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Emrick shifted his hand until he was fisting Ilsa’s hair, tangling it around his fingers and yanking against her scalp, cutting her words off with a cry.
“Shh, human. Let the demon decide for herself.”
Ilsa’s eyes shot to my face, watering from the pain but filled with determination.
I looked away.
I couldn’t face her right now.
Because while she was so steadfast—black and white, right and wrong—I wasn’t so sure. Emrick wasn’t the good guy, but who was in this world? Was it still wrong to be working for one bad guy against another?
Why shouldn’t I work for Emrick?
He was right. I could unleash all my desires, stay here on Earth, earn an income, which otherwise I wouldn’t be able to do. I had so much fun taking down all his damn clubhouses, but when I thought I had it figured out, I had been going about it all wrong. What difference did it make to me who I was unleashing upon? Really, I’d be taking down the same people I had been aiming at before. If they were involved with Emrick, they were unlikely to be innocent people, so my conscience was clear on that front. The only difference would be I wouldn’t be harming anything of Emrick’s.
It’s everything I’d been doing since I got here, but with a wage, and I wouldn’t get shot up with silver bullets in the process because I didn’t know who owned what.
Bonus.
I wanted to tell myself I was doing it only for Ilsa in some selfless act, but it would be a lie. I had no qualms with lying, but what was the point? He made an enticing offer. Ilsa would be safe, I’d keep doing what I was doing, and all would be right as it were.
“All right.”
The silence that rung out after my response was magnified by the grin that lit Emrick’s features, somehow darkening his face further as though he had successfully dragged someone else down with him and was proud of it.
He released Ilsa, pushing her forward so she landed on her hands and knees on the floor. She looked up at me, her eyes wide and pleading. “Ray, you don’t have to do this for me.”
She’d have noticed I couldn’t quite meet her eyes—she wasn’t stupid. But my mind was made up. “I’m not doing this for you,” I muttered.
This was followed by a whoop of laughter from Emrick, and Ilsa stared at me as she pushed herself to her feet, crossing the small room to me as I was released by the guard as well. “What are you saying?”
“I’m not accepting his offerfor you, Ilsa. I’m doing it because it’s a good deal.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Why not? I get to keep doing what I’m doing, but without consequence, without having to worry aboutstepping on the wrong toesand having people come after me, or you, for that matter. What’s the downside?”
“What’s the downside?” she whispered. “I thought you understood.” Her voice was small, and I stared at the ceiling, rolling my eyes upward to avoid looking at her where I’d have to face the truth. “There are always consequences, Ray. Remember… collateral damage.”
When she moved to touch my arm, I wrenched myself from her grasp, unable to take her sensitivity and understanding right now. Ilsa withdrew her hand, looking at me as though the contact had burned her too.
How could she understand? She was only human. I had needs and instincts I absolutely had to get out to keep my demon under control. I didn’t want to go back to Hell, not now I knew the pleasures and fun Earth could provide. Emrick was offering me a solution to all my problems, and if all I had to do was be a hired gun, I didn’t see the problem.
Ilsa couldn’t understand, and I avoided looking at her. Even if I sat her down and explained it to her repeatedly, but she’d never get it. I’d seen her struggle with the morality of my actions since we met, so how could she not see this was basically the same thing? She was judging me by human standards, byherstandards, and by the image she had built of me in her mind over the past few days. But it wasn’t me, not really. I had fallen into the illusion myself, but it couldn’t last.
Because I wasn’t human, I was a demon.
I didn’t have a soul to save.
Except hers.
And maybe Ilsa was better off without me around. Everything that had happened to her was because of me. She was in danger because of me, and she’d had a knife pressed against her throatbecause of me.
This would solve everything.
Except the ache in my chest, which I assumed would go away with time.
“I can’t condone this,” she whispered. Perhaps she was hoping the audience in the room wouldn’t hear.
