I hoped she was right.

  There would be Hell to pay if she wasn’t.

  18

  My heart beat rapidly in my chest. I was thankful my magic was no longer tied to it. No longer bound to destroy me and everything I held dear because of it.

  The cold of the void was brief but welcome. It soothed my frayed ends and helped me steady myself. When the dark cleared, we were standing in an empty apartment with white walls and mahogany stained floors. A window was open, letting in a chilled breeze.

  A lone armchair sat facing it, away from us.

  “I was wondering how long it would take.” My sister’s voice was higher than mine, and yet melodic. She stood, her white hair bound in braids that interlaced themselves around the back of her head. A crown of sorts. She turned, stepping around the chair where she’d been waiting. Watching. It was hard for me to see the blue in her eyes and how it glowed so obviously. Her pale skin seemed to shine. She wore a dark green long-sleeved shirt that clung to her, hiding the demon brands from view.

  “Bree,” I said, sounding stronger than I felt. As if she could hear the thudding of my heart in my chest, she smiled coldly and inclined her head.

  “Piper.” Then her gaze shifted onto Ronan who stood tense at my side—his hand still not leaving mine though my fingers had gone numb. “Harvester.” Despite using his title, she didn’t nod. The term almost seemed to be mocking. “Or I should say, ex-Harvester. The Otherworld cannot run without one of you. The source will have picked someone to take your place by now—” I didn’t miss the way her eyes flicked to mine, as if she couldn’t help herself. She had to see what effect the words had on me. Thanks to Ronan’s brief reveal, they had no impact. She tried to hide her disappointment but failed.

  “We’re not here to talk about him,” I said, taking a bold step forward. “We’re here to talk about you and me, and the solution we’re going to find.” I pulled my hand away from Ronan’s, but he moved with me, shadowing my back. Bree noted the movement with cruel satisfaction.

  “You plan to open a portal?” she asked, leaning against the back of her armchair. The chunky heel of her boots made us the same height, but somehow I still felt small under her gaze.

  “No—”

  “Then there’s nothing to discuss,” she replied. Her fingers snapped and the front door to her very empty apartment opened.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, but the apology sounded more like a frustrated growl than anything. Her eyebrows lifted. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t stand the sight of our mother being used one more time. I’m sorry that our parents tried to hide the worst of it from you so you may not remember all the winter nights when we had no power, and it was you and I huddled together under a blanket on a single twin-sized bed trying not to freeze to death. I’m sorry that food was running out and neither mom nor dad could do anything about it. Not anything that would have mattered . . . and because of that I did what I thought I had to do. I lost big for my decisions. Both my parents and my sister gone in a single instant—”

  “I’m not having this discussion with you,” she said, face closing off; expression going cold. No more cruel amusement in sight.

  “No, we are. Because here’s the thing, Bree, I own my choices and accept the consequences of what I’ve done, and I am sorry, so fucking sorry that sixteen-year-old me didn’t have all the answers and it cost us both. You suffered for my decisions and I can’t undo that. I can’t change it—”

  “No,” she agreed. “You can’t. So why are you here? Why are you doing,” she motioned to all of me, “this? It changes nothing. Your apologies are empty words. Your feelings are irrelevant. You understand you fucked up; great for you. But you’re not doing the one thing I asked. You’re not fixing it.”

  “Because what you want isn’t fixing anything,” I snapped. “You want to run the fuck away and leave me. Again.”

  Her eyebrows rose, and I knew I might have just pushed one step too far.

  “Leave you? Well, that’s some apology, Piper. Even while saying sorry it’s still about you in the end. The victim complex gets old, you know?” She laughed once. It made the hairs on my neck rise. “You said it yourself; I didn’t leave. You chose to make a bargain for power that ended with my conscience being trapped in Hell. I didn’t do that. You did. I simply chose to move the fuck on. Instead of whining about how hard my life was, I made something of myself. I became someone—and not some pathetic human girl you remember. Do you understand that? Do you understand what you took from me by forcing me to come back here? To this world—” she waved her hand about. “This world where all I knew was pain, cold and hungry nights, with two dead parents and a sister that caused it.”

  Her words were a slap across the face because they were true. Every. Single. Word.

  But I couldn’t stop now. I couldn’t run from them like I did last time.

  “No,” I said. “I don’t know what your life was like. Who you were. Are.” I took a deep breath, trying to gain the courage. To do what I had to do, one more time. “But I want to know.”

  Her eyebrows drew together, not expecting my response.

  “What?”

  “I want to make a bargain with you. One demon to another. A compromise.”

  Her expression soured. “I’m not interested in compromises with you. All I want is a portal, and if I don’t get it—”

  “I know,” I replied, voice turning hard. “I’m aware of your threats.”

  “They’re promises,” she replied.

  “They’re war,” I said plainly. “A war this city can’t afford. Not now. I know that. You know that. Which is why I’m doing this, as much as it pains me—I can’t have you destroying their lives because you’re angry at me.” On the surface she seemed unbothered, but I could have sworn I saw something—a faint flicker of regret. A flinch of unease.

  “Then. Send. Me. Back.”

  “I’ll open a portal on two conditions.” It was hard to make those words come out. Harder still because I couldn’t back out. I couldn’t undo them. But there wasn’t another way for us to bargain when the only thing she wanted I was unwilling to move on.

  To compromise, someone’s goalpost had to shift, and hers wasn’t an option.

  Which meant I had to yield.

  At my back, Ronan tensed, clearly not expecting the words I was saying.

  Bree froze. It seems she didn’t either.

  Her lips parted and the pure longing that entered her expression broke through the cold mask she wore. Part of me shriveled and died, feeling like the world's most horrible kind of selfish person for what I’d done. It was also the thing that gave me strength because this was the right way. The only way I might not lose my sister indefinitely.

  “I’m listening,” she said.

  “The first is that whatever involvement you have with the humans ends. No more bombs. No more weapons. No stirring the pot or making things worse.”

  Her lips pressed into a thin line, but she nodded. I had a feeling she didn’t care for being called out and condemned for those actions.

  “The second is that you spend six months here—with me. I want to know about you. What I’ve missed, what and who you’re so desperate to return to . . .” My words trailed as she started to shake her head.

  “No. I’ve already been gone a month and a half. Two weeks at most.”

  My hands clenched into fists. Two weeks?

  “You literally have forever laid out in front of you. Is six months really that much to ask for?”

  “Yes,” she said simply. “Especially when I have no desire to spend any, let alone all my time with you.”

  Ouch. All right, then. “Four months.” She gave me a hard look and pointed her index finger down. “Three months,” I bit out.

  “Three weeks,” she replied, expression hardening. “Only two hours a day.”

  “Bree.” I used her name as a curse.

  “Piper,” she snapped back, unafraid. Beside me, Ronan let out a low growl, not liking her tone.

  I flashed him a look and then returned my attention to her. “Six weeks, half the day.”

  “One month, three hours—and that’s the longest I’m willing to stay here.”

  A month. Less time than she’d already been here. I’d started this bargain with hope. A purpose. Every counter she gave me had that hope sinking. A weight in my stomach instead.

  “Four hours,” I breathed.

  Her eyes flashed. “Fine, but only if the Harvester removes Anders from stalking me.”

  I jerked. My head swung around. Anders. He was alive?

  “Not happening,” Ronan said without looking at me. “You’ve been inciting riots and helping create weapons of mass destruction. I’m not pulling him until you can be trusted not to act like an angry child, stomping her foot because she didn’t get what she wanted.”

  “Until I can be trusted?” She lifted her brows, as if she couldn’t believe what he’d said, then turned to me. “Do you hear this?”

  “I do, and he’s right,” I answered slowly. “You’re only going to be with me four hours a day—”

  “Three if you don’t give me this.”

  My temper snapped. The fuse ignited before I had a hope of even stopping it. “I’ve given you everything you’ve asked. You’re getting a portal in one month’s time. You only have to spend a handful of hours with me a day—and then you’re gone. Forever. And that ignores the fact that I don’t control Ronan. This bargain is between you and me.” Her jaw clenched and I sensed the rising desire in her to lash out. Before she could speak, I said, “One month. Four hours. Every day. Take it or I walk, and it will be that much longer that you have to remain here trying to find a way to open a portal. It only took me a decade to find a way to get to you . . .”

  I crossed my arms over my chest and then waited. It was a tough call. Her stubbornness equaled mine, but she was impatient. Antsy. I sensed it in the desperation, and to some degree—I knew it well. I’d been the same way in trying to get her back, which is why I knew she’d take it. Like it or not, she didn’t have a better option.

  And neither did I.

  One month was hardly enough, but now, it was all I would have.

  Bree lifted her finger, the nail sharpening into a talon. She drew a line down her palm, slicing the skin open without hesitation.

  I lifted my own and then stared at my nails—trying to will one of them to do the same. When nothing happened after a few seconds, Bree said, “Shall I?”

  “No,” Ronan said, taking my hand. There was no room for argument, and I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from flushing with embarrassment. While I had all the knowledge on earth and ten years’ experience with turning my magic on and off—I didn’t know how to manipulate it as she did.

  The pain barely registered when he cut a line across my palm. The skin healed rapidly, leaving behind only a thin trail of blood.

  “One month. Four hours every day. I stay away from the humans and don’t assist in their rebellion—and in return, you will open the portal so I can go home.”

  Home. It was telling how easily she referred to Hell that way.

  This gamble, it was a lost cause. I knew it in my soul.

  One month wasn’t long enough to convince her to stay. Even six was just a wild shot in the dark that I’d hoped she’d accept. But one . . . that was the time I had now to come to terms with the fact I’d well and truly lost her.

  The time I had to accept the inevitable goodbye.

  “Agreed,” I murmured.

  Our hands met. Blood pressed together as the magic bonded and sealed the deal. I felt a zap of power run through me, cold to the core. Bree seemed to experience the same and was more unprepared than me, given how quickly she snatched her hand away.

  “It’s done,” she said, voice hoarse. “You got what you came for. Now get out.”

  “I look forward to hanging out with you tomorrow,” was my reply. If she sensed the edge of a lie in my words, she didn’t say it. I did look forward to it, but I also knew with every fiber of my being that she was going to make this difficult. Painful, even.

  Ronan took my hand, and the void closed in. We were only there a moment before the four walls of my bedroom at Nat’s appeared.

  “Why would you make a deal with her?”

  “You chose to take her from the cabin because it forced me to make some decisions. I’m choosing to do the same,” I replied, dropping his hand. I turned and crossed my arms over my chest, lifting my chin.

  “You’re my atma. She’s—”

  “My sister.”

  Ronan shook his head. “You’re a masochist,” he said after a minute. “She’s going to spend the next month poking and prodding and treating you like shit. You expect me to watch that—”

  “I expect you to respect my choices because I’m a grown-ass adult—something you only seem to want to remember when you’re fucking me.” My head tilted and his eyes flamed with dark fire. “This goes both ways. You told me that. Now prove it. Show me what you want with your actions, not just your words.”

  His jaw clenched and the muscles in his arms bunched tight.

  “It’s hard to override my instincts when you were shot by a gun that had her magic; shot by your ex that got the idea from her. You were a child when you made those choices to try to help your family. She’s a woman who is intent on tearing you down with her bare hands if that’s what it takes—”

  “She’s desperate. Angry. Stubborn. We’re a lot alike in that. But I’m not doing this for her, Ronan. I’m doing this for me. I’ve spent a decade living only for Bree. Now I’ll spend a month coming to terms with the consequences. I need this. Because no matter what she feels, it doesn’t matter when the guilt comes from in me—and if I’m ever going to move on, I need to let it go.”

  The tension drained from him and the black fire in his eyes dissipated.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll respect your decision, but if she tries to hurt you—”

  “Trust that I can handle myself.”

  “But will you?” he asked. The underlying accusation that I’d let her was clear. “I know you can. Bree isn’t a weak demon, but you are one of the strongest in existence. I know you can handle yourself, but will you if she tries?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I will.”

  He held my gaze for a few seconds and then nodded. “Very well—”

  Two knocks at my bedroom door made us pause.

  “You had all weekend to fuck. I’m coming in,” Nat called. The handle turned, and the door opened. Despite her nonchalant words, there was a visible tension in her that drained away when she saw me.

  “What happened to the walls being soundproof?”

  “They are,” she said, striding forward. “But I can feel the change in the air when either of you are near.”

  “It’s the chaos magic,” Ronan said. “You have a heightened awareness of all magic around you.” Nathalie shrugged, picking what I could only assume was cat hair off her sweater. Her practiced casualness made me narrow my eyes at her.

  “We have work to do. This one hogged you for three days, and I don’t really want to leave you two alone given your penchant for starting fires when he’s around.” She hooked her thumb in Ronan’s direction. He appeared unamused at being referred to as ‘this one’.

  “Fortunately for you, ‘this one’ also has things that need to be taken care of,” Ronan replied.

  “Like checking in with Anders?” I asked, letting it be known this was not the end of that conversation. I hadn’t forgotten.

  “Yes, actually,” Ronan said, unaffected by my tone. “Among other things.”

  I wanted to ask what other things he was referring to, but I had a feeling he’d only sidestep an answer. I took the route that would piss him off most instead. “Tell him hi for me. That I’d like to catch up. Maybe get dinner sometime.”

  Black filled his eyes, and I couldn’t help the smirk.

  Without so much as a goodbye, Ronan stepped into the void and blinked out of existence. Nathalie let out a snort, then said, “Using jealousy as foreplay. Nice, Piper. You should have just signed a death warrant.”

  I was fairly certain Ronan wouldn’t kill a middle-aged errand boy out of jealousy, but they both kept this secret from me. Him and Anders.

  So they both could deal with the consequences of it.

  19

  “Let me get this straight—” I held up one hand, and she paused, leaning back, and motioning for me to continue. “You want us to ‘volunteer’ at a food bank you own?”

  Nathalie sat back, plopping a strawberry into her mouth in a carefree gesture. The circles under her eyes had darkened heavily in the last few days. I wondered if the voices had gotten worse and what there was to be done about it. I filed that away for later when we weren’t sitting in the middle of a tiny cafe. We’d just completed dropping off orders for the afternoon, the last one containing fresh produce for the restaurant where we sat. In return, they gave us lunch and three dozen chocolate swirled bagels.

  Each delivery was different and unexpected. One woman paid a fortune for a cashmere blanket. Another traded hard to find herbs in return for a pack of batteries. A family with too many mouths to feed paid over four thousand dollars and a heavy, beautiful heirloom quilt in return for a cast iron pot that multiplied whatever was in it by ten. The quilt was then given to a middle-aged couple—a witch and warlock. The wife came from Lucifer's line and had developed an extreme case of arthritis after his death. She’d been the breadwinner before, and her loss of power resulted in a fall from grace—to the extent she was willing to trade her family's oldest grimoire in return for that quilt and the chance to be warm.

  They were human and supe. Wealthy and poor. Nathalie did business with all of them and asked about their kids, grandkids, jobs, and struggles—all without missing a beat.

  It made me wonder if the voices she’d been hearing were more than the guilt she harbored, instead it was the price she paid for an eidetic memory and sharp mind.

 

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