Company of Angels 02 - The Demoness of Waking Dreams

the liquid into a syringe.
    Shot it into the goblin.
    Massimo released it, setting it on the floor to watch it scramble madly around.
    “Maybe nothing will happen,” Luciana murmured. “Zitella is ancient, and clearly quite mad. Maybe she gave me a bottle of dust.”
    The creature on the floor let out a vile cough, and a jet of crimson blood spewed out of its mouth, the spray making a disgusting mess on the floor. The thing fell sideways, a red foam spilling from its mouth.
    “Then again, maybe the old woman is not insane after all,” the demoness murmured.
    “That’s promising, certainly,” said Massimo. “I’ve never seen one of your poisons kill that quickly before. Or that violently.”
    “But does it have the power to kill an angel as powerful as the one who watches us?” Luciana mused. “We can only determine that by trial and error,” she said. “There’s no guarantee. I would like to test it before I try it on the angel.”
    “How can we do that?”
    “Perhaps Carlotta will help us out. She always knows the location of a Gatekeeper who can be gotten cheaply. We shall go see her.”
    “And risk being caught by the Company?”
    “It is worth the risk this time, Massimo. We will arm ourselves.”
    She handed him a syringe full of the poison, capped it. “Be very careful. I trust you with this. You must promise not to misuse it. It is probably the most dangerous thing we have ever handled. This could change everything.”
    * * *
     
    The party at Carlotta’s was finally coming to an end, after five long days and nights of debauchery.
    Up in Carlotta’s rooms, Corbin and the madam were wrapping up their own private party. Strewn on the floor lay discarded lingerie and high heels from the various women he’d screwed over the past handful of days, as well as empty champagne magnums, a half-eaten platter of caviar and foie gras.
    “I’ve had a hell of a time,” Corbin said. “But now it’s time to say goodbye.”
    “Where’s the money you owe me?” Carlotta said, sitting up with her hand out. “You said you were going to pay for all of this.”
    “Did I really?” he stated, his amber eyes boring into her. “Nobody likes a greedy whore.”
    “And nobody likes a has-been,” she flung out casually.
    “I’ve killed for lesser insults,” he said.
    Inside him, a quiet fury flooded up. He reached into his pocket, where he had kept the little vial of Luciana’s poison since taking it from her. He popped open a new bottle of champagne, poured them each a glass.
    Into hers, he slipped the poison.
    “ Cin cin, darling,” he said, raising the glass.
    “I really don’t feel like it,” she said.
    “Humor me. The last drink of a very enjoyable party.”
    She drank.
    Then she set the glass on the table and turned. He watched her closely, saw her hand touch her throat. She whirled back to look at him, her eyes wide, and choked out, “What the hell did you put in there?”
    He did not bother to answer, but sat down in a chair and finished his own champagne.
    She fell onto the thick patterned carpet, limbs thrashing wildly in violent spasms.
    Finally, she was quiet. Corbin stood, surveying the wreckage of the party.
    And in the middle of it, Carlotta’s body.
    Poison was such a clean kill. Too clean, he thought.
    And that was when he set to work.
    When he finished dismembering her body, there was a large pool of blood in the middle of the carpet. He opened the door and called down to a couple of his Gatekeepers.
    “What happened to her?” one of them asked as they stared at the remnants in the center of the room.
    Hired to replace the ones who had defected in Vegas, these Gatekeepers still had not learned how to keep their mouths shut. But they would learn. Even if he had to teach them the hard way, Corbin knew.
    “Nothing you need to know about,” the Archdemon said, pouring himself another glass of champagne and sipping.
    He felt like toasting himself. It was his first kill since his spectacular defeat at the hands of Julian Ascher, and he felt a sense of triumph rushing through his body. Even if she had only been a second-rate Rogue demon, killing Carlotta brought him a renewed sense of power.
    “If I feel like killing, I kill,” he said. “I don’t need a reason to do it.”
    He wished the same applied to killing angels.
    But there would be consequences that even he could not risk facing.
    The two Gatekeepers stood looking grimly at Carlotta’s body as Corbin drank the