Infernal Games by Jenna Wolfhart
14
“Sansa,” Az said, turning my way. “Do you want to go on a date with the King of Hell?”
Um, no. Obviously not. But I didn’t think I had any say in the matter. Lucifer had made it more than clear that he was the one in control here, and I was just his little puppet on a string. Maybe we could find a way to turn his instruments against him, but now was not that time.
We needed a carefully constructed plan.
Az wanted me to say no. That much was clear. But surely he could see that I couldn’t.
I shifted in my boots, the stage creaking beneath me. The colorful strobe lights had begun to cast pink and yellow hues on the dance floor. Soon, the doors would open. We probably shouldn’t be standing in the middle of a DJ booth arguing about demon dates when the crowd poured in.
“I think I need to go get ready.” Gingerly, I stepped back. “I haven’t done hair and makeup yet.”
“You don’t need any makeup.” Lucifer grinned. My god, he had the most punchable face I’d ever seen.
“Okay, thank you. Off I go.” Twisting on my heels, I made my escape. I’d come here to do what I needed to do. Now Az knew everything. It was up to him what happened next.
“Sansa,” Az called after me. “You didn’t answer my question.”
With a frustrated sigh, I paused and glanced over my shoulder. “What question?”
“Do you want to go on a date with him?”
Frowning, I searched his eyes. They were vacant and hard, as if the fiery, electric Az I knew had vanished. There was no zing between us now. The demon stood before me, cold and calculating. And he demanded a response to a question I didn’t dare answer.
Not truthfully, at least.
Why wasn’t he letting this go?
“Yes,” I said slowly, furrowing my brows. “Of course.”
If I said no, Lucifer would lose his ever-loving shit.
“I see.” Az’s eyes shuttered. “You may go now.”
Shaking my head, I minced out of the club’s main room and headed to the dressing room. That had been a weird-ass exchange. I couldn’t very well say, ‘Nope, the last thing I want to do is have a date with the King of Hell. How about we go back to your penthouse after work? I’ll give you head in the shower like we did earlier today when we were on the run from him.’
That would be jumping right out of the frying pan and into the fire. To put it mildly.
When I pushed into the dressing room, the other girls were mostly ready. Priyanka sat in front of the bank of mirrors, half-dressed and hair uncurled. She flipped a massive golden coin. Heads. Tails. Heads again. Both sides were covered in demon seals, unlike human money. I’d never seen this kind of currency before, but it was the vacancy in her eyes that caught my attention.
I trailed over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. She jumped. “Everything okay?”
“No.” She threw the coin. It slammed against the mirror, shattering it in an instant. Shards rained down on the array of makeup and hair products scattered across the table. A hush swept through the room.
I knelt beside her, searching her tear-stained face. “Pri, what’s going on?”
She glanced up at me. Her dark eyes were shot through with red. I understood at once what that meant. Pri was a fae, and they could sometimes lose themselves to the ferocity inside of them. She was barely holding on to her humanity right now. One wrong move, and she’d let loose her rage.
“Run,” she hissed. “All of you should run.”
“No,” I said firmly, squeezing her hand. “Tell us what’s going on. We can’t help you if you keep it to yourself.”
“I was seeing someone.” Her voice wobbled as several tears spilled down her cheeks. “A wolf who lived down in the Village. We’d only been out a few times, but…it felt good, you know? Anyway, it didn’t last long. The fallen angels are back to their old tricks.” She motioned at the glass. “I went to see him before work. He’s dead. They sliced his neck. And they left that behind.”
I closed my eyes and wound my arms around her as she cried. Gingerly, Piper tiptoed over to us and fished the coin out of the shattered glass. She held it up before her eyes, squinting at it. And then her mouth dropped open.
“Oh, shit. The bastards.”
“What?” I asked, turning toward her. “Whose seal is that?”
I hadn’t gotten a good look at it, but I’d seen enough to recognize it wasn’t Az’s or Lucifer’s seal. There were similarities, of course. Squiggly, twisting lines within a deeply-etched circle. But I’d studied Az’s ring enough to have made order out of the chaos of those lines.
“It’s Morax’s,” Pri said hoarsely.
My stomach hollowed out. “Morax’s? The one that Eisheth destroyed?”
“It’s the one thing in his life that Az has never been able to move past.” Priyanka swiped the tears away. “It’s a message to him. They’re pissed off, probably because he’s trying to convince Lucifer that they’re lying, delusional, or both. Don’t forget, they know the truth about everything.”
An uneasy chill slithered down my spine. In all the chaos of the past few days, it had been easy to forget about the fallen angels. They’d witnessed Az and his Legion storming in to rescue both me and Serena from their wrath. And then he’d tried to make them look like fools. We thought it had worked. Clearly not. We’d only made it worse.
“I’m sorry, Pri.” Sighing, I pulled her close and wished I could do something to numb her hurt. But I couldn’t imagine how she felt, especially since she’d been the one to find him lying in a pool of his own blood. “You should go home and get some rest.”
“I can’t,” she growled in a voice that sounded far more feral than human. “Lucifer came by earlier and ordered all of us to dance, whether we want to or not. It’s a big night, he said. A special guest will be arriving.”
“A special guest?” I frowned. “Who?”
“It’s the last person you’re going to want to see,” Piper said as she dropped the coin onto the table. “Eisheth is coming to Infernal.”
* * *
Eisheth? Gritting my teeth, I slashed my eyes with a dark liner. I needed to get out of this. And soon. Eisheth more than knew who I was. She’d been at that damn ball when Az had pretended he wanted to sacrifice my soul. Somehow, he’d convinced her. And she’d convinced Lucifer…kind of. If she saw me here now, dancing in that damn birdcage, it wouldn’t take her long to figure out that she’d been had.
“I need a wig,” I muttered at my face in the mirror. My features were pretty plain, at least compared to the rest of the girls. In the dark, pulsing light of the club, my eyes and nose might not stand out to a vampire like Eisheth. It was this damn blazing hair that was the problem.
I’d tried to die it over the years, of course. Just to try something a little different. The color never stuck. Within twenty-four hours, the red took over like an encroaching storm of kudzu. Nothing could battle the flames.
Ramona drifted over. She was the only girl who changed her appearance on a daily basis. Some days, she wore a short blue bob and a teensy slip of a dress that matched. Other times, she went with a more voluptuous option. Long, flowing blonde hair with a red lip. Tonight, she wore something in between the two. She was a brunette with bangs, a golden gown, and a muted, natural lip. Stunning.
“I can help with that, hun. You know I love my wigs,” she said with an easy smile. “Unless you want to do something more drastic.”
“What, like, run? And hope for the best?” I shook my head. “No, this is part of his game, and he wants to see my next move. He knows Eisheth met Mia McNally. He’s bringing her here on purpose.”
She laughed, a sound that was deep and melodic. “No, hun. I meant we could give you a glamor. Sometimes, I get a little bored with my wigs and like to change things up. I must warn you, though, my powers aren’t as strong as River’s. Her glamors listen to her, going away when she asks. Whatever I give you, it’ll stay like that for years.”
“Oh.” I ran my fingers through my long strands. As loud as my hair was, I didn’t want to part with it. “Not tonight.”
She nodded and dragged me over to her station. The table hid beneath a hundred different products, wigs, makeup brushes, and magazines. Photographs lined the mirror. The smiling faces of the girls, clearly taken across the span of several years.
“Sit.” She pushed me into the chair and stood behind me, eyeing me up in our reflections. “We need to make you look as different as possible without Lucifer finding it strange. Ah, I’ve got it. Girls!”
Ramona clapped her hands, and everyone gathered around, even Pri. She’d rallied when she’d realized that we had a plot to pull off. Not just to save me, but everyone else that was a part of Az’s Legion. If I went down, they were going down with me.
“I’m putting Mia into a wig so that Eisheth won’t recognize her.” She pressed her thin lips together. “But Lucifer will notice. That’s why we’re all going to wear wigs tonight. If all of us decide to ‘dress up’ then there’s nothing he can say about it. But it’s just this one time!”
The girls clapped their hands and started digging through Ramona’s wigs. Rolling her eyes, she got to work on my hair, choosing a bright silvery blonde.
“They’re going to destroy every single one of my precious children,” she said fondly.
I smiled as the girls bickered over a particularly bright pink wig. If they were going all out, then wanted the loudest color they could find.
When Ramona finished working her magic, she stepped back and let out a low whistle. “Damn. I am good.”
My stomach dropped as I caught sight of myself in the mirror. She was right. Ramona was incredibly good at what she did. I didn’t even recognize myself, and I’d seen my face every single day for my entire life. The blonde locks flowed around a pixie face made rounder by carefully applied highlighter and bronzer. She’d swept deep purple powder around my eyes, which made them look more blue than green. My lips were fuller. My cheekbones higher.
Goodbye, Mia McNally. Hello, Sansa.
“What do you think?” she asked, tapping her makeup brush against the table. “You’ve been quiet for like five minutes now. Don’t tell me you hate it.”
“It’s perfect.” I grinned up at her. “You’re amazing. Has anyone ever told you that?”
“Every single goddamn day.” But she lifted her chin a little, clearly touched by the compliment. “See. I don’t need to use glamor to make a girl feel good.”
“Right.” I pushed up from the chair and wobbled in my heels. Mia McNally liked to wear boots. Sansa didn’t. “Let’s go put on one hell of a show.”
* * *
The club was already hopping by the time we made it out onto the floor. Raucous cheers went up when the cages lowered and we all climbed inside. I didn’t dare scan the crowd. Eisheth would be out there somewhere. And Lucifer. I needed to stay as calm and collected as possible.
The metal groaned beneath me as I hurtled up toward the ceiling. I clung onto the golden bars to hold myself steady, wondering how I would pull this off in heels. These things swayed at the best of times, and knocking my head again would be a great way to bring unnecessary attention onto myself.
The birdcage slowed to a stop and swung on its chain. Music blared from the speakers, hectic and upbeat. I tried to calm my racing heart and give in to the feel of the music. The melody pulsed into my ears, driving out my panic and fear. And so I moved.
As the songs ticked by, I finally worked up the nerves to let my eyes wander through the club. There, in the back left corner, Phenex and Valac stood with arms crossed over their chests. Relief came like a sigh. They were okay. Lucifer hadn’t gotten to them. Whatever had happened on that bridge, they’d both left unscathed.
I cast my gaze around. Stolas stood in the back right, alone. He looked as solid and unyielding as stone. Caim was down near the front. Bael stood near the door leading backstage, and Az was…
Sitting with Eisheth in a booth.
She leaned in close to him with a smug smile and tapped her red-tipped fingernail against his cheek. He responded with a grin of his own. I stopped dancing as a jealous rage whipped through me like a storm. My mouth dropped open. Blood curdled in my veins.
What the fuck was he doing? Az hated Eisheth. She’d destroyed one of his Legion, and now he was tucked into a dark booth with her?
“Hello, Sansa,” a voice murmured into my ear.
Shock punched me in the gut as I whirled from side to side. Lucifer had followed me up here, but where was he? Nowhere to be seen. Fisting my hands, I searched the club for any sign of him. He was doing that weird-ass thing I’d sworn Az had done when we’d first met. Speak to me from a distance. It must have been a demon thing. Eerie and creepy as hell.
“You won’t find me up there, darling,” he said in a purr. “Tell me, what do you think about your dear Asmodeus getting cozy with his former lover?”
I snorted. “I don’t know why he’s doing it, but there’ll be a reason. I know what Eisheth did to him.”
“You mean the death of poor Morax?” Lucifer asked. Gritting my teeth, I continued to search the club for his face. I still hadn’t spotted him. Where the hell was he? “Interesting that he would share such intimate details with a wolf. He won’t even discuss it with me. His King.”
I bit back my next retort, too close to saying something I’d regret. He was baiting me, trying to catch me off guard. It was close to working, but I was smarter than that. He’d have to work a lot harder if he wanted to make me crack.
I turned my back on the disembodied voice. “I’m supposed to be dancing. You’re distracting me.”
AKA: go away, asshole.
A breath whispered in my ear. “Of course, darling. But I’ll see you in the darkness when you’re done.”
