Hell's Geek (9 page)

“This is more than a calamity. You’d better invest in life rafts then. I have a feeling they’re going to sell out in a little bit because, unless we find the source to this water and stop it, I’m going to go on record and say I think we’re all going to get wet.”

Speaking of wet, Valaska couldn’t help but snicker and mutter. “Get us out of this alive, Dex, and I promise to soak you.”

There was that lovely blush she wanted—
I wonder how far down his body it extends.

As he gaped at her, they could hear Lucifer bellow.

“Stop this flood from happening, Adexios. Just because my brother thought it was a good idea to do it on the mortal plane when mankind wouldn’t toe his line doesn’t mean I need it happening in the pit.”

“Maybe God will let you borrow that Noah fellow to build an ark.”

“I am not asking that cheap do-gooder for anything. Because you are going to fix this. And as incentive, once this is over, you can have whatever job you want.”

“Fix this he says. Is that all?”

“Fix it now, or I’ll roast your ribs for dinner!” Lucifer bellowed. They heard a clatter, probably the phone as it went for a ride, but although it landed hard, it didn’t hang up.

“Gaia! Wench, where are you hiding now? I need my slicker and my rubber boots.”

“Not the horned duckies again.” They could hear Gaia sigh. “Can’t you wear something a little more your age?”

An indignant Lucifer huffed before he replied, “Are you mocking my outfit, woman?”

“Yes. Yes I am. Care to
punish
me?”

“Wait until I catch you, wench.”

Midway through Mother Nature’s squealing giggle, Dex hung up. “I don’t think we need to hear out what happens next.”

“Why listen when we could make noises of our own?” While he did get a pink hint to his cheeks, he didn’t immediately pounce on her to start making music.

Instead he said, “What should we do now?”

Given they were stuck in the cabin for the moment, her first thought was to go back to bed and finish what they’d started. However, that was the weak womanly side of her talking, the same side that thought they should keep Dex and play house.

Ugh.

The Amazon warrior knew what had to be done instead.

Stand guard and watch, as well as, “Wait and see where the tide takes us.”

“Don’t feed the Styx Monsters. They’re spoiled enough as it is.” An often heard rant of Charon’s.

As dawn lightened the sky, the fingertips of a reddish radiance poking at his closed eyelids, Adexios stretched then froze.

I think I’m using someone’s lap as a pillow.

While he might have initially fallen asleep sitting alongside Valaska, somehow during the course of his slumber, he’d slumped over and now found his head pillowed on her thighs.

“About time you woke,” she grumbled, yet she did so good-naturedly.

“How long was I out?” he asked, staying where he was. A smart man, he was in no hurry to move.

“A few hours.”

“Did you get any sleep?”

“Some.”

He peeled open an eyelid and glanced at her. Judging by her rigid body and the way she kept staring out the open door, he doubted what sleep she’d gotten amounted to much.

Since she also seemed in no hurry to move, he continued talking. “How’s it looking outside?”

She grimaced. “Wet.”

“Really?” He turned his face to the side, toward her, not away. His lips hovered over the juncture of her thighs. Only the leather of her bottoms separated him from her sex. “How wet?” He blew hotly and couldn’t help a spurt of manly satisfaction when a quiver went through her.

“While your concern with my satisfaction is appreciated, I believe we have more pressing matters.”

“Nothing more pressing than this,” he murmured, on a brazen streak. He pressed his mouth against the seam of her shorts.

Her breath drew in with a sharp gasp.

“Dex!”

“I like it when you say my name like that,” he growled against her.

“Dex, behind you!”

He rolled off her lap as Valaska sprang to her feet. In but a moment, she stood in a ready stance with her sword in hand.

Getting to his knees, Adexios peeked at the doorway to see what had her yelling.

One giant eyeball, suspended on a purple, slimy stalk wavered outside the door.

“Well, hello there, Mr. Sea Monster,” Adexios said as he rose slowly. “I don’t believe we’ve met before.”

The massive orb blinked.

“I don’t suppose you know where you came from?”

A long blink.

“Are you seriously talking to it?” she hissed. “We should kill it now before it calls its friends.”

“Not everything needs to die,” he replied, taking a careful step forward. He held his hands out at the side, empty of weapons as he tried to soothe their visitor. “Nice sea monster. My name is Adexios. Would you like a treat?”

Valaska snorted. “Sure it would. A treat comprised of a yummy idiot who is talking instead of chopping up our visitor for a sushi breakfast.”

“Watch and learn.” He rummaged in his pocket and pulled out half a chocolate bar. Adexios waved it in front of him, noting how the eyeball tracked his movements.

“How’s he supposed to eat that?” she asked with clear confusion. “Oh.”

A tentacle rose from the bumpy waves and snatched the offering. It disappeared back into the water.

The creature blinked. Blinked again. If it was possible for a giant eyeball to smile, this one did.

A horn sounded, but a horn unlike any he’d ever heard before. A long, low, bass sound that made Adexios’ teeth vibrate and the hair on his arms rise.

The giant eye turned to look off into the distance. Without even a blink goodbye, it sank under the waves.

Never a good sign when the monsters ran away.

“What the fuck now?” Valaska asked.

Adexios had an inkling that turned into a nagging certainty when the sound of the horn faded and a strong breeze started.

This definitely is not good.

“We might be in a spot of trouble.”

“Trouble how?”

“I think I know that horn. Or at least I know of it.”

“So what does it mean? Or do I need to torture the answer out of you?”

A part of him was tempted to see what type of torture she’d employ. Erotic torture especially intrigued. However, the situation really was rather dire.

“A big monster is coming.”

“Really?” Rather than cower, her posture straightened.

“Yes, really. Ever heard of a kraken?”

“Yes.” Her eyes shone, and she wet her lips.

“If I’m correct, the horn sound we heard is the one used to call them.”

She didn’t question how the kraken, like that other sea monster, had arrived in this sea, hadn’t existed the day before. Instead, she focused on the important part. “How much time before it arrives?”

Given the summons was magical, and their need to answer if they heard the call imperative? “Now.”

As if he’d practiced the timing, a brown tentacle shot out of the wave nearest the door and, in sea monsters’ language, waved, “Hello, land dweller, prepare to die.”

Before he could yell—because yelling seemed like the right thing to do when confronted by one of the deadliest creatures in the sea—Valaska darted forward and swung. The sharp edge of her blade severed the slimy appendage, with an ease much like his mother’s when she sliced through the crowd during the annual Hellmart clearance sale.

The squirming tip, with its perilous suckers, fell—on the floor inside the cabin!

Adexios darted out of the way, careful to not touch it. “Watch out for those spikes in the center of the suction cups. They’re laced with a narcotic that causes paralysis in the kraken’s prey.”

“Seriously? A giant monster that could crush me in its grip, probably eat me in one bite, and who outweighs me several dozen times over, also has poison?”

“Yes.”

“Awesome. I love a challenge.”

And he loved her fierce bravery. However, it was stupidity that he needed to guard her against. “Not awesome. Like crazy dangerous.”

“Yes.”

“As in you-could-die dangerous,” he expanded.

“Yes.”

“Will anything I say deter you from fighting it?”

She didn’t even pretend to think about it. “No.”

He sighed. “Very well, then if you insist, you should know a few things about the kraken. I’ve already mentioned the poison. It goes without saying that you should avoid it, unless you don’t mind getting eaten and digested over the course of a few years.”

“Don’t get eaten. Check.” She took a moment to strap a knife to her ankle.

“When the kraken’s body emerges from the waves, you’ll note it has a squid-like head, a giant mouth lined in very sharp teeth and one enormous eye.”

“Sounds like an easy target.” Her smile turned upside down in disappointment.

That was about to change. “No, it’s not that easy, seeing as how the eye is a camouflage feature. Most people go for it, thinking they’ll blind or kill the kraken. But taking out the eye does nothing. The suckers on the tentacles”—he kicked at the still-twitching limb until it rolled out the door—“act as some kind of visual receptor. It’s how it can see and aim for its prey, even if the body is still under water.”

“Damn, that’s some awesome defense systems. How do you know this?” she asked casually before lunging at the door and, with a rapid slash back and forth, decapitated two more questing tentacles.

“I took Hell’s version of marine biology in university.”

“You went on to get a higher education when you graduated? I thought that was reserved as a punishment for those who slacked at school in their mortal life?”

“What can I say? I’m a masochist for learning. My mother was mortified, especially when I finished top of my class. But on the upside, I now know everything there is to know about the different classes of sea monsters and how to handle them.”

“Speaking of handle, hold this for a second.” She thrust her sword at him.

His fingers gripped the pommel of the lightweight blade. He held it out in front of him gingerly, somewhat worried he might drop it and impale his foot. He’d done that once with Neptune’s trident when the sea god came to dinner at his parents’ house. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

“Whack off anything that comes through that door.”

“Me? I’m supposed to be the brains of this operation. You’re the brawn.” And he felt no shame in pointing out the obvious. “What will you be doing if I’m defending us?”

“Lightening the load.”

And by lightening, she meant stripping. Off came her top, revealing her breasts in all their splendor. High, firm, and topped with a dark red berry.

A wiggly tentacle came through the door and zinged toward her, aiming for those breasts.

Mine!
He couldn’t have said if he shouted the thought in his mind or aloud. He did, however, slash at the offending kraken limb. It hit the floor with a wet thump while the wagging stump spewed some neon-green gore.

Eew.

Without missing a beast, Valaska sidestepped the jetting ichor while, at the same time, kicking off her boots. She then shoved down her shorts, which left her clad only in her skimpy underwear. She also wore his ardent gaze, but that didn’t do much to cover the amount of tempting skin on display.

He thought she might be done with her tease.

Nope.

There went the thong. This time he didn’t bother removing it from the frame of his glasses, where it dangled. Why remove it when he rather enjoyed smelling the lingering traces of Valaska’s passion. A pity there would not be a repeat, seeing as how she was determined to kill herself.

“You’re going to go fight the kraken naked?” he observed.

“Not entirely.” She pointed to her ankle with its strapped knife.

“You could have kept the panties,” he remarked, distracted by the appearance of her bare mound. He didn’t have the manners or strength to look away.

“You are such a prude, Dex. Tell you what, how about next time there’s the possibility I’ll fight a sea monster, I make sure I bring a bikini?”

“That works for me.”

She rolled her eyes. “Give me back my sword.”

With pleasure. She took it from him, and just in time. She leaped in the air just as a tentacle came whipping through the door, looking to trip her.

Adexios jumped back, making sure to stay far away. He didn’t have a weapon to fight with. Not even a paddle.

But the fireplace did have a poker. Grabbing the heavy metal rod, he was just in time to see the severed stump slide back out the open door, disappearing under the waves. As to the remaining bit that oozed on the floor, Valaska tapped her chin. “I wonder how kraken tentacle tastes breaded and deep fried.”

Maybe he’d toss a chunk in the interdimensional pocket that led to his mom’s fridge. If anyone knew how to cook kraken, it was her. “Can we discuss recipes later? I think you just pissed the kraken off.”

Indeed, the water outside the cabin churned, and their tiny makeshift ship was tossed. If not for the effort of the valiant two, their cabin would be lost.

Funny, how he suddenly had an urge to watch
Gilligan’s Island
.

“If I don’t make it back,” she said, “be sure to tell my sisters I died with extreme honor.”

Died? No. She couldn’t.

Valaska smothered any protest he might have uttered by plastering him with a kiss. A kiss full of passion. A kiss full of hunger. A kiss for him.

Then, she was gone, sword in hand, diving into the waves, even as the massive body of the kraken crested.

Ominous music played in his head.

For a moment, Adexios stared at the massive beast. It was one thing to see drawings, and read about the monsters, another to truly encounter one.

On the Styx, the sea monsters were big but, for the most part, fairly harmless, at least to him. His dad had an understanding with the beasts along the lines of
Try to eat me and my family and I will turn this into another Dead Sea.
No one ever discussed that ill-fated vacation his parents had taken that resulted in his dad having a bit of a temper tantrum.

Whatever happened, word spread, and the monsters in the river behaved, except for the mischief they indulged in with Adexios.

However, the kraken didn’t live in the river that flowed through hell. The kraken were true oceanic predators, living deep below the dark waves, in caverns where they hid until called.

But the question was, who’d called it?

Adexios scanned the waves, looking for a boat of some kind, anything that would show where the person was who had sounded the horn.

All Adexios could see was the barnacle-covered, mutant-appearing, octopus-based kraken. It really was an ugly beast with its bulbous eye, the iris comprised of pure black. Its giant mouth gaped, and as it exhaled, it emitted an obnoxious sound, part foghorn, part chittering with a breath that was definitely fetid.

Ugh. “A little oral hygiene wouldn’t hurt,” he muttered.

Humor at a time like this? It was better than worrying about Valaska, who’d yet to reappear since her dive and to whom, he’d just realized, he’d not told the secret to killing the kraken.