  Drugging and kidnapping me?  What kind of love is that?”

“More love that that bastard has ever shown you.  Where is he, Mercy?  Go ahead, say his name, I dare you to.  You and I both know he won’t come because he doesn’t give a damn about you, not like I do.”

The worst thing was in a way Ben was right.  I knew Adam loved me, but I also knew he wouldn’t come, even if I screamed his name at the top of my lungs.  But just to put the fear into his eyes, I opened up my mouth and yelled, “Adamiel!” for all I was worth.

Ben didn’t so much as blink.  “He won’t come.  The sooner you realize that, the sooner we can start to build our lives together.”

“Oh, for crying out loud…” I lost my last ounce of patience.  “Why can’t you get it through your thick skull that I love him and he loves me?  I might be mad as hell at Adam right now, but that’s what love is.  It doesn’t disappear at the first sign of trouble.  You can drug me and kidnap me and drag me down whatever debauched fantasy Azazael is spinning in your broken, screwed up mind, but it’s not gonna show me that Adam’s any less deserving of my love.  It shows me what you’ve become.” 

Instead of growing angry, Ben shook his head.  “He said you would resist.”  Rising from the couch, he went to the breakfast bar, his body obscuring my view of what he was doing.  “I told him I could get you to see things our way, but he had you pegged alright.  It’s a good thing I like to plan for contingencies.”  Circling around the couch, he held his hands in such a way I couldn’t see what plan he had in mind, but I could tell from the look on his face, it didn’t bode well for me.

My head spun as I tried to stand and lost my balance, falling back against the couch.  The hell with calling for Adamiel, I opened my mouth to scream for the backup he left in his absence.  “Rem…” I never got the rest of his name out as Ben forced my jaw shut and slapped a wide strip of duct tape across my mouth.

“Ah, ah, ah, none of that,” he chided lightly.  “I think for now, we’ll have to keep doing this the hard way.”  Gathering me up into his arms, Ben carried me into a bedroom, depositing me lightly on top of the bed.  I heard a jingle of keys, and for a brief, shining moment, I thought maybe he’d free my wrists, but Ben quickly brought my arms up over my head and refastened the cuffs with my wrists trapped by the brass headboard.

I screamed against the tape, doing little more than making it harder for me to breathe and I started to really panic that I might pass out again.  It wasn’t funny anymore, God only knew what he had in mind for
the hard way
.  With my hands in that position, I couldn’t easily produce my sword, and I couldn’t call for help either.  Forcing myself to calm down, I focused on gathering my Grace around me while he did something outside my visual range. 

“Here we go.  I think you just need another dose of my little love potion, and then we’ll try this again.”  Ben appeared, syringe in hand, and my eyes bulged at the sight of the needle as he sat beside me on the bed.  I couldn’t let him keep doping me, but I either couldn’t focus, or couldn’t figure out how to blast him with my hands chained in the wrong direction.  “Shh, relax, Mercy.”  He stroked the side of my face with the back of his fingers, the needle only inches from my face.  “I’ll keep you company while you sleep.”

My mind scrambled for anything I could possibly use to defend myself, and in a desperate attempt at self preservation, I threw everything I had at him. 

Ben froze in place, the syringe pressing against my inner arm. 

With a mewling cry of relief, I squirmed to inch away from the needle, tears gathering at the corners of my eyes as I stared at the fat drop of liquid that gathered at the tip.  So close!  Only, how the hell was I supposed to get free? 

With a bit more struggling on the bed, I brought my leg up enough to give Ben a shove with my foot, sending him toppling off balance onto the floor.  Hopefully he hadn’t fallen on the syringe, but at that point, it was either him or me.  No amount of wriggling brought my mouth close enough to my hands to pull the tape from my face to call for help.  I pulled until my wrists grew chafed and sore, but the cuffs didn’t budge. 

I heard a groan from the floor and in a panic, I froze Ben again, half expecting it not to work, but he fell silent. 

Now what?

How long could I keep it up?  Freezing Ben every few minutes… would my energy run out before the drugs wore off enough to break free?  Or was I kidding myself in the first place?  Was I even strong enough to break myself free at my full strength? 

“Fancy a bit of help?” The mild question brought my head up, wondering if I was hearing things.  In the doorway stood a well dressed man in an exquisitely tailored suit, diamonds winking from his cuffs and the pin in his scarlet tie.  His blonde hair was slicked back from a perfect brow, and the smooth curve of his lips framed gleaming white teeth.  Almost too pretty to be real, he looked like James Bond and some kind of gangster wrapped all in one.  His bright blue eyes and golden nimbus marked him as an angel, though I had no idea which one. 

Nodding vehemently, I made an
mmph
sound. 

“I could help, you know, but I’m not certain you’d accept it if you knew where it came from,” he considered aloud, not moving a muscle in my direction. 

Who the hell was this guy?

“Oh sorry, I should introduce myself.”  He sketched a half bow, as if reading my mind.  “Lucifer, Prince of the Fallen, at your service.”

Chapter Five

Even without the duct tape across my mouth I would have been speechless at the introduction.  Lucifer?  The actual devil himself?  Was he for real?  What the hell was he doing there in the bedroom?  Was he in cahoots with Ben?  Those and a zillion other questions sped through my mind, but all I could manage was another mmph. 

“That won’t do at all, will it?” He pushed away from the door, crossing to the bed.  “Let’s remove this offending impediment, shall we?”  With a charming smile, he reached down and slowly peeled the sticky tape from my mouth.  It hurt like a sonofabitch, but I was glad he hadn’t ripped it off fast or my lips might have come with it.  “Now then… how may I be of assistance?”

Mashing my lips together against the sting, I took a couple of deep breaths before I answered.  “You’re really Lucifer?  As in Satan, Beelzebub, the devil and all that stuff?”

“A rose by any other name…” he chuckled.  “I trust you, of all people, know not to judge a book by its cover.”

What the hell was that supposed to mean?  If I judged him by his appearance, he seemed like a suave, good looking guy about to leap to my rescue.  Did he mean he had some ulterior motive?  A guy like him most definitely would.  Or was he talking about bad press? 

“Nice to meet you.”  My manners asserted themselves as I floundered under the implications of such a meeting.  “I… um, don’t suppose you’d consider letting me out of these, would you?”

“I’d be very happy to, Mercy.”  His smile flashed wider, and with the barest wave of his hand the cuffs popped open.  I snatched my arms down, rubbing my aching wrists tenderly. 

“Thanks.”  I scooted off the bed, feeling better with it standing between us.  “How did you know my name?”

“I like to keep tabs on the movers and shakers up here from time to time.  You, my dear, are definitely a shaker,” he chuckled.   

“How did you know I was here in the first place?  Or is that why you came?”  My eyes narrowed suspiciously.  “Are you playing good cop/bad cop with Azazael or something?” 

“Actually, Azazael and I are on opposite sides for this one.  So, for the time being, that places me firmly in your corner.”

“For the time being…” I didn’t like the sound of that.  Everybody who’d ever seen a horror movie from the seventies knew the devil wanted nothing more than to escape his imprisonment in Hell and take over the world. 

“Oh, I make no promises for the future,” he smiled again.  “But for now, I came to make sure Azazael didn’t get what he wanted, namely a foothold on this plane.”

“Why would you care what Azazael does?”

“In general I don’t, but his current scheme to be reborn through you happens to interfere with some of my more… long term plans.  So here I am.”  He spread his hands wide. 

“Well, um… thank you,” I replied, still not very sure I could take him at his word.  “I can just mosey on out of here then and you won’t stop me?”  I took a step towards the door, never taking my eyes off of him. 

“Of course.  Or I could give you a ride if you prefer.”  Ben groaned, shifting positions on the ground and Lucifer delivered a swift kick to his head, silencing him as he slumped over again.  “I have to say, I rather like playing the hero, it’s refreshing.”

“Hey, don’t… don’t do that to him, he can’t help it if he’s gone kazoo.”  Torn between leaving and making sure he didn’t do worse to Ben, I hovered by the door. 

“An interesting perspective, given his treatment of you.”  He raised a single brow.  “What would you have me do to him?”

“Nothing, don’t do anything at all to him.”  My hands came up in a supplicating gesture.  “Like I said, it’s not his fault Azazael did that to him.”  Speaking of which… I meant to take a look around and see if I could find the pink plastic jewelry box we’d trapped Azazael in while I had the chance. 

“Surely you don’t intend to let him go in this condition?  What’s to stop him from coming after you again?  From what I saw, he seems to have developed quite an obsession with your considerable charms.  That sort of thing isn’t easily discouraged.”

“I know.”  I chewed on my bottom lip thoughtfully.  “I don’t suppose you can help me decontaminate him, can you?” I threw it out there, kidding mostly, but Lucifer’s smile turned beatific. 

“Absolutely I can.”  His lips puckered, and Lucifer gave a strange little whistle, repeating the tones three times.  A small winged creature appeared in a puff of black smoke.  It had a pixie-like body with an oversized head, its dark wings leathery like a bat’s.  Settling on Lucifer’s outstretched hand, the tiny demon rubbed its head against his thumb like a cat seeking a scratch under the chin. 

“What is that?”

“A souleater, of course.  Affectionate little thing, isn’t she?”  He brought it up to his face and the tiny demon nuzzled against his cheek.

“Yeah, she’s adorable,” I murmured, not liking the thought of being near anything that had the word “eater” as part of its name.  “Now that you called her here, what are you going to do with her?”

“I would have thought that would be self evident.”  He gave me a reproachful look.  “The evil in your friend’s soul will keep this beauty fed for a week.”

“Um… won’t that be a bad thing?  Him walking around without a soul?”  Maybe Lucifer didn’t care, but I was pretty sure Ben would.

“Don’t worry, she’ll only eat the tasty bits.  His soul might be a good deal slimmer when we’re done with him, but he’ll be alive right enough.  Undoubtedly better than the holy fire I’m sure my brethren pitched as his only salvation, yes?”

He had a point there.  “Alright, if you’re sure that’ll do the trick… and it won’t mean you’re getting any part of his soul, right?”

“Contrary to popular belief, I don’t actually spend my waking hours in pursuit of human souls,” he sniffed.  “I can assure you, our gates are overflowing without any need to recruit.”  Great, I’d managed to offend him. 

“Sorry.”  I offered a contrite smile.  “Sunday school didn’t exactly prepare me for anything like this.  Please, whatever you can do to help him would be awesome.”

Mollified, Lucifer bent to whisper something to the souleater, the words blurred and indistinct to my ears.  The creature gave a chirp like a bird, and flew to land on Ben’s shoulder. 

“How does she…”  The words froze in my throat as the demon pried Ben’s lips apart, wriggling her way into his mouth.  As I watched in growing horror, it completely disappeared inside, and I saw movement under the skin of his neck as it moved with slow purpose through his body. 

Ben’s eyes popped open, confusion clouding his features and then he screamed - the most god-awful sound I’d ever heard a human being make before. 

“You have to stop it, she’s killing him!” I started towards him, not knowing how the hell I could help, but needing to try.  Lucifer had other ideas though, easily catching hold of me before I’d gone two steps.